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 p1134  Titii Sodales

Article by Leonhard Schmitz, Ph.D, F.R.S.E, Rector of the High School of Edinburgh,
on p1134 of

William Smith, D.C.L., LL.D.:
A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, John Murray, London, 1875.

TI′TII SODA′LES, a sodalitas or college of priests at Rome, who represented the second tribe of the Romans, or the Tities, that is, the Sabines, who after their union with the Ramnes or Latins continued to perform their own ancient Sabine sacra. To superintend and preserve these, T. Tatius is said to have instituted the Titii sodales (Tacit. Ann. I.54). In another passage (Hist. II.95) Tacitus describes this sacerdotium in a somewhat different manner, inasmuch as he says that it was instituted by Romulus in honour of king Tatius, who after his death was worshipped as a god. But this account seems only to mean that Romulus after the death of Tatius sanctioned the institution of his late colleague and made the worship of Tatius a part of the Sabine sacra. From Varro (de Ling. Lat. V.85, ed. Müller), who derives the name Sodales titii from Titiae aves, which were observed by these priests in certain auguries, it appears that these priests also preserved the ancient Sabine auguries distinct from those of the other tribes. During the time of the republic the Titii sodales are no longer mentioned, as the worships of the three tribes became gradually united into one common religion (Ambrosch, Studien u. Andeut. p192, &c.). Under the empire we again meet with a college of priests bearing the name of Sodales Titii or Titienses, or Sacerdotes Titiales Flaviales; but they had nothing to do with the sacra of the ancient tribe of the Tities, but were priests instituted to conduct the worship of an emperor, like the Augustales (Gruter, Inscript. XIX.4, CCCIV.9, CCCXCVI.1; Inscript. ap. Murat. 299.5; comp. Lucan, Phars. I.602). [Augustales]

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