Noctes Atticae

The weak arguments by which Accius in his Didascalica attempts to prove that Hesiod was earlier than Homer.

As to the age of Homer and of Hesiod opinions differ. Some, among whom are Philochorus [*](F.H.G. i. 393, Müller.) and Xenophanes, [*](Poet, Phil. Frag. 13, Diels; Poesis Ludib. fr. 5, p. 191, Wachsmuth.) have written that Homer was older than Hesiod; others that he was younger, among them Lucius Accius the poet and Euphorus the historian. [*](F.H.G. i. 277, Müller.) But Marcus Varro, in the first book of his Portraits, [*](See note 2, p. 267.) says [*](Fr. p. 258, Bipont.) that it is not at all certain which of the two was born first, but that there is no doubt that they lived partly in the same period of time, and that this is proved by the inscription [*](Anth. Pal. vii. 53, Greek Anth. L.C.L., ii. 53: Hsi/odos Mou/sais (Elikwni/si to/nd' a)ne/qhka.u(/mnw| nikh/sas e)n Xalki/di qei=on (/Omhron.) engraved upon a tripod which Hesiod is said to have set up on Mount Helicon. Accius, on the contrary, in the first book of his Didascalica, [*](Fr. 1, Müller; F.P.R. 7, Bährens.) makes use of very weak arguments in his attempt to show that Hesiod was the elder:

Because Homer,

when he says at the beginning of his poem [*](Iliad. 1. 1.) that Achilles was the son of Peleus, does not inform us who Peleus was; and this he unquestionably would have done, if he did not know that the information had already been given by Hesiod. [*](Frag. 102, Rzach.) Again, in the case of Cyclops,

he would not have failed to note such a striking characteristic and to make particular mention of the fact that he was oneeyed, were it not that this was equally well known from the poems of his predecessor Hesiod.

Also as to Homer's native city there is the very greatest divergence of opinion. Some say that he was from Colophon, some from Smyrna; others

1. This snow-white kid the tomb of Homer marks;
2. For such the Ietae [*](That is, the inhabitants of Ios.) offer to the dead.

That Publius Nigidius, a man of great learning, applied bibosus to one who was given to drinking heavily and greedily, using a new, but hardly rational, word-formation.

PUBLIUS NIGIDIUS, in his Grammatical Notes,[*](Fr. 5, Swoboda.) calls one who is fond of drinking bibax and bibosus. Bibax, like edax, I find used by many others; but as yet I have nowhere found an example of bibosus, except in Laberius, and there is no other word similarly derived. For vinosus, or vitiosus, and other formations of the kind, are not parallel, since they are derived from nouns, not from verbs. Laberius, in the mime entitled Salinator, uses this word thus: [*](v. 80, Ribbeck3.)

1. Not big of breast, not old, not bibulous, not pert.

How Demosthenes, while still young and a pupil of the philosopher Plato, happening to hear the orator Callistratus add ressing the people, deserted Plato and became a follower of Callistratus.

HERMIPPUS has written [*](Fr. Hist. Gr. iii. 49, Mu:;ller.) that Demosthenes, when quite young, used to frequent the Academy and

And this Demosthenes,

when he had left home and, as usual, was on his way to Plato, saw great throngs of people running to the same place; he inquired the reason of this, and learned that they were hurrying to hear Callistratus. This Callistratus was one of those orators in the Athenian republic that they call dhmagwgoi/, or 'demagogues.' [*](Leaders of the people.) Demosthenes thought it best to turn aside for a moment and find out whether the discourse justified such eager haste. He came,

and heard Callistratus delivering that famous speech of his, h( peri\ )Wrwpou= di/kh. [*](The Action about Oropus.) He was so moved, so charmed, so captivated, that he became a follower of Callistratus from that moment, deserting Plato and the Academy.

That whoever says dimidium librum legi, or dimidiam fabulam audivi, and uses other expressions of that kind, speaks incorrectly: and that Marcus Varro gives the explanation of that error: and that no early writer has used such phraseology.

VARRO believes that dimidium librum legi (

I have read half the book

I have read half the play

For,

which I own in common with another person, has been divided into two parts, I ought to speak of it as 'halved,' not as 'a half': but my share of the silver of which the bowl is made is a 'half,' not 'halved.'

1. As if one brought a halved cup of wine,

half,

halved.

Now the point of all this argument, which Varro sets forth acutely, it is true, but somewhat obscurely, is this: dimidiatum is equivalent to dismediatum, and means

divided into two parts,

1. With one eye and two feet, like halved pig,

1. why not? To sell his trash the huckster lauds
2. (The rascal!) half a shoe, a strigil split.

1. At its own season and the self-same time,
2. The half an hour and three at least elapsed,
3. At the fourth hour again. [*](The meaning is very uncertain. Marx thinks that the reference is to the quartam ague, "the attacks of which regularly subside at the same time (eandem ad quartam horam.), after a minimum duration of three hours and a half.' Lucilius refers, not to the fourth hour of the day (non diei horam dicit), but to every fourth hour of the period of illness (totius temporis spatii quo aegrotus cubat febri correptus). Dumtaxat is to be taken with the numeral, as in Plaut. Truc. 445. For ad quartam he cites Seneca, Nat. Quaest. iii. 16. 2, quartana ad horam venit, and Suet. Aug. lxxxvii, 1, ad Kalendas Graecas soluturos.)

three and a half elapsed,

half an hour

a halved hour

the halt part of an hour.

half of the gold,

the halved gold,

half of the provisions,

the halved provisions,

1. He bade them give him half of all the meats;

the halved day,

half,

1. Down to the navel now the halved day is dead.

Sow cypress seed thick, just as flax is commonly sown. Over it sift earth from a sieve to the depth of a halved finger. Then smooth it well with a board, with the feet, or with the hands.

a halved finger,

a half.

half of a finger,

halved.

