Brumalia
ancient Roman religious festival
The Brumalia (Latin: Brumalia [bruːˈmaːlia]) was a winter solstice festival celebrated in the eastern part of the Roman Empire. In Rome there had been the minor holiday of Bruma on November 24, which turned into large scale end of the year festivities in Constantinople and Christianity. The festival included night-time feasting, drinking, and merriment. During this time, prophetic indications were taken as predictions for the remainder of the winter. Despite the 6th century emperor Justinian's official repression of paganism, the holiday was celebrated at least until the 11th century, as recorded by Christopher of Mytilene. No references exist after the 1204 sacking of the capital by the Fourth Crusade.
Etymology
The name of Brumalia comes from bruma, [ˈbruːma], "winter solstice", "winter cold", a shortening of *brevima, [ˈbrɛwɪma], presumed obsolete superlative form of brevis, later brevissima ("smallest", "shallowest", "briefest").
Overview
The Roman "Bruma" is known only from a few passing remarks, none of which predates Imperial times. Mentions of the Brumalia are found after the IV c. Against the Church disapproval John Malalas and John the Lydian used rhetoric that claimed their introduction by Romulus himself.
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This entry incorporates text from “Brumalia” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.