A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology

the twelve Etruscan gods, who formed the council of Jupiter. Their name is probably derived from the ancient verb conso, that is, consulo. According to Seneca (Quaest. Nat. 2.41), there was above the Consentes and Jupiter a yet higher council, consisting of mysterious and nameless divinities, whom Jupiter consulted when he intended to announce to mankind great calamities or changes by his lightnings. The Consentes Dii consisted of six male and six female divinities, but we do not know the names of all of them; it is however certain that Juno, Minerva, Summanus, Vulcan, Saturn, and Mars were among them. According to the Etruscan theology, they ruled over the world and time; they had come into existence at the beginning of a certain period of the world, at the end of which they were to cease to exist. They were also called by the name of Complices, and were probably a set of divinities distinct from the twelve great gods of the Greeks and Romans (Varro, R. R. 1.1, apud Arnob. adv. Gent. 3.40 ; Hartung, Die Relig. d. Röm. ii. p. 5.)

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