Book 5
8
In these verses Aen. vii. 187. Hyginus wrote Frag. 5, Fun. that Virgil was in error, alleging that he did not notice that the words ipse Quirinali lituo lacked something. For, said he, if we have not observed that something is lacking, the sentence seems to read ' girt with staff and scant shift,' which, says he,is utterly absurd; for since the lituus is a short wand, curved at its thicker end, such as the augurs use, how on earth can one be looked upon as ' girt with a lituus? '
