4 Roman and Greek Questions, Fortune, Glory 6 248 3:26:40.

1 Bride touches fire and water: union, purity, shared fortune.

Wherefore do the Romans require a new-married woman to touch fire and water? Solution: Is it not for one of these reasons; amongst elements and principles, one is masculine and the other feminine; — one (fire) hath in it the principles of motion, the other (water) hath the faculty of a subject and matter? Or is it because fire refines and water cleanseth, and a married wife ought to continue pure and chaste? Or is it because fire without moisture doth not nourish, but is adust, and water destitute of heat is barren and sluggish; so both the male and female apart are of no force, but a conjunction of both in marriage completes society? Or is the meaning that they must never forsake each other, but must communicate in every fortune, and although there be no goods, yet they may participate with each other in fire and water?

2 Five torches: odd, generative number; invoke five nuptial gods.

Why do they light at nuptials five torches, neither more nor less, which they call waxen tapers? Solution: Whether it be (as Varro saith) that the Praetors use three, but more are permitted to the Aediles, and married persons do light the fire at the Aediles' torches? Or is it that, having use of many numbers, the odd number was reckoned better and perfecter upon other accounts, and therefore more adapted to matrimony? For the even number admits of division, and the equal parts of opposition and repugnancy, whenas the odd cannot be divided, but being divided into parts leaves always an inequality. The number five is most matrimonial of odd numbers, for three is the first odd and two is the first even, of which five is compounded, as of male and female. because light is a sign of generation, and it is natural to a woman, for the most part, to bring forth so far as five successively, and therefore they use five torches? Or is it because they suppose that married persons have occasion for five Gods, Nuptial Zeus, Nuptial Hera, Aphrodite, Suada, and above all the rest Artemis, whom women invocate in their travail and child-bed sickness?

3 Men avoid Patrician Artemis: rapist torn by dogs.

What is the reason that, seeing there are so many of Artemis's temples in Rome, the men refrain going into that only which stands in Patrician Street? Solution: Is it upon the account of the fabulous story, that a certain man, ravishing a woman that was there worshipping the Goddess, was torn in pieces by dogs; and hence this superstitious practice arose, that men enter not in?

4 Aventine horns: Servius outwits Sabine; sacrifices fated cow.

Why do they in all other temples of Artemis ordinarily nail up stags' horns against the wall, whereas in that of the Aventine they nail up the horns of cattle? Solution: Was it to put them in mind of an old casualty? For it is said, that among the Sabines one Antro Coratius had a very comely cow, far excelling all others in handsomeness and largeness, and was told by a certain diviner that whoever should offer up that cow in sacrifice to Artemis on the Aventine, his city was determined by fate to be the greatest in the world and have dominion over all Italy. This man came to Rome, with an intention to sacrifice his cow there; but a servant acquainted King Servius privately with this prophecy, and the king making it known to Cornelius the priest, Cornelius strictly commanded Antro to wash in Tiber before he sacrificed, for the law equires men so to do who would sacrifice acceptably. Wherefore, whilst Antro went to wash, Servius took the opportunity to sacrifice the cow to the Goddess, and nailed up the horns to the wall in the temple. These things are storied by Juba and Varro, only Varro hath not described Antro by that name, neither doth he say that the Sabine was chosen by Cornelius the priest, but by the sexton.

5 Supposed-dead reenter via roof: ritual rebirth, purification.

Wherefore is it that those that are falsely reported to be dead in foreign countries, when they return, they receive not by the doors, but getting up to the roof of the house, they let them in that way? Solution: Verily the account which Varro gives of this matter is altogether fabulous. For he saith, in the Sicilian war, when there was a great naval fight, and a very false report was rumored concerning many as if they were slain, all of them returning home in a little time died. But as one of them was going to enter in at his doors, they shut together against him of their own accord, neither could they be opened by any that attempted it. This man, falling in a sleep before the doors, saw an apparition in his sleep advising him to let himself down from the roof into the house, and doing so, he lived happily and became an old man; and hence the custom was confirmed to after ages. But consider if these things be not conformable to some usages of the Greeks. For they do not esteem those pure nor keep them company nor suffer them to approach their sacrifices, for whom any funeral was carried forth or sepulchre made as if they were dead; and they say that Aristinus, being one that was become an object of this sort of superstition, sent to Delphi to beg and beseech of the God a resolution of the anxieties and troubles which he had by reason of the custom then in force. Pythia answered thus: The sacred rites t' which child-bed folks conform, See that thou do to blessed Gods perform. Aristinus, well understanding the meaning of the oracle, puts himself into the women's hands, to be washed and wrapped in swaddling clouts, and sucks the breasts, in the same manner as when he was newly born; and thus all others do, and such are called Hysteropotmi (i.e. those for whom a funeral was made while living). But some say that these ceremonies were before Aristinus, and that the custom was ancient. Wherefore it is not to be wondered at, if the Romans, when once they suppose a man buried and to have his lot among the dead, do not think it lawful for him to go in at the door whereat they that are about to sacrifice do go out or those that have sacrificed do enter in, but bid them ascend aloft into the air, and thence descend into the open court of the house. For they constantly offer their sacrifices of purification in this open court.

6 Women kiss kin: detect wine, signal kinship.

Wherefore do women salute their relations with their mouth? Solution: What if it should be (as many suppose) that women were forbid to drink wine; therefore that those that drank it might not be undiscovered, but convicted when they met with their acquaintance, kissing became a custom? Or is it for the reason which Aristotle the philosopher hath told us? Even that thing which was commonly reported and said to be done in many places, it seems, was enterprised by the Trojan women in the confines of Italy. For after the men arrived and went ashore, the women set the ships on fire, earnestly longing to be discharged of their roving and seafaring condition; but dreading their husbands' displeasure, they fell on saluting their kindred and acquaintance that met them, by kissing and embracing; whereupon the husbands' anger being appeased and they reconciled, they used for the future this kind of compliment towards them. Or rather might this usage be granted to women as a thing that gained them reputation and interest, if they appeared hereby to have many and good kindred and acquaintance? Or was it that, it being unlawful to marry kinswomen, a courteous behavior might proceed so far as a kiss, and this was retained only as a significant sign of kindred and a note of a familiar converse among them? For in former time they did not marry women nigh by blood, — as now they marry not aunts or sisters, — but of late they allowed the marrying of cousins for the following reason. A certain man, mean in estate, but on the other hand an honest and a popular man among the citizens, designed to marry his cousin being an heiress, and to get an estate by her. Upon this account he was accused; but the people took little notice of the accusation, and absolved him of the fault, enacting by vote that it might be lawful for any man to marry so far as cousins, but prohibited it to all higher degrees of consanguinity.

7 Spouses exchange no gifts: avoid mercenary love.

7 Why is a husband forbid to receive a gift from his wife, and a wife from her husband? Solution: What if the reason be as Solon writes it, — describing gifts to be peculiar to dying persons, unless a man being entangled by necessity or wheedled by a woman be enslaved to force which constrains him, or to pleasure which persuades him, — that thus the gifts of husbands and wives became suspected? Or is it that they reputed a gift the basest sign of benevolence (for strangers and they that have no love for us do give us presents), and so took away such a piece of flattery from marriage, that to love and be beloved should be devoid of mercenariness, should be spontaneous and for its own sake, and not for any thing else? Or because women, being corrupted by receiving gifts, are thereby especially brought to admit strangers, did it seem to be a weighty thing to require them to love their own husbands that give them nothing? Or was it because all things ought to be common between them, the husbands' goods being the wives', and the wives' goods the husbands'? For he that accepts that which is given learns thereby to esteem that which is not given the property of another; so that, by giving but a little to each other, they strip each other of all.

8 No gifts in-laws: prevent indirect spousal transfers.

8 Why were they prohibited from taking a gift of a son-in-law or of a father-in-law? Solution: Is it not of a son-in-law, that a man may not seem to convey a gift to his wife by his father's hands? and of a father-in-law, because it seems just that he that doth not give should not receive?

9 Husbands send notice: prepare wife, household harmony.

9 Wherefore is it that they that have wives at home, if they be returning out of the country or from any remote parts, do send a messenger before, to acquaint them that they be at hand? Solution: Is not this an argument that a man believes his wife to be no idle gossip, whereas to come upon her suddenly and unexpectedly has a show as though he came hastily to catch her and observe her behavior? Or do they send the good tidings of their coming beforehand, as to them that are desirous of them and expect them? Or rather is it that they desire to enquire concerning their wives whether they are in health, and that they may find them at home looking for them? Or because, when the husbands are wanting, the women have more family concerns and business upon their hands, and there are more dissensions and hurly-burly among those that are within doors; therefore, that the wife may free herself from these things and give a calm and pleasant reception to her husband, she hath forewarning of his coming?

10 Heads covered in worship: humility, avert ill omens.

10 Wherefore do men in divine service cover their heads; but if they meet any honorable personages when they have their cloaks on their heads, they are uncovered? Solution: The latter part of the question seems to augment the difficulty of the former. If now the story told of Aeneas be true, that whilst Diomedes was passing by he offered a sacrifice with his head covered, it is rational and consequent that, while we cover our heads before our enemies, when we meet our friends and good men we should be uncovered. This behavior before the Gods therefore is not their peculiar right, but accidental, continuing to be observed since that example of Aeneas. If there is any thing further to be said, consider whether we ought not to enquire only after the reason why men in divine service are covered, the other being the consequence of it. For they that are uncovered before men of greater power do not thereby ascribe honor unto them, but rather remove envy from them, that they might not seem to demand or to endure the same kind of reverence which the Gods have, or to rejoice that they are served in the same manner as they. But they worship the Gods in this manner, either showing their unworthiness in all humility by the covering of the head, or rather fearing that some unlucky and ominous voice should come to them from abroad whilst they are praying; therefore they pluck up their cloaks about their ears. That they strictly observed these things is manifest in this, that when they went to consult the oracle, they made a great din all about by the tinkling of brass kettles. Or is it as Castor saith, that the Roman usages were conformable to the Pythagoric notion that the daemon within us stands in need of the Gods without us, and we make supplication to them with a covered head, intimating the body's hiding and absconding of the soul?

11 Saturn worship uncovered: ancient rite; god of truth.

11 Why do they sacrifice to Saturn with an uncovered head? Solution: Is this the reason, that, whereas Aeneas hath instituted the covering of the head in divine service, Saturn's sacrifice was much more ancient? Or is it that they are covered before celestial Gods, but reckon Saturn an infernal and terrestrial God? Or is it that nothing of the truth ought to be obscure and darkened, and the Romans repute Saturn to be the father of truth?

12 Saturn father of truth: time reveals all.

12 Why do they esteem Saturn the father of truth? Solution: Is it not the reason that some philosophers believe that Κϱόνος (Saturn) is the same with Χϱόνος (time), and time finds out truth? Or is it for that which was fabled of Saturn's age, that it was most just and most likely to participate of truth?

13 Honor worshipped bareheaded: glory unveiled, illustrious.

13 Why do they sacrifice to Honor (a God so-called) with a bare head? Solution: Is it because glory is splendid, illustrious, and unveiled, for which cause men are uncovered before good and honorable persons; and for this reason they thus worship the God that bears the name of honor?

14 Sons covered, daughters disheveled: honor versus lamentation.

14 Why do sons carry forth their parents at funerals with covered heads, but the daughters with uncovered and dishevelled hair? Solution: Is the reason because fathers ought to be honored by their sons as Gods, but be lamented by their daughters as dead, and so the law hath distributed to both their proper part? Or is it that what is not the fashion is fit for mourning? For it is more customary for women to appear publicly with covered heads, and for men with uncovered. Yea, among the Greeks, when any sad calamity befalls them, the women are polled close but the men wear their hair long, because the usual fashion for men is to be polled and for women to wear their hair long. Or was it enacted that sons should be covered, for the reason we have above mentioned (for verily, saith Varro, they surround their fathers' sepulchres at funerals, reverencing them as the temples of the Gods; and having burnt their parents, when they first meet with a bone, they say the deceased person is deified), but for women was it not lawful to cover their heads at funerals? History now tells us that the first that put away his wife was Spurius Carbilius, by reason of barrenness; the second was Sulpicius Gallus, seeing her pluck up her garments to cover her head; the third was Publius Sempronius, because she looked upon the funeral games.

15 Terminus bloodless: boundaries sacred to peace.

15 What is the reason that, esteeming Terminus a God (to whom they offer their Terminalia), they sacrifice no living creature to him? Solution: Was it that Romulus set no bounds to the country, that it might be lawful for a man to make excursions, to rob, and to reckon every part of the country his own (as the Spartan said) wherever he should pitch his spear; but Numa Pompilius, being a just man and a good commonwealthsman and a philosopher, set the boundaries towards the neighboring countries, and dedicated those boundaries to Terminus as the bishop and protector both of friendship and of peace, and it was his opinion that it ought to be preserved pure and undefiled from blood and slaughter?

16 Matuta excludes servants: mythic jealousy reenacted.

16 Why is it that the temple of Matuta is not to be gone into by maid-servants; but the ladies bring in one only, and her they box and cuff? Solution: If to baste this maid be a sign that they ought not to enter, then they prohibit others according to the fable. For Ino, being jealous of her husband's loving the servant-maid, is reported to have fell outrageously upon her son. The Grecians say the maid was of an Aitolian family, and was called Antiphera. Therefore with us also in Chaeronea the sexton, standing before the temple of Leucothea (Matuta) holding a wand in his hand, makes proclamation that no man-servant nor maid-servant, neither man nor woman Aitolian, should enter in.

17 Pray for siblings’ children: foster familial benevolence.

17 Why do they not supplicate this Goddess for good things for their own children, but for their brethren's and sisters' children? Solution: Was it because Ino was a lover of her sister and nursed up her children, but had hard fortune in her own children? Or otherwise, in that it is a moral and good custom, and makes provision of much benevolence towards relations?

18 Tithe to Hercules: curb wealth; honor frugality.

18 Why do many of the richer sort pay tithe of their estates to Hercules? Solution: Is this the reason, that Hercules sacrificed the tenth part of Geryon's oxen at Rome? Or that he freed the Romans from the decimation under the Etrurians? Or that these things have no sufficient ground of credit from history, but that they sacrificed bountifully to Hercules, as to a certain monstrous glutton and gormandizer of good cheer? Or did they rather do it, restraining extravagant riches as a nuisance to the commonwealth, as it were to diminish something of that thriving constitution that grows up to the highest pitch of corpulency; being of opinion that Hercules was most of all honored with and rejoiced in these frugalities and contractions of abundance, and that he himself was frugal, content with a little, and every way sparing in his way of living?

19 January first: consuls begin; post-solstice renewal.

19 Why do they take the month of January for the beginning of the new year? Solution: Anciently March was reckoned the first, as is plain by many other marks and especially by this, that the fifth month from March was called Quintilis, and the sixth Sextilis, and so forward to the last. December was so called, being reckoned the tenth from March; hence it came to pass that some are of opinion and do affirm that the Romans formerly did not complete the year with twelve months, but with ten only, allotting to some of the months above thirty days. But others give us an account that, as December is the tenth from March, January is the eleventh and February the twelfth; in which month they use purifications, and perform funeral rites for the deceased upon the finishing of the year; but this order of the months being changed, they now make January the first, because on the first day of this month (which day they call the Kalends of January) the first consuls were constituted, the kings being deposed. But some speak with a greater probability, which say that Romulus, being a warlike and martial man and reputing himself the son of Mars, set March in the front of all the months, and named it from Mars; but Numa again, being a peaceable prince and ambitious to bring off the citizens from warlike achievements, set them upon husbandry, gave the pre-eminence to January, and brought Janus into a great reputation, as he was more addicted to civil government and husbandry than to warlike affairs. Now consider whether Numa hath not pitched upon a beginning of the year most suitable to our natural disposition. For there is nothing at all in the whole circumvolution of things naturally first or last, but by law or custom some appoint one beginning of time, some another; but they do best who take this beginning from after the winter solstice, when the sun, ceasing to make any further progress, returns and converts his course again to us. For there is then a kind of tropic in nature itself, which verily increaseth the time of light to us and shortens the time of darkness, and makes the Lord and Ruler of the whole current of nature to approach nearer to us.

20 No myrtle for Bona: avoid Venus, sexual impurity.

20 When the women beautify the temple of the Goddess appropriate to women, which they call Bona, why do they bring no myrtle into the house, although they be zealous of using all budding and flowering vegetables? Solution: Is not the reason (as the fabulous write the story) this, that the wife of Faulius a diviner, having drunk wine secretly and being discovered, was whipped by her husband with myrtle rods; hence the women bring in no myrtle, but offer to her a drink-offering of wine, which they call milk? Or is it this, that, as they abstain from many things, so especially they reserve themselves chaste from all things that appertain to venery when they perform that divine service; for they do not only turn their husbands out of doors but banish from the house every male kind, when they exercise this canonical obedience to their Goddess. They therefore reject myrtle as an abomination, it being consecrated to Aphrodite; and the Aphrodite whom at this day they call Murcia they anciently called Myrtia, as it would seem.

21 Woodpecker sacred: linked to Mars, Romulus.

21 Why do the Latins worship a woodpecker, and all of them abstain strictly from this bird? Solution: Is it because one Picus by the enchantments of his wife transformed himself, and becoming a woodpecker uttered oracles, and gave oraculous answers to them that enquired? Or, if this be altogether incredible and monstrous, there is another of the romantic stories more probable, about Romulus and Remus, when they were exposed in the open field, that not only a she-wolf gave them suck, but a certain woodpecker flying to them fed them; for even now it is very usual that in meads and groves where a woodpecker is found there is also a wolf, as Nigidius writes. Or rather, as they deem other birds sacred to various Gods, so do they deem this sacred to Mars? For it is a daring and fierce bird, and hath so strong a beak as to drill an oak to the heart by pecking, and cause it to fall.

22 Janus double-faced: civilizer, transition from barbarism.

22 Why are they of opinion that Janus was double-faced, and do describe and paint him so? Solution: Was it because he was a native Greek of Perrhaebia (as they story it), and going down into Italy and cohabiting with the barbarians of the country, changed his language and way of living? Or rather because he persuaded those people of Italy that were savage and lawless to a civil life, in that he converted them to husbandry and formed them into commonwealths?

23 Funeral goods at Libitina: birth and death united.

23 Why do they sell things which pertain to funerals in the temple of Libitina, seeing they are of opinion that Libitina is Aphrodite? Solution: Was it that this was one of the wise institutions of King Numa, that they might learn not to esteem these things irksome nor fly from them as a defilement? Or rather is it to put us in mind that whatever is born must die, there being one Goddess that presides over them that are born and those that die? And at Delphi there is the statue of Aphrodite Epitymbia (on a tomb), to which at their drink-offerings they call forth the ghosts of the deceased.

24 Kalends, Nones, Ides: lunar phases mark months.

24 Why have they three beginnings and appointed periods in the months which have not the same interval of days between? Solution: What if it be this (as Juba writes), that on the Kalends the magistrates called (ϰαλεῖν) the people, and proclaimed the Nones for the fifth, while the Ides they esteemed an holy day? Or rather that they who define time by the variations of the moon have observed that the moon comes under three greatest variations monthly; the first is when it is obscured, making a conjunction with the sun; the second is when it gets out of the rays of the sun and makes her first appearance after the sun is down; the third is at her fulness, when it is full moon. They call her disappearance and obscurity the Kalends, for every thing hid and privy they call clam, and celare is to hide. The first appearance they call the Nones, by a most fit notation of names, it being the new moon (novilunium); for they call it new moon as we do. Ides are so called either by reason of the fairness and clear form (εἰδος) of the moon standing forth in her complete splendor, or from the name of Zeus (Διός). But in this matter we are not to search for the exact number of days, nor to abuse this approximate mode of reckoning; seeing that even at this day, when the science of astronomy has made so great increase, the inequality of the motion and course of the moon surpasseth all experience of mathematicians and cannot be reduced to any certain rule of reason.

25 Post-festival days unlucky: preparation, even-number superstition.

25 Why do they determine that the days after the Kalends, Nones, and Ides are unfit to travel or go a long journey in? Solution: Was it (as most men think, and Livy tells us) because on the next day after the Ides of Quintilis (which they now call July), the tribunes of the soldiery marching forth, the army was conquered by the Gauls in a battle about the river Allia and lost the city, whereupon this day was reckoned unlucky; and superstition (as it loves to do) extended this observation further, and subjected the next days after the Nones and Kalends to the same scrupulosity? Or what if this notion meet with much contradiction? For it was on another day they were defeated in battle, which they call Alliensis (from the river) and greatly abominate as unsuccessful; and whereas there be many unlucky days, they do not observe them in all the months alike, but every one in the month it happens in, and it is most improbable that all the next days after the Nones and Kalends simply considered should contract this superstition. Consider now whether — as they consecrated the first of the months to the Olympic Gods, and the second to the infernals, wherein they solemnize some purifications and funeral rites to the ghosts of the deceased — they have so constituted the three which have been spoken of, as it were, the chief and principal days for festival and holy days, designating the next following these to daemons and deceased persons, which days they esteemed unfortunate and unfit for action. And also the Grecians, worshipping their Gods at the new of the moon, dedicated the next day to heroes and daemons, and the second of the cups was mingled on the behalf of the male and female heroes. Moreover, time is altogether a number; and unity, which is the foundation of a number, is of a divine nature. The number next is two, opposite to the first, and is the first of even numbers. But an even number is defective, imperfect, and indefinite; as again an odd number is determinate, definite, and complete. Therefore the Nones succeed the Kalends on the fifth day, the Ides follow the Nones on the ninth, for odd numbers do determine the beginnings. But those even numbers which are next after the beginnings have not that pre-eminence nor influence; hence on such days they take not any actions or journey in hand. Wherefore that of Themistocles hath reason in it. "The Day after the feast contended with the Feast-day, saying that the Feast-day had much labor and toil, but she (the Day after the feast) afforded the fruition of the provision made for the Feast-day, with much leisure and quietness. The Feast-day answered after this wise: Thou speakest truth; but if I had not been, neither hadst thou been." These things spake Themistocles to the Athenian officers of the army, who succeeded him, signifying that they could never have made any figure in the world had not he saved the city. Since therefore every action and journey worth our diligent management requires necessary provision and preparation, but the Romans of old made no family provision on feast-days, nor were careful for any thing but that they might attend divine service, — and this they did with all their might, as even now the priests enjoin them in their proclamations when they proceed to the sacrifices, — in like manner they did not rush presently after their festival solemnities upon a journey or any enterprise (because they were unprovided), but finished that day in contriving domestic affairs and fitting themselves for the intended occasion abroad. And as even at this day, after they have said their prayers and finished their devotion, they are wont to stay and sit still in the temples, so they did not join working days immediately to holy days, but made some interval and distance between them, secular affairs bringing many troubles and distractions along with them.

26 White mourning: purity, simplicity, undyed sincerity.

26 Why do women wear for mourning white mantles and white kerchiefs? Solution: What if they do this in conformity to the Magi, who, as they say, standing in defiance of death and darkness, do fortify themselves with bright and splendid robes? Or, as the dead corpse is wrapped in white, so do they judge it meet that the relations should be conformable thereto? For they beautify the body so, since they cannot the soul; wherefore they wish to follow it as having gone before, pure and white, being dismissed after it hath fought a great and various warfare. Or is it that what is very mean and plain is most becoming in these things? For garments dyed of a color argue either luxury or vanity. Neither may we say less of black than of sea-green or purple, "Verily garments are deceitful, and so are colors." And a thing that is naturally black is not dyed by art but by nature, and is blended with an intermixed shade. It is white only therefore that is sincere, unmixed, free from the impurity of a dye, and inimitable; therefore most proper to those that are buried. For one that is dead is become simple, unmixed, and pure, freed from the body no otherwise than from a tingeing poison. In Argos they wear white in mourning, as Socrates saith, vestments rinsed in water.

27 Walls sacred, gates not: boundaries inviolable; passage practical.

27 Why do they repute every wall immaculate and sacred, but the gates not so? Solution: Is it (as Varro hath wrote) that the wall is to be accounted sacred, that they might defend it cheerfully and even lay down their lives for it? Upon this very account it appears that Romulus slew his brother, because he attempted to leap over a sacred and inaccessible place, and to render it transcendible and profane; but it could not possibly be that the gates should be kept sacred, through which they carried many things that necessity required, even dead corpses. When they built a city from the foundation, they marked out with a plough the place on which they intended to build it, yoking a bull and a cow together; but when they did set out the bounds of the walls, measuring the space of the gates, they lifted up the ploughshare and carried the plough over it, believing that all the ploughed part should be sacred and inviolable.

28 Swear by Hercules outdoors: restrain rash oaths.

28 Why do they prohibit the children to swear by Hercules within doors, but command them to go out of doors to do it? Solution: Is the reason (as some say) that they are of opinion that Hercules was not delighted in a domestic life, but chose rather to live abroad in the fields? Or rather because he was none of their native country Gods, but a foreigner? For neither do they swear by Dionysos within doors, he being a foreigner, if it be he whom the Greeks call Dionysus. Or what if these things are uttered in sport to amuse children; and is this, on the contrary, for a restraint of a frivolous and rash oath, as Favorinus saith? For that which is done, as it were, with preparation causes delay and deliberation. If a man judges as Favorinus doth of the things recorded about Hercules, it would seem that this was not common to other Gods, but peculiar to him; for history tells us that he had such a religious veneration for an oath, that he swore but once only to Phyleus, son of Augeas. Wherefore the Pythia upbraids the Lacedemonians with such swearing, as though it would be more laudable and better to pay their vows than to swear.

29 Bride carried over threshold: symbolic force, permanence.

29 Why do they not permit the new married woman herself to step over the threshold of the house, but the bridemen lift her over? Solution: What if the reason be that they, taking their first wives by force, brought them thus into their houses, when they went not in of their own accord? Or is it that they will have them seem to enter into that place as by force, not willingly, where they are about to lose their virginity? Or is it a significant ceremony to show that she is not to go out or leave her dwelling-place till she is forced, even as she goes in by force? For with us also in Boeotia they burn the axletree of a cart before the doors, intimating that the spouse is bound to remain there, the instrument of carriage being destroyed.

30 “Where Caius, Caia”: shared authority, partnership.

30 Why do the bridemen that bring in the bride require her to say, "Where thou Caius art, there am I Caia"? Solution: What if the reason be that by mutual agreement she enters presently upon participation of all things, even to share in the government, and that this is the meaning of it, Where thou art lord and master of the family, there am I also dame and mistress of the family; while these common names they use promiscuously, as the lawyers do Caius, Seius, Lucius, Titius, and the philosophers use the names of Dion and Theon? Or is it from Caia Secilia, an honest and good woman, married to one of Tarquinius's sons, who had her statue of brass erected in the temple of Sancus? On this statue were anciently hanged sandals and spindles, as significant memorials of her housewifery and industry.

31 Thalassius sung: Sabine abduction legend.

31 Why is that so much celebrated name Thalassius sung at nuptials? Solution: Is it not from wool-spinning? For the Romans call the Greek τάλαϱος (wool-basket) talasus. Moreover, when they have introduced the bride, they spread a fleece under her; and she, having brought in with her a distaff and a spindle, all behangs her husband's door with woollen yarn? Or it may be true, as historians report, that there was a certain young man famous in military achievements, and also an honest man, whose name was Thalassius; now when the Romans seized by force on the Sabine daughters coming to see the theatric shows, a comely virgin for beauty was brought to Thalassius by some of the common sort of people and retainers to him, crying out aloud (that they might go the more securely, and that none might stop them or take the wench from them) that she was carried as a wife to Thalassius; upon which the rest of the rabble, greatly honoring Thalassius, followed on and accompanied them with their loud acclamations, praying for and praising Thalassius; that proving a fortunate match, it became a custom to others at nuptials to call over Thalassius, as the Greeks do Hymenaeus." Question

32 May effigies “Argives”: substitute for ancient sacrifices.

32. Why do they that throw the effigies of men from a wooden bridge into the river, in the month of May, about the full moon, call those images Argives? Solution: Was it that the barbarians that of old inhabited about that place did in this manner destroy the Grecians which they took? Or did their so much admired Hercules reform their practice of killing strangers, and teach them this custom of representing their devilish practice by casting in of images? The ancients have usually called all Grecians Argives. Or else it may be that, since the Arcadians esteemed the Argives open enemies by reason of neighborhood, they that belonged to Evander, flying from Greece and taking up their situation in Italy, kept up that malignity and enmity.

33 Sons dine with fathers: enforce parental sobriety.

33 Why would they not in ancient times sup abroad without their sons, whilst they were in nonage? Solution: Was not this custom brought in by Lycurgus, when he introduced the boys to the public mess, that they might be inured to use of pleasures modestly, not savagely and rudely, having their superiors by them as overseers and observers? Verily it is of no small concernment that parents should carry themselves with all gravity and sobriety in the presence of their children. For when old men are debauched, it will necessarily follow (as Plato saith) that young men will be most debauched.

34 Brutus honors dead in December: year-end rites, Saturnals.

34 What is the reason that, when the other Romans did offer their offerings and libations to the dead in the month of February, Decimus Brutus (as Cicero saith) did it in December? He verily was the first who, entering upon Lusitania, passed from thence with his army over the river Lethe. Solution: May it not be that, as many were wont to perform funeral rites in the latter part of the day and end of the month, it is rational to believe that at the return of the year and end of the month also he would honor the dead? For December is the last month. Or were those adorations paid to the infernal Gods, and was it the season of the year to honor them when all sorts of fruits had attained ripeness? Or is it because they move the earth at the beginning of seed-time, and it is most meet then to remember the ghosts below? Or is it that this month is by the Romans consecrated to Saturn, whom they reckon to be one of the infernal Gods and not of the supernal? Or that whilst the great feast of Saturnals did last, thought to be attended with the greatest feasting and voluptuous enjoyments, it was judged meet to crop off some first-fruits of these for the dead? Or what if it be a mere lie that only Brutus did sacrifice to the dead in this month, since they solemnize funeral rites for Laurentia and offer drink-offerings at her tomb in the month of December?

35 Laurentia revered: Hercules’ favor; left fortune to Rome.

35 Why do they adore Laurentia so much, seeing she was a strumpet? Solution: They say that Acca Laurentia, the nurse of Romulus, was diverse from this, and her they ascribe honor to in the month of April. But this other Laurentia, they say, was surnamed Fabula, and she became noted on this occasion. A certain sexton that belonged to Hercules, as it seems, leading an idle life, used to spend most of his days at draughts and dice; and on a certain time, when it happened that none of those that were wont to play with him and partake of his sport were present, being very uneasy in himself, he challenged the God to play a game at dice with him for this wager, that if he got the game he should receive some boon from the God, if he lost it he would provide a supper for the God and a pretty wench for him to lie with. Whereupon choosing two dice, one for himself and the other for the God, and throwing them, he lost the game; upon which, abiding by his challenge, he prepared a very splendid table for the God, and picking up Laurentia, a notorious harlot, he set her down to the good cheer; and when he had made a bed for her in the temple, he departed and shut the doors after him. The report went that Hercules came, but had not to do with her after the usual manner of men, and commanded her to go forth early in the morning into the market-place, and whomsoever she first happened to meet with, him she should especially set her heart upon and procure him to be her copemate. Laurentia accordingly arising and going forth happened to meet with a certain rich man, a stale bachelor, whose name was Taruntius. He lying with her made her whilst he lived the governess of his house, and his heiress when he died; some time after, she died and left her estate to the city, and therefore they have her in so great a reputation.

36 “Window” gate: Fortune enters Servius; Tanaquil proclaims him.

36 Why do they call one gate at Rome the Window, just by which is the bed-chamber of Fortune, so called? Solution: Was it because Servius, who became the most successful king, was believed to have conversed with Fortune, who came in to him at a window? Or may this be but a fable; and was it that Tarquinius Priscus the king dying, his wife Tanaquil, being a discreet and royal woman, putting her head out at a window, propounded Servius to the citizens, and persuaded them to proclaim him king; and that this place had the name of it?

37 War spoils may decay: trophies fade; don’t renew hatred.

37 Why is it that, of the things dedicated to the Gods, the law permits only the spoils taken in war to be neglected and by time to fall into decay, and permits them not to have any veneration nor reparation? Solution: Is this the reason, that men may be of opinion that the renown of ancestors fades away, and may always be seeking after some fresh monument of fortitude? Or rather because time wears out the marks of contention with our enemies, and to restore and renew them were invidious and malicious? Neither among the Greeks are those men renowned who were the first erectors of stone or brass trophies.

38 No bird-omens after August: year “declines”; birds molt.

38 Why did Q. Metellus, being a high priest and otherwise reputed a wise man and a statesman, prohibit the use of divination from birds after the Sextile month, now called August? Solution: Is it not that — as we make such observations about noon or early in the day, and also in the beginning or middle of the month (when the moon is new or increasing), but beware of the times of the days or month's decline as unlucky — so he also was of opinion that the time of year after eight months was, as it were, the evening of the year, when it declined and hastened towards an end? Or is it because they must use thriving and full-grown birds? For such are in summer; but towards autumn some are moulting and sickly, others chickens and unfledged, others altogether vanished and fled out of the country by reason of the season of the year.

39 Unmustered can’t kill: without commission equals murder.

39 Why is it unlawful for such as are not mustered (although they be otherwise conversant in the army) to slay an enemy or wound him? Solution: This thing Cato Senior hath made clear in a certain epistle, writing to his son and commanding him, if he be discharged of the army having fulfilled his time there, to return; but if he stay, to take commission from the general to march forth in order to wounding and slaying the enemy. Is it the reason, that necessity alone can give warrant for the killing of a man, while he that doth this illegally and without commission is a murderer? Therefore Cyrus commended Chrysantas that, when he was about to slay an enemy and had lifted up his scimitar to take his blow, hearing a retreat sounded, he let the man alone and smote him not, as being prohibited. Or is it that, if a man conflicts and fights with his enemies and falls under a consternation, he ought to be liable to answer for it, and not escape punishment? For verily he doth not advantage his side so much by smiting and wounding him, as he doth mischief by turning his back and flying. Therefore he that is disbanded is freed from martial laws; but when he doth petition to perform the office of a soldier, he doth again subject himself to military discipline and put himself under the command of his general.

40 Zeus priest not anointed outside: modesty; avoid Greek effeminacy.

40 Wherefore was it unlawful for a priest of Zeus to be anointed abroad in the air? Solution: Was it not because it was neither honest nor decent to strip the sons naked whilst the father looked on, nor the son-in-law whilst the father-in-law looked on? Neither in ancient times did they wash together. Verily Zeus is the father, and that which is abroad in the open air may be especially said to be as it were in the sight of Zeus. Or is it thus? As it is a profane thing for him to strip himself naked in the temple or holy place, so did they reverence the open air and firmament, as being full of Gods and Daemons? Wherefore we do many necessary things within doors, hiding and covering ourselves in our houses from the sight of the Gods. Or is it that some things are enjoined to the priest only, other things to all by a law delivered by the priest? With us (in Boeotia) to wear a crown, to wear long hair, to carry iron arms, and not to enter the Phocian borders are peculiar, proper pieces of the magistrate's service; but not to taste autumnal fruits before the autumnal equinox, and not to cut a vine before the spring equinox, are things required of all by the magistrate. For each of these has its season. After the same manner (as it appears) among the Romans it is peculiar to the priest neither to make use of a horse, nor to be absent from home in a journey more than three nights, nor to put off his cap, on which account he is called Flamen. Many other things are enjoined to all sorts of men by the priest; of which one is not to be anointed abroad in the open air. For the Romans have a great prejudice against dry unction; and they are of opinion that nothing hath been so great a cause to the Grecians of slavery and effeminancy as their fencing and wrestling schools, insinuating so much debauchery and idleness into the citizens, yea, vicious sloth and buggery; yea, that they destroyed the very bodies of youths with sleeping, perambulations, dancing, and delicious feeding, whereby they insensibly fell from the use of arms, and instead of being good soldiers and horsemen, loved to be called nimble, good wrestlers, and pretty men. It is hard for them to avoid these mischiefs who are unclothed in the open air; but they that are anointed within doors and cure themselves at home do commit none of these vices.

41 Coin: Janus head, ship: good laws and trade.

41 Why had the ancient coin on one side the image of double-faced Janus stamped, and on the other side the stern or stem of a ship? Solution: What if it be (as they commonly say) in honor of Saturn, that sailed over into Italy in a ship? Or, if this be no more than what may be said of many others besides (for Janus, Evander, and Aeneas all came by sea into Italy), a man may take this to be more probable: whereas some things serve for the beauty of a city, some things for necessary accommodation, the greatest part of the things that beautify a city is a good constitution of government, and the greatest part for necessary accommodation is good trading; whereas now Janus had erected a good frame of government among them, reducing them to a sober manner of life, and the river being navigable afforded plenty of all necessary commodities, bringing them in partly from the sea and partly from the out-borders of the country, their coin had a significant stamp, on one side the double-faced head of the legislator (as hath been said) by reason of the change made by him in their affairs, and on the other a small ship because of the river. They used also another sort of coin, having engraven on it an ox, a sheep, and a sow, to show that they traded most in such cattle, and got their riches from these; hence were many of the names among the ancients derived, as Suillii, Bubulci, and Porcii, as Fenestella tells us.

