The Chanute times. [volume] (Chanute, Kan.) 1897-1913, 1902-04-04
NEWSPAPERS OF OLD ROME.
Discovery OF Tablets Showing How
the "Acta Diurna Urbis" Gave the
News of Caesars Time.

After all. there is nothing new un-
der the sun. London of to-day and
Rome of yesterday are 20 centuries
apart; yet man and manners have
changed but little. If we are to be-
lieve newspaper published when
julius Caesar ruled the world. To
pick up copy of the Acta Diurna
Urbis, which was Rome's leading
daily paper. with Pliny as its star
reporter, one might be reading re-
sumo of twentieth century days
news, twisted into quaint language.
The Acta was court journal as
well as a general newspaper. 1t
printed the laws of the emperor, en-
actments by the senate, the names
of incoming magistrates, list OF
politicians who had an audience with
the emperor or an invitation to his
banquets, the sacrifices to the gods,
the games at the circus, births, mar
riages, divorces and deaths of nota-
BILE people, and general gossip of the
day, says the London Express.
Tablets giving new insight into this
early-day journalism have just been
discovered in Rome. They show that
the Acta must have circulated ex-
tensively in every part of Rome, as
well as in the provinces. 1t was post
ed every morning in the Forum and
copied and sold in the Argiletum-
the Fleet street of ancient Rome.
Zine writing" was not the forte
of those ancient chroniclers. Dry
statements were good enough for
them. Imagination and facts seem
to have been impartially mixed. Side
by side with the statement of
stabbing ARRAY can be found brief
story of wonderful phoenix being
discovered near Rome and exhibited
in the Comitia.
Pliny wrote for the Acta. Pliny
possessed, among other qualifications
for that position, vivid imagination.
Had he lived in the twentieth CEN
fury he would have written lurid and
highly circumstantial accounts of va
rious modern events. His was the
story of the phoenix-which story,
by the way, seems to be the direct
ancestor of that familiar fable of
latter days-the sea serpent.
Pliny contributed to one number
of the Acta an account of an inter-
esting phenomenon. He says that
during the trial of Milo for the muir
der of Clodius shower of baked
bricks fell in several parts of the
city. He neglects to state, however,
whether the streets were paved there
by, or whether the bricks piled them
selves into walls.
Pliny made the mistake of living
1000 years too soon. The Leyds
Press Bureau could have used him
in Berlin.
The Acta was frequently consulted
by literary men of the day. Back
numbers were deposited in library
accessible to students and poets. Sue
tonius consulted these files when he
wrote the lives of the IL Caesars,
and found the birthday of Tiberius,
the birthplace of Caligula, the three
letters added by Claudius to the Ro-
man alphabet, and the dedication OF
| Domitian.
Tacitus admits having copied from
the Acta his description of the fu-
neral of Germanicus and OF the
apotheosis of Claudius. Other note
worthy excerpts made by the same
writer were the debates in the senate
when a temple was to be erected to
Nero, and when the Senator Thra-
seus Indignantly protested against
the cowardice of his colleagues who
applauded Nero's matricide.
Dion heard from the same source
the victories of Commodias in the am
phitheater, and other more disreputa-
BILE exploits of that individual.
A glance at the news summary in
one copy of the Acta, which is I'M
dated, and possibly apocryphal, is,
nevertheless, interesting. 1t shows
that the world has really changed
very little, after all:
"The Consul Savinius will to-day as
sumo the duties of his Office.
"a violent thunderstorm burst yes
terday over the city. A thunderbolt
fell in the afternoon on an oak tree
in the vicinity of the Velia.
"a fatal affray took place at the
Bear Wineshop, near the shrine of
Janus. The landlord was dangerous
ly wounded.
''The Aedile Titianus passed sentence
upon those butchers who notorious
ly sold to the people meat not pre-
viously submitted to inspection. The
fines collected will be devoted to the
erection of shrine.
"Ansidius, the money changer, who
carried on business under the sign of
the Shield of the Climber, has fed
with a considerable sum of money.
He was pursued at once and captured,
and the money was found on his per-
son. The Praetor Fontenius ordered
the money to be restored to those
citizens who had deposited theirfunds
with him.