Cardea
Encyclopedia
Cardea or Carda was the ancient Roman goddess of the hinge (Latin cardo, cardinis), Roman doors being hung on pivot hinges
. The Augustan poet
Ovid
conflates her with another archaic goddess named Carna, whose festival
was celebrated on the Kalends
of June and for whom he gives the alternative name Cranê or Cranea, a nymph
. Ovid's conflation of the goddesses is likely to have been his poetic invention, but it has also been conjectured that Carna was a contracted form of Cardina, and at minimum Ovid was observing that their traditions were congruent.
, Cardea is associated with two otherwise unknown deities who preside over doorways: Forculus, from fores, "door", plural in form because double doors were common on public buildings and elite homes (domūs
); and Limentinus
, from limen, liminis, "threshold" (compare English "liminal"). St. Augustine
mocks the apparent triviality of these "little gods" in one of his "attacks against the multitude of Gods," noting that while one doorkeeper is adequate for a human household, the Roman gods require three: "evidently Forculus can't watch the hinge and the threshold at the same time." Modern scholarship has pointed out that this particular set of divinities belongs to rituals of marking out sacred space and fixing boundaries, religious developments hypothesized to have occurred during the transition from pastoralism
to an agrarian society
. Among Roman deities of this type, Terminus was the most significant.
Stefan Weinstock conjectured that these three doorway deities had a place in cosmology
as the Ianitores terrestres, "doorkeepers of the earth," guarding the passage to the earthly sphere. In the schema presented by Martianus Capella
, the Ianitores terrestres are placed in region 16 among deities of the lowest ranks, while Janus, the divine doorkeeper par excellence, is placed in region 1. This arrangement may represent the ianuae coeli
, the two doors of the heavens identified with the solstice
s. Isidore of Seville
says that there are two ianuae coeli, one rising (that is, in the East) and one setting (the West): "The sun advances from the one gate, by the other he recedes."
Isidore's definition is followed immediately by an explanation of the cardines (plural of cardo), the north-south pivots of the axis on which the sphere of the world rotates. These are analogous to the top-and-bottom pivot hinges of a Roman door.
In addition to the meaning of "door hinge," the cardo was also a fundamental concept in Roman surveying
and city planning. The cardo was the main north-south street of a town, the surveying of which was attended by augur
al procedures that aligned terrestrial and celestial space. The cardo was also a principle in the layout of the Roman army
's marching camp, the gates of which were aligned with the cardinal points to the extent that the terrain permitted.
"), and that she was the guardian of the heart and the vital parts of the human body. The power to avert vampiric striges, which Ovid attributes to the conflated Cardea-Carna, probably belonged to Carna, while the charms fixed on doorposts are rightly Cardea's.
Carna's feast day was marked as nefastus on the calendar
; that is, it was a public holiday when no assembly or court could convene. Mashed beans and lard — a dish perhaps to be compared to refried beans
or hoppinjohn
— were offered to her as res divinae, and thus the day was known as the Kalendae fabariae, the Bean-Kalends, since at this time the bean harvest matured. Beans had many magico-religious properties in ancient Greece and Rome in addition to their importance as a food crop.
William Warde Fowler
took Carna to be an archaic goddess whose cult had not been revivified by religious innovation or reform and thus had lapsed into obscurity by the end of the Republic
. Auguste Bouché-Leclercq considered Carna a goddess of health. Her elusive nature is indicated by the wildly divergent scholarly conjectures she has prompted: "she was considered a chthonic
divinity by Wissowa
, a lunar goddess
by Pettazzoni
, a bean-goddess by Latte
, and a patroness of digestion by Dumézil."
of Ovid, the nymph Cranaë is raped by Janus, a god otherwise portrayed by the poet as avuncular and wise. The story may be the poet's invention, as seems to be the threatened rape of the virginal and venerable Vesta
by the phallic
god Priapus
narrated later in Book 6 (June). As a poetic work of art, the Fasti is a unique fabrication blending authentic folklore, antiquarian knowledge, and fictional elaboration. It has been interpreted as Ovid's challenge to the prevailing orthodoxy of Augustus's religious reforms, which were often innovations of Imperial propaganda
under the cloak of archaic revivalism.
