For Tues. 15APR08

March of the Day
John Phillip Sousa - High School Cadets

Today in Ancient History
[ ante diem xvii kalendas maias ]
ludi Cereri continue (day 4)-- games in honour of the grain goddess Ceres, instituted by/before 202 B.C.
Fordicidia -- an obvious fertility ritual in which a pregnant cow would be sacrificed to the earth goddess Tellus.
421 B.C. -- Peace of Nikias brings the first phase of the Peloponnesian war (a.k.a. the Archidamian War) to an end (by one reckoning.)
69 A.D. -- the forces of emperor wannabe Vitellius defeat the forces of emperor wannabe Otho.
251 A.D. -- Martyrdom of Maximus and Olympiades in Persia.

Today's WWFTD
nubivagant
[fr. classical L. nubivagus, wandering among the clouds] obs. rare passing through the clouds.

"Yet it would be better for a collineomaniac to think, now and then, of the desolation he is bringing down upon happy nests; of how many little broods he may cause to starve; of how many robbed mates he will send, nubivagant, whistling and singing tremulous love notes through the air, vainly searching and calling for their lost spouses, never, never to return!" - H. W. Herbert, Sporting Scenes and Sundry Sketches (1842)

bonus word: collineomaniac, a hunter