In this late manuscript the date is listed in Mensis December (The Month of December) as N The earliest calendar to mention that Invictus as a specified date for Roman religious life comes from a text of the Philocalian Calendar, VIII Kal recorded in an illuminated 4th Century manuscript called The Chronography of 354. Anyway, on another coincidence, a year after Aurelian declared these games in honor of Sol Invictus, he was assassinated by his own pagan Roman officers out of fear he would execute them based on false charges. The best evidence suggest that the games were held October 19-22 of their calendar. But there is no record from the period or early historiographers that these games were associated with December 25th in any way. 588 )Īurelian did declare games to Sol every four years. “The traditional feast days of Sol, as recorded in the early imperial fasti, were August 8th and/or August 9th, possibly August 28th, and December 11th.”(Hijmans, p. But there is no record of this festival being held on December 25th. Aurelian did try to re-introduce the worship of Sol Invictus by decree in the year 274. Īnd, coincidentally, very shortly after Elagabalus tried to establish worship of the Syrian sun god, Sol Invictus, he was thought to be too licentious and was assassinated by his own people, pagan Romans, at the age of 18 years old.įrom that time there is no mention of the celebration of Sol Invictus in Roman history until the rule of Aurelian (A.D. 5 He declared, furthermore, that the religions of the Jews and the Samaritans and the rites of the Christians must also be transferred to this place, in order that the priesthood of Elagabalus might include the mysteries of every form of worship. After coming to Rome and being established as emperor at the age of 14, the Historia states:Ĥ Elagabalus as a god on the Palatine Hill close to the imperial palace and he built him a temple, to which he desired to transfer the emblem of the Great Mother, the fire of Vesta, the Palladium, the shields of the Salii, and all that the Romans held sacred, purposing that no god might be worshipped at Rome save only Elagabalus. He viewed himself as the personal manifestation of the Syrian sun god. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus came to be called Elagabalus after the name of the Syrian sun god, and was himself initiated as a priest of that false god. The Historia Augusta in The Life of Elagabalus (1.3) relates events from the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, a particularly twisted man, who reigned from 218-222 AD.
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