Mars – the Virile God

Marble head of Mars Ultor (c. 2nd century CE)

Simply put, Mars is the God of war, specifically the violence of the warrior within the context of war (Scheid, An Introduction to Roman Religion, at 156). Naturally he is a patron God of the military, but also of less favourably viewed forms of violence, such as banditry, as Apuleius makes clear in The Golden Ass when the leader of a band of robbers says: 

“‘Well now, we’re going to sell the girl and since we’re going to recruit new associates, why not make an offering to Mars the Comrade, though we have no animal fit for the sacrifice, and not even enough wine for a proper drinking bout. Grant me ten of you then, and that should be sufficient to raid the nearest village and furnish a … banquet for us all.’ 

Then he departed, while the rest set about building a large fire, and piled up an altar of green turf to the god Mars. 

On Plagiarism

"Boreas" by John William Waterhouse (1903)

Yesterday I discovered that a website has appropriated a huge amount of content from this blog, ie, entire blogposts, one after the other, and has not only failed to cite the author (me) but has also claimed copyright over content on their website which is in fact stolen from this blog! I don't want to promote traffic by posting a link to it but please know that the people behind this website, if you should come across it, are charlatans. 

While it is theoretically flattering (though not in fact) that they would think content written by me is worth appropriating as their own, what they are doing feels like a most hurtful violation. It is small consolation to discover that they have ripped off many other blogs as well. Small also to see that their most popular post was written by me.


Postscript (2018): there are only two websites that validly reproduce my work, they are romanpagan.blogspot.com and romanpagan.wordpress.com [defunct as of 2026]. If you ever see my content on another website please do not hesitate to contact me by leaving a comment at the end of one of my blogposts.

Organised Religion – A Perspective

Expulsion of heretics (c. 1415 illustration), British Library

Organised religion is a double edged sword. On the one hand organising religion allows religious beliefs to be preserved and propagated – this gives that religion accessibility, strength and potentially longevity. It also enhances the social aspect of religion, acting as a means by which a religious community can come together. On the other hand, organised religion can and does give rise to some serious problems. The main problem, as I see it, is that it is prone to encouraging individuals to believe that they somehow have a monopoly on divine truth. Flowing on from this, members of religious organisations may be prone to developing less flexible attitudes to their own religion, and then impose these onto other would be members of this religion and even non-members (who might be thought of destined to an undesirable future state for not believing in the spiritual authority of the organisation). It can even go so far that some organisations believe they can represent their deity’s approval, and feel entitled to exclude and shun members over trivial theological differences. In this case the believer’s ability to communicate with the divine is superficially abrogated in favour of the believer’s relationship with the leaders of an organisation, some of whom may be corrupt, stupid, fanatical and/or unkind.