The objective of Roman worship was to gain the blessing of the gods and thereby gain prosperity for themselves, their families and communities. Emperors understood the central importance of ...

Aside from the spirits, worshipped privately at home, the Romans had a large number of public gods. Many gods were believed to have taken part in the founding of Rome. All were consulted and ...

Ancient Rome unfairly has a reputation for having stolen or copied their mythology and religious traditions from the Greeks and given them Latin names to claim as their own. This is easily disproved ...

The Romans were always trying to keep on the good side of their gods. They made offerings at temples and shrines to make them happy. Image caption, A statue of Minerva, the Roman goddess of wisdom.

So they got around it by trying to have the best of both worlds by pairing off their Roman gods with their British equivalents, and erecting joint shrines. One of the most famous in Britain is to ...