Post-Augustan poetry from Seneca to Juvenal, / Butler, Harold Edgeworth, 1878-

LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY OF 
CALIFORNIA 

SAN DIEGO 



POST- AUGUSTAN POETRY 

FROM SENECA TO JUVENAL 



BY 

H. E. BUTLER 

FELLOW OF NEW COLLEGE 



OXFORD 

AT THE CLARENDON TRESS 
1909 



HENRY FROWDE, M.A. 

PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD 

LONDON, EDINBURGH, NEW YORK 
TORONTO AND MELBOURNE 



PREFACE 

I HAVE attempted in this book to provide 
something of an introduction to the poetical 
literature of the post-Augustan age. Although 
few of the writers dealt with have any claim to 
be called poets of the first order, and some stand 
very low in the scale of poetry, as a whole the 
poets of this period have suffered greater neglect 
than they deserve. Their undeniable weaknesses 
tend in many cases to obscure their real merits, 
with the result that they are at times either 
ignored or subjected to unduly sweeping con- 
demnation. I have attempted in these pages 
to detach and illustrate their excellences without 
in any way passing over their defects. 

Manilius and Phaedrus have been omitted on 
the ground that as regards the general character 
of their writings they belong rather to the Augustan 
period than to the subsequent age of decadence. 
Manilius indeed composed a considerable portion 
of his work during the lifetime of Augustus, while 
Phaedrus, though somewhat later in date, showed 
a sobriety of thought and an antique simplicity 
of style that place him at least a generation away 
from his contemporaries. The authorities to whose 
works I am indebted are duly acknowledged in 



iv PREFACE 

the course of the work. I owe a special debt, 
however, to those great works of reference, the 
Histories of Roman Literature by Schanz and 
Teuffel, to Friedlander's Sittengeschichte, and, for 
the chapters on Lucan and Statius, to Heitland's 
Introduction to H askings edition of Lucan and 
Legras' Theba'ide de Stace. I wish particularly 
to express my indebtedness to Professor Gilbert 
Murray and Mr. Nowell Smith, who read the 
book in manuscript and made many valuable 
suggestions and corrections. I also have to thank 
Mr. A. S. Owen for much assistance in the correc- 
tions of the proofs. 

My thanks are owing to Professor Goldwin 
Smith for permission to print translations from 
' Bay Leaves', and to Mr. A. E. Street and Mr. F. J. 
Miller and their publishers, for permission to quote 
from their translations of Martial (Messrs. Spottis- 
woode) and Seneca (Chicago University Press) 
respectively. 

H. E. BUTLER. 

November, 1908. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER I 

THE DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY. 

Main characteristics, p. 1. The influence of the principate, p. 1. 
Tiberius, p. 2. Caligula, p. 4. Claudius, p. 5. Nero, p. 6. Decay of 
Roman character, p. 9. Peculiar nature of Roman literature, p. 10. 
Greatness of Augustan poets a bar to farther advance, p. 11. Roman 
education : literary, p. 12 ; rhetorical, p. 14. Absence of true educa- 
tional spirit, p. 16. Recitations, p. 18. Results of these influences, 
p. 19. 

CHAPTER II 

DRAMA 

i. THE STAGE. Drama never really flourishing at Rome, p. 23. Comedy, 
represented by Mime and Atellan farce, p. 24. Legitimate comedy nearly 
extinct, p. 25. Tragedy replaced by salticae fabulae, p. 26 ; or musical 
recitations, p. 28. Pomponius Secundus, p. 29. Curiatius Maternus, 
p. 30. ii. SENECA : his life and character, p. 31. His position in litera- 
ture, p. 35. His epigrams, p. 36. His plays, p. 39. Their genuineness, 
p. 40. The Octavia, Oedipus, Agamemnon, and Hercules Oetaeus, p. 41. 
Date of the plays, p. 43. Their dramatic value, p. 44. Plot, p. 45. 
Descriptions, p. 48. Declamation, p. 49 ; at its best in Troades and 
Phaedra, p. 51. Dialogue, p. 55. Stoicism, p. 58. Poetry (confined 
mainly to lyrics), p. 63. Cleverness of the rhetoric, p. 65. Sententiae, 
p. 68. Hyperbole, p. 69. Diction and metre ; iambics, p. 70 ; lyrics, 
p. 71. Plays not written for the stage, p. 72. Influence on later 
drama, p. 74. iii. THE OCTAVIA. Sole example of fabula praetexta, p. 74. 
Plot, p. 75. Characteristics, p. 76. Date and authorship, p. 77. 



Life, p. 79. Works, p. 81. Influence of Lucilius, p. 83 ; of Horace, 
p. 84. Obscurity, p. 85. Qualifications necessary for a satirist ; Persius' 
weakness through lack of them, p. .87. Success in purely literary satire, 
p. 88. Lack of close observation of life, p. 90. Persius' nobility of 
character, p. 91. His Stoicism, p. 93. His capacity for friendship, p. 95. 



vi CONTENTS 

CHAPTER IV 
LUCAN 

Life, p. 97. Minor works, p. 99. His choice of a subject, p. 101. 
Choice of epic methods, p. 102. Petronius' criticism of historical epic, 
p. 103. Difficulties of the subject, p. 104. Design of the poem, p. 106. 
Characters : Pompey, p. 106. Caesar, p. 108. Cato, p. 109. Descriptive 
passages, p. 112. Hyperbole, p. 115. Irrelevance, p. 116. Lack of poetic 
vocabulary, p. 1 16. Tendency to political satire, p. 1 17. Speeches, p. 120. 
Sententiae, p. 122. Metre, p. 123. Summary, p. 123. 

CHAPTER V 

PETRONIUS 

Authorship of Satyricon ; character of Titus Petronius, p. 125. Literary 
criticism, p. 127. Attack on contemporary rhetoric, p. 128. Eumolpus 
the poet, p. 129 ; laments the decay of art, p. 130. Poem on the 
Sack of Troy, p. 130. Criticism of historical epic, p. 131. The poetic 
fragments, p. 133. Epigrams, p. 134. Question of genuineness, p. 135. 
Their high poetic level, p. 136. 

CHAPTER VI 

MINOR POETRY, 14-69 A.D. 

I. DIDACTIC POETRY. 

i. THE -4* r.\.i. Its design, p. 140. Characteristics of the poem, p. 141. 
Authorship, p. 143. Date, p. 145. ii. COLUMELLA. Life and works, p. 146. 
His tenth book, a fifth Georgic on gardening, p. 147. His enthusiasm 
and descriptive power, p. 148. 

II. CALPURNIUS SICULUS, THE EINSIEDELN FRAGMENTS, AND THE 
PANEGYRICUS IN PISONEM. 

Pastoral poetry, p. 150. Calpurnius Siculus ; date, p. 151. Who was 
he ? p. 152. Debt to Vergil, p. 152. Elaboration of style, p. 153. Ob- 
scurity, affectation and insignificance, p. 154. Einsiedeln fragments ; was 
the author Calpurnius Piso ? p. 156. Panegyricus in Pisonem, p. 157. 
Graceful elaboration, p. 158. Was the author Calpurnius Siculus ? p. 169. 

III. I i.i \- LATIN A. 

Early translations of Iliad, p. 160. Attius Labeo, p. 160. Polybius 
p. 161. Jliae Latino, a summary in verse, p. 161. Date, p. 162. Author- 
ship : the question of the acrostic, p. 162. Wrongly attributed to Silius 
Italicus, p. 163. 

IV. MINOR POETS. 
Gaetulicus, p. 163. Caesius Bassus, p. 164. 



CONTENTS vii 

CHAPTER VII 

EMPERORS AND MINOR POETS, 70-117 A.D. 

I. EMPEROBS AND POETS WHOSE WORKS ARE LOST 
Vespasian and Titus, p. 166. Domitian. The Agon Capitolinus and 
Agon Albanus, p. 167. Literary characteristics of the Flavian age, p. 168. 
Saleius Bassus, Serranus, and others, p. 169. Nerva, p. 169. Trajan, 
p. 170. Passennus Paulus, p. 170. Sentius Augurinus, p. 171. Pliny 
the Younger, p. 172. Almost entire disappearance of poetry after Hadrian, 
p. 174. 

II. SULPICIA. 

Sulpicia, a lyric poetess, p. 174. Martial's admiration for her, p. 175. 
Characteristics of her work, p. 176. Her Satire, p. 176. Is it genuine ? 
p. 177. 

CHAPTER VIII 
VALERIUS FLACCUS 

Epic in the Flavian age, p. 179. Who was Valerius ? His date, p. 180. 
The Argonautica unfinished, p. 181. Its general design, p. 182. Merits 
and defects of the Argonaut-saga as a subject for epic, p. 183. Valerius' 
debt to Apollonius Rhodius, p. 183. Novelties introduced in treatment ; 
Jason, p. 184 ; Medea, p. 185. Valerius has a better general conception 
as to how the story should be told, but is far inferior as a poet, p. 186. 
Obscure learning ; lack of humour, p. 187. Involved language, p. 188. 
Preciosity ; compression, p. 189. Real poetic merit : compared with 
Statius and Lucan, p. 191. Debt to Vergil, p. 191. Metre, p. 192. 
Brilliant descriptive power, p. 193. Suggestion of mystery, p. 193. Sense 
of colour, p. 195. Similes, p. 195. Speeches, p. 197. The loves of 
Jason and Medea, p. 198. General estimate, p. 200. 

CHAPTER IX 

STATIUS 

Life, p. 202. Character, p. 205. The Thebais ; its high average level, 
p. 206. Statius a miniature painter, p. 207. Weakness of the Theban- 
saga as a subject for epic, p. 208. Consequent lack of proportion and 
unity in Thebais, p. 210. Vergil too closely imitated, p. 211. Digressions, 
p. 212. Character-drawing superficial, p. 213. Tydeus, p. 214. Am- 
phiaraus, p. 216. Parthenopaeus and other characters, p. 218. Atmo- 
sphere that of literature rather than life, p. 220. Fine descriptive passages, 
p. 221. Dexterity, often degenerating into preciosity, p. 224. Similes, 
p. 225. Metre, p. 226. The Achilleis, p. 227. The Silvae, p. 227. Flat- 
tery of Domitian, p. 228. Extraordinary preciosity, p. 229. Prettiness 
and insincerity, p. 230. Brilliant miniature -painting, p. 232. The Oeneth- 
liacon Lucani, p. 233. Invocation to Sleep, p. 234. Conclusion, p. 235. 



viii CONTENTS 




Life, p. 236. Weakness of historical epic, p. 238. Disastrous intrusion 
of mythology, p. 239. Plagiarism from Vergil, p. 240. Skill in composi- 
tion of early books, p. 240. Inadequate treatment of closing scenes of 
the war, p. 241. The characters, p. 241. Total absence of any real 
poetic gifts, p. 242. Regulus, p. 244. The death of Paulus, p. 246. 
Fabius Cunctator, p. 247. Conclusion, p. 249. 



CHAPTER XI 

MARTIAL 

Life, p. 251. The epigram, p. 258. Martial's temperament, p. 259. 
Gift of style, p. 260. Satirical tone, good-humoured and non-moral, 
p. 261. Obscenity, p. 263. Capacity for friendship, p. 264. His dislike 
of Rome, p. 267. His love of the country, p. 268. Comparison with 
Silvae of Statins, p. 271. Flattery of Domitian, p. 271. Laments for 
the dead, p. 272. Emotion as a rule sacrificed to point, p. 275. The 
laureate of triviality, p. 276. Martial as a client, p. 277. His snobbery, 
p. 279. Redeeming features ; polish and wit, p. 281. The one perfect 
post-Augustan stylist, p. 284. Vivid picture of contemporary society, 



CHAPTER XII 

JUVENAL 

Life, p. 287. Date of satires, p. 289. Motives (Sat, i), p. 291. Themes 
of the various satires ; third satire, p. 293 ; fourth, fifth, and sixth satires, 
p. 294 ; seventh and eighth satires ; signs of waning power, p. 295 ; 
tenth satire, p. 296 ; eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth satires, 
p. 297 ; fifteenth and sixteenth satires, showing further decline of power, 
p. 298. Juvenal's narrow Roman ideals ; hatred of the foreigner, p. 299. 
Exaggeration, p. 301. Coarseness, p. 303. Vividness of description, 
p. 304. Mordant epigram and rhetoric, p. 308. Moral and religious 
ideals, p. 311. Sententiae, p. 315. Poetry, p. 316. Metre, p. 317. The 
one great poet of the Silver Age, p. 317. 



INDEX OF NAMES . . p. 321 



CHAPTER I 

THE DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY 

DURING the latter years of the principate of Augustus 
a remarkable change in literary methods and style begins 
to make itself felt. The gradual extinction of the great 
luminaries is followed by a gradual disappearance of origin- 
ality and of the natural and easy-flowing style whose 
phrases and felicities adorn, without overloading or ob- 
scuring the sense. In their place comes a straining after 
effect, a love of startling colour, produced now by over- 
gorgeous or over-minute imagery, now by a surfeit of bril- 
liant epigram, while controlling good sense and observance 
of due proportion are often absent and imitative preciosity 
too frequently masquerades as originality. Further, in too 
many cases there is a complete absence of moral enthusiasm, 
close observation, and genuine insight. 

What were the causes of this change ? Was it due mainly 
to the evil influence of the principate or to more subtle 
and deep-rooted causes ? 

The principate had been denounced as the fons et origo 
mali. 1 That its influence was for evil can hardly be denied. 
But it was rather a symptom, an outward and visible sign 
of a deep-engrained decay, which it accentuated and brought 
to the surface, but in no way originated. We are told 
that the principate ' created around itself the quiet of the 
graveyard, since all independence was compelled under 
threat of death to hypocritical silence or subterfuge ; 
servility alone was allowed to speak ; the rest submitted 
to what was inevitable, nay, even endeavoured to accom- 
modate their minds to it as much as possible.' Even if 
this highly coloured statement were true, the influence of 



1 See Teuffel and Schwabe, 272. 
B 



2 DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY I 

such tyrannical suppression of free thinking and free speak- 
ing could only have directly affected certain forms of litera- 
ture, such as satire, recent history, 1 and political oratory, 
while even in these branches of literature a wide field was 
left over which an intending author might safely range. 
The direct influence on poetry must have been exceedingly 
small. If we review the great poets of the Augustan and 
republican periods, we shall find little save certain epigrams 
of Catullus that could not safely have been produced in 
post-Augustan times. Moreover, when we turn to what is 
actually known of the attitude of the early emperors towards 
literature, the balance does not seriously incline against 
them. It may be said without hesitation of the four 
emperors succeeding Augustus that they had a genuine 
taste and some capacity for literature. 

Of two only is it true that their influence was in any 
way repressive. The principate of Tiberius is notorious 
for the silence of literature ; whether the fact is due as 
much to the character of Tiberius as to the temporary 
exhaustion of genius following naturally on the brilliance 
of the Augustan period, is more than doubtful. But 
Tiberius cannot be acquitted of all blame. The cynical 
humour with which it pleased him to mark the steady 
advance of autocracy, the lentae maxillae which Augustus 
attributed to his adopted son, 2 the icy and ironic cruelty 
which was on the most favourable estimate a not incon- 
siderable element in his character, no doubt all exercised 
a chilling influence, not only on politics but on all spon- 
taneous expression of human character. Further, we find 
a few instances of active and cruel repression. Lampoons 
against the emperor were punished with death. 3 Cremutius 
Cordus was driven to suicide for styling ' Brutus and Cassius 
the last of all the Romans '. 4 Mamercus Scaurus had the 
misfortune to write a tragedy on the subject of Atreus in 

1 Cf. Tac. Ann. i. 1. Velleius Paterculus is a good example of the 
servile historian. For an example of servile oratory cf. Tac. Ann. xvi. 28. 
* Suet, Tib. 21. 3 Dion. Ivii. 22 ; Tac. Ann. vi. 39 ; iv. 31. 

4 Tac. Ann. iv. 34. 



I DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY 3 

which he advised submission to Atreus in a version of the 
Euripidean 

ras T&V Tvpdvvtov a/za0ias cpepeiy XP^*'* 1 

He too fell a victim to the Emperor's displeasure, though 
the chief charges actually brought against him were of 
adultery with the Princess Livilla and practice of the black 
art. We hear also of another case in which obiectum est 
poetae quod in tragoedia Agamemnonem probris lacessisset 
(Suet. Tib. 61). It is worthy of notice that actors also 
came under Tiberius's displeasure. 2 The mime and the 
Atellan farce afforded too free an opportunity for impro- 
visation against the emperor. Even the harmless Phaedrus 
seems to have incurred the anger of Sejanus, and to have 
suffered thereby. 3 Nor do the few instances in which 
Tiberius appears as a patron of literature fill us with great 
respect for his taste. He is said to have given one Asellius 
Sabinus 100,000 sesterces for a dialogue between a mush- 
room, a finch, an oyster, and a thrush, 4 and to have 
rewarded a worthless writer, 5 Clutorius Priscus, for a poem 
composed on the death of Germanicus. On the other hand, 
he seems to have had a sincere love of literature, 6 though 
he wrote in a crabbed and affected style. He was a purist 
in language with a taste for archaism, 7 left a brief auto- 
biography 8 and dabbled in poetry, writing epigrams, 9 a lyric 
conquestio de morte Lucii Caesaris, 10 and Greek imitations of 
Euphorion, Rhianus, and Parthenius, the learned poets of 
Alexandria. His taste was bad : he went even farther 
than his beloved Alexandrians, awaking the laughter of his 
contemporaries even in an age when obscure mythological 
learning was at a premium. The questions which delighted 
him were ' Who was the mother of Hecuba ? ' ' What was 



1 Dion. Iviii. 24 ^aBcav ovv TOVTO 6 Ti/S/pio?, (<j) euvro> roVe TO tiros 
fff)r}, 'Arpetiy 8i TTJV ^uiK^ovlav tlvai 7Tpo(77roijo - a/ier'oy. Tac. Ann. vi. 29. 

2 ' Pulsi turn Italia histriones,' Tac. Ann. iv. 14. 

III Prol. 38 sqq., Epil. 29 sqq. * Suet. Tib. 42. 

5 Tac. Ann. iii. 49 ; Dion. Ivii. 20. 6 Suet. Tib. 70. 

7 Suet. Tib. 71. 8 Suet. Tib. 61. 

9 Suidas, s. v. KnTo-ap T(/3eptor. 10 Suet. Tib. 70. 

B 2 



4 DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY I 

the name of Achilles when disguised as a girl ? ' ' What 
did the sirens sing ? ' l Literature had little to learn from 
Tiberius, but it should have had something to gain from 
the fact that he was not blind to its charms : at the worst 
it cannot have required abnormal skill to avoid incurring 
a charge of tiae-majestt. 

The reign of the lunatic Caligula is of small importance, 
thanks to its extreme brevity. For all his madness he 
had considerable ability ; he was ready of speech to a 
remarkable degree, though his oratory suffered from extra- 
vagant ornament 2 and lack of restraint. He had, however, 
some literary insight : in his description of Seneca's rhetoric 
as merae commissioner, ' prize declamations,' and ' sand 
without lime ' he gave an admirable summary of that 
writer's chief weaknesses. 3 But he would in all probability 
have proved a greater danger to literature than Tiberius. 
It is true that in his desire to compare favourably with his 
predecessors he allowed the writings of T. Labienus, Cre- 
mutius Cordus, and Cassius Severus, which had fallen under 
the senate's ban in the two preceding reigns, to be freely 
circulated once more. 4 But he by no means abandoned 
trials for l&se-majestt. The rhetorician Cr,rinas Secundus 
was banished on account of an imprudent phrase in a 
suasoria on the hackneyed theme of tyrannicide. 5 A writer 
of an Atellan farce was burned to death in the amphi- 
theatre 6 for a treasonable jest, and Seneca narrowly escaped 
death for having made a brilliant display of oratory in 
the senate. 7 He also seriously meditated the destruction 
of the works of Homer. Plato had banished Homer from 
his ideal state. Why should not Caligula ? He was with 
difficulty restrained from doing the like for Vergil and Livy. 
The former, he said, was a man of little learning and less 
wit ; 8 the latter was verbose and careless. Even when he 
attempted to encourage literature, his eccentricity carried 

Suet. Tib. 70. 2 Suet. Col. 53. 3 Suet. Col. 53. 

4 Suet. Col. 16. 6 Dion. lix. 20. Suet. Col. 27. 

7 Dion. lix. 19. 
* Suet. Col. 34 ' nullius ingenii minimaeque doctrinae '. 



I DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY 5 

him to such extremes that the competitors shrank in horror 
from entering the lists. He instituted a contest at Lugu- 
dunum in which prizes were offered for declamations in 
Greek and Latin. The prizes were presented to the victors 
by the vanquished, who were ordered to write panegyrics 
in honour of their successful rivals, while in cases where 
the declamations were decided to be unusually poor, the 
unhappy authors were ordered to obliterate their writings 
with a sponge or even with their own tongues, under penalty 
of being caned or ducked in the Rhone. 1 

Literature had some reason to be thankful for his early 
assassination. The lunatic was succeeded by a fool, but 
a learned fool. Claudius was historian, antiquary, and 
philologist. He wrote two books on the civil war, forty- 
one on the principate of Augustus, a defence of Cicero, 
eight books of autobiography, 2 an official diary, 3 a treatise 
on dicing. 4 To this must be added his writings in Greek, 
twenty books of Etruscan history, eight of Carthaginian, 2 
together with a comedy performed and crowned at Naples 
in honour of the memory of Germanicus. 5 His style, accord- 
ing to Suetonius, was magis ineptus quam inelegans. 6 He 
did more than write : he attempted a reform of spelling, 
by introducing three new letters into the Latin alphabet. 
His enthusiasm and industry were exemplary. Such indeed 
was his activity that a special office, 7 a studiis, was estab- 
lished, which was filled for the first time by the influential 
freedman Polybius. Claudius lacked the saving grace of 
good sense, but in happier days might have been a useful 
professor : at any rate his interest in literature was whole- 
hearted and disinterested. His own writing was too feeble 
to influence contemporaries for ill and he had the merit of 
having given literature room to move. Seneca might mock 
at him after his death, 8 but he had done good service. 

1 Suet. Gal. 20. 2 For his writings generally cf. Suet. Claud. 41, 42. 
3 Tac. Ann. xiii. 43. 4 Suet. Claud. 33. 5 Suet. Claud. 11. 

6 Suet. Claud. 41. This is borne out by the fragments of the speech 
delivered at Lyons on the Gallic franchise. C. I. L. 13, 1668. 

7 Suet. Claud. 28. 8 Sc. in the Apocdocyntosis. 



DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY I 

Nero, Claudius' successor, was also a liberal, if embarrassing, 
patron of literature. His tastes were more purely literary. 
He had received an elaborate and diversified education. 
He had even enjoyed the privilege of having Seneca the 
head of the literary profession for his tutor. These in- 
fluences were not wholly for the good : Agrippina dissuaded 
him from the study of philosophy as being unsuited for 
a future emperor, Seneca from the study of earlier and 
saner orators that he might himself have a longer lease of 
Nero's admiration. 1 The result was that a temperament, 
perhaps falsely styled artistic, 2 was deprived of the solid 
nutriment required to give it stability. Nero's great ambi- 
tion was to be supreme in poetry and art as he was supreme 
in empire. He composed rapidly and with some technical 
skill, 3 but his work lacked distinction, connexion of thought, 
and unity of style. 4 Satirical 6 and erotic 6 epigrams, 
learned mythological poems on Attis and the Bacchae, 7 
all flowed from his pen. But his most famous works were 
his Troica* an epic on the Trojan legend, which he recited 
before the people in the theatre, 9 and his 'lAi'ov tfAoxris, 
which may perhaps have been included in the Troica, and 
is famous as having so scandal ran been declaimed over 
burning Rome. 10 But his ambition soared higher. He con- 
templated an epic on the whole of Roman history. It was 
estimated that 400 books would be required. The Stoic 
Annaeus Cornutus justly remarked that no one would read 
so many. It was pointed out that the Stoic's master, 
Chrysippus, had written even more. ' Yes,' said Cornutus, 
' but they were of some use to humanity.' Cornutus was 

1 Suet Ner. 52. 2 Suet. Ner. 49 ' qualis artifex pereo ! ' 

3 Suet. Ner. 52 ; Tac. Ann. xiii. 3. 4 Tac. Ann. xiv. 16. 

6 Suet Domii. I ; Tac. Ann. xv. 49 ; Suet. Ner. 24. 
Mart ix. 26. 9 ; Plin. N. H. xxxvil 50. 

7 Persius is sometimes said to quote from the Bacchae. Cf. SchoL 
Pers. Sat. i. 93-5, 99-102. But see ch. iii, p. 89. 

8 Juv. viii. 221 ; Serv. Verg. Oeorg. iii. 36, Aen. v. 370. 

9 Dion. Ixii. 29. 

10 Dion. Ixii. 18 ; Suet Ner. 38 ; Tac. Ann. xv. 39. For fragments of 
his work see Baehrens, Poet. Rom. Fraym., p. 368. 



I DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY 7 

banished, but he saved Rome from the epic. Nero was 
also prolific in speeches and, proud of his voice, often 
appeared on the stage. He impersonated Orestes matricida, 
Canace parturiens, Oedipus blind, and Hercules mad. 1 It 
is not improbable that the words declaimed or sung in these 
scenes were composed by Nero himself. 2 For the encourage- 
ment of music and poetry he had established quinquennial 
games known as the Neronia. How far his motives for so 
doing were interested it is hard to say. But there is no 
doubt that he had a passionate ambition to win the prize 
at the contest instituted by himself. In A.D. 60, on the 
first occasion of the celebration of these games, the prize 
was won by Lucan with a poem in praise of Nero. 3 Vacca, 
in his life of Lucan, states that this lost him Nero's favour, 
the emperor being jealous of his success. The story is 
demonstrably false, 4 but that Nero subsequently became 
jealous of Lucan is undoubted. Till Lucan's fame was 
assured, Nero extended his favour to him : then partly 
through Lucan's extreme vanity and want of tact, partly 
through Nero's jealousy of Lucan's pre-eminence that favour 
was wholly withdrawn. 5 Nevertheless, though Nero may 
have shown jealousy of successful rivals, he seems to have 
had sufficient respect for literature to refrain from persecu- 
tion. He did not go out of his way to punish personal 
attacks on himself. If names were delated to the senate 
on such a charge, he inclined to mercy. Even the intro- 
duction into an Atellan farce of jests on the deaths of 
Claudius and Agrippina was only punished with exile. 6 
Only after the detection of Piso's conspiracy in 65 did his 
anger vent itself on writers : towards the end of his reign 
the distinguished authors, Virginius Flavus and the Stoic 



1 Suet. Ner. 10, 21. 

2 Philostr. vit. Apoll. iv. 39 aSwi/ ra TOV N/peoroy pfXr) . . . tnijyf peXr) TCI 
fifv e 'Opeore/ay, ra 8' fj- 'A.VTtyovrjf, ra 8* onnOfvovv ra>v TpaywSouptVwi' avrm 
Kal aJSos eKcifjLiTTfv oTrocras Nepcoi> f\vyi( re KOI KOKOOJ tarpffav. 

3 Suet, vita Lucani ; see chapter on Lucan, p. 97. 

4 See chapter on Lucan, p. 98. 

5 Suet. Luc. ; Tac. Ann. xv. 49. 6 Suet. Ner. 39. 



8 DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY I 

Musonius Rufus, were both driven into exile. As for the 
deaths of Seneca and Lucan, the two most distinguished 
writers of the day, though both perished at Nero's hands, 
it was their conduct, not their writings, that brought them 
to destruction. Both were implicated in the Pisonian con- 
spiracy. If, then, Nero's direct influence on literature was 
for the bad, it was not because he was adverse : it suffered 
rather from his favour : the extravagant tastes of the 
princeps and the many eccentricities of his life and character 
may perhaps find a reflection in some of the more grotesque 
extravagances of Lucan, such for instance as the absurdly 
servile dedication of the Pharsalia. But even in this 
direction his influence was probably comparatively small. 
In view, then, of what is known of the attitude of the 
four emperors of the period most critical for Silver Latin 
literature, the period of its birth, it may be said that, on 
the worst estimate, their direct influence is not an important 
factor in the decline. 1 On the other hand, the indirect 
influence of the principate was beyond doubt evil. Society 
was corrupt enough and public life sufficiently uninspiring 
under Augustus. After the first glow of enthusiasm over 
the restoration of peace and order, and over the vindication 
of the Roman power on the frontiers of empire had passed 
away, men felt how thinly veiled was their slavery. Liberty 
was gradually restricted, autocracy cast off its mask : the 
sense of power that goes with freedom dwindled ; little 
was left to waken man's enthusiasm, and the servility 
exacted by the emperors became more and more degrading. 
Unpleasing as are the flatteries addressed to Augustus by 
Vergil and Horace, they fade into insignificance compared 
with Lucan's apotheosis of Nero ; or to take later and 
yet more revolting examples, the poems of the Silvae 

1 It may be urged that the damage lies not in the loss of poetry sup- 
pressed by the Emperor, but in the generation of a type of court poetry, 
examples of which survive in their most repulsive form in the Silvae 
of St at ins and the epigrams of Martial. The objection has its element of 
truth, but only affects a very small and comparatively unimportant 
portion of the poetry of the age. 



I DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY 9 

addressed by Statius to Domitian or his favourites. Further, 
these four emperors of the Julio-Claudian dynasty set a low 
standard of private life : they might command flattery, 
they could hardly exact respect. Two clever lunatics, a 
learned fool, and a morose cynic are not inspiring. 

Nevertheless, however unhealthy its influence may have 
been and there has been much exaggeration on this point 
it must be remembered that the principate found ready to 
its hand a society with all the seeds of decay implanted deep 
within it. Even a succession of sane and virtuous Caesars 
might well have failed, with the machinery and material 
at their disposal, to put new and vigorous life into the 
aristocracy and people of Rome. Even the encroachments 
of despotism on popular liberty must be attributed in no 
small degree to the incapacity of what should have been 
the ruling class at Rome. Despotism was in a sense forced 
upon the emperors : they were not reluctant, but, had they 
been so, they would still have had little choice. The primary 
causes of the decline of literature, as of the decay of life 
and morals, lie much deeper. The influence of princeps 
and principate, though not negligible, is comparatively small. 

The really important causes are to be found first in the 
general decay of Roman character far-advanced before 
the coming of Caesarism, secondly in the peculiar nature 
of Roman literature, and thirdly in the vicious system of 
Roman education. 

It was the first of these factors that produced the lubricity 
that defiles and the lack of moral earnestness that weakens 
such a large proportion of the literature of this age. It is 
not necessary to illustrate this point in any detail. 1 The 
record of Rome, alike in home and foreign politics, during 
the hundred and twenty years preceding the foundation 
of the principate forms one of the most fascinating, but in 
many respects one of the most profoundly melancholy 
pages in history. The poems of Catullus and the speeches 



1 See Tacitus, Dial. 28 sqq. on the moral training of a young Roman 
of his day. Also Juv. xiv. 



10 DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY I 

of Cicero serve equally to illustrate the wholesale corruption 
alike of public and private morality. The Roman character 
had broken down before the gradual inroads of an alien 
luxury and the opening of wide fields of empire to plunder. 
It is an age of incredible scandal, of mob law, of coups 
d'etat and proscriptions, saved only from utter gloom by 
the illusory light shed from the figures of a few great men 
and by the never absent sense of freedom and expansion. 
There still remained a republican liberty of action, an inspir- 
ing possibility of reform, an outlet for personal ambition, 
which facilitated the rise of great leaders and writers. And 
Rome was now bringing to ripeness fruit sprung from the 
seed of Hellenism, a decadent and meretricious Hellenism, 
but even in its decay the greatest intellectual force of the 
world. 

Wonderful as was the fruit produced by the graft of 
Hellenism, it too contained the seeds of decay. For Rome 
owed too little to early Greek epic and to the golden literature 
of Athens, too much to the later age when rhetoric had 
become a knack, and 

the love of letters overdone 
Had swamped the sacred poets with themselves. 1 

Roman literature came too late : that it reached such 
heights is a remarkable tribute to the greatness of Roman 
genius, even in its decline. With the exception of the 
satires of Lucilius and Horace there was practically no 
branch of literature that did not owe its inspiration and 
form to Greek models. Even the primitive national metre 
had died out. Roman literature more especially poetry 
was therefore bound to be unduly self-conscious and was 
always in danger of a lack of spontaneity. That Rome 
produced great prose writers is not surprising ; they had 
copious and untouched material to deal with, and prose 
structure was naturally less rapidly and less radically affected 

1 After the death of the great Augustan authors Alexandrian erudition 
becomes yet more rampant. It was a great assistance to men of second- 
rate poetical talent. 



I DECLINE OF POST- AUGUST AN POETRY 11 

by Greek influence. That she should have produced a 
Catullus, a Lucretius, a Vergil, a Horace, and most wonder- 
ful of all an Ovid was an amazing achievement, rendered 
not the less astonishing when it is remembered that the stern 
bent of the practical Roman mind did not in earlier days 
give high promise of poetry. The marvel is not wholly 
to be explained by the circumstances of the age. The new 
sense of power, the revival of the national spirit under the 
warming influence of peace and hope, that characterize the 
brilliant interval between the fall of the republic and the 
turbid stagnation of the empire, are not enough to account 
for it. Their influence would have been in vain had they 
not found remarkable genius ready for the kindling. 

The whole field of literature had been so thoroughly 
covered by the great writers of Hellas, that it was hard for 
the imitative Roman to be original. As far as epic poetry 
was concerned, Rome had poor material with which to deal : 
neither her mythology the most prosaic and business-like 
of all mythologies nor her history seemed to give any 
real scope for the epic writer. The Greek mythology was 
ready to hand, but it was hard for a Roman to treat it 
with high enthusiasm, and still harder to handle it with 
freshness and individuality. The purely historical epic 
is from its very nature doomed to failure. Treated with 
accuracy it becomes prosy, treated with fancy it becomes 
ridiculous. Vergil saw the one possible avenue to epic 
greatness. He went back into the legendary past where 
imagination could have free play, linked together the great 
heroic sagas of Greece with the scanty materials presented 
by the prehistoric legends of Rome, and kindled the whole 
work to life by his rich historical imagination and his sense 
of the grandeur of the Rome that was to be. His unerring 
choice of subject and his brilliant execution seemed to close 
to his successors all paths to epic fame. They had but 
well-worn and inferior themes wherefrom to choose, and the 
supremacy of Vergil's genius dominated their minds, becom- 
ing an obsession and a clog rather than an assistance to such 
poetic genius as they possessed. The same is true of Horace. 



12 DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY I 

As complete a master in lyric verse as Vergil in heroic, 
he left the after-comer no possibility of advance. As for 
Ovid, there could be only one Ovid : the cleverest and 
most heartless of poets, he at once challenged and defied 
imitation. Satire alone was left with real chance of success : 
while the human race exists, there will always be fresh 
material for satire, and the imperial age was destined to 
give it peculiar force and scope. Further, satire and its 
nearest kin, the epigram, were the only forms of literature 
that were not seriously impaired by the artificial system 
of education that had struck root in Rome. 

Otherwise the tendency to artificiality on the one hand 
and inadequacy of thought on the other, to which the condi- 
tions of its birth and growth exposed Roman literature, 
were aggravated to an almost incredible extent by the 
absurd system of education to which the unformed mind 
of the young Roman was subjected. It will be seen that 
what Greece gave with the right hand she took away with 
the left. 

There were three stages in Roman education, the elemen- 
tary, the literary, the rhetorical. The first, in which the 
litterator taught the three R's, does not concern us here. 
In the second stage the grammaticus gave instruction in 
Greek and Latin literature, together with the elements of 
grammar and style. The profound influence of Greece is 
shown by Quintilian's recommendation x that a boy should 
start on Greek literature, and by the fact that boys began 
with Homer. 2 Greek authors, particularly studied, were 
Aesop, Hesiod, the tragedians, and Menander. 3 Among 
Roman authors Naevius, Ennius, Pacuvius, Accius, Afranius, 
Plautus, Caecilius, and Terence were much read, though 
there was a reaction against these early authors under the 
empire, and they were partly replaced by Vergil, Horace, 
and Ovid. 4 These authors were made vehicles for the 



1 Quint, i. 1. 12. 2 Q u i n t. i. 8. 5 ; Plin. Ep. ii. 14. 

3 Quint, i. 9. 2 ; Cic. Ep. ad Fam. vi. 18. 5 ; Quint, i. 8. 6 ; Stat. Silv. ii. 
1. 114; Ov. Tr. ii. 369. * Cp. Wilkins, Rom. Education, p. 60. 



I DECLINE OF POST- AUGUSTAN POETRY 13 

teaching of grammar and of style. The latter point alone 
concerns us here. The Roman boy was taught to read 
aloud intelligently and artistically with the proper modula- 
tion of the voice. For this purpose he was carefully taught 
the laws of metre, with special reference to the peculiarities 
of particular poets. After the reading aloud (lectio) came 
the enarratio or explanation of the text. The educational 
value of this was doubtless considerable, though it was 
impaired by the importance assigned to obscure mythological 
knowledge and unscientific archaeology. 1 The pupil would 
be further instructed by exercises in paraphrase and by the 
treatment in simple essay form of themes (sententiae). 
' Great store was set both in speaking and writing on a 
command of an abundance of general truths or common- 
places, and even at school boys were trained to commit them 
to memory, to expand them, and illustrate them from 
history.' 2 Finally they were taught to write verse. Such 
at least is a legitimate inference from the extraordinary 
precocity shown by many Roman authors. 3 This literary 
training contained much that was of great value, but it 
also had grave disadvantages. There seems in the first 
place to have been too much ' spoon-feeding ', and too little 



1 Cp. Juv. vii. 231-6 ; Suet. Tib. 70. The result of this type of instruc- 
tion is visible throughout the poets of the age, whereas Vergil and the best 
of the Greek Alexandrians had a true appreciation of the sensuous charm 
of proper names and legendary allusions, as in our literature had Marlowe, 
Milton, Keats, and Tennyson. Cp. Milton, Paradise Lost, Bk. I : 

What resounds 

In fable or romance of Uther's son 

Begirt with British and Armoric knights ; 

And all who since, baptised or infidel, 

Jousted in Aspramont or Montalban, 

Damasco, or Marocco, or Trebisond, 

Or whom Biserta sent from Afric shore, 

When Charlemain with all his peerage fell 

By Fontarabia. 

Or compare Tennyson's use of the names of Arthur's battles, ' Agned 
Cathregonion ' and the ' waste sand -shore of Trath Treroit.' 

2 Wilkins, Roman Education, p. 72. 

3 See Wilkins, op. cit. p. 74. 



14 DECLINE OF POST- AUGUST AN POETRY I 

genuine brain exercise for the pupil. 1 Secondly, the fact 
that at this stage boys were nurtured almost entirely on 
poetry requires serious consideration. The quality of the 
food supplied to the mind, though pre-eminently palatable, 
must have tended to be somewhat thin. The elaborate 
instruction in mythological erudition was devoid of religious 
value ; and indeed of any value, save the training of a purely 
mechanical memory. Attention was called too much to 
the form, too little to the substance. Style has its value, 
but it is after all only a secondary consideration in education. 
The effect upon literature of this poetical training was 
twofold. It caused an undue demand for poetical colour 
in prose, and produced a horrible precocity and cacoethes 
scribendi 2 in verse, together with an abnormal tendency to 
imitation of the great writers of previous generations. 3 

But the rhetorical training which succeeded was respon- 
sible for far worse evils. The importance of rhetoric in 
ancient education is easily explained. The Greek or Roman 
gentleman was destined to play a part in the public life 
of the city state. For this purpose the art of speaking 
was of enormous value alike in politics and in the law 
courts. Hence the universal predominance of rhetoric in 
higher education both in Rome and Greece. 4 The main 
instrument of instruction was the writing of themes for 
declamation. These exercises were divided into suasoriae 
deliberative speeches in which some course of action was 
discussed and controversiae where some proposition was 
maintained or denied. Pupils began with suasoriae and 



1 Wilkins, Roman Education, p. 75. 

2 The most striking instances of this precocity are Q. Suipicius Maximus, 
who at the age of twelve and a half won the prize for Greek verse at the 
Agon Capitolinus A.D. 94 (cp. Kaibel, Epigr. Or. 618), and L. Valerius 
L. F. Pudens, aged thirteen, who won the prize for Latin verse in A.D. 106. 
Cp. C. I. L. ix. 286. 

3 For the importance attached to imitation see Quint, x. 2. 

4 The Greek rhetoricians of this period lay great stress on the importance 
of avoiding declamatory rhetoric. They belong to the Attic revival. But 
the Attic revival never really ' caught on ' at Rome ; by the time of 
Quintilian the mischief was done. 



I DECLINE OF POST- AUGUST AN POETRY 15 

went on to controversiae. Regarded as a mental gymnastic, 
these themes may have possessed some value. But they 
were hackneyed and absurdly remote from real life, as 
can be judged from the examples collected by the elder 
Seneca. Typical subjects of the suasoria are ' Aga- 
memnon deliberates whether to slay Iphigenia ' ; l ' Cicero 
deliberates whether to burn his writings, Antony having 
promised to spare him on that condition ' ; 2 ' Three hun- 
dred Spartans sent against Xerxes after the flight of troops 
sent from the rest of Greece deliberate whether to stand 
or fly.' 3 

The controversies requires further explanation. A general 
law is stated, e. g. incesta saxo deiciatur. A special case 
follows, e. g. incesti damnata antequam deiceretur invocavit 
Vestam : deiecta vixit. The special case had to be brought 
under the general rule ; repetitur ad poenam* Other 



1 Sen. Suas. 3. 2 Ib. 7. 

3 Ib. 2. I subjoin the text of the last. The author is Triarius. ' Non 
pudet Laconas ne pugna quidem hostium, sed fabula vinci ? Magnum 
est alumnum virtutis nasci et Laconem : ad certam victoriam omnes 
remansissent : ad certam mortem tantum Lacones. Non est Sparta 
lapidibus circumdata : ibi muros habet ubi viros. Melius revocabimus 
fugientes trecenos quam sequemur. Sed montes perforat, maria contegit. 
Nunquam solido stetit superba felicitas et ingentium imperiorum magna 
fastigia oblivione fragilitatis humanae conlapsa sunt. Scias licet non ad 
finem pervenisse quae ad invidiam perducta sunt. Maria terrasque, 
rerum naturam statione immutavit sua : moriamur trecenti, ut hie 
primum invenerit quod mutare non posset. Si tarn demens placiturum 
consilium erat, cur non potius in turba fugimus ? ' 

4 Latro is the author of the following treatment of the theme. 
' Hoc exspectastis ut capite demisso verecundia se ipsa antequam im- 
pelleretur deiceret ? id enim deerat ut modestior in saxo esset quam in 
sacrario fuerat. Constitit et circumlatis in frequentiam oculis sanctissi- 
mum numen, quasi parum violasset inter altaria, coepit in ipso quo vin- 
dicabatur violare supplicio : hoc alterum damnatae incestum fuit, damnata 
est quia incesta erat, deiecta est quia damnata erat, repetenda est quia 
et incesta et damnata et deiecta est, dubitari potest quin usque eo de- 
icienda sit, donee efficiatur propter quod deiecta est ? patrocinium suum 
vocat pereundi infelicitatem. Quid tibi, importuna mulier, precor nisi 
ut ne bis quidem deiecta pereas ? " Invocavi," inquit, " deos ", statuta in 
illo saxo deos nominasti, et miraris si te iterum deici volunt ? si nihil 
aliud, loco incestarum stetisti.' Sen. Cont. i. 3. 



16 DECLINE OF POST- AUGUSTAN POETRY I 

examples are equally absurd : l one and all are ridiculously 
remote from real life. It was bad enough that boys' time 
should be wasted thus, but the evil was further emphasized 
by the practice of recitation. These exercises, duly corrected 
and elaborated, were often recited by their youthful authors 
to an audience of complaisant friends and relations. Of 
such training there could be but one possible result. ' Less 
and less attention was paid to the substance of the speech, 
more and more to the language ; justness and appropriate- 
ness of thought came to be less esteemed than brilliance and 
novelty of expression.' 2 

These formal defects of education were accompanied 
by a widespread neglect of the true educational spirit. 
The development on healthy lines of the morale and intellect 
of the young became in too many instances a matter of 
indifference. Throughout the great work of Quintilian we 
have continued evidence of the lack of moral and intellectual 
enthusiasm that characterized the schools of his day. Even 
more passionate are the denunciations levelled against con- 
temporary education by Messala in the Dialogue of Tacitus. 3 
Parents neglect their children from their earliest years : they 
place them in the charge of foreign slaves, often of the most 
degraded character ; or if they do pay any personal atten- 
tion to their upbringing, it is to teach them not honesty, 
purity, and respect for themselves and their elders, but 
pertness, luxurious habits, and neglect alike of themselves 
and of others. The schools moreover, apart from their 
faulty methods and ideals of instruction, encourage other 
faults. The boys' interests lie not in their work, but in 



1 e. g. Sen. Cont. i. 7 ' Liberi parentes alant aut vinciant : quidam 
alterum fratrem tyrannum occidit, alterum in adulterio deprehensum 
deprecante patre interfecit. A piratis captus scripsit patri de redemptione. 
Pater piratis epistolam scripsit, si praecidissent manus, duplam se daturum. 
Piratae ilium dimiserunt : patrem egentem non alit.' 

2 For a brilliant description of the evils of the Roman system of educa- 
tion see Tac. Dial. 30-5. See also p. 127 for the very similar criticism of 
Petronius. 

3 cc. 28-30. Cp. also Quint, i. 2 1-8. 



I DECLINE OF POST- AUGUSTAN POETRY 17 

the theatres, the gladiatorial games, the races in the circus 
those ancient equivalents of twentieth-century athleticism. 
Their minds are utterly absorbed by these pursuits, and there 
is little room left for nobler studies. ' How few boys will 
talk of anything else at home ? What topic of conversation 
is so frequent in the lecture-room ; what other subject so 
frequently on the lips of the masters, who collect pupils 
not by the thoroughness of their teaching or by giving 
proof of their powers of instruction, but by interested visits 
and all the tricks of toadyism ? ' l Messala goes on 2 to 
denounce the unreality of the exercises in the schools, 
whose deleterious effect is aggravated by the low standard 
exacted. ' Boys and young men are the speakers, boys and 
young men the audience, and their efforts are received 
with undiscriminating praise.' 

The same faults that were generated in the schools were 
intensified in after-life. In the law courts the same smart 
epigrams, the same meretricious style were required. No true 
method had been taught, with the result that ' frivolity of 
style, shallow thoughts, and disorderly structure' prevailed; 
orators imitated the rhythms of the stage and actually 
made it their boast that their speeches would form fitting 
accompaniments to song and dance. It became a common 
saying that ' our orators speak voluptuously, while our 
actors dance eloquently '. 3 Poetical colour was demanded 
of the orator, rhetorical colour of the poet. The literary 
and rhetorical stages of education reacted on one another. 4 



1 The schoolmaster was not infrequently, it is to be feared, of doubtful 
character. Cp. the case of the famous rhetorician Remmius Palaemon. 
Cp. also Quint, i. 3. 13. 

a c. 35. 3 Tac. Died. 26. 

4 The influence of rhetoric was of course large in the Augustan age. 
Vergil and still more Ovid testify to this fact. But the tone of rhetoric 
was saner in the days of Vergil. Ovid, himself no inconsiderable influence 
on the poetry of the Silver Age, begins to show the effects of the new and 
meretricious type of rhetoric that flourished under the anti-Ciceronian 
reaction, when the healthy influence of the great orators of a saner age 
began to give way before the inroads of the brilliant but insincere epi- 
grammatic style. This latter style was fostered largely by the importance 

BUTLER Q 



18 DECLINE OF POST- AUGUSTAN POETRY I 

Further, just as the young poet had to his great detriment 
been encouraged to recite at school, so he had to recite 
if he was to win fame for his verse in the larger world. 
Even in a saner society poetry written primarily for recitation 
must have run to rhetoric ; in a rhetorical age the result 
was disastrous. In an enormous proportion of cases the 
poet of the Silver Age wrote literally for an audience. Great 
as were the facilities for publication the poet primarily 
made his name, not by the gradual distribution of his 
works among a reading public, but by declaiming before 
public or private audiences. The practice of gathering 
a circle of acquaintances together to listen to the recitations 
of a poet is said first to have been instituted by Asinius 
Pollio, the patron of Vergil. There is evidence to show 
that all the poets of the Augustan age gave recitations. 1 
But the practice gradually increased and became a nuisance 
to all save the few who had the courage to stand aloof 
from these mutual admiration societies. Indiscriminate 
praise was lavished on good and bad work alike. Even 
Pliny the younger, whose cultivation and literary taste place 
him high above the average literary level of his day, approves 
of the increase of this melancholy harvest of minor poetry 
declaimed by uninspired bards. 2 The effect was lamentable. 
All the faults of the suasoria and controversia made their 
appearance in poetry. 3 The poet had continually to be 
performing acrobatic feats, now of rhetoric or epigram, 
now of learning, or again in the description of blood-curdling 
horrors, monstrous deaths and prodigious sorceries. Each 
work was overloaded with sententiae and purple patches. 4 
So only could the author keep the attention of his audience. 



assigned to the controversia and suasoria as opposed to the more realistic 
methods of oratorical training during the last century of the republic. 

1 See Mayor on Juv. iii. 9. 

2 Cp. Juv. i. 1 sqq., iii. 9. For the enormous part played in social 
life by recitations cp. Plin. Ep. i. 13, ii. 19, iv. 5, 27, v. 12, vi. 2, 17, 21, 
viii. 21. 

3 Cp. especially the speeches of Lucan. 

4 For some very just criticism on this head cp. Quint, viii. 5. 25 sqq. 



I DECLINE OF POST- AUGUSTAN POETRY 19 

The results were disastrous for literature and not too satis- 
factory 1 for the authors themselves, as the following curious 
passage from Tacitus (Dial. 9) shows : 

Bassus is a genuine poet, and his verse possesses both beauty and 
charm : but the only result is that, when after a whole year, working 
every day and often well into the night, he has hammered out one 
book of poems, he must needs go about requesting people to be 
good enough to give him a hearing : and what is more he has to 
pay for it : for he borrows a house, constructs an auditorium, 
hires benches and distributes programmes. And then admitting 
his recitations to be highly successful yet all that honour and 
glory falls within one or two days, prematurely gathered like grass 
in the blade or flowers in their earliest bloom : it has no sure or 
solid reward, wins no friendship or following or lasting gratitude, 
naught save a transient applause, empty words of praise and a 
fleeting enthusiasm. 

The less fortunate poet had to betake himself to the 
forum or the public baths or some temple, there to inflict 
his tawdry wares upon the ears of a chance audience. 2 
Others more fortunate would be lent a room by some rich 
patron. 3 Under Nero and Domitian we get the apotheosis 
of recitation. Nero, we have seen, established the Neronia 
in 60 and himself competed. Domitian established a quin- 
quennial competition in honour of Jupiter Capitolinus in 86 
and an annual competition held every Quinquatria Minervae 
at his palace on the Alban mount. 4 From that time forward 
it became the ambition of every poet to be crowned at these 
grotesque competitions. 

The result of all these co-operating influences will be evident 
as we deal with the individual poets. Here we can only 
give a brief summary of the general characteristics of this 



1 For amusing instances of rudeness on the part of members of the 
audience cp. Sen. Ep. cxxii. 11 ; Plin. Ep. vi. 15. 

2 Petr. 83, 88-91, 115. Mart. iii. 44. 10 ' et stanti legis et legis cacanti. ] 
in thermas f ugio : sonas ad aurem. | piscinam peto : non licet natare. | ad 
cenam propero : tones euntem. I ad cenam venio : f ugas sedentem. | lassus 
dormio : suscitas iacentem.' Cp. also 3, 50 and passim. Plin. Ep. vi. 
15 ; Juv. i. 1-21 ; iii. 6-9 ; vii. 39 sqq. 

3 Plin. Ep. viii. 12. 4 Suet, Dom. 4, 

C 2 



20 DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY I 

fantastic literature. We have a striving after originality 
that ends in eccentricity : writers were steeped in the great 
poets of the Augustan age : men of comparatively small 
creative imagination, but, thanks to their education, possessed 
of great technical skill, they ran into violent extremes to 
avoid the charge of imitating the great predecessors whom 
they could not help but imitate ; hence the obscurity of 
Persius the disciple of Horace and of Statius and Valerius 
Flaccus the followers of Vergil. Hence Lucan's bold 
attempt to strike out a new type of epic, an attempt that 
ended in a wild orgy of brilliant yet turbid rhetoric. The 
simple and natural was at a discount : brilliance of point, 
bombastic description, gorgeous colour were preferred to 
quiet power. Alexandrian learning, already too much in 
evidence in the Augustan age, becomes more prominent 
and more oppressive. For men of second-rate talent it 
served to give their work a spurious air of depth and origin- 
ality to which it was not entitled. The necessity of patronage 
engendered a fulsome flattery, while the false tone of the 
schools of rhetoric, 1 aided perhaps by the influence of the 
Stoical training so fashionable at Rome, led to a marvellous 
conceit and self-complacency, of which a lack of humour 
was a necessary corollary. These symptoms are seen at 
their worst during the extravagant reign of Nero, though the 
blame attaches as much to Seneca as to his pupil and 
emperor. Traces of a reaction against this wild unreality 
are perhaps to be found in the literary criticism scattered 
up and down the pages of Petronius, 2 but it was not till 
the extinction of Nero and Seneca that any strong revolt 
in the direction of sanity can be traced. Even then it is 
rather in the sphere of prose than of poetry that it is mani- 
fest. Quintilian headed a Ciceronian reaction and was 
followed by Pliny the younger and for a time by Tacitus. 
But we may perhaps trace a similar Vergilian reaction in 
the verse of Silius, Statius, and Valerius. 3 Their faults 



1 Tac. Dial. 35. 2 g ee c h. v . 

3 There had always, it may be noted, existed an archaistic section of 



I DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY 21 

do not nauseate to the same extent as those of their pre- 
decessors. But the mischief was done, and in point of 
extravagance and meretricious taste the difference is only 
one of degree. 

Satire alone attains to real eminence : rhetoric and 
epigram are its most mordant weapons, and the schools 
of rhetoric, if they did nothing else, kept those weapons 
well sharpened : the gross evils of the age opened an ample 
field for the satirist. Hence it is that all or almost all 
that is best in the literature of the Silver Age is satirical 
or strongly tinged with satire. Tacitus, who had many of 
the noblest qualifications of a poet, almost deserves the 
title of Rome's greatest satirist ; the works of Persius and 
Juvenal speak openly for themselves, while many of the 
finest passages in Lucan are most near akin to satire. It 
is true that under the principate satire had to be employed 
with caution ; under the first two dynasties it was compelled 
to be general in tone : it was not until after the fall of 
Domitian, under the enlightened rule of Nerva and Trajan, 
that it found a freer scope and was at least allowed to lash 
the vices of the present under the names of the past. 

It is in satire alone that we find any trace of genuine 
moral earnestness and enthusiasm ; and the reason for this 
is primarily that the satirists wrote under the influence of 
the one force that definitely and steadily made for righteous- 
ness. It is the Stoic philosophy that kindles Persius and 
Lucan, while Tacitus and Juvenal, even if they make no pro- 
fession of Stoicism, have yet been profoundly influenced by 
its teaching. Their morality takes its colour, if not its form, 
from the philosophy of the ' Porch '. The only non-satirical 
poetry primarily inspired by Stoicism is the dramatic verse 
of Seneca. That its influence here is not wholly for the best 



literary society. Seneca (Ep. cxiv. 13), Persius (i. 76), and Tacitus (Dial. 
23) deride the imitators of the early poets of the republic. But virtually 
no trace of pronounced imitation of this kind is to be observed in the 
poetry that has survived. Novelty and what passed for originality were 
naturally more popular than the resuscitation of the dead or dying 
past. 



22 DECLINE OF POST-AUGUSTAN POETRY I 

is due only in part to the intrinsic qualities of its teaching. 
It is rather in its application that the fault lies ; it dominates 
and crushes the drama instead of suffusing it and lending 
it wings ; it insists on preaching instead of suggesting. It 
is too insistent and aggressive a creed to harmonize with 
poetry, unless that poetry be definitely didactic in type and 
aim. But it is admirably suited to be the inspiration of 
satire, and it is therefore that the satire makes a far stronger 
moral appeal than any other form of post-Augustan liter- 
ature. 

Satire apart, the period is in the main an age of belles 
lettres, of ' the literary gourmet, the connoisseur, the blase 
and disillusioned man of society, passionately appreciative 
of detail, difficulties overcome, and petty felicities of expres- 
sion.' l It is the fashion to despise its works, and the fashion 
cannot be described as unhealthy or unjust. Yet it produced 
a few men of genius, while even in the works of those who were 
far removed from genius, the very fact that there is much 
refinement of wit, much triumphing over technical difficulties, 
much elaborate felicity of expression, makes them always 
a curious and at times a remunerative study. But perhaps 
its greatest claim upon us lies in the unexpected service 
that it rendered to the cause of culture. In the darkness 
of the Middle Ages when Greek was a hidden mystery to 
the western world, Lucan and Statius, Juvenal and Persius, 
and even the humble and unknown author of the Ilias 
Latina did their part in keeping the lamp alive and 
illumining the midnight in which lay hidden the ' budding 
morrow ' of the Renaissance. 



Boissier, V Opposition sous les Cesars, p. 238. 



