Fitz Jenő (szerk.): Religions and Cults in Pannonia. Exhibiton an Székesfehérvár, Csók István Gallery 15 May - 30 September 1996 – Szent István Király Múzeum közleményei: A. sorozat 33. (1998)

INTERPRETATION Aequorna She belongs to the deities of the Northern Adriatic area and was the most important deity of Emona (Ljubljana) and its environment. As early as in the Republican age the aldermen of the merchant settlement made a sanctuary built for her honour, to which three small votive altars may have belonged. Settlers from Emona in Savaria (Szombathely) dedicated an insrciption to Aequorna as well. Aquileia In the whole course of Pannonia's history Aquileia, the most important city of north-east Italy, played a special role as for Romanisation, culture, the diffusion of different religions and economical connections. Though the town did not belong to Pannónia, the major part of the religions widespread in Italy and in the Empire was transmitted through Aquileia. That was the situation also in the 4th century, when the city had a leading role in the diffusion of Christianity in our area. Two years after the Edict of Constantine the Great, in 314, the church of two halls of the town was built, named later Theodoriana. These two halls formed the first and largest cathedral in this area. In the further architectural development of the church Oriental influences predominated. In 1901 a relief came to light near to the basilica San Felice e Fortunato, which was regarded by the majority of specialists as a representation of the Apostles Peter and Paul. Today the possibility of a profane monument cannot be excluded; perhaps it represented two emperors or, ifit was a religious monument, on ground of the site the two martyrs of Aquileia, Felix and Fortunate. The 6th century text of Venantius Fortunatus relates beyond the historical and archaeological sources of a contemporaneous veneration.Following the dating of S. Tavano the slab could originate in the 4th or 5th decade of the 4th century. Most archaeologists agree that the basilica San Felice e Fortunato was built after 380, so that a different date can be considered as well: in 340 the battle fought among the sons of Constatine the Great took place along the river Alsa only a few kilometres from Aquileia. The two persons represented might be thus the victorious Constantine II and Constans. Artebudz to Brogdos According to the incised text a person named Artebudz offered the vessel deposited in the grave to the border god Brogdos. (Poetovio, Western Cemetery, Grave 8, 2nd to 3rd century A.D.) Traces of the religion of the Celts during the Roman period One century and a half after the Roman conquest (40 A.D.) in the province Pannónia the local population consisted partly of the indigenous Celts. The traces of their creed are, though, hard to find in this period. In the Roman Empire the local gods and goddesses were identified with the official Roman deities, so that the figure of an original Celtic god is rather dim. The individual Celtic tribes had deities of their own, who were not always identic with those of the neighbouring tribes. The Celtic animal representations indicate a deity or his/her function. The boar is the symbol of fight, on the other hand it had an important role in the other-world, which is proven by the sepulchral sculpture or by the sacrified animal, resp. the remnants of animals consumed at the funeral feast laid down in the grave itself. We find the stylized representation of the boar on the horse trappings of the chariot interments of the Roman period.The stag is connected, too, with the other-world, or else it symbolizes strength and wealth. The painted ornamental vessels of the Roman period are decorated with stags, representations of trees and solar motives (wheel), other-world symbols of the Celtic peoples and even of the earlier population. According to Celtic belief the dead had to go a long way to reach the otherworld. Rich Eraviscans had about the turn of the 1st and 2nd centuries burials with coaches and horses, richly equipped. People who could not afford this luxury, made the other-world journey carved on their tombstones. On these we see vehicles of two or four wheels, with horses, on the forage rack a servant girl sits. Diana The goddess of hunt and the wild animals of the forest, virginal protector of the expectant mothers. The figure of the classical Diana was completed in Pannónia with features from the Balkans and West Europe as well as with local Celtic characteristics. In Carnuntum her small sanctuary came to light along the paved street of the town. 122