CIRCUMAMBULATION. - A rite consisting in walking around the boundaries of a piece of land, a building, or an object. This circuit is performed for two reasons: either to enclose the circumambulated thing in a sacro-magical circle that prevents evil influences from penetrating and drives away those that may be lurking within it (apotropaic c.); or to procure for those who walk around the object charged with "sacrality" the benefits that derive from it (augural c.).
It is a rite of universal use that can be performed either to the rhythm of dance, or at a run, or at a processional pace, and it is integrated by prayer formulas, by lustral rites (water, fumigations, lighted torches) and by the carrying of sacred objects or sacrificial animals.
Examples of apotropaic c.: the running of the Luperci sodales around the slopes of the Palatine to enclose the hill, originally, within a magic circle against the snares of wolves for the flocks of the primitive shepherds; the lustration of the fields by leading around them the three sacrificial animals: pig, sheep and ox (Cato, De agr., 141); the circuit that, in Indian ritual, the sacrificer performs around the offered thing, holding a burning coal in his hand (Socr. Books of the East, XII, p. 145); the c. of the corpse in funerary rites: in the funeral of Patroclus (Il., XIII, 13); of Pallas (Virgil, Aev., XI, 188); in the imperial apotheosis (Herodian, IV, 2).
Examples of augural c.: the running that the newborn is made to do around the fire in Athens at the Amphidromia (v.); the triple circuit that the bride performs on the camel around her father's tent among the Arabs of Sinai; the circuit of the Ka'bah that Muslims perform seven times when they make the pilgrimage; the circuit that devout Buddhists perform around the stūpa (tomb-sanctuaries) containing the relics of their saints. A characteristic example of c. is found in the Old Testament in that for the capture of Jericho (Ios. 6, 1-20), which Joshua had the soldiers perform for six days around the walls, and on the seventh, seven times by the Ark of the Covenant. The c. is also found among ecclesiastical rites: in the consecration of a church on the day of its dedication; in the exequies of the faithful of the Latin rite; in other rites of a particular and local character.
Nicola Turchi