Diana

The sacred grove of Diana Nemorensis stood on the shore of Lake Nemi, in the Alban Hills south of Rome. Strabo described the ritual that governed it: a fugitive slave could enter the grove, break a branch from a specific tree, and challenge the reigning priest to single combat. If he won, he became the new Rex Nemorensis, the King of the Wood. He held the position until someone killed him.

Frazer’s Question

James George Frazer opened The Golden Bough in 1890 with this ritual, calling it “the most puzzling legend in the whole of classical antiquity.” His twelve-volume answer connected the priest-king of Nemi to sacred kingship traditions across the world: the idea that a king embodies the life of the land and must be killed when his strength fails. Whether Frazer’s answer was correct is still debated. The question was the right one.

The Goddess

Diana was a goddess of margins. She presided over the boundary between wild and cultivated, between animal and human, between living and dead. She hunted with a bow and a pack of hounds. She protected women in childbirth. She was worshipped by the lower classes, by slaves, and by women, the people at the edges of Roman social power.

The Moon

Diana was identified with the moon, Hecate with the underworld aspect of the moon, and Luna with the celestial body itself. The three formed a tripartite lunar goddess: Diana on earth, Luna in the sky, Hecate below. Catullus addressed all three forms in a single hymn. The division was Roman. The function was older.

Sources

Bibliography. The same list is held in the article’s frontmatter for the citation tools that read it programmatically.

• Strabo, Geography V.3.12: the Rex Nemorensis at Nemi
• Frazer, The Golden Bough (1890/1922): Diana at Nemi as central case
• Ovid, Metamorphoses: Diana and Actaeon
• Catullus, Poem 34: hymn to Diana