42 Saturn temple holds treasury: Saturn’s age = justice; secure site.

42 Why do they use the temple of Saturn for a chamber of public treasury, as also an office of record for contracts? Solution: Is not this the reason, because this saying hath obtained credit, that there was no avarice or injustice among men while Saturn ruled, but faith and righteousness? Or was it that this God presided over the fruits of the field and husbandry? For the sickle signified as much, and not, as Antimachus was persuaded and wrote with Hesiod: With crooked falk Saturn 'gainst heavens fought, Cut off his father's privities, foul bout. Money is produced from plenty of fruit and the vent of them, therefore they make Saturn the author and preserver of their felicity. That which confirms this is that the conventions assembled every ninth day in the marketplace (which they call Nundinae) they reckon sacred to Saturn, because the abundance of fruit gave the first occasion of buying and selling. Or are these things farfetched, and was the first that contrived this Saturnine chamber of bank Valerius Publicola, upon the suppression of the kings, being persuaded it was a strong place, conspicuous, and not easily undermined by treachery?

43 Ambassadors registered there: quaestors managed foreign guests.

43 Wherefore did ambassadors, from whencesoever they came to Rome, go to Saturn's temple, and there have their names recorded before the treasurers? Solution: Was this the cause, that Saturn was a foreigner, and therefore much rejoiced in strangers? Or is this better resolved by history? Anciently (as it seems) the quaestors sent entertainment to the ambassadors (they called the present lautia), they took care also of the sick, and buried their dead out of their public stock; but now of late, because of the multitude of ambassadors that come, that expense is left off; yet it remains still in use to bring the ambassadors unto the treasurers, that their names may be recorded.

44 Zeus priests can’t swear: avoid curses, perjury risk.

44 Why is it not lawful for Zeus's priests to swear? Solution: Is it not the reason, that an oath is a kind of test imposed on a free people, but the body and mind of a priest ought to be free from imposition? Or is it not unlikely that he will be disbelieved in smaller matters, who is entrusted with divine and greater? Or is it that every oath concludes with an execration of perjury? And an execration is a fearful and a grievous thing. Hence neither is it thought fit that priests should curse others. Wherefore the priestess at Athens was commended for refusing to curse Alcibiades, when the people required her to do it; for she said, I am a praying not a cursing priestess. Or is it that the danger of perjury is of a public nature, if a perjured and impious person presides in offering up prayers and sacrifices on the behalf of the city?

45 Veneralia wine flows: vow after victory; teach sobriety.

45 Why is it that in the solemn feast called Veneralia they let wine run so freely out of the temple of Aphrodite? Solution: Is this the reason (as some say), that Mezentius the Etrurian general sent to make a league with Aeneas, upon the condition that he might have a yearly tribute of wine; Aeneas refusing, Mezentius engaged to the Etrurians that he would take the wine by force of arms and give it to them; Aeneas, hearing of his promise, devoted his wine to the Gods, and after the victory he gathered in the vintage, and poured it forth before the temple of Aphrodite? Or is this a teaching ceremony, that we should feast with sobriety and not excess, as if the Gods were better pleased with the spillers of wine than with the drinkers of it?

46 Horta temple always open: goddess of urging, vigilance.

46 Wherefore would the ancients have the temple of Horta to stand always open? Solution: Is this the reason (as Antistius Labeo hath told us), that hortari signifies to quicken one to an action, that Horta is such a Goddess as exhorts and excites to good things, and that they suppose therefore that she ought always to be in business, never procrastinate, therefore not to be shut up or locked? Or is it rather that Hora, as now they call her (the first syllable pronounced long), being a kind of an active and busy Goddess, very circumspect and careful, they were of opinion that she was never lazy nor neglectful of human affairs? Or is it that this is a Greek name, as many others of them are, and signifies a Goddess that always oversees and inspects affairs; and that therefore she has her temple always open, as one that never slumbers nor sleeps? But if Labeo deduceth Hora aright from hortari, consider whether orator may not rather be said to be derived from thence, — since the orator, being an exhorting and exciting person, is a counsellor or leader of the people, — and not from imprecation and prayer (orando), as some say.

47 Vulcan temple outside: fire danger; or secret council.

47 Why did Romulus build the temple of Vulcan without the city? Solution: What if it were by reason of that fabled grudge which Vulcan had against Mars for the sake of Aphrodite, that Romulus, being reputed the son of Mars, would not make Vulcan a cohabitant of the same house or city with him? Or may this be a silly reason; and was that temple at first built by Romulus for a senate house and a privy council, for him to consult on state affairs together with Tatius, where they might be retired with the senators, and sit in consultation about matters quietly without interruption from the multitude? Or was it that Rome was formerly in danger of being burnt from heaven; and he thought good to adore that God, but to place his habitation without the city?

48 Consualia rest animals: honor Consus/Poseidon; grant leisure.

48 Wherefore did they, in the feasts called Consualia, put garlands on the horses and asses, and take these beasts off from all work? Solution: Was it not because they celebrated that feast to Poseidon the cavalier, who was called Consus, and the ass takes part and share with the horse in his rest from labor? Or was it that, after navigation came in and traffic by sea, there succeeded a kind of ease and leisure to the cattle in some kind or other?

49 Candidates without tunics: stop bribery; show scars; humble.

49 Wherefore was it a custom among the candidates for magistracy to present themselves in their togas without tunics, as Cato tells us? Solution: Was it not that they should not carry money in their bosoms to buy votes with? Or is it that they preferred no man as fit for the magistracy for the sake of his birth, riches, or honors, but for his wounds and scars; and that these might be visible to them that came about them, they came without tunics to the elections? Or, as by courteous behavior, supplication, and submission, so by humbling themselves in nakedness did they gain on the affections of the common people?

50 Flamen resigns if wife dies: rites need wife; grief.

50 Why did the Flamen Dialis (Zeus's priest), when his wife died, lay down his priestly dignity, as Ateius tells us? Solution: Is it not for this reason, because he that marries a wife and loses her after marriage is more unfortunate than he that never took a wife; for the family of a married man is completed, but the family of him that is married and loseth his wife is not only incomplete but mutilated? Or is it because his wife joins with the husband in consecration (as there are many sacred rites that ought not to be performed unless the wife be present), but to marry another immediately after he hath lost the former wife is not perhaps easy to do, and besides is not convenient? Hence it was not lawful formerly to put away a wife, nor is it at this present lawful; except that Domitian in our remembrance, being petitioned, granted it. The priests were present at this dissolution of marriage, doing many terrible, strange, and uncouth actions. But thou wilt wonder less, if thou art informed by history that, when one of the censors died, his partner was required to lay down his place. When Livius Drusus died, Aemilius Scaurus his colleague would not abandon his government before one of the tribunes of the people committed him to prison.

51 Lares with dog: guardians—fierce to strangers, kind within.

51 Why is a dog set before the Lares, whom they properly call Praestites, while the Lares themselves are covered with dogs' skins? Solution: Is it that Praestites are they that preside, and it is fit that presidents should be keepers, and should be frightful to strangers (as dogs are) but mild and gentle to those of the family? Or is it rather what some Romans assert, that — as some philosophers who follow Chrysippus are of the opinion that evil spirits wander up and down, which the Gods do use as public executioners of unholy and wicked men — so the Lares are a certain sort of furious and revengeful daemons, that are observers of men's lives and families, and are here clothed with dogs' skins and have a dog sitting by them, as being sagacious to hunt upon the foot and to prosecute wicked men?

52 Dog to Mana Geneta: like Hecate; “no homeborn good”=no deaths.

52 Why do they sacrifice a dog to Mana Geneta, and pray that no home-born should become good? Solution: Is the reason that Geneta is a deity that is employed about the generation and purgation of corruptible things? For this word signifies a certain flux (i.e. Mana from manare) and generation, or a flowing generation; for as the Greeks do sacrifice a dog to Hecate, so do the Romans to Geneta on the behalf of the natives of the house. Moreover, Socrates saith that the Argives do sacrifice a dog to Eilioneia (Lucina) to procure a facility of delivery. But what if the prayer be not made for men, but for dogs puppied at home, that none of them should be good; for dogs ought to be currish and fierce? Or is it that they that are deceased are pleasantly called good; and hence, speaking mystically in their prayer, they signify their desire that no home-born should die? Neither ought this to seem strange; for Aristotle says that it is written in the treaty of the Arcadians with the Lacedemonians that none of the Tegeates should be "made good" on account of aid rendered to the party of the Lacedemonians, i.e. that none should be slain.

53 “Sardians” sold at games: mock Veientes’ king; Lydian link.

53 Why is it that to this very day, while they hold the games at the Capitol, they set Sardians to sale by a crier, and a certain old man goes before in way of derision, carrying a child's bauble about his neck, which they call bulla? Solution: Was it because a people of the Tuscans called Veientes maintained a fight a long time with Romulus, and he took this city last of all, and exposed them and their king to sale by an outcry, upbraiding him with his madness and folly? And since the Tuscans were Lydians at first, and Sardis was the metropolis of the Lydians, so they set the Veientes to sale under the name of Sardians, and to this day they keep up the custom in a way of pastime.

54 Macellum name: from cook word; or robber Macellus.

54 Why do they call the flesh-market Macellum? Solution: Was it not by corrupting the word μάγειϱος, a cook, as with many other words, that the custom hath prevailed? For C and G are nigh akin to one another, and g came more lately into use, being inserted among the other letters by Sp. Carbilius; and now by lispers and stammerers L is pronounced instead of R. Or this matter may be made clear by a story. It is reported, that at Rome there was a stout man, a robber, who had robbed many, and being taken with much difficulty, was brought to condign punishment: his name was Macellus, out of whose riches a public meat-market was built, which bare his name.

55 Minstrels cross-dress: tricked back to Rome in women’s robes.

55 Why are the minstrels allowed to go about the city on the Ides of January, wearing women's apparel? Solution: Is it for the reason here rehearsed? This sort of men (as it seems) had great privileges accruing to them from the grant of King Numa, by reason of his godly devotion; which things afterward being taken from them when the Decemviri managed the government, they forsook the city. Whereupon there was a search made for them, and one of the priests, offering sacrifice without music, made a superstitious scruple of so doing. And when they returned not upon invitation, but led their lives in Tibur, a certain freedman told the magistrates privately that he would undertake to bring them. And providing a plentiful feast, as if he had sacrificed to the Gods, he invited the minstrels; women-kind was present also, with whom they revelled all night, sporting and dancing. There on a sudden the man began a speech, and being surprised with a fright, as if his patron had come in upon him, persuaded the pipers to ascend the caravans that were covered all over with skins, saying he would carry them back to Tibur. But this whole business was but a trepan; for he wheeling about the caravan, and they perceiving nothing by reason of wine and darkness, he very cunningly brought them all into Rome by the morning. Most of them, by reason of the night-revel and the drink that they were in, happened to be clothed in flowered women's robes; whereupon, being prevailed upon by the magistrates and reconciled, it was decreed that they should go up and down the city on that day, habited after this manner.

56 Carmenta temple by matrons: childbirth strike; oracle-goddess.

56 Why are they of opinion that matrons first built the temple of Carmenta, and at this day do they worship her most? Solution: There is a certain tradition that, when the women were prohibited by the senate from the use of chariots drawn by a pair of horses, they conspired together not to be got with child and breed children, and in this manner to be revenged on their husbands until they revoked the decree and gratified them; which being done, children were begot, and the women, becoming good breeders and very fruitful, built the temple of Carmenta. Some say that Carmenta was Evander's mother, and going into Italy was called Themis, but as some say, Nicostrata; who, when she sang forth oracles in verse, was called Carmenta by the Latins; for they call verses carmina. There are some of opinion that Carmenta was a Destiny, therefore the matrons sacrifice to her. But the etymology of the word is from carens mente (beside herself), by reason of divine raptures. Hence Carmenta had not her name from carmina; but contrariwise, her verses were called carmina from her, because being inspired she sang her oracles in verse.

57 Rumina milk not wine: goddess of nursing, infant safety.

57 What is the reason that, when the women do sacrifice to Rumina, they pour forth milk plentifully on the sacrifices, but offer no wine? Solution: Is it because the Latins call a breast ruma, and that tree (as they say) is called ruminalis under which the she-wolf drew forth her breast to Romulus? And as we call those women that bring up children with milk from the breast breast-women, so did Rumina — who was a wet nurse, a dry nurse, and a rearer of children — not permit wine, as being hurtful to the infants.

58 Patres vs Patres Conscripti: original nobles vs later enrolled.

58 Why do they call some senators Patres Conscripti, and others only Patres? Solution: Is not this the reason, that those that were first constituted by Romulus they called Patres and Patricians, as being gentlemen who could show their pedigree; but those that were elected afterwards from among the commonalty they called Patres Conscripti?

59 Hercules and Muses altar: he taught letters; honor teaching.

59 Why was one altar common to Hercules and the Muses? Solution: Was it because Hercules taught letters first to Evander's people, as Juba tells us? And it was esteemed an honorable action of those that taught their friends and relations; for it was but of late that they began to teach for hire. The first that opened a grammar school was Spurius Carbilius, a freeman of Carbilius, the first that divorced his wife.

60 Women barred from great altar: arrived late; mythic exclusion.

60 What is the reason that, of Hercules's two altars, the women do not partake or taste of the things offered on the greater? Solution: Is it not because Carmenta's women came too late for the sacrifices? The same thing happened also to the Pinarii; whence they were excluded from the sacrificial feast, and fasting while others were feasting, they were called Pinarii (from πεινάω). Or is it upon the account of that fabulous story of the coat and Dejaneira?

61 Rome’s guardian god unnamed: prevent enemy “evocation” spells.

61 What is the reason that it's forbidden to mention, enquire after, or name the chief tutelary and guardian God of Rome, whether male or female? — which prohibition they confirm with a superstitious tradition, reporting that Valerius Soranus perished miserably for uttering that name. Solution: Is this the reason (as some Roman histories tell us), that there are certain kinds of evocations and enchantments, with which they are wont to entice away the Gods of their enemies, and to cause theirs to come and dwell with them; and they feared lest this mischief should befall them from others? As the Tyrians are said to bind fast their images with cords, but others, when they will send any of them to washing or purifying, require sureties for their return; so did the Romans reckon they had their God in most safe and secure custody, he being unexpressible and unknown? Or, as Homer hath versified, The earth all Gods in common have?" that men might worship and reverence all Gods that have the earth in common, so did the ancient Romans obscure the Lord of their Salvation, requiring that not only this but all Gods should be reverenced by the citizens?

62 Pater Patratus chief: has father and son; “complete” peacemaker.

62 Why among them that were called Feciales (in Greek, peace-makers) was he that was named Pater Patratus accounted the chiefest? But this must be one who hath his father living, and children of his own; and he hath even at this time a certain privilege and trust, for the Praetors commit to those men's trust the persons of those who, by reason of comeliness and beauty, stand in need of an exact and chaste guardianship. Solution: Is this the reason, that they must be such whose children reverence them, and who reverence their parents? Or doth the name itself suggest a reason? For patratum will have a thing to be complete and finished; for he whose lot it is to be a father whilst his father liveth is (as it were) perfecter than others. Or is it that he ought to be overseer of oaths and peace, and (according to Homer) to see before and behind? He is such a one especially, who hath a son for whom he consults, and a father with whom he consults.

63 Rex Sacrorum avoids politics: kingly name kept only for rites.

63 Why is he that is called Rex Sacrorum (who is king of priests) forbid either to take upon him a civil office or to make an oration to the people? Solution: Was it that of old the kings did perform the most and greatest sacred rites and offered sacrifices together with the priests; but when they kept not within the bounds of moderation and became proud and insolent, most of the Grecians, depriving them of their authority, left to them only this part of their office, to sacrifice to the Gods; but the Romans, casting out kings altogether, gave the charge of the sacrifice to another, enjoining him neither to meddle with public affairs nor to hold office, so that they might seem to be subject to royalty only in their sacrifices, and to endure the name of king only with respect to the Gods? Hence there is a certain sacrifice kept by tradition in the market-place near the Comitia, which as soon as the king (i.e. the chief priest) hath offered, he immediately withdraws himself by flight out of the market-place.

64 Leave food on table: think tomorrow; share with servants.

64 Why do they not suffer the table to be quite voided when it's taken away, but will have something always to remain upon it? Solution: What if it be that they would intimate that something of our present enjoyments should be left for the future, and that today we should be mindful of tomorrow? Or that they reckon it a piece of manners to repress and restrain the appetite in our present fruitions? For they less desire absent things, who are accustomed to abstain from those that are present. Or was it a custom of courtesy towards household servants? For they do not love so much to take as to partake, deeming that they hold a kind of communion with their masters at the table. Or is it that no sacred thing ought to be suffered to be empty? And the table is a sacred thing.

65 First night in dark: modesty; conceal flaws; shame illicit sex.

65 Why doth not a man lie at first with a bride in the light, but when it is dark? Solution: Is it not for modesty's sake, for at the first congress he looks upon her as a stranger to him? Or is it that he may be inured to go into his own wife with modesty? Or, as Solon hath written, "Let the bride go into the bed-chamber gnawing a quince, that the first salutation be not harsh and ungrateful." So did the Roman lawgiver command that, if there should be any thing absurd and unpleasant in her body, she should hide it? Or was it intended to cast infamy upon the unlawful use of venery by causing that the lawful should have certain signs of modesty attending it?

66 Race round “Flaminia”: funded by Flaminius’ field; built road.

66 Why was one of the horse-race rounds called Flaminia? Solution: Is it because, when Flaminius, one of the ancients, bestowed a field on the city, they employed its revenue on the horse-races, and with the overplus money built the way which they call Flaminia?

67 Lictors: from “bind” (ligare/alligare); or public ministers.

67 Why do they call the rod-bearers lictors? Solution: Is this the reason, because these men were wont to bind desperate bullies, and they followed Romulus carrying thongs in their bosoms? The vulgar Romans say alligare, to bind, when the more refined in speech say ligare. Or is now C inserted, when formerly they called them litores, being liturgi, ministers for public service; for λῇτον until this day is writ for public in many of the Grecian laws, which scarce any is ignorant of.

68 Luperci dog: purification rite; dog vs wolf; Pan’s dog-love.

68 Why do the Luperci sacrifice a dog? The Luperci are they that run up and down naked (saving only their girdles) in the Lupercal plays, and slash all that they meet with a whip. Solution: Is it not because these feats are done for the purification of the city? For they call the month February, and indeed the very day Februatus, and the habit of whip ping with thongs they call februare, the word signifying to cleanse. And to speak the truth, all the Grecians have used, and some do use to this very day, a slain dog for an expiatory sacrifice; and among other sacrifices of purification, they offer whelps to Hecate, and sprinkle those that need cleansing with the puppy's blood, calling this kind of purifying puppification. Or is it that lupus is λύϰος, a wolf, and Lupercalia are Lycaea; but a dog is at enmity with a wolf, therefore is sacrificed on the Lycaean festivals? Or is it because the dogs do bark at and perplex the Luperci as they scout about the city? Or is it that this sacrifice is offered to Pan, and Pan loves dogs because of his herds of goats.

69 Septimontium no yoke-carts: rest beasts; keep citizens present.

69 Why, upon the festival called Septimontium, did they observe to abstain from the use of chariots drawn by a pair of horses; and even until now, do they that regard antiquity still abstain? They do observe the Septimontium feast in honor of the addition of the seventh hill to the city, upon which it became Septicollis, sevenhilled Rome. Solution: What if it be (as some of the Romans conjecture) because the parts of the city are not as yet everywhere connected? Or if this conceit be nothing to the purpose, what if it be that, when the great work of building the city was finished and they determined to cease the increasing of the city and further, they rested themselves and rested the cattle that bore a share in the labor with them, and provided accordingly that they might participate of the holiday by rest from labor? Or was it that they would have all the citizens always present for the solemnity and return of a festival, especially that which was observed in remembrance of the compact uniting the parts of the city; and that none should desert the city for whose sake the feast is kept, they were not allowed to use their yoke chariots that day?

70 Furcifer: thief paraded with cart-fork (furca) as shame.

70 Why do they call those Furciferi which are convict of thefts or any other of those slavish crimes? Solution: Was it this (which was an argument of the severity of the ancients), that whenever any convicted his servant of any villany, he enjoined him to carry the forked piece of timber that is under the cart (the tongue of the cart), and to go with it through the next villages and neighborhood, to be seen of all, that they might distrust him and be aware of him for the future? This piece of wood we call a prop, the Romans call it furca, a fork; hence he that carries it about is called furcifer, a fork-bearer.

71 Hay on horned ox: warning sign; “hay on horns” = dangerous.

71 Why do they bind hay about the horns of oxen that are wont to push, that they may be shunned by him that meets them? Solution: It is that by reason of gormandizing and stuffing their guts oxen, asses, horses, and men become mischevous, as Sophocles somewhere saith, Like full-fed colt thou kickest up heels, From stuffed paunch, cheeks, and full meals? Therefore the Romans say that M. Crassus had hay about his horns, for they that were turbulent men in the commonwealth were wont to stand in awe of him as a revengeful man and one scarce to be meddled with; although afterwards it was said again, that Caesar had taken away Crassus's hay, being the first man of the republic that withstood and affronted him.

72 Augurs’ open lantern: mind open; avoid windy, false omens.

72 Why would they have the lanthorns of the soothsaying priests (which formerly they called Auspices, and now Augures) to be always open at top, and no cover to be put upon them? Solution: Is it as the Pythagoreans do, who make little things symbols of great matters, — as forbidding to sit down upon a bushel and to stir up the fire with a sword, — so that the ancients used many enigmatical ceremonies, especially about their priests, and such was this of the lanthorn? For the lanthorn is like the body encompassing the soul, the soul being the light withinside, and the understanding and judgment ought to be always open and quick-sighted, and never to be shut up or blown out. And when the winds blow, the birds are unsettled and do not afford sound prognostics, by reason of their wandering and irregularity in flying; by this usage therefore they teach that their soothsayers must not prognosticate when there are high winds, but in still and calm weather, when they can use their open lanthorns.

73 Sore priests barred: divination needs wholeness, no pain/defilement.

73 Why were priests that had sores about them forbid to use divination. Solution: Is not this a significant sign that, whilst they are employed about divine matters, they ought not to be in any pain, nor have any sore or passion in their minds, but to be cheerful, sincere, and without distraction? Or it is but rational, if no man may offer a victim that hath a sore, nor use such birds for soothsaying, that much more they should themselves be free from these blemishes, and be clean, sincere, and sound, when they go about to inspect divine prodigies; for an ulcer seems to be a mutilation and defilement of the body.

74 Temple of Small Fortune: Servius rose from low birth; small causes.

74 Why did Servius Tullius build a temple of Small Fortune, whom they call Brevis? Solution: Was it because he was of a mean original and in a low condition, being born of a captive woman, and by fortune came to be king of Rome? Or did not that change of his condition manifest the greatness rather than the smallness of his fortune? But Servius most of all of them seems to ascribe divine influence to Fortune, giving thereby a reputation to all his enterprises. For he did not only build temples of Hopeful Fortune, of Fortune that averteth evil, of Mild, Primogenial, and Masculine Fortune; but there is a temple also of Private Fortune, another of Regardful Fortune, another of Hopeful Fortune, and the fourth of Virgin Fortune. But why should any one mention any more names, seeing there is a temple also of Ensnaring Fortune, which they name Viscata, as it were ensnaring us when we are as yet afar off, and enforcing us upon business. Consider this now, whether it be that Servius found that great matters are effected by a small piece of Fortune, and that it often falls out that great things are effected by some or do come to nought by a small thing being done or not done. He built therefore a temple of Small Fortune, teaching us to take care of our business, and not contemn things that happen by reason of their smallness.

75 Let candle burn out: respect “living” fire; avoid waste; leave for others.

75 Why did they not extinguish a candle, but suffer it to burn out of its own accord. Solution: Is this the reason, that they adored it as being related and akin to unquenchable and eternal fire? Or is it a significant ceremony, teaching us that we are not to kill and destroy any animated creature that is harmless, fire being as it were an animal? For it both needs nourishment and moves itself, and when it is extinguished it makes a noise as if it were then slain? Or doth this usage instruct us that we ought not to make waste of fire or water, or any other necessary thing that we have a superabundance of, but suffer those that have need to use them, leaving them to others when we ourselves have no further use for them?

76 Little moons on shoes: ancient lineage; remind mutability; obey higher power.

76 Why do they that would be preferred before others in gentility wear little moons on their shoes? Solution: Is this the reason (as Castor saith), that this is a symbol of the place of habitation that is said to be in the moon, signifying that after death souls should have the moon under their feet again? Or was this a fashion of renown among families of greatest antiquity, as were the Arcadians of Evander's posterity, that were called men born before the moon (πϱοσέληνοι)? Or is this, like many other customs, to put men who are lofty and high-minded in mind of the mutability of human affairs to either side, setting the moon before them as an example, When first she comes from dark to light, Trimming, her face becomes fair bright, Increasing, till she's full in sight; Declining then, leaves nought but night?" Or was this for a doctrine of obedience to authority, — that they would have us not discontented under it; but, as the moon doth willingly obey her superior and conform unto him, always vamping after the rays of the sun (as Parmenides hath it), so they that are subjects to any prince should be contented with their lower station, in the enjoyment of power and dignity derived from him?

77 Year Zeus, months Hera: sun makes year; moon makes months; childbirth aid.

77 Why are they of an opinion that the year is Zeus's, but the months Hera's? Solution: Is it because Zeus and Hera reign over the invisible Gods, who are no otherwise seen but by the eyes of our understanding, but the Sun and Moon over the visible? And the Sun verily causeth the year, and the Moon the months. Neither ought we to think that they are bare images of them, but the Sun is Zeus himself materially, and the Moon Hera herself materially. Therefore they name her Hera (a juvenescendo, the name signifying a thing that is new or grows young) from the nature of the Moon; and they call her Lucina (as it were bright or shining), and they are of opinion that she helps women in their travail-pains. Whence is that of the poets: By azure heaven beset with stars, By th' moon that hastens births; for they suppose that women have the easiest travail at the full of the moon.

78 Sinister lucky: left lightning omen; gods’ right = our left; language pun.

78 What is the reason that a bird called sinister in soothsaying is fortunate? Solution: What if this be not true, but the dialect deludes so many? For they render ἀϱιστεϱόν sinistrum; but to permit a thing is sinere, and they say sine when they desire a thing to be permitted; therefore a prognostic permitting an action (being sinisterium) the vulgar do understand and call amiss sinistrum. Or is it as Dionysius saith, that when Ascanius, the son of Aeneas, had pitched battle against Mezentius, a flash of lightning portending victory (as they prognosticated) came on his left hand, and for the future they observed it so; or, as some others say, that this happened to Aeneas? Moreover, the Thebans routing and conquering their enemies by the left wing of the army at Leuctra, they continued in all battles to give the left wing the pre-eminence. Or is it rather as Juba thinks, that to those that look toward the east the north is on the left hand, which verily some make the right hand and superior part of the world? Consider whether the soothsayers do not, as it were, corroborate left-hand things, as the weaker by nature, and do intimate as if they introduced a supply of that defect of power that is in them. Or is it that they think that things terrestrial and mortal stand directly over against heavenly and divine things, and do conjecture that the things which to us are on the left hand the Gods send down from their right hand?

79 Triumph bones allowed in city: special honor without envy (token fire).

79 Why was it lawful to bring the bones of one that had triumphed (after he was dead and burnt) into the city and lay them there, as Pyrrho the Liparaean hath told us? Solution: Was it for the honor they had for the deceased? For they granted that not only generals and other eminent persons, but also their offspring, should be buried in the market-place, for example, Valerius and Fabricius. And they say, when the posterity of these persons died, they were brought into the market-place, and a burning firebrand was put under them and immediately taken away; and thus all that might have caused envy was avoided, and the right to the honor was fully confirmed.

80 Hosts ask consuls not to come: keep top honor for triumpher.

80 Why did they that publicly feasted the triumphers humbly request the consuls, and by messengers sent beseech them, not to come to their supper? Solution: Was it that it was necessary to give the supreme place and most honorable entertainment to the triumpher, and wait upon him home after supper; whereas, the consuls being present, they might do such things to none other but them?

81 Tribunes no purple: people’s office; must seem common; doors always open.

81 Why did not the tribune of the people wear a purple garment, whenas each of the other magistrates wore one? Solution: What if the tribune is not a magistrate at all? For he neither hath lictors, nor sitting in tribunal doth he determine causes; neither do the tribunes, as the rest, enter upon their office at the beginning of the year, nor do they cease when a dictator is chosen; but as if they translated all magistratic power to themselves, they continue still, being (as it were) no magistrates, but holding another kind of rank. And as some rhetoricians will not have a prohibition to be judicial proceeding, seeing it doth something contrary to judicial proceeding, — for the one brings in an action at law and gives judgment upon it, but the other nonsuits it and dismisseth the cause, — after the like manner they are of opinion that tribuneship is rather a curb to magistracy, and that it is an order standing in opposition to government rather than a piece of government itself; for the tribune's office and authority is to withstand the magistrate's authority, even to curtail his extravagant power. Perhaps these and similar reasons may be mere ingenious devices; but in truth, since tribuneship takes its original from the people, popularity is its stronghold, and it is a great thing not to carry it above the rest of the people, but to be like the citizens they have to do with in gesture, habit, and diet. State indeed becomes a consul and a praetor; but as for a tribune (as Caius Curio saith), he must be one that even is trampled upon, not grave in countenance, nor difficult of access, nor harsh to the rabble, but more tractable to them than to others. Hence it was decreed that the tribune's doors should not be shut, but be open night and day as a haven and place of refuge for distressed people. And the more condescending his outward deportment is, by so much the more doth he increase in his power; for they dignify him as one of public use, and to be resorted to of all sorts even as an altar; therefore by the reverence they give him, he is sacred, holy, and inviolable; and when he makes a public progress, it is a law that every one should cleanse and purify the body as defiled.

82 Fasces bound rods, axe: delay anger; rods correct, axe ends incorrigible.

82 Why before the chief officers are rods carried bound together, with the axes fastened to them? Solution: What if it be a significant ceremony, to show that a magistrate's anger ought not to be rash and ungrounded? Or is it that, while the rods are leisurely unloosing, they make deliberation and delay in their anger, so that oftentimes they change their sentence as to the punishment? Now, whereas some sort of crimes are curable, some incurable, rods correct the corrigible, but the axes are to cut off the incorrigible.

83 Romans scolded Bletonesians: “sacrifice” vs daemon-rite; Sibyl command.

83 What is the reason that the Romans, when they were informed that the barbarians called Bletonesians had sacrificed a man to the Gods, sent for their magistrates to punish them; but when they made it appear that they did it in obedience to a certain law, they dismissed them, but prohibited the like action for the future; whenas they themselves, not many years preceding, buried two men and two women alive in the Forum Boarium, two of whom were Greeks and two Gauls? For it seems absurd to do this themselves, and yet to reprimand the barbarians as if they were committing profaneness. Solution: What if this be the reason, that they reckoned it profane to sacrifice a man to the Gods, but necessary to do so to the Daemons? Or were they of opinion that they sinned that did such things by custom or law; but as for themselves, they did it being enjoined to it by the Sibylline books? For it is reported that one Elvia, a virgin, riding on horseback was struck with lightning and cast from her horse, and the horse was found lying uncovered and she naked, as if on set purpose; her clothes had been turned up from her secret parts, also her shoes, rings, and head-gear all lay scattered up and down, here and there; her tongue also was hanging out of her mouth. And when the diviners declared that it was an intolerable disgrace to the holy virgins that it should be published, and that some part of the abuse did touch the cavaliers, a servant of a certain barbarian cavalier informed, that three vestal virgins, Aemilia, Licinia, and Martia, about the same time had been deflowered, and for a long time played the whores with some men, among whom was Butetius, the said informer's master. The virgins being convict were punished; and the fact appearing heinous, it was thought meet that the priest should consult the Sibylline books, where there were oracles found foretelling these things would come to pass for mischief to the republic, and enjoining them — in order to avert the impending calamity — to provide two Grecians and two Gauls, and bury them alive in that place, in order to the appeasing some alien and foreign Daemons.

84 Day begins at midnight: military needs; hard sunrise boundary; sun turns toward us.

84 Why do they take the beginning of the day from the midnight? Solution: Is the reason that the commonweal had a military constitution at the first? For many matters of concern on military expeditions are managed by night. Or did they make sunrising the beginning of business, and the night the preparation for it? For men ought to come prepared to action, and not to be in preparation when they should be doing, — as Myso is reported to have said to Chilo the Wise, when he was making a fan in winter. Or as the noontide to many is the time for finishing public and weighty affairs, so did it seem meet to make midnight the beginning? This hath this confirmation, that a Roman governor would make no league or confederation in the afternoon. Or is it impossible to take the beginning and end of the day from sunrising to sunsetting? For, as the vulgar measure the beginning of the day by sense to be the first appearance of the sun, and take the first beginning of the night to be the complete withdrawment of the sun from sight, we shall thus have no equinoctial day; but the night which we suppose comes nearest in equality to the day will be manifestly shorter than the day by the diameter of the sun. Which absurdity the mathematicians, going about to solve, have determined that, where the centre of the sun toucheth the horizon, there is the true parting point between day and night. But this contradicts sense; for it must follow that whilst there is much light above the earth, yea, the sun illuminating us, we will not for all this confess it to be day, but must say that it is still night. Whereas then it is hard to take the beginning of the day from the rising and setting of the sun, by reason of the forementioned absurdities, it remains to take the zenith and the nadir for the beginning. The last is best, for the sun's course from noon is by way of declination from us; but from midnight he takes his course towards us, as sunrising comes on.

85 Women not to grind/cook: Sabine treaty clause after reconciliation.

85 Wherefore did they not in ancient times suffer women to grind or play the cook? Solution: Haply, because they remembered the covenant that they made with the Sabines; for after they had robbed them of their daughters, and fighting many battles became reconciled, among other articles of agreement this was recorded, that a wife was not to grind nor play the cook for a Roman husband.

86 No May weddings: expiations/dead rites; Flaminica mourning; June fits youth.

86 Why do they not marry wives in the month of May? Solution: Is this the reason, that because May is between April and June, — concerning which months they have an opinion that that is sacred to Aphrodite, this to Hera, both of them being nuptial Gods, — they either take an opportunity a little before May, or tarry till it be over? Or is it that in this month they offer the greatest expiatory sacrifice, now casting the images of men from a bridge into the river, and formerly men themselves? Moreover, it is by law required that the Flaminica, the reputed priestess of Hera, should be most sourly sullen during the time, and neither wash nor trim up herself. Or is it because many of the Latins in this month offer oblations unto the dead? And therefore perhaps they worship Hermes in this month, which from Maia derives its name? Or, as some say, is May derived from elder age (maior) and Hera from younger (iunior)? For youth is more suitable to matrimony, as Euripides hath said, Old age the Cyprian queen must ever shun, And Aphrodite from old men in scorn doth run. Therefore they marry not in May, but tarry till June, which is presently after May.

87 Part bridal hair with spear: marriage by force; soldier-husband symbol; Hera’s spear.

87 Why do they part the hair of women when they are married with the point of a spear? Solution: What if it be a significant ceremony, showing that they took their first wives in marriage by force of arms and war? Or is it that they may instruct them that they are to dwell with husbands that are soldiers and warriors, and that they should put on such ornamental attire as is not luxurious or lascivious, but plain? So Lycurgus commanded that all the gates and tops of houses should be built with saw and hatchet, and no other sort of workmen's instrument should be used about them; yea, he rejected all gayety and superfluity. Or doth this action parabolically intimate divorce, as that marriage can be dissolved only by the sword? Or is it that most of these nuptial ceremonies relate to Hera? For a spear is decreed sacred to Hera, and most of her statues are supported by a spear, and she is surnamed Quiritis, and a spear of old was called quiris, wherefore they surname Mars Quirinus?

88 Lucar: play-funds from sacred groves (luci) revenue.

88 Why do they call the money that is laid out upon the public plays lucar? Solution: Is it because there are many groves consecrated to the Gods about the city, which they call luci, and the revenue of these they expend upon the said plays?

89 Quirinalia “Feast of Fools”: for those missing curia/tribe rites earlier.

89 Why do they call the Quirinalia the Feast of Fools? Solution: Was it because they set apart that day for those that were unacquainted with their own curiae, as Juba saith? Or was it for them that did not sacrifice with their tribes, as the rest did, in the Fornicalia, by reason of business or long journeys or ignorance, so that it was allowed to them to solemnize that feast upon this day?

