, when the Sun seemed to be struggling to rise again and the apparent death of Nature had to be exorcised with special rituals, so that the Sun would recover its course.
very similar to our Christmas and New Year celebrations. Gifts were exchanged, a large banquet was prepared to cheer up the long night vigil, waiting for the Sun to rise again in the new year. There was a game very similar to today's tombola: the numbers drawn also had oracular functions, and were used to predict the future.
Many Roman buildings are oriented in such a way as to create luminous "special effects" in the days of the Winter Solstice. We discovered it in Hadrian's Villa in Tivoli, in the buildings of Roccabruna and Accademia.
In the Accademia the Sun enters through a door and its rays illuminate the building for its entire length, also crossing the Temple of Apollo, on the days of the Winter and Summer Solstice.
In Roccabruna the same thing happened in the small Temple on the upper floor (which was destroyed), where the Sun entered from the main door, located at the top of a staircase. The Temple must have resembled what is seen in a fresco of Herculaneum, preceded by a staircase.
In the domed hall on the lower floor of Roccabruna, a special light conduit still creates a Circle of Light on the days of the Winter Solstice, while on those of the Summer Solstice a Blade of Light is seen.
The illuminations were a sacred luminous signal: those were the right days to celebrate rituals linked to the Saturnalia and Fors Fortuna, as we explain in detail in our book «Villa Adriana. Architettura Celeste. I Segreti dei Solstizi» which you can purchase in this website.
Originally the Saturnalia were dedicated to the god Saturn. When he was replaced by Dionysus, the wild parties and abundant libations typical of his cult were added to the old rituals. Shops, schools and courts were closed, wars were suspended.
In the 3rd century AD Saturnalia was joined by the cult of Sol Invictus, an oriental solar deity that was imported by the emperor Elagabalus in 218 AD. In 274 AD. Aurelian made it the official state cult. The Sun god was Dominus Populi Romani (lord of the Roman people), and the emperor Aurelian became Dominus et Deus, deified already in life as a descendant of the Sun god by birth.
The Sol Invictus was the Invincible Sun, which was reborn every day and every year to new life and defeated Darkness and Death. Emperor Hadrian was depicted as Sol Invictus driving the Quadriga of the Sun, a bronze sculpture that appears to have stood on top of his Mausoleum, now Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome.