Today | News | Books | Recipes Adventure | Science Fiction | Ghost stories | Poetry | Children | History Bookour descent from the infamous sanctuary.[502] That first of your ancestors, whoever he was, was either a shepherd, or else--what I would rather not mention! FOOTNOTES: [396] _Stemmata._ "The lines connecting the descents in a pedigree," from the garlands of flowers round the Imagines set up in the halls (v., 19) and porticoes (vi., 163) of the nobiles; which were joined to one another by festoons, so that the descent from father to son could be readily traced. Cf. Pers., iii., 28. "Stemmate quod Tusco ramum millesime ducis." Of Ponticus nothing is known. [397] _Vultus._ Because these Imagines were simply busts made of wax, colored. [398] _Virgâ._ "What boots it on the lineal tree to trace Through many a branch the founders of our race." Gifford. [399] _Numantinos._ Scipio Africanus the Younger got the name of Numantinus from Numantia, which he destroyed as well as Carthage. [400] _Ortu._ "Just at the hour when those whose name you boast Broke up the camp, and march'd th' embattled host." Hodgson. [401] _Fabius_, the founder of the Fabian gens, was said to have been a son of Hercules by Vinduna, daughter of Evander, and by virtue of this descent the Fabii claimed the exclusive right of ministering at the altar consecrated by Evander to Hercules. It stood in the Forum Boarium, near the Circus Flaminius, and was called Ara Maxima. Cf. Ovid, Fast., i., 581, "Constituitque sibi quæ Maxima dicitur, Aram, Hic ubi pars urbis de bove nomen habet." Cf. Virg., Æn., viii., 271, "Hanc aram luco statuit quæ Maxima semper dicetur nobis, et erit quæ Maxima semper." Quintus Fabius Maximus Æmilianus, the consul in the year B.C. 121, defeated the Allobroges at the junction of the Isère and the Rhone, and killed 130,000: for which he received the name of Allobrogicus. Cf. Liv., Ep. 61. Vell., ii., 16. [402] _Euganea_, a district of Northern Italy, on the confines of the Venetian territory. [403] _Pumice._ The pumice found at Catana, now Catania, at the foot of Mount Ætna, was used to rub the body with to make it smooth (cf. ix., 95, "Inimicus pumice lævis." Plin., xxxvi., 21. Ovid, A. Am., i., 506, "Nec tua mordaci pumice crura teras"), after the hairs had been got rid of by the resin. Vid. inf. 114.--_Traducit._ Vid. ad xi., 31. [404] _Frangendâ._ The busts of great criminals were broken by the common executioner. Cf. x., 58, "Descendunt statuæ restemque sequuntur." Tac., Ann., vi., 2, "Atroces sententiæ dicebantur in effigies." Cf. Ruperti, ad Tac., Ann., ii., 32. Suet., Domit., 23. "He blast his wretched kindred with a bust, For public justice to reduce to dust." Gifford. [405] _Paulus._ He mentions (Sat. vii., 143) two lawyers, bearing the names of Paulus and Cossus, who were apparently no honor to their great names. (For Cossus, cf. inf. _Gætulice_.) [406] _Gætulice._ Cn. Cornelius Lentulus Cossus received the name of Gætulicus from his victory over the Gætuli, "Auspice Augusto," in his consulship with L. Calpurnius Piso Augur. B.C. 1. Vid. Clinton, F. H., in an. Flor., iv., 12. [407] _Silanus._ The son-in-law of the Emperor Claudius, who, as Tacitus says (Ann., xvi., 7), "Claritudine generis, and modestâ juventâ præcellebat." Cf. Ann., xii. Suet., Claud., 27. "Hail from whatever stock you draw your birth, The son of Cossus, or the son of earth." Gifford. [408] _Osiri invento._ Vid. ad vi., 533. [409] _Nanum cujusdam._ There is probably an allusion here to Domitian's fondness for these deformities. Cf. Domit., iv., "Per omne spectaculum ante pedes ei stabat puerulus coccinatus, _parvo portentosoque capite_, cum quo plurimum fabulabatur." Cf. Stat., Sylv., i.; vi., 57, _seq._ [410] _Scabie._ "That mangy larcenist of casual spoil, From lamps extinct that licks the fetid oil." Badham. [411] _Creticus._ Q. Metellus had this surname from his conquest of Crete, B.C. 67. Vell. Pat., ii., 34. Flor., iii., 7. Cf. ii., 78, "Cretice pelluces." P. Sulpicius Camerinus was one of the triumvirs sent to Athens for Solon's laws. Cf. vii., 90. Liv., iii., 33. Camerinus was a name of the Sulpician gens, and seems to have been derived from the conquest of Cameria in Latium. (Cf. Facciol.) Liv., i., 38. The name of Creticus was actually given in derision to M. Antonius, father of the triumvir, for his disastrous failure in Crete. Vid. Plut. in Ant. [412] _Rubellius_ Blandus was the father, Plautus the son. Both readings are found here. Of the latter Tacitus says (Ann., xiv., 22), "Omnium ore Rubellius Plautus celebrabatur, _cui nobilitas per matrem ex Julia familiâ_." His mother Julia was daughter of Drusus, the son of Livia, wife of Augustus. Germanicus, his mother's brother, was father of Agrippina, mother of Nero: hence, inf. 72, "inflatum plenumque Nerone propinquo." Cf. Virg., Æn., i., 288, "Julius a magno demissum nomen Julo." [413] _Aggere._ Cf. ad vi., 588. [414] _Vivas._ "Long may'st thou taste the secret sweets that spring In breasts affined to so remote a king." Gifford. [415] _Nobilis indocti._ "Who help the well-born dolt in many a strait, And plead the cause of the unletter'd great." Badham. [416] _Marmoreum._ "For 'tis no bar to kindred, that thy block Is form'd of flesh and blood, and theirs of rock." Gifford. [417] _Fervet._ "Frequenter celebratur." Lubin. Some commentators interpret it of the eager clapping of the hands of the spectators: others, of the prize of victory. "The palm of oft-repeated victories." Hodgson. "Whom many a well-earned palm and trophy grace." Gifford. "Whose easy triumph and transcendent speed, Palm after palm proclaim." Badham. [418] _Nepos_, the name of a noted miller at Rome. [419] _Aliquid._ "Sometimes great." So i., 74, "Si vis esse _aliquis_." Hall imitates this beautifully: "Brag of thy father's faults, they are thine own; Brag of his lands, if they are not foregone: Brag of thine own good deeds; for they are thine, More than his life, or lands, or golden line." [420] _Nerone._ Cf. ad l. 39. [421] _Sensus communis._ There are few phrases in Juvenal on which the commentators are more divided. Some interpret it exactly in the sense of the English words "common sense." Others, "fellow-feeling, sympathy with mankind at large." Browne takes it to be "tact." Cf. Hor., i., Sat. iii., 66; Phædr., i., Fab. vii., 4. There is a long and excellent note in Gifford, who translates it himself by "a sense of modesty," but allows that in Cicero it means "a polite intercourse between man and man;" in Horace, "suavity of manners;" in Seneca, "a proper regard for the decencies of life:" by others it is used for all these, which together constitute what we call "courteousness, or good breeding." So Quintilian, I., ii., 20. Hodgson turns it, "For plain good sense, first blessing of the sky, Is rarely met with in a state so high." Badham, "In that high estate Plain common sense is far from common fate." [422] _Stratus humi._ "Stretch'd on the ground, the vine's weak tendrils try To cl |