For educational purposes I am reading a commentary on Caesar's _Bellum civile 3_ by J.M. Carter (Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 1993). Among wealth of information on Roman culture I found two notes that could be of interest for the Mantovani -- especially those reading the Bucolics.
On BC 3,4,5 (Pompey conscripting his slaves and his body of shepherds) Carter notes: _The two categories overlap, as large numbers of shepherds were slaves -- so much so that they were felt to represent a potential threat to safety. Caesar himself when he became dictator enacted that at least a third of shepherds employed by ranchers should be free adult males..._ Later, on BC 3,21,4 (Milo sent by Caelius to win over the shepherds in the country around Thurii): _shepherds: notoriously independent, tough, well-armed, and likely to be dissaffected_ What do you think, how does this information from 49. B.C. fit with Virgil's shepherds and Arcadia, _invented_ in 42. B.C? Neven ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 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
