the vestal virgins were associated with the prosperity of which civilization
Human sacrifice In ancient Rome, human sacrifice was infrequent but documented. Roman authors often contrast their own behavior with that of people who would commit the heinous act of human sacrifice. These authors make it clear that such practices were from a much more uncivilized time in the past, far removed.[24] It is thought that many ritualistic celebrations and dedications to gods used to involve human sacrifice, but have now been replaced with symbolic offerings. Dionysius of Halicarnassus[25] says that the ritual of the Argei, in which straw figures were tossed into the Tiber river, may have been a substitute for an original offering of elderly men. Cicero claims that puppets thrown from the Pons Suplicius by the Vestal Virgins in a processional ceremony were substitutes for the past sacrifice of old men.[26] After the Roman defeat at Cannae, two Gauls and two Greeks in male-female couples were buried under the Forum Boarium, in a stone chamber used for the purpose at least once before.[27] In Livy's description of these sacrifices, he distances the practice from Roman tradition and asserts that the past human sacrifices evident in the same location were â€œwholly alien to the Roman spirit." [28] The rite was apparently repeated in 113 BCE, preparatory to an invasion of Gaul.[29] They buried both the Greeks and the two Gauls alive as a plea to the Gods to save Rome from destruction at the hands of Hannibal. When the Romans conquered the Celts in Gaul, they tortured the people by cutting off their hands and feet and leaving them to die. The Romans justified their actions by also accusing the Celts of practicing human sacrifice.[30]