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PUBLII OVIDII NASONIS FASTORUM

LIBRI VI.


OVID'S FASTI;

NOTES AND AN INTRODUCTION,

BY

THOMAS KEIGHTLEY,

Author of The Mythology of Ancient Greece and Italy, History of Greece,
History of Rome, etc.



Sex ego Fastorum scripsi, totidemque libellos;
Cumque suo finem mense volumen habet.
OVID. TRIST. II. 549.




PREFACE


No one, I should think, who has even done nothing more than look into
Ovid's Fasti, will refuse his assent to the following words of Hercules
Ciofanus, one of the earliest editors of this poem: _Ex omnibus_, says
he, _veterum poetarum monumentis nullum hodierno die exstat opus, quod,
aut eruditione aut rebus quae ad Romanam antiquitatem cognoscendam
pertineant, hos Ovidii Fastorum libros antecellat_. In effect we have
here ancient Roman history, religion, mythology, manners and customs, and
moreover much Grecian mythology, and that portion of the ancient
astronomy which regards the rising and setting of the different
constellations. These altogether form a wide field of knowledge; and in
my opinion there is not, in the whole compass of classical literature, a
work better calculated to be put into the hands of students.

Accordingly the Fasti are read at some of our great public schools and at
several of the private ones, and I have lately had the gratification of
seeing this very edition adopted at one of the most eminent of the great
schools. The name of the master of that school, did I feel myself at
liberty to mention it, would be a warrant for the goodness, at least the
relative goodness, of the present edition.

At the same time I will candidly confess that the work falls far short of
my own ideas of perfection in this department of literature. Circumstances,
which it is needless to mention, caused it to be executed in a very hurried
manner and without the necessary apparatus of books. It was in fact
undertaken, written, and printed in little more than two months. This is
mentioned in explanation of, not in excuse for, its defects--for no such
excuse should be admitted.

The text is that of Krebs, the latest German editor; from which however I
have occasionally departed, especially in the punctuation. In the notes
will be found the most important various readings of the fifty-eight MSS.
of this poem which have been collated. I have also adopted the Calendar
of Krebs' edition, as being on the whole the best, and as its copiousness
enables it to supply the place of arguments to the several books.

In the Introduction I have given such matter as the student should be
acquainted with previous to commencing the poem. The study of it will, I
trust, be found to be of advantage. My plan in writing the notes was, to
be as concise as was compatible with a full elucidation of the meaning of
the author. While therefore no difficult passage is left without at least
an attempt at explaining it, I have avoided swelling out my notes with
mythic or historic notices and narrations which may be found in the
Classical Dictionary. I suppose, for example, the student to know, or to
be able easily to discover, who Hercules and Romulus were, and where
Mount Haemus lies. Perhaps it would have been better if the notes on the
first two or three books had been more copious; those on the three last
are, I believe, sufficiently so.

Many references will be found to Niebuhr's History of Rome, and to my own
Mythology of Greece and Italy. For those to the former work I may perhaps
be entitled to thanks, as leading the attention to the noble discoveries
of the Bacon of history, as he is justly styled by Dr. Arnold. This last
eminent scholar is himself engaged on a History of Rome, of which apart
has appeared, and which promises to form a permanent portion of our
historic literature. In my own epitome of the Roman history sufficient
information on the portions of it alluded to will be found by those who
have not access to the work of Niebuhr. For the accuracy and fidelity of
the translation of Niebuhr's history by my friends Hare and Thirlwall, I
can pledge myself without any reservation. It may be useful here to add,
that the dates in the following notes are those of the Varronian
chronology, and not the Catonian as in my History of Rome.

With respect to my Mythology, I may boldly say it is the only work on the
subject in our language. Even the first edition (which is the one
referred to in the notes) received the approbation of the most competent
judges, and the second has been so much enlarged and improved as to form
in reality a new work. At the same time, I do not enjoin the study of it:
the references were merely intended for the use of those who desire
something more than the ordinary superficial acquaintance with mythology.

The _errata_, or typographical errors, are more numerous than they should
have been; but a complete list of them will be found on the page opposite
the commencement of the poem. There are, however, two or three errors of
a graver kind, which I may here rectify.

