Perhaps the most remarkable of the various forms of decorated ‘Samian’ vessels is the jug or vase which is the main subject of this paper. Previously, the precise shape of these vessels was a matter of doubt, the recorded fragments being incomplete, generally lacking neck, handle and base. An attempt was made in 1933 to restore fragments existing in London on the lines of the St. Rémy green-glazed form, Déchelette 62, but this restoration has been found to be only approximately correct for the particular fragments which belong to Hermet's decorated form 15, as shown in his work La Graufesenque (Condatomago).

The fifth-century Christian writer Sozomen of Constantinople preserves a story told by certain pagans about the philosopher Sopater of Apamea, whom the emperor Constantine put to death in a.d. 333 on the advice of the Christian Flavius Ablabius, then Praetorian Prefect of the East. Constantine had consulted the philosopher — so the story goes — in an attempt to redress his guilt at having ordered the murder of some of his nearest relations, among them his son Crispus. But Sopater replied that such moral defilement could admit of no purification. Afterwards, on meeting some Christian bishops, Constantine was delighted to learn that the sins of those who truly repented could be washed away in Christian baptism. It was this that led him to adopt the faith, and to encourage his subjects to do the same.

In discussion over the dating of the Bucolics of Calpurnius Siculus, an important role has always been played by attempts to identify the character of Meliboeus, who is to be read as a bucolic allegory of the poet's patron. By providing a new interpretation of the description of Meliboeus’ literary production, I argue that he must be the agricultural writer Columella. A consideration of other aspects of Meliboeus confirms this identification, as does the analysis of a number of significant allusions to De cultu hortorum, the poem that makes up the tenth book of Columella's De re rustica. I then establish the date of Columella and discuss the consequences for dating Calpurnius, placing some parts of his book later in the reign of Nero than has been customary.

Early one bright afternoon, seventeen centuries ago, Constantine stood staring at the sun. According to his self-appointed biographer Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea, who claimed to have heard the story from Constantine himself, the emperor was on campaign, when, ‘around midday, as the day was declining’ he saw a shining cross of light over the sun, with the attached text ‘By this conquer’. The understandably startled ruler slept on the matter, whereupon Christ appeared in a dream and instructed him to fashion himself a copy of the holy sign, which would protect him against his enemies. He did as he had been told, took Christian clerics as his advisers and, not long afterwards, set off for Italy to fight his rival, Maxentius. The rhetorician Lactantius, writing about twenty years before Eusebius, presented a different tale in his De mortibus persecutorum: Constantine, on the eve of his decisive battle against Maxentius in a.d. 312, at the Milvian Bridge to the north of Rome, was instructed in a dream to ‘mark the heavenly sign of God’ on his shields. Constantine's moment of epiphany, sometimes equated with his ‘conversion’, has traditionally been seen both as one of history's great turning-points and as one of its most enduring enigmas. The interpretation of Constantine's vision(s) is further complicated by an anecdote that appears in an anonymous panegyric of the emperor, delivered in a.d. 310. Having turned off from the road to visit ‘the most beautiful temple in the world’, Constantine was greeted by a remarkable sight: ‘For you saw, I believe, Constantine, your Apollo, accompanied by Victory, offering you laurel crowns, which each brought an omen of thirty years [of life or rule]’.

Counsel often open their address with the words ‘May it please your Lordship’, though they doubt whether their client's merit justifies such conventional optimism. In submitting this slight tribute of admiration and gratitude to Norman Baynes, I have similar feelings, but I hope that the subject at least will find favour with one who, as lawyers are proud to remember, is one of themselves as well as a famous historian.

It may not be actually stated that the wicked uncle of the fairy tale was also a guardian, but probably he was; for uncles are the commonest guardians in all ages, and their perfidy is a typical example of human wickedness. Among those who suspected them most were, according to our tradition, the ancient lawgivers of Greece; for guardianship and the connected subject of second marriages occupy quite a noticeable place in the scanty records of both Solon and Charondas. Solon, according to Diogenes Laertius, laid down that a guardian must not marry the mother of his ward, and that the person who would inherit from the ward must not be his guardian.

Much has been written on the ‘Constitutio Antoniniana,’ especially since the publication of Papyrus Giessen 40, but very little in English. It may therefore be useful if, before I state my own views on the subject, I briefly summarise the main stages of the controversy up to the point which it has hitherto reached.

In the autumn of 1921 a scheme for the extension of the Exchange at Bordeaux led to the demolition of certain properties in the Rue du Pont-de-la-Mousque. During the operations the workmen encountered the original Roman wall of the town, built about A.D. 300 as a result of the great invasion of A.D. 276. The Chamber of Commerce, on the enlightened initative of their President, M. Étienne Huyard, decided to follow up the discovery by a systematic and careful excavation. The decision was justified by its happy results. Many interesting objects which had been utilized as building material were brought to light. These included a votive altar with an inscription which is of peculiar importance because of the light which it throws on the early relations of Gaul and Britain. A brief account of it may not be unwelcome to readers of the Journal of Roman Studies.