Menœceus was son of Creon, and in the war of the Argives against Thebes, Teresias declared that the Thebans should conquer if Menœceus would sacrifice himself for his country; and accordingly he killed himself outside the gates of Thebes.
The lines quoted by Cicero here appear to have come from the Latin play of Prometheus by Accius; the ideas are borrowed, rather than translated, from the Prometheus of Æschylus.
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From exerceo.
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Each soldier carried a stake, to help form a palisade in front of the camp.
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Insania—from in, a particle of negative force in composition, and sanus, healthy, sound.
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The man who first received this surname was L. Calpurnius Piso, who was consul, 133 b.c., in the Servile War.