Sodales Augustales

{{Priesthoods of ancient Rome}}

The Sodales or Sacerdotes Augustales (singular Sodalis or Sacerdos Augustalis),Tacitus, Annales 1.83 or simply Augustales,Tacitus, Annales 1.54CIL 10.1624; ILS 156 were an order (sodalitas) of Roman priests originally instituted by Tiberius to attend to the maintenance of the cult of Augustus and the Julii.{{Cite book |last1=Gordon |first1=Richard L. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=x8w0DwAAQBAJ |title=Beyond Priesthood: Religious Entrepreneurs and Innovators in the Roman Empire |last2=Petridou |first2=Georgia |last3=Rüpke |first3=Jörg |date=2017-08-21 |publisher=Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG |isbn=978-3-11-044764-4 |language=en}}{{Cite book |last=Ruepke |first=Joerg |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=F4fiDwAAQBAJ |title=Pantheon: A New History of Roman Religion |date=2020-11-03 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-0-691-21155-8 |pages=284 |language=en}}{{Cite book |last=Scheid |first=John |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D6Sluj3NQz0C |title=An Introduction to Roman Religion |date=2003 |publisher=Indiana University Press |isbn=978-0-253-21660-1 |pages=139 |language=en}} Their establishment in 14 AD is described in the Annales of Tacitus.{{Cite book |last=Shannon-Henderson |first=Kelly E. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-ZSBDwAAQBAJ |title=Religion and Memory in Tacitus' Annals |date=2018-12-12 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-256910-3 |pages=47 |language=en}}{{Cite book |last1=Rüpke |first1=Jörg |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BgxHEAAAQBAJ |title=Religion in the Roman Empire |last2=Woolf |first2=Greg |date=2021-10-06 |publisher=Kohlhammer Verlag |isbn=978-3-17-029225-3 |pages=112 |language=en}} Their membership and organisation was very different from that of the Augustales or seviri Augustales, found throughout the cities and towns of the western Roman empire and usually selected by town councilors. Up to 95% of attested seviri Augustales were freedmen. Many were members of professional associations, not invariably wealthy but still respectable, acting as benefactors to their communities and the State by funding public gifts (Munera), such as entertainments, new buildings and distribution of the Cura Annonae (annona or grain dole).Vandevoorde, Lindsey, "Of Mice and Men. Financial and Occupational Differentiation among *Augustales", Histoire et anthropologie des mondes anciens, Anthropologie et Histoire des Mondes Antiques - UMR 8210, 7 | 2015, Marchands romains au long cours

https://doi.org/10.4000/mondesanciens.1534 [https://journals.openedition.org/mondesanciens/1534#tocto1n1]

In Rome, the twenty one sodales were chosen by lot from among the aristocracy, to which were added Tiberius, Drusus, Claudius, and Germanicus, as members of the imperial family. Women might be appointed priestesses of Augustus, a practice probably originating in the appointment of Livia by a decree of the Senate as priestess to her deceased husband.Dio Cassius. LVI.46 A flamen could also be a member of the Augustales.Orelli, Inscrip. 2366, 2368 These senatorial sodales Augustales were very different from the municipal seviri Augustales, as Linderski put it: “two vastly dissimilar organizations sharing a similar name”.{{cite journal|last1=Linderski|first1=J.|title=Augustales and Sodales Augustales|journal=Roman Questions II, Selected Papers|date=2007|page=183}} Related to the sodales Augustales were lesser known priesthoods that maintained the cults to deceased, deified emperors, each of whom had their own dedicated sodality.{{Cite book |last=Blakely |first=Sandra |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=buw7DwAAQBAJ |title=Gods, Objects, and Ritual Practice |date=2017-07-01 |publisher=ISD LLC |isbn=978-1-937040-80-2 |pages=252 |language=en}}