CENSORINUS, Roman grammarian and writer, flourished during the 3rd century A.D. He was the author of a lost work De Accentibus and of an extant treatise De Die Natali, written in 238, dedicated to his patron as a birthday gift and dealing with the natural history of man, the influence of the stars and genii, music, religious rites, astronomy and the doctrines of the Greek philosophers. The second part deals with chronological and mathematical questions and has been useful in determining the principal epochs of ancient history. The chief authorities used were Varro and Suetonius. Some scholars hold that the work is practically an adaptation of the lost Pratum of Suetonius. The fragments of a work De Natali Institutione are not by Censorinus.
The only good edition with commentary is still that of H. Linden brog (1614) ; the most recent critical editions are by 0. Jahn (1845), F. Hultsch (1867) , and J. Cholodniak (1889) . There is an English translation of the De Die Natali (the first II chapters being omitted) , with notes by W. Maude (New York, 1900) .