They buried the men halfway down (dimidiatos) in the ground and built a fire around them; thus they destroyed them.

That it is recorded in literature and handed down by tradition, that great and unexpected joy has brought sudden death to many, since the breath of life was stifled and could not endure the effects of an unusual and strong emotion.

ARISTOTLE the philosopher relates [*](Frag. 559, V. Rose.) that Polycrita, a woman of high rank in the island of Naxos, on suddenly and unexpectedly hearing joyful news, breathed her last. Philippides too, a comic poet of no little repute, when he had unexpectedly won the prize in a contest of poets at an advanced age, and was rejoicing exceedingly, died suddenly in the midst of his joy. The story also of Diogoras of Rhodes is widely known. This Diogoras had three young sons, one a boxer, the second a pancratist, [*](The pancratium was a contest including both wrestling and boxing.) and the third a wrestler. He saw them all victors

Moreover, I have read in our annals that at the time when the army of the Roman people was cut to pieces at Cannae, [*](216 B.C. ) an aged mother was overwhelmed with grief and sorrow by a message announcing the death of her son; but that report was false, and when not long afterwards the young man returned from that battle to the city, the aged mother, upon suddenly seeing her son, was overpowered by the flood, the shock, and the crash, so to speak, of unlooked-for joy descending upon her, and gave up the ghost.

The variations in the period of gestation reported by physicians and philosophers; and incidentally the views also of the ancient poets on that subject and many other noteworthy and interesting particulars; and the words of the physician Hippocrates, quoted verbatim from his book entitled Peri\ Trofh=s. [*](On Nurture.)

BOTH physicians and philosophers of distinction have investigated the duration of the period of gestation in man. The general opinion, now accepted as correct, is that after the womb of a woman has conceived the seed, the child is born rarely in the seventh month, never in the eighth, often in the ninth, more often in the tenth in number; and that the end of the tenth month, not its beginning, is

1. And then the girl whom he did violate
2. Brought forth a daughter when ten months had sped.

1. The woman is ten months with child . . .

1. And may a child in the tenth month be born?—
2. By Pollux! in the ninth, and seventh, and eighth.

Eighth-month's children exist and do not exist.

They exist, since they appear to live after the miscarriage; but they do not exist, since they die afterwards; they exist and do not exist therefore, since they live for the moment in appearance, but not in reality.

But Varro says [*](l. c.) that the early Romans did not regard such births as unnatural rarities, but they did believe that a woman was delivered according to nature in the ninth or tenth month, and in no others, and that for this reason they gave to the three Fates names derived from bringing forth, and from the ninth and tenth months.

For Parca,

is derived from partuis with the change of one letter, and likewise Nona and Decima from the period of timely delivery.

Nona, Decuma, Morta

1. When will the day be present that Morta has predicted?

Furthermore, besides what I have read in books about human gestation, [*](XII Tab. iv. 4, Schöll. The fragment is not extant, but it is cited also by Ulpian, Dig. xxxviii. 16. 3. 11: post decem menses mortis natus non admittetur ad legitimam hereditatem.) also heard of the following case, which occurred in Rome: A woman of good and honourable character, of undoubted chastity, gave birth to a child in the eleventh month after her husband's death, and because of the reckoning of the time the accusation was made that she had conceived after the death of her husband, since the decemvirs had written that a child is born in ten months and not in the eleventh month. The deified Hadrian, however, having heard the case, decided that birth might also occur in the eleventh month, and I myself have read the actual decree with regard to the matter. In that decree Hadrian declares that he makes his decision after looking up the views of the ancient philosophers and physicians.

This very day I chanced to read these words in a satire of Marcus Varro's entitled The Will: [*](Fr. 543, Bücheler3.)

If one or more sons shall be born to me in ten months, let them be disinherited, if they are asses in music; [*](That is, stupid, half-witted.) but if one be born to me in the eleventh month, according to Aristotle, [*](i.e., as Aristotle says may happen; Hist. Anim. vii. 4.) let Attius have the same rights under my will as Tettius.

let Attius be as Tettius,

But if it is a fact that gestation cannot be prolonged beyond the tenth month, it is pertinent to ask why Homer wrote that Neptune said to a girl whom he had just violated: [*](Odyss. xi. 248.)

1. Rejoice, O woman, in this act of love;
2. A year gone by, fair offspring shall be thine,
3. For not unfruitful is a god's embrace.

When I had brought this matter to the attention of several scholars, some of them argued that in Homer's time, as in that of Romulus, the year consisted, not of twelve months, but of ten; others, that it was in accord with Neptune and his majesty that a child by him should develop through a longer period than usual; and others gave other nonsensical reasons. But Favorinus tells me that periplome/nou e)niautou= does not mean

when the year is ended

when it is nearing its end

In this instance Favorinus did not use the word adfectus in its popular signification (but yet correctly); for as it was used by Marcus Cicero and the most polished of the early writers, it was properly applied to things which had advanced, or been carried, not to the very end, but nearly to the end. Cicero gives the word that meaning in the speech On the Consular Provinces. [*](§ 19, bellum adfectum videmus ct, vere ut dicam, paene cawfectum; cf. § 29.)

