from the supposition of its having two heads; and the truth | length; that of the former species, on the contrary, equals the is, that from its cylindrical form the head and tail so much thickness of a child's wrist of ten or twelve years old. The resemble each other that the error is almost pardonable; A. alba inhabits the same localities and lives in the same besides which, the eyes are nearly imperceptible. This is manner as the A. fuliginosa, from which indeed it differs the snake which, being supposed blind, and vulgarly said to only in size, colour, the proportionate length of the tail and be fed by the large ants already described, is in this country body, and in having the mouth provided with a greater honoured with the name of King of the Emmets. The flesh number of teeth, all, however, equally small and weak. of the amphisbæna, dried and reduced to a fine powder, is 3. A. cæca, a species mentioned by Baron Cuvier in the confidently administered as a sovereign and infallible re- second edition of the Règne Animal, but without any detailed. medy in all cases of dislocation and broken bones; it being description. It inhabits the island of Martinique, and is very naturally inferred that an animal which has the power said to be entirely deprived of sight, at least M. Cuvier was of healing an entire amputation in its own case, should at unable to discern any trace of eyes. He supposes it, neverleast be able to cure a simple fracture in the case of another. theless, to be identical with the Amphisbæna vermicularis Two centuries have scarcely passed since opinions equally of Spix, which that naturalist describes as having eyes credulous and absurd were universally prevalent among the scarcely perceptible. most enlightened nations of Europe, when grave and learned physicians administered the bezoar or rhinoceros horn with as much confidence as the simple Brazilian present does the powdered flesh of the amphisbæna. The works of Prince Maximilian of Neuwied and M. Spix on the general zoology and erpetology of Brazil conattain descriptions of three or four smaller species of amphisbænas. The genus amphisbæna, as at present defined, contains only American species, which are confined to Brazil, Surinam, and other tropical parts of the continent. Of these the following are the principal. 1. The A. fuliginosa, the first, and still the best known species of the whole genus, is, like all the other amphisbænas, confined to the hotter regions of South America, and does not inhabit Ceylon or any other part of the East Indies, as Linnæus and Lacepède have erroneously supposed, and asserted on the authority of Seba. The general colour of this serpent is a deep brown varied with shades of white, more or less intense according to the difference of the individual and the season of casting the old and acquiring V [Amphisbæna fuliginosa.] the new external skin. It grows to the length of eighteen inches or two feet, of which, however, the tail measures only an inch or fifteen lines. The body is surrounded by upwards of two hundred rings, and the tail by twenty-five or thirty; the eyes are covered and almost concealed by a membrane, which, added to their naturally diminutive size, has given rise to the popular opinion that the animal was entirely deprived of sight; an opinion extended with no better reason to the common blind-worm (Anguis fragilis). It lives upon worms and insects, particularly ants, in the mounds of which it usually conceals itself. The antipathy which most people entertain against serpents in general has given rise to a belief common among travellers, that this species is venomous, but without the slightest foundation in reality, as it is entirely destitute of fangs, and its teeth in other respects so small as to be incapable of inflicting a wound. 2. A. alba, so called from its colour, which is that of uniform pale straw without any marks or spots. The head of this species is short and thick, and its mouth small. The body usually measures from one foot six to one foot nine or ten inches, and is surrounded by two hundred and twentythree rings; the tail is from an inch and a half to two inches in length, and is surrounded by sixteen or eighteen rings. The thickness of the body seldom exceeds that of a man's fore-finger, and is uniform throughout its whole AMPHI'SCII, literally double shadowed, a Greek term applied by antient astronomers to the inhabitants of the torrid zone, with whom the sun passes the meridian at noon, sometimes on the north, sometimes on the south, of the zenith, and whose shadows at noon are therefore turned to the south during one part of the year, and to the north during the remainder. AMPHITHEATRE, the name by which a species of structure much used by the Romans, and combining the forms and some of the uses of the antient theatre and circus, [Amphitheatre of Verona.] is generally distinguished; indeed most of the Roman classical writers apply to it the name of circus also. A distinction, however, is now always made; the term amphitheatre being applied to the species of structure here referred to, and circus being restricted to the Roman stadium or hippodrome. [See CIRCUS.] The name amphitheatre seems intended to convey the idea of a double theatre; but what is termed a theatre is, with reference to its original uses, more strictly an odeum, and what we call an amphitheatre was truly a theatre. The one was for hearing music and recitations, and the other for seeing sights, -as the words import. [See THEATRE.] The form of the amphitheatre is, on the plan, that of an ellipsis, with a series of arcaded concentric walls, separating corridors which have constructions with