List of Roman deities

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Religion in
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Marcus Aurelius sacrificing
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Practices and beliefs
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Deified leaders:

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The Roman deities most widely known today are those the Romans identified with Greek counterparts (see

Roman art, and religious life as it was experienced throughout the Empire. Many of the Romans' own gods remain obscure, known only by name and sometimes function, through inscriptions and texts that are often fragmentary. This is particularly true of those gods belonging to the archaic religion of the Romans dating back to the era of kings, the so-called "religion of Numa", which was perpetuated or revived over the centuries. Some archaic deities have Italic or Etruscan counterparts, as identified both by ancient sources and by modern scholars. Throughout the Empire, the deities of peoples in the provinces
were given new theological interpretations in light of functions or attributes they shared with Roman deities.

An extensive alphabetical list follows a survey of theological groups as constructed by the Romans themselves.

Imperial cult
.

Titles and honorifics

Certain honorifics and titles could be shared by different gods, divine personifications, demi-gods and divi (deified mortals).

Augustus and Augusta

Imperial cult
.

Pax and Victoria
.

Bonus and Bona

The epithet Bonus, "the Good," is used in Imperial ideology with abstract deities such as Bona Fortuna ("Good Fortune"), Bona Mens ("Good Thinking" or "Sound Mind"), and Bona Spes ("Valid Hope," perhaps to be translated as "Optimism"). During the Republic, the epithet may be most prominent with Bona Dea, "the Good Goddess" whose rites were celebrated by women. Bonus Eventus, "Good Outcome", was one of Varro's twelve agricultural deities, and later represented success in general.[2]

Roman Isis in black and white marble, from the time of Apuleius

Caelestis

From the middle Imperial period, the title Caelestis, "Heavenly" or "Celestial" is attached to several goddesses embodying aspects of a single, supreme Heavenly Goddess. [

Phoebus", that is, Diana or Artemis as she is worshipped at Ephesus; or Proserpina as the triple goddess of the underworld. Juno Caelestis was the Romanised form of the Carthaginian Tanit.[4]

Grammatically, the form Caelestis can also be a masculine word, but the equivalent function for a male deity is usually expressed through syncretization with Caelus, as in Caelus Aeternus Iuppiter, "Jupiter the Eternal Sky."

Invictus

Brigetio, Pannonia[5]

Invictus ("Unconquered, Invincible") was in use as a divine epithet by the early 3rd century BC. In the Imperial period, it expressed the invincibility of deities embraced officially, such as Jupiter, Mars,

Mithraic mysteries.[6]

Mater and Pater

Mater ("Mother") was an honorific that respected a goddess's maternal authority and functions, and not necessarily "motherhood" per se. Early examples included

Terra Mater (Mother Earth) and the Mater Larum (Mother of the Lares). Vesta, a goddess of chastity usually conceived of as a virgin, was honored as Mater. A goddess known as Stata Mater was a compital deity credited with preventing fires in the city.[7]

From the middle Imperial era, the reigning Empress becomes Mater castrorum et senatus et patriae, the symbolic Mother of military camps, the

Matres or Matronae).[8] See also Magna Mater
(Great Mother) following.

Gods were called Pater ("Father") to signify their preeminence and paternal care, and the

Liber
, among others.

Magna Mater

"The Great Mother" was a title given to

Maia and other goddesses.[9]

Collectives

Even in invocations, which generally required precise naming, the Romans sometimes spoke of gods as groups or collectives rather than naming them as individuals. Some groups, such as the Camenae and Parcae, were thought of as a limited number of individual deities, even though the number of these might not be given consistently in all periods and all texts. The following groups, however, are numberless collectives.

Spatial tripartition

Varro grouped the gods broadly into three divisions of heaven, earth, and underworld:

  • di superi, the gods above or heavenly gods, whose altars were designated as altaria.[10]
  • di terrestres, "terrestrial gods," whose altars were designated as arae.
  • di inferi, the gods below, that is, the gods of the underworld, infernal or chthonic gods, whose altars were foci, fire pits or specially constructed hearths.

More common is a dualistic contrast between superi and inferi.

Di indigetes and novensiles

The di indigetes were thought by Georg Wissowa to be Rome's indigenous deities, in contrast to the di novensides or novensiles, "newcomer gods". No ancient source, however, poses this dichotomy, which is not generally accepted among scholars of the 21st century. The meaning of the epithet indiges (singular) has no scholarly consensus, and noven may mean "nine" (novem) rather than "new".

Roman god lists

Triads

Groupings of twelve

Lectisternium of 217 BC

A lectisternium is a banquet for the gods, at which they appear as images seated on couches, as if present and participating. In describing the lectisternium of the Twelve Great gods in 217 BC, the Augustan historian Livy places the deities in gender-balanced pairs:[13]

Divine male-female complements such as these, as well as the

anthropomorphic influence of Greek mythology, contributed to a tendency in Latin literature to represent the gods as "married" couples or (as in the case of Venus and Mars) lovers.[citation needed
]

Di Consentes on an altar

Dii Consentes

Varro uses the name Dii Consentes for twelve deities whose gilded images stood in the forum. These were also placed in six male-female pairs.[14] Although individual names are not listed, they are assumed to be the deities of the lectisternium. A fragment from Ennius, within whose lifetime the lectisternium occurred, lists the same twelve deities by name, though in a different order from that of Livy: Juno, Vesta, Minerva, Ceres, Diana, Venus, Mars, Mercurius, Jove, Neptunus, Vulcanus, Apollo.[15]

The Dii Consentes are sometimes seen as the Roman equivalent of the Greek Olympians. The meaning of Consentes is subject to interpretation, but is usually taken to mean that they form a council or consensus of deities.

Di Flaminales

The three Roman deities cultivated by major flamens[16]

Twelve Roman deities attended by the minor flamens

Di selecti

Varro[18] gives a list of twenty principal gods of Roman religion:

Sabine gods

See also:
Sabine gods

Varro, who was himself of Sabine origin, gives a list of Sabine gods who were adopted by the Romans:[19]

Livia, wife of Augustus, dressed as the goddess Ops.

Elsewhere, Varro claims

Sol Indiges – who had a sacred grove at Lavinium – as Sabine but at the same time equates him with Apollo.[21][22] Of those listed, he writes, "several names have their roots in both languages, as trees that grow on a property line creep into both fields. Saturn, for instance, can be said to have another origin here, and so too Diana."[c]

Varro makes various claims for Sabine origins throughout his works, some more plausible than others, and his list should not be taken at face value.

bride abduction of the Sabine women by Romulus's men, and in the Sabine ethnicity of Numa Pompilius, second king of Rome, to whom are attributed many of Rome's religious and legal institutions.[24] Varro says that the altars to most of these gods were established at Rome by King Tatius as the result of a vow (votum).[d]

Indigitamenta

Main article: Indigitamenta

The indigitamenta are deities known only or primarily as a name; they may be minor entities, or epithets of major gods. Lists of deities were kept by the College of Pontiffs to assure that the correct names were invoked for public prayers. The books of the Pontiffs are lost, known only through scattered passages in Latin literature. The most extensive lists are provided by the Church Fathers who sought systematically to debunk Roman religion while drawing on the theological works of Varro, also surviving only in quoted or referenced fragments. W.H. Roscher collated the standard modern list of indigitamenta,[25] though other scholars may differ with him on some points.

Alphabetical list

A

"lizard-slayer" Apollo on a mosaic from Roman Africa

B

A Bacchus from Roman Spain, 2nd century

C

  • Caca, an archaic fire goddess and "proto-Vesta";[31] the sister of Cacus.
  • Cacus, originally an ancient god of fire, later regarded as a giant.
  • Caelus, god of the sky before Jupiter.
  • Antevorta, and Postvorta
    .
  • Cardea, goddess of the hinge (cardo), identified by Ovid with Carna (below)
  • flamen minor. The leader of the Camenae
    .
  • Antevorta
    and Postvorta or Porrima, future and past.
  • Carna, goddess who preserved the health of the heart and other internal organs.
  • Ceres, goddess of the harvest and mother of Proserpina, and one of the Dii Consentes. The Roman equivalent of Demeter [Greek goddess].
  • Clementia, goddess of forgiveness and mercy.
  • Cloacina, goddess who presided over the system of sewers in Rome; identified with Venus.
  • Concordia, goddess of agreement, understanding, and marital harmony.
  • Consus, chthonic god protecting grain storage.
  • Cupid, Roman god of love. The son of Venus, and equivalent to Greek Eros.
  • Cura, personification of care and concern who according to a single source[32] created humans from clay.
  • Cybele, an imported tutelary goddess often identified with Magna Mater

D

  • Dea Dia, goddess of growth.
  • Larenta
    .
  • Dea Tertiana and Dea Quartana, the sister goddesses of tertian and quartan fevers. Presumably daughters or sisters of
    Dea Febris
    .
  • Lachesis
    .
Diana Nemorensis on a denarius

E

The Gallo-Roman horse goddess Epona
  • Egeria, water nymph or goddess, later considered one of the Camenae.
  • Empanda or Panda, a goddess whose temple never closed to those in need.
  • Gallo-Roman
    goddess of horses and horsemanship, usually assumed to be of Celtic origin.

F

  • Falacer, obscure god. He was assigned a minor flamen.
  • Fama, goddess of fame and rumor.
  • phallic god who protected from invidia (envy) and the evil eye
    .
  • Fauna
    , goddess of prophecy, but perhaps a title of other goddesses such as Maia.
  • Faunus, god of flocks.
  • Faustitas, goddess who protected herd and livestock.
  • Febris, goddess of fevers with the power to cause or prevent fevers and malaria. Accompanied by Dea Tertiana and Dea Quartiana.
  • Februus, god of Etruscan origin for whom the month of February was named; concerned with purification
  • Fecunditas, personification of fertility.
  • Felicitas, personification of good luck and success.
  • Ferentina, patron goddess of the city Ferentinum, Latium, protector of the Latin commonwealth.
  • Feronia, goddess concerned with wilderness, plebeians, freedmen, and liberty in a general sense. She was also an Underworld goddess.
  • Fides
    , personification of loyalty.
  • Flora, goddess of flowers, was assigned a flamen minor.
  • Fornax, goddess probably conceived of to explain the Fornacalia, "Oven Festival."
  • Fontus or Fons, god of wells and springs.
  • Fortuna
    , goddess of fortune.
  • Fufluns, god of wine, natural growth and health. He was adopted from Etruscan religion.
  • Fulgora, personification of lightning.
  • Furrina, goddess whose functions are mostly unknown, but in archaic times important enough to be assigned a flamen.

G

  • Genius, the tutelary spirit or divinity of each individual
  • Gratiae, Roman term for the Charites or Graces.

H

Roman statue of the infant Hercules strangling a snake
  • Hercules, god of strength, whose worship was derived from the Greek hero Heracles but took on a distinctly Roman character.
  • Hermaphroditus, an androgynous Greek god whose mythology was imported into Latin literature.
  • honor
    .
  • Hora, the wife of Quirinus
    .

I

J

A janiform sculpture, perhaps of Janus
Punishment of Ixion: in the center is Mercury holding the caduceus and on the right Juno sits on her throne. Behind her Iris stands and gestures. On the left is Vulcan (blond figure) standing behind the wheel, manning it, with Ixion already tied to it. Nephele sits at Mercury's feet; a Roman fresco from the eastern wall of the triclinium in the House of the Vettii, Pompeii, Fourth Style (60-79 AD).
  • Janus
    , double-faced or two-headed god of beginnings and endings and of doors.
  • Juno, Queen of the gods, goddess of matrimony, and one of the Dii Consentes. Equivalent to Greek Hera.
  • flamen maior. Equivalent to Greek Zeus
    .
  • Justitia, goddess of justice.
  • Juturna, goddess of fountains, wells, and springs.
  • Juventas, goddess of youth.