Moreover, Hippocrates, in that book of which I wrote above, when he mentioned the number of days within which the embryo conceived in the womb is given form, and had limited the time of gestation itself to the ninth or tenth month, but had said that this nevertheless was not always of the same duration, but that delivery occurred sometimes more quickly, sometimes later, finally used these words:

In these cases there are longer and shorter periods, both wholly and in part; but the longer are not much longer or the shorter much shorter.

I recall that this question was carefully and thoroughly investigated at Rome, an inquiry demanded by a suit at law of no small moment at the time, whether, namely, a child that had been born alive in the eighth month but had died immediately, satisfied the conditions of the ius trium liberorrum, [*](The fathers of three children were granted certain privileges and immunities.) since it seemed to some that the untimely period of the eighth month made it an abortion and not a birth.

But since I have told what I have learned about a birth after a year in Homer and about the eleventh month, I think I ought not to omit what I read in the seventh book of the Natural Histoy of Plinius Secundus. But because that story might seem to be beyond belief, I have quoted Pliny's own words: [*](vii. 40.)

Masurius makes the statement [*](Fr. 24, Huschke; Memor. 21, Jur. Civ. 31, Bremer.) that the praetor Lucius Papirius, when an heir in the second degree [*](The heir or heirs in the second degree inherited only in case the heirs in the first degree died, or were otherwise incompetent.) brought suit for the possession of an inheritance, decided against him, although the mother [*](That is, the mother of the heir in the first degree.) said that she had been pregnant for thirteen months; and the reason for his decision was that it seemed to him that no definite period of gestation had been fixed by law.

Yawning during childbirth is fatal, just as to sneeze after coition produces abortion.

The statement of men of the highest authority that Plato bought three books of Philolaus the Pythagorean, and that Aristotle purchased a few books of the philosopher Speusippus, at prices beyond belief.

THE story goes that the philosopher Plato was a man of very slender means, but that nevertheless he bought three books of Philolaus the Pythagorean for ten thousand denarii.1 That sum, according to some writers, was given him by his friend Dion of Syracuse.

Aristotle too, according to report, bought a very few books of the philosopher Speusippus, after the latter's death, for three Attic talents, a sum equivalent in our money to seventy-two thousand sesterces. [*](These were very high prices. The first book of Martial's Epigrams, 700 lines, in an elegant form, cost only five denarii, and cheaper editions could be bought for from six to ten sesterces. See Martial, i. 117. 15ff., and Friedländer, Roman Life and Manners, Eng. Trans., iii. p. 37.)

The bitter satirist Timon wrote a highly abusive work, which he entitled Si/llos. [*](Meaning a lampoon, or satirical poem.) In that book he addresses the philosopher Plato in opprobrious terms, alleging that he had bought a treatise on the Pythagorean philosophy at an extravagant figure, and that from it he had compiled that celebrated dialogue the Timaeus. Here are Timon's lines on the subject: [*](Poet. Phil. Frag. 54, Diehls; Poesis Ludib. 26, p 130, Wachsmuth.)

1. Thou, Plato, since for learning thou didst yearn,
2. A tiny book for a vast sum did'st buy,
3. Which taught thee a Timacus to compose.

What is meant by pedari senafores, and why they are so called; also the origin of these words in the customary edict of the consuls:

senators and those who are allowed to speak in the senate.

THERE are many who think that those senators were called pedarii who did not express their opinion in words, but agreed with the opinion of others by stepping to their side of the House. How then? Whenever a decree of the senate was passed by division, did not all the senators vote in that manner? Also the following explanation of that word is given, which Gavius Bassus has left recorded in his Commentaries. For he says [*](Frag. 7, Fun.) that in the time of our forefathers senators who had held a curule magistracy used to ride to the House in a chariot, as a mark of honour; that in that chariot there was a seat on which they sat, which for that reason was called curulis; [*](For currulis, from currus. This derivation is given by Thurneysen, T.L.L. s.v., with the suggestion that the name, as well as the seat itself, was of Etruscan origin.) but that those senators who had not yet held a curule magistracy went on foot to the House: and that therefore the senators who had not yet held the higher magistracies were called pedarii. Marcus Varro, however, in the Menippean Satire entitled (Ippoku/wn, says [*](Frag. 220, Büchcler. ) that some knights were called pedarii, and he seems to mean those who, since they had not yet been enrolled in the senate by the censors, were not indeed senators, but because they had held offices by vote of the people, used to come into the senate and had the right of voting. In fact, even those who had filled curule magistracies, if they had not

Senators and those who have the right to express their opinion in the senate.

I have had a line of Laberius copied also, in which that word is used; I read it in a mime entitled Stricturae: [*](v. 88, Ribbeck3, who reads: sine lingua caput peddrii senténtias, and gives other versions.)

1. The aye-man's vote is but a tongueless head.

Why, according to Gavius Bassus, a man is called parcus and what he thought to be the explanation of that word; and how, on the contrary, Favorinus made fun of that explanation of his.

