Juno (mythology)
Juno ( Latin Iuno , nickname " Unxia ") is an old Italian, especially Roman goddess. She was considered the goddess of childbirth, marriage, and care. The month name June is derived from Juno.
Origins and cult
After she was equated with the Greek goddess Hera and held her role or function, she became the wife of Jupiter and thus queen of the goddesses. The equation probably happened under Etruscan influence. Juno was worshiped by the Etruscans under the name Uni . Her parents were Saturnus and Ops .
According to Varro , the cult of Juno Lucina, the goddess of childbirth, was introduced by the Sabine king Titus Tatius . Juno was the patroness of the city of Rome , was venerated on the Capitol , which also happened as part of the Capitoline Triassic . Her holiday was the Matronalia or feriae Matronales (from Latin matrona - "dignified married woman") on March 1st . Her sacred animal was the goose , which is why geese were kept at her temple on the Capitol. When these warned the citizens of Rome of attacking enemies by loud chatter, the warning was attributed to Juno and was nicknamed Moneta , the warner or admonisher. At the same time, she was still the patron saint of the early urban mint in Rome, as it is said to have been around 289 BC on the Capitol in a building belonging to the Juno Temple. Was established.
Outside Rome there were important Juno cults in Teanum Sidicinum , Aesernia , Lanuvium , Gabii , Veii and Perusia, among others . The Sabine goddess Juno Curitis was also transferred to Rome as Juno Quiritis . She is often equated iconographically with Isis .
Sometimes the tradition of Valentine's Day is traced back to one of her memorial days, when she was offered flower offerings on February 14th .
Iuno ( pl. Junones ) was also called the personal protective spirit of a woman. She was the female counterpart to male genius . In this role as a genius, she could occasionally act as the protective goddess of a prostitute.
iconography
The peacock is an attribute of Junos , especially in baroque allegories of love and beauty. On Roman coins, she is also accompanied by a peacock, carries a (long) scepter and the offering bowl. There are also pictures of Juno carrying ears of grain. In allegorical representations of the four-element doctrine , Juno stands for air.
literature
- Julius Vogel : Iuno . In: Wilhelm Heinrich Roscher (Hrsg.): Detailed lexicon of Greek and Roman mythology . Volume 2.1, Leipzig 1894, Col. 574-612 ( digitized version ).
- Georg Wissowa : Religion and cult of the Romans. Beck, Munich 1902, pp. 113-120 ( digitized version ).
- Carl Olof Thulin : Iuno 1. In: Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume X, 1, Stuttgart 1918, Sp. 1114-1125.
- Werner Eisenhut : Iuno. In: The Little Pauly (KlP). Volume 2, Stuttgart 1967, Sp. 1563-1568.
- Fritz Graf : Juno. In: The New Pauly (DNP). Volume 6, Metzler, Stuttgart 1999, ISBN 3-476-01476-2 , Sp. 72-76.
- Gunther Martin: Hera. In: Maria Moog-Grünewald (Ed.): Mythenrezeption. The ancient mythology in literature, music and art from the beginnings to the present (= Der Neue Pauly . Supplements. Volume 5). Metzler, Stuttgart / Weimar 2008, ISBN 978-3-476-02032-1 , pp. 322-325.
- Carl Thulin : Juno 1 . In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume X, 1, Stuttgart 1918, Col. 1114-1123.
Web links
- “Goethes Juno” - Documentation by Jutta Assel and Georg Jäger
- Juno in the Warburg Institute Iconographic Database (approx. 400 images)
Individual evidence
- ^ Nancy Thomson de Grummond : Etruscan Myth, Sacred History and Legend. Univ. of Pennsylvania Museum of Archeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, PA 2006, pp. 78-84.
- ↑ Julius Rosenbaum : The story of the lust epidemic. First part: the epidemic of lust in antiquity. Lippert, Halle 1839, p. 70 ( Google Books ); compare Max Ihm : I. Junones. In: Wilhelm Heinrich Roscher (Hrsg.): Detailed lexicon of Greek and Roman mythology. Volume 2.1, Leipzig 1894, Col. 615-617.