Festival of Juno Caprotina

Juno Caprotina, Festival of

July 7

Juno was the ancient Roman goddess of women and marriage, identified with the Greek goddess Hera. As the highest deity in the Roman pantheon next to Jupiter, her brother and husband, she ruled all aspects of women's lives, including sexuality and childbirth, and served as a kind of guardian angel for women. Along with Jupiter and Minerva, she shared a temple on the Capitoline Hill in Rome; together they were known as the Capitoline Triad. This temple contained Juno's sacred geese, whose cackling, according to Plutarch, saved Rome from the Gauls in 390 b.c.e.
The two most important festivals in honor of Juno were the Juno Caprotina (or Nonae Caprotinae ) and the Matronalia. The former was held under a wild fig tree in the Campus Martius, or Field of Mars, a floodplain of the Tiber River. The kalends or first day of every month were sacred to Juno, and she was also associated with the ancient ceremony of announcing at the new moon the date of the nones ( see Ides).
The month of June, named after the goddess Juno, is still considered the most popular month for getting married.

SOURCES:
AmerBkDays-2000, p. 491
DictRomRel-1996, p. 164
FestRom-1981, p. 161
OxClassDict-1970, p. 569
OxYear-1999, p. 285

Celebration day: Jul 7