time *; and it was the duty of the pontifical college in particular to see that the intercalations were duly made. There is authority enough to prove that U. C. 702, U. C. 704, and U. C. 708, were regular intercalary years on which principle, U. C. 706 would be, or should have been, so too.

First-it appears from Asconii Præfatio in Orationem pro Milone, that U. C. 702, when Pompey was consul iii. sine collega, was intercalated. Pompey himself was appointed consul v Kal. Martias, mense interkalario and the Oratio pro Milone was delivered vi Ides of April afterwards ↑.

:

For the next year, Cicero writes to Atticus, from his province, Ut simus annui, ne intercaletur quidem P: again, in a letter written on the Ides of February, U. C. 704: Cum scies Romæ intercalatum sit necne 9. So likewise: Ea sic observabo, quasi intercalatum non sit. And that there was the usual intercalation, U. C. 704, whether Cicero wished it or not, appears from Dios. Curio, says Dio, to serve a party purpose in behalf of Cæsar, proposed another intercalary month to be inserted that year: ἠξίου μῆνα ἄλλον . . . ἐπεμβληθῆναι. There had been one, then, inserted previously.

As to the year U. C. 708, it was intercalated, according to Suetonius, ex consuetudine*.

The irregularity of the intercalations, generally speaking, of which Suetonius complains loc. cit. renders it superfluous to go much further back, in tracing out the series of such years, for any length of time. The first instance of intercalation upon record, according to Varro, as quoted by Macrobius, was Coss. Pinario et Furio, U.C.282: according to Fulvius, also quoted, was much later, U. C. 562, or 563. The Fasti triumphales and consulares notice some such years. B. C. 189 was an intercalated year. Lucius Scipio Asiaticus triumphed that year, Mense intercalario, pridie Kalendas Martias". B. C. 167 was intercalated Postridie Terminalia *: and B. C. 170 was the same, Tertio die post Terminalia y.

In these last instances, there were three years between two successive intercalations; which does not of itself imply any irregularity. The year of Numa 2 consisting of 355 days, not of 354, was ten days and six hours, not eleven days and six hours, less than a Julian one of 365 days and six hours. But the rule, originally, was to intercalate first 22 days, and then 23, alternately, every two years, the place of the intercalation being after Feb. 23: Terminalibus jam peractis. Four such intercalations in eight years would amount to ninety days; but the corresponding excess of eight Julian over eight of Numa's years would amount only to eighty-two: a difference which in 24 years, or three periods of eight years, would be equal to 24 days.

*The intercalation extraordinary in this year, or that in consequence of the rectification of the calendar, an intercalation

made at twice, is alluded to by Cicero, Ad Fam. vi. 14: Ego idem tamen, cum a. d. v Kalendas intercalares priores, &c.

y xliii. II.

Cf. Solini Polyhistor, i. §. 43. Ammianus Marcellinus, xxvi. 1. 447. Servius, Ad Æneid. v. 49. Macrobius, i. 14. u Livy, xxxvii. 59. * xlv. 44. Macrobius, i. 13.

To restore, therefore, the equality of the year of Numa to the Julian or Solar, tertio quoque octennio, says Macrobius, ita intercalandos dispensabant dies, ut non nonaginta, sed (90–24) sexaginta sex intercalarent". I understand this to mean that for the last eight years of every 24, they introduced three intercalary months of 22 days; two at the end of three years, and one at the end of two*. On this principle, between two successive intercalations, (as for instance, B. C. 170 and B. C. 167.) there might be periodically, that is, every 24 years, three years', and not two years' interval. This could not, however, have been the case, at the period of the battle of Pharsalia; because U. C. 704, before it, and U. C. 708, after it, were, as we have seen, intercalated years.

