Mars Grabovius

Mars Grabovius is the second member of the Grabovian triad of Iguvium, corresponding to the Roman Mars in his double character as god of war and of the protection of the fields and the community. In the lustration of the people he receives three oxen before the Tesenacan Gate. Alongside his martial aspect, the Iguvine cult also knows a closely related figure, Çerfus Martius ('the growth-god of Mars'), whose Çerfian deities frame the agrarian and apotropaic side of the same ritual complex. His shared epithet Grabovius binds him with Jupiter and Vofionus as the three gate-gods who guard the sacred circuit of the city.

Domains

• war
• agricultural protection

Powers

• to defend the people of Iguvium from his station at the Tesenacan Gate

Epithets

• GrabovieGiacomo Devoto, Tabulae Iguvinae, 2nd ed. (Rome, 1940), s.v. Grabovius. (secondary)

Relations

• ally: Jupiter GraboviusCo-invoked with Jupiter Grabovius, the sovereign head of the Grabovian triad.Michael Weiss, Language and Ritual in Sabellic Italy (Brill, 2010), pp. 105-140. (secondary)
• ally: Vofionus GraboviusCo-invoked with Vofionus Grabovius as the three Grabovii of the city's three gates.James W. Poultney, The Bronze Tables of Iguvium (1959), pp. 230-256. (secondary)
• ally: Çerfus MartiusClosely bound to Mars through his epithet Martius; the Çerfian complex doubles the martial-agrarian sphere of Mars Grabovius within the city gates.James W. Poultney, The Bronze Tables of Iguvium (1959), pp. 252-268. (secondary)

Sources

• Mars Grabovius (Umbrian Mart Grabovie) is the warrior-and-protector god of the Grabovian triad of Iguvium, propitiated with oxen at the Tesenacan Gate in the city's lustration.: James W. Poultney, The Bronze Tables of Iguvium (American Philological Association / Oxford University Press, 1959). (secondary); Michael Weiss, Language and Ritual in Sabellic Italy: The Ritual Complex of the Third and Fourth Tabulae Iguvinae (Brill, 2010). (secondary)