Little girls consecrated to goddess Diana

From an article by Rachel A. Diana “Diana as Mourning Aide” >>>

“As part of her underworld aspect, Diana was called upon to aid parents during their time of mourning a deceased child. She helped guide them through the grief process as they transitioned from being a parent to being childless. While no literary example exists to prove this, the evidence can be found in portrait sculptures from ancient Rome.

As Eve D’Ambra points out in her article Daughters as Diana: Mythological Models in Roman Portraiture, young girls were sometimes depicted in the guise of Diana in funerary sculptures from the first through the third centuries CE. There are about eleven examples in the form of portrait statues and funerary reliefs. There may have been more than this originally, but it is possible that many were mistaken for the goddess herself ¹.

In one portrait from the mid-second century, a little girl between the estimated ages of six and eight is dressed in a chiton and has a quiver strapped to her back. Her physiognomy is the combination of a little girl with chubby cheeks and a mature young adult with a stern brow. Despite her cheeks, this little girl appears strong willed and determined, qualities that would have been celebrated.” 

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“Daughters as Diana: Mythological Models in Roman Portraiture”
In: Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome. Supplementary VolumesVol. 7, Role Models in the Roman World. Identity and Assimilation (2008), pp. 171-183 
Eve D’Ambra >>>

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