The passage affords us yet another proof as to the causes that were supposed in Antiquity to condition the rise of diseases of the genitals, and we need certainly feel no surprise if we find the ætiological relations of these complaints even in professional writers wrapped in all but impenetrable obscurity.
Now what _is_ the word ἐναρέες? Some scholars take it to be Greek; and accordingly would read ἐναγέες (persons who have sinned against the godhead), as _Bouhier_ did, and perhaps _Caelius Rhodoginus_ even in his time, or else ανάριες (_imbelles, ad luctum_ veneream inepti,—unwarlike, i.e. unfit for the struggle of love), which was _Coray’s_ emendation. _Stark_ does not believe in any corruption of the word, but thinks it should be derived from ἐναίρω (_spolio_,—I rob, spoil), ἔναρα (_spolia_,—spoils), making it signify _virilitate spoliati_,—men robbed of their virility. But ἐναίρω according to _Buttmann’s_ Lexilogus, p. 276., means “to send down to Hades”, to slay, ἔναρα the spoils taken from the _slain_, and from this comes the idea of spoliation, deprivation. The word undoubtedly occurs (Homer, Iliad XXIV. 244.) in the sense of “to be slain”, but the meaning _virilitate spoliari_ (to be deprived of virility) without the addition of some supplemental word can certainly not be authenticated in old Writers. Supposing this derivation to be correct, ἐναρέες might signify simply (Temple) robbers, and as a matter of fact the glosses give ὁπλίται (warriors) as an explanation. It is a surprising thing that those who make out the νοῦσος θήλεια to have been gonorrhœa (clap), should not have derived the word from ἐάρ, the sap, the seed, with inserted ν.