Noctes Atticae

The names of certain weapons, darts and swords, and also of boats and ships, which are found in the books of the early writers.

ONCE upon a time, when I was riding in a carriage, to keep my mind from being dull and unoccupied and a prey to worthless trifles, it chanced to occur to me to try to recall the names of weapons, darts and swords which are found in the early histories, and also the various kinds of boats and their names. Those, then, of the former that came to mind at the time are the following: spear, pike, fire-pike, half-pike, iron bolt, Gallic spear, lance, hunting-darts, javelins, long bolts, barbed-javelins, German spears, thonged-javelin, Gallic bolt, broadswords, poisoned arrows, [*](See McCartney, Figurative Use of Animal Names, p. 47.) Illyrian hunting-spears, cimeters, darts, swords, daggers, broadswords, double-edged swords, small-swords, poniards, cleavers.

Of the lingula, or

little tongue,

since it is less common, I think I ought to say that the ancients applied that term to an oblong small-sword, made in the form of a tongue; it is mentioned by Naevius in his tragedy Hesione. I quote the line: [*](Fr. 1, Ribbeck3, who gives the title as Aesiona. There is of course a word-play on lingula.)

1. Pray let me seem to please you with my tongue,
2. But with my little tongue (lingula).

The rumpia too is a kind of weapon of the Thracian people, and the word occurs in the fourteenth book of the Annals of Quintus Ennius. [*](Ann. 390, Vahlen2; cf. Livy xxxi. 39. 11.)

The names of ships which I recalled at the time are these: merchant-ships, cargo-carriers, skiffs, warships, cavalry-transports, cutters, fast cruisers, or, as the Greeks call them, ke/lhtes, barques, smacks, sailing-skiffs, light galleys, which the Greeks call i(stiokopoi or e)paktri/des, scouting-boats, galliots, tenders, flatboats, vetutiae moediae, yachts, pinnaces, long-galliots, scullers' boats, caupuls, [*](Many of these names, both of weapons and ships, are most uncertain; for some no exact equivalent can be found.) arks, fair-weather craft, pinks, lighters, spy-boats.

That Asinius Pollio showed ignorance in criticizing Sallust because he used transgressus (crossing) for transfretatio (crossing the sea) and trangressi (those who had crossed) for qui transfretaverant (those who had crossed the sea).

ASINIUS POLLIO, in a letter which he addressed to Plancus, and certain others who were unfriendly to Gaius Sallustius, thought that Sallust deserved censure because in the first book of his Histories he called the crossing of the sea and a passage made in ships transgresses, using transgressi of those who had crossed the sea, for which the usual term is transfretare. I give Sallust's own words: [*](Hist. i. 104, Maur.)

Accordingly Sertorius, having left a small garrison in Mauretania and taking advantage of a dark night and a favourable tide, tried either by secrecy or speed to avoid a battle while crossing (in transgressu).

Then later he wrote: [*](ib. i. 105.)

When they had crossed (transgressos), a mountain which had been seized in advance by the Lusitanians gave them all shelter.

This, they say, is an improper and careless usage, supported by no adequate authority.

For transgressus,

says Pollio,

comes from transgredi, 'to step

v2.p.289

across,' and this word itself refers to walking and stepping with the feet.

Therefore Pollio thought that the verb transgredi did not apply to those who fly or creep or sail, but only to those who walk and measure the way with their feet. Hence they say that in no good writer can transgressus be found applied to ships, or as the equivalent of transfretatio.

But, since cursus, or

running,

is often correctly used of ships, I ask why it is that ships may not be said to make a transgressus, especially since the small extent of the narrow strait which flows between Spain and the Afric land is most elegantly described by the word transgressio, as being a distance of only a few steps. But as to those who ask for authority and assert that ingredi or transgredi has not been used of sailing, I should like them to tell me how much difference they think there is between ingredi, or

march,

and ambulare, or

walk.

Yet Cato in his book On Farming says: [*](i. 3.)

A farm should be chosen in a situation where there is a large town near by and the sea, or a river where ships pass (ambulant).

Moreover Lucretius, by the use of this same expression, bears testimony that such figures are intentional and are regarded as ornaments of diction. For in his fourth book he speaks of a shout as

marching

(gradientem) through the windpipe and jaws, which is much bolder than the Sallustian expression about the ships. The lines of Lucretius are as follows: [*](iv. 526.)

1. The voice besides doth often scrape the throat;
2. A shout forth marching (gradiens) doth make the windpipe rough.

Accordingly, Sallust, in the same book, uses progressus, not only of those who sailed in ships, but also of floating skiffs. I have added his own words about the skiffs: [*](Hist. i. 98, Maur.)

Some of them, after going (progressae) but a little way, the load being excessive and unstable, when panic had thrown the passengers into disorder, began to sink.

A story of the Roman and the Carthaginian people, showing that they were rivals of nearly equal strength.

IT is stated in ancient records that the strength, the spirit and the numbers of the Roman and the Carthaginian people were once equal. And this opinion was not without foundation. With other nations the contest was for the independence of one or the other state, with the Carthaginians it was for the rule of the world.