CHAPTER II 

DRAMA 
I 

THE STAGE 

THE drama proper had never flourished at Rome. The 
causes are not far to seek. Tragic drama was dead in 
Greece by the time Greek influence made itself felt, while 
the New Comedy which then held the stage was of too 
quietly realistic a type and of too refined a wit and humour 
to be attractive to the coarser and less intelligent audiences 
of Rome. Terence, ^the dimidiatus Menander, as Caesar 
called him, though he won himself a great n^me with the 
cultured classes by the purity and elegance of his Latin 
and the fine drawing of his characters, was a failure with 
popular audiences owing to his lack of broad farcical humour. 
Plautus with his coarse geniality and lumbering wit made 
a greater success. He had grafted the festive spirit of 
Roman farce on to the more artistic comedy of Athens. 
Tragedy obtained but a passing vogue. Ennius, Accius, 
and Pacuvius were read and enjoyed by not a few educated 
readers, but for the Augustan age, as far as the stage was 
concerned, they were practically dead and buried. The 
Roman populace had by that period lost all taste for the 
highest and most refined forms of art. The races in the 
circus, the variety entertainments and bloodshed of the 
amphitheatre had captured the favour of the polyglot, 
pampered multitude that must have formed such a large 
proportion of a Roman audience. 

Still, dramatic entertainments had by no means wholly 
disappeared by the time of the Empire. But what remained 
was of a degraded type. The New Comedy of Athens, as 
transferred to the Roman stage, had given ground before 
the advance of the mime and the fabula Atellana. The 
history of both these forms of comedy belongs to an earlier 



24 DRAMA II 

period. For the post-Augustan age our evidence as to their 
development is very scanty. Little is known save that 
they were exceedingly popular. Both were characterized 
by the broadest farce and great looseness of construction ; 
both were brief one-act pieces and served as interludes or 
conclusions to other forms of spectacle. 

The Atellan was of Italian origin and contained four 
stock characters, Pappus the old man or pantaloon, Dos- 
sennus the wise man, corresponding to the dottore of modern 
Italian popular comedy, Bucca the clown, and Maccus the 
fool. It dealt with every kind of theme, parodied the 
legends of the gods, laughed at the provincial's manners 
or at the inhabitants of Italian country towns, or depicted 
in broad comic style incidents in the life of farmer and 
artisan. Maccus appeared as a young girl, as a soldier, as 
an innkeeper ; Pappus became engaged to be married ; 
Bucco turned gladiator ; and in the rough and tumble of 
these old friends the Roman mob found rich food for 
laughter. 1 

The mime was of a very similar character, but freer in 
point of form. It renounced the use of masks and reached, 
it would seem, an even greater pitch of indecency than 
the Atellan. The subjects of a few mimes are known to 
us. Among the most popular were the Phasma or Ghost 2 
and the Laureolus 3 of Catullus, a writer of the reign of 
Caligula. In the latter play was represented the death 
by crucifixion of the famous brigand ' Laureolus ' ; so 
degraded was popular taste that on one occasion it is 
recorded that a criminal was made to take the part of 
Laureolus and was crucified in grim earnest upon the stage. 4 
In another mime of the principate of Vespasian the chief 
attraction was a performing dog, 5 which, on being given 



1 Macrobius (Sat. 10. 3) speaks of a revival of the Atellan by a certain 
Mummius, but gives no indication of the date. 

2 Juv. viii. 185. 

3 Suet. Calig. 57; Joseph. Ant. xix. 1. 13; Juv. viii. 187. 

4 Mart, de Spect. 7. 

5 Plutarch, de Sollert. Anim. xix. 9. 



II THE STAGE 25 

a pretended opiate, went to sleep and later feigned a gradual 
revival in such a realistic manner as to rouse the wildest 
applause on the part of the audience. 

Both Atellan and mime abounded in topical allusions 
and spared not even the emperors. Allusion was made to 
the unnatural vices attributed to Tiberius, 1 to the deaths 
of Claudius and Agrippina, 2 to the avarice of Galba, 3 to the 
divorce of Domitian, 4 and on more than one occasion heavy 
punishment was meted out to authors and actors alike. 5 

Legitimate comedy led a struggling existence. An in- 
scription at Aeclanum 6 records the memory of a certain 
Pomponius Bassulus, who not only translated certain 
comedies of Menander but himself wrote original comedies ; 
while in the letters of Pliny 7 we meet with Vergilius Romanus, 
a writer of comedies of ' the old style ' and of mimiambi. 
He possessed, so Pliny writes, ' vigour, pungency, and wit. 
He gave honour to virtue and attacked vice.' It is to 
be feared that such a form of comedy can hardly have been 
intended for the public stage, and that Vergilius, like so 
many poets of his age, wrote for private performance or 
recitation. These two writers are the only authors of 
legitimate comedies known to us during the Silver Age. 
But both fabulae palliatae and togatae, that is to say, comedies 
representing Greek and Roman life respectively, continued 
to be acted on the public stage. The Incendium 8 of 
Afranius, a fabula togata, was performed in the reign of 
Nero, and the evidence of Quintilian 9 and Juvenal 10 shows 
that palliatae also continued to be performed. But true 
comedy had been relegated to a back place and the Silver 
Age did nothing to modify the dictum of Quintilian, 11 in 
comoedia maxime claudicamus. 

As with comedy so with tragedy. Popular taste rejected 



1 Suet. Tib. 45. 2 ib. Ner. 39. 

3 Ib. GaXb. 13. * Ib. Dom. 10. 

5 Ib. Calig. 27 ; Nero, 1. c. ; Tac. Ann. iv. 14. 

6 C. I. L. ix. 1165. 7 Ep. vi. 21. 

8 Suet. Ner. 11. Quint, xi. 3. 178. 

1 Juv. iii. 93. " x. 1, 99. 



26 DRAMA II 

the Graeco-Roman tragedy as tedious, and it was replaced 
by a more sensuous and sensational form of entertainment. 
The intenser passions and emotions were not banished from 
the stage, but survived in the salticae fabulae and a peculiar 
species of dramatic recitation. Infinitely debased as were 
these substitutes for true drama, the forms assumed by the 
decomposition of tragedy are yet curious and interesting. 
The first step was the separation of the cantica from the 
diverbia. Lyric scenes or even important iambic mono- 
logues were taken from their setting and sung as solos upon 
the stage. 1 It was found difficult to combine effective 
singing with effective gesture and dancing, for music had 
become more florid and exacting than in the days of Euri- 
pides. A second actor appeared who supplied the gesture 
to illustrate the first actor's song. 2 From this peculiar 
and to us ridiculous form of entertainment it is a small 
step to the fabula saltica, which was at once nearer the 
legitimate drama and further from it. It was nearer in 
that the scenes were not isolated, but formed part of a 
more or less carefully constructed whole. It was further 
inasmuch as the actor disappeared, only the dancer re- 
maining upon the stage. The words of the play were rele- 
gated to a chorus, while the character, actions, and emotions 
of the person represented by the words of the chorus were 
set forth by the dress, gesticulation, and dancing of the panto- 
mimus. How the various scenes were connected is uncertain ; 
but it is almost a necessary inference that the connexion 
was provided by the chorus or, as in modern oratorio, by 
recitative. To us the mimetic posturing of the pantomimus 
appears an almost ridiculous substitute for drama ; but the 
dancing of the actors seems to have been extraordinarily 
artistic and at times to have had a profound effect upon the 
emotions of the audience, 1 while the brilliant success in our 
own time of plays in dumb show, such as the famous 
Enfant Prodigue, should be a warning against treating the 
pantomimus with contempt. 

This form of entertainment was first introduced at Rome 
1 Lucian, de Salt. 27. 2 Suet. Ner. 24. 3 Lucian, de Salt. 79. 



II THE STAGE 27 

in 22 B.C. by the actors Pylades and Bathyllus, 1 the former 
being famed for his tragic dancing, the latter for a broader 
and more comic style, whose dramatic counterpart would 
seem to have been the satyric drama. 2 The satyric element 
seems, however, never to have become really popular, the 
fabula saltica as we know it dealing mainly with tragic or 
highly emotional themes. Indeed, to judge from Lucian's 
disquisition on the art of dancing, the subjects seem to 
have been drawn from almost every conceivable source 
both of history and mythology. 3 Many of these salticae 
fabulae must have been mere adaptations of existing 
tragedies. Their literary value was, according to Plutarch, 
by no means high ; 4 it was sacrificed to the music and 
the dancing, for the emotional effect of which Lucian can 
scarcely find sufficiently high terms of praise. 5 The themes 
appear to have been drawn from the more lurid passages 
in mythology and history. If the libretto was not coarse 
in itself, there is abundant evidence to show that the sub- 
jects chosen were often highly lascivious, while the move- 
ments of the dancers not seldom men of the vilest character 
were frequently to the last degree obscene. 6 Inadequate 
as this substitute for the drama must seem to us, we must 
remember that southern peoples were and indeed are 
far more sensitive to the language of signs, to expressive 
gesticulation and the sensuous movements of the body 7 
than are the less quick-witted and emotional peoples of 
the North ; and further, even if for the most part these 
fabulae salticae had small literary value, distinguished 
poets did not disdain to write librettos for popular actors. 



1 Suet. ap. Hieronym. (Roth, p. 301, 25). 

2 Plut. Qu. Conv. vii. 8. 3 ; Sen. Contr. 3. praef. 10. 

3 Lucian, op. cit., 37-61. 

4 Plut. Qu. Conv. iv. 15. 17 ; Libanius (Reiske) iii, p. 381. 

5 Lucian, op. cit., 69 sqq. 

6 e. g. Pasiphae, Cinyras and Myrrha, Jupiter and Leda. Lucian, 1. c. ; 
Joseph. Ant. lud. xix. 1. 13; Juv. vi. 63-6. 

7 For the effect of such dancing cp. the interesting stories told by Lucian, 
op. cit., 63-6. Cp. also Liban., iii, p. 373. For the importance attached 
to gesture in ancient times see Quint, xi. 3. 87 sqq. 



28 DRAMA II 

Passages from the works of Vergil were adapted for such 
performances ; l Lucan wrote no less than fourteen fabulae 
salticae, 2 while the A gave of Statius, 3 written for the dancer 
Paris, is famous from the well-known passage in the seventh 
satire of Juvenal. Nothing survives of these librettos to 
enlighten us as to their literary characteristics, and the 
other details of the performance do not concern us here. 4 
It is sufficient to say that the pantomimus had an enormous 
vogue in the Silver Age, and won a rich harvest by his 
efforts, and that the factions of the theatre, composed 
of the partisans of this or that actor, were scarcely less 
notorious than the factions of the circus for the disturb- 
ances to which they gave rise. 5 

Of the musical recitations of portions of existing tragedies 
or of tragic episodes written for the occasion we possess 
even less knowledge. The passages selected or composed 
for this purpose were in all probability usually lyric, but 
we hear also of the chanting of iambics, as, for instance, in 
the case of the Oedipus in Exile, in which Nero made his 
last appearance on the stage. 6 Of the part played by the 
chorus and of the structure of the librettos we know nothing ; 
they may have been purely episodic and isolated or may, 
as in the salticae fabulae, have been loosely strung together 
into the form of an ill-constructed play. That they were 
sometimes written in Greek is known from the fact that 
the line quoted by Suetonius from the Oedipus in Exile 
mentioned above is in that language. Of the writers of 
this debased and bastard offspring of drama we know nothing 
save that Nero, who was passionately fond of appearing 
in them, seems also to have written them. 7 

The tragic stage had indeed sunk low, when it served 
almost entirely for exhibitions such as these. Nevertheless 



1 Story of Turnus ; Suet. Ner. 54. Dido ; Macrob. Sat. v. 17. 15. 

2 See p. 100. 3 j uv- vij. 92. 

For the general history of the pantomimus see Friedlaender, Sitten- 
geschicht, II. iii. 3, and Lucian, de Saltatione. 

6 Dion. liv. 17 ; Tac. Ann. i. 54 and 77 ; Dion. Ivii. 14. 
6 Suet. Ner. 46. 7 See p. 7 note. 



II THE STAGE 29 

tragedy had not ceased to exist even if it had ceased to 
hold the stage. 1 Varius and Ovid had won fame in the 
Augustan age by their Thyestes and Medea, and the post- 
Augustan decadence was not without its tragedians. One 
only is mentioned by Quintilian in his survey of Roman 
poetry, Pomponius Secundus. Of him he says (x. 1. 98), 
' Of the tragedians whom I myself have seen, Pomponius 
Secundus is by far the most eminent ; a writer whom the 
oldest men of the day thought not quite tragic enough, 
but acknowledged that he excelled in learning and elegance 
of style.' Pomponius was a man of great distinction. 2 
His friendship for Aelius Gallus, the son of Sejanus, had 
brought him into disgrace with Tiberius, but he recovered 
his position under Claudius. He attained to the consul- 
ship, and commanded with distinction in a war against 
the Chatti in A.D. 50. Of his writings we know but very 
little. Of his plays nothing is left save a brief fragment 3 
from a play entitled Aeneas ; whether it dealt with the 
deeds of Aeneas in his native land or in the land of his 
adoption is uncertain, though it is on the whole probable 
that the scene was Italian and that the drama was there- 
fore a fabula praetexta. Whether his plays were performed 
on the public stage is not quite clear. Tacitus tells us of 
riots in the theatre in A.D. 44, 4 when ' poems ' by Pomponius 
were being recited on the stage. But the words used by 
the historian (is carmina scaenae dabat) point rather to the 
recitation of a dramatic solo than to a complete tragedy 
of the orthodox type. Pomponius, dramatist and philo- 
logist, 5 remains a mere name for us. 



1 There is no clear proof of the performance on the Roman stage of 
any tragedy in the strict sense of the word during the Silver Age. The 
words used e.g. in Dio Chrys. (19, p. 261 : 23, p. 396), Lucian (Nigrin. 8), 
Libanius (iii, p. 265, Reiske) may refer merely to the performance of isolated 
scenes. See note on Vespasian's attitude to the theatre, p. 166. 

2 Pliny the elder wrote his life. Plin. Ep. iii. 5. Cp. also Tac. Ann. 
v. 8 ; xii. 28 ; Plin. N. H. xiii. 83. 

3 Ribbeck, Trag. Rom. Fr. p. 268, fr. 1 ; p. 331 (ed. 3). 

4 Ann. xi. 13. 

6 Charis, Gr. Lat. i. p. 125, 23 ; p. 137, 23. 



30 DRAMA II 

Another distinguished writer of plays was Curiatius 
Maternus, a well-known orator ; it is in his house that 
Tacitus places the scene of the Dialogus, and he is the chief 
character of the conversation. He had written his first 
tragedy under Nero, 1 and at the time of the Dialogus 
(A.D. 79-81) his Cato a fabula praetexta was the talk of 
Rome. 2 He had written another historical drama on the 
ancestor of Nero, L. Domitius Ahenobarbus, the persistent 
foe of Julius Caesar, who perished on the field of Pharsalia. 3 
He had also written plays on the more hackneyed themes 
of Medea and Thyestes. 3 He had all the opportunities and 
all the requisite gifts for a successful public career, but his 
heart was with the Muses, and he resolved to quit public 
life and to devote himself wholly to poetry, for there, in 
his estimation, the truest fame was to be found. 4 Here 
our knowledge ends. Of the details of his life we are as 
ignorant as of his plays. 

A few other names of tragic poets are known to us. 
Paccius wrote an Alcithoe, 5 Faustus a Thebais and a Tereus, 5 
Rubrenus Lappa an Atreus* while Scaevus Memor, 7 victor 
at the Agon Capitolinus and brother of Turnus the satirist, 
wrote a Hercules and a Hecuba or Troades. 8 Martial (xi. 9) 
styles him the ' glory of the Roman buskin ', but he too 
is but the shadow of an empty name. The tragedies of 
the age are lost to us, all save the tragedies of the philo- 
sopher Seneca, plays of which, save for one casual reference 9 
in Quintilian, contemporary literature gives no hint, but 
which, however little they may have deserved it, were 
destined to have no negligible influence on the subsequent 
history of the world's drama. 

l Tac. Dial. 11. 2 ib. 2, 3. 3 Ib. 3. 

4 Ib. 11. 5 j uv . vii. 12. 6 ib. vii. 72. 

7 He flourished in reign of Domitian. Schol. Vail. luv. i. 20 ; Mart, 
xi. 9 and 10 ; Donat. Qramm. Lat. iv. p. 537, 17 ; Apollin. Sid. ix. 266. 

8 In the fragment preserved by Donatus (Ribbeck, Trag. Rom. Fr. 
p. 269) the chorus address Hecuba under the name Cisseis. ' Fulgentius 
expos, serm. antiq. 25 (p. 119, 5, Helm) says Memos (Schopen emends to 
Memor) in tragoedia Herculis ait : ferte suppetias opiimi comites.' 

9 xi. 2. 8 



31 

II 

SENECA 

Lucius Annaeus Seneca, one of the most striking figures 
among the great writers of Rome, was born at Cordova * 
about the opening of the Christian era, to be the most 
remarkable member of a remarkable family. His father, 
who bore the same name, was the famous rhetorician to 
whom we have already referred. His elder brother, M. 
Annaeus Novatus, 2 was adopted by L. lunius Gallic, whose 
name he assumed, had a distinguished public career, and 
is best known to us, in his capacity of governor of Achaea, 
as the ' Gallic ' of the Acts. The youngest of the family, 
M. Annaeus Mela, 2 remained in the equestrian order and 
devoted himself to the acquisition of wealth, regarding 
this as the safest path to fame. He succeeded to some 
extent in his object, but his main claim upon our remem- 
brance is as the father of the poet Lucan. Lucius Seneca 
came to Rome at an early age, 3 and, in spite of the bad 
health which afflicted him all his life long, 4 soon made his 
mark as an orator. Indeed, so striking was his success that 
although he showed no particular eagerness for a political 
career his sheer mastery of the Roman speech wakened 
the jealousy of Caligula, 5 who only spared his life on the 
ground that he suffered from chronic asthma and was not 
likely to live long, and contented himself, therefore, with 
mordant but not unjust criticism of the style of his intended 
victim. 6 But though oratory provided Seneca with the 
readiest means for the gratification of his not inconsiderable 
vanity, and for the exercise of his marvellous powers of wit 
and epigram, it was not the pursuit of rhetoric and its 
prizes that really held the first place in his heart. That 



1 Mart. i. 61, 7 ; Poet. Lot. Min. iv. p. 62, 19, Bachrens. 

2 Tac. Ann. xv. 73 ; xvi. 17. 3 Sen. ad Helv. de Cons. xix. 2. 

4 Sen. ad Helv. 1. c. ; Ep. Ixxviii. 1. Dion. Cass. lix. 19. 

5 Dion. Cass. 1. c. 6 Suet. Calig. 53. See ch. i. p. 4. 



32 DRAMA II 

place was claimed by philosophy. His first love was 
Pythagoreanism, which he studied under Sotion 1 of Alexan- 
dria, whose influence was sufficient to induce his youthful 
pupil to become a convinced vegetarian. But his father, 
who hated fads and philosophers, persuaded Seneca with- 
out much difficulty to ' dine better ', and the doctrines of 
Pythagoras were soon displaced by the more fashionable 
teaching of the Stoics. From the lips of Attalus 2 he learned 
all the principles of that ascetic school. ' I besieged his 
class-room,' he writes ; ' I was the first to come, the last 
to go ; I would waylay him when out walking and lead him 
to discuss serious problems.' Whether he denounced vice 
and luxury, or extolled poverty, Attalus found a convinced 
disciple in Seneca. His convictions did not possess sufficient 
weight to lead him to embrace a life of austere poverty, 
but he at least learned to sleep on a hard mattress, and to 
eschew hot baths, wine, unguents, oysters, and mushrooms. 
How far his life conformed to the highest principles of his 
creed, it is hard to say. If we are to believe his detractors, 
he was guilty of committing adultery with the Princess 
Julia Livilla, was surrounded with all the luxuries that the 
age could supply, and drained the life-blood of Italy and 
the provinces by extortionate usury. 3 During his long 
exile in Corsica he could write a consolatory treatise to his 
mother on the thesis that the true philosopher is never an 
exile ; 4 wherever he is, there he is at home ; but little more 
than a year later he writes another consolatory treatise to 
the imperial freedman Polybius, full of the most grovelling 
flattery of Polybius himself and of the Emperor Claudius, 5 
the same Claudius whom he afterwards bespattered with 
the coarse, if occasionally humorous, vulgarity of the 



1 Ep. cviii. 17 sqq. ; Hieronym. ad ann. 2029. That he knew and never 
lost his respect for the teaching of Pythagoras is shown by the frequency 
with which he quotes him in the letters. 

2 Ep. cviii. 3 sqq. 

3 Cp. the speech of Suillius, Tac. Ann. xiii. 42 ; Dion. Cass. Ixi. 10. 

4 ad Hdv. de. Cons. 6 sqq. 

5 ad Polyb. de Cons. 



II SENECA 33 

Apocolocyntosis. 1 He was tutor to the young Nero, but had 
not the strength to check his vices. He sought to control 
him by flattery and platitudes rather than by the high 
example of the philosophy which he professed. 2 The 
composition of the treatise ad Neronem de dementia was 
a poor reply to Nero's murder of Britannicus. 3 He could 
write eloquently of Stoic virtue, but when he himself was 
confronted with the hard facts of life over which Stoicism 
claimed to triumph, he proved no more than a ' lath painted 
to look like iron '. Such is the case against Seneca. That 
it can be rebutted entirely it is impossible to claim. 
But we must remember the age in which he lived. Its 
love of debauchery was only equalled by its prurient love 
of scandal. Seneca's banishment on the charge of an 
intrigue with Livilla is not seriously damaging. The 
accusation may have been true : it is at least as likely to 
have been false, for it was instigated by Messalina. That 
he lived in wealth and luxury is undoubted : his only 
defence was that he was really indifferent to it ; he could 
face any future ; he had, therefore, a right to enjoy the 
present. 4 That he ground down the provincials by his 
usury is possible ; the standard in such matters was low, 
and the real nature of his extortions may never have come 
home to him ; he must have depended largely on his 
agents. With regard to his management of the young 
princeps the case is different. Seneca was given an almost 
impossible task. Neither his nature nor his surroundings 



1 The Apocolocyntosis almost undoubtedly by Seneca hardly falls 
within the scope of this work. Such intrinsic importance as it possesses 
is due to the prose portions. In point of form it is an example of the 
Menippean Satire, that strange medley of prose and verse. The verse 
portions form but a small proportion of the whole and are insipid and 
lacking in interest. 

2 He was forbidden by Agrippina to give definite philosophical instruc- 
tion. Cp. Suet. Nero, 52. 

3 Cp. ad Ner. de Clem. ii. 2 ; Henderson, Life of Nero, Notes, p. 459. 

4 For what may be regarded as an academic apologia pro vita sua, cp. 
Ep. 5; 17; 20; de Ira, iii. 33 ; de Const. Sap. 1-4, 10-13 ; de Vit. Beat. 
17-28, &c. 

BUTLER J) 



34 DRAMA II 

made Nero a suitable subject for moral instruction. Seneca 
must have been hampered at every turn. He must either 
bend or break. At least he won the respect of his pupil, 
and the good governance of the empire during the first 
five years of Nero's reign was due largely to the fact that 
the power was really in the hands of Seneca and Burrus. 1 
Many of the weaknesses of his character may be accounted 
for by physical debility, and we must further remember 
that a Stoic of the age of Nero found himself in a most 
difficult position. He could not put his principles into 
full practice in public life without incurring the certain 
displeasure of the emperor. The stricter Stoic, therefore, 
like Thrasea, retired to the seclusion of his estates ' con- 
demning the wicked world of Rome by his absence from it '. 2 
Seneca, weaker, but possessed of greater common sense, 
chose the via media. He was content to sacrifice something 
of his principles to the service of Rome and of himself. 
It is not necessary to regard him as wholly disinterested 
in his conduct ; it is unjust and absurd to regard him as 
a glorified Tartuffe. 3 Such a supposition is adequately 
refuted by his writings. It is easy for a writer at once 
so fluent and so brilliant to give the impression of in- 
sincerity ; but the philosophical works of Seneca ring sur- 
prisingly true. We cannot doubt his faith, though his life 
may at times have belied it. He reveals a warmth of human 
feeling, a richness of imagination, a comprehension of human 
failings and sorrows, that make him rank high among the 
great preachers of the world. Even here, it is true, he has 
his failings ; he repeats himself, has little constructive 
talent, and fails at times to conceal a passion for the obvious 
beneath the brilliance of his epigram. But alike in the 
spheres of politics and literature he is the greatest man of 



1 Dion. Cass. Ixi. 4. 5. 2 Tac. Ann. xvi. 28. 

3 This is Dion's view, Ixi. 10. For an ingenious view of Seneca's 
character see Ball, Satire of Sen. on apotheosis of Claudius, p. 34. 'It 
may be that Seneca cared less for the realization of high ideals in life 
than for the formulation of the ideals as such. Sincerity and hypocrisy 
are terms much less worth controversy in some minds than others.' 



II SENECA 35 

his age. In literature he stands alone : he is a prose Ovid, 
with the saving gift of moral fervour. His style is terse 
and epigrammatic, but never obscure ; it lacks the roll of 
the continuous prose of the Augustan age, but its phrases 
have a beauty and a music of their own : at their best they 
are touched with a genuine vein of poetry, at their worst 
they have a hard brilliance against the attractions of which 
only the most fastidious eye is proof. He towered over 
all his contemporaries. In him were concentrated all the 
excellences of the rhetorical schools of the day. Seneca 
became the model for literary aspirants to copy. But he 
was a dangerous model. His lack of connexion and rhythm 
became exaggerated by his followers, and the slightest 
lack of dexterity in the imitator led to a flashy tawdriness 
such as Seneca himself had as a rule avoided. He was 
too facile and careless a composer to yield a canon for style. 
The reaction came soon. Involved, whether justly or not, 
in the Pisonian conspiracy of 65 A.D., he was forced to 
commit suicide. He died as the Stoics of the age were 
wont to die, cheerfully, courageously, and with self-conscious 
ostentation. 1 Within a few years of his death the great 
Ciceronian reaction headed by Quintilian began. The very 
vehemence with which the Senecan style was attacked, 
now by Quintilian 2 and later by Fronto, 3 shows what 
a commanding position he held. 

He was poet as well as philosopher. Quintilian tells us 
that he left scarcely any branch of literature untouched. 
' We possess,' he says, ' his speeches, poems, letters, and 
dialogues.' 4 Two collections of poems attributed to Seneca 
have come down to us, a collection of epigrams and a collec- 
tion of dramas. There is strangely little external evidence 
to support either attribution, but in neither case can there 
be any serious doubt as to the general correctness of the 
tradition. 



i Tac. Ann. xv. 61-4. 2 Quint, x. 1. 125-9. 3 Fronto, p. 155, N. 
4 Quint, x. 1. 129. Over and above his writings on moral philosophy 
we possess seven books ad Lucilium naturalium quaestinnum, 

P? 



36 DRAMA II 

The Anthologia Latina, compiled at Carthage in the sixth 
century, opens with seventy-three epigrams, of which three 
are attributed by the MSS. to Seneca (Poet. Lat. Min. 1-3, 
Baehrens). The jfirst is entitled de qualitate temporis and 
descants on the ultimate destruction of the world by fire 
a well-known Stoical doctrine. The second and third are 
fierce denunciations of Corsica, his place of exile. The rest 
are nameless. But there are several which can only be 
attributed to Seneca. The mnth is entitled de se ad patriam, 
and is addressed to Cordova by one plunged in deep mis- 
fortune a clear reference to his banishment in Corsica, 
The fifty-first is a prayer that the author's two brothers 
may be happier than himself, and that ' the little Marcus 
may rival his uncles in eloquence '. The brothers are 
described one as older, the other as younger than the author. 
It is an obvious inference that the brothers referred to are 
Gallic and Mela, while it is possible that the little Marcus 
is no other than the gifted son of Mela, Marcus Annaeus 
Lucanus, the epic poet. 1 The fifteenth represents him as 
an exile in a barren land : he appeals to a faithful friend 
named Crispus, probably the distinguished orator Passienus 
Crispus, the younger, who was consul for the second time in 
44 A. D. 2 There are also other epigrams which, though 
less explicit, suit the circumstances of Seneca's exile. The 
fifth is written in praise of the quiet life. The author has 
two brothers (1. 14), and at the opening of the poem cries, 
' let others seek the praetorship ! ' In this connexion it 
is noteworthy that at the time of his banishment Seneca 
had held no higher office than the quaestorship. The 
seventeenth and eighteenth are on the same subject, and 
contain a solemn warning against regum amicitiae, appro- 
priate enough in the mouth of the victim of a court intrigue. 
Epigrams 29-36 are devoted to the praises of Claudius 
for his conquest of Britain. Claudius had banished him 



1 Patruos duos more naturally, however, refers to Gallic and Mela, 
in which case Marcus is the son of Seneca himself. 

2 Cp. P. L. M. iv. 15, 8; Plin. N. H. xvi. 242. 



II SENECA 37 

and was a suitable subject for flattery. For the rest the 
poems are largely of the republican character so fashionable 
in Stoic circles during the first century of the empire. There 
are many epigrams on Cato l and the Pompeys. Others, 
again, are of a rhetorical nature, dealing with scholastic 
themes ; 2 others of an erotic and even scandalous character. 
We can claim no certainty for the view that all these poems 
are by Seneca, but there is a general resemblance of style 
throughout, and probability points to the whole collection 
being by the same author. The fact that the same theme 
is treated more than once scarcely stands in the way. We 
cannot dictate the amusements of a weary exile. It would 
be rash even to deny the possibility of his being the author 
of the erotic poems. 3 Philosopher as he was, he had been 
banished on a charge of adultery : without in any way 
admitting the truth of that accusation, we may readily be- 
lieve that he stooped to one of the fashionable amusements 
of the day, the composition of pointed and unsavoury verse ; 
for the standard of morality in writing was far lower than 
the standard of morals in actual life. 4 

The poems repay reading, but call for little comment. 
They lack originality. The thought is thin, the expression 
neat, though scarcely as pointed as we might expect from 
such an author, while the metre is graceful : the treatment 
of the elegiac is freer than that of Ovid, but pleasing and 
melodious. At times powerful lines flash out. 

qua frigida semper [1] 

praefulget stellis Arctos inocciduis (xxxvi. 6) 

shines out from the midst of banal flattery of the emperor 
with astonishing splendour. The poem de qualitate temporis 



[1] Where the cold constellation of the heaven gleams ever with un- 
setting stars. 