Ovid begins by noting that the first day of the month is dedicated to Carna. He then identifies her as the goddess of the hinge, who is elsewhere known as Cardea, a name Ovid does not use: "By means of her divine presence (numen
) she opens things that have been closed, and closes things that have been opened." The source of her powers (vires) have become obscured by time (aevum), but he promises that his poem (carmen) will clarify the matter (6.101–104).
The setting is the sacred grove (lucus
) of the otherwise unknown god Alernus, for whom, Ovid claims, the state priests
still carry out sacra, sacred rites. The nymph named at that time Cranaë was born there. She was a huntress, often mistaken for the "sister of Phoebus," that is, Diana
, except that she used hunting javelins and nets rather than a bow and arrow. When her many would-be lovers attempted to seduce her, she demurred claiming lack of privacy, and played the same trick on each one: "lead the way to a secluded cave, and I'll follow." As the gullible youth went ahead, Cranaë held back until she was camouflaged among the bushes (6.105–118).
Janus too was seized by desire for the nymph. She responded to his sweet-talk (verbis mollibus) by attempting the same ruse; however, as Ovid points out in a characteristic moment of comedy and cruelty colliding, the two faces of Janus allow him to see what goes on behind, and Cranaë was unable to elude him. She was powerless (nil agis, "you can do nothing," the poet repeats twice); the god "occupies her with his embrace," and after overpowering her to achieve his goal, treats the encounter as contractual: "In exchange for our intercourse (pro concubitu), the right (ius
) of the hinge will be yours; take that as payment for the virginity you deposited" (6.119–128).
As a pledge, he gives her the whitethorn, or hawthorn, which has the power to repel injurious influences from the entrances to houses (6.129–130). This is the "hinge" or turning point of the unnamed Cardea's transformation from a maiden nymph of the wild to a goddess who polices the threshold or boundaries (limina
) of domesticity. The tale of Cranaë's rape, though stocked by Roman rather than Greek figures, would be not out of place in Ovid's Metamorphoses: the heroine doesn't change into a tree, but her transformation resides in the token of the whitethorn tree.
, singular strix, the word for an owl
as a bird of evil omen and supposedly derived from the verb strideo, stridere, "shriek." At the same time, Ovid says that they are the winged creatures who tormented the marooned Phineas
by stealing the food off his table — that is, the Harpies. They are a "disconcerting composite" that recalls images on certain curse tablet
s, one of which shows a "heart-feasting Hecate
" that matches Ovid's description. The poet himself emphasizes that it's hard to tell what they really are, whether they were born as birds, or whether they had been transformed by an incantation (carmen, the word Ovid has just used to describe his own account). He then glosses carmen as "a crone
's Marsian
chant" (neniaque … Marsa …anūs).
Hinge
A hinge is a type of bearing that connects two solid objects, typically allowing only a limited angle of rotation between them. Two objects connected by an ideal hinge rotate relative to each other about a fixed axis of rotation. Hinges may be made of flexible material or of moving components...
. The Augustan poet
Augustan literature (ancient Rome)
Augustan literature is the period of Latin literature written during the reign of Augustus , the first Roman emperor. In literary histories of the first part of the 20th century and earlier, Augustan literature was regarded along with that of the Late Republic as constituting the Golden Age of...
Ovid
Ovid
Publius Ovidius Naso , known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who is best known as the author of the three major collections of erotic poetry: Heroides, Amores, and Ars Amatoria...
conflates her with another archaic goddess named Carna, whose festival
Roman festivals
In ancient Roman religion, holidays were celebrated to worship and celebrate a certain god or divine event, and consisted of religious observances and festival traditions, usually with a large feast, and often featuring games . The most important festivals were the Saturnalia, the Consualia, the...
was celebrated on the Kalends
Kalends
The Calends , correspond to the first days of each month of the Roman calendar. The Romans assigned these calends to the first day of the month, signifying the start of the new moon cycle...
of June and for whom he gives the alternative name Cranê or Cranea, a nymph
Nymph
A nymph in Greek mythology is a female minor nature deity typically associated with a particular location or landform. Different from gods, nymphs are generally regarded as divine spirits who animate nature, and are usually depicted as beautiful, young nubile maidens who love to dance and sing;...
