в целом в западной культуре подобные термины применяются к пехоте скорее в смысле "бедняги", нежели в оскорбительном...
По поводу самой цитаты есть мнение что она, хотя и дословно верная, не передаёт смысл того, что имел в виду Плавт:
Quote:
Art. Quid in Cappadocia, ubi tu quingentos simul,
ni hebes machaera foret, uno ictu occideras?
Pyrg. At peditastelli quia erant, sivi viverent.
.
Which some people translate as:
Quote:
Ah, yes, mere infantry. Poor beggars - so I let them live.
but which is more correctly translated as:
"When you were in Cappadocia you would have killed five-hundred men with one stroke, had your sabre not been blunt?"
"Because they were mere poor infantry, I let them live"
Point is, it is a scene in his miles gloriosous, wherein a braggart soldier brags about his exploits and is ridiculed by the other for it. Anybody who translates it as "mere infantry - poor beggars" is just not doing any service to Plautus and leaves out the important context of the scene.