another more accurate division was introduced at an early period; for Anaximander, or, according to others, his disciple Anaximenes, is said to have made the Greeks acquainted with the use of the Babylonian chronometer or sun-dial (called πόλος, or ὡρολόγιον), by means of which the natural day was divided into twelve equal spaces of time. The division of the day most generally observed by the Romans, was that into _tempus antemeridianum_ and _pomeridianum_, the _meridies_ itself being only considered as a point at which the one ended and the other commenced. But as it was of importance that this moment should be known, an especial officer [ACCENSUS] was appointed, who proclaimed the time of mid-day. The division of the day into twelve equal spaces, which were shorter in winter than in summer, was first adopted when artificial means of measuring time were introduced among the Romans from Greece. This was about the year B.C. 291, when L. Papirius Cursor, after the war with Pyrrhus in southern Italy, brought to Rome an instrument called _solarium horologium_, or simply _solarium_. But as the solarium had been made for a different latitude, it showed the time at Rome very incorrectly. Scipio Nasica, therefore, erected in B.C. 159 a public clepsydra, which indicated the hours of the night as well as of the day. Even after the erection of this clepsydra it was customary for one of the subordinate officers of the praetor to proclaim the third, sixth, and ninth hours; which shows that the day was, like the night, divided into four parts, each consisting of three hours.--All the days of the year were, according to different points of view, divided by the Romans into different classes. For the purpose of the administration of justice all days were divided into _dies fasti_ and _dies nefasti_. DIES FASTI were the days on which the praetor was allowed to administer justice in the public courts; they derived their name from _fari_ (_fari tria verba_; _do_, _dico_, _addico_). On some of the dies fasti comitia could be held, but not on all. The regular _dies fasti_ were marked in the Roman calendar by the letter F, and their number in the course of the year was 38.--Besides these there were certain days called _dies intercisi_, on which the praetor might hold his courts, but not at all hours, so that sometimes one half of such a day was _fastus_, while the other half was _nefastus_. Their number was 65 in the year.--DIES NEFASTI were days on which neither courts of justice nor comitia were allowed to be held, and which were dedicated to other purposes. The term _dies nefasti_, which originally had nothing to do with religion, but simply indicated days on which no courts were to be held, was in subsequent times applied to religious days in general, as _dies nefasti_ were mostly dedicated to the worship of the gods.--In a religious point of view all days of the year were either _dies festi_, or _dies profesti_, or _dies intercisi_.