83. From the aures ‘ears’ seem to have been said the words audio ‘I hear’ and ausculto ‘I listen, heed’; aures ‘ears’ from aveo ‘I am eager,’ because with these we are ever eager to learn, which Ennius seems to wish to show as the radical in his Alexander, when he says:
A long time eager have been my spirit and my ears, Awaiting eagerly some message from the games.
It is on account of this eagerness of the ears that the theatres are filled. From audire ‘to hear’ is derived also auscultare ‘to listen, heed,’ because they are said auscultare who obey what they have heard; from which comes the poet’s saying:
I hear, but do not heed.
With the change of a letter are formed odor or olor ‘smell’; from this, olet’it emits an odour,’ and odorari ‘to detect by the odour,’ and odoratus ‘perfumed,’ and an odora ‘fragrant’ thing, and similarly other words.
84. With the mouth edo ‘I eat,’ sorbeo ‘I suck in,’ bibo ‘I drink,’ poto ‘I drink.’ Edo from Greek ἔδω ‘I eat’; from this, esculentum ‘edible’ and esca ‘food’ and edulia ‘eatables’; and because in Greek it is γεύεται ‘he tastes,’ in Latin it is gustat. Sorbere ‘to suck in,’ and likewise bibere ‘to drink,’ from the sound of the word, as for water fervere ‘to boil’ is from the sound like the action. From the same language, because there it is πότον ‘drink,’ is potio ‘drink,’ whence poculum ‘cup,’ potatio ‘drinking-bout,’ repotia ‘next day’s drinking.’ From the same comes puteus ‘well,’ because the old Greek word was like this, and not φρέαρ as it is now.
85. From manus ‘hand’ comes manupretium ‘workman’s wages’; mancipium ‘possession of property,’ because it capitur ’is taken’ manu ‘in hand’; manipulus ‘maniple,’ because it unites several manus ‘hands’; manipularis ‘soldier of a maniple,’ manica ‘sleeve.’ Manubrium ‘handle,’ because it is grasped by the manus ‘hand.’ Mantelium ‘towel,’ on which the manus ‘hands’ terguntur ‘are wiped.’...
86. Now first I shall put down some extracts from the Censors’ Records:
When by night the censor has gone into the sacred precinct to take the auspices, and a message has come from the sky, he shall thus command the herald to call the men: “May this be good, fortunate, happy, and salutary to the Roman people — the Quirites — and to the government of the Roman people — the Quirites — and to me and my colleague, to our honesty and our office: All the citizen soldiers under arms and private citizens as spokesmen of all the tribes, call hither to me with an inlicium ‘invitation,’ in case any one for himself or for another wishes a reckoning to be given.”
87. The herald calls them first in the sacred precinct, afterwards he calls them likewise from the walls. When it is dawn, the censors, the clerks, and the magistrates are anointed with myrrh and ointments. When the praetors and the tribunes of the people and those who have been called to the invitation meeting have come, the censors cast lots with each other, as to which one of them shall conduct the ceremony of purification. When the sacred precinct has been determined, then after that he who is to perform the purification conducts the assembly.
88. In the Consular Commentaries I have found the following account:
He who is about to summon the citizen-army, shall say to his assistant, “Gaius Calpurnius, call all the citizens hither to me, with an inlicium ‘invitation.’” The assistant speaks thus: “All citizens, come ye hither to the judges, to an invitation meeting.” “Gaius Calpurnius,” says the consul, “call all the citizens hither to me, to a gathering.” The assistant speaks thus: “All citizens, come hither to the judges, to a gathering.” Then the consul makes declaration to the army: “I order you to go by the proper way to the centuriate assembly.”
89. Why the latter speaks to the accensus ‘assistant’ and the former to the herald — this is the reason: in some affairs the accensus ‘assistant’ acciebat ‘gave the call’ just like a herald, from which the accensus also got his name. That the accensus was accustomed ciere ‘to give the call,’ is shown by the Boeotia, a comedy which some say is a work of Plautus, and others say is a work of Aquilius, in this verse:
Soon as the aide had called that’ twas the hour of noon.
