Luna (goddess)

In ancient Roman religion and mythology, Luna (Latin: Lūna) is the divine embodiment of the Moon. She is often seen as the female partner of the Sun, Sol, who is thought of as a god. Luna is also sometimes shown as one part of a group of three Roman goddesses, called the triple goddess, along with Diana and either Proserpina or Hecate. Sometimes, the name Luna does not mean a separate goddess but describes another goddess in her role as the moon goddess, like Diana or Juno.

In Roman art, Luna is shown with a crescent moon and a special two-yoke chariot called a biga. In a special song called the Carmen Saeculare from 17 BC, the writer Horace called her the "two-horned queen of the stars" and asked her to listen to girls singing, just as Apollo listens to boys.

Luna’s story in Roman stories and writing comes from her Greek counterpart, Selene. Many stories about Selene were told in Roman art and books using Luna’s name instead. One well-known story is about Endymion, which was often painted on walls in Roman homes.

Function and worship

Varro grouped Luna and Sol together as visible gods, different from invisible gods like Neptune and deified people such as Hercules. Some believed Luna helped protect Rome. In the Imperial cult, Sol and Luna stood for Rome's power and the hope for peace.

Varro also included Luna and Sol among gods important to farming. Virgil linked them to agriculture, calling them the world's brightest lights. Varro counted Luna among the twenty main gods of Rome, known as the di selecti.

Cult and temples

The ancient Romans believed Luna, the goddess of the Moon, was worshipped as far back as the time of their kings. One story says a leader named Titus Tatius brought her worship to Rome from a nearby group called the Sabines. Later, another king named Servius Tullius built a temple for Luna on Aventine Hill, close to a temple for Diana. Every year on March 31, people celebrated the day the temple was founded. The temple faced some tough times — a big windstorm once broke its doors in 182 BC, and later in 84 BC, it was struck by lightning on the same day a leader named Cinna was killed. Some think the temple might have been destroyed in a big fire in Rome during the time of Emperor Nero.

Luna also had another temple on Palatine Hill, where she was called Noctiluna, meaning "Night-Shiner." An ancient writer named Varro said this temple glowed at night, but we don’t know much more about it.

Chariot of the Moon

See also: Sun chariot

Luna is often shown driving a special two-horse chariot called a biga. In Roman art, she is frequently shown alongside the Sun, who drives a four-horse chariot called a quadriga.

The writer Isidore of Seville said the quadriga stands for the sun's path through the four seasons. The biga stands for the Moon, because it moves along with the sun or because we can see it both during the day and at night. It had one black horse and one white horse.

Luna in her biga was also part of Mithraic symbols, often shown with a special image called the tauroctony. In one old painting at the mithraeum of S. Maria Capua Vetere, one of Luna’s horses was light-colored, and the other was dark brown.

A biga pulled by oxen was also driven by Hecate, who is linked with the earth in the group of three goddesses that includes the “horned” or crescent-crowned Diana and Luna. The three forms of Hecate were linked by Servius with Luna, Diana, and Proserpina. The old Greek poet Hesiod said Hecate once had power over the sky, land, and sea.