90 Hercules sacrifice: name no other god; exclude dogs (his enemy).

90 What is the reason that, when there is a sacrifice to Hercules, they mention no other God and no dog appears within the enclosure, as Varro saith? Solution: Is the reason of their naming no other God, because they are of opinion that Hercules was but a half God? And, as some say, Evander built an altar to him and brought him a sacrifice, whilst he was yet here among men. And of all creatures he had most enmity to a dog, for this creature always held him hard to it, as did Cerberus; and that which most of all prejudiced him was that, when Oionus, the son of Licymnius, was slain for a dog's sake by the Hippocoontidae, he was necessitated to take up the cudgels, and lost many of his friends and his brother Iphicles.

91 Patricians barred near Capitol: Manlius’ tyranny fear; house over forum dread.

91 Why was it unlawful for the patricians to dwell about the Capitol? Solution: Was it because M. Manlius, whilst he dwelt there, affected arbitrary government; upon whose account the family came under an oath of abjuration that no Manlius should for the future bear the name of Marcus? Or was this an ancient suspicion? For the potent men would never leave calumniating Publicola, a most popular man, nor would the common people leave fearing him till he had plucked down his house, which seemed to hang over the market-place.

92 Oak crown for saving citizen: oak everywhere; sacred to city-guard gods.

92 Why do they put on a garland of oaken leaves on him that saves a citizen in battle? Solution: Is it because it is easy to find an oak everywhere in the military expeditions? Or is it because a crown is sacred to Zeus and Hera, who in their opinion are the city guardians? Or was it an ancient custom among the Arcadians, who are something akin to the oak? For they repute themselves the first men produced of the earth, as the oak among the vegetables.

93 Vultures for omens: rare, portentous; “just” scavenger; Romulus’ twelve.

93 Why do they for the most part use vultures for soothsaying? Solution: Was this the reason, because twelve vultures appeared to Romulus upon the building of Rome? Or because of all birds this is least frequent and familiar? For it is not easy to meet with young vultures, but they fly to us unexpectedly from some remote parts; therefore the sight of them is portentous. Or haply they learned this from Hercules, if Herodotus speak true that Hercules rejoiced most in the beginning of an enterprise at the sight of a vulture, being of opinion that a vulture was the justest of all birds of prey. For first, he meddles not with any living creature, neither doth he destroy any thing that hath breath in it, as eagles, hawks, and other fowls do that prey by night, but lives only upon dead carcasses; and next, he passeth by all those of his kind, for none ever saw a vulture feeding on a bird, as eagles and hawks do, which for the most part pursue birds like themselves, and slay them, even as Aeschylus hath it, A bird that preys on birds, how can't be clean? And verily this bird is not pernicious to men, for it neither destroys fruits nor plants, nor is hurtful to any tame animal. Moreover if it be (as the Egyptians fabulously pretend) that the whole kind of them is of the female sex, and that they conceive by the reception of the east wind into their bodies, as the trees do by receiving the west wind, it is most probable that very certain and sound prognostics may be made from them; whereas in other birds (there being so many rapines, flights, and pursuits about copulation) there are great disturbances and uncertainties attending them.

94 Aesculapius outside city: healthier air; Epidaurus model; serpent chose island.

94 For what reason is the sanctuary of Aesculapius placed without the city? Solution: Was it because they reckoned it healthier to spend time outside the city than within? For the Greeks have placed Asklepieia for the most part in cleaner and somewhat higher places. Or is it because they suppose this God was fetched from Epidaurus, and the Asklepieion is not by that city, but far from it. Or is it because the serpent disembarked from the trireme onto the island and disappeared, so they think the God himself intimated to them the place to establish it?

95 Chaste avoid pulse: funeral food; windy, lust-stirring; needs purging.

95 Why was it ordained that they that were to live chaste should abstain from pulse? Solution: Did they, like the Pythagoreans, abominate beans for the causes which are alleged, and the lathyrus and erebinthus as being named from Lethe and Erebus? Or was it because they used pulse for the most part in their funeral feasts and invocations of the dead? Or rather was it because they should bring empty and slender bodies to their purifications and expiations? For pulse are windy, and cause a great deal of excrements that require purging off. Or is it because they irritate lechery, by reason of their flatulent and windy nature?

96 Defiled Vestal buried: can’t shed holy blood; no fire burial; ritual vault.

96 Why do they inflict no other punishment on Vestal Virgins, when they are defiled, than burying them alive? Solution: Is this the reason, because they burn the dead, and to bury her by fire who hath not preserved sacred the divine fire would be unjust? Or was it that they judged it a wicked act to cut off a person sanctified by the greatest ceremonial purification, and to lay hands on a holy woman; and therefore they contrived a machine for her to die in of herself, and let her down into a vault made under ground, where was placed a candle burning, also some bread and milk and water, and then the den was covered with earth on top? Neither by this execrable manner of devoting them are they exempt from superstition; but to this day the priests going to the place perform purgatory rites.

97 October Horse ritual: warlike victor to Mars; tail blood to Regia; head-fight.

97 What is the reason that, at the horse-race on the Ides of December, the lucky horse that beats is sacrificed as sacred to Mars; and a certain man, cutting off his tail, brings it to a place called Regia, and besmears the altar with the blood of it; but for the head, one party coming down from the way called Sacred, and others from the Suburra, do fight? Solution: Whether was it (as some say) that, reckoning that Troy was taken by a horse, they punish a horse, as being the Renowned Trojan race commixt with Latin boys? Or is it because a horse is a fierce, warlike, and martial beast, therefore they do sacrifice to the Gods the things that are most acceptable and suitable; and he that conquers is offered, because victory and prowess doth belong to that God? Or is it rather because to stand in battle is the work of God, and they that keep their ranks and files do conquer those that do not keep them but fly, and swiftness of foot is punished as the maintenance of cowardice; so that hereby it is significantly taught that there is no safety to them that run away?

98 Censors start with geese meat/statue: honor saved Capitol; teach vigilance.

98 What is the reason that the censors entering upon their office do nothing before they have contracted for providing meat for the sacred geese, and for polishing the statue? Solution: Is this the reason, that they begin with those things that savor of most frugality, and such things as want not much charge and trouble? Or is it in grateful commemoration of what these creatures did of old, when the Gauls invaded Rome and the barbarians scaled the walls of the Capitol by night? For the geese were sensible of it when the dogs were asleep, and they with their gaggling awaked the watch? Or, seeing the censors are the conservers of such things as are of greatest and most necessary concern, — to oversee and narrowly inspect the public sacrifices, and the lives, manners, and diet of men, — do they presently set before their consideration the most vigilant creature, and by the watchfulness of these instruct the citizens not to disregard or neglect sacred things? As for the polishing of the statue, it is necessary, for the minium (wherewith they of old colored the statues) soon fades.

99 Augur not deposed: skill can’t be removed; oath secrecy; fixed number.

99 What is the reason that of the other priests they depose any one that is condemned or banished, and substitute another in his room; but remove not the augur from his priesthood so long as he lives, though he be convicted of the greatest crimes? They call them augurs who are employed in soothsaying. Solution: Is the reason (as some say) that they will have none to know the mysteries of the priests who is not a priest? Or that the augur is bound by oath to discover to none the management of sacred things; therefore they refuse to absolve him from his oath, when he is reduced to a private capacity? Or is it that the name of augur is not a title of honor and dignity, but of skill and art? It would therefore be the like case to depose a musician from being a musician or a physician from being a physician, with that of prohibiting a diviner from being a diviner; seeing they cannot take away his faculty, though they deprive him of the title. Moreover they do not substitute augurs, because they will keep to the number of augurs that were at the beginning.

100 Ides August: servants feast (Servius’ birth); women wash heads.

100 What is the reason that in the Ides of August (which at first they called Sextilis) all the men-servants and maid-servants do feast, but the free women make it most of their business to wash and purge their heads? Solution: Was it that King Servius about this day was born of a captive maid-servant, and hence the servants have a vacation time from work; and that rinsing the head was a thing that took its original from a custom of the maid-servants upon the account of the feast, and finally passed also into the free women?

101 Boys wear bullae: honor badge; mark freeborn from slaves; chastity curb.

101 Why do they finify their boys with necklaces, which they call bullae? Solution: What if this were for the honor of the wives which were taken by force? For as many other things, so this might be one of the injunctions laid on their posterity. Or did they it in honor of Tarquin's manhood? For it is reported of him that, whilst he was but a boy, being engaged in a battle against the Latins and Tuscans, charging his enemies, he fell from his horse; yet animating those Romans which were engaged in the charge, he led them on courageously. The enemies were put to a remarkable rout, and sixteen thousand were slain; whereupon he had this badge of honor bestowed upon him by his father the king. Or was it that by the ancients it was neither lewd nor dishonorable to love beautiful slaves (as now the comedies testify), but that they resolvedly abstained from freeborn servants; and lest, by coming accidentally on naked boys, they should ignorantly transgress, the free boys wore this mark of distinction? Or was this a protector of good order, and after a manner a curb of incontinency; they being ashamed to pretend to manhood before they have put off the badge of children? That which they say who follow Varro is not probable, that boule by the Aeolians is called bolla, and this is put about children as a teaching sign of good counsel. But consider whether they do not wear it for the moon's sake. For the visible face of the moon, when it is halved, is not spherical, but shaped like a lentil or a quoit; and (as Empedocles supposeth) so is also the side that is turned away from us.

102 Name day: boys 9, girls 8: female faster; odd/male, even/female symbolism.

102 Why do they name boys when they are nine days old, and girls when they are eight? Solution: Perhaps it's a natural reason, that girls are forwarder, for the female grows up and comes to full stature and perfection before the male. But they take the day after the seventh, because the seventh is dangerous to infants by reason of the navel-string; for with many it falls off at seven days, and until it falls off, an infant is more like a plant than an animal. Or is it, as the Pythagoreans reckon, that the even number is the feminine, and the odd number the masculine? For it is a fruitful number, and excels the even in respect of its composition. And if these numbers be divided into units, the even, like a female, hath an empty space in the middle; the odd number always leaves a segment full in the middle, wherefore this is fit to be compared to the male, that to the female. Or is it thus, that of all numbers nine is the first square number made of three, which is an odd and perfect number, but eight is the first cube made of two, an even number; whence a male ought to be square, superexcelling, and complete; but a woman, like a cube, constant, a good housewife, and no gadding gossip? This also may be added that, as eight is a cube from the root two, and nine a square from the root three, so the female makes use of two names, and the males of three.

103 “Spurius” for unknown father: Sp.=sine patre misread; not “seed.”

103 Why do they call those whose fathers are not known Spurius? Solution: It is not verily — as the Grecians suppose and as the rhetoricians say in their determinations — because they are begot of some promiscuous and common seed (as the Greeks say σπόϱος). But Spurius is found among first names, as Sextus, Decimus, Caius. But the Romans do not write all the letters of the first name; but either one letter, as T. for Titus, L. for Lucius, M. for Marcus; or two letters, as Ti. for Tiberius, Cn. for Cnaeus; or three, as Sex. for Sextus, and Ser. for Servius. Now Spurius is of those that are written with two letters, Sp. But with these same letters they write without father, S. for sine, and P. for patre, which truly hath caused the mistake. Moreover, we may meet with another reason, but it is more absurd. They say, that the Sabines called the privities of a woman spurius; and therefore they call him so, by way of reproach, who is born of a woman unmarried and unespoused.

104 Dionysos “Liber Pater”: frees tongues; libation-giver; Eleutherae link.

104 Why did they call Dionysos Liber Pater? Solution: Was the reason because they make him, as it were, the father of liberty to tipplers? For most men become very audacious and are filled with too much licentious prattle, by reason of too much drink. Or is this it, that he hath supplied them with a libamen, a drink-offering? Or is it, as Alexander hath said, that Dionysos is called Eleutherius from his having his abode about Eleutherae, a city of Boeotia?

105 Holidays: widows marry, not virgins: avoid tears/pomp; Sabine-memory omen.

105 For what cause was it, that on high holidays it was not a custom for virgins to marry, but widows did marry then? Solution: Is the reason, as Varro saith, that virgins, forsooth, are married weeping, but women with joyful glee, and people are to do nothing of a holiday with a heavy heart nor by compulsion? Or rather is it because it is decent for virgins to marry with more than a few present, but for widows to marry with a great many present is indecent? For the first marriage is zealously affected, the second to be deprecated; yea, they are ashamed to marry a second husband while their first husband lives, and they grieve at doing so even when he is dead. Hence they are pleased more with silence than with tumults and pompous doings; and the feasts do attract the generality of people to them, so that they cannot be at leisure on holidays for such wedding solemnities. Or was it that they that robbed the Sabines of their daughters that were virgins on the feast-day raised thereby a war, and looked therefore upon it as unlucky to marry virgins on holidays?

106 Fortuna Primigenia: Servius’ rise; Fortune birthed Rome; chance as origin.

106 Why do the Romans worship Fortuna Primigenia? Solution: Was it because Servius, being by Fortune born of a servant-maid, came to rule king in Rome with great splendor? And this is the supposition of most Romans. Or rather is it that Fortune hath bestowed on Rome itself its very original and birth? Or may not this matter require a more natural and philosophical reason, even that Fortune is the original of all things and that Nature itself is produced out of things that come by Fortune, when events that come by chance fall into an order among themselves?

107 Actors “histriones”: Etruscan star Histrus; name spread.

107 Why do the Romans call the artists who appear in the worship of Dionysos histriones? Solution: Is it for the reason which C. Rufus tells us? For he says, that in ancient time, C. Sulpicius and Licinius Stolo, being consuls, a pestilence raging in Rome, all the actors upon the stage were cut off; wherefore, upon the request of the Romans, many and good artists came from Etruria, among whom he that excelled in fame and had been longest experienced on the public stages was called Histrus, and from him they named all the stage-players.

108 No close-kin marriage: widen alliances; avoid family strife; protect wives.

108 Why do not men marry women that are near akin? Solution: Is this the reason, that they design by marriage to augment their family concerns and to procure many relations, by giving wives to strangers and marrying wives out of other families? Or do they suspect that the contentions that would happen among relations upon marriage would destroy even natural rights? Or is it that, considering that wives by reason of weakness stand in need of many helpers, they would not have near akin marry together, that their own kindred might stand by them when their husbands wrong them?

109 Flamen avoids meal/leaven: “killed” grain; fermentation = corruption.

109 Why is it not lawful for the high priest of Zeus, which they call Flamen Dialis, to touch meal or leaven? Solution: Is it because meal is imperfect and crude nourishment? For the wheat neither hath continued what it was, neither is it made into bread as it must be; but it hath lost the faculty of seed, and hath not attained to usefulness for food. Wherefore the poet hath named meal, by a metaphor, mill-murdered (μυλήφατον), as if the corn were spoiled and destroyed by grinding. Leaven, as it is made by corruption, corrupts the mass that it is mingled with, for it is made thereby looser and weaker; and fermentation is a kind of corruption, which, if it be overmuch, makes the bread sour and spoils it.

110 Flamen avoids raw flesh: neither living nor cooked; like a wound.

110 Why is the same high priest forbid to touch raw flesh? Solution: Is it because custom makes them averse enough to raw flesh? Or is it that the same reason that makes them averse to meal doth also make them averse to flesh; for it is neither a living creature nor dressed food? Roasting or boiling, being an alteration and change, doth change its form; but fresh and raw flesh offers not a pure and unpolluted object to the eye, but such as is offensive to the eye, and like that of a raw wound.

111 Flamen shuns dog/goat: goat disease/stink; dogs quarrelsome/unclean; sanctuary.

111 Why do they require the priest to abstain from a dog and a goat, and neither to touch or name them? Solution: Was it that they abominated the lasciviousness and stink of a goat, or that they suspected it to be a diseased creature? For it seems this animal is more seized with the falling sickness than other creatures, and is contagious to them that eat or touch it while it hath this disease; they say, the cause is the straightness of the windpipe, often intercepting the breath, a sign of which they make the smallness of their voice to be; for it happens to men that are epileptical, that they utter a voice sounding much like the bleat of a goat. Now in a dog there may be less of lasciviousness and of an ill scent; although some say that dogs are not permitted to go into the high streets of Athens — no, not into the island Delos — by reason of their open coition; as if kine, swine, and horses did use coition in bed-chambers, and not openly and lawlessly. They do not know the true reason, — that, because a dog is a quarrelsome creature, they therefore expel dogs out of sanctuaries and sacred temples, giving safe access to suppliants for refuge. Wherefore it is very likely that the priest of Zeus, being (as it were) an animated and sacred image, granted for refuge to petitioners and suppliants, doth banish or fright away none. For which cause a couch was set for him in the porch of the house, and they that fell on their knees before him had indemnity from stripes or punishment that day; and if one in fetters came and addressed him, he was unloosed, and his fetters were not laid down by the door but thrown from the roof. It would be therefore no advantage that he should carry himself so mild and courteous, if there were a dog at the door, scaring and frighting them that petitioned for sanctuary. Neither did the ancients at all repute this creature clean; for he is offered in sacrifice to none of the celestial Gods, but being sent to Hecate, an infernal Goddess, at the three cross-ways for a supper, takes a share in averting calamities and in expiations. In Lacedemon they cut puppies in pieces to Mars, that most cruel God. In Boeotia public expiation is made by passing between the parts of a dog divided in twain. But the Romans sacrifice a dog in the cleansing month, on the festival which they call Lupercalia. Hence it was not without cause, to prohibit them whose charge it was to worship the highest and holiest God from making a dog familiar and customed to them.

112 Shuns ivy/vines: avoid wine/drunkenness; ivy = Bacchic frenzy.

112 What is the reason that the priest of Zeus is forbid to toucch an ivy, or to pass over that way that is overspread with vine branches? Solution: Is it not of the like nature with those precepts of Pythagoras, not to eat in a chair, not to sit upon a measure called a choenix, and not to step over a broom? For the Pythagoreans do not dread and refrain from these things, but they prohibit other things by these. Now to go under a vine hath reference to wine, because it is not lawful for a priest to be drunk. For the wine is above the heads of those that are drunk, and they are depraved and debased thereby; whereas it is requisite that they should be above pleasure and conquer it, but not be subdued by it. As for the ivy, — it being unfruitful and useless to men, as also infirm, and by reason of its infirmity standing in need of other trees to climb upon, though by its shadow and sight of its greenness it doth bewitch the vulgar, — what if they judge it not convenient to nourish it about a house because it bringeth no profit, or to suffer it to clasp about any thing, seeing it is so hurtful to plants that bear it up, while it sticketh fast in the ground? Hence ivy is forbidden at the Olympic festivals, and neither at Athens in Hera's sacrifices, nor at Thebes in those belonging to Aphrodite, can any wild ivy be seen; though in the Agrionia and Nyctelia (which are services to Dionysos for the most part performed in the dark) it is to be found. Or was this a symbol of the prohibition of revels and sports of Dionysos? For women that were addicted to Bacchanal sports presently ran to the ivy and plucked it off, tearing it in pieces with their hands and gnawing it with their mouths, so that they are not altogether to be disbelieved that say it hath a spirit in it that stirreth and moveth to madness, transporting and bereaving of the senses, and that alone by itself it introduceth drunkenness without wine to those that have an easy inclination to enthusiasm.

113 Priests avoid civil power: offices conflict; executions pollute; sacrifice priority.

113 Why are not these priests allowed to take upon them or attempt civil authority, while they have a lictor and a curule chair for honor's sake, and in some sort of consolation for their being excluded from magistracies? Solution: Was it because in some places of Greece the dignity of priesthood was equal with kingship, and therefore they designated not ordinary persons to be priests? Or was it rather, — since they have appointed office-employments, whereas the charge of kings is unmethodical and indefinite, — that it would not be possible, if both fell out at the same time, that he should be able to attend both, but he must of necessity neglect one (both pressing together upon him), sometimes neglecting the worship of God, and sometimes injuring the subjects? Or else, seeing that there is no less necessity than power attending the administration of civil government, and that the ruler of the people (as Hippocrates saith of the physician) doth see weighty matters and hath to do with weighty matters, and from other men's calamities procures troubles peculiar to himself, did they think him not sacred enough to sacrifice to the Gods and manage the sacrifices who had been present at the condemnation and execution of citizens, and often of some of his own kindred and family, as happened to Brutus?

1 Epidaurus: Artunoi = senators; Konipodes = “dirty-foot” farmers.

2 Onobatis: shamed adulteress paraded on donkey; “unclean” stone.

3 Soloi: Hypekkaustria = Athena’s priestess averting calamities.

4 Cnidus: Amnemones = lifelong noble overseers; Aphester = vote-caller.

5 “Chrestoi”: treaty phrase meaning “don’t kill” Tegeans aiding Sparta.

6 Opus: Crithologus = barley first-fruits priest; two-priest system.

7 Ploiades clouds: steady, whitish shower clouds; not very watery/windy.

8 Platychaetas: Boeotian term for people with wide bordering estates.

9 Delphi: Hosioter = sacrificial “holy” rite; Bysius=Pysius oracle month.

10 Phyxemelum: creeping plant spared from cattle trampling.

11 Aposphendoneti: “sling-repelled” Eretrians driven off Corcyra landing.

12 Charila: 9-year expiation; king feeds all, strikes effigy with shoe.

13 Beggars’ meat: Temo “beggar” gained land; ox-share given to descendants.

14 Coliads: Eumaeus’ line; phagilus = lamb paid as mulct victims.

15 Wooden dog: oracle “bitten”; thorn-briar prick; Locrians “Ozolian” name.

16 Aphabroma: Megarian women’s dress copying prudent Abrota; oracle fixed.

17 Doryxenus: released captive later pays ransom; honored as spear-captive friend.

18 Palintocia: law forcing return of interest paid; “payback usury.”

19 Anthedon proverb: actually Calauria/Hyperia tale; “lees-wine” recognition line.

20 “Darkness at Oak”: Priene women’s oath after massacre at oak battle.

21 Catacautae: Cretan “burners”/burial caste with privileges, infernal consecration.

22 Sepulchre of Boys: trick “buy land” from boys’ soil; boys killed, buried.

23 Argos: Mixarchagetas=Castor hero; Elasii=epilepsy expellers’ descendants.

24 Egknisma: mourning rite stew after relighting “clean” fire; Apollo/Hermes.

25 Alastor/Aliterius/Palamnaïos: terms for hateful criminal/avoided knave.

26 Aenos chant: “never return” to poor homeland; prosperity prayer.

27 Rhodes crier ban: crier helped kidnap bride; chapel exclusion penalty.

28 Tenedos bans: piper lied vs Tenes; Achilles killed Tenes; tabooed.

29 Epidamnus poletes: yearly official monopoly trader with Illyrians.

30 Shore of Araenus: spy “first seize” dispute; curse vs Parians; “curse shore.”

31 Eretria Demeter: sun-roasted meat; captive women fled mid-rite.

32 Miletus Aeinutai: council on ship offshore; “perpetual sailors.”

33 Akmaion Lesche: youth guard-post for Nauplius’ protection.

34 Ox to benefactor: Pyrrhias freed tar-merchant; found hidden treasure; sacrificed ox.

35 Bottiaean maids: “Let’s go to Athens” memory of Athenian-Cretan ancestry.

36 Dionysos “ox-foot”: bull-god; big foot; or mild, harmless coming; ploughing.

37 Achilleum Tanagra: Achilles aided Poemander’s exile-case; grove named for him.

38 Psoloeis/Oleiai: Minos’ mad daughters’ cannibal lot; mourning men/women names.

39 Lycaion entry: willing stoned; unwitting sent to Eleutherae; “stag” oracle.

40 Eunostus grove: chaste hero slain by false charge; women barred as pollution.

41 Scamander river: Trojan woman’s son in Boeotia renamed rivers.

42 “Let this prevail”: Dinon overruled majority—“these are better votes.”

43 Alalcomenae Ithaca: named for Boeotian birthplace tradition of Odysseus.

44 Monophagi Aigina: families feasted survivors privately; later quiet Poseidon rite.

45 Labradean Zeus axe: sacred labra axe from Omphale/Hercules, war spoil to Caria.

46 Tralles “purifying pulse”: homicide wergild paid in orobos; used in expiation.

47 “Worse than Sambicus”: sacrilege thief tortured a year; proverb for suffering.

48 Ulysses shrine Sparta: Palladium theft-oracle; thief’s keeper; Ulysses hero-site.

49 Chalcedon cheek-cover: post-war shortage; widows’ modest court custom copied.

50 Agenor grove rams: linked to Agenor’s famed fine flocks.

51 Ballacrades: boys joke “pear-eaters”; ancient diet of wild pears.

52 Elis mares bred outside: fear Oinomaus’ curse on Elis horse-breeding.

53 Knossos usury snatch-run: make fraud count as violence; punishable.

54 Aphrodite Dexicreon: sailor profited selling water; dedicated statue in thanks.

55 Samos Hermes rite: allow stealing clothes; recalls decade of robbery in exile.

56 Panaema: “all-blood” place from Amazon slaughter by Dionysos.

57 Pedetes Andron: Megarian captives in fetters killed oligarchs; fetters hung; name.

58 Cos Hercules priest cross-dress: Hercules hid as woman on Cos; ritual reenacts.

59 Hamaxocylists: ancestors overturned pilgrims’ wagons into lake; punished; name.

4 - 2 Greek Questions.

1 Who are they at Epidaurus called Κονίποδες and Ἄϱτυνοι? Solution: The managers of the affairs of the commonwealth were one hundred and eighty men; out of these they elected senators, which they called ἄϱτυνοι. The most part of the common people were conversant in husbandry; these they called ϰονίποδες, because (as may be supposed) they were known by their dirty feet when they came into the city.

2 What woman was that among the Cumans called Onobatis? Solution: This was one of the women taken in adultery, which they brought into the market-place, and set her upon a certain stone to be seen of all; from thence they took her and set her on ass-back, and led her round about the city, and afterwards set her up again upon the stone; the rest of her life she led under disgrace. Her they called Onobatis (the woman that rode upon an ass); hence they abominated the stone as unclean. There was also a certain magistrate among them, called Phylactes (a conservator); he that had this office kept the prison for the rest of his time; but at the nocturnal convention of the senators he came into the council, and laying hands on the kings led them forth, and detained them in custody until the senate had determined concerning them, by a vote given in private, whether they had acted unrighteously or not.

3 Who is the Ὑπεϰϰαύστϱια in Soloi? Solution: They call the she-priest of Athena so, because she offers certain sacrifices and oblations for the averting of impending calamities.

4 Who are the Ἀμνήμονες among the Cnidians, and who is the Ἀφεστήϱ? Solution: The sixty select men chosen from among the nobles, whom they used as overseers and principal counsellors for life in matters of greatest concern, they called Amnemones (as a man may suppose) because they were not accountable to any for what they did, or verily (in my opinion) rather because they were men carrying much business in their memories. And he that put questions to vote was called Aphester.

5 Who were the Χϱηστοί among the Arcadians and Lacedemonians? Solution: When the Lacedemonianswere agreed with the Tegeats, they made a league with them, and set up a common pillar on the river Alpheus, upon which this is written, among other things, "Drive out the Messenians from your borders, and make none of them χϱηστοί, good." Aristotle interpreting this saith, that none of the Tegeats ought to be slain that endeavored to bring aid to the Lacedemonians.

6 Who is Κϱιθολόγος among the Opuntians? Solution: The most of the Greeks did use barley at their ancient sacrifices, when the citizens offered their first-fruits; now they called him Crithologus who presided over the sacrifices and received the first-fruits. They had two priests, one that had the chief charge of the divine things, the other of daemonic affairs.

7 What sort of clouds are the Ploiades? Solution: Showering clouds which were carried up and down were, for the most part, called Ploiades, as Theophrastus hath said expressly in his fourth book of Meteors: "Whereas indeed the Ploiades are those clouds which have a consistency and are not so movable, but as to color white, which discover a kind of different matter, neither very watery nor very windy."

8 Who is called Platychaetas among the Boeotians? Solution: They that had many neighboring houses or bordering fields were so called in the Aeolic dialect, as having wide domains. I will add one saying out of the Thesmophylacian law, seeing there are many. . . .

9 Who is he among the people of Delphi who is called Ὁσιωτήϱ? And why do they call one of the months Bysius? Solution: They call the slain sacrifice Ὁσιωτήϱ when the ὅσιος (the holy one) is declared. There are five of these holy ones for life, and these transact many things with the prophets, and sacrifice together with them, supposing that they are descended from Deucalion. The month Bysius, as many think, is the same as Φύσιος (natural), for it is in the beginning of the spring, when most things do sprout and put forth buds. But this is not the true reason. For the Delphians do not use B for PH (as the Macedonians, who say Bilippus, Balacrus, and Beronica, for Philippus, Phalacrus, and Pheronica), but instead of P; they for the most part saying βατεῖν for πατεῖν, and βιϰϱόν for πιϰϱόν. Therefore they say Bysius for Pysius, because in that month they enquire of and consult their God Apollo. This is their genuine and country way of speaking. For in that month an oracle is given forth, and they call that week the nativity of Apollo, and the name is Polythous, not because of their baking a sort of cakes called Pthides, but because then their oracle is full of answers and prophecies. For it is but of late that oraculous answers were given to the enquirers every month. In former times Pythia gave answers only once a year, which was on this day, as Callisthenes and Anaxandridas have told us.

10 What is Phyxemelum? Solution: It is one of the small plants that creep upon the ground, upon whose branches the cattle treading do hinder, hurt, and spoil their growth. Where therefore they have attained some considerable bigness by growth, and escaped the injury of those that use to feed upon them, they are called φυξίμηλα (i.e. that have escaped the danger of cattle), of which Aeschylus is witness.

11 Who are the Ἀποσφενδόνητοι? Solution: The Eretrians inhabited the island of Corcyra. But when Charicrates set sail from Corinth with a considerable strength and overcame them in battle, the Eretrians took shipping and sailed to their native country; of which thing the inhabitants of that country having timely notice, gave them a repulse, and by slinging stones at them impeded their landing. Now being not able either to persuade or force their way, seeing the multitude was implacably bent against them, they sailed into Thrace and took possession of that country, where they say Metho first inhabited, of whose offspring Orpheus was. The city therefore they call Methone, and by the neighboring inhabitants the men are called Aposphendoneti, i.e. they that were repulsed with sling-stones.

12 What was Charila among the Delphians? Solution: The Delphians solemnized three nonennial feasts in regular order, of which they call one Stepterium, another Herois, and the third Charila. The Stepterium represents by imitation the fight which Apollo had with Python, and both his flight and pursuit after the fight unto Tempe. For some say that he fled, as needing purification by reason of the slaughter; others say that he pursued Pythonwounded, and flying along the highway which they now call Sacred, he just missed of being present at his death; for he found him just dead of his wound, and buried by his son, whose name was Aix, as they say. Stepterium therefore is the representation of these or some such things. But as to Herois, it hath for the most part a mysterious reason which the Thyades are acquainted with; but by the things that are publicly acted one may conjecture it to be the calling up of Semele from the lower world. Concerning Charila, they fable some such things as these. A famine by reason of drought seized the Delphians, who came with their wives and children as suppliants to the king's gate, whereupon he distributed meal and pulse to the better known among them, for there was not sufficient for all. A little orphan girl yet coming and importuning him, he beat her with his shoe, and threw his shoe in her face. She indeed was a poor wandering beggar-wench, but was not of an ignoble disposition; therefore withdrawing herself, she united her girdle and hanged herself. The famine hereupon increasing and many diseases accompanying it, Pythiagives answer to the king, that the maid Charila who slew herself must be expiated. They with much ado at last discovering that this was the maid's name which was smitten with a shoe, they instituted a certain sacrifice mixed with expiatory rites, which they yet solemnize to this day every ninth year. Whereat the king presides, distributing meal and pulse to all strangers and citizens (for they introduce a kind of an effigy of the wench Charila); and when all have received their doles, the king smites the idol with his shoe. Upon this the governess of the Thyades takes up the image and carries it away to some rocky place, and there putting a halter about its neck, they bury it in the place where they buried Charila when she had strangled herself.

13 What is the beggars' meat among the Aenianes? Solution: Many have been the removes of the Aenianes. First they inhabited the plain of Dotion; thence they were expelled by the Lapithae to the Aethices; from thence they betook themselves to a region of Molossia about the Aous, where they were called Paravaeans; afterward they took possession of Cirrha; they had no sooner landed at Cirrha (Apollo so commanding their king Oinoclus) but they went down to the country bordering on the river Inachus, inhabited by the Inachians and Achaeans. There was an oracle given to the latter, that they would lose all their country if they should part with any of it, — and to the Aenianes, that they would hold it if they should take it of such as freely resigned it. Temo, a noted man among the Aenianes, putting on rags and a scrip, like a beggar, addressed himself to the Inachians; the king, in a way of reproach and scorn, gave him a clod of earth. He receives it and puts it up into his scrip, and absconds himself, making much of his dole; for he presently forsakes the country, begging no more. The old men wondering at this, the oracle came fresh to their remembrance; and going to the king, they told him that he ought not to slight this man, nor suffer him to escape. Temo well perceiving their designs, hastens his flight, and as he fled, vowed a hecatomb to Apollo. Upon this occasion the kings fought hand to hand; and when Phemius, the king of the Aenianes, saw Hyperochus, the king of the Inachians, charging him with a dog at his heels, he said he dealt not fairly to bring a second with him to fight him; whereupon Hyperochus going to drive away the dog, and turning himself about in order to throw a stone at the dog, Phemius slays him. Thus the Aenianes possessed themselves of that region, expelling the Inachians and Achaeans; but they reverence that stone as sacred, and sacrifice to it, wrapping it in the fat of the victim. And when they offer a hecatomb to Apollo, they sacrifice an ox to Zeus, a choice part of which they distribute to Temo's posterity, and call it the beggars' flesh.

14 Who were the Coliads among the Ithacans? And what was a φάγιλος? Solution: After the slaughter of the suitors, some near related to the deceased made head against Ulysses. Neoptolemus, being introduced by both parties as an arbitrator, determined that Ulysses should remove and hasten out of Cephalenia, Zacynthus, and Ithaca, because of the blood that he had shed there; but that the friends and relations of the suitors should pay a yearly mulct to Ulysses, for the wrong done to his family. Ulysses therefore passed over into Italy; the mulct he devoted to his son, and commanded the Ithacans to pay it. The mulct was meal, wine, honey-combs, oil, salt, and for victims the better grown of the phagili. Aristotle saith phagilus was a lamb. And Telemachus, setting Eumaeusand his people at liberty, placed them among the citizens; and the family of the Coliads is descended from Eumaeus, and that of the Bucolians from Philoetius.

15 What is the wooden dog among the Locrians? Solution: Locrus was the son of Physcius, the son of Amphictyon. Of him and Cabya came Locrus, with whom his father falling into contention, and gathering after him a great number of citizens, consulted the oracle about transplanting a colony. The oracle told him that there he should build a city, where he should happen to be bit by a wooden dog. He, wafting over the sea unto the next shore, trod upon a cynosbatus (a sweet brier), and being sorely pained with the prick, he spent many days there; in which time considering the nature of the country, he built Physcus and Euantheia, and other towns which the Ozolian Locrians inhabited. Some say that the Locrians were called Ozolians (strong-scented people) from Nessus — others again from Python the serpent — cast up there by the surf of the sea, and putrefying upon the shore. And some say that the men wore pelts and ram skins, living for the most part among the herds of goats, and therefore were strong-scented. Others contrariwise say that the country brought forth many flowers, and that this name was from their sweet odor; among them that assert this is Archytas the Amphissean, who hath wrote thus: Macyna crowned with vines fragrant and sweet.

16 What manner of thing is that among the Megarians called ἀφάβϱωμα? Solution: Nisus, of whom Nisaea had its name, in the time of his reign married Abrota of Boeotia, the daughter of Onchestus and sister of Megareus, a woman (as it seems) excelling in prudence and singularly modest. When she died, the Megarians cordially lamented her; and Nisus, willing to perpetuate her memory and renown, gave command that the Megarian women should dress in apparel like unto that which she wore, and that dress they called for her sake aphabroma. And verily it is manifest that the oracle countenanced the veneration of this woman; for when the Megarian women would often have altered their garments, the oracle prohibited it.

17 Who was called δοϱύξενος? Solution: The country of Megaris was anciently settled in villages, the inhabitants being divided into five parts; and they were called Heraenians, Piraenians, Megarians, Cynosurians, and Tripodiscaeans. These the Corinthians drew into a civil war, for they always contrived to bring the Megarians into their power. Yet they waged war with much moderation and neighborly designs; for no man did at all injure the husbandman, and there was a stated ransom determined for all that were taken captives. And this they received after the release of the prisoner, and not before; but he that took the captive prisoner brought him home, gave him entertainment, and then gave him liberty to depart to his own house. Wherefore he that brought in the price of his ransom was applauded, and remained the friend of him that received it, and was called doryxenus, from his being a captive by the spear; but he that dealt fraudulently was reputed an unjust and unfaithful person, not only by the enemy but by his fellow-citizens also.

