Note 84 — LIFE OF CAIUS MARIUS.

This is Aix, about eighteen Roman miles north of Marseilles. Places which were noted for warm springs or medicinal springs were called by the Romans Aquæ, Waters, with some addition to the name. The colony of Aquæ Sextiæ was founded by C. Sextius Calvinus B.C. 120, after defeating the Salyes or Saluvii, in whose country it was. The springs of Aix fell off in repute even in ancient times, and they have no great name now; the water is of a moderate temperature.

Other modern towns have derived their name from the same word Aquæ, which is probably the same as the Celtic word Ac or Acq. There is an Aix in Savoy, and Aix-la-Chapelle (Aachen) in the Rhine Province of Prussia. Sometimes the Aquæ took a name from a deity. In France there were the Aquæ Bormonis, the waters of the God Bormo (Bourbonnes-les-Bains): in England, Aquæ Sulis, the Waters of the Goddess Sulis, which by an error became Solis in our books, as if they were called the waters of the Sun. The inscriptions found at Bath name the goddess Sulia.