The quest of Vergil's birthplace has been brought to a satisfactory conclusion, but the nationality and social origin of the poet are still curiously obscure. He may have been Etruscan, Celtic, Venetian, Ligurian or even Greek; and he is variously described in the ancient biographies as ‘parentibus infimis’ and ‘dignitate eques Romanus.’ To this it may be rejoined that these things matter little in any man, and not at all in the case of a great poet: stemmata quid faciunt? Yet the circumstances of his birth play their part, like the scenery of his early home, in determining the growth of a poet's mind; and for this reason it seems worth while to investigate them afresh, and to attempt a new quest after the elusive facts of Vergil's family.

The ancient evidence for the wars and conquests of Augustus is not only fragmentary: the fragments themselves are capricious and misleading. Chance and design have conspired to produce a like result; and the interested partiality of contemporary authorities has been nobly seconded by the ignorance or the indifference of subsequent compilers. The successes of the Princeps and of his stepsons received ample commemoration and overshadowed the achievements of his lieutenants. The existence of a relatively full narrative in Florus and Orosius of the ‘Bellum Cantabricum’ of 26 B.C, the only Spanish campaign directed by Augustus in person, serves to illustrate by contrast how meagre is the record of that part of the long and arduous task of subduing Spain which was prosecuted and consummated in his absence. Similarly the spectacular conquest of the Alps by Tiberius and Drusus in 15 B.C. is more fully recorded and more widely known than the campaigns of P. Silius Nerva which preceded it and which made it possible.

In the establishing of Vespasian on the imperial throne an important part was played by Ti. Iulius Alexander, the prefect of Egypt. Before any decisive step was taken by Vespasian, the Egyptian prefect had deliberated with either Mucianus or Vespasian, or with both, and had pledged his support. The prefect was, moreover, the first to have his soldiers take the oath of allegiance to Vespasian, on July 1st, 69. The die was cast by Vespasian at the conclusion of a conference held with Mucianus at Mt. Carmel, and it is only reasonable to suppose that Ti. Iulius Alexander had a representative at this all-important meeting. I suggest that there was such a representative, a certain Basilides, concerning whom we have considerable information.

It is reasonable to suppose that these, the only two legions with the title ‘Primigenia,’ were sister legions. Cassius Dio appears to have thought that they were created by Augustus; for, in his (otherwise accurate) list of the foundation dates of legions which survived to his own day, he mentioned XXII (Mommsen's insertion of δευτέρου ϰαὶ in the text of 55, 23, 6 is a certain one) among the legions of Augustus' army. This cannot be XXII Deiotariana, for it was no longer in existence in Cassius Dio's time, but must be XXII Primigenia. Cassius Dio did not include XV Primigenia in his list because, having been disbanded by Vespasian at the beginning of his principate, it did not qualify for a place in that list. As, however, there is no room for these two legions among the twenty-five Roman legions which existed in A.D. 23, Cassius Dio was evidently in error, and the two legions must be supposed to have been created after that date.

The reign of Hadrian marks the beginning of a new epoch in Roman administration and in the history of Roman Law. Hadrian's visit to Britain is immortalised by the Wall which he built from Tyne to Solway. Its construction is characteristic of the Emperor's willingness to renounce further conquests and even to abandon land which had been Roman. The Wall marked the limit of the districts which he was prepared to retain and administer. It followed, not the shortest and easiest route, but a line beyond the fortified area whence a look-out could be kept over the barbarians outside, and its object was the completion and definition of the fortified frontier region whereby it became easier to civilise and to pacify the country which lay to the south. Hadrian's aim was to bring order and peace to the land bounded by the new frontiers of the Roman world. Thus Hadrian may be sharply contrasted with his predecessor Trajan, the soldier on the throne, who owed his elevation to his successful wars in the Rhine region, and who as Emperor extended the frontiers of the Empire on the lower Danube and in the East. On Hadrian's accession the Empire was more powerful than ever before or afterwards, but its financial and military resources were strained to the utmost, and indeed frequently had been overstrained. The small peasant owners and small towns, sources of Roman culture and prosperity, had begun to suffer and disappear.

At rex sollicitus monstris oracula Fauni,

fatidici genitoris, adit lucosque sub alta

consulit Albunea, nemorum quae maxima sacro

fonte sonat saevamque exhalat opaca mephitim.

hinc Italae gentes omnisque Oenotria tellus

in dubiis responsa petunt.

