BOOK II. Lvii. 147-LIX. 149 



went bad; and similarly that it rained iron in the 

 district of Lucania the year before Marcus Crassus 

 was killed " by the Parthians and with him all the 

 Lucanian soldiers, of Avhom there was a large con- 

 tingent in his army ; the shape of the iron that fell 

 resembled sponges * ; the augurs prophecied wounds 

 from above. But in the consulship <= of Lucius Paullus 

 and Gaius Marcellus it rained wool in the vicinity of 

 Compsa ** Castle, near which Titus Annius Milo was 

 killed a year later. It is recorded in the annals of 

 that year that while Milo was pleading a case in 

 court it rained baked bricks. 



LVIII. We are told that during the wars with the Armtfs m 

 Cimbri ^ a noise of clangino; armour and the sounding '''* *^'^' 

 of a trumpet were heard from the sky, and that the 

 same thing has happened frequently both before then 

 and later. In the third consulship / of Marius the 

 inhabitants of Ameria and Tuder? saw the spectacle 

 of heavenly armies advancing from the East and the 

 West to meet in battle, those from the West being 

 routed. It has often been seen, and is not at all 

 surprising, that the sky itself catches fire when the 

 clouds have been set on fire by an exceptionally 

 large flame. 



LIX. The Greeks tell the story that Anaxagoras sun-stonei 

 of Clazomenae in the 2nd year * of the 78th Olympiad 

 was enabled by his knowledge of astronomical 

 literature to prophecy that in a certain number of 

 days a rock would fall from the sun ; and that this 

 occurred in the daytime in the Goat's River district 

 of Thrace (the stone is still shown — it is of the size of 

 a wagon-load and brown in colour), a comet also 

 blazing in the nights at the time. If anyone beheves 

 in the fact of this prophecy, that involves his allowing 



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