Lusus

Lusus is the supposed son or companion of Bacchus, the Roman god of wine and divine madness, to whom Portuguese national mythology attributed the foundation of ancient Lusitania and the fatherhood of its inhabitants, the Lusitanians, seen as the ancestors of the modern Portuguese people. Lusus thus has functioned in Portuguese culture as a founding myth.

History of the name

With the Roman conquest of the Iberian Peninsula (from 219 BC to 17 BC; the Romans called it Hispania), the region of Lusitania was converted in a Roman province, corresponding approximately to the present area of Portugal south of the Douro river with Extremadura (Spain). There are no historic records of the eponyms Luso or Lusus amongst the Pre-Roman peoples of the Iberian Peninsula (in this specific areas, Celts or pre-Celts).

The etymology of Lusitania, like the origin of the name Lusitani who gave its name, is unclear. The name may be of Celtic origin: Lus and Tanus, "tribe of Lus". The name may derive from Lucis or Lusis, an ancient people mentioned in Avienus's Ora Maritima (4th century) and based on the Massaliote Periplus of the 6th century BC), and Tan, from Celtic Tan (Stan), or Tain, meaning a region or implying a country of waters, a root word that formerly meant a prince or sovereign governor of a region.