202
NOTES AND QUERIES. ro* s. n. SKPT. 10,
an inscribed marble block, showing the sur-
rounding remains to have belonged to a
doubtless sumptuous villa pertaining to the
Galba family. I am driven, therefore, to
infer, with Prof. Lanciani, after six days
entirely devoted to careful research on the
actual ground, that the remains seen by Sir
William Gell belong to a period centuries
later than the destruction of Alba Longa.
So much, then, for the statements of cer-
tain modern guide-books to the effect that
"since attention was first turned to this spot,
every succeeding discovery has curiously
confirmed the opinion that this is the true
site of Alba Longa."
This site, it may be added, is a most fascinating one. Far below, partly filling the original crater, are spread the almost wind- less waters of the Lake of Albano, broken here and there by the ripplings of a group of wild duck, and on their further side clearly reflecting the domed church, the now deserted Papal palace, and the neighbouring houses of Castel Gandolfo. All is sunny and peaceful. No thundering or supernatural noises from the mountain ever disturb the peasant sing- ing among his far-down waterside vines, and no showers of pumice fall in the streets of the townlets to banish the tranquillity of their inhabitants.
But in the days of Gell himself, in 1817, a discovery was made over there, at a spot forming a rectangle between our- selves by the Macchia di Marino and Castel Gandolfo, which, as Prof. Lanciani has written, "though neglected and despised at the time, is now considered to be the most important ever made in connexion with the foundation and early history of Rome," namely, an extensive ancient cemetery underlying lava and ashes, in turn covered over by the green wheat of the modern swellings of Pas- colare, called Monte Crescenzio and Monte Cucco. Excavation there has been rewarded by the most remarkable findings of clay "hut-urns " and vases and jars of (imported) black Etruscan ware, together with utensils of various descriptions. In fact, here lies the great burial-ground of the early civilization of this district, itself buried in turn by at least more than one of those comparatively recent eruptions of the Alban mount "In Monte Albano biduum continenter lapidibus pluit " of which Livy, as well as the Arval Inscription, has informed us.
Here, surelv enough, were laid to rest the forefathers or the founders of " Roma Quad- rata," whose descendants were probably driven from the mountain by a recrudescence of its activities. This splendid and spacious ceme-
tery, within a mile of the Via Appia Antica,
was the receptacle of the ancestors of the
Roman people the forebears of the Fabii, the
Julii, &c.
That being so, there arises at once the im- portant question, Where was situated Alba Longa the town of the long street over- looking the Lake of Albano ? It is impossible to suppose that if Alba Longa was situated across the waters at Palazzolo, where Gell placed it, her inhabitants would have carried their dead four miles around the lake in order to bury them here. And we may ask, Is it likely that Alba Longa would have been located at a point so dangerously under the cone of the mountain that not only would it have incurred constant risk of de- struction, but its inhabitants would have had their escape entirely cut off?
Perhaps the only and sure way out of these difficulties, and one with which local evidence certainly agrees, is to believe with Prof. Lanciani that the little town of Castel Gandolfo itself, with its one long street, indeed occupies the site of ancient Alba Longa, and that Palazzolo* had little or nothing to do with it. If we adopt this view, then the above-described cemetery will have been just outside the gate of Alba Longa. ST. CLAIR BADDELEY.
PORTRAITS OF CROMWELL.
I HAVE never seen in ' N. & Q.,' nor in fact
anywhere else, a list of engraved portraits of
Oliver Cromwell. In Frederic Harrison's
' Life of Cromwell ' in the " Twelve English
Statesmen " series, on p. 36, there is an inter-
esting description of Cromwell's features,
made after a study of many portraits of the
Lord Protector. Mr. Harrison writes :
"All the portraits of Cromwell appear to be de- rived from works by Cooper, Walker, Lely, or Faithorne. Their paintings and drawings, with the medals, seem to be the only portraits taken from life ; and a mask was taken after death. Of them all, the best is perhaps the large drawing by Cooprr, in the house of the master, in Sidney Sussex Col- lege, Cambridge. Cooper's miniatures are very numerous and are well known they seem to have been preferred by the Cromwell family."
The following list is of those in my own collection, and a few which have come to my notice. It would be interesting and valuable to have this list increased by other contri- butors :
- Palazzolo as a place-name evidently commemo-
rates an important villa of imperial times. In the lower courses of the wall of the courtyard of the monastery may still be seen fragments of "opus reticulatum."
