Their virginity was deemed essential to Rome's survival; if found guilty of inchastity, they were buried or entombed alive.

In some Roman traditions, Rome's founders Romulus and Remus and the benevolent king Servius Tullius were conceived in this way.

[5] Another proposed etymology is that Vesta derives from Latin vestio ("clothe"), as well as from Greek ἑστία (hestia, "hearth" = focus urbis).

[10] According to tradition, worship of Vesta in Italy began in Lavinium, the mother-city of Alba Longa and the first settlement by the Trojan refugees after their flight from Troy's destruction, led there by Aeneas and guided by Venus.

The existence of Vestal Virgins in Alba Longa is connected with early Roman traditions, for the mother of Romulus' and Remus, Silvia, was a priestess of Vesta, impregnated by either Mars or Hercules.

After assuming the office of pontifex maximus in 12 BC, Augustus gave part of his private house to the Vestals as public property and incorporated a new shrine of Vesta within it.

The old shrine remained in the Forum Romanum's temple of Vesta, but Augustus' gift linked the public hearth of the state with the official home of the pontifex maximus and the emperor's Palatine residence.

[19] In 12 BC, 28 April (first of the five day Floralia) was chosen ex senatus consultum to commemorate the new shrine of Vesta in Augustus' home on the Palatine.

Dedications in the Atrium of Vesta, dating predominantly AD 200 to 300, attest to the service of several Virgines Vestales Maxime.

379, Gratian stepped down as pontifex maximus;[17] in 382 he confiscated the Atrium Vestae[15] and simultaneously withdrew its public funding.

[24] Depicted as a good-mannered deity who never involved herself in the quarreling of other gods, Vesta was ambiguous at times due to her contradictory association with the phallus.

Unlike most gods, Vesta was hardly depicted directly; nonetheless, she was symbolized by her flame, the fire stick, and a ritual phallus (the fascinus).

She was sometimes thought of as a personification of the fire stick which was inserted into a hollow piece of wood and rotated – in a phallic manner – to light her flame.

It was also because the virgins' ritual concern extended to the agricultural cycle and ensured a good harvest that Vesta enjoyed the title of Mater ("Mother").

Servius's hair was kindled by his father without hurting him, and even his statue in the temple of Fortuna Primigenia was unharmed by fire after his assassination.

[50] The temple of Vesta held not only the ignes aeternum ("sacred fire"), but the Palladium of Pallas Athena and the di Penates as well.

[51] The Palladium of Athena was, in the words of Livy: "fatale pignus imperii Romani" ("[a] pledge of destiny for the Roman empire").

[58] The Vestal Virgins lived together in a house near the Forum (Atrium Vestae), supervised by the Pontifex Maximus.

A Vestal who broke her vow of chastity could be tried for incestum and if found guilty, buried alive in the Campus Sceleris ('Field of Wickedness').

[58][59][60] The februae (lanas: woolen threads) that were an essential part of the Vestal costume were supplied by the rex sacrorum and flamen dialis.

[64] Domestic and family life in general were represented by the festival of the goddess of the house and of the spirits of the storechamber – Vesta and the Penates – on Vestalia (7 – 15 June).

[65] On the first day of festivities the penus Vestae (sanctum sanctorum of her temple which was usually curtained off) was opened, for the only time during the year, at which women offered sacrifices.

[66] As long as the curtain remained open, mothers could come, barefoot and disheveled, to leave offerings to the goddess in exchange for a blessing to them and their family.

[68][25] The final day (15 June) was Q(uando) S(tercum) D(elatum) F(as) ["when dung may be removed lawfully"] – the penus Vestae was solemnly closed; the Flaminica Dialis observed mourning, and the temple was subjected to a purification called stercoratio: the filth was swept from the temple and carried next by the route called clivus Capitolinus and then into the Tiber.

When the handmaid gave birth to twins by the phantom, Tarchetius handed them over to his subordinate, Teratius, with orders to destroy them.

[72][73] Plutarch concludes with a contrast between Promathion's version of Romulus' birth and that of the more credible Fabius Pictor which he describes in a detailed narrative and lends support to.

King Tarquinius, upon hearing this, was astonished; but Tanaquil, whose knowledge of divination was well-known, told him it was a blessing that a birth by the hearth's phallus and a mortal woman would produce superior offspring.

[76] In book 6 of Ovid's Fasti: Cybele invited all the gods, satyrs, rural divinities, and nymphs to a feast, though Silenus came uninvited with his donkey.

As he approached her in order to violate her, the ass brought by Silenus let out a timely bray, whereupon Vesta awoke and Priapus barely escaped the outraged gods.