The Clothing Metaphor in Roman Depictions of Emotion

This chapter explores the clothing metaphor in Roman epic through the use of the Latin verb induo, –ere. The verb induere, meaning ‘to put on an article of dress or ornament’ – like its Greek equivalent ἐνδύω – often appears in metaphorical contexts, and one of its most significant uses is in relation to emotion.¹ The basis of my enquiry into the epic uses of induere finds its justification in Silius Italicus’ Punica 1.38-39 when Hannibal, at the start of the epic, is said to ‘clothe himself with all the wrath of the goddess [Juno]’ (iamque deae cunctas sibi belliger induit iras | Hannibal).² Here, induit deploys the idea of emotion as a figurative mantle, and prompts further considerations, not only in this particular passage but also elsewhere, about the clothing metaphor in the representation of emotional concepts. 

Textile imagery is a topos in epic poetry, either through the production of textile such as Helen’s tapestry (Il., 3.125-128) and Penelope’s φᾱρος (Od., 2.97) or ekphrasis as a poetic device.³ The evocation of woven fabric is part of a long poetic tradition that associates storytelling with weaving and stitching. Texts are etymologically defined and viewed as woven things.⁴ The purpose of this chapter is to examine the role and significance of clothing as a metaphor for inner disposition, emotion, and interiority.

Modern scholarship has made several forays into the use of textile imagery in epic. The emphasis is mostly on weaving and stitching as narrative devices, as well as cloaks and shields for their ekphrastic value.⁵ Douglas Cairns has recently gone further afield, in a recent study where he explores garment as a metaphor for emotion. The material in focus there covers mostly Homer and early Greek hexameter.⁶ The clothing metaphor, however, in the representation of emotion, and to a larger extent, of the mind or the soul, is indeed a phenomenon that exceeds the boundaries of Greek culture. One of key questions that underpins this volume is: why is dress a paradigmatic tool to represent interiority? And in our case, why is dress a privileged motif to express emotion specifically? In this chapter, I will argue that just as one can modify their appearance with clothing, so emotion can modify the content of the mind and make it ‘other’. The idea of emotion as an ‘othering’ process is one that we can find in Stoic discourse, especially Seneca, and it is this particular line of thought that helps understand the dress metaphor as an expression of emotion.⁷

In the first section, I begin by reviewing the various uses of the clothing metaphor through the verb induere. As metaphor, induere appears in the context of metamorphosis, emotion, and personified natural phenomena.⁸ I shall focus on the first two categories, where induere occurs more frequently, as an attempt to explore the possibility of epic metamorphosis as an expression of interiority. In the second section, I will examine occurrences of induere specifically in relation to emotional concepts, and the ways in which it informs Roman thought on emotion.

Part I

The origin of this enquiry into the epic uses of induo was initially prompted by Silius’ image of a Hannibal fully cloaked in divine anger (Pun., 1.38-39), which led to a fruitful detour. In Seneca, the verb induere takes on a philosophical significance, especially in his letters, when discussing the relationship between the soul and the body. In letter 92, Seneca describes the body as a cloak to the soul:

Quod de ueste dixi, idem me dicere de corpore existima. nam hoc quoque natura ut quandam uestem animo circumdedit, uelamentum eius est (Ep., 92.13)

“And you may assume that what I have said about dress applies also to the body. For nature has surrounded our soul with the body as with a sort of garment; the body is its cloak.” [Trans. R.M. Gummere]

The clothing imagery takes a further metaphorical turn in letter 94, when considering the materiality of the soul:

Nulla res magis animis honesta induit dubiosque et in prauum inclinabiles reuocat ad rectum quam bonorum uirorum conuersatio (Ep., 94.40)

“There is no better means to clothe the soul in what is honourable and call back to the right path those who are wavering and prone to corruption than the company of good men.”

This is an image already present in letter 67 when Seneca exhorts Lucilius to clothe himself in the mind of great men as a method for self-improvement:

Indue magna uiri animum et ad opinionibus uulgi secede paulisper (Ep., 67.12)

“Clothe yourself with the mind of a great man and withdraw for a while from the opinions of the common crowd.”

