Fig. 123.—“Ligurius Successus, in peace.”
Fig. 124.—“Domitius in peace. Lea erected this.”[674]
This ancient epigraphy often betrays extreme ignorance, and sets at defiance all the laws of grammatical construction. The spelling is frequently atrocious, and the general style and character utterly barbarous, rendering the meaning extremely obscure or altogether undecipherable. The language was much corrupted by the foreigners and slaves who formed so large a portion of the population. The later examples are often marked by the absence of terminal inflexions and the use of prepositions instead, and by other indications of the falling to pieces of the stately Latin tongue, which had been the vehicle of such a noble literature and such lofty eloquence, and of its degeneracy from
the purity of the Augustan era into the mixed dialect of the Middle Ages, from which the modern Italian has sprung.[675]
The barbarous Latinity of the following indicates the degradation into which the language had fallen:
IIBER QVI VIXI QVAI QVO
PARE IVA ANOIVE I ANORV
M PLVI MINVI XXX I PACE.
Read: Liber, qui vixit cum compare sua annum I. Annorum plus minus XXX. In pace.
Liber, who lived with his wife one year. He lived thirty years, more or less. In peace.