cardea

Though ridiculed as the Goddess of Door Hinges, Cardea was in fact an important Deity of the Roman family.

She personified the hinges of the front door, and therefore the comings and goings of family life. She was particularly invoked to protect sleeping children against night-spirits who might harm or kill them. According to Ovid she is often in company with Janus, the two-faced God of Thresholds and Beginnings and Endings. She is similar to the Greek goddess Artemis also.

She looks both forward and backward in time.

June first or second is her festival, Beltane. June is the "hinge of the year", another term for the summer solstice. Originally, Cardea was the hinge on which the year turned; that is, a Goddess of the turning seasons. The hinge is a symbolic device celebrated each summer. Swinging on a swing was part of a ritual to encourage the growth of crops. Ancient Roman farmers hung balls, masks and small images of human figures, called oscilla, on trees or in doorways to swing in the wind. Children would skip along, hand in hand, swinging their arms, singing songs of summer. That hinge on which turns the year is the North Star, so she was another Goddess who lives in a starry castle at the hinge of the universe behind the North Wind, as did Arianrhod. Cardea is the Keeper of the Four Winds.

The adjective "cardinal", meaning "very important", is etymologically connected to Her name. Her name is also connected with the Latin "cerdo", meaning craftsman, as she is benefactress of crafts people; from which the Irish derived the name of their God of locksmithing, Credne.