staircases and radiating passages between them. It encloses an open space called the arena, either on, or a very little above or below the level of the surface of the ground on which the structure is raised. From the innermost concentric wall,-which bounds the arena, and which will be from ten to fifteen feet above its level,-an inclined plane runs upwards and outwards over the intermediate wall, staircases, and corridors, to a gallery or galleries over the outermost corridors. The inner and upper part of the inclined plane is covered with a graduated series of benches following the general form of the plan; these are intercepted at intervals by radial passages leading by a more easy graduation to and from the staircases which pass through the substructions of the benches to the corridors. These corridors, in the principal stories, continue uninterruptedly all round the edifice, and afford easy access to, and egress from, every part. In cases where the radiating passages through the bank of benches were few, concentric platforms or precinctions went round to make the communications complete. The external elevation of an amphitheatre is almost dictated by its internal arrangement and construction, and it generally falls into two or more stories of open arches, which are necessary to give light and air to the corridors and staircases. The Amphitheatre seems to have been contrived for the more convenient exhibition of such shows as were confined throughout to the same place, such as combats, which could not be seen advantageously along the length of the circus; and moreover the circus had not the lofty stereobate, podium, or cincture, to protect the spectators from the savage and powerful brute animals which were frequently used in the public shows of the Romans. Indeed, it is reported that this defect was a cause of the abandonment of the circus for such exhibitions as required the use of wild beasts. The great length also of the circus would be a sufficient reason for adopting the more compressed and lofty form given to the amphitheatre, whose arrangement admits of a far greater number of persons being brought within a smaller area, and consequently within more convenient view of the arena. At first, and for some time, amphitheatres were constructed of timber. Several accidents occurred, indeed, in consequence of the use of such, from fire, and from their incapacity to bear the weights they were subjected to; and, in one instance, it is related by Tacitus, (Annal. iv. 62,) that an amphitheatre of this kind fell during the exhibition of the shows, in the town of Fidena, when 50,000 persons were either killed or hurt. Afterwards they were more securely and more permanently constructed of brick or stone, according to the facilities the place afforded, or the means of the people at whose expense the structures were laid. It was in the latest period of the Republic that the Romans were debased by the gladiatorial and other shows which led to the use and construction of amphitheatres; and to the gratification of this passion for demoralizing public spectacles may be attributed, in some degree, its eventual overthrow, in all but form, and the establishment of the despotism of the emperors. All the powerful men in the state who aimed still higher, sought favour with the people by these barbarous entertainments; and the sums expended and the numbers of men and beasts engaged, and for the most part destroyed, in furnishing them seem almost in credible. The difference in the national characteristics of the Greeks and Romans is by nothing more forcibly illustrated than by the constant indications of theatres or odeums which mark the sites or immediate vicinities of antient Greek cities, and the remains of amphitheatres which are common to those of the Romans. To save unnecessary expense, the Grecian theatre was formed on or in the side of a hill, whenever the locality would afford this advantage; the seats were generally cut in the living rock, and such constructions added before it in the formation of the orchestra and proscenium and their accessories, as were absolutely necessary to complete the theatre. The amphitheatre of the Romans was raised, for the most part, within the town or city, on the level plain, of costly magnificence, and generally of enormous extent, while their theatres are in every respect secondary, and of inferior importance. Indeed, theatres for music and the drama are seldom found among the remains of purely Roman cities, but almost every Roman colony, and even camp, bears indications of a constructed or excavated amphitheatre. The great mother city of Rome herself can hardly be said to exhibit the remains of a theatre, unless it be that which is called the theatre of Marcellus; and even this appears to have been more used for games of the circus, or amphitheatrical shows, than for dramatic representations, and is not of extraordinary extent. But the Colosseum would contain from eighty to a hundred thousand persons;and the little city of Pompeii, which has indeed two theatres, has, moreover, an amphitheatre, whose arena alone would contain them both. The Grecian cities of Sicily, on the contrary, exhibit remains and indications of spacious theatres where those of the amphitheatres of their Roman masters are few and unimportant; and the old cities of Greece itself, and the Grecian cities of Asia Minor, are almost entirely free from the pollution of the latter species of structure, the Roman garrisons appearing to have contented themselves with castrensian or camp-built amphitheatres alone. Ofthis sort,-the Castrensian amphitheatre, we have indications still existing in England; the