victim, which gave the ceremony a markedly
religious significance. The customs connected with the bringing of the
bride to the bridegroom's house--so beautifully depicted in Catullus'
_Epithalamium_--her forcible abduction from her parents, the ribaldry
of the bridegroom's companions, the throwing of nuts as a symbol of
fecundity, the carrying of the bride over the threshold, a relic
probably of primitive marriage by capture, the untying of the bridal
knot on the bridal couch--are perhaps more akin to superstition than
religion, but we may notice two points in the proceedings. Firstly, the
three coins (_asses_) which the bride brought with her, one to give to
her husband as a token of dowry, one to be offered at the hearth to her
new Lar Familiaris, one to be offered subsequently at the nearest
_compitum_ (a clear sign of connection between the household Lar and
those of the fields); and secondly, an echo of the feature so marked
all through domestic life, the crowd of little _numina_, who took their
part in assisting the ceremony. There was Domiduca, who brought the
bride to the bridegroom's house, Iterduca, who looked after her on the
transit, Unxia, who anointed her, Cinxia, who bound and unbound her
girdle, and many others.

This sketch of the household worship of the Romans will, I hope, have
justified my contention that there was in it an element more truly
'religious' than anything we should gather from the ceremonies of the
state. The ideas are simpler, the _numina_ seem less cold and more
protective, the worshippers more sensible of divine aid. When we have
looked at the companion picture of the farmer in the fields, we shall
go on to see how the worship of the agricultural household is the
prototype and basis of the state-cult, but first we must consider
briefly the very difficult question of the relation of the living to
the dead.

=3. Relation of the Living and the Dead.=--The worship of the spirits
of dead ancestors is so common a feature in most primitive religions
that it may seem strange even to doubt whether it existed among the
Romans, but, although the question is one of extreme difficulty, and
the evidence very insufficient, I am inclined to believe that, though
the living were always conscious of their continued relation to the
dead, and sensitive of the influence of the powers of the underworld,
yet there was not, strictly speaking, any cult of the dead. Let us
attempt briefly to collect the sali