The Pontifex Maximus was the high priest of the Ancient Roman College of Pontiffs. This was the most important position in the Ancient Roman religion, open only to patricians until 254 BC, when a plebeian first occupied this post. A distinctly religious office under the early Roman Republic, it gradually became politicized until, beginning with Augustus, it was subsumed into the Imperial office. It was last held by the Christian Roman Emperor Gratian.^[1][2]

Pontifex Maximus remains in use as a title or description of the Popes, whether inherited from the Roman emperors or arisen independently as a way of indicating the greatest bishop.^[3] It appears on buildings, monuments and coins etc. dedicated or made during each specific pontificate. But Pontifex Maximus is not included in the current official list of papal titles,^[4] which includes instead: Summus Pontifex - more exactly, Summus Pontifex Ecclesiae Universalis (Supreme Pontiff of the whole Church) - meaning "Highest or Supreme Pontiff", while the literal translation of Pontifex Maximus is "Greatest Pontiff".

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Etymology

The term pontifex literally means "bridge-builder" (pons + facere); Maximus literally means 'the greatest', i.e. the highest. This was perhaps originally meant in a literal sense: the position of bridge-builder was indeed an important one in Rome, where the major bridges were over the Tiber, the holy river (and a deity, at the same time); only prestigious authorities with sacral functions could be allowed to "disturb" it with mechanical additions. However, it was always understood in its symbolic sense as well: the pontifices were the ones who smoothened the bridge between gods and men (Van Haeperen). It has besides been noted that in ancient India similar concepts were in use in similar ages, here too ideally regarding rivers and bridges.

An alternate opinion holds that pontifex means 'preparer of the road', derived from the Etruscan word pont, 'road'.^[2] The word has also been thought by some to be a corruption of a similar-sounding but etymologically unrelated Etruscan word for priest, but this theory is a minority opinion.

The Pagan Pontifices

Origins during the Regal Period

The Collegium Pontificum or College of Pontiffs was the most important priesthood of ancient Rome. The foundation of this sacred college is attributed to the second king of Rome, Numa Pompilius. It is safe to say that the collegium was tasked to act as advisers of the rex (king) in all matters of religion. The collegium was headed by the pontifex maximus and all the pontifices held their office for life. Prior to its institution, all religious and administrative functions and powers were naturally exercised by the king. Very little is known about this period of Roman history regarding the pontiffs as the main historical sources are lost and some of the events from this period are regarded as semi-legendary or mythical. Most of the records of ancient Rome were destroyed when it was sacked by the Gauls in 390 BC. Accounts from this early period come from excerpts of writings made during the Republican Period.

Development during the Roman Republic

In the Roman Republic, the Pontifex Maximus was the highest office in the polytheistic Roman religion, which was very much a state cult. He was the most important of the Pontifices (plural of Pontifex), in the main sacred college (Collegium Pontificum) which he directed. According to Livy, after the overthrow of the monarchy, the Romans also created the priesthood of the Rex Sacrorum or 'king of rites' or 'king of the sacred rites' to perform the religious duties and rituals and sacrifices previously done by the king. He was, however, explicitly prohibited from assuming any political office or sit in the Senate as a precaution to prevent the holder from becoming a tyrant. The Rex Sacrorum was further subordinated by the founders of the Roman Republic under the Pontifex Maximus as a further guard against tyranny.^[5] Other members of this priesthood included the Flamines (each devoted to a major deity), and the Vestales. During the early Republic, the Pontifex Maximus selected the members to hold these posts. However, there were many other religious officials, including the Augures and Haruspices (two originally Etruscan types of reading of the will of the gods: from the flight and conduct of birds viz. the entrails of sacrificial animals), Fetiales and many other colleges and individual offices.

The official residence of the Pontifex Maximus was the Domus Publica which stood between the House of the Vestal Virgins and the Via Sacra, close to the Regia, in the Roman Forum. His religious duties were carried out from the Regia or 'house of the king'.

Unless the pontifex maximus was also a magistrate at the same time, he was not allowed to wear the toga praetexta, i.e. toga with the purple border. However, he could be recognized by the iron knife (secespita)^[2] or the patera^[6] and the distinctive robes or toga with part of the mantle covering the head.