For the ancient mind, the soul is not a definite invariable, but quite the opposite, and one can modify or improve upon the content of the soul by changing its fabric, as it were. This is in essence the idea that the Latin verb induere appears to convey in the context of the clothing metaphor, at least in Seneca.⁹ In all these examples, the interiority of the soul is conceptualised in terms of clothing that is only visible to the eyes of the mind, and which significantly speaks to the malleability of the soul. In Seneca, there is a philosophical finality to this line of thinking. For the Stoic proficiens, to strive for progress on the road to philosophical wisdom implies that one has agency over the substance of the soul through their attitude, emotions, and behaviour.

Let us now review the main uses of the Latin verb induo, –ere, and its Greek equivalent in epic settings for comparative purposes in order to determine patterns in its occurrences, especially in relation to emotion. In its literal use, both in Latin and in Greek, induo/ἐνδύω means putting on a garment or an article of dress or ornament.¹⁰ It is also found alongside arma, when getting oneself into gear for battle, and in this case, the verb denotes putting on armour or single items such as a helmet or a shield.¹¹ In the Iliad, it is worth noting that the verb is mainly used in relation to gods getting ready for battle, mostly Athena, as well as kings (more specifically Agamemnon and Nestor).¹²

Used metaphorically, induo, –ere often appears in the context of metamorphosis – divine and mortal – , emotional concepts, and personified nature.¹³ In this chapter, I shall primarily focus on the first two categories.¹⁴ Examples of divine metamorphosis refer to gods and other deities changing their divine appearance in order to conceal themselves from the mortal gaze. One significant example of the figurative uses of induere is found in the Aeneid:

Tu faciem illius noctem non amplius unam

falle dolo, et notos pueri puer indue uultus,

ut, cum te gremio accipiet laetissima Dido

regalis inter mensas laticemque Lyaeum,

cum dabit amplexus atque oscula dulcia figet,

occultum inspires ignem fallasque ueneno.

(Aen., 1.683-688.)

“You, for no more than one night, feign by craft his appearance, and boy that you are, put on the boy’s familiar face, so that when Dido, at the height of her joy, takes you on her lap amid the royal feast and the flowing wine, when she embraces you and imprints sweet kisses, you may breathe into her a hidden fire and beguile her with your poison.” [Trans. H.R. Fairclough adapted]

Here, in one of the most notorious scenes of the Aeneid, Cupid is being personally instructed by Venus to play the part of little Ascanius, so as to surreptitiously inspire Dido with an all-consuming passion for Ascanius’ father, Aeneas. In order to do so, Cupid is told ‘indue uultus’, that is to “wear the face” of the little boy Ascanius. Face-wearing, so to speak, is remarkably evocative of the mask worn in tragedy to impersonate one or more characters.¹⁵ Tragedy, of course, because of the fatal implications that such a passion carries for Dido. The symbolic use of induere as putting on a face, like one would wear a mask in tragedy is again found, unsurprisingly, in Ovid’ Metamorphoses, when Jupiter puts on the face and dress of Diana to deceive the trust of the goddess’ attendant, Callisto, and rape her:

protinus induitur faciem cultumque Dianae

atque ait: “o comitum, uirgo, pars una mearum,

in quibus es uenata iugis?

(Met., 2.425-427.)

“At once he [Jupiter] assumed the features and dress of Diana and said:”young maiden, one of my dear companions, where on the slopes have you hunted today?”

Later on, Jupiter rehearses a similar role, that of the sexual predator, when he is again said to “wear the face of the bull” in order to lure Europa into his turf and abscond with her: induitur faciem tauri, Met., 2.850. Similarly, in Aeneid 7, Allecto puts on hoary locks and fillets as she becomes Calybe, Juno’s aged priestess, to intoxicate Turnus with a lust for war: induit albos | cum uitta crinis, 7.417-418. The verb also appears in the context of physical transformation incurred by mortal beings as the result of divine action, with the change being either temporary or permanent. At the beginning of Aeneid 7, the clothing metaphor had already been pressed into service to speak of the transformations that Circe inflicts upon men by turning them into beasts of various kinds:

quos hominum ex facie dea saeua potentibus herbis

induerat Circe in uultus ac terga ferarum.

