"Hersilus cum Marulla, quæ ei mater, soror, et sponsa fuit."
Your correspondent has not mentioned the source of his explanation of the enigma: I presume it is traditional. The ancient inscription, it will be seen, solves it in the last two lines. The coincidence of these two inscriptions is not a little remarkable.
"SENICAPRI QVICVMQVE SVBIS SACRARIA FAVNI HÆC LEGE ROMANA VERBA NOTATA MANV. HERSILVS HIC IACEO MECVM MARVLLA QVIESCIT QVÆ SOROR ET GENITRIX, QVÆ MIHI SPONSA FVIT VERA NEGAS, FRONTEMQVE TRAHIS: ENIYGMATA SPHYNGOS CREDIS, SVNT PYTHIO VERA MAGIS TRIPODE. ME PATER E NATA GENVIT, MIHI IVNGITVR ILLA, SIC SOROR ET CONIVNCX, SIC FVIT ILLA PARENS."
In that entertaining volume La Sylva Curiosa de Julian de Medrano, Cavallero Navarro, first printed in 1583, and reprinted at Paris in 1608, a somewhat similar story is related, and the monumental inscription in French is given. Some of these stories must surely be apocryphal.[2]
"Passing through the Bourbonnese country I was told, that many years since a young gentleman there had, by some fortuitous accident, lain with his own mother, who became pregnant by him. That some time after, a favourable opportunity offering, he went to the wars, and was absent from his home some fourteen or fifteen years. At the expiration of that time returning home, he found his mother well stricken in years, who had a few days previous taken into her service a handsome lass, who had been brought up from infancy in the mountains of Auvergne. This young woman being of a naturally affectionate disposition, seemed much attached to her mistress, and relieved her of all her household cares, without knowing how nearly they were related; for she was her daughter, the fruit of the intercourse with her son, now master of the house; notwithstanding there was no one in those parts that knew it. The young man seeing her virtuous, graceful, and handsome, became enamored of her, in so much that, although his relations wished him to marry a rich wife, and all that his friends endeavoured to divert his passion, and counselled him to bestow his love elsewhere, it was all to no purpose, but, preferring her to all others he had seen, he married her. They lived together many years, had several children, and were buried in the same tomb, without either of them having ever known that they were father and daughter, brother and sister! until after a lapse of time, a shepherd from Auvergne coming into the Bourbonnese country, told the history to the inhabitants of the place where this doubly incestuous couple lived. When I passed through the country I was shown the spot where they dwelt, and the church where they were interred; and a copy of the epitaph which was placed upon their tomb was given me, which was as follows:
"'Cy gîst la fille, cy gîst le père,
Cy gîst la sœur, cy gîst le frère,
Cy gîst la femme et le mary,
Et si n'y a que deux corps ici.'"
[2]Stories of the same nature are told in the Heptameron of the Queen of Navarre, 3me Journée, Nouvelle 30me, where the scene is laid in Languedoc; and by Jeremy Taylor in his Ductor Dubitantium, B. i. C. iii. Sect. 3., who cites Comitolus as his authority: here the scene is laid in Venice. By others the scene has been placed in London, and also in Scotland. Horace Walpole's Postscript to his Tragedy will of course be known to most of your readers.