Cosconius records the same in his work on Civil Cases, that the praetor had the habit of ordering his accensus, at the time when he thought that it is the third hour, to call out that it is the third hour, and likewise midday and the ninth hour.
90. That someone was regularly sent around the walls, inlicere ‘to entice’ the people to that place from which he might call them to the gathering, not only before the consuls and the censors, but also before the quaestors, is shown by an old Commentary on the Indictment which the quaestor Manius Sergius son of Manius brought against Trogus, accusing him of a capital offence; in which there is the following:
91. You shall give your attention to the auspices, and take the auspices in the sacred precinct; then you shall send to the praetor or to the consul the favourable presage which has been sought. The praetor shall call the accused to appear in the assembly before you, and the herald shall call him from the walls: it is proper to give this command. A horn-blower you shall send to the doorway of the private individual and to the Citadel, where the signal is to sound. Your colleague you shall request that from the speaker’s stand he proclaim an assembly, and that the bankers shut up their shops. You shall seek that the senators express their opinion, and bid them be present; you shall seek that the magistrates express their opinion, the consuls, the praetors, the tribunes of the people, and your colleagues, and you shall bid them all be present in the temple; and when you send the request, you shall summon the gathering.
92. In the same Commentary on the Indictment, this is the summing up of the edict written at the end:
Likewise in what pertains to those who have received from the censors the contract for the trumpeter who gives the summons to the centuriate assembly, they shall see to it that on that day, on which the assembly shall take place, the trumpeter shall sound the trumpet on the Citadel and around the walls, and shall sound it before the house-entrance of this accursed Titus Quintius Trogus, and that he be present in the Campus Martius at daybreak.
93. That between the sending around the walls and the calling of the gathering some time elapses, is clear from those things the doing of which in the meantime is written down as the inlicium ‘invitation’; but the people is called to appear in the assembly because for any other reason this magistrate cannot call together the citizen-army of the City. The censor, the consul, the dictator, the interrex can, because the censor arranges in centuries the citizen-army for a period of five years, when he must ceremonially purify it and lead it to the city under its standards; the dictator and the consul do so every year, because the latter can order the citizen-army where it is to go, a thing which they are accustomed to order on account of the centuriate assembly.
94. Therefore there is no doubt that this is the inlicium, when they go around the walls that the people may inlici ‘be enticed’ before the eyes of the magistrate who has the authority to call the men into that place from which the voice of the one who is calling them to the gathering can be heard. Therefore there come from the same source also illici ‘to be enticed’ and inlicis ‘thou enticest,’ which are in the Chorus of Proserpina, and pellexit ‘lured,’ which is in the Hermiona, when Pacuvius says:
Desire for another’s kingdom lured him on.
So also the altar of Jupiter Elicius ‘the Elicited’ on the Aventine, from elicere ‘to lure forth.’
95. This is now done otherwise than it was of old, because the augur is present with the consul when the citizen-army is summoned, and says in advance the formulas which he is to say. The consul regularly gives order to the augur, not to the assistant nor to the herald, that he shall call the inlicium ‘invitation.’ I believe that this was begun on an occasion when the assistant was not present; it really made no difference to whom he gave the order, and it wa
s for form’s sake only that certain things were done, but they were not always said or done in just the same way. This very word inlicium I have found written in the Commentaries of Marcus Junius; that however inlex in Plautus’s Versa is a person who does not obey the lex ‘law,’ and in the same work illex is also that which illicit ‘entices,’ is the result of the fact that I has much in common with E and C with G.