An indication of this is found in the following word and act of each of the two peoples: Quintus Fabius, a Roman general, delivered a letter to the Carthaginians, in which it was written that the Roman people had sent them a spear and a herald's staff, signs respectively of war and peace; they might choose whichever they pleased and regard the one which they should choose as sent them by the Roman people. The Carthaginians replied that they chose neither one; those who had brought them might leave whichever they liked; that whatever should be left them they would consider that they themselves had chosen.

Marcus Varro, however, says that neither the spear itself nor the staff itself was sent, but two

tokens, on one of which was engraved the representation of a staff; on the other that of a spear.

About the limits of the periods of boyhood, manhood and old age, taken from the History of Tubero.

TUBERO, in the first book of his History,[*](Fr. 4, Peter2.) has written that King Servius Tullius, when he divided the Roman people into those five classes of older and younger men for the purpose of making the enrolment, regarded as pueri, or

boys,

those who were less than seventeen years old; then, from their seventeenth year, when they were thought to be fit for service, he enrolled them as soldiers, calling them up to the age of forty-six iuniores, or

younger men,

and beyond that age, seniores, or

elders.

I have made a note of this fact, in order that from the rating of Servius Tullius, that most sagacious king, the distinctions between boyhood, manhood, and old age might be known, as they were established by the judgment, and according to the usage, of our forefathers.

That the particle atque is not only conjunctive, but has many and varied meanings.

THE particle atque is said by the grammarians to be a copulative conjunction. And as a matter of fact, it very often joins and connects words; but sometimes it has certain other powers, which are

not sufficiently observed, except by those engaged in a diligent examination of the early literature. For it has the force of an adverb when we say

I have acted otherwise than (atque) you,

for it is equivalent to aliter quam tu; and if it is doubled, it amplifies and emphasizes a statement, as we note in the Annals of Quintus Ennius, unless my memory of this verse is at fault: [*](Ann. 537, Vahlen.2)

1. And quickly (atque atque) to the walls the Roman manhood came.

The opposite of this meaning is expressed by deque, also found in the early writers. [*](Text and meaning are uncertain of this and the following sentence; see critical note.)

Atque is said to have been used besides for another adverb also, namely statim, as is thought to be the case in these lines of Virgil, where that particle is employed obscurely and irregularly: [*](Georg. i. 199.)

1. Thus, by Fate's law, all speeds towards the worse,
2. And giving way, falls back; e'en as if one
3. Whose oars can barely force his skiff upstream
4. Should chance to slack his arms and cease to drive;
5. Then straightway (atque) down the flood he's swept away.

On the origin of the term terra Italia, or

the land of Italy

; of that fine which is called

supreme

; concerning the reason for the name and on the Aternian law; and in what words the

smallest

fine used to be pronounced in ancient days.

TIMAEUS, in the History[*](F.H.G. i. 195, Müller ) which he composed in the Greek language about the affairs of the Roman people, and Marcus Varro in his Human Antiquities, [*](x. f. 1, Mirsch.) wrote that the land of Italy derived its name from a Greek word, oxen in the old Greek tongue being called i)taloi/; for in Italy there was a great abundance of cattle, and in that land pastures are numerous and grazing is a frequent employment.

Furthermore, we may infer that it was for the same reason—namely, since Italy at that time so abounded in cattle—that the fine was established which is called

supreme,

consisting of two sheep and thirty oxen each day, obviously proportionate to the abundance of oxen and the scarcity of sheep. But when a fine of that sort, consisting of cattle and sheep, was pronounced by a magistrate, oxen and sheep were brought, now of small, again of greater value; and this made the penalty of the fine unequal. Therefore later, by the Aternian law, [*](Passed by the consul, A. Atinius, in 454 B.C.) the value of a sheep was fixed at ten pieces of brass, of the cattle at a hundred apiece. Now the

smallest

fine is that of one sheep. The

supreme

fine is of that number which we have mentioned, beyond which it is not lawful to impose a fine for a period of successive days; [*](That is, for a certain number of animals to be paid on a number of successive days.) and for that reason it is called

supreme,

that is, greatest and heaviest.

When therefore even now, according to ancient usage, either the

smallest

or the

supreme

fine is pronounced by Roman magistrates, it is regularly observed that oves (

sheep

) be given the masculine gender; and Marcus Varro has thus recorded the words of the law by which the smallest fine was pronounced: [*](xxiii. fr. 2, Mirsch.)

Against Marcus Terentius, since, though summoned, he has neither appeared nor been excused, I pronounce a fine of one sheep (unum ovem)

; and they declared that the fine did not appear to be legal unless that gender was used.

Furthermore, Marcus Varro, in the twenty-first book of his Human Antiquities, also says [*](xxi. fr. 1, Mirsch.) that the word for fine (multa) is itself not Latin, but Sabine, and he remarks that it endured even to within his own memory in the speech of the Samnites, who are sprung from the Sabines. But the upstart herd of grammarians have asserted that this word, like some others, is used on the principle of opposites. [*](That is, the lucus a non lucendo idea.) Furthermore, since it is a usage and custom in language for us to say even now, as the greater number of the early men did, multam dixit and multa dicta est, I have thought it not out of place to note that Marcus Cato spoke otherwise. [*](Fr. 82, Peter2.) For in the fourth book of his Origins are these words:

Our commander, if anyone has gone to battle out of order, imposes (facit) a fine upon him.

But it may seem that Cato changed the word with an eye to propriety, since the fine was imposed in camp and in the army, not pronounced in the comitium or in the presence of the people.