Like so much Roman culture, the word calendae was directly incorporated into the early Church which replaced the pagan gods’ name days and feast days with their Christian equivalents. Nones – nine days before the ides and so the fifth day of the month, except in March, May, July and October when it was the 7th. Ides – the 13th day of the month except in March, May, July and October, when the ides fell on the 15th. When they saw it, they would ‘declare’ the number of days till the nones (five or seven, depending on the month the Romans didn’t number the days of the month like we do, but defined days as a certain number of days before or after key days in each month, namely the nones – 5 or 7 days into the new months – and the ides – 15 days in i.e. In Rome new moons were not calculated mathematically but observed by the priests from the Capitol.
Kalends itself derived from the Latin verb calare meaning ‘to announce solemnly, to call out’, as the Roman priests did when they proclaimed the new moon that marked the kalends. This word referred to the first day of the Roman month when debts fell due and accounts were reckoned. In fact the word we use, ‘calendar’, is also Latin, from kalendae, the plural of kalends. So the poem was intended to be in 12 books, one for each month, with each month containing an introduction (and explanation of the etymology of the month’s name) before moving on to zero in on the 10 or 12 key dates in each month. Slowly, by association, the word fasti came to mean list of significant or important dates. Rome’s college of priests declared some days legitimate to do business (dies fasti) and other days not legitimate (dies nefasti). Originally the word ‘fasti’ meant something like legitimate or legal. It’s an odd omission and the same goes for all the other astrological passages – meaning they all remained obscure and enigmatic to me from start to finish. The OUP edition has an impressively long Index of Names, from which I learn that the Lyre and the Lion are constellations, which I think I could have worked out for myself – but nothing explaining what this passage refers to, in astrological or mythological terms. What’s odd is that, although the Oxford University Press (OUP) edition I set out to read (translation by Ann and Peter Wiseman) is festooned with notes, there are no notes to explain this little passage. On the night coming after this star, the fire that gleams in the middle of Lion‘s chest will have been submerged. When the seventh rising sun from here has plunged himself into the waves, there will now be no Lyre shining anywhere in the sky. They were the most notable among many aspects of the poem which were obscure or downright incomprehensible. Unfortunately, the most striking thing about the astrological references is that they made no sense to me whatsoever. And the stars were also meant to exert a concealed influence on human affairs, and understanding how this worked was a special science known only to soothsayers and priests. The stars themselves were arranged in constellations thought to depict various gods and heroes and monsters who had been immortalised in the sky, so you have a whole set of stories to tell right there. The Romans took study of the stars very seriously. Speaking of venerable experts on astrology, Ovid says:įollowing these masters I too will measure out the skies,Īnd attribute the wheeling signs to their proper dates. All of these elements had customs and traditions and legends associated with them and it was these that Ovid set out to investigate and set down in chronological order.
Juno and venus conspire translation plus#
This is more colourful than it sounds because the Roman calendar was packed with feast days and festivals and anniversaries of great battles or constitutional landmarks, plus the dies comitiales or dates assigned for the numerous elections to the various magistracies. The Fasti was intended to be a longish poem about the Roman calendar. The Roman poet, Pūblius Ovidius Nāsō, generally known simply as Ovid was half-way through writing the Fasti when, in 8 AD, he was abruptly sent into exile. (Anne and Peter Wiseman’s prose translation) The word ‘fasti’ Times and their reasons, arranged in order through the Latin year, and constellations sunk beneath the earth and risen, I shall sing. Their origins, and the stars that set beneath the earth and rise. I’ll speak of divisions of time throughout the Roman year,
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