Re: IACTA ALEA EST questions

This is reasonable.  Thanks so much, James.
Daniel

On Thu, 29 Apr 2004, James Butrica wrote:

> >A colleague in the Law School asks me:
> >
> >Why did Caesar (as reported by Suetonius *Caesar 32) use the singular
> >in his famous aleatory remark?  Is there a significance to the sort of
> >game that was played with one die, as opposed to more than one?
>
> As far as I can see (haven't combed through the PHI results yet), *alea* is
> never used at all in the plural, because it designates the game, not the
> token used in it. A better question might be, why did he use *alea* at all
> instead of *tali* or *tesserae*?
>
> And it seems he might have said "Iacta alea esto" rather than *est*; at
> least that's what Erasmus apparently thought, on the basis of the relevant
> passages of Appian and Plutarch, which do involve an imperative.
>
>
> >
> >Plutarch's *Life of Caesar says that this is a proverbial expression.  Was
> >it proverbial before Caesar, or did it become proverbial between the time
> >of Caesar and Plutarch?
> >
> >Thanks for any light you can shine on these questions.
> >
> >Daniel Levine
> >Professor, Classical Studies
> >University of Arkansas
> >dlevine@xxxxxxxx
>
>
> James L. P. Butrica
> St. John's NL  A1C 5S7
> (709) 753-5799 (home)
> (709) 737-7914 (office)
>