The reader will observe perhaps with surprise how completely I mistook
the sense of Lib. II. vv. 619, 620; though it is so obvious. The passage
might possibly bear the sense which I have given it; but it surely is not
what the poet meant. I was led into the error by v. 566. My interpretation
certainly gives the more poetical sense, and it is curious enough that I
have since met with the very same idea in one of the plays of our old
dramatist Ford:

"These holy rites perform'd, now take your times To spend the remnant of
the day in feasts. Such fit repasts are pleasing to the saints Who are
your guests, though not with mortal eyes To be beheld."

In the note on Lib. III. v. 845, the remark on _furta_ is trifling; for
that word is equivalent to _fures_, as _servitia_ is to _servi, operae_ to
_operarii_, etc., such being one of the peculiarities of the Latin
language. The time of the death of the Fabii is given incorrectly in the
note on Lib. II. v. 195: it should be "the Quinctilis of the year 277."
There is, I believe, no other error of any importance. Should another
edition be called for at any future time, I shall endeavour to make it
more complete,

T. K.

_Tunbridge Wells_, Aug. 30, 1839.




INTRODUCTION

§ 1. OF THE RISING AND SETTING OF THE STARS--§ 2. OF THE ROMAN YEAR
--§ 3. OF THE ROMAN MONTHS AND DAYS--§ 4. OF THE ROMAN FASTI--§ 5. OF
OVID'S POEM ON THE FASTI--§ 6. OF THE EDITIONS OF THIS POEM.


§ 1.

_Of the Rising and Setting of the Stars_.

The attention of a people who, like the ancient Greeks, dwelt in a region
where, during a great part of the year, the night might be passed in the
open air, and no mists or clouds obscured the heaven, must have been
early drawn to those luminous points which are scattered over it in such
profusion. They must have early learned to distinguish various clusters
of them, and thence to give them appropriate names. Accordingly, in the
most ancient portion of Grecian literature, the Homeric and Hesiodic
poems, we find various groupes of the stars designated by peculiar names.
Such are Orion, the Hyades, the Pleiades, the Bear or Wain, the Dog and
the Ploughman or Bear-ward (Boötes or Arcturus). The case was the same in
the East; we meet in the book of Job (c. ix. 9.) names for the Pleiades,
Hyades and Orion, and (xxvi. 14.) the constellation named the Great
Serpent. The people of ancient Italy appear to have done the same: the
Latin name of the Pleiades was _Vergiliae_, that of the Hyades _Suculae_,
the seven stars, which form the constellation of the Great Bear, were
named by them the _Septem Triones_, or Seven Oxen; for, as they go round
and round the pole without ever setting, the analogy between them and the
oxen, which trod out the corn by going round and round the _area_, or
threshing-floor, was an obvious one. Doubtless, the brilliant constellation
Orion, had a peculiar Latin name, which has not come down to us; of the
others, none but Greek appellations occur.

A very short acquaintance with the face of the stellar heaven sufficed to
shew, that it did not always remain the same. During a part of the year
Orion flamed in full magnificence on the sky, and, to the eye of the
Grecian herdsman and hunter, he and his Dog pursued the Bear, who kept
_watching_ him while the Pleiades (Peleiades, pigeons) were _flying_
before him; at another season the sky was destitute of this brilliant
scene. It was soon observed that the stars made 'their exits and their
entrances' at regular periods, corresponding with the changes which took
place in the course of nature on earth, and these coincidences were
marked and employed for agricultural purposes. A people who have no
regular scientific calendar, always contrives a natural one, taken from
celestial or terrestrial appearances. Thus the North American Aborigines
designate times and seasons by the flowering of certain plants; the
ancient Greeks appear to have done something of the same kind, for one of
Hesiod's designations of a particular season is, _when the thistle is in
blossom_; we ourselves call the first season of the year the Spring, (i.e.
of plants,) and our Transatlantic brethren term the autumn, the Fall
(of the leaves).

The Greeks, however, seem early to have seen the superior accuracy and
determinateness of the celestial phenomena. In the didactic poem of
Hesiod, this mode of marking the times of navigation and of rural labours
is frequently employed, and its use was retained by the countryfolk of
both Greece and Italy far into the time of the Roman empire. Those who
wrote on rural subjects or natural history, employed it; we meet it in
Aristotle, as well as in Pliny and Columella.

