Citation with stable link: Philip A. Harland, 'Pelasgian diasporas: Varro on Roman origins and human sacrifice at the Saturnalia festival (mid-first century BCE),' Ethnic Relations and Migration in the Ancient World, last modified September 12, 2026, https://philipharland.com/Blog/?p=23507.
Ancient authors: Marcus Terentius Varro (mid-first century BCE), Human and Divine Antiquities, book 8 on festivals, as cited by Ambrosius Theodosius Macrobius (early fifth century CE), The Saturnalia 1.7.17-18; 1.7.28-34 (link; link to Latin)
Comments: The Pelasgians from the mists of time were a favourite ethnic group to evoke as an explanation for the origins of other peoples. And so there are many stories about Pelasgian migrations and settlements. For some time, Greek elites debated how the earlier Pelasgian people related to later Greek populations, with a number of these authors appealing to Pelasgians as their own ancestors (link to posts on this site). Varro illustrates that some among the Roman elites joined in.
Macrobius has one of the main characters in his dialogue cite Varro’s story of the origins of the Romans. According to this citation of Varro, Varro explained the origins of the Saturnalia festival in Rome with reference to the notion that the earliest Romans (or Latins generally) were, in fact, Pelasgian migrants. According to this tale, the Pelasgians consulted the god at Dodona (in what would become Epeiros, Greece) who instructed them to travel to a land (Italy) to mix with and / or expel Aborigines (“from the beginning” people) and Sikelians (Sicilians). At first these earliest Romans (Pelasgians) interpreted other elements in the oracle to mean that they should appease the god “Dis with human heads and Saturn with the human sacrificial victims.” Hercules later intervened to makes things more civil, involving a substitution for the sacrifice.
The idea that “we” used to engage in human sacrifice or the eating of human flesh in the mists of time but, thankfully, discovered civilized living long ago (in contrast to other peoples who remain barbarous) is a quite common trope. This use of human sacrifice discourse has a different valence from accusations of human sacrifice against contemporary foreign peoples or subgroups within one’s own society (on which see many other posts in criminalization of peoples category).
The Greek author Dionysios of Halikarnassos would, a little bit later, likewise have Romans as descendents of Pelasgians, but emphatically by way of Greeks themselves (link).
After the citation of Varro, the Macrobius’ dialogue then turns to other cases where very ancient practices of human sacrifice were substituted with supposedly symbolic gestures alluding to that old practice. Among the examples is the notion that, in the time Tarquinius (legendary final king of Rome pictured living in the sixth century BCE), other cults likewise entailed sacrificing human beings, in this case boys. These too were substituted. Plutarch likewise associates Tarquinius with human sacrifice, but with a Catilinarian, conspiratorial spin (link).
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[Macrobius’ character Praetextatus explains the origins of the Saturnalia]
(1.7.17) . . . Praetextatus [one of the characters in the discussion] at first tried to refer the question to the others but gave in to a general demand that he should deal with the topic of the Saturnalia festival himself. (1.7.18) When it was silent, he began as follows:
“It is proper for me to present here an account of the origin of the Saturnalia festival, but not the one that pertains to the mysterious nature of the divine, but the one that is a mixture of myth or is explained to the populace by those who are experts about nature. However, I may not deal with the secret nature of the deity, for it is not permissible even at the sacred rites themselves to reveal the hidden principles which flow from the fountain of pure truth. Whoever attains to knowledge of them is ordered to keep that information locked in his conscience. . . [omitted portions of Praetextatus explanations].
