Fabulinus
Encyclopedia
In the popular religion of ancient Rome
, though not appearing in literary Roman mythology
, the god Fabulinus (from fabulari, to speak) taught children to speak. He received an offering when the child spoke its first words. He figured among what Walter Pater
enumerated in Marius the Epicurean
(1885) among:
Religion in ancient Rome
Religion in ancient Rome encompassed the religious beliefs and cult practices regarded by the Romans as indigenous and central to their identity as a people, as well as the various and many cults imported from other peoples brought under Roman rule. Romans thus offered cult to innumerable deities...
, though not appearing in literary Roman mythology
Roman mythology
Roman mythology is the body of traditional stories pertaining to ancient Rome's legendary origins and religious system, as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans...
, the god Fabulinus (from fabulari, to speak) taught children to speak. He received an offering when the child spoke its first words. He figured among what Walter Pater
Walter Pater
Walter Horatio Pater was an English essayist, critic of art and literature, and writer of fiction.-Early life:...
enumerated in Marius the Epicurean
Marius the Epicurean
Marius the Epicurean: his sensations and ideas is an historical and philosophical novel by Walter Pater , written between 1881 and 1884, published in 1885 and set in A.D. 161-177, in the Rome of the Antonines...
(1885) among:
the names of that populace of 'little gods', dear to the Roman home, which the pontiffs had placed on the sacred list of the Indigitamenta, to be invoked, because they can help, on special occasions, were not forgotten in the long litany— Vatican who causes the infant to utter his first cry, Fabulinus who prompts his first word, CubaCuba (mythology)In ancient Roman religion, Cuba was a goddess of infants.Early Roman religion was concerned with the interlocking and complex interrelations between gods and humans. In this, the Romans maintained a large selection of divinities with unusually specific areas of authority. A sub-group of deities...
who keeps him quiet in his cot, DomiducaDomiducaIn Roman mythology, the goddess Domiduca protects children on the way back to their parents' home.Also, Domiduca and Domiducus were two gods of marriage who were believed to protect the bride on her way to the house of the bridegroom. The names occur as epithets of Jupiter and Juno...
especially, for whom Marius had through life a particular memory and devotion, the goddess who watches over one's safe coming home".