BIGA, in antiquity, a chariot drawn by two horses abreast. Chariot-races, with two horses, were introduced into the Olympic games in the 93d Olympiad; but the invention was much more ancient, as we find that the heroes in the Iliad fight from chariots of that kind. The moon, night, and the morning, are by mythologists supposed to be carried in bigæ, the sun in quadrigæ. Statues in bigæ were at first only allowed to the gods, then to conquerors in the Grecian games; under the Roman emperors, the like statues, with bigæ, were decreed and granted to great and well-deserving men, as a kind of half triumph, being erected in most public places of the city. Figures of bigæ were also struck on their coins. The drivers of bigæ were called bigarii; a marble bust of one Florus a bigarius is still seen at Rome.