[770]. ‘Light’ is not uncommon in England for a ‘ride’ or clearing in a wood.
[771]. Below, pp. [222], and [228].
[772]. On the whole subject of the religious ideas arising from the first cultivation of land in a wild district I know nothing more instructive than Robertson Smith’s remarks in Religion of the Semites, Lecture iii.; I have often thought that they throw some light on the origin of Mars and kindred numina. The most ancient settlements in central Italy are now found to be on the tops of hills, probably once forest-clad (see Von Duhn’s paper on recent excavations, Journal of Hellenic Studies, 1896, p. 125). For a curious survival of the feeling about woods and hill-tops in Bengal, see Crooke, Religion, &c., in India, ii. 87.
[773]. R. R. 139. For piacula of this kind see also Henzen, Acta Fratr. Arv. 136 foll.; Marq. 456.
[775]. See a passage in Frontinus (Grom. Vet. 1. 56: cp. 2. 263).
[776]. Röm. Jahr, p. 221, and note 81 on p. 222.
[777]. Festus, 377 ‘Umbrae vocantur Neptunalibus casae frondeae pro tabernaculis.’ Wissowa (Lex. s. v. Neptunus, 202) compares the σκιάδες of the Spartan Carneia (also in the heat of summer), described in Athenaeus, 4. 141 F.
[778]. Müller-Deecke, Etrusker, ii. 54, with Deecke’s note 51 b. The Etruscan forms are Nethunus and Nethuns. The form of the word is adjectival like Portunus, &c.; but what is the etymology of the first syllable? We are reminded of course of Nepe or Nepete, an inland town near Falerii; and to this district the cult seems specially to have belonged. Messapus, ‘Neptunia proles,’ leads the Falisci and others to war in Virg. Aen. 7. 691, and Halesus, Neptuni filius, was eponymous hero of Falerii (Deecke, Falisker, 103). There is no known connexion of Neptunus with any coast town.
[779]. 13. 23. 2: cp. Varro, L. L. 5. 72.