(Aen., 7.19-20)

“These were they whom, robbing them of their human form with potent herbs, Circe, cruel goddess, had clothed in the features and frames of beasts.”

In book 11 of the Metamorphoses, Apollo is much more targeted in his punishment of Midas who denied him victory in the music contest that opposed Apollo himself to the god Pan:

… nec Delius aures

humanam stolidas patitur retinere figuram,

sed trahit in spatium uillisque albentibus inplet

instabilesque imas facit et dat posse moueri:

cetera sunt hominis, partem damnatur in unam

induiturque aures lente gradientis aselli.

(Met., 11.174-179)

“The Delian god did not suffer brutish ears to retain their human form, but lengthened them out and filled them with shaggy, grey hair; he also made them unstable at the base and gave them power to move. Human otherwise, he was punished in this, that he wore the ears of a sluggard ass.” [Trans. F.J. Miller adapted]

The function of induere shifts in divine and mortal contexts of metamorphosis to reveal or conceal divine or human identity by altering their appearance, though divine entities are endowed with far more agency than their mortal counterparts, who have virtually none. So far, induere implies figurative clothing to signify a change of physical appearance through facial features, hair, shape or form of the body, and attire. The change even crosses over the divide from human/divine to animal form. Additionally, induere is also used to denote a shift in gender identity. In Metamorphoses 8, Mestra, anxious to avoid being raped by her pursuer, implores Neptune, who had previously raped her, to come to her rescue. Neptune’s intervention results in her being turned into a fisherman to escape her aggressor:

‘eripe me domino, qui raptae praemia nobis

uirginitatis habes!’ ait: haec Neptunus habebat;

qui prece non spreta, quamuis modo uisa sequenti

esset ero, formamque nouat uultumque uirilem

induit et cultus piscem capientibus aptos.

(Met., 8.850-854)

“‘Save me from a master, O you who hold the prize of my stolen virginity’ [Mestra] said, and this Neptune had taken; although she had just been seen by her owner in hot pursuit, the god, granting her wish, changed her form and put on her the face of a man and the garments proper to a fisherman.”

The change in gender identity was already implied in a previous example, when Jupiter becomes Diana at Met., 2.425, but the text places little emphasis on gender, while here it is a key element of Mestra’s metamorphosis as she pointedly assumes (induit) uultum… uirilem, the face of a man. Whether the change is voluntary, as in the case of Mestra, or inflicted upon, as with Midas, or Circe’s victims, the metaphorical use of induere, which depicts that change as putting on a garment, points out a change of identity that makes one ‘other’. Change as ‘othering’ of the outer self is literalised with ‘face-wearing’ as when Neptune has Mestra put on the face of a man, or Cupid putting on the face of Ascanius. The procedure is again reminiscent of the mask worn in tragedy which allows the male actor to become ‘other’, whether it is a god, a slave or a woman. But one may ask to what extent does a change in appearance, even temporary, such as divine polymorphism, reflect the interiority of its subject?

The clothing metaphor speaks of change as concealment insofar as it operates as a disguise of the original form. The initial body, conceived as the visible marker of physical identity to others, appears ‘cloaked’ in its new features. We saw earlier how induere speaks of emotion like a metaphorical mantle and reveals something about the interiority of the mind. In its figurative use, therefore, induere has a liminal function, or so it appears. If we were to revisit Virgil’s passage on Circe along this line of thought, what would it tell us? The full passage is as follows:

hinc exaudiri gemitus iraeque leonum

uincla recusantum et sera sub nocte rudentum,

saetigerique sues atque in praesepibus ursi

saeuire ac formae magnorum ululare luporum,

quos hominum ex facie dea saeua potentibus herbis

induerat Circe in uultus ac terga ferarum.

