Operatives, welcome to CODEX 2. Make your selection.

Vesta

Ignis Promētheī

Where the Verb Goes

In CODEX 1 you saw that Promētheus hominēs amat runs in an unusual order: subject, then object, then verb. English puts the verb in the middle, but Latin usually puts it at the end of the sentence, so train your eye to look for it there.

You can see it all through the key-texts: Vesta ignem amat, puellae ignem servant, Promētheus ignem capit. Each time, the verb comes last. When you read a Latin sentence, you often meet the characters first and find out only at the very end what happened between them. Roman readers were used to this, and it gave their sentences a little suspense.

Latin word order can also bend in a way English cannot. In English, "Prometheus loves humans" and "humans love Prometheus" mean different things, and only the order tells you who loves whom. A Roman could shuffle the words of a Latin sentence and it would still mean the same thing, because Latin did not use word order to show who is doing what.

So how did a Roman reader know who was doing what? The answer is right in front of you, on the ends of the words, and you have been reading it all along without noticing. The next two CODEX entries show you where to look.

Considera: Look at two sentences from CODEX 1: Promētheus hominēs amat and hominēs Promētheum amant. The same two characters appear in both, in a different order, and the words themselves have changed a little too. Can you spot the change?

Vesta and the Roman Hearth

Every Roman home had a focus, a hearth, at its center. The family cooked at the focus, gathered around it to keep warm, and honored the gods of the household there. The larēs, the spirits who guarded the family, lived near the hearth, and so did the penātēs, the gods of the storeroom. So, in her quiet way, did Vesta herself.

Vesta has almost no stories about battles, jealousy, or adventures. She tended the fire, and the fire held everything together. When a Roman family moved to a new home, they carried a glowing ember from the old hearth to light the new one. That small flame was the family's way of saying: we are still here, and we are still us.

Considera: Why would a family carry fire from one home to another instead of simply lighting a new one?

The Vestal Virgins

The first key-text mentions puellae, girls, who look after the fire in Vesta's temple. They were the Vestal Virgins, six priestesses chosen as young girls to serve Vesta for thirty years. Their most important job was to keep the sacred flame burning in the Temple of Vesta. The temple stood in the Roman Forum, the great open square at the heart of the city.

That flame was the hearth of the whole city, a focus for all of Rome. Romans believed Rome was safe as long as it burned. If it ever went out, people saw it as a sign of disaster. The Vestal who let it go out could be severely punished.

The Vestals were some of the most honored people in Rome. They could own land and houses, speak as witnesses in court, and even pardon a prisoner and set him free. Most Roman women had very little say in public life. The Vestals had real power, and all of it came from one simple thing: they kept the flame alive.

Considera: The Vestals had enormous power and responsibility, all because they tended a fire. What does that tell you about how Romans thought about fire?

What Fire Made Possible

The second key-text describes life for mortals before Prometheus brought them fire: long nights, bad food, and sleeping among bare rocks. Once the fire came, everything changed, and they had light, cooked food, tools and weapons, and real houses.

Almost everything people made in the ancient world started with fire. Metalworkers used it to melt bronze and iron, potters used it to harden clay, glassmakers used it to melt sand into glass, and bakers used it to turn grain into bread. Every craft and every city began with a flame.

The key-text says ignis cibum bonum facit and ignis arma facit: fire makes good food, and fire makes weapons. The same fire made tools and houses, and in the end it made whole cities. The Romans knew this, and they honored it by keeping a flame at the center of every home and at the heart of their city.

Two Fires, One Gift

Vesta's flame in the temple and Prometheus's gift to mortals are two sides of the same story. Prometheus stole the fire and gave it to humans, and the Vestals took that gift and kept it burning. It took one act of disobedience to bring the fire down to earth, and hundreds of years of careful tending to keep it alive.

The two key-texts set these side by side. In the first, the fire burns in Vesta's temple and Rome is safe: ignis ārdet. Rōma tūta est. In the second, Prometheus suffers forever for bringing that fire into the world: Promētheus semper miser est. The gift and its cost have always gone together.

Considera: The fire that keeps Rome safe is the same fire Prometheus is suffering for. What do you think about that?