a.d. VI Non. Mart.
March 2 in Ancient Rome
Valentinian and Valens outlaw Manichaean meetings
Rome’s war on a Persian religion
religionAD 372
Julian date · ≈ Mar 3 on our calendar
A law sent from Trier to the prefect of Rome ordered heavy fines for Manichaean teachers, disgrace for their hearers and confiscation of their meeting houses.
Valentinian I
Background
Manichaeism was founded in third-century Persia by the prophet Mani, who taught that the world was a battleground between light and darkness. It spread along trade routes into the Roman empire and was distrusted by pagan and Christian rulers alike, partly because of its Persian origin. By the 370s the emperors were Christians, and the brothers Valentinian I in the West and Valens in the East used law to police religious dissent.
This short ruling, issued at Trier and addressed to Ampelius, prefect of the city of Rome, is blunt. Wherever a Manichaean assembly or "crowd of this kind" was found, its teachers were to be heavily fined, those who attended were to be marked as disgraced and cut off from the company of others, and the houses where the "profane teaching" was given were to be confiscated by the treasury.
The law shows how religious identity was becoming a legal matter in the late empire, with property and reputation at stake. It also had a famous near-contemporary audience: in the 370s the young Augustine of Hippo was himself a Manichaean "hearer" in Africa per Augustine, Confessions, before his later conversion to catholic Christianity.
Ancient source: Codex Theodosianus 16.5.3 · Reference
Sources
☁ Rome today (1991–2020 avg): 14°/5°C (57°/41°F) · rain 40% of days
Rome in MarchMarch, once the first month of the year, reopened the seasons of war and…
Fields & crops
Columella calls March the best time for pruning vines and the first digging of vineyards; spring crops like millet were readied per Columella 11.2.
Courts & law
Legal and public business resumed in full after winter. At the Liberalia (17 Mar.) many boys put on the plain toga of manhood and were enrolled as adult citizens, with a family procession to the Forum per Ovid, Fasti 3.771–88.
Senate & politics
From c. 222 to 153 BC the consuls entered office on the Ides of March; Livy records it for 217 BC, and the starting year is a modern reconstruction per Livy 22.1.4. From 153 BC they took office on the Kalends of January per Livy, Per. 47. Caesar was killed at a Senate meeting on the Ides of March 44 BC per Suetonius, Velleius.
Military
The month of Mars opened the campaign season. The Salii carried the sacred shields, and the Tubilustrium (23 Mar.) purified the war trumpets per Varro and Ovid.
Festivals & religion
Matronalia (1 Mar.), Liberalia (17 Mar.), when boys often took the man's toga, and the Quinquatrus of Minerva (19–23 Mar.), a holiday for craftsmen, teachers and doctors per Ovid, Fasti 3.
Daily life
March, once the first month of the year, reopened the seasons of war and sailing. The Salii, Mars' leaping priests, danced through the city. On the Kalends (Matronalia), married women received gifts and in turn served a meal to the household's enslaved people per Macrobius 1.12.7; Ovid, Fasti 3. Columella treats March as prime time for pruning vines and digging per Columella 11.2.
For soldiers, the campaign season began; for traders, sea routes reopened and grain ships from Egypt and Africa could sail again, easing city food supplies.
Sources: Ovid, Fasti 3 · Varro, De Lingua Latina 6 · Macrobius, Saturnalia 1.12 · Livy 22.1.4 (Latin) · Livy, Periochae 47 (Latin) · Livy, Periochae 116 (Latin) · Suetonius, Divus Iulius 80–81 (Latin) · Velleius Paterculus 2.56 (Latin)
All days in March →
LATIN LINE OF THE DAY
Ille sapit quisquis, Postume, vixit heri.
“The wise man, Postumus, is whoever lived yesterday.”
Martial, Epigrams 5.58 · translation ours (literal)
