Some students have even interpreted the strategy of the Forum Augustum as phallic, "with its two semi-round galleries or exedrae as the testicles and its prolonged projecting forecourt as the shaft". In medieval Latin, a vogue for scholarly obscenity led to a perception of the dactyl, a metrical unit of verse represented - ‿ ‿, as an picture of the penis, with the lengthy syllable (longum) the shaft and the two quick syllables (breves) the testicles. The English phrase "penis" derives from penis, which originally intended "tail" but in Classical Latin was used on a regular basis as a risqué colloquialism for the male organ. There are approximately one hundred twenty recorded Latin conditions and metaphors for the penis, with the biggest category dealing with the male member as an instrument of aggression, a weapon. To Romans and Greeks, castration and circumcision have been joined as barbaric mutilations of the male genitalia. During the Republican period of time, a Lex Cornelia prohibited different kinds of mutilation, such as castration. The poetry collection referred to as the Priapea promotions with phallic sexuality, including poems spoken in the person of Priapus.
