Faun

Originally fauns of Roman mythology were ghosts (genii) of rustic places, lesser versions of their chief, the god Faunus.

Before their conflation with Greek satyrs, they and Faunus were represented as naked men (e.g. the Barberini Faun).

[1] Romans believed fauns stirred fear in men traveling in lonely, faraway or wild places.

They were also capable of guiding men in need, as in the fable of The Satyr and the Traveller, in the title of which Latin authors substituted the word Faunus.

[5] The French symbolist Stéphane Mallarmé's well-known masterpiece L'après-midi d'un faune (published in 1876) describes the sensual experiences of a faun who has just woken up from his afternoon sleep and discusses his encounters with several nymphs during the morning in a dreamlike monologue.