Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 4.djvu/546

 452 NOTES AND QUERIES. no* s. iv. DEC. 2.iws. of the ordinary spelling, which was therefore retained. The Greek language does not help us much. PROF. STRONG, quoting Teuffel, says that BepyiXios is "almost invariably" found. But Suidas has OvepyiAios, and "Stephanus scribit in dictione Mantuana Btpyi'Aios," as Carolus Ruseus, the learned editor of the Dolphin edition of the poet's works, tells us, from whom I borrow these details. The same writer agrees with Pierius that the vowels e and i were often inter- changed by the ancients. Quintilian informs us that Deana is found for Diana, Menerva for Minerva, " leber " and " magester " for liber and magister. Just as we have Verginius for Virginius in some codices, so Vergilius is occasionally used for Virgilius. But in all these instances the i at length prevailed.* The derivation of the name is not known. Some fancy it comes from a laurel branch (virga laurea), which his mother saw in a dream during her pregnancy ; others that it arose from his maiden-like bashfulness (vir- ffinalis verecundia), in consequence of which he was at Naples surnamed Parthenias, from " TLapdcvos, yirgo," which legend does not imply that his mother was one, as a corre- spondent seems to think (ante, p. 309). The attempt to connect the name with ver, the spring, has no better foundation, it would appear. Notwithstanding the fact that "Vergilius" occurs "in theoldest Medicean MSS., and in the Vatican MS." (' Roman Literature,' edited by Rev. H. Thompson, p. 66 ; see also E. M. Thompson's 'Handbook of Greek and Latin Palaeography,' pp. 185-88-89, in which fac- similes are given which show how slight was the difference between e and i}, and in spite of the arguments of Politian, the spelling of the poet's name, which he tried to change and which was therefore the usual one before his time, has been Virgilius, with few exceptions, up to our own days. Polydore Vergil is one of the writers who accepted the teaching of Politian, for he spells not only the poet's name but his own with an e in his volumes ' De Rerum Inven- toribus' and ' De Prodigiis.' He claimed descent from the "ancient and noble Ver- gilian family," whose crest was a laurel with two lizards. In the third book of the first work he has a poem in praise of the laurel, which, being sempervirent, enjoys a per- petual spring (ver), and is therefore a fitting emblem of his illustrious house, about which I can find no information. He is quite in Etymology,' p. 264, third ed. London, 1875. earnest, as any one can see from the lines I quote:— Ver ago perpetuum, hie primo ver tempore mon- 8 trans, Unde tenet nomen Vergiliana domus, (,>»:<• tam initin.1 ;i diu casuraque tempore nullo Stabit, quam viridi fronde perennis ero.* I think this derivation is comparable with that of Menage, satirized by a French epi- grammatist in the following quatrain :— Alphana vient d'eqtuw, sans doute, Mais il faut avouer aussi Qu'en venant de Ik jusqu'ici II a bien change sur la route. Textor's 'Officina,' a book which went through numerous editions in the sixteenth century, has everywhere Virgilius. See, especially, the chapter ' De Poetis Grsecis et Latinis' (vol. ii. p. 251, ed. 1574). Cornelius Schrevelius, in his edition of the poet's ' Opera Omnia, cum Nbtis Selectissimis Variorum' (Lugd. Batav., 1666), has a note on the first page which runs thus: " Ver- gilium et non Virgilium scribendum esse, ex monumentis veterum, Angelus Politianus, Misc. C. 77, ostendit." He, however, adheres to the ordinary spelling with nearly all editors both before and after his time. In his ' Testirnonia de Virgilio et ejus Scriptis,' prefixed to the volume, he makes no reference to Horace, who mentions his friend's name ten times in his works. Some of the authors quoted by Schrevelius merely refer to the poet's ' /Eneid'; others speak of him as Maro ; but among those who call him Vir- gilius are Velleius, Macrobius, Quintilian, Tacitus, St. Jerome, St. Augustine, Lac- tantius, and a writer in the fifth book of the 'Anthology,' who has Bipyi'A.A.io«. In Lowndes's ' Manual' there is a long list of editions and translations of Virgil's dif- ferent poems, which extends from about the middle of the sixteenth century until 1834 (Pickering's ed.); but there is only one men- tioned (p. 1873), a version in Greek of the second book of the ' ^Eneid' " per Georgivm Etherigevm Oxoniensem, Medicum, et Grrecse Linguae Professorem. Lond. apud Regin. Wolfium. 1553," which has the e instead of the i. I have Heyne's edition. London, 1826, the Delphin, 1834, Anthon's, Young's, and others, among which is the "Oxford Pocket Text," 1886, and in not one of these do I find Politian's spelling adopted. It was only in the latter part of the nineteenth century, nearly four hundred years after the Italian scholar's death, that some one was convinced I'ranciscvin Hegervm.
 * See Peile's ' Introduction to Greek and Latin
 * Ed. 1644, pp. 185-6, Lvgdvni Batavorvm, apod