1 For these cp. Ep. xiv. 13 ; ib. civ. 29. 

2 e.g. 71 'de Atho monte', 57 'de Graeciae ruina', 50 'do bono quietae 
vitac ', 47, 48 ' morto omnes aequari ', 25 ' de spc '. 

3 There is, in fact, direct evidence that he wrote such verses. Plin. 
Ep. v. 3. 5. 4 Cp. p. 263. 



38 DRAMA II 

(^) closes with four fine lines with the unmistakable Senecan 
ring about them 

quid tarn parva loquor ? moles pulcerrima caeli [1] 

ardebit flammis tota repente suis. 
omnia mors poscit. lex est, non poena, perire : 

hie aliquo mundus tempore nullus erit. 

Cato (9) deliberates on suicide with characteristic rhetoric, 
artificial in the extreme, but not devoid of dignity 

estne aliquid, quod Cato non potuit ? [2] 

dextera, me vitas ? durum est iugulasse Catonem ? 

sed, quia liber erit, iam puto, non dubitas. 
fas non est vivum cuiquam ssrvire Catonem : 

quinetiam vivit nunc Cato, si moritur. 

Cleverest of all is the treatment of the rhetorical theme of 
the two brothers who meet in battle in the civil war (72). 
The one unwittingly slays the other, strips the slain, and 
discovers what he has done 

quod fuerat virtus, factum est scelus. haeret in hoste [3] 

miles et e manibus mittere tela titnet. 
inde ferox : ' quid, lenta manus, nunc denique cessas ? 

iustius hoste tibi qui moriatur adest. 
fraternam res nulla potest defendere caedem ; 

mors tua sola potest : morte luenda tua est, 
scilicet ad patrios referes spolia ampla penates ? 

ad patrem victor non potes ire tuum, 



[1] Why speak of things so small ? The glorious vault of heaven one 
day shall blaze with sudden self-kindled flame. Death calls for all creation. 
'Tis a law, not a penalty to perish. The universe itself shall one day be 
as though it had never been. 

[2] Is there then that which Cato had not the heart to do ? Right-hand, 
dost thou shrink from me ? Is it hard to slay Cato ? Nay, methinks 
thou dost hesitate no more, for thou shalt set Cato free. 'Tis a crime 
that Cato should live to be any man's slave ; nay, Cato truly lives if 
Cato die. 

[3] What had been valour now is made a crime. The soldier halts by his 
foe and fears to launch his shafts. Then his courage rekindled. ' What ! 
coward hand, dost thou delay now ? There is one here whom thou 
shouldst slay sooner than the foe. Naught can assoil of the guilt of a 
brother's blood save only death ; 'tis thy death must atone. Shalt thou 
bear home to thy father's halls rich spoil of war ? Nay, victor thus, thou 



II SENECA 39 

scd potes ad fratrem : mine fortiter uterc telo ! 

impius hoc telo es, hoc potes esse pius. 
vivere si poteris, potuisti occidere fratrem ! 

nescisti : sed scis : haec mora culpa tua eat. 
viximus adversis, iaceamus partibus isdein 

(dixit et in dubio est utrius ense cadat). 
ense meo moriar, maculato morte nefanda? 

cui moreris, ferrum quo moriare dabit.' 
dixit et in fratrem fraterno concidit ense: 

victorem et victum condidit una manus. 1 

This is not poetry of the first class, if indeed it is poetry 
at all. But it is trick-rhetoric of the most brilliant kind 
without degenerating into bombastic absurdity. There is, in 
fact, a restraint in these epigrams which provides a remark- 
able contrast with the turgid extravagance that defaces 
so much of the dramas. This is in part due to the difference 
of the moulds into which the rhetoric is run, but it is hard 
to resist the belief that the epigrams written mainly 
during the exile in Corsica are considerably later than 
the plays. They are in themselves insignificant ; they 
show no advance in dexterity upon the dramas, but they 
do show a distinct increase of maturity. 

The plays are ten in number ; they comprise a Hercules 
Furens, Troades, Phoenissae (or Thebais), Medea, Phaedra 
(or Hippolytus), Oedipus, Agamemnon, Thyestes, Hercules 
Oetaeus, and sole example of the fabula praetexta the 



canst not go to meet thy sire. But victor thou canst go to meet thy brother ; 
now use thy weapon bravely. This weapon stained thee with crime, 'tis 
this weapon shall make thee clean. If thou hast heart to live, thou hadst 
the heart to slay thy brother ; thou hadst no such murderous thought, 
but now thou hast ; this thy tarrying brings thee guilt. We have lived 
foes, let us lie united in the peace of the grave.' He ceased and doubted 
on whose sword to fall. ' Shall I die by mine own sword, thus foul with 
shameful murder. He for whom thou diest shall give thee the steel 
wherewith to die.' He ceased, and fell dead upon his brother, slain by 
his brother's sword. The same hand slew both victor and vanquished. 



1 Cp. the not dissimilar situation in Sen. Oed. (936), where Oedipus medi- 
tates in very similar style, as to how he may expiate his guilt The 
couplet vivere si poteris, &c., is nothing if not Senecan. 



40 DRAMA II 

Octavia. Despite the curious silence of Seneca himself 
and of his contemporaries, there can be little doubt as to 
the general correctness of the attribution which assigns to 
Seneca the only Latin tragedies that grudging time has 
spared us. The Medea, Hercules Furens, Troades, Phaedra; 
Agamemnon, and Thyestes are all cited by late writers, 
while Quintilian 1 himself cites a line from the Medea as the 
work of Seneca. The name Seneca, without any further 
specification, points as clearly to Seneca, the philosopher, 
as the name Cicero to the great orator. The absence of 
any further or more explicit reference on the part of Quin- 
tilian to Seneca's achievements as a tragedian is easily 
explained on the supposition that the critic regarded them 
as but an insignificant portion of his work. Yet stronger 
confirmation is afforded by the internal evidence. The 
verse is marked by the same brilliant but fatiguing terseness, 
the same polish and point, the same sententiousness, the 
same succession of short stabbing sentences, that mark 
the prose works of Seneca. 2 More remarkable still is the 
close parallelism of thought. The plays are permeated 
through and through with Stoicism, and the expression 
given to certain Stoical doctrines is often almost identical 
with passages from the philosophical works. 3 Against 



1 Quint, viii. 3. 31 ('memini iuvenis admodum inter Poinponium ac 
Senecam etiam praefationibus esse tractatum, an "gradus eliminet" in 
tragoedia dici oportuisset') shows Seneca as critic of dramatic diction; 
there is no evidence to show what these praefationes were, but they may 
have been prefaces to tragedies. The Medea (453) is cited by Quintilian 
ix. 2. 8. For later quotations from the tragedies, cp. Diomedes, gr. Lat. 
i. p. 511, 23 ; Terentianus Maurus, ibid. vi. p. 404, 2672 ; Probus, ibid. iv. 
p. 229, 22, p. 246, 19; Priscian, ibid. ii. p. 253, 7 and 9 ; Tertullian, de An. 
42, de Resurr. 1 ; Lactantius, SchcH. Stat. Theb. iv. 530. 

2 Cp. also the iambic translation of Cleanthes, Ep. cvii. 11 : 

due, o parens celsique dominator poli, 
quocunque placuit : nulla parendi mora est. 
adsum impiger. fac nolle, comitabor gemens 
malusque patiar, facere quod licuit bono. 
ducunt volentem fata, iiolentem trahunt. 

3 Some of the more remarkable parallels have been collected by Nisard 
(Etudes tmr les poctea latins de la decadence, i. 68-91), e.g. Med. 163 



II SENECA 41 

these evidences the silence of Seneca himself counts for 
little. We may charitably suppose that he rated his plays 
at their just value. In any case a poet is under no compul- 
sion to quote his own verses, or even to refer to them, in 
works of a totally different nature. 1 

A more serious question is whether Seneca is the author 
of all the plays transmitted to us under his name. The 
authenticity of four of these dramas has been seriously 
questioned. That the Octavia is by a later hand may be 
regarded as certain. Seneca could hardly have dared to 
write a play on so dangerous a theme the brutal treatment 
by Nero of his young wife Octavia. Moreover, Seneca 
himself is one of the dramatis personae, and there are clear 
references to the death of Nero, while the style is simple 
and restrained, and wholly unlike that of the other plays. 
It is the work of a saner and less flamboyant age. 2 The 
Agamemnon and the Oedipus have been suspected on the 
ground that certain of the lyric portions are written in a 



' qui nil potest sperare, desperet nihil '. Ep. v. 7 ' desines timere, si 
sperare desieris '. Oed. 705 ' qui sceptra duro saevus imperio regit, timet 
timentes : metus in auctorem redit '. Ep. cv. 4 ' qui timetur, timet : 
nemo potuit terribilis esse secure', de Ira, ii. 11 ' quid quod semper in 
auctores redundat timor, nee quisquam metuitur ipse securus ? ' Oed. 
980 sqq. ; de Prov. v. 6 sqq. ; Phoen. 146-53 ; Ep. xii. 10 ; de Prov. vi. 7 ; 
Here. F. 463, 464 ; Ep. xcii. 14. 

1 The arguments against the Senecan authorship are of little weight. 
It has been urged (a) that the MSS. assign the author a praenomen Marcus. 
No Marcus Seneca is known, though Marcus was the praenomen of both 
Gallio and Mela, and of Lucan. Mistakes of this kind are, however, by 
no means rare (cp. the 'Sextus Aurelius Propertius Nauta ' of many MSS. 
of that poet : both ' Aurelius ' and ' Nauta ' are errors), (b) Sidonius 
Apollinaris (ix. 229) mentions three Senecas, philosopher, tragedian, and 
epic writer (i.e. Lucan). But Sidonius lived in the fifth century A. D., 
and may easily have made a mistake. Such a mistake actually occurs 
(S. A. xxiii. 165) where he seems to assert that Argentaria Polla, Lucan's 
faithful widow, subsequently married Statius. The mistake as regards 
Seneca is probably due to a misinterpretation of Martial i. 61 ' duosque 
Senecas unicumque Lucanum | facunda loquitur Corduba'. Not being 
acquainted with the works of the elder Seneca the rhetorician, Sidonius 
invented a new author, Seneca the tragedian. 

2 See ch. ou Octavia, p. 78. 



42 DRAMA II 

curious patchwork metre of a character fortunately unique 
in Latin lyric verse. The Agamemnon further has two 
choruses. 1 But in all other respects the language, technique, 
and metre closely resemble the other dramas. Neither 
objection need carry any weight. There is no reason why 
Seneca should not have introduced a double chorus or have 
indulged in unsuccessful metrical experiments. 2 Far more 
difficult is the problem presented by the Hercules Oetaeus. 
It presents many anomalies, of which the least are a double 
chorus and a change of scene from Oechalia to Trachis. 
Imitations and plagiarisms from the other plays abound, 
and the work has more than its fair share of vain repetitions 
and tasteless absurdities. On the other hand, metre and 
diction closely recall the dramas accepted as genuine. 
It is hard to give any certain answer to such a complicated 
problem, but it is noteworthy that all the worst defects in 
this play (which among its other peculiarities possesses 
abnormal length) occur after 1. 705, while the earlier scenes 
depicting the jealousy of Deianira show the Senecan dramatic 
style almost at its best. Even in the later portion of the 
play there is much that may be by the hand of Seneca. 
It is impossible to brand the drama as wholly spurious. 
The opening lines (1-232) may not belong to the play, 
but may form an entirely separate scene dealing with the 
capture of Oechalia : there is no reason to suppose that they 
are not by Seneca, and the same statement applies to the 
great bulk of 11. 233-705. The remainder has in all prob- 
ability suffered largely from interpolation, but its general 
resemblance to Seneca in style and diction is too strongly 
marked to permit us to reject it en bloc. The problem is too 
obscure to repay detailed discussion. 3 The most probable 



1 Leo, Sen. tragoed. i. 89-134. 

2 It is not even necessary to suppose with Leo that these were the 
earliest of the plays and that these metrical experiments were youthful 
indiscretions which failed and were not repeated. Leo, i. p. 133. 

3 For a detailed treatment see Leo, i. p. 48. Mclzer, de H. Oetaeo 
Annaeano, Chemnitz, 1890; Classical Review, 1905, p. 40, Summers. 



II SENECA 43 

solution of the question would seem to be that the work 
was left in an unfinished condition with inconsistencies, self- 
plagiarisms, repetitions, and absurdities which revision would 
have removed ; this unfinished drama was then worked over 
and corrected by a stupid, but careful student of Seneca. 

There is such a complete absence of evidence as to the 
period of Seneca's life during which these dramas were 
composed, that much ingenuity has been wasted in attempts 
to solve the problem. The view most widely held why 
it should be held is a mystery is that they were composed 
during Seneca's exile in Corsica (41-9 A. D.). 1 Others, again, 
hold that they were written for the delectation of the young 
Nero, who had early betrayed a taste for the stage. This 
view has nothing to support it save the accusation men- 
tioned by Tacitus, 2 to the effect that the patronage and 
approval of Nero led Seneca to write verse more frequently 
than his wont. Direct evidence there is none, but the 
general crudity of the work, coupled with the pedantic 
hardness and rigidity of the Stoicism which pervades the 
plays, points strongly to an early date, considerably earlier 
than the exile in Corsica. There is no trace of the mature 
experience and feeling for humanity that characterize the 
later philosophical works. On the contrary, these plays 
are just what might be expected of a young man fresh 
from the schools of rhetoric and philosophy. 3 As to the 
order in which the plays were written there is practically 
nothing to guide us. 4 The Hercules Oetaeus is probably 



1 See p. 39 on relation of epigrams to dramas. 2 Ann. xiv. 52. 

3 See also note on p. 42 for Leo's ingenious, but inconclusive theory 
for the dates of the Agamemnon and Oedipus. 

4 There is but one passage that can be held to afford the slightest 
evidence for a later date, Med. 163 ' qui nil potest sperare, desperet nihil ' 
seems to be an echo of Ep. v. 7 ' sed ut huius quoque diei lucellum tecum 
communicem, apud Hecatonem nostrum inveni ..." desines ", inquit, 
" timere, si sperare desieris " .' This aphorism is quoted as newly found. 
The letters were written 62-5 A. D. This passage would therefore suggest 
a very late date for the Medea. But Seneca had probably been long 
familiar with the works of Hecato, and the epigram is not of such pro- 
fundity that it might not have occurred to Seneca independently. 



44 DRAMA II 

the latest, for in it we find plagiarisms from the Hercules 
Furens, Oedipus, Thyestes, Phoenissae, Phaedra, and Troades. 
Even here, however, there is an element of uncertainty, for 
it is impossible to ascertain whether any given plagiarism 
is due to Seneca or to his interpolators. 

Leaving such barren and unprofitable ground, what can 
we say of the plays themselves ? Even after making due 
allowance for the hopeless decline of dramatic taste and 
for the ruin wrought by the schools of rhetoric, it is hard 
to speak with patience of such productions, when we recall 
the brilliance and charm of the prose works of Seneca. 
We can forgive him being rhetorical when he speaks for 
himself ; when he speaks through the lips of others he is 
less easily tolerable. 

Drama is a reading of human life : if it is to hold one's 
interest it must deal with the feelings, thought, and action 
of genuine human beings and represent their complex inter- 
action : the characters must be real and must differ one 
from the other, so that by force of contrast and by the 
continued play of diverse aspects and developments of the 
human soul, the significance, the pathos, and the power of 
the fragment of human life selected for representation may 
be fully brought out and set before our eyes. If these 
characteristics be absent, the drama must of necessity be 
an artistic failure by reason of its lack of truth. But it 
requires also plot, with a logical growth leading to some 
great climax and developing a growing suspense in the 
spectator as to what shall be the end. It is true that plot 
without reality may give us a successful melodrama, that 
truth of character-drawing with a minimum of plot may 
move and interest us. But in neither case shall we have 
drama in its truest and noblest form. 

Seneca gives us neither the half nor the whole. The 
stage is ultimately the touchstone of dramatic excellence. 
But if it is to be such a touchstone, it must have an audience 
with a penetration of intelligence and a soundness of taste 
such as had long ceased to characterize Roman audiences. 
The Senecan drama has lost touch with the stage and lacks 



II SENECA 45 

both unity and life. Such superficial unity as his plots 
possess is due to the fact that they are ultimately imita- 
tions of Greek l drama. A full discussion of the plots is 
neither necessary here nor possible. A few instances of 
Seneca's treatment of his material must suffice. 2 He has 
no sense of logical development ; the lack of sequence 
and of proportion traceable in the letters is more painfully 
evident in the tragedies. 

The Hercules Fur ens supplies an excellent example of 
the weakness of the Senecan plot. It is based on the 
'H/m/cAjjs jucuro/xeros of Euripides, and such unity as it 
possesses is in the main due to that fact. It is in his chief 
divergences from the Euripidean treatment of the story 
that his deficiencies become most apparent. Theseus 
appears early in the play merely that he may deliver a long 
rhodomontade on the appearance of the underworld, whence 
Hercules has rescued him ; and, worst of all, the return of 
Hercules is rendered wholly ineffective. Amphitryon hears 



1 For comparative analyses of Seneca's tragedies and the corre- 
sponding Greek dramas see Miller's Translation of the Tragedies of 
Seneca, p. 455. 

2 The Phaedra of Seneca is interesting as being modelled on the lost 
Hippolytus Veiled of Euripides. Phaedra herself declares her passion to 
Hippolytus, with her own lips reveals to Theseus the pretended outrage 
to her honour, and slays herself only on hearing of the death of Hippolytus. 
Cp. Leo, Sen. Trag. i. 173. The Phoenissae presents a curious problem. 
It is far shorter than any of the other plays and has no chorus. It falls 
into two parts with little connexion. I. (a) 1-319. Oedipus and Antigone 
are on their way to Cithaeron. Oedipus meditates suicide and is dis- 
suaded by Antigone. (6) 320-62. An embassy from Thebes arrives 
begging Oedipus to return and stop the threatened war between his sons. 
He refuses, and declares the intention of hiding near the field of battle 
and listening joyfully to the conflict between his unnatural sons. II. The 
remaining portion, on the other hand, seems to imply that Oedipus is still 
in Thebes (553, 623), and represents a scene between Jocasta and her 
sons. It lacks a conclusion. These two different scenes can hardly have 
belonged to one and the same play. They may be fragments of two 
separate plays, an Oedipus Coloneus and a Phoenissae, or may equally 
well be two isolated scenes written for declamation without ever having 
been intended for embodiment in two completed dramas. Cp. Ribbeck, 
Gesch. Rom. Dichtung, iii. 70, 



46 DRAMA II 

the approaching steps of Hercules as he bursts his way to 
the upper world and cries (523) 

est est sonitus Herculei gradus. 

The chorus then, as if they had heard nothing, deliver them- 
selves of a chant that describes Hercules as still a prisoner 
in Hades. When Hercules at last is allowed to appear, 
he appears alone, and delivers a long ranting glorification 
of himself (592-617) before he is joined by his father, wife, 
and children. As Leo has remarked, 1 this episode has been 
tastelessly torn into two fragments merely to give Hercules 
an opportunity for turgid declamation. 

The Medea, again, is, on the whole, Euripidean in form, 
though it probably owes much to the influence of Ovid. 2 
It is, moreover, the least tasteless and best constructed of 
his tragedies. It loses comparatively little by the omission 
of the Aegeus episode, but suffers terribly by the insertion 
of a bombastic description of Medea's incantations. The 
love of the Silver Age for rhetoric has converted Medea 
into a skilful rhetorician, its love for the black art has 
degraded her to a vulgar sorceress. Nothing, again, can be 
cruder or more awkward than the manner in which the news 
of the death of Creon and his daughter is announced. After 
an interval so brief as scarcely to suffice even for the con- 
veyance of the poisoned gifts to the palace, in rushes a 
messenger crying (879) 

periere cuncta, concidit regni status. [1] 

nata atque genitor cinere permixto iacent. 

Cho. qua fraude capti ? Nunt. qua sclent reges capi, 

donis. Cho. in illis esse quis potuit dolus ? 

Nunt. et ipse miror vixque iam facto malo 

potuisse fieri credo ; quis cladis modus ? 

[1] All is lost ! the kingdom's fallen ! Father and daughter lie in 
mingled dust ! 

Ch. By what snare taken ? 

Mess. By gifts, the snare of kings. 

Ch. What harm could lurk in them ? 

Mess. Myself I marvel, and scarce though the deed is done can I believe 

1 Sen, Trag. i. 161. 2 Leo, op. cit., i, 166 sqq. 



II SENECA 47 

avidus per omnem regiae partem furit 
ut iussus ignis : iam domus tota occidit, 
urbi timetur. Cho. unda flammas opprimat. 
Nunt, et hoc in ista clade mirandum accidit, 
alit unda flammas, quoque prohibetur magis, 
magis ardet ignis : ipsa praesidia occupat. 

That is all : if we had not read Euripides we should scarcely 
understand the connexion between the gifts and the 
mysterious fire. Seneca, with the lack of proportion dis- 
played in nearly all his dramas, has spent so much time 
in describing the wholly irrelevant and absurd details of 
Medea's incantations that he finds no room to give what 
might be a really dramatic description of the all-important 
catastrophe in which Medea's vengeance finds issue. There 
is hardly a play which will not provide similar instances 
of the lack of genuine constructive power. In the Oedipus 
we get the same long narrative of horror that has disfigured 
the Hercules Furens and the Medea. Creon describes to 
us the dark rites of incantation used to evoke the shade 
of Laius. 1 In the Phaedra we find what at first would 
seem to be a clever piece of stagecraft. Hippolytus, scan- 
dalized at Phaedra's avowal of her incestuous passion, 
seizes her by the hair and draws his sword as though to 
slay her. He changes his purpose, but the nurse has seen 
him and calls for aid, denouncing Hippolytus' violence and 
clearly intending to make use of it as damning evidence 
against him. But the chorus refuse to credit her, and the 



it possible. How died they ? Devouring flames rage through all the 
palace as at her command. Now the whole house is fallen and men fear 
for the city. 

Ch. Let water quench the flames. 

M ess. Nay, in this overthrow is this added wonder. Water feeds the 
flames and opposition makes the fire burn fiercer. It hath seared even 
that which should have stayed its power. 



1 530-658. The Oedipus is based on the O. Rex of Sophocles, but 
is much compressed, and the beautiful proportions of the Greek are lost. 
In Seneca out of a total of 1 ,060 lines 330 are occupied by the lyric measures 
of the chorus, 230 by descriptions of omens and necromancy. 



48 DRAMA II 

incident falls flat. 1 Everywhere there is the same casual 
workmanship. If we stop short of denying to Seneca the 
possession of any dramatic talent, it is at any rate hard 
to resist the conviction that he treated the plays as a 
parergon, spending little thought or care on their ensemble, 
though at times working up a scene or scenes with an 
elaboration and skill as unmistakable as it is often mis- 
directed. 

The plays are, in fact, as Nisard has admirably put it, 
drames de recette. The recipe consists in the employment 
of three ingredients description, declamation, and philo- 
sophic aphorism. There is room for all these ingredients 
in drama as in human life, but in Seneca there is little else : 
these three elements conspire together to swamp the drama, 
and they do this the more effectively because, for all their 
cleverness, Seneca's description and declamation are radi- 
cally bad. It is but rarely that he shows himself capable of 
simple and natural language. If a tragic event enacted 
off the stage requires description, it must outdo all other 
descriptions of the same type. And seeing that one of the 
chief uses of narrative in tragedy is to present to the imagina- 
tion of the audience events which are too horrible for their 
eyes, the result in Seneca's hands is often little less than 
revolting. For example, the self-blinding of Oedipus is set 
forth with every detail of horror, possible and impossible, 
till the imagination sickens. 

(961) gemuit et dirum fremens 

manus in ora torsit, at contra truces 



1 It is also to be noted that the nurse does not make use of this device 
till after Hippolytus has left the stage, although to be really effective her 
words should have been uttered while Hippolytus held Phaedra by the 
hair. The explanation is, I think, that the play was written for recitation, 
not for acting. Had the play been acted, the nurse's call for help and 
her accusation of Hippolytus could have been brought in while Hippo- 
lytus was struggling with Phaedra. But being written for recitation 
by a single person there was not room for the speech at the really 
critical moment, and therefore it was inserted afterwards too late. 
See p. 73, 



II SENECA 49 

oculi steterunt et suam intent! maiiuni 
ultro insequuntur, vulneri occurrunt *uo. 
scrutator avidus manibus uncis lumina, 
radice ab ima funditus vulsos sinml 
cvolvit orbes ; haeret in vacuo manus 
ct fixa penitus unguibus lacerat cavos 
alte recessus luminum et inanes sinus 
saevitque frustra plusque quam satis est furit. 

The last line is an epitome of Seneca's methods of descrip- 
tion. Yet more revolting is the speech of the messenger 
describing the banquet, at which Atreus placed the flesh 
of Thyestes' murdered sons before their father (623-788). 
Nothing is spared us, much that is impossible is added. 1 
At times, moreover, this love of horrors leads to the intro- 
duction of descriptions wholly alien to the play. In the 
Hercules Furens the time during which Hercules is absent 
from the scene, engaged in the slaying of the tyrant Lycus, 
is filled by a description of Hades from the mouth of 
Theseus, who is fresh-come from the underworld. The 
speech is not peculiarly bad in itself ; it is only very long 2 
(658-829) and very irrelevant. 

The effect of the declamation is not less unhappy. 
Seneca's dramatis personae rarely speak like reasoning 
human beings : they rant at one another or at the audience 
with such overwrought subtleties of speech and rhetorical 
perversions that they give the impression of being no 
more than mechanical puppets handled by a crafty but 
inartistic showman. All speak the same strange language, a 
language born in the rhetorical schools of Greece and Rome. 
Gods and mortals alike suffer the same melancholy fate. 
Juno, when she declares her resolve to afflict Hercules 
with madness, addresses the furies who are to be her 
ministers as follows (H. F. 105) : 



1 Similarly, Medea, being a sorceress, must be represented engaged in 
the practice of her art. Hence lurid descriptions of serpents, dark invoca- 
tions, &c. (670-842). 

2 Seneca never knows when to stop. Undue length characterizes 
declamations and lyrics alike. 

BUTLEB 



50 DRAMA II 

coiicutite pectus, acrior mentcm excoquat [I] 

quam qui caminis ignis Aetnaeis furit : 

ut possit animo captus Alcides agi 

magiio furore percitus, nobis prius 

iiisaniendum est luno, cur nondum furis V 

me me, sorores, mente deiectam mea 

versate primam, facere si quicquam apparo 

digiium noverca ; vota mutentur mea : 

natos reversus videat incolumes precor 

nianuque fortis redeat : inveni diem 

invisa quo nos Herculis virtus iuvet. 

me vicit et se vincat et cupiat mori 

ab inferis reversus. . . . 

pugnanti Herculi 
tandem favebo. 

She is clearly a near relative of that Oedipus who, in the 
Phoenissae, begs Antigone to lead him to the rock where 
the Sphinx sat of old (120) : 

dirige hue gressus pedum, [2] 
hie siste patrern. dira ne sedes vacet, 



[1] Distract his heart with madness : let his soul 

More fiercely burn than that hot fire which glows 

On Aetna's forge. But first, that Hercules 

May be to madness driven, smitten through 

With mighty passion, I must be insane. 

Why rav'st thou not, O Juno ? Me, oh, me, 

Ye sisters, first of sanity deprive, 

That something worthy of a stepdame's wrath 

I may prepare. Let all my hate be change 

To favour. Now I pray that he may come 

To earth again, and see his sons unharmed ; 

May he return with all his old time strength. 

Now have I found a day when Hercules 

May help me with his strength that I deplore. 

Now let him equally o'ercome himself 

And me ; and let him, late escaped from death, 

Desire to die ... And so at last I'll help 

Alcides in his wars. MlLLER. 

