One other passage I will seek to illustrate from writers of the same or the next generation: Georg. IV 372 Eridanus, quo non alius per pinguia culta In mare purpureum violentior effluit amnis'. In another place he calls it 'fluviorum rex', by which he would seem to denote its size. As it is far the greatest river in Italy, patriotism would induce the people, while their geographical notions were limited, to think it therefore one of the largest and swiftest rivers in the world: indeed Strabo in his dry prose says it is the greatest river in Europe next to the Danube. As to its rapidity, I see from Conington that opinions are much divided: it has, I can testify from crossing it more than once in boats, a very powerful current; but last September on going over it near Ferrara by the railway-bridge, a young friend and I, looking by the way over different sides of the bridge, came to somewhat different conclusions; he pooh-poohing its rapidity and being certainly a far acuter observer than I am. But let us hear Livy: XXI 43 4 he puts into Hannibal's mouth the words, 'circa Padus amnis, maior ac violentior Rhodano': these words are supposed to be spoken only a few weeks after Hannibal had crossed the Rhone where it was six times as great as the Po at any point which he could possibly have seen, and certainly one of the very swiftest of large rivers. After this we need not feel surprised at Virgil's hyperbole, who like his 'conterraneus' Livy would feel a local pride in the great Cisalpine stream just think how Pope and other patriots speak of our respectable but not gigantic Thames. At the same time editors seem not to attend enough to the way in which Virgil limits his statement: 'In mare-effluit': in this perhaps is contained the gist of his expression; which then might be illustrated by the oldest extant Italian geographer Pomponius Mela who says (II 63) 'inde tam citus prosilit [Padus], ut discussis fluctibus diu qualem emisit undam agat, suumque etiam in mari alveum servet'. I have never seen its mouths, and am unable to say if this description applies at the present day. H. A. J. MUNRO. ΟΝ ἀναιρεῖν ΑND ἐναίρειν, ΤΟ SLAY. THE meaning of both these words in the above sense is familiar to most; the origin of that meaning however is rather obscure, and the investigation of it leads to some curious results. That αἱρέω and αἴρω are forms of the same word cannot be doubted. To remove by lifting' is the primary idea of both. The root contained the lost F (compare ἀείρω), which accounts for the aspirate in αἱρέω, and the double form has the analogy of κύω, κύσω, κυέω, κυήσω, αἴνω and αἰνέω, κύρω and κυρέω, μαρτύρομαι and μαρτυρέω, and many other words. The former compound is more readily explained than the other. It was a euphemism, and signified generally, 'to make away with.' It was a very old notion that when a person was lost, or had disappeared from sight, he had been caught up into heaven, or carried away by a tornado. Hence such notions arose as that of the Sphinx and the Harpies, and the idea is very clearly seen in such passages as Od. 1. 241, νῦν δέ μιν ἀκλειῶς ἅρπυιαι ἀνηρείψαντο, with which compare xx. 77, and ib. 66, ὡς δ ̓ ὅτε Πανδαρέου κούρας ἀνέλοντο θύελλαι. So also Il. VI. 345, ὥς μ ̓ ὄφελ ̓ ἤματι τῷ, ὅτε με πρῶτον τέκε μήτηρ, Hence too arose the beautiful legend of Boreas carrying off Orithyia, Plat. Phædr. p. 229 c, φαίην ἂν αὐτὴν πνεῦμα Βορέου κατὰ τῶν πλησίον πετρῶν σὺν Φαρμακείᾳ παίζουσαν ὦσαι· καὶ οὕτω δὴ τελευτήσασαν λεχθῆναι ὑπὸ τοῦ Βορέου ἀνάρπαστον γεγονέναι. From this notion of sudden and mysterious removal a man was said ανηρπάσθαι οι ανάρπαστος γεγονέναι oι ἀνη ρῇσθαι, as in Dem. Mid. p. 555, ἐγὼ μὲν γὰρ ἴσως διεωσάμην, καὶ ἄλλος τις ἂν, ψευδῆ λόγον καὶ συκοφαντίαν, καὶ οὐκ ἀνήρπασμαι, and ibid. p. 548 fin., ὡς δέον, εἴ τις ὑβρισθεὶς ὑπὸ τούτου δίκης ἀξιοῖ τυχεῖν καὶ μὴ σιωπᾷ, τοῦτον ἐξόριστον ἀνηρῆσθαι καὶ μηδαμῆ παρεθῆναι, i.e. ' to be caught up and carried beyond the confines and there put to death, and not to be allowed to return (lit. to be allowed to pass in) even for burial.' This last passage is interesting as illustrating the transitional meaning between the old Epic and the common Attic. Hesychius, ἀναιρετὴς, φονευτής. ἀναιρώ, φονεύω. ἀνεῖλεν, ἐφόνευσεν. ἀνέλω· φονεύσω. It is unnecessary to give examples from the classic writers, the use being a common one. Our term 'to make away with' is therefore an exact equivalent to ἀναιρεῖν. Both phrases are intended to avoid the shock to the feelings which would be caused by more plainly suggesting a violent end. So the Greeks use åpavтos and ἀφανισθῆναι οι one lost at sea. Still more common and (as I should have expected before knowing the fact, but after investigating the word) more epic is ἐναίρειν. Thus, Il. xxiv. 243, ῥηίτεροι γὰρ μᾶλλον ̓Αχαιοῖσιν δὴ ἔσεσθε Ibid. XXI. 485, ἤτοι βέλτερόν ἐστι κατ ̓ οὔρεα θῆρας ἐναίρειν. In the middle voice, Il. XVI. 92, Τρώας ἐναιρόμενος. Hesych. ἐναίρει· ἀναιρεῖ, φθείρει.