Angerona

In Roman religion, Angerona or Angeronia was an old Roman goddess, whose name and functions are variously explained. She is sometimes identified with the goddess Feronia.

According to ancient authorities, she was a goddess who relieved men from pain and sorrow, or delivered the Romans and their flocks from angina (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; a late antique source suggests it was Amor, i.e. Roma inverted. Sorania and Hirpa have also been put forward as candidates for the secret name. Modern scholars regard her 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 December. 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 (Macrobius i. 10; Pliny, Nat. Hist. iii. 9; Varro, L. L. vi. 23). She was worshipped as Ancharia at Faesulae, where an altar belonging to her has been discovered. In art, she was depicted with a bandaged mouth and a finger pressed to her lips, demanding silence.

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. In Latin the cognate word angustiae designates a space of time considered as disgracefully and painfully too short. Angerona and the connected cult guaranteed the overcoming of the unpleasant angusti dies narrow, short days.

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