512
NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. i. JUKE 25, IDM.
ALAKE (10 th S. i. 468). This has nothing
to do with Alexander or Melech. In the
language spoken by the Akus or Egbas (for
the inhabitants of Abeokuta are known by
both these names) Alake means " Lord of
Ake." Al is a possessive prefix, and Ake
(two syllables) is a proper name, that of the
head town or village of the group known
collectively as Abeokuta. For the early
history of Egba-land and its metropolis see
the late Sir R. F. Burton's ' Abeokuta and
the Camaroons Mountains,' 1863.
JAMES PLATT, Jun.
GENEALOGY : NEW SOURCES (10 th S. i. 187, 218, 258, 396). I shall be glad if MR. GERALD MARSHALL will kindly inform me where and how the Admiralty Bill Books of the seven- teenth and eighteenth centuries may be seen. G. B.
'THE YONG SOULDIER' (10 th S. i. 428, 477). MR. FYNMORE quotes an error made by me which occurs in the first edition of my 'Army Lists of Roundheads and Cavaliers.' How I came to fall into it I cannot explain, but so it is that I made the blunder of confounding John Rainsford with Thomas Rainborowe, the Parliamentarian officer who was mur- dered at Doncaster, 29 October, 1648. An account of this latter person, communicated by me, appears in Archceologia, vol. xlvi. p. 9. EDWARD PEACOCK.
KING JOHN'S CHARTERS (10 th S. i. 469). The places which W. I. seeks to identify must be looked for on the other side of the Channel :
Vallis Rodol[li] is Vaudreuil, on the Eure.
Castrum de Vir, the castle of Vire, a town in the south-west of Normandy, towards the frontier of Maine.
Bonavilla super Tokam, Bonneville on the Touques. S. G. HAMILTON.
" HUMANUM EST ERRARE " (10 th S. i. 389).
The philosophy which is summed up in this maxim is a commonplace of the Greek and Latin literatures, occurring in various forms through the different centuries. Thence it passed, as has so frequently been the case with proverbial sayings, into the European literatures, where it has become widely and endurmgly domesticated. I have noted a large number of examples for my forthcoming Dictionary of Phrases, &c.,' and add here a selection from the Greek and Latin speci- mens arranged chronologically, to illustrate tne trequency of its occurrence, and some the various verbal forms which it has assumed. So far I have failed to trace an
earlier " origin " than A.D. 1745 (Melchior de
Polignac) for the precise Latinized form in
which the maxim is now current in England,
though " Errasse humanum est " of St. Jerome
is probably the real source.
dfji.apT(i)Xal....fV dvOpuwouriv eVovrcu Theognis, v. 327-8.
yap
TOIS Tracri KOIVOV eari T
Sophocles, ' Antigone,' 1023-4 (said by Teiresias).
dfj.apTflv i/cos dvOpwirovs. Euripides, ' Hippolytus,' 615 (the Nurse).
TO yap dfj.apTa.vfiv, dvdpdaTrovs 6'vras, ovSev, oTaai, 6av/j.aa-Tov. Xenophon, ' Cyropjedia,' V. iv. 19. ^
/z^Sfv d/j,apTfiv eort 6e(t>v. Demosthenes, ' De Corona,' V. ix. 289 (in the epigram on the Greeks who fell at Chseronea).
av8p<j)iros wv rjfj.apTOV ov Oavpa&Tfov. Menander, Fragm. 499, Kock.
Censen' hominem me esse ? erravi. Terence, ' Adelphi,' IV. ii. 40 (Demea).
...possum falli, ut homo. Cicero, 'Ad Atticum,* xiii. 21, 5.
Cujusvis hominis est errare, nullius nisi insipi- entis in errore perseverare. Cicero, ' Philippics,' xii. 2, 5. (The thought is also contained in his ' De Invent.,' ii. 3, 9: " JNon enim parum cognosse, sed in parum cognito diu et stulte perseverasse turpe est.")
Per humanos, inquit, errores. Seneca (Rhetor), ' Excerpta ex Controversiis,' IV. iii.
Nemo nostrum non peccat. Homines sumus, non dei. Petronius, 'Satyricon,' cap. 75.
Fateor me, domina, saepe pecasse ; nam et homo sum et adhuc juvenis. Ibid., cap. 130.
...ut...breviter amplectar, homo sum. Pliny (Secundus), 'Epistolse,' V. iii. 2.
r]yciTO t dvOpwirwv fj.ev fivai TO . Lucian, ' Demon.,' 7.
Peccare enim hominis est, insidias tenders diabqli. Jerome, ' Adv. Ruf.,' iii. 33 (col. 560 Vail.).
...si errasti, ut homo. Ibid., iii. 36 (col. 568 V.).
...errasse humanum eat, et confiteri errorem prudentis. Jerome, ' Epistolse,' Ivii. 12.
Errare humanum est. Melchior de Polignac, 1 Anti-Lucretius ' (pub. A.D. 1745), v. 58.
Examples from English and continental literature could be multiplied almost indefi- nitely : two of the most famous may be given here :
To err is human ; to forgive, divine.
Pope, ' Essay on Criticism,' Pt. II. 325. Es irrt der Mensch, so lang' er strebt.
Goethe, ' Faust : Prologue in Heaven.'
I should be very grateful to E. W. B. if he could supply the precise words of, and refer- ence to, the example he has found in the letters of Severus of Antioch.
WM. SWAN SONNENSCHEIN.
[MR. CIIR. WATSON also sends the reference to Cicero's ' Philippics.']
