The Historical Child / Paidology; The Science of the Child

by Oscar Chrisman

The thermæ, baths, at Rome, under the empire, covered large spaces, with magnificent structures adorned with paintings and sculptures, the walls lined inside with marble, with marble columns, and silver mouthpieces for the water pipes. There were rooms not only for bathing, but also large halls for swimming, and rooms for places of meeting for conversation, for listening to the reading of poems by their authors, for gymnastic exercises, and the like, and provided with libraries and museums. Thus these thermæ became centers for gatherings of various kinds and places of amusement.

Games and Plays.

Ball was a game especially liked by the boys and young men of Rome. There were three kinds of balls used—a large hollow ball, a small hollow ball, and a ball stuffed with feathers. At the country villas about Rome there was usually a place for ball-playing. The boys used the streets and squares of Rome for ball-playing, particularly before the butchers' shops in the Forum Romanum. They played ball alone or with a few or with many. In one game the ball was thrown up into the air and all tried to catch it. The trigon, or pila trigonalis, was a favorite way of playing ball, the players being placed in a triangle and they were to fling the ball at one another, the one failing to catch it and return it being the loser. There was a game in which they would choose sides and have the ground marked out as for lawn-tennis.

Religion.

The child came in contact with religion at his very earliest life in the home in the worship of the household gods, the Penates and Lares, the former being the gods of the hearth, who guarded the stores and provisions of the family, and the latter were the spirits of departed ancestors, who were the protectors of the family. In the atrium was the image of the chief lar between two penates, to whom were offered sacrifices each morning by the father as priest, and birthdays and marriages and the putting on of the toga virilis by the boy and the return of a member of the family after a long absence were occasions of special religious exercises. The young people, too, were led further into religion as the gens and the state carried on similar sacrifices and ceremonies for the common good, for the state had its common hearth, presided over by the Vestal Virgins, who guarded the sacred fire upon the altar, which symbolized the home.

Vestal Virgins.

This temple of Vesta went through a purification on June first of each year and a renewal of the fire was made on March first. In case the fire went out it was kindled again by the rubbing together of two pieces of "lucky wood," thus producing a fire, and in later times by use of a concave mirror to focus the sun's rays. This was the most sacred of all worship at Rome and the letting this fire go out was considered a great evil, as this was emblematic of the state and its extinction meant the extinction of the nation, hence the Virgin who, through carelessness or negligence, permitted this was severely scourged in the dark by the pontifex.

There were six Vestal Virgins. When chosen, the girl was not to be younger than six nor older than ten; she was to be the daughter of freeborn parents, alive at the time of her selection and residing in Italy, and not engaged in any dishonorable calling; she was to be free from mental and physical defects.

At the time of the admission of a Vestal, her hair was cut off, and a very solemn ceremony was gone through with, after which she was dressed in white and admitted to the work of the Virgins. It appears that her hair was allowed to grow again and to be worn long. Her dress was always white and she wore round her forehead a broad band which had ribbons fastened to it. In processions and at sacrifices she wore a white veil, buckled under the chin.

The term of service was thirty years, the Vestal being a novice during the first ten years, an active priestess the second ten, and a teacher of novices the remaining period. At the end of the term of service of thirty years, the vestal could go back to her family and even get married, but most of them remained in the service of the goddess.