Quaestiones Romanae

Question 64. Why do they not suffer the table to be quite voided when it’s taken away, but will have something always to remain upon it?

Solution. What if it be that they would intimate that something of our present enjoyments should be left for the future, and that to-day we should be mindful of tomorrow? Or that they reckon it a piece of manners to repress and restrain the appetite in our present fruitions? For they less desire absent things, who are accustomed to abstain from those that are present. Or was it a custom of courtesy towards household servants? For they do not love so much to take as to partake, deeming that they hold a kind of communion with their masters at the table. Or is it that no sacred thing ought to be suffered to be empty? And the table is a sacred thing.

Question 65. Why doth not a man lie at first with a bride in the light, but when it is dark?

Solution. Is it not for modesty’s sake, for at the first congress he looks upon her as a stranger to him? Or is it that he may be inured to go into his own wife with modesty? Or, as Solon hath written, Let the bride go into the bed-chamber gnawing a quince, that the first salutation be not harsh and ungrateful. So did the Roman lawgiver command that, if there should be any thing absurd and unpleasant in her body, she should hide it? Or was it intended to cast infamy upon the unlawful use of venery by causing that the lawful should have certain signs of modesty attending it?

Question 66. Why was one of the horse-race rounds called Flaminia?

Solution. Is it because, when Flaminius, one of the ancients, bestowed a field on the city, they employed its revenue on the horse-races, and with the overplus money built the way which they call Flaminia?

Question 67. Why do they call the rod-bearers lictors?

Solution. Is this the reason, because these men were wont to bind desperate bullies, and they followed Romulus carrying thongs in their bosoms? The vulgar Romans say alligare, to bind, when the more refined in speech say ligare. Or is now c inserted, when formerly they called them litores, being liturgi, ministers for public service; for λῇτον until this day is writ for public in many of the Grecian laws, which scarce any is ignorant of.

Question 68. Why do the Luperci sacrifice a dog? The Luperci are they that run up and down naked (saving only their girdles) in the Lupercal plays, and slash all that they meet with a whip.

Solution: Is it not because these feats are done for the purification of the city? For they call the month February, and indeed the very day Februatus, and the habit of whip ping with thongs they call februare, the word signifying to cleanse. And to speak the truth, all the Grecians have used, and some do use to this very day, a slain dog for an expiatory sacrifice; and among other sacrifices of purification, they offer whelps to Hecate, and sprinkle those that need cleansing with the puppy’s blood, calling this kind of purifying puppification. Or is it that lupus is λύκος, a wolf, and Lupercalia are Lycaea; but a dog is at enmity with a wolf, therefore is sacrificed on the Lycaean festivals? Or is it because the dogs do bark at and perplex the Luperci as they scout about the city? Or is it that this sacrifice is offered to Pan, and Pan loves dogs because of his herds of goats.

Question 69. Why, upon the festival called Septimontium, did they observe to abstain from the use of chariots drawn by a pair of horses; and even until now, do they that regard antiquity still abstain? They do observe the Septimontium feast in honor of the addition of the seventh hill to the city, upon which it became Septicollis, seven-hilled Rome.

Solution. What if it be (as some of the Romans conjecture) because the parts of the city are not as yet everywhere connected? Or if this conceit be nothing to the purpose, what if it be that, when the great work of building the city was finished and they determined to cease the increasing of the city any further, they rested themselves and rested the cattle that bore a share in the labor with them, and provided accordingly that they might participate of the holiday by rest from labor? Or was it that they would have all the citizens always present for the solemnity and return of a festival, especially that which was observed in remembrance of the compact uniting the parts of the city; and that none should desert the city for whose sake the feast is kept, they were not allowed to use their yoke chariots that day?

Question 70. Why do they call those Furciferi which are convict of thefts or any other of those slavish crimes?

Solution. Was it this (which was an argument of the severity of the ancients), that whenever any convicted his servant of any villany, he enjoined him to carry the forked piece of timber that is under the cart (the tongue of the cart), and to go with it through the next villages and neighborhood, to be seen of all, that they might distrust him and be aware of him for the future? This piece of wood we call a prop, the Romans call it furca, a fork; hence he that carries it about is called furcifer, a fork-bearer.

Question 71. Why do they bind hay about the horns of oxen that are wont to push, that they may be shunned by him that meets them?

Solution. It is that by reason of gormandizing and stuffing their guts oxen, asses, horses, and men become mischievous, as Sophocles somewhere saith,

full-fed colt thou kickest up heels,

From stuffed paunch, cheeks, and full meals?

Therefore the Romans say that M. Crassus had hay about

Question 72. Why would they have the lanthorns of the soothsaying priests (which formerly they called Auspices, and now Augures) to be always open at top, and no cover to be put upon them?

Solution. Is it as the Pythagoreans do, who make little things symbols of great matters,—as forbidding to sit down upon a bushel and to stir up the fire with a sword,—so that the ancients used many enigmatical ceremonies, especially about their priests, and such was this of the lanthorn? For the lanthorn is like the body encompassing the soul, the soul being the light withinside, and the understanding and judgment ought to be always open and quick-sighted, and never to be shut up or blown out. And when the winds blow, the birds are unsettled and do not afford sound prognostics, by reason of their wandering and irregularity in flying; by this usage therefore they teach that their soothsayers must not prognosticate when there are high winds, but in still and calm weather, when they can use their open lanthorns.