Mercury (mythology) Mercury (mythology) Mercury (; Latin: "Mercurius" ) is a major god in Roman religion and mythology, being one of the Dii Consentes within the ancient Roman pantheon. He is the god of financial gain, commerce, eloquence, messages, communication (including divination), travelers, boundaries, luck, trickery and thieves; he also serves as the guide of souls to the underworld. He was considered the son of Maia, who was a daughter of the Titan Atlas, and Jupiter in Roman mythology. His name is possibly related to the Latin word "merx" ("merchandise"; cf. "merchant", "commerce", etc.), "mercari" ("to trade"), and "merces" ("wages"); another possible
The Boy Who Was in history, connected only by Nino's involvement. Chapter 3, "Poseidon and the Greeks", covers the building of the temple of Poseidon in Paestum. Chapter 4, "The Romans and the Volcano", tells of the destruction of Pompeii. Chapter 5, "The Last of the Goths", is a highly romanticized view of the fall of the Ostrogothic kingdom in southern Italy which followed the western Roman empire and was in turn followed by the Lombards. Chapter 6, "The Normans and the Saracens", has Nino telling Robert Guiscard's army about a group of Norman soldiers sixty years earlier who repelled a Saracen pirate attack