The familiar lupine, then, plays an critical role in demonstrating the Cynic ideal of the self-sufficient life. Clearly, then, there existed a close association between the fare of the poor and philosophic sects, the Cynics in particular, which served as a basis for satire in the Greek literary tradition, and it was the lupine especially that was singled out as representative of this link. It is comedy with a point, and considering the author's artful accumulation of images, the parody of the Cynics could not have been missed. By framing the essential message of Cynic hypocrisy with the activities surrounding the tattered tunicula and, in order that the point is in no way missed, with the prominent reference to lupines, Petronius has mounted a biting, yet humorous assault upon Cynic attitudes and behavior, all the more effectively brought to bear by using the very weaponry of the Cynics themselves. Raith, 5. 3.
All translations are the author's.
See Courtney, 17-18. The equivalent of the tribon is the Latin pallium . See Dudley, 21-22. For the association of lupines as stage money in this passage, see Panayotakis, 26-27 and references there. The collection is dated to the First or Second Century A.D. 15.