2. CLAUDIUS, Stemma, No. 18],
probably the sister of App. Claudius Pulcher [CLAUDIUS, No. 17], and
grand-daughter of App. Claudius Caecus. Her fame is connected with the story of the
transportation of the image of Cybele from Pessinus to Rome. The vessel conveying the image
had stuck fast in a shallow at the mouth of the Tiber. The soothsayers announced that only a
chaste woman could move it. Claudia, who had been accused of incontinency, stepped forward
from among the matrons who had accompanied Scipio to Ostia to receive the image, and after
calling upon the goddess to vindicate her innocence, took hold of the rope, and the vessel
forthwith followed her. A statue was erected to her in the vestibule of the temple of the
goddess. (Fasti, 4.305,
&c.; Cic. de Harusp. Resp. 13;