Saturn reigned as a righteous and benevolent king, and taught the inhabitants of Italy agriculture, while giving them laws. The Romans believed that during this Golden Age, Italy was ruled by the god Saturn (the Roman equivalent of the Greek Cronus). Slavery and private property were alike unknown: all men had all things in common.” “the earth brought forth abundantly: no sound of war or discord troubled the happy world: no baleful love of lucre worked like poison in the blood of the industrious and contented peasantry. Saturnalia was celebrated in commemoration of the legendary Golden Age, a time in the past when, as Frazer wrote: As Sir James Frazer puts it in his work, The Golden Bough, it was a time “when the darker passions find a vent which would never be allowed them in the more staid and sober course of ordinary life.” Commemoration of the Roman Golden Age and Saturn This was a period when the Romans indulged in oodles of joyous and merry activities – some may even call it excessive enjoyment. Despite efforts to reduce the length of the celebration - Augustus tried to reduce it to three days and Caligula attempted to cut it to five - the celebration of Saturnalia remained a weeklong event. Originally, this celebration was held annually for a day on the 17th of December, but the festival was so popular that it was extended to a week (December 17-23). The renewal of light and the coming of the new year was celebrated in the later Roman Empire at the Dies Natalis of Sol Invictus, the "Birthday of the Unconquerable Sun," on December 25.Saturnalia was a festival celebrated by the ancient Romans. In one of the interpretations in Macrobius's work, Saturnalia is a festival of light leading to the winter solstice, with the abundant presence of candles symbolizing the quest for knowledge and truth.
The Saturnalia was the dramatic setting of the multivolume work of that name by Macrobius, a Latin writer from late antiquity who is the major source for the holiday. Modern understanding of the festival is pieced together from several accounts dealing with various aspects. The Greek equivalent was the Kronia.Īlthough probably the best-known Roman holiday, Saturnalia as a whole is not described from beginning to end in any single ancient source. The revelries of Saturnalia were supposed to reflect the conditions of the lost mythical age, not all of them desirable. In Roman mythology, Saturn was an agricultural deity who reigned over the world in the Golden Age, when humans enjoyed the spontaneous bounty of the earth without labor in a state of social egalitarianism.
The poet Catullus called it "the best of days." The holiday was celebrated with a sacrifice at the Temple of Saturn in the Roman Forum and a public banquet, followed by private gift-giving, continual partying, and a carnival atmosphere that overturned Roman social norms: gambling was permitted, and masters provided table service for their slaves. Saturnalia was an ancient Roman festival in honour of the deity Saturn held on December 17 of the Julian calendar and later expanded with festivities through December 23. Freebase (0.00 / 0 votes) Rate this definition: