[60] Via Ardeatina. The highway to the little city of Ardea, situated on a hill eighteen miles south of Rome. See Liv. 1, 57; V, 11.
[61] Oracle of the faun. This was about two-thirds of the distance from Rome to Ardea.
[62] Lavinium, Laurentum. Only the ruins of these two cities exist at the present day.
[63] Setian wine. Setia, a city in Latium, south-east of Suessa Pometia. A famous place for wine, now Sezze. See Liv. VI, 30; VII; 42 etc. Plin. Hist. Nat. XIV; 6, 60. Mart. Ep. IV, 64, 69; VI, 86; IX, 2; X, 13, 36; XIII, 23 (—“old Setian wine may be compared to Chian figs.”)
[64] Acta Diurna. The official collection and publication of important news was first introduced by Julius Caesar. These publications were called acta diurna urbis or acta diurna populi. After one number of this official gazette was prepared, it was multiplied by an army of copyists, and sent to the most distant provinces. Besides the official news, the acta diurna published miscellaneous communications about specially important events in public life, family news, art notices, etc. See Hübner in Fleckeisen’s Jahrbuch, Suppl. III, pages 364-594, as well as the admirable explanation by Göll, “the newspaper of Rome” in his “Pictures of Civilization.”
[65] There lay her favorite authors neatly arranged in ivory cases. Valuable books were kept in closed boxes.
[66] The head of Jupiter, copied from the world-famed work of Phidias. The most renowned and perhaps most magnificent creation of Greek plastic art, was the Pan-hellenic Zeus at Olympia, a work of Phidias. Everything the ancient authors tell us of this colossal statue sounds extremely enthusiastic. Thus an epigram runs:
“Great Zeus did descend to earth his image to reveal,
Or, Phidias, to behold the god, Olympus thou did’st scale.”
Dio Chrysostomus writes: “No one who has seen Phidias’ Zeus, is capable of forming any other image of the god.... A man, whose soul is troubled, oppressed by the many cares and griefs life offers, so that he would no longer be refreshed by sweet slumber, must I think, while confronting this statue, forget everything that is gloomy and terrible. Thus, Phidias, hast thou designed and executed thy work. Such light and grace animate thy art.” Phidias had created his statue of the god according to the image of the Homeric verse, where Zeus grants the entreaty of the imploring Thetis: