In Praise of Ianus

On Neos Alexandria’s temple pages, there used to be a page about Ianus that I compiled. The new NA site has not put that page up yet, but I’ve reproduced it here, in order to have the information available to all in the meantime. After all, today is Ianus’ biggest holiday!

Blessing: Ianus is the archetypal “gateway god,” and makes access to the other gods through prayer more easy and efficient. Not simply a forethought or an afterthought, honors paid to Ianus at the beginnings or endings of devotions to other gods are, at least for some sensibilities (especially those of the Roman sort), essential. He can (and should) also be honored on a regular basis—at least on the first of January, or even at the turning of each secular month—for all of the beginnings and endings that surround and encompass human life. 


Equations and epithets: Cozevius (Umbrian form of Consivius) and Consivius (god of conception and sowing of grain), Cerus (“good creator”?), Portunus (god of doors and ports), Patulcius (“opener”), Pater (“father”), Bifrons (“two-faced”), Quadrifrons (“four-faced”), Clusivus (“closer”), Geminus (“twin/twofold”), Ianeus (“moving”), Junonius (“of Juno of the kalends”); syncretized to Zeus/Jupiter, Apollon Thyraios and Apollo Aguieus, and Diana Trivia/Hekate, Quirinus (god of battles/deified form of Romulus)

Associations:
 doorways, gateways, arches, colonnades, bridges, ports, keys, rods, beginnings and endings, conception/birth and death, war and peace

Festivals:
 January 1 (Festival of Ianus); all of January (month of Ianus); kalends (1st) of every month; August 17 (Portunalia); October 18 (restoration of Temple of Ianus in Rome by Augustus and Tiberius, 17 C.E.)

Ways to honor: offerings of wine, incense, and prayers before other rituals to Roman gods, on significant “entrances and exits,” and on his own festivals, for good luck and fortune on future endeavors and for thanks on successful completions

Marcus Terentius Varro, De Lingua Latina 7.26-27 (from the Carmen Saliare)

Arise Consivius , truly, I commit all things to Patulcius.
Now you are Ianeus, you are good Cerus, good Ianus,
You will come before all, the superior of these kings.

Proclus, “Hymn to Hecate and Janus” (trans. Frederick Grant)

Hail, Mother of the Gods, the many-named, the nobly born!
Hail, Hecate, guardian of the gates, the Mighty one! And thou too,
Hail, O Janus, the Forefather, Zeus the immortal! Hail, Zeus supreme!
Be it mine to enjoy a life radiant on its journey, weighed down with good things!
Keep far from my body the sickness that destroys,
And upward lead my soul, from wandering in error here below,
After it has cleansed itself in soul-awakening mysteries!
Reach out to me your hands, I pray you, and show to my yearning heart
The path divine, that I may behold [its] glorious light
And find an escape from the bane of gloomy Becoming!
Reach out to me your hands, I pray, and with favoring winds
Bring me at last, and weary, to safe anchor in the harbor of devotion!
Hail, Mother of the Gods, the many-named, the nobly born!
Hail, Hecate, guardian of the gates, the Mighty one! And thou too,
Hail, O Janus, the Forefather, Zeus the immortal! Hail, Zeus supreme!

Cicero, De Deorum Natura Book II, Chapter 27.67

Also, as the beginning and the end are the most important parts of all affairs, they held that Janus is the leader in a sacrifice, the name being derived from ire (“to go”), hence the names jani for archways and januae for the front doors of secular buildings.

Ovid, Fasti, Book I, lines 63-288 (trans. J. G. Frazer)

