Leonardo Magini
ASTRONOMY AND CALENDAR
IN ANCIENT ROME
The Eclipse Festivals
«L'ERMA» di BRETSCHNEIDER
ASTRONOMY AND CALENDAR
I N ANCIENT ROME
The Eclipse Festivals
by
Leonardo Magini
«L'ERMA» di BRETSCHNEIDER
CONTENTS
Foreword by Vittorio Castellani
P R E F A C E : A S T R O N O M Y AND A S T R O L O G Y I N R O M E
PART I: T H E E C L I P S E C Y C L E
1.1. Solar eclipses and lunar eclipses
1.2 Ascending lunar node and descending lunar node, or Head
and Tail of the Dragon
1.3 The Saros cycle
1.4 The period of revolution of the lunar nodes and the Saros
cycle, w i t h the eclipse year
1.5 The N u m a n year and the 24-year cycle of intercalations
1.6 The Saros cycle and the festival of Anna Perenna, the period o f r e v o l u t i o n o f the l u n a r nodes and the festival o f October
Equus
PART II: A S T R O N O M I C A L C Y C L E S AND R O M A N F E S T I V A L S
2 . 1 . The solar eclipse o f the first day o f the cycle, 1 M a r c h o f
year 01
2.2. 15 M a r c h , Anna Perenna
2.3. 15 October, October Equus
2.4. 20 June, Summanus
9
13
11
22
25
31
31
38
41
46
59
67
PART I H : E C L D 7 S E S AND T H E A N C I E N T ROMAN C A L E N D A R
3.1. The cadence of the solar and l u n a r eclipses w i t h i n the
Saros cycle
3.2. The cadence of the solar and lunar eclipses w i t h i n the
N u m a n cycle
3.3. The cadence of the solar and lunar eclipses and the festivals
of the N u m a n year
3.4. 24 February, Regifugium, and 9 June, Vestalia
3.5. Theoretical eclipses and real eclipses, eclipses of m y t h and
eclipses of history
104
CONCLUSION
109
73
80
89
93
5
Appendix 1. Theoretical months and real months, theoretical
lunations and real lunations
References
Index of subjects
Table 14: The solar and lunar eclipses of the first Saros cycle i n
the N u m a n cycle
FIGURES
Figure 1. Eclipse of the sun
Figure 2. Eclipse of the m o o n
Figure 3. The piane of the apparent orbits of the m o o n and of
the sun
Figure 4. The apparent orbits of the sun and m o o n and the t w o
lunar nodes
Figure 5. The retrograde m o t i o n of the lunar nodes along the
ecliptic
Figure 6. Sidereal m o n t h and synodic m o n t h
Figure 7. The Head and the Tail of the Dragon, i.e. the ascending and descending lunar nodes
Figure 8. The so-called "Saros-Canon", Babylonian tablet dating
from the t h i r d century B.C. ( F r o m Pannekoek 1989)
Figure 9. The movement of the earth around the sun, w i t h the
First Point of Aries, or Point Gamma, and the Point of Libra
Figure 10. The lunar nodes and the passage through the Points
of Aries and L i b r a
Figure 11. The arresting points of the m o o n
Figure 12. N u n d i n a l table of the market days of the cities of
L a t i u m and Campania
TABLES
Table 1. The Saros cycle
Table 2. The N u m a n cycle of 24 intercalated lunar years
Table 3. The N u m a n cycle and the motions of the sun, m o o n and
Venus
Table 4. The Saros cycle, the revolution of the lunar nodes and
the festivals of the N u m a n year
Table 5. The solar eclipses i n the Saros cycle
Table 6. The lunar eclipses i n the Saros cycle
6
113
119
123
127
17
18
19
19
22
23
24
29
68
69
72
112
25
35
36
39
76
78
Table 7. The solar eclipses i n the N u m a n cycle
Table 8. The lunar eclipses i n the N u m a n cycle
Table 9. The Saros cycle i n the first 19 years o f the N u m a n cycle
Table 10. The solar eclipses and the festivals of Vesta and of the
kingship
Table 11. The Eclipse Table i n the Dresden Codex and the intervals between the festivals i n the N u m a n cycle
Table 12. The first new moons of the various years of the N u m a n
cycle
Table 13. The first full moons o f the various years o f the N u m a n
cycle
Table 14. The solar and lunar eclipses of the first Saros cycle i n
the N u m a n cycle
82
84
88
103
106
115
116
127
Note. I n the few cases i n this book i n w h i c h etymological questions are addressed (especially chapter 2.2, on Anna Perenna), the author does not respect the universally accepted laws that regulate the phonetic correspondences between Indo-European languages. The author maintains that the
Etruscan language is the bearer of an onomasticon and lexicon at least partially related to the Indo-Iranian group and that i t had a function, i n late
protohistoric times, of cultural and linguistic intermediary between the I n do-Iranian and Roman worlds. (See, most recently, the author's "L'etrusco,
lingua dell'Oriente indoeuropeo", communication to the Sodalizio GiottoIo gico Milanese, 14 June 1999, in press.)
