"colonia," and the latter a "municipium,"--London being a mere
"praefectura." It is then the height of absurdity to believe that
if Tacitus wrote the Annals we should have heard in that work London
spoken of as "remarkably celebrated for the multiplicity of its
merchants and its commodities": "copia negotiatorum et commeatuum
maxime celebre" (XIV. 33).

X. The author of the Annals pretends to know more about prominent
individuals in Rome than was known to their distinguished
contemporaneous countrymen. He writes of Labeo Antistius, as if
that jurisconsult were an example to the age in which he lived of
all the virtues and all goodness, and possessed, to a masterly
extent, accomplishments and acquirements; for thus he speaks of
him in conjunction with Capito Ateius: "Capito Ateius ...
principem in civitate locum studiis adsecutus--Labeonem Antistium,
iisdem artibus praecellentem ... namque illa aetas duo pacis
decora simul tulit; sed Labeo incorrupta libertate ...
celebratior" (An. III. 75). Horace, who was a contemporary of
Labeo's, says that he was a maniac, or, at any rate--"considered
very crazy in the company of the sane":--

"Labeone insanior inter
Sanos dicatur." (Sat. I. III. 82.)


Hitherto Horace by the side of "Tacitus" has been no better than a
clay pitcher by a porcelain vase; thus his disparaging, but,
doubtless, quite correct estimate of Labeo has been till now
altogether disregarded, in consequence of this passage in the
Annals, from its author being credited with having exceeded what