864 Mr Forbes's Physical Notices of the Bay of Naples. 



pairs and additional walls to be built towards the side of the 

 sea. This lapidary document I had first the good fortune to 

 find copied in the margin of a fine map of the Bay of Naples, 

 published by Morghen in 1772. I afterwards met with it in 

 an extremely curious little work of Capaccio, an author to 

 whom I had occasion to refer as an authority in the last Num- 

 ber of these Notices,* but whose " Vera Antichita di Poz- 

 zuolo"" I had not then met with, which bears the date of 1652. 

 He does not mention the discovery of this antiquity, which had 

 probably been long preserved in the town of Pozzuoli. It 

 was thence removed to Naples, and afterwards to the villa of 

 S. Arpino, where, according to a later testimony,-f- it appears 

 long to have remained, and perhaps does so still. It has been 

 transferred, confessedly, from the copy of Capaccio into the 

 work of Komanelli ; J and in these three works only, two of 

 them old and scarce, does the knowledge of this interesting 

 inscription lie, which I hesitate not to call one of the most re- 

 markable, and considering its date and great length, one of the 

 most fortunately preserved inscriptions I have met with. The 

 space it would occupy forbids my transferring it into a paper 

 rather of a scientific than an antiquarian character, which I 

 should wilUngly have done, since it has not found its way into 

 any of the voluminous " Thesauri,''^ and " Corpora Absolu- 

 tissima'''' of inscriptions, of which I have examined a great 

 nujmber. The following fragment of the commencement wiU 

 illustrate our immediate object of inquiry : — 



A. COLONIA. DEDVCTA. AN. XC 



N. FVFIDIO. N.F. M. PVLLIO. DVOVIR. 



P. RVTILIO. CN. MANLIO. COS. OPE 



RVM. LEX. II. LEX. PAEIETI. FACIVN 



DO. IN. AREA. QVAE. EST. ANTE. AEDEM. 



SERAPI. TRANS. VIAM. 



QVI. REDERIT. FRAEDES. DATO. PRAE 



DIAQ. SVBSIGNATO. DVVMVIRVM. 



ARBITRATV. 



* * * * 



* In the last No. of this Journal, p. 127. 

 •f- Galanti, Descrizione di Wapoli e Contorni. 

 X Viagfrii, &c. ii. 133. 