The Pontifex was not simply a priest. He had both political and religious authority. It is not clear which of the two came first or had the most importance. In practice, particularly during the late Republic, the office of Pontifex Maximus was generally held by a member of a politically prominent family. It was a coveted position mainly for the great prestige it confers on the holder; Julius Caesar became pontifex in 73 BC and pontifex maximus in 63 BC. Being Pontifex Maximus was not a full-time job and did not preclude the office-holder from holding a secular magistracy or serving in the military.

The most recent general study of the pontifical college (Van Haeperen 2002), omits the earliest periods of Roman history, as too little is known. The major Roman source, Varro's book on the pontiffs, is lost: only a little of it survives in Aulus Gellius and Nonius Marcellus. More information is to be found in remarks by Cicero, Livy, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Valerius Maximus, in Plutarch's vita of Numa Pompilius, Festus' summaries of Verrius Flaccus, and in later writers. Some of these sources present an extensive list of everyday actions that were taboo for the Pontifex Maximus; it seems difficult to reconcile these lists with evidence that many Pontifices Maximi were prominent members of society who lived normal, non-restricted lives.

Election and number of pontifices

The number of Pontifices, (s)elected by co-optatio (i.e the remaining members nominate their new colleague) for life, was originally five, including the pontifex maximus.^[1][2] The pontifices, moreover, can only come from the old nobility, the patricians. However, in 300 BC/299 BC the lex Ogulnia opened the office and admitted the plebs (plebeians) to run for the charge, so that part of the prestige of the title was lost. But it was only in 254 BC that Tiberius Coruncanius became the first plebian Pontifex Maximus.^[7] The lex Ogulnia also increased the number of pontiffs to nine(the pontifex maximus included). In 104 BC the lex Domitia prescribed that the election would henceforward be voted by the comitia tributa(an assembly of the people divided into voting districts); by the same law, only 17 of the 35 tribes of the city could vote. This law was abolished in 81 BC by Sulla in lex Cornelia de Sacerdotiis, which restored to the great priestly colleges their full right of co-optatio (Liv. Epit. 89; Pseudo-Ascon. in Divinat. p102, ed. Orelli; Dion Cass. xxxvii.37). Also under Sulla, the number of pontifices was increased to fifteen, the pontifex maximus included. In 63 BC, when Julius Caesar was Pontifex Maximus, the law of Sulla was abolished and a modified form of the lex Domitia was reinstated providing for election by comitia tributa once again but Marcus Antonius later restored the right of co-optatio to the college (Dion Cass. xliv.53). Also under Julius Caesar, the number of pontifices were increased to sixteen, the pontifex maximus included. The number of pontifices varied during the empire but is believed to have been regular at fifteen.^[1]

Extraordinary appointment of dictators

The office came into its own with the abolition of the monarchy, when most sacral powers previously vested in the King were transferred either to the Pontifex Maximus or to the Rex Sacrorum, though traditionally a (non-political) dictator (see also: basileus, interrex) was formally mandated by the Senate for one day, to perform a specific rite.

According to Livy in his "History of Rome", an ancient instruction written in archaic letters commands: "Let him who is the Praetor Maximus fasten a nail on the Ides of September." This notice was fastened up on the right side of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, next to the chapel of Minerva. This nail is said to have marked the number of the year. It was in accordance with this direction that the consul Horatius dedicated the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus in the year following the expulsion of the kings; from the Consuls the ceremony of fastening the nails passed to the Dictators, because they possessed greater authority. As the custom had been subsequently dropped, it was felt to be of sufficient importance to require the appointment of a Dictator. L. Manlius was accordingly nominated but his appointment was due to political rather than religious reasons. He was eager to command in the war with the Hernici. He caused a very angry feeling among the men liable to serve by the inconsiderate way in which he conducted the enrolment. At last, in consequence of the unanimous resistance offered by the tribunes of the plebs, he gave way, either voluntarily or through compulsion, and laid down his Dictatorship. Since then, this rite has been performed by the Rex Sacrorum.( Livius, Titus. "History of Rome" (HTML). ''Ancient History Sourcebook: Accounts of Roman State Religion, c. 200 BCE- 250CE''. (public domain)© Paul Halsall, August 1998, Fordham University. Retrieved on 2006-08-23.)

