Editing Proserpina (section)

===Libera and Proserpina===
Libera was officially identified as Proserpina from 205 BC, when she and Ceres acquired a Romanised form of Greek mystery rite, the ''[[Ceres (mythology)#Middle Republic|ritus graecia cereris]]''. This was part of Rome's religious recruitment of deities to serve as divine allies against Carthage, towards the end of the [[Second Punic War]]. In the late Republican era, [[Cicero]] described Liber and Libera as Ceres' children. At around the same time, [[Gaius Julius Hyginus|Hyginus]] equated Libera with Greek [[Ariadne]].<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Wiseman |first=T. P. |year=1988 |title=Satyrs in Rome? The Background to Horace's Ars Poetica |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S0075435800014040/type/journal_article |journal=Journal of Roman Studies |language=en |volume=78 |page=7 n54 |doi=10.2307/301447 |jstor=301447 |s2cid=161849654 |issn=0075-4358}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Hyginus |url=https://lateinlex.de/?call=Puc&permalink=Hyg_fab_224 |title=Fabulae |at=224 |language=la |quote="Qui facti sunt ex mortalibus immortales ... Ariadnen Liber pater Liberam appellavit, Minois et Pasiphaes filiam;"}}</ref> The older and newer forms of her names, cult, and rites, and their diverse associations, persisted well into the late Imperial era. [[St. Augustine]] (354–430&nbsp;AD) wrote that Libera was a goddess of female fertility, just as Liber was a god of  male fertility.<ref>Spaeth, 1996, p. 131, citing [[Cicero]], ''[[De Natura Deorum]]'' 2.62, and [[Saint Augustine]], [[De Civitate Dei]], 4.11; both of whom most likely used the Late Republican polymath [[Marcus Terentius Varro|Varro]] as their source.</ref>