User:Est. 2021/Draft/Śuri/Epithets

Usil
He is the representation of power and strength. His iconic depiction features the god rising out of the sea, with a fireball in either outstretched hand, on an engraved Etruscan bronze mirror in late Archaic style, formerly on the Roman antiquities market. On Etruscan mirrors in Classical style, Usil appears with a halo. However, while the god is depicted as male in most artworks, there are also feminine depictions.

His places of worship, according to Mauro Cristofani, are in Cortona, Populonia and Magliano, but there are also traces of a priestly college in Tarquinia and Tuscania.

Usil has been syncretised with the Greek Helios and Roman Sol, and later Apollo (Apulu); in fact, he appears on an Etruscan mirror from the Vatican dating from the 4th century BC, on which Usil is seen holding the bow of Apulu. In artwork Usil is shown in close association with Thesan, the dawn goddess, something almost never seen with Helios and Eos.

Mentions and iconography
He's mentioned as son of Tinia and Semla, brother of Fufluns and twin brother of Aritimi.

In art, he is depicted with a crown and laurel branches. His most famous representation is the Apollo of Veii, attributed to Vulcas.

He does not appear on the Liver of Piacenza.

Calu
He is identified by his wolf attributes, such as a wolf-like appearance or a human with a wolf-skin cap.

Images
Aita is a relatively late addition to the Etruscan pantheon, appearing in iconography and in Etruscan text beginning in the 4th century BC, and is heavily influenced by his Greek counterpart, Hades. Aita is pictured in only a few instances in Etruscan tomb painting, such as in the Golini Tomb from Orvieto and the tomb of Orcus II from Tarquinia. In these tomb paintings, he is shown with his consort Persipnei, also spelled Phersipnai , the Etruscan equivalent to the Greek Persephone.

Although Aita is very rarely depicted, he may appear enthroned and sometimes wears a wolf cap, borrowing a key attribute from the earlier Etruscan underworld wolf-deity, named Calu. Other examples of Aita in Etruscan art depict his abduction of Persipnei. Aside from tomb painting, Aita may be identified in a few examples in other media, including on a 4th-century painted vase from Vulci, two 2nd century alabaster ash urns from Volterra, and a Red Figure 4th-3rd century Oinochoe.

Underworld and lightning god
Vetis, Manth and Summanus are epithets of Śuri as god of the underworld, wolves and lightning (as well as volcanoes, fire, health and plague), ideally opposed to the Greco-Roman god Zeus/Jupiter (Iūpiter), but also  equated with Hades, Apollo and Asclepius.
 * Vetis / Veivis, cognate to Vēdius, Vēdiovis, Vēiovis, Vēive
 * Manth, latinised as Mantus; cognate to Manes.
 * Summanus, cognate to Manes; supposedly from Summus Manium

Vetis
Vetis or Veivis, latinized as Vejovis (  or Vēdiovis; rare Vēive  or Vēdius), was a Roman god of Etruscan origins.

Representation
Vejovis was portrayed as a young man, holding a bunch of arrows, pilum or lightning bolts in his hand, and accompanied by a goat.

Romans believed that Vejovis was one of the first gods to be born. Though he was associated with volcanic eruptions, his original role and function is obscured to us. He is occasionally identified with Apollo and young Jupiter but he also was a god of healing, and became associated with the Greek Asclepius.

Aulus Gellius, in the Noctes Atticae, written almost a millennium after; speculated that Vejovis was an ill-omened counterpart of Jupiter; compare Summanus. Aulus Gellius observes that the particle ve- that prefixes the name of the god also appears in Latin words such as vesanus, "insane," and thus interprets the name Vejovis as the anti-Jove.

Worship
He was mostly worshipped in Rome and Bovillae, in Latium. On the Capitoline Hill and on the Tiber Island, temples were erected in his honour. Among them, there was a temple between the two peaks of the Capitoline Hill in Rome, where his statue carried a bundle of arrows and stood next to a statue of a she-goat.

Sacrifices
In spring, multiple goats were sacrificed to him to avert plagues. Gellius informs us that Vejovis received the sacrifice of a female goat, sacrificed ritu humano; this obscure phrase could either mean "after the manner of a human sacrifice" or "in the manner of a burial." These offerings were less about the animal sacrificed and more about the soul sacrificed.

Festivals
Vejovis had three festivals in the Roman Calendar: on 1 January, 7 March, and 21 May.

Consort
The epithets of this divine couple indicate that they were connected to the Manes, chthonic divinities or spirits of the dead in ancient Roman belief and called man(im) by the Etruscans.

