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VOL. XII

THE ANCIENTS AND THE WAR: ADDENDA

That the interests of classicists are not all ancient is shown by the numerous modern analogies to things Greek and Roman noted by contributors to these columns during the Great War1. The present paper is a supplement to an article called The Ancients and the War, which the writer published in THE CLASSICAL WEEKLY 11.142-144.

For the student of linguistics contemporary military slang affords a fascinating study. Each of the warring nations has a distinctive brand of humor. An Italian nickname for the Austrian soldier is gobbo, 'hunchback'. Tête de boche, an expression applied to a dull-witted person, is said to mean, literally, 'wooden head'". As early as 1889 boche signified also a German. "The French of the lower classes frequently refer to a German as a tête carrée ('square head')".

The tendency to represent despised (or but little known) races and peoples as deformed or as abnormally constituted was far more prevalent when means of travel and communication were not so readily available as now. Examples of the free play of Greek imagination may be found in great numbers: e.g. Ημίκυνες, Κυνοκέφαλοι, Μονόμματοι, Μακροκέφαλοι, Πυγμαῖοι, Στεγανόποδες, Στερνόφθαλμοι, Cynamolgi (caninis capitibus), Hippopodes (equinis pedibus), Trispathami (ternas spithamas longitudine)8.

When the Tyrrheni were attacking Agylla, one of them approached the walls and asked the name of the town. Instead of getting an answer, he was greeted with the salutation Χαῖρε. On capturing the town, the invaders called it Caere (Strabo 5, page 220). This story has an analogue in a no less apocryphal account of the origin of the name Sammy, which appeared in a Canadian newspaper:

The welcoming French shouted enthusiastically, 'Vive les amis', pronounced 'Veev lay zammie', and the soldiers thought that, instead of cheering their arriving friends, the crowds were giving them a nickname referring to Uncle Sam.

Soldiers in a foreign country naturally have difficulty with proper names and just as naturally associate them in whole or in part with words in their own language.

No. 17

One cannot avoid the conviction that soldiers are responsible for many popular etymologies in Latinized place names, since soldiering seems to have been the chief motive for going abroad (cf. militiae = 'abroad'). Populonia, evidently in the Etruscan derived from the Etruscan Bacchus Phuphluns, is formed as if from populus; Velathri> Volaterra (cf. volare and terra)9a; Tarvisium> Trivicium (cf. tres and vici); Cabillonum> Caballodunum (cf. caballus). There was a deity in the Alps worshipped as Poeninus10 (Livy 21.38.9), but, after the passage of Hannibal, the name was associated with the Poeni193.

Greek names suffered the same fate on the lips of Romans. 'Ορμίαι ('Anchorage'), named διὰ τὸ εὔορμον (Strabo, page 233), becomes Formiael". In late Latin Saguntum becomes Sanguintum under the influence of sanguis. Τραχινή ('Rough Land') changes to Terracina, a form based on terra. Φόρκες ('Deep Valley') masquerades in Latin as Furculae (i. e. in Furculae Caudinae).

Tommy Atkins in Europe did exactly the same thing. A few examples of Atkinisms may be given: Hazebrouck> Hazy-Brook; Bailleul> Ballyall; Ploegstraete> Plug-Street; Rue de Bois> Rude Boys; Étaples > Eatables. The crowning illustration, Wipers for Ypres, must not be omitted. German distortions are common: Quesnoy> Genua; Neufchâtel Neuschrapnell; Pérenchiès> Baerenschiss.

Private Peat tells us (107) that the Canadians used to inquire after the health of the Clown Prince, Von Woodenburg, One O'Clock (= Von Kluck), and One Bumstoff (= Von Bernstorff). Among ancient parodies on names are the celebrated Biberius Caldius Mero (Suetonius, Tib. 42) and Mobilior for Nobilior112.

When the British wanted to land troops at Gallipoli, they filled the S. S. River Clyde with men and ran her ashore in the face of attacks. The soldiers called the steamship The Wooden Horse, in allusion to the somewhat similar expedient of the ancient Greeks on the other side of the Dardanelles.

Cheval de bois seems to be a French allusion to the famous wooden horse leaping over the walls of Troy. It is a term used in French aviation fields when a student allows his machine to jump out of the confines of the training grounds13.

