ludi secularis, in antiquity, solemn games held among the Romans once in an age. These games lasted three days and as many nights, during which time sacrifices were performed, theatrical shows exhibited, with combats, sports, &c. in the circus. The occasion of these games, according to Valerius Maximus, was to stop the progress of a plague. The first who had them celebrated at Rome was Valerius Publicola, the first consul created after the expulsion of the kings. The ceremonies to be observed therein were found prescribed in one of the books of the Sibyls. At the time of the celebration of the secular games, heralds were sent throughout all the empire, to intimate that every one might come and see those solemnities which he never yet had seen, nor was ever to see again. Authors are not agreed as to the number of years wherein these games returned, partly because the quantity of an age or seculum among the ancients is not known, and partly on other accounts; some will have it that they were held every hundred years, and that the seculum or age was our century.