Chapter 11.—Concerning the
Surnames of Jupiter, Which are Referred Not to Many Gods, But to
One and the Same God.
They have called him Victor,
Invictus, Opitulus, Impulsor, Stator, Centumpeda, Supinalis,
Tigillus, Almus, Ruminus, and other names which it were long to
enumerate. But these surnames they have given to one god on
account of diverse causes and powers, but yet have not compelled
him to be, on account of so many things, as many gods. They gave
him these surnames because he conquered all things; because he was
conquered by none; because he brought help to the needy; because he
had the power of impelling, stopping, stablishing, throwing on the
back; because as a beam
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he held together and sustained the
world; because he nourished all things; because, like the pap,
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he nourished
animals. Here, we perceive, are some great things and some small
things; and yet it is one who is said to perform them all. I
think that the causes and the beginnings of things, on account of
which they have thought that the one world is two gods, Jupiter and
Janus, are nearer to each other than the holding together of the
world, and the giving of the pap to animals; and yet, on account of
these two works so far apart from each other, both in nature and
dignity, there has not been any necessity for the existence of two
gods; but one Jupiter has been called, on account of the one
Tigillus, on account of the other Ruminus. I am unwilling to say
that the giving of the pap to sucking animals might have become
Juno rather than Jupiter, especially when there was the goddess
Rumina to help and to serve her in this work; for I think it may be
replied that Juno herself is nothing else than Jupiter, according
to those verses of Valerius Soranus, where it has been
said:
“Almighty Jove, progenitor of
kings, and things, and gods,
And eke the mother of the gods,”
etc.
Why, then, was he called Ruminus, when they who
may perchance inquire more diligently may find that he is also that
goddess Rumina?
If, then, it was rightly thought
unworthy of the majesty of the gods, that in one ear of corn one
god should have the care of the joint, another that of the husk,
how much more unworthy of that majesty is it, that one thing, and
that of the lowest kind, even the giving of the pap to animals that
they may be nourished, should be under the care of two gods, one of
whom is Jupiter himself, the very king of all things, who does this
not along with his own wife, but with some ignoble Rumina (unless
perhaps he himself is Rumina, being Ruminus for males and Rumina
for females)! I should certainly have said that they had been
unwilling to apply to Jupiter a feminine name, had he not been
styled in these verses “progenitor and mother,” and had I not
read among other surnames of his that of Pecunia [money], which we
found as a goddess among those petty deities, as I have already
mentioned in the fourth book. But since both males and females
have money [
pecuniam
], why has he not been called both
Pecunius and Pecunia? That is their concern.
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Tigillus.
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Ruma.