The first flying machine, which was invented by Archytas of Tarentum, was a περιστερά (columba) 14. It is a striking coincidence that one type of German aircraft is named Taube. Albatross is another 'bird' name. The French have a cigogne ('stork') and canard ('duck'). The aviation student is started on a penguin, so named "because of its humorous resemblance to the quaint arctic birds and its inability in common with them to do any flying".

Military writers have commented on the similarity of the moving sheds of the ancients and the tanks of to-day. It is interesting, however, to compare, or rather to contrast, the animal names of the various 'species'. The larger types of the Romans were called testudines ('tortoises'), owing to the manner of their construction and shape. The more nimble ones were named musculi ('mice'). In post-classical times such contrivances were known as catti and cancres. The modern devices move on a 'caterpillar' belt. The first ones were 'male' and 'female'. The smaller, lighter, and more mobile models of the French enjoy the sobriquet mosquitoes; those of the British are styled whippets, after a breed of dogs used in northern England for coursing and racing.

Serpents were represented in antiquity by the asp (i. e. 'shield')15. In the present war the fast aeroplanes which guard reconnaisance machines overhead, underneath and on the sides have been called vipers (at times maggots).

In his previous paper the writer called attention to the prevalence of animal names in Roman military parlance and listed twenty-three instances. The contemporary soldier displays the same tendencies. In newspapers we have been reading about naval camels (guns), caterpillar tractors, elephant dugouts, elephant rifles, maggots, mosquitoes, penguins, flying pigs, rabbit holes, vipers, and whippets. Even the torpedo is indebted to a fish for its name. The shape of the machine gun is said to account for the Italian nicknames for it, capra ('goat') and cavaletta ('locust'). The French have a squatty little trench mortar which they call crapouillot ('small toad'). Illustrations may be culled from the German war glossary:

A French 75-mm. shell is a 'Kettenhund' (watchdog) or a 'Windhund' (greyhound). A French 75-H. E. shell has only one name: it is 'Stinkwiesel' (skunk), while a low-velocity French shell is a 'Blindschleiche' (slowworm). The common heavy shells of all the Allies are variously named, but mostly they are known as 'Schwarze Biester' (black beasts) or 'Schwarze Säue' (black sows) 16.

The animal kingdom is, then, well represented in the slang dictionary. Flowers are not so fortunate. One may, however, note the Roman lilia (=teretes stipites, Caesar, B. G. 7.73) and the Gewittertulpe (steel helmet) of the Germans. As for the produce of trees, the glandes ('acorns': glans is, of course, not a slang word) remind us of the French nickname for bullets, marrons ('chestnuts') and pruneaux ('plums').

Cuneus, forfices and serra (Gellius 10.9) are expressions taken from the domain of mechanics. During the present war, wedges, pincer drives and hammer blows1 have been engrossing our attention.

Missouri mules are sometimes honored as American ponies, with a covert allusion to Shetland ponies. Cooties are often called pants rabbits and seam squirrels. Such contemporary slang makes one appreciate more the humor of the Roman soldiers in calling the elephants of Pyrrhus boves Lucae (Pliny, N. H. 8.16). One can not help thinking that the Greek who first called ostriches sparrows (στρουθοί) was blessed with a sense of humor18.

Soldiers who die in France 'go West'. The origin of this expression has troubled some writers. The explanation is obvious. The region of the dead is naturally in the land of the setting sun, and the dead have been 'going West' from time immemorial. When Ulysses went to pay a visit to Hades, he directed his course Westward. The mythologies of many savage tribes retain the same tradition to-day19.

Our analogies need not be confined to verbal similarities. One reads occasionally of draftees who have inflicted wounds upon themselves in order to evade military service. Ammianus Marcellinus (15.12.3) gives us a little insight into ancient conditions:

Nec eorum <= Gallorum> aliquando quisquam, ut in Italia, munus Martium pertimescens pollicem sibi praecidit, quos iocaliter murcos appellant20. The implication is that such occurrences were all too frequent in Italy. Attention has been called before in these columns to deliberate mutilation by and upon ancient 'slackers'21.

In the days before our recruits outnumbered the regular army, the rookie was catapulted skyward from a blanket tightly held. The form of amusement is by no means new22, although the anicents used a sagum (cf. sagatio) 23.

