Picus

, a king of Latium, son of Saturn, who married Venilia, who is also called Canens, by whom he had Faunus. He was tenderly loved by the godde Pomona, and he returned a mutual affection. As he was one day hunting in the woods, he was met by Circe, who became deeply enamoured of him, and who changed him into a woodpecker, called by the name of pic us among the Latins. His wife Venilia was so disconsolate when she was informed of his death, that she pined away. Some suppose that Picus was the son of Pilumnus, and that he gave out prophecies to his subjects, by means of a favourite woodpecker, from which circumstance originated the fable of his being metamorphosed into a bird. Virgil , Æneid , bk. 7 , lis. 48, 171, . — Ovid , Metamorphoses , bk. 14 , li. 320 , .