(Aen., 7.15-20)

“From these shores could be heard the angry growls of lions chafing at their bonds and roaring in midnight hours, bristly boars and bears in cages raging, and huge shapes of wolves howling; these were they whom, robbing them of their human form with potent herbs, Circe, cruel goddess, had clothed in the features and frames of beasts.” [Trans. H.R. Fairclough adapted]

Virgil, here, is gesturing at the episode of the Odyssey when Circe had already turned Odysseus’ companions into swine, presumably for trespassing (Od., 10.210-243). But why is Circe said to have ‘clothed’ them in the form of beasts? Reading the Homeric episode through its Virgilian allusion and specifically induit, a link between men’s debased instincts and their beastly appearance as swine could be suggested. ‘Debased’ because at the beginning of Odyssey book 10, on their way to Ithaca, Odysseus’ crew persuaded themselves that the bag gifted by king Aeolus to Odysseus contains silver, and wanting their share they open the bag, and release the winds that send their fleet back to the island of Aeolus. This particular event is essentially what restarted Odysseus’ wanderings across the sea. A potential link therefore exists between the men’s greed and their subsequent transformation into swine. It is noteworthy that the Homeric Circe is depicted weaving on her loom when first sighted by Odysseus’ companions (Od., 10.220-223).¹⁶ In Virgil, induerat seemingly metaphorises the goddess’ woven work to speak of her alternative work as a sorceress. We could also read induerat from another angle: in the Homeric text, Circe’s passions and lascivious nature (Od., 10.296-301, 333-347) point to her appetitive soul, and could therefore the physical changes she operates in others be a reflection of her inner disposition? Whose interiority is induerat referring to?

Part II

Speaking of the passions, induere brings to the fore the clothing metaphor in the conceptualisation of emotion more explicitly elsewhere. The first example to which I would like to return is the image of Hannibal cloaked in Juno’s anger at the start of Punica 1:

Iamque deae cunctas sibi belliger induit iras

Hannibal, …

(Pun., 1.38-39)

This line is particularly significant in its use of the clothing metaphor in relation to emotion, and of emotion as an ‘othering’ process. Hannibal, here, is not only cloaked in the mantle of divine anger, he is also figuratively ‘encoding himself in the feminising language of emotion’.¹⁷ Two elements support this view. Firstly, Juno’s intertextual anger lends a feminising edge to the emotion, with which Hannibal is explicitly associated. Secondly, Seneca, in De ira, specifically frames anger as ‘a most womanish … weakness’ (ita ira muliebre maxime … vitium est, 1.20.3). Though his gender-specific view on anger may not be representative of the Stoic tradition, it reflects, nonetheless, Roman cultural discourse on certain emotional concepts. As for Hannibal, although his characterisation in the Punica is most ambivalent, in Roman Stoic terms, his surrender to violent emotions sets him rather apart from the Roman virile ethos of self-restraint, moderatio, and draws him closer to the feminising sphere of excessive passions.¹⁸

In fact, the clothing metaphor as a narrative device to describe the onslaught of emotion as ‘othering’, can be better understood when viewed through the lens of Roman Stoic thought. The power of emotion to disrupt the self beyond recognition is best exemplified in Seneca’s description of angry individuals who did not recognize themselves when faced with their own image in a mirror:

Quibusdam, ut ait Sextius, iratis profuit aspexisse speculum; perturbauit illos tanta mutatio sui ; uelut in rem praesentem adducti non agnouerunt se. Et quantulum ex uera deformitate imago illa speculo repercussa reddebat ? (Ira, 2.36.1-2)

“As Sextus remarks, it has proved beneficial to some people to see themselves in a mirror while they are angry; the great change in themselves has struck them; brought, as it were, face to face with their anger they did not recognise themselves. And how little of the real ugliness did that image reflected in the mirror disclose!” [Trans. J.W. Basore adapted]

Seneca explicitly distinguishes between the internal processes of anger which are fleshed out in terms of deformitas, a deformity of the soul, and its terrible physiological manifestations. The latter only partially translate the extent of the inner change undergone by its subject. And yet, these external signs of anger are difficult to ignore for ‘the greater it [anger] is, the more plainly it boils forth’ (quantoque maior, hoc efferuescit manifestius, Ira, 1.6). In letter 85, Seneca repeatedly cautions Lucilius against the corruptibility of emotion through its power to alter the self in order to become that emotion:¹⁹

Deinde si das aliquid iuris tristitiae, timori, cupiditati, ceteris motibus prauis, non erunt in nostra potestate. Quare ? Quia extra nos sunt, quibus inritantur. Itaque crescent, prout magnas habuerint minoresue causas, quibus concitentur. Maior erit timor, si plus, quo exterreatur, aut propius aspexerit, acrior cupiditas, quo illam amplioris rei spes euocaverit. Si in nostra potestate non est, an sint adfectus, ne illud quidem est, quanti sint ; si ipsis permisisti incipere, cum causis suis crescent tantique erunt, quanti fient. Adice nunc, quod ista, quamuis exigua sint, in maius excedunt. Numquam perniciosa seruant modum. (Ep., 85.11-12).

