Editing Mithraism (section)

===Feasting===
The archaeology of numerous mithraea indicates that most rituals were associated with feasting &ndash; as eating utensils and food residues are often found. These tend to include both animal bones and also very large quantities of fruit residues.<ref name=Clauss-2000/>{{rp|style=ama|p= 115}} The presence of large numbers of cherry-stones in particular would tend to confirm mid-summer (late June, early July) as a season especially associated with Mithraic festivities. The [[Virunum]] ''album'', in the form of an inscribed bronze plaque, records a Mithraic festival of commemoration as taking place on 26&nbsp;June 184. Beck argues that religious celebrations on this date are indicative of special significance being given to the summer [[solstice]]; but this time of the year coincides with ancient recognition of the solar maximum at midsummer, when iconographically identical holidays such as [[Litha]], [[Saint John's Eve]], and [[Jāņi]] are also observed.

For their feasts, Mithraic initiates reclined on stone benches arranged along the longer sides of the mithraeum{{snd}}typically there might be room for 15 to 30&nbsp;diners, but very rarely many more than 40&nbsp;men.<ref name=Clauss-2000/>{{rp|style=ama|p= 43}} Counterpart dining rooms, or ''[[triclinium|triclinia]]'', were to be found above ground in the precincts of almost any temple or religious sanctuary in the Roman empire, and such rooms were commonly used for their regular feasts by Roman 'clubs', or ''[[collegia]]''. Mithraic feasts probably performed a very similar function for Mithraists as the ''collegia'' did for those entitled to join them; indeed, since qualification for Roman ''collegia'' tended to be restricted to particular families, localities or traditional trades, Mithraism may have functioned in part as providing clubs for the unclubbed.<ref>{{cite book |last= Burkert |first= Walter |year=1987 |title= Ancient Mystery Cults |publisher= Harvard University Press |isbn=0-674-03387-6 |page=41 }}</ref> The size of the mithraeum is not necessarily an indication of the size of the congregation.<ref name=Bjørnebye-2007/>{{rp|style=ama|pp= 12, 36}}