suppose, incense was burnt and part of the victims.

[A] The knife, which is cut in demi relief, on the _Taurobolium_,
is crooked upon the back, exactly in the same manner, and form, as
may be seen on some of the medals of the Kings of Macedonia.

The Latin inscription under the bull's head, is very well cut, and very
legible, by which it appears, that by the express order of CYBELE, the
reputed mother of the Gods, for the honour and health of the Emperor
_Antoninus Pius_, father of his country, and for the preservation of his
children, children, _Lucius Æmilius Carpus_[B] received the horns of
the bull, by the ministration of _Quintus Samius Secundus_, transported
them to the Vatican, and consecrated, at his own expence, this altar and
the head of the bull[C]; but I will send the inscription, and a
model[D] of the altar, as soon as I can have it made, as I find here a
very ingenious sculptor and modeller; who, to my great serprize, says
no one has hitherto been taken from it. And here let me observe, lest I
forget it, to say, that _Augustus_ lived three years in this city.

[B] _Lucius Æmilius Carpus_ was a Priest, and a man of great
riches: he was of the quality of _Sacrovir_, and probably one of
the six Priests of the temple of Angustus.--_Sextumvir Augustalii_.

[C] Several inscriptions of this kind have been found both in Italy
and Spain, but by far the greater number among the Gauls; and as
the sacrifices to the Goddess Cybele were some of the least ancient
of the Pagan rites, so they were the last which were suppressed on
the establishment of Christianity. Since we find one of the
Taurobolian inscriptions, with so recent a date as the time of the
Emperor Valentinian the third. The silence of the Heathen writers