[279] The Nonae Caprotinae (July 7), the day when women sacrificed to Juno Caprotina under a wild fig-tree in the Campus Martius, is not known to us except from Varro. See _R.F._ p. 178, where (note 8) is a suggestion that the festival had to do with the _caprificatio_, or method of ripening the figs, which Dr. Frazer has expanded in his _Lectures on Kingship_, p. 270, believing the process to be that of fertilisation.
[280] _Classical Review_, vol. ix. p. 474 foll. The same view has recently been taken independently by W. Otto in _Philologus_, 1905, pp. 215 foll., 221. It is perfectly clear that the monthly sacrifice to Juno was the duty of the wife of the _rex sacrorum_; a pontifex minor is also mentioned (Macrob. i. 15. 19).
[283] See Ihm's article "Iunones" in _Myth. Lex._ vol. ii. 615; Pliny, _N.H._ ii. 16.
[284] Dr. J. B. Carter tells me that he has abandoned this explanation of the evolution of Juno. On the other hand, von Domaszewski seems in some measure to accept it (_Abhandlungen_, p. 169 foll.), when he says that "similar functions, when exercised by different _numina_, can eventually produce a god. _Auf diese Weise ist Iuno geworden._" He means that the creative power is called Juno in a woman, or in a people (Iuno Populonia), or in the curiae (Iuno Curitis), and that an independent deity, Juno _par excellence_, emerges from all these. But so far I cannot follow him.
[285] There is no real evidence from purely Roman sources of this fancied conjugal or other relation, if we exclude that of the alleged cult of Juno by the Flaminica Dialis. This has been well seen and expressed by W. Otto, _l.c._ p. 215 foll.; see also _Classical Review_ as quoted above. As we shall see in the next lecture, Dr. Frazer is much concerned to show that Jupiter and Juno are actually a married pair, and consequently he will have nothing to do with my opinion on this point: _Early History of Kingship_, p. 214 foll., and _Adonis_, _Attis,_ _Osiris_, ed. 2, p. 410, note 1.
[288] I have discussed the Vestalia and the nature of Vesta and her cult in _R.F._ p. 145 foll. See also Marquardt, p. 336 foll., and Wissowa, _R.K._ p. 141 foll.
[289] Ovid, _Fasti_, vi. 296, says that he had been stupid enough to believe that there was a statue in the _aedes Vestae_, but found out his mistake:--