Nenia Dea

Last updated June 28, 2024

Nenia Dea (Engl.: Goddess Nenia; rarely Naenia^[1]) was an ancient funeral deity of Rome, who had a sanctuary outside the Porta Viminalis.^[2] The cult of Nenia is doubtless a very old one, but according to Georg Wissowa ^[3] the location of Nenia's shrine (sacellum) outside the center of early Rome indicates that she didn't belong to the earliest circle of Roman deities. In a different interpretation her shrine was located outside the old city walls, because it had been the custom for all gods connected to death or dying.^[4]

Goddess of the Roman funerary lament

Nenia shares her name with the nenia that sometimes took the meaning of carmen funebre ("dirge"), and Marcus Terentius Varro regarded the Nenia Dea as a personification of the funerary lament's protective power.^[5] She was therefore a goddess also connected to the end of a person's life. Varro assigned the Nenia Dea to a polar position with respect to the god Ianus, which was probably inspired by one of the ancient Roman etymologies of the word nenia, defining it as nenia finis ("end", fig.: "finale").^{[ citation needed ]}

Arnobius places men who are near to death under Nenia's care.^[6] Although Arnobius' writings are mainly influenced by Cornelius Labeo, the identification of Nenia as the goddess of human transience here also suggests a Varronian origin.^[7] It is unclear whether Tertullian referred to the Nenia Dea when he wrote about the "goddess of death herself".^[8] Whether the worship of Nenia herself was part of the last rites is uncertain. However, Lucius Afranius clearly associates the term nenia (i.e. the funeral song) with the obsequies.^[9]

Further hypotheses

Heller rejects Nenia's status as a funerary deity and makes a guess as to her original nature as the goddess of "children's playtime".^[10] Heller's restrictive emphasis on nenia as a "jingle" or "plaything" alone has however been refuted,^[11] since sufficient sources on the funerary nature have been delivered by Heller himself, albeit disregarded.^[12]

In any case, even Heller's erroneous interpretation of the term nenia could in principle be applicable to Roman funerary customs, because death was also seen as a rebirth into the afterlife. Lucretius explicitly connects the funeral lamentations with the "wail that children raise upon first seeing the shores of light."^[13] Furthermore, the dirges could sometimes also have paralleled the lullabies that mothers sing to their children,^[14] since some neniae were sung with a soothing voice.^[15] However, this source and other sources on the nenia as a lullaby do not specifically refer to dirges, but to neniae in general.^[16] Beside the lament to fend off perdition, Nenia's character might have included some of the hypothesized philosophies, e.g. the wailing of rebirth, but since the sources are silent with respect to the goddess herself, these views on the Nenia Dea remain speculation.

