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. Valerius Publicola was the first who celebrated them at Rome in the year of the city 245. The solemnity was as follows: The whole world was invited by a herald to a feast which they had never seen already, nor ever should see again. Some days before the games began, the quindecimviri in the Capitol and the Palatine temple, distributed to the people purifying compositions, of various kinds, as flambeaus, sulphur, &c. From hence the populace passed to Diana’s temple on the Aventine mount, with wheat, barley, and oats, as an offering. After this, whole nights were spent in devotion to the Deities. When the time of the games was fully come, the people assembled in the Campus Martius, and sacrificed to Jupiter, Juno, Apollo, Latona, Diana, the Parcae, Ceres, Pluto, and Proserpine. On the first night of the feast the emperor, with the quindecimviri, caused three altars to be erected on the banks of the Tiber, which they sprinkled with the blood of three lambs, and then proceeded to regular sacrifice. A space was next marked out for a theatre, which was illuminated with innumerable flambeaus and fires. Here they sang hymns, and celebrated all kinds of sports. On the day after, having offered victims at the Capitol, they went to the Campus Martius, and celebrated sports to the honour of Apollo and Diana. These lasted till next day, when the noble matrons, at the hour appointed by the oracle, went to the Capitol to sing hymns to Jupiter. On the third day, which concluded the solemnity, twenty-seven boys, and as many girls, sung in the temple of Palatine Apollo hymns and verses in Greek and Latin, to recommend the city to the protection of those deities whom they deigned particularly to honour by their sacrifices.

The inimitable Carmen Seculare of Horace was composed for this last day, in the Secular Games, held by Augustus. It has been much disputed whether these games were held every hundred, or every hundred and ten years. Valerius Antius, Varro, and Livy, are quoted in support of the former opinion: In favour of the latter may be produced the quindecemviral registers, the edicts of Augustus, and the words of Horace in the Secular poem,

Catua undenos decies per annos.

It was a general belief, that the girls who bore a part in the song should be soonest married; and that the children who did not dance and sing at the coming of Apollo, should die unmarried, and at an early period of life.

Secular Poem, a poem sung or rehearsed at the secular games; of which kind we have a very fine piece among the works of Horace, being a satyrical ode at the end of his epodes.