FERIAE MARTI. (PRAEN.) N̄ MARTIS. (PHILOC.) IUN[O]NI LUCINAE E[S]QUILIIS QUOD EO DIE AEDES EI [DEDICA]TA EST PER MATRONAS QUAM VOVERAT ALBI[NIA] ... VEL UXOR ... SI PUERUM ... [AT]QUE IPSA[M].... (PRAEN.) This was the New Year’s day of the Roman religious calendar. From Macrobius[62] we learn that in his day the sacred fire of Vesta was now renewed, and fresh laurels fixed on the Regia, the Curiae, and the houses of the flamens; the custom therefore was kept up long after the first of March had ceased to be the civil New Year. Ovid alludes to the same rites, and adds the Aedes Vestae as also freshly decorated[63]: Neu dubites, primae fuerint quin ante Kalendae Martis, ad haec animum signa referre potes. Laurea flaminibus quae toto perstitit anno Tollitur, et frondes sunt in honore novae. Ianua tunc regis posita viret arbore Phoebi; Ante tuas fit idem, curia prisca, fores. Vesta quoque ut folio niteat velata recenti, Cedit ab Iliacis laurea cana focis. The mention of these buildings carries us back to the very earliest Rome, when the rex and his sons and daughters[64] (Flamines and Vestales, in their later form) performed between them the whole religious duty of the community; to these we may perhaps add the warrior-priests of Mars (Salii). The connexion of the decoration with the Mars-cult is probable, if not certain; the laurel was sacred to Mars, for in front of his _sacrarium_ in the regia there grew two laurels[65], and it has been conjectured that they supplied the boughs used on this day[66]. March 1 is also marked in the calendar of Philocalus as the birthday of Mars (N̄ = natalis Martis). This appears in no other calendar as yet discovered, and is conspicuously absent in the Fasti Praenestini; it is therefore very doubtful whether any weight should be given to a fourth-century writer whose calendar had certainly an urban and not a rustic basis[67]. There is no trace of allusion to a birth of Mars _on this day_ in Latin literature, though the day is often mentioned. There was indeed a pretty legend of such a birth, told by Ovid under May 2[68], which has its parallels in other mythologies; Juno became pregnant of Mars by touching a certain flower of which the secret was told her by Flora: Protinus haerentem decerpsi pollice florem; Tangitur et tacto concipit illa sinu. Iamque gravis Thracen et Iaeva Propontidis intrat Fitque potens voti, Marsque creatus erat.