Notes

↑ Cf. e.g. "Nēnia" Archived 2010-12-03 at the Wayback Machine , in: Oskar Seyffert, Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, 1894, p. 414; this alternative spelling was only used by later authors in antiquity and in some secondary scholarly publications. The spelling naenia does not accord with any of the earliest ancient sources on the goddess, e.g. by Varro, although it might in theory have been used also by the Romans.
↑ Sextus Pompeius Festus, De verborum significatu 161.32–162.1 Müller, 2nd ed. Leipzig 1880 (156.13–15 Lindsay, Leipzig 1913): <Neniae deae> sacellum ultra portam <Viminalelm …… > …………t aediculam. Cf. Paulus ed. of Fest. De verb. sign. 163 Müller (157 Lindsay): Neniae deae sacellum extra portam Viminalem fuerat dedicatum.
↑ Georg Wissowa, Religion und Kultus der Römer, München 1912/1971, p. 197.
↑ "Naenia" Archived 2011-05-14 at the Wayback Machine , in: William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, Boston 1870, p. 1135.
↑ Marcus Terentius Varro, Antiquitatum rerum humanarum et divinarum libri XLI 14, fragment 65 Agahd, Leipzig 1898; testimony in: Aurelius Augustinus, De Civitate Dei 6.9; see also: Georg Wissowa, Religion und Kultus der Römer, München 1912/1971, p. 245; Kroll, "Nenia", in: RE 2392; Kurt Latte: Römische Religionsgeschichte, München 1960, p. 52.
↑ Arnobius of Sicca, Against the heathen 4.7.
↑ Contra: R. Agahd "Varronis Antiquitatum rerum divinarum Libri", in: Jahrbuch für classische Philologie, Supplement Volume 24, Leipzig 1898, p. 124; pro: John Lewis Heller: "Nenia 'παίγνιον'", in: Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, Vol. 74, 1943, p. 225: The explicitness of the identification as finis strongly suggests a Varronian origin.
↑ Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, Libri duo ad Nationes II.15.
↑ Lucius Afranius, Com. fragment 218¹, in Sextus Pompeius Festus, De verborum significatu 161.14–16 Müller (154.20–22 Lindsay); John Lewis Heller: "Nenia 'παίγνιον'", in: Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, Vol. 74, 1943, p. 228, fragment completed as: <Afra>nius in Materte<ris: ut cum nenia tibicines exe>quias eant. See also: Thomas Habinek, The World of Roman Song. From Ritualized Speech to Social Order, Baltimore 2005.
↑ John Lewis Heller: "Nenia 'παίγνιον'", in: Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, Vol. 74, 1943, p. 263
↑ Wilhelm Kierdorf, Laudatio Funebris. Interpretationen und Untersuchungen zur Entwicklung der römischen Leichenrede, Meisenheim am Glan 1980, p. 97; Kurt Latte, Römische Religionsgeschichte, München 1960, p.101; also referring to Nilsson, Opusc. I 107.
↑ Thomas Habinek, The World of Roman Song. From Ritualized Speech to Social Order, Baltimore 2005, pp. 233–243.
↑ Titus Lucretius Carus, On the Nature of Things , II 575–577; see also II 579–80; cp. also the feeding of the deceased with breast-milk as a Roman funerary custom.
↑ Anthony Corbeill, Nature Embodied. Gesture in Ancient Rome, Princeton 2004.
↑ Arnobius of Sicca, Against the heathen 7.32.
↑ Still, it was speculated that the worship of Nenia was to "procure rest and peace for the departed in the lower world" (cf. "Naenia" Archived 2011-05-14 at the Wayback Machine , in: William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, Boston 1870, p. 1135).

Related Research Articles

Jupiter, also known as Jove, is the god of the sky and thunder, and king of the gods in ancient Roman religion and mythology. Jupiter was the chief deity of Roman state religion throughout the Republican and Imperial eras, until Christianity became the dominant religion of the Empire. In Roman mythology, he negotiates with Numa Pompilius, the second king of Rome, to establish principles of Roman religion such as offering, or sacrifice.

In Roman religion, Angerona or Angeronia was an old Roman goddess, whose name and functions are variously explained. She is sometimes identified with the goddess Feronia.

Bona Dea was a goddess in ancient Roman religion. She was associated with chastity and fertility among married Roman women, healing, and the protection of the state and people of Rome. According to Roman literary sources, she was brought from Magna Graecia at some time during the early or middle Republic, and was given her own state cult on the Aventine Hill.

Fontus or Fons was a god of wells and springs in ancient Roman religion. A religious festival called the Fontinalia was held on October 13 in his honor. Throughout the city, fountains and wellheads were adorned with garlands.

Mellona or Mellonia was an ancient Roman goddess said by St. Augustine to promote the supply of honey as Pomona did for apples and Bubona for cattle. Arnobius describes her as "a goddess important and powerful regarding bees, taking care of and protecting the sweetness of honey."

In ancient Roman religion, the diiNovensiles or Novensides are collective deities of obscure significance found in inscriptions, prayer formulary, and both ancient and early-Christian literary texts.

