ere are five arrondissements, of which the chief towns are Rodez, capital
of the department, Espalion, Millau, St Affrique and Villefranche, with 43
cantons and 304 communes. Rodez is the seat of a bishopric, the diocese of
which comprises the department. Aveyron belongs to the 16th military
region, and to the _academie_ or educational circumscription of Toulouse.
Its court of appeal is at Montpellier. The department is traversed by the
lines both of the Orleans and Southern railways. The more important towns
are Rodez, Millau, St Affrique, Villefranche-de-Rouergue and Decazeville.
The following are also of interest:--Sauveterre, founded in 1281, a
striking example of the bastide (_q.v._) of that period; Conques, which has
a remarkable abbey-church of the 11th century like St Sernin of Toulouse in
plan and possessing a rich treasury of reliquaries, &c.; Espalion, where
amongst other old buildings there are the remains of a feudal stronghold
and a church of the Romanesque period; Najac, which has the ruins of a
magnificent chateau of the 13th century; and Sylvanes, with a church of the
12th century, once attached to a Cistercian abbey.

AVEZZANO, a town of the Abruzzi, Italy, in the province of Aquila, 67 m. E.
of Rome by rail and 38 m. S. of Aquila by road. Pop. (1901) 9442. It has a
fine and well-preserved castle, built in 1490 by Gentile Virginio Orsini;
it is square, with round towers at the angles. Avezzano is on the main line
from Rome to Castellammare Adriatico; a branch railway diverges to
Roccasecca, on the line from Naples to Rome. The Lago Fucino lies 1-1/2 m.
to the east.

AVIANUS, a Latin writer of fables, placed by some critics in the age of the
Antonines, by others as late as the 6th century A.D. He appears to have
lived at Rome and to have been a heathen. The 42 fables which bear his name
are dedicated to a certain Theodosius, whose learning is spoken of in most
flattering terms. He may possibly be Macrobius Theodosius, the author of
the _Saturnalia_; some think he may be the emperor of that name. Nearly all
the fables are to be found in Babrius, who was probably Avianus's source of
inspiration, but as Babrius wrote in Greek, and Avianus speaks of having
made an elegiac version from a rough Latin copy, probably a prose
paraphrase, he was not indebted to the original. The language and metre are
on the whole correct, in spite of deviations from classical usage, chiefly
in the management of the pentameter. Th