Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/239

 CUAP. IX. THE KING. '2'6'6 therefore, to perform religious ceremonies. An ancient king of Sicyon was deposed because, having soiled liis hands by a murder, he was no longer in a condition to offer the sacrifices.' Being no longer fit for a priest, lie could no longer be king. Homer and Virgil represent the kings as continually occupied with sacred ceremonies. We know from Demosthenes that the ancient kings of Attica per- formed themselves all the sacrifices that were pre- scribed by the religion of ihe city; and from Xenophon that the kings of Sparta were the chiefs of the Lacedce- monian leligion.*^ The Etruscan Lucumones were, at the same time, magistrates, military chiefs, and pontiffs.^ The case was not at all different with the Koman kings. Tradition always represents them as priests. The first was Romulus, who was acquainted with the. science of augury, and who founded the city in accord- ance with religious rites. The second was Numa: he fulfilled, Livy tells us, the greater part of the priestly functions ; but he foresaw that his successors, often having wars to maintain, would not always be able to take care of the sacrifices, and instituted the flamens to replace the kings when the latter were absent from Rome. Thus the Roman priesthood was only an emanation from the primitive royalty. These king-priests were inaugurated with a religious ceremonial. The new king, being conducted to the summit of the Capitoline Hill, was seated upon a stone seat, his face turned towards the south. On his left was seated an augur, his head covered with sacred fillets, and holding in his hand the augur's staff. He ' Nic. Damas., Frar/. Hist. Gr., t. III. p. 394. 2 Demosthenes, in year. Xenophon, Gov. Laced., 13. ' Virgil, X. 175. Livy, V. 1. Censorinus, i.