Note 2, 56 — A. PERSIUS FLACCUS (continued 4)

56. nam: ‘for instance.’ G., 500, R. 1.—fratres aenos: ‘brazen brotherhood’ (Gifford). There are various interpretations: 1. The gods generally (Jahn). 2. The fifty sons of Aegyptus, whose statues stood in the portico of the Palatine Apollo over against those of the fifty Danaides, Prop., 2, 31, 1 seqq.; Ov., Trist., 3, 1, 59 seqq. (Scholiast). 3. The Dioscuri. The first explanation is the best. All the gods might appear in vision, but some were more famous for such appearances than others. The very existence of the statues of the sons of Aegyptus is problematical, and their connection with dreams inexplicable (Jahn). As for the Dioscuri, they were notoriously beardless youths, apart from the fact that qui mittunt points to more than two (Casaubon).