7
FOREWORD
I n the Timaeus Plato relates h o w an Egyptian priest answered Solon,
w h o was interrogating h i m about events of the past, w i t h the following
words: "O Solon, Solon! You Greeks are stili children, and there is no
Greek w h o is old!" He went on to explain: "You are young i n spirit. I n y o u r
souls y o u have no ancient o p i n i o n that comes to you from ancient tradition.", adding that Greek society was periodically overwhelmed by traum a t i c events that "leave only those of you w h o are illiterate and ignoranti
consequently you constantly start anew, like youths, k n o w i n g n o t h i n g of
w h a t occurred here or i n your o w n country i n ancient times."
To our ears these ancient words should sound like a forewarning o f
w h a t w o u l d occur i n times very near our o w n . Can we not perhaps consider o u r o w n society such a "child", having lost the m e m o r y o f so many
civilisations that went before, among t h e m some of the greatest? I t is true
that o u r society was b o r n o n the s t i l l - w a r m ashes of the R o m a n w o r l d and
that a sturdy u m b i l i c a l cord b o u n d i t to that w o r l d and, t h r o u g h it, to the
Greek; b u t i t is j u s t as true that what little remained of the broader cult u r a l context of the ancient w o r l d was fragmentary and confused. Our
society developed i n a c u l t u r a l framework i n w h i c h there was the widelyheld belief that the entire w o r l d , and w i t h i t the entire h u m a n race, had
come i n t o existence just a few m i l l e n n i a before our o w n era, due to a popu l a r b u t incautious reading o f the Bible.
Centuries were needed for archaeological research, w h i c h started
from those few confused fragments, to be organised into a coherent
ensemble, shedding light not only o n the extreme a n t i q u i t y o f m a n but
also o n the great and forgotten development of many o f the civilisations
that preceded our o w n . The archaeologist's spade has thus b r o u g h t back to
light not only the glories of the Egyptian antiquities b u t also so many of
the civilisations that have marked the stages o n man's laborious path to
the realisation, perhaps, of a more complete identity of his o w n . The
Sumerians, Assyrians, Babylonians, Hittites, Phrygians, Mycenaeans, to
m e n t i o n a few of these way-stations at random, have thus often unexpectedly re-emerged f r o m the mists of the past, thereby w i n n i n g the place that
they too deserve i n the history of the development of m o d e m m a n k i n d . I t
is becoming ever more clear that w h i l e civilisations and their empires may
pass away, every one of t h e m leaves a trace, almost a seed, that survives by
9
mysterious and hidden means to reach m o d e m m a n .
This investigation w h i c h , t h r o u g h the past, studies the roots of m o d e m m a n is no longer l i m i t e d to the evidence that emerges from the soil
turned over by the archaeologist's spade. Georges D u m é z i l was one o f the
first to teach us that excavating among myths and legends can lead us to
equally precious evidence about the t h i n 'red line' that runs t h r o u g h the
times of history, connecting peoples w h o seem very distant from one
another i n both t i m e and space. I n this context, the author o f this essay,
Leonardo M a g i n i , leads us t h r o u g h new, very fertile territory, showing us
h o w the apparently chaotic assembly of the annual festivals of the R o m a n
w o r l d can conceal very different recollections and evidence of the c u l t u r a l
sphere i n w h i c h early Rome moved.
Starting from a felicitous i n t u i t i o n , the investigation moves on to
harsh and difficult terrain, where clues must be sought, meditated upon,
weighed; where knowledge of astronomy is filled out w i t h the exegesis of
poetic texts, opening the way to fascinating hypotheses, and shedding light
at the same t i m e on a great part of those same texts. N o t least among the
virtues of Magini's w o r k is that we read ancient works w i t h new eyes,
where the many apparent 'poetic flowerings' that weighed d o w n o u r
school translations suddenly transform i n t o allusions o f h i t h e r t o unsuspected c u l t u r a l significance; we discover a treasure-chest whose precious
contents n o r m a l l y r e m a i n hidden to someone approaching from another
context and culture. Once again we see h o w the ancient w o r l d moved i n
the context of unified knowledge that produced Lucretius' De Rerum
Natura; a context unfortunately n o w u n k n o w n to o u r o w n society, where
the average educated person often boasts his total ignorance of science.
