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1 “Comes exterior.” In walking with a companion, the side which is most exposed was called the outer side. When three people walk together, the middle is, for the same reason, the most honorable place, and is therefore always given to the person of most distinction, interior comes.
2 “Quinte, puta, aut Publi.” A slave was no sooner made free, than he qualified himself with a surname, such as Marcus, Quintus, Publius, which carried a sort of dignity with it. The Romans saluted each other by their surnames.
3 “Pingui tentus omaso.” Furius, in a poem on the Gallic war, had said, “Iupiter hibernas cana nivo conspuet Alpes.” Horace applies it to the author himself; adding “pingui tentus omaso” in ridicule of his appearance. “Furius poeta immanis ventris, qui nivem spumam (sputum) Iovis dixit. Ideo hoc ejus persona dedit, tanquam ipse spuat.”: Sch. Acr. Orelli considers three several passages of Furius to be referred to: “rubra canicula findit infantes statuas,” is a passage in which Furius describes a statuary, and thought he had a happy expression in infantes, since statues are ἀγλώττοι. By “pingui tentus omasi”, some general opposed to Caesar is described as a voracious barbarian. “Hibernas”, etc., formed the first line of his poetical history of Caesar.
4 “Sublatus” . A word taken from a Roman custom of laying their new-born infants on the ground, and educating only those the father took up.
5 “Prima cera” signifies the first page of the will, in which the testator's name was written. “Secundo versus” was the second line, which contained the names of the heirs and co-heirs.
6 The quinqueviri were a kind of tip-staff or bailiff, in the colonies and municipal towns. A man who had passed through these little offices may well be supposed to be sufficiently knowing in what we call the practice, and from this body public notaries and registers were chosen. Horace therefore means, by “scriba recoctus”, a notary sufficiently refined in tricks and cunning of the law. Recoctus is properly double-dyed, that hath fully taken its color.
7 “Quidquid dicam, aut erit, aut non.” It is well disputed, whether these words be spoken in jest by Tiresias, to rally the monarch who consults him, or whether he too carelessly discovers his real opinion of his art. There is an acknowledged ambiguity and double meaning in his expression, under which, perhaps, the poet disguises his own sentiments of the skill of these diviners, and the frequent ambiguity of their answers.
8 Although Tiresias gives Ulysses no better reason for his wife's virtue than the avarice of her lovers, yet the monarch hears him patiently, since even this reason proves her sufficiently virtuous. Our poet probably took the hint of this passage from homer, who makes Penelope reproach her wooers with their want of generosity, and never having made her any presents. The next line is almost a translation from the Odyssey.
9 “Elata.” Carried out to the funeral pile. Ter. Andr. i. “Effertur, Imus.”
10 “Nummo addicere.” When a counterfeit sale was made of any thing left by will, the forms of law were to be observed. The buyer and seller went to a public officer called Libripens, or keeper of the scales; and the purchaser, in the presence of witnesses, put a piece of money into the scales, which the seller took out, and the sale was afterward deemed legal. Nummo addicere means here "to sell for nothing."
Horace. The Works of Horace. C. Smart. Theodore Alois Buckley. New York. Harper & Brothers. 1863.
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