In the first of his letters ex Ponto (vv. 51–58) Ovid mentions the confession of sins practised in the religion of Isis by the faithful (in the presence of a priest?). One man, seated before the altar of the goddess (Isiacos focos, v. 52), confessed that he had offended her divinity (numen violasse fatentem, v. 51); a second, deprived of his sight in punishment for some similar crime, went along the public road crying out that he had merited the castigation (se meruisse, v. 54). Ovid affirms that he had seen all this with his own eyes (vidi ego, v. 51). It may be that his vidi ego is purely rhetoric. Confession of sins, however, was certainly practised in Egypt ab antiquo, as is proved by a group of Theban inscriptions of the epoch of the XlXth Dynasty (about 1300 B.C.) dedicated to various divinities, amongst whom is a local goddess assimilated to Isis-Hathor. Moreover, ophthalmia was very common in Egypt.

In the campaign of 1931–32 at Dura-Europos on the Euphrates there was found among the military archives in the temple of Artemis Azzanathcona a papyrus document containing a list of the festivals which were officially celebrated by the Roman garrison in the city. This document, of unique interest and importance, placed by internal evidence in the reign of Severus Alexander between the years A.D. 223 and 225, contains among its entries the two lines quoted above. In them is prescribed for celebration on two different dates a hitherto unknown festival which is of some little importance both for the religious life of the Roman army and for the history of Roman festivals during the Empire. An attempt will be made in this paper to interpret its nature and to touch briefly on both these aspects of its significance.

That Bede knew and used several Latin versions of Acts is abundantly clear from his own statements. Moreover, his special interest in this book of the New Testament is suggested by the fact that he composed two separate commentaries on it and may have proceeded, in part at least, from the comparative neglect of Acts by earlier commentators. Neither Bede's Commentary on Acts nor his Retractation can be dated precisely, but this much can be regarded as certain, that the former is an early work, while the latter was composed towards the end of his life. Thus twenty years or more may have elapsed before Bede, following the example of the eximius doctor Augustinus, revised errors that he had committed in the Commentary, defended himself against the attack of critics, and added much new material that was the fruit of his ripest scholarship.