Not M a g i n i . He manages to b r i n g together scientific knowledge and
evidence from the past, thus following a line of research too rarely pursued, and from w h i c h we yet await m a n y i m p o r t a n t acquisitions.
F o l l o w i n g a thousand fragile clues, M a g i n i culminates his investigation i n
b r i n g i n g us face to face w i t h the evidence that behind the N u m a n calendar lies ancient and sophisticated astronomical knowledge whose roots
may be i n Mesopotamia. At the same time he throws convincing new light
o n well-known episodes i n Roman history, such as the difficult and hardw o n p u b l i c a t i o n of a public calendar, w h i c h can n o w be seen less as a
result o f an arbitrary decision of the patrician classes t h a n as the end, the
rejection, of the sacred l i n k between the celestial sphere and the w o r l d of
h u m a n activities.
Once again we discover that i n the history of h u m a n societies very l i t tle is b o r n of that chance to w h i c h we often attribute w h a t we do not
understand. We are discovering that as biological research allows us to
t h r o w light on the phylogenetic lines of the animai species, and i n particular o f the h u m a n species, the investigation of traditions brings us ever
closer to the discovery of a c u l t u r a l phylogenesis. A phylogenesis whose
outlines we can already make out and whose development may stili be the
10
most difficult but also the most fascinating task i n the investigation of
man's past. We thank M a g i n i for the step he has helped us take i n this
direction and for the poetry he himself lends to the task. Beyond o u r obvious gain i n erudition, i t should be considered evidence that each o f us is,
for the m o m e n t albeit unconsciously, the point towards w h i c h a large port i o n of the past events of the h u m a n race flows.
V I T T O R I O CASTELLANI
University o f Pisa
Centro Interdisciplinare Linceo
11
PREFACE
ASTRONOMY A N D ASTROLOGY I N R O M E
"Free ran the stars and unobserved, i n their revolutions" (libera currebant et inobservata per annum / sidera), says Ovid i n the Fasti referring to
the time of even more ancient Rome, the Rome of Romulus and N u m a and
of the other kings and of the early Republic. A Rome and an age w h i c h for
the poet are now long ago i n the dark, deep night of prehistory, i n w h i c h
shine the lonely lights of m y t h , bright and resplendent like stars.
Focussing on those lights and, where possible, taking advantage of the
inexhaustible reserve of "prehistoric memory" preserved by the myths and
rites connected w i t h the festivals of the calendar that t r a d i t i o n attributes to
N u m a (circa 715-673 B.C.), in Le feste di Venere we began the recovery and
interpretation of the traces of an astronomical science and of an astrologicai t r a d i t i o n already forgotten by the Romans of historical times.
Roman astronomy officially does not exist. Just open a handbook of
the History of Astronomy: complete and detailed though i t may be, we w i l l
search i n vain, leafing through chapters dedicated to Babylonian and
Egyptian astronomy, Chinese and I n d i a n , Greek and Arab, Maya and Aztec
and Inca, Polynesian and Micronesian, for even a paragraph devoted to
Roman astronomy. I t w o u l d be a great deal to find a m e n t i o n of the name
of Gaius Sulpicius Gallus, w h o passed into history, or perhaps only i n
chronicle, as the first Roman able to predict eclipses.
Before h i m , there was no one; after h i m , a all-encompassing sweeping
fashion from afar invaded Rome, exciting their imaginations and upsetting
their minds. I t penetrated so deeply that even today, at this great distance
i n time, many people are u n w i t t i n g l y stili its prey.
In fact, of ali those who check in their morning paper or on the radio or television to see what the stars foresee for their sign—the loves of Aries, the mon1
2
3
3.111-2; translation by the author.
Le feste di Venere. Fertilità femminile e configurazioni astrali nel calendario di Roma antica ('The Venus festivals. Female fertility and astrai configurations in the ancient Rome calendar'), L'Erma di Bretschncider, Rome 1996.
In the recent, well-documented Astronomy before the Telescope, edited by C. Walker,
London 1996, the chapter Astronomy in Etruria and Rome by T. W. Potter takes up 6 pages in
a volume of 350 pages. On Gaius Sulpicius Gallus, see Cicero, de republica 1.23.
