DISCOVERY 



101 



from the money at stake, everyone was also a passionate 

 partisan of his particular colour. Emperors them- 

 selves were known to abuse their power in the interests 

 of their faction, and Caligula, an ardent Green, was 

 accused of poisoning the horses of the Blues. "A 

 party cry was supplied to the populace, which could 

 not understand horses and racing, but could always 

 rally to the meaningless colours. Nero or Marcus 

 Aurelius might be master of the world, the Empire 

 might be at peace or tottering in civil war and insurrec- 

 tion, the barbarians on the frontiers advancing or 

 driven back ; at Rome for high or low, free or slave, 

 men or women. Green and Blue was the one theme of 

 anxiety and hope." ^ So intense was the rivalry that 

 riots between the factions were frequent ; the most 

 notorious are those which took place in the Circus of 

 Constantinople in a.d. 552, in which 30,000 people 

 were killed, and the Emperor Justinian but narrowly 

 escaped the loss of his life and throne. 



Returning to our text, the curious phrase after 

 Victoricus' name is to be explained by magical usage. 

 Individuals in these spells are invariably denoted by 

 their mother's name, and not by a patronymic, because 

 it was of the first importance that there should be no 

 mistake as to the objective of the spell. " It is a wise 

 child," says the proverb, " who knows his own father," 

 but about the mother there can be no physical doubt. 

 In this case, however, the author of the spell was 

 evidently ignorant of the name of the mother of 

 Victoricus, and was obliged, for formal completeness, 

 to refer his ancestry to Earth, the mother of all 

 things. The names of the horses and their owners 

 are specified, and to provide for contingencies a general 

 clause is added in case some other animal from the 

 Blue stables is actually run. Horses were usually 

 given " lucky " names indicative of desirable qualities 

 or success. Thus in our list Juvenis suggests youthful 

 vigour ; Advocatus, trusty help in time of need ; 

 Bubalus, the swiftness of the gazelle ; and Eximius, 

 excellence ; while Victor, Dominatus or Dominator, 

 and Laureatus ^ (crowned with laurel) are associated 

 with victory. It was a horse called Victor owned by 

 a certain Gutta Calpurnianus, which held the amazing 

 record of 429 victories in the circus at Rome. To 

 have won a hundred races earned a horse the title of 

 Centenarius and special trappings. The names Pom- 

 peianus and Baianus are connected with the horses' 

 origin. The first may indicate that the horse was 

 reared at the place Alba Pompeia, or possibly that 

 it came from the stud of a man called Pompeius. 

 Baianus probably refers to Baias near Syracuse. In 



' Friedlander, Roman Life and Manners under the Early 

 Empire, vol, ii, p. 29. 



' See below. The name is omitted by mistake in the first 

 list of Blue horses. 



the fifth century B.C., in the time of iEschylus and 

 Herodotus, Sicily was already famous for its horses. 

 Under the early Roman Empire enormous stud farms 

 were developed in the island to meet the constant 

 demands of the circus, and " when Gregory the Great 

 was selling off the horses on the property of the Church 

 in Sicily, a mere four hundred that were to be left 

 seemed too inconsiderable to take into account." ^ 



" Bind their legs and their motion and their leaping 

 and their running, dull their eyes that they may not 

 see, twist their souls and their heart that they may 

 not breathe. As this cock is bound feet and hands 

 [sic] and head, so bind the legs and hands and head 

 and feet of Victoricus, the Blue charioteer, to-morrow 

 and the horses which he is going to drive, Juvenis and 

 Advocatus and Bubalus and Lauriatus belonging to 

 Secundinus, and Pompeianus and Baianus and Victor 

 and Eximius belonging to Victoricus, and Dominatus 

 belonging to Messala and any others which may be 

 harnessed with them." 



The deposition of the spell was evidently accom- 

 panied by the magical binding of a cock, the object 

 of which was to effect upon the familiar principle of 

 sympathetic magic a similar " binding " of Victoricus 

 and the horses. We may compare a passage in a 

 Latin magical tablet which runs : " In the same way as 

 I have twisted out and nailed down the tongue of this 

 living cock, thus may the tongues of my enemies be 

 silenced towards me." Narrative charms work upon 

 the same principle of like causing like, the narrative 

 taking the place of imitative action. Thus, headache 

 may be driven away by reciting how Headache met 

 Jesus upon the seashore, and Jesus ordered him to go 

 off into the wilds and enter into the head of a bull.* 



" Further, I conjure you by the god of the upper 

 heaven, who is seated above the Cherubim, who hath 

 put boundaries to the land and separated the sea, iao, 

 abriao, arbathiao, adonai sabao, that ye bind Vic- 

 toricus the Blue charioteer and the horses which he 

 intends to drive, Juvenis and Advocatus belonging 

 to Secundinus, and Pompeianus and Baianus and 

 Victor and Eximius belonging to Victoricus, and 

 Dominatus belonging to Messala, that they may not 

 arrive at victory to-morrow in the circus. Now ! 

 Now ! Quickly ! Quickly ! " 



The words of power here employed again show the 

 use which the magic of late classical times made of 

 Jewish religion and the Septuagint. Adonai and 

 Sabaoth are favourite divine names for such use 

 throughout the Middle Ages. Iao, it will be noticed, 

 is followed by arbitrary compounds without meaning — ■ 

 abriao, arbathiao. 



' Friedlander, op. cit., p. 25. 



' Pradel, Griechische und Suditalienische Gebete, Besch- 

 worungen und Rezepte des Miitelalters, pp. 15-16. 



