Cleveland wil constitute a similar Board of Scientific Terms from the specialists whose reports ar printed by the goverment.

The Committee was continued.

24. Vergil's use of the word Atrium, by Dr. H. W. Magoun, of Oberlin, O.

The word atrium occurs in Vergil six times. Servius and the commentators seem to take it for granted that he always had a Roman atrium in mind, and either ignore it altogether or comment upon it as though used in its ordinary sense. There are, however, reasons for believing that Vergil was strongly influenced in certain passages by his Homeric sources, and took atrium as the best Latin equivalent for a word which had long been obsolete in this sense in the Greek itself, and could not therefore be readily Latinized. The passages are all in the Aeneid, and are as follows:

The two last citations occur in similes — Amata raving through the city like a flying top, and Juturna driving through the ranks of the foe like a swallow that flies through the house of a wealthy man. They offer little to consider; for the plural is the favorite form in the poets, and is therefore without special significance. It has been questioned, Beck. Gal. tr. by M., p. 251, whether the "fountain" mentioned in the last passage is the one in the atrium; but it seems best to take it so; for passages in Cicero make it clear that in Vergil's time atria built in the Corinthian style with pillars were common among the rich, and it may be assumed that he refers to such an atrium here. The citation from book IV. refers to the main hall of Dido's palace and may be passed over, since the passage from book I. refers to the same, and it will be quite sufficient to consider that. The citations from book II. refer to a single room. Vergil is describing the assault on the

palace of Priam. Pyrrhus is raging at the doors, a hole is cut through the stout oak, and the interior is seen [citation]. Terror reigns within, the women run to and fro, the Danaans burst in the doors, and the guards are overcome. In the meantime, Priam puts on his armor; the women flee to an altar in the midst of the palace, near which were the Penates, shaded by an aged bay-tree; and Hecuba sees Priam and calls him to her side. Then a son of Priam, escaping the general slaughter, flees [citation] through the long porticoes and traverses the deserted halls, only to be overtaken and slain in the sight of his parents.'

There are now several things to be noted. The bay-tree, 513, growing in the house, aedibus in mediis, seems to be Homeric and may perhaps have been suggested by the olive in the house of Ulysses, Od. XXIII. 190 f., although Servius places it in the impluvium, as if it were like the foliage in the later Roman atria, and Metcalfe, Beck. Gal. p. 251, thinks that Vergil has the atria of his own day in mind. They have failed to note, however, that the house seems to have been built about the tree as it stood in the primeval forest, cf. VII. 59–63, which was not the Roman method by any means in the days of Vergil; and where atria were fine enough to contain trees, the Penates in his time were provided with a special place in the interior of the house. It may safely be asserted that they were never found in the atria of such houses in his day, although they may possibly have been in those of the humbler sort. Again, Priam has scarcely armed himself before Hecuba sees him and calls him to the altar. The arms, then, must have been somewhere near. Lastly, Polites flees, after the slaughter at the threshold, first through porticoes and then through atria, and is finally slain in the penetralia, since it is close by the altar and the Penates that he falls and perishes at the hand of Pyrrhus. Now it appears from such passages as Hom. I. VI. 242 ff. and 316, that the Homeric house had first an avλý, an open court made with porticoes, and then a large hall, the uéyapov (called also dua), in which the arms were hung, cf. Od. XIX. 4 ff. and XXII. 23 ff., and at the inner end of which the hearth was placed, cf. Od. VI. 303 ff. and XX. 122 f. This hearth, ẻσxápn, which might also be termed the altar of 'Iσrin, was the sanctuary of suppliants, cf. Od. VII. 153, and it is further clear from such passages as Eur. Med. 396 that the Deol Kтýσioι (the Greek Penates) were regularly placed in its near neighborhood, although the coì mатрo had an altar in the avλý, cf. Il. XI. 774. Vergil must have been acquainted with all these facts, and it is hard to escape the conviction that he had them in mind in this place. The description of the first glimpse of the interior (see citation) also agrees with this idea and becomes, on this basis, very lifelike and natural: a hole is burst in the door, a swift glance reveals the a¿ìý (domus intus), the μéyapov (atria) with the hearth, or altar, and the Penates at its further end (penetralia), and the eye then returns and rests upon the armed men that await them at the threshold. Moreover, the Homeric arrangement of the Penates and the hearth appears to be referred to in other passages dealing with the city of Troy and the camp of Aeneas, cf. II. 297 and V. 660; and finally, in line 503, in the very midst of the story he distinctly mentions the TEVTÝKOνта láλaμoι of II. VI. 244. The use of penetralia in line 508 does not invalidate the reasoning; for Vergil uses the word in a still more general sense of the cells of the ant, Geor. I. 379, and it may here be taken to mean that he saw the enemy invading the sanctity of his home. On the above considerations, it seems only fair to Vergil, although this view

upsets the theory held by Metcalfe, Henry, and Kappes that Vergil follows the plan of a Roman house in this place and refers to the cavaedium by cavae — aedes in line 487, to suppose that he uses the word atria in these two passages, not in its ordinary sense, but as an equivalent for the Homeric uéyapov, which appears to have also had an open roof.

