-------- Original Message --------
The translation I got for Catullus' Carmina XVI word "patice",addressed
to
Aurelius, was "catamite". In Czchech the word "patice" exists (related
to
"plugs").
Catamite, "a younger partner in a pederastic relationship between two
males"
is, surprisingly, related to Zeus's cupbearer Ganymede, through the
Romans
and Etruscans.
Nabokov must have known! Until now I merely thought of Ganymede in
connection to his mythic death and survival as set in constrast to the
waiters in Ada, its "bouteillers".
The Wikipedia information came as a bonus:
"The word catamite is derived from the Latin catamitus, itself borrowed
from
the Etruscan catmite, a corruption of the Greek Ganymedes, the boy who
was
seduced by Zeus and became his beloved and cup-bearer in Greek
mythology."