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To the Romans of the Republic [1], Apollo was a comparatively minor god, first the god of healing and of the Sibylline oracles and in the Second Punic War, the god that guaranteed the Romans victory. It is unclear whether the Romans borrowed Apollo from the Greeks directly or through the Italians, especially Etruscans, and whether he was worshipped as the god of prophecy right from the start.
from http://janusquirinus.org/
Legend preserved a strange old woman before the last of the Tarquins [2], the Etruscan kings of Rome, nine books which she claimed contain the divine oracles, and offered to sell them to him. Tarquin asked the price and she set one so exorbitant that the king burst into laughter. The woman set before him a portable hearth in which she burned three of the nine books, and then asked the king if he wished to buy the remaining six at the same price. The king's hilarity redoubled. The woman burned three more books, and imperturbably offered to sell him the last three, still at the same price. Faced with such assurance, Tarquin became serious and then purchased the remainder without bargaining [3]. The old woman, who turned out to be none other than the Sibyl of Cumae, then disappeared, having delivered to Rome one of the great instruments of its religious exploration [4]. These are the sacred Sibylline books, considered to hold the secrets of the fate of Rome and consulted as an oracle when a crisis threatened Rome. It was at the bidding of Sibylline Books that most of the Greek cults were introduced to Rome.
from http://janusquirinus.org/
An question then arises: what was the relationship of Apollo to the Sibyl of Cumae? The sibyls were prophetic priestesses and Apollo was the god of prophecy. Apollo’s chief Italian sect was in Cumae and stood there in the closest association with the oracle of the Sibyl [5]. Five hundred years later, a historian recorded the college of priests to the Sibylline Books in ~300 BCE was called antistites Apollinaris sacri [6] and the priests bore the tripod and dolphin, the symbols of the god of prophecy. But does that necessarily mean Apollo was the god of prophecy from the start?
from http://janusquirinus.org/
The first temple of Apollo in Rome, vowed to him as during a plague in 433 BCE [7] and dedicated in 431, was to Apollo, the god of healing, not Apollo, the god of prophecy and the Vestal Virgins invoked Apollo under the name of Physician and Healer, "Apollo Medicus, Apollo Paean" [8]. In 399 BCE, another plague caused the senate to order the Sibylline Books to be consulted and the first time in Rome, there was a lectisternium, a feast of gods, with Apollo as one of the guests. He was probably again a healing god, considering the situation [9].
from http://janusquirinus.org/
It was not until the Second Punic War that Apollo was consulted in earnest, this time, definitely as the god of prophecy. The war was in its third year and was not going well for the Romans. Hannibal had crossed the Alps and had defeated the mighty Roman army in Cannae. The Romans were frightened and for once, the Sibylline Books failed them. It was decided that Apollo should be consulted in his own home at Delphi. The emissary [10] returned with instructions to the names of the gods to whom prayer was to be offered, and according to what rites. The oracle continued, “If you do thus, Romans, your situation will be better and easier, and your state will go on more in accordance with your desire, and the Roman people will have the victory in the war. When you have successfully administered and preserved your state, from the gains made you shall send a gift to Pythian Apollo and do honour to him out of the booty, the profits and the spoils” [11]. Finally, Apollo admonished the Romans, “You shall keep yourselves from disorderly excitement” [12]. Since Cannae was the last great Roman setback, the embassy to Delphi must have seemed the turning point of fate [13].
from http://janusquirinus.org/
This is an important moment in the development of the Roman cult of Apollo [14], reinforced by another oracle called the carmina Marciana [15] who told the Romans to vow annual games to Apollo to secure victory in the war [16]. Thus, in 212 BCE, Apollo was honoured by the first celebration of the Ludi Apollinares, the Games of Apollo. In 210, the games were decreed to be observed in perpetuity [17] and formally enrolled in the pontifical calendar [18].
from http://janusquirinus.org/
Let us now turn to the origin of Apollo’s cult in Rome. Some scholars think that the Romans borrowed Apollo from the Greeks directly, others think that Apollo arrived in Rome via the Etruscans [19]. This is made more complicated because the fact that Latium was distinct from Etruria is often overlooked. After all, Cumae, where Apollo’s chief Italian sect stood there in the closest association with the oracle of the Sibyl, as mentioned above, was in Latium and not in Etruria. More than that, a number of cities in southern Italy and Sicily, including Cumae, were originally Greek colonies, collectively called Magna Graecia.
from http://janusquirinus.org/
The linguistic evidence gives conflicting answers. The Sibylline books were probably at first composed from formulas of various sources, Etruscan as much as Latin and more than Greek [20]. This points to a possibility of an Etruscan origin if Apollo was connected to the Sibylline books when the books were purchased. However, Etruscans, when they adapted Greek gods into their pantheon, tended to drop syllables from borrowed Greek words and Apollo was Aplu to the Etruscans. In that the Romans retained the exact same form of Apollo as the Greek and not the abbreviated Etruscan form, it was more probable that they borrowed Apollo directly from the Greeks and not the Etruscans [21]. Yet another scholar claims that is the name “Aplu” was taken over from Latin Apollo, not directly from Greek Apollo, and points out that no cult of Apollo in Etruria is attested [22] despite the statue of Apollo from the Etruscan city of Veii.
from http://janusquirinus.org/
The reason why the first temple of Apollo was in Campus Martius is another contentious point. The temple was built over an “Apollinar” [23], i.e. a place sacred to Apollo, which some proponents of an Etruscan origin take to mean that there was already an open cult-place of the god. The opponents argue that the temple was in Campus Martius, i.e. outside of the city walls, which meant Apollo was considered as a foreign god who was not allowed in the formal boundaries of the city. Yet another example is the first lectisternium. Although the gods and goddesses were Greek or marked with a Greek stamp, the rite itself, apparently, came from the Etruscan town of Caere [24].
from http://janusquirinus.org/
This confusion is actually not that surprising. Apollo, who was so widely worshipped in the Greek-speaking world that any nation in contact with Greek civilisation, even indirectly, must have been familiar with his name [25]. Perhaps the origin of Apollo’s cult at the very first was Magna Graecian, and from there spread through the Italian cultures, included both Etruscan and Roman, acquiring and intermixing local characteristics?
from http://janusquirinus.org/
From whichever culture the Romans borrowed Apollo, more than any other member of the Roman pantheon, Apollo maintained his distinctively Hellenic character and proclaimed his origin and legacy through the retention of his Greek name [26]. But that did not stopped Apollo from becoming the great god of the state in the early empire... [27]
from http://janusquirinus.org/
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