AT the dinners of the philosopher Favorinus, after the guests had taken their places and the serving of the viands began, a slave commonly stood by his table and began to read something, either from Grecian literature or from our own. For example, one day when I was present the reading was from the treatise of the learned Gavius Bassus On the Origin of Verbs and Substantives. In it this passage occurred: [*](Frag. 6, Fun.)

Parcus is a compound word, made up

v1.p.305

of par arcae, that is 'like a strong-box;' for just as all valuables are put away in a strong-box and preserved and kept under its protection, just so a man who is close and content to spend little keeps all his property guarded and hidden away, as in a strong-box. For that reason he is called parcus, as if it were par arcus.

Then Favorinus, on hearing these words, said:

That fellow Gavius Bassus has made up and contrived an origin for that word in an unnatural, altogether laboured and repellent manner, rather than explained it. For if it is permissible to draw on one's imagination, why would it not seem more reasonable to believe that a man is called parcus for the reason that he forbids and prevents tile spending of money, as if he were pecuniarcus. Why not rather,

adopt an explanation which is simpler and nearer the truth? For parcus is derived neither from arca nor from arceo, but from parum and parvum.

A discourse of the philosopher Favorinus carried on in the Socratic manner with an over-boastful grammarian; and in that discourse we are told how Quintus Scaevola defined penus [*](A store of provisions.) ; and that this same definition has been criticized and rejected.

IN the entrance hall of the palace on the Palatine a large number of men of almost all ranks had gathered together, waiting an opportunity to pay their respects to Caesar. [*](Doubtless Antoninus Pius, since Gellius always refers to Divus Hadrianus.) And there in a group of scholars, in the presence of the philosopher Favorinus, a man who thought himself unusually rich in grammatical lore was airing trifles worthy of the schoolroom, discoursing on the genders and cases of nouns with raised eyebrows and an exaggerated gravity of voice and expression, as if he were the interpreter and sovereign lord of the Sibyl's oracle. Then, looking at Favorinus, although as yet he was hardly acquainted with him, he said: "Penus too is used in different genders and is variously declined. For the early writers used to say hoc penus and haec penus, and in the genitive peni and penoris; Lucilius in his sixteenth satire also used the word mundus, which describes women's ornaments, not in the masculine gender, as other writers do, but in the neuter, in these words: [*](519 Marx, who reads in the second line: quid mundum atque penus.)

1. A man once willed his wife all ornaments (mundum omne) and stores.
2. But what are ornaments? Who will determine that?

Well and good, master, whatever your name is, you have taught us more than enough about many things of which we were indeed ignorant and certainly did not ask to know. For what difference does it make to me and the one with whom I am speaking in what gender I use penus, or with what endings I inflect it, provided no one of us does this too barbarously? But this is clearly what I need to know, what penus is, and how far that word may be employed, so that I may not call a thing in everyday use by the wrong name, as those do who begin to speak their Latin in the slave-market.

Your question is not at all difficult,

Who indeed does not know that penus is wine, wheat, oil, lentils, beans, and the other things of that kind?

Is not penus also,

millet, panic-grass, [*](A kind of grass of the genus Panicun, a word derived, not from panis, bread, but from panus, an ear of millet, or similar grain (Walde).) acorns and barley? for these too are almost of the same sort;

I do not want you to trouble yourself further about the question whether those things which I have mentioned are called penus. But can you not, instead of telling me some essential part of penus, rather define the meaning of the word by stating its genus and adding its species?

Good Heavens!

I don't understand

v1.p.313

what you mean by genus and species.

You ask,

to have a matter which has been stated clearly stated still more clearly, which is very difficult; for it is surely a matter of common knowledge that every definition consists of genus and species. But if you ask me to predigest it for you, as they say, I will certainly do that too, for the sake of showing you honour.

And then Favorinus began in this wise:

If,

I should now ask you to tell me, and as it were to define in words, what a man is, you would not, I suppose, reply that you and I are men. For that is to show who is a man, not to tell what a man is. But if, I say, I should ask you to define exactly what a man is, you would undoubtedly tell me that a man is a mortal living being, endowed with reason and knowledge, or you would define him in some other manner which would differentiate him from all other animals. Similarly, then, I now ask you to tell what penus is, not to name some example of penus.

I have never learned philosophy, nor desired to learn it, and if I do not know whether barley is included under penus, or in what words penus is defined, I am not on that account ignorant also of other branches of learning.

To know what penus is,

is not more a part of my philosophy than of your grammar. For you remember, I suppose, that it is often inquired whether Virgil said penum struere longam or longo ordine; [*](Aen. i. 704 f.: Quinquaginta intus famulae, quibus ordine longo cura penum struere et flammis adolere Penates. The MSS. and Servius have longo; Charisius, longam.) for you surely know that both readings are current. But to make you feel easier in mind, let me say that not even those old masters of the law who

v1.p.315

were called 'wise men' are thought to have defined penus with sufficient accuracy. For I hear that Quintus Scaevola used the following words to explain penus: [*](Jur. Civ. fr. 1, Huschke; II. 5a, Bremer.) Penus,' said he, 'is what is to be eaten or drunk, which is prepared for the use of the father of the family himself; or the mother of the family, or the children of the father, or the household which he has about him or his children and which is not engaged in work [*](If the reading is correct, opus must mean field-work, the reference being to the household servants of the paterfamilies and his children.) . . . as [*](There is a lacuna in the text.) Mucius says ought to be regarded as penus. For articles which are prepared for eating and drinking day by day, for luncheon or dinner, are not penus; but rather the articles of that kind which are collected and stored up for use during a long period are called penus, because they are not ready at hand, but are kept in the innermost part of the house.' [*](Penitus, like Penates, is connected with penus in the sense of an inner chamber. Penus is derived by some from the root pa- of pasco, pabulum, etc.; by others it is connected with pe/nomai and po/nos, as the fruit of labour. Walde, Lat. Etym. Wörterb. s.v., separates penus, an inner chamber, from penus, a store of provisions, connecting the latter with pasco, the former with penes, penetro and Penates.) This information,

