“Virgile,” Sainte-Beuve wrote between fifty and sixty years ago in words which have become classical, “depuis l'heure où il parut a été le poète de la Latinité toute entière.” The saying has long been noted as marking what may be called the reinstatement of Virgil as a poet, after a period in which he had suffered some partial eclipse under the ignorant and impatient attacks of the romantic school. But to us now it may bear a further and a larger significance. The position of Virgil as a poet stands at the present day in need of no defence, but it is only during the last generation that his importance has come to be realised as an interpreter and recorder of Roman history and of the Latin civilisation. Classical study has during that generation been revolutionised. Our knowledge and understanding of the ancient world have become not only immensely greater in amount, but different in kind; year by year, almost day by day, we are getting more into touch with that world as something alive and solid. The studies of this Society, defined by us as those dealing with the history, art, and archaeology of Rome, Italy, and the Roman Empire, bear directly on our appreciation of the most learned and most comprehensive of Roman or Italian poets; and conversely Virgil's poetry yields up to the new methods and new enthusiasm of historians, artists, and archaeologists material which is so far from being exhausted that we seem still only beginning to sort it out, co-ordinate it, and use it.

Though I have described my paper as “some notable judicia populi,” I must make the somewhat paradoxical explanation that more than half the cases dealt with never reached the stage of being judicia populi at all. Still, but for suicide or voluntary exile, or the dropping of the preliminary trial, they would all of them have had to come before the people, and I hope that this will justify my title.

The city of Lanuvium, now called Civita Lavinia, stands on a beautiful site looking out westwards over its vine-clad slopes across the plain to the sea, and eastwards to the mountains beyond Velletri. The oldest city stood on the crest of the hill; on the central of the three summits was the arx and near were remains which have been connected with a temple. Moreover, excavation has disclosed something of the ancient plan of the city, a theatre, an underground aqueduct and other structures.

This paper has been written in connexion with Sir William Ramsay's Oxford Seminar for Historical Research in the Eastern Provinces of the Roman Empire. It is the result of an examination of Cicero's correspondence during his journey to Cilicia in the summer and autumn of the year 51; and while there is probably nothing contained in it which has not already been the subject of comment before, yet the conclusions arrived at respecting the precise dates and details of Cicero's movements will be found to differ in some considerable degree from the estimates of previous editors or commentators, especially those of O. E. Schmidt, the latest scholar, so far as I know, who has published a detailed reckoning of the times and rates of the journey in question.

The written history of the Roman operations in Caledonia is incomplete and shadowy. In the Agricola the legions march across the stage fighting victoriously, but the natives, except in the battle of Mons Graupius, hardly emerge from the forests and the marshes. In recent years not a little has been done to shed clearer light on the Roman campaigns. Roads have been traced, remains of forts have been recovered and laid bare, periods of occupation have been worked out, and the collection of relics becomes daily larger and of greater importance. Looking over the material which has been gathered together in the past ten years, the question naturally suggests itself: has the investigation of Roman sites in Scotland resulted in any corresponding increase in our knowledge of the native population against whom these campaigns were directed? To this, it seems, the answer must be in the affirmative.

It is to be feared that the greater part of the Histories of Tacitus is lost beyond recall: Latin literature appears but rarely among the treasures of the sands of Egypt. The consequent gap in our knowledge is very imperfectly filled by the records that do remain. It is certain that many events of importance have been wholly passed over in them, while many others are referred to in such an incidental and cursory way that varying interpretations seem possible, and conjecture becomes permissible and even necessary.

We know in general that Vespasian was an energetic reformer and reorganiser: it may be possible, even with our fragmentary evidence, to trace his reorganisation of the two wealthiest provinces, Asia and Africa, somewhat more fully than has hitherto been done. With regard to Asia, the conjecture seems justifiable that Eprius Marcellus was Vespasian's agent for reform, and that his prolonged tenure of the proconsulship of Asia is to be so explained. And in Africa, there may be some reason for supposing that Q. Vibius Crispus performed a similar service, and that his proconsulship there was similarly extended.

Ham Hill forms the north-western and highest part of an irregular upland overlooking the lowlands of Somerset, some five miles west of Yeovil. The hill is famous for its earthworks, and for many antiquities of the Stone, Bronze, Late Celtic, and Roman periods which have been found upon it. Most of these seem to belong to its western portion, but the south-east corner near Bedmore, or Batemoor, Barn in the parish of Montacute has yielded interesting finds.

It is my purpose in this article to discuss the interpretation of the relief from the Ara Pacis, now in the Uffizi Gallery, which is traditionally known as the “Tellus relief” (plate IV).

The most recent detailed discussion of the, Ara Pacis is the monograph of F. Studniczka, which marks a considerable advance on previous work. Studniczka shows that the west door was flanked by two reliefs having to do with legendary figures of Italic or Roman history; to the south, Aeneas sacrificing, and to the north, Mars gazing on the wolf and twins; while the east door was flanked to the south by the so-called “Tellus,” facing right, and to the north by a relief representing Roma and secondary figures, facing left. That the west end was the front of the structure is made clear by the fact that the figures of the north and south sides are facing in that direction.

“Data sunt ipsis quoque fata sepulcris!” It is a pleasure to be able to inform the readers of the Roman Journal that an important monument, which they have known only as described and inadequately illustrated in works of a century ago, is still extant and available for study; and moreover to be able to publish it in photograph (plates VI and VII).