The traditional view from the time of Servius onwards has been that this passage refers to a shrine in the neighbourhood of Tibur, and that the waters described are those of the sulphur lakes of Albula, white and strong-smelling, which lie two miles away in the open country. This view was first challenged by Bonstetten in 1805, and his theory has been further developed by Carcopino. The main objections to the old view are, firstly, that Albula lies about thirty miles north in the Sabine region, well away both from the district in which is set the action of the last six books of the Aeneid, and from the home of Latinus, whether the latter was at Laurentum (the existence of which is now doubted by some scholars) or at Lavinium; secondly, the difference in name, for that the springs near Tibur were called ‘Albula’ is well attested by ancient notices; and thirdly, the difficulty of access. Both Bonstetten and Carcopino are in agreement in locating the oracle at the sulphur springs near Pratica di Mare, the ancient Lavinium : neither, however, seems to have investigated the site as fully as was desirable, and it may be of interest to give the results of a further exploration.

‘Art in Rome and Roman art are two notions not necessarily identical.’ Some years ago, I began a paper on the chronology of Roman sculpture under the Republic with these words, and since then Mrs. Strong has published her book Art in Ancient Rome, which by its title seems to express the same view—a view corroborated by the materials studied in the first chapters. Therefore, notwithstanding some recent objections, in matters of plastic art at Rome, I persist in distinguishing a Latin and a Roman period, meeting about 90 B.C., the epoch of the Social War.

The two following notes deal with parallel and interrelated aspects of imperial policy noticeable in Spain after the institution of the Principate, namely, the attitude of the provincials to the Princeps and his house, and the survival of Nationalism. Under the first head are included both religious and non-religious institutions, showing in each case not only the reactions of the Spanish provincials to the Principate but also the personal efforts made by the Princeps to ingratiate himself and his dynasty, while in the second note an attempt is made to demonstrate that the imperial administration, so far from aiming at a paralysis of nationalism, went out of its way to encourage it.

This important war has recently been the subject of several studies. None the less, opinions are still divided about the central problem—did Octavian occupy only a small portion of Roman Dalmatia, or did he conquer almost the whole of that region? That is the question, and there is as yet no final solution. The following pages are written in an attempt to make a solution easier.

The traditional date for the Syrian governorship of M. Titius, ‘about 10 B.C.’, is derived from a passage in Josephus, where he is referred to in connection with Herod's supposed ‘third journey’ to Rome. The circumstances of this third journey have caused considerable perplexity to those who have investigated the details of the reign of Herod the Great. The trouble is due to a confusion in Josephus himself, who can be shown to be narrating a series of events as occurring after, which in reality refer to the years immediately before, 12 B.C. The ‘third journey’ was never undertaken or, indeed, contemplated, and the context in which the name of Titius occurs is to be dated to 12 B.C. and not later.

Perhaps the most remarkable product of Rhenish glass-furnaces during the Imperial period is the well-known fabric bearing polychrome or monochrome applied decoration. These are the glasses termed by German archaeologists ‘Schlangenfaden’ or ‘snake-thread’ glass. They are of various shapes and were produced in great numbers from the last quarter of the second to the fourth century A.D., probably largely, if not entirely, at Cologne.

Pubblicazioni della Società Italiana per la ricerca dei Papiri greci e latini in Egitto. Estratto dal volume undecimo.—No. 1182: Frammenti di Gaio a cura di Vincenzo Arangio-Ruiz.—Firenze: Stab. tipogr. E. Ariani, 1933: 52 pp. with 4 plates. (Referred to below as A.-R.)

The data which Beloch has collected for the population of Syria are very scanty, and his calculations are highly insecure. It is perhaps possible to reach a more certain result by a closer study of the most important piece of evidence on the topic that we possess. The census conducted by Sulpicius Quirinius as legatus of Syria in A.D. 6–7, which, owing to its mention in the Gospel of St. Luke (ii, I), has evoked endless controversy among commentators, is also referred to in an inscription, probably found at Beyrout and preserved since the eighteenth century at Venice, which supplies information of a precision unique of its kind. We read, in fact, in the epitaph of an officer, Q. Aemilius Secundus:—Iussu Quirini censum egi Apamenae civitatis millium hominum civium CXVII. To estimate the value of the figure 117,000, it is important to decide what the author of the inscription meant by homines cives.

Dr. W. W. Tarn in his article in JRS xxii, 135 ff., has convincingly argued that in 37 B.C. Antony re-named his two children by Cleopatra, with the intention of using the name Alexander Helios in particular to attract the sentiment and religious enthusiasm of the East. His article is not concerned with the result of this propaganda, and the present note is an attempt to consider the literary evidence for its success or failure.

In the first place we should expect that, if Antony wished to give prominence to Alexander Helios and Cleopatra Selene, he would be forced to minimise to some extent the claims of other children of himself or of Cleopatra. Of these children Caesarion is by far the most important. As early as 42 Cleopatra had been given permission by the Triumvirs to proclaim him King of Egypt, in return for the help she had sent to Dolabella (Dio xlvii, 31, 5). He continued to retain the title until his death, and there seems to have been no attempt to subordinate him to the other children : if anything, his position becomes more important as he grows older.