Thus Favorinus used to lead ordinary conversations of this kind from insignificant and trivial topics to those which were better worth hearing and knowing, topics not lugged in irrelevantly, nor by way of display, but springing from and suggested by the conversations themselves.

Besides what Favorinus said, I think this too ought to be added to our consideration of penus,

On the difference between a disease and a defect, and the force of those terms in the aediles' edict; also whether eunuchs and barren women can he returned, and the various views as to that question.

THE edict of the curule aediles, [*](The aediles, and some other magistrates, issued an edict, or proclamation, at the beginning of their term of office, relating to the matters over which they had jurisdiction. When successive officials adopted and announced the same body of rules (edictum tralaticium), the edict assumed a more or less permanent form and became practically a code of laws.) in the section containing stipulations about the purchase of slaves, reads as follows: [*](F.J.R. p. 214; cf. Hor. Epist. ii. 2. 1 ff.)

See to it that the sale ticket of each slave be so written that it can be known

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exactly what disease or defect each one has, which one is a runaway or a vagabond, or is still under condemnation for some offence.

Therefore the jurists of old raised the question [*](III. p. 510, Bremer.) of the proper meaning of a

diseased slave

defective,

Disease is an unnatural condition of any body, which impairs its usefulness.

But,

one who stutters or stammers is defective rather than diseased, and a horse which bites or kicks has faults rather than a disease. But one who has a disease is also at the same time defective. However, the converse is not also true; for one may have defects and yet not be diseased. Therefore in the case of a man who is diseased,

it will be just and fair to state to what extent ' the price will be less on account of that defect.'

With regard to a eunuch in particular it has been inquired whether he would seem to have been sold contrary to the aediles' edict, if the purchaser did not know that he was a eunuch. They say that Labeo ruled [*](Ad. Ed. Aed. fr. 28, Huschke; 12, Bremer.) that he could be returned as diseased; and that Labeo also wrote that if sows were sterile and had been sold, action could be brought on the basis of the edict of the aediles. But in the case of a barren woman, if the barrenness were

For,

many men lack some one tooth, and most of them are no more diseased on that account, and it would be altogether absurd to say that men are not born sound, because infants come into the world unprovided with teeth.

I must not omit to say that this also is stated in the works of the early jurists, [*](Cael. Sab. ad. ed. fr. 1 ff., Bremer.) that the difference between a disease and a defect is that the latter is lasting, while the former comes and goes. But if this be so, contrary to the opinion of Labeo, which I quoted above, neither a blind man nor a eunuch is diseased.

I have added a passage from the second book of Masurius Sabinus On Civil Law.: [*](Fr. . 5 Huschke; 173 ff., Bremer.)

A madman or a mute, or one who has a broken or crippled limb, or any defect which impairs his usefulness, is

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diseased. But one who is by nature near-sighted is as sound as one who runs more slowly than others.

That before the divorce of Carvilius there were no lawsuits about a wife's dowry in the city of Rome; further, the proper meaning of the word paelex and its derivation.

IT is on record that for nearly five hundred years after the founding of Rome there were no lawsuits and no warranties [*](That is, the repayment of the dowry in case of a divorce was not secured. A cautio was a verbal or written promise, sometimes confirmed by an oath, as in Suet. Aug. xcviii. 2, ius iurandum et cautionem exegit.) in connection with a wife's dowry in the city of Rome or in Latium, since of course nothing of that kind was called for, inasmuch as no marriages were annulled during that period. Servius Sulpicius too, in the book which he compiled On Dowries, wrote [*](Fr. 1, Huschke; p. 227, Bremer.) that security for a wife's dower seemed to have become necessary for the first time when Spurius Carvilius, who was surnamed Ruga, a man of rank, put away his wife because, owing to some physical defect, no children were born from her; and that this happened in the five hundred and twenty-third year after the founding of the city, in the consulship of Marcus Atilius and Publius Valerius. [*](231 B.C.) And it is reported that this Carvilius dearly loved the wife whom he divorced, and held her in strong affection because of her character, but that above his devotion and his love he set his regard for the oath which the censors had compelled him to take, [*](An oath was regularly required by the censors that a man married for the purpose of begetting legal heirs (liberorum quacrendorum causa); cf. Suet. Jul. lii. 3.) that he would marry a wife for the purpose of begetting children.

Moreover, a woman was called paelex, or

concubine,

Let no concubine touch the temple of Juno; if she touch it, let her, with hair unbound, offer up a ewe lamb to Juno.

Now paelex is the equivalent of pa/llac, that is to say, of pallaki/s. [*](Walde, Lat. Etymn. Wörterb. s.v., regards paelex and the Greek pa/llac and pallaki/s, the former in the sense of a young slave, as loan words from the Phoenician-Hebrew pillegesh, concubine. The spelling pellex is due to popular etymology, which associated the word with pellicio, entice.) Like many other words of ours, this one too is derived from the Greek.