. Ovid's conflation of the goddesses is likely to have been his poetic invention, but it has also been conjectured that Carna was a contracted form of Cardina, and at minimum Ovid was observing that their traditions were congruent.
Cardea and doorways
In the Christian polemic of the Church FathersChurch Fathers
The Church Fathers, Early Church Fathers, Christian Fathers, or Fathers of the Church were early and influential theologians, eminent Christian teachers and great bishops. Their scholarly works were used as a precedent for centuries to come...
, Cardea is associated with two otherwise unknown deities who preside over doorways: Forculus, from fores, "door", plural in form because double doors were common on public buildings and elite homes (domūs
Domus
In ancient Rome, the domus was the type of house occupied by the upper classes and some wealthy freedmen during the Republican and Imperial eras. They could be found in almost all the major cities throughout the Roman territories...
); and Limentinus
Limentinus
Limentinus is the Roman God whose responsibility was to protect the threshold of the house. His associates are Cardea and Forculus.The whole door is protected by Janus. Limentinus is mentioned by St. Augustine as a protector of the threshold and may have been responsible for preventing Silvanus...
, from limen, liminis, "threshold" (compare English "liminal"). St. Augustine
Augustine of Hippo
Augustine of Hippo , also known as Augustine, St. Augustine, St. Austin, St. Augoustinos, Blessed Augustine, or St. Augustine the Blessed, was Bishop of Hippo Regius . He was a Latin-speaking philosopher and theologian who lived in the Roman Africa Province...
mocks the apparent triviality of these "little gods" in one of his "attacks against the multitude of Gods," noting that while one doorkeeper is adequate for a human household, the Roman gods require three: "evidently Forculus can't watch the hinge and the threshold at the same time." Modern scholarship has pointed out that this particular set of divinities belongs to rituals of marking out sacred space and fixing boundaries, religious developments hypothesized to have occurred during the transition from pastoralism
Pastoralism
Pastoralism or pastoral farming is the branch of agriculture concerned with the raising of livestock. It is animal husbandry: the care, tending and use of animals such as camels, goats, cattle, yaks, llamas, and sheep. It may have a mobile aspect, moving the herds in search of fresh pasture and...
to an agrarian society
Agrarian society
An agrarian society is a society that depends on agriculture as its primary means for support and sustenance. The society acknowledges other means of livelihood and work habits but stresses the importance of agriculture and farming, and was the most common form of socio-economic oganization for...
. Among Roman deities of this type, Terminus was the most significant.
Stefan Weinstock conjectured that these three doorway deities had a place in cosmology
Cosmology
Cosmology is the discipline that deals with the nature of the Universe as a whole. Cosmologists seek to understand the origin, evolution, structure, and ultimate fate of the Universe at large, as well as the natural laws that keep it in order...
as the Ianitores terrestres, "doorkeepers of the earth," guarding the passage to the earthly sphere. In the schema presented by Martianus Capella
Martianus Capella
Martianus Minneus Felix Capella was a pagan writer of Late Antiquity, one of the earliest developers of the system of the seven liberal arts that structured early medieval education...
, the Ianitores terrestres are placed in region 16 among deities of the lowest ranks, while Janus, the divine doorkeeper par excellence, is placed in region 1. This arrangement may represent the ianuae coeli
Caelus
Caelus or Coelus was a primal god of the sky in Roman myth and theology, iconography, and literature...
, the two doors of the heavens identified with the solstice
Solstice
A solstice is an astronomical event that happens twice each year when the Sun's apparent position in the sky, as viewed from Earth, reaches its northernmost or southernmost extremes...
s. Isidore of Seville
Isidore of Seville
Saint Isidore of Seville served as Archbishop of Seville for more than three decades and is considered, as the historian Montalembert put it in an oft-quoted phrase, "le dernier savant du monde ancien"...
says that there are two ianuae coeli, one rising (that is, in the East) and one setting (the West): "The sun advances from the one gate, by the other he recedes."
