Annotations to James Joyce's Ulysses/Oxen of the Sun/398

Annotations

nisus formativus     (Latin) formative tendency. This was Johann Friedrich Blumenbach's term for the creative impulse (German: Bildungstrieb) which he believed all living things possessed. By attributing this to the spermatozoon, the author seems to be appropriating Blumenbach's term to describe Aristotle's theory that the semen or male principle determines the sex of the embryo: if the male principle prevails, the embryo becomes male; if the male principle is prevailed over, the embryo does not become male (i.e. a female embryo is one which was not made male).

succubitus felix     (Latin) the fertile one who has lain under [another]. If this were in the feminine (succubita felix), it could refer to a woman who has lain down passively in order to let a man mount her. However, the masculine gender and the context suggest that the expression actually refers to a happily chosen position; felix can mean happy. This may allude to Aristotle's theory that the passive female element may prevail over the male during sexual intercourse (resulting in a female embryo) if, for example, the copulating creatures face north or south.

Hyg. et Eug. Doc.     Doctor of Hygienics and Eugenics, a mock academic degree describing Mulligan's present preoccupation with hygienics and eugenics. Like Stephen's mock degree, Mulligan's suggests a Dog Latin adaptation of Divinitatis Doctor (Doctor of Divinity).

Disc. Bacc.     (Dog Latin) Disciplinis Baccalaureus, Bachelor of Discipline, a mock Latin academic degree analogous to B. A. (Artium Baccalaureus, or Bachelor of Arts). Gifford translates this as Bachelor of Discourse, but in this section the degrees conferred on the graduates generally reflect the points they are making; Crotthers attributes the demise in the calibre of the race to discipline in the home.

Bacc. Arith.     (Dog Latin) Baccalaureus Arithmeticorum, Bachelor of Arithmetic, a mock Latin academic degree analogous to B. A. (Artium Baccalaureus, or Bachelor of Arts). This particular degree is appropriate, as Lynch is proposing a law of numeration to account for everything.