Thesauros Literature biography Ἀίτια Ῥωμαϊκά

Ἀίτια Ῥωμαϊκά

Ἀίτια Ῥωμαϊκά Plutarch
20 Was this goddess, as the mythologists relate, the wife of the seer Faunus; and was she secretly addicted to wine, Cf. 265 b, supra. but did not escape detection and was beaten by her husband with myrtle rods, and is this the reason why they do not bring in myrtle and, when they make libations of wine to her, call it milk?
20 Or is it because they remain pure from many things, particularly from venery, when they perform this holy service? For they not only exclude their husbands, but they also drive everything male out of the house Cf. Life of Caesar, ix. (711 e), Life of Cicero, xix. (870 b); Juvenal, vi. 339. whenever they conduct the customary ceremonies in honour of the goddess. So, because the myrtle is sacred to Venus, they religiously exclude it. For she whom they now call Venus Murcia, in ancient days, it seems, they styled Myrtia.
21 Why do the Latins revere the woodpecker and all strictly abstainNo doubt this means from eating it since they used to eat all small birds. from it?
21 Is it because, as they tell the tale, Picus, Cf. Ovid, Metamorphoses, xiv. 320 ff. transformed by his wife’s magic drugs, became a woodpecker and in that form gives oracles and prophecies to those who consult him?

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