Book 6
20
That Virgil removed Nola from one of his lines and substituted ora because the inhabitants of Nola had refused him water; and also some additional notes on the agreeable euphony of vowels.
20
I HAVE found it noted in a certain commentary that the following lines were first read and published by Virgil in this form: Georg. ii. 244 f. Such is the soil that wealthy Capua ploughs And Nola near Vesuvius' height. That afterwards Virgil asked the people of Nola to allow him to run their city water into his estate, which was near by, but that they refused to grant the favour which he asked; that thereupon the offended poet erased the name of their city from his poem, as if consigning it to oblivion, changing Nola to ora (region) and leaving the phrase in this form:
