Charlotte Higgins picks up on some big ones:

• Five historical clangers in Kevin Macdonald’s The Eagle | Guardian.

Excerpt from an item in the Tufts Daily:

Rather than submitting an application, prospective students came to campus and completed an entrance examination the June before their first year. The exam covered a wide range of subjects — if “wide” can be taken to mean classical history, languages and literature. Students taking this exam in 1888 were tested on Caesar, Cicero, Virgil and Ovid in Latin, as well as Homer’s writings in their original Greek. Students also solved problems in arithmetic, algebra and plane geometry; demonstrated their knowledge of ancient Greek and Roman history and geography; and translated a passage of “The Iliad” into English. And no need to worry about running out of time: This exam lasted for two days.

But let’s say you came out of the womb reading Virgil and could practically translate ancient Greek in your sleep. What could you expect once you arrived for the 1888−89 academic year? To say the least, Tufts was a pretty happening place to be. […]

• via Alanna Tuller | Archive Addict – Tufts Daily – Features.

… outside of the math component, it sounds an awful lot like the comprehensive exams one has to write for a Ph.D. nowadays, no?

Robert Garland gathers some useful evidence:

n.b. this article is from 1991 and appeared before another book considered Roman Youth in rather more depth:
Restless Youth in Ancient Rome. London: Routledge, 1993. (reviewed by someone I know for BMCR, back when he was young and cynical)(now he’s old and cynical)

ante diem xvi kalendas apriles

• Festival of Mars continues (day 18)
• 37 A.D. — The dead emperor Tiberius’ will is annulled and Gaius (Caligula) is given the title “Augustus” by the senate
• 235 A.D. (?) — murder of Alexander Severus at Moguntiacum (Mainz)

The folks who run the Ostia Antica Field school write to say they still have a few spots open and are extending their deadline to April 30th …

See the original ad here:

• 2011 Ostia Marina Summer Field School