The aspiration to fame being open, avowed, and honourable, it was no scandal if a Roman of consular rank insisted on a mention in books of history written by a friend and destined (it was clear) to undying renown. Pliny saw his chance (Epp. VII, 33). There was another way and device. By publishing his own correspondence, Pliny was able to put in circulation a kind of autobiography, subtle and unimpeachable. The collection carries no fewer than eleven letters to the address of Cornelius Tacitus, and he is referred to in four others. Pliny quietly established a claim to parity in the field of eloquence.

The site on Middle Hill at Woodeaton, known as the ‘Roman field,’ has long been famous locally for the number of objects which have been picked up on its surface: and a detailed account of the chief finds, so far as they could be traced, was given by Miss Taylor in vol. vii of the Journal. In regard to coins, however, a good deal can now be added to her account from the collections that have come to the Ashmolean Museum since it was written: and it will be seen that there is some evidence to be derived from them as to the currency in use during the period when the place was a centre of activity.

It is not easy to say exactly what this activity was: though numerous coins and small articles, especially fibulae, have been found on the surface, there are hardly any traces of permanent buildings on the site. The Oxford University Archaeological Society, in the course of its trial excavations, came on some fragments of painted plaster which look as if they had belonged to a substantial erection, but there were no foundations of a corresponding character discovered. Potsherds are not uncommon, but are nearly all of late and rough ware, and seem to be distributed irregularly about the field. In fact, there is nothing to suggest that the place was continuously inhabited by a population of such importance as would be expected from the multitude of small finds.

The immense detail of the work that was devoted to the study of Livy's style during the last century brought Livian scholarship almost to a standstill, as it were, by its own bulk. Historians still needed to analyse his subject-matter, and there was scope for examination of the manuscript tradition; but the literary critic who considered treating Livy's style, syntax, and diction could hardly expect to do more than refine on the results of his predecessors. And who, unaided, would set himself alongside Madvig or Weissenborn ? More recently, however, three separate lines of research have given us a fresh perspective.

No ruins of the ancient world outside Italy are more famous than the beautiful romantic remains of Queen Zenobia's city—the desert-city of caravans. No city of the Near East has yielded such an abundance of inscriptions, sculptures and fragments of painting. For more than a century and a half collectors and dealers have found in Palmyra a happy hunting ground; almost every museum has its Palmyrene bust or Palmyrene inscription or some small object such as the common clay tessera. A considerable number of the antiquities found at Palmyra have been published—most of the inscriptions in the Palmyrene dialect of Aramaic or in Greek, numerous sculptures, and many paintings found in tombs. The most important Palmyrene texts have been translated and will shortly be available to those historians who are not acquainted with Semitic languages.

The bronze bust reproduced in fig. I and on plates I and II, from photographs supplied by the kindness of Mr. Wright, director of the Colchester Museum, was found along with two others, a statuette of Iupiter and a fine mask of Silenus, at Colchester in October, 1845. All three bronzes were described by the late Sir Charles Newton, then quite a young man, in a letter to Sir Henry Ellis. Newton's account of the find is as follows:

The three bronzes … were discovered on the line of railway now running between Colchester and Ipswich, about a mile to the east of the Colchester terminus and half a mile west of the town. They were dug up at the depth of about five feet from the surface; portions of red pottery, bronze and lead, were found near them, and, at a distance of about six feet, a human skull and some horses' teeth. The spot presented no indications of having been a place of dwelling or of sepulture, but two or three hundred yards nearer the terminus is a small rising ground, in cutting through which the railway labourers are said to have found urns containing bones.

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.