“If, then, you grant any scope to sadness, fear, desire, and the other depraved emotions, they will not be in our power. Why? Because the means of arousing them are external to us. Hence, they will increase in proportion to the causes by which they are stirred up are greater or lesser. Fear will be greater if what frightens it gets bigger or approaches nearer; desire will be keener, the larger the item one hopes to obtain. If it is not in our power to determine whether emotion should occur at all, then neither is the extent of their power. If you allow them to begin, they will increase as their causes increase, and their magnitude will be whatever it becomes. Besides, even the smallest feelings may grow out of control. That which is destructive never observes a limit.” [Trans. by Graver and Long with adaptations]

Here, Seneca explicitly describes the means by which emotion occurs as external to the mind (extra nos sunt). Although the experience of emotion is an internal phenomenon, the correlation between the cause for emotion, and its occurrence articulates emotions as external agents, which left unexamined, have the ability to gain ever-growing influence over the mind. This type of influence, according to Seneca, is not to be wished for because of its power in overriding one’s own uoluntas. Significantly, the development of emotion is not depicted as a process that is indigenous to its habitat, but rather as an invasive one, a most insidious force that corrupts the mind by exerting full control over it. But it is probably Seneca’s inner / outer duality in his discussion of mind as self vs. emotion as transferred influence, that best demonstrates the dynamic of emotion as an ‘othering’ process to its recipient.

I would like to add one more category of thought to the idea of emotion as an ‘othering’ concept. It is worth noting that in ancient moral reasoning, the notion of ‘other’ is often described as effeminatum, that is ‘unmanly’ or ‘womanish’, which culturally infers a weakness of some kind. Such a weakness is believed to lie in the mind’s disobedience to reason, resulting in the development of the passions.²⁰ A feeble mind is stereotypically construed in ancient terms as feminine. Seneca, for instance, expresses such a view when he praises Marcia on her lack of ‘female weakness of mind’ (Marc., 1.1) – which is why he feels compelled to warn her against excessive grief, since her disposition of mind is conducive to learning (unlike her poor female fellows).²¹ Similar examples in Seneca boast direct links between a propensity for emotion, the feeble mind, and the feminine, a view which no doubt harks back to ancient Greek philosophical discourse on women as irrational beings, and particularly prone to emotions.²² This is further reflected in the context of the clothing metaphor, where the garment as the embodiment of emotion denotes a change, abstract or concrete, across categories of being, which makes one ’other’, from divine to mortal, male to female, human/divine to animal, and vice versa.

In the Punica, Hannibal is said to wear Juno’s mantle when embracing his anger. In Thebaid 8, the horses are said to be incensed as if they had “clothed themselves” with the rage of their riders:

quid mirum caluisse uiros? flammantur in hostem

cornipedes niueoque rigant sola putria nimbo,

corpora ceu mixti dominis irasque sedentum

induerint: sic frena terunt, sic proelia poscunt

hinnitu tolluntque armos equitesque supinant.

(Theb., 8.390-394)

“What wonder that men are hot? The horses are aflame against the enemy and bathe the crumbling ground in a white shower, as though their bodies had mingled with their masters and they had put on their riders’ rage; so do they champ the bit, so neigh for battle, and rear up and throw the horsemen backwards.” [Trans. D.R. Shackleton Bailey]

In this passage, induerint creates imagery where the horses are personified through their acquisition of human emotion. In fact, by doing so, their bodies are mingled with that of their masters, and they become ‘other than’ horses: they figuratively turn into centaurs. This example is emblematic of the corruptibility and infectious nature of emotion, on which Stoic thought places so much emphasis. It also fittingly captures the idea of emotion as ‘othering’, an important point that Seneca attempts to convey in his letters.

