Irenaeus Fabula 13. De Bubulco et Leone

I'm embarking on a new Latin fable project here at the Latin Via Fables blog: digitizing the 300 fables in the Mithologica sacro-profana, seu florilegium fabularum by P. Irenaeus, published in 1666, which has recently become available at GoogleBooks. For a complete index of the fables in the book, with links to the fables I've digitized so far, check out the Aesopus wiki page at Aesopus.PBwiki.com.

Today's fable is De Bubulco et Leone, the story of the cowherd who thought he wanted to find the lion who had raided his herd. In Perry's indexing system, this is Perry 49.

To make reading the fable easier, I've provided a segmented version of the story below.

Bubulcus domini sui armenta custodiens, forte amiserat viitulum; et nullo non loco quaesitum, minime inveniens, precatur Iovem, vovetque, si furem ostendat, haedum ipsi immolaturum. Non diu post offendit in saltu leonem trucem, vitulum suum devorantem: cuius aspectu et occursu perterritus, ocius aufugit; iterumque Iovi supplicans vovet, si se a tanto periculo faciat immunem, non iam vitulum, sed bovem integrum dicaturum. Indicat caecas hominum mentes, preces indiscretas, improvida consilia, nunc vota voventium, nunc retractantium, et ut plurimum sibi ipsis nociva precantium.

Bubulcus
domini sui armenta custodiens,
forte amiserat viitulum;
et nullo non loco quaesitum,
minime inveniens,
precatur Iovem,
vovetque,
si furem ostendat,
haedum ipsi immolaturum.
Non diu post
offendit in saltu leonem trucem,
vitulum suum devorantem:
cuius aspectu et occursu perterritus,
ocius aufugit;
iterumque Iovi supplicans vovet,
si se
a tanto periculo faciat immunem,
non iam vitulum,
sed bovem integrum dicaturum.
Indicat
caecas hominum mentes,
preces indiscretas,
improvida consilia,
nunc vota voventium,
nunc retractantium,
et
ut plurimum sibi ipsis
nociva precantium.

Here's an illustration for the fable (image source):

---

Aesop's Fables in Latin now available at Amazon.com.