[446] _Promethea._ "E'en from Prometheus' self thy lineage trace, And ransack history to adorn thy race." Hodgson. [447] _Frangis virgas._ "Rods broke on our associates' bleeding backs, And headsmen laboring till they blunt their axe." Dryden. [448] _Incipit ipsorum._ "The lofty pride of every honor'd name Shall rise to vindicate insulted fame, And hold the torch to blazon forth thy shame." Hodgson. [449] _Contra te stare._ "Will to his blood oppose your daring claim, And fire a torch to blaze upon your shame." Gifford. [450] _Temples._ The sealing of wills was usually performed in temples; in the morning, and fasting, as the canon law afterward directed. [451] _Santonico._ The Santones were a people of Aquitania, between the Loire and Garonne. Cf. Mart., xiv., Ep. 128, "Gallia Santonico vestit te bardocucullo." [452] _Sufflamine._ "The introduction of the drag-chain has a local propriety: Rome, with its seven hills, had just so many necessities for the frequent use of the sufflamen. This necessity, from the change of the soil, exists no longer." Badham. [453] _Testes._ Cf. vi., 311, Lunà teste. [454] _Damasippus_ (cf. Hor., ii., Sat. iii., 16) was a name of the Licinian gens. "Damasippus was sick," says Holyday, "of that disease which the Spartans call horse-feeding." [455] _Hordea._ Horses in Italy are fed on barley, not on oats. [456] _Eponam_ (cf. Aristoph., Nub., 84), the patroness of grooms. Some read "Hipponam," which Gifford prefers, from the tameness of the epithet "solam." Cf. Blunt's Vestiges, p. 29. "On some rank deity, whose filthy face We suitably o'er stinking stables place." Dryden. [457] _Amomo_, an Assyrian shrub. Cf. iv., 108. [458] _Idumeæ._ The gate at Rome near the Arch of Titus, through which Vespasian and Titus entered the city in triumph after their victories in Palestine. [459] _Dominum._ Cf. Mart., i., Ep. 113, "Cum te non nossem dominum regemque vocabam." Cf. iv., Ep. 84, 5. [460] _Inscripta lintea._ Perhaps "curtains, having painted on them what was for sale within." Others say it means "embroidered with needlework;" or "towels," according to Calderinus, who compares Catull., xxv., 7. [461] _Armeniæ._ The allusion is to Corbulo's exploits in Parthia and Armenia in Nero's reign, A.D. 60. Cf. ad iii., 251. There were great disturbances in the same quarters in Trajan's reign, which caused his expedition, in A.D. 114, against the Armenians and Parthians. In A.D. 100, Marius Priscus was accused by Pliny and Tacitus. Vid. Plin., ii., Ep. xi. Probably half way between these two dates we may fix the writing of this Satire.