previous next

CHAP. 3.—WHETHER MAGIC WAS EVER PRACTISED IN ITALY. AT WHAT PERIOD THE SENATE FIRST FORBADE HUMAN SACRIFICES.

It is clear that there are early traces still existing of the introduction of magic into Italy; in our laws of the Twelve Tables for instance; besides other convincing proofs, which I have already noticed in a preceding Book.1 At last, in the year of the City 657, Cneius Cornelius Lentulus and P. Licinius Crassus being consuls, a decree forbidding human sacrifices2 was passed by the senate; from which period the celebration of these horrid rites ceased in public, and, for some3 time, altogether.

1 B. xxviii. c. 4.

2 These sacrifices forming the most august rite of the Magic art, as practised in Italy.

3 That this art was still practised in secret in the days of Pliny himself, we learn from the testimony of Tacitus (Annals, II. 69), in his account of the enquiries instituted on the death of Germanicus.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

load focus Latin (Karl Friedrich Theodor Mayhoff, 1906)
hide Places (automatically extracted)

View a map of the most frequently mentioned places in this document.

hide References (5 total)
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: