Diana, one of the Di Consentes, is a goddess of roads, the moon, fertility, childbirth, healing, forests, hunting, and the Underworld. She seems, as her name indicates, to have originally been a goddess of moonlight and the day (Diana from dies, meaning day), and is possibly associated with Ianus. Her ancient temple on the Aventine […]
Ceres, one of the Di Consentes, is a goddess of the earth, grain, crops, and laws. She is also a goddess related to death and purification: after a funeral, in order to purify themselves from the defilement they received from the dead, the family would sacrifice a sow to Ceres; and if an individual died […]
Apollo, one of the Di Consentes, is one of the few deities of the Roman pantheon who is entirely a Greek deity. The Romans had no equivalent in their pantheon before coming into contact with the worship of Apollo through trade with the Greeks. He is a god of healing, disease, prophecy, music, theater, purification, […]
Ianus (Janus in English) is the god of gateways, beginnings, endings, change, transitions, and the first month of the year, and is the guardian of keys and doors. When one is praying to other deities or doing a ritual, Ianus must be the first deity invoked. In Ovid’s Fasti, Ianus explains this: “It is through I, who […]
The Di Consentes are the chief deities of the Roman pantheon. They are 12 in number: 6 gods and 6 goddesses. Ennius, an author who wrote in the 3rd century BCE, lists them as Iuno, Vesta, Minerva, Ceres, Diana, Venus, Mars, Mercurius, Iuppiter, Neptunus, Vulcanus, and Apollo. Livy writes that a lectisternium, or feast for the […]
Iuppiter (Jupiter in English) is the chief god of the Roman pantheon and the head of the 12 Di Consentes. According to some scholars, he was originally a sky god, similar to – or equivalent to – the Indo-European sky god, and inhabited an oak tree on the Capitoline Hill. In any case, he is […]
Hi there, and welcome to this blog! I’m Iulla. Some of you may know me from my main blog on WordPress, Lucus Antiquus, or from my Tumblr of the same name, or one of several pagan fora. There is a sad lack of accurate resources out on the internet of the Roman pantheon. There are websites, such as God Checker, […]