One sees occasionally pictures of shells labelled with such grim pleasantries as A Gift for Fritz, A Pill for Kaiser Bill. Such an outlet for mirth is nothing new. Many inscriptions are found on the glandes of the ancients: e. g. Asc(u)lanis (d)on(um), Feri Pompeium Strabonem), Fer salutem Pompeio (clearly ironical), Fugitivi peristis ('Death to the fugitives!'), τρωγάλιον ('bonbon'), τρώγε, πρόσεχε, δέξαι, λάβε 4.

The iron cross has been bestowed so freely upon German soldiers that it is now esteemed at but little more than its intrinsic value. The ridicule directed at the practice reminds one of Cato's strictures upon Nobilior for cheapening military distinctions:

"Iam principio quis vidit corona donari quemquam, cum oppidum captum non esset aut castra hostium non incensa essent?" Fulvius autem, in quem hoc a Catone dictum est, coronis donaverat milites, quia vallum curaverant, aut qui puteum strenue foderant (Gellius 5.6.25-26).

In an emergency the ancients employed women's hair in tormenta (Caesar, B. C. 3.9.3; Appian 8.13.93). The modern parallels already cited (THE CLASSICAL WEEKLY 11.142) may be further augmented by a clipping from the Philadelphia Public Ledger of July 9, 1918:

In Holland the Germans are now offering high prices for combings, which are used for driving belts. Last November the women's Red Cross union in Germany obtained permission to collect women's hair for belts for submarine engines. Thus it is seen that even supplies for makeshifts are running short.

Statistics as to the relative expenditure of ammunition in antiquity and to-day would prove interesting. It is estimated that in the Civil War only one bullet in every thirty thousand killed a man.

Up to the present time in the war on the western front two tons of ammunition have been used for each soldier killed, captured, or seriously wounded.

In this connection it is worth while to quote some figures given in accounts of the operations of Caesar and Pompey at Dyracchium (Suetonius, Julius 68.3):

Denique una sextae legionis cohors praeposita castello quattuor Pompei legiones per aliquot horas sustinuit paene omnis confixa multitudine hostilium sagittarum, quarum centum ac triginta milia intra vallum reperta sunt26.

No account is taken of the arrows that fell extra vallum. However, if the cohort was at its full strength, over 200 arrows were shot for each defender. In the same engagement 120 arrows struck the shield of Scaeva. According to Suetonius, almost all of Caesar's men

were hit; according to Caesar himself, not a one came out unscathed (B. C. 3.53.3). These figures add some confirmation to the assertions of military critics that in proportion to the numbers engaged war to-day is far less deadly than in antiquity.

A story in Herodotus (7.226) gives us a vague idea about the amount of ammunition that might be expended. At Thermopylae the Spartan Dieneces was informed by a Trachinian that, when the barbarians let fly their shafts, they obscured the light of the sun. Undaunted the Spartan replied, 'We shall fight them in the shade and not in the sun'27.

In July in the operations in the Champagne General Gouraud withdrew most of his men from the front line and concentrated them on the second. The Germans swept over the outer line, but reached the main defense exhausted and were easily defeated. About a month later the Germans decided to adopt French tactics against General Mangin on a small front between Moulin-sous-Touvent and Hautbraye.

They calculated that the French, having easily demolished the front line, would advance across the intermediate zone behind, swept by the German artillery and machine guns. When they arrived at the line of resistance they would be shattered, worn out and incapable of effective action, exactly as happened to themselves in the Champagne28.

The manoeuvres were similar to those of Pompey and Caesar at Pharsalus (Caesar, B. C. 3.92): Pompeius suis praedixerat ut Caesaris impetum exciperent neve se loco moverent aciemque eius distrahi paterentur; fore ut duplicato cursu Caesaris milites exanimarentur et lassitudine conficerentur.

sperabat

The French nullified the German plan by stopping at the front line. Caesar's troops foiled Pompey in much the same fashion:

Sed nostri milites signo dato cum infestis pilis procucurrissent atque animum advertissent non concurri a Pompeianis, usu periti ac superioribus pugnis exercitati sua sponte cursum represserunt et ad medium fere spatium constiterunt, ne consumptis viribus appropinquarent.

The supernatural and miraculous are still influencing the destinies of mankind. At the beginning of the war we read a great deal about the Angel of Mons appearing before the French soldiers. There is also a story that at the first battle of the Marne

Jeanne d'Arc gathered a celestial host, and that it was this which the Germans were permitted to see for a little while, that the heart of France might go on beating29.

