Bridging the Continental divide: neo-Latin and its cultural role in Jacobean Scotland, as seen in the Delitiae Poetarum Scotorum (1637)

Subtler in its suggestion than 'Classicum' (d2_MelA_023), this poem alludes to the figure of the assassin Brutus in antiquity. The use of the word 'acer' to describe the 'heart' or emotional and inner power of Brutus is ambiguous, meaning both 'stern' in quality but also 'sharp', referring perhaps to the weapons of both Lucius Brutus, who reputedly overthrew Tarquinius Superbus to found the Roman Republic in 509 BC, and Iunius Brutus, the assassin of Julius Caesar and last defender of the dying Republic. Metre: elegiac couplets.