1.1
Such were the memorable things in the career of Pericles, as we have received them, and now let us change the course of our narrative and tell of Fabius. It was a nymph, they say, or a woman native to the country, according to others, who consorted with Hercules by the river Tiber, and became by him the mother of Fabius, the founder of the family of the Fabii, which was a large one, and of high repute in Rome.
1.2
But some writers state that the first members of the family were called Fodii in ancient times, from their practice of taking wild beasts in pitfalls. For down to the present time fossae is the Latin for ditches, and fodere for to dig. In course of time, by a change of two letters, they were called Fabii. This family produced many great men, and from Rullus, the greatest of them, and on this account called Maximus by the Romans, the Fabius Maximus of whom we now write was fourth in descent.
1.3
He had the surname of Verrucosus from a physical peculiarity, namely, a small wart growing above his lip and that of Ovicula, which signifies Lambkin, was given him because of the gentleness and gravity of his nature when he was yet a child. Indeed, the calmness and silence of his demeanour, the great caution with which he indulged in childish pleasures, the slowness and difficulty with which he learned his lessons, and his contented submissivness in dealing with his comrades, led those who knew him superficially to suspect him of something like foolishness and stupidity. Only a few discerned the inexorable firmness in the depth of his soul, and the magnanimous and leonine qualities of his nature.
