View source for Angerona

{{Short description|Gallo Roman goddess}}
{{About|the goddess|the [[moth]] [[genus]]|Angerona (moth)|the community in the United States|Angerona, West Virginia}}
{{Infobox deity 
| type = Celtic
| other_names =  Angeronia,Ágach,Agroná 
| image = N06 Angerona, Schönbrunn (03).jpg
| caption = Statue of Angerona, one of the [[sculptures in the Schönbrunn Garden]] (1773–80); note the fingers on lips
| deity_of = Goddess who relieves pain and sorrow, prevents angina, protects Rome and its sacred name  
| symbols = mouth bandaged and sealed, finger on lips
| festivals = [[Divalia]]
}}
In ancient [[Gallo-Roman religion]]  '''Angerona''' or '''Angeronia''' was an old Celtic goddess adopted by Romans, whose name and functions are variously explained. She is sometimes identified with the goddess [[Feronia (mythology)|Feronia]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://flowersforgods.com/roman-goddess-angerona/|title=Roman Goddess: Angerona|date=2018-11-23|website=Flowers for Gods|language=en-US|access-date=2019-10-11|archive-date=2019-10-11|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191011231212/http://flowersforgods.com/roman-goddess-angerona/|url-status=dead}}</ref>

==Description==
According to ancient authorities, she was a goddess who relieved men from pain and sorrow, or delivered the Romans and their flocks from ''angina'' ([[Peritonsillar abscess|quinsy]]). Also she was a protecting goddess of Rome and the keeper of the sacred name of the city, which might not be pronounced lest it should be revealed to her enemies. It was even thought that ''Angerona'' itself was this name.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} A late antique source suggests the sacred name of the city was Amor, ''i.e.'' Roma reversed. ''Sorania'' and ''Hirpa'' have also been put forward as candidates for the secret name.<ref>{{cite web |last=LaBadie |first=Horace W. Jr. |title=What was the secret name of Rome? |url=http://hwlabadiejr.tripod.com/roma.htm |access-date=2 September 2018}}</ref>

Modern scholars regard Angerona as a goddess akin to [[Ops]], [[Acca Larentia]], and [[Dea Dia]]; or as the goddess of the new year and the returning sun. According to Mommsen, ''ab angerendo'' {{=}} ''ἀπὸ τοῦ ἀναφέρεσθαι τὸν ἥλιον''. Her festival, called [[Divalia]] or [[Angeronalia]], was celebrated on 21&nbsp;December. Pliny The Elder says January. The priests offered sacrifice in the temple of [[Volupia]], the goddess of pleasure, in which stood a statue of Angerona, with a finger on her mouth, which was bound and closed.<ref>[[Macrobius]] I, 10;<br/>[[Pliny the Elder|Pliny]], ''Natural History'' III, 9;<br/>[[Marcus Terentius Varro|Varro]], ''De Lingua Latina'' VI, 23</ref> She was worshiped as Ancharia at [[Faesulae]], where an altar belonging to her was discovered in the late 19th century.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} In art, she was depicted with a bandaged mouth and a finger pressed to her lips, demanding silence.<ref>Statue of Angerona. Bronze 662 ([http://medaillesetantiques.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/c33gbf19z http://medaillesetantiques.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/c33gbf19z]), [[Honoré Théodoric d'Albert de Luynes|de Luynes]] collection, BnF</ref>
  
[[Georges Dumézil]] considers Angerona as the goddess who helps nature and men to sustain successfully the yearly crisis of the winter days. These culminate in the winter solstice, the shortest day, which in Latin is known as ''bruma'', from ''brevissima (dies)'', the shortest day. The embarrassment, pain and anguish caused by the lack of light and the cold are expressed by the word ''angor''.<ref>Dumézil (1977) p. 296-299.</ref> In Latin the cognate word ''angustiae'' designates a space of time considered as disgracefully and painfully too short. Dumézil cites a description of the turn in the year by [[Macrobius]]: "the time when the light is ''angusta''&nbsp;...; the solstice, day in which the sun rises finally" [''ex latebris angustiisque''&nbsp;...]<ref>[[Macrobius]]. ''Saturnalia'' I 25, 15</ref> and [[Ovid]]: "The summer solstice does not make my nights short, and the winter solstice does not make days ''angustos''."<ref>[[Ovid]]. ''Tristia'', V 10, 7-8</ref>

Dumézil pointed out that the Roman goddesses whose name ends with the suffix ''-ona'' or ''-onia'' to discharge the function of helping worshipers to overcome a particular time or condition of crisis: instances include [[Bellona (goddess)|Bellona]] who allows the Roman to wade across war in the best way possible, [[Orbona]] who cares for parents who lost a child,<ref>[[Cicero]]. ''De Natura Deorum'' III 63; [[Arnobius]]. ''Adversus Gentiles'', IV 7.</ref> [[Pellonia (deity)|Pellonia]] who pushes the enemies away,<ref>Arnobius ''Adversus Gentiles'' IV 4.</ref> [[Fessonia (goddess)|Fessonia]] who permits travellers to subdue fatigue.<ref>Augustine. ''De Civitate Dei'', IV 21.</ref>

