THE GOD
LIBER PATER appears around 2000 BC as the rustic God for vine, wine, fertility, mystical ecstasy and freedom. He is still celebrated today during Liberalia, on March 17th. In his early days, he coexisted with a number of gods from the same cult in different areas of the Ancient world. As such, he was named Osiris in Egypt, Phanaces in Mysia, Shadrapa in Phoenicia, Dionysus in Greece, Bacchus among the living, Aidoneus in the underworld, etc. These gods were born at the different places where vine was cultivated in the ancient times.
In 496 BC, due to a famine and the recommendations of the Sibylline Books, the cult of Liber Pater and his wife, Libera, was introduced in the roman Empire, with a dedicated temple on the Aventine Hill. From this date, the cult of Liber Pater stood out and expanded with the Roman imperial conquests, absorbing similar cults from Asia Minor, Europe and Africa.
Julius Caesar is the first emperor to make official in Rome the cult of Liber Pater and his celebration, Liberalia. Wine consumption is strongly growing, and Liber Pater accompanies this movement by becoming the patron god of vineyard and wine. The Thiasos, religious communities created by Liber Pater adepts, develop throughout the empire and express wishes for their god.
Liber Pater played a great role in the empire’s religion. Cleared out of his excesses, he became an aesthetic, pictorial and literary theme favored by the aristocracy. Numerous inscriptions related to Liber Pater and his cult can be found on monuments in Europe, Middle East or Northern Africa.