See Janus comes, Germanicus, the herald of a lucky year to thee, and in my song
takes precedence. Two-headed Janus, opener of the softly gliding year, thou who
alone of the celestials dost behold thy back, O come propitious to the chiefs
who toil ensures peace to the fruitful earth, peace to the sea. And come
propitious to thy senators and to the people of Quirinus, and by thy nod unbar
the temples white. A happy morning dawns. Fair speech, fair thoughts I crave!
Now must good words be spoken on a good day. Let ears be rid of suits, and
banish mad disputes forthwith! Thou rancorous tongue, adjourn thy wagging!
Dost mark how the sky sparkles with fragrant fires, and how Cilician saffron
crackles on the kindled hearths? The flame with its own splendor beats upon the
temples’ gold and spreads a flickering radiance on the hallowed roof. In
spotless garments the procession wends to the Tarpeian towers: the people wear
the color of the festal day; and now new rods of office lead the way, new purple
gleams, and a new weight is felt by the far-seen ivory chair. Heifers, unbroken
to the yoke, offer their necks to the axe, heifers that cropped the sward on the
true Faliscan plains. When from his citadel Jupiter looks abroad on the whole
globe, naught but the Roman empire meets his eye. Hail, happy day! and evermore
return still happier, day worthy to be kept holy by a people the masters of the
world.

But what god am I to say thou art, Janus of double shape? for Greece hath no
divinity like thee. The reason, too, unfold why alone of all the heavenly ones
thou dost see both back and front. While thus I mused, the tablets in my hand,
methought the house grew brighter than it was before. Then of a sudden sacred
Janus, in his two-headed shape, offered his double visage to my wondering eyes.
A terror seized me, I felt my hair stiffen with fear, and with a sudden chill my
bosom froze. He, holding in his right hand his staff and in his left the key,
to me these accents uttered from his front mouth: “Dismiss thy fear, thy answer
take, laborious singer of the days, and mark my words. The ancients called me
Chaos [from hiare], for a being from of old am I; observe the long, long ages of
which my song shall tell. Yon lucid air and the three other bodies, fire,
water, earth, were huddled all in one. When once, through the discord of its
elements, the mass parted, dissolved, and went in diverse ways to seek new
homes, flame sought the height, air filled the nearer space, while earth and sea
sank in the middle deep. ‘Twas then that I, till that time a mere ball, a
shapeless lump, assumed the face and members of a god. And even now, small
index of my erst chaotic state, my front and back look just the same. Now hear
the other reason for the shape you ask about, that you may know it and my office
too. Whate’er you see anywhere–sky, sea, clouds, earth–all things are closed
and opened by my hand. The guardianship of this vast universe is in my hands
alone, and none but me may rule the wheeling pole. When I choose to send forth
peace from tranquil halls, she freely walks the way unhindered. But with blood
and slaughter the whole world would welter, did not the bars unbending hold the
barricaded wars. I sit at heaven’s gate with the gentle Hours; my office
regulates the goings and the comings of Jupiter himself. Hence Janus is my name
[Eanus, from eo, 1st person singular of verb ire, "to go"]; but when the priest
offers me a barley cake and spelt mingled with salt, you would laugh to hear the
names he gives me, for on his sacrificial lips I’m now Patulcius and now Clusius
called [from pateo, "to be open/revealed," and claudo/cludo, "to close"]. Thus
rude antiquity made shift to my mark my changing functions with the change of
name. My business I have told. Now learn the reason of my shape, though
already you perceive it in part. Every door has two fronts, this way and that,
whereof one faces the people and the other the house-god; and just as your human
porter, seated at the threshold of the house-door, sees who goes out and in, so
I, the porter of the heavenly court, behold at once both East and West. Thou
seest Hecate’s faces turned in three directions that she may guard the
crossroads where they branch three several ways; and lest I should lose time by
twisting my neck, I am free to look both ways without budging.”

Thus spake the god, and by a look confessed that, were I fain to ask him more,
he would not grudge reply. I plucked up my courage, thanked the god composedly,
and with eyes turned to the ground I spoke in few: “Come, say, why doth the new
year begin in the cold season? Better had it begun in spring. Then all things
flower, then time renews his age, and new from out the teeming vine-shoot swells
the bud; in fresh-formed leaves the tree is draped, and from earth’s surface
sprouts the blade of corn. Birds with their warblings winnow the warm air; the
cattle frisk and wanton in the meads. Then suns are sweet, forth comes the
stranger swallow and builds her clayey structure under the lofty beam. Then the
field submits to tillage and is renewed by the plough. That is the season which
rightly should have been called New Year.”