The remaining citation has reference to the feast in the palace of Dido, of which he says, I. 638: mediisque parant convivia tectis; cf. the Homeric use οἱ δῶμα for μέγαρον, II. VI. 316, etc. Servius regards both this passage and the citation as having reference to the early customs of the Romans, and Metcalfe, Beck. Gal. p. 250, cites his quotation from Cato on line 726 (730) as an evidence that in the early days the atrium was the dining-room of the house. The same authority, however, on the following page cites the passage itself as an evidence that the atria of Vergil's time had become "very magnificent." This comes painfully near convicting Vergil of an anachronism; but is it necessary? We have no means of knowing what idea Vergil had of a Carthaginian house; but as Carthage was destroyed more than seventy years before he was born, and the scene is laid in Homeric times, it seems very unlikely that any factor of that kind entered into the question. On the other hand (there is hardly a page of the Aeneid which does not contain some item suggestive of Homer), the palace of Dido is represented as magnificent, I. 637, cf. Od. VII. 81 ff., the city excites the admiration of Aeneas, I. 421 f., cf. Od. VII. 43 ff., and the whole setting of the passage seems to be Homeric. Again, the μéyapov, or dŵμa, was the dininghall in which feasts were held, cf. Od. XX. 248 ff. etc., and finally, Dido, while upbraiding her faithless lover, laments that she has no little Aeneas to play in her aula, IV. 328. It does not help matters to suppose that aula here stands for atrium, as is commonly done in the case of III. 354 (Servius and Heyne seem to regard it as an avλý), although Vergil expressly says, 295, that Helenus is reigning over Grecian cities. It is much simpler to believe that Vergil is consistent (it is like him), and as he must have been acquainted with Greek houses, cf. Hor. Car. I. 3, 1-8, it seems quite probable that he conceives of Helenus as receiving his guests in an avλý such as he himself had seen. The other three passages in which aula occurs all point to an intentional use of the word as appropriate to the passage, not as a poetic makeshift — Aen. I. 140, the palace of Aeolus, cf. Od. X. 10; G. II. 504, of foreign conquests, cf. lines 487-97, which tend to give a Greek tone to the passage and suggest that the conquests are in the East; and G. IV. 202, where the bees in question are of the Greek variety, cf. 177, and therefore make an avλý, figuratively speaking, even if they do elect Quirites, 201; for the poet is not to be held to too strict an account. Again, there is abundant evidence that Vergil was a careful user of words. The huts of Carthage are called magalia, I. 421 and IV. 259, and those of Libya mapalia, G. III. 340; a Trojan in prayer speaks of the tholos of a temple, IX. 406; and even his use of thalamus (the metre forbids cubiculum and dormitorium is late) goes to show how careful he was to be consistent. In three passages it refers to a room in Dido's palace, IV. 133, 392, 495; but in fourteen (?) others, — G. IV. 189, 333, 373: Aen. II. 503; VI. 280, 397, 521, 528, 623; VII. 97; VIII. 372; X. 497: Ciris (?) 217, 512,· - with hardly an exception, the color or setting is so distinctly Greek or Trojan (Homeric) that the word seems not merely appropriate, but technically correct. In the Latin sense, 'marriage-bed,' 'marriage,'

he uses it eight times, Aen. IV. 18, 550; VII. 253, 388; IX. 591; X. 388, 648; yet all but two of these, IX. 591 and X. 388, seem to be in keeping with the other passages and both cases occur in the later books, which show other evidences of increasing freedom in dealing with his subject. It is very probable, then, that Vergil means an avλ when he uses aula; and, if he does, it seems clear that here again, in the two passages relating to Dido's palace, he has used the word atrium as an equivalent for the Homeric μéyapov. Such an explanation relieves all four of the passages from difficulty, is in strict keeping with Vergil's methods and character, and is far more natural than the supposition that he pictures the houses of his own day and then attaches usages and customs of his remote ancestors to give the whole an antique flavor. He may indeed have been influenced somewhat in his conception of ancient palaces by what he saw about him in Rome; but that is quite a different matter from supposing that he took these things as a basis rather than his Homeric sources.

