Faunus
Encyclopedia
In ancient Roman religion
and myth
, Faunus was the horned god
of the forest, plains and fields; when he made cattle fertile he was called Inuus
. He came to be equated in literature with the Greek god Pan.
Faunus was one of the oldest Roman deities, known as the di indigetes
. According to the epic poet Virgil
, he was a legendary king of the Latins who came with his people from Arcadia. His shade was consulted as a god of prophecy under the name of Fatuus, with oracles in the sacred grove
of Tibur, around the well Albunea
, and on the Aventine Hill
in ancient Rome
itself.
Marcus Terentius Varro
asserted that the oracular responses were given in Saturnian verse
. Faunus revealed the future in dreams and voices that were communicated to those who came to sleep
in his precincts, lying on the fleeces of sacrificed lambs. W. Warde Fowler
suggested that Faunus is identical with Favonius, one of the Roman wind gods (compare the Anemoi
).
i was assumed besides the chief Faunus. In fable Faunus appears as an old king of Latium, son of Picus
, and grandson of Saturnus, father of Latinus by the nymph Marica. After his death he is raised to the position of a tutelary deity of the land, for his many services to agriculture and cattle-breeding.
Faunus was known as the father or husband or brother of Bona Dea
(Fauna
, his feminine side) and of Latinus
by the nymph
Marica (who was also sometimes Faunus' mother). Faun
s are place-spirits (genii) of untamed woodland. Educated, Hellenizing Romans connected their fauns with the Greek satyr
s, who were wild and orgiastic drunken followers of Dionysus
, with a distinct origin.
identified him as Lupercus
("he who wards off the wolf"), the protector of cattle, following Livy
, who named his aspect of Inuus as the god who was originally worshiped at the Lupercalia
, celebrated on the anniversary of the founding of his temple, February 15, when his priests (Luperci) wore goat-skins and hit onlookers with goat-skin belts.
Two festivals, called Faunalia, were celebrated in his honour—one on the 13th of February, in the temple of Faunus on the island in the Tiber
, the other on the 5th of December, when the peasants brought him rustic offerings and amused themselves with dancing (Peck 1898).
A euhemeristic
account made Faunus a Latin
king, son of Picus
and Canens
. He was then revered as the god Fatuus after his death, worshipped in a sacred forest outside what is now Tivoli
, but had been known since Etruscan times as Tibur, the seat of the Tiburtine Sibyl
. His numinous presence
was recognized by wolf skins, with wreaths and goblets.
In Nonnos
' Dionysiaca
, Faunus/Phaunos accompanied Dionysus when the god campaigned in India.
of literate upper-class Roman culture in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, the Romans tried to equate their own deities with one of the Greeks', applying in reverse the Greeks' own interpretatio graeca
. Faunus was naturally equated with the god Pan, who was a pastoral god of shepherds who was said to reside in Arcadia
. Pan had always been depicted with horns
and as such many depictions of Faunus also began to display this trait. However, the two deities were also considered separate by many, for instance, the epic poet Virgil
, in his Aeneid
, made mention of both Faunus and Pan independently.
for many centuries. An example of this was a set of thirty-two 4th-century spoons found near Thetford
in England in 1979. They had been engraved with the name "Faunus", and each also had a different epithet after the god's name. The spoons also bore Christian symbols, and it has been suggested that these were initially Christian but later taken and devoted to Faunus by pagans. The 4th century was a time of largescale Christianisation, and the discovery provides us with evidence that even during the decline of traditional Roman religion
, the god Faunus was still worshipped. In Gaul
, Faunus was identified with the Celtic Dusios
.
Religion in ancient Rome
Religion in ancient Rome encompassed the religious beliefs and cult practices regarded by the Romans as indigenous and central to their identity as a people, as well as the various and many cults imported from other peoples brought under Roman rule. Romans thus offered cult to innumerable deities...
and myth
Roman mythology
Roman mythology is the body of traditional stories pertaining to ancient Rome's legendary origins and religious system, as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans...
, Faunus was the horned god
Horned God
The Horned God is one of the two primary deities found in some European pagan religions. He is often given various names and epithets, and represents the male part of the religion's duotheistic theological system, the other part being the female Triple Goddess. In common Wiccan belief, he is...
of the forest, plains and fields; when he made cattle fertile he was called Inuus
Inuus
In ancient Roman religion, Inuus was a god, or aspect of a god, who embodied copulation. The evidence for him as a distinct entity is scant. Servius says that Inuus is an epithet of Faunus , named from his habit of intercourse with animals, based on the etymology of ineundum, "a going in,...
