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World Mythology Dictionary:

Fortuna

(European mythology)

An Italian goddess identified with the Greek goddess of luck Tyche, ‘child of Zeus the Deliverer’. The Greeks thought that Tyche worked obscurely, lifting up one man and pushing down another; she was chance personified. In Italy Fortuna, or Fors, began as a bringer of increase, the luck of good crops and plentiful flocks. Gradually her cult assumed in Rome a much wider role, perhaps because luck is no respecter of persons. Indeed, hers was one of the very few festivals, held every June, which slaves could attend as well as free persons. Normally slaves or prisoners were considered to pollute any religious ceremony at which they happened to be present, so that elaborate precautions were taken to exclude them before the proceedings began. Popular Fortuna survived into the Middle Ages as Fortune's Wheel. Felicitas, specifically the goddess of good luck, was made an official cult under the Roman emperors, who saw her as an ally of Victoria.

 
 
Dictionary: For·tu·na  (fôr-tū'nə, -tyū'-) pronunciation
n. Roman Mythology.

The goddess of fortune.

[Latin Fortūna.]


 
Classical Literature Companion: Fortūna

Fortūna or Fors Fortuna, Italian goddess, perhaps originally the ‘bringer’ of fertility (Lat. ferre, ‘to bring’), but identified with the Greek Tȳchē and so the goddess of chance or luck. She had an ancient temple in the Forum Boarium at Rome. Her cult was said to have been introduced into Rome by Servius Tullius; she was not, therefore, one of the most ancient deities, a fact confirmed by her not having a flamen. She was worshipped at Antium and at Praenestē, where she had an oracular shrine. At Rome her festival on 24 June was a popular holiday, and large crowds including slaves flocked to her shrine, near the river Tiber about 2 km. (1 mile) downstream from the city, to witness the sacrifices. The Romans addressed her by a variety of epithets expressing either particular kinds of good luck or the kinds of people to whom she granted it.

 
Celtic Mythology: Fortuna

The Roman personification of fortune, luck, and chance appears frequently in ancient Celtic iconography, although she is not recorded as having a Celtic name. She is usually portrayed with a characteristic wheel or a rudder on a globe, implying an instant, random change in direction. Her wheel may associate her with the Celtic sun-god, whose solar symbol is also identified with the wheel. She is often depicted with the Gaulish Mercury and with Rosmerta, goddess of prosperity; her worship may have contributed to the depiction of Celtic divinities, especially Rosmerta and Nehalennia, a mother-goddess.

 
Columbia Encyclopedia: Fortuna
(fôrtū'nə) , in Roman religion, goddess of fortune. Worshiped under several forms, she appears to have originally been a goddess of fertility. She was later identified with Tyche, the Greek goddess of chance, and like her was represented with a ship's rudder and a cornucopia.

 
Wikipedia: Fortuna


Fortuna governs the circle of the four stages of life, the Wheel of Fortune, in a manuscript of Carmina Burana
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Fortuna governs the circle of the four stages of life, the Wheel of Fortune, in a manuscript of Carmina Burana

In Roman mythology, Fortuna (equivalent to the Greek goddess Tyche) goddess of fortune, was the personification of luck, hopefully of good luck, but she could be represented veiled and blind, as modern depictions of Justice are seen, and came to represent the capriciousness of life. She is also a goddess of fate.

Fortuna had a retinue that included Copia among her blessings. Under the name Annonaria she protected grain supplies. In the Roman calendar, June 11 was sacred to Fortuna, with a greater festival to Fors Fortuna on the 24th [1].

Fortuna was propitiated by mothers. Traditionally her cult was said to be introduced to Rome by Servius Tullius. Fortuna had a temple in the Forum Boarium, a public sanctuary on the Quirinalis, as the tutelary genius of Roma herself, Fortuna Populi Romani, the "Fortune of the Roman people", and an oracle in Praeneste where the future was chosen by a small boy choosing oak rods with possible futures written on them. The temple is called the temple of Fortuna Muliebris.

All over the Roman world, Fortuna was worshipped at a great number of shrines under various titles that were applied to her according to the various circumstances of life in which her influence was hoped to have a positive effect. Fortuna was not always positive: she was doubtful (Fortuna Dubia); she could be "fickle fortune" (Fortuna Brevis), or downright evil luck (Fortuna Mala).

Her name seems to derive from Vortumna, "she who revolves the year", however the earliest reference to the Wheel of Fortune, emblematic of the endless changes in life from prosperity to disaster, occurs in Cicero, In Pisonem, ca. 55 BCE.

Middle Ages

The traumatic humiliation of Emperor Valerian by king Shapur I of Persia (260) passed into European cultural memory as an instance of the reversals of Fortuna. In Hans Holbein's pen-and-ink drawing (1521), the universal lesson is brought home by its contemporary setting.
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The traumatic humiliation of Emperor Valerian by king Shapur I of Persia (260) passed into European cultural memory as an instance of the reversals of Fortuna. In Hans Holbein's pen-and-ink drawing (1521), the universal lesson is brought home by its contemporary setting.

