Note 51 — THE EARLIEST HISTORY.

It is well known that there exists in Stobæus a poem on Rome, as the authoress of which Erinna is mentioned. As Erinna, however, sung in times in which Rome cannot be supposed to have in any way created a sensation in Æolia, one has had recourse to the explanation, that it was a hymn on strength. Strength cannot however be called a daughter of Mars. The poem is of a far later period, and from these premises some one might perhaps succeed in guessing the misspelt name of the author. He certainly belongs to the time after the war of Hannibal, and perhaps even as late as the times of the emperors: the most likely supposition, however, seems to me that he was a contemporary of Sylla.