Isidore's definition is followed immediately by an explanation of the cardines (plural of cardo), the north-south pivots of the axis on which the sphere of the world rotates. These are analogous to the top-and-bottom pivot hinges of a Roman door.
In addition to the meaning of "door hinge," the cardo was also a fundamental concept in Roman surveying
Surveying
See Also: Public Land Survey SystemSurveying or land surveying is the technique, profession, and science of accurately determining the terrestrial or three-dimensional position of points and the distances and angles between them...
and city planning. The cardo was the main north-south street of a town, the surveying of which was attended by augur
Augur
The augur was a priest and official in the classical world, especially ancient Rome and Etruria. His main role was to interpret the will of the gods by studying the flight of birds: whether they are flying in groups/alone, what noises they make as they fly, direction of flight and what kind of...
al procedures that aligned terrestrial and celestial space. The cardo was also a principle in the layout of the Roman army
Roman army
The Roman army is the generic term for the terrestrial armed forces deployed by the kingdom of Rome , the Roman Republic , the Roman Empire and its successor, the Byzantine empire...
's marching camp, the gates of which were aligned with the cardinal points to the extent that the terrain permitted.
Carna and the Bean-Kalends
Macrobius (5th century) says that the name Carna was derived from caro, carnis, "flesh, meat, food" (compare English "carnal" and "carnivoreCarnivore
A carnivore meaning 'meat eater' is an organism that derives its energy and nutrient requirements from a diet consisting mainly or exclusively of animal tissue, whether through predation or scavenging...
"), and that she was the guardian of the heart and the vital parts of the human body. The power to avert vampiric striges, which Ovid attributes to the conflated Cardea-Carna, probably belonged to Carna, while the charms fixed on doorposts are rightly Cardea's.
Carna's feast day was marked as nefastus on the calendar
Roman calendar
The Roman calendar changed its form several times in the time between the founding of Rome and the fall of the Roman Empire. This article generally discusses the early Roman or pre-Julian calendars...
; that is, it was a public holiday when no assembly or court could convene. Mashed beans and lard — a dish perhaps to be compared to refried beans
Refried beans
Refried beans is a dish of cooked and mashed beans and is a traditional staple of Mexican and Tex-Mex cuisine, although each cuisine has a somewhat different approach when making the dish.-Ingredients and preparation:...
or hoppinjohn
Hoppin' John
Hoppin' John is the Southern United States' version of the rice and beans dish traditional throughout West Africa. It consists of black-eyed peas and rice, with chopped onion and sliced bacon, seasoned with a bit of salt. Some people substitute ham hock or fatback for the conventional bacon; a...
— were offered to her as res divinae, and thus the day was known as the Kalendae fabariae, the Bean-Kalends, since at this time the bean harvest matured. Beans had many magico-religious properties in ancient Greece and Rome in addition to their importance as a food crop.
William Warde Fowler
William Warde Fowler
William Warde Fowler was an English historian and ornithologist, and tutor at Lincoln College, Oxford. He was best known for his works on ancient Roman religion....
took Carna to be an archaic goddess whose cult had not been revivified by religious innovation or reform and thus had lapsed into obscurity by the end of the Republic
Roman Republic
The Roman Republic was the period of the ancient Roman civilization where the government operated as a republic. It began with the overthrow of the Roman monarchy, traditionally dated around 508 BC, and its replacement by a government headed by two consuls, elected annually by the citizens and...
. Auguste Bouché-Leclercq considered Carna a goddess of health. Her elusive nature is indicated by the wildly divergent scholarly conjectures she has prompted: "she was considered a chthonic
Chthonic
Chthonic designates, or pertains to, deities or spirits of the underworld, especially in relation to Greek religion. The Greek word khthon is one of several for "earth"; it typically refers to the interior of the soil, rather than the living surface of the land or the land as territory...
divinity by Wissowa
Georg Wissowa
Georg Otto August Wissowa was a German classical philologist who was born in Neudorf, near Breslau.Wissowa studied at the University of Breslau, and in 1886 became a professor at the University of Marburg, and in 1895 a professor at the University of Halle.Wissowa was a specialist in the study of...