[2] Direct me thither, set thy father there. 

Let not that dreadful seat be empty long, 



II SENECA 51 

inoiistrum repone niaius. hoc saxuui iiisideiis 
obscura nostrae verba fortunae loquar, 
quae nemo solvat. 

. . . saeva Thebarum lues 
luctifica caecis verba committens modis 
quid simile posuit ? quid tarn inextricabile ? 
avi geuer patrisque rivalis sui 
f rater suorum liberum et fratrum parens ; 
uno avia partu liberos peperit viro, 
sibi et nepotes. moustra quis tanta explicat ? 
ego ipse, victae spolia qui Sphingis tuli, 
haerebo fati tardus interpres mei. 

There is no need to multiply instances ; each play will 
supply many. Only in the Troades l and the Phaedra 
does this declamatory rhetoric rise to something higher 
than mere declamation and near akin to true poetry. In 
these plays there are two speeches standing on a different 
plane to anything else in Seneca's iambics. In the Troades 
Agamemnon is protesting against the proposed sacrifice of 
Polyxena to the spirit of the dead Achilles (255). 



But place me there a greater monster still. 
There will I sit and of my fate propose 
A riddle dark that no man shall resolve. 

What riddle like to this could she propose, 

That curse of Thebes, who wove destructive words 

In puzzling measures ? What so dark as this ? 

He ivas his grandsire's son-in-law, and yet 

His father's rival ; brother of his sons, 

And father of his brothers : at one birth 

The grandame bore unto her husband sons, 

And grandsons to herself. Who can unwind 

A tangle such as this ? E'en I myself, 

Who bore the spoils of triumph o'er the Sphinx, 

Stand mute before the riddle of my fate. 

MILLER. 



' ! As a whole the Troades fails, although, the play being necessarily 
episodic, the deficiencies of plot are less remarkable. But compared 
with the exquisite Troades of Euripides it is at once exaggerated and 
insipid, 

E 2 



52 DRAMA II 

quid caede dira nobiles clari duels [1] 

aspergis umbras ? noscere hoc primum decet, 
quid facere victor debeat, victus pati. 
violenta nemo imperia continuit diu, 
moderata durant ; . . . 

magna momento obrui 
vincendo didici. Troia nos tumidos facit 
nimium ac feroces ? stamus hoc Danai loco, 
unde ilia cecidit. fateor, aliquando impoteiis 
regiio ac superbus altius memet tuli ; 
sed fregit illos spiritus haec quae dare 
potuisset aliis causa, Fortunae favor, 
tu me superbum, Priame, tu timidum facis. 
ego esse quicquam sceptra nisi vano putem 
fulgore tectum nomen et falso comam 
vinclo decentem ? casus haec rapiet brevis, 
nee mille forsan ratibus aut annis decem. 
. . . fatebor . . . affligi Phrygas 
vincique volui ; mere et aequari solo 
utinam arcuissem. 

The thought is not deep : the speech might serve for a 
model for a suasoria in the schools of rhetoric. But there 
is a stateliness and dignity about it that is most rare in 
these plays. At last after dreary tracts of empty rant we 
meet Seneca, the spiritual guide of the epistles and the 
treatises. 



[1] Why besmirch with murder foul the noble shade of that renowned 
chief ? First must thou learn the bounds of a victor's power, of the 
vanquished' s suffering. No man for long has held unbridled sway ; only 
self-control may endure ... I myself have conquered and have learned 
thereby that man's mightiness may fall in the twinkling of an eye. Shall 
Troy o'erthrown exalt our pride and make us overbold ? Here we the 
Danaans stand on the spot whence she has fallen. Of old, I own, I have 
borne myself too haughtily, self-willed and proud of my power. But For- 
tune's favour, which had made another proud, has broken my pride. Priam, 
thou makest me proud, thou makest me tremble. I count the sceptre 
naught save a glory bright with worthless tinsel that sets the vain splendour 
of a crown upon my brow. All this the chance of one short hour may take 
from me without the aid of a thousand ships and ten long years of siege. . . . 
I will own my fault ... I desired to crush and conquer Troy. Would 
I had forbidden to lay her low and raze her walls to the ground ! 



II SENECA 53 

Far more striking, however, from the dramatic stand- 
point, are the great speeches in the Phaedra, where the 
heroine makes known her passion for Hippolytus(600sqq.). 
They are frankly rhetorical, but direct, passionate, and to 
the point. They contain few striking lines or sentiments, 
but they are clear and comparatively free from affectation. 
Theseus has maddened Phaedra by his infidelities, and has 
long been absent from her, imprisoned in the underworld. 
An uncontrollable passion for her stepson has come upon 
her. She appeals to the unsuspecting Hippolytus for pity 
and protection (619) : 

muliebre non est regna tutari urbium ; f 1] 

tu qui iuventae flore primaevo viges 

cives paterno fortis imperio rege, 

sinu receptam supplicem ac servam tege. 

miserere viduae. Hipp. Summus hoc omen dens 

avertat. aderit sospes actutum parens. 

Phaedra then begins to show her true colours. * Nay ! ' 
she replies, ' he will not come. Pluto holds him fast, the 
would-be ravisher of his bride, unless indeed Pluto, like 
others I wot of, is indifferent to love.' Hippolytus attempts 
to console her : he will do all in his power to make life 
easy for her : 

et te merebor esse ne viduam putes [2] 

ac tibi parentis ipse supplebo locum. 

These innocent words are as fuel to Phaedra's passion. 
She turns to him again appealing for pity, pity for an ill 
she dare not name 

quod in novercam cadere vix credas malum. 
He bids her speak out. She replies, ' Love consumes me 



[1] Tis no woman's task to rule cities. Do thou, strong in the flower of 
thy first youth, flinch not, but govern the state by the power thy father 
held. Take me and shield me in thy bosorn, thy suppliant and thy slave ! 
Pity thy father's widow. 

Hipp. Nay, high heaven avert the omen. Soon shall my father return 
unscathed. 

[2] I shall prove me worthy of thee : so thou shalt not deem thyself 
a widow. I will fill up my absent father's room. 



54 DRAMA II 

with an all-devouring flame.' He still fails to catch her 
meaning, supposing that the passion of which she speaks 
is for the absent Theseus. She can restrain herself no 
longer : ' Aye, 'tis for Theseus ! ' she cries (646) : 

Hippolyte, sic est ; Thesei vultus amo l [1] 

illos priores quos tulit quondam puer, 

cum prima puras barba signaret genas 

monstrique caecam Cnosii vidit domum 

et longa curva fila collegit via. 

quis turn ille fulsit ! presserant vittae comam 

et ora fiavus tenera tinguebat pudor ; 

inerant lacertis mollibus fortes tori ; 

tuaeque Phoebes vultus aut Phoebi mei, 

tuusque potius talis, en talis fuit 

cum placuit hosti, sic tulit celsum caput : 

in te magis refulget incomptus decor ; 

est genitor in te totus et torvae tamen 

pars aliqua matris miscet ex aequo decus : 

in ore Graio Scythicus apparet rigor. 

si cum parente Creticum intrasses fretum, 

tibi fila potius nostra nevisset soror. 

te te, soror, quacumque siderei poli 



[1J Even so, Hippolytus ; I love the face that Theseus wore, in the days 
of old while yet he was a boy, when the first down marked his bright 
cheeks and he looked on the dark home of the Cretan monster and gathered 
the long magic thread along the winding way. Ah ! how then he shone 
upon my eyes. A wreath was about his hair and his delicate cheeks 
glowed with the golden bloom of modesty. Strong sinews stood out 
upon his shapely arms and his countenance was the countenance of the 
goddess that thou servest or of mine own bright sun -god ; nay, rather 'twas 
as thine own. Even so, even so looked he when he won the heart of her 
that was his foe, and lofty was his carriage like to thine. But in thee 
still brighter shines an artless glory, and on thee is all thy father's beauty. 
Yet mingled therewith in equal portion is something of thy wild mother's 
fairness. On thy Greek face is seen the fierceness of the Scythian. Hadst 
thou sailed o'er the sea with thy sire to Crete, for thee rather had my 
sister spun the magic thread. On thee, on thee, my sister, I call where'er 



1 Cp. Apul. Met. x. 3, where 'a step -mother in similar circumstances 
defends her passion with the words, 'illius (sc. patris) enim recognoscens 
imaginem in tua facie merito te diligo/ 



II SENECA 55 

in parte fulges, invoco ad causam parem : 
domus sorores una corripuit duas, 
te genitor, at me natus. en supplex iacet 
adlapsa genibus regiae proles domus, 
respersa nulla labe et intacta, innocens 
tibi mutor uni. certa descend! ad preces : 
finem hie dolori faciet aut vitae dies, 
miserere amantis. 1 

Then the storm of Hippolytus' anger breaks. Here at 
least Seneca has used his great rhetorical gifts to good 
effect. The passion may be highly artificial when com- 
pared with the passion of the genuinely human Phaedra 
of Euripides, but it is nevertheless passion and not bom- 
bast : crudity there may be, but there is no real irrelevance. 
There is less to praise and more to wonder at in Seneca's 
dialogue. Instead of rational conversation or controversy, 
he gives us a brilliant but meretricious display of epigram, 
the mechanical nature of which is often emphasized by 
a curious symmetry of structure. For line after line one 
character takes up the words of another and turns them 
against him with dexterity as extraordinary as it is mono- 
tonous. The resulting artificiality is almost incredible. It 
appears in its most extravagant form in the Thyestes. 2 
Scarcely less strained, though from the nature of the subject 
the extravagance is less repellent, is a passage in the Troades. 
Achilles' ghost has demanded the sacrifice of Polyxena. 
Agamemnon hesitates to give orders for the sacrifice. 



thou shinest in the starry heaven, on thee I call to aid my cause'. 
Lo ! sisters twain hath one house brought to naught thee did the 
father ruin, me the son. Lo ! suppliant at thy knees I fall, the daughter 
of a king, stainless and pure and innocent. For thee alone I swerve 
from my course. I have steeled my soul and stooped to beg of thee. 
To-day shall end either my sorrow or my life. Pity, have pity, on her 
that loves thee. 



1 This speech is closely imitated by Racine in his Phedre. 

2 Cp. esp. 995-1006 : the agnosco fratrem of Thyestes is perhaps the 
most monstrous stroke of rhetoric in all Seneca. Better, but equally 
revolting, are 11. 1096-1112 from the same play. 



56 DRAMA II 

Pyrrhus, Achilles' son, enumerates the great deeds of his 
father, and asks, indignantly, if such glory is to win naught 
save neglect after death. Agamemnon has sacrificed his 
own daughter, why should he not sacrifice Priam's ? Aga- 
memnon in the speech quoted above refuses indignantly. 
' Sacrifice oxen if you will : no human blood shall be shed ! ' 
Pyrrhus replies (306) : 

hac dextra Achilli victimam reddam suam. [1] 

quam si negas retinesque, maiorem dabo 

dignamque quam det Pyrrhus ; et nimium diu 

a caede nostra regia cessat manus 

paremque poscit Priamus. Agam. haud equidem nego 

hoc esse Pyrrhi maximum in bello decus, 

saevo peremptus ense quod Priamus iacet, 

supplex pater nus. Pyrrh. supplices nostri patris 

hostesque eosdem novimus. Priamus tamen 

praesens rogavit ; tu gravi pavidus metu, 

nee ad rogandum fortis Aiaci preces 

Ithacoque mandas clausus atque hostem tremens. 

Agamemnon retorts, ' What of your father, when he shirked 
the toils of war and lay idly in his tent ? '- 



[1] By this right hand he shall receive his own. 

And if thou dost refuse and keep the maid, 
A greater victim will I slay, and one 
More worthy Pyrrhus' gift : for all too long 
From royal slaughter hath my hand been free, 
And Priam asks an equal sacrifice. 

Agam. Far be it from my wish to dim the praise 

That thou dost claim for this most glorious deed 
Old Priam slain by thy barbaric sword, 
Thy father's suppliant. 

Pyrrh. I know full well 

My father's suppliants and well I know 

His enemies. Yet royal Priam came 

And made his plea before my father's face ; 

But thou, o'ercome with fear, not brave enough 

Thyself to make request, within thy tent 

Did trembling hide, and thy desires consign 

To braver men, that they might plead for thee. 

MILLER. 



II SENECA 57 

levi canoram verberans plectro chelyn. [1] 

Pyrrh, tune magnus Hector, arma contemnens tua, 

cantus Achillis timuit et tanto in metu 

navalibus pax alia Thessalicis fuit. 
Agam. nempe isdem in istis Thessalis navalibus 

pax alta rursus Hectoris patri fuit. 
Pyrrh. est regis alti spiritum regi dare. 
Agam. cur dextra regi spiritum eripuit tua ? 
Pyrrh. mortem misericors saepe pro vita dabit. 
Agam. et nunc misericors virginem busto petis ? 
Pyrrh. iamne immolari virgines credis nefas ? 
Agam. praeferre patriam liberis regem decet. 
Pyrrh. lex nulla capto parcit aut poenam impedit. 
Agam. quod non vetat lex, hoc vetat fieri pudor. 
Pyrrh. quodcumque libuit facere victori licet. 
Agam. minimum decet libere cui multum licet. 

The cleverness of this is undeniable : individual lines (e.g. 
the last) are striking. Taken collectively they are ineffec- 
tive ; we feel, moreover, that the cleverness is mere knack : 
the continued picking up of the adversary's words to be 
used as weapons against himself is wearisome. It would 
be nearly as great a strain to listen to such a dialogue as 
to take part in it : the atmosphere is that of the school 



[1] Idly strumming on his tuneful lyre. 

Pyrrh. Then mighty Hector, scornful of thy arms, 

Yet felt such wholesome fear of that same lyre, 
That our Thessalian ships were left in peace. 

Agam. An equal peace did Hector's father find, 
When he betook him to Achilles' ships. 

Pyrrh. 'Tis regal thus to spare a kingly life. 

Agam. Why then didst thou a kingly life despoil ? 

Pyrrh. But mercy oft doth offer death for life. 

A gam. Doth mercy now demand a maiden's blood ? 

Pyrrh. Canst thou proclaim such sacrifice a sin ? 

A gam. A king must love his country more than child. 

Pyrrh. No law the wretched captive's life doth spare. 

Agam. What law forbids not, yet may shame forbid. 

Pyrrh. 'Tis victor's right to do whate'er he will. 

Agam. Then should he will the least, who most can do. 

MILLER. 



58 DRAMA II 

of rhetoric, an atmosphere in which sensible and natural 
dialogue is impossible. 1 

The characters naturally suffer from this continued dis- 
play of declamatory rhetoric. They have but one voice 
and language ; they differ from one another only in their 
clothes and the situations in which they are placed. It 
is true that some of them are patterns of virtue and others 
monsters of iniquity. But strip off the coating of paint, 
and within the limits of these two types for there are 
but two the puppets are precisely the same. There is 
none of the play of light and shade so essential to drama : 
all is agonizingly crude and lurid. This is not due to the 
rhetoric alone, there is another influence at work. The 
plays are permeated by a strong vein of Stoicism. Carried 
to its logical conclusion Stoicism lays itself open to taunts 
such as Cicero levels at his friend Cato in the pro Murena, 2 
where he delivers a humorous reductio ad dbsurdum of its 
tenets. Such a philosophy is fatal to the drama. It allows 
no room for human sentiment or human weakness ; the 
most virtuous affections are chilled and robbed of their 
attractiveness : there are no gradations of temperament, 
intellect, or character : pathos disappears. The Stoic ideal 
was a being in whom the natural impulses and desires 
should be completely subjected to the laws of pure reason. 
It tends in its intensity to a narrowness, an abstract un- 
reality which is unfavourable to the development of the 
more human virtues. What it gave with one hand the 
more rigid Stoic philosophy took away with the other. It 



1 For other examples of dialogue cp. esp. Medea, 159-76, 490-529 
(perhaps the most effective dialogue in Seneca), Thyestes, 205-20 ; H. F. 
422-38, for which see p. 62. 

2 Pro M. 61 ' Fuit enim quidam summo ingenio vir, Zeno, cuius 
inventorum aemuli Stoici nominantur : huius sententia et praecepta 
huiusmodi : sapientem gratia nunquam moveri, nunquam cuiusquam 
delicto ignoscere ; neminem misericordem esse nisi stultum et levem : 
viri non esse neque exorari neque placari : solos sapientes esse, si dis- 
tortissimi sint, formosos, si mendicissimi, divites, si servitutem serviant 
reges,' &c. He goes on to put a number of cases where the Stoic rules 
break down. 



II SENECA 59 

preached the brotherhood of man and took away half the 
value of sympathy. And here in the plays there is nothing 
of the mitis sapientia, the concessions to mortal weakness, 
the humanity, which characterize the prose works of Seneca 
and have won the hearts of many generations of men. 
There the hardness of Stoicism is softened by ripe experience 
and a tendency to eclecticism, and the doctrinaire stands 
less sharply revealed. ' Sous 1'austerite du philosophe, on 
trouve un homme.' The most noteworthy result of this 
hard Stoicism upon the plays is the almost complete absence 
of pathos springing from the tenderer human affections. 
Seneca's tragedy may sometimes succeed in horrifying us, 
as in the ghastly rhetoric of the Thyestes or the Medea. 
He moves us rarely. 

But there are a few striking exceptions to the rule, notably 
the beautiful passage of the Troades, where Andromache 
bids her companions in misfortune cease from useless 
lamentation x (409) : 

quid, maesta Phrygiae turba, laceratis comas [1] 

miserumque tunsae pectus effuso genas 

fletu rigatis ? levia perpessae sumus, 

si flenda patimur. Ilium vobis modo, 

mibi cecidit olim, cum ferus curru incite 

mea membra raperet et gravi gemeret sono 

Peliacus axis pondere Hectoreo tremens. 

tune obruta atque eversa quodcumque accidit 

torpens malis rigensque sine sensu fero. 

iam erepta Danais coniugem sequerer meum, 



[1] Why, ye sad Phrygian women, do ye rend your hair and beat your 
woeful breasts and bedew your cheeks with streaming tears ? But light 
is our sorrow, if it lies not too deep for tears. For you Ilium but now 
has fallen, for me it fell long ago, when the cruel wheels of the swift car 
of Peleus' son dragged in the dust the limbs of him I loved, and groaned 
loud as they quivered beneath the weight of Hector dead. Then was 
I overthrown, then cast to utter ruin, and since then I bear whatso falleth 
upon me, with a heart that is numb with grief, chilled and insensible, and 
long since had I snatched myself from the hands of the Greeks and followed 



Cp. Eurip. Andr. 453 sqq. 



60 DRAMA II 

nisi hie teneret : hie meos animos domat 
morique prohibet ; cogit hie aliquid deos 
adhuc rogare tempus aerumnae addidit. 

Even here the pathos is the calm and reasoned pathos of 
hopelessness, the pathos of a Stoic who preaches endurance 
of evils against which his philosophy is not proof. Here, 
too, we find the Stoic attitude towards death. Death is 
the end of all ; there is naught to dread ; death puts an 
end to hope and fear : to die is to be as though we had 
never been (394) : 

post mortem nihil est, ipsaque mors nihil, [1] 

velocis spatii meta novissima ; 

spem ponant avidi, solliciti metum. 

tempus nos avidum devorat et chaos : 

mors individua est, noxia corpori 

nee parcens animae : Taenara et aspero 

regnum sub domino limen et obsidens 

custos non facili Cerberus ostio 

rumores vacui verbaque inania 

et par sollicito fabula somriio. 

quaeris quo iaceas post obitum loco ? 

quo non nata iacent. 

Death brings release from sorrow : the worst of torture is 
to be forced to live on in the midst of woe 



my husband, did not my child keep me among the living : he checks my 
purpose and forbids me to die ; he constrains me still to make supplication 
to heaven and prolongs my anguish. 

Since naught remains, and death is naught 

But life's last goal, so swiftly sought : 

Let those who cling to life abate 

Their fond desires, and yield to fate ; 

Soon shall grim time and yawning night 

In their vast depths engulf us quite ; 

Impartial death demands the whole 

The body slays nor spares the soul. 

Dark Taenara and Pluto fell, 

And Cerberus, grim guard of hell 

All these but empty rumours seem, 

The pictures of a troubled dream. 

Where then will the departed spirit dwell ? 

Let those who never came to being tell. MILLER. 



II SENECA 61 

mors votum meum cries Hecuba (1171) [1] 

infantibus violenta, virginibus venis, 
ubique properas, saeva : me solani times. 

So, too, Andromache, in the passage quoted above, almost 
apologizes for not having put an end to her existence. 
Polyxena meets death with exultation (Tro, 945, 1152-9): 
even the little Astyanax is infected with Stoic passion for 
suicide (1090) : 

nee gradu segni puer [2] 

ad alta pergit moenia. ut summa stetit 
pro turre, vultus hue et hue acres tulit 
intrepidus ammo. . . . 

non flet e turba omnium 
qui fletur ; ac, dum verba fatidici et preces 
concipit Vlixes vatis et saevos ciet 
ad sacra superos, sponte desiluit sua 
in media Priami regna. 

The enthusiasm for death is carried too far. 1 Even the 
agony of the Troades fails really to stir us : it depresses 
us without wakening our sympathy. So, too, with other 
scenes : in the Hercules Furens we have the virtuous Stoic 
in the persons of Megara and Amphitryon confronting 
the instans tyrannus in the person of Lycus : it is the hack- 
neyed theme of the schools of rhetoric, 2 but derives its 
inspiration from Stoicism (426) : 



[1] death, my sole desire, for boys and maids 

Thou com'st with hurried step and savage mien : 
But me alone of mortals dost thou fear. 

MILLER. 

[2] And with no lingering pace the boy climbed the lofty battlements, and 
all about him cast his keen gaze with dauntless soul . . . But he alone 
of all the throng who wept for him wept not at all, and, while Ulysses 
' uttered in priestly wise the words of fate and prayed ' and called the 
cruel gods to the sacrifice, the boy of his own will cast himself down to 
death on the fields that Priam ruled. 



1 For still greater exaggeration cp. P/ioen. 151 aqq. ; Oed. 1020 sqq. 

2 Cp. Sen. Contr* ii. 5 ; ix. 4. 



62 DRAMA II 

Lye. cogere. Meg. cogi qui potest nescit mori. [1] 

Lye. effare potius, quod novis thalamis parem 

regale munus. Meg. aut tuam mortem aut meain. 

Lye. moriere demens. Meg. coniugi occurram meo. 

Lye. sceptrone nostro famulus est potior tibi ? 

Meg. quot iste famulus tradidit reges neci. 

Lye. cur ergo regi servit et patitur iugum ? 

M eg. imperia dura tolle : quid virtus erit ? 1 

Lye. obici feris monstrisque virtutem putas ? 

Meg. virtutis est domare quae cuucti pa vent. 

Lye. tenebrae loquentem magna Tartareae premunt. 

Meg. non est ad astra mollis e terris via. 2 

So, too, a little later (463) Amphitryon crushes Lycus with 
a true Stoic retort : 

Lye. quemcumque miserum videris, hominem scias. [2] 
AmpJt. quemcumque fortem videris, miserum neges. 3 

Admirable as are the sentiments expressed by these virtuous 
and calamitous persons, they leave us cold : they are too 
self -sufficient to need our sympathy. Pain and death have 
no terrors for them ; why should we pity them ? But it 
would be unjust to lay the blame for this absence of pathetic 



[1] Lye. Thou shall be forced. 

Meg. He can be forced, who knows not how to die. 

Lye. Tell me what gift I could bestow more rich 

Than royal wedlock ? Meg. Or thy death or mine. 

Lye. Then die, thou fool. Meg. 'Tis thus I'll meet my lord. 

Lye. Is that slave more to thee than I, a king ? 

M eg. How many kings has that slave given to death ! 

Lye. Why does he serve a king and bear the yoke ? 

Meg. Remove hard tasks, and where would valour be ? 

Lye. To conquer monsters call'st thou valour then ? 

Meg. 'Tis valour to subdue what all men fear. 

Lye. The shades of Hades hold that boaster fast. 

M eg. No easy way leads from the earth to heaven. 

MILLEK. 
[2] Lye. Whoe'er is wretched, him mayst thou know for mortal. 

Amph. Whoe'er is brave, thou mayst not call him wretched. 



1 Cp. Sen. de Prov. iv. G ' calainitas virtutis occasio est '. 

2 Cp. Sen. Ep. xcii. 30, 31 ' magnus erat labor ire in caelum '. 

3 Cp. Sen. Ep. xcii. 16 sqq. 



II SENECA 63 

power entirely on the influence of Stoicism. The scholastic 
rhetoric is not a good vehicle for pathos, and must bear 
a large portion of the blame, though even the rhetoric 
is due in no small degree to the Stoic type of dialectic. 
As Seneca himself says, speaking of others than himself, 
' Philosophia quae fuit, facta philologia est.' l And it must 
further be remembered that of the few flights of real poetry 
in these plays some of the finest were inspired by Stoicism. 
The drama cannot flourish in the Stoic atmosphere, poetry 
can. Seneca was sometimes a poet. His best - known 
chorus, the famous regem non faciunt opes of the Thyestes 
(345), is directly inspired by Stoicism. The speeches of 
Agamemnon and Andromache, together with the chorus 
already quoted from the Troades, all bear the impress of 
the Stoic philosophy. The same is true of the scarcely 
inferior chorus on fate from the Oedipus (980). 

But there are other passages of genuine poetry where 
the Stoic is silent. The chorus in the Hercules Furens 
(838), giving the conventional view of death, will stand 
comparison with the chorus of the Troades, giving the 
philosophic view. The chorus on the dawn (H. F. 125) 
brings the fresh sounds and breezes of early morning into 
the atmosphere of the rhetorician's lecture-room. The 
celebrated 

vcnient annis saecula seris [1] 

quibus Oceanus vincula rerum 

laxet et ingens pateat tellus 

Tethysque novos detegat orbes 

nee sit terris ultima Thule (M ed. 375) 

has acquired a fictitious importance since the discovery 
of the new world, but shows a fine imagination, even if 
as has been maintained it is merely a courtly reference 
to the British expedition of Claudius. And the invocation 

[1] Late in time shall come an age, when Ocean shall unbar the world, 
and the whole wide earth be revealed, and Tcthys shall show forth a new 
world, nor Thule be earth's limit any more. 

1 Ep. cviii. 24. 



64 DKAMA II 

to sleep in the Hercules Furens ^proved worthy to provide 
an inspiration for Shakespeare 1 (1063) : 

solvite tantis animum monstris [1] 

solvite superi, caecam in melius 

flectite mentem. tuque, o domitor 

Somne malorum, requies animi, 

pars humanae melior vitae, 

volucre o matris genus Astraeae, 

frater durae languide Mortis, 

veris miscens falsa, futuri 

certus et idem pessimus auctor, 

pax errorum, portus vitae, 

lucis requies noctisque comes, 

qui par regi famuloque venis, 

pavidum leti genus humanum 

cogis longani discere noctem : 

placidus fessum lenisque fove, 

preme devinctum torpore gravi. 

But the poetry is confined mainly to the lyrics. In them, 
though the metre be monotonous and the thought rarely 
more than commonplace, the feeling rings true, the expression 
is brilliant, and the never absent rhetoric is sometimes 



[1] Save him, ye gods, from monstrous madness, save him, restore his 
darkened mind to sanity. And thou, sleep, subduer of ill, the spirit's 
repose, thou better part of human life, swift-winged child of Astraea, drowsy 
brother of cruel death, mixing false with true, prescient of what shall be, 
yet oftener prescient of sorrow, peace mid our wanderings, haven of man's 
life, day's respite, night's companion, that comest impartially to king 
and slave, thou that makest trembling mankind to gain a foretaste of the 
long night of death ; do thou bring gentle rest to his weariness, and sweet 
balm to his anguish, and overwhelm him with heavy stupor. 



1 Cp. Macbeth ii. 2. 36, Macbeth does murder sleep, &c. For other 
Shakespearian parallels, cp. Macbeth, Canst thou not minister to a 
mind diseased ? H. F. 1261 ' nemo pollute queat I animo mederi.' 
Macbeth, I have lived long enough. . . . And that which should accompany 
old age, As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, I must not look to 
have. U. F. 1258 ' Cur animam in ista luce detineam amplius | morerque 
nihil est ; cuncta iam amisi bona, I mentem, arma, famam, coniugem, 
natos, manus.' J. Phil. vi. 70. Cunliffe, Influence of Seneca on 
Elizabethan Tragedy. 



II SENECA 65 

transmuted to a more precious substance with a far-off 
resemblance to true lyrical passion. In the iambics, with 
the exception of the passages already quoted from the 
Troades and the Phaedra, touches of genuine poetry are 
most rare. 1 In certain of the long descriptive passages 
(H. F. 658 sqq., Oed. 530 sqq.) we get a stagey picturesque- 
ness, but no more. It is for different qualities that we read 
the iambics of Seneca, if we read them at all. 

