[3613] To spare the reader the trouble of doing a sum, I give the proof. The 1st of January, 702, fell, as we have already seen (p. 713), on a market-day; therefore, if the 1st of January, 711, did the same, the number of days that elapsed from the 1st of January, 702, to the last day of December, 710, inclusive, must have been divisible by 8. The year 702 contained 378 days; each of the years 703-7 contained 355 days; 708 contained 445; and ex hypothesi 709 and 710 each contained 365. Now 378 + 355 × 5 + 445 + 365 × 2 = 3,328, which is exactly divisible by 8.
[3614] Cf. Th. Mommsen, Die röm. Chron. bis auf Caesar, 1859, pp. 25, 286. Unger remarks (Neue Jahrbücher für Philologie, &c., cxxix, 1884, p. 760) that the outburst of 676 [or rather 677] was too insignificant to have been selected by Macrobius as an illustration. Moreover, says Holzapfel, the particular tumultus owing to which the superstitious dread of the coincidence of nundinae with the Kalends of January was intensified must have been preceded by other calamities associated with the same coincidence. In the earlier part of 702, when the Kalends of January fell on a market-day, there were no consuls, which might well awaken apprehensions. In 705, when the same coincidence occurred, the Civil War broke out. The Lepidianus tumultus of 711 was accompanied by proscriptions; therefore the superstition would have been confirmed, as Macrobius says, by that tumultus.
Undoubtedly,—if, as Holzapfel maintains, it is true that in 711 the Kalends of January fell upon a market-day. But this is the very point at issue; and Holzapfel seems to ignore the possibility that the Lepidianus tumultus of 677 may also ‘have been preceded by other calamities associated with the same coincidence’. Moreover, Matzat objects that of the events of 711 the outbreak of Lepidus was the least important, and that if Macrobius had intended to refer to that year, he would have said tumultus Antonianus. Holzapfel replies that when Lepidus joined Antony, the war which the latter had begun assumed a new phase, and Lepidus became commander-in-chief of the united armies (Velleius Paterculus, ii, 63, § 1; Appian, B. C., iii, 84), a fact which justifies the phrase, Lepidianus tumultus. Further, to show how flagitious the conduct of Lepidus appeared to contemporaries, he refers to Cicero, Fam., xii, 8, § 1 (Scelus adfinis tui Lepidi ... cognosse te arbitror), 9, § 2 (Nos, confectum bellum quom putaremus, repente a Lepido tuo in summam sollicitudinem sumus adducti), and 10, § 3 (Praeclare viceramus, nisi spoliatum, inermem, fugientem Lepidus recepisset Antonium. Itaque numquam tanto odio civitati Antonius fuit quanto est Lepidus; ille enim ex turbulenta re p., hic ex pace et victoria bellum excitavit).
[3615] Neue Jahrbücher für Philologie, &c., cxxix, 1884, p. 760.
[3616] Hermes, xxiii, 1888, pp. 60-1.
[3617] Pharsalia, viii, 808.
[3618] Philologus, xlix, 1890, p. 69.
[3619] Matzat’s theory, Holzapfel insists (Philologus, xlix, 1890, pp. 71-2), forces him to contradict himself. First, he argues (Röm. Chron., i, 1883, p. 17) that Caesar fixed the time of his first intercalation simply with the object of preventing the Kalends of January, 711, from falling on a market-day; in other words, he holds that the intercalary day contemplated by Caesar was a movable one. But if so, we must disregard the testimony of Dion, who says that the intercalation of 713 was ‘contrary to the regulations’ (παρὰ τὰ καθεστηκότα). Accordingly in Hermes, xxiii, 1888, p. 51, Matzat silently abandons his earlier view, and assumes that Caesar intended to intercalate in 714, 718, 722, &c. But if this cycle had been observed, the 1st of January, 714, 717, 720, and so on, would have fallen on a market-day; and therefore Matzat’s revised theory is obviously irreconcilable with his original view, that Caesar intercalated in 710 in order to prevent the Kalends of January, 711, from falling on a market-day.
Matzat has not, so far as I can discover, made any rejoinder to Holzapfel’s article; but it is not impossible to answer this argument. Supposing that Caesar intercalated in 710 in order to prevent the Kalends of January, 711, from falling on a market-day, why should we disregard the testimony of Dion? Caesar’s regulation was that the intercalation should take place every four years. If, no matter for what reason, the first intercalation took place in 710, the second would fall due in 714. By transferring it to 713, Caesar’s regulation would be contravened. Nor is the theory that Caesar intended to intercalate in 714, 718, 722, &c., necessarily inconsistent with the view that he intercalated in 710 in order to prevent the Kalends of January, 711, from falling on a market-day; for, as I have remarked in the text, he may perhaps have failed to look ahead.
[3620] Röm. Chron., pp. 328-9; Philologus, xlix, 1890, pp. 77-8.