A Companion Roman Religion - Spiritual Minds

of the relief. Both insignia combined, otherwise restricted to higher offices, were acces-

sible to freedmen in Rome only through the office of vicomagister.

This sacrificial scene’s importance is aptly summarized by I. Scott Ryberg (1955:

59): “The historical value of the relief is, however, much greater than its artistic value,

for it constitutes the earliest evidence, literary, epigraphical, or archaeological, of the

offering of a bull to the Genius Augusti.” Moreover the vicus Aescletiscene has been

repeatedly seen as the most comprehensive image of those rites the vicomagistri

performed at the compita. The magistriin office are gathered in the presence of the

inhabitants of their vicus. The four are grasping the paterafor the preliminary sacrifice

166 Katja Moede

Figure 12.1 Altar of the magistriof the vicus Aescleti(Rome, ad2/3) (photo: Rome,
Musei Capitolini. Archivio Fotografico dei Musei Capitolini).