Septimontium

{{Short description|Ritual occasion in ancient Rome}} [[File:Roma Septimontium PNG.png|thumb|Map of the Seven hills of Rome]] The '''Septimontium''' was a proto-urban festival celebrated in ancient Rome by ''montani'', residents of the seven ''(sept-)'' communities associated with the hills or peaks of Rome ''(montes)'': Oppius, Palatium, Velia, Fagutal, Cermalus, Caelius, and Cispius.<ref>{{cite book|title=Classical Philology|url=https://archive.org/details/classicalphilol01orggoog|year=1906|publisher=University of Chicago Press|pages=[https://archive.org/details/classicalphilol01orggoog/page/n87 71]–}}</ref> The Septimontium was celebrated in September, or, according to later calendars, on 11 December. It was not a public festival in the sense of ''feriae populi'', according to Varro,<ref>Varro, ''De lingua latina'' 6.24.</ref> who sees it as an urban analog to the rural Paganalia.<ref>Robert E.A. Palmer, ''The Archaic Community of the Romans'' (Cambridge University Press, 2009), pp. 122–123.</ref><ref name="Fulminante2014">{{cite book|author=Francesca Fulminante|title=The Urbanisation of Rome and Latium Vetus: From the Bronze Age to the Archaic Era|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XE5kAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA75|date=10 February 2014|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-107-03035-0|pages=75–}}</ref>

The etymology from ''septem'' ("seven") has been doubted; the festival may instead take its name from ''saept-'', "divided," in the sense of "partitioned off, palisaded."<ref>Kurt A. Raaflaub, "Between Myth and History: Rome's Rise from Village to Empire (the Eighth Century to 264)," in ''A Companion to the Roman Republic'' (Blackwell, 2010), p. 136.</ref> The ''montes'' include two divisions of the Palatine Hill and three of the Esquiline Hill, among the traditional "seven hills of Rome".<ref>Timothy Venning, ''A Chronology of the Roman Empire'' (Continuum, 2011), p. 27.</ref>

Plutarch's notice of this festival is obscure, and confuses the nature of the Septimontium as represented by inscriptions and Festus with the proverbial seven hills of Rome. At this time, he notes, Romans refrained from operating horse-drawn vehicles.<ref>Plutarch, ''Roman Questions'' [https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Plutarch/Moralia/Roman_Questions*/C.html#69 69.]</ref>

==Further reading== *L.A. Holland, "Septimontium or saeptimontium?" ''TAPA'' 84 (1953) 16–34.

==References== {{Reflist}}

Category:Ancient Roman festivals Category:Septimontium Category:September observances Category:December observances