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Date: Sun, 07 Feb 1999 12:00:48 +0200
From: John Glucker <glucker@post.tau.ac.il>
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Subject: Re: Saturnalia Sacrifice
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Fred Mench wrote:
> 
> Dear List Members,
> 
> My colleague, Demetrios Constantelos, came across a reference to a 10th century
> Greek manuscript in which the story of the martyrdom of St Dasios (time of
> Diocletian) was related, including the detail that it was the practice at the
> Kronia (presumably = Saturnalia) to choose a young Roman soldier to enjoy a
> month of the best of life (wine, women & song), at the end of which he would be
> sacrificed to the god(s).
> 
> Does anyone know about any connection of a human sacrifice of this sort with
> Roman ritual, especially with the Saturnalia, in the time of Diocletian or any
> other time? The story sounds unlikely to me on the face of it & Demetrios thinks
> it unlikely that Lactantius or some anti-pagan source wouldn't have mentioned it
> if they knew about it. Is this made up out of whole cloth, on the analogy of the
> traditional dying king topos?
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> Fred Mench
> Stockton College


Some details in this story remind me of Josephus, *Contra Apionem* 2.89-97,
one of the earliest and most lurid libels against the Jews. This part of
Josephus has reached us only in the Latin translation made in the sixth
century; but it is more than likely that at the time of Diocletian, and for a
good few years later, The Greek origial of the whole work was still current.
John Glucker.
.