Non. Iul.
July 7 in Ancient Rome
Nonae Caprotinae: the slave women’s festival
The maid with the torch in the fig tree
festivalRepublic & Empire (annual)
Roman calendar date
On the Nones of July, Plutarch says, slave women ran about in fine clothes, play-fought and feasted under wild fig branches, remembering a maid who once saved Rome.
Background
After the Gauls sacked Rome, Plutarch says, neighbouring Latins demanded Roman freeborn girls as wives, which the Romans suspected was really a demand for hostages. A maidservant named Tutula, or Philotis, offered a plan tradition.
She and other young slave women dressed as noble brides and went to the enemy camp. At night they stole the soldiers' swords, while Tutula climbed a wild fig tree, spread a cloak behind her and held up a torch toward Rome. The Romans rushed out so suddenly that officers called each other by name in the confusion, and they took the camp. This, Plutarch says, happened on the Nones of Quintilis, and the festival remembered it per Plutarch.
The festival was a rare holiday for enslaved women. Crowds ran out of the city shouting common names like Gaius, Marcus and Lucius. Maidservants, gaily dressed, ran about joking with everyone they met and staged mock fights, then ate and drank under the shade of wild fig branches. The name Nonae Caprotinae, Plutarch explains, may come from caprificus, the wild fig. Plutarch also reports that Romulus vanished on this day near the Goat's Marsh, another explanation for the name disputed.
Ancient source: Plutarch, Camillus 33; Numa 2; Romulus 27 · Reference
Sources
Read moreRomulus vanishes in a storm
Romulus vanishes in a storm
The founder who left no body
politicsRegal period [tradition]
Pre-reform Roman calendar
Non. Iul. · Roman date in the pre-Julian calendar (day inferred, not written in the source)
Plutarch says Romulus disappeared on the Nones of Quintilis, leaving no body behind; some blamed the senators, others told of a sudden storm near the Goat’s Marsh.
Background
Romulus, Rome's legendary founder and first king, did not die in any ordinary way, according to tradition. Late in his reign, Plutarch says, he had grown proud and acted without consulting the senate, which made the senators resentful per Plutarch.
He vanished on the Nones of Quintilis, Plutarch writes, "leaving nothing of certainty to be related of his death", only the date, because ceremonies were still performed on that day to recall it. Unlike the mysterious death of Scipio Africanus, whose body could at least be seen, Romulus left no body and no shred of clothing. Some said the senators attacked him in the temple of Vulcan, cut his body to pieces and each carried away a part hidden in his robe. Others said he was speaking to the people outside the city near the Goat's Marsh when a sudden, violent storm burst, and he disappeared tradition.
The official story became that Romulus had been taken up to the gods and was worshipped as Quirinus. The two versions, divine ascent or political murder, show how Romans could imagine their founder either as a god or as the first king brought down by the senate.
Before Caesar's reform (45 BC) the calendar had drifted from the seasons, so the real seasonal date was different; we don't give a modern equivalent. Why?
Ancient source: Plutarch, Romulus 27 · Reference
Sources
☁ Rome today (1991–2020 avg): 30°/19°C (86°/66°F) · rain 13% of days
Rome in JulyWater was precious: Rome's aqueducts fed public fountains, from which most…
Fields & crops
Harvest finished in the uplands; threshing and storage, stubble burned or grazed, and the first ploughing of fallow per Columella 11.2. Cato advises that olive groves be hoed and vines tied in summer, and that the threshing floor be ready before grain is brought in per Cato, Agr. 2, 91.
Courts & law
Courts sat less during the Ludi Apollinares (6–13 July); much elite business paused as senators left the hot city late Republic.
Senate & politics
Renamed from Quintilis in 44 BC for Julius Caesar, born in this month. Republican consular elections were often held in July late Republic. Caesar was born on 12 or 13 July disputed: sources differ on the day; after his death the month was renamed in his honour by a law of Mark Antony in 44 BC per Macrobius 1.12.34.
Military
Peak campaign season. On 15 July the equites paraded through Rome (transvectio equitum), revived by Augustus per Suetonius, Aug. 38.
Festivals & religion
Ludi Apollinares (6–13 July), founded during the war with Hannibal; the Poplifugia (5 July); the Lucaria in sacred groves (19 and 21 July); Neptunalia (23 July) with leafy shelters against the heat per Varro and Festus.
Daily life
Water was precious: Rome's aqueducts fed public fountains, from which most people carried water up the stairs of their apartment blocks per Frontinus, De aquis. Food spoiled quickly; those without kitchens bought cooked food at taverns and street stalls. Graffiti at Pompeii record prices for bread, wine and oil, and rents for rooms per Pompeian inscriptions. Martial jokes that he lives up three tall flights of stairs, a common lot for renters satire, Martial 1.117. The well-off escaped to villas; the poor had no such option.
Sources: Frontinus, De aquis · Suetonius, Augustus 38
All days in July →
LATIN LINE OF THE DAY
'Quae tua sunt, tibi habe: quae mea, redde mihi.'
“"What is yours, keep for yourself: what is mine, give back to me."”
Martial, Epigrams 10.51.16 · translation ours (literal)
