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In dies meliora.

Getting better every day.

EMBLEMA XLV.

A bristly boar (labelled Ulterius) with a man pointing to a banner with the words PLUS OLTRE wrapped round two pillars.
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Rostra novo mihi setigeri suis[1] obtulit anno,
Haecque cliens ventri xenia, dixit, habe.
Progreditur semper, nec retrò respicit unquam,
Gramina cùm pando proruit ore vorax.
Cura viris eadem est, ne spes sublapsa retrorsum
Cedat, & ut melius sit, quod & ulterius.[2]

A dependant of mine brought me the head of a bristly boar at the New Year and said: Here is a present for your insides. - The pig always moves forwards and never looks back as it greedily tears up plants with its flat snout. - Men have the same attitude - they don’t want hopes to collapse and fall back, they do want what lies ahead also to be better.

Notes:

1.  setigeri suis, ‘of a bristly boar’. For pork as a seasonal present at the Saturnalia (17-23 December), see Martial, Epigrams, 14.71: ‘This pig, fattened on acorns among the foaming boars, will make your Saturnalia happy’.

2.  ulterius. This, the last word of the epigram, is written on the back of the boar in the pictura, where it suggests the meaning ‘ever onward’. Ulterius is sometimes used as a device of Charles V.

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Pudicitia.

Chastity

EMBLEMA XLVII.

A shield bearing a bird, leaning against a tree
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Porphyrio, domini si incestet in aedibus uxor,
Despondetque animum, praeque dolore perit.
Abdita in arcanis naturae est caussa: sit index
Sincerae haec volucris certa pudicitiae.[1]

If the wife in its master’s house is unfaithful, the moorhen despairs and dies of grief. The reason lies hidden in the secrets of nature. This bird may serve as a sure sign of untarnished chastity.

Notes:

1.  For this information about the porphyrio (purple gallinule, a kind of moorhen) see Aelian, De Natura animalium, 3.42; Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae, 9,388C: the purple gallinule ... when it is domesticated, ... keeps a sharp eye on married women and is so affected if the wife commits adultery, that it ends its life by strangling and so gives warning to its master.

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