Bidendal (or Bidental)

Bidendal (Or Bidental)

in pagan superstition, is a popular appellation given to any place stricken with a thunderbolt, and on that account held too sacred to be trodden on. The Romans, believing that an evidence that Jupiter claimed such a place for himself, surrounded it with a wall, rail, stakes, or even a rope, and expiated by the sacrifice of a bidens, or two-year-old sheep.

⇒See also the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia.