a.d. V Kal. Mart.
February 25 in Ancient Rome
Valentinian I proclaimed emperor
politicsAD 364
Julian date · ≈ Feb 26 on our calendar
After Jovian's death the army marched to Nicaea and chose the Pannonian officer Valentinian. Ammianus says he would not appear on the day before, the leap day, which he thought unlucky.
Valentinian I
Background
In February 364 the emperor Jovian, who had made a humiliating peace with Persia after Julian's death, died suddenly on the road to Constantinople. The army and its senior officers, gathered at Nicaea, had to choose a new ruler quickly.
They chose Valentinian, a tough officer from Pannonia, son of a soldier who had risen from the ranks. Ammianus, who served in the army in these years, says Valentinian kept out of sight to avoid the leap day (bissextus) of February, which he thought unlucky, and was proclaimed the morning after it per Ammianus 26.1.7, 26.2.1–2. When he was presented to the troops, they demanded he name a co-emperor at once; Valentinian replied that the decision was now his per Ammianus. Socrates gives 25 February; Ammianus gives no date, but a proclamation on the morning after the leap day points to 26 February in modern reckoning, the date most modern accounts use disputed.
A month later he made his brother Valens emperor of the East and took the West himself. He spent his reign fighting on the Rhine and Danube, and was known for his ferocious temper. He died in 375 of a stroke while shouting at envoys of the Quadi per Ammianus.
⚠ Uncertain date: Socrates (HE 4.1) gives 25 February; Ammianus (26.1.7–26.2.2) gives no date but puts the proclamation the morning after the leap day, i.e. 26 February in modern reckoning.
Ancient source: Socrates Scholasticus, Church History 4.1; Ammianus Marcellinus 26.1.7 · Reference
Sources
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Rome in FebruaryFebruary was Rome's month of purification and of the dead.
Fields & crops
The west wind (Favonius) brought the first signs of spring around 7 February per Columella 11.2: vines were pruned, trees grafted, and meadows cleared and manured.
Courts & law
February was when the Senate traditionally heard foreign embassies late Republic, per the lex Gabinia and Cicero's letters. Ordinary law courts kept sitting except on festival days.
Senate & politics
As the last month of the old year, February was used for the intercalary month when the pre-Julian calendar needed correcting, inserted after the Terminalia (23 Feb.), a source of political manipulation pre-Julian.
Military
Still the closed season; armies prepared for spring, recruits trained, and supplies were gathered at frontier bases.
Festivals & religion
The month's name comes from februa, means of purification. The Lupercalia (15 Feb.), the Parentalia for the family dead (13–21 Feb.) ending with the Feralia, the Caristia family reunion (22 Feb.) and the Terminalia for boundary stones (23 Feb.) filled it per Ovid, Fasti 2.
Daily life
February was Rome's month of purification and of the dead. During the Parentalia (13–21 February) families brought simple offerings—wreaths, grain, salt, bread soaked in wine, violets—to their ancestors' tombs per Ovid, Fasti 2.533–42. Death was close: perhaps a quarter or more of infants died in their first year, and tombstones for young children are common modern demographic estimate; disputed in detail.
On farms Columella says the west wind (Favonius) starts about 7 February, signalling pruning, grafting and the first spring work per Columella 11.2. The Lupercalia (15 February) saw young men run through the streets striking women with goatskin strips, believed to help fertility and childbirth per Ovid and Plutarch.
Sources: Ovid, Fasti 2 · Columella 11.2
All days in February →
