Disputatio:Iter a Vadis Sabatiis Pisas

Nomen

You seem to have wavered a little here, Massimo! Surely Via Aemilia Scauri is correct, isn't it? Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 08:42, 12 Septembris 2007 (UTC)

my Latin is

very poor therefore I am not able to do the choice between Via Aemilia Scaura (de et en wiki) et Via Aemilia Scauri (it.wiki). I let you decide what the correct name is --Massimo Macconi 09:11, 12 Septembris 2007 (UTC).

Ah, yes, I see, I didn't notice the interwiki dispute! Well, the Italians have it right. The proper form is Via Aemilia Scauri, and I have a printed reference for it, so I'll move the article and add the reference. The grammatical logic is clear if you know where you're starting from. Aemilius (like other nomina) is a noun which can also serve as an adjective, meaning "attached to the gens Aemilia". Now there is, as we know, more than one Via Aemilia, and the obvious way to distinguish them was using the cognomen of the creator. But a cognomen is (usually) an adjective already; in this case "scaurus" means with swollen ankles. That isn't appropriate to the name of a road! So we have to use the genitive, to make it clear that this is not the Via Aemilia with swollen ankles, but the Via Aemilia of Aemilius Scaurus. Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 11:46, 12 Septembris 2007 (UTC)

thank you very much for your exhaustive and clear explanation. I'll also change the de and en.wiki--Massimo Macconi 12:02, 12 Septembris 2007 (UTC)

After all that, there seems to be no early authority for the name at all (as admitted by Smith, see link on page: he refers only to Strabo, who gives no name for the road). So I have now treated it as a road without a name. Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 19:46, 18 Iulii 2010 (UTC)