Page:The history of Rome. Translated with the author's sanction and additions.djvu/139

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Chap. VII.]
THE HEGEMONY OF ROME IN LATIUM.
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already been observed that the Servian military constitution is essentially of an Hellenic type (P. 108); and it will be afterward shown that the games of the circus were organized on an Hellenic model. The new regia also with the city-hearth was quite a Greek prytaneion, and the round temple of Vesta, looking towards the east, and not consecrated by the augurs, was constructed in no respect according to Italian, but wholly in accordance with Hellenic ritual. With these facts before us, the statement of tradition appears not at all incredible that the Ionian confederacy in Asia Minor to some extent served as a model for the Romano-Latin league, and that the new federal sanctuary of the Aventine was for that reason constructed in imitation of the Artemision at Ephesus.