[55] Cornelia, the "mother of the Gracchi", was the elder daughter of Scipio Africanus the Elder. The young Scipio of my story, who is, I may say, an imaginary character, but is supposed to belong to a younger generation than Scipio Africanus the Younger, the conqueror of Carthage, would therefore be her great-nephew. Scipio himself was her nephew by adoption (being the adopted son of her brother), and her first cousin by blood. (He was a son of Æmilius Paullus, and she was the daughter of Æmilius Paullus's sister.) He was also her son-in-law. Her elder son Tiberius was born in 163 B.C., and was therefore seventeen at this time; the younger, Caius, was about nine.
[56] About 10.30 p.m.
[57] Ἔσσεται ἦμαρ ὅτ' ἄν ποτ' ὀλώλῃ Ἴλιος ἱρή.
[58] Still called by the same name, at the south-east extremity of the Morea.
[59] The inhabitants of Delos were sent away from their island by the Roman government in 167 B.C. The Athenians had done exactly the same thing in 422 B.C., but the oracle of Delphi had warned them that they must be brought back, and this was accordingly done some time afterwards.
[60] In 404 B.C., when the Spartans and their allies had captured Athens, Corinth voted for the total destruction of the city.
[61] The Achæan League.
[62] It was the favourite plan of the Peloponnesian states in the Persian war to fortify the Isthmus and leave all Northern Greece at the mercy of the Persians; but this plan was abandoned owing to the declaration of the Athenians that, if it was persisted in, they would make terms with the Persians. A wall, of course, would have been useless, if the fleet of the enemy were free to land an army wherever it pleased. The work, however, was begun, though never completed.
[63] A novus homo was one who could not reckon among his ancestors anyone who had risen to the rank of consul or prætor.
[64] Five thousand sesterces would be £40, 7s. 1d., and the total price paid would be a little over £4000; the property qualification of a knight was £3600.