Hail Jupiter!
Hail Venus!
Lord of intoxication and Lady of the garden’s growth,
We ask for bountiful harvest,
And we celebrate the joy you represent for us.
May we touch base with the rural foundation of our sustenance!
And may we gain sacred insight today into both our world of growth
And the realm of other vision!
Today we wish and honour the wish as well.
Salve Iuppiter!
Salve Venus!

* * * * *

The FP designation of these feriae Iovi may indicate the festival as the central one of the month. It may also designate the commemorative novemdiale that stretches from these Vinalia Rustica or Vinalia Altera through the Consualia, Volcanalia and Opiconsivia to the Volturnalia. Jupiter as a wine-lord has already been encountered on the March Liberalia and the Vinalia Priora in April. Verrius Flaccus tells us that on this day the new wine was first brought into the city.

As had occurred on the Vinalia Priora, a temple of Venus was dedicated on the Vinalia Rustica – the aedes in the Circus Maximus. As a garden-goddess, Venus is of the same type as Pomona and Flora and may in fact be identical, as they, with Diana. A further temple to Venus ad Libitinam was also dedicated on this day. The goddess may have originally been (and before her identity by Ennius with the Greek Aphrodite) a female counterpart to Jupiter in his capacity as an earth-lord.

From Varro we learn that these Vinalia constituted a holiday in particular for the holitores, the growers or kitchen-gardeners. The name rusticus indicates the countryside focus of the celebration.