Venas
Messapian · deity · iron age to roman messapia · deity
Venas matters because she is not borrowed. Her name is the Messapic reflex of the same Indo-European word that gave Latin Venus and Sanskrit vánas, 'desire', which makes her an inherited goddess of the Iapygian stock rather than a Roman import into it — a useful check on the assumption that everything Italic and southern came from Rome or from Greece. She is invoked in company: the dedications set her beside Zis, the sky-god, and beside Taotor.
Domains
- love
Relations
- ally: Taotor
Sources
- Reference treatment of Messapic religion and its inherited theonyms Zis, Venas and Taotor.