When intercourse with Egypt and Phoenicia had called the thoughts of the
Greeks to natural science, the rude astronomy of their rustic forefathers
became the subject of improvement. The name of Thales is, as was to be
expected, to be found at the head of the cultivators of this science. He
is said to have been the first who taught to distinguish between the real
and apparent rising and setting of a constellation; which implies a
knowledge of spheric astronomy. His example was followed and observation
extended by others, and as rain, wind, and other aërial phenomena were
held to be connected with the rising and setting of various signs, the
times of their risings and settings, both apparent and real, were
computed by Meton, Eudoxus, and other ancient astronomers. The tables
thus constructed were cut on brass or marble, and fixed up (whence they
were called [Greek: parapaegmata],) in the several cities of Greece, and
the peasant or sailor had only to look on one of these _parapegmata_, to
know what sign was about to rise or set, and what weather might be
expected. Without considering the difference of latitude and longitude,
the Romans borrowed the _parapegmata_, like every thing else, from the
Greeks. The countrymen, as we learn from Pliny (xviii. 60, 65,), ceased
to mark the stellar heaven, a _Kalendarium rusticum siderale_, (Colum.
ix. 14) taught him when the signs rose and set, and on what days he was
to expect sacrifices and festivals. When Virgil (G. I. 257.) says,

Nec frustra signorum obitus speculamur et ortus,
Temporibusque parem diversia quattuor annum.

it is, (as Voss observes,) more probable that it is one of these
calendars, and not the actual heaven that he means.

Before the time of Thales it was, of course only the visible and apparent
risings and settings of the signs that were the subject of observation.
But astronomers now learned to distinguish these phenomena into three
kinds. These they termed the cosmic, acronych, and heliac risings and
settings. The cosmic rising or setting ([Greek: kosmikos epitolae], or
[Greek: dusis],) was the true one in the morning; the acronych ([Greek:
akronychos][1]), _prima nox_, is evening, the beginning (one end) of the
night, the true one in the evening; the heliac, ([Greek: haeliakos]) the
apparent rising in the morning or setting in the evening. A star was said
to rise or set cosmically, when it rose or set at sun-rise; it rose or
set acronychally, when it rose or set at sun-set; it rose heliacally,
when in the morning it just emerged from the solar rays, it set in the
same manner, when in the evening it sank immediately after him. Two
general observations may be made here. 1. In the morning the true rising
precedes the apparent one, perhaps several days. 2. In the evening the
apparent setting precedes the real one. To illustrate this. Let us
suppose it 'spring time when the sun with Taurus rides,' the Hyades which
are in the head of Taurus will rise with the sun, but lost in his
effulgence they will elude our vision; at length when in his progress
through the Tauric portion of the ecliptic, he has left them a sufficient
distance behind him, their rising (as his motion in the ecliptic is
contrary to his apparent diurnal motion,) will precede his by a space of
time which will allow them to be seen. The real evening setting of a
star, is its sinking at the same moment with the sun below the horizon,
its heliac setting, is its becoming visible as he is setting and then
disappearing, that is ceasing to be visible after sun-set, in the western
part of the hemisphere. Thus the sun and the Hyades may actually set
together several days before they become sufficiently elongated from him,
to admit of their being seen before they set.

There are thus three risings, and three settings of a star, namely:--

The true morning rising, i. e. the cosmic.
The apparent morning rising, i. e. the heliac.
The true evening rising, i. e. the acronych.

The true morning setting, i. e. the cosmic.
The true evening setting, i. e. the acronych.
The apparent evening setting, i. e. the heliac.

Of these, the one which is most apt to engage the attention, is the
acronych or true evening rising, that is the rising of the star at the
eastern verge of the horizon, at the moment the sun is sinking on the
western side. It is of this I think, that Hesiod always speaks. The
attention of the constructors of parapegmata does not seem to have been
directed to the risings of the stars at different hours of the night.


§ 2.

_Of the Roman Year_.