I have thus far been able to find nothing in positive support of the above views. Heyne compares I. 725 with Od. I. 365, and adds below: "Non lucernas vel candelabra posuit sed lychnos, funalia . . . cf. Odyss. n, de regia Alcinoi, 100 sqq.," and he says of porticibus longis, II. 528: "Si Homerica et non sua potius tempora sequutus est, albovo av expressit, quae a¿λǹv ab utraque parte ornabat"; but his note on II. 512 and the excursus on the passage make it clear that he holds practically the common view. He says: "Graecis poetis erat ara Iovis Herei (Διός Ερκείου) in atrio aedium Priami, ἐν αὐλῇ· eam aram Virgilius in impluvium, si interiora domus ita appellare licet, transtulit . . . ut Penatium ara esset; propius hoc ad Romanum morem. v. Excurs." In the excursus he makes interiora domus refer to the peristylium of a Roman house. He does, however, recognize that there are difficulties in the passage. If Vergil means the μéyapov, all these difficulties disappear, and that he does seems to be the only logical conclusion; for, as was suggested at the beginning, he could not use a Latinized form of μévapov. In the sense of the main hall of the ȧvôpúv, the word is cited only in Homer. In Herodotus it is used of sacred edifices alone, and in later times it seems to have been confined entirely to underground caves sacred to Demeter and Persephone, in which sense it would probably have been understood by his readers, if Vergil had been bold enough to turn it into a Latin word. The best thing that he could do was to use the word atrium in its place, very much as we should use the word hall or halls to-day if writing a poem in English under similar circumstances; for it is probable that every foreign word which he used was familiar to his readers in the sense in which he used it. He accordingly used the technical term where he could do so, and translated elsewhere. Finally, the common view, that atria in the passages corresponds to avλý, loses sight of the fact that the Homeric auλý was not a room at all, but an open, unpaved court.

25. On the Accent of certain Enclitic Combinations in Greek, by Professor Francis G. Allinson, of Brown University.

This paper appears in full in the Transactions.

Professor J. Irving Manatt, of Brown University, then made some remarks on recent progress in Mycenaean archaeology.

26. Notes on the Hippolytus of Euripides, by Professor J. E. Harry, of Georgetown College.

I. THE CHARACTER OF PHAEDRA.

Down to the time of Wilamowitz-Möllendorff it was generally believed that Euripides represented Phaedra as being what she pretended to be- - a virtuous woman, who really tried to remain true to her husband, and earnestly desired that her passion for Hippolytus should not be revealed to the young man. Wilamowitz says this view is not the correct one, that Phaedra is only playing a part in her dialogue with the nurse (516-524), that she really sees through the design of her servant, and hopes that she will approach the youth for whom she has conceived such a strong passion. Kalkman follows W.-M.'s lead, and others

subscribe to the same opinion.

But, if we should adopt this view, would we not impute excessive subtlety to Euripides, as well as to Phaedra? Would we not demand too much of the audience? The average Athenian was not dull, but could he (in the brisk dialogue of Euripides) have taken all these subtle points which have escaped the scrutinizing glance of all the painstaking students, only to be discovered after the lapse of twenty-three hundred years? If this was the poet's design, and he has lacked an interpreter from that day to this, was it not too deep for even the quick-witted Athenian? Could he understand the real significance of Phaedra's words when she declared over and over again what her feelings are and what she has determined to do?

Phaedra was not spotless any more than Hippolytus, but she could not be called unchaste.

Every utterance of hers shows how she tried to stem the tide and die evkλens. Her great misfortune is not to have hearkened to the voice of reason in time. Whither her passion might have carried her (even the strongest have succumbed) we can only conjecture, for the nurse precipitates matters by revealing to Hippolytus the whole situation. That this was done without the queen's knowledge and consent is clear. That she, perhaps, intuitively divines somewhat of her servant's purpose without knowing to what lengths she would go, does not affect the question. In her present state of mind she is easily led on by the nurse. She is not able to take the lead herself until she is roused by the terrible reality, until her worst fears have been realized. Then she summons up all her strength and carries out her previous resolution, viz., to take her own life. But now her reputation is at stake, and another shall suffer as well as sheκακόν γε χατέρῳ γενήσομαι θανοῦσ ̓ (728).

This conception of Phaedra harmonizes with the circumstances attending the production of the two dramas. Euripides must have intended that his second play should be entirely changed: he could not have retained the old Phaedra without deceiving his audience, and this he would not wish his players to do; for, as Hamlet says, their business is to tell all.

1 So Puntoni De Phaedrae indole et moribus in Euripidis Hippolyto Stephanephoro, Pisa, 1884.