Septimius Severus’ Hochzeitstraum

Abstract

According to a contemporary legend, omens and, above all, dreams foretold the elevation of Septimius Severus to the purple. Before his wedding to Iulia Domna, he saw Diva Faustina iunior in a dream preparing the couple’s nuptial chamber in the great temple of Venus by the Palatine. After a discussion of the dream’s underlying conception as a prophetic text, its origins are traced to the practice of contracting senatorial marriages by the cult monument of Diva Faustina and Marcus Aurelius that was set up in that temple in 176 AD. As an added consequence, Rome can be pinpointed as the location of the wedding.