so stamped to signify to the besieged that Phæneas was then on the Roman side.
ΕΥΣΚΑΝΟΥ is on a glans made of brass. Vischer explains it as standing for εὖ σκήνου, an ironical address to the person struck by it, “be lodged well,” “take good quarters.” The view of Curtius, that it was an address to the missile to place itself well in the head of the enemy, seems to me preferable. ΤΡΩΓΑΛΙΟΝ, i. e. τρωγάλιον, is on a bullet preserved at Argos. It means “a sweet-meat,” or “fruit for dessert,” and is used here in the sense—‘Here’s a sugar plum for you.’ On the original the inscription stands thus:
ΤΡΩΓ
Ε
ΑΛΙΟΝ,
whence Goettling proposed the strange reading Τρῶγε Ἅλιον, in the sense, I presume, “Bite it in vain,” like our “This is a hard nut to crack.” Curtius explains the Ε as a numeral denoting the number of bullets thus inscribed. To me this explanation seems unsatisfactory, and I am inclined to suggest that it was intended that τρωγ should be taken twice, scil. τρῶγε τρωγάλιον, “eat a sugar plum.”
ESVREIS ET ME CELAS, i. e. esuris et me celas, “you are starving, and hide[1] it from me,” refers to the famine in Perusia, during the siege, and the extraordinary care with which L. Antonius endeavoured to conceal it from the besiegers. See Appian, v. 35. On the same glans, which bears C·CAESARVS VICTORIA, we have also
LANTONI·CALVI[2]
PERISTI,
i. e. L. Antoni calve peristi, “Lucius Antonius, you bald-pate, you are undone.” There is no historical testimony as to the baldness of Lucius Antonius, but De Minicis believes that he has found evidence of it on a denarius bearing a representation of his head.
Some expressions in inscriptions of this class are, as might be expected, very coarse. Thus we have on one, belonging to the be-
- ↑ This use of celare with the accusative is not uncommon. Thus in Cicero, Phil. ii. Eteuim vereor, ne aut celatum me ab ipsis illis non honestum, &c. The meaning of celatum me is not “that I was concealed,” but “that I was kept in the dark,” “that it was concealed from me.” See Epist. ad fam. vii. 20.
- ↑ The second I is effaced, II standing as usual for E; or the horizontal lines of E have disappeared.
