Festivals and Rituals
The festivals of Mars cluster in his namesake month of March (Latin Martius), with a few observances in October, the beginning and end of the season for military campaigning and agriculture. Festivals with horse racing took place in the Campus Martius. Some festivals in March retained characteristics of new year festivals, since Martius was originally the first month of the Roman calendar.
- February 27: Equirria, involving chariot or horse races;
- March 1: Mars' dies natalis ("birthday"), a feria also sacred to his mother Juno;
- March 14: a second Equirria, again with chariot races;
- March 14 or 15: Mamuralia, a new year festival when a figure called Mamurius Veturius (perhaps the "old Mars" of the old year) is driven out;
- March 17: an Agonalia or Agonium Martiale, an obscure type of observance held at other times for various deities;
- March 23: Tubilustrium, a purification of the deploying army March 23;
- October 15: the ritual of the October Horse, with a chariot race and Rome's only known horse sacrifice;
- October 19: Armilustrium ("purification of arms").
Mars was also honored by chariot races at the Robigalia and Consualia, though these festivals are not primarily dedicated to him. From 217 BC onward, Mars was among the gods honored at the lectisternium, a banquet given for deities who were present as images.
Roman hymns (carmina) are rarely preserved, but Mars is invoked in two. The Arval Brothers, or "Brothers of the Fields," chanted a hymn to Mars while performing their three-step dance. The Carmen Saliare was sung by Mars' priests the Salii while they moved twelve sacred shields (ancilia) throughout the city in a procession. In the 1st century AD, Quintilian remarks that the language of the Salian hymn was so archaic that it was no longer fully understood.
Read more about this topic: Mars (mythology)
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