> the most famous roman religious festival honored the god whose best-remembered character trait was eating his children. but, like the god for which it was named, the saturnalia was adapted from an older version known to the greeks > the kronia is first recorded in ionia, the central part of western anatolia (modern turkey) in the eighth century bc, a little before the time of the prophet isaiah. from there, the celebration spread to athens and the island of rhodes, ultimately making its way westward to rome, shifting over time from midsummer to the winter solstice. both festivals were a time of merriment and abandoning social norms, with gambling, gift-giving, suspension of normal business, and the reversal of roles by slaves and their masters > but dont let the annual party fool you. the god has a dark side. its well documented that both saturn and kronos accepted human sacrifices > condemned prisoners were sacrificed to kronos at rhodes; children were offered to the god at crete; and, as baal hammon, the god was offered sacrifices of phoenician children well into the christian era
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