With the erection of the first sundial in the Roman Forum
in 491 the Greek hour (--ora--, -hora-) began to come into use at
Rome: it happened, however, that the Romans erected a sundial which
had been prepared for Catana situated four degrees farther to the
south, and were guided by this for a whole century. Towards the end
of this epoch we find several persons of quality taking an interest
in mathematical studies. Manius Acilius Glabrio (consul in 563)
attempted to check the confusion of the calendar by a law, which
allowed the pontifical college to insert or omit intercalary months at
discretion: if the measure failed in its object and in fact aggravated
the evil, the failure was probably owing more to the unscrupulousness
than to the want of intelligence of the Roman theologians. Marcus
Fulvius Nobilior (consul in 565), a man of Greek culture, endeavoured
at least to make the Roman calendar more generally known. Gaius
Sulpicius Gallus (consul in 588), who not only predicted the eclipse
of the moon in 586 but also calculated the distance of the moon
from the earth, and who appears to have come forward even as an
astronomical writer, was regarded on this account by his
contemporaries as a prodigy of diligence and acuteness.

Agriculture and the Art of War

Agriculture and the art of war were, of course, primarily regulated
by the standard of traditional and personal experience, as is very
distinctly apparent in that one of the two treatises of Cato on
Agriculture which has reached our time. But the results of Graeco-
Latin, and even of Phoenician, culture were brought to bear on these
subordinate fields just as on the higher provinces of intellectual
activity, and for that reason the foreign literature relating to
them cannot but have attracted some measure of attention.

Jurisprudence

Jurisprudence, on the other hand, was only in a subordinate degree
affected by foreign elements. The activity of the jurists of this
period was still mainly devoted to the answering of parties consulting
them and to the instruction of younger listeners; but this oral
instruction contributed to form a traditional groundwork of rules,
and literary activity was not wholly wanting. A work of greater
importance for jurisprudence than the short sketch of Cato was the
treatise published by Sextus Aelius Paetus, surnamed the "subtle"
(-catus-), who was the first practical jurist of his time, and, in
consequence of his exertions for