No complete account of Pompey's settlement of Asia Minor has been preserved. The text of Cassius Dio is missing, and Xiphilinus supplies no more than a general phrase. Appian, after mentioning the foundation of Nicopolis in Lesser Armenia, describes the recognition of Ariobarzanes as king of Cappadocia with the accession of Sophene and Gordyene, of Castabala and certain other cities in Cilicia. These events he assigns to a time before Pompey's Syrian expedition. In a later passage, in which Pompey's achievements and arrangements are summed up, he speaks of the assignment of Armenia (Major) to Tigranes, Bosporus to Pharnaces, Cappadocia and the other places described before to Ariobarzanes. Seleuceia and other territory in Mesopotamia are given to Antiochus of Commagene. He continues: ἐποίει δὲ ϰαὶ τετράρχας, Γαλλογραιϰῶν μέν, οἳ νῦν εἰσὶ Γαλάται Καππαδόϰαις ὅμοροι, Δηιόταρον ϰαὶ ἑτέρους, Παϕλαγονίας δὲ Ἄτταλον ϰαὶ Κόλχων Ἀρίσταρχον δυνάστην. Then after referring to the appointment of Archelaus as priest-king in Comana and of the recognition as amicus populi Romani of Castor of Phanagoreia he adds: πολλὴν δὲ ϰαὶ ἑτέροις χώραν τε ϰαὶ χρήματα ἔδωϰεν.

Tentative suggestions which conform to the conditions of a scientific hypothesis may play a useful part in furthering the slow and unending process of rediscovering antiquity. Proof or disproof of them must naturally await the discovery of fresh evidence, and such evidence may never come; but if it does, its appearance is doubly welcome when it furnishes proof. It is nearly forty years since my travels in Anatolia took me into the angle of north-western Galatia, lying between north-eastern Phrygia and the southern boundary of Bithynia, which ran along the watershed between the middle Sangarius and its chief tributary the Tembrogius or Tembris. The southern side of this watershed, immediately to the west of the junction of the two rivers, is an infertile and thinly populated district, but farther west, towards the Phrygian border, the mountain slopes open out into a broad plain which runs down to the Tembrogius; near its head are the two villages of Upper (or Great) and Lower Igde-agatch. Westward of this plain and separated from it only by a low ridge is a pleasant valley, watered by an affluent of the Tembrogius.

The Emperor Julian stood to the Roman world of the fourth century as the personification of the older faith, and with him died the hopes of a pagan restoration. His death came at a critical moment, and both pagan and Christian felt that it could have been no human hand which dealt the fatal blow. To Kallistos Julian was the victim of a demon : Κάλλιστος δέ, writes Socrates, ὁ ἐν τοῖς οἰϰείοις τοῦ βασιλέως στρατευόμενος (i.e. as one of the imperial domestici), ἱστορήσας τὰ ϰατ᾿ αὐτὸν ἐν ἡρωιϰῷ μέτρῳ, τὸν τότε πόλεμον διηγούμενος ὑπὸ δαίμονος βληθέντα τελευτῆσαι ϕηαίν. The comment of the Christian historian is interesting : ὅπερ τυχὸν μὲν ὡς ποιητὴς ἔπλασε, τυχὸν δὲ ϰαί οὕτως ἔχει· πολλοὺσς γὰρ ἐριννύες μετῆλθον. Libanius pictures the blessings which men anticipated under Julian's rule and adds ταῦτα ϰαὶ ἔτι πλείω προσδοϰώμενα χορὸς φθονερῶν ἀφείλετο δαιμόνων. To the Christian similarly it was the saints who had fulfilled the will of Heaven in removing the Apostate persecutor of the Church, though a human assassin could hardly have been condemned—σχολῇ γε ἄν τις ϰαὶ αὐτῷ μέμψαιτο διὰ Θεόν ϰαὶ θρησϰείαν ἣν ἐπῄνεσεν ἀνδρείῳ γενομένῳ.

It is now some ten years since Sir Flinders Petrie entrusted to me, with the wish that I would edit them, one Latin and seven Greek tablets acquired by him in Egypt and placed among the collections of University College, London. The Greek tablets I edited in the 1927 volume of Ancient Egypt. I began the decipherment of the Latin tablet at the same time but then laid it aside, and its publication has remained ever since in abeyance, one of the tasks to be attempted ‘at a more convenient season.’ The primary cause of the delay was the pressure of more urgent work; but I must confess that a contributory factor was the difficulty of decipherment. Not only is the hand by no means among the easier examples of Latin cursive (the writer makes little distinction in form between certain of his characters) but, more seriously, the outside of the tablet had been so much rubbed and defaced as to obscure the writing in many places.

The following pages must be regarded rather as stating a question than as claiming to answer it. This is fitting, since the revered scholar in honour of whom the article is written is eminently qualified to deal with the constitutional question involved and the writer certainly is not.

