16. LASCIVUS. Ausonius commemorates (Professor.
Burdigal. Epigram. ii.) among the teachers of Bordeaux, Leontius, a grammaticus or
grammarian, surnamed LASCIVUS, "a name," adds Ausonius, "unworthy of
the purity of his life," who had been his friend and companion from early youth. Fabricius is
in one place (Bibl. Graec. vol. viii. p. 325) inclined to identify with
this Leontius of Bordeaux a Leontius MYTHOGRAPHUS, or SCRIPTOR
FABULARUM, a writer of some merit, whose works were discovered and
designed for publication by Brassicanus; but the design was never executed, and the MS. has
been either lost or destroyed. (Not. ad Petronii Arbitri Satyricon,
100.121, p. 572, ed. Burmann, prima, or vol. i. p. 741, ed. secunda.) Gesner also thought he
had somewhere read the work of one Leontius in which some of the myths of the poets were
related. Sidonius Apollinaris, a generation later than Ausonius, mentions a Pontius Leontius
of Bordeaux or the neighbourhood (Epistol. lib. 8.11, 12), whose castle
at the confluence of the Garonne and Dordogne he describes in one of his poems. (Carmen xxii. Burgus Pontii Leontii). This Pontius
Leontius is by Fabricius in another place (Bibl. Graec. vol. iv. p. 94,
note w.) identified with the fabulist of Brassicanus. But the Leontii of Ausonius and
Sidonius, however doubtful it may be which (if either) of them is the fabulist, must be
distinguished from each other, as well as from two other Leontii, bishops of Bordeaux,
mentioned by Venantius Honorius Fortunatus, bishop of Poitiers in the sixth century (Carmin. lib. 4.9, 10); one of whom is especially commemorated by him for his
pious care in the restoration of ruined churches, Carmin. lib. i. passim.) Burmann identifies, but without any apparent
reason, this Leontius of Venantius with the Pontius Leontius of Sidonius, and supposes the
works mentioned by Brassicanus to have been written by him; but we think the opinion that, the
fabulist was the Leontius Lascivus of Ausonius is the most probable. (Burmann, l.c.: Fabric. ll. cc., and Bibl. Med. et Infim.
Latinit. vol. iv. pp. 268, 269.)