BONA DEA, a Roman divinity, who is described as the wife, sister, or daughter of Faunus, and so famous for her chastity that after her death she was deified. Her sacrifices were performed only by women, and in so secret a manner that it was death for any man to intrude himself into the assembly. Cicero reproaches P. Clodius with having entered this temple disguised as a singing woman, and by his presence polluted the mysteries of the Bona Dea. What kind of mysteries these were, we learn incidentally from Juvenal, Sat. vi. 313, where the abominations practised in them are very significantly pointed at.