Fortuna did not disappear from the popular imagination with the ascendancy of Christianity by any means (illustration, left). In the 6th century, the Consolation of Philosophy, by statesman and philosopher Boethius, written while he faced execution, reflected the Christian theology of casus, that the apparently random and often ruinous turns of Fortune's Wheel are in fact both inevitable and providential, that even the most coincidental events are part of God's hidden plan which one should not resist or try to change. Events, individual decisions, the influence of the stars were all merely vehicles of Divine Will. Fortune crept back in to popular acceptance. In succeeding generations Consolation was required reading for scholars and students.

Albrecht Dürer's engraving of Fortuna, ca 1502
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Albrecht Dürer's engraving of Fortuna, ca 1502

The ubiquitous image of the Wheel of Fortune found throughout the Middle Ages and beyond was a direct legacy of the second book of Boethius's Consolation. The Wheel appears in many renditions from tiny miniatures in manuscripts to huge stained glass windows in cathedrals, such as at Amiens. Lady Fortune is usually represented as larger than life to underscore her importance. The wheel characteristically has four shelves, or stages of life, with four human figures, usually labeled on the left regnabo (I shall reign), on the top regno (I reign) and is usually crowned, descending on the right regnavi (I have reigned) and the lowly figure on the bottom is marked sum sine regno (I have no kingdom). Medieval representations of Fortune emphasize her duality and instability, such as two faces side by side like Janus; one face smiling the other frowning; half the face white the other black; she may be blindfolded but without scales, blind to justice. Occasionally her vivid clothing and bold demeanor suggest the prostitute. She was associated with the cornucopia, ship's rudder, the ball and the wheel.

Fortune would have many influences in cultural works throughout the Middle Ages. In Le Roman de la Rose, Fortune frustrates the hopes of a lover who has been helped by a personified character "Reason". In Dante's Inferno, in the seventh canto, Virgil explains the nature of Fortune. Boccaccio's De Casibus Virorum Illustrium ("The Fortunes of Famous Men"), used by John Lydgate to compose his Fall of Princes, tells of many where the turn of Fortune's wheel brought those most high to disaster. Fortune makes her appearance in Carmina Burana (see image). Lady Fortune appears in chapter 25 of Machiavelli's The Prince, in which he says Fortune only rules one half of men's fate, the other half being of their own will. Machiavelli reminds the reader that Fortune is a woman, that she favours a strong, or even violent hand, and the she favours the more aggressive and bold young man than a timid elder. Even Shakespeare was no stranger to Lady Fortune:

When in disgrace with Fortune and men's eyes
I all alone beweep my outcast state ... — Sonnet 29

Aspects of Fortuna

Lady Fortune in a Boccaccio manuscript
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Lady Fortune in a Boccaccio manuscript
  • Fortuna Annonaria brought the luck of the harvest
  • Fortuna Belli fortune of war
  • Fortuna Primigenia directed the fortune of a firstborn child at the moment of birth
  • Fortuna Virilis attended a man's career
  • Fortuna Redux brought one safely home
  • Fortuna Respiciens fortune of the provider
  • Fortuna Muliebris the luck of a woman. Typical of Roman attitudes, the fortune of a woman in marriage, however, was Fortuna Virilis.
  • Fortuna Victrix brought victory in battle
  • Fortuna Augusta fortune of the emperor
  • Fortuna Balnearis fortune of the baths
  • Fortuna Conservatrix fortune of the Preserver
  • Fortuna Equestris fortune of the Knights
  • Fortuna Huiusque fortune of the present day
  • Fortuna Obsequens fortune of indulgence
  • Fortuna Privata fortune of the private individual
  • Fortuna Publica fortune of the people
  • Fortuna Romana fortune of Rome
  • Fortuna Virgo fortune of the virgin

See also

References

  • Howard Rollin Patch (1922), The Tradition of the Goddess Fortuna in Medieval Philosophy and Literature
  • Howard Rollin Patch (1923), Fortuna in Old French Literature
  • Howard Rollin Patch (1927, repr. 1967), The Goddess Fortuna in Medieval Literature
  • Lesley Adkins, Roy A. Adkins (2001) Dictionary of Roman Religion

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:
Roman mythology series
Major deities Apollo · Ceres · Diana · Juno · Jupiter · Mars · Mercury · Minerva · Venus · Vulcan · Divus Augustus · Divus Julius · Fortuna · Lares · Pluto · Quirinus · Sol · Vesta
Personified concepts Aius Locutius · Angerona · Concordia · Copia · Fides · Fortuna · Spes

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Copyrights:

World Mythology Dictionary. A Dictionary of World Mythology. Copyright © Arthur Cotterell 1979, 1986, 2003. All rights reserved.  Read more
Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Classical Literature Companion. The Concise Oxford Companion to Classical Literature. Copyright © 1993, 2003 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.  Read more
Celtic Mythology. A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. Copyright © James MacKillop 1998, 2004. All rights reserved.  Read more
Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Fortuna".  Read more

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