Interpretatio romana în lumea punică

Religion and politics were closely related in ancient world and the corollary was a thorough attention toward the religion of the conqueror. The governors of the provinces generally encouraged the Roman (and Greek) cults, beside the indigenous ones, that were “translated”: this “Roman translation” (interpretatio Romana) is, in a certain degree, an appropriation. The phenomenon was well attested in Northern Africa, in multiple and complex modalities. The traditional local divinities continued to be worshiped in a Roman frame; the approximate equivalence of a local god with a Roman god, by means of shared traits, is the starting point of a new cult, eventually materialised in some new monuments (temples, shrines, statues), that validate the effects of the interpretatio Romana.