I. The Gift for the recovery of Livia.—II. Julius Caesar and the Pomoerium.—III.—Julia, the wife of Tiberius.—IV. The statement about her proved false by a coin.—V. Value of coins in detecting historical errors.—VI. Another coin shows an error about Cornutus.—VII. Suspicion of spuriousness from mention of the Quinquennale Ludicrum.—VIII. Account of cities destroyed by earthquake contradicted by a monument.—IX. Bracciolini's hand shown by reference to the Plague.—X. Fawning3 of Roman senators more like conduct of Italians in the fifteenth century.—XI. Same exaggeration with respect to Pomponia Graecina and the Romans.— XII. Wrong statement of the images borne at the funeral of Drusus.—XIII. Similar kind of error committed by Bracciolini in his "De Varietate Fortunae".—XIV. Errors about the Red Sea.— XV. About the Caspian Sea.—XVI. Accounted for.—XVII. A passage clearly written by Bracciolini.
It is now, however, time to pass on to other matters more interesting and important, and, it may be, more convincing.
I. Famianus Strada is very much surprised in his Prolusions (I. 2 Histor.) that it should be stated in the third book of the Annals (71), that when a gift for the recovery of Livia was to be presented to Fortune the Equestrian5, it had to be made at Antium, where, it is stated, there was a temple which had that title, there being none in Rome that was so named. Here are the words of Bracciolini, in his own style, too, and his own history, neither of which is, nor could be that of Tacitus: "A debate then came on about a matter of religion, as to the temple in which the offering was to be placed, which the Knights6 of Rome had promised to present to Fortune the Equestrian for the health of the Imperial Princess" (a phrase which no Roman would have used); "for though there were many shrines7 of that Goddess in Rome, yet there was none with that name: it was resolved:—'that there be a temple at Antium which has such an appellation8, and that all religious rites9 in towns in Italy, and temples and statues of Gods and Goddesses, be under Roman law and rule': consequently, the offering was set up at Antium": "Incessit dein religio, quonam in templo locandum erat donum, quod pro1 valetudine Augustae equites Romani voverant Equestri Fortunae: nam etsi delubra ejus deae multa in urbe, nullum tamen tali cognomento erat; repertum est, 'aedem esse apud Antium quae sic nuncuparetur, cunctasque caerimonias Italicis in oppidis, templaque et numinum effigies12, juris atque imperii Romani esse': ita donum apud Antium statuitur" (An. III. 71). This, however, was not the case; for Famianus Strada says that there was a temple in Rome which had been dedicated13 to Fortune the Equestrian for more than 200 years by Quintus Fulvius after the war with the Celtiberians, when he was Praetor; and, afterwards when he was Censor14, he erected15 a magnificent edifice16 in honour of the goddess: the gift and the temple are both mentioned by Livy (XL. 42), also by Vitruvius, Julius Obsequens, Valerius Maximus, Publius Victor, and other historians and antiquaries. One cannot then well understand how a fact like this could have been unknown to Tacitus, who must have been acquainted with all the public buildings in Rome, especially the Temples; though it is quite easy to conceive how the slip could have been made by a writer of the fifteenth century: indeed, it would be odd if Bracciolini had not, now and then, fallen into such errors, which, though trivial in themselves, become mistakes of mighty17 magnitude in an inquiry18 of this description.
