Ebook The Sixteen Satires of Juvenal

Beside the subtler indications of authenticity which have been illustrated, there are many other confirmatory points of resemblance, fewest in the Fourteenth but more numerous in the Tenth and Thirteenth Satires, which will present themselves to any careful reader. In spite of Juvenal's Openly expressed contempt for ancient mythology and his tory, there is no tendency in his writing more distinctive than his allusiveness. The young nobleman who drives his 'own horses is called Automedon, after the charioteer of Achilles: Jehu, as we might put it. The next-door neighbour, whose house takes fire, is Ucalegon, by a remi niscence from the leneid; Domitian is Agamemnon, king of men; and the baby son is a hopeful Aineas. Nor are we surprised to find Rutilus, the domestic bully, called the Antiphates and Polyphemus of his terrified house hold, much as we might say that a thrice-made widower was a modern Bluebeard. Many of Juvenal's thoughts and some of his expressions would not be fully intelligible to any one who had not the [eneid at his fingers' ends, like the schoolmaster who is described in the Seventh Satire as being expected to tell you off-hand the name of the nurse of Anchises, all about the stepmother of Archemorus, the exact age of Acestes when he died, and the number of wine-jars which he gave to the Trojans.