Nothing is better established by competent authority, than that two kinds
of year were in use among the ancient Romans, the one of ten, the other
of twelve months. In the usual spirit of referring their ancient
institutions to those whom they regarded as their first kings, the
ten-month year was ascribed to Romulus, the improved one of twelve months
to Numa. This was the current opinion, such as we find it in the
following poem; some ancient writers, however, such as Licinius Macer and
Fenestella, to whom we may perhaps add Plutarch, rejected the ten-month
year as a mere fiction. Their opinion has been adopted by the great
Joseph Scaliger, who asserts that the Roman year always consisted of
twelve months. Both opinions may, I think, be maintained, the Romans may,
from the beginning of their state, have had a year of twelve months,
which I would call the Roman year, and yet have used along with it a year
of ten months, which, for reasons which will presently appear, I call the
Etruscan year. I will commence by showing that a year of ten months was
in use even in the time of the republic.

Ten months was the term for mourning; the fortunes of daughters, left by
will, were to be paid in three instalments of ten months each; on the
sale of olives, grapes on the vine, and wine in the vessels, ten month's
credit was given; the most ancient rate of interest also supposes a year
of ten months. It may further be noted, that even Scaliger, who rejected
this year, could not avoid remarking, how singular it was, that the
household festivals of the Saturnalia and the Matronalia should be the
one at the end of December, the other at the beginning of March. He did
not perceive that this would seem to indicate a time when, at the end of
a year of ten months, these two festivals were one, and male and female
slaves together enjoyed the liberty of the season.

These are mere presumptions; a nearer approach can be made to certainty.
There was nothing the ancient inhabitants of Italy more carefully
shunned, than drawing down the vengeance of the gods, by even an
involuntary breach of faith. It was also the custom, especially of the
Etruscans, to make peaces under the form of truces, for a certain number
of years. Now we find that, in the year 280, a peace was made with Veii
for 40 years. In 316 Fidenas revolted and joined Veii, which must then
have been at war with Rome, but 316-280, is only 36, yet the Romans,
though highly indignant, did not accuse the Veientines of breach of
faith. Suppose the truce made for 40 ten-month years, and it had expired
in the year 314. Again, in 329, a truce was made for twenty years, and
Livy says that it was expired in 347, but 347-329 is 18 not 20. Let the
year have been, of ten months, and the truce had ended in the year 346.
These are Etruscan cases, but we find the same mode of proceeding in
transactions with other nations; a truce for 8 years was made with the
Volscians in 323, and in 331 they were at war with Rome, without being
charged with perjury.

This ten-month year was that of the Etruscans who were the most learned
and cultivated people of the peninsula. As the civil years of the Latin
and other peoples were formed on various principles, and differed in
length, the Romans at least, if not the others, deemed it expedient to
use, in matters of importance, a common fixed measure of time. On all
points relating to science and religion they looked up to the Etruscans;
it was, therefore, a matter of course that their year should be the one
adopted.

This Etruscan year consisted of 304 days, divided into 38 weeks of eight
days each. It is not absolutely certain that it was also divided into
months, but all analogy is in favour of such a division. Macrobius and
Solinus say, that it contained six months of 31, and four of 30 days, but
this does not seem to agree with weeks of eight days; perhaps there were
nine months of four weeks and one of two, or more probably eight of four
weeks and two of three.[2] This year, which depended on neither the sun
nor the moon, was a purely scientific one, founded on astronomical
grounds and the accurate measurement of a long portion of time. It served
the Etruscans as a correction of their civil lunar year, the one which
was in common use, and, from the computations which have been made, it
appears that, by means of it, it may be ascertained that the Etruscans
had determined the exact length of the tropical or solar year, with a
greater degree of accuracy than is to be found in the Julian computation.

Like the Etruscans, the Romans employed for civil purposes a lunar year,
which they had probably borrowed also from that people. This year, which,
of course, like every year of the kind, must have consisted of twelve
months, fell short of the solar year by the space of 11 days and 6 hours,
and the mode adopted for bringing them into accordance was to
intercalate, as it was termed, a month in every other year, during
periods of 22 years, these intercalated months consisting alternately of
22 and 23 days. This month was named Mercedonius. In the last biennium of
the period no intercalation took place. As five years made a lustre, so
five of these periods made a secle, which thus consisted of 110 years or
22 lustres, and was the largest measure of time among the Romans.[3]

The care of intercalating lay with the pontiffs, and they lengthened and
shortened the year at their pleasure, in order to serve or injure the
consuls and farmers of the revenue, according as they were hostile or
friendly toward them. In consequence of this, Julius Caesar found the year
67 days in advance of the true time, when he undertook to correct it by
the aid of foreign science. From his time the civil year of the Romans
was a solar, not a lunar one,[4] and the Julian year continued in use
till the Gregorian reformation of the Calendar.