II. A writer who could be so ignorant about the temples in Rome is just the sort of writer who would display ignorance about the public works in that city. Cognate19 then with this blunder in the first part of the Annals is the blunder in the last part about that ancient right, the enlargement of the pomoerium. We are told that those only who had extended the bounds of the Empire by the annexation20 of countries which they had brought under subjection were entitled to add also to the City, and that the only two of all the generals who had exercised this privilege before the time of Claudius, were Sylla and Augustus. "Pomoerium urbis auxit Caesar more prisco, quo iis qui protulere imperium, etiam terminos urbis propagare datur. Nec tamen duces Romani, quamquam magnis nationibus subactis, usurpaverant, nisi Lucius Sulla et divus Augustus" (An. XII. 23). Justus Lipsius, at this misstatement, is, strange to say, quite contented21 by merely remarking in a merry mood: "I am not going to defend you, Cornelius: you are wrong: an enlargement was also made by Julius Caesar, who was 'pitched in'" ("interjectus") "between these two." "Non defendo te, Corneli: erras: etiani C. Caesar auxit interjectus inter4 eos duos." Any critic ought not to be facetiously22 playful, but seriously startled and unaccountably puzzled, that Tacitus, or any Roman of his stamp, should have been ignorant of a fact which must have been known to all his well informed countrymen, from its having been borne testimony23 to by so many eminent24 writers;—by Cicero in his Letter to Atticus (I. 13), by Cassius Dio in the 43rd Book of his History, by Aulus Gellius in his "Noctes Atticae" (XIII. 14), and, omitting all the antiquaries such as Fulvius and Onuphrius, Mark Antony in his Funeral Oration25 over the remains26 of Caesar, where he bewails the fate of an Emperor, who had been slain27 in the City, the pomoerium of which he had enlarged: [Greek: en tae polei enedreutheis, ho kai to pomaerion autaes apeuxaesas] (Cas. Dio. XLIV. 49). This fact seems to have been unknown just as well to Shakespeare as to Bracciolini; or our great national poet would have taken cognizance of it somewhere, perhaps in that part of Mark Antony's speech, where reference is made to what Caesar did for the Romans:
"Moreover, he hath left you all his walks,
His private arbours, and new-planted orchards28
On this side Tiber: he hath left them you,
And to your heirs for ever; common pleasures,
To walk abroad and recreate yourselves."
(Jul. Caesar, Act III. sc. 2)
III. A writer who could entirely29 overlook such a memorable30 achievement of Julius Caesar distinctly shows himself in his incorrectness about the career of such a distinguished31 member of the Augustan family as Julia, the wife of Tiberius: she is spoken of as having died in the first year of the reign33 of Tiberius, after having been banished34 by her father for infamous35 adulteries to the island of Trimetus, where, deserted36 by her husband, she must have speedily perished, in lieu of languishing37 in exile for twenty years, had she not been supported by the bounty38 of "Augusta". "Per idem tempus Julia mortem obiit quam neptem Augustus convictam adulterii damnatus est, projeceratque haud procul Apulis littoribus. Illic viginti annis exilium toleravit, Augustae ope sustentata" (An. IV. 71).
IV. A very small brass39 coin preserved in the National Collection in Paris informs us that Julia was alive at least three years after that date. So far from having been doomed40 by her husband to perish through want, Tiberius held her in such uncommon41 esteem42 that he ordered a coin to be struck in her honour in the fourth year of his reign for the money bears the inscription43, in Greek capitals, [Greek: IOULIA], with the initials, [Greek: LD], signifying in the fourth year of Tiberius after the death of Augustus.
V. Now let the reader bear in mind that when we find in the Annals a statement so contrary to what we gather from an old coin, we must set down that statement as a pure figment of history; for nothing can be so valuable for correct and exact information as coins, which were always struck among the ancient Romans by public authority, by the decrees of the Senate or the Comitia Curiata, or by the edicts of the Decuriones (Councils of the Municipal towns or Colonies), and of the Propraetors or Proconsuls of the Provinces.
VI. A coin of the latter description lays bare another very gross error committed in the first part of the Annals in making Caius Caecilius Cornutus governor of Paphlagonia in the time of Tiberius (An. IV. 28): Cornutus must have been a Proconsul of that province in the time of either Galba or Otho. The coin, which is a large brass one, exhibits, on its obverse side, Cornutus with a helmet on his head, and underneath44 [Greek: AMISOU], meaning that he was the Governor of Paphlagonia, of which "Amisus" was the capital, while on the reverse side are the words [Greek: EPI GAIOU KAIKILIOU KORNOUTOU]; Rome, sitting upon shields, holds the Roman world in her right hand Victory stretches forth45 hers to place a crown on the head of Cornutus, and beneath is [Greek: ROMAE], which, during the period of the Empire, was inscribed46 on coins, but only in the time of Galba and Otho, because Amisus, that is Paphlagonia, was then subject to Rome, that is, the Senate, under Caius Caecilius Cornutus, as Africa was under Caius Clodius Mucrinus.
