Indigetes (of the Indigetes)

INDIGETES (of the Indigetes). - The term, which evidently indicates a category or a group of divinities, occurs, for example, in a Roman formula of collective invocation reported by Livy, and precisely after the names of Janus, Jupiter, Mars, Quirinus, Bellona and the novensiles gods.

Roman grammarians already explain the term in different ways: gods with a secret name, gods who are invoked (cf. indigitare), ancestral gods, men made gods, etc. From the scanty ancient data it emerges only that, besides the collectivity of the I., there were individual divinities that bore the appellation Indiges: thus a god worshipped near the Numicus River at Lavinium, identified now with Jupiter, now with Aeneas or with Anchises; or, in Rome itself, a god who had his festival (Aganium Indigetiis) on 11 December and who seems identical with the Sol Indiges worshipped on the Quirinal, which also had a festival on 9 August. Among modern scholars until recently the interpretation prevailed (Wissowa) according to which the term would have indicated the "indigenous" Roman divinities as distinct from imported divinities (novensiles - novensides). Once the inconsistency of this thesis had been demonstrated, the meaning of "divine ancestor" was maintained (Koch), founded on the Greek translation of indiges as γενάρχης, and on the facts of the cult of Lavinium. But the discussion on the subject still continues, revolving, more than around the scanty data, around attempts at an etymological explanation of the word.

Angelo Brelich