Quinquatria March 19

According to Varro, it was so called because it was held on the fifth (quinqu-) day after the Ides, in the same way that the Tusculans called a festival on the sixth day after the Ides Sexatrus or that of the seventh Septimatrus. Both Varro and Festus state that the Quinquatrus was celebrated for only one day, but Ovid says that it was celebrated for five days, hence its name: on the first day no blood was shed, but on the last four there were gladiatorial contests.

The first day was the festival proper, and that the next four were an expansion made perhaps in the time of Caesar to gratify the people. The ancient Roman religious calendars assign only one day to the festival.

Ovid says that this festival was celebrated in commemoration of the birthday of Minerva; but according to Festus, it was sacred to Minerva because her temple on the Aventine was consecrated on that day. On the fifth day of the festival, according to Ovid, the trumpets used in the sacred rites were purified; but this seems to have originally been a separate festival called Tubilustrium, which the old calendars place on March 23. When the celebration of Quinquatrus was extended to five days, the Tubilustrium is said to have fallen on the last day of that festival.

As this festival was sacred to Minerva, it seems that women were accustomed to consult fortune-tellers and soothsayers on this day. Domitian had it celebrated every year at his villa in Alban, situated at the foot of the Alban Hills, and instituted a college to direct the celebration, which consisted of spectacles of wild beasts, exhibitions of plays, and contests of orators and poets.

There was also another festival of this name called Quinquatrus Minusculae or Quinquatrus Minores, celebrated on the Ides of June, during which the tibicines passed through the city in procession to the temple of Minerva.