Thus questioned I at length; he answered prompt and tersely, throwing his words
into twain verses, thus: “Midwinter is the beginning of the new sun and the end
of the old one. Phoebus and the year take their start from the same point.”

Next I wondered why the first day was not exempt from lawsuits. “Hear the
cause,” quoth Janus. “I assigned the birthday of the year to business, lest
from the auspice idleness infect the whole. For the same reason every man just
handsels his calling, nor does one more than but attest his usual work.”

Next I asked, “Why, Janus, while I propitiate other divinities, do I bring
incense and wine first of all to thee?” Quoth he, “It is that through me, who
guard the thresholds, you may have access to whatever gods you please.” “But
why are glad words spoken on thy Calends? and why do we give and receive good
wishes?” Then, leaning on the staff he bore in his right hand, the god replied:
“Omens are wont,” said he, “to wait upon beginnings. At the first word ye prick
up anxious ears; from the first bird he sees the augur take his cue. On the
first day the temples and ears of the gods are open, the tongue utters no
fruitless prayers, and words have weight.” So Janus ended. I kept not silence
long, but caught up his last words with my own: “What mean the gifts of dates
and wrinkled figs,” I said, “and honey glistering in snow-white jar?” “It is
for the sake of the omen,” said he, “that the event may answer to the flavor,
and that the whole course of the year may be sweet, like its beginning.” “I
see,” said I, “why sweets are given. But tell me, too, the reason for the gift
of cash, that I may be sure of every point in thy festival.” The god laughed,
and “Oh,” quoth he, “how little you know about the age you live in if you fancy
that honey is sweeter than cash in hand! Why, even in Saturn’s reign I hardly
saw a soul who did not in his heart find lucre sweet. As time went on the love
of pelf grew, till now it is at its height and scarcely can go farther. Wealth
is more valued now than in the years of old, when the people were poor, when
Rome was new, when a small hut sufficed to lodge Quirinus [Romulus], son of
Mars, and the river sedge supplied a scanty bedding. Jupiter had hardly room to
stand upright in his cramped shrine, and in his right hand was a thunderbolt of
clay. They decked with leaves the Capitol, which now they deck with gems, and
the senator himself fed his own sheep. It was no shame to take one’s peaceful
rest on straw and to pillow the head on hay. The praetor put aside the plough
to judge the people, and to own a light piece of silver plate was a crime. But
ever since the Fortune of this place has raised her head on high, and Rome with
her crest has touched the topmost gods, riches have grown and with them the
frantic lust of wealth, and they who have the most possessions still crave for
more. They strive to gain that they may waste, and then to repair their wasted
fortunes, and thus they feed their vices by ringing the changes on them. So he
whose belly swells with dropsy, the more he drinks, the thirstier he grows.
Nowadays nothing but money counts: fortune brings honors, friendships; the poor
man everywhere lies low. And still you ask me, What’s the use of omens drawn
from cash, and why do ancient coppers tickle your palms! In the olden time the
gifts were coppers, but now gold gives a better omen, and the old-fashioned coin
has been vanquished and made way for the new. We, too, are tickled by golden
temples, though we approve of the ancient ones: such majesty befits a god. We
praise the past, but use the present years; yet are both customs worthy to be
kept.” He closed his admonitions; but again in calm speech, as before, I
addressed the god who bears the key: “I have learned much indeed; but why is
the figure of a ship stamped on one side of the copper coin, and a two-headed
figure on the other?” “Under the double image,” said he, “you might have
recognized myself, if the long lapse of time had not worn the type away. Now
for the reason of the ship. In a ship the sickle-bearing god [Saturn] came to
the Tuscan river after wandering over the world. I remember how Saturn was
received in this land: he had been driven by Jupiter from the celestial realms.
From that time the folk long retained the name of Saturnian, and the country,
too, was called Latium from the hiding [latente] of the god. But a pious
posterity inscribed a ship on the copper money to commemorate the coming of the
stranger god. Myself inhabited the ground whose left side is lapped by sandy
Tiber’s glassy wave. Here, where now is Rome, green forest stood unfelled, and
all this mighty region was but a pasture for a few kine. My castle was the hill
which common folk call by my name, and which this present age doth dub
Janiculum. I reigned in days when earth could bear with gods, and divinities
moved freely in the abodes of men. The sin of mortals had not yet put Justice
to flight (she was the last of the celestials to forsake the earth): honor’s
self, not fear, ruled the people without appeal to force: toil there was none
to expound the right to righteous men. I had naught to do with war: guardian
was I of peace and doorways, and these,” quoth he, showing the key, “these be
the arms I bear.” The god now closed his lips. Then I thus opened mine, using
my voice to lure the voice divine. “Since there are so many archways, why dost
thou stand thus consecrated in one alone, here where thou hast a temple
adjoining two forums?” Stroking with his hand the beard that fell upon his
breast, he straightway told the warlike deeds of Oebalian Tatius, and how the
traitress keeper, bribed by armlets, led the silent Sabines the way to the
summit of the citadel. “From there,” quoth he, “a steep slope, the same by
which even now ye descend, led down into the valleys and the forums. And now
the foe had reached the gate from which Saturn’s envious daughter [Juno] had
removed the opposing bars. Fearing to engage in fight with so redoubtable a
deity, I slyly had recourse to a device of my own craft, and by the power I
wield I opened the fountains’ mouths and spouted out a sudden gush of water; but
first I threw sulphur into the water channels, that the boiling liquid might bar
the way against Tatius. This service done, and the Sabines repulsed, the place,
now rendered safe, resumed its former aspect. An altar was set up for me,
joined to a little shrine: in its flames it burns the sacrificial spelt and
cake.” “But why hide in time of peace and open thy gates when men take arms?”
Without delay he rendered me the reason that I sought. “My gate, unbarred,
stands open wide, that when the people hath gone forth to war, the road for
their return may be open too. I bar the doors in time of peace, lest peace
depart, and under Caesar’s star I shall be long shut up.” He spoke, and lifting
up his eyes that saw in opposite directions, he surveyed all that the whole
world held. Peace reigned, and on the Rhine already, Germanicus, thy triumph
had been won, when the river yielded up her waters to be thy slaves. O Janus,
let the peace and the ministers of peace endure for aye, and grant that its
author may never forgo his handiwork.

