rine pater?"[277] Now the Quirinal was, of course, _within_ the
walls, and the Romans who identified the two deities noted this point of
contrast with the Mars-cult; for Servius writes, "Quirinus est Mars qui
praeest paci et _intra civitatem_ colitur, nam belli Mars _extra
civitatem_ templum habet." In keeping with this is the use of the word
Quirites of the Romans in their civil capacity; but unluckily we are
altogether uncertain as to the etymology and history of both Quirites
and Quirinus.[278] And as Quirinus never became, like Mars, an important
property of the Roman people, but was speedily obscured and only revived
by the legend of late origin which identified him with Romulus, he is
not of importance for my subject, and I may leave him to etymologists
and speculators.

There is one other deity of whom I might naturally be expected to say
something; I mean Juno. But our familiarity with Juno in Roman
literature must not be allowed to lead us into believing too rashly that
she was one of those great _numina_ of the early Roman State with whom I
have just been dealing. She had no special festival in the
calendar;[279] her connection with the Kalends she shared, as we have
seen, with Janus. She had no special priest of her own; for in spite of
all assertions that the flaminica Dialis was attached to her cult, I am
convinced that I was right some years ago in maintaining that this is an
error, though a natural one.[280] It cannot be proved that she had any
ancient temple in the city; for the oldest known to us as strictly
indigenous, that of Juno Moneta on the arx, was not dedicated till 344
_B.C._, and we do not know that there was an older altar on the same
spot.[281] Assuredly Rome was not in early times a great centre of the
Juno cult, as were some of the cities in her neighbourhood, _e.g._
Lanuvium, Falerii, and Veii;[282] and the gradual establishment of her
position as a truly Roman goddess may be explained by her appearance in
the trias of deities in the Capitoline temple at the end of the regal
period, and by the removal to Rome of Juno Regina of Veii still later,
after the destruction of that city.

What, then, was Juno originally to the Roman religious mind? There is no
more difficult question than this in our whole subject; as we probe
carefully in those dark ages she baffles us continually. Undoubtedly she
was a woman's deity, and we may aptly say of her "varium et mutabile
semper femina." The most sing