Politics and Religion in the Bacchanalian Affair of 186 B.C.E.

Abstract

T HE harsh suppression of the Bacchic cult in Italy by a decree of the Roman Senate in 186 B.C.E. (senatus consultum de Bacchanalibus)2 prompted Burkert to observe that in the degree of its cruelty-over six thousand executions-"there is nothing comparable in religious history before the persecutions of Christians."3 Besides the senatus consultum there is Livy's dramatic and engaging account.4 It is this narrative that brought support to the notion that women must have made up the most influential group within the cultic organization. Any social group (such as the lower classes and slaves, for example) suffering from "fickleness of mind (leuitas animi)"; i.e., lacking an appropri-