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In the second place, the nymph Egeria at Nemi appears to
have been merely a form of Diana, and Egeria is definitely said to
have been a Dryad, a nymph of the oak. Elsewhere in Italy the
goddess had her home on oak-clad mountains. Thus Mount Algidus, a
spur of the Alban hills, was covered in antiquity with dark forests
of oak, both of the evergreen and the deciduous sort. In winter the
snow lay long on these cold hills, and their gloomy oak-woods were
believed to be a favourite haunt of Diana, as they have been of
brigands in modern times. Again, Mount Tifata, the long abrupt ridge
of the Apennines which looks down on the Campanian plain behind
Capua, was wooded of old with evergreen oaks, among which Diana had
a temple. Here Sulla thanked the goddess for his victory over the
Marians in the plain below, attesting his gratitude by inscriptions
which were long afterwards to be seen in the temple. On the whole,
then, we conclude that at Nemi the King of the Wood personated the
oak-god Jupiter and mated with the oak-goddess Diana in the sacred
grove.


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