At Rome during this winter many prodigies either occurred about the city, or,
as usually happens when the minds of men are once inclined to superstition,
many were reported and readily believed; among which it was said that an infant
of good family, only six months old, had called out "Io triumphe" in the herb
market: that in the cattle market an ox had of his own accord ascended to the
third story, and that thence, being frightened by the noise of the inhabitants,
had flung himself down; that the appearance of ships had been brightly visible
in the sky, and that the temple of Hope in the herb market had been struck by
lightning; that the spear at Lanuvium had shaken itself; that a crow had flown
down into the temple of Juno and alighted on the very couch; that in the territory
of Amiternum figures resembling men dressed in white raiment had been seen in
several places at a distance, but had not come close to any one; that in Picenum
it had rained stones; that at Caere the tablets for divination had been lessened
in size; and that in Gaul a wolf had snatched out the sword from the scabbard
of a soldier on guard, and carried it off. On account of the other prodigies
the decemvirs were ordered to consult the books; but on account of its having
rained stones in Picenum the festival of nine days was proclaimed, and almost
all the state was occupied in expiating the rest, from time to time. First of
all the city was purified, and victims of the greater kind were sacrificed to
those gods to whom they were directed to be offered; and a gift of forty pounds'
weight of gold was carried to the temple of Juno at Lanuvium; and the matrons
dedicated a brazen statue to Juno on the Aventine; and a lectisternium was ordered
at Caere, where the tablets for divination had diminished; and a supplication
to Fortune at Algidum; at Rome also a lectisternium was ordered to Youth, and
a supplication at the temple of Hercules, first by individuals named and afterwards
by the whole people at all the shrines; five greater victims were offered to
Genius; and Caius Atilius Serranus the praetor was ordered to make certain vows
if the republic should remain in the same state for ten years. These things,
thus expiated and vowed according to the Sibylline books, relieved, in a great
degree, the public mind from superstitious fears.
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