Metus hostium, metus deorum. Timore religioso e controllo politico a Roma

Fear of the enemy and fear of the gods are expressions of an innate fear of the ‘other’, present in every culture and consistently used both as a channel for social anxieties and as a tool of political control. Rome is no exception. This paper analyses several exemplary historical episodes that illustrate the political significance of religious fear, which was often stoked in response to social anxiety about external threats. In literary sources, however, such responses take on different ritualistic connotations depending on their origin—whether they arise from popular fervour, as in the case of the group of sacrificuli ac vates that spread during the Hannibalic War (Livy, Ab Urbe Condita, 25.1.8), or from the intervention of the central government, as in the early religious reforms of King Numa Pompilius (Livy, Ab Urbe Condita, 1.19.4). The nocturnal and almost criminal atmosphere of grassroots religious phenomena stands in stark contrast to the ‘daylight’ official nature of rites introduced and regulated from above.