Plutarch's Romane Questions · Plutarch
21.
_What is the reason that the Latines doe so much honour and reverence the Woodpecker, and forbeare altogether to do that bird any harme?_ IS it for that _Picus_ was reported in old time by the enchantments and sorceries of his wife, to have changed his owne nature, and to be metamorphozed into a Woodpecker; under which forme he gave out oracles, and delivered answeres unto those who propounded unto him any demaunds? Or rather, because this seemeth a meere fable, and incredible tale: there is another storie reported, which carieth more probabilitie with it, and soundeth neerer unto trueth. That when _Romulus_ and _Remus_ were cast foorth and exposed to death; not onely a female woolfe gave them her teats to sucke, but also a certeine Woodpecker flew unto them, and brought them food in her bill, and so fedde them: and therefore haply it is, that ordinarily in these daies wee may see, as _Nigidius_ hath well observed; what places soever at the foot of an hill covered and shadowed with oakes or other trees a Woodpecker haunteth, thither customably you shall have a woolfe to repaire. Or peradventure, seeing their maner is to consecrate unto every god one kinde of birde or other, they reputed this Woodpecker sacred unto _Mars_, because it is a couragious and hardy bird, having a bill so strong, that he is able to overthrow an oke therewith, after he hath jobbed and pecked into it as farre as to the very marrow and heart thereof.
_How is it that they imagine_ Janus _to have had two faces, in which maner they use both to paint and also to cast him in mold_. IS it for that he being a Græcian borne, came from _Perrhœbia_, as we finde written in histories; and passing forward into _Italy_, dwelt in that countrey among the Barbarous people, who there lived, whose language and maner of life he changed? Or rather because he taught and perswaded them to live together after a civill and honest sort, in husbandry and tilling the ground; whereas before time their manners were rude, and their fashions savage without law or justice altogether.
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