Salica, a town of Spain.
Salii, a college of priests at Rome, instituted in honour of Mars, and appointed by Numa to take care of the sacred shields called Ancylia, B.C. 709. See: [Ancyle]. They were 12 in number, the three elders among them had the superintendence of all the rest; the first was called præsul, the second vates, and the third magister. Their number was afterwards doubled by Tullus Hostilius, after he had obtained a victory over the Fidenates, in consequence of a vow which he had made to Mars. The Salii were all of patrician families, and the office was very honourable. The 1st of March was the day on which the Salii observed their festivals in honour of Mars. They were generally dressed in a short scarlet tunic, of which only the edges were seen; they wore a large purple-coloured belt about the waist, which was fastened with brass buckles. They had on their heads round bonnets with two corners standing up, and they wore in their right hand a small rod, and in their left a small buckler. In the observation of their solemnity they first offered sacrifices, and afterwards went through the streets dancing in measured motions, sometimes all together, or at other times separately, while musical instruments were playing before them. They placed their body in different attitudes, and struck with their rods the shields which they held in their hands. They also sung hymns in honour of the gods, particularly of Mars, Juno, Venus, and Minerva, and they were accompanied in the chorus by a certain number of virgins, habited like themselves, and called Saliæ. The Salii instituted by Numa were called Palatini, in contradistinction from the others, because they lived on mount Palatine, and offered their sacrifices there. Those that were added by Tullus were called Collini, Agonales, or Quirinales, from a mountain of the same name, where they had fixed their residence. Their name seems to have been derived a saliendo, or saltando, because during their festivals it was particularly requisite that they should leap and dance. Their feasts and entertainments were uncommonly rich and sumptuous, whence dapes saliares is proverbially applied to such repasts as are most splendid and costly. It was usual among the Romans when they declared war, for the Salii to shake their shields with great violence, as if to call upon the god Mars to come to their assistance. Livy, bk. 1, ch. 20.—Varro, de Lingua Latina, bk. 4, ch. 15.—Ovid, Fasti, bk. 3, li. 387.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus, bk. 3.—Florus, bk. 1, ch. 2, &c.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 8, li. 285.——A nation of Germany who invaded Gaul, and were conquered by the emperor Julian. Ammianus Marcellinus, bk. 17.
Salinātor, a surname common to the family of the Livii and others.
Salius, an Acarnanian at the games exhibited by Æneas in Sicily, and killed in the wars with Turnus. It is said by some that he taught the Latins those ceremonies, accompanied with dancing, which afterwards bore his name in the appellation of the Salii. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 298; bk. 10, li. 753.
Crispus Sallustius, a Latin historian, born at Amiternum, in the country of the Sabines. He received his education at Rome, and made himself known as a public magistrate in the office of questor and consul. His licentiousness, and the depravity of his manners, however, did not escape the censure of the age, and Sallust was degraded from the dignity of a senator, B.C. 50. His amour with Fausta the daughter of Sylla was a strong proof of his debauchery; and Milo the husband, who discovered the adulterer in his house, revenged the violence offered to his bed, by beating him with stripes, and selling him his liberty at a high price. A continuation of extravagance could not long be supported by the income of Sallust, but he extricated himself from all difficulties by embracing the cause of Cæsar. He was restored to the rank of senator, and made governor of Numidia. In the administration of his province, Sallust behaved with unusual tyranny; he enriched himself by plundering the Africans, and at his return to Rome he built himself a magnificent house, and bought gardens, which, from their delightful and pleasant situation, still preserve the name of the gardens of Sallust. He married Terentia the divorced wife of Cicero; and from this circumstance, according to some, arose an immortal hatred between the historian and the orator. Sallust died in the 51st year of his age, 35 years before the christian era. As a writer he is peculiarly distinguished. He had composed a history of Rome, but nothing remains of it except a few fragments, and his only compositions