But now for what I have been allowed to learn from the calendar itself. On this day the senate dedicated two temples. The island, which the river hems in with its parted waters, received him whom the nymph Coronis bore to Phoebus. Jupiter has his share of the site. One place found room for both, and the temples of the mighty grandsire and the grandson are joined together.
Who says me nay if I would tell also of the stars, their risings and their settings? That was part of my promise. Ah happy souls, who first took thought to know these things and scale the heavenly mansions! Well may we believe they lifted up their heads alike above the frailties and the homes of men. Their lofty natures neither love nor wine did break, nor civil business nor the toils of war; no low ambition tempted them, nor glory’s tinsel sheen, nor lust of hoarded pelf. The distant stars they brought within our ken, and heaven itself made subject to their wit. So man may reach the sky: no need that Ossa on Olympus should be piled, and that Pelion’s peak should touch the topmost stars. Under these leaders we, too, will plumb the sky and give their own days to the wandering signs.
III. Non. 3rd
Therefore when the third night before the Nones has come, and the ground is sprinkled and drenched with heavenly dew, you shall look in vain for the claws of the eight-footed Crab: headlong he’ll plunge beneath the western waves
Non. 5th
Should the Nones be at hand, showers discharged from sable clouds will be your sign, at the rising of the Lyre.
V. Id. 9th
Add four successive days to the Nones, and on the Agonal morn Janus must be appeased. The day may take its name from the attendant who, in garb succinct, fells at a blow the victim of the gods; for just before he dyes the brandished knife in the warm blood, he always asks “Agone?” (“Shall I proceed?”), and not until he is bidden does he proceed. Some believe that the day is named Agonal from the driving of the victims, because the sheep do not come but are driven (agantur) to the altar. Others think the ancients called this festival Agnalia (“festival of lambs”), dropping a single letter from its proper place. Or perhaps, because the victim fears the knives mirrored in the water before they strike, the day may have been so styled from the brute’s agony. It may be also that the day took a Greek name from the games (agones) which were wont to be held in the olden time. In the ancient tongue, too, agonia meant a sheep, and that last, in my judgement, is the true reason of the name. And though that is not certain, still the King of the Sacred Rites is bound to placate the divinities by sacrificing the mate of a woolly ewe. The victim is so called because it is felled by a victorious right hand; the hostia (sacrificial victim) takes its name from conquered hostes (foes).
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