Secular Games (Noun)
Meaning
The centennial rites and games of ancient Rome that marked the commencement of a new generation (100 years representing the longest life in a generation); observances may have begun as early as the 5th century BC and lasted well into the Christian era.
Classification
Nouns denoting acts or actions.
Usages
Examples
- Secular games involved multiple types of performance, including theatrical, musical, and athletic events.
- Ancient historians tend to downplay the actual happenings of the secular games and instead focus on the mythological origins of the events.
- The secular games often highlighted discrepancies within Roman social structures during which established social expectations were often turned upside-down.
- Although the Romans conducted the secular games irregularly, at an average interval of a century or longer, during the late Republic they were held much more frequently.
- A typical example of the kind of reversals found in Roman secular games involved temporarily reversing certain common social roles between masters and slaves.