extant are his history of Catiline’s conspiracy, and of the wars of Jugurtha king of Numidia. In these celebrated works the author is greatly commended for his elegance, the vigour and animation of his sentences; he everywhere displays a wonderful knowledge of the human heart, and paints with a masterly hand the causes that gave rise to the great events which he relates. No one was better acquainted with the vices that prevailed in the capital of Italy, and no one seems to have been more severe against the follies of the age, and the failings of which he himself was guilty in the eyes of the world. His descriptions are elegantly correct, and his harangues are nervous and animated, and well suiting the character and the different pursuits of the great men in whose mouths they are placed. The historian, however, is blamed for tedious and insipid exordiums, which often disgust the reader without improving him; his affectation of old and obsolete words and phrases is also censured, and particularly his unwarrantable partiality in some of his narrations. Though faithful in every other respect, he has not painted the character of Cicero with all the fidelity and accuracy which the reader claims from the historian; and in passing in silence over many actions which reflect the greatest honour on the first husband of Terentia, the rival of Cicero has disgraced himself, and rendered his compositions less authentic. There are two orations or epistles to Cæsar, concerning the regulations of the state, attributed to him, as also an oration against Cicero, whose authenticity some of the moderns have disputed. The best editions of Sallust, are those of Haverkamp, 2 vols., 4to, Amsterdam, 1742; and of Edinburgh, 12mo, 1755. Quintilian, bk. 10, ch. 1.—Suetonius, The Grammarians in The Cæsars.—Martial, bk. 14, ltr. 191.——A nephew of the historian, by whom he was adopted. He imitated the moderation of Mæcenas, and remained satisfied with the dignity of a Roman knight, when he could have made himself powerful by the favours of Augustus and Tiberius. He was very effeminate and luxurious. Horace dedicated bk. 2, ode 2, to him. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 1.—Pliny, bk. 34.——Secundus Promotus, a native of Gaul, very intimate with the emperor Julian. He is remarkable for his integrity, and the soundness of his counsels. Julian made [♦]him prefect of Gaul.——There is also another Sallust, called Secundus, whom some have improperly confounded with Promotus. Secundus was also one of Julian’s favourites, and was made by him prefect of the east. He conciliated the good graces of the Romans by the purity of his morals, his fondness for discipline, and his religious principles. After the death of the emperor Jovian, he was universally named by the officers of the Roman empire to succeed on the imperial throne; but he refused this great though dangerous honour, and pleaded infirmities of body and old age. The Romans wished upon this to invest his son with the imperial purple, but Secundus opposed it, and observed that he was too young to support the dignity.——A prefect of Rome in the reign of Valentinian.——An officer in Britain.
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Salmăcis, a fountain of Caria, near Halicarnassus, which rendered effeminate all those who drank of its waters. It was there that Hermaphroditus changed his sex, though he still retained the characteristics of his own. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 4, li. 285; bk. 15, li. 319.—Hyginus, fable 271.—Festus, Lexicon of Festus.
Salmōne, a town of Elis in Peloponnesus, with a fountain, from which the Enipeus takes its source, and falls into the Alpheus, about 40 stadia from Olympia, which, on account of that, is called Salmonis. Ovid, bk. 3, Amores, poem 6, li. 43.——A promontory at the east of Crete. Dionysius of Halicarnassus, bk. 5.
Salmoneus, a king of Elis, son of Æolus and Enarette, who married Alcidice, by whom he had Tyro. He wished to be called a god, and to receive divine honours from his subjects; therefore to imitate the thunder, he used to drive his chariot over a brazen bridge, and darted burning torches on every side, as if to imitate the lightning. This impiety provoked Jupiter. Salmoneus was struck with a thunderbolt, and placed in the infernal regions near his brother Sisyphus. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 11, li. 235.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 9.—Hyginus, fable 60.—Diodorus, bk. 4.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 6, li. 585.
Salmōnis, a name given to Olympia. See: [Salmone].——The patronymic of Tyro daughter of Salmoneus. Ovid, Amores, bk. 3, poem 6, li. 43.