18 What is παλιντοϰία? Solution: When the Megarians had expelled Theagenes the tyrant, they managed the commonweal for some time with moderation. But then (to speak with Plato), when their orators had filled out to them, even to excess, the pure strong wine of liberty, they became altogether corrupt, and the poor carried themselves insolently toward the richer sort in this among other things, that they entered into their houses and demanded that they might be feasted and sumptuously treated. But where they prevailed not, they used violence and abusive behavior, and at last enacted a law to enable them to fetch back from the usurers the use-money which at any time they had paid, calling the execution thereof palintocia, i.e. the returning of use-money.

19 What is the Anthedon of which Pythia speaks, Drink wine on th' lees, Anthedon's not thy home? For Anthedon in Boeotia did not produce much wine. Solution: Of old they called Calauria Irene from a woman Irene, which they fable to be the daughter of Poseidon and Melanthea, the daughter of Alpheus. Afterwards, when the people of Anthes and Hyperes planted there, they called the island Anthedonia and Hyperia. The oracle, as Aristotle saith, was this: Drink wine on th' lees, Anthedon's not thy home, Nor sacred Hypera where thou drank'st pure wine. Thus Aristotle; but Mnasigeiton saith that Anthus, who was brother to Hypera, was lost when he was an infant, and Hypera rambling about to find him, came at Pherae to Acastus (or Adrastus), where by chance he found Anthus serving as a wine-drawer. There while they were feasting, the boy bringing a cup of wine to his sister, he knew her, and said to her softly, Drink wine on th' lees, Anthedon's not thy home.

20 What is that darkness at the oak, spoken of in Priene? Solution: The Samians and Prienians waging war with each other, as at other times they sufficiently injured each other, so at a certain great fight the Prienians slew a thousand of the Samians. Seven years after, fighting with the Milesians at the said oak, they lost all the principal and chief of their citizens together, at the time when Bias the Wise (who was sent ambassador from Priene to Samos) was famous. This grievous and sad calamity befalling the women, there was established an execration and oath — to be taken about matters of the greatest concern — by "the Darkness at the Oak," because their children, fathers, and husbands were there slain.

21 Who were they among the Cretans called Καταϰαῦται? Solution: They say that the Tyrrhenians took away by force from Brauron the daughters and wives of the Athenians, at the time when they inhabited Lemnos and Imbros; from whence being driven they came to Laconia, and fell into a commixture with that people, even so far as to beget children on the native women. Thus, by reason of jealousy and calumnies, they were again constrained to leave Laconia, and with their wives and children to waft over into Crete, having Pollis and his brother their governors. There waging war with the inhabitants of Crete, they were fain to permit many of them that were slain in battle to lie unburied; in that at first they had no leisure, by reason of the war and peril they were in, and afterwards they shunned the touching of the dead corpses, being corrupted by time and putrefied. Therefore Pollis contrived to bestow certain dignities, privileges, and immunities, some on the priests of the Gods, and some on the buriers of the dead, consecrating their honors to the infernal Deities, that they should remain perpetual to them. Then he divided to his brother a share by lot. The first he named priests, the others catacautae (burners). But as to the government, each of them managed it apart, and had, among other tranquillities, an immunity from those injurious practices which other Cretans were wont to exercise towards one another privily; for they neither wronged them, nor filched or robbed any thing from them.

22 What was the Sepulchre of the Boys at Chalcedon? Solution: Cothus and Arclus the sons of Zuthus came to Euboea to dwell, the Aeolians possessing the greatest part of the island at that time. The oracle told Cothus, that he should prosper and conquer his enemies if he bought the country. Therefore, going on shore a little after, he happened to meet with some children playing by the seaside; whereupon he fell to play with them, conforming himself to their humors and showing them many outlandish toys. Seeing the children very desirous to have these, he refused to give them any upon any other terms than to receive land for them. The boys, taking up some earth from the ground, gave it to him, receiving the toys, and departed. The Aeolians perceiving what was done, — and the enemies sailing in upon them, — moved by indignation and grief, slew the children and buried them near the wayside that goes from the city to the Euripus; and that place is called the Sepulchre of the Boys.

23 Who is Μιξαϱχαγέτας in Argos? And who are the Ἐλάσιοι? Solution: They call Castor Mixarchagetas, and are of opinion that he was buried in the country; but they worship Pollux as one of the celestial Deities. Those which they supposed were able to drive away the falling sickness, they called Elasii (expellers), esteeming them to be of the posterity of Alexida the daughter of Amphiaraus.

24 What is that which is called ἔγϰνισμα by the Argives? Solution: It was a custom among those that lost any of their kindred or acquaintance, presently after mourning to sacrifice to Apollo, and thirty days after to Hermes. For they are of opinion that, as the earth receives the bodies of the deceased, so Hermes receives their souls. Giving then barley to Apollo's minister, they take the flesh of the sacrifice, and extinguishing the fire as polluted but kindling it again afresh, they boil this flesh, calling it ἔγϰνισμα.

25 Who are Ἀλάστωϱ, Ἀλιτήϱιος, and Παλαμναῖος? Solution: For we must not give credit to those that say that such are called aliterii who, in the time of dearth, watch the miller (ἀλοῦντα ἐπιτηϱοῦντες) and steal the corn. But he was called Alastor who did exploits not to be forgotten (ἄληστα) but to be had in remembrance for a long time. Aliterius is he whom we should avoid (ἀλεύασθαι) and observe upon the account of his knavery. Such things (saith Socrates) were engraven in plates of brass.

26 What is the meaning of this, that the virgins that follow those that lead the ox from Aenos to Cassiopaea sing, till they approach the borders, in this manner, To native country dear O may ye ne'er return? Solution: The Aenianes, being first driven out by the Lapithae, took up their habitation about Aethacia, and then about Molossis and Cassiopaea. But the country affording no staple commodity, and being ill bestead with troublesome neighbors, they went into the Cirraean plain, under the conduct of Oinoclus their king. And when there were great droughts there, by warning from an oracle (as they say) they stoned Oinoclus; and betaking themselves to ramble again, they came into this country which they now possess, being very pleasant and fruitful. Whence with good reason they pray to the Gods that they may never return again to their ancient native country, but may abide where they are in prosperity.

27 What is the reason that at Rhodes the crier never enters into the chapel of Ocridion? Solution: Was it because Ochimus espoused his daughter Cydippe to Ocridion? But Cercaphus, who was brother to Ochimus, falling in love with the maid, persuaded the crier (for it was the custom to fetch the brides by the crier) to bring her to him when she should be delivered to him. This being accordingly done, Cercaphus got the maid and fled; afterwards, when Ochimus was grown old, he returned. Wherefore it was enacted by the Rhodians that a crier should not enter into the chapel of Ocridion, because of the injustice done by him.

28 What is the reason that at Tenedos a piper might not go into the temple of Tenes, and that no mention might be made of Achilles in that temple? Solution: Was it because, when his step-mother accused Tenes that he would have lain with her, Molpus a piper bore false witness against him; whereupon Tenes took occasion to fly into Tenedos with his sister? And they say that Achilles was strictly charged by Thetis his mother not to slay Tenes, as one that was much respected by Apollo, and that the Goddess committed the trust to one of the household servants that he should take special care and put him in mind of it, lest Achilles should kill Tenes at unawares. But when Achilles made an incursion into Tenedos and pursued the sister of Tenes, being very fair, Tenes met him and defended his sister; whereupon she escaped, but Tenes was slain. Achilles, knowing him as he fell down dead, slew his own servant, because he being present did not admonish him to the contrary. He buried Tenes, whose temple now remains, into which no piper enters, nor is Achilles named there.

29 Who was the πωλήτης amongst the Epidamnians. Solution: The Epidamnians, who were neighboring to the Illyrians, perceiving that the citizens that had frequent commerce with them were debauched, and fearing an innovation, made choice of an approved man yearly from amongst them, who should deal as a factor with the barbarians in all matters of trade and traffic, managing the whole business of dealing and commerce on the behalf of all the citizens; and this man was called poletes, or the seller.

30 What is the shore of Araenus in Thrace? Solution: The Andrians and Chalcidians sailing into Thrace to get them a seat, the city Sane being betrayed was delivered up to them both in common; and being told that Acanthuswas deserted by the barbarians, they sent two spies thither. These approaching the city and perceiving all the enemies to be fled, the Chalcidian outruns the other, intending to seize the city for the Chalcidians; but the Andrian, finding himself not able to overtake him, darts his lance and fixeth it exactly in the gates, and saith that he had first seized the city for the Andrians. Hence a great contention arising, they agreed together without a war to make the Erythraeans, Samians, and Parians umpires in all matters of controversy between them. The Erythraeans and Samians brought in the verdict for the Andrians, but the Parians for the Chalcidians; hence the Andrians about this place bound themselves under a curse, that they would not give wives in marriage to the Parians nor take wives of them. Therefore they called the place the Shore of Araenus (i.e. of the curse), whereas before it was called the Shore of the Dragon.

31 In the solemn feasts to the honor of Demeter, why do the Eretrian women roast their meat not at the fire, but by the sun; and why do they not call upon Kalligeneia? Solution: Was it because it came in course to the women which Agamemnon carried captive from Troy to solemnize a feast to Demeter in this place, and while they were so doing, a fair wind arose, and they suddenly made sail, leaving the sacrifices imperfect.

32 Who were the Ἀειναῦται amongst the Milesians? Solution: The tyrants Thoas and Damasenor being deposed, two factions got the government of the city, one of which was called Ploutis, the other Cheiromacha, and the potent men prevailing, they settled the state affairs in the association. And when they would sit in council about matters of greatest concern, they went on ship-board and launched out to a great distance from the shore; and when they were agreed upon a point in debate, they sailed back again, and upon this account were called ἀειναῦται (perpetual mariners).

33 Why do the Chalcidians call a certain place about Pyrsopius the Ἀϰμαίων Λέσχη, the Youth's Conventicle? Solution: They say that Nauplius, being persecuted by the Achaeans, addressed himself to the Chalcidians for redress, making his defence against the accusation and recriminating on the Achaeans. Whereupon the Chalcidians, refusing to deliver him into their hands lest he should be slain by treachery, granted him a guard of lusty young men, and appointed their post in that place where they had mutual society together and guarded Nauplius.

34 Who was he that sacrificed an ox to his benefactor? Solution: In a haven of Ithaca there was a pirate ship, in which happened to be an old man who had earthern pots holding pitch. It fell out that an Ithacan skipper named Pyrrhias put into this port, who ransomed the old man upon free cost, only upon his supplication and out of commiseration towards him, and at the request of the old man he purchased also some of his tar-pots. The piratesdeparting and all fear of danger over, the old fellow brings Pyrrhias to his earthen pots, and shows him a great deal of gold and silver blended amongst the pitch; whereupon Pyrrhias attaining to great riches treated the old man well in all respects, and sacrificed an ox to him. Hence they say proverbially that none hath sacrificed an ox to his benefactor but Pyrrhias.

35 Why was there a custom amongst the Bottiaean maids, as they danced, to sing, "Let us go to Athens"? Solution: It is reported that the Cretans (in payment of a vow) sent the firstlings of men to Delphi; but when such as were sent found no plentiful provision there, they departed from thence in search of a plantation, and first sat down at Iapygia. From thence they went and possessed that part of Thrace which now they have, Athenians being mixed with them; for it is probable that Minos did not destroy those young men which the Athenians sent in a way of tribute, but only detained them in servitude. Some that were descended from these and were accounted Cretanswere sent with others to Delphi; so the Bottiaean daughters, in remembrance of their pedigree, sing on their feast-days, "Let us go to Athens."

36 Why do the Eleian women in their hymns beseech Dionysos that he will come to their help with an ox's foot? The hymns run thus: "Come, O hero Dionysos, to thy holy temple placed by the sea; hasten with the Graces to thy temple with a neat's foot." Then they redouble this, "O worthy Bull"! Solution: Was it because some call Dionysos Bull-begot, and some Bull? Or as some say ox-foot for a great foot; as the poet saith ox-eye for a great eye, and βουλάϊος for haughty? Or is it rather, because the foot of an ox is innocent and his bearing horns on his head is pernicious, that so they desire the God may come to them mild and harmless? Or is it because many men are of opinion that this God presides over ploughing and sowing?

37 What is the meaning of that place at Tanagra, before the city, called Achilleum? For it is reported that the city had rather enmity than kindness for Achilles, in that he took Stratonice, the mother of Poemander, by force of arms, and slew Acestor the son of Ephippus. Solution: Now Poemander the father of Ephippus (whilst the region of Tanagra was still inhabited by villagers), being besieged in Stephon (a village so called) by the Achaeansbecause he refused to aid them in the wars, left that country the same night, and fortified Poemandria. Policrithus the architect coming in, disparaging his works and making a ridicule of them, leaped over the ditch; Poemander, falling into a rage, catched up a great stone suddenly to throw at him, which had been hid there a great while, lying over some sacred nocturnal relics. This Poemander hurling rashly slung, and missing Policrithus, slew his own son Leucippus. He was then forced by law to depart out of Boeotia and become a wandering and begging pilgrim; neither was that easy for him to do, because of the incursions which the Achaeans made into the region of Tanagra. Wherefore he sent Ephippus his son to beg aid of Achilles. He by persuasion prevailed with Achilles to come, with Tlepolemus the son of Hercules, and with Peneleos the son of Hippalcmus, all of them their kindred. By these Poemander was introduced into Chalcis, and was absolved by Elephenor from the murder; he ascribed great honor to these men, and assigned groves to each of them, of which this kept the name of Achilles's Grove.

38 Who amongst the Boeotians were the Ψολόεις, and who the Ὀλεῖαι? Solution: They say that Minos's daughters — Leucippe, Arsinoe, and Alcathoe — falling mad, had a greedy appetite for man's flesh, and accordingly cast lots for their children. Whereupon it fell to Leucippe's lot to produce her son Hippasus to be cut in pieces. The husbands of these women, that were clothed in coarse apparel by reason of sorrow and grief, were called Psoloeis, the women Ὀλεῖαι, that is ὀλοαί (destructive). And to this day the Orchomenians call their posterity so. And it is so ordered that, in the yearly feast called Agrionia, there is a flight and pursuit of them by the priest of Dionysos, with a drawn sword in his hand. It is lawful for him to slay any of them that he takes, and Zoilus a priest of our time slew one. This thing proved unlucky to them; for Zoilus, sickening upon a wound that he got, wasted away for a long time and died; whereupon the Orchomenians, falling under public accusations and condemnations, removed the priesthood from their family, and made choice of the best man in the whole multitude.

39 Why do the Arcadians stone those that go willingly into the Lycaion, while those that go in ignorantly they carry forth to Eleutherae? Solution: Is it on the ground that they gained their liberty by being thus absolved, that the story has gained credit? And is this saying "to Eleutherae" the same as "into the region of security," or "thou shalt come to the seat of pleasure"? Or is the reason to be rendered according to that fabulous story, that of all the sons of Lycaon Eleuther and Lebadus alone were free from that conspiracy against Zeus, and fled into Boeotia, where the Lebadenses use the like civil polity to that of the Arcadians, and therefore they send them to Eleutherae that enter unwittingly into the inaccessible temple of Zeus? Or is it (as Architimus saith in his remarks on Arcadia) that some that went into the Lycaion unawares were delivered up to the Phliasians by the Arcadians, and by the Phliasians to the Megarians, and by the Megarians to the Thebans which inhabit about Eleutherae, where they are detained under rain, thunder, and other direful judgments from Heaven; and upon this account some say this place was called Eleutherae. But the report is not true that he that enters into the Lycaion casts no shadow, though it hath had a firm belief. And what if this be the reason of that report, that the air converted into clouds looks darkly on them that go in? Or that he that goes in falls down dead? — for the Pythagoreans say that the souls of the deceased do neither give a shadow nor wink. Or is it that the sun only makes a shadow, and the law bereaveth him that entereth here of the sight of the sun? Though this they speak enigmatically; for verily he that goes in is called Elaphus, a stag. Hence the Lacedemonians delivered up to the Arcadians Cantharion the Arcadian, who went over to the Eleans whilst they waged war with the Arcadians, passing with his booty through the inaccessible temple, and fled to Sparta when the war was ended; the oracle requiring them to restore the stag.

40 Who is Eunostus, the hero of Tanagra; and what is the reason that women may not enter into his grove? Solution: Eunostus was the son of Elieus who came of Cephisus and Scias, but they say received his name from Eunosta, the nymph that brought him up. This man was honest and just, and no less temperate and austere. They say that Ochna his niece fell in love with him, who was one of the daughters of Colonus; and when he perceived that she tempted him to lie with her, manifesting his indignation he went and accused her to her brethren. But she had cried Whore first and provoked her brethren, Echimus, Leon, and Bucolus, to kill Eunostus, by her false suggestion that he would have forced her; wherefore these laid wait for the young man and slew him, upon which Elieus secured them. Now Ochna growing penitent and full of terror, as well to discharge the grief she had for her beloved as out of commiseration towards her brethren, confesses the whole truth to Elieus, and he declares it to Colonus, who condemned them. Whereupon Ochna's brethren fled, but she broke her neck from some high place, as Myrtis the Anthedonian poetess hath told us. Therefore he kept the tomb and grove of Eunostus from the access and approach of women, insomuch that upon earthquakes, droughts, and other portents that often there happened, the Tanagrians made diligent search whether any woman had not by stealth got nigh to that place. And there are some (of whom Clidamus, a man of great fame, is one) who report that Eunostus met them as he was going to the sea to wash himself because a woman had entered into his grove. Diocles also, in his Treatise concerning Shrines, relates the edict of the Tanagrians upon the things that Clidamus declared.

41 Whence is it that in Boeotia there is a river at Eleon called Scamander? Solution: Deimachus, the son of Eleon and intimate friend of Hercules, bore his part in the siege of Troy. But the war proving long (as it seems), he took to him Glaucia the daughter of Scamander who had fallen in love with him, and got her with child: soon after, fighting against the Trojans, he was slain. Glaucia, fearing that she might be apprehended, fled to Hercules, and acquainted him with her late affection towards Deimachus, and the familiarity she had with him. Hercules, both out of commiseration to the woman, as also for joy that there was an offspring left of so good a man and his intimate acquaintance, took Glaucia on shipboard; and when she was delivered of a son, brought her into Boeotia, and committed her and her child to the care of Eleon. The son was named Scamander, and came to reign over that country. He called the river Inachus by his own name Scamander, and the next rivulet he named from his mother Glaucia; but the fountain he called Acidusa by his own wife's name, by whom he had three daughters, which they have a veneration for to this day, styling them virgins.

42 Whence was that proverbial speech, "Let this prevail"? Solution: Dinon the Tarentine general, being a man well skilled in military affairs, when the citizens manifested their dislike of a certain opinion of his by lifting up of hands, as the crier was declaring the majority of votes, stretched forth his right hand and said, This is better. Thus Theophrastus hath told the story; and Apollodorus in his Rhytinus adds this: When the crier had said, 'These are the most suffrages;' 'Aye, but,' saith Dinon, 'these are the best,' and ratifies the suffrages of the minority.

43 Why is the city of the Ithacans called Alalcomenae? Solution: It is affirmed by most, that it was because Anticlea in the time of her virginity was forcibly seized upon by Sisyphus, and brought forth Ulysses. But Ister the Alexandrian hath acquainted us in his memoirs, that Anticlea was married to Laertes, and being brought to a place about the Alalcomeneum in Boeotia, was delivered of Ulysses; and therefore Ulysses called the city of Ithaca by the same name, to renew the memory of the place in which he had been born.

44 Who are the Monophagi in Aigina? Solution: Many of the Aiginetans that fought against Troy were slain in those wars, but more of them by storm in the voyaging by sea. The relations therefore receiving those few that were left, and observing the other citizens overwhelmed with sorrow and grief, thought it not convenient to make any public appearances of joy or to sacrifice to the Gods; but every one entertained privately in his own house his relations that were escaped with feasts and entertainments, they themselves giving attendance to their fathers, kinsfolks, brethren, and acquaintance, none of other families being admitted thereto. Hence in imitation of these they celebrate a sacrifice to Poseidon, which is called the Thiasi, in which they revel without any noise, each family apart by itself, for the space of sixteen days, without any servant attending them; then offering sacrifices to Aphrodite, they finish this solemn feast. Upon this account they are called Monophagi, i.e. such as feed apart by themselves.

45 What is the reason that the statue of Labradean Zeus in Caria is made so as to hold an axe lifted up, and not a sceptre or thunderbolt. Solution: Because Hercules slaying Hippolyta, and taking away from her amongst other weapons her pole-axe, presented it to Omphale. After Omphale the kings of the Lydians carried it, as part of the sacred regalities which they took by succession, until Candaules, disdaining it, gave it to one of his favorites to carry. But afterwards Gyges revolting waged war against him; Arselis also came to the aid of Gyges from the Mylassians with a great strength, slew Candaules with his favorite, and carried away the pole-axe into Caria with other spoils; where furbishing up the statue of Zeus, he put the axe into his hand and called it the Labradean God, — for the Lydians call an axe labra.

46 What is the reason that the Trallians call the pulse ὄϱοβος by the name ϰαθαϱτής (i.e. purifying), and use it especially in expiations and purifications. Solution: Was it because the Leleges and Minyae, in former times driving out the Trallians, possessed themselves of the city and that country, and afterwards the Trallians returned and conquered them; and as many of the Leleges as were not slain or fled, but by reason of indigency and weakness were left there, they made no account of whether they lived or died, and therefore enacted a law that any Trallian that slew one of the Minyae or Leleges should be guiltless, provided only that he paid a measure of this pulse to the relatives of the slain person?

47 Why is it spoken by way of proverb amongst the Eleans, "Thou sufferest worse things than Sambicus"? Solution: It is said that one Sambicus an Elean, having many comrades with him, did break off many of the devoted bronze offerings placed in Olympia and disposed of them, and at length robbed the sanctuary of Artemis the Episkopos [Bishopess] in Elis, called the Aristarcheion. Presently after the committing of this sacrilege, he was taken and tormented the space of a year, being examined concerning all his accessories, and so died; hence this proverb arose from his suffering.

48 Why is the sanctuary of Ulysses in Lacedemon built hard by the heroon of the Leucippides? Solution: One Ergiaeus, of the posterity of Diomedes, by the persuasion of Temenus stole the Palladium from Argos, Leager being conscious of and accessory to the felony, for he was one of the intimates of Temenus. Afterward Leagros, by reason of a feud betwixt him and Temenus, went over into Lacedemon and transported the Palladium thither. The kings receive him readily, and place the Palladium next to the temple of the Leucippides, and sending to Delphiconsult the oracle about its safety and preservation. The oracle answered that they must make one of them that stole it the keeper of it. So they erected there the heroon of Ulysses, especially since they supposed that hero was related to the city by the marriage of Penelope.

49 What is the reason that it is a custom amongst the Chalcedonian women, that, if at any time they happen to meet with other women's husbands, especially magistrates, they cover one cheek? Solution: The Chalcedonianswarred against the Bithynians, being provoked thereto by every kind of injury. And Zipoetus being king of the Bithynians, they brought out all their forces, with the addition of Thracian auxiliaries, and were wasting the country with fire and sword. Zipoetus then pitching his camp against them at a place called Phalium, the Chalcedonians, fighting ill through desperateness and disorder, lost about eight thousand soldiers, but were not all cut off, Zipoetusin favor of the Byzantines yielding to a cessation of arms. Now, there being a great scarcity of men in the city of Chalcedon, most of the women were necessitated to marry their freedmen and aliens; others that chose widowhood rather than marriage to such, if they had any occasion to go before judges or magistrates, managed their own affairs, only withdrawing their veil from one side of their face. Then the married women, imitating these as their betters, for modesty's sake took up the same custom.

50 Why do the Argives bring their sheep to the grove of Agenor to take ram? Solution: Was it because Agenortook care to have the fairest sheep, and of all kings possessed the most flocks of sheep?

51 Why did the Argive boys on a certain feast-day call themselves Ballacrades in sport? Solution: Was it because they report that the first people that were brought by Inachus out of the countries into the plains, lived upon ἀχϱάδες, i.e. wild pears? But wild pears were first discovered by the Grecians in Peloponnesus, while that country was called Apia, whence wild pears came afterwards to be called ἄπιοι.

52 For what reason do the men of Elis lead their mares out of their borders when they would have them leaped by their horses? Solution: Was it that of all kings Oinomaus was the greatest lover of horses, and being most fond of this creature, imprecated many and great curses upon horses that should leap mares in Elis; wherefore the people, fearing his curse, do abominate this thing?

53 What was the reason of the custom amongst the Knossians, that those who borrowed money upon usury should snatch it and run away? Solution: Was it that, in case they should attempt to defraud the usurers, they might be liable for the violence, and thereby receive further punishment?

54 What is the cause that in Samos they call upon Aphrodite of Dexicreon? Solution: Was this the reason, that the women of Samos, by lasciviousness and bawdry falling into great debauchery, were reformed by Dexicreon, a mountebank, using some charms towards them? Or was it because Dexicreon, being the master of a ship, and sailing to Cyprus on a trading voyage, and being about to take in his lading, was commanded by Aphrodite to lade with water and nothing else, and sail back with all possible speed? Being persuaded hereto, he took in much water and set sail immediately; still winds and a calm detaining him, he sold his water to merchants and seamen distressed with thirst, whereby he gathered up much money; from which he erected a statue to Aphrodite, and called it by his own name. If this story be true, it is manifest that the Goddess intended not only the enriching of one man, but the saving of many alive by one man.

55 What is the reason that amongst the Samians, when they sacrifice to Hermes the munificent, they suffer a man to filch and steal garments if he will? Solution: Because, when at the command of the oracle they transplanted themselves from that island into Mycale, they lived ten years upon robbery; and after this, sailing back again into their island, they conquered their enemies.

56 Whence is that place in the island Samos called Panaema (Πάναιμα)? Solution: Was it because the Amazons, flying before Dionysos from the coasts of Ephesus, fell upon Samos, and thereupon Dionysos rigging up his ships wafted over, and joining battle slew abundance of them about that place, which, by reason of the plenty of blood spilled there, the beholders by way of admiration called Panaema? Some say that this slaughter was about Phloeum, and show their bones there; but others say also that Phloeum was rent off from Samos by the dreadful and hideous cry that was uttered at their death.

57 Upon what account was the Andron in Samos called Pedetes? Solution: The Geomori got the government into their hands, after Demoteles was slain, and after the dissolution of his monarchial constitution. At this time the Megarians waged war with the Perinthians, being a Samian colony, and brought fetters with them (as they say) to put on the captives. When the Geomori were acquainted with these proceedings, they immediately sent aid, sending forth nine commanders and manning thirty ships, two of which, launching forth and lying before the haven, were destroyed with lightning. The commanders, proceeding on their voyage in the rest, subdued the Megarians, and took six hundred of them alive. They were so elevated with this victory, that they meditated the subversion of this Geomoran oligarchy; but the occasion was given by the states themselves writing to them that they should bring the Megarian captives bound in their own fetters. When they received these letters, they showed them privately to the Megarians, persuading them to concur with them in a conspiracy to procure the people's liberty. A consult was held in common between them about this matter, and they decided that the best way was to beat off the rings from the fetters, and put them on the legs of the Megarians, and fasten them with thongs to their girdles, that they might not fall off nor being loose hinder them in their going. Accordingly they accoutred the men in this manner, and giving each of them a scimitar, they soon sailed back to Samos and landed, and accordingly led the Megarians through the market-place to the council-house, where all the Geomori were sitting together. Then, the sign being given, the Megarians fell on and slew those men. Whereupon, the city being set at liberty, they admitted the Megarians (as many as would) into the number of citizens, and erecting a magnificent edifice, hung up the fetters (πέδαι) in it. From this the house was named Πεδήτης.

58 What is the reason that the chief priest of Hercules in Antimachia at Cos, when he manageth the sacrifice, is clothed in women's apparel, and wears a mitre upon his head? Solution: Hercules, setting sail from Troy with six ships, was attacked by a storm, and lost all his ships but one, with which only he was forced by the wind upon the coast of Cos, and fell upon a place called Laceter, saving nothing besides his men and armor. There happening to meet with a flock of sheep, he requested one ram of the shepherd (the man was called Antagoras), who, being a robust-bodied young man, challenged Hercules to fight with him; and if he were worsted, Hercules should carry away the ram. As soon as this fellow engaged with Hercules, the Meropes came in to the aid of Antagoras; and the Grecians coming in to assist Hercules, a great fight ensued. Whereat (they say) Hercules, overpowered by the multitude, betook himself for refuge to a Thracian woman, and was concealed by disguising himself in woman's apparel. But when afterwards, conquering the Meropes and passing under purification, he married the daughter of Alciopus, he put on a flowery robe. Hence the priests offer sacrifices in the place where the battle was fought, and the bridegrooms are clothed in women's apparel when they receive their brides.

59 Whence was the race of Hamaxocylists in Megara? Solution: In that licentious democracy under which the demanding back of interest money paid to usurers was introduced and sacrilege was permitted, the Peloponnesians went on a pilgrimage to Delphi through the borders of Megara, and lodged in Aegira by the lake-side with their wives and children, in their caravans, as they best could. There a resolute drunken company of the Megarians in a riotous and cruel manner overturned their wagons, and overwhelmed them in the lake; so that many of the pilgrims were drowned. The Megarians indeed, by reason of the disorder of the government, neglected the punishment of this wickedness; but the Amphictyons, taking into consideration the sanctity of this pilgrimage, punished the actors of this villany, some with banishment, some with death. Hence the posterity of these villains were called Ἁμαξοϰυλισταί, i.e. overturners of wagons.

4 - 3 Greek and Roman Parallel Stories.

1 Most people are apt to take the histories of former times for mere forgeries and fables, because of many passages in those relations that seem to be very extravagant. But yet, according to my observation, we have had as strange occurrences of a later date in the Roman times as any we have received from antiquity; for proof whereof, I have here matched several stories of the ancients with modern instances, and cited my authorities.
Datis, an eminent Persian commander, drew out three hundred thousand men to Marathon, a plain of Attica, where he encamped and declared war against the inhabitants. The Athenians made no reckoning at all of so barbarous a rabble, but sent out nine thousand men against him, under the command of Cynaegirus, Polyzelus, Callimachus, and Miltiades. Upon the joining of battle, Polyzelus was struck blind at the sight of a wonderful apparition; Callimachus's body was struck through with a great many lances, continuing in an upright posture even when he was dead; Cynaegirus had both his hands cut off upon laying hold of a Persian ship that was endeavoring to get away. King Asdrubal, having possessed himself of Sicily, proclaimed war against the Romans. Metellus, who was appointed by the Senate to command in chief, overcame him. L. Glauco, a patrician, laid hold of the vessel that Asdrubal was in, and lost both his hands upon it. — Aristides Milesius gives this account in his First Book of the Affairs of Sicily, and Dionysius Siculus had it from him.

1 Ancient marvels matched with later Roman parallels, authorities cited.

2 Persian hand-burning spy; Roman Mucius mirrors fearless defiance.

3 Blood-written trophies decide Argive, Roman disputed victories.

4 Leonidas, Roman Fabius seize crowns, die heroically.

5 Anchurus, Curtius leap into chasms, saving cities.

6 Amphiaraus, Valerius swallowed; altars mark prophesied victories.

7 Pyraechmes, Metius torn by horses for treachery.

8 Philip, Horatius lose eyes defending homelands.

9 Icarius, Roman Saturn temple myths explain plagues.

10 Fathers immure traitor sons; burial denied.

11 Darius, Brutus execute sons plotting betrayal.

12 Victorious sons disobey; fathers execute them.

13 Rejected lovers besiege cities; maidens survive leaps.

14 Daughters offered; gods substitute victims compassionately.

15 Greedy women crushed by promised golden rewards.

16 Twin champions win; sisters slain for grief.

17 Palladium saviors struck blind, later restored.

18 Codrus, Decius self-sacrifice secure victories.

19 Incestuous fathers slain by wronged daughters.

20 Leaders sacrifice daughters to win wars.

21 Jealous wives killed by dogs; husbands suicide.

22 Incest exposed; daughters transformed, fathers perish.

23 Foreign captives freed by lovesick princesses; suicides.

24 Treacherous guardians blinded for murdering entrusted boys.

25 Jealous brothers kill favored siblings; banished.

26 Fateful spear, boar hunt; kin slain.

27 Seduced daughters spared drowning; later reunited lovers.

28 Incestuous siblings commit suicide by sword.

29 Bestial unions produce daughters, even deities.

30 Servant women substitute wives; cities saved.

31 Ration-cutting officials stoned as suspected traitors.

32 Conspiring nobles dismember kings; divine rumors pacify mobs.

33 Stepmothers kill favored sons; banished.

34 Slandered stepsons killed by divine bull.

35 Virgins spared by eagle omens; substitutes sacrificed.

36 Exposed twins suckled by wolves; future founders.

37 Sons avenge murdered fathers; acquitted.

38 Cruel hosts slain by heroic Hercules.

39 Tyrants test tortures on inventors themselves.

40 Fathers drown pursuing abducted daughters.

41 Oracles guide founders to garland-dancing settlements.

2 Xerxes came with an army of five millions of men to Artemisium, and declared war against the country. The Athenians, in a very great surprise, sent Agesilaus, the brother of Themistocles, to discover the motions of the enemy, notwithstanding a dream of his father Neocles, that his son had lost both his hands. This Agesilaus put himself into a Persian habit, and entered the barbarians' camp; where, taking Mardonius (an officer of the king's guards) for Xerxes himself, he killed him. Whereupon he was immediately seized, bound, and carried to Xerxes, who was just then about to sacrifice an ox to the Sun. The fire was kindled upon the altar, and Agesilaus put his right hand into it, without so much as shrinking at the pain. He was ordered upon this to be untied; and told the king that the Athenians were all of the same resolution, and that, if he pleased, he should see him burn his left hand too. This gave Xerxes an apprehension of him, so that he caused him to be still kept in custody. — This I find in Agatharchides the Samian, in the Second Book of his Persian History. Porsena, a king of Tyrrhenia, encamped himself beyond the Tiber, and made war upon the Romans, cutting off the supplies, till they were brought to great want of provisions. The Senate were at their wits' end what to do, till Mucius, a nobleman, got leave of the consuls to take four hundred of his own quality to advise with upon the matter. Mucius, upon this, put himself into the habit of a private man, and crossed the river; where finding one of the king's officers giving orders for the distribution of necessaries to the soldiers, and taking him for the king himself, he slew him. He was taken immediately and carried to the king, where he put his right hand into a fire that was in the room, and with a smile in the middle of his torments, — Barbarian, says he, I can set myself at liberty without asking you leave; and be it known to you, that I have left four hundred men in the camp as daring as myself, that have sworn your death. This struck Porsena with such a terror, that he made peace with the Romans upon it. — Aristides Milesius is my author for this, in the Third Book of his History.

3 There happened a dispute betwixt the Argives and Lacedemonians about a claim to the possession of Thyreatis. The Amphictyons gave their opinion for a trial of it by battle, so many and so many of a side, and the possession to go to the victor. The Lacedemonians made choice of Othryades for their captain, and the Argives of Thersander. The battle was fought, and the only two survivors that appeared were Agenor and Chromius, both Argives, who carried their city the news of the victory. In this interim, Othryades, who was not as yet quite dead, made a shift to raise himself by the help of broken lances, gathered the shields of the dead together, and erected a trophy with this inscription upon it in his own blood. "To Zeus the Guardian of Trophies." The controversy still depended, till the Amphictyons, upon an ocular examination of the matter, gave it for the Lacedemonians. — This is according to Chrysermus, in his Third Book of the Peloponnesian History. In a war that the Romans had with the Samnites, they made Posthumius Albinus their general. He was surprised in the difficult pass called the Caudine Forks, where he was hemmed in and lost three legions, he himself likewise falling upon the place grievously wounded. In the dead of the night, finding himself near his end, he gathered together the targets of his dead enemies, and raised a trophy with them, which he inscribed with his hand dipped in blood, "Erected by the Romans to Zeus, Guardian of the Trophies, for a victory over the Samnites." But Fabius Gurges, that was despatched away with troops under his command, so soon as he came to the place and saw the trophy, took up an auspicious omen upon it, fought the enemy, and overcame them, took their king prisoner, and sent him to Rome. — This is in the Third Book of Aristides Milesius's Italian History.

4 Upon the Persians falling into Greece with a body of five millions of men, the Spartans sent out Leonidas with a party of three hundred soldiers to secure the Pass of Thermopylae. As they were at dinner, the barbarians fell in upon them; upon which, Leonidas bade them eat as if they were to sup in another world. Leonidas charged at the head of his men into the body of the barbarians; and after many wounds received, got up to Xerxes himself, and took his crown from his head. He lost his life in the attempt, and Xerxes causing him to be cut up when he was dead, found his heart all hairy. — Aristides, in the First Book of his Persian History. In the Punic war the Romans sent out three hundred men under the command of Fabius Maximus, where they were all lost; and he himself, after he had received a mortal wound, assaulting Hannibal, took his diadem from his head, and died in the action. According to Aristides Milesius.

