Crossword-Solution: OPPIDUM 7 letters, 1 clue 🏆 scrabble score: 14

The Latin is: "Oppidum ad Salaminium amnis latus recentibus ac sumptuosioribus aedificiis attollebatur; antiquius et ipsa vetustate in cultius quod in Paphiis finibus exstructum erat." The English version is: "The town on Salaminia side was better built than that in Paphia." Surely there is in the Latin the particularity which we might expect from a person who had known Athlone before the war.

And, when a man applied his eye to this mark, he saw cut out, on the slope of the mound facing him, a restricted surface of land occupied almost entirely by an old brick wall, a remnant of the original Fort Fréfossé or of the old Roman _oppidum_ built on this spot.

Demetrius, the owner's brother, had bred and trained them--four magnificent black Arabs--and they excited much interest among the knowing judges who were wont to collect and lounge about the 'oppidum', as it was called, behind the 'carceres'--[The covered sheds or stalls in which the horses were brought to wait for the start.]--to inspect the racers, predict the winner, offer counsel to the drivers, and make bets.

The competing chariots usually arrived at the amphitheatre in grand procession, but this had not been thought advisable in the prevailing excitement; they had driven into the oppidum singly and without any display; and the images of the gods, which in former days had always been placed on the spina before the games began, had long since fallen into disuse.

Lots were now drawn in the oppidum to decide which shed each chariot was to start from, and in which naissus each was to run.