96. But since in this connexion I have spoken at length on a few matters, I shall speak briefly on a number of topics, and especially on the Latin words whose origin they think to be in the Greek tongue: as scalpere ‘to engrave’ from σκαλεύειν ‘to scratch,’ sternere ‘to spread out’ from στρωννύειν, lingere ‘to lick up’ from λιχμᾶσθαι, i ‘go thou’ from ἴθι, ite ‘go ye’ from ἴτε, gignitur ‘he is born’ from γίγνεται, ferte ‘bear ye’ from φέρετε, providere ‘to act with foresight’ from προιδεῖν ‘to see ahead, foresee,’ errare ‘to stray’ from ἔρρειν ‘to go away’; strangu-lare ‘to strangle’ from the word σταραγγαλᾶν, tinguere ‘to dip, dye’ from τέγγειν. Besides, there is depsere ‘to knead’ from δεψῆσαι; from the word which they call μαλάσσειν, we say malaxare ‘to soften,’ as gargarissare ‘to gargle’ from ἀναγαργαρίζεσθαι, putere ‘to stink’ from πύθεσθαι ‘to decay,’ domare ‘to subdue’ from δαμάζειν, mulgere ‘to milk’ from ἀμέλγειν, pectere ‘to comb’ from πέκειν, stringere ‘to scrape’ from στλεγγίζειν: for this is from σταλεγγίς ‘scraper,’ as runcinare ‘to plane’ from runcina ‘plane,’ of which ῥυκάνη is the Greek source.
97. As to what concerns the sources of the words which belong to this book, sufficiently numerous examples of this kind have, I think, been set down; I shall stop, and since I have undertaken to send you three books on these topics, two about prose composition and one about poetical, and I have sent you the two about prose, the former about places and the things that are in them, the latter about time-ideas and those things which are associated with them, I shall at last, in the next book, begin to write of the sources of words used in poetry.
BOOK VII
1. The words of the poets are hard to expound. For often some meaning that was fixed in olden times has been buried by a sudden catastrophe, or in a word whose proper make-up of letters is hidden after some elements have been taken away from it, the intent of him who applied the word becomes in this fashion quite obscure. There should be no rebuking then of those who in examining a word add a letter or take one away, that what underlies this expression may be more easily perceived: just as, for instance, that the eyes may more easily see Myrmecides’ indistinct handiwork in ivory, men put black hairs behind the objects.
2. Even though you employ these tools to unearth the intent of him who applied the word, much remains hidden. But if the art of poesy, which has in the verses preserved many words that are early, had in the same fashion also set down why and how they came to be, the poems would bear fruit in more prolific measure; unfortunately, in poems as in prose, not all the words can be assigned to their primitive radicals, and there are many which cannot be so assigned by him whom learning does not attend with favour in his nocturnal studies, though he read prodigiously. In the interpretation of the Hymns of the Salians, which was made by Aelius, an outstanding scholar in Latin literature, you will see that the interpretation is greatly furthered by attention to a single poor letter, and that much is obscured if such a letter is passed by.
3. Nor is this astonishing: for not only were there many who failed to recognize Epimenides when he awoke from sleep after fifty years, but even Teucer’s own family, in the play of Livius Andronicus, do not know who he is after his absence of fifteen years. But what has this to do with the age of poetic words? If the reign of Numa Pompilius is the source of those in the Hymns of the Salians and those words were not received from earlier hymn-makers, they are none the less seven hundred years old. Therefore why should you find fault with the diligence of a writer who has not been able to find the name of the great-grandfather or the grandfather of a demigod’s great-grandfather, when you yourself cannot name the mother of your own great-grandfather’s great-grandfather? This interval is much closer to us, than the stretch from the present time to the beginning of the Salians, when, they say, the first poetic words of the Romans were composed, in Latin.
4. Therefore the man who has made many apt pronouncements on the origins of words, one should regard with favour, rather than find fault with him who has been unable to make any contribution; especially since the etymologic art says that it is not of all words that the basis can be stated — just as it cannot be stated how and why a medicine is effective for curing; and that if I have no knowledge of the roots of a tree, still I am not prevented from saying that a pear is from a branch, the branch is from a tree, and the tree from roots which I do not see. For this reason, he who shows that equitatus ‘cavalry’ is from equites ‘cavalrymen,’ equites from eques ‘cavalryman,’ eques from equus ‘horse,’ even though he does not give the source of the word equus, still gives several lessons and satisfies an appreciative person; whether or not we can do as much, the present book itself shall serve as testifying witness.