Virgil, Aeneid Book 7, lines 170-191 (trans. H. Rushton Fairclough)

Stately and vast, towering with a hundred columns, his house crowned the city, once the palace of Laurentian Picus, awe-inspiring with its grove and the sanctity of olden days. Here ‘twas auspicious for kings to receive the scepter, and first uplift the fasces; this shrine was their senate-house, this the scene of their holy feasts; here, after slaughter of the rams, the elders were wont to sit down at the long line of tables. Yea, and in order are images of their forefathers of yore, carved of old cedar—Italus and father Sabinus, planter of the vine, guarding in his image the curved pruning-hook, and aged Saturn, and the likeness of two-faced Janus—all standing in the vestibule; and other kings from the beginning, and they who had suffered wounds of war, fighting for their fatherland. Many arms, moreover, hang on the sacred doors, captive chariots, curved axes, helmet-crests and massive bars of gates; javelins and shields and beaks wrenched from ships. There sat one, holding the Quirinal staff and girt with short robe, his left hand bearing the sacred shield—even Picus, tamer of steeds, whom his bride Circe, smitten with love’s longing, struck with her golden rod, and with drugs changed into a bird with plumes of dappled hue.

Book 7, lines 601-610
A custom there was in Hesperian Latium, which thenceforth the Alban cities held holy, as now does Rome, mistress of the world, what time they first rouse the war-god to battle, be it Getae or Arabs or Hyrcanians against whom their hands prepare to carry tearful war, or to march on India’s sons and pursue the Dawn, and reclaim their standards from the Parthian:—there are twin gates of War (so men call them), hallowed by religious awe and the terrors of fierce Mars: a hundred brazen bolts close them, and the eternal strength of iron, and Janus their guardian never quits the threshold.

