Plutarch's Romane Questions · Plutarch
68.
_Wherefore doe the_ Luperci _at_ Rome _sacrifice a Dogge? Now these_ Luperci _are certeine persons who upon a festivall day called_ Lupercalia, _runne through the citie all naked, save that they have aprons onely before their privy parts, carying leather whippes in their hands, wherewith they flappe and scourge whomsoever they meet in the streets_. IS all this ceremoniall action of theirs a purification of the citie? whereupon they call the moneth wherein this is done _Februarius_, yea, and the very day it selfe _Febraten_, like as the maner of squitching with a leather scourge _Februare_, which verbe signifieth as much as to purge or purifie? And verily the Greeks, in maner all, were wont in times past, and so they continue even at this day, in all their expiations, to kill a dogge for sacrifice. Unto _Hecate_ also they bring foorth among other expiatorie oblations, certeine little dogges or whelpes: such also as have neede of clensing and purifying, they wipe and scoure all over with whelpes skinnes, which maner of purification they tearme _Periscylacismos_. Or rather is it for that _Lupus_ signifieth a woolfe, & _Lupercalia_, or _Lycæa_, is the feast of wolves: now a dogge naturally, being an enemie to woolves, therefore at such feasts they sacrificed a dogge. Or peradventure, because dogges barke and bay at these _Luperci_, troubling and disquieting them as they runne up and downe the city in maner aforesaid. Or else last of all, for that this feast and sacrifice is solemnized in the honor of god _Pan_; who as you wot well is pleased well enough with a dogge, in regard of his flocks of goates.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.