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In Roman Mythology , Diana was the Virgin Goddess of the Hunt , the Equivalent of the Greek Goddess Artemis . Born with her Twin brother Apollo on the island of Delos , Diana was the daughter of Jupiter and Latona . Diana was the perpetually virginal huntress goddess, associated with wild animals and woodlands. She also later became a the water nymph, her servant and assistant midwife; and Virbius , the woodland god. Diana was worshipped in a temple on the Aventine Hill and at the city of Ephesus , where the Temple Of Artemis stood. Being placed on the Aventine, and thus outside the Pomerium , meant that Diana's cult essentially remained a 'foreign' one, like that of Bacchus ; she was never officially 'transferred' to Rome as Juno was after the sack of Veii . It seems that her cult originated in Aricia , where her priest, the Rex Nemorensis remained. Diana was regarded with great reverence by lower-class citizens and Slaves ; slaves could receive asylum in her temples. She was worshipped at a festival on August 13 , when King Servius Tullius , himself born a slave, dedicated her shrine on the Aventine. Diana is usually depicted with a deer. This is because Diana was the patroness of hunting, and also because she is said to have transformed a man she found spying on her while taking a bath into a deer when he tried to flee her. MODERN DAY Diana remains an important figure in some modern mythologies. In Freemasonry , she is considered a symbol of imagination, sensibility, and the creative insanity of poets and artists. Those who believe that prehistoric peoples lived in Matriarchal Societies consider Diana to have originated in a Mother Goddess worshipped at that time, and she is still worshiped today by women practicing the religion known as Dianic Wicca . EXTERNAL LINKS |
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