Essentially the question is: Could a civil action lie against an ex-magistrate (consul, praetor, proconsul or the like) on account of any acts done by him in professed exercise of his imperium ? And it suggested by the fact that, while the surviving lay and legal source tell us a good deal about criminal proceedings in such cases, we hear, as it seems, nothing about civil remedies.

This article has been suggested by a notable new book, H. Rudolph's Stadt und Staat im römischen Italien, in which the author propounds original solutions to several problems of the Roman administration of Italy. His principal contribution to this subject is a theory which assigns to Caesar a leading part in the reformation of the municipal constitutions.

According to Rudolph a first step, but only a short one, in the reorganisation of Italy after the Social War was taken by Cinna, who instituted the quattuorvirate as the universal type of magistracy in the newly enfranchised municipalities. The next step, by which Sulla concentrated the higher jurisdiction of Italy at Rome, was longer, but in a backward direction.

‘Ceteris in rebus statim ab initio principatus usque ad exitum civilis et clemens, mediocritatem pristinam neque dissimulavit umquam ac frequenter etiam prae se tulit. quin et conantis quosdam originem Flavii generis ad conditores Reatinos comitemque Herculis … referre irrisit ultro’ (Suet. Div. Vesp. 12).

Vespasian came of peasant stock; he succeeded to a position which had been occupied by men of the noblest birth. For the Julio Claudians no proofs need be produced; of their successors Galba boasted descent from Jupiter and (strangely) Pasiphae, and Otho from Etruscan princes; even Vitellius had a pedigree going back to Faunus and a local goddess, Vitellia. Vespasian was far too shrewd to make similar claims; he deliberately rejected the attempts of flatterers to find him a noble ancestor. Much of the Life of Suetonius is evidence for the statement ‘mediocritatem pristinam neque dissimulavit umquam ac frequenter etiam prae se tulit.’ His reign marked a return to simpler ways of living, and emphasised a contrast with the pomp and extravagance of a Nero, wealthy and degenerate (see infra, p. 55). It was a realistic and sensible policy, and likely to win support from the lower classes of population in Italy, whether peasants or city proletariate.

Since the time of Edward III, St. George has been the patron-saint of England, and his fight with the dragon is familiar wherever the gold sovereign has been in circulation. As a special guardian of soldiers, this hero of the Faith has won a world-wide fame: his achievements have inspired innumerable artists and have produced, a whole literature of edifying stories in many tongues. But the oldest legend of the Cappadocian martyr is so wild a fable, so utterly devoid not only of truth but of plausibility, that the great wonder-worker himself has sometimes been regarded—in my opinion wrongly–as purely mythical. The paucity of authentic information in the hagiographical writings increases the value for the historian of such popular traditions as are connected with his cult.

The immense mound of many million broken jars known as Monte Testaccio—still to be seen at the old emporium of Rome—provides in the trade-marks some material not elsewhere available for the study of Roman commerce; and Dressel's publication of many hundred of these marks (CIL xv, 2) deserves the highest praise for the patience expended in their transcription, despite the fact that later scholars have had to correct many of the conclusions that Dressel ventured to draw from them.

Since not a single one of these jars has been discovered unbroken, we must gain our knowledge of the customary items from the fragments of several jars. These items, not always found in the same order, are usually the following :

(1) The potter's trade-mark (usually the initials of the potter's name) was stamped on the handle before the jar was baked. See CIL xv, 2, nos. 2558 ff., for these.

(2) At the foreign customs or shipping office the full jar was marked in bold brush strokes with the weight of the empty jar, the name of the shipper (owner), and the weight of the full jar, thus :

(The shipper usually owned his cargo, hence the genitive form of his name.)

(3) By the side of an inscription of this kind there occurs another in smaller lettering containing a number of items that concern the customs house as well as the shipper—e.g. no. 4366 :

The interpretation is probably as follows (cf. Am. Jour. Phil. 1936, 87 ff.):

‘Received ; Hispalis ; value 20 sest. ; weight 215 lbs. ; from estate of Capito ; export duty : 2 asses; name of clerk; consular date (A.D. 179).’

The relations between the Empire and the Church are a subject of such major interest, which has attracted so much attention from historians both ecclesiastical and lay, that it would be rash to suppose anything relevant and of value still to remain unsaid. Nevertheless, if it be permissible to think that the most familiar accounts are not the most satisfactory, some service may be done by emphasizing again certain considerations which, though they have not completely escaped notice hitherto, have too often been overlooked; and for such an undertaking the present occasion is perhaps made appropriate by the interest in early Christian history which the scholar whom we honour has combined with his studies of pagan Rome.

Soon after the publication of my recent article on ‘The Dating-Value of Samian Ware’ I learned with much satisfaction that the attack I had endeavoured to meet was in reality no more than the preliminary bombardment of an isolated sector, and that it was to be followed very shortly by a general assault, in which no part of the front would be spared. This is what I have all along hoped for, having every confidence in the impregnability of the position. Nevertheless, hoste vicino, it may not be amiss to strengthen the defences by developing a line of evidence which has not yet been given the prominence to which it is entitled. I mean the literary tradition. Though accidental, the delay in dealing with it has been fortunate. In the interval the discussion has taken a turn which lends to the testimony of Tacitus a degree of significance that may well prove to be decisive, for it is Tacitus alone who counts. Before hearing what he has to say, it will be convenient to clear the ground by dismissing the less important witnesses.