principal are at Cirencester and Dorchester; but these were originally little more than mere excavations, or turf-built cinctures made up with what walling was absolutely necessary to form the grand concentric bank of benches. In the provinces of Gaul, both transalpine and cisalpine,-Nismes and Verona, by the remains of their amphitheatres, show how much more completely the inhabitants were nationalized, or Romanized, than were those of Greece or of Britain. There is, perhaps, no species of structure peculiar to the Romans, with the details of which we are so well informed, as of those of the amphitheatre, and there is hardly any one of which we have fewer descriptions by ancient writers. The remains which still exist in various places tell us much more plainly what they were than the most elaborate descriptions can do; and although there is no example of an amphitheatre in complete preservation, or even nearly so, yet the existing specimens preserve the various parts so completely, that there is but little difficulty in supplying from one of them what is defective in another. Still there are minor particulars of which we must remain ignorant, unless we take them from such descriptions as exist, or supply them from analogy. We know of no sort of antient edifice, generally, in which so much ingenuity is displayed in the arrangement, or so much skill in the construction, as were exemplified by the Romans in the design and execution of the amphitheatre; but here the merit ends,- for in architectural demerit, the external composition of the amphitheatre is hardly outdone by the triumphal arch, which is the worst that ever was imagined before the revival, as it is called, of architecture in the fifteenth century. As the most remarkable, and one of the most perfect in its details, of the remaining examples of the amphitheatre, that which is known as the Colosseum at Rome is here used to illustrate this kind of edifice; the plan and elevation are almost entirely made out from the existing remains; and the section also, to a certain extent, as well as from the analogy afforded by other examples and from probability. The vignette sketch at the head of this article is a view of the amphitheatre of Verona, as it exists, looking down into it; this will aid the section in giving an idea of the arrangement of the benches, and the mode of access to them. The form of the external periphery of the plan is that of an ellipsis, whose conjugate diameter, or minor axis, is to the transverse, or major axis, as five to six, nearly, the length through, from outside to outside of the external wall, being 620 feet, and the breadth to the same extent, 513 feet; but as these dimensions are variously stated by different authorities, something may be allowed for inaccuracy, and the proportion between one diameter and the other may be fairly assumed in the original draft to have been as above stated. Indeed, if the projection of the substructions be added to each diametrical length, that proportion will be produced as nearly as possible, and in this the architect appears to have erred; for if he had any reason for the proportion assumed between the conjugate and transverse, or between the breadth and length of the ellipsis, it should have been taken on the extent of the outer wall, so that its periphery might be true, which is not the case. Of course, in the diminishing series of concentric walls the proportion of the ellipsis is continually altering, so that the diameters of the arena are as five to eight, as nearly as may be, the length being 287 feet, and the breadth 180 feet. The difference between the external and internal diameters, of 333 feet, or 166 ft. 6 in. at each end, is occupied by four corridors and two blocks of radiating substructions,-in, or between, which are the staircases and ways from the outer corridors to the inner, and to the arena, together with the concentric or encircling walls which gird the structure, separate the corridors, and enclose the arena. Two of the surrounding corridors lie together, or adjoin each other, on the outer side; and in this particular, the Colosseum exceeds every other structure of the kind of which we have any knowledge, all the rest having but one only; it thus acquires a second gallery, as may be perceived by referring to the section, in which, also, it is singular. The space covered by this immense edifice will be found to be little short of six acres. The outer encircling wall is pierced with eighty openings, leaving, of course, an equal number of piers; every opening is arched, and in or against every pier is a column projecting about half its diameter, and supporting an entablature which runs in an unbroken line all round the structure. With the exception of the four central openings, which lie on the diameters of the ellipsis, and are each nearly two feet wider than the rest, all the openings are very nearly the same, their width being 14 feet 6 inches. An exactly similar series of arches, diminished only in proportion to the smaller extent of the ellipsis, separates the second corridor from the first; and another, bearing the same relation to the second series that the second does to the first, or outer, bounds the second corridor. The inner faces the outer piers, both faces of the piers of the intermediate series, and the outer faces of the piers of the innermost series, have pilasters projecting from them, corresponding in height with the external columnar ordinance, and bearing a moulded architrave, from the top of which semicircular arches are turned over the corridors and continued all round the edifice. The accompanying plan and section exhibit the general