636 THE NATURE OF ROMAN MYTHOLOGY
In about 55 B.C. Lucretius began his poem with an eloquent invocation to
Venus as the creative principle of life. The opening lines of the poem transfer
the majesty and creative power of the Greek Aphrodite to a Roman context (De
Rerum Natura 1. 1-13):Mother of the descendants of Aeneas, bringer of pleasure to gods and men, nur-
turing Venus, beneath the gliding constellations of heaven you fill the ship-
bearing sea and the fruitful lands. Through you all living things are conceived
and at birth see the light of the sun. Before you, O goddess, the winds with-
draw, and at your coming, the clouds in heaven retreat. For you the variegated
earth puts forth her lovely flowers, for you the waters of the sea laugh and the
sky at peace shines, overspread with light. For you the West Wind, creator of
life, is unbarred. You first, O goddess, and your coming do the birds of the air
salute, their hearts struck by your power.At about the time that Lucretius was writing his poem, the Roman general
Pompey dedicated a temple in his theater (the first permanent stone theater at
Rome) to Venus Victrix (Bringer of Victory). The family of Julius Caesar traced
its ancestry back to her, and he dedicated a temple to her in his forum (which
was completed by Augustus). Her connection with Troy led to her importance
in the Aeneid as the mother of Aeneas. More than a century later, Hadrian ded-
icated one of Rome's most magnificent temples to the two goddesses, Venus Fe-
lix (Bringer of Success) and Roma Aeterna, thus uniting the personification of
the city with its divine ancestress.
The shrine of Venus Cloacina stood in the Forum Romanum. Cloacina was
presumably the goddess of the Cloaca, the Etruscan drainage system that drained
the Forum area and allowed the city of Rome to develop in the low-lying ground
from the sixth century onward. How this goddess was identified with Venus is
unknown. Among Italian divinities connected with the success of agriculture
was Robigo, the goddess of blight, whose festival, the Robigalia, was celebrated
in April. She was offered the gruesome sacrifice of a dog and a sheep so that
the growing crops would not be attacked by mildew. Naming a divinity after a
natural feature (good or ill) is typical of Roman religion.
The protector of gardens, Priapus, was orginally Greek. He was represented
by a wooden statue, painted red, with an enormous erect phallus. His principal
cult in the Greek world was at Lampsacus (a city overlooking the Hellespont),
where he was offered the sacrifice of a donkey (see Color Plate 6). Ovid explains
the choice of this victim in this story (Fasti 1. 415-440):^5t
Red Priapus, the ornament and guardian of gardens, loved Lotis, above all the
Naiads. She laughed at him scornfully. It was night, and [the Naiads], made
drowsy by wine, lay in different places overcome with sleep. Lotis, just as she
was, tired by play, slept farthest away on the grassy ground beneath the branches
of a maple. Up rose her lover, and holding his breath he silently made his way
on tiptoe to the nymph's resting place. Even now he was balancing [on tiptoe]