It is rapidly coming to be agreed among scholars that a re-dating of the earliest Roman coinage, centring round the transference of the denarius from 269 to circa 187 B.C., is now inevitable. Such a re-dating is bound to have very wide effects outside the coinage. The whole question of the expression of values in terms of money must come up for reconsideration. It is my object in this paper to concentrate on one part of the general question—the property qualifications of the Roman classes. The evidence is scanty and, for the earlier period, of problematic value. The figures of the Servian constitution, in particular, even if we admit them to have any real reference to early Roman history, must have been expressed in terms of money at a comparatively late date. Until we know when they began to be so expressed, we do not know what they really mean in value. Even our scanty records, however, if critically examined in their correct historical order, will yield definite results of a somewhat surprising character.

Since Sir Henry Stuart Jones has included Mithraism among his many interests, it seems appropriate to offer to him on this occasion some remarks on its general significance. No phenomenon in Imperial paganism has attracted as much attention, and this is natural.

Virtus, Albine, est pretium persolvere verum

quis in versamur, quis vivimus rebus, potesse.

Let us make another provisional attempt to determine the pretium verum of Mithraism.

We see in it something of eastern worship detached from its native content and developed in a new milieu; apparently it had no oecumenical organization; certainly it tolerated other gods, and lent itself to an unchecked local diversification of forms. In all these respects it was essentially on a par with the other ‘oriental religions in Roman paganism.’ Nevertheless, it differed from them in various significant ways. The normal exclusion of women and the moral demands made of the initiate have often been remarked; but that is not all.

A Botticellesque ‘Venus among Cupids’ in the National Gallery (no. 916) now attributed to Jacopo del Sellajo (pl. III) attracted my attention when I saw it again in July last for the similarity of the composition to the familiar group of Terra Mater and the children as represented on innumerable Roman monuments—a transcript almost of its rendering in the mosaic recently discovered at Antioch by the American mission (pl. iv, i). The influence of the ancient motive is likewise apparent in Sellajo's—or another's —repetition of the ‘Venus and Cupids’ motive in the Louvre (no. 1299—pl. v), and it makes itself felt, though less obviously perhaps, in Botticelli's ‘Venus and Mars’ in the National Gallery (no. 915—pi. vi). The un-Venus like character of Sellajo's goddess had, as I subsequently discovered, struck A. L. Mayer, who thought that the picture might represent an allegory of Fertility (Fruchtbarkeit)–an excellent suggestion, supported by the evidence of the bunch of grapes, from which, however, he omitted to draw the necessary conclusion. The dependence of Botticelli's picture upon an antique model has long been admitted, but the incongruity between the Mars who lies steeped in voluptuous slumber and the demure Florentine lady who faces him in seemly half-sitting posture had scarcely been noted : she, too, recalls Terra Mater, rather than any softly reposing nymph or Venus.

The world of learning owes debts many and varied to Sir Henry Stuart Jones: it is the Camden Professor and historian of Rome that Oxford knows best. In Roman history, wherever knowledge may be deepened and however horizons may be widened, the transformation of the Roman State and the transition from Republic to Principate must ever claim the centre of interest. For this reason a paper concerning one of Caesar's partisans, a military man from Spain, may be offered as a tribute from the School of Literae Humaniores—and from one of the three Colleges with which Sir Henry's life in Oxford has been identified.

When I received the welcome invitation to take part in this tribute to Sir Henry Stuart Jones, I realized, to my great regret, that other pressing obligations would not leave me time to prepare a paper worthy of the occasion. But, as altogether to miss this opportunity of expressing my respect and admiration would have been most distasteful, I have ventured to offer him the notes which follow, slight and modest though they are.

It had long been known that in Egypt under Augustus dates were given, in accordance with age-old custom, by his regnal years; but the papyri have revealed, as I was able to show with the help of two examples in 1895, that side by side with this system there existed another method of dating by the years τῆς Καίσαρος κρατήσεως θεοῦ υἱοῦ, both systems alike reckoning from the Egyptian New Year's day in 30 B.C. ( I Thoth = 29 August).

The Papyrus Tebtunis 33 contains the copy of a letter, probably from a high official at Alexandria, to Asklepiades, superintendent of revenues, announcing the approaching visit to the Fayûm of Lucius Memmius, a Roman senator who was coming as a tourist, and giving instructions for his reception and entertainment. The copy is enclosed in a letter, dated [(ἔτους)] ε Ξαντικοῦ ιζ Μεχεὶρ ιζ (i.e. 112 B.C.), from Hermias—probably the Hermias mentioned in the lengthy document P. Teb. 27 of 113 B.C.—to Horos, the royal scribe, telling him to take care that its instructions are followed.