The gate of the year

Figure on the left:

Statue of Antinous, the favourite of the Roman emperor Hadrian, represented in the guise of the god Vertumnus, II century A.D., now in the Louvre Museum, Paris.
Vertumnus was identified by Varro (Latin Language, II, 46) with Voltumna, the most prominent god among the Etruscans, who had a well-known sanctuary in the territory of Volsinii (an ancient Etruscan city whose location is still debated, some identifying it with modern Orvieto, others with Bolsena). In Rome, the god Vertumnus was properly associated with the transformations of the plant world and to the changing of the seasons, as it is evidenced by the popular etymology which linked his name with the verb vertere, “to turn, to change”. Considered patron of the gardens and of agricultural works, to him were offered the first fruits and the first flowers springing up on the cultivated fields. His main feast, the Vertumnalia, was held in October and celebrated the passage from the summer season to the autumn. Ovid, in his Metamorphoses (XIV, 609-697), reports the legend of the love story between Vertumnus and the Nymph Pomona, a minor deity who protected the fields and the fruit trees. To conquer Pomona’s love, the god shows his capacities to change his appearance, assuming the aspect of several young farmers and at last of an old woman, who persuades Pomona to accept Vertumnus’s amorous advances.
[Image: http://www.antinous.eu/antinous_de_god.htm]

Figure on the right:

Painting by the Milanese painter Giuseppe Arcimboldo, realized in 1590-91, representing the German Emperor Rudolph II, in the guise of the god of the seasons Vertumnus. The painting is now in the Skokloster Castle, Sweden.
[Image: http://www.wikiart.org/en/giuseppe-arcimboldo/vertumnus-emperor-rudolph-ii]




Tree Symbols

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Figure on the left: Statue of Antinous, the favourite of the Roman emperor Hadrian, represented in the guise of the god Vertumnus, II century A.D., now in the Louvre Museum, Paris. Vertumnus was identified by Varro (Latin Language, II, 46) with Voltumna, the most prominent god among the Etruscans, who had a well-known sanctuary in the territory of Volsinii (an ancient Etruscan city whose location is still debated, some identifying it with modern Orvieto, others with Bolsena). In Rome, the god Vertumnus was properly associated with the transformations of the plant world and to the changing of the seasons, as it is evidenced by the popular etymology which linked his name with the verb vertere, “to turn, to change”. Considered patron of the gardens and of agricultural works, to him were offered the first fruits and the first flowers springing up on the cultivated fields. His main feast, the Vertumnalia, was held in October and celebrated the passage from the summer season to the autumn. Ovid, in his Metamorphoses (XIV, 609-697), reports the legend of the love story between Vertumnus and the Nymph Pomona, a minor deity who protected the fields and the fruit trees. To conquer Pomona’s love, the god shows his capacities to change his appearance, assuming the aspect of several young farmers and at last of an old woman, who persuades Pomona to accept Vertumnus’s amorous advances. [Image: http://www.antinous.eu/antinous_de_god.htm] Figure on the right: Painting by the Milanese painter Giuseppe Arcimboldo, realized in 1590-91, representing the German Emperor Rudolph II, in the guise of the god of the seasons Vertumnus. The painting is now in the Skokloster Castle, Sweden. [Image: http://www.wikiart.org/en/giuseppe-arcimboldo/vertumnus-emperor-rudolph-ii]