Book 8, lines 351-358
“This grove,” he cries, “this hill with its leafy crown,—though we known not what god it is—is yet a god’s home: my Arcadians believe they have looked on Jove himself, while oft his right hand shook the darkening aegis and summoned the storm-clouds. Moreover, in these two towns, with walls o’erthrown, thou seest the relics and memorials of men of old. This fort father Janus built, that Saturn; Janiculum was this called, that Saturnia.”

Book 12, lines 195-215
Thus first Aeneas, and after him Latinus thus follows, uplifting eyes to heaven, and outstretching his right hand to the stars: “By these same Powers I swear, Aeneas, by Earth, Sea, Stars, Latona’s two-fold offspring, and two-faced Janus, and the might of the gods below, and the shrines of cruel Dis: may the great Sire hear my words, who sanctions treaties with his thunderbolt! I touch the altars, I adjure these fires and gods that stand between us: no time shall break this peace and truce for Italy, howsoever things shall issue; nor shall any force turn aside my will, not though, commingling all in deluge, it should plunge land into water, and dissolve Heaven into Hell: even as this sceptre” (for haply in his hand he bore his sceptre) “shall never burgeon with light leafage into branch or shade, now that once hewn in the forest from the nether stem, it is reft of its mother, and beneath the steel has shed its leaves and twigs; once a tree, now the craftsman’s hand has caused it in seemly bronze and given it to sires of Latium to bear.” With such words they sealed the faith between them, amid the gazing lords; then over the flame duly slay the hallowed beasts, and tear out the live entrails, and pile the altars with laden chargers.

Titus Livius (Livy), History of Rome, Book 1, Chapter 19

Having in this way obtained the crown, Numa prepared to found, as it were, anew, by laws and customs, that City which had so recently been founded by force of arms. He saw that this was impossible whilst a state of war lasted, for war brutalised men. Thinking that the ferocity of his subjects might be mitigated by the disuse of arms, he built the temple of Janus at the foot of the Aventine as an index of peace and war, to signify when it was open that the State was under arms, and when it was shut that all the surrounding nations were at peace. Twice since Numa’s reign has it been shut, once after the first Punic war in the consulship of T. Manlius, the second time, which heaven has allowed our generation to witness, after the battle of Actium, when peace on land and sea was secured by the emperor Caesar Augustus. After forming treaties of alliance with all his neighbours and closing the temple of Janus, Numa turned his attention to domestic matters. The removal of all danger from without would induce his subjects to luxuriate in idleness, as they would be no longer restrained by the fear of an enemy or by military discipline. To prevent this, he strove to inculcate in their minds the fear of the gods, regarding this as the most powerful influence which could act upon an uncivilised and, in those ages, a barbarous people. But, as this would fail to make a deep impression without some claim to supernatural wisdom, he pretended that he had nocturnal interviews with the nymph Egeria: that it was on her advice that he was instituting the ritual most acceptable to the gods and appointing for each deity his own special priests. First of all he divided the year into twelve months, corresponding to the moon’s revolutions. But as the moon does not complete thirty days in each month, and so there are fewer days in the lunar year than in that measured by the course of the sun, he interpolated intercalary months and so arranged them that every twentieth year the days should coincide with the same position of the sun as when they started, the whole twenty years being thus complete. He also established a distinction between the days on which legal business could be transacted and those on which it could not, because it would sometimes be advisable that there should be no business transacted with the people.

Pliny, Natural History, Book 34, Chapter 16 (trans. John Bostock)

And then besides, King Numa dedicated the statue of the two-faced Janus; a deity who is worshipped as presiding over both peace and war. The fingers, too, are so formed as to indicate three hundred and sixty-five days, or in other words, the year; thus denoting that he is the god of time and duration.