5 There was a terrible earthquake, with a wonderful eruption of water, at Celaenae, a city of Phrygia, that swallowed up a great many houses, people and all. Midas upon this consults the oracle, which gave him for answer, that if he would cast into that gulf the most precious thing that he had in the world, the earth should close again. Whereupon he threw in a mass of gold and silver; but never the better. This put it in the head of Anchurus, the son of Midas, to consider, that the most precious thing in Nature is the life and soul of a man; so that he went presently and embraced his father and his wife Timothea, mounted his horse, and leaped into the abyss. The earth closed upon it, and Midas raised a golden altar in the place, laid his hand upon it, and dedicated it TO JUPITER IDAEUS. This altar becomes stone at that time of the year when it was usual to have these eruptions; and after that season was over, it is turned to gold again. — My author is Callisthenes, in his Second Book of Transformations. The River Tiber, in its course over the Forum, opened a huge cavity in the ground, so that a great many houses were buried in it. This was looked upon as a judgment upon the place, from Zeus Tarsius; who, as the oracle told them, was not to be appeased without throwing into it what they held most valuable. So they threw a quantity of gold and silver into it. But Curtius, one of the bravest young men they had, gave a better guess at the mind of the oracle; and reflecting upon it, that the life of a man was much more excellent than treasure, took his horse and plunged himself into the gulf, and so redeemed his country. — Aristides, in the Fortieth Book of his Italian History.

6 As several great captains were making merry with Polynices, an eagle passing by made a stoop, and carried up into the air the lance of Amphiaraus, who was one of the company; and then falling down, it stuck in the ground, and was turned into a laurel. The next day, when the armies were in action, the earth opened and swallowed up Amphiaraus with his chariot, in that very place where at present the city Harma stands, so called from that chariot. — This is in Trisimachus's Third Book of the Foundations of Cities. When the Romans made war upon Pyrrhus, the king of the Epirots, the oracle promised Aemilius Paulus the victory in case he should erect an altar in that place where he should see an eminent man with his chariot swallowed up into the ground. Some three days after, Valerius Conatus, a man skilled in divining, was commanded in a dream to take the pontifical habit upon him. He did so, and led his men into the battle, where, after a prodigious slaughter of the enemy, the earth opened and swallowed him up. Aemilius built an altar here, obtained a great victory, and sent a hundred and sixty castle-bearing elephants to Rome. This altar delivers oracles about that season of the year in which Pyrrhus was overcome. — Critolaus has this in his Third Book of the History of the Epirots.

7 Pyraechmes, king of the Euboeans, made war upon the Boeotians. Hercules, when he was yet a youth, overcame this king, had him drawn to pieces with horses, and threw away the carcass unburied. The place where this was done is called Pyraechmes's horses. It lies upon the River Heraclius, and there is heard a neighing whensoever any horse drinks of that river. — This is in the Third Book of Rivers. Tullus Hostilius, a king of the Romans, waged war against the Albans, whose king's name was Metius Fufetius; and he many times kept off from fighting. He had the ill luck to be once worsted, upon which the Albans gave themselves up to drinking and making good cheer, till Tullus fell in upon them when they were in their cups, and tore their king to pieces betwixt two horses. — Alexarchus, in the Fourth Book of his Italian History.

8 Philip had a design to sack Olynthus and Methone, and in trying to pass the River Sandanus, was shot in the eye with an arrow by one Aster, an Olynthian, with these words: It is Aster that sends Philip this mortal shaft. Philip upon this swam back again to his own people, and with the loss of an eye saved his life. — Callisthenes, in his Third Book of the Macedonics. Porsena made war upon the Romans, and pitched his camp on the further side of the Tiber, where he intercepted all relief, till they were pinched with famine. Horatius Cocles, being chosen general, took possession of the wooden bridge, where he opposed himself to the enemy that were pressing to come over; but finding himself overpowered with numbers, he commanded his people to cut down the bridge behind him, by which means he hindered them from coming over. But in the mean time receiving a wound in his eye, he threw himself into the river, and swam over to his own party. — So Theotimus in the Second Book of his Italian History.

9 Eratosthenes in Erigone tells a story of Icarius, that entertained Dionysos under his roof; and it runs thus. Saturn, having taken up his lodging with an husbandman who had a very beautiful daughter named Entoria, took her to his bed, and had several sons by her, Janus, Hymnus, Faustus, and Felix. He taught his host Icarius the use of wine and the way of dressing his vines, with a charge that he should likewise instruct his neighbors in the mystery. His acquaintance, hereupon finding that this strange drink had cast them into a deeper sleep than ordinary, took a fancy that they were poisoned, and stoned Icarius in revenge; whereupon his grandchildren hanged themselves for grief. Upon a time, when the plague was very hot in Rome, the Pythian oracle being consulted gave this answer, that upon the appeasing the wrath of Saturn, and the Manes of those that were unjustly killed, the pestilence would cease. Lutatius Catulus, a man of the first quality, caused a temple upon this occasion to be erected near the Tarpeian Mount, which he dedicated to Saturn, placing an altar in it with four faces; possibly with a respect to Saturn's four children, or to the four seasons of the year. He also instituted the month of January. But Saturn translated them all to heaven among the stars, some of which are called Protrygeteres, as forerunners of the vintage; only Janus rises first, and has his place at the feet of the Virgin. — Critolaus, in his Fourth Book of Celestial Appearances.

10 In the time of the devastation of Greece by the Persians, Pausanias, the Lacedemonian commander, took a bribe of 500 talents of Xerxes, to betray Sparta. The treason being discovered, his father Agesilaus pressed him so hard, that he was fain to take sanctuary in the temple of Athena, called Chalcioecus, where he caused the doors to be bricked up, and his son to be immured till he died of hunger; and his mother after this would not suffer the body to be buried. — Chrysermus, in his Second Book of Histories. The Romans, being in war with the Latins, made choice of P. Decius for their general. Now there was a certain patrician, a young man and poor (Cassius Brutus by name), who proposed for a certain reward to open the gates to the enemy; but being detected, he fled to the temple of Athena Auxiliaria. But his father Cassius, an ensign-bearer, shut him up there till he died of famine, and his dead body was not allowed burial. — Clitonymus, in his Italian History.

11 Darius, the Persian, had a battle with Alexander near the River Granicus, where he lost seven satraps, and five hundred and two chariots armed with scythes. And yet he would have tried the fortune of another battle the day following; but his son Ariobarzanes, in favor of Alexander, undertook to betray his father into his hands. The father was so transported with passion at the indignity of the thing, that he cut off his son's head for it. — Aretades Cnidius, in the Third of his Macedonian History. Brutus, that was created consul by the unanimous vote of the citizens, forced away Tarquinius Superbus into banishment for his abominable tyranny. He fled to the Tuscans, and by their assistance made war upon the Romans. The sons were treating to betray the father; the business was discovered, and they lost their heads for it. — Aristides Milesius, in his Italian History.

12 Epaminondas, a Theban general, managed a war against the Spartans. He went from the army to Thebes, to be present there at a public election of magistrates; but first enjoined his son Stesimbrotus that he should not fight the enemy in his absence upon any terms. The Spartans being informed that Epaminondas was not with the army, reproached the young man with want of courage, and so far provoked him, that without any regard to his father's command he gave the Spartans battle, and overcame them. His father was so incensed against him for this action, that though he crowned him for the victory, he cut off his head for his disobedience. — Ctesiphon, in his Third Book of the Boeotian History. In a war that the Romans had against the Samnites, they gave the command to Manlius, surnamed Imperiosus. He had occasion to go to Rome, to be present there at the choice of consuls, and gave his son in charge not to engage the enemy in the mean time. The Samnites, understanding this, irritated the young man with opprobrious words, as if he declined fighting out of cowardice, and in the end provoked him to a battle; upon which action he carried the day; but his father caused his head to be struck off for breaking his order. — This is in Aristides Milesius.

13 Hercules made love to Iole, but she gave him the repulse, and so he went and assaulted Oichalia. Iole threw herself headlong down from the wall, but the whiffling of the wind under her garments broke the fall, and she had no hurt. — This story is in Nicias Maleotes. Valerius Torquatus was the Romans' general in the war they had with the Tuscans; who, upon the sight of Clusia, the daughter of the Tuscan king, fell in love with her, and when he found he could do no good on't, laid siege to the city. Clusia, upon this, threw herself headlong from a tower; but Aphroditewas so careful of her, that by the playing of the wind in the folds of her garments, she was wafted safe to the ground. Torquatus, however, offered her violence, and for so doing he was banished by a public decree into the isle of Corsica. — Theophilus, in the Third Book of his Italian History.

14 While the Carthaginians were treating an alliance with the Sicilians against the Romans, the Roman general Metellus was observed to omit sacrificing only to Vesta, who revenged herself upon him by sending a cross wind to the navy. But Caius Julius, a soothsayer, being consulted in the matter, gave answer, that this obstacle would be removed upon the general's sacrificing his daughter: so that he was forced to produce his daughter Metella for a sacrifice. But Vesta had compassion for her, and so sent her away to Lamusium, substituting a heifer in her stead, and made a priestess of her to the dragon that is worshipped in that place. — So Pythocles, in the Third Book of his Italian History. Something like this happened to Iphigenia in Aulis, a city of Boeotia. — See Meryllus, in the First Book of his Boeotic History.

15 Brennus, a king of the Gauls, after the wasting of Asia, came to Ephesus, and there fell in love with a country girl, who promised him that for such a certain reward in bracelets and other curiosities of value he should have the use of her body, and that she would further undertake to deliver up Ephesus into his hands. Brennus ordered his soldiers to throw all the gold they had into the lap of this avaricious wretch, which they did, till she perished under the weight of it. — Clitophon in the First Book of his Gallican History. Tarpeia, a virgin that was well born, and had the keeping of the Capitol in the war betwixt the Sabines and the Romans, passed a promise unto Tatius, that she would open him a passage into the Tarpeian Mount, provided that he would give her all the jewels that the Sabineswore, for a reward. The Sabines hearing this crushed her to death — Aristides's Milesius, in his Italic History.

16 After a long war betwixt two cities, Tegea and Phenea, they came to an agreement to refer the decision of the controversy, by combat, to three twin-brothers on each side, the sons of Reximachus for Tegea, and the sons of Damostratus for Phenea. Upon the encounter, two of the sons of Reximachus were slain; but Critolaus, the third, had a fetch beyond his two brothers; for, under a pretence of running away, he divided his enemies that pursued him, and so taking them one by one, he killed them all. The Tegeans upon his return went all overjoyed to gratulate the victor. Only his sister Demodice was not so well pleased; for she was betrothed, it seems, to Demodicus, one of the brothers, that was now slain. Which Critolaus took so ill that he killed his sister, and being afterwards indicted for murder at the instigation of his mother, he was acquitted. — Demaratus, in his Second Book of the ArcadianHistory. In the heat of the war betwixt the Romans and Albans, they came to this agreement, that the cause should be determined by a trial at arms betwixt three and three twins on each side, the Curiatii for the Albans, and the Horatii for the Romans. Upon the encounter, the Curiatii killed two of the others; the third survivor, under the color of flying, destroyed his enemies one by one, as they followed him. All his friends came to joy him of his victory, save only his sister Horatia; for one of the Curiatii, that her brother killed, was her sweetheart. Horatius for this killed his sister. — Aristides Milesius, in his Italian Commentaries.

17 The temple of Athena in Ilium happened to be on fire. Ilus ran presently to save the Palladium (an image dropped from heaven); but upon the taking of it up, he was struck blind, it being a thing unlawful for any man to look upon. But upon appeasing the Deity, he was afterwards restored to his sight. — Dercyllus, in his First Book of Foundations. Metellus, an eminent man, as he was walking out of the city, was interrupted by ravens, that laid hold of him and kept a flapping of him with their wings. This omen surprised him, and back he went into the city again, where he found the temple of Vesta all in a flame. He went and took away the Palladium, and fell blind upon't. But some time after, the Goddess being pacified gave him the use of his eyes again. — Aristides Milesius, in his Italian History.

18 Upon a time when the Thracians were engaged in a war against the Athenians, the oracle promised them victory if they would but save the life of Codrus. Codrus upon this puts himself in a coarse disguise, and away he goes into the enemies' camp with a scythe in his hand, where he killed one, and another killed him, so that the Athenians got the better on't. — Socrates, in his Second Book of his Thracian History. Publius Decius, a Roman, at a time when they were in war with the Albans, had a dream that his death would bring a great advantage to the Romans; upon which consideration he charged into the middle of his enemies, where he killed many, and was slain himself: his son Decius did the like in the Gallic war, for the conservation of the Roman State. — Aristides Milesiusis my author.

19 There was one Cyanippus a Syracusan, that sacrificed to all the Gods but Dionysos; who took the contempt so heinously that he made him drunk, in which fit he got his daughter Cyane into a corner and lay with her. She in the mean time slipped his ring off his finger, and gave it to her nurse to keep, as a circumstance that some time or other might come to be brought in evidence. There brake out a pestilence, and the Pythian oracle advised the sacrificing of an incestuous person to the Gods that are the averters of such calamities, as the only remedy. Cyane, that understood the meaning of the oracle better than other people, took her father by the hair of the head and dragged him forth, first stabbing him and then herself. — Dositheus, in the Third Book of his Sicilian History. In the time of celebrating the Bacchanalia at Rome, Aruntius, that had never drunk any wine since he was born, did not show such reverence for the power of the God as he ought to have done, so that Dionysos intoxicated him; and in that freak, Aruntius ravished his daughter Medullina. She came to know the ravisher by his ring, and an exploit came into her head, above what from her age could have been expected. She made her father drunk and set a garland upon his head, carrying him to the altar of Thunder, where with tears she killed him for robbing her so treacherously of her virginity. — Aristides, in the Third Book of his Italian History.

20 Erechtheus was told in a war he had with Eumolpus, that he should have the better of his enemy if he would but sacrifice his daughter. He advised upon the matter with his wife Praxithea, and delivered up his daughter after the manner of a common sacrifice. — Euripides, in his Erechtheus. Marius, finding himself hard put to it in the Cimbrian war, had it revealed to him in a dream, that he should overcome his enemies if he would but sacrifice his daughter Calpurnia. He did it, preferring the common safety before any private bond of Nature, and he got the victory. There are two altars in Germany, where about that time of the year may be heard the sound of trumpets. — Dorotheus, in the Fourth Book of his Italian History.

21 There was one Cyanippus, a Thessalian, who was a great lover of the chase and was often abroad a hunting. This same Cyanippus was newly married, and his staying out so long and so often in the woods gave his wife a jealousy of an intrigue there with some other woman; insomuch that she followed him one time, and got into a thicket to watch him. The rustling of the boughs in the place where she lay brought the dogs thither in expectation of some game, where they tore this tender-hearted woman to pieces, as if she had been a brute beast. Cyanippuswas so surprised with so dismal and unthought-of a spectacle, that he killed himself. — Parthenias the Poet. Sybaris is a city of Italy, where there was one Aemilius, a very handsome young man, and a lover of hunting. His wife (whom he had lately married) took up a suspicion that, under color of the chase, he carried on an assignation with some other woman. She traced him to the wood, and upon the noise of the boughs in her passage, the dogsran presently to her and tore her to pieces; and her husband stabbed himself immediately upon this miserable accident. — Clitonymus, in the Second Book of his Sybaritics.

22 One Smyrna (to whom Aphrodite owed a shame, it seems) fell passionately in love with her father Cinyras, and made the nurse her confidant. She goes craftily to work with her master, and tells him of a maid there in the neighborhood that loved him above all things in the world, but she could not in modesty appear publicly to him. So the father lay ignorantly with his own daughter. But some time after, having a great mind to see his mistress, he called for a light, and when he saw who it was, he pursued the incestuous wretch with his drawn sword; but by the providence of Aphrodite, she was rescued from that danger, and turned into a myrrh-tree. — Theodorus, in his Transformations. One Valeria Tusculanaria (for whom Aphrodite had no kindness) fell downright in love with her father Valerius. She told the nurse the secret, who ordered it so that she brought the father and the daughter together, telling him, that a maid there hard by was fallen desperately in love with him, but that she durst not lie with him for fear of being known. The father was got into his cups, and as he was in bed with his daughter, called for a candle. The nurse waked Valeria, and away she goes wandering up and down the country with her great belly. She had at last a fall from a precipice, but escaped without so much as any miscarriage; for she was delivered at her time, and the child's name was Sylvanus (or goat-footed Pan). Valerius, in the anxiety of his mind, threw himself from the same precipice. — Aristides Milesius, in the Third Book of his Italian History.

23 Diomedes, after the destruction of Troy, was cast by stress of weather upon the coast of Libya, where Lycusthe son of Mars was king, whose custom it was to sacrifice all strangers to his father; but his daughter Callirrhoefalling in love with Diomedes, betrayed her father and set Diomedes at liberty; who presently went his way without any regard to his benefactress, and Callirrhoe hanged herself upon it. — Juba, Book the Third of his Libyan History. Calpurnius Crassus, a famous man bearing arms with Regulus, was sent to the Massyllians to attack the castle of Garaetius, being a very strong place. He was taken in the enterprise, and designed for a sacrifice to Saturn; but Bisaltia, the king's daughter, out of a passionate kindness to Calpurnius, betrayed her father. Calpurnius left her, and after his departure Bisaltia cut her own throat. — Hesianax's Third Book of African History.

24 When Priam found that Troy was given for lost, he sent his young son Polydore into Thrace with a vast sum of gold, and put all into the hands of Polymestor his kinsman. So soon as Troy was taken, Polymestor killed the child, and took the gold to himself. Hecuba, being driven upon that quarter, overreached Polymestor by craft, under pretence of giving him a great treasure, at which time she, with the assistance of her fellow-prisoners, tore out his eyes with her nails. — Euripides the Tragedian. When Hannibal was ravaging the country of Campania, Lucius Thymbris deposited his son Rustius, with a vast sum of money, in the hands of Valerius Gestius his kinsman; who upon intelligence that the enemy carried all before him, out of pure avarice and without any regard to humanity or justice, killed the child. It so fell out that Thymbris, as he was walking about the fields, found the dead body of his son; whereupon he called his kinsman under pretence of a treasure that he would show him. He took his opportunity, put out his eyes, and crucified him. — Aristides's Third Book of his Italic History.

25 Aeacus had two sons by Psamathe, Phocus and Telamon, the former better beloved than the other. Telamon one day took out his brother a hunting; and a boar presenting himself, he threw his lance in pretence at the boar, but in truth at his brother, whom he hated, and so killed him; for which his father banished him. — Dorotheus's First Book of Transformations. Caius Maximus had two sons, Rhesus the one, by Ameria , . . . and the other Similius. The brothers were a hunting together, and Rhesus having killed the other, put it off — when he came home — that it was by chance, and far from any design of doing it. But his father, when he came in time to know the truth of it, banished the son. — Aristocles, in the Third Book of his Italian History.

26 Mars is said to have begotten Meleager upon Althaea. — Euripides, in his Meleager. Septimius Marcellustook to wife one Sylvia, and a great lover of hunting he was. Mars put himself in the habit of a shepherd, whored the new wife and got her with child; which being done, he told her who he was, and gave her a spear, telling her that the fate of the child she went withal was wrapped up in the fate of that spear. . . . Septimius slew Tuscinus; but Mamercus, in his sacriticing to the Gods for a fruitful season, omitted only Demeter, who in revenge sent a wild boar into his grounds. Whereupon getting a knot of huntsmen together, he killed him, and delivered the head and skin to his sweetheart; but Scymbrates and Muthias, the maid's uncles, took them away from her. Mamercus in a rage killed them upon it, and the mother burned the spear. — Menyllus, in the Third Book of his Italian History.

27 When Telamon, the son of Aeacus and Endeis, came to Euboea, he debauched Periboea the daughter of Alcathous, and fled away by night. The father understanding this, and suspecting the villany to be done by some of the citizens, he delivered his daughter to one of the guards to be thrown into the sea. But the soldier, in compassion to the woman, rather sold her, and she was carried away by sea to the island of Salamis, where Telamon bought her, and had by her Ajax. — Aretades Cnidius, in his Second Book of Islands. Lucius Troscius had by Patris a daughter called Florentia, who, being corrupted by Calpurnius a Roman, was delivered by her father to a soldier, with a charge to throw her in the sea and drown her. The man had compassion of her, and rather sold her. And when good fortune brought the ship to Italy, Calpurnius bought her, and had Contruscus by her. . . .

28 Aeolus, a great king of Etruria, had by Amphithea six daughters, and as many sons. Macareus, the youngest of them, had the carnal knowledge of one of his sisters, who was delivered of a boy. Her father sent her a sword to kill the child with; but that was so impious, that she chose rather to kill herself. And Macareus laid violent hands upon himself too. — Sostratus, in his Second Book of Tuscan History. Papirius Tolucer married Julia Pulchra, by whom he had six sons and six daughters. Papirius Romanus, the eldest of the six, got Canulia his sister with child. When the father came to the knowledge of it, he sent his daughter a sword, with which she killed herself; and Romanus did the same. — Chrysippus, in his First Book of Italian History.

29 Aristonymus, an Ephesian and the son of Demostratus, was a woman-hater; but he had to do with an ass, which brought him forth in the ordinary course of time a most beautiful daughter, which he called Onoscelis. — Aristotle's Second Book of Paradoxes. Fulvius Stellus had an aversion to women too; but entertained himself to his satisfaction with a mare, by which he had a very handsome daughter, that he called Hippona; and this is the goddess that has the care of the breed of horses. — According to Agesilaus, in the Third Book of his ItalianHistory.

30 The Sardians, being engaged in war with the Smyrnaeans, besieged Smyrna, and sent them word by their ambassadors, that they would never raise the siege till the Smyrnaeans should deliver up their wives to their embraces. The men of Smyrna would have been hard put to it upon this pinching necessity, if it had not been for the advice of a pretty wench that was a maid-servant to Phylarchus. Her counsel to her master was this; that instead of sending free women, they should rather dress up the servants and send them. The Smyrnaeans followed their advice; and when the Sardians had wearied themselves with their mistresses, the Smyrnaeans easily overcame them. From whence there is a festival day observed under the name of Eleutheria, which is celebrated among the Smyrnaeans with great solemnity; the servants being dressed up with all the ornaments of the free women. — Dositheus, in the Third Book of his Lydian History. Atepomarus, a king of the Gauls, being in war with the Romans, made a public declaration, that he would never agree to a peace till the Romans should prostitute their wives to them. The Romans advised with the maid-servants, and sent them in the place of the free women; the barbarians plied the work so hard, that they were soon tired and fell asleep. Retana (who was the authoress of the counsel) climbed a fig-tree, and so got on the wall; and finding how it was, gave notice of it to the consuls. The Romans upon this made a sally and routed the enemy; in memory whereof was instituted the Servants' Holiday, and this was the rise of it. — Aristides Milesius, in the First Book of his Italian History.

31 In the war betwixt the Athenians and Eumolpus, provisions falling short, the commissary Pyrandrus, upon a point of prudence and good husbandry, made some small abatement in the soldiers' proportions. The citizens suspected treachery in the case, and stoned him to death. — Callisthenes, Third Book of his History of Thrace. The Romans being in war with the Gauls, and provisions for the belly being very scarce, Cinna contracted the soldiers' allowance to a less proportion than they had formerly. The citizens interpreted this abatement to an ambitious design he had upon the government, and so stoned him for it. — Aristides, Book Third of his ItalianHistory.

32 In the time of the Peloponnesian war, Pisistratus an Orchomenian had a spite at the nobility, and to make himself popular, favored the common people. The Senate conspired against him, and treacherously killed him, cutting him into small gobbets which they carried away with them in their bosoms, and paring off the surface of the ground that no signs of the murder might appear. The common people, however, upon a jealousy of the matter, went tumultuously to the senate house; but the king's younger son Telesimachus that was dipped in the conspiracy, diverted them with a sham story, telling them that he himself had seen his father in a form more than human, walking as lively as was possible up the Pisaean mountain. And so he imposed upon the people. — Theophilus's Second Book of Peloponnesian Histories. The Senate of Rome, being hard put to it for the maintaining of a war with so many of their neighbors, thought it good husbandry to shorten the people's allowance of corn, which Romulus the king took very ill; and not only did he restore it to the people, but several great men were punished for it. Upon this he was murdered in the Senate by a conspiracy of the nobles, who cut him all to pieces, and carried them severally away in the lappets of their garments. The Romans came to the senate house in a hurry, and brought fire with them to set all in a flame; but Julius Proculus, one that was in the plot, told them that he saw Romulusupon a mountain, of a size larger than any man, and that he was translated into the number of the Gods. The Romans believed him, and quietly withdrew. — Aristobulus, in the Third Book of his History of Italy.

33 Pelops the son of Tantalus and Euryanassa, had two children, Atreus and Thyestes, by his wife Hippodamia; and by the Nymph Danais he had Chrysippus, whom he loved better than his lawful children. But Laius the Theban in the heat of his lust forcibly abused his body; and being taken by Atreus and Thyestes, obtained his pardon from Pelops, in regard that love had provoked him to it. Hippodamia's advice to Atreus and Thyestes was, that they should kill Chrysippus, as one that would interpose between them and the crown. Upon their refusal to do so base a thing, she herself put her own hands to the work, and in the dead of the night took Laius's sword when he was asleep, wounded Chrysippus with it, and left the weapon in his body. This circumstance of Laius's sword brought him into suspicion of the murder, till he was cleared by Chrysippus himself, who, being as yet but half dead, gave his testimony to the truth. Pelops buried his son, and then banished his wife. — Dositheus, in his Pelopidae. Ebius Toliex had two sons by his wife Nuceria, and a third called Firmus by an enfranchised woman, who was very handsome and better beloved by the father than those that were legitimate. Nuceria that hated this by-blow, advised her sons to despatch Firmus; but upon their refusal, she did it herself; and in the dead of the night got the sword of him that guarded the body of Firmus, gave him a mortal wound, and left the weapon sticking in his body. The boy cleared his keeper by a particular account of the matter of fact; the father buried his son, and sent away his wife into banishment. — Dositheus, Book Third of his Italian History.

34 Theseus, the true son of Poseidon, had Hippolytus by the Amazon Hippolyta, and afterward married Phaedra the daughter of Minos, who fell deep in love with Hippolytus, and made use of the nurse's mediation to help forward the incest. But Hippolytus upon this left Athens and went away to Troezen, where he diverted himself with hunting. Now this lascivious woman, finding her design disappointed, forged several scandalous letters to the prejudice of the chaste young man, and ended her days with a halter. Theseus gave credit to the slander, and Poseidon having promised him a grant of any three things he would ask, he made it his request that he would destroy Hippolytus. So Poseidon sent a bull to the coast where Hippolytus was driving his chariot, which put his horses into such a fright, that they ran away with them, and overturning the chariot killed the master. ComminiusSuper, a Laurentine, had a son by the nymph Egeria, whom he called Comminius; after which he married one Gidica, who fell passionately in love with her son-in-law. And receiving a repulse, she framed slanderous letters against him, which she left behind her, and so hanged herself. Comminius, reflecting upon the crime and believing the calumny, applied himself to Poseidon, who with a terrible bull frighted the horses so, while the youth was in the chariot, that they overturned all, and killed him with the fall. — Dositheus, Book Third of Italian Histories.

35 In the time of a great plague in Lacedemon, they were told by the oracle, that the pestilence would cease upon the sacrificing of a noble virgin every year. It fell one time by lot to Helena, who was brought out and dressed up ready for the sacrifice. An eagle at that time flying by took away the sword, and carrying it into a herd of cattlelaid it down upon a heifer; whereupon they spared the virgin. — Aristodemus, in his Third Collection of Fables. There was a dreadful plague in Falerii, which the oracle said would be removed upon the sacrificing of a virgin to Hera every year. While this superstition was in course, it fell to Valeria Luperca's lot to be the sacrifice. An eagleflew away with the drawn sword, but laid a stick upon the fuel prepared for the fire, with a little mallet fixed to it. The sword he threw upon a heifer feeding near the temple. The virgin perceiving this sacrificed the heifer; and taking up the mallet, went about from house to house, and with a gentle knock called to those that were sick, bidding them be of good health. And this was the rise of the ceremony which continues to this day. — Aristides, in his Nineteenth Book of Italian Histories.

36 Philonome, the daughter of Nyctimus and Arcadia, went many times to the chase with Artemis. Mars lay with her in the shape of a shepherd, and fetched up her belly. She was delivered in time of twins, which for fear of her father she threw into the river Erymanthus. By a strange fatality of providence they were driven safe into a hollow oak, which happening to be the kennel of a wolf, this wolf threw her whelps into the river, and suckled the children. Tyliphus a shepherd, that had seen this with his own eyes, took these children and brought them up as his own, calling one of them Lycastus, and the other Parrasius, which reigned successively in Arcadia. — This is reported by Zopyrus Byzantius, in the Third Book of his Histories. Amulius dealing very tyrannically with his brother Numitor, killed his son Aenitus as they were a hunting, and made his daughter Sylvia . . . a priestess of Hera. Mars got her with child, and when she had laid her belly of twins, she confessed the truth to the tyrant; which put him in such an apprehension, that he exposed them both on the side of the river Tiber, where they were carried by the stream to a place where a she-wolf had her whelps. The wolf cast away her own, and gave suck to these children. Faustus a shepherd, observing this, took the children to himself, and called them by the names of Romus and Romulus, which came afterwards to be the founders of Rome. — Aristides's Italian Histories.

37 After the destruction of Troy, Agamemnon and Cassandra were killed; but Orestes, that was brought up with Strophius, revenged the death of his father. — Pyrander's Fourth Book of Peloponnesian Histories. FabiusFabricianus, a kinsman of Fabius Maximus, having taken Tuxium, the chief city of the Samnites, sent to Rome the image of Aphrodite Victrix, which among them was held in great veneration. His wife Fabia was debauched by Petronius Valentinus, a handsome young man, and afterwards she treacherously murdered her husband; but for her son Fabricianus who was yet in his infancy, she shifted him away to be privately brought up, and so provided for his security. When he was grown up, he destroyed both his mother and the adulterer, and was formally acquitted for it by a decree of the Senate. — Dositheus's Third Book of Italian History.

38 Busiris, the son of Poseidon and Anippe the daughter of Nilus, was used to invite strangers in to him under a pretence of hospitality, and then to murder them; but divine vengeance met with him at last, for Hercules found out the villainy, and killed him with his club. — Agatho the Samian. Hercules, as he was driving Geryon's oxenthrough Italy, took up his lodging with King Faunus there, the son of Hermes, whose custom it was to sacrifice strangers to his father. He set upon Hercules, and had his brains beaten out for his pains. — Dercyllus's Third Book of Italian History.

39 Phalaris of Agrigentum, a cruel tyrant, was wont to put strangers and travellers to the most exquisite torment. Perillus, a brass-founder, made a cow of brass, and presented it to the king for a new invention, that he might burn strangers alive in it. Phalaris for this once was just, in making the first proof of it upon Perillus himself; and the invention was so artificial, that upon putting it in execution, the engine itself seemed to bellow. — Second Book of Questions or Causes. In Egesta, a city of Sicily, there was a certain tyrant called Aemilius Censorinus, who was so inhuman that he proposed rewards to the inventors of new tortures. There was one Aruntius Paterculus that had framed a brazen horse, and made a present of it to the tyrant to practise with it upon whom he pleased. It was the first piece of justice that ever the tyrant did, to make trial of the torment upon the author of it, that he might first feel himself the torments he had provided for others. He was afterwards thrown down from the Tarpeian Rock. It may be thought that unmerciful rulers are from this tyrant called Aemilii. — Aristides's Fourth Book of Italian History.

40 Evenus, the son of Mars and Sterope, had a daughter Marpessa by his wife Alcippe, the daughter of Oinomaus; and this girl he had a mind to keep a virgin. But Idas, the son of Aphareus, ran away with her from a choir. Evenus pursued him, and finding he could not overtake him, he threw himself into the river Lycormas, and became immortal. — Dositheus's First Book of Italian History. Anius, a king of the Tuscans, had a delicate, handsome daughter, whose name was Salia, and he took great care to keep her a virgin. But Cathetus, a man of quality, seeing her sporting herself, fell passionately in love with her, and carried her away to Rome. The father made after her, and when he saw there was no catching of her, he threw himself into a river that from him took the name of Anio. Cathetus begot Latinus and Salius upon the body of Salia, the root of a noble race. — Aristides Milesius, and Alexander Polyhistor's Third Book of Italian History.

41 Hegesistratus an Ephesian committed a murder in his family, and fled to Delphi; on consulting the oracle what place to settle in, the answer was, that when he should come to a place where he should see the country people dancing with garlands of olive-leaves, he should settle there. He travelled into a certain country of Asia, where he found as the oracle told him, and there built a city which he called Elaeus. — Pythocles the Samian, in the Third Book of his Georgics. Telegonus, the son of Ulysses by Circe, was sent to find out his father, and commanded by an oracle to erect a city where he should see the country people dancing with garlands. He came into a certain place of Italy, where he found the countrymen dancing with wreaths of ilex about their heads; so that there he built a city, and called it Prinistum, for an ilex in Greek is πϱῖνος. The Romans corruptly call this city Praeneste. — Aristocles, in the Third Book of his Italian History.

4 - 4 Fortune of the Romans.

1 Virtue vs Fortune contest: who founded Rome’s empire?

1 Among the many warm disputes which have often happened between Virtue and Fortune, this concerning the Roman empire is none of the least considerable, whether of them shall have the honor of founding that empire at first, and raising it afterwards to vast power and glory. The victory in this cause will be no small commendation of the conqueror, and will sufficiently vindicate either of the contending parties from the allegations that are usually made against it. For Virtue is accused as unprofitable, though beautiful, and Fortune as unstable, though good; the former as laboring in vain, the latter as deceitful in its gifts. But who can deny but Virtue has been most profitable, if Rome does favor her cause in this contention, since she procured so much good to brave and gallant men; or that Fortune is most constant, if she be victorious in this contest, since she continued her gifts with the Romans for so long a time? Ion the poet has written somewhere in prose, that Fortune and Wisdom, though they be very much different from one another, are nevertheless the causes of the very same effects. Both of them do advance and adorn men; both do raise them to glory, power, and empire. It were needless to multiply instances by a long enumeration of particulars, when even Nature itself, which produces all things, is by some reputed Fortune, and by others Wisdom. And therefore the present controversy will conciliate great honor and veneration to the city of Rome, since she is thought worthy of the same enquiry which uses to be made concerning the earth and seas, the heavens and the stars, — whether she owes her being to Fortune or to Providence.

2 Both conspired; like elements mixed, they stabilized world politics.

2 In which question, I think it may be truly affirmed that, notwithstanding the fierce and lasting wars which have been between Virtue and Fortune, they did both amicably conspire to rear up the structure of her vast empire and power, and join their united endeavors to finish the most beautiful work that ever was of human production. It was the opinion of Plato, that the whole world was composed of fire and earth, as necessary first principles, which being mixed together did render it visible and tangible, — the earth contributing weight and firmness, while the fire gave color, form, and motion to the several parts of matter; but for the tempering and union of these extremes, he thought it necessary that the water and air, being of a middle nature, should mitigate and rebate the contrary force by composition. After the same manner did God and Time, who laid the foundations of Rome, conjoin and mingle Virtue and Fortune together, that by the union of their several powers, they might compose a Vesta, truly sacred and beneficent to all men, which should be a firm stay, an eternal support, and a steady anchor (as Democrituscalls it) amidst the fluctuating and uncertain affairs of human life. For as naturalists say, that the world was not framed at first into that beautiful order and structure in which we now behold it, nor would these several bodies that compose it unite and mix so that Nature might receive a common form by their union, but that all things did fluctuate a long while in confusion and crashing, — whilst some bodies were still small and variously moved, and slipped and avoided all seizure and connections, and others which were greater and already compacted, being of contrary natures, did frequently justle and jar one against another, — and that all was full of destruction and confusion and wreck, until such time as the earth, being framed of them both in its due magnitude, was established in its proper place, and by its stability gave occasion to all the other bodies of the universe either to settle upon it or round about it; just so it happened to the greatest kingdoms and empires of men, which were long tossed with various changes and broken in pieces by mutual clashings. And for want of one supreme ruler over all, while all aspired to rule, the world was filled with unspeakable violence, confusion, and revolution in all things, until such time as Rome was raised to its just strength and greatness, which, comprehending under her power many strange nations and even transmarine dominions, did lay the foundation of firmness and stability to the greatest of human affairs; for by this vast compass of one and the same empire, government was secured as in an unmovable circle, resting upon the centre of peace. Whosoever therefore contrived and compassed these great designs must not only have been endowed with all virtues, but likewise have been assisted by Fortune in many things; as will plainly appear from the following discourse.

