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The ''rex Nemorensis'' (Latin, "king of Nemi" or "king of the Grove") was a priest of the goddess Diana at Aricia in Italy, by the shores of Lake Nemi, where she was known as Diana Nemorensis. The priesthood played a major role in the mythography of J.G. Frazer in ''The Golden Bough'', whose interpretation has exerted a lasting influence. ==Ancient sources== The tale of the ''rex Nemorensis'' is told in a number of ancient sources. Ovid gives a poetic account of the priesthood of Nemi in his ''Fasti'', Book 3 (on the month of March), noting that the lake of Nemi was "sacred to antique religion," and that the priest who dwelt there "holds his reign by strong hands and fleet feet, and dies according to the example he set himself."〔''Regna tenent fortes manibus pedibusque fugaces, / et perit exemplo postmodo quisque suo.''〕 The Latin name of the priesthood is given by Suetonius: "He The Greek geographer Strabo also mentions the institution: "and in fact a barbaric, and Scythian, element predominates in the sacred usages, for the people set up as priest merely a run-away slave who has slain with his own hand the man previously consecrated to that office; accordingly the priest is always armed with a sword, looking around for the attacks, and ready to defend himself."〔Strabo, ''Geographia'' V, 3, 12.〕 Pausanias gives an etiological myth on the founding of the shrine: In Roman mythology, Hippolytus was deified as the god Virbius; Artemis was the Greek name of the goddess identified with the Roman Diana. A possible allusion to the origins of the priesthood at Nemi is contained in Vergil's ''Aeneid'', as Virgil places Hippolytus at the grove of Aricia.〔Vergil, ''Aeneid'', book VII, 761 et. seq.〕 An alternative story has the worship of Diana at Nemi instituted by Orestes; the flight of the slave represents the flight of Orestes into exile.〔Servius on Aeneid, 2.116 and 6.136〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Rex Nemorensis」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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