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 Lectureships 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 Lordship.'

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 worship was conducted with a great noise of musical instruments.

114. NOSTRA TYMPANA] This playful protest indicates that there was a growing fashion 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]).