In ancient Roman religion, Feronia was a goddess broadly associated with fertility and abundance. She was especially honored among plebeians and freedmen. Her festival, the Feroniae, was November 13, during the Ludi Plebeii ("Plebeian Games"), in conjunction with Fortuna Primigenia; both were goddesses of Praeneste.[1]
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Varro places Feronia in his list of Sabine gods[2] who had altars in Rome. Inscriptions to Feronia are found mostly in central Italy.[3] She was among the deities that Sabine moneyers placed on their coins to honor their heritage.[4] She may have been introduced into Roman religious practice when Manius Curius Dentatus conquered Sabinum in the early 3rd century BC.[5]
Many versions of Feronia’s cult have been supposed, and it is not quite clear that she was only one goddess or had only one function in ancient times. Some Latins believed Feronia to be a harvest goddess, and honoured her with the harvest firstfruits[6] in order to secure a good harvest the following year.
Feronia also served as a goddess of travellers, fire, and waters.
In Vergil's Aeneid, troops from Feronia's grove fight on the side of Turnus against Aeneas.[7] The Arcadian king Evander recalls how in his youth he killed a son of Feronia, Erulus, who like Geryon had a triple body and a triple soul; Evander thus had to kill him thrice.[8] Erulus, whom Vergil identifies as king at Praeneste, is otherwise unknown in literature.[9]
Feronia had a temple at the base of Mt. Soracte which was near Capena.[10] The Lucus Feroniae, or "grove of Feronia" (Fiano Romano) was the site of an annual festival in her honour,[11] which was in the nature of a trade fair.[12] The place, in the territory of Capena in southwestern Etruria, was plundered of its gold and silver by Hannibal's retreating troops in 211 BCE, when he turned aside from the Via Salaria to visit the sanctuary;[13] later it became an Augustan colonia. Its status as a colony is recorded in a single inscription, copied in a manuscript of the rule of the Farfa Abbey[14] as colonia Iulia Felix Lucoferonensis.[15]
Another important site was in Anxur (Terracina, southern Latium), where Servius recorded a joint cult of "the boy Jupiter" (puer Iuppiter) under the name of Anxyrus and "Juno the Virgin" (Iuno virgo), whom he identifies as Feronia.[16] According to another tradition, slaves who had just been freed might go to the shrine at Terracina and receive upon their shaved heads the pileus, a hat that symbolized their liberty.
Her temple in the Campus Martius, in what is now Largo di Torre Argentina was established before 217 B.C.E. It may have been dedicated by Curtius Dentatus following his victory over the Sabines. His building program also included the Anio Vetus, a major new aqueduct, and a number of fountains are near the temple.[17] Feronia's cults at Aquileia and Terracina were near springs that were used in her rites.[18] The Augustan poet Horace speaks of the water (lympha) of Feronia, in which "we bathe our face and hands."[19]
The Feralia on February 21 is a festival of Jupiter Feretrius, not Feronia.
Varro identified Feronia with Libertas, the goddess who personified Liberty.[20] According to Servius,[21] Feronia was a tutelary goddess of freedmen (dea libertorum). A stone at the Terracina shrine was inscribed "let deserving slaves sit down so that they may stand up free." Livy notes[22] that in 217 BC freedwomen collected money as a gift for Feronia.[23] Some sources state that slaves were set free at her temple near Ternacia.[24]
Charles Godfrey Leland found surviving traditions concerning the "witch" Feronia in 19th century Tuscany.[25]