Plutarch, Life of Numa 19.5-20.2 (trans. Bernadotte Perrin)

Of the months which were added or transposed by Numa, February must have something to do with purification, for this is nearest to the meaning of the word, and in this month they make offerings to the dead and celebrate the festival of the Lupercalia, which, in most of its features, resembles a purification. The first month, January, is so named from Janus. And I think that March, which is named from Mars, was moved by Numa from its place at the head of the months because he wished in every case that martial influences should yield precedence to civil and political. For this Janus, in remote antiquity, whether he was a demi-god or a king, was a patron of civil and social order, and is said to have lifted human life out of its bestial and savage state. For this reason he is represented with two faces, implying that he brought men’s lives out of one sort and condition into another.
He also has a temple at Rome with double doors, which they call the gates of war; for the temple always stands open in time of war, but is closed when peace has come. The latter was a difficult matter, and it rarely happened, since the realm was always engaged in some war, as its increasing size brought it into collision with the barbarous nations which encompassed it round about. But in the time of Augustus Caesar it was closed, after he had overthrown Antony; and before that, when Marcus Atilius and Titus Manlius were consuls, it was closed a short time; then war broke out again at once, and it was opened. During the reign of Numa, however, it was not seen open for a single day, but remained shut for the space of forty-three years together, so complete and universal was the cessation of war.

Macrobius, Saturnalia (trans. Percival Vaughan Davies)

Book I, Chapter 7
19. According to Hyginus, who has followed Protarchus of Tralles, Janus ruled over the country now called Italy, and he and Cameses, who was also a native of it, held the land in joint sovereignty, the country being called Camesene and the town Janiculum. 20. Later the kingdom passed to Janus alone.

Janus is believed to have had two faces and so could see before him and behind his back—a reference, no doubt, to the foresight and shrewdness of the king, as one who not only knew the past but would also foresee the future, just as Antevorta and Postvorta are worshipped at Rome as deities most fittingly associated with divination.

21. When Saturn arrived by ship, Janus received him here as his guest and learned from him the art of husbandry, thereby improving a mode of life which, before men understood how to make use of the fruits of the earth, had been brutish and rude; and he rewarded Saturn by sharing his kingdom with him. 22. Janus was also the first to strike coins of bronze, and in this too he showed his high regard for Saturn; for on one side of a coin he stamped the image of his own head but on the other side a ship, that posterity might preserve the remembrance of Saturn, whose coming had been by ship. And that the bronze coinage was so marked is evident even today from the game of chance in which boys throw pennies in the air, calling “heads” or “ships,” for the game bears witness to the old usage.

23. Janus and Saturn reigned together in harmony and built two neighboring towns by their joint endeavors, as is clear not only from the line in Vergil which runs:
This fortress twon the name Janiculum, that Saturnia, bore
[Aeneid 8.358]
but also from the fact that later generations dedicated two successive months to these personages, December having in it the festival of Saturn and January embodying the name of Janus.

24. It was during their reign that Saturn suddenly disappeared, and Janus then devised means to add to his honors. First he gave the name Saturnia to all the land which acknowledged his rule; and then he built an altar, instituting rites as to a god and calling these rites the Saturnalia—a fact which goes to show how very much older the festival is than the city of Rome. And it was because Saturn had improved the conditions of life that, by order of Janus, religious honors were paid to him, as his effigy indicates, which received the additional attribute of a sickle, the symbol of harvest.

25. Saturn is credited with the invention of the art of grafting, with the cultivation of fruit trees, and with instructing men in everything that belongs to the fertilizing of the fields. Furthermore, at Cyrene his worshippers, when they offer sacrifice to him, crown themselves with fresh figs and present each other with cakes, for they hold that he discovered honey and fruits. Moreover, at Rome men call him “Sterculinus,” as having been the first to fertilize the fields with dung (stercus). 26. His reign is said to have been a time of great happiness, both on account of the universal plenty that then prevailed and because as yet there was no division into bond and free—as one may gather from the complete license enjoyed by slaves at the Saturnalia.

Book I, Chapter 9
1. I have reminded you that Janus reigned in company with Saturn, and I have just set out the opinions which the mythographers and the physicists hold about Saturn. I shall now proceed to set forth also the theories propounded by each of these authorities about Janus.

