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An augur with sacred chicken; he holds a lituus, the curved wand often used as a symbol of augury on Roman coins. Augury was a Greco-Roman religion practice of observing the behavior of birds, to receive omens. When the individual, known as the augur, read these signs, it was referred to as "taking the auspices". "Auspices" (Latin: auspicium ...
The augural ceremony and function of the augur was central to any major undertaking in Roman society – public or private – including matters of war, commerce, and religion. Augurs sought the divine will regarding any proposed course of action which might affect Rome's pax, fortuna, and salus (peace, good fortune, and well-being). [2]
Roman haruspicy was a form of communication with the gods. Rather than strictly predicting future events, this form of Roman divination allowed humans to discern the attitudes of the gods and react in a way that would maintain harmony between the human and divine worlds ( pax deorum ). [ 5 ]
Ornithomancy (modern term from Greek ornis "bird" and manteia "divination"; in Ancient Greek: οἰωνίζομαι "take omens from the flight and cries of birds") is the practice of reading omens from the actions of birds followed in many ancient cultures including the Greeks, and is equivalent to the augury employed by the ancient Romans.
[74] In Roman art, the covered head is a symbol of pietas and the individual's status as a pontifex, augur or other priest. [75] It has been argued that the Roman expression of piety capite velato influenced Paul's prohibition against Christian men praying with covered heads: "Any man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his ...
In Ancient Roman mythology, Attus Navius was a famous augur during the reign of Tarquinius Priscus. When Tarquinius desired to increase the number of the equestrian centuries, and to name them in his own honour, Navius opposed him, declaring that it must not be done unless the omens were propitious, and, as a proof of his powers of divination ...
The auguraculum (pl.: auguracula) was a roofless temple oriented to the cardinal points, in which the priests of ancient Rome practiced augury and ornithomancy. [1] The priest observer was positioned at the center of the temple, in a tent or a hut, and watched portions of the sky from which came the birds, which were marked out by stones placed along the perimeter of the temple.
As an augur he engaged in heated debate with his senior colleague Gaius Claudius Marcellus (praetor 80 BC), who maintained that augury was established from a belief in divination but perpetuated through political expediency, while Appius strongly advocated an extreme traditionalist view upholding the authenticity of the craft and eventually ...