A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

,'LIVIUS. LIVIUS. 791
explariati6n of some of the words and abireivations from one who was'vell acquainted with his subject,
in the- inscription,: no doubt seems for a moment to and were probably drawn up not long- after the
have been entertained that it was a genuine me- appearance of the volumes which they abridge. By
morial of the historian. Accordingly, the Bene- some they have been ascribed to Livy himself, by
dictine fathers of the monastery transported the others to Florus; but there is nothing in the lanL
tablet to the vestibule of their chapel, and caused guage or context to warrant either of these, con
a portrait of. Livy. to be -painted- beside it. In clusions; and external evidence is altogether
1413, about fifty years after the discovery just wanting.,described, in digging the foundations for the erection From the circumstance that a short introduction
of new buildings in connection with the monastery, or preface is found at the beginning of books 1, 21,
the workmen reached an ancient pavement com- and 31, and that each of these marks the composed of square bricks cemented'with lime. This mencement of an important epoch, the whole work
having been broken through, a leaden coffin became has been divided into decades, or groups, containvisible, which was found to contain human bones. ing ten books each, although there is no good
An old monk declared that this was the very spot reason to believe that any such division was introabove which the tablet had been found, when im- duced until after the fifth or sixth century, for
mediately the cry rose that the remains of Livy Priscian and Diomedes, who quote repeatedly from
had been brought to light, a report which filled the particular books, never allude to any such distribuwhole city with extravagant joy. The new-found tion. The commencement of book xli. is lost, but
treasure was deposited in the town hall, and to the there is certainly no remarkable crisis at this place
ancient tablet a modern epitaph was affixed. At which invalidates one part of the argument in
a subsequent period a costly monument was favour of the antiquity of the arrangement.
added as a further tribute to his memory. Here, The first decade (bks. i —x.) is entire. It emit might have been supposed, these weary bones braces the period from the foundation of the city to.would at length have been permitted to rest in the year B. c. 294, when the subjugation of the
-peace. But in 1451, Alphonso of Arragon preferred Samnites may be said to have been completed.:a request to the Paduans, that they would be The second decade (bks. xi-xx.) is altogether
pleased to bestow upon him the bone of Livy's lost. It embraced the period from B. c. 294 to
right arm, in order that'he might possess the limb B. C. 219, comprising an account of the extension
by which the immortal narrative had been actually of the Roman dominion over the whole of Southern
penned. This petition was at last complied with; Italy and' a portion of Gallia Cisalpina; of the
but just as the valuable relic reached Naples,. Al- invasion of Pyrrhus; of the first Punic war; of
phonso died, and the Sicilian fell heir to the prize. the expedition against the Illyrian pirates, and of
-Eventually, it passed into the hands of Joannes Jo- other matters which fell out between the conclusion:vianus PontaXus, by whom it was enshrined with an of the peace with Carthage and the siege of
appropriate legend. So far all was well. In the Saguntum.
lapse of time, however, it was perceived, upon The third decade (bks. xxi-xxx.) is entire. It
comparing the tablet dug up in the monastery of embraces the period from B. c. 219 to B c. 201,
St. Justina, with others''of a similar description, comprehending the,whole of the second Punic war,
that the contractions had been erroneously ex- and the contemporaneous struggles in Spain and
plained, and consequently the whole tenor of the Greece.
words misunderstood. It was clearly proved that The fourth decade (bks. xxxi-xl.) is entire,
L. did not stand for LuvcIvs but for LIBERTUS, and also one half of the fifth(bks. xli-xlv.). These
and that the principal person named was Titus fifteen books embrace the period from B. C. 201 to
Livius Halys, freedman of Livia, the fourth daugh- B. C. 167, and develope the progress of the Roman
-ter of a Titus Livius, that he had in accordance with arms in Cisalpine Gaul, in Macedonia, Greece and'the' usual custom adopted the designation'of his Asia, ending with the triumph of Aemilius Paul-'former master, that he had been a priest of Concord lus, in which Perseus'and his three sons were exat Padua, an office which it appeared from other hibited as captives.
records had often'been filled by persons in his' Of the remaining books nothing remains except
station, and -that he had set up this stone to mark inconsiderable fragments, the most notable'being a
the burying-ground of himself and his kindred. few chapters of the 91st book, concerning the
-Now since the supposition that the skeleton in the fortunes of Sertorius.
leaden coffin was that of the historian rested solely The whole of the above were riot brought to
upon -the authority of the inscriptions when this light at once. The earliest editions contain 29
support was withdrawn, the whole fabric of con- books only, namely, i-x., xxi-xxxii., xxxiv —
jecture fell to the ground, and it became evident xl., the last breaking off abruptly in the middle of
the relics were those of an obscure freedman. chapter 37, with the word edixerunt. In 1518
The great and only extant work of Livy is a the latter portion of bk. xxxiii., beginning in chapter
History of Rome, termed by himself Annales 17th with artis faucibus, together with what was
(xliii. 13), extending from the foundation of the wanting of bk. xl., were supplied from a MS. becity to the death of Drusus, B. c. 9, comprised in longing to the cathedral church of St. Martin at
142 books: of these thirty-five have descended to -Mayence. In 1531 bks. xli.-xlv. were discovered
us; but of the whole,- with the exception of two, by Grynaeus in the convent of Lorsch, near Worms,
we possess summaries, which, although in them- and were published forthwith at Basle by Frobeselves dry and lifeless, are by no means destitute nius; and finally, in 1615, a MS. was found at
of value,'since they afford a complete index or table Bamberg, which filled up the gap remaining in bk.
of contents, and are occasionally our sole authorities xxxiii.; and this appeared complete for the first
for the transactions of particular periods. The time at Rome in 1616. The fragment- of bk. xci.
compiler of these Epitomes,-as they are generally was copied from a palimpsest in the. Vatican by
ealled, is unknown; but they must -have proceeded Paulus Jacobus Bruns in 17721 and printed in the
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