farther
proof that the Romans did not regard the night as forming any part of the
birthday, but also as affording an opportunity of recording an opinion as
to the interpretation of Varro's words, which, in this passage, do not
appear to have ever been properly understood.

After stating that many persons in Umbria reckon from noon to noon as one
and the same day, Varro remarks:

"Quod quidem nimis absurdum est; nam qui calendarum hora sexta natus
est apud Umbros, dies ejus natalis videri debebit et calendarum
dimidiatus, et qui est post calendas dies ante horam ejusdem diei
sextam."

Now why should _beginning one's birthday at noon_ appear so absurd to
Varro? Simply because the hours of the night were not then supposed to be
included in the birthday at all, and therefore Varro could not _realize_
the idea of a birthday continued through the night.

He says that, according to the Umbrian reckoning, a person born on any day
_after_ the point of noon, would have only half a birthday on that day; and
for the other half, he would have to take the forenoon of the following
day. Varro had no notion of joining the afternoon of one day to the
forenoon of another, because he looked upon the unbroken presence of the
sun as the very essence of a natal day.

Nothing can be plainer than that this was the true nature of the absurdity
alluded to; but it would not suit the prejudices of the commentators,
because it would compel them to admit that _sexta hora must have been in
the afternoon_, in opposition to their favourite dogma that it was always
in the forenoon.

For if Varro had intended to represent sexta hora in the _forenoon_, he
would have said that the other half-day must be taken from the _after_noon
of the _pridie_, instead of saying, as he does say, that it must be taken
from the _fore_noon of the _postridie_ of the Calends.

Consequently, Varro means by "qui Calendarum hora sexta natus est," a
person born in the sixth hour of the day of the Calends; the sixth hour
being that which immediately succeeded noon--the _media hora_ of Ovid. But
what Varro more immediately means by it is, not any particular point of
time, but generally any time _after noon_ on the day of the Calends.

That the true position of _sexta hora_, when implying duration, was in the
afternoon, has long been a conviction of mine; and I have elsewhere
produced undeniable evidence that it was so {543} considered by ancient
authors. Bu