in Antiquity, feasts celebrated every year by the Romans, on the 8th of the kalends of April, or the 25th of March, in honour of Cybele, the mother of the gods. The hilaria were celebrated with great pomp and rejoicing. Every person dressed himself as he pleased, and assumed the marks or badges of whatever dignity or quality he had a fancy for. The statue of the goddess was carried in procession through the streets of the city, accompanied by multitudes in the most splendid attire. The day before the festival was spent in tears and mourning. Cybele represented the earth, which at this time of the year begins to feel the kindly warmth of the spring; so that this sudden transition from sorrow to joy was an emblem of the vicissitude of the seasons, which succeed one another. The Romans originally derived this feast from the Greeks, who called it ascensus, ascensus; and the eve of the day they spent in tears and lamentations, whence they denominated it xaralos, descensus. But afterwards, the Greeks took the name hixa from the Romans; as appears from Photius, in his extract of the life of the philosopher Isidore.