5. In this book I shall speak of the words which have been put down by the poets, first those about places, then those which are in places, third those about times, then those which are associated with time-ideas; but in such a way that to them I shall add those which are associated with these, and that if any word lies outside this fourfold division, I shall still include it in the account.
6. I shall begin from this:
One there shall be, whom thou shalt raise up to sky’s azure temples.
Templum ‘temple’ is used in three ways, of nature, of taking the auspices, from likeness: of nature, in the sky; of taking the auspices, on the earth; from likeness, under the earth. In the sky, templum is used as in the Hecuba:
great temples of the gods, united with the shining stars.
On the earth, as in the Periboea:
To Bacchus’ temples aloft On sharp jagged rocks it draws near.
Under the earth, as in the Andromacha:
Be greeted, great temples of Orcus, By Acheron’s waters, in Hades.
7. Whatever place the eyes had intuiti ‘gazed on,’ was originally called a templum ‘temple,’ from tueri ‘to gaze’; therefore the sky, where we attuimur ‘gaze at’ it, got the name templum, as in this:
Trembled the mighty temple of Jove who thunders in heaven, that is, as Naevius says, Where land’s semicircle lies, Fenced by the azure vault.
Of this temple the four quarters are named thus: the left quarter, to the east; the right quarter, to the west; the front quarter, to the south; the back quarter, to the north.
8. On the earth, templum is the name given to a place set aside and limited by certain formulaic words for the purpose of augury or the taking of the auspices. The words of the ceremony are not the same everywhere; on the Citadel, they are as follows:
Temples and wild lands be mine in this manner, up to where I have named them with my tongue in proper fashion.
Of whatever kind that truthful tree is, which I consider that I have mentioned, temple and wild land be mine to that point on the left.
Of whatever kind that truthful tree is, which I consider that I have mentioned, temple and wild land be mine to that point on the right.
Between these points, temples and wild lands be mine for direction, for viewing, and for interpreting, and just as I have felt assured that I have mentioned them in proper fashion.
9. In making this temple, it is evident that the trees are set as boundaries, and that within them the regions are set where the eyes are to view, that is we tueamur ‘are to gaze,’ from which was said templum and contemplare ‘to contemplate,’ as in Ennius, in the Medea:
Contemplate and view Ceres’ temple on the left.
Contempla ‘do
thou contemplate’ and conspicare ‘do thou view’ are the same, it is obvious, and therefore the augur, when he makes a temple, says conspicione ‘for viewing,’ with regard to where he is to delimit the conspectus ‘view’ of the eyes. As to their adding cortumio when they say conspicio, this term is derived from the vision of the cor ‘heart’; for cor is the basis of cortumio.
10. As to his adding that the temples shall be tesca ‘wild lands,’ those who have written glossariesa say that this means that the temples are inviolable. This is quite wrong: for the Hostilian Meeting-House is a temple and is not inviolable. But that people should have the idea that a temple is a consecrated building, seems to have come about from the fact that in the city Rome most consecrated buildings are temples, and they are likewise inviolable, and that certain places in the country, which are the property of some god, are called tesca.
11. For there is the following in Accius, in the Philoctetes of Lemnos:
What man are thou, who dost advance To places desert, places waste?
What sort of places these are, he indicates when he says:
Around you you have the Lemnian shores, Apart from the world, and the high-seated shrines Of Cabirian Gods, and the mysteries which Of old were expressed with sacrifice pure.
Then:
You see now the temples of Vulcan, close by Those very same hills, upon which he is said To have fallen when thrown from the sky’s lofty sill.
And:
The wood here you see with the smoke gushing forth, Whence the fire — so they say — was secretly brought To mankind.
Therefore he made no mistake in calling these lands tesca, and yet he did not do so because they were consecrated; but because men attuentur ‘gaze at’ places where mysteries take place, they were called tuesca.
12. Tueri has two meanings, one of ‘seeing’ as I have said, whence that verse of Ennius:
I really see thee, sire? Oh Jupiter! And:
Who will now wish, though father or kinsman, to look on your faces?
Delphi Complete Works of Varro Page 49
