by Terry McCombs

Terry McCombs maintained the "God/dess of the Month Club" on soc.religion.paganism for several years, producing monthly profiles of deities drawn from across the world's traditions. His approach was comparative and eclectic, treating each deity as a window into a shared human experience rather than the exclusive property of any one culture.

His June 2008 entry profiles Fortuna — the Roman goddess of chance, fate, and the capriciousness of destiny. Older than Jupiter and Juno, Fortuna was the patron of farmers, women in their first marriages, slaves, soldiers, and anyone whose future hung in the balance. Her oracle temples were more popular than Delphi for the ordinary Roman. She may, in fact, have invented the fortune cookie.

Preserved here from the Usenet archive as a document of early internet-era comparative paganism.

Name: Fortuna, "Lot Distributor." Her name may have come from Vortumna, "she who revolves the year." She was given a long list of specific titles (see below).

Area of Influence: Fate, chance, the destiny of newborn children, fertility, luck (both good and bad), farmers, women in their first marriages, and anything where the outcome is unpredictable.

Symbols: Wheel. Globe. Ship's rudder. Horn of plenty. Oak. Ear of wheat.

Usual Image: A woman wearing a brightly colored loose-fitting woolen chiton, holding a cornucopia in her left hand and ears of wheat in her right, with a ship's rudder by her right leg, standing on or near a wheel. Sometimes she holds a globe instead of a horn of plenty. In some images she is blindfolded like Justice — however, unlike Justice, she does not carry a scale, so her judgments are neither fair nor beyond influence.

Holy Days: June 6th, and Fors Fortuna on June 24th. Each of her many temples also had festival days on the anniversary of their founding.

Relatives: Said by some to be the eldest daughter of Zeus and Hera — however, she was also said to be their nurse, and was depicted holding them as babies at her breast. She had no husband or children, but she did have an entourage: Abundantia, who sometimes held her cornucopia and gave out luck and prosperity; Copia, goddess of wealth and plenty; Antevorte, goddess of the future; Moneta, goddess of prosperity; and Necessitas, goddess of destiny.

Synodeities: Tyche (Greek), Nortia (Etruscan), Xolotl (Aztec god of bad luck), King Wan (Chinese), Bes (Egyptian), Ganesha (Hindu), Jyeshtha (Hindu goddess of bad luck), Pachamama (Incan), Benzaiten, Fukurokuju, Hotei, Jurojin, and Kishijoten (Japanese), Belobog (Slavic).

Fortuna is a very old goddess, considered a "foreign goddess" by the Romans due to her main site of worship being outside the city. Evidence seems to indicate that she was worshiped in the area before the later goddess Hera was worshiped there, or the still later god Zeus — and certainly much, much later, God Jesus took up residence there.

At first mainly a goddess of fertility, she later became associated with fate and destiny, and more specifically with the capriciousness of fate and destiny. As such she was known as Fortuna Populi Romani, the "Fortune of the Roman People," and Fortuna Obsequens, the Fortuna who lets you indulge yourself — but also as Fortuna Mala, the bringer of double-plus nasty bad luck. However, despite her fickleness, or perhaps because of it, she was loved (and perhaps feared a little) by the Roman people, so that one of the greatest temples ever built by them — the Fortuna Primigenia — was dedicated not to Zeus, Apollo, or Diana, but to Fortuna.

Fortuna was also Fortuna Populi Romani in that her temples were the most common source for the citizens of Rome seeking a clue about their futures. The Oracle of Delphi is better remembered today, but she and her sisters were more for the wealthy and influential.

For the everyday Roman — and even slaves and visiting barbarians who wanted a peek at their fates — the place to go was a temple of Fortuna. There they could buy a cake in which one or more oak or cloth strips had been baked. On these strips were written random words or phrases in Latin; it was then up to the person to interpret just what these words meant. In other words, the Romans invented the fortune cookie.

They could also go to the main temple of Fortuna, which had been built on the site where, according to legend, a box had been found in a cave containing strips of oak with words written on them in an archaic alphabet. There, a boy using an oak rod would pick some of those chits out of the box and the supplicant's fate was revealed, or an answer to their question given. This practice, along with the fortune cakes, was so popular that both stayed around well into the Christian era — until ended by the Emperor Theodosius in the 4th century CE.

While her cakes might have been taken away, Fortuna insisted on staying, thriving even into the Middle Ages, and every era after that, on into our own era where she has become better known as Lady Luck.

But then, if you are going to weather the tempest of time and destiny, who better to do it than the Goddess of Fate?

Other Titles of Fortuna

Fortuna Annonaria — the luck of the harvest

Fortuna Belli — fortune in war

Fortuna Primigenia — the fortune of a firstborn child at the moment of birth

Fortuna Virilis — men's fortunes; also the fortune of a woman in marriage

Fortuna Redux — to make it home safe

Fortuna Respiciens — fortune in providing for the family

Fortuna Muliebris — women's fortunes

Fortuna Victrix — to bring victory in battle

Fortuna Balnearis — to have luck at the baths

Fortuna Equestris — for luck on horseback

Fortuna Huiusque — fortune of the present day

Fortuna Obsequens — fortune in indulgence

Fortuna Privata — fortune for an individual

Fortuna Romana — the fortune of Rome

Fortuna Virgo — fortune for virgins

Fortuna Dubia — when your fate was doubtful

Fortuna Brevis — fortune at its most fickle

Fortuna Mala — bad luck

Fortuna Publica Populi Romani Quiritium Primigenia — First-born Fortuna of the Roman Nation, its People and Citizens

— Terry McCombs

Colophon

Written and posted by Terry McCombs to soc.religion.paganism on June 30, 2008, as part of his monthly "God/dess of the Month Club" series, which profiled deities from across the world's traditions. Original Message-ID: [email protected].

Preserved from the Usenet archive for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.

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