XLI. The _Syrtes_ were two great gulfs on the north coast of Africa. For Scylla and Charybdis, see note on Book III stanza lv. The Lapithae were a Thessalian tribe, ruled by Perithous. The Centaurs came to his marriage feast, and at the instigation of Mars, fought with the Lapithae until the latter were defeated. 'Diana's ire' was caused by neglect on the part of king Oeneus of Calydon to sacrifice to her. She sent a wild boar to ravage the country. LXIX. 'Trivia's lake' refers to the little lake of Nemi. A famous temple of Diana stood here, tended by a priest who was a runaway slave. He gained his office by slaying his predecessor and held it only so long as he could escape a similar fate. Cf. stanza ciii. 'Velia's fountains,' a lake in the Umbrian hills beyond Reate. LXXXVII. Agylla was the original name of Caere. XC. Homole and Othrys were mountains in Thessaly. XCI. The Anio flows through the hills near Tibur, and joins the Tiber close to 'Antemnae's tower-girt height.' Cf. stanza lxxxiv. Anagnia was the largest town of the Hernici, and Amasenus was a river of Latium. XCIII. All these places were close to each other in Etruria, a few miles north of Rome. XCIV. It is probable that this passage was left unfinished by Virgil. The simile is taken from Homer, and used here in two different ways, the poet evidently postponing his final decision as to which he would adopt, until he revised the poem. XCV. Clausus, according to a legend preserved by Livy, was a Sabine who left his own countrymen and joined the Romans. For this he was rewarded by a gift of land on the Anio. He was regarded as the ancestor of the Claudian family. XCVI. The name of the Allia was ill-omened because it was on the banks of this stream that the Gauls under Brennus inflicted a crushing defeat on the Romans in 390 B.C. XCVIII. The Oscans were one of the old non-Latin tribes of Italy. Some fragments of their language still remain. CIII. The legend was that Hippolytus, the son of Theseus, king of Athens, was loved by his step-mother Phaedra. Hippolytus rejected her love, and she killed herself, leaving a writing accusing him of having tempted her. Theseus in his wrath besought Poseidon to slay his son, and the latter sent a monster from the sea, which terrified the horses of Hippolytus so that they ran away and killed their master. Aesculapius raised him to life, however, and Diana concealed him in the grove of Aricia under the name of Virbius. The Virbius in the text is the son of this Hippolytus, also called Virbius. CVI. Io, the daughter of Inachus, king of Argos, was loved by Jupiter, and turned by him into a white cow in order to escape the jealousy of Juno. The latter, however, set Argus with the hundred eyes to watch her. NOTES TO BOOK EIGHT