The Pontifices also explain, to those who inquire of them, the
proper ceremonies at funerals. For Numa taught them not to think that
there was any pollution in death, but that we must pay due honours to
the gods below, because they will receive all that is noblest on earth.
Especially he taught them to honour the goddess Libitina, the goddess
who presides over funeral rites, whether she be Proserpine, or rather
Venus, as the most learned Romans imagine, not unnaturally referring our
birth and our death to the same divinity.
He also defined the periods of mourning, according to the age of the
deceased. He allowed none for a child under three years of age, and for
one older the mourning was only to last as many months as he lived
years, provided those were not more than ten. The longest mourning was
not to continue above ten months, after which space widows were
permitted to marry again; but she that took another husband before that
term was out was obliged by his decree to sacrifice a cow with calf.
Of Numa's many other institutions I shall only mention two, that of the
Salii and of the Feciales, which especially show his love of justice.
The Feciales are, as it were, guardians of peace, and in my opinion
obtain their name from their office; for they were to act as mediators,
and not to permit an appeal to arms before all hope of obtaining justice
by fair means had been lost.
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