Orcus The so-called Tomb of Orcus, an Etruscan site at Tarquinia, is a misnomer, resulting from its first discoverers mistaking as Orcus a hairy, bearded giant that was actually a figure of a Cyclops. The Romans sometimes conflated Orcus with other gods such as Pluto, Hades, and Dis Pater, god of the land of the dead. The name "Orcus" seems to have been given to his evil and punishing side, as the god who tormented evildoers in the afterlife. Like the name Hades (or the Norse Hel, for that matter), "Orcus" could also mean the land of the dead. Orcus was
90482 Orcus a result of rotational fission of the primordial Orcus, which would have rotated much faster than now. On 23 March 2009, Brown asked readers of his weekly column to suggest possible names for the satellite, with the best one to be submitted to the International Astronomical Union (IAU) on 5 April. The name Vanth, after the Etruscan goddess who guided the souls of the dead to the underworld, was eventually chosen from among a large pool of submissions. This submission was assessed by the IAU's Committee for Small Body Nomenclature, which voted to approve it in March 2010, in accordance