L

  • Lares, household gods.
  • Latona, goddess of light.
  • Laverna, patroness of thieves, con men and charlatans.
  • Lemures, the malevolent dead.
  • Levana, goddess of the rite through which fathers accepted newborn babies as their own.
  • Letum, personification of death.[citation needed]
  • Bacchus and Greek Dionysus
    .
  • Libera, Liber's female equivalent, assimilated to Roman Proserpina and Greek Persephone
    .
  • Liberalitas, goddess or personification of generosity.
  • Libertas, goddess or personification of freedom.
  • Libitina, goddess of death, corpses and funerals.
  • Lua, goddess to whom soldiers sacrificed captured weapons, probably a consort of Saturn.
  • Lucifer, god of the morning star
  • Lucina
    , goddess of childbirth, but often as an aspect of Juno.
  • Luna, goddess of the moon.
  • Pan
    .
  • Lympha, often plural lymphae, a water deity assimilated to the Greek nymphs.

M

Capitoline Triad of Juno, Jupiter, and Minerva

N

Neptune velificans on a 3rd-century mosaic
  • Naenia, goddess of funerary lament.
  • Nascio, personification of the act of birth.
  • Ananke
    .
  • Nemesis, goddess of revenge (Greek
    ), adopted as an Imperial deity of retribution.
  • Neptune, god of the sea, earthquakes, and horses, and one of the Dii Consentes. Greek equivalent is Poseidon.
  • Nerio, ancient war goddess and the personification of valor. The consort of Mars.
  • Neverita, presumed a goddess, and associated with Consus and Neptune in the Etrusco-Roman zodiac of Martianus Capella but otherwise unknown.[33]
  • Nixi, also di nixi, dii nixi, or Nixae, goddesses of childbirth.
  • Nona, minor goddess, one of the Parcae (Roman equivalent of the Moirai). The spinner of the thread of life, her Greek equivalent was Clotho.
  • Nortia a Roman-adopted Etruscan goddess of fate, destiny, and chance from the city of Volsinii, where a nail was driven into a wall of her temple as part a new-year ceremony.
  • Nox, goddess of night, derived from the Greek Nyx
    .

O

  • Ops or Opis, goddess of resources or plenty.
  • Orcus
    , a god of the underworld and punisher of broken oaths.

P

Aeneas and the Penates, from a 4th-century manuscript
  • Penates or Di Penates
    , household gods.
  • Picumnus, minor god of fertility, agriculture, matrimony, infants and children.
  • Picus, Italic woodpecker god with oracular powers.
  • Pietas, goddess of duty; personification of the Roman virtue pietas
    .
  • Pilumnus, minor guardian god, concerned with the protection of infants at birth.
  • Dis pater or Orcus
    .
  • Pomona, goddess of fruit trees, gardens and orchards; assigned a flamen minor.
  • Antevorta. One of the Carmentes and the Camenae
    .
  • Portunus, god of keys, doors, and livestock, he was assigned a flamen minor.
  • Prorsa Postverta
    , goddess of childbirth and the past, one of the two Carmentes (other being Porrima).
  • Priapus, phallic guardian of gardens, originally Greek.
  • Proserpina, Queen of the Dead and a grain-goddess, the Roman equivalent of the Greek Persephone.
  • Providentia, goddess of forethought.
  • Aidôs
    .

Q

  • Querquetulanae, nymphs of the oak.
  • Quirinus, Sabine god identified with Mars; Romulus, the founder of Rome, was deified as Quirinus after his death. Quirinus was a war god and a god of the Roman people and state, and was assigned a flamen maior; he was one of the Archaic Triad gods.
  • Quiritis, goddess of motherhood. Originally Sabine or pre-Roman, she was later equated with Juno.

R

  • Robigo or Robigus, a god or goddess who personified grain disease and protected crops.
  • Roma
    , personification of the Roman state.
  • Rumina, goddess who protected breastfeeding mothers.