One will recall the traditions about the Thundering Legion of Marcus Aurelius and the story of Constantine's vision of the cross.

The Infantry Drill Regulations of the United States Army (edition of 1911) states (§ 319) in the rules for the attack that the "skirmishers spring forward shouting".

The psychology of battle cries is explained by Caesar, В. С. 3.92.5:

neque frustra antiquitus institutum est ut signa undique concinerent clamoremque universi tollerent; quibus rebus et hostis terreri et suos incitari existimaverunt.

See also the discussion in Gellius 1.11, especially 9. Although one feels a certain amount of reservation in comparing any other nation with the Germans, it may not be improper to note certain points of resemblance. The Germans have not been greater inventors than were the Romans, but they have assimilated, developed, and organized the results of the ingenuity of other peoples, as did the Romans before them. The aeroplane, the machine gun, the submarine, trench warfare, the barrage, all of which have been effectively employed by the Germans, are not due to German originality; neither are the telegraph, the telephone and wireless telegraphy, which are absolutely essential to the successful prosecution of war to-day.

a

The Romans were, then, just as alert as the Germans in adapting and improving. 'Whatever seemed suitable anywhere among friends or foes, with the utmost zeal they imitated at home' (Sallust, Cat. 61). A Greek, Polybius (6.25.11), pays them similar tribute: 'Whatever they saw, they lost no time in imitating; for, if any nation is adept at transferring customs and imitating what is better, it is the Romans'. To the credit of the Romans, they imitated a foreign Kultur likewise32.

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS.

It is well known that the scenes from the siege of Troy which Aeneas sees depicted in Juno's temple at Carthage form a well-ordered panorama. It has also been said repeatedly that a certain parallelism is unmistakable in the scenes selected by the poet. But I cannot find anywhere a detailed discussion of these pictures. And yet they deserve such treat

ment.

The first question which arises is: How many scenes did Vergil mean to place before his readers? It is commonly assumed that there were eight: (1) the flight of the Greeks (467); (2) the flight of the Trojans (468); (3) the horses of Rhesus (469-473); (4) Troilus dragged by Achilles (474-478); (5) the suppliant Trojan women (479-482); (6) the ransoming of Hector's body (483-487); (7) Aeneas and Memnon fighting the Greeks (488-489);(8) Penthesilea and her Ama

EUGENE S. MCCARTNEY.

zons (490-493). For reasons which will become apparent later, I believe we ought to assume nine scenes: 1-6 as above; (7) Aeneas and the Greek chiefs (488); (8) Memnon and his Ethiopians (489); (9) Penthesilea (490-493).

In

The next question is: How were the pictures arranged on the wall of the temple? There are two passages which seem to give a hint for the answer. 456 we read videt Iliacas ex ordine pugnas; in 467-468 we read hac fugerent Graii hac Phryges. The latter passage appears to contradict the former, for ex ordine would seem to mean 'one after the other', 'in a line', while the second passage would seem to indicate that the two contrasted scenes formed the two endscenes of the frieze. That the latter view is the correct one will, I trust, become evident from the subjoined diagram.

The reasons for this proposed arrangement are as follows:

In the pictorial relief sculptures of Hellenistic times we may get a few hints with reference to the painting of the times in such matters at least as the arrangement and balance of figures, the subjects treated and the general progress of artistic skill.

So Fowler and Wheeler, Greek Archaeology, 528. Nor must we underrate the importance of mosaics, such as that of the Issos-battle, and the mosaics

of the sarcophagi, for our reconstruction at least of the laws of composition governing the ancient paintings.

Looking now at the proposed arrangement from this point of view, we see at the two extreme ends masses of fleeing and pursuing warriors, presumably distinguished by barbarian and Grecian dress and armament. The next pair of pictures is Troilus-Rhesus. The two scenes from the Troilus-legend most frequently represented are (a) Achilles hiding at the fountain which Polyxena and Troilus are approaching, and (b) the killing of Troilus near the shrine of Apollo Thymbraeus. Either of these two moments offers an architectural background, though in the second scene painters were usually satisfied to indicate the shrine by an altar. Vergil's description seems to occupy a middle ground between the two. We see, I think, the well-house and before it the chariot of the poor boy, whose horses are dragging their unfortunate master along the ground with Achilles in close pursuit. The parallel picture of Rhesus shows us the tent, corresponding to the wellhouse, and in front of it the body of Rhesus, while Diomede is driving away the horses.