. He came to be equated in literature with the Greek god Pan.
Faunus was one of the oldest Roman deities, known as the di indigetes
Di indigetes
In Georg Wissowa's terminology the di indigetes or indigites were Roman deities and spirits not adopted from other mythologies, as distinguished from the di novensides...
. According to the epic poet Virgil
Virgil
Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil in English , was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He is known for three major works of Latin literature, the Eclogues , the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid...
, he was a legendary king of the Latins who came with his people from Arcadia. His shade was consulted as a god of prophecy under the name of Fatuus, with oracles in the sacred grove
Sacred grove
A sacred grove is a grove of trees of special religious importance to a particular culture. Sacred groves were most prominent in the Ancient Near East and prehistoric Europe, but feature in various cultures throughout the world...
of Tibur, around the well Albunea
Albunea
Albunea, the Tiburtine Sibyl, was in Roman mythology a prophetic nymph or Sibyl, a naiad who lived in the sulfuric spring near Tibur , with a well and a temple. Near it was the oracle of Faunus Fatidicus. Lactantius states that the tenth Sibyl, called Albunea, was worshiped at Tibur, and that her...
, and on the Aventine Hill
Aventine Hill
The Aventine Hill is one of the seven hills on which ancient Rome was built. It belongs to Ripa, the twelfth rione, or ward, of Rome.-Location and boundaries:The Aventine hill is the southernmost of Rome's seven hills...
in ancient Rome
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
itself.
Marcus Terentius Varro
Marcus Terentius Varro
Marcus Terentius Varro was an ancient Roman scholar and writer. He is sometimes called Varro Reatinus to distinguish him from his younger contemporary Varro Atacinus.-Biography:...
asserted that the oracular responses were given in Saturnian verse
Saturnian (poetry)
Saturnian meter or verse is an old Latin and Italic poetic form, of which the principles of versification have become obscure. Only 132 complete uncontroversial verses survive. 95 literary verses and partial fragments have been preserved as quotations in later grammatical writings, as well as 37...
. Faunus revealed the future in dreams and voices that were communicated to those who came to sleep
Incubation (ritual)
Incubation is the religious practice of sleeping in a sacred area with the intention of experiencing a divinely inspired dream or cure. Incubation was practised by many ancient cultures...
in his precincts, lying on the fleeces of sacrificed lambs. W. Warde Fowler
William Warde Fowler
William Warde Fowler was an English historian and ornithologist, and tutor at Lincoln College, Oxford. He was best known for his works on ancient Roman religion....
suggested that Faunus is identical with Favonius, one of the Roman wind gods (compare the Anemoi
Anemoi
In Greek mythology, the Anemoi were Greek wind gods who were each ascribed a cardinal direction from which their respective winds came , and were each associated with various seasons and weather conditions...
).
Consorts and family
A goddess of like attributes, called Fauna and Fatua, was associated in his worship. She was regarded sometimes as his wife, sometimes as his sister. As Pan was accompanied by the Paniskoi, or little Pans, so the existence of many FaunFaun
The faun is a rustic forest god or place-spirit of Roman mythology often associated with Greek satyrs and the Greek god Pan.-Origins:...
i was assumed besides the chief Faunus. In fable Faunus appears as an old king of Latium, son of Picus
Picus
In Roman mythology, Picus was the first king of Latium. He was known for his skill at augury and horsemanship. The witch Circe turned him into a woodpecker for scorning her love. Picus' wife was Canens, a nymph who killed herself after his transformation. They had one son, Faunus.According to...
, and grandson of Saturnus, father of Latinus by the nymph Marica. After his death he is raised to the position of a tutelary deity of the land, for his many services to agriculture and cattle-breeding.
Faunus was known as the father or husband or brother of Bona Dea
Bona Dea
Bona Dea was a divinity in ancient Roman religion. She was associated with chastity and fertility in women, healing, and the protection of the Roman state and people...
(Fauna
Fauna (goddess)
In ancient Roman religion, Fauna is a goddess said in differing ancient sources to be the wife, sister, or daughter of Faunus. Varro regarded her as the female counterpart of Faunus, and said that the fauni all had prophetic powers...