Angerona's ''feriae'' named ''Angeronalia'' or ''Divalia'' took place on December&nbsp;21 – the day of the winter solstice. On that day the pontiffs offered a sacrifice to the goddess ''in curia Acculeia'' according to [[Varro]]<ref>[[Marcus Terentius Varro|Varro]]. ''De Lingua Latina'', VI 23</ref> or ''in sacello Volupiae'', near the ''Porta Romanula'', one of the inner gates on the northern side of the Palatine.<ref>[[Macrobius]]. ''Saturnalia'', I 10, 7.</ref> A famous statue of Angerona, with her mouth bandaged and sealed and with a finger on the lips in the gesture that requests silence,<ref>Solinus. ''De Mirabilibus Mundi'', I 6</ref> was placed in Angerona's shrine, on an altar to [[Volupia]].<ref>[[Macrobius]]. ''Saturnalia'', I 10, 8.</ref> Dumézil sees in this peculiar feature the reason of her being listed among the goddesses who were considered candidates to the title of secret tutelary deity  of Rome.<ref>[[Macrobius]]. ''Saturnalia'', III 8, 3-4.</ref>

Dumézil considers this peculiar feature of Angerona's statue to hint to a  prerogative of the goddess which was well known to the Romans, i.e. her will of requesting silence. He remarks silence in a time of cosmic crisis is a well documented point in other religions, giving two instances from Scandinavian and Vedic religion.{{citation needed|date=October 2025}}

Among the Scandinavians god [[Viðarr]] is considered the second strongest after [[Thor]]. His only known act is placed at the time of the "[[Ragnarök|Dusk of the gods]]", the great crisis in which the old world disappears, as the wolf [[Fenrir]] swallows [[Oðinn]] and the sun.<ref>''[[Völuspa]]'' 53;<br/>''Edda Snorra Sturlusonar ([[Snorri's Edda]])'' p. 73 F. Jónsson (1931), cited by Dumézil (1977) p. 298.</ref>  Then Viðarr defeats Fenrir permitting the rebirth of the world with a female sun, the daughter of the disappeared one. The eschatological crisis in which Fenrir devours the sun is seen as the "Great Winter" ''[[Fimbulvetr]]'' and the god who kills Fenrir, Viðarr, is defined the "silent Ase":<ref>''Edda Snorra Sturlusonar'' p. 33, cited by Dumézil (1977) p. 298.</ref> Silence must be associated with his exceptional force and his feat as savior of the world. Angerona too discharges the function of saving the sun in danger, thanks to her silence and the concentration of mystical force it brings.{{citation needed|date=October 2025}}
In Vedic religion silence is used in another crisis of the sun, that of the eclipse: When the sun was hidden in the demonic dark, [[Atri]] took it away from there by means of the fourth ''[[bráhman]]'' and a cult to the gods through "nude worship", i.e. with a force from within and no uttered words.<ref name=Dumézil-1956>Dumézil, G. (1956). ''Déesses latines et mythes védiques''. Paris.</ref>{{rp|pages=55–64}}

Dumézil (1956) proposes that the association between ''Angerona'' and ''Volupia'' can be explained as the pleasure that derives from a fulfilled desire, the achievement of an objective. Note that the meaning of the archaic adjective ''volup(e)'' does not refer to 'pleasure' in the carnal sense of the later word ''voluptas''.<ref name=Dumézil-1956/>{{rp|pages=66–69}} Thence the description ''θεός τῆς βουλῆς καί καιρῶν'' ["goddess of advice and of favorable occasions"] given in a Latin-Greek glossary.<ref name=Dumézil-1956/>{{rp|pages=66–69}}

==References==
{{reflist|25em}}
*{{EB1911|wstitle=Angerona|volume=2|page=8}}

==Bibliography==
*[[Georges Dumézil|Dumézil, G.]] (1977) ''La religione romana arcaica. Con un'appendice sulla religione degli Etruschi''. Milano, Rizzoli. Edizione e traduzione a cura di Furio Jesi based on an expanded version of ''La religion romain archaïque'' Paris Payot 1974 2nd edition.
*[[Hendrik Wagenvoort]], "Diva Angerona," reprinted in ''Pietas: Selected Studies in Roman Religion'' (Brill, 1980), pp.&nbsp;21–24 [https://books.google.com/books?id=xWaOxU28Nn4C&dq=%22Angerona+was+a+goddess%22+inauthor:Wagenvoort&pg=PA21 online.]

{{Roman religion}}

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