Going back to Jupiter’s polymorphism in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, a similar interpretation could apply to Jupiter counterfeiting his own appearance to appear as the goddess Diana, or a bull. Either mantle acts as a visual, externalised expression of the othering process that desire exerts upon his mind as he turns into a sexual predator. The difference between divine and mortal beings remains that violent or excessive emotion cannot lead the gods to destruction.

While so far, we have seen that emotion can be worn as a garment, another intriguing example of the clothing metaphor is found again in the Thebaid, where it is the emotion that wears the face of its host:

ita est: veniunt. tanta autem audacia Thebis?

an dubitent, age, dum inferias et busta colamus?’

haec Pauor attonitis; uariosque per agmina uultus

induitur: nunc Pisaeis e milibus unus,

nunc Pylius, nunc ore Lacon, hostesque propinquos

adiurat turmasque metu consternat inani.

nil falsum trepidis.

(Theb., 7.125-131)

“So it is. They come. But is Thebes so bold? Well, are they to wait, look you, while we attend to funerals and sepulchres?’ Thus, Panic speaks to their bewilderment. He [Panic] takes on various guises as he goes through the host, now one of Pisa’s thousands, now a Pylian, now a Laconian by the look of him, and swears that the enemy are close, confounding the troops with vain alarm. To the frightened nothing is false.” [Trans. D.R. Shackleton Bailey]

Pauor, here, appears as a personified allegory of the emotional concept of panic.²³ In Latin, pauor denotes a type of fear significantly stronger than metus.²⁴ In this passage, panic is not an abstract emotion, but rather an external, independent entity endowed with a sense of agency. On a campaign to spread the rumour of an impending attack by the Thebans, Pauor circulates among the different factions of the Argive army, each time shifting his appearance to lend credibility to his words (adiurat). Unlike previous examples, where it is the emotion that is worn like a metaphorical garment, here it is the abstract emotion rendered poetically concrete that wears uarios uultus, the face of various soldiers, in order to borrow their voice. As such, the image externalizes the cognitive aspect inherent to the development of panic by illustrating the role that language plays in it. The fact that Pauor here acts as a substitute for Fama emphasises the emotional outcome arising from rumour that portends impending danger.²⁵ Significantly, Seneca draws a specific link between rumour and panic, highlighting the latter as the most insidious kind of fear (Epist., 13.8-9), to which Statius’ poetic imagery bears further resonance.²⁶

It is not unusual in epic for pauor to tread in Fama’s footsteps, but it is typically subordinated to Fama’s action.²⁷ Here, by shifting the focus exclusively onto Panic, and having it act as a subject of cognitive verbs (induitur…adiurat), the accent is placed on the ability of emotion to argue its way into the mind by altering one’s perception of reality. The process of face-wearing, in particular, pinpoints the idea that appearance of cause is central to the development of fear, especially panic. More specifically, Pauor’s deliberate action to mask itself with the human face, a reversed dynamic of mask-wearing in the context of tragedy, but still a mask, nonetheless, articulates panic at its inception as an intersubjective process that requires sight and hearsay in order to spread and conquer.²⁸ Pauor’s human face is a face that reflects interiority. And in terms that echo Senecan discourse on the aggressive trajectory of emotion, that interiority is very much weaponised against the Argives who are falling victims to the false belief of approaching danger.

To conclude briefly, dress is a significant and multifaceted metaphor in its illustration of emotion as an ‘othering’ process. Such a process is rendered in terms that make the inner outwardly visible through change. This is mostly articulated through a series of binaries: human/divine, human/animal, divine/animal, masculine/feminine, which all carry physiological manifestations. The verb induere, as a metaphor, opens poetic space for an ambiguous relationship between inner and outer as one reveals the other paradoxically through concealment. Even when Hannibal is the grammatical agent in ‘putting on iras’, his association with Juno through anger, feminises him, making him other than the active uir. Circe’s othering is twofold: while she actively clothes the sailors with the form of beasts revealing their inner, less-than-human emotional makeup, she also reveals her own interiority. Pauor puts on uarios uultus, the face of various men, in a manner that imitates the ubiquity of panic, which, once unleashed, extends beyond the self and rapidly contaminates others through sight and speech. Such examples unveil how the clothing metaphor is poetically harnessed to inform the workings of emotion in the ancient mind.

