The Asinaria is a comedy about a young man's efforts to obtain the necessary money to buy a year of service from his beloved girl Philaenium. The servants of this adulescens are plotting to collect money from a buyer who has just acquired some asses (asini) from the young man's mother. When they succeed in executing this plan, they torment the lovers (the adulescens Argyrippus and Philaenium) and force them to beg for the money (through terms of endearment, the riding scene and the facetious deification of the servants). Only after this do they hand over the twenty minae to their young master. However, the boy's father also wants to share in the girl's services and goes to the brothel with his son. The young man's mother finds out about this and, outraged, removes her husband from this house.

The eponymous asses are an essential element of the play—they are an object of the theme of deception which allows the theme of love to evolve and the play to end happily. The asses are sold by Artemona, the young man's mother. However, some scholars have associated the asses with several characters in the play. HendersonFootnote ¹ suggests that Artemona should be seen as the ὀναγός—an ass-driver from the Greek title of the original (10). This is because she sold the asses, allowing the comedy plot to start and all the characters to appear on stage. SchwarzFootnote ² proposes that Libanus should be perceived as the ass-driver. Gellar-Goad develops this idea by implying that, during the third scene of the third act, Argyrippus ‘is ridden like an ass’Footnote ³ by this servant; he also suggests that the title perhaps refers to a merchant Pelleus who buys the donkeys from Artemona. Gellar-Goad writes that ‘several elements contribute to the assiness of this scene’Footnote ⁴—for example, the minae are metonymically called asses and Argyrippus is forced to act as an ass. He even calls the wallet containing the money for the asses an ‘assload’,Footnote ⁵ because the young man, depicted as an ass, wants to carry it as his load (onus). Gellar-Goad argues that the word onus hides a paronomastic pun alluding to the Greek ὄνος—an ass. Undoubtedly, the money in the Asinaria is referred to through the metaphor of ‘the asses’. This seems clear from the servants’ joke about taking the pole to prevent the asses from the wallet to bray (588–90).Footnote ⁶ This metonymy animates and zoomorphizes the money which begins behaving in the same way as the sold animals. This metaphor is also used in other comedies: in Persa 316–17,Footnote ⁷ money in a wallet is associated with oxen; in Truc. 654–5,Footnote ⁸ money is referred to as sheep desired by she-wolves, that is, sex-workers. The joke depends on the double meaning of the word lupae and minae: ‘the coins’ and ‘the bare-bellied sheep’.Footnote ⁹ All quoted passages mention crumina, ‘a small moneybag’ (Festus 53 Lindsay sacculi genus). However, none of these wallets could contain the aforementioned animals. As discussed by Gellar-Goad,Footnote ¹⁰ the words that refer to carrying the moneybag's load in the Asinaria (for example sustinere, 658; labor, 659; imponere, 659; baiiolare, 660; inanis, 660; pressatum umerum, 661) are deliberately chosen to contrast the small size of the moneybag and the supposed weight and size of the animals in the bag or the weight of the money inside. The terms referring to a burden are used to build an absurd joke and not to show a real, heavy load. Therefore, when Argyrippus asks the servant to put the wallet around his neck (657 hic pone, hic istam colloca cruminam in collo plane) and on his shoulders (661 ARG. quin tradis huc cruminam pressatum umerum), this does not mean that the young man is being treated as an ass carrying the burden. A crumina was usually hung around the human neck or worn over the shoulders.Footnote ¹¹ These conclusions are corroborated by the money-loading scene in the Pseudolus, where the old man Simo puts a crumina on his servant's shouldersFootnote ¹² (1315–18 PSEUD. onera hunc hominem ac me consequere hac. | SIMO egone istum onerém? PSEUD. onerabi’, scio. | SIMO quid ego huic homini faciam? satin ultro et argentum aufert et mé inridet? | PSEUD. uae uictis! SIMO uorte ergo umerum). This action is called onerare and the joke seems analogous to the joke about onus in the Asinaria. Therefore, the argument about load-carrying evidencing Argyrippus’ transformation into an ass is unconvincing. Consequently, it is important to consider whether the riding sequence in the third act of the Asinaria, when the servant mounts the young man, is really an ass ride (a donkey ride), as Gellar-Goad suggests (although he also frequently means an erotic game) or a horse ride, as other scholars indicate (for example Gray, Sergi, Slater, Henderson, Hurka, Porter).Footnote ¹³

