certain inferior deities among the ancient Romans, who were the guardians of houses; they were also sometimes taken for the guardians of streets and ways, and Tibullus makes them the guardians of the fields. According to Ovid, they were the sons of Mercury and Laura, whose tongue was cut out by Jupiter because she revealed his adulteries to Juno: and not contented with this, he delivered her to Mercury, with orders to conduct her to hell; but this god falling in love with her by the way, had twins by her, who from their mother were called lares.

These domestic deities were sometimes represented under the figure of a dog, the symbol of fidelity; because dogs have the same function as the lares, which is to guard the house. At other times their images were covered with the skin of a dog, and had the figure of that domestic animal standing by them. The principal sacrifices to the lares were incense, fruit, and a hog.

The Romans had a private place in their houses, called lararium, in which, among other statues of their gods, were their lares, and the images of their ancestors. Tertullian tells us, that the custom of worshipping the lares arose from their anciently interring their dead in their houses; whence the credulous people took occasion to imagine, that their souls continued there likewise, and thence proceeded to pay them divine honours. To which may be added, that the custom of burying them in the highways might occasion their being considered likewise as gods of the highways.