What Servius Sulpicius wrote in his work On Dowries about the law and usage of betrothals in early times.

IN the book to which he gave the title On Dowries Servius Sulpicius wrote [*](Fr. 2, Huschke; p. 226, Bremer.) that in the part of Italy known as Latium betrothals were regularly contracted according to the following customary and legal practice.

One who wished to take a wife,

demanded of him from whom she was to be received a formal promise that she would be given in marriage. The man who was to take the woman to wife made a corresponding promise. That contract, based upon pledges given and received, was called sponsalia, or 'betrothal.' Thereafter, she who had been promised was called sponsa, and he who had asked her in marriage, sponsus. But if, after such

v1.p.327

an interchange of pledges, the bride to be was not given in marriage, or was not received, then he who had asked for her hand, or he who had promised her, brought suit on the ground of breach of contract. The court took cognizance of the case. The judge inquired why the woman was not given in marriage, or why she was not accepted. If no good and sufficient reason appeared, the judge then assigned a money value to the advantage to be derived from receiving or giving the woman in marriage, and condemned the one who had made the promise, or the one who had asked for it, to pay a fine of that amount.

Servius Sulpicius says that this law of betrothal was observed up to the time when citizenship was given to all Latium by the Julian law. [*](90 B.C.) The same account as the above was given also by Neratius in the book which he wrote On Marriage. [*](Fr. 1, Bremer.)

A story which is told of the treachery of Etruscan diviners; and how because of that circumstance the boys at Rome chanted this verse all over the city:

Bad counsel to the giver is most ruinous.

The statue of that bravest of men, Horatius Cocles, which stood in the Comitium [*](The Comitium, or place of assembly (com-, co), was a templum, or inaugurated plot of ground, orientated according to the points of the compass, at the north-western corner of the Forum Romanum.) at Rome, was struck by lightning. To make expiatory offerings because of that thunderbolt, diviners were summoned from Etruria. These, through personal and national hatred of the Romans, had made up their minds to give false directions for the performance of that rite.

They accordingly gave the misleading advice that the statue in question should be moved to a lower position, on which the sun never shone, being cut off by the high buildings which surrounded the place on every side. When they had induced the Romans to take that course, they were betrayed and brought to trial before the people, and having confessed their duplicity, were put to death. And it became evident, in exact accord with what were later found to be the proper directions, that the statue ought to be taken to an elevated place and set up in a more commanding position in the area of Vulcan; [*](On the lower slope of the Capitoline Hill, at the northwest corner of the Forum.) and after that was done, the matter turned out happily and successfully for the Romans. At that time, then, because the evil counsel of the Etruscan diviners had been detected and punished, this clever line is said to have been composed, and chanted by the boys all over the city: [*](p. 37, Bährens, who needlessly changes the reading.)

1. Bad counsel to the giver is most ruinous.

This story about the diviners and that senarius [*](The senarius was an iambic trimeter, consisting of six iambic feet, or three dipodies. The early Roman dramatic poets allowed substitutions (the tribrach, irrational spondee, irrational anapaest, cyclic dactyl, and proceleusmatic) in every foot except the last; others conformed more closely to the Greek models.) is found in the Annales Maximi, in the eleventh book, [*](Fr. 3, Peter.) and in Verrius Flaccus' first book of Things Worth Remembering. [*](p. xiii, Müller.) But the verse appears to be a translation of the Greek poet Hesiod's familiar line: [*](Works and Days, 166.)

1. And evil counsel aye most evil is
2. To him who gives it.

A quotation from an early decree of the senate, which provided that sacrifice should be made with full-grown victims because the spears of Mars had moved in the sanctuary; also an explanation of the meaning of hostiae succidaneae and likewise of porca praecidanea; and further, that Ateius Capito called certain holidays praecidaneae.

NOT only was an earthquake regularly reported, and expiatory offerings made on that account, but I also find it mentioned in early records, that report was made to the senate when the spears of Mars [*](The spears sacred to Mars and the sacred shields (ancilia) were said to move of their own accord when danger threatened. According to Dio, xliv. 17, they shook violently before the death of Caesar.) had moved in the sanctuary in the Regia. [*](A building in the Roman Forum, near the temple of Vesta, the official headquarters of the pontifex maximus. According to tradition, it was built and dwelt in by Numa. It contained a sanctuary of Mars, in which the sacred spears and shields (ancilia) were sometimes kept. Dio, however, xliv. 17, tells us that at the time of Caesar's death they were in his house, i. e. the domus public (see Suet. Jul. xlvi.).) Because of such an occurrence, a decree of the senate was passed in the consulship of Marcus Antonius and Aulus Postumius, [*](99 B. C.) of which this is a copy:

Whereas Gaius Julius, son of Lucius, the pontifex, has reported that the spears of Mars have moved in the sanctuary in the Regia, the senate has therefore decreed with reference to that matter, that Marcus Antonius the consul should make expiation to Jupiter and Mars with full-grown victims, and with unweaned victims to such of the other gods as he thought proper. They decided that it should be regarded as sufficient for him to have sacrificed with these. If there should be any need of additional victims, the additional offerings should be made with red victims.

