pr. Kal. Mai.
April 30 in Ancient Rome
Private prisons are declared treason
No private jails
politicsAD 388
Julian date · ≈ May 1 on our calendar
A one-sentence law of Valentinian II, Theodosius and Arcadius ruled that anyone who locked an accused person in a private prison would be treated as guilty of treason.
si quis posthac reum privato carceri destinarit, reus maiestatis habeatur.
If anyone hereafter assigns an accused person to a private prison, let him be held guilty of treason.
Theodosius I
Background
In the late Roman empire, powerful landowners often acted as if the law stopped at their gates. They kept armed retainers and dependent farmers, and some held people in their own lock-ups to pressure debtors or settle disputes. Public prisons existed, but they were meant only to hold the accused for trial, under the authority of officials.
This law, issued at Thessalonica and addressed to Erythrius, prefect of Egypt, is a single sentence: "If anyone hereafter assigns an accused person to a private prison, let him be held guilty of treason (maiestas)." Maiestas was the most serious charge in Roman law, normally used for crimes against the emperor and the state. By using it here, the emperors treated private imprisonment as a theft of public power that belonged to them alone.
The law was clearly thought clear enough: the later Visigothic summary that accompanies it in the Code says simply that "this law needs no interpretation". Its harsh tone suggests the problem was real and widespread disputed how effective it was. For an ordinary farmer or debtor, it meant at least a legal claim against being chained in a landlord's cellar.
Ancient source: Codex Theodosianus 9.11.1 · Reference
Sources
Read moreGalerius’ edict of toleration ends the Great Persecution in the East
Galerius’ edict of toleration ends the Great Persecution in the East
A persecutor grants toleration
religionAD 311
Julian date · ≈ May 1 on our calendar
Dying of a terrible illness, the emperor Galerius, a chief persecutor of the Christians, issued an edict at Nicomedia allowing them to be Christians again and to rebuild their meeting places.
Hoc edictum proponitur Nicomediae pridie Kalendas Maias ipso octies et Maximino iterum consulibus
This edict was posted at Nicomedia on the day before the Kalends of May, when he himself was consul for the eighth time and Maximinus for the second.
Constantine
Background
From AD 303 the emperors of the Tetrarchy had waged the "Great Persecution" against Christians: churches were destroyed, scriptures burned, and believers imprisoned, tortured or executed. Galerius, who ruled the eastern provinces, was remembered by Christians as its fiercest supporter per Lactantius. By 311 he was gravely ill with a disease Lactantius describes in horrifying detail.
The edict, quoted in full by Lactantius, does not apologize. It says the emperors had wanted Christians to return to the ancient institutions of Rome; many had been subdued by fear or put in danger, but great numbers persisted, worshipping neither the gods nor their own God properly. So, "from our wonted clemency", the emperors allowed them "to be Christians again" and to rebuild their places of assembly, provided they did not offend public order. In return, Christians were to pray to their God for the emperors' safety and for the state.
Lactantius, writing to his friend Donatus, says the prison gates were opened and Donatus was freed after six years in jail. Within days Galerius died. Two years later, Constantine and Licinius went further with the so-called Edict of Milan, but this was the first legal end to persecution.
Ancient source: Lactantius, On the Deaths of the Persecutors 34–35 · Reference
Sources
Read moreFloralia: games for the goddess of flowers begin
Floralia: games for the goddess of flowers begin
A thousand garlands for Flora
festivalRepublic & Empire (annual)
Roman calendar date
The games of Flora opened, running into early May, with garlands, colourful clothes, torches and a famously free-and-easy stage.
mille venit variis florum dea nexa coronis; / scaena ioci morem liberioris habet.
A goddess comes framed in a thousand varied garlands of flowers, and the stage has freer licence for mirth.
Background
Spring flowers meant more than beauty to Romans: if the blossoms on grain, vines, olives and beans failed, there would be no harvest. Flora was the goddess of that flowering, and her games were among the most cheerful of the year.
Ovid introduces her at the end of April: a goddess comes "framed in a thousand varied garlands of flowers", and "the stage has freer licence for mirth". He saves the full story for May. There Flora herself tells him she was once the nymph Chloris, and that her games began when the plebeian aediles, the Publicius brothers, prosecuted rich men for grazing their herds illegally on public land; part of the fines paid for new games in her honour per Ovid.
Ovid also lists the festival's habits. While white clothes were worn for Ceres, Flora's worshippers dressed in many colours, because flowers come in every colour. There were lights and torches, and Flora explains that night-time licence suits her pleasures. Instead of lions, gentle deer and shy hares were hunted, because her care was gardens and fields, not the wild. The message, Ovid's Flora says, was simple: enjoy life's beauty while it blooms, because "the thorn is spurned when the rose has fallen".
Ancient source: Ovid, Fasti 4.943–948, 5.183–378; Calendar of 354 (PRIDIE KAL. MAI.: LVDI FLORALES) · Reference
Sources
☁ Rome today (1991–2020 avg): 20°/11°C (68°/52°F) · rain 36% of days
Rome in AprilApril was full of agricultural festivals at a tense time: last year's grain…
Columella
Signals a storm. (De Re Rust. 11.2)
Fields & crops
Spring sowing of millet and panic grass around the Ides; vines dug and vegetables planted out. Mildew on the young grain was the great fear per Columella 11.2; Ovid, Fasti 4.
Courts & law
Many days were taken up by games (Megalesia, Cerealia, Floralia), when courts did not sit; legal business squeezed into the gaps late Republic.
Senate & politics
Aediles who ran the April games used them to win votes; lavish shows could make a political career late Republic.
Military
Armies marched out to campaign; the sea lanes were open, so troops and grain ships moved again.
Festivals & religion
Veneralia (1 Apr.), Megalesia for the Great Mother (4–10 Apr.), Fordicidia (15 Apr.), Cerealia (12–19 Apr.), Parilia, Rome's birthday (21 Apr.), Vinalia (23 Apr.), Robigalia (25 Apr.) and the Floralia from 28 April per Ovid, Fasti 4.
Daily life
April was full of agricultural festivals at a tense time: last year's grain was running low and the new harvest was still weeks away. The Cerealia honoured Ceres, goddess of grain; the Robigalia (25 April) sacrificed a dog to keep mildew (robigo) off the crops per Ovid, Fasti 4.905–42. At the Parilia (21 April), Rome's birthday, shepherds purified flocks and leaped over bonfires per Ovid, Fasti 4.721–82.
Women of different ranks worshipped Venus and Fortuna Virilis on 1 April; Ovid says women of lower status bathed in the men's baths that day per Ovid, Fasti 4.133–50.
Sources: Ovid, Fasti 4 · Columella 11.2
All days in April →
LATIN LINE OF THE DAY
Hominem pagina nostra sapit.
“My page tastes of humanity.”
Martial, Epigrams 10.4 · translation ours (literal)
