ANNUIT COEPTIS !

HAPPY NEW YEAR !
HAPPY NEW BEGINNINGS!
ANNUIT COEPTIS !

The back of the dollar bill has several famous Virgilian phrases that the founding fathers thought appropriate to memorialize.
The new country, America, with its vast, rich wilderness and its democratic philosophy, was metaphorically a “Novus Ordo  Seclorum” (“ A New Order of the Ages”), the phrase deriving from Virgil’s fourth Eclogue.
Then there is that fine phrase above the pyramid,  another quote from Virgil, “Annuit Coeptis” which translates as “ (God or Providence) has favored New Beginnings.”  The phrase comes from Virgil’s farmer’s manual, the Georgics:
“Da facilem cursum, atque audacibus annue cœptis“
“Give me an easy course and favor my daring new undertakings.”
Annuit Coeptis: Thirteen letters, thirteen colonies.

The obverse of the dollar bill has the most famous phrase  of them all  “E Pluribus Unum” (“Out of Many, One”).
Again, Thirteen letters, thirteen colonies.

And here we see Janus, the Roman god of the past and the future, of doors and portals, of births and deaths, of war and peace, of new beginnings.
He was a Roman God- there was no Greek antecedent.
The Etruscans before the Romans had their own  Janus-like deity, the “bifrons” (two-headed) Culsans.
Janus, Janua, Doors: May they all open for you in 2019!
May you have New Beginnings!
Annuit Coeptis !

Janus Bifrons sculpture (Giano Bifronte, 2nd cent BCE, from Vulci, Viterbo,  Italia).