pun on _veneficium_ and _beneficium_ which cannot be reproduced.
THE FLORIDA
CHAPTER 2. _Plautus._ Truculentus, ii. 6. 8.
_the great poet._ Homer, Iliad, iii. 12.
CHAPTER 3. _Vergil._ Ecl. iii. 27.
CHAPTER 4. _Antigenidas_, a famous musician of the first half of the
fourth century B.C. Others attribute the grievance to his pupil
Ismenias. This story is also told by Dio Chrysostom xlix.
CHAPTER 6. _Nabataea_, a district at the north-east end of the Red
Sea.
_Arsaces_, a king of Persia (perhaps Artaxerxes II, 379 B.C.) from
whom the Parthian kings traced their descent. Here _Arsacidae_ =
Parthians.
_Ityraea_, a district under Mount Hermon to the north of Bashan.
_Ganges._ The quotation is from Statius, Silvae, ii. 4. 25.
_wash gold._ Lat. _colare_ = to strain, sift.
CHAPTER 7. _Alexander._ This story of his portraits is told by many
writers, though Lysippus is substituted for Polycletus by the more
accurate, inasmuch as Polycletus was a sculptor of the fifth century,
and contemporary with Pheidias! This is quite characteristic of
Apuleius.
_Apelles_, the greatest of Greek painters, floruit circa 332 B.C.
_Pyrgoteles_, one of the most famous gem-engravers of Greece. Little
is known of him beyond this story.
_the professor's gown._ Cp. Aulus Gellius, ix. 2, where a man with a
long beard and huge cloak tries to persuade Herodes Atticus that he is
a philosopher. Herodes replies, 'I see the cloak and the gown, but not
the philosopher.'
CHAPTER 9. _Hippias of Elis_, one of the early sophists (middle of the
fifth century B.C.); cp. Plat. Hipp. Min. 368 B.
_the reciter's wand._ It was the custom in Greece for a reciter to
hold in his hand a wand or [Greek: rhabdos].
_Severianus_, proconsul of Africa between 161 and 169 A.D., as is
shown by the words _the two Caesars_, M. Aurelius and L. Verus.
CHAPTER 10. _The Sun._ The passage quoted is from some unknown
tragedy, perhaps a Phoenissae, cp. Eur. Phoen. 1.
_Mercury._ Those born under Mercury had a 'mercurial' disposition,
those under Mars a 'martial' temper (cp. _ignita_).
_other divine influences that lie midway._ Cp. note on Apologia, chap.
43.
CHAPTER 11. _darnel._ The quotation is from Vergil, Georgic i. 154.
Cp. also Ecl. v. 37.
CHAPTER 14. _Crates._ Cp. Florida 22, and Apologia, chap. 22.
CHAPTER 15. _Polycrates_, floruit circa 530 B.C.
_Pythagoras._ See note on Apologia, chap. 4.
_Pherecydes._ See note on Apologia, ch. 27.
_Anaximander_, an Ionian philosopher, born 610 B.C.
_Epimenides._ See note on Apologia, chap. 27.
_Creophylus_, an early epic poet, reputed author of the 'Capture of
Oechalia', which he was said to have received from Homer as the dowry
of the latter's daughter.
_Leodamas._ Nothing is known of this Leodamas. Apuleius may have made
a slip and written Leodamas for Hermodamas, who is mentioned by Diog.
Laert. viii. 2, as the descendant of Creophylus.
CHAPTER 16. _Philemon_ was a writer of the 'new', not the 'middle' comedy.
_'farewell' and 'applaud'._ Cp. the well-known epitaph:--'iam mea
peracta, mox vestra agetur fabula: valete et plaudite.'
_Aemilianus Strabo_ was _consul suffectus_ in 156 A.D. See
Prosopographia imp. Rom. part 3. nr. 674, p. 275.
_while breath still_, &c., from Vergil, Aeneid iv. 336.
_priesthood_ of the province of Africa. See Introduction, p. 12.
CHAPTER 17. _Scipio Orfitus_, proconsul of Africa, 163, 4 A.D. See
Prosopographia imp. Rom. part 1, nr. 1184, p. 464.
_Orpheus to woods_, &c., from Vergil, Eclogue vii. 56.
CHAPTER 18. _the tragic poet._ Unknown.
_Plautus._ Truculentus, prologue 1-3.
_no rose without a thorn._ The Latin is _ubi uber, ibi tuber_.
Wherever you get rich soil, there you will find pignuts.
_the council of Africa_ was theoretically an association for the
worship of the imperial house. It had some political importance,
however, inasmuch as it might criticize the governor and forward its
criticisms to the Emperor at Rome.
_Protagoras_, a famous sophist of Abdera (latter half of fifth
century).
_dilemma._ See note on Apologia, chap. 9, _self-inconsistency_. A
closely parallel story is told of Corax and Tisias, rhetoricians
slightly earlier in date.
_Thales of Miletus_, the first of the great mathematicians and
physical philosophers of Greece: one of the seven sages. He flourished
towards the end of the seventh century B.C.
CHAPTER 19. _Asclepiades_, a famous physician from Bithynia, of the
first half of the first century B.C.
CHAPTER 20. _The first cup_, &c. The wise author of this saying was,
according to Diog. Laert, i. 72, Anacharsis.
_Empedocles._ See note on Apologia, chap. 27.
_Epicharmus_, a famous comic poet of Megara in Sicily. He flourished
early in the fifth century B.C.
_Xenocrates._ Diog. Laert. mentions five writers of this name, none of
them of any great importance. It is possible that we should read
_Xenophanes_, who, according to Diog. Laert. ix. 10, wrote _silli_, a
form of lampoon or satire. He was the founder of the Eleatic school
and probably flourished about 500 B.C.
CHAPTER 22. _Crates pure and simple_, i.e. by his renunciation of the
world described in chap. 15.
CHAPTER 24. The MSS. give this as a prologue to the de deo Socratis.
It belongs, however, manifestly to the Florida.
_Aristippus_, founder of the Cyrenaic school, a friend and younger
contemporary of Socrates.
* * * * *
OXFORD
PRINTED AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
BY HORACE HART, M.A.
PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY