THE LIVES
OF
THE TWELVE CAESARS
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Lives of the Grammarians -
Lives of the Poets
[310] A.U.C. 748.
[311] Ostia, at the mouth of the Tiber, about thirteen miles from the
city, was founded by Ancus Martius. Being the port of a city like Rome,
it could not fail to become opulent; and it was a place of much resort,
ornamented with fine edifices, and the environs "never failing of pasture
in the summer time, and in the winter covered with roses and other
flowers." The port having been filled up with the depositions of the
Tiber, it became deserted, and is now abandoned to misery and malaria.
The bishopric of Ostia being the oldest in the Roman church, its bishop
has always retained some peculiar privileges.
[312] The Gymnasia were places of exercise, and received their name from
the Greek word signifying naked, because the contending parties wore
nothing but drawers.
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