Some Notes on the Treatment of the English Catholics in the Reign of Elizabeth A French Co-operative Historical Enterprise Material for Southwestern History in the Central DOCUMENTS-Narrative and Letter of William Henry Trescot, concerning the Negotiations between South Carolina and L The American Historical Review AMUNCLAE A SERPENTIBUS DELETAE EAVING Tarracina and going toward Fundi, after having walked the via Appia for four miles, between the skirts of Mount Giusto and the banks of the river Canneto, you come to one of the issues of the large lake, Fundanus, formed by the numerous streams which drain the ample valley surrounding it. This lake in ancient times must have occupied a much wider territory than at present and must have had much more active and direct communication with the sea. The region, which will shortly be traversed by a railroad, destined to make it once more, as in the past, the route of more rapid communication between Rome and Naples, is now infected with deadly malaria and has for many scores of years been avoided by those travellers who, from Latium, venture as far as the coasts of Campania. Yet this same region was famous in the Roman era for the fertility of its plains, which, though of a swampy nature, yielded the renowned vines which produced the Caecuban wine. Likewise, as is proved by the conspicuous ruins of funerary monuments along the via Appia, and as is indicated by the story of Speluncae (now Sperlonga), where Tiberius came so near to losing his life, it was one of the favorite spots among the great and wealthy of Rome.1 Here, too, near the lake of Fundi, is said to have flourished the city of Amyclae or Amunclae, whose disappearance gave rise to the strangest and most startling stories.2 'Tacitus, Annals, IV. 59; Suetonius, Tiberius, 39; cf. Strabo, V. 233 C. From passages in Strabo, loc. cit.; Pliny, Natural History, XIV. 52, 65: Athenaeus, Epitome, I. 27; Martial, XII. 17 (cf. XIII. 115), it is demonstrated that the Fundana vina were distinct from the Caecubum. Moreover Pliny says that even before his time the vines of the ager Caecubus, supported on poplar trees planted in this swampy region, had become no longer as famous as they had once been. Cf. Pliny, Nat. Hist., XXIII. 35. 2 Isigonus Nicaensis, frag. 17, in Müller, Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, IV., p. 437 : λιμην είναι Μικλαίαν καλουμένην καὶ παρ' αὐτῇ πόλιν ἐρημον, ἐς τοὺς ἐνοικούντας στερηθῆναι τῆς πόλεως διὰ τὸ πλῆθος τῶν ὕδρων, AM. HIST. REV., VOL. XIII.—I. ( 1 ) |