Abstract

Everyone interested in Latin Etymology knows the last word on mehercle, that the old vocative of meus is prefixed to the old Second Declension form Herclus, Voc. -lě. Without discussing whether this explanation is wholly true or partly wrong, I wish here to disqualify two pieces of evidence. Both originate from a marginal annotation on Rufinus' translation of Eusebius' Church History in, I think, a seventh-century English MS. These marginalia were used for the Leyden Glossary and for the common source of the E E and Corpus Glossaries. The compiler of Leid. transferred them unaltered to his pages; and in the section devoted to Rufinus glosses we find Mehercule: mi fortis. The other compiler often recasts them for dictionary purposes. He gave this item the form Herculus: fortis . But of course the original annotation mi fortis was a mere lucky guess, and the substitution of ‘Herculus’ for Hercules was sheer ignorance