In this scene (Asin. 697–710), there are many equine terms which suggest that we are dealing with a horseplay as opposed to an assplay.Footnote ¹⁴ First, Libanus demands to be carried on the back of Argyrippus (699 uehes pól hodie me). The young man, who is surprised by this bold request, repeats the verb uehere twice (700–1) to ensure that he understood the servant correctly. As he is subsequently blackmailed by his servant, who threatens that he will not receive the promised money, he invites Libanus to mount him (702 and 705 inscende, mirrored in the later expression descendam in line 710). The servant then admits proudly that he has subdued his master as he would tame an animal (702 sic istic solent superbi subdomari) and lectures Argyrippus about how to behave like a horse (704 nec te equo magis est equos nullus sapiens).Footnote ¹⁵ This is the line where the horse is mentioned explicitly, allowing us to associate all the above-quoted expressions (uehere, inscendere, descendere, subdomari) with equine terminology.

Line 706 adds additional lexemes to this category. Although the barley (hordeum) that is taken away from Argyrippus as a punishment for his lazy walk may have been the feed of asses and horses,Footnote ¹⁶ the expression tolutim badizas can only refer to a horse.Footnote ¹⁷ In particular, the adverb tolutim denotes the equine motion; however, the exact meaning of this word is controversial (Gray: ‘at a gallop’; Hurka: ‘im Trab’).Footnote ¹⁸ Even de Melo translates it in two distinct ways: ‘into a trot’Footnote ¹⁹ (as in the OLD) or ‘with a high-stepping gait’.Footnote ²⁰ The second translation follows the opinion of Adams who recognizes this kind of gait as ‘artificial and only acquired by training’.Footnote ²¹ The latter explanation seems more probable, as we may infer from Varro (Sat. Men. fr. 559.1–2 Astbury² sed et ecus, qui ad uehendum est natus, tamen hic traditur magistro ut, | equiso doceat tolutim) and Pliny the Elder (HN 8.166 unde equis tolutim carpere incursum traditur arte). Nevertheless, according to all of these translations, the word in question undoubtedly refers to horses. On the other hand, the verb badizo, -are, which follows tolutim, is a calque of the Greek βαδίζω,Footnote ²² ‘to walk’. In the comedies of Menander, it describes the stage motion of the characters in the play, especially their entrance and exit from the stage (Sam. 159, 258, 421, 661, 663, 680, 693; Dys. 147, 361, 589, 638, 925; Epit. 283, 376 Kassel–Schröder).Footnote ²³ Therefore, the phrase tolutim badizas excellently expresses two sides of the situationFootnote ²⁴—it refers to the gait of the horse, that is, the current role of Argyrippus, and the movement of the man, that is, the real human nature of the adulescens.