1
2
3
13
ey of Taurus, the health of Gemini—how many know that astronomy and astrology were born, grew up and developed hand i n hand, coming to us first w i t h
the Roman conquest of Greece and then w i t h that of Egypt and Mesopotamia?
Who recalls that, i n that epoch, not even the most miserable of slaves could live
without consulting his personal 'Chaldaean' about everything; that the emperor himself behaved the same; that Caesar and Augustus made ampie and uninhibited use of astrology? W h o now realises that the two divine arts, which lived
side by side for thousands of years, have, since Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler and
Newton, taken irremediably different paths? The first has remained prerogative
of a handful of highly advanced experts i n philosophical and scientific research;
the second has become a refugium peccatorum of the worries and insecurities
of life, a miserable heir, a pedestrian reworking, poor remains of what was originally a glorious and glittering vision of man and the world?
"For I shall sing of God, silent-minded monarch of nature," writes Manilius, "who, permeating sky and land and sea, controls w i t h uniform compact
the mighty structure; how the entire universe is alive i n the mutuai concord of
its elements and is driven by the pulse of reason, since a single spirit dwells i n
ali its parts and, speeding through ali things, nourishes the world and shapes
it like a living creature..." Continuing "this God and all-controlling reason,
then, derives earthly beings from the signs of heaven; though the stars are remote at a far distance, he compels recognition of their influences, i n that they
give to the peoples of the w o r l d their lives and destinies and to each man his
o w n character ." And finally, "who after this can doubt that a link exists between heaven and man?" (Quis dubitet post haec hominem coniungere caelo?)
Who, indeed, could doubt that the need to j o i n indissolubly the life of
m a n and life of the cosmos is a form of insurance against ali anxieties, yesterday, today and forever? Or that the need to think that we come into the
w o r l d under a certain star—with the sun and the m o o n i n a certain sign, as
well as Mercury and Venus and Mars and Jupiter and Saturn and the lunar
nodes—is a way, and not such a primitive one at that, of seeking and defining
one's o w n individuality and identity?
I n Rome, everyone was caught up i n the fashion, including even the most
difficult to catch: artists, writers and poets, either by their free choice or else
by Imperiai solicitation. Cicero translated Aratus and dealt w i t h the stars i n
his Somnium Scipionis and De natura deorum; Virgil sang of stars and eclipses
in the Georgics; Ovid studied astronomy to write the Fasti and the Metamorphoses; Manilius, w i t h the composition of the Astronomica, realised the dream
of being the first i n the West to teli of the motions of the heavens and the relationship between the life of the stars and the life of man, recounting "strange
lore untold by any before me" (hospita sacra ferens nulli memorata
priorum).
The first i n the West: i n perfectly good faith each of them could have sworn
that, i n Rome, never i n the past had anyone studied such questions as the mo4
5
4
5
14
Astronomica 2.60-6, 82-6 and 105.
Astronomica 1.6.
tion of the stars and the signs of the zodiac, the cycles of the planets and the
eclipses of the sun and the moon. "Free ran the stars and unobserved..."
Hence the general conviction that the Romans—not only the Romans
of archaic Rome, b u t also their successors u n t i l almost the beginning of our
era—did not k n o w astronomy. W i t h time this conviction became a convent i o n . For example: "Ti we can speak of Greek astronomy, it is not possible,
however, to speak of R o m a n astronomy; the Greeks—wrote Soubiran—
knew h o w to describe the heavenly phenomena acting at once as observers
and theoreticians. I t is sufficient to recali Aristarchos, Eudoxos, Hipparchos, Ptolemy; ali wrote treatises that, i n content and form, are true scientific works. I n Rome, however, i t is difficult to cite the name of one authentic astronomer; i f Sulpicius Gallus knew h o w to predict eclipses, that
d i d not make h i m a m a n of science but a generally educated man, lover of
literature, sciences and the arts. Caesar, i n fact, consulted the Alexandrian
astronomer Sosigenes for the reform of the Roman calendar."
But then, i f Caesar needed Sosigenes, to what unknown astronomer of
what unnamed school did Numa turn, centuries earlier, to construct "his" calendar? To w h o m belong those "happy souls, who first took thought to know the
stars, their risings and their settings, and scale the heavenly mansions"? Who
are those who were able "to lift their heads above the frailties and the homes of
men" and to bring "the distant stars within our ken, and heaven itself made subject to their wit"?
