This may be a bit late - also I'm not able to check whether anyone else has replied, so I apologise for any repetition.
A quick glance at my trusty Lewis and Short Latin dictionary tells me that 'anthrax', the Greek word for 'coal' was not the name of any specific disease in classical Latin, though it was used for large sores or carbuncles - also for dark red minerals. The Cattle Plague of Noricum, the Alpine area of Northern Italy, which is described at the end of Georgics III, is often taken to be anthrax. I think V generally tries to get his scientific facts right, but he is always more interested in making moral and religious rather than scientific points. His description: 1. The disease was baffling from the point of view of medical theory, since it seemed to combine 'fiery' and 'watery' symptoms in rapid succession, ie high fever and softening of the internal organs. We learn that distinguished scientists had tried to tackle the disease but with no success, theoretical or practical. 2. The organs then become a dense, sticky mass. When taken from sacrificial animals and placed on the altar fire, they fail to flair up. Prophecy is impossible, and general religious use of animals ceases. 3. Blood flows sluggishly from wounds. 4. Other animals beside cattle are affected. They sweat massively and their skins become dry and hard. Some die at this point. 5. Others continue with high fever and breathing difficulties. Their tongues swell and they cannot drink. Efforts at tube-feeding succeed only temporarily. 6. Convulsions occur and the animals bite themselves. They then die. 7. Cattle then succumb. The onset is often very sudden. 8. Predators avoid the stricken flocks and herds. 9. In coastal areas, there is an increase in sea-animals washed ashore. Seals seem to leave the sea for the rivers. 10. Birds fall to the ground, affected by noxious vapours. 11. Touching the skins of dead animals produces severe, possibly fatal, fevers in human beings. Some of this seems to represent gossip and panic. Still, the picture of simultaneous invasion of earth, sea and sky is very powerful. All the four books of the Georgics end with some reference to the death, usually sacrificial, of cattle. In Book I disturbing physical symptoms in sacrificial animals, sinister streaks or filaments, are mentioned. This is only an incidental detail in the main theme of the end of Book I, the human sacrifice of civil war. The disturbing analogies between animal and human sacrifice are pursued throughout the poem. Disease and political conflict are made to seem, even before biological warfare had brought them together, to be aspects of the same malevolent force, which we seek to overcome by finding a form of prayer and sacrifice that will work. The poem ends with an exotic story in which science and religion combine to defeat disease and death. Whether V really believed in this possibility is very much open to debate! - Martin Hughes On Mon, 22 Oct 2001, Salmon, Leigh Anne wrote: > Please help. I am to give a lecture on Anthrax this week. In doing my > research, I discovered that Virgil had referenced this disease in his works. > I would love someone to point out the passage, or provide me with a > translation of the passage for use in my lecture. > > Thank you for your help, > Leigh Anne Salmon, RN, BSN > Coordinator > Jefferson County Occupational Health > Courthouse > Room 825 > > ----------------------------------------------------------------------- > To leave the Mantovano mailing list at any time, do NOT hit reply. > Instead, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message > "unsubscribe mantovano" in the body (omitting the quotation marks). You > can also unsubscribe at http://virgil.org/mantovano/mantovano.htm#unsub > ----------------------------------------------------------------------- To leave the Mantovano mailing list at any time, do NOT hit reply. Instead, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message "unsubscribe mantovano" in the body (omitting the quotation marks). You can also unsubscribe at http://virgil.org/mantovano/mantovano.htm#unsub
