Lupercus

The Latins sometimes called him Incubus or the “Nightmare,” and at Rome he was worshipped as Lupercus, or Lynceus.

Her festivals were the festivals of the doings and events of nature, the Lupercalia of Lupercus, the Palilia of Pales; she was and she remains pagan, if pagan is to mean the natural as opposed to the supernatural attitude towards life—natural and humanistic as opposed to mystic and ideal.

In the dim twilight we see all Roman things coming down the Tiber to the foot of the Palatine—the original Roma Quadrata—and we see that the nucleus of the settlement there was the cave of Lupercus, the Italian shepherds' god, identified later with the Arcadian Pan.

Among the oldest feasts were undoubtedly the Lupercalia, in honour of Lupercus, the god of fertility; the Equiria, in honour of Mars; the Palilia; the great September festival; and the Saturnalia.

When there was a feast, all of these various kinds of families learned something of the worship of Mars, or Maia Dia, or Saturn, or Pales, or Lupercus.