[220] Avo, generally an ancestor. Our king Aeneas himself, who sent us hither, is descended from Jove, i. e. more immediately through Venus. ‘Suprema’ is not i. q. “ultimus” v. 49, but means ‘most exalted,’ as in 10. 350, “Boreae de gente suprema.” Comp. Plaut. Most. 5. 2. 20, “quod faciunt summis nati generibus.” ‘Supremus’ is a title of Jove, like ὕψιστος, “summus:” see Forc. s. v. ‘Supremus.’ So probably Enn. A. 184, “Nomine Burrus, uti memorant, a stirpe supremo,” which Virg. perhaps imitated. “Genus ab Iove summo” 6. 123. “De gente” 5. 373.
This text is part of:
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.