VII. No one would have been more willing than Bracciolini himself to have acknowledged the ample sufficiency of this argument to prove in the cases of Julia and Cornutus the forgery of the Annals; for he was himself a great collector of the coins and medals of antiquity47, from which he gained a great deal of his historical information: he must, for example, have had in his possession, or have seen somewhere one of those medals which antiquaries say were struck in the time of Nero with a table, a garland, a pot, and the inscription: "Certa: Quinq. Rom. Co. Se." meaning "Certamen, Quinquennale Romae constituit"; for in the fourteenth book of the Annals (20) he makes mention of a set of games by the name "Quinquennale Ludricum," and in the sixteenth (4) by the title "Lustrale Certamnen, though no one has been able to decide, or even divine, what games these were on account of their exceeding insignificance48: his object, then, in mentioning them, when their chief constituents49 or principal prizes were a table, a garland, and a pot, was evidently to impress his reader with his most intimate knowledge of ancient Roman customs, and leave his reader to infer with certainty that the Annals must have proceeded from a native Roman; but here it strikes me that he altogether defeated his own purpose; for if the Annals had been written by Tacitus, that grave historian took such high ground that he would have deemed it beneath him to notice any such trivial amusements, just as Hume and Henry, in tracing the history of the people of England, did not descend50 to make any inquiry into or mention of the precise time when such popular games were instituted, as the Maypole or country fairs, horse-racing or football.
VIII. Monuments as well as coins may be relied upon for correcting errors made by historians. There is a monument at Puteoli erected in the time of Tiberius A.D. 30, containing the names of fourteen cities in Asia Minor51 that were destroyed by a series of earthquakes that took place during seven years in the course of the reign of Tiberius, the first being Cilicia (Nipp. I. 233), which was destroyed A.D. 23, and the last, and greatest of all, being Ephesus, which was reduced to ruins A.D. 29. A passage in the second book of the Annals (47) describes twelve famous cities of Asia owing their sudden destruction to an earthquake occurring at night. We are told that "the usual means of escape by rushing into the open air was of no avail: the yawning earth swallowed up everybody: huge mountains sank down, level plains rose into hills, and lightning flashed throughout the catastrophe53." Substitute "villages" for "famous cities," "hills" for "huge mountains," and we have, perhaps, as good an account as can be found in such few words of one of those dreadful calamities54 of nature,—though it happened not in the reign of Tiberius but three years before the death of Bracciolini,—the entire destruction of the city of Naples and its surrounding villages in 1456, when all the inhabitants perished, men, women and children, to the number of no fewer than 20,000 souls. "Eodem anno duodecim celebres Asiae urbes conlapsae nocturno motu terrae; quo improvisior graviorque pestis fuit. Neque solitum in tali casu effugium in aperta prorumpendi, quia diductis terris hauriebantur. Sedisse immensos montes, enisa in arduum quae plana fuerint, effulsisse inter ruinam ignis memorant." (II. 47).
IX. It will be here seen that the only thing mentioned as breaking out more suddenly and being more dreadful in its devastation55 than an earthquake is the "plague": "quo IMPROVISIOR GRAVIORque PESTIS fuit." Bracciolini spoke32 from personal observation. When he was here in England in 1422, he would not venture abroad nor leave London, on account of the plague which raged in the provinces and extended over almost the whole island (Ep. I. 7.). Details of this pestilence56 have not come down to us, but we see how terrible must have been its character, when this strong and lasting57 impression was left on the memory of Bracciolini, that he avails himself of it in this passage of the Annals to serve as a symbol of the worst species of destructiveness, from which we needs must gather that nothing could have broken out so unexpectedly and without apparent cause as the plague in England in 1422, nor have been more frightful58 and more rapid in its fatality59.