Even in its worst moments the rhetoric is capable of 
extorting our unwilling admiration by its sheer cleverness 
and audacity. A good example is to be found in the passage 
of the Thyestes, where Atreus meditates whether he shall 
call upon his sons Menelaus and Agamemnon to aid him 
in his unnatural vengeance on Thyestes. He has doubts 
as to whether he is their father, for Thyestes had seduced 
their mother Aerope (327) : 

prolis incertae fides [1] 

ex hoc petatur scelere : si bella abnuunt 
et gerere nolunt odia, si patruum vocant, 
pater est. eatur. 

[1] And by this test of crime, 

Let their uncertain birth be put to proof: 
If they refuse to wage this war of death 
And will not serve my hatred ; if they plead 
He is their uncle then he is their sire. 
So to my work ! 

MILLER'S translation slightly altered. 



1 An exception might be made in favour of the beautiful simile describing 
Polyxena about to die, notable as giving one of the very few allusions to 
the beauty of sunset to be found in ancient literature (Troad. 1137) : 

ipsa deiectos gerit 

vultus pudore, sed tamen fulgent genae 
magisque solito splendet extremus decor, 
ut esse Phoebi dulcius lumen solet 
iamiam cadentis, astra cum repetunt vices 
premiturque dubius nocte vicina dies. 
Fine, too, are the lines describing the blind Oedipus (Oed. 971) : 

attollit caput 

cavisque lustrans orbibus caeli plagas 
noctem experitur. 



66 DRAMA II 

Equally ingenious is the closing scene between Atreus and 
Thyestes after the vengeance is accomplished and Thyestes 
has feasted on the flesh of his own sons (1100) : 

Thy. quid liberi meruere ? Atr. quod fuerant tui. [1J 

Thy. natos parenti Atr. fateor et, quod me iuvat, 

certos. Thy. piorum praesides testor deos. 
Atr. quin coniugales ? Thy. scelere quid pensas scelus ? 
Atr. scio quid queraris : scelere praerepto doles, 

nee quod nefandas hauseris angit dapes ; 

quod non pararis : fuerat hie animus tibi 

instruere similes inscio fratri cibos 

et adiuvante liberos matre aggredi 

similique leto sternere hoc unum obstitit : 

tuos putasti. 

These passages are as unreal as they are repulsive, but 
they are diabolically clever. Seneca's rhetoric is, however, 
as we have already seen, capable of rising to higher things, 
and even where he does not succeed, as in the passages 
quoted above from the Phaedra and Troades, 1 in introduc- 
ing a genuine poetic element, he often produces striking 



[1] Thy. What was my children's sin ? 

Atr. This, that they were thy children. 

Thy. But to think 
That children to the father 

Atr. That indeed, 

I do confess it, gives me greatest joy, 
That thou art well assured they were thy sons. 

Thy. I call upon the gods of innocence 

Atr. Why not upon the gods of marriage call ? 

Thy. Why dost thou seek to punish crime with crime ? 

Atr. Well do I know the cause of thy complaint : 
Because I have forestalled thee in the deed. 
Thou grievest, not because thou hast consumed 
This horrid feast, but that thou wast not first 
To set it forth. This was thy fell intent, 
To arrange a feast like this unknown to me, 
And with their mother's aid attack my sons, 
And with a like destruction lay them low. 
But this one thing opposed thou thought'st them thine. 

MILLER. 



pp. 52 sqq., 59. 



II SENECA 67 

declamatory effects. The exit of the blind Oedipus, as he 
goes forth into life-long banishment, bringing peace to 
Thebes at the last, is highly artificial in form, but, given the 
rhetorical drama, is not easily surpassed as a conclusion 

mortifera mecum vitia terrarum extraho. [1J 

violenta Fata et horridus Morbi tremor, 
Maciesque et atra Pestis et rabidus Dolor, 
mecum ite, mecum. ducibus his uti libet (1058). 

So likewise the last despairing cry of Jason, as Medea 
sails victoriously away in her magic car 

per alta vade spatia sublimi aethere, [2] 

testare nullos esse qua veheris deos 

forms a magnificent ending to a play which, for all its 
unreality, succeeds for more than half its length (1-578) 
in arresting our attention by its ingenious rhetoric and its 
comparative freedom from mere bombast. Excellent, too, 
is the speech (Phoen. 193) in which Antigone dissuades 
her father from suicide. ' What ills can time have in store 
for him compared to those he has endured ? ' 

qui fata proculcavit ac vitae bona [3] 

proiecit atque abscidit et casus suos 
oneravit ipse, cui deo nullo est opus, 
quare ille mortem cupiat aut quare petat ? 
utrumque timidi est : nemo contempsit mori 
qui concupivit. cuius haut ultra mala 



[1] With me to exile lead I forth 'all pestilential humours of the land. Ye 
blasting fates ', ye trembling agues, famine and deadly plague and mad- 
dened grief, go forth with me, with me ! My heart rejoices to follow in 
your train. 

[2] Sail on through the airy depths of highest heaven, and bear witness 
that, where thou soarest, no gods can be. 

[3] Who tramples under foot his destiny, 

Who disregards and scorns the goods of life, 
And aggravates the evils of his lot, 
Who has no further need of Providence : 
Wherefore should such a man desire to die, 
Or seek for death ? Each is the coward's act. 
No one holds death hi scorn who seeks to die. 
The man whose evils can no further go 

F 2 



68 DRAMA II 

exire possunt, in loco tuto est situs, 
quis iam deorum, velle fac, quicquam potest 
inalis tuis adicere ? iam nee tu potes 
nisi hoc, ut esse te putes dignum nece 
non es nee ulla pectus hoc culpa attigit. 
et hoe magis te, genitor, insontem voca, 
quod innocens es dis quoque invitis. . . . 

quidquid potest 

auferre cuiquam mors, tibi hoc vita abstulit. 

It is, however, in isolated lines and striking sententiae 
that Seneca's gift for rhetorical epigram is seen at its best. 
Nothing could be better turned than 

quaeris Alcidae parem ? [1] 

neino est nisi ipse : (H. F. 84). 

curae leves loquuntur, ingentes stupent (Phaedra 607). [2J 
fortem facit vicina libertas senem (Phaedra 139). [3] 

qui genus iactat suum, 
aliena laudat (H. F. 340). 

fortuna fortes metuit, ignavos premit (Med. 159). 
fortuna opes auferre, non animum potest (Med. 176). 
maius est monstro nefas : [4] 

nam monstra fato, moribus scelera imputes (Phaedra 143). 



Is safely lodged. Who of the gods, think'st thou, 
Grant that he wills it so, can add one jot 
Unto thy sum of trouble ? Nor canst thou, 
Save that thou deem'st thyself unfit to live. 
But thou art not unfit, for in thy breast 
No taint of sin has come. And all the more, 
My father, art thou free from taint of sin, 
Because, though heaven willed it otherwise, 
Thou still art innocent. . . . 

Whatever death 

From any man can take, thy life hath taken. MILLEK. 

[l] a Cp. Theobald: None but himself can be his parallel. 
[2] Cp. Sir W. Raleigh : Passions are best compared with floods and 
streams, The shallow murmur but the deep are dumb. 
[3] For dawning freedom makes the aged brave. MILLER. 

[4] For thy impious love is worse 

Than her unnatural and impious love. 

The first you would impute to character, 

The last to fate. MILLER. 



II SENECA 69 

If nothing had survived of Seneca's plays but a collection 
of sententiae, we might have regretted his loss almost as 
we regret the loss of Menander. 

Here his merits, such as they are, end : they fail to 
justify us in placing him high as a dramatist ; and he 
has many faults over and above those incidental to his 
style and modes of thought. While freer than most of his 
contemporaries from the vain display of obscure erudition, 
he falls into the common vice of introducing ' catalogues '. 
They are dull in epic : in drama they are worse than 
dull. The Hercules Furens is no place for a matter-of-fact 
catalogue of the hero's labours, set forth (210-248) in 
monotonous iambics from the mouth of Amphitryon. If 
they are to be described at all, they demand the decora- 
tive treatment of lyric verse, 1 nor is a catalogue of the 
herbs used by Medea to poison the robe destined for her 
rival any more excusable. 2 Again, like his contemporaries, 
he shows a lack of taste and humour which in its 
worst manifestations passes belief. Not a few of the 
passages already quoted serve to illustrate the point. 
But for fatuity it would be hard to surpass the words 
with which Amphitryon interrupts Theseus' account of 
the horrors of the underworld : 

estne aliqua tellus Cereris aut Bacchi ferax ? (H. F. 697.) 

Scarcely less absurd is the chorus in the Phaedra, who, 
when hymning the power of love, give a long list of 
animals subject to such passion : the catalogue culminates 
with the statement that even whales and elephants fall in 
love (351) : 

amat insani belua ponti 
Lucaeque boves. 

But all such ( instances pale before the conclusion of the 
Phaedra. Not content with giving a ghastly and exagger- 
ated account of the death of Hippolytus, Seneca must needs 



1 Cp. Eur. H. F. 438 sqq. 

2 For further examples cp. H. F. 5-18, Troades 215-19. 



70 DRAMA II 

bring the fragments of his mutilated body upon the scene. 
Theseus, at the suggestion of the chorus, attempts to put 
them together again. The climax comes when, finding 
an unidentifiable portion, he cries (1267) : 

quae pars tui sit dubito, sed pars est tui ! 

The actual language of the plays is pure and classical. 
There is no trace of provincialism, nothing to suggest that 
Seneca was a Spaniard. Its vices proceed from the false 
mould in which it has been cast. There is a lack of connect- 
ing particles, and we proceed by a series of short rhetorical 
jerks. 1 It is the style that Seneca himself condemns in 
his letters (114. 1). Its faults are further aggravated by 
the metre : taken line by line, the iambics of Seneca are 
impressive : taken collectively they are monotonous in 
the extreme. The ear suffers a continual series of stabs, 
which are not the less unpleasant because none of them 
go deep. The verse seems formed, one might almost say 
punched out, by a relentless machine. It is never modified 
by circumstances ; it is the same in narrative and dialogue, 
the same in passion and in calm, if indeed Seneca can ever 
be said to be either passionate or calm. Its pauses come 
with monotonous regularity at the end of the line, diversified 
only by an occasional break at the caesura in the third 
foot. Nor does the rule 2 observed by Seneca, that only 
a spondee or anapaest is permitted in the fifth foot, tend 
to relieve the monotony, though it does much to give the 
individual lines such weight as they possess. A more 
complete contrast with the iambics of the early Latin 
Tragedies cannot be imagined. What has been gained 



1 This terse stabbing rhetoric is characteristic of Stoicism ; the same 
short, jerky sentences reappear in Epictetus. Seneca is doubtless influenced 
by the declamatory rhetoric of schools as well, but his philosophical train- 
ing probably did much to form his style. 

2 Exceptions are so few as to be negligible. The effect of this rule 
is aggravated by the fact that in nine cases out of ten the accent of the 
word and the metrical ictus ' clash ', this result being obtained ' by most 
violent elisions, such as rarely or never occur in the other feet of the verse '. 
Munro, J. Phil. 6, 75. 



II SENECA 71 

in polish has been lost in dignity. Whence the Senecan 
iambic is derived, is a question which cannot be answered 
with certainty. It is wholly unlike the early Roman 
tragic iambic. Elision is rare, and there is little variety. 
Instead of the massive and rugged measure of Pacuvius 
or Accius, we have a finished and elegant monotony. In 
all likelihood it is the lineal descendant of the iambic of 
Ovid. 1 In view of Seneca's great admiration for Ovid 
he quotes him continually in his prose works of Ovid's 
mastery of rhetoric and epigram, and yet more of the dis- 
tinct parallels traceable between the Phaedra and Medea of 
Seneca and the corresponding Heroides of Ovid, it becomes 
a strong probability that the Senecan iambic was deeply 
influenced if not actually created by the iambic style of 
the earlier poet's lost drama, the famous Medea? 

As to the models to which he is indebted for his treatment 
of choric metres we know nothing. In spite of the fact 
that he employs a large variety of metres, and that his 
choruses at times stray from rhetoric into poetry of a high 
order, there is in them a still more deadly monotony than 
in his iambics. The chorus are devoid of life ; they are there 
partly as a concession to convention, but mainly to supply 
incidental music. Their inherent dullness is not relieved 
by the metre. Of strophic arrangement there is no clear 
trace ; in a large proportion of cases the choruses are written 
in one fixed and rigid metre admitting of no variety : even 
where different metres alternate, the relaxation is but 
small, for the same monotony reigns unchecked within 
the limits of each section. The strange experiments in 
mixed metres in the Agamemnon and Oedipus show Seneca's 
technique at its worst : they are composed of fragments 
of Horatian metres, thinly disguised by inversions and 
resolutions of feet : they lack all governing principle and 
are an unqualified failure. Of the remaining metres the 
Anapaestic, Asclepiad, Sapphic, and Glyconic predominate. 

1 The older and more rugged iambic survives in the fables of Phaedrus, 
written at no distant date from these plays, if not actually contemporary. 

2 Cp. Leo, op. cit. i. 166, 174. 



72 DRAMA II 

He is, perhaps, least unsuccessful in his treatment of the 
Anapaest : the lines do not lack melody, and the natural 
flexibility of the metre saves them from extreme monotony, 
though they would have been more successful had he em- 
ployed the paroemiac line as a solemn and resonant close 
to the march of the dimeter. But one wearies soon of the 
eternal Asclepiads and Glyconics which he often allows to 
continue in unbroken and unvaried series for seventy or 
eighty lines together. He rarely allows any variation 
within the Glyconic and never makes use of it to break 
the monotony of the Asclepiad. Still worse are his Sapphics. 
Abandoning the usual arrangement in stanzas of three 
lesser Sapphics followed by an Adonic verse, his Sapphic 
choruses consist almost entirely of the lesser Sapphic varied 
by a very occasional Adonic. The continual succession 
of these lines without so much as an occasional change of 
caesura to diversify the rhythm is at times almost intoler- 
able. At the close of such choruses we feel as though we 
had jogged at a rapid trot for long miles on a very hard 
and featureless road. 

Language and metre work hand in hand with rhetoric 
to make these strange plays dramatically ineffective. So 
strange are they and in many ways so unlike anything 
else in Classical literature, that the question as to the 
purpose with which they were written and the place they 
occupied in the literature of their day affords an interesting 
subject for speculation. Were they written for the stage ? 
Decayed as was the taste for tragedy, tragedies may occasion- 
ally have been acted. 1 But there are considerations which 
suggest doubt as to whether the plays of Seneca were written 
with any such purpose. Even under Nero it is scarcely 
credible that the introduction of the mangled fragments 
of Hippolytus upon the stage would be possible or palatable. 2 

1 See p. 29. 

2 These horrors go beyond the crucifixion scene in the Laureolus (see 
p. 24), and the tradition of genuine tragedy was all against such presen- 
tation. As far as the grotesqueness and bombast of the plays go, the 
age of Nero might have tolerated them. We must remember that seven- 



II SENECA 73 

Medea kills her children coram populo, and, not content with 
killing them, flings their bodies at Jason from her magic 
chariot high in air. Hercules kills his children in full 
view of the audience, not within the house as in the corre- 
sponding drama of Euripides. Such scenes suggest that 
the plays were written not for the stage but for recitation 
with musical interludes from a trained choir. Indications 
that this was the case are to be found in the Hercules 
Furens. While the hero is engaged in slaying his children, 
Amphitryon, in a succession of short speeches, gives the 
details of the murder. This would be ridiculous and 
unnecessary were the scene actually presented on the stage, 
whereas they become absolutely necessary on the assump- 
tion that the play was written for recitation. 1 This 
assumption has the further merit of being charitable ; 
skilful recitation would cover many defects that would 
be almost intolerable on the stage. 

It is improbable, however, that the drama of Seneca 
occupied an important position in the literature of their 
day. The golden age of tragedy was past, and it is hard 
to believe that these plays are favourable specimens even 
of their own age. The authors of the Silver Age virtually 
ignore their existence, and, with the exception of two refer- 
ences in Tertullian and one in Apollinaris Sidonius, they 
are quoted only by scholars and grammarians. 

They have small intrinsic value : but they afford interest- 
ing evidence for the taste 2 of their own day, and their 
influence on modern drama has been enormous. In the 
Renaissance at the dawn of the drama's revival, Seneca 



teen th -century England enjoyed the brilliant bombast of Dryden (e.g. in 
Aurungzebe) and that the eighteenth delighted in the crude absurdities 
of such plays as George Barnwdl. 

1 Cp. also Phaedra 707, where Hippolytus' words, ' en impudicum crine 
contorto caput | laeva reflexi,' can only be justified as inserted to explain 
to the hearers what they could not see. See also p. 48, note. 

2 They have been influenced by the pantomimus and the dramatic 
recitation so fashionable in their day, inasmuch as they lack connexion, 
and, though containing effective episodes, are of far too loose a texture to 
be effective drama. 



74 DRAMA II 

was regarded as a dramatist of the first order. Scaliger 
ranked him above Euripides : it was to him men turned 
to find models for tragedy. Everywhere we see traces of 
the Senecan drama. 1 It is a tribute to the dexterity of 
his rhetoric that his influence should have been so enormous, 
but it is to be regretted in the interests of the drama. 
For to Seneca more than to any other man is due the 
excessive prominence of declamatory rhetoric, which has 
characterized the drama throughout Western Europe from 
the Renaissance down to the latter half of the nineteenth 
century, and has proved a blemish to the work of all save 
a few great writers who recognized the value of rhetoric, 
but never mistook the shadow for the substance. 



Ill 
THE 'OCTAVIA' 

A tragedy with this title is included by the MSS. among 
the plays of Seneca. Its chief interest lies in the fact that it 
is the one surviving example of a fabula praetexta, or tragedy, 
drawn from Roman life. It deals with a tragic incident 
of Nero's reign, the final extinction of the Claudian house. 
Octavia, daughter of Claudius and Messalina, is the heroine. 
Her life was one long tragedy. Her childhood was darkened 
by the disaster that befell her unworthy mother, her maturer 
years by her marriage to Nero. She was a mere pawn in 
the game of politics. The marriage was brought about 
by the designs of Agrippina, to render Nero secure of the 
principate. To effect this end her betrothed Silanus was 



1 See R. Fischer, Die Kunstentwicldung der englischen Tragodie ; 
J. W. Cunliffe, Influence of Seneca on Elizabethan Tragedy ; J. E. Manly, 
Introductory Essay to Miller's Translation of the Tragedies of Seneca. The 
Senecan drama finds its best modern development in the tragedies of 
Alfieri. Infinitely superior in every respect as are the plays of the modern 
dramatist, he yet reveals in a modified form not a few of Seneca's faults. 
There is often a tendency to bombast, an exaggeration of character, 
a hardness of outline, that irresistibly recall the Latin poet. 



II THE 'OCTAVIA' 75 

killed, Claudius, her father, and Britannicus, her brother, 
dispatched by poison. Soon her own wedded life turned 
to tragedy. Nero fell madly in love with Poppaea, and 
resolved to put away Octavia. At Poppaea's instigation 
she was accused of a base intrigue. The plot failed ; the 
false charge could not be pressed home ; she was divorced 
on the ground of sterility, and imprisoned in a town of 
Campania. A rumour arose that she was to be reinstated ; 
the mob of Rome declared itself in her favour and gave 
wild expression to its joy. Poppaea's statues were cast 
down, Octavia's replaced. Poppaea was furious. She laid 
siege to Nero and won him to her will. The old false 
charge of adultery was trumped up ; a complaisant freed- 
man was found to confess himself Octavia's lover. She 
was banished to Pandataria and slain (June 9, 62 A.D.). 

The play gives us a compressed version of the tragedy. 
It opens with a speech by Octavia's nurse, setting forth 
the sorrows of her young mistress. The speech over, she 
leaves the stage to be succeeded by Octavia, who, in a lament 
closely modelled on the lament of the Sophoclean Electra, 1 
bewails the sorrows of her house, the deaths of Messalina, 
Claudius, and Britannicus. The nurse reappears, attempts 
to console her, and counsels submission to fate. Octavia 
changes her strain and prays for death. After a lament 
from the chorus, Nero and Seneca enter on the scene. 
Seneca urges moderation and sets forth his ideal of mon- 
archy. Nero is quite his match in argument, rejects his 
advice, and, concluding with the words 

desiste tandem, iam gravis nimium mihi, [1] 

instare : liceat facere quod Seneca improbat (588). 

declares his intention of marrying Poppaea without delay. 
An interesting chorus follows, describing how Rome of 



[1] Have done at last, 

For wearisome has thine insistence grown ; 
One still may do what Seneca condemns . . . 

MILLER. 



The debt is as good as acknowledged, 11. 58 sqq. 



76 DRAMA II 

old expelled the kings for their crimes. Nero has sinned 
even more than they. Has he not slain even his mother ? 
There follows a long and interesting description of the 
murder, 1 which serves as an introduction to the entrance of 
the ghost of Agrippina in the guise of an avenging fury, 
prophesying the dethronement and death of her unnatural 
son. She is succeeded on the stage by Octavia, resigned 
to the surrender of her position and content to be no more 
than Nero's sister ; once more the chorus bewail her fate. 
At last her rival Poppaea appears in conversation with 
her nurse. The nurse congratulates her, but Poppaea has 
been terrified by visions of the night and is ill at ease. Her 
rival is not yet removed and her own place is still insecure. 
At this point comes the one ray of hope that illumines this 
sombre drama. A messenger arrives with the news that 
the people have risen in Octavia's favour. But the reader is 
not left in suspense for a moment. Nero appears and orders 
the suppression of the emeute and the execution of Octavia. 
The chorus mourn the fate of the beloved of the Roman 
people. Their power and splendour is but brief : Octavia 
perishes untimely, like Gracchus and Livius Drusus. She 
herself appears in the hands of soldiers, being dragged off 
to execution and death. Like Cassandra, 2 she compares 
her fate with that of the nightingale, to whom the gods 
gave a new life of peace full of sweet lamentation as a close 
to her troubled human existence. One more song of con- 
dolence from the chorus, one more song of sorrow from 
Octavia, and she is taken from our sight, and the play 
closes with a denunciation by the chorus of the hardness 
of heart and the insatiate cruelty of Rome. 

It is not hard to summarize the general effect of this 
curious drama. Its author has read the Greek tragedians 
carefully and to some purpose ; he has studied the characters 
of Electra, Cassandra, and Antigone with diligence, if without 
insight. He clearly feels deep sympathy for Octavia, and 
to some extent succeeds in communicating this sympathy 

l 11. 310 sqq. 2 ]. 915. 



II THE ' OCTAVIA ' 77 

to the audience. His heroine speaks in character : she is 
never a male Stoic, flaunting in female garb, she is a genuine 
woman, a gentle, lovable creature broken down by misfor- 
tune. The other characters are uninteresting. Nero is 
an academic tyrant, Seneca an academic adviser, Poppaea 
is little more than a lay figure. The most that can be said 
for them is that they do not rant. The chorus are on the 
whole a fairly satisfactory imitation of a chorus of sympa- 
thetic Greek women. 1 There is nothing forced or unnatural 
about them ; they are real human beings ; their sympathy 
is genuine, and its expression appropriate. But they are 
dull ; monotonous lamentation in monotonous anapaests 
is the height of their capacity. The play is a failure : 
the subject is not in itself dramatic ; if it had been, it 
would have been spoiled by the treatment it receives. 
We are never in suspense ; Octavia has never the remotest 
chance of escape ; our pity for her is genuine enough, 
but her character lacks both grandeur and psychological 
interest : the pathos of her situation will not compensate 
us for the absence of a dramatic plot. The fall of the 
house of Claudius compares ill with the tragedy of the 
Pelopidae. And the treatment of the story, from the 
dramatic standpoint, is childish. The play is scarcely 
more than a series of melancholy monologues interspersed 
with not less melancholy dirges from the chorus. The 
most we can say of it is that it is simple and unaffected : 
if it lacks brilliance, it also lacks exaggeration. Thought 
and diction are commonplace and uninspired, but they 
are never absurd an extraordinary merit in a poet of the 
Silver Age. 

It will have been sufficiently evident from this brief 
sketch that the Octavia is in all respects very different 
indeed from the other plays that claim Seneca for their 
author. It is free from their faults and their merits alike. 
It never sinks to their depths, but it never rises to their 



1 There is no direct evidence of the sex of the chorus hi the Octavia. In 
Greek drama they would almost certainly have been women. 



78 DRAMA II 

heights. Apart, however, from these general considerations, 1 
there is evidence amounting almost to certainty that the 
Octavia is not by Seneca. The tragedy takes place in 
the lifetime of Seneca. Seneca himself figures in the play. 
The story is of such a nature that it could hardly have 
been written, much less published, in the reign of Nero. 
Yet more conclusive is the fact that the ghost of Agrippina 
prophesies the fate of Nero in such a way as to make it 
certain that the author outlived the emperor and was 
acquainted with the facts of his death. 2 

Who then was the author ? When did he write ? Evidence 
is almost absolutely lacking. From its comparative sanity 
and simplicity and its intense hatred of Nero it may reason- 
ably be conjectured that it is the work of the Flavian age ; 
the age of the anti-Neronian reaction and of the return 
to saner models in life and literature. But there is no 
certainty ; it may have been written under Nerva, Trajan, 
or Hadrian. It stands detached and aloof from the litera- 
ture of its age. 



1 The diction is wholly un-Senecan. There is no straining after epigram ; 
the dialogue, though not lacking point (e.g. the four lines 185-8, or 
451-60), does not bristle with it, and is far less rhetorical and more natural. 
The chorus confines itself to anapaests, is simpler and far more rele- 
vant. The all pervading Stoicism is the one point they have in common. 

2 The imitation of Lucan in 70, 71 ' magni resto nominis umbra,' is 
also strong evidence against the Senecan authorship. 



CHAPTER III 

PERSIUS 

IT is possible to form a clearer picture of the personality 
of Aulus Persius Flaccus, the satirist, than of any other 
poet of the Silver Age. Not only are the essential facts of 
his brief career preserved for us in a concise, but extremely 
relevant biography taken from the commentary of the 
famous critic Valerius Probus, but there are few poets 
whose works so clearly reveal the character of their author. 

Persius was born at the lofty hill-town of Volaterrae, in 
Tuscany, on the 4th of December, 34 A. D. 1 He was scarcely 
six years old when he lost his father, a wealthy Roman 
knight, named Flaccus. His mother, Fulvia Sisennia, 
married again, but her second husband, a knight named 
Fusius, died after a few years of wedded life. Persius was 
educated at home up to the age of twelve, when he was 
taken to Rome to be taught literature by Remmius Palaemon 
and rhetoric by Verginius Flavus. Of the latter nothing 
is known save that he wrote a much-approved textbook 
on rhetoric and was exiled by Nero ; 2 the former was 
a freedman whose remarkable talents were only equalled 
by his gross vices ; he had a prodigious memory, was a 
skilful improvvisatore, and the most distinguished teacher 
of the day. 3 At the age of sixteen, shortly after his assump- 
tion of the toga virilis, the young Persius made the friendship 
which was to be the ruling influence of his life. He learned 
to know and love the great Stoic teacher, Cornutus, with an 
attachment that was broken only by death. It was from 



1 Probus, vita. 'A. Persius Flaccus natus est pridie non. Dec. Fabio 
Persico, L. Vitellio coss.' Hieronym. ad aim. 2050 = 34 A. D. ' Persius 
Flaccus Satiricus Volaterris nascitur.' Where not otherwise stated the 
facts of Persius' life are drawn from the biography of Probus. 

2 Quint, vii. 4, 40; Tac. Ann. xv. 71. 

3 Suet, de Gramm. 23. 



80 PERSIUS III 

Cornutus that he imbibed the principles of Stoicism, and 
at his house that he met the Greek philosophers, Petronius 
Aristocrates of Magnesia and the Lacedaemonian physician, 
Claudius Agathurnus, whose influence upon his character 
was only less than that of Cornutus. Among his intimates 
he counted Calpurnius Statura, who died in early youth, 
and the famous lyric poet, Caesius Bassus, 1 who was destined 
long to survive his friend and to do him the last service 
of editing the satires, which his premature death left un- 
published and unfinished. Lucan also was one of his fellow 
students in the house of Cornutus, 2 while at a later date 
he made the acquaintance of Seneca, the leading writer 
of the day, although he never felt the seductive attractions 
of his fluent style and subtle intellect. More important 
influences were his almost filial respect and affection for 
the distinguished orator, 3 M. Servilius Nonianus, and his 
close companionship with Thrasea Paetus, the leader of 
the Stoic opposition. 4 At one time Persius, if the scholiast 
may be believed, 5 contemplated a military career. The 
statement is scarcely probable in view of the contempt 
and dislike with which he invariably speaks of soldiers, 
nor is it easy to conceive a profession less suited to the 
temperament of the quiet and retiring poet. Whatever 
his original intentions may have been, he actually chose 
the secluded life of study, the vita umbratilis, as the Romans 
called it, remote from the dust and heat of the great world. 
That he was wise we cannot doubt. It was the only life 
possible in those days for a man of his character. ' Fuit 



1 Bassus was many years his senior addressed as senex in Sat. vi. 6, 
written late in 61 or early in 62 A. D. and perished in the eruption of 
Vesuvius, 79 A. D. Cp. Schol. ad Pers. vi. 1. 