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Notes

1. L&S s.v. induo; see also TLL 7,1: 1262 esp. 1263, 40 for its metaphorical uses.
2. On this particular phrase, see Agri 2022, 86-87. For a discussion on anger in the Punica, see Stocks 2018.
3. Goddesses, such as Calypso and Circe, are also shown weaving at Od., 5.61-62 and 10.220-223, respectively.
4. L&S s.v. textum, which itself derives from texo, –ere, to weave; Barthes 1973, 100-101: “Texte veut dire Tissu; mais alors que jusqu’ici on a toujours pris ce tissu pour un produit, un voile tout fait, derrière lequel se tient, plus ou moins caché, le sens (la vérité), nous accentuons maintenant, dans le tissu, l’idée générative que le texte se fait, se travaille à travers un entrelacs perpétuel ; perdu dans ce tissu – cette texture – le sujet s’y défait, telle une araignée qui se dissoudrait elle-même dans les secrétions constructives de sa toile”. Correspondingly, see also Liddell-Scotts.v. ὁ ῥαψ-ῳδός, rhapsode, from ῥάπτω, to sew, and ᾠδή, song, e.g., “one who stitches or strings songs together”.
5. Most recently Fanfani et al. 2016. See also Shapiro 1980, Pantelia 1993, Rosati 1999 esp. 245-247, Bulloch 2006, Robinson 2006, Mason 2016, and Koopman 2018. On the connection between weaving and storytelling as intertwined pursuits for women in epic, see Clader 1976, Clayton 2004, and Bergren 2008.
6. Cairns 2016, 25-41.
7. On the incursion of emotion as an ‘othering’ process, see Agri 2022, 44-46.
8. All instances of induere as metaphor in the context of personified nature are listed below, n. 10.
9. For further examples, see Sen., Ben., 2.2, 2.17.
10. For occurrences of induere in its literal meaning (excluding arma, on which see note below), see Aen. 3.525-527, 11.76-79; Ov., Met., 4.481-484, 6.566-570, 6.594-600, 9.80-84, 9.157-158, 11.573-576, 11.589-591, 11.668-670, 14.45-49, 14.650; Luc. 6.654-656, 8.240; V.Fl., Arg., 2.265-266, 8.234-236; Stat. Theb., 1.82-85, 2.292-293, 4.209-210, 9.795-796, 10.65-66, 11.161; Sil. Pun. 4.13-14, 5.140, 16.240.
11. Examples of induo, –ere in the context of arma are found at: Aen., 2.391-393, 2.275, 7.638-640, 9.180, 9.365-366, 11.5-8, 11.438-440; Ov., Met., 11.382-383, 13.288-291, 14.798-799; Luc. 1.125-127, V.Fl., Arg., 4.250-251, 7.89-92, and possibly 7.371-372 where Medea is “armed” with her poisons, which could be viewed as an equivalent to arma; Theb., 6.731-734; Pun., 4.13-14, 5.140, 9.380-381, 12.561-562, 14.296-297.
12. In the Iliad, instances of ἐνδύω in its literal meaning include: 2.42-43, 5.736-737, 8.387-388, 10.21-22, 10.131.
13. Occurrences of induere in the context of personified nature include: Met., 7.280-281, Luc. 7.834-835, V.Fl., Arg., 2.19-20, 4.93-94, 4.509, Theb., 5.753, 11.43-44, Pun., 17.195.
14. Metaphorical instances of induere not directly discussed in this chapter include: Ov., Met., 11.199-204, V.Fl., Arg., 2.398-399 (on the metaphorical bonds of matrimony); Theb., 7.772; Pun., 9.545-546.
15. Many thanks to Anne-Sophie Noël for suggesting this most pertinent link. The occurrence that informs such a link in its direct filiation to tragedy is Theb., 2.94-97 where the ghost of Laius appears to Eteocles as Tiresias, on which see Parkes 2021, esp. 121.
16. On Circe at her loom, see Pantelia 1993, 497-499, who notes that Circe and Calypso (Od., 5.61-62) are the only female characters in Homer who sing while they weave.
17. Agri 2022, 86.
18. On Hannibal’s association with the feminine see Keith 2000, 92-3; Stocks 2014, 81-96 and more generally for his characterisation in the Punica. For a reading of Hannibal along the lines of Stoic thought in terms of emotion and gender, see Agri 2022, esp. 81-94.
