Cult

Sacrifices

Sacrificial victims (hostiae) offered to Jupiter were the ox (castrated bull), the lamb (on the Ides, the ovis idulis) and the wether (on the Ides of January).^[44] The animals were required to be white. The question of the lamb's gender is unresolved; while a lamb is generally male, for the vintage-opening festival the flamen Dialis sacrificed a ewe.^[45] This rule seems to have had many exceptions, as the sacrifice of a ram on the Nundinae by the flaminica Dialis demonstrates. During one of the crises of the Punic Wars, Jupiter was offered every animal born that year.^[46]

Temples

Temple of Capitoline Jupiter

Main article: Temple of Jupiter (Capitoline Hill)

The temple to Jupiter Optimus Maximus stood on the Capitoline Hill in Rome.^[47] Jupiter was worshiped there as an individual deity, and with Juno and Minerva as part of the Capitoline Triad. The building was supposedly begun by king Tarquinius Priscus, completed by the last king (Tarquinius Superbus) and inaugurated in the early days of the Roman Republic (September 13, 509 BC). It was topped with the statues of four horses drawing a quadriga, with Jupiter as charioteer. A large statue of Jupiter stood within; on festival days, its face was painted red. ^[48] In (or near) this temple was the Iuppiter Lapis: the Jupiter Stone, on which oaths could be sworn.
Jupiter's Capitoline Temple probably served as the architectural model for his provincial temples. When Hadrian built Aelia Capitolina on the site of Jerusalem, a temple to Jupiter Capitolinus was erected in the place of the destroyed Temple in Jerusalem.

Other temples in Rome

There were two temples in Rome dedicated to Iuppiter Stator; the first one was built and dedicated in 294 BC by Marcus Atilius Regulus after the third Samnite War. It was located on the Via Nova, below the Porta Mugonia, ancient entrance to the Palatine.^[49] Legend has attributed its founding to Romulus.^[50] There may have been an earlier shrine (fanum), since the Jupiter's cult is attested epigraphically.^[51] Ovid places the temple's dedication on June 27, but it is unclear whether this was the original date,^[52] or the rededication after the restoration by Augustus.^[53]

Altar to Jupiter on the outskirts of legionary fortress, 2nd–3rd century AD. Inscription: "Dedicated by L. Lollius Clarus for himself and his family"

A second temple of Iuppiter Stator was built and dedicated by Quintus Caecilus Metellus Macedonicus after his triumph in 146 BC near the Circus Flaminius. It was connected to the restored temple of Iuno Regina with a portico (porticus Metelli).^[54]
Iuppiter Victor had a temple dedicated by Quintus Fabius Maximus Gurges during the third Samnite War in 295 BC. Its location is unknown, but it may be on the Quirinal, on which an inscription reading D]iovei Victore^[55] has been found, or on the Palatine according to the Notitia in the Liber Regionum (regio X), which reads: aedes Iovis Victoris. Either might have been dedicated on April 13 or June 13 (days of Iuppiter Victor and of Iuppiter Invictus, respectively, in Ovid's Fasti).^[56] Inscriptions from the imperial age have revealed the existence of an otherwise-unknown temple of Iuppiter Propugnator on the Palatine.^[57]