Editing Novensiles (section)

==Council on lightning==
[[Pliny the Elder|Pliny]]<ref>Pliny, ''[[Natural History (Pliny)|Natural History]]'' 2.52.</ref> mentions nine gods of the Etruscans who had the power of wielding thunderbolts, pointing toward Martianus's Novensiles as gods pertaining to the use of thunder and lightning ''(fulgura)'' as signs. Books on how to read lightning were one of the three main branches of the ''[[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#disciplina Etrusca|disciplina Etrusca]]'', the body of Etruscan religious and divinatory teachings. Within the Etruscan discipline, Jupiter has the power to wield three types of admonitory lightning ''([[Glossary of ancient Roman religion#manubia|manubiae]])'' sent from three different celestial regions.<ref>[[Massimo Pallottino]], "The Doctrine and Sacred Books of the ''Disciplina Etrusca''," ''Roman and European Mythologies'' (University of Chicago Press, 1992), pp. 43–44; Stefan Weinstock, "Libri fulgurales," ''Papers of the British School at Rome'' 19 (1951), p. 125. The word may be either a [[Latinisation (literature)|Latinized]] word from [[Etruscan language|Etruscan]] or less likely a formation from ''manus'', "hand," and ''habere'', "to have, hold." It is not apparently related to the more common Latin word ''manubiae'' meaning "booty (taken by a general in war)."</ref> The first of these, mild or "perforating"<ref>The description of the three types of lightning as "perforating," "crushing," and "burning" is Weinstock's, ''Libri fulgurales'', p. 127.</ref> lightning, is a beneficial form meant to persuade or dissuade.<ref>[[Georges Dumézil]], ''La religion romaine archaïque'' (Paris 1974), pp. 630 and 633 (note 3), drawing on [[Seneca the Younger|Seneca]], ''Naturales Questiones'' 2.41.1–2 and 39.</ref> The other two types are harmful or "crushing" lightning, for which Jupiter requires the approval of the [[Di Consentes]], and completely destructive or "burning" lighting, which requires the approval of the ''[[dii involuti|di superiores et involuti]]'' (hidden gods of the "higher" sphere).<ref>Weinstock, p. 127.</ref>

Several scholars<ref>C.O. Thulin, "Die Goetter des Martianus Capella und der Bronzenleber von Piacenza," in ''Religiongeschichtliche Versuche und Vorarbeiten'' (1906) pp. 34-40; A. Grenier, "Indigetes et Novensiles," in ''Boletim de Philologia'' supplem. 1951, pp. 203-4; Gérard Capdeville, "Les dieux de Martianus Capella," ''Revue de l'histoire des religions'' 213 (1996), pp. 269-274.</ref> have identified the Novensiles with the council of gods who decide on the use of the third, most destructive type of lightning. Carl Thulin proposed that two [[wikt:theonym|theonyms]]  from the [[Piacenza Liver]] — a bronze model of a sheep's liver covered with Etruscan inscriptions pertaining to [[haruspicy]] — ought to be identified with the two councils, ''Cilens(l)'' with the Novensiles and ''Thufltha(s)'' with the ''Consentes [[Penates]]''.<ref>Thulin, "Die Goetter des Martianus Capella," pp. 34–40 ''et passim'' [https://books.google.com/books?id=AhsAAAAAYAAJ&q=%22Favores+Opertanei%22 online.]</ref> The Novensiles would thus correspond to the ''di superiores et involuti''<ref>Named as such by Seneca, ''Naturales Questiones'' 2.41.1–2; [[Sextus Pompeius Festus|Festus]] p. 219M = 114 edition of Lindsay; entry on ''peremptalia fulgura'', p. 236 in the 1997 [https://books.google.com/books?id=_Ugb6woUJLoC&dq=manubia+OR+manubiae&pg=PA236 Teubner edition]; and Martianus Capella; see also [[Arnobius]], ''Adversus Nationes'' 3.38.</ref> and possibly the ''Favores Opertanei''  ("Secret Gods of Favor") referred to by Martianus Capella. Martianus, however, locates the ''Favores''<ref>Martanus Capella, 1.45. For the passage in translation, see de Grummond, ''Etruscan Myth, Sacred History, and Legend'', pp. 45–46. The name ''Favores'', "favoring" gods, is a euphemism (compare [[Erinyes|Eumenides]]) in contrast to their destructive power; Iiro Kajanto, "Fortuna," ''Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt'' II. 17.1 (1981), p. 507, note 18.</ref> in the first region of the sky, with the ''Di Consentes'' and Penates, and the Novensiles in the second; the ''Favores'' are perhaps the ''Fata'', "Fates".<ref>Gérard Capdeville, "Les dieux de Martianus Capella," ''Revue de l'histoire des religions'' 213 (1996), pp. 260–262 and 273–274; see also Nancy Thomson de Grummond, ''The Religion of the Etruscans'' (University of Texas Press, 2006), pp. 41–42.</ref>