X. Another instance in the first part of the Annnals of how Bracciolini modified circumstances from his own period, and then, —knowing that human actions are ever repeating themselves, just as that the human passions remain the same in all ages,—remitted them to the first century, is his account of the fawning of the Roman Senators, when he represents them imploring60 Tiberius and Sejanus to deign61 to vouchsafe62 to the citizens the honour of an audience: the Emperor and the Minister refuse the supplication63; their condescension64 extends no further than to their not crossing over to the island of Caprea, but remaining on the coast of Campania: thither65 the Senators, the knights, and the vast mass of the commonalty of the City resort to exhibit a disgraceful spirit of sycophancy66 and servility; they hurry continually to and from Rome, crowd into Campania in such numbers that they are forced to lie in the open fields night and day, some on the bare sands of the seashore, without distinction of rank; and they put up with the insolence67 of the porters of Sejanus, who deny them ingress to the Minister. "Aram Clementiae, aram Amicitiae effigiesquecircum Caesaris ac Sejani censuere; crebrisque precibus efflagitabant, visendi sui copiam facerent. Non illi tamen in urbem, aut propinqua urbi digressi sunt: satis visum, omittere insulam, et in proximo Campaniae adspici. eo venire patres, eques, magna pars68 plebis, anxii erga Sejanum; cujus durior congressus, atque eo per ambitum, et societate consiliorum parabatur. Satis constabat auctam, ei adrogantiam, foedum illud in propatulo servitium spectanti. quippe Romae, sueti discursus; et magnitudine urbis incertum, quod quisque ad negotium pergat: ibi campo aut litore jacentes, nullo discrimine noctem ac diem, juxta gratiam aut fastus janitorum perpetiebantur" (An. IV. 74).
A man must be credulous69 beyond measure who can believe that such degrading servility was ever manifested among all classes by the ancient Roman people; the picture, nevertheless, seems to have much truth in it, though tinged70 with exaggeration; but the painting must be transferred from the first to the fifteenth century: there was then a schism71 in the Church: every now and then the Pope would leave Rome, and stay at Florence, Reate, Ferrara, or some other city in Italy; thereupon crowds of sycophantic72 devotees, of whom the Roman Church has always had multitudes, would crouch73 into the presence of the Sovereign Pontiff, and put themselves to a wonderful amount of inconvenience, by thronging74 into towns beyond the power they possessed75 of affording accommodation: these flying visits of the Popes into small country towns always occurred during the heats of summer; hence the pilgrims lay in the open air; and all this suffering they submitted to with the patient spirit of martyrs76, only to obtain an audience, to have a sight of and a blessing77 from the Holy Father. When we remember too what was the power of the Popes in those days, we can easily fancy how true is the remainder of the picture when those to whom an audience was denied returned home in alarm, and how ill-timed was the joy of those whose unfortunate friendship with some cruel Papal Minister portended78 their imminent79 death. "Donec idque vetitum. et revenere in urbeni trepidi, quos non sermone, non visu dignatus erat: quidam male alacres, quibus infaustae amicitiae gravis exitus imminebat" (l. c.)
XI. The same love of extraordinary exaggeration is found in the last as in the first part of the Annals, showing thereby80 that the whole work came from the same source. In the thirteenth book Pomponia Graecina is described as changing not her weeds nor her lamenting81 spirit for "forty" years,—mourning, too, as she was, not for a husband, a son or a father, but Julia, the daughter of Drusus, who was murdered by Messalina. "Nam post Juliam, Drusi filiam, dolo Messalinae interfectam, per 'quadraginta' annos, non cultu nisi lugubri, non animo nisi moesto egit." (An. XIII. 32). Lipsius saw something so extraordinary in this, that, in his usual way, without any authority of manuscript or edition, he cut short the term, substituting "fourteen" for "forty,"—"quatuordecim" for "quadraginta."