Their names are also linked to Mana Genita and Manius, as well as the Greek Mania (or Maniae), goddess of insanity and madness. Both the Greek and Latin Mania derive from PIE (Proto-Indo-European) *men-, "to think." Cognates include Ancient Greek μένος, and Avestan 𐬎𐬫𐬥𐬌𐬀𐬨.

Summanus
Summanus was the god of nocturnal thunder in ancient Roman religion, as counterposed to Jupiter, the god of diurnal (daylight) thunder. His precise nature was unclear even to Ovid.

Pliny thought that he was of Etruscan origin, and one of the nine gods of thunder. Varro, however, lists Summanus among gods he considers of Sabine origin, to whom king Titus Tatius dedicated altars (arae) in consequence of a votum. Paulus Diaconus considers him a god of lightning.

The name Summanus is thought to be from Summus Manium "the greatest of the Manes", or sub-, "under" + manus, "hand".

According to Martianus Capella, Summanus is another name for Pluto as the "highest" (summus) of the Manes. This identification is taken up by later writers such as Camões ("If in Summanus' gloomy realm / Severest punishment you now endure ...") and Milton, in a simile to describe Satan visiting Rome: "Just so Summanus, wrapped in a smoking whirlwind of blue flame, falls upon people and cities".

Georges Dumézil has argued that Summanus would represent the uncanny, violent and awe-inspiring element of the gods of the first function, connected to heavenly sovereignty. The double aspect of heavenly sovereign power would be reflected in the dichotomy Varuna-Mitra in Vedic religion and in Rome in the dichotomy Summanus-Dius Fidius. The first gods of these pairs would incarnate the violent, nocturnal, mysterious aspect of sovereignty while the second ones would reflect its reassuring, daylight and legalistic aspect.

Temple and Cult
The temple of Summanus was dedicated during the Pyrrhic War c. 278 BCE on June 20. It stood at the west of the Circus Maximus, perhaps on the slope of the Aventine. It seems the temple had been dedicated because the statue of the god which stood on the roof of the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus had been struck by a lightning bolt. Every June 20, the day before the summer solstice, round cakes called summanalia, made of flour, milk, and honey and shaped as wheels, were offered to him as a token of propitiation: the wheel might be a solar symbol. Summanus also received a sacrifice of two black oxen or wethers. Dark animals were typically offered to chthonic deities.

Saint Augustine records that in earlier times Summanus had been more exalted than Jupiter, but with the construction of a temple that was more magnificent than that of Summanus, Jupiter became more honored.

Cicero recounts that the clay statue of the god which stood on the roof of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus was struck by a lightning bolt: its head was nowhere to be seen. The haruspices announced that it had been hurled into the Tiber River, where indeed it was found on the very spot indicated by them.

The temple of Summanus itself was struck by lightning in 197 BCE.

Summanus and Mount Summano
Mount Summano (elevation 1291 m), located in the Alps near Vicenza (Veneto, Italy), is traditionally considered a site of the cults of Pluto, Jupiter Summanus, and the Manes.

The area was one of the last strongholds of pagan religion in Italy, as shown by the fact that Vicenza had no bishop until 590 CE.

Archeological excavations have found a sanctuary space that dates to the first Iron Age (9th century BCE) and was continuously active until late antiquity (at least the 4th century CE). The local flora is very peculiar, because it was customary in ancient times for pilgrims to bring offerings of flowers from their own native lands.

The mountaintop is frequently struck by lightning. The mountain itself has a deep grotto named Bocca Lorenza, in which, according to local legend, a young shepherdess became lost and disappeared. The story might be an adaptation of the myth of Proserpina, who was abducted by Pluto.

Sethlans
Sethlans is an epithet of Śuri as god of volcanoes, fire, the forge, metalworking, and by extension craftsmanship in general, equivalent to the Egyptian Ptah (creator god), the Greek Hephaestus and the Roman Vulcan.

In Etruscan mythology, Sethlans was the god of fire, the forge, metalworking, and by extension craftsmanship in general, the equivalent, though their names share no etymology, to Greek Hephaestus, Egyptian Ptah and the Roman Vulcan. Sethlans is one of the indigenous Etruscan gods. In Etruscan arts Sethlans may be identified by his tools, the hammer and tongs of the blacksmith, and by the pileus or conical cap he wears.
 * Merge:

By what appears to be a curious omission, his name does not appear on the bronze liver of Piacenza.