2. The mythographers say that, when Janus was king, every man’s house was sacred and inviolable and that for the protection thus afforded divine honors were decreed for him, the entrances into and exits from a house being dedicated to him in gratitude for his favor. 3. Xenon, too, relates in the first book of his Italian Antiquities that in Italy Janus was the first to build temples to the gods and to ordain religious ceremonies and that for this he was rewarded with the privilege of being for all time the first to be called on by name at a sacrifice. 4. Moreover, some think that he has received the epithet of “two-faced” (bifrons) because of his knowledge of the past and foreknowledge of the future.

5. The physicists on the other hand produce strong evidence for his divinity. For there are some who identify Janus with Apollo and Diana and maintain that he combines in himself the divine attributes of both. 6. Indeed, as Nigidius, too, relates, Apollo is worshipped among the Greeks under the name of “the God of the Door” (Thyraios), and they pay honors at altars to him before their doors, showing thereby that he has power over their going out and their coming in. Among the Greeks Apollo is also called “the Guardian of the Streets” (Aguieus), as presiding over the streets of a city (for in Greece the streets within a city’s baoundaries are called aguiai); and to Diana, as Trivia, is assigned the rule over all roads. 7. At Rome all doorways are under the charge of Janus, as is evident from his name which is the Latin equivalent of the Greek Thyraios; and he is represented as carrying a key and a rod, as the keeper of all doors and a guide on every road. 8. Nigidius declared that Apollo is Janus and that Diana is Jana, that is to say, Jana (iana) with the addition of the letter “D,” which is often added to the letter “I” for the sake of euphony (as, for example, in such words as reditur, redhibetur, redintegratur, and the like).

9. Some are of the opinion that Janus represents the sun and that his two faces (geminus) suggest his lordship over each of the two heavenly gates, since the sun’s rising opens and his setting closes the day. The fact that men call on the name of Janus first when any god is worshipped is held to indicate that it is through him that access may be had to the god to whom the sacrifice is being made, and that it is as it were through his doors that he suffers the prayers of suppliants to pass to the gods. 10. Again, it is as marking his connection with the sun that an image of Janus commonly shows him expressing the number three hundred with his right hand and sixty five with his left; for these numbers point to the measure of a year, and it is a special function of the sun to determine this measure.

11. Others hold that Janus is the universe, that is to say, the heavens, and that the name is derived from eundo, since the universe is always in motion, wheeling in a circle and returning to itself at the point where it began. That is why Cornificius remarks, in the third book of his Derivations, “Cicero does not call the god ‘Janus’ but “Eanus,’ as though from eundo.” 12. And it is for this reason that the Phoenicians in their sacred rites have portrayed the god in the likeness of a serpent coiled and swallowing its own tail, as a visible image of the universe which feeds on itself and returns to itself again. 13. Thus, among us too, Janus looks toward the four quarters of the world, as for example in the statue brought from Falerii. And Gavius Bassus, in his book on the gods, says that figures of Janus have two faces, since he is the doorkeeper of both heaven and hell, and that the figures are quadriform, as though to show that his greatness embraces all the regions of the world. 14. Moreover, in the ancient songs of the Salii he is hymned as the god of gods; and Marcus Messala (who was the colleague of Gnaeus Domitius in the consulship and held the office of augur for fifty-five years) begins a reference to Janus, as follows: “He it is who fashions all things and guides them; he it is who in the compass of the heavens has joined together water and earth—the force which is naturally heavy and tends to fall downward to the depths below—with fire and air, which are light by nature and tend to soar to the boundless heights above; and it is this mighty power of the heavens that has united two opposing forces.”

