The Apollinarian Games founded for victory not for health

While the Ludi Apollinares were celebrated in Rome for the first time according to the Soothsayer Marcius' prescriptions and after Sibylline verses, a sudden attack from the enemy had the people taking up arms and marching to war. At the same time a flush of arrows was seen to rain on the assailants, putting them to flight while the victorious Romans returned to the games in honour of the god who had just saved them. It is on the basis of this account that it is thought that the games were established because of this victory and not because of a pestilence as some suppose.

Macrobius, Saturnalia, I, 17, 27 (éd. Nisard, 1854) translation of the French by the translator of the course.