XII. A mistake which no Roman could have made occurs in the first part of the Annals, where, we are told that, at the funeral of Drusus, the father of Germanicus, "the images of the Claudii and the Julii were borne around his bier":—"circumfusas lecto Claudiorum Juliorumque imagines" (III. 5). Should the reader turn for the venfication of this curious statement to some modern edition of the works of Tacitus, it is possible that he may find "Liviorum" instead of "Juliorum," for reasons which will be immediately given; but if he will consult any of the MSS. or editions prior to the time of Justus Lipsius, he will find the passage as given. The error was so monstrous82, that Lipsius corrected it; because the Romans, at the obsequies of their great, only carried around the bier the images of the ancestors of the deceased. Accordingly Lipsius asks the very pertinent83 question, how at the funeral procession of Drusus, who was no member of the Julian family, not even by adoption84, the images of members of that house could be borne? He, therefore, substituted a family to which Drusus belonged, the Livii. Freinshemius followed him, and some of the subsequent editors, among them Ernesti, who observes he could see no reason why the images of the Livii should have been omitted at the funeral of Drusus; nor anybody else, except for the very strong and simple reason that the author of the Annals, being Bracciolini, was not acquainted with the fact, which must have been familiar to Tacitus, that the Livii, and not the Julii, were the great ancestors of Drusus.
XIII. That Bracciolini was just the sort of man to fall into glaring mistakes, oftener than otherwise from perverseness85, or some peculiar86 humour, such as a resolution to be in the wrong, would appear to be the case from the remarkable87 error which he commits in his "Historia de Varietate Fortunae," respecting the beginning of the French kingdom which he puts down at "a little beyond the year 900,"—"paulo ultra nongentesimum annum" (Hist. de Var. For. II. p. 45), thus entirely discarding the Merovingian and Carlovingian dynasties, and ascribing the commencement of the French kingdom to the beginning of the Capetian house; and he gives his reason; for he says that until "a little beyond 900," France had been divided among a number of Princes; but so it was even when Hugh Capet, putting an end to the system of anarchy88 which had prevailed before his time, established real monarchy89; yet monarchy, after all, was not so real then as it was in the time of Charlemagne: Capet was only the most powerful prince among a number of others, who, nominally90 acknowledging him as king, were absolute in their own rights, raised taxes, dispensed91 justice, framed laws, coined money and made war. It is true that it is not very easy to get at the proper history of France at the period in question, from there not being the requisite92 authority for a correct knowledge of those dark and distant times: a great deal of obscurity and conjecture93, too, exist as to the actual character of the monarchy,—as to whether, for example, Clovis and his predecessors94 were real kings, or merely knights errant, and whether their successors were as absolute as the Emperors among the Romans, or more magistrates95 than sovereigns as among the Germans, all sorts of doubts having been raised and mistiness96 thrown over these and other important matters by the ingenuity97 of such writers as Adrien de Valois, Boulainvilliers, Daniel, Dubos, Mad'lle de Lézardière, Mably, Montesquieu, Mad'lle Montlozier, Velly and others: still the historians of France are all unanimous in agreeing, that the French monarchy commenced hundreds of years before the date fixed98 by Bracciolini, namely, at the commencement of the fifth century, some preferring to begin with Marchomir, Duke of the Sicambrian Franks, and others with Pharamond, (though Marchomir, before Pharamond, was, certainly, king of Gallic France).
XIV. We are told in the first part of the Annals (II. 61) that the boundaries of the Roman Empire extended to the Red Sea. This is generally supposed to allude99 to the possession of Mesopotamia, Assyria and Armenia by the Romans, which they held only for two years, from 115 to 117. Now, none of these provinces, only Arabia, Susiana, Persis, Carmania and Gedrosia, bordered upon what the Romans called "The Red Sea," and we "The Indian Ocean"; for the ancients believed that from about twelve degrees south of the sources of the Nile, from a country named by them Agyzimba, there was a continuation of land stretching from Africa to Asia, an opinion entertained by all the old geographers100, from Hipparchus to Marinus of Tyre and Ptolemy, and never abandoned, until long after the death of Bracciolini, when the Portuguese101 under Vasco de Gama, doubling the Cape52 of Good Hope, and hugging the shores of eastern Africa and of Asia, reached India by the sea towards the close of the fifteenth century. The Indian Ocean having then been known for many hundred years by the name of the Red Sea, and looked upon as a vast body of inland water, like the Mediterranean102, we have, unquestionably, a gross error with respect to the geography of Asia, as it was known in the time of Tacitus, when it is written in the Annals: "Exin ventum Elephantinen ac Syenen, claustra olim Romani Imperii, quod nunc RUBRUM AD MARE103 patescit."(An. II. 61).
