Noctes Atticae

A conversation held with a grammarian, who was full of insolence and ignorance, as to the meaning of the word obnoxius; and of the origin of that word.

I INQUIRED at Rome of a certain grammarian who had the highest repute as a teacher, not indeed

for the sake of trying or testing him, but rather from an eager desire for knowledge, what obnoxius meant and what was the origin and history of the word. And he, looking at me and ridiculing what he considered the insignificance and unfitness of the query, said:

Truly a difficult question is this that you ask, one demanding very many sleepless nights of investigation! Who, pray, is so ignorant of the Latin tongue as not to know that one is called obnoxius who can be inconvenienced or injured by another, to whom he is said to be obnoxius because the other is conscious of his noxa, that is to say, of his guilt? Why not rather,

said he,

drop these trifles and put questions worthy of study and discussion?

Then indeed I was angry, but thinking that I ought to dissemble, since I was dealing with a fool, I said;

If, most learned sir, I need to learn and to know other things that are more abstruse and more important, when the occasion arises I shall inquire and learn them from you; but inasmuch as I have often used the word obnoxious without knowing what I was saying, I have learned from you and am now beginning to understand what not I alone, as you seem to think, was ignorant of; for as a matter of fact, Plautus too, though a man of the first rank in his use of the Latin language and in elegance of diction, did not know the meaning of obnoxius. For there is a passage of his in the Stichus which reads as follows:

1. By Heaven! I now am utterly undone,
2. Not only partly so (non obnoxie). [*](497. Cf. Salmasius, ad loc., obnoxie perire dicitur, qui non plane nec funditus perit, sed aliquam spem salutis habet. Cf. Poen. 787; Amph. 372.)

This does not in the least agree with what you have

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taught me; for Plautus contrasted plane and obnoxie as two opposites, which is far removed from your meaning.

But that grammarian retorted foolishly enough, as if obnoxius and obnoxie differed, not merely in form, but in their substance and meaning:

I gave a definition of obnoxins, not obnoxie.

But then I, amazed at the ignorance of the presumptuous fellow, answered:

Let us, as you wish, disregard the fact that Plautus said obnoxie, if you think that too far-fetched; and let us also say nothing of the passage in Sallust's Catiline: [*](xxiii. 3.) 'Also to threaten her with his sword, if she would not be submissive (obnoxia) to him'; but explain to me this example, which is certainly more recent and more familiar. For the following verses of Virgil's are very well known: [*](Georg. i. 395–6.)

1. For now the stars' bright sheen is seen undimmed.
2. The rising Moon owes naught (nec .. obnoxia) to brother's rays;

but you say that it means 'conscious of her guilt.' In another place too Virgil uses this word with a meaning different from yours, in these lines: [*](Georg. ii. 438.)

1. What joy the fields to view
2. That owe no debt (non obnoxia) to hoe or care of man.

for care is generally a benefit to fields, not an injury, as it would be according to your definition of obnoxius. Furthermore, how can what Quintus Ennius writes in the following verses from the Phoenix [*](257 ff., Ribbeck.3) agree with you:

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1. 'Tis meet a man should live inspired by courage true,
2. In conscious innocence should boldly challenge foes.
3. True freedom his who bears a pure and steadfast heart,
4. All else less import has (obnoxiosae) and lurks in gloomy night?

But our grammarian, with open mouth as if in a dream, said:

Just now I have no time to spare. When I have leisure, come to see me and learn what Virgil, Plautus, Sallust and Ennius meant by that word.

So saying that fool made off; but in case anyone should wish to investigate, not only the origin of this word, but also its variety of meaning, in order that he may take into consideration this Plautine use also, I have quoted the following lines from the Asinaria: [*](282.)

1. He'll join with me and hatch the biggest jubilee,
2. Stuff'd with most joy, for son and father too.
3. For life they both shall be in debt (obnoxii) to both of us,
4. By our services fast bound.

Now, in the definition which that grammarian gave, he seems in a word of such manifold content to have noted only one of its uses—a use, it is true, which agrees with that of Caecilius in these verses of the Chrysium: [*](21, Ribbeck.3)

1. Although I come to you attracted by your pay,
2. Don't think that I for that am subject to your will (tibi . . . obnoxium);
3. If you speak ill of me, you'll hear a like reply.

On the strict observance by the Romans of the sanctity of an oath; and also the story of the ten prisoners whom Hannibal sent to Rome under oath.

AN oath was regarded and kept by the Romans as something inviolable and sacred. This is evident from many of their customs and laws, and this tale which I shall tell may be regarded as no slight support of the truth of the statement. After the battle of Cannae Hannibal, commander of the Carthaginians, selected ten Roman prisoners and sent them to the city, instructing them and agreeing that, if it seemed good to the Roman people, there should be an exchange of prisoners, and that for each captive that one side should receive in excess of the other side, there should be paid a pound and a half of silver. Before they left, he compelled them to take oath that they would return to the Punic camp, if the Romans would not agree to an exchange.

The ten captives come to Rome. They deliver the message of the Punic commander in the senate. The senate refused an exchange. The parents, kinsfolk and connexions of the prisoners amid embraces declared that they had returned to their native land in accordance with the law of postliminium, [*](Recovery of civic rights by a person who has been reduced to slavery by capture in war, Pomponius, Dig. xlix. 15. 5, and 19.) and that their condition of independence was complete and inviolate; they therefore besought them not to think of returning to the enemy. Then eight of their number rejoined that they had no just right of postliminium, since they were bound by an oath, and they at once went back to Hannibal, as they had sworn to do. The other two remained

in Rome, declaring that they had been released and freed from their obligation because, after leaving the enemy's camp, they had returned to it as if for some chance reason, but really with intent to deceive, and having thus kept the letter of the oath, they had come away again unsworn. This dishonourable cleverness of theirs was considered so shameful, that they were generally despised and reprobated; and later the censors punished them with all possible fines and marks of disgrace, on the ground that they had not done what they had sworn to do.

Furthermore Cornelius Nepos, in the fifth book of his Examples [*](Corn. Nepos, Ex. fr. 2, Peter2,) has recorded also that many of the senators recommended that those who refused to return should be sent to Hannibal under guard, but that the motion was defeated by a majority of dissentients. He adds that, in spite of this, those who had not returned to Hannibal were so infamous and hated that they became tired of life and committed suicide.