Calendrical Notes

[Clavdivs]

To-day is the third day before the Nones of January (ANTE DIEM III NONAS IANVARII), in modern reckoning the third of January.

The late calendars of Polemius (fifth century) and Philocalus (fourth century) give between them to-day, -to-morrow and the day after to-morrow as LVDI, public games. Polemius reveals that by this late period these were the dates of the LVDI COMPITALES (with to-morrow explicitly marked as the day of the LVDI COMPITALES = COMPITALIA?), but this dating rested purely on tradition, i.e. they never became FERIAE STATIVAE, festivals of fixed date. These late dates are contradicted by e.g. Dionysius of Halicarnassus, a source of the first century B.C.E., who gives them as ''a few days'' after the SATVRNALIA (Roman Antiquities, Book IV Chapter XIV).

Macrobius, also of fourth-century date, makes this clear in the sixteenth chapter of the first book of his Saturnalia, in which he ranks them as FERIAE CONCEPTIVAE held a few days after the Saturnalia.

Returning to the Republican period, Varro, in his ''Latin Language'' (Book Six, Chapter Twenty-Five), gives us the following: ''...now I shall speak of the annual festivals which are not fixed on a special day. The COMPITALIA is the day assigned to the Lares of the highways, therefore where the highways 'COMPETVNT' (meet), sacrifice is then made at the 'COMPITA' (crossroads).''

In Rome, the SACELLA of the Lares Compitales, two in each case, were erected at the points where two VICI or streets of houses met. These, naturally, formed the religious centres of their district and colleges or COLLEGIA COMPITALICIA were set up. These were open to freedmen, slaves and other lowly men and were much exploited by unscrupulous populists, leading to their suppression in 64 B.C.E (the year of the consulship of Caesar and Figulus, of the City six hundred and ninety). They were revived by perhaps the most notorious populist of all, CLODIVS PVLCHER, who abandoned his patrician status, in a LEX CLODIA DE COLLEGII in 56 B.C.E. (the year of the consulship of Lentulus and Philippus, of the City six hundred and ninety-eight)

It has commonly been said that Julius Caesar suppressed them, but the passage in Suetonius, in the forty-second chapter of his ''Julius'': ''He dissolved all guilds, except those of ancient foundation.'' This cannot refer to the COLLEGIA COMPITALICIA, for Dionysius of Halicarnassus, again in the fourteenth chapter of the fourth book of the Roman Antiquities, states that they were founded by Servius Tullius, the penultimate king of Rome: ''he commanded that there should be erected in every street by the inhabitants of the neighbourhood chapels to heroes whose statues stood in front of the houses, and he made a law that sacrifices should be performed to them every year, each family contributing a honey-cake. He directed also that the persons attending and assisting those who performed the sacrifices at these shrines on behalf of the neighbourhood should not be free men, but slaves, the ministry of servants being looked upon as pleasing to the heroes. This festival the Romans still continued to celebrate even in my day in the most solemn and sumptuous manner a few days after the Saturnalia, calling it the Compitalia, after the streets; for compiti is their name for streets.And they still observe the ancient custom in connexion with those sacrifices, propitiating the heroes by the ministry of their servants, and during these days removing every badge of their servitude, in order that the slaves, being softened by this instance of humanity, which has something great and solemn about it, may make themselves more agreeable to their masters and be less sensible of the severity of their condition.''

We must, then, conclude that the COLLEGIA lapsed in the disturbed times of the civil wars and then were revived by Augustus which is indeed the clear sense of Suetonius' ''Augustus'', Chapter 31 -- '' He also revived some of the ancient rites which had gradually fallen into disuse, such as the augury of Safety, the office of Flamen Dialis, the ceremonies of the Lupercalia, the Secular Games, and the festival of the Compitalia... He provided that the Lares of the Crossroads should be crowned twice a year, with spring and summer flowers.''

In the country districts, too, the COMPITALIA was celebrated. A. Persius Flaccus, a satirist of the first century C.E., gives us invaluable information regarding its rites. In the fourth Satire, parodying a miser, we find:

''...whenever he fastens up the yoke at the festival of crossroads and thoroughfares, in the extremity of his dread at scraping off the ancient incrustation from his dwarf wine jar, groans out ''May it be for the best!'' as he munches onions, coats and all, with salt, and while his slaves are clapping their hands with ecstasy at the mess of meal, gulps down the mothery lees of expiring vinegar''

Thus, we know that a yoke was set up, perhaps at the crossroads (cf. Ovid in his ''Fasti'' on the Paganalia: ''Let the farmer hang the toil-worn plough on its post''), the commentator on my copy of Persius gives ''The yoke was hung up, with the other parts of the plough, as a symbol of the suspension of labour.'

There was evidently a feast, though less miserable than onions, PVLS and salt, and wine was drunk in abundance (Cf. Cato's DE AGRICVLTVRA: ''In addition, issue 3½ congii [of wine, i.e. eighteen pints and 2 gills] per person for the Saturnalia and the Compitalia.) with the toast ''HOC BENE SIT''. The plebeian character of the Compitalia is as clear in the country as in the city -- the master provides a meal for his slaves. Cf. also Cato's DE AGRICVLTVRA, on the duties of the VILICVS, ''He must perform no religious rites, except on the occasion of the Compitalia at the cross-roads, or before the hearth'', thus, it was essentially a celebration of rude and rustic people, superintended not by the master but by his steward.

The sacrifice (Warde Fowler) appears to have been offered at an altar set up at a crossroads, or where two paths between fields crossed.