arrangement of the corridors here described, though the details cannot, on so small a scale, be made obvious. The elevation shows how a second and third columnar ordinance, with corresponding and nearly similar arched intervals, superimpose the lowest, and each other, and that each of these two upper ordinances rests upon a continued stylobate or dado, which is broken into every interval, or under every column. The section indicates the repetition of the double series of outer corridors in every story, or behind every one of the three columnar ordinances, and above the outermost corridor in the third story, a mezzanine, or small middle story, for a corridor behind the first, and under the second, or upper, gallery. The same diagrams show that the third story of columns is superimposed by a pilastraded ordinance on a continued and recessed dado also, with a deep plinth: they show, moreover, that a bold and massive entablature crowns the whole elevation, and runs its cornice round in one un broken line. of high rank as could obtain the advantage, but the women generally occupied the galleries. As the plan indicates, the four central entrances,-those which lie on the ends of the diameters of the ellipsis,―are wider than the corresponding parts of the rest of the structurè. They were arcaded through, and finished more carefully, especially those leading from the sides, or on the minor axis; these, it is most likely, were reserved for those persons who went to the seats on the podium, and as they gave access also to the arena, they would of necessity he more strictly guarded. It does not appear that any part of the structure above the level of the ground, and outside of the arena, was appropriated as dens for the beasts which were used in the shows; for indeed, the corridor leading to the principal seats in the amphitheatre must have been traversed by them in their way to the arena, if that were the case. Substructions were discovered and excavated a few years ago over the whole extent of the arena; these lead to a belief that it was floored with wood, so that the animals required for the day may have been kept in dens under the floor, and allowed to issue at traps in it. But some have supposed dens ranged all round the arena, within its surface and below the podium, from which the beasts would issue to the combat directly. In the Colosseum the great crowning cornice of the external elevation is pierced through at regular intervals with square holes or mortises, from which grooves are cut down through the rest of the entablature flush with the outer sur face of the wall; and every mortise and groove is imme diately above a strong projecting stone or corbel at about two thirds the height of the pilastraded ordinance. These are supposed to have been used to insert and receive poles to carry an awning strained over the whole enclosure to protect the spectators from the sun and from rain. If this were the case, there must have been some intermediate sup port for it of which we are not aware; such an extent of clotn or canvass could hardly have been borne in that manner. The external elevation is composed, as it has been already described, and as the elevation indicates,―of three series or stories of attached or engaged columns with their usual accessories, and a pilastraded ordinance, forming a species of attic, which is pierced with windows,-one in every other interspace. The lowest ordinance of columns rests on the upper step of the substructions, or on the ground floor of the structure; it is of what is termed the Doric style or order, but in the debased Roman manner, and its entablature wants the distinguishing feature of that style, the triglyph, indeed, it may be more aptly designated by the Vitruvian term Tuscan, since it certainly is not Doric, and may be of the latter. The intervening arches are semicircular; they spring from moulded imposts, and have moulded archivolts on their outer faces. The second ordinance is in the Roman Ionic style, having voluted capitals to the columns; and the third is in the Corinthian or foliated style: these, as before stated, rest upon continued, but broken or recessed, stylobata, but their entablatures are, like the rest, perfectly unbroken throughout, and the arches in the intercolumniations in both, correspond exactly--except in minor details-with those of the lowest or Doric ordinance. The pilasters have foliated capitals also, and are called composite; they rest on deep plinths under which there is a continued and recessed dado superimposing the Corinthian entablature ;-this dado is pierced with holes or small windows alternating with those of the ordinance above, to give light to the corridor behind the lower and under the upper gallery on the inside. The crowning entablature is made bold and effective by deep modillion blocks or consoles occupying the whole depth of the frieze. From the third series of eighty piers, on the ground story, as many walls, with the exceptions to be noticed, run inwards to the third concentric corridor, which is arched over as the outer ones are; the walls are continued on the other side of it to the fourth or innermost corridor, which is bounded on the other side by the massive wall of the podium encircling the arena, and is also arched over, though it is not so lofty as the other three corridors are. Between the radiating walls of the two blocks separating the second from the third, and the third from the fourth corridors, are, of course, as many intervals. Some of these form the traversing passages; and the rest, in the outer block, contain the staircases which lead to the upper concentric corridors and so onward to the