, his feminine side) and of Latinus
Latinus
Latinus was a figure in both Greek and Roman mythology.-Greek mythology:In Hesiod's Theogony, Latinus was the son of Odysseus and Circe who ruled the Tyrsenoi, presumably the Etruscans, with his brothers Ardeas and Telegonus...
by the nymph
Nymph
A nymph in Greek mythology is a female minor nature deity typically associated with a particular location or landform. Different from gods, nymphs are generally regarded as divine spirits who animate nature, and are usually depicted as beautiful, young nubile maidens who love to dance and sing;...
Marica (who was also sometimes Faunus' mother). Faun
Faun
The faun is a rustic forest god or place-spirit of Roman mythology often associated with Greek satyrs and the Greek god Pan.-Origins:...
s are place-spirits (genii) of untamed woodland. Educated, Hellenizing Romans connected their fauns with the Greek satyr
Satyr
In Greek mythology, satyrs are a troop of male companions of Pan and Dionysus — "satyresses" were a late invention of poets — that roamed the woods and mountains. In myths they are often associated with pipe-playing....
s, who were wild and orgiastic drunken followers of Dionysus
Dionysus
Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...
, with a distinct origin.
Festivals
The Christian writer Justin MartyrJustin Martyr
Justin Martyr, also known as just Saint Justin , was an early Christian apologist. Most of his works are lost, but two apologies and a dialogue survive. He is considered a saint by the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church....
identified him as Lupercus
Lupercus
Lupercus of Berytus was a Greek grammarian. He wrote On the Word, The Foundation of Arsinoe in Egypt, and more.- References :http://www.stoa.org/sol-bin/search.pl?search_method=QUERY&login=guest&enlogin=guest&page_num=1&user_list=LIST&searchstr=Arsinoe&field=any&num_per_page=25&db=REAL...
("he who wards off the wolf"), the protector of cattle, following Livy
Livy
Titus Livius — known as Livy in English — was a Roman historian who wrote a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people. Ab Urbe Condita Libri, "Chapters from the Foundation of the City," covering the period from the earliest legends of Rome well before the traditional foundation in 753 BC...
, who named his aspect of Inuus as the god who was originally worshiped at the Lupercalia
Lupercalia
Lupercalia was a very ancient, possibly pre-Roman pastoral festival, observed on February 13 through 15 to avert evil spirits and purify the city, releasing health and fertility...
, celebrated on the anniversary of the founding of his temple, February 15, when his priests (Luperci) wore goat-skins and hit onlookers with goat-skin belts.
Two festivals, called Faunalia, were celebrated in his honour—one on the 13th of February, in the temple of Faunus on the island in the Tiber
Tiber Island
The Tiber Island , is a boat-shaped island which has long been associated with healing. It is an ait, and is one of the two islands in the Tiber river, which runs through Rome; the other one, much larger, is near the mouth. The island is located in the southern bend of the Tiber. It is...
, the other on the 5th of December, when the peasants brought him rustic offerings and amused themselves with dancing (Peck 1898).
A euhemeristic
Euhemerus
Euhemerus was a Greek mythographer at the court of Cassander, the king of Macedon. Euhemerus' birthplace is disputed, with Messina in Sicily as the most probable location, while others champion Chios, or Tegea.-Life:...
account made Faunus a Latin
Latium
Lazio is one of the 20 administrative regions of Italy, situated in the central peninsular section of the country. With about 5.7 million residents and a GDP of more than 170 billion euros, Lazio is the third most populated and the second richest region of Italy...
king, son of Picus
Picus
In Roman mythology, Picus was the first king of Latium. He was known for his skill at augury and horsemanship. The witch Circe turned him into a woodpecker for scorning her love. Picus' wife was Canens, a nymph who killed herself after his transformation. They had one son, Faunus.According to...
and Canens
Canens (mythology)
In Roman mythology, Canens was the personification of song. She was a nymph from Latium.The witch Circe turned her husband Picus into a woodpecker because he scorned her love. Canens searched for her husband for six days and then threw herself into the Tiber river. She sang one final song and...
. He was then revered as the god Fatuus after his death, worshipped in a sacred forest outside what is now Tivoli
Tivoli, Italy
Tivoli , the classical Tibur, is an ancient Italian town in Lazio, about 30 km east-north-east of Rome, at the falls of the Aniene river where it issues from the Sabine hills...
