Editing Di Penates (section)

==Public Penates==
The Penates of Rome (''Penates Publici Populi Romani'') had a temple on the Velia near the [[Palatine Hill|Palatine]]. [[Dionysius of Halicarnassus]] says it housed statues of two youths in the archaic style.<ref>Dionysius of Halicarnassus, ''Roman Antiquities'' 1.68.</ref>

The public [[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#cultus|cult]] of the ancestral gods of the [[Roman people]] originated in [[Lavinium]],<ref>[[Varro]], ''De lingua latina'' 5.144, says of Lavinium that "this is where our Penates are"; Tim Cornell, ''The Beginnings of Rome: Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c. 1000–264 BC)'' (Routledge, 1995), p. 66.</ref> where they were also closely linked with [[Vesta (mythology)|Vesta]]. One tradition identified the public Penates as the sacred objects rescued by [[Aeneas]] from [[Troy]] and carried by him to Italy.<ref>[[Ovid]], ''[[Fasti (Ovid)|Fasti]]'' 3.615; [[Propertius]] 4.1.</ref> They, or perhaps rival duplicates, were eventually housed in the [[Temple of Vesta]] in the [[Roman Forum|Forum]]. Thus, the Penates, unlike the localized Lares, are portable deities.<ref>Johnston, ''Religions of the Ancient World'', p. 435.</ref>

Archaeological evidence from Lavinium shows marked influence from [[archaic Greece|Greece in the archaic period]], and Aeneas was venerated there as [[Jupiter Indiges]].<ref>Cornell, ''The Beginnings of Rome'', pp. 66, 68 and 109; Schutz, ''Women's Religious Activity'', p. 123.</ref> At the New Year on [[Martius (month)|March 1]], [[Roman magistrate]]s first sacrificed to [[Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus|Capitoline Jupiter]] at Rome, and then traveled to [[Lavinium]] for sacrifices to Jupiter Indiges and Vesta, and a ceremonial visit to the "Trojan" Penates.<ref>[[Emma Dench]], ''Romulus' Asylum: Roman Identities from the Age of Alexander to the Age of Hadrian'' (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 202; [[Arnaldo Momigliano]], "How to Reconcile Greeks and Trojans," in ''On Pagans, Jews, and Christians'' (Wesleyan University Press, 1987), p. 272.</ref>