Germania and Agricola Part 11

_Virgines festinantur_==nuptiae virginum festinantur, poetice. The words properare, festinare, accelerare are used in both a trans. and intrans.

sense, cf. Hist. 2, 82: festinabantur; 3, 37: festinarentur. Among the Romans, boys of fourteen contracted marriage with girls of twelve. Cf.

Smith's Dic. Ant.

_Eadem, similis, pares_. The comparison is between the youth of the two s.e.xes at the time of marriage; they marry at the same age, equal in stature and equal in strength. Marriages unequal in these respects, were frequent at Rome.--_Pares--miscentur_. Plene: pares paribus, validae validis miscentur. On this kind of brachylogy, see further in Dod. Essay on style of T., H. p. 15. _Miscentur_ has a middle sense, as the pa.s.sive often has, particularly in Tacitus. Cf. note 21: _obligantur_.

_Referunt_. Cf. Virg. Aen. 4, 329: parvulus Aeneas, qui te tamen ore _referret_. See note, 39: auguriis.

_Ad patrem_. _Ad_ is often equivalent to _apud_ in the best Latin authors; e.g. Cic. ad Att. 10, 16: ad me fuit==apud me fuit. Rhena.n.u.s by conjecture wrote _apud_ patrem to correspond with apud avunculum. But Pa.s.sow restored _ad_ with the best reason. For T. prefers _different_ words and constructions in ant.i.thetic clauses. Perhaps also a different sense is here intended from that which would have been expressed by _apud_. Wr. takes _ad_ in the sense, _in respect to: as in respect to a father_, i.e. as they would have, if he were their father.

_Exigunt_, sc. hunc nexum==sororum filios.

_Tanquam_. Like Greek os to denote the views of others, not of the writer. Hence followed by the subj. H. 531; Z. 571.

_Et in animum_. _In_==quod attinet ad, _in respect to_. The commonly received text has _ii et animum_, which is a mere conjecture of Rhen.

According to K., _teneant_ has for its subject not _sororum filii_, but the same subject as _exigunt_. Render: _Since, as they suppose, both in respect to the mind_ (the affections), _they hold it more strongly, and in respect to the family, more extensively_.

_Heredes_ properly refers to property, _successores_ to rank, though the distinction is not always observed.--_Liberi_ includes both sons and daughters.

_Patrui_, paternal uncles; _avunculi_, maternal.

_Propinqui_, blood relations; _affines_, by marriage.

_Orbitatis pretia_. _Pretia==proemia_. _Orbitatis==childlessness_. Those who had no children, were courted at _Rome_ for the sake of their property. Vid. Sen. Consol. ad Marc. 19: in civitate nostra, plus gratiae orbitas confert, quam eripit. So Plutarch de Amore Prolis says: the childless are entertained by the rich, courted by the powerful, defended gratuitously by the eloquent: many, who had friends and honors in abundance, have been stripped of both by the birth of a single child.

XXI. _Necesse est_. It is their duty and the law of custom. Gun.-- _Nec_==non tamen.--_Homicidium_. A post-Augustan word.

_Armentorum ac pecorum_. For the distinction between these words, see note, -- 5. The high value which they attached to their herds and flocks, as their _solae et gratissimae opes_, may help to explain the law or usage here specified. Moreover, where the individual was so much more prominent than the state, homicide even might be looked upon as a private wrong, and hence to be atoned for by a pecuniary satisfaction, cf. Tur.

Hist. Ang. Sax., App. No. 3, chap. 1.

_Juxta libertatem_, i.e. _simul c.u.m libertate_, or inter liberos homines.

The form of expression is characteristic of the later Latin. Cf. Hand's Tursellinus, vol. III. p. 538. Tacitus is particularly partial to this preposition.

_Convictibus_, refers to the entertainment of countrymen and friends, _hospitiis_ to that of strangers.

_Pro fortuna. According to his means_. So Ann. 4, 23: fortunae inops.

_Defecere_, sc. epulae. Quam exhausta sint, quae apparata erant, cf. 24: omnia defecerunt.

_Hospes_. Properly _stranger_; and hence either _guest_ or _host_. Here the latter.--_Comes. Guest_. So Gun. and the common editions. But most recent editors place a colon after _comes_, thus making it _predicate_, and referring it to the _host_ becoming the guide and _companion_ of his guest to another place of entertainment.

_Non invitati_, i.e. etiam si non invitati essent. Gun.

_Nec interest_, i.e. whether invited or not.

_Jus hospitis. The right of the guest_ to a hospitable reception, So Cic.

