In AD 32 Gallio proposed in the Senate that ex-members of the Praetorian guard be permitted to use the theatre seats reserved for members of the equestrian order; this resulted in a bitter and sarcastic letter from Tiberius to the Senate attacking Gallio's presumption; he was first exiled, then brought back to custody in Rome after it was decided that Lesbos, chosen by him, was too pleasant a place of exile (Tac Ann VI 3; Dio LXVIII 18 4).
1. EXCVSABILE. The word is extremely rare, and is not found in verse outside the Ex Ponto: compare I vii 41-42 'quod nisi delicti pars excusabilis esset, / parua relegari poena futura fuit' and III ix 33-34 'nil tamen e scriptis magis excusabile nostris / quam sensus cunctis paene quod unus inest'.
2. HABVISSE could have the usual past sense of the perfect infinitive, but more probably is equivalent to habere: compare ix 20 'gauderem lateris non habuisse locum' and see at viii 82 imposuisse ([p 282]).
3-4. CAELESTI CVSPIDE FACTA ... VVLNERA. 'Wounds inflicted by no human weapon'. The cuspis is attributed to Mars at Am I i 11, to Neptune at Met XII 580, and to Athena at Fast VI 655. At Sen Ag 368-71 'tuque, o magni nata Tonantis / inclita Pallas, / quae Dardanias saepe petisti / cuspide terras', R. J. Tarrant cites HF 563 (Dis), HF 904 & Phaed 755 (Bacchus), HO 156 (Hercules), and Juvenal II 130 (Mars). Professor Tarrant points out to me that the cuspis does not seem to be attributed to Jupiter, no doubt because the fulmen was too firmly established as his weapon. Ovid is therefore not making his customary specific equation of Augustus with Jupiter.
4. FOVISTI. Fouere was a technical term in medicine for bathing something in a liquid (Cato Agr 157 4, Celsus IV 2 4, Columella VI 12 4). The word occurs in this sense in poetry: see Met II 338-39 'nomen ... in marmore lectum / perfudit lacrimis et aperto pectore fouit', Met VIII 654 (perhaps spurious; the passage is one where textual doublets occur), Met X 186-87 (Hyacinthus has just been struck by Apollo's discus) 'deus conlapsos ... excipit artus, / et modo te refouet, modo tristia uulnera siccat', Met XV 532 'et lacerum foui Phlegethontide corpus in unda', and Aen XII 420 'fouit ea uulnus lympha longaeuus Iapyx'.
5. RAPTI. The word could be taken to mean 'dead'; compare xvi 1 'Nasonis ... rapti', where the context shows this is the meaning, and EP I ix 1-2 (to Cotta Maximus) 'Quae mihi de rapto tua uenit epistula Celso, / protinus est lacrimis umida facta meis'. For the similarly ambiguous use of ademptus, see at vi 49 qui me doluistis ademptum ([p 243]).
6. QVOD QVERERERE. For the phrase, compare Am I iv 23-24 (Ovid is listing the signals his girl should use at the dinner-table) 'si quid erit de me tacita quod mente queraris, / pendeat extrema mollis ab aure manus', Tr V i 37 (of Fortune) 'quod querar, illa mihi pleno de fonte ministrat', Her XIX 79, and Her XX 34 & 94.
7-8. PVDICA / CONIVGE. Being pudica, she deserved to survive—Professor E. Fantham points out to me here Ovid's use of what could be called the quid profuit topic.
The reference to Gallio's wife seems rather cool in tone. For some very warm descriptions of recently deceased wives, see Lattimore 275-80.
8. NON HABVERE NEFAS. This sense of habere, very common in prose, does not seem to occur elsewhere in Ovid; but Professor R. J. Tarrant cites Aen V 49-50 'dies ... adest quem semper acerbum, / semper honoratum ... habebo'.