The fall of the Republic is in any case a convenient point from which to survey the religious ideas and practice of the conquerors of the civilized world. It is not indeed a more significant epoch in the history of the Roman religion than the era of the Punic wars, when Rome ceased to be a peninsular, and began to be a cosmopolitan state; but it is a turning-point in the history of the calendar and of religious worship as well as of the constitution. Henceforward, in spite of the strenuous efforts of Augustus to revive the old forms of worship, all religious rites have a tendency to become transformed or overshadowed, first by the cult of the Caesars[49]; secondly, by the steadily increasing influence of foreign and especially of Oriental cults; and lastly, by Christianity itself[50].
Taking our stand, then, in the year 46 B.C., the last year of the pre-Julian calendar, we are able in a small volume, by carefully working through that calendar, to lay a firm foundation of material for the study of the religious life and thought of the Roman people while it was still in some sense really Roman. The plan has indeed its disadvantages; it excludes the introduction of a systematic account of certain departments of the subject, such as the development of the priesthoods, the sacrificial ritual, the auspicia, and the domestic practice of religious rites[51]. But if it is true, as it undoubtedly is, that in dealing with the Roman religion we must begin with the cult[52], and that for the cult the one ‘sincerum documentum’ is to be found in the surviving Fasti, these drawbacks may fairly be deemed to be counterbalanced by distinct advantages. And in order to neutralize any bewilderment that may be caused by the constant variety of the rites we shall meet with, both in regard to their origin, history, and meaning, some attempt will be made, when we have completed the round of the year, to sum up our results, to sketch in outline the history of Roman religious ideas, and to estimate the influence of all this elaborate ceremonial on the life and character of the Roman people.
In order to fit the calendar of each month into a single page of this work it has been necessary to print the names of the festivals, and the indications of Kalends, Nones, &c. in _small_ capital letters instead of the large capitals in which they appear in the originals (see above, p. 15). In the headings to the days as they occur throughout the book the method of the originals will be reproduced exactly, i. e. large capitals represent in every case the most ancient calendar of the Republic, and small capitals the _additamenta ex fastis_.