XV. The same confusion of ideas with respect to the Indian Ocean, and pointing to identity of authorship, is found in the last, as well as in the first, part of the Annals, when the Hyrcanian ambassadors returning home from Rome have a military escort as far as the shores (it is said) "of the Red Sea," which they are to pass over in order to avoid the territories of the enemy:—"eos regredientes Corbulo, ne Euphraten transgressi hostium custodiis circumvenirentur, dato praesidio ad littora 'Maris Rubri' deduxit, unde vitatis Parthorum finibus, patrias in sedes remeavere" (An. XIV. 25). Here the "Red Sea" clearly means the Caspian Sea, because the Parthians lived to the south of the Hyrcanians, and there was no means of the ambassadors by crossing the Euphrates or going southwards, getting into their country without passing through the territory of their enemies, but by travelling northwards they would pass through Media across the Caspian Sea to their own shores. It is difficult to determine whether Bracciolini did not give the name of "Mare Rubrum" to any large body of water which he believed communicated with the Indian Ocean, which he may have thought was the case with the Caspian, in common with Strabo, and before Strabo Eratosthenes, and after Strabo Pomponius Mela: or Bracciolini may have thought that the Caspian had no communication with any other sea,—was perfectly104 mediterranean, and that being in the midst of land, it ought to have the same name given to it as the lndian Ocean, that neither mingled105 with nor joined any other sea. Let the error have originated as it might, it is of a character so cognate with that in the second book, as to induce one to believe that both parts of the Annals proceeded from the same hand, and that that could not have been the hand of Tacitus, as in his day the Romans spoke specifically of the Euxine and the Caspian Sea, so that if he had written the Annals, he would have written in the first instance, "ad Pontum Euxinum," and in the second,"Caspii Maris."
XVI. But if my theory be accepted that Bracciolini forged both parts of the Annals, these errors are not at all to be wondered at; for at the commencement of the fifteenth century, even his countrymen, the Italians, especially the rich merchants of his native city, Florence, as well as the other wealthy traders of Venice and Genoa, who dealt in spices and other Oriental productions, alone practised navigation and cultivated commerce in the countries of Asia, and though better informed of those parts of the world than the other nations of Europe, had yet but a confused and false conception of the Red Sea and the waters in the East.
There ought, further, to be no surprise that Bracciolini possessed this limited geographical106 knowledge of the lands and waters of Asia, considering that, up to his time, only a few travellers, such as Carpin and Asevlino, Rubrequis, Marco Polo and Conti, had penetrated108 into the central portions of that continent:—as to Africa, its very shape was unknown, for navigation scarcely extended beyond the Mediterranean: at the commencement of the fifteenth century, indeed, not only information about the different quarters of the globe, but letters, arts, the sciences, and the greater part of our present ideas, were all prostrate109, —crushed beneath the weight of weapons and silent amid the din10 of arms, for everybody thought of nothing but wars.
