Gods with Thunderbolts: Religion in Roman Britain

by Guydela Bedoyere (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2007

  $3.39

  One of the Roman Empire's greatest achievements was religious tolerance, at least by modern standards. It was a world in which Fortuna and Fate ruled the minds of men and women. That world left behind a marvellous legacy of literary and archaeological records - temples and shrines, altars and votive gifts, curse tablets and inscriptions. In addition to the Gods of Rome, Roman Britain had native cults like that of Cocidius from the northern frontier and exotic imports from Persia and Egypt such as Mithras and Isis. Finally, there were the tensions created by the legitimisation of Christianity in the fourth century. This is the first book that attempts, systematically, to unravel the wide-ranging evidence that we have for the multifarious beliefs and practices of those living in Roman Britain.

• Used

  Hardcover
  2002

  $3.39

  In the year 60 the Roman army crossed from North Wales to Anglesey to destroy the centre of Druid spiritual power which had lain behind resistance to the conquest of Britain. The bewildered soldiers were confronted by a frenzy and a noise which was a definition of barbarity and chaos - at least that was how the army saw it. Religion dominates our record of Roman Britain. Most of the surviving inscriptions record dedications to gods. Temples and shrines are recorded on inscribed slabs more frequently than any other class of structure. The religious sculpture, the inscribed religious texts and the religious artefacts provide us with almost all we know about the ordinary people of Roman Britain. This book is a narrative history of cult and belief in Roman Britain and what it tells us about the minds of men and women in that time, as well as what it tells us about the centuries before and afterwards.