beneath the earth in some necropolis, into which no Galassi or Campanari can dig his way. The standard Italian of the present day is the offspring of that Latinity which was spoken by the Etrusco-Romans; but we find no trace of ancient barbarism in any Tuscan writer. Surely it is a fair inference, that while the Rætian element, introduced into the northern cities by an aristocracy of conquest, was not permanently influential, but was absorbed, like the Norman French in this country, by the Pelasgo-Umbrian language of the bulk of the population, the latter, which may be termed "the common Etruscan," like the Sabello-Oscan and other dialects, merged in the old Latin, not because the languages were unlike, but because they were sister idioms, and embraced one another as soon as they had discovered their relationship1. The only way to escape from all the difficulties of this subject is to suppose that the city on the Tiber served as a centre and rallying point for the languages of Italy as well as for the different tribes who spoke them, and that Rome admitted within her walls, with an inferior franchise, which in time completed itself, both the citizens and the vocabularies of the conquered Italian states. If this absorbing centralization could so thoroughly Latinize the Celtic inhabitants of Lombardy, and even the transalpine branch of the Gallic race, much more would it be likely to affect the Etruscans, who extended to the Tiber, and whose language, in its predominant or Pelasgian character, approximated so closely to the cognate idiom of the old Latin tribes.

1 Among many instances of the possibility at least of such a transition, not the least interesting is the derivation of Populonia from Phupluns, the Etruscan Bacchus; so that this city, the Etruscan name of which was Popluna, is the Dionysopolis of Etruria (see Gerhard in the Rhein. Mus. for 1833, p. 135). Now it is clear that as Nethuns = Nethu-nus, is the god of nethu, so Phupluns = Poplu-nus is the god of poplu. It seems that the ancients planted the poplar chiefly on account of their vines, and the poplar was sacred to Hercules, who has so many points of contact with Bacchus. Have we not, then, in the word phupluns the root of populus, a word quite inexplicable from the Latin language alone? A sort of young, effeminate Hercules, who appears on the coins of Populonia (see Müller, Etrusk. I. p. 331), is probably this Poplunus. The difference in the quantity of the first syllables of Populus and Populonia is not surprising, as the latter is an exotic proper name, and the former a naturalized common term.

CHAPTER VI.

THE OLD ROMAN OR LATIN LANGUAGE.

§ 1. Fragments of old Latin not very numerous. § 2. Arvalian Litany. § 3. Chants

preserved by Cato. § 4. Fragments of Salian hymns. § 5. Old regal laws. § 6. Remains of the XII. Tables. § 7. Table I. §8. Table II. § 9. Table III. § 10. Table IV. § 11. Table V. § 12. Table VI. § 13. Table VII. § 14. Table VIII. § 15. Table IX. § 16. Table X. § 17. Table XI. § 18. Table XII. § 19. The Tiburtine Inscription. § 20. The epitaphs of the Scipios. § 21. The Columna Rostrata. § 22. The Silian and Papirian Laws and the edict of the Curule Ediles. § 23. The Senatus-Consultum de Bacchanalibus, 24. The old Roman law on the Bantine Table.

§ 1. Fragments of Old Latin not very numerous.

HAV

AVING in the preceding chapters given specimens of the languages spoken by those nations which contributed in different proportions to the formation of the Roman people, the next step will be to collect the most interesting remains of the old Roman language,-considered as the offspring of the Umbrian, Oscan, and Tuscan,-such as it was before the predominance of Greek cultivation had begun to work on this rude composite structure. The total loss of the genuine Roman literature1 will, of course, leave us but a scanty collection of such documents. Indeed, for the earlier centuries we have only a few brief fragments of religious and legal import. As we approach the Punic wars, the inscriptions become more numerous and complete; but then we are drawing near to a period when the Roman language began to lose its leading characteristics under the pressure of foreign influences, and when it differed little or nothing from that idiom which has become familiar to us from the so-called classical writings of the Augustan age.

Polybius, speaking of the ancient treaty between Rome and Carthage (III. 22), remarks that the old Latin language differed so much from that which was spoken in his own time, that the best-informed Romans could not make out some expressions without difficulty, even when they paid the greatest attention: τηλικαύτη γὰρ ἡ διαφορὰ γέγονε τῆς διαλέκτου, καὶ παρὰ Ρωμαίοις, τῆς νῦν πρὸς τὴν ἀρχαίαν, ὥστε τοὺς συνετωτάτους

yàp ʼn

1 See Macaulay, Lays of Ancient Rome, pp. 15, sqq.

ἔνια μόλις ἐξ ἐπιστάσεως διευκρινείν. The great mass of words must, however, have been susceptible of interpretation; for he does not shrink from translating into Greek the substance at least of that very ancient treaty.

Accordingly, we find that the most primitive specimens of Latinity may now-a-days be understood by the scholar, who, after all, possesses greater advantages than Polybius and his contemporary Romans. This will appear if we examine the song of the Fratres Arvales, which is one of the most important and ancient specimens of the genuine Roman language. The inscription, in which it is preserved, and which was discovered in the year 1777, is probably not older than A. D. 218; but there is every reason to believe that the cantilena itself was the same which was sung in the earliest ages of Rome,-for these litanies very often survive their own significance. The monks read the Latin of their missals without understanding it, and the Parsees of Gujerat cannot interpret their sacred Zend. It appears from the introductory remarks, that this song was confined to the priests, the Publici being excluded: "Deinde subselliis marmoreis consederunt; et panes laureatos per Publicos partiti sunt; ibi omnes lumemulia cum rapinis acceperunt, et Deas unguentaverunt, et Ædes clusa est, omnes foris exierunt: ibi Sacerdotes clusi succincti, libellis acceptis, carmen descindentes tripodaverunt in verba hæc:

1. Enos Lases juvate (ter),

2. Neve luaerve Marmar sins incurrere in pleoris

(ter)

3. Satur furere (vel fufere) Mars limen salista berber (ter)

4. Semunis alternei (vel alternis?) advocapit conctos (ter)

5. Enos Marmor (vel Mamor) jurato (ter)

6. Triumpe, triumpe, triumpe, triumpe, triumpe. Post tripodationem, deinde signo dato Publici introiere, et libellos receperunt." (See Orelli, Inscript. Lat. I. p. 391, no. 2271.)

