The God of Spanking

The followers of the Roman god, Saturn would celebrate the saturnalia by whipping somebody passing by.
I think this would be enough to qualify him as the god of spanking.

IIRC it was young women on the streets who were whipped with switches (although moderately rather than punitively) on the Saturnalia, ceremonial flagellation which was supposed to increase their fertility... --C.K.

Have we just uncovered a potent argument against corporal punishment?

Guy

There's a bit of confusion here over which was the god of spanking, and I nominate Lupercus.

Saturnalia was when the slaves and their masters "switched" places for a day - but there were limits, mostly because the slaves knew who was going to be the master the rest of the year. During this thread it's being confused with Lupercalia.

Lupercalia (named for the god Lupercus, who is sometimes identified as Faunus/Pan) had a major feast Feb 13 to 15. To quote Plutarch:
At this time many of the noble youths and of the magistrates run up and down through the city naked, for sport and laughter striking those they meet with shaggy thongs. And many women of rank also purposely get in their way, and like children at school present their hands to be struck, believing that the pregnant will thus be helped in delivery, and the barren to pregnancy.

The thongs were made of freshly cut goat or dog skin - cut from the 2 goats and 1 dog that were sacrificed.

"The sacrificial feast followed, after which the Luperci cut thongs from the skins of the victims, which were called februa, dressed themselves in the skins of the sacrificed goats, in imitation of Lupercus, and ran round the walls of the old Palatine city, the line of which was marked with stones, with the thongs in their hands in two bands, striking the people who crowded near. Girls and young women would line up on their route to receive lashes from these whips. This was supposed to ensure fertility, prevent sterility in women and ease the pains of childbirth."

William Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar, where Mark Antony is instructed by Caesar to strike his wife Calpurnia:

CAESAR (to Calpurnia)

Stand you directly in Antonius' way,
When he doth run his course. Antonius!

ANTONY

Caesar, my lord?

CAESAR

Forget not, in your speed, Antonius,
To touch Calpurnia; for our elders say,
The barren touched in this holy chase,
Shake off their sterile curse.

So Lupercus, who teaches us that corporal punishment can overcome sterility and result in a pain free delivery, is the one we should be looking at.

In Asimov's "The Naked Sun", a roboticist called DeMarre was trying to train robots to spank unruly children, but he had problems getting them to ignore the three laws of robotics.

He never accomplished the task, for he became the murder victim around which the rest of the novel was written.

Ms. Thrashbottom has outdone herself with that disguise! One would never think . . . .

I agree with Goodgulf that Lupercus is the best choice.
In Pompeii you can see a 2000 year old frieze in The Villa of Mysteries of a Lupercalian scene where one of the pictures shows a young woman being whipped for fertility. I thought it was absolutely amazing to see it painted as it was all those years ago.
A must see if you are ever there, but I think that it is on the net.

Interesting.. Found it at:
http://www.art-and-archaeology.com/timelines/rome/empire/vm/villaofthemysteries.html

Where they try to interpret the mystery, but of course there are no written records - only guesses.

Goodgulf