6. King Theodoric to Agapitus, Praefectus Urbis.

[One of the MSS. reads Pontifici, but this is clearly wrong. The language is not at all suitable to be addressed to a Pope, and there was no Pope Agapetus till 535, nine years after the death of Theodoric.]

Mosaics ordered for Ravenna.

'I am going to build a great Basilica of Hercules at Ravenna, for I wish my age to match preceding ones in the beauty of its buildings, as it does in the happiness of the lives of my subjects.

'Send me therefore skilful workers in Mosaic' [of which kind of work we have a very good description as follows].

(Cassiodorus on Mosaic).

'Send us from your city some of your most skilful marble-workers, who may join together those pieces which have been exquisitely divided, and, connecting together their different veins of colour, may admirably represent the natural appearance[220]. From Art proceeds this gift, which conquers Nature. And thus the discoloured surface of the marble is woven into the loveliest variety of pictures; the value of the work, now as always, being increased by the minute labour which has to be expended on the production of the Beautiful.'