"Ecce _levis_ summo de vertice visus Iüli
Fundere lumen _apex_...."
_Æn._ II. 682-3.
The common translations of _apex_ with its epithet _levis_ seem to me to
be strangely deficient in sense. I am anxious to submit an idea which
has occurred to me to the judgment of the riper scholars whose
well-known names are subscribed to so many valuable articles in "N. &
Q." The Delphin note defines _apex_ to be "summa pars pilei," the
conical termination of the bonnet worn by Iülus; and in this all other
comments on this passage (at least with which I am acquainted) seem to
agree. But in what sense can any part of a cap or bonnet be
_levis_--_light_, _flimsy_, _worthless_, or _capricious_? which I take
to be the only meanings of which _levis_ is capable. Surely Virgil would
not be guilty of so meaningless an epithet--of so palpable an instance
of school-boy _cram_? Now, from a passage in Euripides, _Phoen._
1270-4.,
"... ἐμπύρους τ' ἀκμὰς
ῥήξεις τ' ἐνώμων ὑγρότητ' ἐναντίαν,
ἄκραν τε λαμπάδ', ἣ δυοῖν ὅρους ἔχει,
νίκης τε σῆμα καὶ τὰ τῶν ἡσσωμένων."
it seems clear to me that Virgil meant, by _levis apex_, a _light,
flickering, lambent, pyramidal flame_, the omen of success in the
Πυρομαντεία.
The nature of the flame which consumed the sacrifice was one point which
the haruspices, both Greek and Roman, particularly observed in
endeavouring to ascertain the will of the gods; hence the expressions
ἔμπυρα σήματα, φλογωπὰ σήματα. See Valckenaer on this very
passage of the Phoenissæ.