Duties

The main duty of the Pontifices was to maintain 'pax deorum' or 'peace of the gods'.^[8][9][10]

The immense authority of the sacred college of pontiffs was centered on the Pontifex Maximus, the other pontifices forming his consilium or advising body. His functions were partly sacrificial or ritualistic, but these were the least important. His real power lay in the administration of jus divinum or divine law;^[11] the information collected by the pontifices related to the Roman religious tradition was bound in a corpus which summarized dogma and other concepts. The chief departments of jus divinum maybe described as follows:

1. The regulation of all expiatory ceremonials needed as a result of pestilence, lightning, etc.
2. The consecration of all temples and other sacred places and objects dedicated to the gods by the state through its magistracies.
3. The regulation of the calendar; both astronomically and in detailed application to the public life of the state.
4. The administration of the law relating to burials and burying-places, and the worship of the Manes or dead ancestors.
5. The superintendence of all marriages by conferratio, i.e. originally of all legal patrician marriages.
6. The administration of the law of adoption and of testamentary succession.

The pontifices had many relevant and prestigious functions such as being in charge of caring for the state archives, the keeping the official minutes of elected magistrates (see Fasti) and list of magistrates, and they kept the records of their own decisions (commentarii) and of the chief events of each year, the so-called "public diaries", the Annales maximi.^[12]

The pontifex maximus is also subject to several taboos. Among them is the prohibition from leaving Italy. However, Plutarch described Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica Serapio (141 - 132 BC) as the first to leave Italy and thus break the sacred taboo after being forced by the Senate to leave Italy. Publius Licinius Crassus Dives Mucianus (132 - 130 BC) was the first to leave Italy voluntarily. Afterwards it became common and no longer against the law for the pontifex maximus to leave Italy. Among the most notable of which was Julius Caesar (63 - 44 BC).

The Pontifices were in charge of the Roman calendar and determined when intercalary days needed to be added to sync the calendar to the seasons. Since the Pontifices were often politicians, and because a Roman magistrate's term of office corresponded with a calendar year, this power was prone to abuse: a Pontifex could lengthen a year in which he or one of his political allies was in office, or refuse to lengthen one in which his opponents were in power. Under his authority as Pontifex Maximus, Julius Caesar introduced the calendar reform that created the Julian calendar, with a fault under a day per century, easily corrected by a modification of the rules for bisextile days (only added in a leap-year) to produce our present Gregorian calendar.

Under the Roman Empire

After Caesar's assassination in 44 BC, his ally Marcus Aemilius Lepidus was selected as Pontifex Maximus. Though Lepidus eventually fell out of political favor and was sent into exile as Augustus consolidated power, he retained the priestly office until his death in 13 BC, at which point Augustus was selected to succeed him and given the right to appoint other pontifices. Thus, from the time of Augustus, the election of pontifices ended and membership into the sacred college was deemed a sign of imperial favour.^[2] With this attribution, the new office of Emperor was given a religious dignity and the responsibility for the entire Roman state cult. Most authors contend that the power of naming the Pontifices was not really used as an instrumentum regni, an enforcing power.

From this point on, Pontifex Maximus was one of the many titles of the Emperor, slowly losing its specific and historical powers and becoming simply a referent for the sacral aspect of imperial duties and powers. During the Imperial period, a promagister (vice-master) performed the duties of the pontifex maximus in lieu of the emperors whenever they were absent (Van Haeperen). In post-Severan times (post AD 235), the small number of pagan senators interested in becoming pontiffs led to a change in the pattern of office holding. In Republican and Imperial times no more than one family member of a gens was member of the College of Pontiffs, nor did one person hold more than one priesthood in this collegium. Obviously these rules where loosened in the later part of the third century AD. In periods of joint rule, two pontifices maximi could serve together, as Pupienus and Balbinus did in 238 — a situation unthinkable in Republican times. In the crisis of the Third Century, usurpers did not hesitate to claim for themselves the role not only of Emperor but of Pontifex Maximus as well. Even the early Christian Emperors continued to use it; it was only relinquished by Gratian in AD 376, at the time of his visit to Rome (Van Haeperen).