, a lunar goddess
Lunar deity
In mythology, a lunar deity is a god or goddess associated with or symbolizing the moon. These deities can have a variety of functions and traditions depending upon the culture, but they are often related to or an enemy of the solar deity. Even though they may be related, they are distinct from the...
by Pettazzoni
Raffaele Pettazzoni
Raffaele Pettazzoni was a historian of Italian religion. He was one of the first academics to propose a historical approach to the study of religion...
, a bean-goddess by Latte
Kurt Latte
Kurt Latte was a German philologist and classical scholar known for his work on ancient Roman religion.His major work is Römische Religionsgeschichte , which was intended to replace the work of Georg Wissowa that by then was nearly 60 years old. Although widely referenced, Latte's work has not...
, and a patroness of digestion by Dumézil."
The rape of Cranaë
In the FastiFasti (poem)
The Fasti is a six-book Latin poem by Ovid believed to have been left unfinished when the poet was exiled to Tomis by the emperor Augustus in the year 8...
of Ovid, the nymph Cranaë is raped by Janus, a god otherwise portrayed by the poet as avuncular and wise. The story may be the poet's invention, as seems to be the threatened rape of the virginal and venerable Vesta
Vesta (mythology)
Vesta was the virgin goddess of the hearth, home, and family in Roman religion. Vesta's presence was symbolized by the sacred fire that burned at her hearth and temples...
by the phallic
Phallus
A phallus is an erect penis, a penis-shaped object such as a dildo, or a mimetic image of an erect penis. Any object that symbolically resembles a penis may also be referred to as a phallus; however, such objects are more often referred to as being phallic...
god Priapus
Priapus
In Greek mythology, Priapus or Priapos , was a minor rustic fertility god, protector of livestock, fruit plants, gardens and male genitalia. Priapus is marked by his absurdly oversized, permanent erection, which gave rise to the medical term priapism...
narrated later in Book 6 (June). As a poetic work of art, the Fasti is a unique fabrication blending authentic folklore, antiquarian knowledge, and fictional elaboration. It has been interpreted as Ovid's challenge to the prevailing orthodoxy of Augustus's religious reforms, which were often innovations of Imperial propaganda
Imperial cult (ancient Rome)
The Imperial cult of ancient Rome identified emperors and some members of their families with the divinely sanctioned authority of the Roman State...
under the cloak of archaic revivalism.
Ovid begins by noting that the first day of the month is dedicated to Carna. He then identifies her as the goddess of the hinge, who is elsewhere known as Cardea, a name Ovid does not use: "By means of her divine presence (numen
Numen
Numen is a Latin term for a potential, guiding the course of events in a particular place or in the whole world, used in Roman philosophical and religious thought...
) she opens things that have been closed, and closes things that have been opened." The source of her powers (vires) have become obscured by time (aevum), but he promises that his poem (carmen) will clarify the matter (6.101–104).
The setting is the sacred grove (lucus
Lucus
In ancient Roman religion, a lucus is a sacred grove.Lucus was one of four Latin words meaning in general "forest, woodland, grove" , but unlike the others it was primarily used as a religious designation...
) of the otherwise unknown god Alernus, for whom, Ovid claims, the state priests
College of Pontiffs
The College of Pontiffs or Collegium Pontificum was a body of the ancient Roman state whose members were the highest-ranking priests of the polytheistic state religion. The college consisted of the Pontifex Maximus, the Vestal Virgins, the Rex Sacrorum, and the flamines...
still carry out sacra, sacred rites. The nymph named at that time Cranaë was born there. She was a huntress, often mistaken for the "sister of Phoebus," that is, Diana
Diana (mythology)
In Roman mythology, Diana was the goddess of the hunt and moon and birthing, being associated with wild animals and woodland, and having the power to talk to and control animals. She was equated with the Greek goddess Artemis, though she had an independent origin in Italy...
, except that she used hunting javelins and nets rather than a bow and arrow. When her many would-be lovers attempted to seduce her, she demurred claiming lack of privacy, and played the same trick on each one: "lead the way to a secluded cave, and I'll follow." As the gullible youth went ahead, Cranaë held back until she was camouflaged among the bushes (6.105–118).
Janus too was seized by desire for the nymph. She responded to his sweet-talk (verbis mollibus) by attempting the same ruse; however, as Ovid points out in a characteristic moment of comedy and cruelty colliding, the two faces of Janus allow him to see what goes on behind, and Cranaë was unable to elude him. She was powerless (nil agis, "you can do nothing," the poet repeats twice); the god "occupies her with his embrace," and after overpowering her to achieve his goal, treats the encounter as contractual: "In exchange for our intercourse (pro concubitu), the right (ius
Ius
Ius or Jus etymologically means "that which is binding" and comes from the same root as iungere, "to join." In ancient Rome it was used primarily to mean a right to which a citizen was entitled by virtue of his citizenship...
) of the hinge will be yours; take that as payment for the virginity you deposited" (6.119–128).
As a pledge, he gives her the whitethorn, or hawthorn, which has the power to repel injurious influences from the entrances to houses (6.129–130). This is the "hinge" or turning point of the unnamed Cardea's transformation from a maiden nymph of the wild to a goddess who polices the threshold or boundaries (limina
Liminality
Liminality is a psychological, neurological, or metaphysical subjective state, conscious or unconscious, of being on the "threshold" of or between two different existential planes, as defined in neurological psychology and in the anthropological theories of ritual by such writers as Arnold van...
) of domesticity. The tale of Cranaë's rape, though stocked by Roman rather than Greek figures, would be not out of place in Ovid's Metamorphoses: the heroine doesn't change into a tree, but her transformation resides in the token of the whitethorn tree.
Carna and the striges
The aition of the whitethorn explains why, Ovid says, a branch or twig of it is used to repel tristes … noxas, "baleful harms," from doorways (fores). Why is this necessary? Because there are greedy winged creatures ready to fly in and suck the blood from sleeping infants so young they still take only breast milk. Ovid describes these creatures (6.131–142) as having a large head, prominent eyes, and beaks suited for snatching and carrying off; their wings are white, and their talons are like hooks. They are given the name strigesStrix (mythology)
Strix was the Ancient Roman and Greek word for owl. In folklore it was considered a bird of ill omen that fed on human flesh and blood, a product of metamorphosis...
, singular strix, the word for an owl
Owl
Owls are a group of birds that belong to the order Strigiformes, constituting 200 bird of prey species. Most are solitary and nocturnal, with some exceptions . Owls hunt mostly small mammals, insects, and other birds, although a few species specialize in hunting fish...
as a bird of evil omen and supposedly derived from the verb strideo, stridere, "shriek." At the same time, Ovid says that they are the winged creatures who tormented the marooned Phineas
Phineas
In Greek mythology, Phineas was a Phoenician King of Thrace.The name 'Phineas' or 'Phineus' may be associated with the ancient city of Phinea on the Thracian Bosphorus.-Phineas, Son of Agenor:...
by stealing the food off his table — that is, the Harpies. They are a "disconcerting composite" that recalls images on certain curse tablet
Curse tablet
A curse tablet or binding spell is a type of curse found throughout the Graeco-Roman world, in which someone would ask the gods to do harm to others.-Description:...
s, one of which shows a "heart-feasting Hecate
Hecate
Hecate or Hekate is a chthonic Greco-Roman goddess associated with magic, witchcraft, necromancy, and crossroads.She is attested in poetry as early as Hesiod's Theogony...
" that matches Ovid's description. The poet himself emphasizes that it's hard to tell what they really are, whether they were born as birds, or whether they had been transformed by an incantation (carmen, the word Ovid has just used to describe his own account). He then glosses carmen as "a crone
Crone
The crone is a stock character in folklore and fairy tale, an old woman who is usually disagreeable, malicious, or sinister in manner, often with magical or supernatural associations that can make her either helpful or obstructing. She is marginalized by her exclusion from the reproductive cycle,...
's Marsian
Marsi
Marsi is the Latin exonym for a people of ancient Italy, whose chief centre was Marruvium, on the eastern shore of Lake Fucinus, drained for agricultural land in the late 19th century. The area in which they lived is now called Marsica. During the Roman Republic the people of the region spoke a...
chant" (neniaque … Marsa …anūs).