XVII. While treating of maritime110 matters, I may refer to a passage in the second book of the Annals, which forcibly impresses me as being penned by Bracciolini, in whose declining years Prince Henry of Portugal, with a passion for voyages and discoveries, gave a new direction to the genius of his age by laying the foundation for a revolution which must be for ever memorable in modern history. On Prince Henry giving the signal, navigation spread its sails; discovery followed discovery with amazing, speed; successes attended every expedition; each started after the other rapidly, and soon in all directions; the navigators returning home brought news so strange,—so animating111 all minds,—so inspiring all imaginations,—of the fresh lands they had seen that we can easily imagine a writer living in the midst of all these stirring accounts, who was desirous of producing as much effect as possible in a history that he was forging, writing thus of mariners112 on their "return from a long distance": "they talk about wonders, the power of whirlwinds and unheard of birds, monsters of the deep having the forms of half men and half beasts,—things either actually seen or else believed under the influence of excitement": —Lipsius adds in a note, "rather based on pure fancy,"—"vanitate efficta";—had the great Dutch critic for a moment dreamt that Bracciolini had forged the "Annals of Tacitus," he would have known that the observation, as far as concerned the author's own period, was founded on fact, the English having then had the good fortune to discover,—(or, as it was known to the Romans, more properly, re-discover) Madeira; for the first time, in modern days, the French nobleman in the service of Spain, Jean de Bethencourt, reached the Canaries; the Flemings, too, for the first time got as far as the Azores; above all, Gilianez, in 1433, doubling Cape Boyador, or Nun11, arrived on the West Coast of Africa to a few degrees above the equator: every one of them returned with wonderful news of his voyage which was looked upon as something marvellous:—accordingly their great contemp- orary, Bracciolini, wrote thus, thinking of the miraculous113 narrative114 that was told by each adventurous115 navigator of his time:—"Ut quis ex longinquo venerat, miracula narrabant, vim116 turbinum, et inauditas volucres, monstra maris, ambiguas hominum et belluarum formas, —visa, sive ex motu credita" (An. II. 24). Nothing was going on in the days of Tacitus, which could have put such a notion in his head; nor is the passage from which it is taken at all in his style, as will be admitted when I immediately proceed to compare and contrast certain passages in Bracciolini and himself with the view of examining the graphic107 powers which they both possessed.
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forgery
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fawning
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inter
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equestrian
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knights
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appellation
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effigies
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dedicated
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censor
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| n./vt.审查，审查员；删改 | |
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15
ERECTED
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| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
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edifice
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| n.宏伟的建筑物(如宫殿，教室) | |
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17
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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18
inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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19
cognate
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| adj.同类的，同源的，同族的；n.同家族的人，同源词 | |
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20
annexation
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| n.吞并，合并 | |
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21
contented
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| adj.满意的，安心的，知足的 | |
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22
facetiously
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| adv.爱开玩笑地；滑稽地，爱开玩笑地 | |
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23
testimony
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| n.证词；见证，证明 | |
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24
eminent
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| adj.显赫的，杰出的，有名的，优良的 | |
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25
oration
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| n.演说，致辞，叙述法 | |
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26
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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27
slain
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| 杀死，宰杀，杀戮( slay的过去分词 )； (slay的过去分词) | |
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28
orchards
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| （通常指围起来的）果园( orchard的名词复数 ) | |
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29
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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30
memorable
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| adj.值得回忆的，难忘的，特别的，显著的 | |
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31
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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32
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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33
reign
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| n.统治时期，统治，支配，盛行；v.占优势 | |
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34
banished
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| v.放逐，驱逐( banish的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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35
infamous
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| adj.声名狼藉的，臭名昭著的，邪恶的 | |
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36
deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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37
languishing
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| a. 衰弱下去的 | |
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38
bounty
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| n.慷慨的赠予物，奖金；慷慨，大方；施与 | |
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39
brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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40
doomed
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| 命定的 | |
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41
uncommon
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| adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的 | |
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42
esteem
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| n.尊敬，尊重；vt.尊重，敬重；把…看作 | |
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43
inscription
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| n.（尤指石块上的）刻印文字，铭文，碑文 | |
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44
underneath
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| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
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45
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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46
inscribed
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| v.写，刻( inscribe的过去式和过去分词 )；内接 | |
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47
antiquity
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| n.古老；高龄；古物，古迹 | |
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48
insignificance
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| n.不重要；无价值；无意义 | |
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49
constituents
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| n.选民( constituent的名词复数 )；成分；构成部分；要素 | |
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50
descend
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| vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降 | |
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51
minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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52
cape
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| n.海角，岬；披肩，短披风 | |
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53
catastrophe
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| n.大灾难，大祸 | |
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54
calamities
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| n.灾祸，灾难( calamity的名词复数 )；不幸之事 | |