Legacy

Christian usage

In Christian circles, when Tertullian, Montanist, furiously applied the term to Pope Callixtus I, with whom he was at odds, c. 220, over Callixtus's relaxation of the Church's penitential discipline, allowing repentant adulterers and fornicators back into the Church, under his Petrine authority to "bind and loosen," it was in bitter irony:

"In opposition to this [modesty], could I not have acted the dissembler? I hear that there has even been an edict sent forth, and a peremptory one too. The 'Pontifex Maximus,' that is the 'bishop of bishops,' issues an edict: 'I remit, to such as have discharged [the requirements of] repentance, the sins both of adultery and of fornication.' O edict, on which cannot be inscribed, 'Good deed!' … Far, far from Christ's betrothed be such a proclamation!" (Tertullian, On Modesty ch. 1)

It is not clear if the word Pontifex was commonly used by early 3rd-century Christianity, as it was later, to denote a bishop. Tertullian's usage is unusual in that most of the technical terms of Roman paganism were avoided in the vocabulary of Christian Latin in favour of neologisms or Greek words. Pontifex summus was an expression used to distinguish Hilary of Arles (died 449) as the bishop of the notable see of Gallia Narbonensis, in relation to those of less importance, by Eucherius of Lyons (died c. 449) (Catholic Encyclopedia, quoting Pat. Lat., L, 773), but other such early instances are difficult to find, and it may be significant that Pontifex summus was substituted for the pagan formula Pontifex maximus by Bishop Eucherius.

The last traces of emperors being at the same time chief pontiffs are found in inscriptions of Valentinian, Valens, and Gratianus (Orelli, Inscript. n1117, 1118). From the time of Theodosius I (379–395), the emperors no longer appear in the dignity of pontiff; but the title was later applied to the Christian bishop of Rome.^[13] In 382, the Emperor Gratian, at the urging of St. Ambrose, removed the Altar of Victory from the Forum, withdrew the state subsidies that funded many pagan activities and formally renounced the title of Pontifex Maximus.^[14] It is said that Pope Damasus I was the first Bishop of Rome to assume the title,^[15] From the reign of Theodosius, no power or office in late antiquity has claimed or contested the legitimacy of the Bishop of Rome from holding the the ancient Roman title and office of Pontifex Maximus. In Emperor Theodosius's law of 27 February 380 (De Fide Catolica), enacted in Thessalonica and published in Constantinople for the whole empire, by which he established Catholic Christianity as the official religion of the empire, he referred to Damasus (bishop of Rome, in the Latin-speaking west) as "pontificem" and to Peter (bishop of Alexandria, in the Greek-speaking east) as "episcopum" (from Greek ἐπίσκοπος: ...the profession of that religion which was delivered to the Romans by the divine Apostle Peter, as it has been preserved by faithful tradition and which is now professed by the Pontiff Damasus and by Peter, Bishop of Alexandria... We authorize the followers of this law to assume the title Catholic Christians; but as for the others.... Some see in this an implied significant differentiation, but the title pontifex maximus is not explicitly used in the text; pontificem is used instead: ...declarat quamque pontificem damasum sequi claret et petrum alexandriae episcopum...(Theodosian Code XVI.1.2; and Sozomen, "Ecclesiastical History", VII, iv. ^[16]).

It is thus not clear if the title Pontifex Maximus was used consistently by the Bishops of Rome from the time it was relinquished by the Emperor Gratian (AD 376) onwards. This was a time when the declining Roman Empire was transitioning from pagan to Christian, and Constantinople would begin to assert itself to pre-eminence, historically leading to conflict with the Bishops of Rome. Pope Leo the Great, near the final collapse of the Roman Empire with the invasion of the Huns and Vandals, is also said to have assumed the title Pontifex Maximus.^[17] By the end of the 6th century, Gregory I was the first Pope to employ "Pontifex Maximus" in a formal sense, in a broader program of asserting Roman primacy. It has remained a title or description of the popes to this day, but is not included in the official list of papal titles, as given, for example, in the Annuario Pontificio.

Despite its transformation from its original Roman roots, the title "Pontifex Maximus" has been in existence and in continued use since the birth of Rome.^[18] The pope is seen as, for all intents and purposes, the "high priest" (which is another translation of pontifex maximus) of the Catholic religion. Therefore, in terms of its origins, but not its usage, the title "Pontifex Maximus" is thus the oldest title applied to the pope, except for the word "pope" itself, which in its original Greek form dates back beyond the time of Homer,^[19] and the office of "Pontifex Maximus" could be said to be the oldest continuing Roman institution or European office, spanning a history of almost 3,000 years.

• The title Pontifex Maximus was briefly usurped,1902–1906, by the head of the Filipino sect Aglipayanism.