S

Christ
depicted in his guise. 3rd century AD

T

  • Talasius, a god of marriage
  • Tellus
    .
  • Tempestas, a goddess of storms or sudden weather, usually plural as the Tempestates
  • Terra Mater or Tellus, goddess of the earth and land. The Greek equivalent is Gaea, mother of titans, consort of Caelus (Uranus).
  • Terminus
    , the rustic god of boundaries.
  • Tiberinus, river god; deity of the Tiber river.
  • Tibertus, god of the river Anio
    , a tributary of the Tiber.
  • Tranquillitas, goddess of peace and tranquility.
  • Trivia, goddess of crossroads and magic, equated with Hecate
    .

V

Venus, Vulcan, Mars, and Cupid on a wall painting from Pompeii
  • Vacuna, ancient Sabine goddess of rest after harvest who protected the farmers' sheep; later identified with Nike and worshipped as a war goddess.
  • Vagitanus, or Vaticanus, opens the newborn's mouth for its first cry.
  • Jupiter
    , as the meaning of his name suggests. May be a god of the underworld.
  • Venilia or Venelia, sea goddess, wife of Neptune or Faunus.[citation needed]
  • Venti, the winds, equivalent to the Greek Anemoi: North wind Aquilo(n) or Septentrio (Greek Boreas); South wind Auster (Greek Notus); East wind Vulturnus (Eurus); West wind Favonius (Zephyrus); Northwest wind Caurus or Corus (see minor winds).
  • Venus, goddess of love, beauty, sexuality, and gardens; mother of the founding hero Aeneas; one of the Dii Consentes.
  • Veritas, goddess and personification of the Roman virtue of veritas or truth.
  • Verminus, god of cattle worms.
  • Vertumnus, Vortumnus or Vertimnus, god of the seasons, and of gardens and fruit trees.
  • Vesta, goddess of the hearth, the Roman state, and the sacred fire; one of the Dii Consentes.
  • Vica Pota, goddess of victory and competitions.
  • Victoria, goddess of victory.
  • Viduus
    , god who separated the soul and body after death.
  • Hippolytus
    .
  • virtus
    .
  • Volturnus, god of water, was assigned a flamen minor. Not to be confused with Vulturnus.
  • Voluptas, goddess of pleasure.
  • Vulcan, god of the forge, fire, and blacksmiths, husband to Venus, and one of the Dii Consentes, was assigned a flamen minor.

See also

For minor deities known for a single function or by a single name, see:

A number of figures from Greek mythology who were not part of Roman religious practice appear in Latin mythological narratives and as poetic allusions; for these names, see:

Notes and references

Notes

  1. Sabine language
    .
  2. Semo Sancus or Dius Fidius
    .
  3. Latin
    : e quis nonnulla nomina in utraque lingua habent radices, ut arbores quae in confinio natae in utroque agro serpunt: potest enim Saturnus hic de alia causa esse dictus atque in Sabinis, et sic Diana.
  4. Lucina
    ."