15. Again, in our sacred rites we invoke Janus and Janus Geminus, Janus Pater, Janus Junonius, Janus Consivius, Janus Quirinus, and Janus Patultius and Clusivius. 16. I have already explained why we call on the god as “Geminus”; we call on him as “Pater” as the god of gods; and as “Junonius” because the beginning not only of January but of all the months is his, and Juno has authority over all the Kalends—and so it is that Varro in the fifth book of his Antiquities of Religion writes that twelve altars, corresponding to the twelve months, are dedicated to Janus. He is called upon as “Consivius” from conserendo, as the patron of “sowing,” that is to say, as the patron of the propagation of the human race, whose sowing and increase are of him; and he is invoked as “Quirinus,” as the lord of battles, from the spear which the Sabines call curis. Finally, we invoke him as “Patultius and Clusivius” because his doors are open (patent) in time of war and shut (clauduntur = cluduntur) in time of peace; and for this custom the following reason is given. 17. In the war which followed the capture of the Sabine maidens the enemy rushed to attack a certain gate (situated at the foot of the Viminal Hill and afterward, in consequence of what occurred, known as the gate of Janus) and the Romans hurried to shut it; but, after it had been shut, the gate then opened again of its own accord. This happened a second and yet a third time; and, since the gate could not be closed, a large body of armed men stood on guard before its threshold, while the fight went on fiercely elsewhere. Suddenly a rumor spread that our troops had been routed by Tatius. 18. Whereupon the men who were guarding the approach to the gate fled in terror, and the Sabines were just about to burst in through the open gate when (so the story goes) a great stream of water came gushing in a torrent through it from the temple of Janus, and large numbers of the enemy perished, either scalded by the boiling heat of the water or overwhelmed by its force and depth. It was therefore resolved to keep the doors of the temple of Janus open in times of war, as though to indicate that the god had gone forth to help the city.
So much, then, for Janus.

Book I, Chapter 13.1-3
Romulus was succeeded by Numa. From such knowledge as he could acquire with only his natural genius to teach him—living, as he did, in an unkindly climate and in an age that was still uncivilized—or perhaps learning something from the practice of the Greeks, Numa added fifty days to the year, to enlarge it to three hundred and fifty-four days, the period which he believed to correspond with the completion of the twelve circuits of the moon. To these fifty additional days he added six others, by taking one from each of the six months which had thirty days apiece, and the fifty-six days thus made available he divided equally to make two new months. The first of those two months he named January and made it the first month of the year, as the month of the two-faced god who looks back to the year that is past and forward to the beginnings of the year to come. The second month he dedicated to Februus, the god who is believed to have charge over the ceremonies of purification; for it was necessary that the city should be purified in the month in which Numa ordained the payment of due rites to the departed spirits.

Book I, Chapter 15.19
At Rome too, on all the Kalends, in addition to the offering made to Juno by the minor priest in the ward Calabra, the high priestess also (that is to say, the wife of the high priest) sacrifices a sow or a female lamb to Juno in the Royal Palace. And it is from this goddess that Janus derives the style Junonius, to which we have referred, for it appears that just as all places of entry are regarded as belonging to him so all the Kalends are assigned to Juno.

Book I, Chapter 16.24-25
Whereupon the Senate ordered the question of these religious observances to be referred to the college of pontiffs, who declared that the morrow of all Kalends, Nones, and Ides were to be regarded as “black” days; so that these days were neither days on which battle might be offered, nor days free from religious restrictions, nor days on which assemblies of the people might be held.
It is also said, by the pontiff Fabius Maximus Servilianus, in his twelfth Book, that a sacrifice in honor of a deceased relative ought not to be offered on a “black” day, because in such sacrifices prayer must also be made first to Janus and Jupiter, and on such a day the names of these gods should not be uttered.

Book I, Chapter 17.64
Men call Apollo “the Twin God” (Didumaios) because he presents a twin form of his own divinity, by himself giving light and shape to the moon, for, as a twofold star giving light from a single source, he illumines the periods of day and night. And this too is the reason why the Romans worship the sun under the name and form of Janus, with the style of the Didymaean Apollo.

Modern hymns and poetry

“Ianus”
by P. Sufenas Virius Lupus (from The Phillupic Hymns

May Ianus Patulcius open the door for me
as I open this prayer, may all doors be opened;
May Ianus Pater watch over and protect me
as he watched over Saturn in his exile;
May Ianus Bifrons keep guard before and behind me
as age is ahead of and youth is afar from me;
May Ianus Quadrifrons protect me on all sides
as ways converge in me and as paths branch out of me;
May Ianus Geminus’ temple doors ever open for our aid,
and may his doors ever close for our peace;
May Ianus Clusivus close the door for me
as I close this prayer, may there be a close to all troubles.