This was the name of the fifth month of the republican calendar until Marco Antonio during his consulship he proposed to the Senate to change Quintilis to Iulius in honor of his idolized mentor the dictator Gaius Julius Caesar .
It was the month consecrated to Minerva , divinity of wisdom associated with the Greek Athena and one of the three superior divinities of the Roman pantheon, the Capitoline triad, together with Jupiter and Juno . The month was represented in the calendar as a tan young man whose hair resembled ears of corn because it was the month in which the farmers began to reap their fields of farro (ancient wheat), oats, and rye.
The Kalendas of Quintilis was a disastrous day. Nothing good could be done until the 4th:For example, on the Kalends of Iulius 31, a young man named C. César Augusto Germanico was appointed consul. History will remember him by the nickname given to him by his father's legionnaires during his childhood in Germany: Caligula (booties)
On the 5th there was an imprecise celebration in honor of Jupiter called Publifuges . The Ludi Apollinares also began , from 5 to 12, consecrated to Apollo and established during the Second Punic War to entertain the citizens and ward off the dangers that plagued the republic. It was a kind of "Thanksgiving" to the Roman army in which banquets, games and processions of the matrons took place to the temples where they performed a curious ritual:They swept the altars with their loose hair.
On the 7th, tribute was paid to the death of Romulus, which occurred in 715 BC. It was a licentious day that also coincided with a curious celebration, the Nonas Caprotinas , or fig festival, a ritual in honor of Juno in which female slaves played a predominant role.
The day after the Ides, the celebration of the Stella Maris took place, linked to Isis in the days of the Empire. Sirius, the brightest star in the sky and guide to navigators in the Eastern Mediterranean, was revered.
According to tradition Caius Julius Caesar he was born on the 11th of this month. That is why Marco Antonio he chose this month, and no other, to change his name in honor of the dictator. But the entertainment for César did not end here. On July 18, 29 B.C. (curious date, not chosen at random years later), his adoptive son, Augusto , consecrated a temple dedicated to the cult of Divine Caesar, the dictator who guaranteed the welfare of the Empire. Every year, from the 20th to the end of the month, the Games in his honor were held throughout the Empire.
The 20th was the big day for Minerva . The Panateneas were celebrated , direct inheritance of the great Athenian festivals in honor of Athena. They consisted of a massive civic celebration in which the noblest ladies of the city offered the goddess an exquisite tunic called palladium and that had taken them nine months to make. This luxurious garment was placed on the image of Minerva in a solemn ritual and, later, a procession was carried out through the streets so that the people could caress it or even take a piece of it. Priests with olive branches, young dancers, music and color accompanied the goddess. Minerva was the protector of the cities and her protective halo descended to all citizens. Every four years, major festivities called Great Panathenaic took place. . Whoever has been able to see or attend the procession of the Mare de Deu dels Desamparats leaving the Basilica of the Virgin in Valencia does not need more words to describe this festivity.
Between the 19th and the 21st the Lucaria was celebrated , the festival of the sacred forests associated with the agricultural goddess Dea Dia.
On the 23rd, the last great festivity of the month took place:the Neptunalia . They were festivals whose purpose was to ward off drought in honor of Neptune, god of the waters and protector of fishermen and sailors. These festivities were held near the sea, preferably on a cape, where an ox was brought to be sacrificed in honor of the god and served as food for the ceremonial banquet. The attendees decorated their tunics with plant elements, they drank in abundance and nautical competitions were held.
Collaboration of Gabriel Castelló author of Bravery