3 Virtue arrives with wounded heroes; deeds challenge “mere chance.”

3 And now methinks I behold, as from a turret, Virtue and Fortune coming to this conference. As to Virtue, her gait is modest, her countenance grave, the blushing color of her face shows her earnest desire of obtaining victory and honor in this contest. Fortune in her hasty pace, leaves her far behind, but she is led and accompanied by many brave and gallant men, A martial host, ghastly with bloody arms," all wounded in the fore part of their bodies, distilling blood mingled with sweat, and they lean upon the bending spoils of their enemies. If you enquire who they are, they answer, We are of the Fabricii, Camilli, and Lucii, and Cincinnati, and Fabii Maximi, and Claudii Marcelli, and the Scipios. I perceive also in the train of Virtue Caius Marius angry with Fortune, and Mucius Scaevolaholding out his burning hand and crying with a loud voice, Will ye attribute this to Fortune also? And Marcus Horatius, who behaved himself gallantly at the river Tiber, when he cut the bridge and swam over, being loaded with Tyrrhenian darts, showing his wounded thigh, thus expostulates from out of the deep whirlpool of the river, Was I also thus maimed by mere chance? Such is the company of Virtue, when she comes to the dispute; "a company powerful in arms, terrible to their foes."

4 Fortune shifts from empires, settles permanently in Rome with champions.

4 But as to Fortune, her gait is hasty, her looks bold, her hope arrogant; and leaving Virtue far behind her, she enters the lists, not, as she is described, with light wings, balancing herself in the air, or lightly tripping with her tiptoes upon the convexity of the globe, as if she were presently to vanish away out of sight. No, she does not appear here in any such doubtful and uncertain posture; but as the Spartans say that Aphrodite, when she passed over the Eurotas, put off her gewgaws and female ornaments, and armed herself with spear and shield for the sake of Lycurgus; so Fortune, having deserted the Persians and Assyrians, did swiftly fly over Macedonia, and quickly threw off her favorite Alexander the Great, and after that, having passed through the countries of Egypt and Syria, and oftentimes by turns supported the Carthaginians, she did at last fly over Tiber to the Palatine Mount, and there she put off her wings, her Mercurial shoes, and left her slippery and deceitful globe. Thus she entered Rome, as one that was to be resident there, and thus she comes to the bar in this controversy. She is no more uncertain, as Pindar describes her; she does not henceforth guide a double helm, but continues constant to the Romans, and therefore may be called the sister of Eunomia and Persuasion, and the daughter of Providence, as Alcmandescribes her pedigree. This is certain in the opinion of all men, that she holds in her hand the Horn of Plenty, not that which is filled with verdant fruits, but that which pours forth abundance of all things which the earth or the sea, the rivers or the metals, or the harbors afford. Several illustrious and famous men are seen to accompany her, Numa Pompilius from the Sabines, and Priscus from Tarquinii, whom, being foreigners and strangers, Fortuneseated on the throne of Romulus. Aemilius Paulus also, bringing back his army from Perseus and the Macedonians, and triumphing in an unbloody and entire victory, does greatly magnify and extol Fortune. The same does Caecilius Metellus, that brave old gentleman surnamed Macedonicus, whose corpse was carried forth to its funeral by his four sons, Quintus Balearicus, Lucius Diadematus, Marcus Metellus, and Caius Caprarius, and his two sons-in-law, — who were all six honorable men, and of consular dignity, — and also by his two grandsons, who were famous for the good offices they did to the commonwealth, both abroad by their heroical actions and at home by the administration of justice. Aemilius Scaurus, from a mean estate and a meaner family, was raised by Fortune to that height of dignity that he was chosen Prince of the Senate. It was Fortune that took Cornelius Syllaout of the bosom of Nicopolis the whore, and exalted him above the Cimbrian triumphs of Marius and the dignity of his seven consulships, giving him at once the powers of a monarch and a dictator; upon which account he adopted himself and all his memorable actions to Fortune, crying out with Oidipus in Sophocles, I think myself the son of Fortune. In the Roman tongue he was called Felix, the happy; but he writ himself to the Greeks Lucius Cornelius Sylla Venustus, i. e. Beloved of Aphrodite, — which is also the inscription on all his trophies, both those at Chaeronea with us, and those in honor of his victories over Mithridates; and that not without reason, since it is not the Night, as Menander thought, but Fortune, that enjoys the greatest part of Aphrodite.

5 Romans built Fortune temples early; Virtue honored much later.

5 And thus, having made a seasonable beginning in defence of Fortune, we may now call in, for witnesses in this cause, the Romans themselves, who attributed more to Fortune than to Virtue. For the temple of Virtue was but lately built by Scipio Numantinus, a long time after the building of the city. And after that, Marcellus dedicated a temple to Virtue and Honor; and Aemilius Scaurus, who lived in the time of the Cimbrian war, founded another to the Mind, when now, by the subtilties of sophists and encomiastics of orators, these things began to be mightily extolled. And to this very day there is no temple built to Wisdom, nor to Temperance, Patience, Magnanimity, or Continence. On the contrary, the temples dedicated to Fortune are splendid and ancient, almost as old as the first foundations of Rome itself. The first that built her a temple was Ancus Marcius, born of the sister of Numa, being the third king from Romulus; and he seems to have made Fortune surname to Fortitude, to which she contributes very much for obtaining victory. The Romans built the temple of Feminine Fortune before the time of Camillus, when by the help of the women they turned back Marcius Coriolanus, leading up the Volsci against the city of Rome; for the women being sent ambassadors to him, together with his mother and wife, prevailed with the man to spare the city at that time and to draw off the army of the barbarians. It is said that this statue of Fortune, when it was consecrated, uttered these words: It was piously done, O ye city matrons, to dedicate me by the law of your state. But (which is more remarkable) Furius Camillus, having quenched the flame of the Gallic war, and rescued Rome from the balance and scales in which her price was weighed to them in gold, did not upon this occasion found a temple to Prudence and Fortitude, but to Fame and Presage; which he built hard by the New Way, in that very place where (it is said) Marcus Caedicius walking in the night-time heard a prophetical voice, commanding him shortly to expect a war from the Gauls. And the Fortune whose temple is near the river they call Fortis (that is, stout, or valiant, or manly), as having the power of conquering all things. And her temple is built in those very gardens which were left by Caesar as a legacy to the people, because they thought that he also was raised to the height of power by the favor of Fortune.

6 Caesar risks winter seas; “you carry Caesar and his Fortune.”

6 And so Caesar himself testified, otherwise I should be ashamed to say such a thing of so great a person. For when he loosed from Brundisium, and embarked in pursuit of Pompey, on the fourth day of January, though it was then the latter end of winter, he passed over the sea in safety by the good conduct of Fortune, which was stronger than the rigor of the season. And when he found Pompey powerful by sea and land, with all his forces lying together, and himself with his small party altogether unable to give him battle, while the army of Antonius and Sabinus lagged behind, he ventured to set forth again in a little bark, unknown either to the master of the vessel or the pilot, who took him for some servant. But when he saw the pilot began to change his purpose of putting out to sea, because of the violence of the waves, which hindered the sailing out at the mouth of the river, he presently plucked off the disguise from his head and showed himself, encouraging the pilot in these words: Put on, brave fellow, and fear nothing, but commit the sails to Fortune, and expose all boldly to the winds; for thou carriest Caesarand Caesar's fortune. So resolute was Caesar upon this assurance, that Fortune did favor him in his voyages and journeys, his armies and battles; and that it was her province to give calmness to the sea and warmth to a winter season, to give swiftness to the slowest, and vigor to the most sluggish creatures; and (which is more incredible than all this) he believed that Fortune put Pompey to flight, and gave Ptolemy the opportunity of murdering his guest, so that Pompey should fall and Caesar be innocent.

7 Augustus prays for his own Fortune; Antony warned it will desert him.

7 What shall I say of his son, the first that had the honor to be surnamed Augustus, who was emperor four and fifty years? Did not he pray the Gods for his grandson, when he sent him forth to battle, to grant him the courage of Scipio, and the wisdom of Pompey, but his own Fortune, as counting her the chief artificer of his wonderful self? It was she that imposed him upon Cicero, Lepidus, Pansa, Hirtius, and Mark Antony, and by their victories and famous exploits, by their navies, battles, and armies, raised him to the greatest height of power and honor, degrading them by whose means he was thus advanced. For it was for him that Cicero governed the state, Lepidus conducted the armies, and Pansa gained the victories. It was for him that Hirtius fell, and Mark Antonycommitted licentious outrages. Nay, even Cleopatra herself is to be reckoned as part of his good fortune; for on her, as on a dangerous rock, Antony was shipwrecked, although he was so mighty a commander, that Augustus alone might wear the title of Caesar. It is reported of Antony and Augustus, when they lived familiarly together in daily conversation, that Antony was always beaten by Caesar at ball or dice, and in quail or cock fighting. Whereupon a certain friend, who pretended to the art of divination, did freely admonish Antony, and say: "What have you to do, my friend, with this young man? Why don't you avoid his company? You excel him in glory and largeness of empire, you exceed him in age and experience, having signalized your valor in the wars. But your Genius is afraid of his; your Fortune, which is great by itself, does fawn upon his, and will undoubtedly pass over to him, unless you remove yourself to a great distance."

8 Romulus saved by lucky chain: servant, fig, wolf, woodpecker, secrecy.

8 By these testimonies of men the cause of Fortune is supported; after which I proceed now to other arguments taken from the things themselves, beginning from the first foundations of the city of Rome. And first of all, it cannot be denied that, by the birth and preservation of Romulus, by his education and growth, the foundations of Romewere first laid by Fortune; but then withal it must be acknowledged that Virtue finished the building. As to their origin and birth who first founded and built the city, it looked like a wonderful good Fortune. For it is said that their mother conceived by a God; and as Hercules is said to have been sown in a long night, the natural day being preternaturally prolonged by the sun's standing still; so it is reported concerning the begetting of Romulus, that the sun was eclipsed at the time, being in conjunction with the moon, as the immortal God Mars was with the mortal Sylvia. The same is said to have happened about the time of his death. For on the seventh of July, called Nonae Capratinae, which is a feast observed to this day with great solemnity, while the sun was under an eclipse, he suddenly vanished out of the sight of men. After their nativity, when the tyrant would have murdered the new-born babes, by the conduct of Fortune, who was concerned for the preservation of their lives, Romulus and Remus fell into the hands of a servant no ways barbarous and cruel, but pitiful and tender-hearted, who laid them on the pleasant green bank of a river, in a place shaded with lowly shrubs, near to that wild fig-tree, to which the name of Ruminalis was afterwards given. There it was that a she-wolf, having lost her young whelps, by chance lighted on them, and being burdened with her swollen dugs, inflamed for want of evacuation, she gladly let out her overheated milk, as if it had been a second birth, and suckled the young children. The woodpecker also, a bird sacred to Mars, came often unto them, and supporting herself upon one claw, she did by turns open both their mouths with the other, and distribute unto each of them convenient gobbets of her own food. This fig-tree was therefore called Ruminalis, from Ruma, the dug, which the wolf lying down there gave to the infants. And from a veneration of this strange chance of Romulus and of every thing resembling it, the inhabitants thereabout would not expose any of their offspring; but they carefully reared and fostered all new births. Above all things, the hidden craft of Fortuneappeared in their education at the city Gabii; for there they were secretly nursed and brought up, and the people knew nothing of their pedigree, that they were the sons of Sylvia and the grandchildren of king Numitor; which seems to be so ordered on purpose to prevent that untimely death which the knowledge of their royal race would occasion, and to give them opportunity of showing themselves hereafter by their famous exploits, and discovering the nobility of their extraction by their heroical actions. And this brings to my mind the saying of that great and wise commander Themistocles to some of the Athenian captains, who, having followed him in the wars with good success, were grown ambitious to be preferred above him. There was an eager contest, said he, between the festival day and the day following, for precedency. Thou, says the following day, art full of tumult and business, but I give men the peaceful opportunity of enjoying themselves. Ay, says the festival, that's true; but then, I pray you, tell me, if I had not been, where had you been? So, says Themistocles, if I had not preserved my country in the war with the Medes, what use would there be of you now? And after this manner Fortune seems to accost the virtue of Romulus: it is true indeed, your actions are great and famous, by which you have clearly shown that you are descended of the race of the Gods. But see now how far you come behind me. For if I had not relieved the infants in their distress by my bounty and humanity, if I had deserted and betrayed them when they lay naked and exposed, how could you have appeared with such lustre and splendor as now you do? If a she-wolf had not then lighted upon them, inflamed with the abundance and pressure of her milk, which wanted one to give food unto more than any food for herself; if some wild beast had happened to come in her stead, hungry and ravaging for meat; then there had been no such beautiful and stately palaces, temples, theatres, walks, courts, and forum, as now you justly glory of; then your followers had still been shepherds, and your buildings cottages or stables, and they had still lived in subjection to the Albanian, Tyrrhenian, or Latin lords. Certainly the first beginning of all things is of greatest importance, and more especially in building of a city. But it was Fortune that first gave a beginning to Rome, by preserving the founder of it in so many dangers to which he was exposed. For as Virtue made Romulus great, so Fortune preserved him till his virtue did appear.

9 Numa’s reign: long peace credited to Fortune; Janus gate shut.

9 It is confessed by all, that the reign of Numa, which lasted longest, was conducted by a wonderful good fortune. For as to the story of the wise goddess Egeria, one of the Dryades, — that she being in love conversed familiarly with him, and assisted him in laying the platform and cementing the frame of the commonwealth, — it appears to be rather fabulous than true, since there were others that had Goddesses for their wives and are said to have been loved by them, such as Peleus, Anchises, Orion, and Emathion, who, for all that, did not live so pleasantly and free from trouble. But Numa seems to have had good fortune for his domestic companion and colleague in the government, which, receiving the city of Rome into her protection, at such time as she was tossed like a troublesome sea by the wars of neighboring states, and inflamed with intestine feuds, did quickly heal those breaches and allay those storms that threatened her ruin. And as the sea is said to receive the halcyon brood in a tempest, which it preserves and nourishes; so the people of Rome being lately gathered together, after various commotions and tossings, were by Fortune delivered from all wars, diseases, dangers, and terrors, and settled in such a lasting peace, that they had time and leisure to take root in their new soil and grow up securely into a well-compacted city. For as a great ship or galley is not made without many blows, and much force from hammers, nails, wedges, saws, and axes, and being once built, it must rest for some time upon the stocks, until the bands of its structure grow strong and tenacious, and the nails be well fastened which hold its parts together, lest, being launched while it is loose and unsettled, the hulk should be shattered by the concussion of the waves and let in the water, — so the first artificer of Rome, having built the city of rustical men and shepherds, as on strong foundations, was forced to endure hard labor and maintain dangerous wars against those who opposed its first origination and institution; but after it was once framed and compacted by this force, the second artificer, by the benignity of Fortune, gave it so long rest and peace, till all its parts were consolidated and settled in a firm and lasting posture. But if at that time, when the city was newly built, some Porsena had advanced the Etruscan camp and army to the walls, being yet moist and trembling, or some warlike revolter of the Marsian grandees, or some envious and contentious Lucanian, such as in latter times were Mutius or the bold Silo, or the last plague of Sylla's faction, Telesinus, who with one alarm armed all Italy, — if any of these, I say, had encompassed the philosopher Numawith the sound of trumpets, while he was sacrificing and praying to the Gods, the city being yet unsettled and unfinished, he could never have resisted so great a torrent and tempest, nor increased unto so great numbers of stout and valiant men. That long time of peace therefore in Numa's reign did prepare and fortify the Romans against all the wars which happened afterwards; for by its continuance, during the space of forty-three years, the body of the people was confirmed in that athletic habit which they acquired in the war under Romulus, and which generally prevailed henceforward against all their enemies. For in these years they say Rome was not afflicted with famine or pestilence, with barrenness of the earth, or any notable calamity by winter or summer; all which must be attributed, not to human prudence, but to the good conduct of divine Fortune governing for that time. Then the double gate of Janus was shut, which they call the gate of war, because it is always opened in time of war and shut in time of peace. After Numa's death, it was opened again when the war with the Albans commenced, which was followed with other wars without number in a continued series of time; but after four hundred and eighty years, it was shut again when peace was concluded at the end of the first Punic war, in the consulship of Caius Atilius and Titus Manlius. The next year it was opened again, and the wars lasted until the victory which Augustus obtained at Actium. Then the Roman arms rested but a little while; for the tumults from Cantabria and the wars with the Gauls and Germans breaking in upon them quickly disturbed the peace. These things I have added to explain this argument of the good fortune of Numa.

10 Fortune temples abound; Servius’ rise and rule portrayed as Fortune-made.

10 Even those kings which followed him have admired Fortune as the governess and nurse of Rome, and the city supporter, as Pindar saith. For proof of this, we may consider that the temple of Virtue at Rome was but lately built, many years after the beginning of the city, by that Marcellus who took Syracuse. There is also a temple dedicated to the Mind, or rather to good counsel, called Mens, by Scaurus Aemilius, who lived in the time of the Cimbrian war, when the arms of rhetoric and the sophistry of logic had crept into the city. And even to this day, there are no temples built to Wisdom, Temperance, Patience, and Magnanimity; but the temples of Fortune are very ancient and splendid, adorned with all sorts of honors, and divided amongst the most famous parts and places of Rome. The temple of Manly Fortune was built by Ancus Marcius, the fourth king; which name was therefore given it, because Fortune does contribute very much to valor in obtaining victory. The temple of Feminine Fortunewas consecrated by the matrons, when they drove away Marcius Coriolanus at the head of an army marching against Rome, as everybody knows. Moreover, Servius Tullius, who above all the kings did most enlarge the power of the people and adorn the commonwealth, who first established a good order for the giving of suffrages and for the good discipline of the militia, who was the first censor and overseer of men's lives and sobriety, and is esteemed a most wise and valiant man, — even he threw himself upon Fortune, and owned his kingdom to be derived from her. So great was her kindness to him, that she is thought to have descended into his house by a gateway (which is now called Fenestella) and there to have conversed familiarly with him. Upon which account he built two temples to Fortune, one to that which is called Primogenia in the Capitol, i. e. the first born, as one may expound it; another to that which is called Obsequens, which some interpret as being obsequious to his desires, and others as mild and gentle. I will henceforth leave the Roman names, and endeavor to reckon up and interpret in Greek the meaning of these temples. There is the sanctuary of Private Fortune (Ἰδίας Τύχης ἱερόν) on the Palatine, and that of Sticky/Birdlime (Ἰξευτρίας); which name, though it seems ridiculous, does by a metaphor explain to us the nature of Fortune, that she attracts things at a distance, and retains them when they are brought to contact. At the fountain which is called Mossy (Μουσκῶσαν) the sanctuary of Virgin Fortune (Παρθένου Τύχης ἱερόν) is still to be seen; and that of Regardful Fortune (Ἐπιστρεφομένης, turning-round) in Aiskylia (the Esquiline?). There is an altar also to Fortune of Good Hope (Εὐέλπιδος) in the long narrow street; and near to the altar of AphroditeEpitalaria (Foot-winged) there is a chapel to Male Fortune (Ἀφροδίτης Ἐπιταλαρίου βωμὸν Ἄρρενος Τύχης). Infinite are the honors and titles of Fortune, the greater part of which were instituted by Servius, who knew that "Fortuneis of great weight — nay, is every thing — in all human affairs," and more especially had found by experience that by her favor he was preferred from a captive and hostile nation to be king of the Romans. For when Corniculum was taken by the Romans, the virgin Ocresia being taken at the same time, she for her illustrious beauty and virtue (which the meanness of her fortune could not hide or obscure) was presented to Tanaquil, the consort of King Tarquinius, with whom she served till she was married to one of the retainers whom the Romans call clients; and of them was born Servius. Others tell the story after this manner: that the virgin Ocresia using often to receive the first-fruits and libations from the royal table, which were to be offered in sacrifice, it happened on a time that when, according to the custom, she had thrown them into the fire, upon the sudden expiration of the flame, there appeared to come out of it the genital member of a man. The virgin, being frighted with so strange a sight, told the whole matter to Queen Tanaquil; who, being a wise and understanding woman, judged the vision to be divine, and therefore dressed up the virgin in all her bridal ornaments and attire, and then shut her up in a room together with this apparition. Some attribute this amour to Lar the household God, and others to Vulcan; but whichsoever it was, Ocresia was with child, and gave birth to Servius. And while he was yet an infant, his head was seen to send forth a wonderful brightness, like lightning darted from the skies. But Antias tells this story after a different manner: that when Servius's wife Getania was dead, he fell into a sleep through grief and dejection of mind, in the presence of his mother, and then his head was seen by the woman encompassed by fire; which, as it was a certain token that he was born of fire, so was a good omen of that unexpected kingdom which he obtained after the death of Tarquin, by the means of Tanaquil. This is so much the more to be wondered at, because he of all kings seems to have been least fitted by Nature and most averse by inclination to monarchical government; since he would have resigned his kingdom and divested himself of regal authority, if he had not been hindered by the oath which it appears he made to Tanaquil when she was dying, that he should continue during his life in kingly power, and never change that form of government which he had received from his ancestors. Thus the reign of Servius was wholly owing to Fortune, because he both received it beside his expectation, and retained it against his will.

11 Rome’s explosive conquests read as a “gale” of Fortune beyond counsel.

11 But lest we should seem to shun the light of bright and evident arguments, and retreat to ancient stories, as to a place of darkness and obscurity, let us now pass over the time of the kings, and go on in our discourse to the most noted actions and famous wars of following times. And first of all it must be confessed that the boldness and courage which are necessary for war do aid and improve military virtue, as Timotheus says; and yet it is manifest to him that will reason aright, that the abundance of success which advanced the Roman Empire to such vast power and greatness is not to be attributed to human strength and counsels, but to a certain divine impulse and a full gale of running Fortune, which carried all before it that hindered the rising glory of the Romans. For now trophies were erected upon trophies, and triumphs hastened to meet one another; before the blood was cold upon their arms, it was washed off with the fresh blood of their falling enemies. Henceforth the victories were not reckoned by the numbers of the slain or the greatness of the spoils, but by the kingdoms that were taken, by the nations that were conquered, by the isles and continents which were added to the vastness of their empire. At one battle Philip was forced to quit all Macedonia, by one stroke Antiochus was beaten out of Asia, by one victory the Carthaginianslost Libya; but which is yet more wonderful, Armenia, the Euxine sea, Syria, Arabia, the Albanians, Iberians, with all the regions as far as Caucasus and the Hyrcanians, were by one man and the success of one expedition reduced under the power of the Roman Empire. The Ocean, which environs the whole earth, beheld him thrice victorious; for he subdued the Numidians in Africa, as far as the southern shores; he conquered Spain, which joined in the madness of Sertorius, as far as the Atlantic Ocean; and he pursued the Albanian kings as far as the Caspian sea. Pompeius Magnus, one and the same man, achieved all those great and stupendous things, by the assistance of that public Fortune which waited upon the Roman arms with success; and after all this, he sank under the weight of his own fatal greatness. The great Genius of the Romans was not propitious for a day only, or for a little time, like that of the Macedonians; it was not powerful by land only, like that of the Laconians, or by sea only, like that of the Athenians. It was not too slowly sensible of injuries, as that of the Persians, nor too easily pacified, like that of the Colophonians; but from the beginning growing up with the city, the more it increased, the more it enlarged the empire, and constantly aided the Romans with its auspicious influence by sea and land, in peace and war, against all their enemies, whether Greeks or barbarians. It was this Genius which dissipated Hannibal the Carthaginian, when he broke in upon Italy like a torrent, and the people could give no assistance, being torn in pieces by intestine jars. It was this Genius that separated the two armies of the Cimbri and Teutones, that they should not meet at the same time and place; by which means Marius the Roman general encountered each army by itself, and overcame them; which, if they had been joined together, would have overflowed all Italy like a deluge, with three hundred thousand valiant men, invincible in arms. It was the same Genius that hindered Antiochus by other occasions from assisting Philip while he was engaged in war with the Romans; so that Philip was first vanquished while Antiochus was still in danger. It was by the conduct of the same Genius that Mithridates was taken up with the Sarmatic and Bastarnic wars while the Marsians attacked Rome; that jealousy and envy divided Tigranes from Mithridates while the latter was flushed with success; but both of them were joined together in the defeat, that they might perish in the same common ruin.

12 Geese save Capitol; chance footprints reveal path; Fortune draws Gauls away.

12 What shall I say more? Has not Fortune relieved the city, when it was reduced to the greatest extremity of danger? When the Gauls encamped about the Capitol and besieged the castle, And heaped the camp with mountains of the dead," did not Fortune and chance discover their secret attack in the night-time, which otherwise had surprised all men? Of which wonderful accident it will not be unseasonable to discourse here a little more largely. After the great overthrow and slaughter of the Romans at the river Allia, some of those that remained fled hastily to Rome, and communicated their terror and consternation to the people there. Some trussed up their bag and baggage and conveyed themselves into the Capitol, resolving there to wait the event of so dismal a calamity; others flocked in great multitudes to Veii, and there proclaimed Furius Camillus dictator, giving him now in their distress an absolute and unaccountable power, whom before in their pride and prosperity they had condemned and banished, as guilty of robbing the public treasure. But Camillus, to strengthen his title to this authority, which might seem to be given him only for the present necessity, contrary to the law of the state touching the election of such a magistrate, scorned to accept an election from a body of armed soldiers, so lately shattered and beaten, as if the government of the city were dissolved; but sent to acquaint the senators that were in the Capitol, and know if they would approve the election of the soldiers. To accomplish this, there was one C. Pontius, who undertook to carry the news of this decree to those in the Capitol, though it was with great danger of his life; for he was to go through the midst of the enemies, who were entrenched and kept watch about the castle. He came therefore in the night-time to the river Tiber, and by the help of broad corks supporting the weight of his body, he was carried down the stream in a smooth calm water, and safely landed on the other side. From thence he passed through places uninhabited, being conducted by darkness and silence, to the rock of the Capitol; and climbing up through its winding and rough passages, with much labor and difficulty at last he arrived at the summit, where, being received by the watch, he acquainted the senators with what was done by the soldiers, and having received their approbation of the decree of election, he returned again to Camillus. The next day after, one of the barbarians by chance walking about this rock, and seeing in one place the prints of his feet and his falls, in another place the grass trodden down which grew upon the interspersed earth, and the plain marks of his body in its winding ascent through the craggy precipice, went presently and informed the rest of the Gauls of the whole matter. They, finding that a way was shown them by the enemy, resolved to follow his footsteps; and taking the advantage of the dead time of the night, when all were fast asleep, not so much as a watch stirring or a dog barking, they climbed up secretly to the castle. But Fortune in this case was wonderfully propitious to the Romans, in discovering and preventing such an imminent danger by the voice of the sacred geese, which were maintained about the temple of Hera for the worship of that Goddess. For that animal being wakeful by nature and easily frighted with the least noise, these sacred geese had been so much neglected by reason of the scarcity of provisions which was in the castle, that they were more easily wakened by the approach of the enemy out of their light and hungry sleep. Therefore they presently perceived the Gauls appearing upon the walls, and with a loud voice flew proudly towards them; but being yet more frightened with the sight of their shining armor, they raised a louder gaggling noise, which wakened the Romans; who understanding the design, presently beat back the enemies, and threw them down over the precipices of the rock. Therefore, in remembrance of this wonderful accident, a dog fastened to a cross, and a goose lying in a bed of state upon a rich cushion, are carried about, even to this day, in pompous solemnity. And now who is not astonished that considers how great the misery of the city was at that time, and how great its happiness is now at this day, when he beholds the splendor and riches of its donatives, the emulation of liberal arts that flourish in it, the accession of noble cities and royal crowns to its empire, and the chief products of sea and land, of isles and continents, of rivers and trees, of animals and fields, of mountains and metallic mines, crowding to adorn and beautify this place? Who is not stunned with admiration at the imminent danger which then was, whether ever those things should be or no; and at those poor timorous birds, which first began the deliverance of the city, when all places were filled with fire, darkness, and smoke, with the swords of barbarians and bloody-minded men? What a prodigy of Fortune was it that those great commanders, the Manlii, the Servii, Postumii, and Papirii, so famous for their warlike exploits and for the illustrious families that have descended from them, should be alarmed in this extremity of danger by the silly geese, to fight for their country's God and their country? And if that be true which Polybius writes in his second book of those Gauls which then possessed Rome, — that they made a peace with Camillus and departed, as soon as they heard the news of the invasion that was made upon their territories by the neighboring barbarians, — then it is past all controversy, that Fortune was the cause of Rome's preservation by drawing off the enemies to another place, or rather forcing them from Rome beyond all men's expectation.

13 Alexander’s early death framed as Rome’s luck; invasion averted.

13 But why do I dwell upon those things which have nothing of certain or evident truth, since the memories of those times have perished, and the history of them is confused, as Livy tells us? For those things which happened in following ages, being plain and manifest to all, do sufficiently demonstrate the benignity of Fortune to Rome; among which I reckon the death of Alexander to be no small cause of the Romans' happiness and security. For he, being a man of wonderful success and most famous exploits, of invincible confidence and pride, who shot like a star, with incredible swiftness, from the rising to the setting sun, was meditating to bring the lustre of his arms into Italy. The pretence of this intended expedition was the death of Alexander Molossus, who was killed at Pandosia by the Bruttians and Lucanians; but the true cause was the desire of glory and the emulation of empire, which instigated him to war against all mankind, that he might extend his dominion beyond the bounds of Dionysos and Hercules. He had heard of the Roman power in Italy, terrible as an army in battle array; of the illustrious name and glory which they had acquired by innumerable battles, in which they were flushed with victory; and this was a sufficient provocation to his ambitious spirit to commence a war against them, which could not have been decided without an ocean of blood; for both armies appeared invincible, both of fearless and undaunted minds; and the Romans then had no fewer than one hundred and thirty thousand stout and valiant men," All expert soldiers, skilled on foot to dare, Or from the bounding courser urge the war.

4 - 5 Fortune or Virtue of Alexander the Great.

1.1 Fortune claims Alexander; philosophy defends his hard-won empire.

This is the oration of Fortune, asserting and challenging Alexander to be her masterpiece, and hers alone. In contradiction to which it behooves us to say something on the behalf of philosophy, or rather in the defence of Alexander himself, who cannot choose but spurn away the very thought of having received his empire as a gift at the hands of Fortune, knowing that it was so dearly bought with the price of his lost blood and many wounds, and that in gaining it, Full many a bloody day In toilsome fight he spent, And many a wakeful night In battle's management;" and all this in opposition to armies almost irresistible, numberless nations, rivers before impassable, and rocks impenetrable; choosing, however, for his chiefest guides and counsellors prudence, endurance, fortitude, and steadiness of mind.

1.2 Alexander rebukes Fortune, recounts wounds proving earned greatness.

And now, methinks, I hear him speaking thus to Fortune, when she signalizes herself with his successes: Envy not my virtue, nor go about to detract from my honor. Darius was a fabric of thy own rearing, who of a servant and the king's courier was by thee advanced to be monarch of all Persia. The same was Sardanapalus, who from a comber of purple wool was raised by thee to wear the royal diadem. But I, subduing as I marched, from Arbelaforced my passage even to Susa itself. Cilicia opened me a broad way into Egypt; and the Granicus, o'er which I passed without resistance, trampling under foot the slain carcasses of Mithridates and Spithridates, opened the way into Cilicia. Pamper up thyself, and boast thy kings that never felt a wound nor ever saw a finger bleed; for they were fortunate, it is true, — thy Ochi and thy Artaxerxes, — who were no sooner born but they were by thee established in the throne of Cyrus. But my body carries many marks of Fortune's unkindness, who rather fought against me as an enemy than assisted me as her friend. First, among the Illyrians I was wounded in the head with a stone, and received a blow in the neck with an iron mace. Then, near the Granicus my head was a second time gashed with a barbarian scimitar; at Issus I was run through the thigh with a sword; at Gaza I was shot in the ankle with a dart; and not long after, falling heavy from my saddle; I forced my shoulder out of joint. Among the Maracadartae my shinbone was split with an arrow. The wounds I received in India and my strenuous acts of daring courage will declare the rest. Then among the Assacani I was shot through the shoulder with another arrow. Encountering the Gandridae, my thigh was wounded; and one of the Mallotes drew his bow with that force, that the well-directed arrow made way through my iron armor to lodge itself in my breast; besides the blow in my neck, when the scaling-ladders brake that were set to the walls, and Fortune left me alone, to gratify with the fall of so great a person not a renowned or illustrious enemy, but ignoble and worthless barbarians. So that had not Ptolemy covered me with his shield, and Limnaeus, after he had received a thousand wounds directed at my body, fallen dead before me; or if the Macedonians, breathing nothing but courage and their prince's rescue, had not opened a timely breach, that barbarous and nameless village might have proved Alexander's tomb.

1.3 Youth amid chaos dares Persia with scant men.

Take the whole expedition together, and what was it but a patient endurance of cold winters and parching droughts; depths of rivers, rocks inaccessible to the winged fowl, amazing sights of strange wild beasts, savage diet, and lastly revolts and treasons of far-controlling potentates. As to what before the expedition befell me, it is well known that all Greece lay gasping and panting under the fatal effects of the Philippic wars. But then the Thebans, raising themselves upon their feet again after so desperate a fall, shook from their arms the dust of Chaeronea; with them also joined the Athenians, reaching forth their helping hands. The treacherous Macedonians, studying nothing but revenge, cast their eyes upon the sons of Aeropus; the Illyrians brake out into an open war; and the Scythians hung in equal balance, seeing their neighbors meditating new revolutions; while Persian gold, liberally scattered among the popular leaders of every city, put all Peloponnesus into motion. King Philip's treasuries were at that time empty, and besides he was in debt, as Onesicritus relates, two hundred talents. In the midst of so much pressing want and such menacing troubles, a youth but new past the age of childhood durst aspire to the conquest of Babylon and Susa, or rather project in his thoughts supreme dominion over all mankind; and all this, trusting only to the strength of thirty thousand foot and four thousand horse. For so many there were, by the account which Aristobulus gives; by the relation of King Ptolemy, there were five thousand horse; from both which Anaximenesvarying musters up the foot to three and forty thousand, and the horse to five thousand five hundred. Now the glorious and magnificent sum which Fortune had raised up to supply the necessities of so great an expedition was no more than seventy talents, according to Aristobulus; or, as Duris records it, only thirty days' provision.

1.4 Aristotle shaped him; philosophy guided deeds beyond poetry.

You will say therefore that Alexander was too rash and daringly inconsiderate, with such a slender support to rush upon so vast an opposition. By no means: for who was ever better fitted than he for splendid enterprises, with all the choicest and most excelling precepts of magnanimity, consideration, wisdom, and virtuous fortitude, with which a philosophical education largely supplied him for his expedition? So that we may properly affirm that he invaded Persia with greater assistance from Aristotle than from his father Philip. As for those who write how Alexander was wont to say that the Iliad and Odyssey had always followed him in his wars, in honor to Homer I believe them. Nevertheless, if any one affirm that the Iliad and Odyssey were admitted of his train merely as the recreation of his wearied thoughts or pastime of his leisure hours, but that philosophical learning, and commentaries concerning contempt of fear, fortitude, temperance, and nobleness of spirit, were the real cabinet provision which he carried along for his personal use, we contemn their assertion. For he was not a person that ever wrote concerning arguments or syllogisms; none of those who observed walks in the Lyceum, or held disputes in the Academy; for they who thus circumscribe philosophy believe it to consist in discoursing, not in action. And yet we find that neither Pythagoras nor Socrates, Arcesilaus nor Carneades, was ever celebrated for his writings, though they were the most approved and esteemed among all the philosophers. Yet no such busy wars as these employed their time in civilizing wild and barbarous kings, in building Grecian cities among rude and unpolished nations, nor in settling government and peace among people that lived without humanity or control of law. They only lived at ease, and surrendered the business and trouble of writing to the more contentious sophists. Whence then came it to pass that they were believed to be philosophers? It was either from their sayings, from the lives they led, or from the precepts which they taught. Upon these grounds let us take a prospect of Alexander, and we shall soon find him, by what he said, by what he acted, and by the lessons he taught, to be a great philosopher.

