The task of feeding the city plebs and providing for their entertainment was a ruinous legacy left by the Republic to the principate. Although the number of recipients of free corn was not increased after Augustus, the public spectacles became ever more numerous and more magnificent. Under Tiberius eighty-seven days of the year were regularly occupied by these entertainments but by the time of Marcus Aurelius there were one hundred and thirty-five such holidays. In addition came extraordinary festivals to celebrate special occasions, like the one hundred and twenty-three day carnival given by Trajan at his second Dacian triumph in 106 A. D. The spectacles were of three main types; the chariot races in the circus, the gladiatorial combats and animal baiting in the amphitheatre, and the dramatic and other performances in the theatre. The expense of these celebrations fell upon the senatorial order and the princeps. Indeed the most important function of the consulship, praetorship and, until its disappearance in the third century, the aedileship, came to be the celebration of the regular festivals. The sums provided for such purposes by the state were entirely inadequate and so the cost had to be met largely from the magistrates’ private resources. The extraordinary spectacles were all given at the expense of the princeps who also at times granted subventions to favored senators from the imperial purse. The cost of the public shows placed as heavy a drain upon the fortunes of the senatorial order as did the _summa honoraria_ upon the holders of municipal offices.