From curculio@glasscity.net Sun Mar  5 19:37:03 2000
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From: "Michael Hendry" <curculio@glasscity.net>
To: <classics@u.washington.edu>
References: <v03007800b4e8a0ea182f@[10.80.1.53]> <v03007800b4e8ca4cbd73@[10.80.1.53]>
Subject: Re: The Eternal Rabbit
Date: Sun, 5 Mar 2000 22:43:44 -0500
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It may be totally irrational, but I would be annoyed and disgusted if I
found that the "frog legs" at a French or Italian restaurant were actually
toad legs.  Wouldn't you?

Michael Hendry
Bowling Green State University
Home address:  129 W. Reed / Bowling Green, OH 43402
Telephone:  (419) 352-6852
E-mail:  curculio@glasscity.net
Web-page:  http://www.glasscity.net/users/curculio  (still being transfered
and upgraded)
----- Original Message -----
From: David Lupher <dlupher@ups.edu>
To: <classics@u.washington.edu>
Sent: Sunday, March 05, 2000 9:59 PM
Subject: Re: The Eternal Rabbit


> Michael Hendry notes:
> >There is an even closer connection between *lepos, leporis* and *lepus,
> >leporis*, and it is classically-attested.  Here is Martial 5.29:
> >
> >    Si quando leporem mittis mihi, Gellia, dicis:
> >       "Formonsus septem, Marce, diebus eris."
> >    Si non derides, si uerum, lux mea, narras,
> >       edisti numquam, Gellia, tu leporem.
>
> Yes, the pun here is obvious, and it was noted by Pliny the Elder
> at Nat. Hist. Bk 28.79.260: "Cato thought that to take hare as food
> is soporific, and a popular belief is that it also adds charm to
> the person for nine days, a flippant pun" (Rackham's version).
> Oddly, though Pliny called this a "frivolus iocus," the word which
> Rackham translates "charm" here is not "leporem" but "gratiam."
> No matter; Pliny clearly saw a pun here.
>
> But the jokester who composed the SHA's life of Alexander Severus
> cited (or manufactured?) some verses that make the pun even more
> explicit than did Martial, whose epigram he cites (ch. 38).  He
> ("Aelius Lampridius") says that a poet sent Alexander these verses:
> pulchrum quod vides esse nostrum regem,
> pulchrum quod Syra detulit propago,
> venatus facit et lepus comesus,
> de quo continuum capit leporem.
> (The second line is corrupt.  Morel, in "Fragmenta Poetrarum Latinorum,"
>  prints: "pulchrum quem tetulit Syrum propago.")  See Morel or the SHA
> for a Latin translation of Alexander Severus' supposed witty reply,
> obviously indebted to the Martial epigram
>
> >Also, a rabbit (cuniculus) is not quite the same thing as a hare (lepus),
> >which makes some of DL's connections even more fanciful than they would
be
> >otherwise.
>
> Picky picky. I suppose that you are the kind of pedant who distinguishes
> between frogs and toads.
>
> David Lupher
> Classics Dept.
> Univ. of Puget Sound
>
>
>

.