88.
What is the reason that the monie emploied upon plates and publike shewes is called among them, Lucar?
May it not well be that there were many groves about the citie consecrated unto the gods, which they named Lucos: the revenues whereof they bestowed upon the setting forth of such solemnities?
89.
Why call they Quirinalia, the Feast of fooles?
Whether it is because (as Juba writeth) they attribute this day unto those who knew not their owne linage and tribe? or unto such as have not sacrificed, as others have done according to their tribes, at the feast called Fornacalia. Were it that they were hindred by other affaires, or had occasion to be forth of the citie, or were altogether ignorant, and therefore this day was assigned for them, to performe the said feast.
90.
What is the cause, that when they sacrifice unto Hercules, they name no other God but him, nor suffer a dog to be seene, within the purprise and precinct of the place where the sacrifice is celebrated, according as Varro hath left in writing?
Is not this the reason of naming no god in their sacrifice, for that they esteeme him but a demigod; and some there be who hold, that whiles he lived heere upon the earth, Evander erected an altar unto him, and offered sacrifice thereupon. Now of all other beasts he could worst abide a dog, and hated him most: for this creature put him to more trouble all his life time, than any other: witnesse hereof, the three headed dog Cerberus, and above all others, when Oeonus the sonne of Licymnius was slaine [[146]]by a dog, he was enforced by the Hippocoontides to give the battell, in which he lost many of his friends, and among the rest his owne brother Iphicles.
91.