FLAMEN. The city of Rome presented itself as a community of people and gods, and the institution of the priesthood was necessary to mediate between those two spaces, to interpret the will of the gods and to ensure accuracy in the performance of rites. The flamines—etymologically, the "dispensers of the sacred" (Isidorus, Etymologiae 7.12.17)—were the sacerdotes of a particular deity (Cicero, De legibus 2.20). They stood in contrast to the pontiffs, who were learned men and men of law, and to other colleges of priests that acted in the name of the community.

The etymology of the word flamen is not clear. Based on the common etymology of the words flamen and brahman established by Georges Dumézil, Henri Le Bourdellès (1970) pointed out that the term—also recorded in the Messapic and Persian languages—designated the priest as invocator or minister of the word. But the functional...