Irenaeus Fabula 15. Camelus

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 Camelus, the story of theh camel who foolishly asked Zeus to give him a pair of horns. In Perry's indexing system, this is Perry 117.

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

Camelus non ursis, non leonibus, non equis mole corporis et viribus inferior, sed solo animo, ab aliis animalibus impetitus, a Iove petiit cornua, quibus contra hostes armaretur proeliareturque. Irrisit cameli postulationem Iupiter, non ad arma natum sed ad onera servitiamque, petere cornua nec solum negavit, sed etiam aures mutilavit laceravitque, prohibuitque ne deinceps supra se conditionemque se erigeret et indebita postularet.

Camelus
non ursis, non leonibus, non equis
mole corporis et viribus inferior,
sed solo animo,
ab aliis animalibus impetitus,
a Iove petiit cornua,
quibus
contra hostes
armaretur proeliareturque.
Irrisit cameli postulationem
Iupiter,
non ad arma natum
sed ad onera servitiamque,
petere cornua
nec solum negavit,
sed etiam aures
mutilavit laceravitque,
prohibuitque
ne deinceps
supra se conditionemque
se erigeret
et indebita postularet.

Here's an illustration for the fable from an edition of Aesop's fables published in 1479 (image source):

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