Note 61 — Chapter III · Pliny’s Natural History
Reading edition
Alcuini Epistolae, 103, vol. vi, pp. 431–432, of Bibliotheca Rerum Germanicarum, ed. Philip Jaffé, Berlin, 1873. “Vel quid acutius quam quod naturalium rerum divitissimus [or devotissimus] inventor, Plinius Secundus, de caelestium siderum ratione exposuit, investigari valet?” In Migne’s Patrologia Latina, vol. c, col. 278, the letter is given as number 85. For other references to Pliny by earlier writers, see Bibliothèque Latine-Française, C. L. F. Panckoucke, vol. cvi which forms the opening volume of Pliny’s work in that set.