, but had been known since Etruscan times as Tibur, the seat of the Tiburtine Sibyl
Tiburtine Sibyl
The Tiburtine Sibyl was a Roman sibyl, whose seat was the ancient Etruscan town of Tibur .The mythic meeting of Cæsar Augustus with the Sibyl, of whom he inquired whether he should be worshiped as a god, was a favored motif of Christian artists. Whether the sibyl in question was the Etruscan Sibyl...
. His numinous presence
Numen
Numen is a Latin term for a potential, guiding the course of events in a particular place or in the whole world, used in Roman philosophical and religious thought...
was recognized by wolf skins, with wreaths and goblets.
In Nonnos
Nonnus
Nonnus of Panopolis , was a Greek epic poet. He was a native of Panopolis in the Egyptian Thebaid, and probably lived at the end of the 4th or early 5th century....
' Dionysiaca
Dionysiaca
The Dionysiaca is an ancient epic poem and the principal work of Nonnus. It is an epic in 48 books, the longest surviving poem from antiquity at 20,426 lines, composed in Homeric dialect and dactylic hexameters, the main subject of which is the life of Dionysus, his expedition to India, and his...
, Faunus/Phaunos accompanied Dionysus when the god campaigned in India.
Equation with Pan
With the increasing HellenizationHellenization
Hellenization is a term used to describe the spread of ancient Greek culture, and, to a lesser extent, language. It is mainly used to describe the spread of Hellenistic civilization during the Hellenistic period following the campaigns of Alexander the Great of Macedon...
of literate upper-class Roman culture in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC, the Romans tried to equate their own deities with one of the Greeks', applying in reverse the Greeks' own interpretatio graeca
Interpretatio graeca
Interpretatio graeca is a Latin term for the common tendency of ancient Greek writers to equate foreign divinities to members of their own pantheon. Herodotus, for example, refers to the ancient Egyptian gods Amon, Osiris and Ptah as "Zeus", "Dionysus" and "Hephaestus", respectively.-Roman...
. Faunus was naturally equated with the god Pan, who was a pastoral god of shepherds who was said to reside in Arcadia
Arcadia
Arcadia is one of the regional units of Greece. It is part of the administrative region of Peloponnese. It is situated in the central and eastern part of the Peloponnese peninsula. It takes its name from the mythological character Arcas. In Greek mythology, it was the home of the god Pan...
. Pan had always been depicted with horns
Horned deity
A horned deity or, Horned God in mythology represents a solar god often associated with vegetation, that's honored as the Holly King or Oak King in Neopagan rituals. Most often, the Horned God is considered a male fertility god. The use of horns as a symbol for power dates back to the ancient world...
and as such many depictions of Faunus also began to display this trait. However, the two deities were also considered separate by many, for instance, the epic poet Virgil
Virgil
Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil in English , was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He is known for three major works of Latin literature, the Eclogues , the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid...
, in his Aeneid
Aeneid
The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It is composed of roughly 10,000 lines in dactylic hexameter...
, made mention of both Faunus and Pan independently.
Later worship
Faunus was worshipped across the Roman EmpireRoman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
for many centuries. An example of this was a set of thirty-two 4th-century spoons found near Thetford
Thetford
Thetford is a market town and civil parish in the Breckland district of Norfolk, England. It is on the A11 road between Norwich and London, just south of Thetford Forest. The civil parish, covering an area of , has a population of 21,588.-History:...
in England in 1979. They had been engraved with the name "Faunus", and each also had a different epithet after the god's name. The spoons also bore Christian symbols, and it has been suggested that these were initially Christian but later taken and devoted to Faunus by pagans. The 4th century was a time of largescale Christianisation, and the discovery provides us with evidence that even during the decline of traditional Roman religion
Religion in ancient Rome
Religion in ancient Rome encompassed the religious beliefs and cult practices regarded by the Romans as indigenous and central to their identity as a people, as well as the various and many cults imported from other peoples brought under Roman rule. Romans thus offered cult to innumerable deities...
, the god Faunus was still worshipped. In Gaul
Gaul
Gaul was a region of Western Europe during the Iron Age and Roman era, encompassing present day France, Luxembourg and Belgium, most of Switzerland, the western part of Northern Italy, as well as the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the left bank of the Rhine. The Gauls were the speakers of...
, Faunus was identified with the Celtic Dusios
Dusios
In the Gaulish language, Dusios was a divine being among the continental Celts who was identified with the god Pan of ancient Greek religion and with the gods Faunus, Inuus, Silvanus, and Incubus of ancient Roman religion. Like these deities, he might be seen as multiple in nature, and referred to...
.