Note 223 — ROMAN PEOPLE (continued 3)

I adhere to what was said in R.F. p. 312 foll. We do not know, and probably never shall know, the original deity concerned in that festival. The ritual is wholly unlike that of the rustica Faunalia (R.F. p. 256 foll.). I believe that it dates from a time anterior to the formation of real gods—possibly from an aboriginal people who did not know any. (I am glad to see this view taken in the latest summary of German learning on this subject, Einleitung in die Altertumswissenschaft, by Gaercke and Norden, vol. ii. p. 262.) At the moment of printing an interesting discussion of the Lupercalia, by Prof. Deubner, who treats it as a historical growth, in which are embodied ideas and rites of successive ages, has appeared in Archiv (1910, p. 481 foll.). See Appendix B.