19. Agri 2022, 44-5. On the dangers of the passions as agents external to the mind and their hegemonic nature, see also Sen., Ep., 85.13 and 116.2-3. See Plat., Tim., 43c where the environment is noted as a source of disturbance to the soul through its senses, and Arist., De an., 2.2, 413b20. Significantly, Aristotle describes perception as a process during which the external object affects the perceiving faculty, altering it to be like itself, De an., 2.5, 418 a1-5.
20. See Agri 2022, 45, n. 7-8.
21. For a discussion to bridge the gap between Seneca’s gender-moral reasoning and the Stoic theoretical view on gender equality, see Manning 1973.
22. On examples that illustrate this type of gender-moral reasoning in Seneca, see Helu., 16.1: Non est quod utaris excusatione muliebris nominis, cui paene concessum est immoderatum in lacrimas ius, non immensum tamen, “it is not for you to make use of the excuse of being a woman, who, in a way, has been granted the right to inordinate, yet not unlimited, tears.” And again, at Helu., 16.2: non potest muliebris excusatio contingere ei, a qua omnia muliebra vitia afuerunt (‘the excuse of being a woman cannot apply to one who has always lacked all the weaknesses of a woman’). On women’s propensity for emotions in ancient Greek thought, see Konstan 2006, 58, 133, 163, and 259-260.
23. Similarly, Theb., 7.108-113 (see n. 16 below), Pun., 6.556-557.
24. TLL s.v. pauor refers to intense fear, and as such it is closer to formido than metus in degree and intensity.
25. See Theb., 7.108-113 where Mars’ dispatch of Pauor is framed in terms that subsume the role of Fama: inde unum dira comitum de plebe Pauorem | quadripedes anteire iubet: non alter anhelos | insinuare metus animumque auertere ueris | aptior. innumerae monstro uocesque manusque | et facies quamcumque uelit; bonus omnia credi | auctor et horrificis lymphare incursibus urbes. (From that place, he [Mars] bids Panic, one of his dreadful companions, run ahead of his steeds: no other is better suited to instil panting fears and turn the mind away from reality. The monster has countless voices and hands and whatever face it pleases; everything is believable on his good authority and he can drive cities crazy with his terrifying assaults). Compare with Aen., 4.174-190. On similarities between Pauor and Fama, see Agri 2022, 166-167. On the concept of F/fama in Latin literature, see Hardie 2012.
26. Ep., 13.8-9: First of all, consider whether your proofs of future trouble are certain. For it is more often the case that we are troubled by our apprehensions, and that we are mocked by that mocker, rumour, which is wont to settle wars, but much more often settles individuals. Yes, my dear Lucilius; we agree too quickly with what people say. We do not put to the test those things which cause our fear; we do not examine them; we shrink back and retreat just like soldiers who are forced to abandon their camp because of a dust-cloud raised by stampeding cattle, or are thrown into a panic by the spreading of some unauthenticated rumour. And somehow or other it is the idle report that disturbs us the most. For truth has its own definite boundaries, but that which arises from uncertainty is delivered over to guesswork and the irresponsible license of a frightened mind. That is why no fear is so ruinous and so uncontrollable as panic. For other fears are groundless, but this particular fear is witless. [Trans. R.M. Gummere].
27. On the link between Fama and pauor, see Pun., 4.5-9, for instance.
28. An excellent and most intriguing example that denotes the element of intersubjectivity that is embedded in the development of panic is found at Pun., 15.735-736: cunctisque pauorem | Gallorum induerat pauor (‘the panic of the Gauls had shrouded everyone in panic’).