2 Lucan was five years his junior. Cp. p. 97. 

3 Cp. Tac. Ann. xiv. 19; Dial 23; Quint, x. 1. 102. 

4 This friendship lasted ten years, presumably the last ten of Persius' 
life ; up. Prob. vit. 

The second satire is addressed to Plotius Macrinus, who, according 
to the scholiast, was a learned man, who ' loved Persius as his son, having 
studied with him in the house of Servilius Nonianus.' 

5 See O. Jahn's ed., p. 240. 



Ill PERSIUS 81 

morum lenissimorum, verecundiae virginalis, pietatis erga 
matrem et sororem et amitam exemplo sufficientis : fuit 
frugi, pudicus.' Even in a saner, purer, and less turbulent 
age, such a one would have been more fitted for the paths 
of study than for any branch of public life. He died of 
a disease of the stomach on the 24th of November, 62 A. D., 
in his villa on the Appian Way, some eight miles south of 
Rome, 1 leaving behind him a valuable library, a small 
amount of unpublished verse, and a considerable fortune, 
amounting to 2,000,000 sesterces. The whole of this fortune 
he bequeathed to his mother and sister, only begging them 
to give to his friend Cornutus a sum of 100,000 sesterces, 
twenty pounds weight of silver plate, and the whole of his 
library, containing no less than 700 volumes by the Stoic 
Chrysippus. Cornutus accepted the books, but refused 
the rest, showing that indifference to wealth that was to 
be looked for, though not always to be found, in professors 
of the Stoic philosophy. The literary work left by the 
dead poet was submitted by his mother to the judgement 
of Cornutus, himself a poet. 2 The bulk of the work was 
not great. Persius had in his boyhood written a praetexta 
or tragedy with a Roman plot, a book of poems describing 
his journeys with Thrasea, 3 and a few verses on his kins- 
woman Arria, the wife of Caecina Paetus, immortalized 
by her devotion to her husband and her heroic death. 4 As 
the work of his maturer years he left his satires. Cornutus 
recommended that all save the satires should be destroyed ; 
they alone, unfinished though they might be, were worthy 
of the memory of his dead friend. He began the task of 
correcting them for publication, but transferred it to Caesius 
Bassus, at the latter's earnest entreaty. Of the nature 

1 Prob. vit. 'decessit VIII Kal. Dec. P. Mario, Afinio Gallic coss.' Hiero- 
nym. ad ann. 2078 = 62 A. D. ' Persius moritur anno aetatis XXVIII.' 

2 Prob. vit. 

3 Such at least is a plausible inference. Probus tells us that he used 
to travel abroad with Thrasea. It is a natural conjecture that these 
hodoeporica were in the style of Horace's journey to Brundisium. 

4 Cp. Mart. i. 13 ; Plin. Ep. iii. 16. She was the mother of the wife 
of Thrasea. 

BUTLER 



82 PERSIUS III 

of the correction and editing required we are ignorant, 
save for the statement of Probus that a few lines were 
removed from the end of the book to give it an appearance 
of completion. 1 The poems met with instant success ; 2 
they excited both wonder and criticism ; that they continued 
to be read is shown by the existence of copious scholia, 
which must, indeed, have been almost necessary for such 
continuance of their popularity. 3 

The slender volume of Persius' works is composed of 
six satires in hexameter verse and a prologue written in 
choliambi. The first deals with the corruption of literature ; 
the second, addressed to Macrinus on his birthday, treats 
of the right and wrong objects of prayer ; the third is an 
appeal to an indolent young man for energy and earnest- 
ness ; the fourth, almost a continuation of the third, attacks 
the lack of ' self -reverence, self-knowledge, self-control ', in 
public men ; the fifth, addressed to his friend and teacher 
Cornutus, maintains the Stoic doctrine that all the world 
are slaves ; only the righteous man attains to freedom ; 
in the sixth, addressed to Caesius Bassus, the poet claims 
the right to spend his wealth in reasonable enjoyment, 
and denounces the grasping and unseemly selfishness of an 
imaginary heir to his fortune. In the prologue or epilogue 
as it is sometimes regarded 4 he sarcastically disclaims 



1 This may mean that the last satire was actually incomplete, but that 
the omission of a few lines at the end gave it an appearance of completion ; 
or that a few lines intended for the opening of a seventh satire were 
omitted. 

2 So Probus. Cp. also Quint, x. 1. 94 ' multum et verae gloriae quamvis 
uno libro meruit.' Mart. iv. 29. 7. 

3 Hieronym. in apol. contra Rufin. i. 16 ' puto quod puer legeris . . . 
commentaries . . . aliorum in alios, Plautum videlicet, Lucretium, Flaccum, 
Persium atque Lucanum.' The high moral tone of the work, coupled 
perhaps with the smallness of its bulk, is in the main responsible for its 
survival. Scholia from different sources have come down to us under the 
title of Cornuti commentum. Whether such a person as the commentator 
Cornutus existed or not is uncertain. The name may have been attached 
to the scholia merely to give them a spurious importance as though 
possessing the imprimatur of the friend and teacher of the poet. 

4 The choliambi are placed after the satires by two of the three best 



Ill PERSIUS 83 

any pretensions to poetic inspiration, and hints ironically 
that, in view of the number of poets who write merely to 
win their bread, inspiration may be regarded as unnecessary. 
The ambition to win fame as a satirist was first fired 
in Persius by his reading the tenth book of the satires 
of Lucilius. If we may believe Probus, he imitated the 
opening of that book in his first satire, beginning like Lucilius 
by detracting from himself and proceeding to attack other 
authors indiscriminately. 1 Not enough of the tenth book 
of Lucilius has survived to enable us to check the accuracy 
of this statement, though it finds independent testimony 
in a remark of the scholiast on Horace, that the tenth book 
of Lucilius contained free criticisms of the early poets of 
Rome. 2 Further, the third satire is said by the scholiast 
to have been modelled on the fourth book of Lucilius, 
and there is a certain amount of evidence for supposing 
the choliambi of the epilogue to be an imitation of a Lucilian 
model. 3 We have, however, no means of testing the truth 
of these assertions : the debt of Persius to Lucilius must be 
taken on trust. Of his enormous indebtedness to Horace 
we have, on the other hand, the clearest evidence. It is 
hard to conceive two poets with less in common as regards 
ideals, temperament, and technique ; and yet throughout 
Persius we are startled by strange, though unmistakable, 
echoes of Horace. 



MSS., but before them by the scholia and inferior MSS. It is of little 
importance which we follow. But it seems probable that Probus (see 
below) regarded the choliambi as a prologue. Such at least is my inter- 
pretation of sibi primo (i.e. in the prologue) mox omnibus detrectaturua. 
The lines have rather more force if read first and not last. 

1 Prob. vit. ' sed mox ut a schola magistrisque devertit, lecto Lucili 
libro decimo vehementer saturas componere studuit ; cuius libri principium 
imitatus est, sibi primo, mox omnibus detrectaturus, cum tanta recentium 
poetarum et oratorum insectatione,' &c. This can only refer to the 
prologue and the first satire, and seems to point to its having been the 
first to be composed. According to the scholiast the opening line is taken 
from the first satire of Lucilius. 

2 Porphyr/od Hor. Sat. i. 10. 53 ' facit autem Lucilius hoc cum alias 
turn vel maxime in tertio libro, . . . et nono et decimo. 

3 Cp. Nettleship's note ad loc., and Petron. 4. 

G 2 



84 PERSIUS III 

He knows his Horace by heart, and Horace has become 
a veritable obsession. He is not content with giving his 
characters Horatian names. 1 That might be convention, 
not plagiarism. But phrase after phrase calls up the 
Horatian original. He runs through the whole gamut of 
plagiarism. There is plagiarism, simple and direct. 

si 

sub rastro crepet argenti mihi seria, dextro 
Hercule! (2. 10) 

is undisguisedly copied from Horace (Sat. ii. 6. 10). 

si urnam argenti fors quae mihi monstret, ut illi, 
thesauro invento, qui mercennarius agrum 
ilium ipsum mercatus aravit, dives amico 
Hercule ! 

But as a rule, since he cannot keep Horace out, he strives 
to disguise him. The familiar 

si vis me flere, dolendum est 
primum ipsi tibi 

of the Ars Poetica (102) reappears in the far less natural 

verum nee nocte paratum [2] 

plorabit, qui me volet incurvasse querela (Pers. i. 91). 

He speaks of his verses so finely turned and polished 

ut per leve severos [3] 

effundat iunctura unguis (i. 64). 

In this fantastically contorted and affected phrase we may 
espy an ingenious blending of two Horatian phrases, 



[1] that I could hear a crock of silver chinking under my harrow, by 
the blessing of Hercules. CONINGTON. 

[2] A man's tears must come from his heart at the moment, not from 
his brains overnight, if he would have me bowed down beneath his 
piteous tale. CONTNGTON. 

[3] So that the critical nail runs glibly along even where the parts join. 

CONINGTON. 



e. g. Dama, Davus, Natta, Nerius, Craterus, Pedius, Bestius. 



Ill PERSIUS 85 

totus teres atque rotundus, 
extern! ne quid valeat per leve morari (Sat. ii. 7. 86), 

and the simple 

ad unguem factus 

of Sat. i. 5. 32. 1 

There is no need to multiply instances. Horace appears 
everywhere, but quantum mutatus ab illo ! As the result of 
this particular method of borrowing, assisted by affectations 
and obscurities which are all his own, Persius attains to 
a kind of spurious originality of diction, which often degener- 
ates into sheer eccentricity. In spite of the fact that the 
original text can almost everywhere be reconstructed with 
certainty, he is almost the most obscure of Latin poets 
to the modern reader. A few instances will suffice. There 
were, it appears, three ways of mocking a person behind his 
back : one might tap the fingers against the lower portion 
of the hand in imitation of a stork's beak, one might imitate 
a donkey's ears, or one might put out one's tongue. When 
Persius wishes to say ' Janus, I envy you your luck, for no 
one can mock at you behind your back ! ' he writes (i. 58) : 

lane, a tergo quern nulla ciconia pinsifc, [1] 

nee manus auriculas imitari mobilis albas, 

nee linguae, quantum sitiat canis Apula, tantae. 

The obscurity of the first line springs in part from the 
fact that the custom is not elsewhere spoken of. The 
second line may pass. The third defies literal translation. 
It means ' no long tongues thrust out like the tongue of 
a thirsty Apulian bitch '. But the omission of all mention 
both of ' protrusion ' and of the ' dog days ' makes the Latin 
almost without meaning. The epithet Apula becomes 

[1] Happy Janus, whom no stork's bill batters from behind, no nimble 
hand quick to imitate the ass's white ears, no long tongues thrust out like 
the tongue of a thirsty Apulian bitch. 



1 Instances might be almost indefinitely multiplied. The whole of 
Pers. i, but more especially the conclusion, is strongly influenced by Hor. 
Sat. i. 10. Cp. also Pers. ii. 12, Hor. Sat. ii. 5. 45 ; Pers. iii. 66, Hor. Ep. i. 
18. 96 ; Pers. v. 10, Hor. Sat. i. 4. 19, &c., &c. 



86 PERSIUS III 

absurd. A ' thirsty Apulian dog ' is barely sufficient to 
suggest the midsummer drought of Apulia. This is an 
extreme case ; it is perhaps fairer to quote lines such as 

si puteal multa cautus vibice flagellas (iv. 49), 

' if in your zeal for the main chance you flog the exchange 
with many a stripe,' a mysterious passage generally sup- 
posed to mean ' if you exact exorbitant usury '. A little 
less enigmatic, but fully as forced and unnatural is 

dum veteres avias tibi de pulmone revello (v. 92), 

' while I pull your old grandmotherly views from your 
heart,' or the extraordinarily harsh metaphor of the first 
satire (24) 

quo didicisse, nisi hoc fermentum et quae semel intus [1] 
innata est rupto iecore exierit caprificus ? 

which means nothing more than ' What is the good of study 
unless a man brings out what he has in him ? ' A far more 
serious source of obscurity, however, is his obscurity of 
thought. Even when the sense of individual lines has 
been discovered, it is often difficult to see the drift of the 
passage as a whole. Logical development is perhaps not 
to be expected in the ' hotch-potch ' of the ' satura '. 
But one has a right to demand that the transitions should 
be easy and the drift of the argument clear. This Persius 
refuses us. The difficulties which he presents are as in 
the case of Robert Browning in part due to his adoption 
of the traditional dramatic form in satire, a form in which 
clearness of expression is as difficult as it is desirable. But 
we cannot excuse his obscurity as we sometimes can in 
Browning either as being to some extent a realistic repre- 
sentation of the discursiveness and lack of method that 
characterize the reasonings of the average intelligent man, 
or on the other hand as springing from the intensity of 
the poet's thought. It is not the case with Persius that 



[1] What is the good of past study, unless this leaven unless the wild 
fig-tree which has once struck its root into the breast, break through and 
come out ? CONINGTON. 



Ill PERSIUS 87 

his thoughts press so thick and quick upon him, or are 
of so deep and complicated a character, as to be incapable 
of simple and lucid expression. It is sheer waywardness 
and perversity springing from the absence of true artistic 
feeling to which we must attribute this cardinal defect. 
For his thought is commonplace, and his observation of 
the minds and ways of men is limited. 

The qualities that go to the making of the true satirist 
are many. He must be dominated by a moral ideal, not 
necessarily of the highest kind, but sufficiently exalted 
to lend dignity to his work and sufficiently strongly realized 
to permeate it. He must have a wide and comprehensive 
knowledge of his fellow men. A knowledge of the broad 
outlines of the cardinal virtues and of the deadly sins is 
not sufficient. The satirist must know them in their 
countless manifestations in the life of man, as they move 
our awe or our contempt, our admiration or our terror, 
our love or our loathing, our laughter or our tears. He 
must be able to paint society in all its myriad hues. He 
must have a sense of humour, even if he lacks the sense 
of proportion ; he must have the gift of laughter, even 
though his laughter ring harsh and painful. He must 
have the gift of mordant speech, of epigram, and of rhetoric. 
He must drive his points home with directness and lucidity. 
Mere denunciation of vice is not enough. Few prophets 
are satirists ; few satirists are prophets. 

Of these qualities Persius has all too few. The man 
who has become the pupil of a Cornutus at the age of six- 
teen, who has shunned a public career, and is characterized 
by a virginalis verecundia, is not likely, even in a long life, 
to acquire the knowledge of the world required for genuine 
satire. The satirist, it might almost be said, must not only 
have walked abroad in the great world, but must have 
passed through the fire himself, and in some sense experienced 
the vices he has set himself to lash. But Persius is young 
and, as far as might be in that age, innocent. His outlook 
is from the seclusion of literary and philosophic circles, 
and his satire lacks the peculiar vigour that can only be 



88 PERSIUS III 

gotjrom jostling one's way in the wider world. In conse- 
quence the picture of life which he presents lacks vividness. 
A few brilliant sketches there are ; but they are drawn 
from but a narrow range of experience. There is nothing 
better of its kind than the description in the first satire 
of the omnipresent poetaster of the reign of Nero, with 
his affected recitations of tawdry, sensuous, and soulless 
verse (15) : 

Scilicet haec populo pexusque togaque recenti [1] 

et natalicia tandem cum sardonyche albus 

sede leges celsa, liquido cum plasmate guttur 

mobile conlueris, patranti fractus ocello. 

tune neque more probo videas nee voce serena 

ingentis trepidare Titos, cum carmina lumbum 

intrant et tremulo scalpuntur ubi intima versu. 

A few lines later comes a similar and equally vivid picture 
(30): 

ecce inter pocula quaerunt [2] 

Romulidae saturi, quid dia poemata narrent. 
hie aliquis, cui circum umeros hyacinthina laena est, 
rancidulum quiddam balba de nare locutus, 
Phyllidas Hypsipylas, vatum et plorabile siquid, 
eliquat ac tenero subplantat verba palato. 

Here the poet is describing what he has seen ; in the world 
of letters he is at home. He can laugh pungently enough 
at the style of oratory prevailing in the courts 



[1] Yes you hope to read this out some day, got up sprucely with 
a new toga, all in white, with your birthday ring on at last, perched up 
on a high seat, after gargling your supple throat by a liquid process of 
tuning, with a languishing roll of your wanton eye. At this you may see 
great brawny sons of Rome all in a quiver, losing all decency of gesture 
and command of voice, as the strains glide into their very bones, and the 
marrow within is tickled by the ripple of the measure. CONINGTON. 

[2] Listen. The sons of Rome are sitting after a full meal, and inquiring 
in their cups, ' What news from the divine world of poesy ? ' Hereupon 
a personage with a hyacinth-coloured mantle over his shoulders brings 
out some mawkish trash or other, with a snuffle and a lisp, something 
about Phyllises or Hypsipyles, or any of the many heroines over whom 
poets have snivelled, filtering out his tones and tripping up the words 
against the roof of his delicate mouth. CONINGTON. 



Ill PERSIUS 89 

uilne pudet capiti non posse pericula cano [1] 

pellere, quin tepidum hoc optes audire ' decenter '. 
' fur es ', ait Pedio. Pedius quid ? crimina rasis 
librat in antithetis, doctas posuisse figuras 
laudatur, ' bellum hoc ? ' (i. 83). 

He can parody the decadent poets with their effeminate 
rhythms and their absurdities of speech. 1 He can mock 
the archaizer who goes to Accius and Pacuvius for his 
inspiration. 2 He can give an admirable summary of the 
genius of Lucilius and Horace 

secuit Lucilius urbem, [2] 

te Lupe, te Muci, et genuinum fregit in illis ; 
omne vafer vitium ridenti Flaccus amico 
tangit et admissus circum praecordia ludit, 
callidus excusso populum suspendere naso (i. 114). 

[1] Are you not ashamed not to be able to plead against perils threaten- 
ing your grey hairs, but you must needs be ambitious of hearing mawkish 
compliments to your ' good taste' ? The accuser tells Pedius point blank, 
' You are a thief.' What does Pedius do ? Oh, he balances the charges 
in polished antitheses he is deservedly praised for the artfulness of his 
tropes. Monstrous fine that ! CONINGTON. 

[2] Lucilius bit deep into the town of his day, its Lupuses and Muciuses, 
and broke his jaw-tooth on them. Horace, the rogue, manages to probe 
every fault while making his friend laugh ; he gains his entrance and 
plays about the heartstrings with a sly talent for tossing up his nose and 
catching the public on it. CONINGTON 



1 i. 92-102. According to the scholiast the last four lines 

torva Mimalloneis implerunt cornua bombis, 
et raptum vitulo caput ablatura superbo 
Bassaris et lyncem Maenas flexura corymbis 
euhion ingeminat, reparabilis adsonat echo (i. 99) 
are by Nero. But it is incredible that Persius should have had such 
audacity as openly to deride the all-powerful emperor. The same remark 
applies to other passages where the scholiast and some modern critics 
have seen satirical allusions to Nero (e.g. prologue and the whole of Sat. iv). 
The only passage in which it is possible that there was a covert allusion 
to Nero isi. 121, which, according to the scholiast, originally ran auriculas 
asini Mida rex habet. Cornutus suppressed the words M ida rex and substi- 
tuted quis non. For an ingenious defence of the view that Persius hits 
directly at Nero see Pretor, Class. Rev., vol. xxi, p. 72. 

2 i. 76 'Estnunc Brisaei quern venosus liber Acci, | sunt quos Pacuvius- 
que et verrucosa moretur I Antiopa, aeruinnis cor luctificabile fulta.' 



90 PERSIUS III 

But the first satire stands alone qua satire. It is not, per- 
haps, the most interesting to the modern reader. It mocks 
at empty literary fashions, which have comparatively small 
human interest. But it is in this satire that Persius comes 
nearest the true satirist. The obscurity and affectation 
of its language is its one serious fault ; otherwise it shows 
sound literary ideals, close observation, and a pretty vein 
of humour. Elsewhere there is small trace of keen observa- 
tion * of actual life ; he calls up before his reader no vision 
of the varied life of Home, whether in the streets or in the 
houses of the rich. Instead, he laboriously tricks out some 
vice in human garb, converses with it in language such 
as none save Persius ever dreamed of using, or scourges 
it with all the heavy weapons of the Stoic armoury. There 
is at times a certain violence and even coarseness 2 of descrip- 
tion which does duty for realism, but the words ring hollow 
and false. The picture described or suggested is got at 
second-hand. He lacks the vivacity, realism, and common 
sense of Horace, the cultured man of the world, the biting 
wit, the astonishing descriptive power, and the masterly 
rhetoric of Juvenal. We care little for the greater part 
of Persius' disquisition 3 on the trite theme of the schools, 
' what should be the object of man's prayers to heaven ? ' 
when we have read the tenth satire of Juvenal. There is 
the same commonplace theme in both, and there is perhaps 
less originality to be found in the general treatment applied 
to it by Juvenal. But Juvenal makes us forget the trite- 
ness of the theme by his extraordinary gift of style. Like 
Victor Hugo, he has the gift of imparting richness and 
splendour to the obvious by the sheer force and glory of 
his declamatory power. Similarly the fifth satire, where 
Persius descants on the theme that only the good man is 
free, while all the rest are slaves, compares ill as a whole 



1 The description of the self-indulgent man who, feeling ill, consults 
his doctor and then fails to follow his advice (iii. 88), is a possible exception. 
It is noteworthy that in Sat. iv he addresses a young aspirant to a political 
career as though free political action was still possible at Rome. 

2 e.g. iv. 41. 3 B u t see below, p. 91. 



Ill PERSIUS 91 

with the dialogue between Horace and Davus on the same 
subject (Sat. ii. 7). There is such a harshness, an angularity 
and bitterness about it, that he wholly fails of the effect pro- 
duced by the easy dignity of the earlier poet. It is abrupt, 
violent, and obscure ; and for this reason the austere Stoic 
makes less impression than his more engaging and easy- 
going predecessor. Horace knew how to press home his 
points, even while he played about the hearts of men. 
Persius has neither the persuasiveness of Horace nor the 
force of Juvenal. 

But Persius, if he falls below his great rivals in point 
of art, is in one respect immeasurably their superior. He 
is a better and a nobler man. In his denunciations of 
vice his eyes are set on a more exalted ideal, an ideal from 
which he never wanders. There is a world of difference 
between the ' golden mean ' of Horace, and the worship 
of virtue that redeems the obscurities of Persius. There 
is a still greater gulf between the high scorn manifested 
by Persius for all that is base and ignoble, and the fierce, 
almost petulant, indignation of Juvenal, that often seems 
to rend for the mere delight of rending, and is at times 
disfigured by such grossness of language that many an un- 
sympathetic reader has wondered whether the indignation 
was genuine. Neither Horace nor Juvenal ever rose to 
the moral heights of the conclusion of the second satire (61): 

curvae in terris animae et caelestium inanes, [1] 

quid iuvat hoc, templis nostros immittere mores 

et bona dis ex hac scelerata ducere pulpa ? 

haec sibi corrupto casiam dissolvit olivo 

et Calabrum coxit vitiato murice vellus, 

haec bacam conchae rasisse et stringere venas 

ferventis massae crudo de pulvere iussit. 



[1] O ye souls that cleave to earth and have nothing heavenly in you ! 
How can it answer to introduce the spirit of the age into the temple- 
service and infer what the gods like from this sinful pampered flesh of 
ours ? The flesh it is that has got to spoil wholesome oil by mixing casia 
with it to steep Calabrian wool in purple that was made for no such use ; 
that has made us tear the pearl from the oyster, and separate the veins 
of the glowing ore from the primitive slag. It sins yes, it sins ; but it 



92 PERSIUS III 

peccat et haec, peccat, vitio tamen utitur. at vos 
dicite, pontifices, in sancto quid facit aurum ? 
nempe hoc quod Veneri donatae a virgine pupae, 
quin damus id superis, de magna quod dare lance 
non possit magni Messalae lippa propago ? 
compositum ius fasque animo sanctosque recessus 
mentis et incoctum generoso pectus honesto: 
haec cedo ut admoveam templis et farre litabo. 

This is real enthusiasm, though the theme be trite, and it 
is noteworthy that the enthusiasm has clarified the lan- 
guage, which goes straight to the point without obscurity 
or circumlocution. Here alone does the second satire of 
Persius surpass the more famous tenth satire of Juvenal. 
Yet even this fine outburst is surpassed by the deservedly 
well-known passage of the third satire, in which Persius 
appeals to a young man ' who has great possessions ' to 
live earnestly and strenuously (23) : 

udum et molle lutum es, nunc nunc properandus et acri [1] 

fingendus sine fine rota, sed rure paterno 

est tibi far modicum, purum et sine labe salinum 

(quid metuas ?) cultrixque foci secura patella est. 

hoc satis ? an deceat pulmonem rumpere ventis, 

stemmate quod Tusco ramum millesime ducis, 

censoremve tuum vel quod trabeate salutas ? 

ad populum phaleras, ego te intus et in cute novi. 



takes something by its sinning ; but you, reverend pontiffs, tell us what 
good gold can do in a holy place. Just as much or as little as the dolls 
which a young girl offers to Venus. Give we rather to the gods such an 
offering as great Messala's blear-eyed representative has no means of 
giving, even out of his great dish duty to God and man well blended in 
the mind purity in the shrine of the heart, and a manly flavour of noble- 
ness pervading the bosom. Let me have these to carry to the temple, 
and a handful of meal shall win me acceptance. CONINGTON. 

[1] You are moist soft earth, you ought to be taken instantly, instantly, 
and fashioned without end by the rapid wheel. But you have a paternal 
estate with a fair crop of corn, a salt-cellar of unsullied brightness (no fear 
of ruin surely !), and a snug dish for fireside service. Are you to be satisfied 
with this ? or would it be decent to puff yourself and vapour because your 
branch is connected with a Tuscan stem, and you are thousandth in the 
line, or because you wear purple on review days and salute your censor ? 
Off with your trappings to the mob ! I can look under them and see 



Ill PERSIUS 93 

non pudet ad morem discincti vivere Nattae. 
sed stupet hie vitio et fibris increvit opimum 
pingue, caret culpa, nescit quid perdat, et alto 
demersus summa rursus non bullit in unda. 

magne pater divum, saevos punire tyrannos 
haut alia ratione velis, cum dira libido 
moverit ingenium ferventi tincta veneno : 
virtutem videant intabescantque relicta. 
anne magis Siculi gemuerunt aera iuvenci, 
et magis auratis pendens laquearibus ensis 
purpureas subter cervices terruit, ' imus, 
imus praecipites ' quam si sibi dicat et intus 
palleat infelix quod proxima nesciat uxor ? 

The man who wrote this has ' loved righteousness and 
hated iniquity '. In the work of Persius' rivals it is scarcely 
an exaggeration to say that it is the hatred of iniquity 
that is most prominent ; the love of righteousness holds 
but a secondary place. 

Persius is uncompromising ; he is the true Stoic with 
the motto ' all or nothing '. But he has nothing of the 
stilted Stoicism that is such a painful feature of the plays 
of Seneca ; nor, however perverse and affected he may be 
in diction, do we ever feel that his Stoicism is in some 
respects no better than a moral pose, a distressing feeling 
that sometimes afflicts as we read Seneca's letters or con- 
solatory treatises. He speaks straight from the heart. His 
faults are more often the faults of the school of philosophy 



your skin. Are you not ashamed to live the loose life of Natta ? But he 
is paralysed by vice ; his heart is overgrown by thick collops of fat ; he 
feels no reproach ; he knows nothing of his loss ; he is sunk in the depth 
and makes no more bubbles on the surface. Great Father of the Gods, 
be it thy pleasure to inflict no other punishment on the monsters of 
tyranny, after their nature has been stirred by fierce passion, that has 
the taint of fiery poison let them look upon virtue and pine that they 
have lost her for ever ! Were the groans from the brazen bull of Sicily 
more terrible, or did the sword that hung from the gilded cornice strike 
more dread into the princely neck beneath it, than the voice which whispers 
to the heart, ' We are going, going down a precipice,' and the ghastly 
inward paleness, which is a mystery, even to the wife of our heart ? 

CONINGTON. 



94 PERSIUS III 

than of the schools of rhetoric. The young Lucan is said 
to have exclaimed, after hearing a recitation given by 
Persius : l ' That is real poetry, my verses are mere jeux 
d' esprit.' 

