Dec. 1. 1855.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



419 



Moses mortuus est, Moses, dim carus eloquio. 



Sanctus sit omnis homo, cum puro zelo, 



Nam ad medietatem aliquaiido, baud quicquam re- 



servans. 

 Pertingit homo. Sed, cum pili mutantur, apparet, 

 Quem finem habeamus. Quippe ad coelum verum 



amcenum, 

 Vadit homo, sive multum, sive parum vivat." 



Wagenseil's Notes on the Treatise iSootah, in the 

 Mishna. — Sui'enhusius, iii. 196. 



The above is by Rabbi Leo Mutiensis, and a 

 literary curiosity, forming an Ottava^ composed, 

 when in his seventeenth year, on the death of his 

 teacher, Moses. "Done non traducendo," says 

 Leo, " ma facendo communi, queste due, tanto 

 diverse, lingue, che nelio stesso suggetto, ei pre- 

 feriscono, con le medesime voci, si e reso cosa 

 notabile e capriccio, diletteuole a ciascuno." The 

 Hebrew reads as Italian, and the Italian as He- 

 brew, both in sound and sense, but in different 

 words. It is an extraordinary production, and 

 deserves to be rescued from the Talmudic depths 

 in which it now lies buried. I have inserted a ^ at 

 the commencement of the last line, which appears 

 to be wanting. T. J. Buckton. 



Lichfield. 



THE FOUK LAST KINGS OF ROME. 



(^Continued from p. 301.) 



It is hazardous, as a rule, to deal with the chro- 

 nology of such semi-mythical beings as the kings 

 of Rome are. But the alteration in that chrono- 

 logy which I now make is of some importance, 

 and is supported by so many concurrent circum- 

 stances, that the truth of it cannot be doubted. 

 It is, that the reign of the elder Tarquin did not 

 last more than one year at the most. Our autho- 

 rities say that it lasted thirty-eight, and I ground 

 my contrary opinion on the following circum- 

 stances : — First, the truce for 100 years, which 

 Romulus granted to Veil just before his apothe- 

 osis (say in a. u. c. 37), does not, according to 

 Livy (i.42.), expire till 176. Then the remark 

 in Livy, i. 18. (which, inasmuch as it is contrary 

 to his own chronology, is certainly derived from 

 some ancient book), according to which more than 

 100 years subsequent to Numa's accession (38), 

 in the reign of Servius (this commenced in 176), 

 Pythagoras assembled the youth of the remoter 

 parts of Italy, &c. Farther, the sons of Ancus 

 complain, in 176 (Livy, i. 40.), that within the 

 space of a little more than 100 years from the 

 time when Romulus was king (37), a slave (Ser- 

 vius) should sit on his throne. And lastly, the 

 internal improbability, that the sons of Ancus, 

 who were young men when Tarquin I. usurped 

 the throne, should allow him to remain in undis- 

 puted possession of it for thirty-eight years, and 

 then suddenly remember their own title to it and 

 No. 318.] 



kill him. If we reject thirty-seven out of the 

 thirty-eight years of Tarquin I.'s reign, all is 

 clear : the truce with Veil expires at the proper 

 period, the time between Numa's accession and 

 Servius is exactly 100 years (Pythagoras, be it 

 remembered, is not placed in the beginning of the 

 reign of Servius) ; and the time between the reign 

 of Romulus and Servius's accession, in the words 

 of the sons of Ancus, a little more, and we escape 

 the impossibility of the thirty-eight years of quie- 

 tude of the latter parties. The events which 

 really happened in the reign of Tarquin I., may 

 easily have happened in the compass of a year ; 

 the others have been transferred to him from 

 Tarquin II., and even from Porsena through his 

 medium. 



A word now on the history of Servius. Plu- 

 tarch, without specifying which, says that Caecilia 

 was the wife of one of Tarquin's sons. Sir G. C. 

 Lewis (Cred. of the early History of Rome') seems 

 at a loss to tell which ; and remarks that, accord- 

 ing to the common account, the two sons of Pris- 

 cus marry the two daughters of Servius, and that 

 the three sons of Superbus were unmarried. He 

 however has forgotten Servius (believed to have 

 been the son-in-law of Priscus), and to him the 

 passage in Plutarch, without doubt, refers. Ser- 

 vius was, therefore, the husband of Csccilia ; who, 

 as is proved by her name*, was the daughter of 

 Casles (or Caelius, misprinted, p. 240., Coelius), 

 The history of Cajles is very obscure, but he was 

 certainly a powerful chief. Here we see the origin 

 and untrustworthiness of another story respecting 

 Servius, which clashes with our view (the story 

 that he was the son-in-law of Tarquin I.), viz, 

 the Roman historians knew that Servius married 

 the daughter of some powerful chief, and not 

 knowing his name — or perhaps having heard of 

 it, and yet not able to give it correctly, as they 

 placed Cteles in the Romulian era — they set it 

 down at once as Tarquin I. 



It is almost unnecessary to point out the palpa- 

 ble inconsistencies in the received account of the 

 accession of Servius to the throne of Rome. Tar- 

 quin I. had two sons, both of whom survived their 

 father, of whom Superbus was one ; and Servius 

 was, even according to the received account, a 

 foreigner. And yet the mother of the first (Ta- 

 naquil) is represented as plotting in favour of the 

 second ; quite regardless of the legitimate claims 

 of her own offspring, who are not even mentioned. 

 Such was the absurd story by which the Roman 



* There can be no doubt that the very common ter- 

 mination to Roman proper names, -ilius, implies descent. 

 It is in fact filius, the / being dropped in composition. 

 Thus, Numa Pompilius is called the son of Pompo ; Tul- 

 lus Hostilius, the grandson of Hostus ; Ofilius Calavius, 

 the son of Ovius or Ofius (Livj% ix. 6.), &c. This upsets 

 Ihne's derivation of Pompilius, Publilius, &c., from 

 Populus. 



