In a paper on Justus Lipsius and the text of Tacitus's Annals, published in the last issue of this Journal, the present writer did not touch upon the difficult question of interpolations. It has been asserted that ‘there are not many glosses in Tacitus’. This can hardly hold for the Histories and Annals XI–XVI, that is, for the works contained in the Second Mediceus. In fact, the two codices unici differ in this as in other respects. As for the Med. no. II, that is, for Histories and Annals XI–XVI, I still feel convinced by W. Heraeus's and C. D. Fisher's arguments. Arguments are indeed hardly needed in a case like Hist. II, 98, where a snatch of verse has been thrust into the text, cutting one Tacitean word in two. There are not a few cases where interpolation of glosses can be proved, and the whole subject might usefully be gone over again in its own context.

The Nerva Inscription in Beroea still lies, where Delacoulonche first reported it, on the right hand of the entrance to the Orta Cami. During a visit to Beroea in 1936, in the company of Mr. C. F. Edson of Harvard University, I was enabled to gather some fresh information about this dedication.

The slab of marble which bears the inscription is embedded in the ground on its side, so that the left half of the inscription has not been seen since the building of the Mosque, the raising of the heavy marble flags of the entrance being a formidable task without some mechanical aid. A rough-surfaced margin surrounds the smooth inscribed field. The lettering is elaborate Imperial, with many ligatures. H. 116 m. Exposed W. at top 0.53 m. Exposed W. at bottom 0.50 m.

Two localities of ancient Cyrenaica bore the name Βόρειν. The first, recognized by the ancient geographers as the eastern extremity of the Greater Syrtis, was a promontory and harbour which, from the evidence of the Stadiasmus Marts Magni, lay 131 stades (23·5 km.) south of the city of Berenice. It has been convincingly identified with the modern Ras Taiúnes, a small headland at precisely that distance from Benghazi. There is no evidence that this promontory was ever the site of permanent settlement in the form of a village or fort.

The Tabula Hebana ( = TH) has brought fresh evidence about the honours decreed for Germanicus after his death in A.D. 19. These clauses of the tablet, in contrast to the central, legal, clauses, have been unduly neglected in the discussion. I do not claim that they are as important as the legal clauses; but I feel that they are worth greater attention than they have so far received and that at least one of the two honours which I propose to discuss in this article, the provision of the empty curule chairs (1. 50 ff.), is of considerable interest. My answer to the question it raises need not be the right one; but often questions are more important than the answers.

When we consider the information concerning the history of the earliest days of Rome which ancient authors have handed down to us, we have to ask ourselves : which parts of it are acceptable and which are not ? What, after all, do we really know about early Roman history ?

Modern scholars view these problems from very different psychological standpoints. Some of them ask why we should refuse credence to a venerable tradition which has been given an artistic form of great beauty by writers of genius, and which is full of lessons of political and moral importance. Others, however, seized with the full frenzy of the critic, and with uncompromising devotion to logic, discard all, or practically all, the tradition. Whatever the cost, they intend to reach the truth. These two conflicting tendencies prevail turn and turn about in accordance with the views dominating in different periods or with the different temperaments or ages of individual scholars.

A paper by me on the same subject appeared in the Journal as long ago as 1929 (pp. 19 ff.). The criticism of the traditional datings there suggested seems in the main to have stood the test of time. But reconstruction should follow in due course on demolition; and, although no final scheme can yet be proposed, already it should not be premature to formulate some results to which research is pointing. Before we can produce a perfect figure we need a rough casting on which to work.

The earliest Roman tradition about coinage is of a very mixed character. A number of references to Roman coins—scattered at intervals over the period of the Kings and the Early Republic—may be dismissed as later intrusions. The golden prime of the Etruscan Kings will surely have known the precious metals—perhaps actual coins of foreign cities; but it has no coins of its own to show. A more trustworthy tradition tells of a form of reckoning in oxen and sheep—the ‘pecunia’ (from ‘pecus’, ‘flock’), which became the Latin word for money—only giving place officially to the currency of uncoined bronze (‘Aes Rude’) in the age of the Decemvirs.