Inasmuch as the senate called some victims succidaneae, it is often inquired what that word means.

1. Should I the victim of your folly be
2. And let you sacrifice my back to it,
3. As substitute for yours?

Now it is said that the victims were called succidaneae —which is equivalent to succaedaneae, the diphthong ae, according to the custom in compound words, being changed to i—because if the expiation was not effected by the first victims, other victims were brought and killed after them; and since these, after the first had already been offered, were substituted for the sake of making atonement and were

slain in succession to

Moreover, it is on the same linguistic principle that praecidanea is applied to those victims which are offered on the day before the regular sacrifices. Also the sow is called praecidalea [*](From prae and caedo, slay beforehand.) which it was usual to offer up to Ceres before the harvesting of the new crops, for the sake of expiation in case any had failed to purify a defiled household, or had performed that rite in an improper manner.

But that a sow and certain victims are called praecidaneae, as I have said, is a matter of common knowledge; that some festivals are called praecidaneae is a fact I think that is not known to the general public. Therefore I have quoted a passage from the fifth book of the treatise which Ateius Capito compiled On Pontifical Law: [*](Fr. 8, Huschke; 1, Bremer.)

Tiberius

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Coruncanius, the pontifex maximus, appointed feriae praecidaneae, or

a preparatory festival,

for a day of ill-omen. The college of pontiffs voted that there need be no religious scruple against celebrating the feriae praecidaneae on that day.

On a letter of the grammarian Valerius Probus, written to Marcellus, regarding the accent of certain Punic names.

VALERIUS PROBUS the grammarian was conspicuous among the men of his time for his learning. He pronounced Hannibalem and Hasdrubalem and Hamilcarem with a circumflex accent on the penult, and there is a letter addressed To Marcellus, in which he asserts that Plautus, [*](Frag. inc. xlii. Götz.) and Ennius and many other early writers pronounced in that way; but he quotes a single line of Ennius alone, from the book entitled Scipio.

That verse, composed in octonarii, [*](The term octonarius is applied both to a trochaic tetrameter acatalectic (as here in the Latin verse) or to an iambic tetrameter acatalectic. It consisted of eight trochaic or iambic feet. Substitutions were allowed in every foot except the last. See note on senarius, p. 329.) I have appended; in it, unless the third syllable of Hannibal's name is circumflexed, [*](In the Latin line the ictus falls on the penult Hánnibális, but the ordinary pronunciation was Hanníbalis.) the metre will halt. The verse of Ennius to which I referred reads thus: [*](Varia, 13, Vahlen2, who reads quaque.)

And where near Hannibal's forces he had camped. [*](Vahlen and the T.L.L. take considerat from consido, Weiss from considero.)

What Gaius Fabricius said of Cornelius Rufinus, an avaricious man, whose election to the consulship he supported, although he hated him and was his personal enemy.

FABRICIUS LUSCINUS was a man of great renown and great achievements. Publius Cornelius Rufinus was, to be sure, a man energetic in action, a good warrior, and a master of military tactics, but thievish and keen for money. This man Fabricius neither respected nor treated as a friend, but hated him because of his character. Yet when consuls were to be chosen at a highly critical period for the State, and that Rufinus was a candidate while his competitors were without military experience and untrustworthy, Fabricius used every effort to have the office given to Rufinus. [*](This was in 290 B.C. at the beginning of the last Samnite war. Rufinus was consul again in 277 B. C.) When many men expressed surprise at his attitude, in wishing an avaricious man, towards whom he felt bitter personal enmity, to be elected consul, he said:

I would rather be robbed by a fellow-citizen than sold [*](That is, sold into slavery by a victorious foe.) by the enemy.

This Rufinus afterwards, when he had been dictator and twice consul, Fabricius in his censorship expelled from the senate [*](In 275 B.C.) on the charge of extravagance, because he possessed ten pounds weight of silver plate. That remark of Fabricius about Rufinus I gave above in the form in which it appears in most historians; but Marcus Cicero, in the second book of the De Oratore, says [*](§268.) that it was not made by Fabricius to others, but to Rufinus himself, when he was thanking Fabricius because he had been elected consul through his help.

On the proper meaning of religiosus; and what changes the meaning of that word has undergone; and remarks of Nigidius Figulus on that subject, drawn from his Commentaries.

NIGIDIUS FIGULUS, in my opinion the most learned of men next to Marcus Varro, in the eleventh book of his Grammatical Commentaries, quotes [*](Fr. 4, Swoboda.) a truly remarkable line from an early poet: [*](p. 297, Ribbeck3, who reads: réligentem esse <téd> oportet, réligiosus né fuas, following Fleckeisen.)

1. Best it is to be religious, lest one superstitious be;

The suffix osus in words of this kind, such as vinosus, mulierosus, religiosus, always indicates an excessive amount of the quality in question. Therefore religiosus is applied to one who has involved himself in an extreme and superstitious devotion, which was regarded as a fault.

But in addition to what Nigidius says, by another shift in meaning religiosus began to be used of an upright and conscientious man, who regulates his conduct by definite laws and limits. Similarly too the following terms, which have the same origin, appear to have acquired different meanings; namely, religiosus dies and religiosa delubra. For those days are called religiosi which are of ill-fame and are hampered by an evil omen, so that on them one must refrain from offering sacrifice or beginning any new business whatever; they are, namely, the days that the ignorant multitude falsely and improperly call ne fasti. [*](On ne fasti dies it was impious for legal business to be carried on, or assemblies held.) Thus Marcus Cicero, in the ninth

Our forefathers maintained that the day of the battle at the Allia was more calamitous than that on which the city was taken; because the latter disaster was the result of the former. Therefore the one day is even now religiosus, while the other is unknown to the general public.

