Bible Encyclopedias
Juturna

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

Search for…

Enter query below:

or

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W Y Z

Prev Entry
Jutland

Next Entry
Juvenal

Resource Toolbox

Print Article

(older form Diuturna, the lasting), an old Latin divinity, a personification of the never-failing springs. Her original home was on the river Numicius near Lavinium, where there was a spring called after her, supposed to possess healing qualities (whence the old Roman derivation from juvare, to help). Her worship was early transferred to Rome, localized by the Lacus Juturnae near the temple of Vesta, at which Castor and Pollux, after announcing the victory of lake Regillus, were said to have washed the sweat from their horses. At the end of the First Punic War Lutatius Catulus erected a temple in her honour on the Campus Martius, subsequently restored by Augustus. Juturna was associated with two festivals: the Juturnalia on the 11th of January, probably a dedication festival of a temple built by Augustus, and celebrated by the college of the fontani, workmen employed in the construction and maintenance of aqueducts and fountains; and the Volcanalia on the 23rd of August, at which sacrifice was offered to Volcanus, the Nymphs and Juturna, as protectors against outbreaks of fire. In Virgil, Juturna appears as the sister of Turnus (probably owing to the partial similarity of the names), on whom Jupiter, to console her for the loss of her chastity, bestowed immortality and the control of all the lakes and rivers of Latium. For the statement that she was the wife of Janus and mother of Fontus (or Fons), the god of fountains, Arnobius (Adv. gentes iii. 29) is alone responsible.

See Virgil, Aeneid, xii. 139 and Servius ad loc.; Ovid, Fasti, ii. 583-616; Valerius Maximus, i. 8.i; L. Deubner, "Juturna and die Ausgrabungen auf dem romischen Forum," in Neue Jahrb. f. das klassische Altertum (1902), p. 370.