Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

[Clai Rice]

A colleague, Margaret Freeman, wrote the following paragraph in a recent
paper on "Mending Wall"

That significance, as George Monteiro (1988:126-129) has shown us, is
deeply embedded in two historical, cultural domains: the existence of a
Spanish proverbial saying (una pared entre dos vezinos guarda mas (haze
durar) la
amistad) which goes back "at least to the Middle Ages" and was recorded
by Emerson in his journal of 1832 as "A wall between both, best
preserves friendship"; and the myth of the god of boundaries, named
Terminus by the Romans, who celebrated a Terminalia festival each year
on February 23 (in early spring) when "neighbors on either side of  any
boundary gathered around the landmark" to offer sacrifice to the god and
celebrate with a feast.

The 1988 book is: Montiero, George. Robert Frost and the New England
Renaissance. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1988.

--Clai Rice

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org