upper benches and galleries;-in the inner block are those which lead to the lower benches, and small staircases in the thickness of the innermost wall conduct to the benches immediately on the podium. The benches extend in one long graduated and concentric series from the podium up to the level of the second story of the outer corridors, and over all the constructions within the second of them: they are bounded above by a wall which is pierced with doors. These give access from the upper and inner corridor, to the radiating flights of steps which intercept the benches at intervals, and cut them up into wedges, by which name in Latin, cunei, the divisions thus made were distinguished. This encircling wall has windows in it also, which may have been requisite to aid in ventilating the immense area; or they may have been intended merely to afford a view of the arena to persons who could not find room on the benches. The section shows that the radiating flights of steps intercepting the benches do not run through their whole extent, but are themselves intercepted and taken up again,-other lines or flights commencing intermediately, and at intermediate heights. Access is given to these flights at their upper ends, by doorways from the corridors behind, sometimes directly, and sometimes by means of the internal staircases; and in most cases a short reversed flight of steps is made on the outside of the doorways, or vomitories, as they are termed, to afford headway, and avoid intercepting the benches further back than could be possibly helped. Almost every thing that appears in the section above the level of the third story, except the external wall itself, is restored from analogy and conjecture. The peristyle, or encircling range of columns before the upper gallery, is entirely from conjecture; but for The style of these architectural decorations is, for the the galleries themselves there is sufficient evidence in the ex- most part, as rude and tasteless as it well can be. The isting indications of stairs, and in the toothings of the remain-storied columnar ordinances, too, besides being themselves ing walls and piers. The benches in the grand series were probably of stone, perhaps of marble, but in the galleries it is most likely they were of wood, and graduated so as to give their occupiers a view of the arena. The most distinguished seats were those on the podium, and these were assigned to the emperor,-whose place was, by way of eminence, called the suggestum,-and to the senators, to foreign ambassadors, and to the great officers of the state. The cunei, or wedges, behind and above, were assigned to different classes, according to their rank, station, and tribe. The Vestal virgins had one of the best positions assigned to them, and with them sat such ladies bad in detail, are bad in the composition, or in their collocation with arches; for-taking them separately-the columns of each ordinance are too far apart to support their entablature sufficiently, which, therefore, itself appears weak, and they look straggling and inefficient. Taken together, the ordinances but repeat these faults, and have in the whole a poor and mean effect; the shelf-like cornices of their entablatures cut up, and destroy the simplicity of, the elevation, which no observer would suppose to be, as it is, nearly 160 feet high. The storied series of arches with simple blocking courses alone, and continued unbroken reobata under each arcaded story, and with the broad and simple attic--without pilasters-but crowned nevertheless by the fine bold entablature, would have been a far nobler composition. The practice here exemplified, nevertheless, which may be fairly termed a vice, seems to have pervaded the architecture of the Romans, for either columnar or pilastraded ordinances, and sometimes, as in this case, both, are found on almost all the examples that remain to us of their amphitheatres. Internally, however, the amphitheatre must have been strikingly grand and impressive; here none of the littlenesses of storied columns appeared, but the long unbroken lines of the podium, and the graduated series of the benches, and the galleries with the encircling peristyle above-when it existed-would have been as beautiful in general effect, as anything architecture ever produced. There are varieties in the arrangement of the details of the amphitheatre, as other examples show. Intermediate concentric galleries, platforms, or precinctions sometimes intercepted the great bank of graduated benches to serve as passages of communication; and sometimes each staircase communicated directly and exclusively with one vomitory, instead of leading to encircling corridors which communicated generally, and gave access alike to every part of the enclosure. Next in importance to the Colosseum at Rome, of existing structures of the kind, is the Amphitheatre of Verona. The prefixed vignette will give a tolerable idea of its state of preservation. The great external cincture is entirely gone, with the exception of four arches and their accessories; but the great bank of concentric benches, with the staircases leading to them, and the parts about the arena, remain in a comparatively perfect state. The outer cincture was pierced with seventy-two arches, which number appears in the inner, with the corresponding radiating walls to the traversing passages and staircases,-for this had not a second encircling corridor on the outside of the stairs block as the Colosseum has. The outer dimensions of this structure were 500 feet by 404 feet; the length of its arena is 242 feet, and its breadth or length, on the conjugate, 146 feet; the form, of course, was