Плутарх - Plutarch's Lives - Volume I

These ridiculous legends show the way in which the people had become accustomed to regard the gods. Indeed Numa is said to have placed all his hopes in religion, to such an extent that even when a message was brought him, saying, "The enemy are approaching," he smiled and said, "And I am sacrificing."

XVI. The first temples that he founded are said to have been those of Fides or Faith, and Terminus. Fides is said to have revealed to the Romans the greatest of all oaths, which they even now make use of; while Terminus is the god of boundaries, to whom they sacrifice publicly, and also privately at the divisions of men's estates; at the present time with living victims, but in old days this was a bloodless sacrifice, for Numa argued that the god of boundaries must be a lover of peace, and a witness of righteousness, and therefore averse to bloodshed.

Indeed Numa was the first king who defined the boundaries of the country, since Romulus was unwilling, by measuring what was really his own, to show how much he had taken from other states: for boundaries, if preserved, are barriers against violence; if disregarded, they become standing proofs of lawless injustice. The city had originally but a small territory of its own, and Romulus gained the greater part of its possessions by the sword. All this Numa distributed among the needy citizens, thereby removing the want which urged them to deeds of violence, and, by turning the people's thoughts to husbandry, he made them grow more civilised as their land grew more cultivated. No profession makes men such passionate lovers of peace as that of a man who farms his own land; for he retains enough of the warlike spirit to fight fiercely in defence of his own property, but has lost all desire to despoil and wrong his neighbours. It was for this reason that Numa encouraged agriculture among the Romans, as a spell to charm away war, and loved the art more because of its influence on men's minds than because of the wealth which it produced. He divided the whole country into districts, which he called pagi, and appointed a head man for each, and a patrol to guard it. And sometimes he himself would inspect them, and, forming an opinion of each man's character from the condition of his farm, would raise some to honours and offices of trust, and blaming others for their remissness, would lead them to do better in future.

XVII. Of his other political measures, that which is most admired is his division of the populace according to their trades. For whereas the city, as has been said, originally consisted of two races, which stood aloof one from the other and would not combine into one, which led to endless quarrels and rivalries, Numa, reflecting that substances which are hard and difficult to combine together, can nevertheless be mixed and formed into one mass if they are broken up into small pieces, because then they more easily fit into each other, determined to divide the whole mass of the people of Rome into many classes, and thus, by creating numerous petty rivalries, to obliterate their original and greatest cause of variance.

His division was according to their trades, and consisted of the musicians, the goldsmiths, the builders, the dyers, the shoemakers, the carriers, the coppersmiths, and the potters. All the other trades he united into one guild. He assigned to each trade its special privileges, common to all the members, and arranged that each should have its own times of meeting, and worship its own special patron god, and by this means he did away with that habit, which hitherto had prevailed among the citizens, of some calling themselves Sabines, and some Romans; one boasting that they were Tatius's men, and other Romulus's. So this division produced a complete fusion and unity. Moreover he has been much praised for another of his measures, that, namely, of correcting the old law which allows fathers to sell their sons for slaves. He abolished this power in the case of married men, who had married with their father's consent; for he thought it a monstrous injustice that a woman, who had married a free man, should be compelled to be the wife of a slave.

XVIII. He also dealt with astronomical matters, not with perfect accuracy, and yet not altogether without knowledge. During the reign of Romulus the months had been in a state of great disorder, some not containing twenty days, some five–and–thirty, and some even more, because the Romans could not reconcile the discrepancies which arise from reckoning by the sun and the moon, and only insisted upon one thing, that the year should consist of three hundred and sixty days.

Numa reckoned the variation to consist of eleven days, as the lunar year contains three hundred and fifty–four days, and the solar year three hundred and sixty–five. He doubled these eleven days and introduced them every other year, after February, as an intercalary month, twenty–two days in duration, which was called by the Romans Mercedinus. This was a remedy for the irregularities of the calendar which itself required more extensive remedies.

He also altered the order of the months, putting March, which used to be the first month, third, and making January the first, which in the time of Romulus had been the eleventh, and February the second, which then had been the twelfth. There are many writers who say that these months, January and February, were added to the calendar by Numa, and that originally there had only been ten months in the year, just as some barbarians have three, and in Greece the Arcadians have four, and the Acarnanians six. The Egyptians originally had but one month in their year, and afterwards are said to have divided it into four mouths; wherefore, though they live in the newest of all countries, they appear to be the most ancient of all nations, and in their genealogies reckon an incredible number of years, because they count their months as years.

XIX. One proof that the Romans used to reckon ten months and not twelve in the year is the name of the last month; for up to the present day it is called December , the tenth, and the order of the months shows that March was the first, for the fifth month from it they called Quintilis , the fifth; and the sixth month Sextilis, and so on for the others, although, by their putting January and February before March, it resulted that the month which they number fifth is really seventh in order. Moreover, there is a legend that the month of March, being the first, was dedicated by Romulus to Mars, and the second, April, to Aphrodité (Venus); in which month they sacrifice to this goddess, and the women bathe on the first day of it crowned with myrtle. Some, however, say that April is not named after Aphrodité, because the word April does not contain the letter h , and that it comes from the Latin word aperio , and means the month in which the spring–time opens the buds of plants; for that is what the word signifies. Of the following months, May is named after Maia, the mother of Hermes or Mercury, for it is dedicated to her, and June from Juno. Some say that these names signify old age and youth, for old men are called by the Latins majores, and young men juniores. The remaining months they named, from the order in which they came, the fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth: Quintilis, Sextilis, September, October, November, December. Then Quintilis was called Julius after Julius Caesar, who conquered Pompeius; and Sextilis was called Augustus, after the second of the Roman Emperors. The next two months Domitian altered to his own titles, but not for any long time, as after his death they resumed their old names of September and October. The last two alone have preserved their original names without change. Of the months, added or altered by Numa, Februarius means the month of purification, for that is as nearly as possible the meaning of the word, and during it they sacrifice to the dead, and hold the festival of the Lupercalia, which resembles a ceremony of purification. The first month, Januarius, is named after Janus. My opinion is, that Numa moved the month named after Mars from its precedence, wishing the art of good government to be honoured before that of war. For Janus in very ancient times was either a deity or a king, who established a social polity, and made men cease from a savage life like that of wild beasts. And for this reason his statues are made with a double face, because he turned men's way of life from one form to another.