2-634-369 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

'She carried in her arms nine books', c1912 (1912). Lucius Tarquinius Superbus (died 495 BC) the seventh king of Rome, was offered the sacred prophecies of Sybyl Cumae by an old women asking an exorbitant price, he refused and six of the books were burnt before he relented. The books were thereafter kept in the Temple of Jupiter on the Capitoline Hill, Rome, to be consulted in times of emergency. From The Story of Rome, by Mary MacGregor. [Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd., 1912]