[299] Henzen, _Acta Fratr. Arv._ pp. 144, 146; Cato, _R.R._ 139; _C.I.L._ vi. 110 and 111. Other references are given by Wissowa, _R.K._ p. 33, note 2.
[300] For Pales, _R.F._ p. 80 note; for Pomona, Wissowa, _R.K._ p. 165.
[301] The passage runs thus (Aug. _C.D._ iv. 32): "Dicit enim (Varro) de generationibus deorum magis ad poetas quam ad physicos fuisse populos inclinatos, et ideo et sexum et generationes deorum maiores suos (id est veteres credidisse Romanos) et eorum constituisse coniugia." There is an amusing passage in Lactantius, i. 17 (_de Falsa Religione_), which Dr. Frazer might read with advantage. It begins, "Si duo sunt sexus deorum, sequitur concubitus." Then he goes on mockingly to argue that the gods must have houses, cities, lands which they plough and sow, which proves them mortal. Finally he takes the whole series of inferences backwards, finishing with "si domibus carent, ergo et concubitu. Si concubitus ab his abest, et sexus igitur foemineus," etc. All this, he means, can be inferred from the fact that gods are of both sexes; but that they have _concubitus_ can no more be inferred from his argument than that they plough and sow.
[302] Dr. Frazer conjectures a sacred marriage of Jupiter and Juno under the forms of Janus and Diana, in _Kingship_, p. 214; but he is well aware that it is pure guesswork. There was, indeed, at Falerii such a marriage of Juno with an unknown deity (Ovid, _Amores_, iii. 13), of which, however, we do not know the history. Falerii was one of those cities, like Praeneste, where Etruscan, Greek, and Latin influences met. The "Orci nuptiae" on which Frazer lays stress was simply the Greek marriage of Pluto and Proserpine: "Orci coniux Proserpina," Aug. _C.D._ vii. 23 and 28, Agahd, p. 152. Wissowa shows this conclusively, _R.K._ p. 246. Orcus was Graecised as Plutus, but was himself totally without personality.
[303] Dr. Frazer wrongly translates this as "ancient prayers" (p. 411), adding "the highest possible authority on the subject." _Oratio_ is never used in this sense until Christian times: the word is always _precatio_. All scholars are agreed that what is meant is invocations to deities in old speeches, such as occur once or twice in Cicero (_e.g._ at the end of the _Verrines_); cp. Livy xxix. 15. As the recording of speeches cannot be assumed to have begun before the third century B.C., this does not carry us very far back. That century is also the age in which the pontifices were probably most active in drawing up _comprecationes_; see below, p. 285 foll.