Moreover, the expression quadrupedo in line 708 also refers to the motion of a horse. UssingFootnote ²⁵ claims that it also has an adverbial function, but this differs from tolutim, which he understands as ‘at gallop’, and in his opinion quadrupedo should be understood as ‘at trot’. Ortoleva, Hurka and PorterFootnote ²⁶ interpret quadrupedo in the opposite way, as ‘at gallop’. This is corroborated by the OLD (quadrupedus, ‘of or involving galloping’). Strikingly, both expressions are repeated by Fronto in opposition to each other when he discusses the features of the literary style (Fronto, Ep. 19.13–14 van den Hout siue quadrupedo <cursu> acurrant atque exerceantur seu tolutim)Footnote ²⁷ and the artificial and ‘slow pace of Seneca's [the Younger] phrases’Footnote ²⁸ (Fronto, Ep. 153.15 van den Hout sententias eius tolutares uideo nusquam quadrupedo concitas cursu tendere). Therefore, in Fronto's letters, tolutim and tolutaris metaphorically refer to the slower gait of a horse and quadrupedo refers to a faster one. It is therefore evident that, in the Asinaria, the servant wants to take Argyrippus in gallop and consequently threatens to stir him (agitabo) with a spur (calcari). The vocabulary used in this passage belongs to horse riding. SergiFootnote ²⁹ notes that the expression aduorsom cliuom, ‘uphill’, at the end of line 708, is an equine termFootnote ³⁰ (cf. Lucil. fr. 318 Krenkel si ómne iter éuadít stadiúmque acclíue tolútim). This is mirrored in the later phrase in procliui, meaning ‘downhill’ (710).

The final expression in this scene that is worthy of examination is postidea ad pistores dabó, ut ibi cruciere currens (709). Gellar-GoadFootnote ³¹ reads this sentence as presenting the horrible fate of an ass or an enslaved person working in the mill and being tortured. His opinion of treating Argyrippus as an enslaved person evidently has value, as the young man agreed to call Libanus and Leonidas his patrons (652–3, 689–90). The comic inversion in this scene of Saturnalian spirit and the role reversal between a young master and his servants has been emphasized by Segal.Footnote ³² Furthermore, the threat of sending the enslaved person to the mill as a punishment is well known from the comedies of Plautus, Naevius, Caecilius Statius and Ennius.Footnote ³³ Additionally, asses were commonly employed in ancient mills. However, these arguments do not exclude horses as animals working in animal mills. In fact, horses were often used there,Footnote ³⁴ particularly horses that had no value and were useless in other kinds of work. Argyrippus is judged by Libanus as such a worthless animal (710 nequam es) after his attempts at trotting and galloping; consequently, his future as a horse working in the mill is very likely.Footnote ³⁵

Alongside the equine terms indicated above, the comedy offers another clue to suggest that the riding scene requires the participation of a horse rather than an ass. The hint lies within the young man's name, Argyrippus, coined on the model of Greek Ἀργύριππος. However, the name seems a humorous Plautine invention,Footnote ³⁶ because it has not been attested in Greek ancient sources.Footnote ³⁷ Nevertheless, the meaning of this name is clear: it should be understood as ‘Silverhorse’Footnote ³⁸ or ‘Horse for silver’.Footnote ³⁹ The name is undoubtedly one of a number of nomina loquentia, which point to the plot of the play: the efforts to acquire silver to buy a year of sex services. The connotations of this name with silver are underlined several times throughout the passages that allude to its etymology (74–5 nam me hodie orauit Argyrippus filius | uti sibi amanti facerem argenti copiam; 364 ní hodie Argyrippo argenti éssent uiginti minae; 732–3 animum, Argyrippe, aduorte sis. pater nos ferre hoc iussit | argentum ad té). One of the ways to obtain the money from the servants is for Argyrippus to perform horseplay for them.Footnote ⁴⁰ This is how the adulescens becomes a horse for the twenty silver minae.

To conclude: the equine terms used in the scene in question suggest a transformation of Argyrippus into a horse rather than into a donkey, and his name confirms this hypothesis. The young man is treated by Libanus as a quadruped and is even threatened to be sent to the mill, the place of punishment for the lowest enslaved servants and beasts of burden. Turning a mill was in ancient times normal work for asses, but was ‘the lowest fate to which a horse could descend’.Footnote ⁴¹ Therefore, the servant's threat seems far stronger if we assume that Argyrippus acts as a horse. Thus the threat reduces the young citizen, enslaved and humiliated by his own servant, to the lowest possible status. This inversion of power dynamics between the enslaver and the enslaved person agrees with the Saturnalian spirit of the whole scene, which reverses the conventional roles of the characters multiple times.