A still more recent example of an intercalary year was U. C. 671, two years before U. C. 673, when Cicero's Oration pro P. Quintio was pronounced b. On this principle, U. C. 703, just 32 years afterwards, it might be said, would be intercalary. But two intercalations only might take place in six years. U. C. 671

* And this was more agreeable to the usage of the Greeks, who intercalated thrice in the octaeteric cycle; in the third, the fifth, and the eighth years, respectively: τοὺς ἐμβολίμους μῆνας ἔταξαν ἄγεσθαι ἐν τῷ τρίτῳ ἔτει, καὶ πέμπτῳ, καὶ ὀγδόῳ δύο μὲν μῆνας, μεταξὺ δύο ἐτῶν πιπτόντων, that is, two complete years; viz. between the eighth and third, and the fifth and eighth: eva dè, peταξὺ ἑνὸς ἐνιαυτοῦ ἀγομένου, viz. that between the third and fifth. Geminus, cap. vi. Uranologion, 35.C.D. Epiphanius' account of the octaeteric cycle, in his time,

a Cf. Livy, i. 19.

differs from this; for he speaks
of ninety days as being to be
distributed over the cycle, in
three intercalary months of full
thirty days each ; κατὰ τρία ἔτη
μὴν εἶς, καὶ κατὰ δύο τὰ ὕστερα ἔτη
rà
un eis: that is, every three
years one month, which means
two months in the first six
years, and every two last years
of the cycle one month: Ope-
rum i. 825. C. Audiani xiii. On
this principle, the intercalated
years were the third, the sixth,
and the eighth; which Geminus
supposed to be the third, the
fifth, and the eighth.

b Capp. 6. 8. 12. 18. 25. Aulus Gellius, xv. 28.

might be one of those; and U. C. 674 the next: and U. C. 676 might be the end of that cycle of 24 years. Hence U. C. 676 + 24 or U. C. 700, would be the end of the next and U. C. 702, U. C. 704, U. C. 706, U. C. 708, would be the first eight years of the next cycle, and all intercalary of course.

The implicit testimony of Cicero respecting the date of the vernal equinox, U. C. 705, before the correction of the calendar, derives some confirmation from Dionysius of Halicarnassus, where he speaks of certain ceremonies as performed on the Ides or at the middle of May, oσov TI MIкpòv after the vernal equinox. Dionysius, it is true, was writing his history between U. C. 725 and U. C. 747, and therefore after the correction of the calendar in U. C. 708, when the vernal equinox had been fixed to March 25. But he can scarcely mean here the vernal equinox, as it had been recently fixed; he must mean it as it had been before: for he would not have called the Ides of May oroV TI μικρὸν after March 25.*

But the most decisive criterion of the difference between the civil year and the solar, at particular periods before the redressing of the calendar, is supplied by the dates of eclipses, which are mentioned in the Roman historians, and specified according to the old style. Thus, there was a solar eclipse, B. C. 190, v Ides of Quintilise. This must be the eclipse, mentioned in Pingrè for that year, on March 14, and vi

It may be supposed, too, from what is mentioned in Livyd, relating to the Ver Sacrum, that the time of the vernal equinox, U. C. 560, was somewhere about Pridie Kalendas Maias, if not that day itself. This would shew

c Ant. Rom. i. 38. p. 97. 1. 1.

a continued rate of progression for 520 years, which in the course of 148 more, might bring it to the middle of May. For the explanation of the phrase, Ver Sacrum, see Dionysius Hal. Ant. Rom. i. 16.

d xxxiv. 44.

Livy xxxvii. 4.

sible all over Europe. Between March 14 and v Ides of Quintilis (July 11) in the year of Numa, the difference would be 115 days in all f.

There was an eclipse of the moon, the night before Pridie Nonas Septembres *, Sept. 35. old style, B. C. 168, the night before the battle of Pydna; which

f Macrobius, i. 13. g Cicero, De Repub. i. circa principium. Livy, xliv. 37. Valerius Maximus, viii. xi. 1. Pliny, H. N. ii. 9. Justin, xxxiii. 1. Zonaras, ix. 23.458. A. Cf. 24. 459. D. Polybius, xxix. 6. and Suidas, in Пoλλà KEVÀ TOÛ TOλÉμOV.