DEA DIA. — A very ancient Roman divinity, as may be deduced from certain elements of her cult, such as the absolute prohibition against using iron instruments in the ceremonies (the pruning of the plants in the grove sacred to the goddess, as well as the engraving on marble
of the ritual acts, etc., had to be purified with a double piaculum); the practice of venerating ancient pots (a practice which, from other authors, is known to belong to the archaic period, cf. Dionisio d'Alicarnasso, II, 23); and, furthermore, her connection with the very ancient sodality of the Fratres Arvales, whose Acta (belonging, however, only to the imperial period) are the sole sources transmitting information about her.
Since the divinity was venerated by this sodality, which was essentially agrarian in character, it has easily been possible to recognize in D. D. a rustic divinity (like Cerere, Tellus, etc.), of which she would be an indigitamentum, since her designation is not a proper name but rather a surname. The offerings made to her—wine, dried fruit, incense, sows (the latter especially sacred to Cerere), etc.—also confirm her rustic character. The festivals of D. D. were established annually by the ceremony of the iudicio (between 7 and 12 January) by the magister of the Arvales, and fell in the month of May (27, 29, 30). They began in the city, continued in the grove and then in the city, and ended on the third day in the city. The grove was the locus Deus Dine (on a hill along the via Campana, approximately 5 miles from Rome), in which the goddess’s temple stood; at the foot of the hill were the altar and the foculus for the sacrifices, along with other sacred buildings; in the immediate vicinity there was a circus in which, once the ceremonies in honor of the goddess had ended, races were held.
More recently, an attempt has also been made to associate D. D. (from a form *Divia) with Diana, and to see in her a lunar goddess.
Cesare D'Onofrio