OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE,

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several generations, in the possession of Gordi-an’s family. p It was distinguished by ancienttrophies of naval victories, and decorated withthe works of modern painting. His villa on theroad to Praeneste was celebrated for baths of sin-gular beauty and extent, for three stately roomsof an hundred feet in length, and for a magnifi-cent portico, supported by two hundred columnsof the four most curious and costly sorts of mar-ble . 13 The public shews exhibited at his ex-pence, and in which the people were entertainedwith many hundreds of wild beasts and gladia-tors/ seem to surpass the fortune of a subject;and whilst the liberality of other magistrateswas confined to a few solemn festivals in Rome ,the magnificence of Gordian was repeated, whenhe was sedile, every month in the year, and ex-tended, during his consulship, to the principal

p Hist. August, p. 152. Tlie celebrated bouse of Pompey in cariniswas usurped by Marc Antony , and consequently became, after the tri-umvir’s death, a part of the imperial domain. The emperor Trajan al-lowed, and even encouraged, the rich senators to purchase those magni-ficent and useless palaces (Plin. Panegyric , c. 50j; and it may seemprobable that, on tin's occasion, Pompty’s house came into the posses-sion of Gordian’s great-grandfather.

q The Claudian, the Numidian, the Carystian, and the Synna-dian. The colours of Roman marbles have been faintly described,and imperfectly distinguished. It appears, however, that the Carys-tian was a sea-green, and that the marble of Synnada was white,mixed with oval spots of purple. See Salmasius ad Hist. August,p. 164.

r Hist. August, p. 151, 152. He sometimes gave five hundred pairof gladiators, never less than one hundred and fifty. He once gave, forthe use of the circus, one hundred Sicilian, and as many Cappadocianhorses. The animals designed for hunting were chiefly bears, boars,bulls, stags, elks, wild asses, <Stc. Elephants and lions seem to have beenappropriated to imperial magnificence.

CHAP.

VII.