From Ars Amatoria, this simple sentence:
“vir male dissumulat, tectius illa cupit.”
The role of “tectius” here I find confusing. “tectius” is a NEUTER comparative adjective of tectus, NOM or ACC case. What is it modifying? Seems like it should be “illa”, but the gender is wrong.
I’m pretty sure the sentence means something like
“The man pretends badly, the woman hides her desires”
What’s the deal here?
I think the second part means “she desires (some)thing more hidden”, if you know what I mean…
Of course! That makes perfect sense…
Thanks!
Here TECTIUS could be used as an adverb (Bennett § 76, page 42 [52]). Literally “She desires in a more hidden way” (i.e. “more discretely”)
dah why does my vocabulary suck…600 words seemed so good to me before but I can’t understand jack.
hah bravo skylax vous l’avez tué 