ATHENAEUM  , a name originally applied in

ancient Greece ('ABrtvauw) to buildings dedicated to Athena, and specially used as the designation of a temple in Athens, where poets and men of learning were accustomed to meet and read their productions . The academy for the promotion of learning which the emperor Hadrian built (about A.D . 135) at Rome, near the Forum, was also called the Athenaeum . Poets and orators still met and discussed there, but regular courses of instruction were given by a staff of professors in rhetoric, jurisprudence, grammar and philosophy . The institution, later called Schola Romana, continued in high repute till the 5th century . Similar academies were also founded in the provinces and at Constantinople by the emperor Theodosius II . In modern times the name has been applied to various academies, as those of Lyons and Marseilles, and the Dutch high schools; and it has become a very general designation for literary clubs . It is also familiar as the title of several literary periodicals, notably of the London literary weekly founded in 1828 .