OF THE SACERDOTAL COLLEGIES IN BOOK I OF AB URBE CONDITA, BY LIVY: A STUDY ON ROMAN RELIGION DURING THE MONARCHY (753 - 509 BC).

Abstract

This project aims to analyze and understand the perspective of Livy (59 BC - 17 AD) on the figure of priests present in book I of his Magnum opus, Ab Urbe Condita Libri. Dating back to the 1st century BC, the pessimism expressed in Livy's work about its reality is certainly due to the context of the Roman civil wars. Since his reports were permeated by a moralistic bias linked to the confection of a Roman identity, corroborated by the Augustan context in which Livy found himself, given that the princeps centralized in himself the figure of restorer of the virtues and customs of Rome. Through the literary analysis of Livy's work, the different functions and the key role of priests in Roman society will be analyzed in their varied scopes among the different existing priestly positions. Thus, the composition and distinction of the priestly colleges will be analyzed throughout the Roman monarchy, between the years 753 to 509 BC. The period portrayed by Lívio in the first book, allows verifying the prominence role of the Roman priests by the importance that religion assumes in his narrative, constituting a pessimistic perspective before the Romans of the 1st century while he salutes the first Romans. Furthermore, the figure of monarchs presented by the author corroborates their image as founders of Rome and its main institutions. Therefore, their representation in Livy's work will be problematized in order to verify possible assimilations with the figure of Augustus.