5 FEBRUARY 1927, Page 37

PRIMITIVE ITALY. By Professor L6on Homo. Tran::- lated from the

French. (Kegan Paul. 18s.):--The sub-title, "The Beginnings of Roman Imperialism," mirrors the contents of this able and scholarly work, which has sum- moned to its aid all the resources of anthropology, archaeology, epigraphy- and philology. Here is laid bare the real history ofRome's origins (in the course of which the romantic legends of Horatius Codes, Virginia and Lucretia disappear), and especially of her Etruscan origins, for to the Etruscans the Romans owe their first entry on that path of culture which led to the ultimate coincidence of tubs and orbis. In volume characterized alike by scientific caution and a marked power of lucid reconstruction, it is rather dreadful to meet on p. 116 (in an excelleot trauslatioo):-. nye principle aspeell.". _