Religiosus is that which because of some sacred quality is removed and withdrawn from us; the word is derived from relinquo, as is caerimonia from careo.

1. Then too I give her nothing, except to say

   All right;

2. For I avoid confessing my impecunious plight.

fond of wine

fond of women

whimsical

wordy

notorious

talented

beautiful

dutiful

showy

well-trained

full of wisdom

victorious

one should regard his deeds, not his words if they are less eloquent (facundiosa)

The order observed in calling upon senators for their opinions; and the altercation in the senate between Gaius Caesar, when consul, and Marcus Cato, who tried to use up the whole day in talk.

BEFORE the passage of the law which is now observed in the proceedings of the senate, the order in calling for opinions varied. Sometimes the man was first called upon whom the censors had first enrolled in the senate, sometimes the consuls elect; some of the consuls, influenced by friendship or some personal relationship, used to call first upon anyone they pleased, as a compliment, contrary to the regular order. However, when the usual order was not followed, the rule was observed of not calling first upon any but a man of consular rank. It is said that Gaius Caesar, when he was consul with Marcus Bibulus, [*](In 59 B.C.) called upon only four senators out of order. The first of these was Marcus Crassus, but after Caesar had betrothed his daughter to Gnaeus Pompeius, he began to call upon Pompeius first. [*](See Suet. Jul. xxi., who adds the information that it was the custom for the consul to maintain throughout the year the order with which he had begun on the first of January.)

Caesar gave the senate his reason for this procedure, according to the testimony of Tullius Tiro, Cicero's freedman, who writes [*](Fr. 1, Peter; p. 6, Lion.) that he had the information from his patron. Ateius Capito has made the same statement in his work On Senatorial Conduct. [*](Fr. 18, Huschke; 1, Bremer.)

In the same treatise of Capito is this passage: [*](Fr. 18, Huschke; 2, Bremer. )

The consul Gaius Caesar called upon Marcus Cato for his opinion. Cato did not wish to have the motion before the house carried, since he did not think it for the public good. For the purpose of delaying action, he made a long speech and tried to use up the whole day in talking. For it was a senator's right, when asked his opinion, to speak beforehand on any other subject he wished, and as long as he wished. Caesar, in his capacity as consul, summoned an attendant, [*](According to Suet. Jul. xx. 4, it was a lictor.) and since Cato would not stop, ordered him to be arrested in the full tide of his speech and taken to prison. The senate arose in a body and attended Cato to the prison. But this,

aroused such indignation, that Caesar yielded and ordered Cato's release.

The nature of the information which Aristoxenus has handed down about Pythagoras on the ground that it was more authoritative; and also what Plutarch wrote in the same vein about that same Pythagoras.

AN erroneous belief of long standing has established itself and become current, that the philosopher Pythagoras did not eat of animals: also that he abstained from the bean, which the Greeks call ku/amos. In accordance with that belief the poet Callimachus wrote: [*](Fr. 128, Schn.)

1. I tell you too, as did Pythagoras,
2. Withhold your hands from beans, a hurtful food.

Plato therefore bids us go to our

v1.p.349

sleep in such bodily condition that there may be nothing to cause delusion and disturbance in our minds. It is thought to be for that reason too that the Pythagoreans were forbidden to eat beans, a food that produces great flatulency, which is disturbing to those who seek mental calm.

So then Cicero. But Aristoxenus the musician, a man thoroughly versed in early literature, a pupil of the philosopher Aristotle, in the book On Pythagoras which he has left us, says that Pythagoras used no vegetable more often than beans, since that food gently loosened the bowels and relieved them. I add Aristoxenus' own words: [*](F. H. G. ii. 273.)

Pythagoras among vegetables especially recommended the bean, saying that it was both digestible and loosening; and therefore he most frequently made use of it.

Aristoxenus also relates that Pythagoras ate very young pigs and tender kids. This fact he seems to have learned from his intimate friend Xenophilus the Pythagorean and from some other older men, who lived not long after the time of Pythagoras. And the same information about animal food is given by the poet Alexis, in the comedy entitled

The Pythagorean Bluestocking.

1. O wretches, utter wretches, from beans withhold your hands.

Plutarch too, a man of weight in scientific matters, in the first book of his work On Homer wrote that Aristotle [*](Fr. 194, Rose.) gave the same account of the Pythagoreans: namely, that except for a few parts of the flesh they did not abstain from eating animals. Since the statement is contrary to the general belief, I have appended Plutarch's own words: [*](vii., p. 100, Bern.)

Aristotle says that the Pythagoreans abstained from the matrix, the heart, the a)kalh/fh and some other such things, but used all other animal food.

But as to Pythagoras himself, while it is well known that he declared that he had come into the world as Euphorbus, what Cleanthes [*](F. H. G. ii. 317.) and Dicaearchus [*](F. H. G. ii. 244.) have recorded is less familiar—that he was afterwards Pyrrhus Pyranthius, then Aethalides, and then a beautiful courtesan, whose name was Alco.