Editing Ceres (mythology) (section)

===Expiations===
In Roman theology, [[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#prodigium|prodigies]] were abnormal phenomena that manifested [[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#ira deorum|divine anger]] at human impiety. In Roman histories, prodigies cluster around perceived or actual threats to the Roman state, in particular, famine, war and social disorder, and are expiated as matters of urgency. The establishment of Ceres' Aventine cult has itself been interpreted as an extraordinary expiation after the failure of crops and consequent famine. In Livy's history, Ceres is among the deities placated after a remarkable series of prodigies that accompanied the disasters of the [[Second Punic War]]: during the same conflict, a lightning strike at her temple was expiated. A fast in her honour is recorded for 191 BC, to be repeated at 5-year intervals.<ref>Livy, [[Ab Urbe Condita Libri (Livy)|Ab Urbe Condita]], 36.37.4-5. Livy describes the fast as a cyclical ''ieiunium Cereris''; but see also Viet Rosenberger, in Rüpke, Jörg (Editor), ''A Companion to Roman Religion'', Wiley-Blackwell, 2007, p 296; if expiatory, it may have been a once-only event.</ref> After 206, she was offered at least 11 further official expiations. Many of these were connected to famine and manifestations of plebeian unrest, rather than war. From the Middle Republic onwards, expiation was increasingly addressed to her as mother to Proserpina. The last known followed [[Great Fire of Rome|Rome's Great Fire of 64 AD]].<ref>Spaeth, 1996, pp. 14–15, 65–7(?).</ref> The cause or causes of the fire remained uncertain, but its disastrous extent was taken as a sign of offense against [[Juno (mythology)|Juno]], [[Vulcan (mythology)|Vulcan]], and Ceres-with-Proserpina, who were all given expiatory cult. Champlin (2003) perceives the expiations to Vulcan and Ceres in particular as attempted populist appeals by the ruling emperor, [[Nero]].<ref>For the circumstances of this expiation, and debate over the site of the Cerean expiation, see Edward Champlin, ''Nero'', Harvard University Press, 2003, pp. 191–4: this expiation is usually said to be at the Aventine Temple. Champlin prefers the mundus (at or very near the [[Comitia]]). [https://books.google.com/books?id=30Wa-l9B5IoC&dq=Ceres+expiation+64&pg=PA192 Google-books preview]</ref>