elliptical. The amphitheatre at Nismes in Languedoc is large and in comparatively good preservation;-the great external cincture of an amphitheatre remains in a very perfect state at Pola in Istria; Rome contains the remains of a second amphitheatre called the Castrensian ;--there are also considerable remains of an amphitheatre at Capua, and of another at Pozzuoli near Naples. That of Pompeii, it has been already remarked, was an extensive structure,-it was in many respects peculiar, but it is not so well preserved as some other examples which have been more exposed, as it suffered considerably from earthquakes before it was buried. At Pæstum, there are indications of an amphitheatre, though not a large one; at Catania, in Sicily, the upper and outer encircling corridor of an extensive amphitheatre is accessible, considerably under the level of the modern city, buried by the torrents of lava from Mount Etna. Syracuse and several others of the antient cities of Sicily exhibit remains or indications of small amphitheatres. Indeed, wherever Roman remains are found to any extent, whether at home or abroad, some indication may be almost certainly discovered of the existence at some time of an amphitheatre. AMPHIUMA, in zoology, a singular genus of batrachian reptiles, first noticed by Dr. Garden in 1771, in a letter to Linnæus. The remarkable and anomalous order of batrachians, to which this genus belongs, are more extensively spread throughout the New World, and exhibit a far greater diversity of organic modification in the western hemisphere, than in all the rest of the earth together. It is here alone that the menopomæ, the amphiuma, the axolotls, the menobranchi, and the sirens, are to be found: these singular animals abound in all the lakes and stagnant waters, and astonish the observer equally by the variety as by the novelty of their forms. The most remarkable character of these reptiles is the complete metamorphosis which they undergo in their progress from youth to maturity; a metamorphosis which not only affects their outward form, but entirely changes their systems of circulation and respiration. When first separated from the spawn or egg, they appear in what is called the tadpole form, respiring by means of gills and inhabiting the waters. At this period they have neither legs nor arms, but a long tail compressed sidewise enables them to move about in the manner of fishes. Gradually, however, they acquire legs and feet, and whilst the formation of these members is in progress, the lungs likewise are developed, in some genera entirely replacing the gills, in others continuing to exist and act simultaneously with these organs throughout the remainder of the animal's life. [Amphiuma tridactylum.] The external form of the amphiuma is very similar to that of the common eel, but the whole anatomy and physiology of the animal approximates it more nearly to the common water-newt (Triton marmorata) than to any other known species. From this creature indeed it differs principally in the extreme length of its body and the diminutive size of its extremities, which rather resemble small tentaculi than actual legs. The only two known species inhabit the stagnant pools and ditches in the neighbourhood of New Orleans, and those in Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina. They bury themselves in the mud at the bottom of the ditches, particularly on the approach of winter, and vast numbers of them are sometimes found in draining and clearing ponds, at the depth of three or four feet from the surface. They are also capable of existing on land, but as their food in all probability exists only in the water, they never voluntarily abandon that element. The two known species, A. didactyla and A. tridactyla, differ principally in the number of their toes, the one having only two, the other three on each foot. A'MPHORA, in its ordinary acceptation, means an earthen vessel, used as a measure for liquids both by the Greeks and Romans. It received its name on account of its two ears or handles. The proper form of the Greek word is Amphoreus. It is generally two feet, or two feet and a half in height; and the body, which is usually about six inches in diameter ending upwards with a short neck, tapers toward the lower part almost to a point. The Attic amphora contained three Roman urnæ, or seventy-two sextaries, equal to about two gallons, five pints and a half of English winemeasure. The Roman, sometimes called the Italic amphora, contained two urnæ or forty-eight sextaries, about seven gallons, one pint English. Homer mentions amphora both of gold and stone; and the Egyptians had them ɔf brass. There are various specimens of earthen amphoræ in the British Museum, in the Elgin and Townley Galleries. The amphora is still the largest liquid measure used by the Venetians, containing sixteen quarts. There was another amphora among the Romans, which was a dry-measure, and contained about three bushels. Earthen amphora of the Roman time have been occasionally found in England. Like other domestic vessels of the Romans, they appear to have been sometimes used as funeral urns. Columella says they were used to preserve olives in. When filled with wine, they were usually lined with pitch or some other coating, on account of the porous nature of the material of which they were formed. ̄_Amphora were placed as urinals in the public streets of Rome till the time of Vespasian. AMPLITUDE, the angular distance of a celestial body from the east point when it rises, or from the west point when it sets. It depends upon the declination of the star and the latitude of the place, and may be computed from the formula, |