LOSS OF THE EARLY ANNALS.
Huenced the regulation of festivals, and were essential parts
of the contents of the pontifical books14; they would therefore
have been recorded, and not have been calculated backwards,
if the annales maximi had been preserved. Ihis is unsophis-
ticated evidence of what I have said.
Servius says15 that the annals were divided into eighty
books. That this scholion does not exist in the Codex Ful-
densis is no argument against its genuineness; for 1 do not see
why any one should have fabricated such a statement. In the
time of Cicero, specimens of these pontifical annals were in the
hands of the public: they formed a part of the Roman lite-
rature. In the introduction to his work De Legibus, he sayslb:
past annales—quibus nihil potest esse JUCUNDIUS. How they
could be called Jucundi is hardly comprehensible. All the
manuscripts of the work De Legibus are but copies of one and
the same, and were made in the fifteenth century, after 1420;
and the reading of all is jucundius. Ursinus wished to change
it into∕e∕wmwsιτ, others into incomptius. But an author like
Cicero may sometimes use a bold expression which puzzles us,
and he may have meant to say, that these annals were delightful
to him, merely because they were historical records of great
antiquity. Whether, however, this was actually his meaning
in this passage, is a very doubtful point; but we can make no
alteration.
From the passages in which Livy mentions the appointment
of the magistrates18 in very short sentences, we may form some
idea of the character of these pontifical annals. I believe that
the copy which he used did not begin till the year 460; other-
wise I do not see why he did not always observe the same
practice. These annals first recorded the names of the magis-
trates, and then the memorable events of the year, and the
persons who had most distinguished themselves in it : I am con-
vinced that according to their original plan they never entered
into the details of battles or of other subjects. That which
constitutes the real character of history they never possessed
in any higher degree than the annals of the middle ages.
14 Compare Catoin Gellius, ɪi. 28.
*5 On Æn, ɪ. 373. 16 i. 2.
17 In vol. i. p.250, Nicbuhr seems to have adopted the correction of Ursinus.
18 Uor instance, at the conclusion of the tenth book, and in the third and
fourth decads at the end of every year.—N.
CHARACTER OF THE ANNALS. χi
It yet remains to be mentioned that Diomedes19 says, that the
res gestae populi Romani are recorded by the pontiffs and scribes
(he uses the present tense). Although every thing, which such
writers say, must not be subjected to a rigid criticism, still the
expression is important: he cannot have wished to deceive,
and must have known the truth. Now, when Cicero says that
annals were kept only down to the time of P. Mucius, I believe
that two kinds of annals must be distinguished. The old ones
may have ceased then, and yet have been continued in some
sense. It is possible that at the time of P. Mucius they were
neglected as superfluous, for a literature had then sprung up
among the Bomans20, and another mode of recording the
events of the day was probably adopted about that time in
the Acta DiurnaA Nevertheless, annals may in a certain
sense still have been continued; at least similar annals may
have been kept privately. I have been led to suppose this by
the immensely important fragment of a Eoman chronicle of
the tenth century which was discovered by Pertz.*'2 The
author of it was Benedict, a monk of the monastery of Soracte.
In this fragment, relating to the time of Pope John VIII.,
many ostenta are recorded, and, what is curious enough, in the
genuine old language, as for example, murus de coelo tactus
est. In many monasteries the annals of St. Hieronymus were
continued, the most remarkable events of every year, such as
the accession of an emperor, being entered in them. It is
this fact, which induces me to consider the circumstance of
Diomedes having used the present tense in the abovementioned
passage, as one of great importance. In the work “ De
Origine Gentis Romanæ,” first published by Andrew Schottus23
as a work of Aurelius Victor, the pontifical annals are ridicu-
lously adduced for the settlement of Æneas in Italy.24 This
work is an impudent fabrication25 by a literary impostor of
19 iii. 480. ∞ Compare vol. ɪ. p 250.
21 The Acta Diurna arc often called simply Diurna, from which the modern
word journal has been formed. They were a kind of city newspaper, in which
the Minutes of the proceedings of the senate also were published. Our system
of book-keeping, called the Italian, was known among the Romans.—N. See
vol. ii. p. 602, note 1319.
22 Respecting this chronicle, see Archiu fur die altéré Deutsche Geschichts-
kunde, v. p.146. Pertz has since (1839) published it in his Monum. Germ.
Hist. Script, tom.iii. p 695, foil. 23 Antwerji, 1579.
2t In cap. 9. In the same book (c. 7) we find the pontifical annals also
adduced for the arrival of Hercules in Italy. ≈ Comp. vol. ɪi. p.9, note 11.