Bident Jupiter (also known as Jove, Etruscan Tinia), the trident or bident thus represents a forked lightning bolt. In ancient Italy, thunder and lightning were read as signs of divine will, wielded by the sky god Jupiter in three forms or degrees of severity (see "manubia"). The Romans drew on Etruscan traditions for the interpretation of these signs. A tile found at Urbs Salvia in Picenum depicts an unusual composite Jove, "fairly bristling with weapons": a lightning bolt, a bident, and a trident, uniting the realms of sky, earth, and sea, and representing the three degrees of ominous lightning (see also
Godefroy Wendelin illud sensus testatur, plane ut est cum sex planetis circa Solem, sic etiam se rem habere cum quatuor Jovialibus, ut circa corpus Jovis quilibet, quo longius ab illo potest excurrere, hoc tardius redeat, et id quidem proportione non eadem, sed majore, hoc est sescupla proportionis intervallorum cujusque a Jove: quae plane ipsissima est, qua utebantur supra sex planetae. Intervalla enim quatuor Jovialium a Jove prodit Marius in suo Mundo Joviali ista: 3, 5, 8, 13 (vel 14 Galilaeo) … Periodica vero tempora prodit idem Marius ista: dies 1. h. 18 1/2, dies 3 h. 13 1/3, dies 7 h. 3,