1.5 He civilized barbarians, spreading Greek customs across Asia.

And first, if you please, consider that which seems the farthest distant of all from the common received opinion, and compare the disciples of Alexander with the pupils of Plato and Socrates. The latter instructed persons ingenuous, such as speak the same speech, well understanding (if nothing else) the Grecian language. But there were many with whom their precepts did not prevail; for men like Critias, Alcibiades, and Cleitophon shook off their doctrine like a bridle, and followed the conduct of their own inclinations. On the other side, take a view of Alexander's discipline, and you shall see how he taught the Hyrcanians the conveniency of wedlock, introduced husbandry among the Arachosians, persuaded the Sogdians to preserve and cherish — not to kill — their aged parents; the Persians to reverence and honor — not to marry — their mothers. Most admirable philosophy! which induced the Indians to worship the Grecian Deities, and wrought upon the Scythians to bury their deceased friends, not to feed upon their carcasses. We admire the power of Carneades's eloquence, for forcing the Carthaginian Clitomachus, called Asdrubal before, to embrace the Grecian customs. No less we wonder at the prevailing reason of Zeno, by whom the Babylonian Diogenes was charmed into the love of philosophy. Yet no sooner had Alexander subdued Asia, than Homer became an author in high esteem, and the Persian, Susian, and Gedrosian youth sang the tragedies of Euripides and Sophocles. Among the Athenians, Socrates, introducing foreign Deities, was condemned to death at the prosecution of his accusers. But Alexander engaged both Bactriaand Caucasus to worship the Grecian Gods, which they had never known before. Lastly, Plato, though he proposed but one single form of a commonwealth, could never persuade any people to make use of it, by reason of the austerity of his government. But Alexander, building above seventy cities among the barbarous nations, and as it were sowing the Grecian customs and constitutions all over Asia, quite weaned them from their former wild and savage manner of living. The laws of Plato here and there a single person may peradventure study, but myriads of people have made and still make use of Alexander's. And they whom Alexander vanquished were more greatly blessed than they who fled his conquests. For these had none to deliver them from their ancient state of misery; the others the victor compelled to better fortune. True therefore was that expression of Themistocles, when he was a fugitive from his native country, and the king entertained him with sumptuous presents, assigning him three stipendiary cities to supply his table, one with bread, a second with wine, a third with all manner of costly viands; Ah! young men, said he, had we not been undone, we had surely been undone. It may, however, be more justly averred of those whom Alexander subdued, had they not been vanquished, they had never been civilized. Egypt had not vaunted her Alexandria, nor Mesopotamia her Seleucia; Sogdiana had not gloried in her Propthasia, nor the Indians boasted their Bucephalia, nor Caucasus its neighboring Grecian city; by the founding of all which barbarism was extinguished and custom changed the worse into better. If then philosophers assume to themselves their highest applause for cultivating the most fierce and rugged conditions of men, certainly Alexander is to be acknowledged the chiefest of philosophers, who changed the wild and brutish customs of so many various nations, reducing them to order and government.

1.6 He sought one world, blending nations through shared customs.

It is true indeed that the so much admired commonwealth of Zeno, first author of the Stoic sect, aims singly at this, that neither in cities nor in towns we should live under laws distinct one from another, but that we should look upon all men in general to be our fellow-countrymen and citizens, observing one manner of living and one kind of order, like a flock feeding together with equal right in one common pasture. This Zeno wrote, fancying to himself, as in a dream, a certain scheme of civil order, and the image of a philosophical commonwealth. But Alexander made good his words by his deeds; for he did not, as Aristotle advised him, rule the Grecians like a moderate prince and insult over the barbarians like an absolute tyrant; nor did he take particular care of the first as his friends and domestics, and scorn the latter as mere brutes and vegetables; which would have filled his empire with fugitive incendiaries and perfidious tumults. But believing himself sent from Heaven as the common moderator and arbiter of all nations, and subduing those by force whom he could not associate to himself by fair offers, he labored thus, that he might bring all regions, far and near, under the same dominion. And then, as in a festival goblet, mixing lives, manners, customs, wedlock, all together, he ordained that every one should take the whole habitable world for his country, of which his camp and army should be the chief metropolis and garrison; that his friends and kindred should be the good and virtuous, and that the vicious only should be accounted foreigners. Nor would he that Greeks and barbarians should be distinguished by long garments, targets, scimitars, or turbans; but that the Grecians should be known by their virtue and courage, and the barbarians by their vices and their cowardice; and that their habit, their diet, their marriage and custom of converse, should be everywhere the same, engaged and blended together by the ties of blood and pledges of offspring.

1.7 Mass weddings symbolized union of Europe and Asia.

Therefore it was that Demaratus the Corinthian, an acquaintance and friend of Philip, when he beheld Alexander in Susa, bursting into tears of more than ordinary joy, bewailed the deceased Greeks, who, as he said, had been bereaved of the greatest blessing on earth, for that they had not seen Alexander sitting upon the throne of Darius. Though most assuredly, for my part, I do not envy the beholders this show, which was only a thing of chance and a happiness of more ordinary kings. But I would gladly have been a spectator of those majestic and sacred nuptials, when, after he had betrothed together a hundred Persian brides and a hundred Macedonian and Greek bridegrooms, he placed them all at one common table within the compass of one pavilion embroidered with gold, as being all of the same family; and then, crowned with a nuptial garland, and being himself the first to sing an epithalamium in honor of the conjunction between two of the greatest and most potent nations in the world, of only one the bridegroom, of all the brideman, father, and moderator, he caused the several couples to be severally married. Had I but beheld this sight, ecstasied with pleasure I should have then cried out: "Barbarous and stupid Xerxes, how vain was all thy toil to cover the Hellespont with a floating bridge! Thus rather wise and prudent princes join Asia to Europe. They join and fasten nations together not with boards or planks, or surging brigandines, not with inanimate and insensible bonds, but by the ties of legitimate love, chaste nuptials, and the infallible gage of progeny."

1.8 He adopted Persian dress to reconcile conquered peoples

But then, when he considered the Eastern garments, Alexander preferred the Persian before the Medianhabit, though much the meaner and more frugal garb. Therefore rejecting the gaudy and scenical ornament of barbarian gallantry, such as were the tiara and candys, together with the upper breeches, according to the report of Eratosthenes, he ordered a mixture of the Macedonian and Persian modes to be observed in all the garments which he wore. As a philosopher, he contented himself with mediocrity; but as the common chieftain of both and as a mild and affable prince, he was willing to gain the affection of the vanquished by the esteem which he showed to the mode of the country; that so they might continue the more steadfast and loyal to the Macedonians, not hating them as their enemies, but loving them as their princes and rulers. This behavior was contrary to that of persons insipid and puffed up with prosperity, who wedded to their own humors admire the single colored robe but cannot endure the tunic bordered with purple, or else are well pleased with the latter and hate the former, like young children, in love with the mode in which, as another nurse, their country's custom first apparelled them. And yet we see that they who hunt wild beasts clothe themselves with their hairy skins; and fowlers make use of feathered jerkins; nor are others less wary how they show themselves to wild bulls in scarlet or to elephants in white; for those creatures are provoked and enraged at the sight of these colors. If then this potent monarch, designing to reclaim and civilize stubborn and warlike nations, took the same course to soften and allay their inbred fury which others take with wild beasts, and at length brought them to be tame and tractable by making use of their familiar habits and by submitting to their customary course of life, thereby removing animosity from their breasts and sour looks from their countenances, shall we blame his management; or rather must we not admire the wisdom of him who by so slight a change of apparel ruled all Asia, subduing their bodies with his arms and vanquishing their minds with his habit? It is a strange thing; we applaud Socratic Aristippus, because, being sometimes clad in a poor threadbare cloak, sometimes in a Milesian robe, he kept a decency in both; but they censure Alexander, because he gave some respect to the garb and mode of those whom he had vanquished, as well as to that of his native country; not considering that he was laying the foundation of vast achievements. It was not his design to ransack Asia like a robber, or to despoil and ruin it, as the prey and rapine of unexpected good fortune, as afterwards Hannibal pillaged Italy, and before him the Treres ravaged Ionia and the Scythians harassed Media, — but to subdue all the kingdoms of the earth under one form of government, and to make one nation of all mankind. So that if the same Deity which hither sent the soul of Alexander had not too soon recalled it, one law had overlooked all the world, and one form of justice had been as it were the common light of one universal government; while now that part of the earth which Alexander never saw remains without a sun.

1.9 His sayings reveal philosophical courage from youth onward.

Thus, in the first place, the very scope and aim of Alexander's expedition speaks him a philosopher, as one that sought not to gain for himself luxurious splendor or riches, but to establish concord, peace, and mutual community among all men. Next, let us consider his sayings, seeing that the souls of other kings and potentates betray their conditions and inclinations by their expressions. Antigonus the Aged, having heard a certain poet sing before him a short treatise concerning justice, said, Thou art a fool to mention justice to me, when thou seest me thundering down the cities belonging to other people about their ears. Dionysius the Tyrant was wont to say that children were to be cheated with dice, but men with oaths. Upon the monument of Sardanapalus this inscription is to be seen: All I did eat and drink, and all that lust To me vouchsafed, I have; all else is gone. What now can a man say of these apophthegms, but that the first denotes injustice and immoderate desire of sovereignty; the next impiety; and the third sensuality? But as for the sayings of Alexander, set aside his diadem, his claimed descent from Ammon, and the nobility of his Macedonian extraction, and you would believe them to have been the sayings of Socrates, Plato, or Pythagoras. For we omit the swelling hyperboles of flattery which poets have inscribed under his images and statues, studying rather to extol the power of Alexander than his moderation and temperance; as, for example: The statue seems to look to Zeus and say, Take thou Olympus; me let Earth obey! and that other: This is Alexander the son of Zeus. But these, as I said, were only the flashes of poetic adulation magnifying his good success. Let us therefore come to such sentences as were really uttered by Alexander himself, beginning first with the early blossoms of his childhood. It is well known that for swiftness in running he exceeded all that were of his years; for which reason some of his most familiar play-fellows would have persuaded him to show himself at the Olympic games. He asked them whether there were any kings to contend with him. And when they replied that there were none, he said, The contest then is unequal, for I can conquer only private men, while they may conquer a king. His father, King Philip, being run through the thigh in a battle against the Triballi, and, though he escaped the danger, being not a little troubled at the deformity of his limping; Be of good cheer, father, said he, and show yourself in public, that you may be reminded of your bravery at every step. Are not these the products of a mind truly philosophical, which by an inspired inclination to what is noble already contemns the disfigurings of the body? Nor can we otherwise believe but that he himself gloried in his own wounds, which every time he beheld them called to his remembrance the conquered nation and the victory, what cities he had taken, what kings had surrendered themselves; never striving to conceal or cover those indelible characters and scars of honor, which he always carried about him as the engraven testimonies of his virtue and fortitude.

1.10 He revered Homer, philosophers, emulated Diogenes’ virtue.

Then again, if any dispute arose or judgment were to be given upon any of Homer's verses, either in the schools or at meals, this that follows he always preferred above the rest: Both a good king, and far renowned in war;" believing that the praise which another by precedency of time had anticipated was to be a law also to himself, and saying that Homer in the same verse had extolled the fortitude of Agamemnon and prophesied of Alexander's. Crossing therefore the Hellespont, he viewed the city of Troy, revolving in his mind the heroic acts of antiquity. At this time one of the chief citizens proffering to him Paris's harp, if he pleased to accept it; I need it not, said he, for I have that with which Achilles pleased himself already, When he the mighty deeds of heroes sung, Whose fame so loudly o'er the world has rung;" but as for Paris, his soft and effeminate harmony was devoted only to the pleasures of amorous courtship. Now it is part of a true philosopher's soul to love wisdom and chiefly to admire wise men; and this was Alexander's praise beyond all other princes. His high esteem for his master Aristotle we have already mentioned. No less honor did he give to Anaxarchus the musician, whom he favored as one of his choicest friends. To Pyrrhon the Elean, the first time he saw him, he gave a thousand crowns in gold. To Xenocrates, the companion of Plato, he sent an honorary present of fifty talents. Lastly, it is recorded by several that he made Onesicratus, the disciple of Diogenes the Cynic, chief of his pilots. But when he came to discourse with Diogenes himself at Corinth, he was struck in such a manner with wonder and astonishment at the course of life and sententious learning of the person, that frequently calling him to mind he was wont to say, Were I not Alexander, I would be Diogenes. That is, I would have devoted myself to the study of words, had I not been a philosopher in deeds. He did not say, Were I not a king, I would be Diogenes; nor, Were I not opulent, an Argeades. For he did not prefer fortune before wisdom, nor the purple robe or regal diadem before the beggar's wallet and threadbare mantle; but he said, Were I not Alexander, I would be Diogenes. That is: "Had I not designed to intermix barbarians and Greeks and to civilize the earth as I marched forward, and had I not proposed to search the limits of sea and land, and so, extending Macedon to the land-bounding ocean, to have sown Greece in every region all along and to have diffused justice and peace over all nations, I would not have sat yawning upon the throne of slothful and voluptuous power, but would have labored to imitate the frugality of Diogenes. But now pardon us, Diogenes. We follow the example of Hercules, we emulate Perseus, and tread in the footsteps of Dionysos, our divine ancestor and founder of our race; once more we purpose to settle the victorious Greeks in India, and once more to put those savage mountaineers beyond Caucasus in mind of their ancient Bacchanalian revels. There, by report, live certain people professing a rigid and austere philosophy, and more frugal than Diogenes, as going altogether naked; pious men, governed by their own constitutions and devoted wholly to God. They have no occasion for scrip or wallet, for they never lay up provision, having always fresh and new gathered from the earth. The rivers afford them drink, and at night they rest upon the grass and the leaves that fall from the trees. By our means shall they know Diogenes, and Diogenes them. But it behooves us also, as it were, to make a new coin, and to stamp a new face of Grecian civility upon the barbarian metal."

1.11 His virtues mixed: courage, temperance, justice, humanity.

Tell me now; can such generous acts of Alexander as these be thought to speak the spontaneous favors of Fortune, only an impetuous torrent of success and strength of hand? Do they not rather demonstrate much of fortitude and justice, much of mildness and temperance, in one who managed all things with decorum and consideration, with a sober and intelligent judgment? Not that I (believe me) go about to distinguish between the several acts of Alexander, and to ascribe this to fortitude, that to humanity, another to temperance; but I take every act to be an act of all the virtues mixed together. This is conformable to that Stoic sentence, "What a wise man does he does by the impulse of all the virtues together; only one particular virtue seems to head every action, and calling the rest to her assistance drives on to the end proposed." Therefore we may behold in Alexander a warlike humanity, a meek fortitude, a liberality poised with good husbandry, anger easily appeased, chaste amours, a busy relaxation of mind, and labor not wanting recreation. Who ever like him mixed festivals with combats, revels and jollity with expeditions, nuptials and bacchanals with sieges and difficult attempts? To those that offended against the law who more severe? To the unfortunate who more pitiful? To those that made resistance who more terrible? To suppliants who more merciful? This gives me an occasion to insert here the saying of Porus. For he being brought a captive before Alexander, and by him being asked how he expected to be treated, Royally, said he, O Alexander. And being further asked whether he desired no more, he replied, Nothing; for all things are comprehended in that word "royally." And for my part, I know not how to give a greater applause to the actions of Alexander, than by adding the word "philosophically," for in that word all other things are included. Being ravished with the beauty of Roxana, the daughter of Oxyarthes, dancing among the captive ladies, he never assailed her with injurious lust, but married her philosophically. Beholding Darius stuck to the heart with several arrows, he did not presently sacrifice to the Gods or sing triumphal songs to celebrate the end of so long a war, but unclasping his own cloak from his shoulders he threw it over the dead corpse philosophically, as it were to cover the shame of royal calamity. Another time, as he was perusing a private letter sent him by his mother, he observed Hephaestion, who was sitting by him, to read it along with him, little understanding what he did. For which unwary act Alexander forbore to reprove him; only clapping his signet to his mouth, he thus kindly admonished him that his lips were then sealed up to silence by the friendly confidence which he reposed in him, — all this philosophically. And indeed if these were not acts done philosophically, where shall we find them?

1.12 He rejected lust, prized generosity, upheld disciplined judgment.

Let us compare with his some few acts of those who are by all allowed to be philosophers. Socrates yielded to the lustful embraces of Alcibiades. Alexander, when Philoxenus, governor of the sea-coasts, wrote to him concerning an Ionian lad that had not his equal for youthful beauty, and desired to know whether he should be sent to him or not, returned him this nipping answer: Vilest of men, when wast thou ever privy to any desires of mine, that thou shouldst think to flatter me with such abhorred allurements? We admire the abstinency of Xenocrates for refusing the gift of fifty talents which Alexander sent him; but do we take no notice of the munificence of the giver? Or is the bountiful person not to be thought as much a contemner of money as he that refuses it? Xenocratesneeded not riches, by reason of his philosophy; but Alexander wanted wealth, by reason of the same philosophy, that he might be more liberal to such persons. . . . How often has Alexander borne witness to this in the midst of a thousand dangers? It is true, we believe that it is in the power of all men to judge rightly of things; for nature guides us of herself to virtue and bravery. But herein philosophers excel all others, that they have by education acquired a fixed and solid judgment to encounter whatever dangers they meet with. For most men have no such maxims to defend them as this in Homer: Without a sign his sword the brave man draws, And needs no omen but his country's cause." And that other of Demosthenes: Death is the certain end of all mankind." But sudden apparitions of imminent danger many times break our resolutions; and the fancy troubled with the imagination of approaching peril chases away true judgment from her seat. For fear not only astonishes the memory, according to the saying of Thucydides, but it dissipates all manner of consideration, sense of honor, and resolution; while philosophy binds and keeps them together. . . . Note. — The text is defective at the end, and elsewhere in the last chapter.

2 THE SECOND ORATION OF PLUTARCH CONCERNING THE FORTUNE OR VIRTUE OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT.

2.1 Great rulers foster arts; petty tyrants stifle genius.

We forgot in our yesterday's discourse to tell you, that the age wherein Alexander flourished had the happiness to abound in sciences and in persons of transcending natural endowments. Yet this is not to be ascribed to Alexander's but their own good fortune, which favored them with such a judge and such a spectator of their particular excellencies as was both able rightly to discern and liberally to reward their understood deserts. Therefore it is recorded of Archestratus, born some ages after, an elegant poet but buried in his own extreme poverty, that a certain person meeting him said, Hadst thou but lived when Alexander lived, for every verse he would have gratified thee with an island of Cyprus or a territory fair as that of Phoenicia. Which makes me of opinion that those former famous artists and soaring geniuses may not so properly be said to have lived in the time of Alexander as by Alexander. For as the temperature of the season and limpid thinness of the surrounding air produce plenty of grain and fruit; so the favor, the encouragement, and benignity of a prince increase the number of aspiring geniuses, and advance perfection in sciences. And on the other side, by the envy, covetousness, and contentiousness of those in power, whatever soars to the height of true bravery or invention is utterly quelled and extinguished. Therefore it is reported of Dionysius the Tyrant that, being pleased with the music of a certain player on a harp, he promised him a talent for his reward; but when the musician claimed his promise the next day, Yesterday, said he, by thee delighted, while thou sangest before me, I gave thee likewise the pleasure of thy hopes; and thence immediately didst thou receive the reward of thy delightful pastime, enjoying at the same time the charming expectation of my promise. In like manner Alexander tyrant of the Pheraeans (for it behooves us to distinguish him by that addition, lest we should dishonor his namesake), sitting to see a tragedy, was so affected with delight at the acting, that he found himself moved to a more than ordinary compassion. Upon which, leaping suddenly from his seat, as he hastily flung out of the theatre, How poor and mean it would look, said he, if I, that have massacred so many of my own citizens and subjects, should be seen here weeping at the misfortunes of Hecuba and Polyxena! And it was an even lay but that he had mischiefed the tragedian for having mollified his cruel and merciless disposition, like iron softened by fire. Timotheus also, singing to Archelaus who seemed too parsimonious in remuneration, frequently upbraided him with the following sarcasm: Base earth-bred silver thou admirest. To whom Archelaus not unwittily reparteed: But thou dost beg it. Ateas, king of the Scythians, having taken Ismenias the musician prisoner, commanded him to play during one of his royal banquets. And when all the rest admired and applauded his harmony, Ateas swore that the neighing of a horse was more delightful to his ears. So great a stranger was he to the habitations of the Muses; as one whose soul lodged always in his stables, fitter however to hear asses bray than horses neigh. Therefore, among such kings, what progress or advancement of noble sciences or esteem for learning can be expected? And surely no more can be expected from such as would themselves be rivals, who therefore persecute real artists with all the hatred and envy imaginable. In the number of these was Dionysiusbefore mentioned, who condemned Philoxenus the poet to labor in the quarries, because, being by the tyrant commanded only to correct a tragedy by him written, he struck out every line from the beginning to the end. Nay, I must needs say that Philip, who became a student not till his latter years, in these things descended beneath himself. For it being once his chance to enter into a dispute about sounds with a musician whom he thought he had foiled in his art, the person modestly and with a smile replied, May never so great a misfortune befall thee, O King, as to understand these things better than I do.

2.2 Alexander honored artists yet excelled chiefly in war.

But Alexander, well considering of what persons and things it became him to be the hearer and spectator, and with whom to contend and exercise his strength, made it his business to excel all others in the art of war, and according to Aeschylus, to be A mighty warrior, terrible to his foes. For having learned this art from his ancestors, the Aeacidae and Hercules, he gave to other arts their due honor and esteem without the least emulation; embracing and favoring what was in them noble and elegant, but never suffering himself to be carried away with the pleasure of being a practitioner in any. In his time flourished the two tragedians, Thessalus and Athenodorus, who contending for the prize, the Cyprian kings supplied the charges of the theatre, and the judges were to be the most renowned captains of the age. But at length Athenodorus being adjudged the victor; I could have wished, said Alexander, rather to have lost a part of my kingdom than to have seen Thessalus vanquished. Yet he neither interceded with the judges nor anywhere disapproved or blamed the judgment; believing it became him to be superior to all others, only to submit to justice. To the comedian Lyco of Scarphe, who had inserted into one of his scenes certain verses in the nature of a begging petition, he gave ten talents, laughing heartily at the conceit. Aristonicus was in the number of the most famous musicians of those times. This man being slain in battle, strenuously fighting to assist and save his friend, Alexander commanded his statue to be made in brass and set up in the temple of Pythian Apollo, holding his harp in one hand and his spear upright in the other, not only in memory of the person, but in honor of music itself, as exciting to fortitude and inspiring those who are rightly and generously bred to it with a kind of supernatural courage and bravery. Even Alexander himself, when Antigenides played before him in the Harmatian mood, was so transported and warmed for battle by the charms of lofty airs, that leaping from his seat all in his clattering armor he began to lay about him and attack those who stood next him, thereby verifying to the Spartans what was commonly sung among themselves, The masculine touches of the well-turned lyre Unsheathe the sword and warlike rage inspire." Furthermore, there were also Apelles the painter and Lysippus the statuary both living under the reign of Alexander. The first of which painted him grasping Zeus's thunderbolt in his hand, so artfully and in such lively colors, that it was said of the two Alexanders that Philip's was invincible, but Apelles's inimitable. Lysippus, when he had finished the first statue of Alexander looking up with his face to the sky (as Alexander was wont to look, with his neck slightly bent), not improperly added to the pedestal the following lines: The statue seems to look to Zeus and say, Take thou Olympus; me let Earth obey! For which Alexander gave to Lysippus the sole patent for making all his statues; because he alone expressed in brass the vigor of his mind, and in his lineaments represented the lustre of his virtue; while others, who strove to imitate the turning of his neck and softness and brightness of his eyes, failed to observe the manliness and lion-like fierceness of his countenance. Among the great artists of that time was Stasicrates, who never studied elegance nor what was sweet and alluring to the eye, but only bold and lofty workmanship and design, becoming the munificence of royal bounty. He attended upon Alexander, and found fault with all the paintings, sculptures, and cast figures that were made of his person, as the works of mean and slothful artificers. "But I," said he, "will undertake to fix the likeness of thy body on matter incorruptible, such as has eternal foundations and a ponderosity steadfast and immovable. For the mountain Athos in Thrace, where it rises largest and most conspicuous, having a just symmetry of breadth and height, with members, limbs, and distances answerable to the shape of human body, may be so wrought and formed as to be, not only in imagination and fancy but really, the effigy and statue of Alexander; with his feet reaching to the seas, grasping in his left hand a fair and populous city, and with his right pouring forth an ever-flowing river into the ocean from a bowl, as a perpetual drink-offering. But as for gold, brass, ivory, wood, stained figures, and little wax images, toys which may be bought or stolen, I despise them all." When Alexander heard this discourse, he admired and praised the spirit and confidence of the artist; "But," said he, "let Athos alone; for it is sufficient that it is the monument of the vanquished folly and presuming pride of one king already. Our portraiture the snowy Caucasus, and towering Emodon, Tanais, and the Caspian Sea shall draw. They shall remain eternal monuments of our renown."

2.3 Statues require art; greatness requires virtue, not Fortune.

But grant that so vast an undertaking should have been brought to perfection; is there any person living, do ye think, that would have believed such a figure, such a form, and so great a design, to be the spontaneous and accidental production of fantastic Nature? Certainly, not one. What may we think of the statue representing him grasping thunder, and that other with his spear in his hand? Is it possible that a Colossus of a statue should ever be made by Fortune without the help of art; nay, though she should profusely afford all the materials imaginable of gold, brass, ivory, or any other substance whatever? Much more, is it probable that so great a personage, and indeed the greatest of all who have ever lived, should be the workmanship of Fortune without the assistance of virtue? And all this, perhaps, because she has made him the potent master of arms, horses, money, and wealthy cities? — which he who knows not how to use shall rather find to be destructive and dangerous than aids to advance his power and magnificence, as affording proofs of his weakness and pusillanimity. Noble therefore was the saying of Antisthenes, that we ought to wish an enemy all things beneficial to mankind except fortitude; for so these blessings will belong not to their possessors but to the conqueror. Therefore it was, they say, that Nature provided for the hart, one of the most timorous of creatures, such large and branchy horns, to teach us that strength and weapons nothing avail where conduct and courage are wanting. In like manner, Fortune frequently bestowing wealth and empire upon princes simple and faint-hearted, who blemish their dignity by misgovernment, honors and more firmly establishes virtue, as being that which alone makes a man most truly beautiful and majestic. For indeed, according to Epicharmus, 'Tis the mind only sees, the mind That hears; the rest are deaf and blind. For as for the senses, they seem only to have their proper opportunities to act. But that the mind alone is that which gives both assistance and ornament, the mind that overcomes, that excels, and acts the kingly part, while those other blind, deaf, and inanimate things do but hinder, depress, and disgrace the possessors void of virtue, is easily made manifest by experience. For Semiramis, but a woman, set forth great navies, raised mighty armies, built Babylon, covered the Red Sea with her fleets and subdued the Ethiopians and Arabians. On the other side, Sardanapaluspossessing the same power and dominion, though born a man, spent his time at home combing purple wool, lying among his harlots in a lascivious posture upon his back, with his heels higher than his head. After his decease, they made for him a statue of stone, resembling a woman dancing, who seemed to snap with her fingers as she held them over her head, with this inscription: Eat, drink, indulge thy lust; all other things are nothing. Whence it came to pass that Crates, seeing the golden statue of Phryne the courtesan standing in the temple of Delphi, cried out, There stands a trophy of the Grecian luxury. But had he viewed the life or rather burial (for I find but little difference) of Sardanapalus, would he have imagined that statue to have been a trophy of Fortune's indulgences? Shall we suffer the fortune of Alexander to be sullied by the touch of Sardanapalus, or endure that the latter should challenge the majesty and prowess of the former? For what did Sardanapalus enjoy through her favor, more than other princes receive at her hands — arms, horses, weapons, money, and guards of the body? Let Fortune, with all these assistances, make Aridaeus famous, if she can; let her, if she can, advance the renown of Ochus, Amasis, Oarses, Tigranes the Armenian, or Nicomedes the Bithynian. Of which last two, the one, casting his diadem at Pompey's feet, ignominiously surrendered up his kingdom a prey to the victor; and as for Nicomedes, he, after he had shaved his head and put on the cap of liberty, acknowledged himself no more than a freed vassal of the Roman people.

2.4 Without Alexander, Fortune’s empire collapses into chaos.

Rather let us therefore affirm that Fortune makes her favorites little, poor-spirited, and pusillanimous cowards. But it is not just to ascribe vice to misfortune, fortitude and wisdom to prosperity. Fortune indeed was herself made great by Alexander's reign; for in him she appeared illustrious, invincible, magnanimous, merciful, and just. Insomuch that after his decease Leosthenes likened this vast bulk of power — wandering as in a mist, and sometimes violently rushing one part against the other — to the giant Cyclops, who after he had lost his eye went feeling and groping about with his hands before him, not knowing where to lay them. So strangely did that vast pile of dominion roll and tumble about in the dark of confusion, when shattered into anarchy by the loss of its supreme head. Or rather, as dead bodies, when the soul takes her flight, no longer grow together, no longer act together, but are broken up and dissolved, and are finally dissipated; thus Alexander's empire, wanting his enlivening conduct, panted, gasped, and boiled with fever, struggling with Perdiccas, Meleager, Seleucus, and Antigonus, — as with vital spirits still remaining hot, and with irregular and intermittent pulses, — till at length, totally corrupted and putrefied, it produced a sort of degenerate kings and faint-hearted princes, like so many worms. This he himself seemed to prophesy, reproving Hephaestion for quarrelling with Craterus: What power, said he, or signal achievement couldst thou pretend to, should any one deprive thee of thy Alexander? The same will I be bold to say to the Fortune of that time: Where would have been thy grandeur, where thy glory, where thy vast empire, thy invincibility, should any one have bereaved thee of thy Alexander? — that is, should any one have deprived thee of thy skill and dexterity in war, thy magnificence in expense, thy moderation in the midst of so much affluence, thy prowess in the field, thy meekness to the vanquished? Frame, if thou canst, another piece like him, that missing all his noble qualities shall neither be magnificently liberal nor foremost in battle, that shall not regard nor esteem his friends, that shall not be compassionate to his captives, that shall not moderate his pleasures, that shall not be watchful to take all opportunities, whom victory shall make inexorable and prosperity insolent; and try if thou canst make him another Alexander. What ruler ever obtained renown by folly and improbity? Separate virtue from the fortunate, and he everywhere appears little; — among those that deserve his bounty, for his close-handed illiberality; among the laborious, for his effeminacy; among the Gods, for his superstition; among the good, for his envious conditions; among men, for his cowardice; among women, for his inordinate lust. For as unskilful workmen, erecting small figures upon huge pedestals, betray the slightness of their own understandings; so Fortune, when she brings a person of a poor and narrow soul upon the stage of weighty and glorious actions, does but expose and disgrace him, as a person whom the vanity of his own ill conduct has rendered worthless.

2.5 True greatness lies in virtuous use of power.

So that true grandeur does not consist in the possession but in the use of noble means. For new-born infants frequently inherit their father's kingdoms and empires. Such an one was Charillus, whom Lycurgus carried in his swaddling-bands to the public table, and resigning his own authority proclaimed king of Lacedemon. Yet was not the infant thereby the more famous, but he who surrendered to the infant his paternal right, scorning fraud and usurpation. But who could make Aridaeus great, whom Meleager seated in Alexander's throne, differing from a child only in having his swaddling-clothes of purple? Prudently done, that so in a few days it might appear how men govern by virtue, and how by fortune. For after the true prince who swayed the empire, he brought in a mere player; or rather he exposed the diadem of the habitable world upon the brainless head of a mere mute on the stage. Women may bear the burden of a crown, When a renowned commander puts it on." Yet some may say, it is possible for women and children to confer dignity, riches, and empire upon others. Thus the eunuch Bagoas took the diadem of Persia, and set it upon the head of Oarses and Darius. But for a man to take upon him the burden of a vast dominion, and so to manage his ponderous affairs as not to suffer himself to sink and be overwhelmed under the immense weight of wakeful cares and incessant labor, that is the character which signalizes a person endued with virtue, understanding, and wisdom. All these royal qualities Alexander had, whom some accuse of being given to wine. But he was a really great man, who was always sober in action and never drunk with the pride of his conquests and vast power; while others intoxicated with the smallest part of his prosperity have ceased to be masters of themselves. For, as the poet sings: The vainer sort, that view their heaps of gold, Or else advanced at court high places hold, Grow wanton with those unexpected showers That Fortune on their happy greatness pours." Thus Clitus, having sunk some three or four of the Grecians galleys near the island Amorgos, called himself Poseidon and carried a trident. So Demetrius, to whom Fortune vouchsafed a small portion of Alexander's power, assumed the title of Kataibates (as if descended from heaven), to whom the several cities sent their ambassadors, by the name of God-consulters, and his determinations were called oracles. Lysimachus, having made himself master of some part of the skirts of Alexander's empire, viz., the region about Thrace, swelled to such excess of pride and vain-glory as to break forth into this ranting expression: Now the Byzantines make their addresses to me, because I touch heaven with my spear. At which words, Pasiades of Byzantium being then present said, Let us be gone, lest he pierce heaven with the point of his lance. What shall we, in the next place, think of those who presumed, as imitators of Alexander, to have high thoughts of themselves? Clearchus, having made himself tyrant of Heraclea, carried a sceptre like that of Zeus's in his hand, and named one of his sons Thunderbolt. Dionysiusthe Younger called himself the son of Apollo in this inscription: The son of Doris, but from Phoebus sprung. His father put to death above ten thousand of his subjects, betrayed his brother out of envy to his enemies, and not enduring to expect the natural death of his mother, at that time very aged, caused her to be strangled, writing in one of his tragedies: For tyranny is the mother of injustice. Yet after all this, he named one of his daughters Virtue, another Temperance, and a third Justice. Others there were that assumed the titles of benefactors, others of glorious conquerors, others of preservers, and others usurped the title of great and magnificent. But should we go about to recount their promiscuous marriages like horses, their continual herding among impudent and lawless women, their contaminations of boys, their drumming among effeminate eunuchs, their perpetual gaming, their piping in theatres, their nocturnal revels, and days consumed in riot, it would be a task too tedious to undertake.

2.6 He lived disciplined, chaste, compassionate toward enemies.

As for Alexander, he breakfasted by break of day, always sitting; and supped at the shutting in of the evening; he drank when he had sacrificed to the Gods. With his friend Medius he played for diversion when he was sick with a fever. He also played upon the road as he marched, learning between whiles to throw a dart and leap from his chariot. He married Roxana merely for love; but Statira, the daughter of Darius, upon the account of state-policy, for such a conjunction of both nations strengthened his conquest. As to the other Persian women, he excelled them in chastity and continence as far as he surpassed the men in valor. He never desired the sight of any virgin that was unwilling; and those he saw, he regarded less than if he had not seen them; mild and affable to all others, proud and lofty only to fair youth. As for the wife of Darius, a woman most beautiful, he never would endure to hear a word spoken in commendation of her features. When she was dead, he graced her funeral with such a regal pomp, and bewailed her death so piteously, that his kindness cast discredit upon his chastity, and his very courtesy incurred the obloquy of injustice. Indeed, Darius himself had been moved with suspicion at first, when he thought of the power and the youth of the conqueror; for he was one of those who thought Alexander to be only the darling of Fortune. But when he understood the truth, "Well," said he, "I do not yet perceive the condition of the Persians so deplorable, since the world can never tax us now with imbecility or effeminacy, whose fate it was to be vanquished by such a person. Therefore my prayers shall be to the Gods for his prosperity, and that he may be still victorious in war; to the end that in well-doing I may surpass Alexander. For my emulation and ambition lead me in point of honor to show myself more cordial and friendly than he. If then the Fates have otherwise determined as to me and mine, O Zeus preserver of the Persians, and you, O Deities, to whom the care of kings belongs, hear your suppliant, and suffer none but Alexander to sit upon the throne of Cyrus." This was the manner in which Dariusadopted Alexander, after he had called the Gods to witness the act.

2.7 Grant Fortune battles; virtue won Darius’ admiration

So true it is that virtue is the victor still. But now, if you please, let us ascribe to Fortune Arbela and Cilicia, and those other acts of main force and violence; say that Fortune thundered down the walls of Tyre, and that Fortune opened the way into Egypt. Believe that by Fortune Halicarnassus fell, Miletus was taken, Mazaeus left Euphrates unguarded, and the Babylonian fields were strewed with the carcasses of the slain. Yet was not his prudence the gift of Fortune, nor his temperance. Neither did For tune, as it were empaling his inclinations, preserve him impregnable against his pleasures or invulnerable against the assaults of his fervent desires. These were the weapons with which he overthrew Darius. Fortune's advantages, if so they may be called, were only the fury of armed men and horses, battles, slaughters, and flights of routed adversaries. But the great and most undoubted victory which Darius lost was this, that he was forced to yield to virtue, magnanimity, prowess, and justice, while he beheld with admiration his conqueror, who was not to be overcome by pleasure or by labor, nor to be matched in liberality. True it is, that among the throngs of shields and spears, in the midst of war-like shouts and the clashing of weapons, Tarrias the son of Dinomenes, Antigenes the Pellenian, and Philotas the son of Parmenio were invincible; but in respect of their inordinate debauchery, their love of women, their insatiable covetousness, they were nothing superior to the meanest of their captives. For the last of these vices Tarrias was particularly noted; and when Alexander set the Macedonians out of debt and paid off all their creditors, Tarriaspretended among the rest to owe a great sum of money, and brought a suborned person to demand the sum as due to him; but being discovered, he would have laid violent hands upon himself, had not Alexander forgiven him and ordered him the money, remembering that at the battle of Perinthus fought by Philip, being shot into the eye with a dart, he would not suffer the head of it to be pulled out till the field was clear of the enemy. Antigenes, when the sick and maimed soldiers were to be sent back into Macedon, made suit to be registered down in the number, pretending himself utterly disabled in the wars; which very much troubled Alexander, who was well acquainted with his valor and knew that he wore the scars about him of many a bloody field. But the fraud being detected, that was concealed under some little present infirmity, Alexander asked him the reason of his design; and he answered, he did it for the love of Telesippe, that he might accompany her to the sea, not being able to endure a separation from her. Presently the King demanded to whom the wench belonged, and who was to be dealt with in regard to her. To which he replied, she was free from any tie. Well, then, said the King, let us persuade her to stay, if promises or gifts will prevail. So ready was he to pardon the dotages of love in others, so rigorous to himself. But Philotas the son of Parmenio exercised his incontinency after a more offensive manner. Antigona was a Pellaean virgin among the captives taken about Damascus, a prisoner before to Autophradates, who took her going by sea into Samothrace. The beauty of this damsel was such as kept Philotas constant to her embraces. Nay, she had so softened and mellowed this man of steel, I know not how, that he was not master of himself in his enjoyments, but told her the very secrets of his breast; among other things he said: What had Philip been, but for Parmenio? And what would Alexander now be, but for Philotas? What would become of Ammon and the dragons, should we be once provoked? These words Antigona prattled to one of her companions, and she told them to Craterus. Craterusbrings Antigona privately to Alexander, who forbore to offer her the least incivility, but by her means piercing into Philotas's breast, he detected the whole. Yet for seven years after he never discovered so much as the least sign of jealousy, either in his wine or in his anger; nor did he ever disclose it to any friend, even to Hephaestion, from whom he never concealed the most inward of his counsels and designs. For it is said that once, when Alexanderhad just opened a private letter from his mother and was quietly reading it, Hephaestion looked over his shoulder and began to read it likewise; but Alexander forbore to reprove him, and only took off his signet and clapped it to Hephaestion's mouth.

