Silvanus
Roman god of forests and uncultivated land, protector of boundaries between wild and civilised spaces
The Myth of Silvanus
Silvanus was one of the most popular gods in the Roman countryside, though he had no official state cult or public temple. His worship was intensely personal and local — farmers, woodcutters, and landowners set up countless small shrines and inscriptions to him across the empire. He guarded the boundary between cultivated fields and the wild forest, a transition zone that Romans found both practical and symbolically potent. Silvanus was depicted as a vigorous older man carrying a cypress branch and accompanied by a dog. Unlike Faunus, who was equated with Pan, Silvanus remained distinctively Roman. His inscriptions are among the most numerous of any Roman deity, found from Britain to North Africa.
Parents
None recorded
Symbols
Fun Fact
Silvanus had no official state temple, yet his inscriptions are among the most numerous found across the entire Roman Empire
Words We Inherited
English words and phrases that trace back to this myth. See our full guide to English words from Greek mythology.
Explore Further
Faunus
⚡ godForests, fields, flocks, prophecy
Roman god of the wild, forests, and flocks, equivalent to the Greek Pan
Fauns
🐉 creaturewoodland, pastoral
Goat-legged woodland spirits of Roman origin that became conflated with Greek Satyrs and Pans in later mythological tradition.
Pomona
⚡ godFruit trees, orchards, gardens
Roman goddess of fruit trees and orchards, with no direct Greek equivalent
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⚡ godGod of the wild, shepherds, and panic
Pan was the goat-legged god of the wild, shepherds, and mountain meadows whose sudden appearance could cause "panic" — the irrational terror named after him.
Mars
⚡ godWar, agriculture, guardianship
Roman god of war and agriculture, second in importance only to Jupiter, far more honoured than his Greek counterpart Ares
Jupiter
⚡ godKing of gods, sky, thunder
Supreme deity of the Roman pantheon, equivalent to the Greek Zeus, ruling over gods and mortals from the heavens
Terminus
⚡ godBoundaries, property markers, borders
Roman god of boundary stones and property limits, with no direct Greek equivalent
Panes
🐉 creaturenature spirits
A race of goat-legged nature spirits modelled after the god Pan, haunting wild mountains and forests
Saturn
⚡ godTime, agriculture, abundance, dissolution
Ancient Roman god of agriculture and time, identified with the Greek Kronos, ruler of a lost golden age
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⚡ godKing of the dead
The ruler of the Underworld who received the dead, guarded by Cerberus and feared so deeply that Greeks avoided speaking his name.
Diana
⚡ godHunt, moon, wilderness, crossroads
Roman goddess of the hunt, the moon, and wild places, identified with the Greek Artemis
Hermes
⚡ godMessenger of the gods and patron of thieves
The quicksilver god who guides souls to the Underworld, protects travellers, and invented lying on the day he was born.