literary · Roman

Prayer to Juno

O spouse and sister of Mighty Jupiter, whether You are worshipped and adored in the public rites of the temples of Samos, or whether You are called upon singularly by women in their tearful moment of giving birth, Your glory is nourished. Famous among the Argives whose walls You defend, You who all the east venerates as Life-giving Zygia, who all the west names Lucina, may You be an advocate for me against my utter downfall, Juno Sospita, and endure until the end in all my weary labors, exhausted as I am, deliver me from imminent peril and free me from my fears, for I know You are accustomed to come of Your own accord to the assistance of such women who are pregnant and in danger.

Commentarius · Commentary

Psyche, hunted by Venus, is looking for refuge and prays to Juno. In Apuleius this is her second attempt — she had addressed Ceres in the same way before, and both goddesses will refuse her out of deference to Venus.

The list of cult sites is not ornament but biography. Samos remembers her as an infant — the birth, the crying, the nursing; Carthage worships her as a maiden riding a lion (the local Juno Caelestis, that is, Punic Tanit); Argos knows her already as the Thunderer's wife and queen. Three sanctuaries, three ages of one goddess, laid out geographically.

Then East and West divide her in two: Zygia, patroness of the marriage yoke, and Lucina, helper in childbirth. Apuleius covers the whole known world so as to leave the goddess no name under which she might fail to answer.

And the request itself is phrased as a choice of name: sis mei extremis casibus Iuno Sospita — be to me in my extremity Juno the Saviour. Out of all the aspects listed, Psyche points to the one she needs now.

Fons · Source

AuthorApuleius

WorkMetamorphoses

Section6.4

Period2nd c. AD

Classificatio · Taxonomy

CultureRoman

Formliterary

DeitiesJuno

FunctionsPetition · Invocation

SphereFamily · Personal