[605] ‘Regificus’ is said to occur only in an imitation of this passage and of that just referred to from A. 1 in Val. Fl. 2. 652 foll.; but Enn. Andromacha fr. 9 Vahlen has “auro, ebore instructam regifice,” so that the adj. was probably one of the many compound epithets invented by the old poets, who, like their Greek predecessors, frequently cared only for one part of the compound, ‘regificus’ being regarded as = ‘regalis’ or ‘regius,’ as ‘magnificus’ was found to be virtually convertible with ‘magnus.’ “Regali luxu” 1. 637. ‘Furiarum maxuma’ is explained as a personification of Hunger by Serv., who refers to 3. 252, where the same words occur; but though Celaeno with her Prophecy of Famine illustrates and is illustrated by the office of the fiend here, there is no reason to suppose that the expression has any other but its ordinary sense, one of the Furies, conceived of as the eldest of the sisterhood, being charged with the execution of this mode of punishment. Πρέσβειρα Ἐρινύων occurs Eur. Iph. T. 963. If we suppose Virg. to have thought of three Furies, we may suppose this to be either Allecto or Megaera, Tisiphone, as we have seen v. 555, being otherwise employed. Elsewhere however, 12. 845 foll., Virg. makes the three produced at a birth. ‘Iuxta accubat’ is perhaps suggested by the Erinnys and Orestes sitting opposite to each other in Eur. 1. c.
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John Conington. P. Vergili Maronis opera. P. Vergili Maronis Opera. The works of Virgil, with a Commentary by John Conington, M.A. Late Corpus Professor of Latin in the University of Oxford. London. Whittaker and Co., Ave Maria Lane. 1876.
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