CHAP. VI. Of the Island Tyberina.
OF this Islands beginning, wee have treated before in the description of Mars field, Livie and Dionysius also set downe this storie at large. It resembleth the forme of a biremo gally, & where it is broadest, it is not above a dart shoot over, in length it containeth about two stadia or a quarter of a mile. This was in times past called Lycaonia, and was hallowed to the honour of Aesculapius, whose image from out of Epidaurus was thither brought. Of Aesculapius and his temple, read Plinie.
A temple also of Iupiter standeth in it, dedicated by C. Servilius the Duumvir, which had been vowed by L. Furius sixe yeeres before in the Gaules warre.
In the same Island were sicke folke presented unto Aesculapius (in the field.) And neere unto the temple of the said god, was a lazar-house, for that this god was the inventer and maintainer of Phy∣sicke.
In it also stood the chappell of Faunus, neere to the very river: but scarcely remaine there any to∣kens thereof. This Faunus (as men say) was reported to have beene the first that consecrated chappels and temples to the gods, and for this cause, all such places consecrated to the gods, were called Fana. By the testimonie of Cornelius Tacitus and Suetonius, the statue of the emperour Iulius stood there.