There can be little doubt as to the meaning of any single word in this old hymn, which seems to be written in very rude Saturnian verse, the first half of the verse being alone preserved in some cases; as in Enós Lasés juváte—Enós Mamór juváto. The last line is a series of trochees cum anacrusi, or a still shorter form of the first half of the Saturnian verse.

1. Enos is a form of the first person plural, analogous to the German uns. Lases is the old form of Lares (Quinctil. Institut. Orat. I. 4. § 13; see Müller ad Fest. p. 15).

2. Luærve for luerve-m, according to a custom of dropping the final м, which lasted till Cato's time (see next §). This form bears the same relation to luem that Minerva does to mens. Caterva from catus acutus (above, p. 106), and its synonym acervus from acus, are derivatives of the same kind1. We may also compare bovem, suem, &c. with their older forms, boverem, suerem, &c. Marmar, Marmor, or Mamor, is the Oscan and Tuscan Mamers, i. e. Mars (above p. 146). That Mars, or Mars pater, was addressed as the averter of diseases, bad weather, &c. is clear from Cato, R. R. 141. Sins is sinas: so Tab. Bantin. 1. 19: Bantins for Bantinus, &c. Ple-ores is the genuine comparative of ple-nus, which bears the same relation to λeios that unus does to olos. The fullest form would be ple-iores =λe-loves.

3. "O Mars, having raged to your satisfaction (comp. Hor. I. Carm. II. 37: "longo satiate ludo"), grant that the Sun's light may be warm." Limen for lumen may be com

1 Mr. F. W. Newman (Regal Rome, p. 61) derives caterva from the Welch cad-torva, "battle-troop." I do not know whether this etymology was suggested by the well-known statements in Vegetius, II. 2: "Galli Celtiberique pluresque barbaricæ nationes catervis utebantur in præliis." Isidor. Orig. IX. 33: "proprie Macedonum phalanx, Gallorum caterva, nostra legio dicitur." Döderlein, who proposes (Lat. Syn. u. Et. V. 361) to connect caterva with quattuor, properly remarks that these passages do not show that caterva was considered a Gallic word, but only that, as distinguished from the phalanx and legio, it denoted a less completely disciplined body of men. The natural idea of a "heap" of separable objects is that of a mass piled up to a point, and this is indicated by the roots of ac-er-vus and cat-er-va. The latter therefore, as denoting a body of men, suggests the same arrangement as the cuneus, which is mentioned along with it by Tacitus, Hist. II. 42: "comminus eminus catervis et cuneis concurrebant." On the form of cat-er-va, see below, Ch. XIII. § 5.

pared with plisima for plurima (Fest. p. 205), scripulum for scrupulum, &c. (see below, § 5). Salis is the original form of solis: comp. réλas, λios, Au-selius, &c. The Oscan and Etruscan usage of the auxiliary ta or tu "to cause" (above pp. 125, 129, 184), shows that Döderlein is right in reading ta=da instead of sta (Lat. Syn. u. Et. VI. 330). He quotes Hor. I. Ep. 16, 60: “da mihi fallere, da justo sanctumque videri," though he perceives that ta is connected with rionu rather than with Siswu. Berber is another form of fervere.

4. Semuneis is semones, i. e. semihemones. Advocapit is a contraction for ad vos capite the e being omitted, as in duc, fac, fer, &c.—and it is probable that the phrase is equivalent to adhibete in auxilium, "call to your aid."

§ 3. Chants preserved by Cato.

The other extant religious compositions, though few and scanty, contribute to the same conclusion-that the oldest Latin was not so unlike the language with which we are familiar as to defy interpretation. Two relics of the same kind as the last have been preserved by Cato (R. R. 160), who writes thus: "Luxum si quod est, hac cantione sanum fiet. Harundinem prende tibi viridem P. IV. aut v. longam. Mediam diffinde, et duo homines teneant ad coxendices. Incipe cantare in alio: S[anum] F[iet]. In mota et soluta (vulg. mota væta): daries dardaries astataries, dic sempiterno (vulg. dissunapiter or dic una pariter), usquedum coeant. . . . Ad luxum aut ad fracturam alliga, sanum fiet, et tamen quotidie cantato in alio: S. F. vel luxato vel hoc modo: havat, havat, havat: ista pista sista: domabo damnaustra et luxato." i. e. haveat, haveat, haveat: istam pestem sistam: domabo damna vestra et luxatum (see Grotefend, Rud. L. Umbr. IV. 13). With regard to the second excantatio, which is simple enough, it is only necessary to observe, that the final m is omitted both in the accusatives luxato, pista, &c. and in the future sista; and we are especially told that it was the custom with Cato the Censor to drop the m at the termination of the futures of verbs in -o and -io: thus he wrote dice, facie, for dicam, faciam (see Quinctil. Inst. Or. I. 7, § 23, and cf. IX. 4, § 39; Fest. p. 72. Müll.), recipie for recipiam (Fest. p. 286), attinge for attingam (id. p. 26), ostende for ostendam (id. p. 201), which are all quoted as common ex