Animal Remains from Temples in Roman Britain

Abstract

Approximately twenty temple excavations have yielded significant assemblages of animal bones. All come from Romano-Celtic temples in southern Britain, with the exception of four shrines for eastern cults. This paper picks out major characteristics of the assemblages and draws some general conclusions about the nature of the ritual activity that led to their deposition. At temples such as Uley or Hayling, sacrifices were probably an important part of the rituals, and the animals carefully selected. At other temples, animals had a lesser role, with little evidence of selection. At healing shrines, such as Bath and Lydney, animal sacrifices are not clearly attested, and would probably have taken place away from the areas used for healing humans. In contrast to the Romano-Celtic temples, animal remains at the shrines of eastern cults have very different characteristics: individual deposits can be linked to specific rituals within the cult buildings, and have many similarities to the continental evidence

A social perspective on the introduction of exotic animals: the case of the chicken

“…As in other areas of the world where the chicken was introduced, it is clear that domestic fowl held a great religious significance in Romano-British society where they were associated with the cult of Mithras and the god Mercury: large quantities of cockerel A social perspective 163 remains were recovered from the Mithraea at Walbrook in London and Hadrian's Wall, Northumberland, as well as the shrine to Mercury at Uley, Gloucestershire (King 2005). The evidence for Iron Age Britain is equally suggestive of a religious significance, Morris (2008: 87) having identified a link between deposits of complete/partial domestic fowl skeletons (known as associated bone groups or 'ABGs') and Late Iron Age human graves.…”

Fields, Ritual and Religion: Holistic Approaches to the Rural Landscape in Long‐Term Perspective (c.1500 BC–AD 1086)

“…The evidence for seasonal rituals taking place in temples and shrines is relatively slight but compelling (Henig ; Isserlin ; King ). Epigraphic and material evidence certainly suggests maintenance of many traditional Roman festivals within Britain, including rituals connected to agricultural production such as the Carmen Saliare on the 1 st of March or the Armilustrium on the 19 th and 20 th of October ( RIB 882; RIB 883), and there is also evidence for the sacrifice of harvested crops to Ceres in the autumn (Henig , 214–8).…”

“…Animal bones recovered from temples at Harlow, Uley and Great Chesterford (Woodward and Leach ; Legge et al . ; King ) are suggestive of seasonal sacrifice in the autumn, perhaps as part of harvest celebrations in which ritualized sacrifice of the year's produce was offered to a god and then consumed by the community in a feasting celebration. Moreover, a ritual shaft excavated at Ashill, Norfolk, dating to the first century AD contained a sequence of 12 deposits that, based upon faunal remains contained in each, seem to have been left in the autumnal months as part of an annual ritual (Barton ; Gregory ; Isserlin , 52).…”

Ravens and Crows in Iron Age and Roman Britain

“…in press). At Voorburg (Forum Hadriani) in the Netherlands, a raven, originally complete, was found in a pit or well with a quantity of other animal bones (Zeiler and Vries 2008), and remains have been recovered from the Mithraeum at Weissloch in Germany (King 2005).…”