ANNA PERENNA, an old Roman deity of the circle or "ring" of the year, as the name (per annum) clearly indicates. Her festival, characterized by revelry and licentiousness, fell on the full moon of the first month (March 15), and was held at the grove of the goddess at the first milestone on the Via Fla minia. Sacrifice was offered to her "that the circle of the year might be happily completed." This is all we know for certain about the goddess and her cult ; but the name naturally suggested myth-making, and Anna became a figure in stories in Ovid (Fasti, iii., 523 et seq.) and in Silius Italicus (viii. 5o et seq.). The coarse myth told by Ovid, in which Anna plays a trick on Mars when in love with Minerva, is probably an old Italian folk-tale.