Saturn
Roman god identified with the Greek Cronus, father of Jupiter, Juno, Neptune and Pluto and husband of Ops. The Latin poets do not retell his Greek crimes; they make him the exiled king who hid in Latium — "hid land" — gave its people laws and ruled the golden age, ancestor of the Latin kings through Picus and Faunus, whose sceptre Augustus is to restore. Ovid places the Golden Age before Saturn "had been banished into night".
Why this wins its question: Shows that the Latin Saturn is a different story from Hesiod's Cronus — exile, laws, golden age in Latium — and binds the equation to the epithets and the one line where Ovid says "Saturn yields to Jove".
Key takeaways
- The Roman Saturn is a refugee king in Latium who civilises rather than devours; Virgil derives the very name Latium from his hiding.
- Neither Virgil nor Ovid tells Cronus's crimes; the identification with Cronus rests on the epithets (Son of Saturn, Saturn's daughter) and on "Saturn yields to Jove".
- Livy's first book never names Saturn; his Roman layer here is entirely the poets'.
Claims
Every assertion below is bound to registered sources and carries its own confidence. Weight them; do not treat the page as uniformly authoritative.
Evander tells Aeneas the Latin story: "Saturn from Olympian realms came down, in flight from Jove's dread arms, his sceptre lost, and he an exiled King"; he gathered the savage race, "gave wise laws and statutes; so that latent land was Latium, 'hid land', where he hid so long", and "the golden centuries by legends told were under that good King" (Aen. 8.319–327).
The age decayed into one "prone to insensate war and greed of gain", and "oft the land of Saturn lost its name" (Aen. 8.326–332). On the Capitol Evander points to two ruined strongholds: "one father Janus built, and Saturn one; their names, Saturnia and Janiculum" (Aen. 8.355–358).
Saturn is the root of the Latin line and of the Augustan promise. Latinus descends from Faunus and Picus, "whence the line to Saturn's loins ascends" (Aen. 7.45–49; Ovid too calls "Picus, offspring of Saturn" king of Ausonia, Met. 14.320); Italy is "Hesperia, where Saturn reigned" (Aen. 1.569); and Anchises foretells that Augustus "brings a golden age; he shall restore old Saturn's sceptre to our Latin land" (Aen. 6.792–794).
Ovid's Golden Age has no judge, no war and no plough — "rivers flowed milk and nectar" — and ends with Saturn: "When Saturn had been banished into night and all the world was ruled by Jove supreme, the Silver Age, though not so good as gold ... prevailed" (Met. 1.89–115). Ovid, like Virgil, never narrates the castration or the swallowing that Hesiod tells of Cronus.
His wife is Ops: Byblis argues that "even Saturn married Ops, his own blood-kin, Oceanus his Tethys, Jove, Olympian his Juno" (Met. 9.497–499). Arachne's web shows another union, "Saturn, as a steed, begetter of the dual-natured Chiron" (Met. 6.126).
His children are named by epithet throughout both poems: Jupiter is "the Son of Saturn" (Met. 1.163); Juno "Saturn's daughter" (Aen. 1.23; Met. 3.271) and "Saturn's second child" (Aen. 12.830); Neptune "Saturn's son, the ruler of the seas profound" (Aen. 5.801); Pluto "the son of Saturn" who hurls his sceptre into Cyane's pool (Met. 5.420).
Ovid closes the Metamorphoses on the succession as a parallel of fathers and sons: "to name a parallel befitting these two gods, so Saturn yields to Jove", as Julius Caesar yields to Augustus (Met. 15.858–860).
Questions answered
- Why is Latium named after Saturn's hiding?
- Evander tells Aeneas the Latin story: "Saturn from Olympian realms came down, in flight from Jove's dread arms, his sceptre lost, and he an exiled King"; he gathered the savage race, "gave wise laws and statutes; so that latent land was Latium, 'hid land', where he hid so long", and "the golden centuries by legends told were under that good King" (Aen. 8.319–327). source
- What was the golden age of Saturn?
- Ovid's Golden Age has no judge, no war and no plough — "rivers flowed milk and nectar" — and ends with Saturn: "When Saturn had been banished into night and all the world was ruled by Jove supreme, the Silver Age, though not so good as gold ... prevailed" (Met. 1.89–115). Ovid, like Virgil, never narrates the castration or the swallowing that Hesiod tells of Cronus. source
- Who were the children of Saturn?
- His children are named by epithet throughout both poems: Jupiter is "the Son of Saturn" (Met. 1.163); Juno "Saturn's daughter" (Aen. 1.23; Met. 3.271) and "Saturn's second child" (Aen. 12.830); Neptune "Saturn's son, the ruler of the seas profound" (Aen. 5.801); Pluto "the son of Saturn" who hurls his sceptre into Cyane's pool (Met. 5.420). source
- Who was Saturn's wife?
- His wife is Ops: Byblis argues that "even Saturn married Ops, his own blood-kin, Oceanus his Tethys, Jove, Olympian his Juno" (Met. 9.497–499). Arachne's web shows another union, "Saturn, as a steed, begetter of the dual-natured Chiron" (Met. 6.126). source
- Did Augustus restore the age of Saturn?
- Saturn is the root of the Latin line and of the Augustan promise. Latinus descends from Faunus and Picus, "whence the line to Saturn's loins ascends" (Aen. 7.45–49; Ovid too calls "Picus, offspring of Saturn" king of Ausonia, Met. 14.320); Italy is "Hesperia, where Saturn reigned" (Aen. 1.569); and Anchises foretells that Augustus "brings a golden age; he shall restore old Saturn's sceptre to our Latin land" (Aen. 6.792–794). source