21. Jupiter is troubled
enough, being overwhelmed with fear, and cannot find means to soothe
the rage of his violated mother. He pours forth prayers,
and makes supplication; her ears are closed by grief. The whole
order of the gods is sent to seek his pardon; no one has weight
enough to win a hearing. At last, the son seeking how to make
satisfaction, devises this means: Arietem nobilem bene
grandibus cum testiculis deligit, exsecat hos ipse et lanato exuit ex
folliculi tegmine. Approaching his mother sadly and with
downcast looks, and as if by his own decision he had condemned himself,
he casts and throws these4398
into her
bosom. When she saw
what his pledge was,
4399
| 4399
Virilitate pignoris visa. |
she is somewhat softened, and allows
herself to be recalled to the care of the
offspring which she had
conceived.
4400
| 4400 So
Ursinus suggested, followed by Stewechius and later edd., concepti
fœtus revocatur ad curam; the ms. reads concepit—“is softened
and conceived,” etc. |
After the
tenth month she bears a
daughter, of
beautiful form, whom later ages
have called now Libera, now Proserpine; whom when
Jupiter
Verveceus
4401
| 4401
Jupiter may be here called Verveceus, either as an epithet
of Jupiter Ammon—“like a wether,” or (and this seems
most probable from the context), “dealing with wethers,”
referring to the mode in which he had extricated himself from his
former difficulty, or “stupid.” The ms. reads virviriceus. |
saw to be
strong, plump, and blooming, forgetting what evils and what
wickedness,
and how great recklessness, he had a little before fallen
into,
4402
| 4402
Lit., “encountered”—aggressus. |
he returns to
his former practices; and because it seemed too
4403
| 4403
Lit., “sufficiently.” |
wicked that a
father openly be joined
as in
marriage with his
daughter, he passes into the
terrible form of a
dragon: he
winds his huge coils round the
terrified maiden, and
under a
fierce appearance sports and caresses
her in softest
embraces. She, too, is in consequence filled with the
seed of the
most
powerful Jupiter, but not as her mother
was, for
she
4404
bore a
daughter
like herself; but from the
maiden was
born something like a bull, to
testify to her seduction by
Jupiter. If any one asks
4405
| 4405 Lit.,
“will any one want.” |
who narrates
this, then we shall quote the well-known senarian verse of a Tarentine
poet which
antiquity sings,
4406
| 4406
i.e., handed down by antiquity. [Vol. ii. p. 176, this
series.] |
saying: “The bull begot a
dragon, and the
dragon a bull.” Lastly, the
sacred rites
themselves, and the ceremony of initiation even, named
Sebadia,
4407
| 4407
These seem to have been celebrated in honour of Dionysius as well
as Zeus, though, in so far as they are described by Arnobius, they
refer to the intrigue of the latter only. Macrobius, however
(Saturn., i. 18), mentions that in Thrace, Liber and Sol were
identified and worshipped as Sebadius: and this suggests that we
have to take but one more step to explain the use of the title to
Jupiter also. |
might attest
the truth; for in them a golden snake is let down into the bosom of the
initiated, and taken away again from the lower
parts.
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
