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Lucan, 39-65

"Pharsalia; Dramatic Episodes of the Civil Wars"

C. 48, along with Servilius
Isauricus. (Caesar, "De Bello Civili", iii., 1; Merivale,
chapter xvi.)
(24) In the time of the Empire, the degraded Consulship,
preserved only as a name, was frequently transferred
monthly, or even shorter, intervals from one favourite to
another.
(25) Caesar performed the solemn rites of the great Latin
festival on the Alban Mount during his Dictatorship.
(Compare Book VII., line 471.)
(26) Dyrrhachium was founded by the Corcyreams, with whom the
Homeric Phaeacians have been identified.
(27) Apparently making the Danube discharge into the Sea of Azov.
See Mr. Heitland's Introduction, p. 53.
(28) At the foot of the Acroceraunian range.
(29) Caesar himself says nothing of this adventure. But it is
mentioned by Dion, Appian and Plutarch ("Caesar", 38). Dean
Merivale thinks the story may have been invented to
introduce the apophthegm used by Caesar to the sailor, "Fear
nothing: you carry Caesar and his fortunes" (lines 662-665).
Mommsen accepts the story, as of an attempt which was only
abandoned because no mariner could be induced to undertake
it. Lucan colours it with his wildest and most exaggerated
hyperbole.
(30) See Book I., 463.
(31) The ocean current, which, according to Hecataeus, surrounded
the world. But Herodotus of this theory says, "For my part
I know of no river called Ocean, and I think that Homer or
one of the earlier poets invented the name and introduced it
into his poetry.


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