COMPITALIA.— The Compitalia, one of the three conceptual festivals celebrated at the close of the sowing cycle, fell between December 17 (the Saturnalia) and January 5, tending to be fixed on this latter date, which is the one recorded by the Philocalian Calendar and by Polemius Silvius. They took their name from the fact that they were held at crossroads (compita), where the roads dividing the various farmlands in the countryside and the houses in the city meet (Varro, *De lingua Latina*, VI, 25).
The festivals, as is proven by the paintings of the Roman colony at Delos, were conducted with the sacrifice of a pig in honor of the Lares Compitales, organized by special associations recruited from the common people; but having given occasion for political insinuations, the Senate was forced in 64 BC to suppress them. Revived by Clodius and again suppressed by Caesar, they were reorganized by Augustus in 10 BC and by him himself were made complete with the introduction of a new element, the *genius Augusti*. After the Augustan reorganization, the festival of the city was held twice a year in each of the 265 *vici*. For each *vicus*, a *magister vici* was elected, assisted by four ministers, who oversaw the execution of the festival. These officials were also chosen from among the *tenuiarii*, who aspired to preside over the festival, having the right on that occasion to wear the *praetexta* and to be preceded by lictors. In this way, the cult of the genius of Augustus penetrated all strata of the Roman population, also because it reproduced the fundamental elements of domestic cult.