—ἔναιρε· ἄνελε, φόνευε, σκύλευε.—ἐναίρειν· τὰ αὐτά. Now a remarkable fact here presents itself; the active aorist of ἐναίρειν is not ἐνῆρα but ἤναρον, and yet the medial aorist is ἐνήρατο, regularly infected as from αἴρομαι. Hom. Il. v. 43, Ιδομενεὺς δ ̓ ἄρα Φαῖστον ἐνήρατο, Μῄονος υἱόν. The common epic word for 'spoils' is evapa, often associated with the epithet βροτόεντα, 'gory. It becomes a question then whether ἔναρα is from ἐναίρειν, or conversely, as others think, ἐναίρειν from ἔναρα. See Buttmann, Lexil. p. 119, in v. ἀνήνο Oev, who is evidently much perplexed by évaípewv regarded as a compound, and hazards the very improbable suggestion' that it comes from evepoɩ, and means 'to send to the infernal regions.') It seems more correct to say that evapa is from the same root as ἐναίρω, and that the secondary verb ἐναρίζειν is formed directly from evapa. Properly, evapíčew is 'to play the evapès,' or spoiler. That the 'Evapées of Herod. 1. 105 is really a Greek name, meaning 'spoilers,' and not a Scythian word (though, of course, the root may be the same in both languages), is clear from the context itself. But what must we say of the ev, which Buttmann thinks "perfectly inexplicable" (Lexil. ibid.)? I cannot doubt that 'to lift on a spear's point' -as a gory head, a slaughtered infant, or a mangled limb-was the original sense. This is at once perfectly consistent with the savage customs of primitive man, and gives a direct and easy transition to the sense of 'spoils,' since a skull, a scalp, or a skin of an enemy would always be regarded in this light. It was therefore a war-word in times the most remote and uncivilized. Such an explanation would suggest a new and very emphatic sense to such verses as II. XIII. 483, ὃς μάλα καρτερός ἐστι μάχῃ ἔνι φῶτας ἐναίρειν. The lifting a corpse on a spear would be an act of great strength, but by no means an impossible feat. πισχεν As for the aorist ἤναρον it seems formed (like ήμφίει, ἤμTOXED in later Greek) by prefixing the augment to the preposition, regarded as an integral part of the word. The metrical convenience of such a form, which embodies the short ap of the root, would sufficiently account for its taking the place of 1 He remarks however that καθαίpew, to purify,' is from kalaρòs, not compounded of κατά. 2 The root seems to have been aFp =dƑep, aƑop. Compare dop, 'a sword,' παρήορος, ἠέρθη, ἄωρτο, ἀορτὴρ, with ἀείρω. The shortened root άρ in ένα peîv would result from the total eva nescence of the F, a fact not without analogies even in the more archaic language. The aorist of aipéw, ¿λeîv, may be explained by the being convertible into A, as λeípiov is lilium, &c. In the Homeric yevro the λ is again changed into v (as ἦνθε for ῆλθε), and the initial F into y. the more regular active evnpa, while évýparo is more convenient than vápeTo. Or it may result from a mere interchange of the long and short syllables. As an appendix to these remarks I may briefly add that avaιpeîv, in the well-known sense of 'giving an oracular answer,' as aveînevý Пveía, Herod. I. 13, seems to refer to the raising up from the regions below the responses which the spirits in Hades were thought capable of giving. F. A. PALEY. ON THE WORD ádáμas, ‘ADAMANT.' NEITHER the ancient nor the modern lexicographers appear to have had any clear idea of the meaning of this word. Indeed, the vagueness of the expression is seen by its use even in early poets. Like our term adamant, which is a merely poetical and non-existent thing, it was supposed to be some very hard material; steel, or iron, or some sort of stone, or even the diamond, were taken as possible representatives of it. Thus, in the Prometheus', we find mention of "adamantine chains;" Pindar' gives to Jason an "adamantine plough;" but this was a secondary and merely poetic sense, like the "adamantini clavi” of Horace. Hesychius has ἀδάμας· γένος σιδήρου. In another gloss, ἀγνώμων, ἀπειθὴς, ἀθαμβὴς, ἰσχυρός. Kaì ô Xílos. Liddell and Scott's Lexicon gives as the meaning "the hardest metal, probably steel." But none of these give the true and original meaning, about which there can be no doubt. 'Adáμas meant basalt. Hence, as that material was plutonic, or associated with volcanic regions, it was very appropriately taken by the poets as denoting the hard substance of which the walls of hell were built; thus Propertius, v. 11. 3: "Cum semel infernas intrarunt funera leges, 1 ver. 6. Non exorato stant adamante viæ." 2 Pyth. IV. 224. 3 Carm. III. 24, 5 (from Pind. Pyth. IV. 125). |