BOOZ ENDORMI.
The subject of this exquisite little idyll is taken from the Book of Ruth, chapter iii, in which Ruth the Moabitess is described as lying at the feet of Boaz, the kinsman of her dead husband, Mahlon the Hebrew, in order that she might claim from him that he should marry her and continue the family of Mahlon, as provided by the law of Moses.
Judith. There was a Judith, daughter of Beer the Hittite, one of the wives of Esau (Gen. xxxvi. 34). Hugo may or may not have had this personage in his mind.
asphodèle. Hugo is not always accurate in his local colouring. Asphodels are not found in Palestine.
Galgala, the form found in the Septuagint and Vulgate of the place-name Gilgal.
Les grelots des troupeaux. Here, again, Hugo is inaccurate. Sheep in Palestine do not have bells attached to them.
Jérimadeth. The name seems to be of Hugo's own invention. It was a trick of the poet's to make proper names suit the exigencies of rime, as in this instance, in which 'Jérimadeth rimes with' demandait.
AU LION D'ANDROCLÈS.
It is impossible to name the period to which Hugo is referring in this poem more precisely than by saying that it is the age of Rome under the Empire. As will be seen from the notes, the personages and events alluded to are not all contemporaneous. It was enough for Hugo that they were typical of the Roman decadence.
Trimalcion. The festival of Trimalcion is an episode in the Satyricon of Petronius Arbiter, the poem in which are described all the excesses of Roman luxury and debauchery. Petronius Arbiter lived in the time of Claudius.