Abstract

Varro's Hebdomades vel de imaginibus contained 700 pictures of illustres accompanied by short descriptions in verse and prose, all arranged by the number seven: Gellius provides a detailed excerpt from the first book on the significance of this number. Speculation on the arrangement and content of the fifteen books abounds. On the other hand explicit attestation of personages included in Varro's list is relatively scarce: the discussions in the passage of Gellius on the ages of Homer and Hesiod, and of the former's birthplace in the epigram attached to his portrait certify the rather obvious choice of the two oldest Greek poets, presumably part of a canon of seven