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(the date of his death), when describing the reluctance which he had felt against undertaking a journey which ultimately turned out unluckily, says: 'I often alleged auguries and evil omens, or that I held the day of Saturn sacred.'[1] The parallel passages in Ovid leave little doubt that he means the Sabbath. Tacitus, in the famous though often nonsensical account of the Jews with which he prefaces his story of the fall of Jerusalem, gives as one theory of the Sabbath that it was held in honour of Saturn because 'of the seven stars which rule human affairs Saturn has the highest sphere and the chief power.'[2] Here we find the Jewish week linked on to the planetary, and I now pass on to an examination of the latter.
- ↑ Or 'accursed.'
- ↑ Tac. Hist. V, 4. We may add to these a passage in Dion Cassius, XLIX, 22, which though written in the third century probably comes from a much earlier authority. Describing a capture of Jerusalem about 38 B.C. he notes that this like the earlier one by Pompey (v. infra, p. 21) was effected on 'what was even then called Saturn's day.' Dion, as we shall see, was puzzled by the rise into common currency of the planetary week and very possibly he found this phrase in an earlier or perhaps contemporary authority and noted it as bearing on the question in which he was interested.
