Oramus, si forte non molestum est,
demonstres ubi sint tuae tenebrae.
Te campo quaesivimus minore,
te in circo, te in omnibus libellis,
te in templo summi Iovis sacrato.    5
In Magni simul ambulatione
femellas omnes, amice, prendi,
quas vultu vidi tamen sereno.
†avelte† sic ipse flagitabam,
Camerium mihi, pessimae puellae!    10
Quaedam inquit, nudum reduc <…..>
en hic in roseis latet papillis.
Sed te iam ferre Herculei labos est,
tanto te in fastu negas, amice.
Dic nobis ubi sis futurus, ede    15
audacter, committe, crede luci.
Nunc te lacteolae tenent puellae?
Si linguam clauso tenes in ore,
fructus proicies amoris omnes:
verbosa gaudet Venus loquella.    20
Vel, si vis, licet obseres palatum,
dum vestri sim particeps amoris.
22 vestri V (al. nostri R2m1G2) sim θ: sis V

Poem 55 poses a variety of metrical, textual and semantic problems: why do 13 of its 22 lines have only ten syllables instead of 11? Should ‘poem 58b’ be incorporated into it, and if so, where? What did the narrator say to the girls in line 9? What exactly did the girl say or do in line 11? Who are the lacteolae puellae of line 17? What is the reading (and the meaning) of the last line? This article, however, is concerned only with the topographical details in lines 3–6. I assume for the sake of argument that the poem is complete in itself (even if ‘poem 58b’ is added, it does not affect the topographical question), and I accept the traditional view that Camerius is a friend and approximate contemporary for whom the narrator is searching like Amphitryo for Naucrates, or Epidicus for Periphanes.

Alberti's exasperated comment on Vitruvius must strike chords in the heart of anyone who has ever tried to make sense of the obscurer parts of De Architectura, the only architectural treatise to come down to us from Antiquity. No two words have caused greater difficulty and controversy than ‘scamilli inpares’. I would like to show below some of the confusion generated by these during the Renaissance.

The paper that follows calls for a brief preliminary word of explanation. In a characteristically stimulating note published over 20 years ago M. Louis Robert called attention to a number of inscriptions which attest the existence of an organisation of marble workers based on Nicomedia, an organisation of which he promised a fuller study in the near future. For a number of years I have myself been independently concerned with the archaeological and art-historical aspects of the same phenomenon, and although I had hoped to be able to publish the results of that work with the full benefit of M. Robert's unique knowledge of the epigraphic evidence, I am reluctant to delay publication further simply for that reason. In acknowledging my debt, I feel confident that M. Robert will correct, with his customary thoroughness, any errors of interpretation which I may commit.

Between 1974 and 1978 the settlement archaeology of the Biferno valley in Molise in southern Italy was investigated by a programme of field survey, excavation and allied archaeological research directed by one of us (GB) and termed the Molise Project. For the historic periods the archaeology has been combined with documentary studies; both have then been integrated with geomorphological research into the environmental history of the valley, forming an inter-disciplinary investigation of the relationship between human settlement and landscape change in the valley from prehistoric times to the present day. For interim reports on the project, see Barker (1976, 1977), Barker et al. (1978), and Lloyd and Barker (1981).

S. Cornelia (863583), 15 kilometres north of Rome and midway between Veii and Formello (Figure 1), was rediscovered in 1958 during the South Etruria Survey and excavated by Charles Daniels in 1962–4. It was identified immediately as the domusculta of Capracorum, established by Hadrian I c. 780 (Ward-Perkins 1963: 38; Kahane et al. 1968: 161–4). The site is of lasting importance. Apart from its exceptional intrinsic interest, it provided the first type series of medieval pottery in Lazio and the only fixed (or apparently fixed) points in the chronology of Forum ware and pottery with sparse glaze, both of which are important elements in the debate about the development of early medieval settlement (Luttrell 1975: 271–2; Wickham 1978: 172–9). This paper is an account of the pottery and the evidence for its date.

The churches in Rome built between the end of the eighth and the middle of the ninth century are among the best preserved monuments of the Carolingian era anywhere in Europe. As such, they have afforded scholars the rare opportunity to study in detail the various media utilised in Carolingian church decoration. The floor pavement, however, is an aspect of this decoration that has received little attention and it is my purpose here to point out the presence of a small but distinct group of opus sectile floors in Rome that seem to belong to this period.

Of the Carolingian churches in Rome, S. Prassede, built for Pope Paschal I (817–824), is by far the most complete in its structural fabric, architectural sculpture and mosaic decoration. The best preserved part of the church is the S. Zeno chapel adjoining the right aisle, and the opus sectile pavement of this chapel is perhaps the most luxurious in our series. Indeed, it is the only one to have received previous notice, beginning with its publication by R. Cattaneo in 1890.

The first two years of the reign of Charles IV, the last Capetian king of France, witnessed detailed negotiations between the French court and the papal curia on the question of organising a crusade to the East. The negotiations are striking proof that on crusading matters the papacy still looked to the French crown to take the lead, attempting to continue a tradition of Franco-papal cooperation on the crusade which was rooted in the mid-thirteenth century. In the earlier period this policy of close cooperation was expressed in the expeditions and projects of St. Louis and Charles of Anjou, the aspirations of such popes as Urban IV and Clement IV, and the exemplary crusading zeal of French nobles like Geoffrey of Sergines, Oliver of Termes and Erard of Valéry. But was Franco-papal cooperation still fruitful in the first decades of the fourteenth century? To answer this question definitively would require an exhaustive survey of the achievements of this aspect of papal crusading policy, of the obstacles facing it and of the various alternative approaches which were open to the Roman church.

The fortunes of Venice were built, at least indirectly, on the southeastern coasts of Italy. Venetian help to the Byzantine emperor against first the Saracens and then Guiscard's Normans brought Venice its mighty privileges in Greece and Constantinople. But Venetian cooperation with those who finally came to rule over Apulia also brought rewards, in the form of prosperous trading stations which outrivalled all the achievements of the Apulian merchants themselves; in the form of regular access to supplies of wheat, oil and salted meat; and in the form of additional points of surveillance from which to protect Venetian and subject fleets. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the Venetian government displayed great agility and flexibility in its dealings with the rulers of Apulia and Sicily.