Note 744 — Chapter XVI · FATHER JOVE AND MOTHER VESTA
Reading edition
The suggestion is due to Mr. M. A. Bayfield (Classical Review, xv. 1901, p. 448). He compares the similar execution of the princess Antigone (Sophocles, Antigone, 773 sqq.). However, we must remember that a custom of burying people alive has been practised as a punishment or a sacrifice by Romans, Persians, and Germans, even when the victims were not of royal blood. See Livy, xxii. 57. 6; Pliny, Nat. Hist. xxviii. 12; Plutarch, Marcellus, 3; id., Quaest. Rom. 83; Herodotus, vii. 114; J. Grimm, Deutsche Rechtsalterthümer, 3rd Ed., pp. 694 sq. As to the objection to spill royal blood, see The Golden Bough, Second Edition, i. 354 sq.