# Victoria (mythology)

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In [ancient Roman religion](/source/Religion_in_ancient_Rome) **Victoria** was the deified [personification](/source/Personification) of victory. She first appeared during the [first Punic War](/source/First_Punic_War), seemingly as a Romanised re-naming of [Nike](/source/Nike_(mythology)), the goddess of victory associated with Rome's Greek allies in the Greek mainland and in [Magna Graecia](/source/Magna_Graecia). Thereafter she comes to symbolise Rome's eventual [hegemony](/source/Hegemony) and right to rule. She is a deified abstraction, entitled to a [cult](/source/Cult_(religious_practice)), but unlike Nike, she has virtually no mythology of her own.

## History and iconography

Victoria first appears during the [first Punic War](/source/First_Punic_War), as a translation or renaming of [Nike](/source/Nike_(goddess)), the Greek goddess of victory in peace or war. Nike would have become familiar to the Roman military as a goddess of Rome's Greek allies in the Punic Wars. She was worshipped in Magna Graecia and mainland Greece, and was a subject of Greek myth. Around this time, various Roman war-deities begin to receive the epithet *victor* (conqueror) or *invictus* (unconquered).[1] By the late republican and early imperial eras, Victoria had become a popular civilian and military goddess, both in association with other deities and in her own right. In 294 BC she was given a [temple](/source/Temple_of_Victory) on the [Palatine Hill](/source/Palatine_Hill). It was used to store war-booty, and it hosted the [Magna Mater](/source/Magna_Mater)'s statue while her own temple was under construction. Victoria had several other shrines throughout Rome. In Imperial-era [Timgad](/source/Timgad), *victoria victrix* (conquering victory) was given credit for Imperial successes.[2]

Victoria's coin images and cult images are probably based on an original [cult image](/source/Cult_image) used in her temple. Her cult images show her in the attitude of a winged woman who steps forwards, supported on a globe, and holds aloft (or offers) a wreath or a palm-branch, not symbols of war but of triumph, and a peace that was consequent to victory. Other images show her as human-sized, driving a [triumphal war-chariot](/source/Roman_triumph), or in free-standing statuary, standing on the right-hand palm of a much larger figure, typically Rome's supreme god, [Jupiter](/source/Jupiter_(mythology)), or war-god [Mars](/source/Mars_(mythology)), or [Roma](/source/Roma_(personification)), divine personification of the Roman state.[3][4]

The goddess [Vica Pota](/source/Vica_Pota) is sometimes identified with Victoria, but is almost certainly too ancient for her iconography to have been influenced by Greek Nike, so is treated as a separate deity. Victoria is one of many Roman deities associated with the Sabine goddess [Vacuna](/source/Vacuna).

With the ascendancy of Christianity, Rome's religious affairs and institutions remained under the authority of the ruling emperor as *pontifex maximus*, whether he was Christian or pagan. On the whole, Senates still respected, or at least allowed the performance of pagan sacrificial rites deemed essential to Rome's well-being, including the sacrifice to Victoria at her Senate-house altar before every meeting. This had been an essential procedure ever since the altar had been given by [Octavian](/source/Augustus), in 29 BC.[5] In 379 the Christian emperor [Gratian](/source/Gratian) refused the post of *pontifex maximus*, and abolished state support of Rome's traditional deities and rites. In 382 he had Victoria's altar removed from her temple at the [Curia Julia](/source/Curia_Julia). They had been removed before, by [Constantius II](/source/Constantius_II), and had been returned after protest. This time, despite widespread anger and anxiety, shared by officials at the highest level, they were not restored.[6][7][8]

### Winged victories

Winged figures, very often in pairs, representing victory and referred to as **winged victories**, are common in Roman official iconography, typically hovering high in a composition, and often filling spaces in [spandrels](/source/Spandrel) or other gaps in architecture.[9] These represent the "spirit of victory" rather than a full-blown deity. Pairs of winged victories continued to appear after the [Christianization of the Roman Empire](/source/Christianization_of_the_Roman_Empire) and gradually evolved into depictions of Christian [angels](/source/Angel).[10] A pair, facing inwards, fitted very conveniently into the [spandrels](/source/Spandrel) of arches, and have been very common in [Triumphal arches](/source/Triumphal_arch) and similar designs where a circular element is framed by a rectangle.

## See also

- [Altar of Victory](/source/Altar_of_Victory)
- [Victoria](/source/Victoria_(disambiguation))
- [12 Victoria](/source/12_Victoria), asteroid

## References

1. [Beard, M.](/source/Mary_Beard_(classicist)), [North, J.](/source/John_North_(classicist)), Price, S., *Religions of Rome*, Volume I, illustrated, reprint, Cambridge University Press, 1998, pp.69.ISBN 0-521-31682-0

1. [Beard, M.](/source/Mary_Beard_(classicist)), [North, J.](/source/John_North_(classicist)), Price, S., *Religions of Rome*, Volume I, illustrated, reprint, Cambridge University Press, 1998, pp.69, 323. ISBN 0-521-31682-0

1. Hölscher, Tonio (1967). *Victoria Romana: Archäologische Untersuchungen zur Geschichte und Wesensart der römischen Siegesgöttin von den Anfängen bis zum Ende des 3. Jhs. n. Chr.* (in German). Mainz.

1. Hill, Philip V. “ASPECTS OF JUPITER ON COINS OF THE ROME MINT, A.D. 65-318.” The Numismatic Chronicle and Journal of the Royal Numismatic Society 20 (1960): 115–125. [http://www.jstor.org/stable/42662717](http://www.jstor.org/stable/42662717). accessed December 23, 2020

1. Bellinger & Berlincourt (1962). "Victory as a Coin Type". *American Numismatic Society*. **149**: 1–68.

1. Sheridan, J. J., "The Altar of Victory – Paganism's Last Battle." L'Antiquite Classique 35 (1966): 187.

1. Ambrose Epistles 17–18; Symmachus Relationes 1–3.

1. [Beard, M.](/source/Mary_Beard_(classicist)), [North, J.](/source/John_North_(classicist)), Price, S., *Religions of Rome*, Volume I, illustrated, reprint, Cambridge University Press, 1998, pp.372-374. ISBN 0-521-31682-0

1. ["Winged Victoria Spandrels"](https://www.google.com/search?q=victoria+spandrels&tbm=isch#tbm=isch&q=winged+victoria+spandrel). *google.com*. Retrieved 5 August 2015.

1. Doyle, Chris (2015). '*Declaring Victory, Concealing Defeat: Continuity and Change in Imperial Coinage of the Roman West, c. 383 – c. 408', in G. Greatrex, H. Elton (eds.) Shifting Genres in Late Antiquity. With the assistance of Lucas McMahon. Pp. xvi + 341, ills.*. Farnham, United Kingdom: Ashgate. pp. 157–71. ISBN 978-1-4724-4348-9.

## External links

- [The Warburg Institute Iconographic Database (images of Victoria)](https://iconographic.warburg.sas.ac.uk/category/vpc-taxonomy-000148)

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Victoria (mythology)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_(mythology)) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_(mythology)?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.