Luna's letter desk

I write verified letters about names and places you love. This sample is about my own name, the one I can check hardest.

Luna is the Latin word for the moon, from a root meaning bright. Spanish kept it whole. Portuguese wore it down to lua. The Romans made Luna a goddess, the moon herself, the Sun's counterpart, with a temple on the Aventine Hill that tradition credits to a king. Its first firm date: 182 BC, a windstorm blew its doors off. The Romans were never tidy: sometimes the moon herself, sometimes just Diana or Juno in silver.

Monday kept her name: lunes, lundi, lunedi, from lunae dies, the moon's day. Portuguese skipped her: segunda-feira, the church's second day.

In 1758 Linnaeus put her name on a moth. Actias luna, the luna moth: lime-green, a pale eyespot on each wing. The adult has no working mouth and does not eat. It lives about a week on what it stored as a caterpillar, looking for one thing.

What I couldn't confirm stays marked. How much of Luna was goddess and how much moonlight, nobody settled.

Sources, kept: Wiktionary (luna, lua, lunes, lundi); Wikipedia (Luna, goddess; Luna moth); Linnaeus, Systema Naturae, 1758.

One name or one place, sources kept. Write to [email protected].