Annotations to James Joyce's Ulysses/Circe/465
Annotations
[edit | edit source]virgo intacta (Latin) undefiled virgin.[1] This is the medical term for a girl or woman whose hymen is unbroken, which generally indicates that she has never had sexual intercourse.
fetor judaicus (Latin) Jewish stench.[2] It is said that the myth that Jews emit a fetid stink derives from an error (possibly deliberate) of a medieval copyist, who mistranscribed a passage by Ammianus Marcellinus, replacing Judaeorum petentium (of the attacking Jews) with Judaeorum fetentium (of the ill-smelling Jews).[3]
References
[edit | edit source]- ↑ Gifford (1988) 481.
- ↑ Gifford (1988) 481.
- ↑ Ammianus Marcellinus 22:5:5. and English.
Fishberg, Maurice (1911). The Jews: A Study of Race and Environment. London: The Walter Scott Publishing Company. p. 314. Joyce is believed to have read this book; see Ellmann (1982) 395 and note.