Wine was a Roman essential. It was a medicine and tonic as well as a favourite everyday beverage. So it is no surprise that the Romans celebrated this daily staple with not one, but two yearly festivals.
The word Vinalia takes its name from the Latin for wine: ‘Vinum.’ The first Vinalia of the year, the Vinalia Urbana, was held on the 23rd April. The second, the Vinalia Rustica, was held on the 19th August.
On one level, the Romans regarded the Vinalia Rustica as a commemoration of the beneficence of Jupiter to the Roman state. But the Vinalia Rustica was more complex and multi-layered than that.
The Roman Love of Wine
Romans of all classes adored wine. But it was not always a widely available commodity. The Laws of Romulus forbade wine to all but free men over the age of 35 — possibly because of its limited availability and concerns over its intoxicating properties.
But, by the time of the republic, these ancient prohibitions had fallen by the wayside. The Roman state had expanded, and there was more land for farming. The Roman knowledge of viticulture expanded and in turn, their wine production increased. Wine was now plentiful and so available for all.
Numerous varieties of wine now existed. The drink was served warm or cold, generally watered and often delicately spiced. The Romans regarded wine as a beverage, a medicine — and a culinary ingredient. Everyone — including women —now enjoyed wine as part of everyday life. Cato even recommended a weekly ration of wine for slaves. However, this was for the good of their health and to keep up their strength rather than for recreational use!
In A Short History of Wine, Rodney Philips estimated that during the high point of Roman wine consumption in the imperial period, Rome consumed 180 million litres annually —the equivalent of a bottle of wine a day for every citizen.
The Myth of the Vinalia Rustica
The Vinalia Rustica has its roots in the archaic Roman period. Mythology dates the festival to the time of Aeneas when the Trojan hero struggled to establish a foothold for his people in ancient Latium. In an attempt to secure victory over the Etruscan tyrant Mezentius, Aeneas decided to pledge all of the wine of the next vintage to the god Jupiter — if only he would favour Aeneas with victory.
It seems Jupiter accepted the deal —particularly as greedy Mezentius preferred to keep all his wine to himself. And so, out of gratitude, the Romans established the Vinalia Rustica.
The Rites of the August Vinalia
The later Romans never forgot the significance of this myth in their celebrations of the Vinalia Rustica. ‘This is a day sacred to Jupiter,’ states Varro in On the Latin Language.
In Rome, Jupiter’s chief priest, the Flamen Dialis oversaw the rites of the Vinalia Rustica. During a ceremony known as the auspicatio vindemiae. Varro describes how the flamen:
‘Sacrifices a lamb to Jupiter, and between the cutting out of the victim’s vitals and the offering of them to the god he himself first plucks a bunch of grapes.’
This rite suggests that the festival preceded the beginning of the vintage — the grape harvest. This idea seems likely as theVinalia wasn’t only celebrated in Rome. The whole of
“The new wine shall not be carried into the city until the Vinalia has been proclaimed.”
But Jupiter was not the only god linked to the Vinalia.
Venus and the Vinalia
The Aeneas myth and the format of the formal sacrifices of the Vinalia Rustica suggest the festival was solely dedicated to Jupiter. However, the goddess Venus was also associated with the festival.
Although Varro staunchly defends the day as sacred to Jupiter and ‘not to Venus,’ he also admits in On the Latin Language that:
‘19th August was called the Country Vinalia… because at that time a temple was dedicated to Venus and gardens were set apart for her, and then the kitchen-gardeners went on holiday.’
And, in On Agriculture, that:
‘Venus…who…protects the garden…. in her honour the rustic Vinalia has been established.’
Other Roman writers comment on how popular festivals occurred on the day of the Vinalia Rustica around the temples of Venus in Rome. Here, the ordinary citizens marked the day with wine and revelry. In 295 BC, the temple of Venus Obsequens was even opened on the day of the Vinalia.
But was the opening of the temple the sole reason for Venus’s association with the Vinalia?
A Two-Tier Festival?
It could be that what we have in the Vinalia Rustica was a two-tier festival. On one level, the state was honouring their highest god in an ancient state ceremony. But on another level, the people were celebrating a more popular form of the festival dedicated to a different deity.
Perhaps this reflects the change in the Roman attitude to wine. The celebrations for Jupiter could reflect the time when the people faced limits on much wine they drank due to its rarity and sacred nature. During this period, a donation of the grapes — no matter how small —constituted a true sacrifice. But the more popular celebrations of the people could be a later addition to celebrate the bounty of the harvest.
But the grape harvest occurred in September. This makes the Vinalia Rustica too early for a harvest festival. And why Venus as the deity for the popular festivities?
A Bounty of Grapes
‘This festival is to alleviate weather,’ declared Pliny the Elder in his Natural History when discussing the Vinalia Rustica.‘The grapes are ripe, and Jupiter is feared,’ echoed Virgil in his Georgics.
In light of the quotes, the dedication of the festival makes sense. Aeneas made an offering of the vintage to secure Jupiter’s help against a military enemy. The descendants of his people continued the tradition to ensure protection against a different enemy: the weather.
The Romans picked the first bunch of grapes early and offered them to Jupiter as a conciliatory gesture. In return, they hoped he would hold off any damaging storms that threatened the delicate vines just before they were ready to harvest. This makes the state Vinalia Rustica an Auspicatio — a ceremony to avert the perils of storms or disease from the unripe vintage.
And Venus? Well before she was a goddess of love, Venus was just a simple garden goddess, a protectress of all growing plants —including vines. The fact that she joined Jupiter — if only at a popular level — in a festival dedicated to the protection of the grape harvest illustrates just how important wine was to the Romans.
Sources
Beard, M, North, J and Price, S, Religions of Rome, Vol 2, Cambridge University Press, 2005
Cato, On Agriculture, (trans. William Davis Hooper.) Loeb Classical Library
Dumezil, G (1996 ed) Archaic Roman Religion: Vol 1 and 2, John Hopkins University Press: Baltimore and London
Faas, Patrick, (2003) Around the Roman Table, Macmillan
Phillips, Rod, (2002) A Short History of Wine, Ecco
Pliny, (trans John F Healy) (1991) Natural History, Penguin Books
Price and Kearns, (2003) The Oxford Dictionary of Classical Myth and Religion. Oxford University Press
Schmitz, Leonhard, (1875) Vinalia. From“A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, John Murray, London.
Varro, On Agriculture, (trans. William Davis Hooper.) Loeb Classical Library
W Warde Fowler, (1899) The Roman Festivals at the Period of the Republic, Macmillan and Co.