References

  1. ^ Robert Schilling, "Roman Gods," Roman and European Mythologies (University of Chicago Press, 1992, from the French edition of 1981), pp. 75 online and 77 (note 49). Unless otherwise noted, citations of primary sources are Schilling's.
  2. ^ Hendrik H.J. Brouwer, Bona Dea: The Sources and a Description of the Cult pp. 245–246.
  3. ^ Apuleius, Metamorphoses 11.2.
  4. ^ Benko, Stephen, The virgin goddess: studies in the pagan and Christian roots of mariology, Brill, 2004, pp. 112–114: see also pp. 31, 51.
  5. ^ CIL 03, 11008"A soldier of the Legio I Adiutrix [dedicated this] to the Unconquered God" (Deo Invicto / Ulpius Sabinus / miles legio/nis primae / (A)diutricis).
  6. ^ Steven Ernst Hijmans, Sol: The Sun in the Art and Religions of Rome (diss., University of Groningen 2009), p. 18, with citations from the Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum.
  7. ^ Lawrence Richardson, A New Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992), pp. 156–157.
  8. ^ R.W. Davies, "The Training Grounds of the Roman Cavalry," Archaeological Journal 125 (1968), p. 73 et passim.
  9. ^ Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.12.16–33. Cited in H.H.J. Brouwer, Bona Dea: The Sources and a Description of the Cult (Brill, 1989), pp. 240, 241.
  10. Servius Danielis, note to Aeneid
    5.54; Lactantius Placidus, note to Statius, Theb. 4.459–60.
  11. ^ Livy, 1.38.7, 1.55.1–6.
  12. ^ Dionysius of Halicarnassus 6.17.2
  13. ^ Livy, 22.10.9.
  14. Varro
    , De re rustica 1.1.4: eos urbanos, quorum imagines ad forum auratae stant, sex mares et feminae totidem.
  15. ^ Ennius, Annales frg. 62, in J. Vahlen, Ennianae Poesis Reliquiae (Leipzig, 1903, 2nd ed.). Ennius's list appears in poetic form, and the word order may be dictated by the metrical constraints of dactylic hexameter.
  16. ^ "Flamen | Encyclopedia.com".
  17. ^ Forsythe, Gary, A Critical History of Early Rome: From Prehistory to the First Punic War, University of California Press, August, 2006
  18. De civitate Dei
     7.2.
  19. ^ Varro, De Lingua Latina 5.74
  20. ^ Woodard, Roger D. Indo-European Sacred Space: Vedic and Roman cult. p 184.[when?]
  21. Varro
    . De lingua latina. 5.68.
  22. ^ Rehak, Paul (2006). Imperium and Cosmos: Augustus and the northern Campus Martius. University of Wisconsin Press. p 94.
  23. ^ Clark, Anna. (2007). Divine Qualities: Cult and community in republican Rome. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. pp 37–38;
    Dench, Emma. (2005). Romulus' Asylum: Roman Identities from the Age of Alexander to the Age of Hadrian. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. pp 317–318.
  24. ^ Fowler, W.W. (1922). The Religious Experience of the Roman People. London, UK. p 108.
  25. ^ W.H. Roscher, Ausführliches Lexikon der griechischen und römischen Mythologie (Leipzig: Teubner, 1890–94), vol. 2, pt. 1, pp. 187–233.
  26. ^ Ovid, Fasti 2.67 and 6.105 (1988 Teubner edition).
  27. ^ Ovid, Fasti 6.106.
  28. ^ This depends on a proposed emendation of Aternus to Alernus in an entry from Festus, p. 83 in the edition of Lindsay. At Fasti 2.67, a reading of Avernus, though possible, makes no geographical sense. See discussion of this deity by Matthew Robinson, A Commentary on Ovid's Fasti, Book 2 (Oxford University Press, 2011), pp. 100–101.
  29. ^ As noted by Robinson, Commentary, p. 101; Georges Dumézil, Fêtes romaines d'été et d'automne (1975), pp. 225ff., taking the name as Helernus in association with Latin holus, holera, "vegetables." The risks and "excessive fluidity" inherent in Dumézil's reconstructions of lost mythologies were noted by Robert Schilling, "The Religion of the Roman Republic: A Review of Recent Studies," in Roman and European Mythologies, pp. 87–88, and specifically in regard to the myth of Carna as a context for the supposed Helernus.
  30. ^ Dea feminarum: Macrobius, Saturnalia I.12.28.
  31. ^ Marko Marinčič, "Roman Archaeology in Vergil's Arcadia (Vergil Eclogue 4; Aeneid 8; Livy 1.7), in Clio and the Poets: Augustan Poetry and the Traditions of Ancient Historiography (Brill, 2002), p. 158.
  32. Hyginus, Fabulae 220; compare Prometheus
    .
  33. ^ de Grummond, N. T., and Simon, E., (Editors) The religion of the Etruscans, University of Texas Press, 2006, p.200
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