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==Cult themes in modern scholarship==
Bona Dea's is the only known festival in which women could gather at night, drink strong, sacrificial-grade wine and perform a blood sacrifice. Although women were present at most public ceremonies and festivals, the religious authorities in Roman society were the male [[College of Pontiffs|pontiffs]] and [[augur]]s, and women could not lawfully perform rites at night, unless "offered for the people in proper form".<ref>Cicero, ''De Legibus'', 2.9.21.</ref> Women were allowed wine at these and other religious occasions. At other times, they might drink weak, sweetened, or diluted wine in moderation but Roman traditionalists believed that  in the more distant and virtuous past, this was forbidden,<ref>Aulus Gellius, ''Noctes Atticae'', [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2007.01.0072%3Abook%3D10%3Achapter%3D23%3Asection%3D1 10.23.1]. He claims the principal source for this prohibition is the 2nd century BC agriculturalist and moralist, Cato the Elder. See also {{harvnb|Versnel|1992|p=44}}.</ref> "for fear that they might lapse into some disgraceful act. For it is only a step from the intemperance of [[Liber]] pater to the forbidden things of Venus".<ref>Valerius Maximus, 2.1.5.</ref> Some ancient sources infer that women were banned from offering blood-and-wine sacrifice in their own right; even banned from handling such materials; both claims are questionable.<ref>Prohibitions against the handling of wine and the preparation of meat by Roman women occur in Roman literature as retrospective examples of time-hallowed tradition, in which the Vestals, whose duties include the supervision of Bona Dea's rites, are the significant exception. Some modern scholarship challenges these traditional assumptions. While female drunkenness was disapproved of, so was male drunkenness, and the moderate consumption of wine by women was probably a commonplace of domestic and religious life. Lawful blood-and-wine sacrifice is indicated many female-led cults, particularly in Graeca Magna and Etruria. See Emily A. Hemelrijk, in Hekster, Schmidt-Hofner and Witschel (Eds.), ''Ritual Dynamics and Religious Change in the Roman Empire'', Proceedings of the Eighth Workshop of the International Network Impact of Empire (Heidelberg, July 5–7, 2007), Brill, 2009, pp. [https://books.google.com/books?id=Crzsx0aKeeYC&pg=PA255&dq=Cicero 253–267].</ref> Nevertheless, the strong, sacrificial grade wine used in the rites to Bona Dea was normally reserved for Roman gods, and Roman men.<ref>{{harvnb|Versnel|1992|p=32|ps=: "...the most surprising aspect is the nature of the drinks: during this secret, exclusively female, nocturnal festival the women were allowed to drink – at the very least to handle – wine"}}. See also {{harvnb|Versnel|1992|p=45}}, and {{harvnb|Wildfang|2006|p=31}}.</ref>

The unusual permissions implicit at these rites probably derived from the presence and religious authority of the Vestals. They were exceptional and revered persons; virgins, but not subject to their fathers' authority; and matrons, but independent of any husband. They held forms of privilege and authority otherwise associated only with Roman men, and were answerable only to the Senior Vestal and the [[Pontifex Maximus]]. Their ritual obligations and religious integrity were central to the well being of the Roman state and all its citizens.<ref>Modern scholarship on the Vestals is summarised in {{harvnb|Parker|2004|pp=563–601}}. See also discussion in {{harvnb|Wildfang|2006|pp=31–32}}.</ref>

The euphemistic naming of strong wine at this festival has been variously described as an actual substitution for milk and honey, relatively late in the cult's development; as a theological absurdity;<ref>Versnel, H.S., Inconsistencies in Greek and Roman Religion: Transition and reversal in myth and ritual, BRILL, 1994, p. 233. {{Harvnb|Brouwer|1989}} regards the wine as a substitution for earlier sacrifices of milk and honey.</ref> and as an ingenious justification for behaviours that would be considered unacceptable outside this specific religious sphere. Fauna's myths illustrate the potential of wine as an agent of sexual transgression; wine was thought to be an invention of Liber-Dionysus, who was present as the male principle in certain "soft fruits", including semen and grapes; and ordinary wine was produced under the divine patronage of [[Venus (mythology)|Venus]], the goddess of love and sexual desire. Its aphrodisiac effects were well known.{{Sfn|Staples|1998|pp=85–90}}{{Sfn|Versnel|1992|p=45}}

For Staples, the euphemisms are agents of transformation. The designation of wine as "milk" conceives it as an entirely female product, dissociated from the sexually and morally complex realms of Venus and Liber. Likewise, the wine jar described as a "honey jar" refers to bees, which in Roman lore are sexually abstinent, virtuous females who will desert an adulterous household.{{Sfn|Staples|1998|pp=125–126}} Myrtle, as the sign of Venus, Faunus' lust and Fauna's unjust punishment, is simply banned; or as Versnel puts it, "Wine in, Myrtle out".{{Sfn|Versnel|1992|p=44}} The vine-leaf bowers and the profusion of plants – any and all but the forbidden myrtle – transform the sophisticated, urban banqueting hall into a "primitive" dwelling, evoking the innocence of an ancestral golden age in which women rule themselves, without reference to men or Venus, drinking "milk and honey", which are "markers par excellence of utopian golden times"<ref>{{harvnb|Versnel|1992|p=45}}, citing Graf F., "Milch, Honig und Wein. Zum Verstindnis der Libation im Griechischen Ritual', In G. Piccaluga  (ed.), Perennitas. Studi in onore di A. Brelich, Rome, 1980, pp. 209–21. Some myths credit Liber-Dionysus with the discovery of honey; but not its invention.</ref> – under the divine authority of Bona Dea.<ref>{{harvnb|Versnel|1992|p=45|ps=: "On the other hand, the mimicry may also have functioned as fuel for 'laughter of the oppressed"... "'say, dear, would you be so kind as to pass on the milk?'"}}</ref>