in Antiquity, the name of a minister of sacrifice among the Romans.

The pontifices not being able to attend all the sacrifices performed at Rome to the numerous gods adored by that people, appointed three ministers, whom they called epulones, because they had conferred on them the care and management of the epula, or feasts in the solemn games and festivals. Their number was at length augmented from three to seven, and afterwards to ten. Their first establishment was in the year of Rome 558, under the consulate of L. Furius Purpureo and M. Claudius Marcellus.