INDEX OF GREEK AUTHORS QUOTED (continued 3)
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Fowler, W. Warde (William Warde)
Source notes
1331. Paulus, 85 ‘Quaecumque purgamenti causa in quibusque sacrificiis adhibentur, februa appellantur. Id vero quod purgatur, dicitur februatum.’ The verb februare also occurs. Varro (L. L. 6. 13) says that februum was the Sabine equivalent for purgamentum: ‘Nam et Lupercalia februatio, ut in Antiquitatum libris demonstravi’ (cp. 6. 34). Ovid renders the word by ‘piamen’ (Fasti, 2. 19). Februus, a divinity, is mentioned in Macr. 1. 13. 3; he is almost certainly a later invention (see Lex. Myth. s. v.). The etymology of the word is uncertain.
1332. Varro, R. R. 1. 29. Cp. Colum. xi. 2; and the rustic calendars.
1333. Varro, R. R. 1. 28. See above, p. 295.
1334. This is very distinctly stated by Cicero (de Legibus, 1. 14. 40 ‘In deos impietatum nulla expiatio est’: cp. 2. 9. 22 ‘Sacrum commissum quod neque expiari poterit, impie commissum est’). Even the sailor in Horace’s ode (1. 28), whose duty does not seem exactly binding, is told, if he omits it, ‘teque piacula nulla resolvent.’ On the general question, cp. De Marchi, La Religione nella vita domestica, 246; and Marq. 257. The pontifex Scaevola ‘asseverabat prudentem expiari non posse’ (Macrob. 1. 16. 10). Ovid’s account (Fasti, 2. 35 foll.) is that of a layman and a modern, but not less interesting for that reason.
1335. Varro, L. L. 6. 30 ‘Praetor qui tum (i.e. die nefasto) fatus est, si imprudens fecit, piaculari hostia facta piatur; si prudens dixit, Q. Mucius ambigebat eum expiari ut impium non posse.’
1336. Fasti, 2. 33.
1337. Ib. 31.