Id. Mai.
May 15 in Ancient Rome
Mercuralia: merchants ask Mercury to forgive their lies
A prayer for profitable lies
festivalRepublic & Empire (annual)
Roman calendar date
On the Ides of May, the anniversary of Mercury’s temple by the Circus, traders sprinkled themselves and their goods with water from Mercury’s spring and prayed for profit.
da modo lucra mihi, da facto gaudia lucro, / et fac ut emptori verba dedisse iuvet.
Just give me profit, give me joy of the profit made, and let me enjoy having fooled a buyer.
Background
Mercury was the god of messages, travel and trade, and also of trickery: in myth he stole Apollo's cattle when he was a baby. Rome's merchants made him their patron. Livy records that his temple near the Circus Maximus was dedicated on the Ides of May in the early Republic, and the day became his festival.
Ovid describes how traders celebrated. All those who earned a living selling goods offered incense and asked Mercury to increase their profits. Near the Capena Gate was a spring of Mercury. A merchant, purified and with his tunic belted up, drew water in a clean jar, dipped a laurel branch in it, and sprinkled the goods that would soon have new owners, and his own hair as well.
Then came the prayer, which Ovid turns into comedy satire. "Wash away the lies of the past, wash away the perjured words of yesterday," the trader says. If he swore falsely by Jupiter or misused the gods' names, let the south wind carry the words away, and leave tomorrow free "for further perjuries". "Just grant me profit, and let me enjoy cheating a buyer." Mercury, Ovid says, laughs aloud from heaven, remembering the cattle he stole himself.
Ancient source: Ovid, Fasti 5.663–692; Livy 2.21 · Reference
Sources
☁ Rome today (1991–2020 avg): 22°/13°C (72°/55°F) · rain 25% of days
Rome in MayLate spring was a time of hard field labour and fresh food: beans, greens and…
Columella
South wind or east wind; sometimes a damp day. (De Re Rust. 11.2)
Fields & crops
Hay was cut, barley harvested in warm places, beans threshed, and vines and young crops weeded and hoed per Columella 11.2. Sheep were washed and sheared.
Courts & law
A busy legal season. Romans avoided marrying in May, which was considered unlucky, especially before the Ides per Ovid, Fasti 5.490.
Senate & politics
Senate and assemblies met normally. The temple of Mercury, dedicated on the Ides of May, was the seat of an early guild of merchants per Livy 2.27; on that day traders sprinkled their goods with water from his spring to wash away the month's lies per Ovid, Fasti 5.663–92.
Military
Full campaigning season: armies marched and supply convoys used good roads and calm seas.
Festivals & religion
Floralia ended on 3 May; the Lemuria (9, 11, 13 May) drove ghosts from the house at midnight with black beans; the Argei, rush puppets, were thrown into the Tiber on 14 or 15 May per Ovid, Fasti 5.
Daily life
Late spring was a time of hard field labour and fresh food: beans, greens and the first barley. Enslaved farm workers, often chained in the ergastulum on large estates, did the heaviest work per Columella 1.6–8, who advises on their supervision. In the city, the Floralia's games included mimes and, by tradition, performers who undressed at the crowd's demand per Valerius Maximus and Lactantius; hostile or late sources. Childbirth was a major risk for women at any season; inscriptions record many deaths of young mothers per surviving epitaphs.
Sources: Ovid, Fasti 5 · Columella 1 and 11.2
All days in May →
LATIN LINE OF THE DAY
Hoc est vivere bis, vita posse priore frui.
“To be able to enjoy one's past life is to live twice.”
Martial, Epigrams 10.23 · translation ours (literal)
