Nunc quoque lex volpem Carseolana vetat.’
The best MSS. have ‘nam dicere certam.’ Bergk conjectured ‘namque icere captam.’ The reading given above is adopted from some inferior MSS. by H. Peter (Leipzig, 1889), following Heinsius and Riese. Mr. S. G. Owen of Ch. Ch., our best authority on the text of Ovid, has kindly sent me the suggestion namque ire repertam, comparing, for the use of ire, Ovid, Am. 3. 6. 20 ‘sic aeternus eas.’ This conjecture, which occurred independently to myself, suits the sense and is close to the reading of the best MSS.
[251]. J. Grimm, Reinhardt der Fuchs, cclxix (quoted by Peter). Ovid’s explanation is of course wrong; the story is beyond doubt meant to explain the ritual, or a law to which the ritual gave rise.
[252]. Preller-Jordan, ii. 43. See under Robigalia.
[253]. Myth. Forsch. 107 foll.
[254]. Ovid’s word is terga, but he must, I think, mean ‘tails.’
[255]. Mannhardt, op. cit. 185. Cp. Frazer, Golden Bough, i. 408; ii. 3 and 28 (for fertilizing power of tail).
[256]. Zoological Mythology, ii. 138.
[257]. It may be as well to note that the custom of tying some object in straw—wheel, pole with cross-piece, man who slips out in time, &c.—and then burning it and carrying it about the fields, is common in Europe and elsewhere (Frazer, G. B. ii. 246 foll.). At the same time animals are sometimes burnt in a bonfire: e.g. squirrels, cats, foxes, &c. (G. B. ii. 283). The explanation of Mannhardt, adopted by Mr. Frazer, is that they were corn-spirits burnt as a charm to secure sunshine and vegetation. If the foxes were ever really let loose among the fields, damage might occasionally be done, and stories might arise like that of Carseoli, or even laws forbidding a dangerous practice.
[258]. In C. I. L. 315 this mark is confused with those of the 23rd.