Selections from Erasmus: Principally from his Epistles Part 14

22. HORAM ... DECIMAM] Erasmus is here using the modern, and not the Roman reckoning; for which cf. IX. 217 n.

23. AD ILLORUM CLEPSYDRAS] _sc_. usque ad multam noctem: not being allowed to rise from table, to go to bed.

30. SODALITATIS] The Literary Society over which Wimpfeling presided. Cf.

XVII introduction.

35. ANGLUS EQUUS] A horse given him by an English friend.

39. Maternus Hatten was precentor of the cathedral at Spires.

45. CAESARIS] The Emperor Maximilian.

53. PROFESSUS EST] taught, was professor.

71. PRAEFECTUS] Cf. XVI. 251 n.

73. OFFICIALIS] legal adviser, chancellor.

83. DIE DOMINICO] Sunday: Ital. Domani, Fr. Dimanche.

91. COMITEM NOVAE AQUILAE] Hermann, Count of Neuenahr (Germ. Aar, a poetical name for an eagle).

99. HOMERUS] _Il_. 3. 214.

107. TOTIES OFFERT] Cf. XVI. 135-6.

123. HESIODUS] I have not been able to find this phrase in Hesiod.

Erasmus is perhaps unconsciously contaminating _Sc_. 149 with Hom. _Od_.

17. 322-3.

130. QUANTUS, &c.] Hor. _Epod_. 10. 7, 8.

148. PERIODUS] 'a round'; apparently the canons dined with one another in turn.

193. VEL MANU CONTACTA] 'with a mere touch of my hand.'

211. CUBICULUM] Erasmus had a room in the College du Lis at Louvain.

226. HEBRAEUM] A Jewish physician.

268. LAURINUS] Cf. XVI. 215 n.

291. POETAE] Cf. Hor. _C_. 3. 24. 31-2.

XX

[A letter to Erasmus' old friend and patron.]

10. WINTONIENSEM] Richard Foxe (c. 1448-1528), a powerful statesman and ecclesiastic. He founded Corpus Christi College at Oxford in 1516 to be the home of the Renaissance.

13. EBORACENSIS] In 1518 Wolsey, who was now Archbishop of York and Cardinal, founded six public Lectures.h.i.+ps in Oxford, Theology, Humanity, Rhetoric and Canon Law being among the subjects on which lectures were provided.

14. SCHOLA] the University.

18. ROFFENSI] Cf. XVIII. 3 n.

28. TUAE CELSITUDINI] as we should say, 'your Lords.h.i.+p.'

32. CONFLICTANDUM] in repelling attacks made on his edition of the New Testament.

34. HOMERICA] Cf. _Il_. 1. 194 seq.

XXI

[An account of an explosion of gunpowder which took place in Basel in Sept. 1526. The correspondent to whom the letter is addressed was Princ.i.p.al of Busleiden's Collegium trilingue at Louvain.]

1. AFRICA] An allusion to the proverb, 'Semper Africa novi aliquid apportat.' Erasmus' Africa here is the city of Basel, where religious innovations were already beginning.

21. GIGANTUM MOLES] When they tried to scale the heights of heaven by piling Mt. Pelion on Mt. Ossa.

22. Salmoneus was a presumptuous Thessalian who invented thunder and lightning of his own, and was killed by Jupiter as a punishment.

Ixion was the king of the Lapithae who was bound upon an ever-revolving wheel as punishment for having affronted Juno.

26. FLORENTIAE] When the bellicose Pope Julius II was attacking Bologna in the autumn of 1506, Erasmus took refuge at Florence.

28. TONABAT] Impersonal.

58. PULVERIS BOMBARDICI] 'gunpowder.'

62, 3. RIMAS ... SPECULATORIAS] 'loopholes.'

65. ESSET ONERI FERENDO] Dative of Purpose; cf. solvendo esse, to be solvent.

80. LATERIS] _sc_. turris.

107. MEDIUM UNGUEM] The middle finger was regarded as 'the finger of scorn'.

111. CORYBANTES] The priests of Cybele, the mother of the G.o.ds, whose wors.h.i.+p was conducted with a great noise of musical instruments.

114. NOSTRA TYMPANA] This playful protest indicates that there was a growing fas.h.i.+on of celebrating festive occasions with a din of drums and trumpets. It doubtless embodies also the dislike of the scholar for anything that disturbed his quiet.

ANAPAESTIS] The rataplan and rat-tat of the drum are compared to the metric feet, the anapaest ([Symbols: arsis, arsis, thesis] and the pyrrhic ([Symbols: arsis, arsis]).