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devastation
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| n.毁坏；荒废；极度震惊或悲伤 | |
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56
pestilence
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| n.瘟疫 | |
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57
lasting
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| adj.永久的，永恒的；vbl.持续，维持 | |
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58
frightful
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| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
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59
fatality
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| n.不幸，灾祸，天命 | |
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60
imploring
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| 恳求的，哀求的 | |
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61
deign
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| v. 屈尊, 惠允 ( 做某事) | |
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62
vouchsafe
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| v.惠予，准许 | |
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63
supplication
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| n.恳求，祈愿，哀求 | |
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64
condescension
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| n.自以为高人一等，贬低(别人) | |
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65
thither
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| adv.向那里；adj.在那边的，对岸的 | |
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66
sycophancy
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| n.拍马屁，奉承，谄媚；吮痈舐痔 | |
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67
insolence
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| n.傲慢；无礼；厚颜；傲慢的态度 | |
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68
pars
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| n.部，部分；平均( par的名词复数 )；平价；同等；（高尔夫球中的）标准杆数 | |
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69
credulous
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| adj.轻信的，易信的 | |
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70
tinged
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| v.（使）发丁丁声( ting的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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71
schism
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| n.分派，派系，分裂 | |
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72
sycophantic
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| adj.阿谀奉承的 | |
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73
crouch
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| v.蹲伏，蜷缩，低头弯腰；n.蹲伏 | |
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74
thronging
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| v.成群，挤满( throng的现在分词 ) | |
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75
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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76
martyrs
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| n.martyr的复数形式；烈士( martyr的名词复数 )；殉道者；殉教者；乞怜者（向人诉苦以博取同情） | |
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77
blessing
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| n.祈神赐福；祷告；祝福，祝愿 | |
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78
portended
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| v.预示( portend的过去式和过去分词 )；预兆；给…以警告；预告 | |
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79
imminent
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| adj.即将发生的，临近的，逼近的 | |
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80
thereby
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| adv.因此，从而 | |
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81
lamenting
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| adj.悲伤的，悲哀的v.（为…）哀悼，痛哭，悲伤( lament的现在分词 ) | |
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82
monstrous
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| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
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83
pertinent
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| adj.恰当的；贴切的；中肯的；有关的；相干的 | |
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84
adoption
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| n.采用，采纳，通过；收养 | |
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85
perverseness
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| n. 乖张, 倔强, 顽固 | |
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86
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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87
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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88
anarchy
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| n.无政府状态；社会秩序混乱，无秩序 | |
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89
monarchy
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| n.君主，最高统治者；君主政体，君主国 | |
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90
nominally
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| 在名义上，表面地； 应名儿 | |
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91
dispensed
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| v.分配( dispense的过去式和过去分词 )；施与；配（药） | |
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92
requisite
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| adj.需要的，必不可少的；n.必需品 | |
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93
conjecture
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| n./v.推测，猜测 | |
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94
predecessors
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| n.前任( predecessor的名词复数 )；前辈；（被取代的）原有事物；前身 | |
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95
magistrates
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| 地方法官，治安官( magistrate的名词复数 ) | |
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96
mistiness
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| n.雾，模糊，不清楚 | |
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97
ingenuity
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| n.别出心裁；善于发明创造 | |
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98
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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99
allude
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| v.提及，暗指 | |
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100
geographers
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| 地理学家( geographer的名词复数 ) | |
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101
Portuguese
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| n.葡萄牙人；葡萄牙语 | |
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102
Mediterranean
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| adj.地中海的；地中海沿岸的 | |
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103
mare
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| n.母马，母驴 | |
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104
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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105
mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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106
geographical
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| adj.地理的；地区(性)的 | |
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107
graphic
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| adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的 | |
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108
penetrated
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| adj. 击穿的，鞭辟入里的 动词penetrate的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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109
prostrate
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| v.拜倒，平卧，衰竭；adj.拜倒的，平卧的，衰竭的 | |
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110
maritime
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| adj.海的，海事的，航海的，近海的，沿海的 | |
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111
animating
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| v.使有生气( animate的现在分词 )；驱动；使栩栩如生地动作；赋予…以生命 | |
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112
mariners
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| 海员，水手（mariner的复数形式） | |
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113
miraculous
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| adj.像奇迹一样的，不可思议的 | |
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114
narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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115
adventurous
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| adj.爱冒险的；惊心动魄的，惊险的，刺激的 | |
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116
vim
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| n.精力，活力 | |
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