480 PROCEEDINGS OP THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 



cited by Ussing, these are instanoes in which the comparative has lost its 

 force and is used like a positive. No reader of Vitruvius is unfamiliar 

 with this frequently recurriug phenomenon (see e. g. Praun, p. 80). 

 Finally I fail to see how the example nimium penitus (211, 7) figures 

 among emphasized comparatives. It means ' too deep.' For penitus 

 modified by another adverb, see Cic. Glu. 4: tarn penitus; V. 2, 169: 

 bene penitus; and examples of nimium modifying an adverb are not 

 uncommon (cf. e.g. Cic. Cat. 1, 10 : nimium diu). 



Next we find : * The superlative is repeatedly placed parallel to a posi- 

 tive in such a way that the difference is effaced: 53, 12 : si sit optima 

 seu vitiosa ; 188, 12: quae gravissimae duraeque et insuaves sunt partes. 

 Of course there are cases where no harm is done by such a juxtaposition, 

 and where it may occur even in classical authors ; see Wolfflin, Gompara- 

 tion, p. 54 f. ; but this is not the case here.' — The selection of the two 

 Vitruvian examples is not very fortunate, because it might be thought, 

 particularly in the first, that the difference is not 'effaced.' He is there 

 recommending the use of the 'best' brick, and this is contrasted with 

 brick which is 'faulty,' though not necessarily the 'worst.' In the other 

 example, the foregoing clause should be observed. However, what 

 Ussing really means to criticise is the lack of symmetry shown in the 

 coupling of a positive with a superlative, a lack of which Cicero and 

 writers of his taste would not be guilty, and for this purpose better 

 examples had been 24, 6 : parvo brevissimoque ; 83, 15 : dignam et utilissi- 

 mam; and others cited by Praun (p. 79). This unsymmctrical coupling 

 is to be sure found very often in late Latin, particularly in the Afri- 

 cans, 16 but we must not think that there is no trace of it in early or 

 Augustan Latin. Thus we find: Plaut. Hud. 1321 : miserum istuc ver- 

 bum et pessumum ; Ter. Ph. 226: iustam facilem optumam ; Sail. Or. 

 Lepidi 1 : maxumi et clari estis ; Dec. Brutus ap. Cic. Fam. 11, 19, 2: 

 seditiosum et incertissimum. And a little later, in Velleius 2, 69: acri 

 atque prosperrimo bello. We have even the comparative and superlative 

 joined in Bell. Afr. 56, 2: inlustriores notissimique, formerly emended 

 away by Wolfflin, but allowed in his edition of 1896. 



The next set of evidences which Ussing presents is as follows : ' Among 

 the adverbs may be mentioned aliter, not in the sense of " otherwise," 

 but "differently from one another" ; 33, 24: in eo hominum congressu 

 cum profundebantur aliter e spiritu voces ; cf. 218, 23 : itaque longe 

 aliter distant descriptio7ies horologiorum locorum mutationibus ; forte = 



16 See Sittl, die lokalen Versch&denheiten, p. 101 ff. 



