Therefore, Diana, who though commonly represented in popular myths only as the huntress Diana, was in reality the great mother of the gods, has frequently the boar's head as her accompaniment, in token not of any mere success in the chase, but of her triumph over the grand enemy of the idolatrous system, in which she occupied so conspicuous a place. According to Theocritus, Venus was reconciled to the boar that killed Adonis, because when brought in chains before her, it pleaded so pathetically that it had not killed her husband of malice prepense, but only through accident. But yet, in memory of the deed that the mystic boar had done, many a boar lost its head or was offered in sacrifice to the offended goddess. In Smith, Diana is represented with a boar's head lying beside her, on the top of a heap of stones in which the Roman Emperor Trajan is represented burning incense to the same goddess, the boar's head forms a very prominent figure. On Christmas-day the Continental Saxons offered a boar in sacrifice to the Sun, to propitiate her * for the loss of her beloved Adonis. * The reader will remember the Sun was a goddess. Mallet says, "They offered the largest hog they could get to Frigga"--i.e., the mother of Balder the lamented one. In Egypt swine were offered once a year, at the feast of the Moon, to the Moon, and Bacchus or Osiris; and to them only it was lawful to make such an offering. (AELIAN)
In Rome a similar observance had evidently existed; for a boar formed the great article at the feast of Saturn, as appears from the following words of Martial:--
"That boar will make you a good Saturnalia."
Hence the boar's head is still a standing dish in England at the Christmas dinner, when the reason of it is long since forgotten. Yea, the "Christmas goose" and "Yule cakes" were essential articles in the worship of the Babylonian Messiah, as that worship was practised both in Egypt and at Rome. Wilkinson, in reference to Egypt, shows that "the favourite offering" of Osiris was "a goose," and moreover, that the "goose could not be eaten except in the depth of winter." As to Rome, Juvenal says, "that Osiris, if offended, could be pacified only by a large goose and a thin cake." In many countries we have evidence of a sacred character attached to the goose. It is well known that the capitol of Rome was on one occasion saved when on the point of being surprised by the Gauls in the dead of night, by the cackling of the geese sacred to Juno, kept in the temple of Jupiter. In India, the goose occupied a similar position; for in that land we read of the sacred "Brahmany goose," or goose sacred to Brahma.