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on the week. On the whole we must say that we do not know what in practice the week meant to the plain man of the Empire. Yet we know that he learnt to observe it and must conclude that he had some motive for doing so, whether it took any practical form or not.
Another question which may be asked is whether the spread of the week is due in whole or in part to its being included in the ritual of particular sects or religions. I have already said that the planetary week no doubt received much support from the Sabbatical week of the Jews. So, too, the Christian acceptance of the sevenday week may have helped: though its contribution in the second century must have been small. But there is another religion which may have contributed, if not to establish, at any rate to widen its influence. That religion is Mithraism. We have heard of late years much of the various mystery religions, of the rites of Isis, Cybele, Attis and Adonis, but perhaps none has attracted so much attention as that of the Persian Sun-god Mithras. Many striking suggestions have been made about it. We are told that there was a time when it was an even chance whether Christianity or Mithraism would become the dominant religion of the Empire, and that the fixing of the feast of the Nativity of Christ close to the winter solstice was made in imitation of the Mithraistic feast in celebration of the annual birth of the Sun-god. Mr H. G. Wells in his
