Matronalia - Festival for Juno Lucina

For the Matronalia (Matronales Feriae) Roman matrons and husbands honored the Juno Lucina aspect of Juno (Hera to the Greeks) by feasting on the 1st of March (the pre-Julian calendar's first of the year). In honor of Juno Lucina's temple foundation on the Esquiline, both matrons and husbands visited the temple, laid flower wreaths, and prayed for the protection of their marriages. Lambs and cattle were sacrificed to Juno Lucina, husbands gifted their wives, girls received presents from their lovers, and mistresses feasted their female slaves.

Judith Hallett, Classics Professor at the University of Maryland, describes the Matronalia as a love devotional from husband to wife. "On that day husbands would pray for the health of their wives and give them presents, and wives would dress up...." (Newswise Jan. 11, 2008.) Wives dressed up by dressing down: undoing their belts, leaving not a single knot in their robes, and loosening their braided hair, thereby encouraging Juno Lucina to loosen their wombs and bring forth their "children into the light" -- a phrase attributed to Juno Lucina as the patron goddess of childbirth.

The Matronalia gained added favor in the Roman calendar under Augustus' rule (27 B.C. - A.D.14). With a dwindling population, Augustus focused on the sanctity of marriage and procreation by creating new laws governing childbirth, adultery, and divorce. In his Fasti, Ovid (43 B.C. - A.D. 17) wrote of the Matronalia favorably in the apparent hope of regaining Augustus' goodwill after Augustus banished him to Tomi (see He on the map) in A.D. 8 for an uncertain offense possibly surrounding Ovid's writing of Ars Amatoria.

Bring the goddess flowers: the goddess loves flowering plants:
Garland your heads with fresh flowers, and say:
'You, Lucina, have given us the light of life': and say:
'You hear the prayer of women in childbirth.'
But let her who is with child, free her hair in prayer,
So the goddess may gently free her womb. (Kline Trans.)

In his Fasti, Ovid asks Mars, the war god, why he would allow the Matronalia to be celebrated during the Kalends of Mars' traditional month, March. Mars responds with two explanations, the first citing his son, Romulus, and Romulus' leading of the Roman's against the Sabines where the Romans raped the Sabine women, thereby begetting Roman/Sabine children and ultimately building the Roman populace. According to legend, the Sabine women, through the protection and guidance of Juno, mother goddess, were integral in Rome's rise. Mars then cites the founding of his mother Juno Lucina's temple on the Esquiline and confirms March as being the fruitful season and a just time to observe Juno's rites as mother goddess.

Just as Romans paid respect to Juno during March, in December the masters of the houses celebrated a similar feast called the Saturnalia. The men feasted their slaves much the same as their wives did during the Matronalia.

Matronalia References:

• Smith, William, ed. A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities. John Murray. London, 1878.
• Adkins, Lesley and Roy A. Adkins. Handbook to Life in Ancient Rome. Oxford University Press. New York 1994.
• Boardman, John, Jasper Griffin and Oswyn Murray. The Oxford Illustrated History of the Roman World. Oxford University Press. Oxford, 1988.
• Freeman, Charles. Egypt, Greece and Rome: Civilizations of the Ancient Mediterranean. Second Edition. Oxford University Press. Oxford, 2004.
• Newswise. "How Do I Love Thee? Say it in Latin!" University of Maryland. http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/536839/ 2008.
• Kline, A.S. Ovid's Fasti, Translation. http://www.tonykline.co.uk/PITBR/Latin/Fastihome.htm, 2004.