Roman

Roman mythologies surrounding Ceres were entirely pilfered from the Greeks. The Romans gave Ceres a daughter by Jupiter named Proserpina (just as Demeter was the mother of Persephone by Zeus in Greek tradition). In one of the most well-known mythological tales, Pluto (god of the underworld), having been hit by Cupid’s arrow, sees the beautiful Proserpina among a field of flowers in Sicily. Instantly enraptured by the girl, Pluto kidnaps her and takes her to the underworld. Discovering her daughter is missing, Ceres goes on a desperate quest to find her. Unsuccessful and grief-stricken, the goddess angrily halts food production. Jupiter is forced to appeal to Pluto, demanding that Proserpina be returned to her mother. However, before she is able to leave the underworld, Pluto cleverly gives the girl a handful of pomegranate seeds. Because Proserpina ate the “food of the dead”, she could never completely dwell among the living and was henceforth required to return to the underworld four month of the year. The story serves to explain the changing of the seasons. When Proserpina is with her mother, all plant life flourishes; when she returns to Pluto, the crops won’t grow.

Anna is the sister of Dido (Queen of Carthage) in Roman mythology, the legends about whom are related by Virgil (in the Aeneid). Dido falls in love with Aeneas, but the love is not returned. In despair, Dido kills herself. After her death, Anna flees from Carthage to Italy, where she is kindly received by Aeneas. Here her jealousy of Lavinia (Aeneas’ wife) was roused, and being warned in a dream by the spirit of Dido, she throws herself into the river Numicius. Henceforth she was worshipped as the nymph of that river. Anna was originally an Italian divinity, who was regarded as the giver of life, health, and plenty. She is the goddess whose powers were most manifest at the return of spring when her festival was celebrated.

Claudia Quinta is a legendary Roman figure dating back to the Punic Wars between Rome and Carthage during the 3rd and 2nd centuries B.C. During the Second Punic War against the great military commander Hannibal, the Romans began to develop a cult around Cybele, the Great Mother goddess to ensure their success against Carthage. Her effigy was ordered to be delivered to Rome by ship and all married women of Rome were ordered to the Ostia Harbor to receive the statue. Enter Claudia Quinta. Now this was a woman of poor reputation in ancient Rome. She was vilified for wearing too much make-up and adorning herself with fancy dress. In those days this was considered exceptionally bold and disgraceful for a woman of her time. We rather think of her as sassy and fun, though! In any case, Claudia arrived at port right as the ship got stuck on a sandbar. Ropes were secured to the vessel and all the men tried as they could to pull that ship off the sandbar to no avail. Claudia prayed mightily to Cybele and then tied the ropes to her own sash pulling the ship successfully to port. She became an instant heroine and apparently immediately absolved of all her flashy “sins”. It’s too bad Claudia had to do a man’s job before being recognized for embracing her own inner-goddess!

We cannot find any significant literary characters by the name of Roman