Circus Maximus Quotes

And then, when a handsome young decurion in full ceremonial armor suddenly ran down the steps of the spectator stands, leaping the barrier into the arena to sweep me into a passionate embrace, I thought the cheers would bring the stones of the Circus Maximus tumbling down. When Cai set me back on my feet, I cocked my fist again—in jest this time—and when I didn’t punch him but kissed him, long and slow on his glorious mouth . . .

That is why each year, from 4 to 10 April, games were celebrated (Megalesia): theatrical shows in front of the temple and chariot races in the Circus Maximus on the last day.

Other deities from the African continent gained a foothold in Rome: Jupiter Ammon, a god from Cyrene, was there chiefly through iconography, in the forum of Augustus (in memory of Alexander, the haunting model of universal monarchy), but also on funerary altars where his head with ram's horns safeguarded the tomb. Septimius Severus consecrated a 'gigantic' temple (DC, 77, 16, 3) to the gods of his homeland, Leptis Magna 'the Great': Hercules and Liber who represented the Punic Melqart and Eschmoun. The Virgo Caelestis, 'evoked' in 146 bc by Scipio Aemilianus, also enjoyed the favour of Septimius Severus, whose coinage shows the goddess on a lion's back, like Cybele in the Circus Maximus.