SALUS

in Roman religion, the goddess of safety and welfare, later identified with the Greek Hygieia (q.v.). Her temple on the Quirinal at Rome, dedicated in 302 BC, was the scene of an annual sacrifice on August 5. The augurium salutis, not involving a personification and possibly antedating the deification of Salus, was an annual ascertainment of the acceptability to the gods of prayers for the public salus. Because it was required to be performed on a day of peace, the constant warfare of the late republic caused its interruption, but it was revived by the emperor Augustus. In the empire, the goddess appeared both as Salus Publica and Salus Augusti. She was regularly represented on coins as Hygieia, with patera and sacred snake, or at times with ears of grain, symbolic of prosperity.