[565] Erulus seems to have had three lives, not, like his prototype Geryon, three bodies, though it is difficult to distinguish the conceptions, at least if Aesch. Ag. 869 foll. is right in giving Geryon a separate life for each body. If we take ‘animas’ strictly, we must suppose ‘terna arma movenda’ to be a simple consequence of the three lives: having been killed, he could get up and fight again. Preller, Röm. Myth. p. 693, comp. the story of the centaur Mares, the first inhabitant of Ausonia, told by Aelian 9. 16. Serv. gives as a choice “‘movenda’ vel contra ipsum vel ab ipso,” and Peerlkamp and Ribbeck embrace the former alternative: but Forb. remarks justly that ‘totidem exuit armis’ is in favour of the latter, which is the ordinary view.
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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. and Henry Nettleship, M.A. London. Whittaker and Co., Ave Maria Lane;. George Bell and Sons, York Street, Covent Garden. 1876.
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