2.8 Fortune makes kings suddenly; Alexander earned sovereignty.

These recitals may suffice, without being tedious, to show that he exercised his authority according to all the most illustrious and royal methods of government. To which grandeur if he arrived by the assistance of Fortune, he is to be acknowledged the greater, because he made so glorious a use of her. So that the more any man extols his fortune, the more he advances his virtue, which made him worthy of such fortune. But now I shall return to the beginnings of his advancement and the early dawnings of his power, and endeavor to discover what was there the great work of Fortune, which rendered Alexander so great by her assistance. First then, how came it to pass that some neighing barb did not seat him in the throne of Cyrus, free from wounds, without loss of blood, without a toilsome expedition, as formerly it happened to Darius Hystaspes? Or that some one flattered by a woman, as Darius by Atossa, did not deliver up his diadem to him, as the other did to Xerxes, so that the empire of Persiacame home to him, even to his own doors? Or why did not some eunuch aid him, as Bagoas did the son of Parysatis, who, only throwing off the habit of a messenger, immediately put on the royal turban? Or why was he not elected on a sudden and unexpectedly by lot to the empire of the world, as at Athens the lawgivers and rulers are wont to be chosen? Would you know how men come to be kings by Fortune's help? At Argos the whole race of the Heraclidae happened to be extinct, to whom the sceptre of that kingdom belonged. Upon which consulting the oracle, answer was made to them that an eagle should direct them. Within a few days the eagle appeared towering aloft, but stooping he at length lighted upon Aegon's house; thereupon Aegon was chosen king. Another time in Paphos, the king that there reigned being an unjust and wicked tyrant, Alexander resolved to dethrone him, and therefore sought out for another, the race of the Kinyradae seeming to be at an end. They told him there was one yet in being, a poor man and of no account, who lived miserable in a certain garden. Thereupon messengers were sent, who found the poor man watering some few small beds of pot-herbs. The miserable creature was strangely surprised to see so many soldiers about him, but go he must; and so being brought before Alexander in his rags and tatters, he caused him presently to be proclaimed king and clad in purple; which done, he was admitted into the number of those who were called the king's companions. The name of this person was Alynomus. Thus Fortunecreates kings suddenly, easily changing the habits and altering the names of those that never expected or hoped for any such thing.

2.9 He won empire through toil, wounds, relentless endurance.

All this while, what favors did Fortune shower upon Alexander but what he merited, what he sweat for, what he bled for? What came gratis? What without the price of great achievements and illustrious actions? He quenched his thirst in rivers mixed with blood; he marched over bridges of slain carcasses; he grazed the fields to satisfy his present hunger; he dug his way to nations covered with snow and cities lying under ground; he made the hostile sea submit to his fleets; and, marching over the thirsty and barren sands of the Gedrosians and Arachosians, he discovered green at sea before he saw it at land. So that if I might use the same liberty of speech for Alexander to Fortune as to a man, I would thus expostulate with her: "Insulting Fortune, when and where didst thou make an easy way for Alexander's vast performances? What impregnable rock was ever surrendered to him without a bloody assault, by thy favor? What city didst thou ever deliver unguarded into his hands? Or what unarmed battalion of men? What faint-hearted prince, what negligent captain, or sleepy sentinels did he ever surprise? When didst thou ever befriend him with so much as a fordable river, a mild winter, or an easy summer? Get thee to Antiochusthe son of Seleucus, to Artaxerxes the brother of Cyrus. Get thee to Ptolemy Philadelphus. Their fathers proclaimed them kings in their own lifetime; they won battles which no mothers wept for; they spent their days in festivals, admiring the pomp of shows and theatres; and still more happy, they prolonged their reigns till scarce their feeble hands could wield their sceptres. But if nothing else, behold the body of Alexander wounded by the enemy, mangled, battered, bruised, from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet, With spears, and swords, and mighty stones." At the battle of the Granicus his helmet was cleft to his very scull; at Gaza he was wounded in the shoulder with a dart. Among the Maragandi he was shot in the shin so desperately, that the bone of his shank was broken and started out of the skin. In Hyrcania he was struck in the neck with a stone, which caused such a dimness in his eyes that for many days he was in danger of losing his sight. Among the Assaracans he was wounded in the heel with an Indian dart; at which time he thus derided his flatterers with a smiling countenance, saying, This is blood, and no immortal ichor: Such stream as issues from a wounded God." At Issus he was run through the thigh with a sword by Darius (as Chares relates), who encountered him hand to hand. Alexander also himself, writing the truth with all sincerity to Antipater, said, It was my fortune to be wounded with a poniard in the thigh, but no ill symptoms attended it either when it was newly done or afterwards during the cure. Another time, among the Malli he was wounded with an arrow two cubits in length, that went in at his breast and came out at his neck, as Aristobulusrelates. Crossing the Tanais against the Scythians and winning the field, he pursued the flying enemy a hundred and fifty furlongs, though at the same time laboring with a dysentery.

2.10 Fortune opposed him; virtue sustained against monstrous odds.

"Well contrived, vain Fortune! to advance and aggrandize Alexander by lancing, broaching, boring every part of his body. Not like Athena, — who, to save Menelaus, directed the dart against the most impenetrable parts of his armor, blunting the force of the weapon with his breastplate, belt, and scarf, so that it only glanced upon his skin, and drew forth two or three drops of blood, — but contrariwise, thou hast exposed his principal parts naked to mischief, driving the wounds through the very bones, rounding every corner of his body, besieging the eyes, undermining the pursuing feet, stopping the torrent of victory, and disappointing the prosecution of noble designs. For my part, I know no prince to whom Fortune ever was more unkind, though she has been envious and severe enough to several. However, other princes she destroyed with a swift and rapid destruction, as with a whirlwind; but in her hatred against Alexander she prolonged her malice, and persisted still implacable and inexorable, as she showed herself to Hercules. For what Typhons and monstrous giants did she not oppose against him? Which of his enemies did she not fortify with store of arms, deep rivers, steep mountains, and the foreign strength of massy elephants? Now had not Alexander been a personage of transcending wisdom, actuated by the impulse of a more than ordinary virtue, but had he been supported only by Fortune, he would have trusted to her as her favorite, and spared himself the labor and the turmoil of ranging so many armies and fighting so many battles, the toil of so many sieges and pursuits, the vexations of revolting nations and haughty princes not enduring the curb of foreign dominion, and all his tedious marches into Bactria, Maracanda, and Sogdiana, among faithless and rebellious nations, who were ever breaking out afresh with new wars, like the Hydra putting forth a new head so soon as one was cut off."

2.11 Divine labors sprang from virtue, uniting mankind.

And here I may seem to utter an absurdity, but I will venture to speak it, as being an undoubted truth; that it was by Fortune that he came very near losing the reputation of being the son of Zeus Ammon. For who but one sprung from the Gods, Hercules excepted, would ever have undertaken and finished those hazardous and toilsome labors which he did? Yet what did Hercules do but terrify lions, pursue wild boars, and scare birds; enjoined thereto by one evil man, that he might not have leisure for those greater actions of punishing Antaeus and putting an end to the murders of Busiris. But it was virtue that enjoined Alexander to undertake that godlike labor, not covetousness of the golden burden of ten thousand camels, not the possession of the Median women or glorious ornaments of Persian luxury, not greediness of the Chalybonian wine or the fish of Hyrcania, but that he might reduce all mankind as it were into one family, under one form of government and the same custom of intercourse and conversation. This love of virtue was thoroughly inbred, and increased and ripened as he grew in years; so that once being to entertain the Persian ambassadors in his father's absence, he never asked them any questions that savored of boyish imbecility, — never troubled them to answer any questions about the golden vine, the pendent gardens, or what habit the king wore, — but still desired to be satisfied in the chiefest concerns of the empire, what force the Persians brought into the field, and in what part of the army the king fought; as Ulysses asked, Where are the magazines of arms? And where The barbed steeds provided for the war?" He also enquired which were the nearest roads for them that travelled from the sea up into the country; at all of which the ambassadors were astonished, and said, This youth is a great prince, but ours a rich one. No sooner was Philip interred, but his resolution hurried him to cross the sea; and having already grasped it in his hopes and preparations, he made all imaginable haste to set foot in Asia. But Fortune opposed him, diverted him, and kept him back, creating a thousand vexatious troubles to delay and stop him. First, she contrived the Illyrian and Triballic wars, exciting to hostility the neighboring barbarians. But they, after many dangers run and many terrible encounters, being at length chased even as far as Scythia beyond the river Ister, he returned back to prosecute his first design. But then again spiteful Fortune stirred up the Thebans against him, and entangled him in the Grecian war, and in the dire necessity of defending himself against his fellow-countrymen and relations with fire and sword and hideous slaughter. Which war being brought to a dreadful end, away he presently crossed into Asia, — as Phylarchusrelates, with only thirty days' provision; as Aristobulus reports, with seventy talents, — having before sold and divided among his friends his own revenues and those of his crown. Only Perdiccas refused what he offered him, asking him at the same time what he had left for himself. And when Alexander replied, Nothing but hopes, Then, said he, we will be content with the same; for it is not just to accept of thy goods, but we must wait for those of Darius.

2.12 His virtues matched heroes; surpassed them in greatness.

What were then the hopes with which Alexander passed into Asia? Not a vast power mustered out of populous cities, nor fleets sailing through mountains; not whips and fetters, the instruments of barbarians' fury, to curb and manacle the sea. But in his small army there was surpassing desire of glory, emulation among those of equal age, and a noble strife to excel in honor and virtue among friends. Then, as for himself, he carried with him all these great hopes, — piety towards the Gods, fidelity to his friends, generous frugality, temperance, beneficence, contempt of death, magnanimity, humanity, decent affability, candid integrity, constancy in counsel, quickness in execution, love of precedence in honor, and an effectual purpose to follow the steps of virtue. And though Homer, in describing the beauty of Agamemnon, seems not to have observed the rules of decorum or probability in any of his three similitudes: Like thundering Zeus's, his awful head and eyes The gazing crowd with majesty surprise; In every part with form celestial graced, His breast like Poseidon's, and like Mars his waist;" yet as for Alexander, if his celestial parents formed and composed him of several virtues, may we not conclude that he had the wisdom of Cyrus, the temperance of Agesilaus, the foresight of Themistocles, the skill of Philip, the daring courage of Brasidas, the shrewdness and political skill of Pericles? Certainly, if we compare him with the most ancient heroes, he was more temperate than Agamemnon, who preferred a captive before his lawful wife, though but newly wedded, while Alexander, before he was legally married, abstained from his prisoners. He was more magnanimous than Achilles, who accepted a small sum of money for the redemption of Hector's dead body, while Alexanderspared no expense to adorn the funeral of Darius. Achilles accepted gifts and bribes from his friends, as the atonement of his wrath; Alexander, when once a victor, enriched his enemies. He was much more pious than Diomedes, who scrupled not to fight against the Gods, while Alexander ascribed to Heaven all his successes. Finally, he was more bewailed of his relations than Ulysses, whose mother died for grief, while the mother of Alexander's enemy, out of affection, bare him company in his death.

2.13

In short, if Solon proved so wise a ruler by Fortune, if Miltiades led his armies by Fortune, if Aristides was so renowned for his justice by Fortune, then there is nothing that can be called the work of virtue. Then is virtue only an airy fiction, and a word that passes with some show of glory through the life of man, but feigned and magnified by sophists and lawgivers. But if every one of these whom we have mentioned was wealthy or poor, weak or strong, deformed or beautiful, long or short lived, by Fortune, but made himself a great captain, a great lawgiver, famous for governing kingdoms and commonwealths, by virtue and reason; then in God's name let us compare Alexander with the best of them. Solon by a law made a great abatement upon the payment of the Athenians' private debts, which he called his burden-easing law; Alexander discharged the debts of his Macedonians at his own expense. Pericles, laying a tax upon the Greeks, expended the money in building temples to beautify the citadel of Athens; Alexander sent home ten thousand talents out of the spoils of the barbarians, for the building of temples to the Gods all over Greece. Brasidas advanced his fame all over Greece, by breaking through the enemy's army lying encamped by the seaside near Methone; but when you read of that daring jump of Alexander's (so astonishing to the hearers, much more to them that beheld it) when he threw himself from the walls of the Oxydracian metropolis among the thickest of the enemy, assailing him on every side with spears, darts, and swords, tell me where you meet with such an example of matchless prowess, or to what you can compare it but to a gleam of lightning violently flashing from a cloud, and impetuously driven by the wind? Such was the appearance of Alexander, as he leaped like an apparition to the earth, glittering in his flaming armor. The enemy, at first amazed and struck with horror, retreated and fell back; till seeing him single they came on again with a redoubled force. Now was not this a great and splendid testimony of Fortune's kindness, to throw him into an inconsiderable and barbarous town, and there to enclose and immure him a prey to worthless enemies? And when his friends made haste to his assistance, to break the scaling-ladders, and to overthrow and cast them down? Of three that got upon the walls and flung themselves down in his defence, endearing Fortune presently despatched one; the other, pierced and struck with a shower of darts, could only be said to live. Without, the Macedonians foamed and filled the air with helpless cries, having no engines at hand. All they could do was to dig down the walls with their swords, tear out the stones with their nails, and almost to rend them out with their teeth. All this while, Alexander, Fortune's favorite, whom she always covered with her protection, like a wild beast entangled in a snare, stood deserted and destitute of all assistance, not laboring for Susa, Babylon, Bactria, or to vanquish the mighty Porus. For to miscarry in great and glorious attempts is no reproach; but so malicious was Fortune, so kind to the barbarians, such a hater of Alexander, that she aimed not only at his life and body, but at bereaving him of his honor and sullying his renown. For Alexander's fall had never been so much lamented had he perished near Euphrates or Hydaspes by the hand of Darius, or by the horses, swords, and axes of the Persians fighting with all their might and main in defence of their king, or had he tumbled from the walls of Babylon, and all his hopes together. Thus Pelopidas and Epaminondas fell; whose death was to be ascribed to their virtue, not to such a poor misfortune as this. But what was the singular act of Fortune's favor which we are now enquiring into? What indeed, but in the farthest nook of a barbarous country, on the farther side of a river, within the walls of a miserable village, to pen up and hide the lord and king of the world, that he might there perish shamefully at the hands of barbarians, who should knock him down and pelt him with whatever came next to hand? There the first blow he received with a battle-axe cleft his helmet and entered his skull; at the same time another shot him with an Indian arrow in the breast near one of his paps, the head being four fingers broad and five in length, which, together with the weight of the shaft which projected from the wound, did not a little torment him. But, what was worst of all, while he was thus defending himself from his enemies before him, when he had laid a bold attempter that approached his person sprawling upon the earth with his sword, a fellow from a mill close by came behind him, and with a great iron pestle gave him such a bang upon the neck as deprived him for the present both of his senses and his sight. However, his virtue did not yet forsake him, but supplied him still with courage, infusing strength withal and speed into those about him. For Ptolemy, Limnaeus, and Leonnatus, and some others who had mounted or broken through the wall, made to his succor, and stood about him like so many bulwarks of his virtue; out of mere affection and kindness to their sovereign exposing their bodies, their faces, and their lives in his defence. For it is not Fortune that overrules men to run the hazard of death for brave princes; but the love of virtue allures them — as natural affection charms and entices bees — to surround and guard their chief commander. What person then, at that time beholding in security this strange adventure, would not have confessed that he had seen a desperate combat of Fortune against virtue, and that the barbarians were undeservedly superior through Fortune's help, but that the Greeks resisted beyond imagination through the force of virtue? So that if the barbarians had vanquished, it had been the act of Fortune or of some evil genius or divine retribution; but as the Greeks became the victors, they owed their conquest to their virtue, their prowess, their friendship and fidelity to each other. For these were all the life-guard Alexander had at that time; Fortune having interposed a wall between him and all his other forces, so that neither fleets nor armies, cavalry nor infantry, could stand him in any stead. Therefore the Macedonians routed the barbarians, and buried those that fell under the ruins of their own town. But this little availed Alexander; for he was carried off with the dart sticking in his breast, having now a war in his own bowels, while the arrow in his bosom was a kind of cord, or rather nail, that was driven through his breastplate and fastened it to his body. When they went about to dress him, the forked shape of the iron head would not permit the surgeons to draw it forth from the root of the wound, being fixed in the solid parts of the breast that fortify the heart. Nor durst they attempt to cut away the shaft that stuck out, fearing they should put him to an excess of torment by the motion of the iron in the cleft of the bone, and cause a new flux of blood not easy to be stopped. Alexander, observing their hesitation and delay, endeavored himself with a little knife to cut off the shaft close to the skin; but his hand failed him, being seized with a heavy numbness by reason of the inflammation of the wound. Thereupon he commanded the surgeons and those that stood about him to try the same thing themselves and not to be afraid, giving them all the encouragement he could. Those that wept he upbraided for their weakness; others he called deserters, that refused him their assistance in such a time of need. At length, calling to his friends, he said: Let no one of you fear for me; for how shall I believe you to be contemners of death, when you betray yourselves to be afraid of mine?"

4 - 6 Glory of the Athenians.

4 - 6 - 1 Remove deeds; historians fade, sharing reflected actors’ glory.

. . . These things he rightly spoke to the commanders that accompanied him, to whom he opened the way for future performances, while he expelled the barbarians and restored Greece to her ancient liberty. And the same thing may be said to those that magnify themselves for their writings. For if there were none to act, there would be none to write. Take away the political government of Pericles, and the naval trophies of Phormio at Rhium, and the brave achievements of Nicias at Cythera, Megara, and Corinth, Demosthenes's Pylos, and the four hundred captives taken by Cleon, Tolmides sailing round the Peloponnesus, and Myronidas vanquishing the Boeotians at Oinophyta: and you murder Thucydides. Take away the daring braveries of Alcibiades in the Hellespont, and of Thrasyllus near Lesbos; the dissolution of the oligarchy by Theramenes; Thrasybulus, Archippus, and the seventy that from Phylae ventured to attack the Lacedemonian tyranny; and Conon again enforcing Athens to take the sea: and then there is an end of Cratippus. For as for Xenophon, he was his own historian, relating the exploits of the army under his command, but saying that Themistogenes the Syracusan had written the history of them; dedicating the honor of his writing to another, that writing of himself as of another, he might gain the more credit. But all the other historians, as the Clinodemi, Diyli, Philochorus, Philarchus, were but the actors of other men's deeds, as of so many plays, while they compiled the acts of kings and great generals, and thrusting themselves into the memory of their fame, partake of a kind of lustre and light from them. For there is a certain shadow of glory which reflects from those that act to those that write, while the actions of another appear in the discourse as in a mirror.

4 - 6 - 2 Painting imitates battles; generals win true victories.

But this city was the mother and charitable nurse of many other arts and sciences; some of which she first invented and illustrated, to others she gave both efficacy, honor, and increase. More especially to her is painting beholden for its first invention, and the perfection to which it has attained. For Apollodorus the painter, who first invented the mixing of colors and the softening of shadows, was an Athenian. Over whose works there is this inscription: 'Tis no hard thing to reprehend me; But let the men that blame me mend me. Then for Euphranor, Nicias, Asclepiodorus, and Plistaenetus the brother of Phidias, some of them painted the victories, others the battles of great generals, and some of them heroes themselves. Thus Euphranor, comparing his own Theseus with another drawn by Parrhasius, said, that Parrhasius's Theseus ate roses, but his fed upon beef. For Parrhasius's piece was daintily painted, and perhaps it might be something like the original. But he that beheld Euphranor's Theseus might well exclaim, Race of Erechtheus bold and stout, Whom Pallas bred." Euphranor also painted with great spirit the battle of Mantinea, fought by the cavalry between the Athenians and Epaminondas. The story was thus. The Theban Epaminondas, puffed up with his victory at Leuctra, and designing to insult and trample over fallen Sparta and the glory of that city, with an army of seventy thousand men invaded and laid waste the Lacedemonian territory, stirred up the subject people to revolt, and not far from Mantinea provoked the Spartansto battle; but they neither being willing nor indeed daring to encounter him, being in expectation of a reinforcement from Athens, Epaminondas dislodged in the night-time, and with all the secrecy imaginable fell into the Lacedemonian territory; and missed but little of taking Sparta itself, being destitute of men to defend it. But the allies of the Lacedemonians made haste to its relief; whereupon Epaminondas made a show as if he would again return to spoiling and laying waste the country; and by this means deceiving and amusing his enemies, he retreats out of Laconia by night, and with swift marches coming upon the Mantineans unexpectedly, at what time they were deliberating to send relief to Sparta, presently commanded the Thebans to prepare to storm the town. Immediately the Thebans, who had a great conceit of their warlike courage, took their several posts, and began to surround the city. This put the Mantineans into a dismal consternation, and filled the whole city with dreadful outcries and hurly-burly, as being neither able to withstand such a torrent of armed men ready to rush in upon them, nor having any hopes of succor. But at the same time, and by good fortune, the Athenians came down from the hills into the plains of Mantinea, not knowing any thing of the critical moment that required more speedy haste, but marching leisurely along. However, so soon as they were informed of the danger of their allies, by one that scouted out from the rest, though but few in respect of the number of their enemies, single of themselves, and tired with their march, yet they presently drew up into order of battle; and the cavalry charging up to the very gates of Mantinea, there happened a terrible battle between the horse on both sides; wherein the Athenians got the better, and so saved Mantinea out of Epaminondas's hands. This conflict was painted by Euphranor, and you see in the picture with what strength, what fury and vigor they fought. And yet I do not believe that any one will compare the skill of the painter with that of the general; or would endure that any one should prefer the picture before the trophy, or the imitation before the truth itself.

4 - 6 - 3 History mirrors action; actors outrank narrators always.

Though indeed Simonides calls painting silent poetry, and poetry speaking painting. For those actions which painters set forth as they were doing, those history relates when they were done. And what the one sets forth in colors and figures, the other relates in words and sentences; only they differ in the materials and manner of imitation. However, both aim at the same end, and he is accounted the best historian, who can make the most lively descriptions both of persons and passions. Therefore Thucydides always drives at this perspicuity, to make the hearer (as it were) a spectator, and to inculcate the same passions and perturbations of mind into his readers as they were in who beheld the causes of those effects. For Demosthenes embattling the Athenians near the rocky shore of Pylos; Brasidas hastening the pilot to run the ship aground, then going to the rowers' seats, then wounded and fainting, sinking down in that part of the vessel where the oars could not trouble him; the land fight of the Spartans from the sea, and the sea engagement of the Athenians from the land; then again in the Sicilian war, both a land fight and sea engagement, so fought that neither had the better, . . . So that if we may not compare painters with generals, neither must we equal historians to them. Thersippus of Eroeadae brought the first news of the victory at Marathon, as Heraclides of Pontus relates. But most report that Eucles, running armed with his wounds reeking from the fight, and falling through the door into the first house he met, expired with only these words in his mouth, "God save ye, we are well." Now this man brought the news himself of the success of a fight wherein he was present in person. But suppose that any of the goat-keepers or herd-men had beheld the combat from some high hill at a distance, and seeing the success of that great achievement, greater than by words can be expressed, should have come to the city without any wound or blood about him, and should have claimed the honors done to Cynaegirus, Callimachus, and Polyzelus, for giving an account of their wounds, their bravery and deaths, wouldst thou not have thought him impudent above impudence itself; seeing that the Lacedemonians gave the messenger that brought the news of the victory at Mantinea no other reward than a quantity of victuals from the public mess? But historians are (as it were) well-voiced relators of the actions of great men, who add grace and beauty and dint of wit to their relations, and to whom they that first light upon them and read them are indebted for their pleasing tidings. And being read, they are applauded for transmitting to posterity the actions of those that do bravely. For words do not make actions, though we give them the hearing.

4 - 6 - 4 Poetry embellishes myths; real deeds surpass inventions.

But there is a certain grace and glory of the poetic art, when it resembles the grandeur of the actions themselves; according to that of Homer, And many falsities he did unfold, That looked like truth, so smoothly were they told." It is reported also, that when one of his familiar friends said to Menander, The feasts of Dionysos are at hand, and thou hast made ne'er a comedy; he made him this answer: By all the Gods, I have made a comedy, for I have laid my plot; and there remains only to make the verses and measures to it. So that the poets themselves believe the actions to be more necessary than the words, and the first things to be considered. Corinna likewise, when Pindar was but a young man and made too daring a use of his eloquence, gave him this admonition, that he was no poet, for that he never composed any fables, which was the chiefest office of poetry; in regard that strange words, figures, metaphors, songs, and measures were invented to give a sweetness to things. Which admonition Pindar laying up in his mind, wrote a certain ode which thus begins: Shall I Ismenus sing, Or Melia, that from spindles all of gold Her twisted yarn unwinds, Or Cadmus, that most ancient king, Or else the sacred race of Spartibold, Or Hercules, that far in strength transcends. Which when he showed to Corinna, she with a smile replied: When you sow, you must scatter the seed with your hand, not empty the whole sack at once. And indeed we find that Pindar intermixes in his poetic numbers a collection of all sorts of fables. Now that poetry employs itself in mythology is agreed by Plato likewise. For a fable is the relation of a false story resembling truth, and therefore very remote from real actions; for relation is the image of action, as fable is the image of relation. And therefore they that feign actions fall as far behind historians as they that speak differ from those that act.

4 - 6 - 5 Drama delights crowds; generals secure cities’ safety.

Athens therefore never bred up any true artist in epic or lyric verse. For Cinesias was a troublesome writer of dithyrambics, a person of mean parentage and of no repute; and being jeered and derided by the comedians, proved very unfortunate in the pursuit of fame. Now for the dramatic poets, the Athenians looked upon comedy to be so ignoble and troublesome, that they published a law that no Areopagite should make any comedies. But tragedy flourished and was cried up, and with wonder and admiration heard and beheld by all people in those days, deceiving them with fables and the display of various passions; whereby, as Gorgias says, he that deceived was more just than he that deceived not, and he that was deceived was wiser than he who was not deceived. He that deceived was more just, because it was no more than what he pretended to do; and he that was deceived was wiser, for that he must be a man of no sense that is not taken with the sweetness of words. And yet what benefit did those fine tragedies procure the Athenians? But the shrewdness and cunning of Themistocles walled the city, the industry of Pericles adorned their citadel, and Cimon advanced them to command their neighbors. But as for the wisdom of Euripides, the eloquence of Sophocles, the lofty style of Aeschylus, what calamity did they avert from the city; or what renown or fame did they bring to the Athenians? Is it fitting then that dramatic poems should be compared with trophies, the stage with the generals' office, or lists of dramas with noble achievements?

4 - 6 - 6 Stage extravagance wastes wealth better spent on wars

Would ye that we should introduce the men themselves carrying before them the marks and signals of their own actions, permitting them to enter in order, like the actors upon the stage? But then poets must go before them, with flutes and lyres, saying and singing: Far from our choirs who in this lore's unskilled, Or does not cherish pure and holy thoughts, Nor views nor joins the Muses' generous rites, Nor is perfected in the Bacchic tongue, With which Cratinus bull-devourer sang." And then there must be scenes, and vizards, and altars, and versatile machines. There must be also the tragedy-actors, the Nicostrati, Callippidae, Menisci, Theodori, Poli, the dressers, and sedan-men of tragedy, — like those of some sumptuously apparelled lady, or rather like the painters, gilders, and colorers of statues, — together with a costly preparation of vessels, vizards, purple coats, and machines, attended by an unruly rabble of dancers and guards; and let all the preparation be exceeding costly and magnificent. A Lacedemonian once, beholding all this, not improperly said: How strangely are the Athenians mistaken, consuming so much cost and labor upon ridiculous trifles; that is to say, wasting the expenses of navies and of victualling whole armies upon the stage. For if you compute the cost of those dramatic preparations, you will find that the Athenians spent more upon their Bacchae, Oidipuses, and Antigone, and the woes of Medea and Electra, than in their wars against the barbarians for liberty and extending their empire. For their general oft-times led forth the soldiers to battle, commanding them to make provisions only of such food as needed not the tedious preparation of fire. And indeed their admirals and captains of their ships went aboard without any other provision than meal, onions, and cheese. Whereas the masters of the choruses, feeding their dancers with eels, lettuce, the kernels of garlic, and marrow, feasted them for a long time, exercising their voices and pleasing their palates by turns. And as for these captains, if they were overcome, it was their misfortune to be contemned and hissed at; and if they were victors, there was neither tripod, nor consecrated ornament of victory, as Demetrius says, but a life prolonged among cables, and an empty house for a tomb. For this is the tribute of poetry, and there is nothing more splendid to be expected from it.

4 - 6 - 7 Victories build temples, walls, freedom; festivals honor warriors.

Now then let us consider the great generals as they approach, to whom, as they pass by, all those must rise up and pay their salutations who have never been famous for any great action, military or civil, and were never furnished with daring boldness nor purity of wisdom for such enterprises, nor initiated by the hand of Miltiades that overthrew the Medes, or of Themistocles that vanquished the Persians. This is the martial gang, at once combating with phalanxes by land, and engaging with navies by sea, and laden with the spoils of both.
Give ear, Alala, daughter of War,
to this same prologue of swords and spears. Hasten to death, when for your country vowed,
as Epaminondas said, — for your country, your sepulchres, and your altars, throwing yourselves into most noble and illustrious combats. Their victories methinks I see approaching toward me, not dragging after them a goat or oxfor a reward, nor crowned with ivy and smelling of the dregs of wine. But whole cities, islands, thousand-talent temples, and colonies well peopled are their rewards, being surrounded with trophies and spoils of all sorts. Whose statues and symbols of honor are Parthenons, a hundred feet in length, South-walls, shipsheds, the Propylaea, the Chersonesus, and Amphipolis. Marathon displays the victory of Miltiades, and Salamis the glory of Themistocles, triumphing over the ruins of a thousand vessels. The victory of Cimon brings away a hundred Phoenician galleys from the Eurymedon. And the victory of Cleon and Demosthenes brings away the shield of Brasidas, and the captive soldiers in chains from Sphacteria. The victory of Conon and Thrasybulus walls the city, and brings the people back at liberty from Phylae. The victory of Alcibiades near Sicily restores the languishing condition of the city; and Greece beheld Ionia raised again by the victories of Neleus and Androclus in Lydia and Caria. If you ask what benefit every one of the rest procured to the city; one will answer Lesbos, another Samos, another Cyprus, another the Pontus Euxinus, another five hundred galleys with three banks of oars, and another ten thousand talents, the rewards of fame and trophies won. For these victories the city observes public anniversary festivals, for these victories she sacrifices to the Gods; not for the victories of Aeschylus and Sophocles, not because Carcinus was victorious with his Aerope, or Astydamas with his Hector. But upon the sixth of September, even to this day, the Athenians celebrate a festival in memory of the fight at Marathon. Upon the sixteenth of the same month libations are poured in remembrance of the naval victory won by Chabrias near Naxos. Upon the twelfth they offer thanksgiving sacrifices for the recovery of their liberty. For upon that day they returned back from Phylae. The third of the same month they won the battle of Plataea. The sixteenth of April was consecrated to Artemis, when the moon appeared in the full to the Greeks victorious at Salamis. The twelfth of June was made sacred by the battle of Mantinea, wherein the Athenians, when their confederates were routed and fled, alone by themselves obtained the victory and triumph over their victorious enemies. Such actions as these procured honor and veneration and grandeur to the city; for these acts it was that Pindar called Athens the support of Greece; not because she had set the fortune of the Greeks upright by the tragedies of Phrynichus and Thespis, but because (as he says) "near Artemisium the Athenian youth laid the first glorious foundation of freedom;" and afterwards fixing it upon the adamantine pillars of Salamis, Mycale, and Plataea, they multiplied their felicity to others.

4 - 6 - 8 Oratory inspires; action liberates, outshining crafted speeches.

But as for the writings of the poets, they are mere bubbles. But rhetoricians and orators indeed have something in them that renders them in some measure fit to be compared with great captains. For which reason, Aeschines in derision reports of Demosthenes, that he said he was bringing a suit in behalf of the orator's stand against the generals' office. But for all that, do you think it proper to prefer the Plataic oration of Hyperides to the Plataicvictory of Aristides? Or the oration of Lysias against the Thirty Tyrants, to the acts of Thrasybulus and Archiasthat put them to death? Or that of Aeschines against Timarchus for unchastity, to the relieving of Byzantium by Phocion, by which he prevented the sons of the confederates from being the scorn and derision of the Macedonians? Or shall we set before the public crowns which Demosthenes received for setting Greece at liberty, his oration on the Crown, wherein the rhetorician has behaved himself most splendidly and learnedly, swearing by their progenitors that ventured their lives at Marathon for the liberty of Greece, rather than by those that instructed youth in the schools? And therefore the city buried these heroes at the expense of the public, honoring the sacred relics of their bodies, not men like Isocrates, Antiphon, and Isaeus, and the orator has translated them into the number of the Gods; and by these it was that he chose to swear, though he did not follow their example. Isocratesalso was wont to say, that they who ventured their lives at Marathon fought as if they had been inspired with other souls than their own; and extolling their daring boldness and contempt of life, to one that asked him (being at that time very aged) how he did, — As well, said he, as one who, being now above fourscore and ten years old, esteems death to be the worst of evils. For neither did he spend his years to old age in whetting his sword, in grinding and sharpening his spear, in scouring and polishing his helmet, in commanding navies and armies, but in knitting and joining together antithetical and equally balanced clauses, and words of similar endings, all but smoothing and adapting his periods and sentences with files, planes, or chisels. How would that man have been affrighted at the clattering of weapons or the routing of a phalanx, who was so afraid of suffering one vowel to clash with another, or to pronounce a sentence where but one syllable was wanting! Miltiades, the very next day after the battle of Marathon, returned a victor to the city with his army. And Pericles, having subdued the Samians in nine months, derided Agamemnon that was ten years taking of Troy. But Isocrates was nearly three Olympiads (or twelve years) in writing his Panegyric; in all which time he had neither been a general nor an ambassador, neither built a city, nor been an admiral, notwithstanding the many wars that harassed Greece within that time. But while Timotheus freed Euboea from slavery, while Chabrias vanquished the enemy near Naxos, while Iphicratesdefeated and cut to pieces a whole battalion of the Lacedemonians near Lechaion, while the Athenians, having shaken off the Spartan yoke, set the rest of Greece at liberty, with as ample privileges as they had themselves; he sits poring at home in his study, seeking out proper phrases and choice words for his oration, as long a time as Pericles spent in erecting the Propylaea and the Parthenon. Though the comic poet Cratinus seems to deride even Pericles himself as one that was none of the quickest, where he says of the middle wall: In words the mighty Pericles Has rais'd us up a wall; But 'tis a wall in only words, For we see none at all. Consider now the poor spirit of this great orator, who spent the ninth part of his life in compiling one single oration. But to say no more of him, is it rational to compare the harangues of Demosthenes the orator with the martial exploits of Demosthenes the great leader? For example, the oration against Conon for an assault, with the trophies which the other erected before Pylos? Or the declamation against Amathusius concerning slaves, with the noble service which the other performed in bringing home the Spartan captives? Neither can it be said, that Demosthenes for his oration in regard to foreigners . . . deserved as much honor as Alcibiades, who joined the Mantineans and Eleans as confederates with the Athenians against the Lacedemonians. And yet we must acknowledge that the public orations of Demosthenes deserve this praise, that in his Philippics he bravely encourages the Athenians to take arms, and he extols the enterprise of Leptines. . . .