Tus. Quaes., 1, 26: jus hominum.

_Quantum ad_ belongs to the silver age. In the golden age they said: _quod attinet ad_, or simply _ad_. Gr. Cicero however has _quantum in_, N. D. 3, 7; and Ovid, _quantum ad_, A. A. 1, 744. Cf. Freund sub voce.

_Imputant. Make charge or account of_. Nearly confined to the later Latin. Frequent in T. in the reckoning both of debt and credit, of praise and blame. Cic. said: _a.s.signare_ alicui aliquid.

_Obligantur_, i.e. obligatos esse putant. Forma pa.s.siva ad modum medii verbi Graeci. Gun. Cf. note, 20: _miscentur_.

_Victus--comis. The mode of life between host and guest is courteous_. For _victus_==manner of life, cf. Cic. Inv. 1, 25, 35.

XXII. _E_ is not exactly equivalent here to _a_, nor does it mean simply _after_, but immediately on awaking _out of_ sleep.--_Lavantur_, wash themselves, i.e. bathe; like Gr. louomai. So aggregantur, 13; _obligantur_, 21, et pa.s.sim.

_Calida_, sc. aqua, cf. in Greek, thermo louesthai, Aristoph. Nub. 1040.

In like manner Pliny uses _frigida_, Ep. 6, 16: semel iterumque _frigidam_ poposcit transitque. Other writers speak of the Germans as bathing in their rivers, doubtless in the summer; but in the winter they use the warm bath, as more agreeable in that cold climate. So in Russia and other cold countries, cf. Mur. in loco.

_Separatae--mensa_. Contra Romanorum luxuriam, ex more fere _Homerici_ aevi. Gun.

_Sedes_, opposed to the triclinia, on which the Romans used to _recline_, a practice as unknown to the rude Germans, as to the _early_ Greeks and Hebrews. See Coler. Stud. of Gr. Poets, p. 71 (Boston, 1842).

_Negotia_. Plural==_their_ various _pursuits_. So Cic. de Or. 2, 6: _forensia negotia. Negotium==nec-otium_, C. and G. being originally identical, as they still are almost _in form.--Armati_. Cf. note, 11: _ut turbae placuit_.

_Continuare_, etc. est diem noctemque jungere potando, sive die nocteque perpotationem continuare. K.

_Ut_, sc. solet fieri, cf. ut in licentia, -- 2. The clause limits _crebrae_; it is the _frequent occurrence_ of brawls, that is customary among those given to wine.

_Transiguntur_. See note on transigitur, -- 19.

_Asciscendis_. i.e. a.s.sumendis.

_Simplices_ manifestly refers to the _expression_ of thought; explained afterwards by _fingere_ nesciunt==_frank, ingenuous_. Cf. His. 1, 15: _simplicissime loquimur_; Ann. 1, 69: _simplices curas_.

_Astuta--callida. Astutus_ est natura, _callidus_ multarum rerum peritia.

Rit. _Astutus_, cunning; _callidus_, worldly wise. Dod.

_Adhuc. To this day_, despite the degeneracy and dishonesty of the age.

So Dod. and Or. Rit. says: quae adhuc pectore clausa erant. Others still make it==_etiam, even_. Cf. note, 19.

_Retractatur_. Reviewed, _reconsidered_.

_Salva--ratio est. The proper relation of both times is preserved_, or the advantage of both is secured, as more fully explained in the next member, viz. by _discussing when they are incapable of disguise, and deciding, when they are not liable to mistake_. Cf. Or. in loc., and Botticher, sub v.

Pa.s.sow well remarks, that almost every German usage, mentioned in this chapter, is in marked contrast with Roman manners and customs.

XXIII. _Potui_==pro potu, or in potum, dat. of the end. So 46: Victui herba, vest.i.tui pelles. T. and Sall.u.s.t are particularly fond of this construction. Cf. Bot. Lex. Tac., sub _Dativus_.

_Hordeo aut frumento. Hordeo==barley; frumento_, properly fruit (frugimentum, fruit [Greek: kat exochaen], i.e. grain), grain of any kind, here _wheat_, cf. Veget. R.M. 1, 13: et milites pro frumento hordeum cogerentur accipere.

_Similitudinem vini. Beer_, for which the Greeks and Romans had no name.

Hence Herod. (2, 77) speaks of [Greek: oinos ek kritheon pepoiaemenos], among the Egyptians.

_Corruptus_. c.u.m Tacitea indignatione dictum, cf. 4: _infectos_, so Gun.