There follow two scenes of supplication. Before the statue of Pallas in her shrine we see the Trojan women, gesticulating and offering the gift of the people. To this corresponds Achilles in his tent, before whom Priam gesticulates and ofters his ransom. Professor Knapp correctly notes that the pluperfect raptaverat (483) proves that the dragging of Hector's body formed no part of the picture. The artist-or Vergil-, with a fine sense of balance, omitted this as a mere replica of the Troilus scene.

We come now to the one point that presents difficulty. In reading the text we naturally gather the impression that we are to imagine next to the ransoming of Hector Aeneas fighting, then Memnon, and finally Penthesilea. But, if we arrange the scenes in the way shown by my diagram, we shall have two parallel scenes, in both of which the artistic emphasis rests on the strange, barbarian costume of the central figure. The Ethiopian and the Amazon, representatives of the ends of the world, naturally would appear in στικτοὶ χιτώνες and, perhaps, ἀναξυρίδες· By thus separating the scenes, we gain not only a striking parallelism, but we also introduce a really central scene into the whole series, a scene closely referring to the hero of the poem, Aeneas, whose combat with some Greek leader shows the hero in his glory. While we cannot with certainty say which one of the fights mentioned in the Iliad is meant to be represented, we may, I think, safely eliminate the combat with Diomede, as inappropriate to the glorification of Aeneas; we may think with greater justification of his opponent as Achilles or Idomeneus. It is significant for the attitude of Vergil that in this manner he emphasizes the prominence of his hero and thus prepares the reader for the appreciative and enthusiastic reception given Aeneas by Dido, 617 ff. (Tune ille Aeneas?).

The question now arises whether the poet describes here an actually existing painting, or whether he gives free rein to his imagination, guided perhaps by some

work of art that he had seen with his own eyes. I dare not decide this question without further study. For the former hypothesis a parallel would speak, which, I believe, has escaped the attention of commentators so far. In the prophetic description of the Golden Age, which is to arise under the rule of Augustus, the poet tells us that in the Janus arch (1.294-296) Furor impius intus saeva sedens super arma et centum vinctus aenis post tergum nodis fremet horridus ore cruento. Professor Knapp says that Vergil may have had in mind some work of art. Now Pliny (N. Η. 35.93-94) relates that Apelles painted Belli imaginem restrictis ad terga manibus, and that Augustus had placed this painting in Fori sui celeberrimis partibus. We know apparently little of the date of the Forum Augusti, except that it was begun after the battle at Actium and that its chief edifice, the temple of Mars Ultor, was not dedicated until 2 B. C., nineteen years after Vergil's death. It may well be, though, that the painting was on view in Rome years before the dedication of the temple.

Norden, on pages 121-122 of his commentary on Aeneid 6, compares our Carthaginian picture with the reliefs on the doors of the Cumaean temple. He is inclined to doubt that Vergil describes what he saw with his own eyes, and thinks that he is rather following his imagination in giving a rhetorical ecphrasis. For this view the element of pathos and sentimentality would speak, which Norden has stressed for Book 6, and which is also strongly felt in Book I, especially in the effect of the scene of Hector's ransom on Aeneas. However, the decision cannot be made thus offhand. Rather, it seems to me to be worth while to study the whole Aeneid from this point of view: How much is there in Vergil's epic of things that actually could be seen at Rome and elsewhere (compare e. g. Norden, pages 132 ff., on the spelunca Sibyllae)? And how did he work these into the fabric of his poem under the influence of the laws of ecphrasis? Such an investigation might well be made the subject of a doctor's thesis.

In connection with the question considered in the last two paragraphs of Dr. Riess's paper, attention may be called to the discussion, by Dr. Emily Helen Dutton, in her pamphlet, Reflections on Re-Reading Vergil, 27-29, of the influence exerted on Vergil by the renewed interest in art, of which he saw examples everywhere in Rome. A summary of Dr. Dutton's observations on this point, together with a quotation given by her of some important remarks on this theme by Mr. A. S. Murray, History of Greek Sculpture, Chapter 3, may be found in THE CLASSICAL WEEKLY 11.65-66.

In studying Dr. Riess's most interesting and suggestive paper one might profit by noting also what Mr. W. Warde Fowler says about the Shield of Aeneas, at the close of his book, Aeneas at the Site of Rome: Observa