| | Posted on Tue Nov 20, 2012 18:10:04 | |
| | In line 4, the word "ei" is not a third person dative singular masculine pronoun, rather it is the exclamatory word "ei" which also has an alternate for "hei" as is seen in the Oxford Texts. This exclamation expresses fear or dismay and can be translated as "golly," or "alas."
This point raised contention in my Catullus class in Latin V, for some believed that Catullus was using the third person pronoun to refer to himself. Instead, "mihi" should be understood with "misero" since this is the dative of separation. | |
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