The Sibyls were a Hellenistic tradition of prophetic women originating in Asia Minor; however, by the early Roman Empire, the Sibylline tradition had spread across the ancient Mediterranean. The tradition likely began with a local wise woman in the Troad region, near the small town Marpessus. Over time, from the Archaic to Classical periods and through the Hellenistic and Roman eras, the Sibylline tradition and its prophetesses expanded throughout the Mediterranean world, gaining more fame and recognition. As the Sibylline tradition spread westward across the Mediterranean, it evolved from a series of wise women along the Ionian coast into a tradition of prophetesses deeply linked with the Roman world and prophetic authority, as pagan seers in early Christian theology. But what drove this development, and why did the tradition stay relevant in the minds of ancient peoples and writers? I propose that the Roman world acted as a catalyst in the development of the Sibylline tradition, solidifying many of its later recognizable characteristics. In this paper, I argue that because of the Sibylline tradition’s elevated and prestigious status within the Roman imagination, the Romans fostered the development of the Greco-Roman Sibylline tradition, paving the way for it to be “reforged” by early Christian writers, chief among them Lactantius.
Furthermore, throughout this paper, I argue that to understand better the Greco-Roman Sibylline tradition, the Roman Sibylline Books should be studied alongside the tradition from which they originate rather than treated as separate or only loosely related topics. For my analysis of the Sibylline tradition, I separate it into five various stages: these stages are the Archaic, Hellenized, Roman, Early Christian, and Medieval. This method enables the Sibylline tradition to be viewed as continuous and, since each stage does not have a distinct endpoint, to consider how each stage influenced the next. This approach offers a new perspective compared to H.W. Parke’s division of the Sibylline tradition into different periods and the separation of the Sibylline Books from it in Sibyls and Sibylline Prophecy in Classical Antiquity.
