sovay: (I Claudius)
sovay ([personal profile] sovay) wrote 2010-05-07 06:00 pm (UTC)

Wait, what?

According to Festus, De verborum significatu (On the Meaning of Words) 245.13—17:

pullus Iovis dicebatur Q. Fabius, cui Eburno cognomen erat propter candorem, quod eius natis fulmine icta erat. antiqui autem puerum, quem quis amabat, pullum eius dicebant.

Q. Fabius, whose cognomen was Eburnus (Ivory) on account of his fairness, was called pullus Iovis because his buttocks had been struck by lightning. The ancients referred to the boy whom someone loved as his pullus.

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