Ovid —it seems—refers to the Chaldaean astronomers and astrologers
who, i n his day or a little earlier, introduced the new science to Rome, studied
and organised by their already distant predecessors. The poet does not seem
to k n o w of—and certainly does not teli us of—other nearer precursore, true
astronomers of Roman proto-history whose names are probably lost forever.
Yet one of them suggested to Numa the existence of a cycle of 8766 days, i n
the course of which the sun completes 24 of its annual revolutions, the moon 297
lunations and Venus 15 synodic periods. And someone else saw the possibility
and the necessity of linking the motions of the stars i n heaven to human events
on earth, i n particular the motions of Venus and the moon to female fertility.
The readers of Le feste di Venere have been introduced to the relationships between astrai motions and earthly cadences which we see reflected i n
the festivals of the N u m a n calendar. Accordingly between the festival of the
Veneralia of 1 Aprii and the festival of the Matralia of 11 June—that is between wedding and conception—there are the 71 d a y s that the planet Venus
i n heaven takes to move from its inferior conjunction w i t h the sun to its
6
7
8
Liuzzi 1989, p. 13; who cites Soubiran, "L'astronomie à Rome", in L'astronomie dans
l'antiquité classique, Paris 1979, p. 169 f.
Fasti 1.297-306.
AH the intervals of time are calculated inclusively, that is, counting the first and last day,
in keeping with the Roman method of counting. In the Numan year between 1 Aprii and 11
June there are the 29 days of Aprii plus 31 of May plus 11 of June for a total of 71 days.
6
1
8
15
greatest western elongation. Similarly, i f we take intercalation into account,
between the festival "of the mothers", the Matralia, and the festival "of the
children", the Liberalia of 17 March—that is between conception and b i r t h —
o n average 281 days elapse, i n other words the "forty weeks" of pregnancy.
I am w i l l i n g to leave to others, i f they want it, the j o b of reconciling the
irreconcilable: that a science of the stars did not exist i n Rome w i t h the fact
that the N u m a n calendar is constructed on the basis of ancient astronomical
and astrological knowledge.
I m e n t i o n only that a similar situation is seen in Greece too, and i n relation to astronomical knowledge. True science begins w i t h Thales i n the
sixth century and continues w i t h the great names that we have cited above.
B u t an ancient t r a d i t i o n w o u l d have it that, six centuries earlier, the competition between Atreus and Thyestes for the kingdom of Mycenae was resolved i n favour of the first for his demonstrated ability to predici eclipses.
Another six centuries, or perhaps a little more, separate the two solar
eclipses that occurred at the death of Romulus and at that of Julius Caesar-thus
at least myth and history, for once in agreement, would have it. Plutarch writes,
"(Romulus) died on the nones of July... suddenly there occurred in the sky extraordinary and indescribable phenomena, incredible alterations. The light of
the day is said to have darkened, a night fell that was neither placid nor serene,
but agitated by terrible thunder and shaken from ali directions by gusts of w i n d
and pouring r a i n . " He almost repeats Virgil: "Who dares cali Sun a liar? He
it is / Who often warns of dark revolts afoot, / Conspiracy and cancerous growth
of war. / He too, when Caesar fell, showed pity for Rome, / Hiding his radiant
head in lurid gloom, / That a guilty age feared everlasting night."
Thus, this book aims to ascertain whether, i n addition to recognising the
24-year cycle that unifies the motions of sun, moon and Venus, and the cycle
of that same planet, someone in earliest Rome already knew the regularity of
the cadences of the motions of the two largest heavenly bodies and the periodic repetition of solar and lunar eclipses, i n relation to what m o d e m astronomy calls the Saros cycle and the period of revolution of the lunar nodes.
I f and when such knowledge is demonstrated, we should not marvel that
the people who historicised its entire mythical universe also "calendarised"
—so to speak—the entire body of astronomical knowledge, crystallising in
the myths, i n the rites and in the cadences of the festivals the eternai return
of celestial events. They did this in such a way that the small annual circle of
time encloses not only the memories, the histories and the lives of men, but
also reflects the perennial motions of the heavenly bodies and their life i n the
immensity of the celestial sphere. Thus the calendar reveals itself for what it
originally was: the meeting point between microcosm and macrocosm.
9
10
11
La Maddalena, 21 July 1996 -Torrinpietra, 20 July 1999
9
10
I I
16
Hyginus, Fabulae 258.
Life of Romulus 27.4-7.
Georgics 1.463-8.
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