<Dl> <Dd> See also Women in ancient Rome: Religious life </Dd> </Dl> <Dd> See also Women in ancient Rome: Religious life </Dd> <P> Roman women were present at most festivals and cult observances . Some rituals specifically required the presence of women, but their active participation was limited . As a rule women did not perform animal sacrifice, the central rite of most major public ceremonies . In addition to the public priesthood of the Vestals, some cult practices were reserved for women only . The rites of the Bona Dea excluded men entirely . Because women enter the public record less frequently than men, their religious practices are less known, and even family cults were headed by the paterfamilias . A host of deities, however, are associated with motherhood . Juno, Diana, Lucina, and specialized divine attendants presided over the life - threatening act of giving birth and the perils of caring for a baby at a time when the infant mortality rate was as high as 40 percent . </P> <P> Literary sources vary in their depiction of women's religiosity: some represent women as paragons of Roman virtue and devotion, but also inclined by temperament to self - indulgent religious enthusiasms, novelties and the seductions of superstitio . </P>

What was the primary function of the gods in roman religion