Dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

1000 SACRIFICIUM.'SAECULUM.
sacrifice they washed their hands in water. The only in later times (1lin. II. NV. xiii. 1), but in tile
victim itself was likewise adorned with garlands, early times, and afterwards also, various kinds of
and its hons were sometimes gilt. Before the fragrant wood, such as cedar,fig, vine. and mcyrtleanimal was killed, a bunch of hair was cut from its wood, were burnt upon the altars of the gods.
forehead, and thrown into the fire as primitiae: (Suid. s. v. Nv- cpaAta vSXa.)
this preparatory rite was called tcadpXEOat.. ~ A third class of unbloody sacrifices consisted of
(Hom. It. xix. 254, Od. xiv. 422; I-Ierod. ii. 45, fruit and cakes. The former were mostly offered
iv. 60; Eurip. Ipihig. Tautz. 40.) In the heroic to the gods as primitiae or tithes of the harvest,
ages the princes, as the high priests of their people, and as a sign. of gratitude. They were sometimes
killed the victim; in later times this was done by offered in their- natural state, sometimes also
the priests themselves. When the sacrifice was to adorned or prepared in variousways. Of this kind
be offered to the Olympic gods, the head of the were the eipeeotuvyq, an olive branch wound around
animal was drawn heavenward (see the woodcut. with wool and hung with various kinds of fruits
on the title pagse of this work: comp. Eustath. ad the XSrpat or pots filled with cooked beans [PYAIliad. i. 459); when to the gods of the lower NEPSIA]; the cipyoy or ciepva, or dishes. with
world, to heroes, or to the dead, it was draw-n fruit; the ~brXaL or /koXa [OSClHOPHORIA]. Other
downwards. While the flesh was burning upon instances may be found in the accounts of the
the altar, wine and incense were throwrn upon it various festivals. Cakes (7rEAavot, 7rEl/Uara, ar, -
(Iliad, i. 264, xi. 774, &c), and prayers and music rava, liul)ln.) -were peculiar to the worship of ceraccompanied the solemnity. tain deities, as to that of Apollo. They were
The most common animnal sacrifices at Rome either simple cakes of flour, sometimes also of wax,
were the suovetaurilia, or solitaurilia, consisting of or they were made in the shape of some animal,
a pig, a sheep, and an ox. They were performed and were then offelred as symbolical sacrifices in
in all cases of a lustration, and the victims were the place of real animals, either because they could
carried around the thing to be lustrated, whether not easily be procured or were too expensive for
it was a city, a people, ox -a piece of land. [Lus- the sacrificer. (Suid. s. v. BoSs 7'~b3otos; Serv. ad
TRATIo.1 The Greetk rptiT'r'a, which likewise, A.e. ii. 1 16.)- This appearanceinstead of reality
consisted of an ox, a sheep and a p'g, was the" in sacrifices was also manifest on other occasions,
same sacrifice as the Roma suovetaurilia. (Calli- for we find that sheep were sacrificed instead of
mach. ap. Palot. s. v. TpirrSrav.; Aristoph. P!ot. 820.)' stags,; and were then called' stags; and in the
The customs observed before and during the sacri- temple of Isis at Rome the priests used water of
face of an animal were on the whole the same as the river Tiber instead of Nile water, and called
those observed in Greece. (Virg. Aen. vi. 245; the former water of the Nile. (Fest. s. v. CerServ. ad Aen. iv. 57; Fest. s. v. Inmmolase; Cato, vasia ovis; Serv. 1. c.)
de Re Rust. 134, 132.) But the victim was in See Wachsmuth, liellen. Altertlumnssk. vol. ii.
mnost cases not killed by the priests who conducted pp. 548-559, 2d ed.; lartung, Die Pteligion der
the sacrifice, but by a person called popea, who Riner, vol. i. p. 160, &c. [L. S.]
struck the animal with a hammer before the knife SACRILE'GIUM is the crime of stealing things
was used. (Serv. ad Aen. xii. 120; Stet. Calig. consecrated to the gods, or things deposited in a
32.) The better parts of the intestines (eata) consecrated place. (Quinctil. vii. 3. ~ 21, &c.; Cic.
were strewed with barley meal, wine, and incense, de Leg. ii. 16; Liv. xlii. 3.) A lex Julia referred
and were burnt upon the altar. Those parts of to in the Digest (48. tit. 13. s. 4) appears to ha-ve
the animal which were burnt were called prosecta, placed the crime of sacrilegium on an equality with
prosiciae, or asbleqgniz. When a sacrinfice was peculatus. [PECULATUs. ] Several of the imperial
offered to gods of rivers or the sea, these parts constitutions made death the punishment for a
were not burnt, but thrown into the water. (Cato, sacrilegus, which consisted according to circmnde Re Rust. 134; Macrob. Sat. ii. 2; Liv. xxix. stances either in being given up to wild beasts, in
27'; Virg. Aess. v. 774.) Respecting the use which being burned alive, or hanged. (Dig. 48. tit. 13. s.
the ancients made of sacrifices to learn the will of 6.) Pauslus says in general that a sacrilegus was
the gods, see HARTJSPEX and DIvrNATIO. punished with death, but he distinguishes between
Unbloodl sacrifices. Among these we may first such persons who robbed the sacra publica, and
mention the libations (libationes,;Xoal or o'mromail). such as robbed the sacra privata, and he is of
We have seen above that bloody sacrifices were opinion that the latter, though more than a common
usually accompanied by libations, as wine was thief, yet deserves less punishlmentthan the former.
poured upon them. Libations alwvays accompanied In a wider sense, sacrilegium vwas used by the Roa sacrifice which was offered in concluding a treaty mans to designate any violation of religion (Corn.
with a foreign nation; and that here they fornied a Nep. A/lcib). 6), or of anything which should be
prominent part of the solemnity, is clear from the treated with religious reverence. (Ovid. Al-et. xiv.
fact that the treaty itself was called errroalai. But 539, Remz. Amis. 367, Fast. iii. 700.) Ilence a
libations were also made independent of any other law in the Codex (9. tit. 29. s. 1) states that any
sacrifice, as in solemn prayers (Iliad, xvi. 233), person is guilty of sacrilegium who neglects or
and on many other occasions of public and private violates the sanctity of the divine law. Anlife, as before drinking at meals, and the like. other law (Cod. 9. tit. 29. s. 2) decreed that even
Libations usually consisted of unmixed wine a doubt as to whether a person appointed by
(i'arovosr, s:nerun), but sometimes also of milk, an emperor to some office was worthy of this
honey, and other fluids, either pure or diluted with office, was to be regarded as a crime equal to
water. (Soph. Oed. Col. 159, 481; Plin. I-. AI. sacrilegium. [L. S.]
xiv. 19; Aeschyl. Eaz n. 107.) Incense was like- SACRO'RUM DETESTA'TIO. [G-,sF, p.
wvise an offering which usually accompanied bloody 568, b.]
sacrifices, but it was also burned as an offering by SAECULA'RESLUDI. [LunIS.AEcuLAaR.]
itself. Real incense appears to have been used SAE'CULUM. A saeculum was of a twof.ldd