Noctes Atticae

For what reason our forefathers inserted the aspirate h in certain verbs and nouns.

THE letter h (or perhaps it should be called a breathing rather than a letter) was added by our forefathers to give strength and vigour to the pronunciation of many words, in order that they might have a fresher and livelier sound; and this they seem to have done from their devotion to the Attic language, and under its influence. It is well known that the people of Attica, contrary to the usage of the other Greek races, pronounced i(xqu/s (fish), i(/ppos (horse), and many other words besides, with a rough breathing on the first letter. [*](I find no authority for this. Brugmann in Müller's Handbuch, II, 61 (end) cites i(/ppos as a word which originally had a smooth breathing and acquired the rough from the combination o( i)/ppos. Since the i in i)xqu/s is prosthetic, i(xqu/s, if it existed must have had the same origin, but Brugmann does not cite it. See also Indoger. Forsch. xxii, p. 197 (gives some additional information).) In the same way our ancestors said lachrumae (tears), sepulchrum (burial-place), ahenum (of bronze), vehemens (violent), incohare (begin), helluari (gormandize), hallucinari (dream), honera (burdens), honustum (burdened). For in all these words there seems to be no reason for that letter, or breathing, except to increase the force and vigour of the sound by adding certain sinews, so to speak.

But apropos of the inclusion of ahenum among my examples, I recall that Fidus Optatus, a grammarian of considerable repute in Rome, showed me a remarkably old copy of the second book of the Aeneid, bought in the Sigillaria [*](A street or quarter in Rome where the little images were sold which were given as presents at the festival of the Sigillaria; this was on Dec. 21 and 22, an extension of the Saturnalia, although not a religious holiday. The aureus was the standard gold coin of the Romans, of the value of 100 sesterces; its weight varied at different periods.) for twenty pieces of gold, which was believed to have belonged to

Virgil himself. In that book, although the following two lines were written thus: [*](ii. 469 f. )

1. Before the entrance-court, hard by the gate,
2. With sheen of brazen (aena) arms proud Pyrrhus gleams,

we observed that the letter h had been added above the line, changing aena to ahena. So too in the best manuscripts we find this verse of Virgil's written as follows: [*](Georg. i. 296.)

1. Or skims with leaves the bubbling brass's (aleni) wave.

The reason given by Gavius Bassus for calling a certain kind of judicial inquiry divitiatio; and the explanation that others have given of the same term.

WHEN inquiry is made about the choice of a prosecutor, and judgment is rendered on the question to which of two or more persons the prosecution of a defendant, or a share in the prosecution, is to be entrusted, this process and examination by jurors is called divinatio.[*](Cf. Cicero's Divinatio in Caecilium, preliminary to the prosecution of Verres.) The reason for the use of this term is a matter of frequent inquiry.

Gavius Bassus, in the third book of his work On the Origin of Terms, says: [*](Fr. I. Fun.)

This kind of trial is called divinatio because the juror ought in a sense to divine what verdict it is proper for him to give.

The explanation offered in these words of Gavius Bassus is far from complete, or rather, it is inadequate and meagre. But at least he seems to be trying to show that divinatio is used because in other trials it is the habit of the juror to be influenced by what he has heard and by what has been shown by evidence or by witnesses; but in this instance, when a prosecutor is to be selected, the considerations which can influence a juror are very few and slight, and therefore he must, so to speak,

divine

what man is the better fitted to make the accusation.

Thus Bassus. But some others think that the divinatio is so called because, while prosecutor and defendant are two things that are, as it were, related and connected, so that neither can exist without the other, yet in this form of trial, while there is already a defendant, there is as yet no prosecutor, and therefore the factor which is still lacking and unknown—namely, what man is to be the prosecutor—must be supplied by divination.