Parilia

In ancient Roman religion, the Parilia is a festival of rural character performed annually on 21 April, aimed at cleansing both sheep and shepherd. It is carried out in acknowledgment to the Roman deity Pales, a deity of uncertain gender who was a patron of shepherds and sheep.

Ovid describes the Parilia at length in the Fasti, an elegiac poem on the Roman religious calendar, and implies that it predates the founding of Rome, traditionally 753 BC, as indicated by its pastoral, pre-agricultural concerns. During the Republic, farming was idealized and central to Roman identity, so the festival took on a more generally rural character. Increasing urbanization caused the rustic Parilia to be reinterpreted rather than abandoned, as Rome was an intensely traditional society. During the Imperial period, the date was celebrated as the "birthday" of Rome (dies natalis Romae).

The pastoral structure of the festival is carried out by the shepherd himself. After the sheep pen had been decorated with green branches and a wreath draped on the gate, the remainder of the ceremony took place in sequence. At the first sign of daylight, the shepherd would purify the sheep: by sweeping the pen and then constructing a bonfire of straw, olive branches, laurel, and sulfur. The noises produced by this burning combination were interpreted as a beneficial omen. The shepherd would jump through this flame, dragging his sheep along with him. Offerings of millet, cakes, and milk were then presented before Pales, marking the second segment of the ceremony. After these offerings, the shepherd would wet his hands with dew, face the east, and repeat a prayer four times. Such prayers requested Pales’s assistance in freeing the shepherd and the flock from evils brought about by accidental wrongdoings (e.g. trespassing on sacred grounds and removing water from a sacred water source). The final portion of the rural festival made use of the beverage burranica, a combination of milk and sapa (boiled wine). After consumption of this beverage, the shepherd would leap through the fire three times, bringing an end to the ceremony.

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