We thus see that the civil year of the Romans always consisted of twelve
months, and that a year of ten months was in use along with it in the
early centuries of the state, which served to correct it, and which was
used in matters of importance.[5]


§ 3.

_Of the Months and Days of the Roman Year_.

When it was believed that the year of 304 days was the original civil
year of the Romans, and evidence remained to prove that the commencement
of the year had, in former times, been regulated by the vernal equinox,
instead of the winter solstice, it seemed to follow, of course, that the
original year of Romulus had consisted of but ten months. The
inconvenience of this mode of dividing time must have been thought to
have appeared very early, since we find the introduction of the lunar
year of twelve months ascribed to Numa, who is said to have added two
months to the Romulian year, which, it would thus appear, was regarded
as having been a year of ten lunar months. This placing of the lunar
twelve-month year in the mythic age of Rome, I may observe, tends to
confirm the opinion of its having been in use from the origin of the
city.

The ancient Israelites had two kinds of year, a religious and a civil
one, which commenced at different seasons. Their months also originally,
we are told, proceeded numerically, but afterwards got proper names. As
the month Abib is mentioned by name in the book of Deuteronomy, I hazard
a conjecture, that the civil and religious years had coexisted from the
time of Moses, and that the months of the former had had proper names,
while those of the latter proceeded numerically. Is there any great
improbability in supposing the same to have been the case at Rome? The
religious year of ten months, as being least used, may have proceeded
with numerical appellations from its first month to December, while the
months of the civil year had each their peculiar appellation derived from
the name of a deity, or of a festival. It is remarkable that the first
six months of the year alone have proper names; but the remaining ones
may have had them also, though, from causes which we are unable to
explain, they have gone out of use, and those of the cyclic year have
been employed in their stead.[6]

The oriental division of time into weeks of seven days, though resulting
so naturally from the phases of the moon, was not known at Rome till the
time of the emperors. The Etruscan year, as we have seen, consisted of
weeks of eight days, and in the Roman custom of holding markets on the
_nundines_, or every ninth day, we see traces of its former use, but a
different mode of dividing the month seems to have early begun to
prevail.

In the Roman month there were three days with peculiar names, from their
places with relation to which the other days were denominated. These were
the Kalends (_Kalendae_ or _Calendae_,) the Nones, (_Nonae_) and the Ides
(_Idus_ or _Eidus_). The Kalends (from _calare_, to proclaim,) were the
first day of the month; the Nones (from _nonus_, ninth) were the ninth
day before the Ides reckoning inclusively; the Ides, (from iduare, to
divide,) fell about, not exactly on, the middle of the months. In March,
May, July and October, the Ides were the 15th, and, consequently, the
Nones the 7th day of the month; in the remaining months the Ides were the
13th, the Nones the 5th. The space, therefore, between the Nones and Ides
was always the same, those between the Kalends and Nones, and the Ides
and Kalends, were subject to variation. Originally, however, it would
appear, the latter space also was fixed, and there were in every month,
except February, 10 days from the Ides to the Kalends, The months,
therefore, consisted of 31 and 29 days, February having 28. In the Julian
Calendar, January, August and December were raised from 29 to 31 days,
while their Nones and Ides remained unchanged. It was only necessary then
to know how many days there were between the Kalends and Nones, as the
remaining portions were constant. Accordingly, on the day of new moon,
the pontiff cried aloud _Calo Jana novella_[7] five times or seven times,
and thus intimated the day of the Nones, which was quite sufficient for
the people.

We thus see that the Roman month was, like the Attic, divided into three
portions, but its division was of a more complex and embarrassing kind;
for while the Attic month consisted of three decades of days, and each
day was called the first, second, third, or so, of the decade, to which
it belonged; the days of the Roman month were counted with reference to
the one of the three great days which was before them. It is an error to
suppose that the Romans counted backwards. Thus, taking the month of
January for an example, the first day was the Kalends, the second was
then viewed with reference to the approaching Nones, and was denominated
the _fourth before the Nones_; the day after the Nones was the _eighth
before the Ides_; the day after the Ides, the _nineteenth before the
Kalends_ of February.

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