Tradition of sovereign as High Priest

Main article: Caesaropapism

The practice of religious and secular duality united in the sovereign has a long history, having passed from the Roman to the Byzantine emperors, where it perhaps reached its zenith in the West. The Romanov dynasty of Russia, the Third Rome, claiming direct continuity of office from the Roman emperors, also claimed supreme authority over the Russian Orthodox Church. The first of the Holy Roman Emperors, Charlemagne (d. 814) is said to have regretted that he allowed himself to be crowned by the Pope rather than crowning himself, since his authority was supposed to come directly from God, he was in no need of a "bridge builder".

Though the sovereign of England is Supreme Governor of the Church of England since the English Reformation there is effective separation of church and state.

Eastern traditions, from the ancient Egyptian to the Japanese, have carried the concept even further, by according their sovereigns demigod status. The secular equivalent of the emperor as Pontifex Maximus is the philosopher-king of the Greek sages, with whom the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius is said to have identified, as a stoic, and to which the Prussian king Frederick the Great and the French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte aspired, both as philosophes.

Incomplete list of Pontifices maximi

• 753 BC to 712 BC - Duties and power of office held by the Kings of Rome
• 712 BC - Numa Marcius
• ...
• 509 BC - Papirius
• ...
• 449 BC - Furius
• 431 BC - Cornelius Cossus
• 420 BC - Minucius
• 390 BC - Follius Flaccinator
• ...
• 332 BC - Cornelius Callissa
• 304 BC - Cornelius Scipio Barbatus, possibly Lucius Cornelius Scipio Barbatus
• ...
• 254 BC - Tiberius Coruncanius
• 243 BC - Lucius Caecilius Metellus (d. 221 BC), resigned or removed from office circa 237 BC.
• 237 BC - Lucius Cornelius Lentulus Caudinus (d. ca 213 BC)
• 212 BC - Publius Licinius Crassus Dives (d. 183 BC),
• 183 BC - Gaius Servilius Geminus (d. 180 BC), possibly Gaius Servilius C.f. Geminus
• 180 BC - Marcus Aemilius Lepidus (d. 152 BC)
• 152 BC - Vacant
• 150 BC - Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica Corculum (d. 141 BC)
• 141 BC - Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica Serapio (d. 132 BC Pergamum, Asia Minor)
• 132 BC - Publius Licinius Crassus Dives Mucianus (killed in battle 131 BC, Asia Minor)
• 130 BC - Publius Mucius Scaevola (d. 115 BC or 113 BC)
• 115 BC - Lucius Caecilius Metellus Dalmaticus,
• 103 BC - Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus (d. 88 BC)
• 89 BC - Quintus Mucius Scaevola (murdered 82 BC in the Temple of Vesta)
• 81 BC - Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius (d. ca 63 BC)
• 63 BC - Gaius Julius Caesar
• 44 BC - Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, triumvir (d. 13 BC),
• 6 March 12 BC - Augustus
• 12 BC to AD 376 - Held by the Emperors
• AD 376 to present - Held by the Popes.

Popular culture

In the Protestant Evangelical fiction series Left Behind, Cardinal Peter Mathews is named Pontifex Maximus of Enigma Babylon One World Faith, established by Global Community Supreme Potentate and Antichrist Nicolae Carpathia.

In C. S. Lewis's Christian novel The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Aslan refers to himself as "the great Bridge-Builder", the literal English translation of Pontifex Maximus.

The white supremacist group the World Church of the Creator referred to their leader Matt Hale as 'Pontifex Maximus'.

See also

• List of Pontifices maximi for an incomplete annotated version of this list.

References

• Pauly-Wissowa
• Van Haeperen, Françoise, 2002. Le collège pontifical (3ème s. a. C. - 4ème s. p. C.) in series Études de Philologie, d'Archéologie et d'Histoire Anciennes, no. 39. (Brussels: Brepols) ISBN 90-74461-49-2 (Bryn Mawr Classical review, 2003)
• Encyclopedia Britannica 1911 Ed.

Notes

External links

• article Pontifex in Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities
• List from republican times
• Annotated Pontifex Maximus list
• List of roman consuls (Fasti consulares) 300 BC - AD 60 at http://www.tyndale.cam.ac.uk/Egypt/ptolemies/chron/chronology.htm - in the list of consuls the column on the right (Pontifex Maximus) lists those that are known in this period.
• Catholic Encyclopedia: under "Pope", section V. Titles and Insignia

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