M. CORNELIUS FRONTO
and I altered a syllable in a word, that you paid no attention to it and thought it of no great consequence. I should be loth, therefore, for you not to know the immense difference made by one syllable. I should say Os colluere,[1] but in balneis pavimentum pelluere,[2] not colluere; I should, however, say lacrimis genas lavere,[3] not pelluere or colluere; but vestimenta lavare,[4] not lavere; again, sudorem et pulverem abluere,[5] not lavare; but it is more elegant to say maculam eluere than abluere; if, however, the stain had soaked in and could not be taken out without some damage, I should use the Plautine word elavere.[6] Then there are besides mulsum diluere,[7] fauces proluere,[8] unguium iumento subluere.[9]
5. So many are the examples of one and the same word, with the change of a syllable or letter, being used in various ways and meanings; just as, by Hercules, I should speak with a nicer accuracy of a face painted with rouge, a body splashed with mud, a cup smeared with honey, a sword-point dipped in poison, a stake daubed with bird-lime.
6. Someone maybe will ask, Who, pray, is to prevent me saying vestimenta lavere rather than lavare, sudorem lavare rather than abluere? As for you, indeed, no one will have any right to interfere with or prescribe for you in that matter, as you are a free man born of free parents, and have more than a knight's income,[† 1] and are asked your opinion in the Senate; we, however, who have dedicated ourselves in dutiful service to the ears of the cultured must
- ↑ i.e. "to rinse the mouth."
- ↑ i.e. "to swab the flagged floor in the baths."
- ↑ "To bathe the cheeks in tears."
- ↑ "To wash clothes."
- ↑ "To wash off sweat and dust."
- ↑ "To scour out."
- ↑ "To water mead."
- ↑ "To gargle the throat."
- ↑ "To scrub out a horse's frog."
- ↑ Fronto may have in mind here Hor. Ars Poet. 382-4.
