Focus on this artwork and explore the The curse of Pliny.
Studies of the naturalist and geographer Pliny the Elder on the lands occupied by the Roman Empire are crucial for knowledge and location of Tamaric Fountains. In his Naturalis Historiae, XXXI, 3, is where he alludes its particularity: The sources, too, of the Tamaricus, a river of Cantabria, are considered to possess certain powers of presaging future events: they are three in number, and, separated solely by an interval of eight feet, unite in one channel, and so form a mighty stream. These springs are often dry a dozen times in the day, sometimes as many as twenty, without there being the slightest trace of water there: while, on the other hand, a spring close at hand is flowing abundantly and without intermission. It is considered an evil presage when persons who wish to see these springs find them dry: a circumstance which happened very recently, for example, to Lartius Licinius, who held the office of legatus after his prætorship; for at the end of seven days after his visit he died.
Lartius Licinius was a great supporter of the work of Pliny, with his intense desire for knowledge of new discoveries, he visited the spring when it were in their dry phase, and died a week after in 70 AD.
springs Naturalis Historiae geographer naturalist Roman Empire Cantabri Lartius Licinius Pliny the Elder Cantabria