Nudipedalia
A name given to a procession of barefooted matrons, as an
obsecratio,
in time of great drought (Tertull.
De Ieiun. 16;
Apol. 40;
Petron. Sat. 44).
The magistrates laid aside their insignia, the fasces were reversed, and a sacrifice was
offered at the Temple of Iupiter, the pontifices bearing at the head of the procession a
sacred stone called the
lapis manalis, from the Temple of Mars outside
the Porta Capena ( Non. p. 547; Fest. pp. 2.128; Marquardt,
Staatsverw. iii.
261).