8i Predecessor Query-Applying a LIMIT in 8.0.5

Question

(ok, this may not be the correct forum for this question...but having search around the dicussions, there doesn't appear to be another more appropriate)
This is a common question that has arisen some 90+ times in the discussion groups overall...namely if one wishes to SELECT from a table, subject to some WHERE conditions and the ORDER by some related date/age, how does one limit the size of the resultset passed back. For example, one may wish to recover say the latest 10 or 20 results. For 8.1.5/8.1.6 onwards an encapsulated sub-query would work, for example:
SELECT * FROM
SELECT Article.*
FROM Article,AssetPub
WHERE AssetPub.label = 'xxxxx'
AND Article.id = 'yyyyy'
ORDER BY Article.age
WHERE RowNum < [some number, eg 10 or 20]
Does anyone have any bright ideas as to what might be a suitable equivalent for use with Oracle V8.0.5, in order to achieve the same functionality ?
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Answer 1

If it was only on the Article table, you could create an index on the age fiels and use this in a hint. This gives you the rows in the 'indexed' order. I never tried it but I have read it in a tuning course.
SELECT * FROM
SELECT /*+ INDEX(age_index)
Article.*
FROM Article
WHERE Article.id = 'yyyyy'
WHERE RowNum < [some number, eg 10 or 20]
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