=Quirinus.=--Iuppiter and Mars then became the great state-deities of the developed community and to them is added, as the contribution of the Colline settlement, their own particular deity, Quirinus. He, like them, has his own _flamen_; like Mars he has his _Salii_, and his festival finds its place in the Calendars on February the 17th. But of his ritual and character we know practically nothing: the ritual was obscured because his festival coincided with the much more popular festival of the _curiae_, the _stultorum feriae_: of his character, we can only conjecture that he was to the Colline settlement what Mars was to the Palatine, whereas later after the complete amalgamation he seems to have been distinguished from Mars as representing 'armed peace' rather than war--an idea which is borne out by the associations of the closely allied word _Quirites_. Be that as it may, we have in Iuppiter, Mars, and Quirinus the great state-triad of the synoecismus, who held their own until at the beginning of the next epoch they were supplanted by the new Etruscan triad of the Capitol, Iuppiter, Iuno and Minerva. =2. Organisation.=--It might perhaps be thought that the organisation of religion is a matter remote from its spirit, and is not therefore a suitable subject for discussion, where the object is rather to bring out underlying motives and ideas: but in dealing with the Roman religion, where ceremonial and legal precision were so prominent, it would be even misleading to omit some reference to the very characteristic manner in which the state, taking over the rather chaotic elements of the agricultural worship, organised them into something like a consistent whole. Its most complete achievement in this direction was without doubt the regulation of the religious year. We have spoken many times of the Calendars (_Fasti_): it is necessary now to obtain some clearer notion of what they were. In Rome itself and various Italian towns have been found some thirty inscriptions, one almost complete (Maffeiani), the others more or less fragmentary, giving the tables of the months and marking precisely the character and occurrences of every day in the year. We may take as a specimen the latter half of the month of August from the Fasti Maffeiani. A. EID. [NP]. | C. VOLC. [NP]. B. F. | D. C. C. C. | E. OPIC. [NP]. D. C. | F. C. E. PORT. [NP]. | G. VOLT. [NP]. F. C. | H. [NP]. G. VIN. F.P. | A. F. H. C. | B. F. A. CONS. [NP]. | C. C. B. EN. |