Triumphator and Ancestor Rituals Between Symbolic Anthropology and Magic

• Published in: Numen Vol. 53; no. 3; pp. 251 - 289
• Main Author: Rüpke, Jörg
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: The Netherlands BRILL 2006; Brill Academic Publishers; Brill
• Subjects: Ancient religions : Europe, Mediterranean regions, Near East; Aristocracy; Funerals; Funerary rituals; Hellenistic religions; History and sciences of religions; Honorifics; Magistrates; Nobility; Processions; Religious rituals; Rituals; Roman world; Statues
• ISSN: 0029-5973; 1568-5276; 0029-5973
• DOI: 10.1163/156852706778544997

This article argues that the Roman triumph with the figure of the triumphator and the burial of Roman nobles with the pompa imaginum should be interpreted within the framework of the prestige and practices related to honorific statues. Using the red colour of the triumphator's skin as the main argument, the figure of the triumphator is interpreted as a temporary statue, and the triumph as an attempt on part of the senate to regulate the prestige of honorific statues by tying it to a public ritual. Likewise, the bearers of imagines are interpreted as representing the ensemble of all legitimate — i.e. as based on public positions — statues used to construct a family. Both rituals, as known from late republican sources, developed from the fourth century BC onwards.