In ancient Roman religion, Strenua or Strenia was a goddess of the new year, purification, and wellbeing. She had a shrine (sacellum) and grove (lucus) at the top of the Via Sacra. Varro said she was a Sabine goddess. W.H. Roscher includes her among the indigitamenta, the lists of Roman deities maintained by priests to assure that the correct divinity was invoked in public rituals. The procession of the Argei began at her shrine.

Neptune is the Roman god of freshwater and the sea in Roman religion. He is the counterpart of the Greek god Poseidon. In the Greek-inspired tradition, he is a brother of Jupiter and Pluto; the brothers preside over the realms of heaven, the earthly world, and the seas. Salacia is his wife.

In ancient Roman religion and myth, Janus is the god of beginnings, gates, transitions, time, duality, doorways, passages, frames, and endings. He is usually depicted as having two faces. The month of January is named for Janus (Ianuarius). According to ancient Roman farmers' almanacs, Juno was mistaken as the tutelary deity of the month of January, but Juno is the tutelary deity of the month of June.

The Floralia was a festival in ancient Roman religious practice in honor of the goddess Flora, held on 27 April during the Republican era, or 28 April in the Julian calendar. The festival included Ludi Florae, the "Games of Flora", which lasted for six days under the empire.

Juno was an ancient Roman goddess, the protector and special counsellor of the state. She was equated to Hera, queen of the gods in Greek mythology and a goddess of love and marriage. A daughter of Saturn and Ops, she was the sister and wife of Jupiter and the mother of Mars, Vulcan, Bellona, Lucina and Juventas. Like Hera, her sacred animal was the peacock. Her Etruscan counterpart was Uni, and she was said to also watch over the women of Rome. As the patron goddess of Rome and the Roman Empire, Juno was called Regina ("Queen") and was a member of the Capitoline Triad, centered on the Capitoline Hill in Rome, and also including Jupiter, and Minerva, goddess of wisdom.

In ancient Roman religion, a sacellum is a small shrine. The word is a diminutive from sacrum. The numerous sacella of ancient Rome included both shrines maintained on private properties by families, and public shrines. A sacellum might be square or round.

In ancient Roman religion, Mutunus Tutunus or Mutinus Titinus was a phallic marriage deity, in some respects equated with Priapus. His shrine was located on the Velian Hill, supposedly since the founding of Rome, until the 1st century BC.

Granius Flaccus was an antiquarian and scholar of Roman law and religion, probably in the time of Julius Caesar and Augustus.

In ancient Roman religion, the indigitamenta were lists of deities kept by the College of Pontiffs to assure that the correct divine names were invoked for public prayers. These lists or books probably described the nature of the various deities who might be called on under particular circumstances, with specifics about the sequence of invocation. The earliest indigitamenta, like many other aspects of Roman religion, were attributed to Numa Pompilius, second king of Rome.

The Aventine Triad is a modern term for the joint cult of the Roman deities Ceres, Liber and Libera. The cult was established c. 493 BC within a sacred district (templum) on or near the Aventine Hill, traditionally associated with the Roman plebs. Later accounts describe the temple building and rites as "Greek" in style. Some modern historians describe the Aventine Triad as a plebeian parallel and self-conscious antithesis to the Archaic Triad of Jupiter, Mars and Quirinus and the later Capitoline Triad of Jupiter, Minerva and Juno. The Aventine Triad, temple and associated ludi served as a focus of plebeian identity, sometimes in opposition to Rome's original ruling elite, the patricians.

Salus was the Roman goddess of safety and well-being of both the individual and the state. She is sometimes equated with the Greek goddess Hygieia, though their functions differ considerably.

The di inferi or dii inferi were a shadowy collective of ancient Roman deities associated with death and the underworld. The epithet inferi is also given to the mysterious Manes, a collective of ancestral spirits. The most likely origin of the word Manes is from manus or manis, meaning "good" or "kindly," which was a euphemistic way to speak of the inferi so as to avert their potential to harm or cause fear.

