What was the power of Juno?

Answer 1

Juno was a complex deity. She was a goddess of sovereignty, war and futility. She was the protector of Rome and the Roman state, and of women and childbirth. She was also a patron deity of matrons. She was also a goddess of beginnings and the renewal of time. She was the daughter of Saturn, this sister and wife of Jupiter (the supreme god) and the mother of Mars and Vulcan.

The various aspects of Juno were revealed in her various epithets. Juno Regina was the Patron of Rome and the protector of the Romans and of women and she was a goddess of matrons. Juno Lucina was a protector of childbirth (the name meant "she who brings children into the light" and Lucina was a goddess of childbirth who safeguarded the lives of women in labour). She was also the protector of women. JunoCovella reflected the cyclical renewal of time in the waning and waxing of the moon and she governed the feminine physiological functions, menstrual cycle and pregnancy. She was also associated with beginnings and the kalendae (the first day of the month were dedicated to her. On this day the Pontifex Maximus (the chief priest of Roman state religion) invoked her when he announced the date of the nonae (the day of the half-moon) of the month. Juno was also associated with Janus, the god of the passage of time, beginnings, ends and transitions who was often also given the epithet Iunonius after her. Juno Sospita (the saviour) was the protector of the Romans. Juno Cutitis had to be invoked by those who are involved in war. A temple to Juno Curtis was vowed while Rome was at war in the 4th century BC. Juno Moneta (the warner) was also associated with war. Juno Caprotina was honoured in the festival of the Nonae Caprotinae, where free and lave women had a picnic together and then sacrificed of a male goat to Juno Caprotina under a wild fig tree.