[1739] Præsul was the name applied to the Princeps Saliorum, because he led the sacred dance, as προορχηστὴρ, ἔξαρχος. Called also Præsultor and Præsultator. Amtruo (from am, ἀμφὶ, circum, and trua, "an implement used for stirring things round while they were being cooked") is the technical phrase for the dancing of the Salii. The Præsul danced at the head of the procession, amtruabat; the rest followed, imitating his movements; redamtruabant. This procession took place in the Comitium on the Kalends of March.
[1740] Cf. vii., Fr. 10.
BOOK X.
ARGUMENT.
The old Scholiast, in his Life of Persius, tells us that "after he had quitted school, and the instruction of his tutors, he was so much struck with the tenth book of the Satires of Lucilius, that he was seized with a vehement desire of writing Satire, and immediately applied himself to the imitation of this book, and after first detracting from his own merits, proceeded to disparage the poetical attempts of others." Van Heusde supposes that the book contained a detailed account of the life of Lucilius; and hence the saying of the Scholiast, that "the whole life of Lucilius was as distinctly known as if it had been portrayed in pictures." (So Horace says, Sat., II., i., 30, "Quo fit ut omnis Votivâ pateat veluti descripta tabella Vita senis.") He conjectures the difference between the subjects of the ninth and tenth books to have been this: that in the ninth, Lucilius criticised the ignorance and corrected the mistakes of the Librarii; i. e., those who copied the compositions of the poets, only incidentally, and by the way, touching on the poets themselves. Whereas the tenth was intended directly as an attack upon the poets who preceded him. Jahn, in his prolegomena on Persius, imagines this imitation of the tenth book to have been carried farther than we are perhaps justified in assuming; he conjectures that the Hendecasyllabic Prologue of Persius was a direct imitation of a similar proem, and in the same metre which formed the commencement of this book. This opinion he fortifies by two quotations, one from Petronius, Sat. iv., the other from Apuleius, de Deo Socr., p. 364. In this view Gerlach does not coincide, though he is disposed to admit that Lucilius in all probability began the book with a disparagement of himself, and so far furnished an example for Persius to imitate. It is a question that must remain doubtful, and is of no great importance. It is, however, also clear that this book contained criticisms on the verses of Accius and Ennius. (Vid. Schol. ad Hor., i., Sat. x.)
Perhaps the Fragments (incert. 3, 4, and 5) on Albutius and Mucius may have belonged to this book.
1 ... as we wrote before, the judgment to be formed is concerning the honors of the Crassi ... that is, in each case let us lay down what I should choose, what not.[1741]
2 Behind stood the nimble skirmisher in his cloak.[1742]
3 ... although suddenly to bring down from three pair of stairs.[1743]