References

This article incorporates material from the Citizendium article "Nenia Dea", which is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License but not under the GFDL.

John Lewis Heller, "Nenia 'παίγνιον'", in: Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, Vol. 74, 1943, p. 215–268

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[1] Cf. e.g. "Nēnia" Archived 2010-12-03 at the Wayback Machine , in: Oskar Seyffert, Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, 1894, p. 414; this alternative spelling was only used by later authors in antiquity and in some secondary scholarly publications. The spelling naenia does not accord with any of the earliest ancient sources on the goddess, e.g. by Varro, although it might in theory have been used also by the Romans.

[2] Sextus Pompeius Festus, De verborum significatu 161.32–162.1 Müller, 2nd ed. Leipzig 1880 (156.13–15 Lindsay, Leipzig 1913): <Neniae deae> sacellum ultra portam <Viminalelm …… > …………t aediculam. Cf. Paulus ed. of Fest. De verb. sign. 163 Müller (157 Lindsay): Neniae deae sacellum extra portam Viminalem fuerat dedicatum.

[3] Georg Wissowa, Religion und Kultus der Römer, München 1912/1971, p. 197.

[4] "Naenia" Archived 2011-05-14 at the Wayback Machine , in: William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, Boston 1870, p. 1135.

[5] Marcus Terentius Varro, Antiquitatum rerum humanarum et divinarum libri XLI 14, fragment 65 Agahd, Leipzig 1898; testimony in: Aurelius Augustinus, De Civitate Dei 6.9; see also: Georg Wissowa, Religion und Kultus der Römer, München 1912/1971, p. 245; Kroll, "Nenia", in: RE 2392; Kurt Latte: Römische Religionsgeschichte, München 1960, p. 52.

[6] Arnobius of Sicca, Against the heathen 4.7.

[7] Contra: R. Agahd "Varronis Antiquitatum rerum divinarum Libri", in: Jahrbuch für classische Philologie, Supplement Volume 24, Leipzig 1898, p. 124; pro: John Lewis Heller: "Nenia 'παίγνιον'", in: Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, Vol. 74, 1943, p. 225: The explicitness of the identification as finis strongly suggests a Varronian origin.

[8] Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus, Libri duo ad Nationes II.15.

[9] Lucius Afranius, Com. fragment 218¹, in Sextus Pompeius Festus, De verborum significatu 161.14–16 Müller (154.20–22 Lindsay); John Lewis Heller: "Nenia 'παίγνιον'", in: Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, Vol. 74, 1943, p. 228, fragment completed as: <Afra>nius in Materte<ris: ut cum nenia tibicines exe>quias eant. See also: Thomas Habinek, The World of Roman Song. From Ritualized Speech to Social Order, Baltimore 2005.

[10] John Lewis Heller: "Nenia 'παίγνιον'", in: Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, Vol. 74, 1943, p. 263

[11] Wilhelm Kierdorf, Laudatio Funebris. Interpretationen und Untersuchungen zur Entwicklung der römischen Leichenrede, Meisenheim am Glan 1980, p. 97; Kurt Latte, Römische Religionsgeschichte, München 1960, p.101; also referring to Nilsson, Opusc. I 107.

[12] Thomas Habinek, The World of Roman Song. From Ritualized Speech to Social Order, Baltimore 2005, pp. 233–243.

[13] Titus Lucretius Carus, On the Nature of Things , II 575–577; see also II 579–80; cp. also the feeding of the deceased with breast-milk as a Roman funerary custom.

[14] Anthony Corbeill, Nature Embodied. Gesture in Ancient Rome, Princeton 2004.

[15] Arnobius of Sicca, Against the heathen 7.32.

[16] Still, it was speculated that the worship of Nenia was to "procure rest and peace for the departed in the lower world" (cf. "Naenia" Archived 2011-05-14 at the Wayback Machine , in: William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, Boston 1870, p. 1135).

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7]

[8]

[9]

[10]

[11]

[12]

[13]

[14]

[15]

[16]