Hail Robigus!
Hail Robigo!
Hail Mars!
Hail Quirinus!
We ask that you ward off all malady to our cereal crops
And insure that our nourishment remains safe and protected.
We lustrate our fields on this day in anticipation of the bountiful harvest to come.
Salve Robige!
Salve Robigo!
Salve Marte!
Salve Quirine!

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The Robigalia are concerned with the welfare of the growing wheat. Robigus and/or his female counterpart, the goddess Robigo, personify both the robigo or red rust that might attack the grain crop and the deity/deities who are also the power to keep the cereal blight at bay. The original sacrificial animal for the Robigalia was a dog, and the feriae may have been connected in some way with the movable (feriae conceptivae) Augurium Canarium that involved red suckling puppies. The canine associations and the colour red become reminiscent of the Greek god Ares with whom Ennius identified the Roman Mars. As an agricultural deity, Mars is linked with Robigus, and the latter may be a Martian indigitation or even Mars’ alter ego, the god Quirinus. Ovid informs us, in fact, that the rites of the day are performed by the flamen Quirinalis, the priest of Quirinus. The inclusion of Robigo conforms with the dual gender associations of all the ferial deities of the month of April.

The final three festivals of April, the Parilia, the Vinalia and the Robigalia, suggest respectively the deities Mars, Jupiter and Quirinus – the most archaic triad of Rome and a Roman version of Zeus and the Dioscuri. Robigus/Quirinus, whose festival falls beyond the quasi-terminal point for feriae within the Roman month (the 23rd), would be the chthonian member of the divine twins – in a sense, the Mars of the nether world. His grove was to be found beyond the city limits – stressing perhaps his otherworld associations. Quirinus came to be identified with the apotheosized Romulus, but his real connection would be with (the slain) Remus. The festival games for the Robigalia consisted of races between men and others between boys.