NeptuneBy: Hannah Mead

“Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this bloodClean from my hand? No, this my hand will ratherThe multitudinous seas incarnadine,Making the green one red” –Shakespeare Macbeth

Barlett’s Familiar Quotations

Facts on File

1385 “The se.. Possith hym now vp now doun Til neptune hath of hym compassion.” from Phyllis by Chaucer L.G.W.

Oxford Dictionary

Neptune was the son of Saturn, and Rhea or Ops, and brother of Jupiter. When arrived at maturity, he assisted his brother Jupiter in his expeditions, for which that god, on attaining to supreme power, assigned him the sea and the islands for his empire. Whatever attachment Neptune might have had to his brother at one period, he was at another expelled heaven for entering into a conspiracy against him, in conjunction with several other deities; whence he fled, with Apollo, to Laomedon, king of Troy, where Neptune having assisted in raising the walls of the city, and being dismissed unrewarded, in revenge, sent a sea-monster to lay waste the country.

Myth

On another occasion, this deity had a contest with Vulcan and Minerva, in regard to their skill. The goddess, as a proof of her's, made a horse, Vulcan a man, and Neptune a bull, whence that animal was used in the sacrifices to him, though it is probable that, as the victim was to be black, the design was to point out the raging quality and fury of the sea, over which he presided. The Greeks make Neptune to have been the creator of the horse, which he produced from out of the earth with a blow of his trident, when disputing with Minerva who should give the name to Cecropia, which was afterwards called Athens, from the name in Greek of Minerva, who made an olive tree spring up suddenly, and thus obtained the victory.

In this fable, however, it is evident that the horse could signify nothing but a ship; for the two things in which that region excelled being ships and olive-trees, it was thought politic by this means to bring the citizens over from too great a fondness for sea affairs, to the cultivation of their country, by showing that Pallas was preferable to Neptune, or, in other words, husbandry to sailing, which, without some further meaning, the production of a horse could never have done. It notwithstanding appears that Neptune had brought the management of the horse, as likewise the art of building ships, to very great perfection; insomuch that Pamphus, who was the most ancient writer of hymns to the gods, calls him the benefactor of mankind, in bestowing upon them horses and ships which had stems and decks that resembled towers.

If Neptune created the horse, he was likewise the inventor of chariot-races; hence Mithridates, king of Pontus, threw chariots, drawn by four horses, into the sea, in honor of Neptune: and the Romans instituted horse-races in the circus during his festival, at which time all horses ceased from working, and the mules were adorned with wreaths of flowers.

Neptune, represented as a god of the sea, makes a considerable figure: he is described with black or dark hair, his garment of an azure or sea-green color, seated in a large shell drawn by whales, or sea-horses, with his trident in his hand, attended by the sea-gods PalAemon, Glaucus, and Phorcys; the sea-goddesses Thetis, Melita, and Panopea, and a long train of Tritons and sea-nymphs.

SymbolThe symbol for Neptune is a trident, a three-pronged fork.

Statue of Neptune at the Trevi Fountain in Rome, Italy

The Return of Neptune

1754 John Singleton Copley

Neptune was worshipped by the Romans as the god of springs, lakes, rivers, sea, and horses

He had a temple near the race tracks in Rome (built in 25 BC), the Circus Flaminius, as well as one in the Campus Martius. Only July 23, the Neptunalia was observed at the latter temple.

Worship

Simpson, J. A., and E. S. C. Weiner. "Neptune." Def. 1. a. Second Edition. 1989.      Print. Vol. X of The Oxford English Dictionary. XX vols. 

Bibliography