[Varro’s account of the founding of the Saturnalia by Pelasgians in central Italy]
(1.7.28) “l am also aware of Varro’s account of the origin of the Saturnalia. Varro says that, when the Pelasgians were driven from their homes, they went to diverse lands but most of them came together at Dodona [the oracle of Zeus in what would become Epeiros, Greece]. Doubtful about where they should settle, they consulted the oracle. They received this response: ‘Go in search of the land of the Sikelians (or: Sicilians) and the Aborigines, a land that is sacred to Saturn, namely Kotyle [i.e. Cutiliae] where an island floats. Mix with these people. Then send a tenth of what you acquire to the od Phoebos [Apollo] and offer heads to Hades and a man (phōs) to the Father.’ That was the response which they received. After many wanderings, they came to Latium, where they found a floating island in the lake of Cutiliae [in central Italy, about 100km northeast of the city of Rome]. (1.7.29) For there was a large section of turf – perhaps hardened mud or perhaps an accumulation of marsh land with brushwood and trees forming a luxuriant forest – and it was drifting through the water along with the movement of the waves in such a way as to supply believability to the tale about Delos, the island which, for all its lofty hills and wide plains, used to journey through the seas from place to place. (1.7.30) The discovery of this miracle showed the Pelasgians that these were the dwelling-places that had been predicted. After they had driven out the Sikelian (or: Sicilian) inhabitants, they took possession of the land, dedicating a tenth of the plunder to Apollo in keeping with the response given by the oracle and dedicating a shrine to Dis and an altar to Saturn, whose festival they named the Saturnalia.
[Civilizing role of Hercules and the replacement of the human sacrifices during the Saturnalia]
(1.7.31) “For a long time they [Pelasgians now in Latium] thought they were appeasing Dis with human heads and Saturn with the human sacrificial victims, since the oracle had instructed them to ‘offer heads to Hades and a man (φώτα) to the Father.’ But later, the story goes, Hercules, returning through Italy with the herds of Geryon, persuaded the descendants [of the Pelasgians] to replace these inauspicious sacrifices with other auspicious ones by offering to Dis masks skillfully fashioned to resemble the human face instead of human heads and by honoring the altars of Saturn with lighted candles instead of the blood of a man. For the word phōta [in Greek] means ‘lights’ as well as ‘a man.’ (1.7.32) This is the origin of the custom of sending around wax tapers during the Saturnalia.
[Alternate explanations of the rites in the Saturnalia]
“But other people think that the practice is derived simply from the fact that it was in the reign of Saturn that we made our way, as though to the ‘light,’ from a rude and gloomy existence to a knowledge of the helpful skills. (1.7.33) I should add, however, that I have found it written that, due to greed, many made the Saturnalia an excuse to request and demand gifts from their clients, a practice which rested heavily on those with less resources. A person named Publicius, a tribune, proposed to the people that no one should send anything but wax tapers to someone who was richer than himself.”
[Another case of human sacrifice still practiced under the Roman king Tarquinius, but substituted afterwards]
(1.7.34) At this point, Albinus Caecina [another character in the discussion] interposed:
“Praetextatus, there was a substituted sacrifice like the one you have just mentioned made in later times at the rites of the Compitalia, when games used to be held at crossroads throughout the city. That is to say, when Tarquinius Superbus [final king of Rome, usually imagined to reign in the sixth century BCE] restored these games in honour of the Lares [protective spirits associated with particular places, including crossroads] and of the goddess Mania in keeping with an oracle of the god Apollo which commanded that propitiation be made on behalf of human lives. For that oracle established that an offering should be made ‘for heads with heads.’ (1.7.34) For some time, the ritual required the sacrifice of boys to the goddess Mania, the mother of the Lares, to insure the safety of the family. But after the expulsion of Tarquinius, the consul Junius Brutus decided to change the nature of the sacrificial rite. Brutus ordered that heads of garlic and poppies were to be used at the rite. The result was that the oracle was obeyed, in so far as the oracle had prescribed ‘heads,’ but the crime (scelus) of the inauspicious sacrifice was discarded. It also became the practice to avert any peril that threatened a particular family by hanging up woolen images before the door of the house. As for the games themselves, they were customarily called ‘Compitalia’ from the ‘crossroads’ (compita) at which they were held. But I interrupted you. Please go on.”
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Source of translation: Percival Vaughan Davies, Macrobius: Saturnalia Book One (New York: Columbia University Press, 1969), thoroughly modified by Harland.