If we take Persius at his noblest, Lucan's criticism is 
just. In these passages not only is the thought singularly 
pure and noble, and the expression felicitous, but the 
actual metre represents almost the high-water mark of 
the post-Vergilian hexameter. Here, as in other writers 
of the age, the influence of Ovid is traceable in the increase 
of dactyls and the avoidance of elision. But the verse 
has a swing and dignity, together with a variety, that can 
hardly be found in any other poetry of the Silver Age. It 
is the existence of passages such as these, and the high 
unswerving moral enthusiasm characterizing all his work, 
that have made Persius live through the centuries. It is 
fashionable for the critic to say, ' We lay down Persius 
with a sigh of relief.' That is true, but we feel the better 
for reading him. He is one of the few writers of Rome 
whose personality awakens a feeling of warm affection. 
He was a rigid Stoic, yet not proud or cold. In an age 
of almost universal corruption he kept himself unspotted 
from the world. He had a rare capacity for whole-hearted 
friendship. If his teacher Cornutus had never made another 
convert, and his preaching had been vain, it would have 
been ample reward to have won such a tribute of affection 
and gratitude as the lines in which Persius pours forth 
his soul to him (v. 21) : 

tibi nunc hortante Camena [1] 

excutienda damus praecordia, quantaque nostrae 
pars tua sit, Cornute, animae, tibi, dulcis amice, 
ostendisse iuvat. pulsa dinoscere cautus 



[1] It is to you, at the instance of the muse within me, that I would offer 
my heart to be sifted thoroughly ; my passion is to show you, Cornutus, 
how large a share of my inmost being is yours, my beloved friend ; strike 
it, use every test to tell what rings sound, and what is the mere plaster of 



1 Prob. vita Persii. 



Ill PERSIUS 95 

quid solidum crepet et pictae tectoria linguae, 
hie ego centenas ausim deposcere fauces, 
ut quantum mihi te sinuoso in pectore fixi, 
voce traham pura, totumque hoc verba resignent, 
quod latet arcana non enarrabile fibra. 

cum primum pavido custos mihi purpura cessit 
bullaque subcinctis Laribus donata pependit, 
cum blandi comites totaque inpune Subura 
permisit sparsisse oculos iam candidus umbo, 
cumque iter ambiguum est et vitae nescius error 
deducit trepidas ramosa in compita mentes, 
me tibi supposui. teneros tu suscipis annos 
Socratico, Cornute, sinu. tune fallere sellers 
adposita intortos extendit regula mores, 
et premitur ratione animus vincique laborat 
artificemque tuo ducit sub pollice vultum. 
tecum etenim longos memini consumere soles, 
et tecum primas epulis decerpere noctes. 
unum opus et requiem pariter disponimus ambo, 
atque verecunda laxamus seria mensa. 
non equidem hoc dubites, amborum foedere certo 
consentire dies et ab uno sidere duci : 



a varnished tongue. An occasion indeed it is for which I may well venture 
to ask a hundred voices, that I may bring out in clear utterance how 
thoroughly I have lodged you hi the very corners of my breast, and unfold 
in words all the unutterable feelings which lie entwined deep down among 
my heart -strings. When first the guardianship of the purple ceased to awe 
me and the band of boyhood was hung up as an offering to the quaint 
old household gods, when my companions made themselves pleasant, 
and the folds of my gown, now white, the stripe of purple gone, left me free 
to cast my eyes at will over the whole Subura just when the way of life 
begins to be uncertain, and the bewildered mind finds that its ignorant 
ramblings have brought it to a point where roads branch off then it was 
that I made myself your adopted child. You at once received the young 
foundling into the bosom of a second Socrates ; and soon your rule, with 
artful surprise, straightens the moral twists that it detects, and my spirit 
becomes moulded by reason and struggles to be subdued, and assumes 
plastic features under your hand. Aye, I mind well how I used to wear 
away long summer suns with you, and with you pluck the early bloom 
of the night for feasting. We twain have one work and one set time for 
rest, and the enjoyment of a moderate table unbends our gravity. No, 
I would not have you doubt that there is a fixed law that brings our 
lives into one accord, and one star that guides them. Whether it be in 



96 PERSIUS III 

nostra vel aequali suspendit tempora libra 
Parca tenax veri, seu nata fidelibus hora 
dividit in geminos concordia fata duorum, 
Saturnumque gravem nostro love frangimus una : 
nescio quod certe est quod me tibi temperat astrum. 

There is a sincerity about these beautiful lines that is as 
rare as it is welcome in the poetry of this period. Much 
may be forgiven to the poet who could write thus, even 
though rarely. And it must be remembered that Persius 
is free from the worst of the besetting sins of his age, the 
love of rhetorical brilliance at the expense of sense, a failing 
that he criticizes with no little force in his opening satire. 
His harshness and obscurity are due in part to lack of 
sufficient literary skill, but still more to his attempt to 
assert his originality against the insistent obsession of 
the satires of Horace. As in the case of so many of his 
contemporaries, his literary fame must depend in the main 
on his ' purple patches '. 

But he does what few of his fellow poets do ; he leaves 
a vivid impression of his personality, and reveals a genuine 
moral ardour and nobility of character that refuse to be 
clouded or hidden by his dark sayings and his perverse 
obscurity. 



the equal balance that truthful Destiny hangs our days, or whether the 
birth-hour sacred to faithful friends shares our united fates between 
the Heavenly Twins, and we break the shock of Saturn together by 
the common shield of Jupiter, some star, I am assured, there is which 
fuses me with you. CONTNQTON. 



CHAPTER IV 

LUCAN 

MARCUS ANNAEUS LucANus, 1 the poet who more than 
any other exhibits the typical excellences and defects of 
the Silver Age, was born at Cordova on November 3, 
in the year 39 A. D. 2 He came of a distinguished line. 
He was the son of M. Annaeus Mela, brother of Seneca 
the philosopher and dramatist, and son of Seneca the 
rhetorician. Mela was a wealthy man, 3 and in 40 A. D. 
removed with his family to Rome. His son (whose future 
as a great poet is said to have been portended by a swarm 
of bees that settled on the cradle and the lips of the bard 
that was to be 2 ) received the best education that Rome 
could bestow. He showed extraordinary precocity in all 
the tricks of declamatory rhetoric, soon equalling his in- 
structors in skill and far out-distancing his fellow pupils. 2 
Among his preceptors was his kinsman, the famous Stoic, 
L. Annaeus Cornutus, well known as the friend and teacher 
of Persius. 4 His first appearance before the public was 
at the Neronia in 60 A. D., when he won the prize for Latin 
verse with a poem in praise of Nero. 5 Immediately after- 
wards he seems to have proceeded to Athens. But his 
talents had attracted the attention and patronage of Nero. 
He was recalled to Rome, 6 and at the nomination of the 



1 Our chief authorities for Lucan's life are the ' lives ' by Suetonius 
(fragmentary) and by Vacca (a grammarian of the sixth century). 

2 Vacca. 3 Tac. Ann. xvi. 17. 

4 The young Lucan is said to have formed a friendship with the satirist 
at the school of Cornutus ; Persius was some five years his senior. Vita 
Persii (p. 58, Bucheler). 

5 Suetonius and Vacca. The latter curiously treats this victory as one 
of the causes of Nero's jealousy. Considering that the poem was a pane- 
gyric of the emperor, and that it was Lucan's first step in the imperial 
favour, the suggestion deserves small credit. 

6 Sueton. There is an unfortunate hiatus in the Life by Suetonius, 
occurring just before the mention of the visit to Athens. As the text stands 



98 LUCAN IV 

princeps became Quaestor, although he had not yet attained 
the requisite age of twenty-five. 1 He was also admitted 
to the College of Augurs, and for some time continued to 
enjoy Nero's friendship. But it was not to last. Lucan 
had been educated in Stoic surroundings. Though his own 
relatives managed to combine the service of the emperor 
with their Stoic principles, Lucan had not failed to imbibe 
the passionate regret for the lost liberty of the republic 
that was so prominent a feature in Stoic circles. It was 
not a mere pose that led him to select the civil war as 
the subject of his poem. His enthusiasm for liberty may 
have been literary rather than political in character. But 
when we are dealing with an artistic temperament we must 
bear in mind that the ideals which were primarily inspiration 
for art may on slight provocation become incentives to 
action. And in the case of Lucan that provocation was 
not lacking. As his fame increased, Nero's friendship was 
replaced by jealousy. The protege had become too serious 
a rival to the patron. 2 Lucan's vanity was injured by 
Nero's sudden withdrawal from a recitation. 3 From servile 
flattery he turned to violent criticism : he spared his former 
patron neither in word nor deed. He turned the sharp 
edge of his satire against him in various pungent epigrams, 
and was forbidden to recite poetry or to plead in the law 
courts. 4 But it would be unjust to Lucan to attribute 
his changed attitude purely to wounded vanity. Seneca 
was at this very moment attempting to retire from public 
life. The court of Nero had become no place for him. 
Lucan cannot have been unaffected by the action of his 
uncle, and it is only just to him to admit the possibility 
that the change in his attitude may have been due, at any 



it suggests that the visit to Athens occurred after the victory at the 
Neronia. Otherwise it would seem more probable that Lucan went to 
Athens somewhat earlier (e.g. 57 A. r>.) to complete his education. 

1 Sueton., Vacca. 

2 Vacca; Tac, Ann. xv. 49 ; Dion. Ixii. 29. 

3 Vacca. 4 (Suetonius. 



IV LUCAN 99 

rate in part, to a change in character, an awakening to the 
needs of the State and the needs of his own soul. There is 
no need to question the genuineness of his political enthu- 
siasm, even though it tended to be theatrical and may have 
been largely kindled by motives not wholly disinterested. 
The Pisonian conspiracy found in him a ready coadjutor. 
He became one of the ringleaders of the plot ('paene 
signifer coniurationis'), and in a bombastic vein would 
promise Nero's head to his fellow-conspirators. 1 On the 
detection of the plot, in 65 A. D., he, with the other chiefs 
of the conspiracy, was arrested. For long he denied his 
complicity ; at last, perhaps on the threat or application 
of torture, his nerve failed him; he descended to grovelling 
entreaties, and to win himself a reprieve accused his innocent 
mother, Acilia, of complicity in the plot. 2 His conduct 
does not admit of excuse. But it is not for the plain, matter- 
of-fact man to pass judgement lightly on the weakness of 
a highly-strung, nervous, artistic temperament ; the artist's 
imagination may transmute pain such as others might 
hope to bear, to anguish such as they cannot even imagine. 
There lies the palliation, if palliation it be, of Lucan's crime. 
But it availed him nothing : the reprieve was never won ; 
he was condemned to die, the manner of his death being 
left to his free choice. He wrote a few instructions for 
his father as to the editing of his poems, partook of a sump- 
tuous dinner, and then, adopting the fashionable form of 
suicide, cut the arteries of his arms and bled to death. He 
died declaiming a passage from his own poetry in which 
he had described the death of a soldier from loss of blood. 3 
It was a theatrical end, and not out of keeping with his 
life. 

He lived but a little over twenty-five years and five 



1 Suetonius. 

2 Sueton. ; Tac. Ann. xv. 56. 

3 Vacca ; Sueton. ; Tac. Ann. xv. 70. Various passages in the Plwrsalia 
have been suggested as suitable for Lucan's recitation at his last gasp, 
iii. 038-41, vii. 008-15, ix. 811. 



H 2 



LUCAN IV 

months, but he left behind him a vast amount of poetry 
and an extraordinary reputation. His earliest work l seems 
to have been the Iliacon, describing the death of Hector, 
his ransom and burial. Next came the Catachthonion, 
a short work on the underworld. This was followed by 
the laudes Neronis, to which reference has already been 
made, and the Orpheus, which was extemporized in a com- 
petition with other poets. 2 If we follow the order given 
by Statins, his next work was the prose declamation on the 
burning of the city (64 A. D.) and a poem addressed to his 
wife Polla (adlocutio ad Pollam). Then comes his chef 
d'oeuvre, the Pharsalia, to which we shall return. Of the 
other works mentioned by Vacca, the Silvae must have 
been, like the Silvae of Statius, trifles thrown off hurriedly 
for the gratification of friends or for the celebration of 
some great occasion. 3 The salticae fabulae were libretti 
written for the pantomimus* while the Saturnalia were 
light verse sent as presents to friends on the festival of 



1 Statius, in his GenetMiacon Idicani (Silv. ii. 7. 54), seems to indicate the 
order of the poems : 

ac primum teneris adhuc in annis 
ludes Hectora Thessalosque currus 
ct supplex Priami potentis auruni, 
et sedes reserabis inferorum ; 
ingratus Nero dulcibus theatris 
et noster tibi proferetur Orpheus, 
dices culminibus Remi vagantis 
infandos domini nocentis ignes, 
hinc castae titulum decusque Pollae 
iucunda dabis adlocutione. 
inox coepta generosior iuventa 
albos ossibus Italis Philippos 
et Pharsalica bella detonabis. 

Cp. also Vacca, ' extant eius complurea et alii, ut Iliacon, Saturnalia, 
Catachthonion, Silvarum x, tragoedia Medea imperfecta, salticae fabulae 
xiv, et epigrammata (MSS. appamata sive ippamata), prosae orationes 
in Octavium Sagittam et pro eo, de incendio Urbis, epistularum ex 
Campania, non fastidiendi quideni omnes, tales tamen ut belli civili 
videantur accessio. 1 

2 Vacca. 3 See chapter on Statius. 
4 See chapter on Drama. 



IV LUCAN 101 

Saturn. 1 Of these works nothing has come down to us 
save a few scanty fragments, not in any way calculated 
to make us regret their loss. 2 Even Vacca can find no 
very high praise for them. Judging alike from the proba- 
bilities of the case and from the Pharsalia itself, they must 
have suffered from Lucan's fatal gift of fluency. 

It was the Pharsalia that won Lucan undying fame. 
Three books of this ambitious historical epic were finished 
and given to the world during the poet's lifetime. 3 These 
the poet had, at any rate in part, recited in public, calling 
attention, with a vanity worthy of himself and of the age, 
to his extreme youth ; he was younger than Vergil when 
he composed the Culex \ 4 The remaining seven books 
never had the benefit of revision, owing to the poet's untimely 
end, 5 though curiously enough they show no special signs 
of lack of finish, and contain some of the finest passages 
in the whole work. The composition of all ten books 
falls between 60 and 65 A. D. Lucan had chosen for his 
theme the death-struggle of the republic. It was a daring 
choice for more reasons than one. There were elements of 
danger in singing the praises of Pompey and Cato under the 
principate. To that the fate of Cremutius Cordus bore 
eloquent testimony. 6 But Nero was less sensitive about the 



1 Cp. Mart., bks. xiii and xiv. 

2 There are two fragments from the Iliacon, two from the Orpheus, one 
from the Catachthonion, two from the Epigrammata, together with a few 
scanty references in ancient commentators and grammarians : see Post- 
gate, Corp. Poet. Lat. 

3 Vacca, ' ediderat . . . tres libros, quales videmus.' 

4 Sueton. ' civile bellum . . . recitavit ut praefatione qiiadem aetatem et 
initia sua comparans ausus sit dicere, "quantum mihi restat addilicem".' 
Cp. also Stat. Silv. ii. 7. 73 : 

haec (Pharsalia) primo iuvenis canes sub aevo 
ante annos Culicis Maroniani. 

Vergil was twenty-six when he composed the Culex. Cp. Ribbeck, App. 
Verg. p. 19. 

5 Vacca, ' reliqui septem belli civilis libri locum calumniantibus tanquam 
mendosi non darent ; qui tametsi sub vero ci imine non egent patrocinio : 
in iisdem dici, quod in Ovidii libris praescribitur, potest : emendaturus, si 
licuisset, erat.' 6 See p. 4. 



102 LUCAN IV 

past than Tiberius. The republic had never become officially 
extinct. Tyrannicide was a licensed and hackneyed theme 
of the schools of rhetoric ; in skilful hands it might be 
a subtle instrument of flattery. Moreover, Nero was de- 
scended in direct line from Domitius Ahenobarbus, who 
had fought and died for Pompey on the field of Pharsalus. 
In the books published during Lucan's lifetime there is 
not a line that could have given personal offence to the 
princeps, while the fulsome dedication would have covered 
a multitude of indiscretions. 1 Far more serious were the 
difficulties presented by the nature of the story itself. 
Historical epic rarely admits of artistic treatment, and the 
nearer the date of the events described, the more insoluble 
is the problem. 

Two courses were open to Lucan : he might treat the 
story with comparative fidelity to truth, avoiding all 
supernatural machinery, save such as was justified by 
historical tradition ; on the other hand he might adopt 
the course subsequently pursued by Silius Italicus in his 
poem on the Punic War, and introduce all the hackneyed 
interventions of Olympus, sanctioned by Vergil and followed 
by many a poet since. The latter method is obviously 
only suited for a purely legendary epic, though even the 
legendary epic can well dispense with it, and it might have 
been supposed that an age so sceptical and careless of the 
orthodox theology, as that into which Lucan was born, 
would have felt the full absurdity of applying such a device 
to historical epic. Lucan was wise in his choice, and left 



1 Boissier, L 'Opposition sous les Cesars (p. 279), sees some significance in 
the fact that the list of Nero's ancestors always stops at Augustus. But 
there was no reason why the list should go further than the founder of 
the principate. It is noteworthy that Lucan's uncle Seneca wrote a 
number of epigrams in praise of the Pompeii and Cato. The 
famous lines, 

quis iustius induit arma 

scire nefas : magno se iudice quisque tuetur, 
victrix causa deis placuit, sed victa Catoni (i. 126), 

are supremely diplomatic. Without sacrificing his principles, Lucan avoids 
giving a shadow of offence to his emperor. 



IV LUCAN 103 

Olympus severely alone. But his choice roused contem- 
porary criticism. In the Satyricon of Petronius we find 
a defence of the old conventional mechanism placed in 
the mouth of a shabby and disreputable poet named Eumol- 
pus (118). He complains ' that young men plunge headlong 
into epic verse thinking that it requires no more skill than 
a showy declamation at the school of rhetoric. They do 
not realize that to be a successful poet one must be steeped 
in the great ocean of literature. They do not recognize 
that there is such a thing as a special poetic vocabulary, 1 
or that the commonplaces of rhetoric require to be inter- 
woven with, not merely tacked on to, the fabric of their 
verse, and so it comes about that the writer who would 
turn the Civil War into an epic is apt to stumble beneath 
the burden he takes upon his shoulders, unless indeed he 
is permeated through and through with literature. You 
must not simply turn history into verse : historians do 
it better in prose. Rather the poet should sweep on his 
way borne by the breath of inspiration and untrammelled 
by hard fact, making use of cunning artifice and divine 
intervention, and interfusing his " commonplaces " with 
legendary lore ; only so will his work seem to be the fine 
frenzy of an inspired bard rather than the exactitude of 
one who is giving sworn evidence before a judge '. He then 
proceeds in 295 verses to deal, after the manner he has 
prescribed, with the events contained in the first three 
books of the Pharsalia, the only books that had been made 
public at the time when Petronius' romance was composed. 
Pluto inspires Caesar to the crime of civil war. Peace, 
Fidelity, and Concord fly from the earth at his approach. 
The gods range themselves on this side and on that. Discord 
perched high on Apennine incites the peoples of Italy 
to war. The verse is uninspired, the method is impossible, 
the remedy is worse than the disease. The last hope of 
our taking the poem seriously has departed. Yet this 
passage of Petronius contains much sound criticism. Mili- 

i See p. 116. 



104 LUC AN IV 

tary and political history does not admit of being turned 
into genuine poetry ; an epic on an historic war must depend 
largely on its purple patches of description and rhetoric : it 
almost demands that prominence of epigram and ' common- 
place ' that Eumolpus condemns. 1 Petronius sees the weak- 
ness of Lucan's epic ; he fails because, like Silius Italicus, 
he thinks he has discovered a remedy. The faults of 
Lucan's poem are largely inherent in the subject chosen ; 
they will stand out clearly as we review the structure and 
style of the work. 

In taking the whole of the Civil War for his subject Lucan 
was confronted with a somewhat similar problem to that 
which faced Shakespeare in his Julius Caesar. The problem 
that Shakespeare had to meet was how to prolong and 
sustain the interest of the play after the death of Caesar 
and the events that centre immediately round it. The 
difficulty was surmounted triumphantly. The obstacles 
in Lucan's path were greater. The poem is incomplete, 
and there must be some uncertainty as to its intended 
scope. That it was planned to include the death of Cato 
is clear from the importance assigned him in the existing 
books. But could the work have concluded on such a 
note of gloom as the death of the staunchest champion 
of the republic ? The whole tone of the poem is republican 
in the extreme. If the republic must perish, it should not 
perish unavenged. There are, moreover, many prophetic 
allusions to the death of Caesar, 2 which point conclusively 
to Lucan's intention to have made the vengeance of Brutus 
and Cassius the climax of his poem. The problem which 
the poet had to resolve was how to prevent the interest 
from flagging, as his heroes were swept away before the 
triumphant advance of Caesar. He concentrates our 
attention at the outset on Pompey. Throughout the first 
eight books it is for him that he claims our sympathy. 
And then he is crushed by his rival and driven in flight 



1 Petron., loc. cit. 

2 v. 207, vii. 451, 596, 782, x. 339-42, 431. 



IV LUCAN 105 

to die an unheroic death. It is only at this point that 
Cato leaps into prominence. But though he has a firmness 
of purpose and a grandeur of character that Lucan could 
not give Pompey, he never has the chance to become the 
protagonist. Both Pompey and Cato, for all the fine rhetoric 
bestowed on them, fail to grip the reader, while from the 
very facts of history it is impossible for either of them to 
lend unity to the plot. Both are dwarfed by the character 
of Caesar. Caesar is the villain of the piece ; he is a monster 
athirst for blood, he will not permit the corpses of his enemies 
(over which he is made to gloat) to be buried after the great 
battle, and when on his coming to Egypt the head of his 
rival is brought him, his grief and indignation are represented 
as being a mere blind to conceal his real joy. The successes 
are often merely the result of good fortune. Lucan is 
loth to admit even his greatness as a general. And yet, 
blacken his character as he may, he feels that greatness. 
From the moment of his brilliant characterization of Caesar 
in the first book 1 we feel we have a man who knows what 
he desires and will shrink from nothing to attain his ends ; 
he ' thinks naught yet done while aught remains to do ', 2 
he ' strikes fear into men's hearts because he knows not 
the meaning of fear ', 3 and through all the melodramatic 
rhetoric with which he addresses his soldiers, there shines 
clear the spirit of a great leader of men. Whoever was 
intended by the poet for his hero, the fact remains that 
Caesar dominates the poem as none save the hero should 
do. He is the hero of the Pharsalia as Satan is the hero 
of Paradise Lost* It is through him above all that Lucan 
retains our interest. The result is fatal for the proper 
proportion of the plot. Lucan does not actually alienate 
our sympathies from the republic, but, whatever our moral 
judgement on the conflict may be, our interest centres on 
Caesar, and it is hardly an exaggeration to say that the 

1 i. 143-57. 

2 ii. 657 nil actvun credens cum quid superesset agendum. 

3 v. 317 meruitque timeri non metuens. 

4 See Shelley, Prometheus Unbound, Preface. 



106 LUCAN IV 

true tragedy of the epic would have come with his death. 
The Pharsalia fails of its object as a republican epic ; its 
success comes largely from an unintended quarter. 

What the exact scale of the poem was meant to be it 
is hard to say. Vergil had set the precedent for an epic 
of twelve books, and it is not improbable that Lucan would 
have followed his example. On the other hand, if Cato 
and Caesar had both to be killed in the last two books, 
great compression would have been necessary. In view 
of the diffuseness of Lucan's rhetoric, and the rambling 
nature of his narrative, it is more than probable that the 
epic would have exceeded the limit of twelve books and 
been a formidable rival in bulk to the Punica of Silius 
Italicus. On the other hand, the last seven books of the 
existing poem are unre vised, and may have been destined 
for abridgement. There is so much that is irrelevant that 
the task would have been easy. 

But it is not for the plot that Lucan's epic is read. It 
has won immortality by the brilliance of its rhetoric, its 
unsurpassed epigrams, its clear-cut summaries of character, 
its biting satire, and its outbursts of lofty political enthu- 
siasm. These features stand out pre-eminent and atone 
for its astounding errors of taste, its strained hyperbole, its 
foolish digression. Lucan fails to make his actors live 
as they move through his pages ; their actions and their 
speeches are alike theatrical ; he has no dramatic power. 
But he can sum up their characters in burning lines that 
live through all time and have few parallels in literature. 
And these pictures are in all essentials surprisingly just 
and accurate. His affection for Pompey and the demands 
of his plot presented strong temptations to exalt his char- 
acter at the expense of historical truth. Yet what can be 
more just than the famous lines of the first book, where his 
character is set against Caesar's ? (129) : 

vergentibus annis [1] 

in senium longoque togae tranquillior usu 

[1] One aged grown 

Had long exchanged the corselet for the gown : 



IV LUCAN 107 

dedidicit iam pace dueem : famaeque petitor 
multa dare in volgus ; totus popularibus auris 
inpelli plausuque sui gaudere theatri ; 
nee reparare novas vires, multumque priori 
credere fortunae, stat magni nominis umbra : 
qualis frugifero quercus sublimis in agro 
exuvias veteres populi sacrataque gestans 
dona ducum : nee iam validis radicibus haerens 
pondere fixa suo est, nudosque per aera ramos 
effundens trunco non frondibus efficit umbram. 

Even the panegyric pronounced on him by Cato on hear- 
ing the news of his death is as moderate as it is true and 
dignified (ix. 190) : 

civis obit, inquit, multum maioribus inpar [1] 

nosse modum iuris, sed in hoc tamen utilis aevo, 

cui non ulla fuit iusti reverentia ; salva 

libertate potens, et solus plebe parata 

privatus servire sibi, rectorque senatus, 

sed regnantis, erat. 

. . . invasit ferrum, sed ponere norat ; 



In peace forgotten the commander's art, 
And learned to play the politician's part, 
To court the suffrage of the crowd, and hear 
In his own theatre the venal cheer ; 
Idly he rested on his ancient fame, 
And was the shadow of a mighty name. 
Like the huge oak which towers above the fields 
Decked with ancestral spoils and votive shields. 
Its roots, once mighty, loosened by decay, 
Hold it no more : weight is its only stay ; 
Its naked limbs bespeak its glories past, 
And by its trunk, not leaves, a shade is cast. 

PROF. GOLDWIN SMITH. 
[1] A man, he said, is gone, unequal far 

To our good sires in reverence for the law, 
Yet useful in an age that knew not right, 
One who could power with liberty unite, 
Uncrowned 'mid willing subjects could remain, 
The Senate rule, yet let the Senate reign. 

He drew the sword, but he could sheathe it too, 



108 LUCAN IV 

praetulit arma togae, sed paccm armatus amavit ; 
iuvit sumpta ducem, iuvit dimissa potestas. 

Elsewhere he is as one of the ' strengthless dead ', here 
he lives. Elsewhere he may be invested with the pathos 
that must cling to the shadow of a mighty name, but he 
is too weak and ineffective to be interesting. His wavering 
policy in his last campaign is unduly emphasized. 1 When 
lie is face to face with Caesar at Pharsalus and exhorts his 
men, he can but boast, he cannot inspire. 2 When the battle 
turns against him he bids his men cease from the fight, 
and himself flies, that he may not involve them in his 
own disaster. 3 No less convincing portrait could be drawn. 
The material was unpromising, but Lucan emphasizes all 
his weaknesses and wholly fails to bring out his nobler 
elements. He is unworthy of the line 

nee cinis exiguus tantam compescuit umbram. 

So, too, in a lesser degree with Caesar. For a moment 
in the first book he flashes upon us in his full splendour (143) : 

sed non in Caesare tantum [1] 

nomen erat nee fama ducis : sed nescia virtus 
stare loco, solusque pudor non vincere bello. 
acer et indomitus, quo spes quoque ira vocasset, 
ferre manum et numquam temerando parcere ferro, 
suecessus urgere suos, instare fauori 
numinis, inpellens quidquid sibi summa petenti 
obstaret, gaudensque viam fecisse ruina. 

War was his trade, yet he to peace inclined, 
Gladly command accepted and resigned. PROF. GOLD WIN SMITH. 
[1] Not such the talisman of Caesar's name, 
But Caesar had, in place of empty fame, 
The unresting soul, the resolution high 
That shuts out every thought but victory. 
Whate'er his goal, nor mercy nor dismay 
He owned, but drew the sword and cleft his way ; 
Pressed each advantage that his fortune gave ; 
Constrained the stars to combat for the brave ; 
Swept from his path whate'er his rise delayed, 
And marched triumphant through the wreck he made. 

PROF. GOLDWIN SMITH. 

i vii. 45-150. 2 yij. 342. 3 yjj. 647-727. 



IV LUCAN 10!) 

Here at any rate is Caesar the general : in such a poem 
there is no room for Caesar the statesman. But from this 
point onward we see no true Caesar. Henceforward, save 
for a few brief moments, he is a figure for the melodramatic 
stage alone, a ' brigand chief ', a master hypocrite, the 
favourite of fortune. And yet, for all his unreality, Lucan 
has endowed him with such impetuous vigour and such 
a plenitude of power that he dwarfs the other puppets 
that throng his pages even more, if possible, than in real 
life he overtopped his contemporaries. 

Cato, the third great figure of the Pharsalia, was easier 
to draw. Unconsciously stagey in life, he is little stagier 
in Lucan. And yet, in spite of his absurdity, he has a 
nobility and a sincerity of purpose which is without parallel 
in that corrupt age. He was the hero of the Stoic republi- 
cans * of the early principate, the man of principle, stern 
and unbending. He requires no fine touches of light and 
shade, for he is the perfect Stoic. But from the very rigidity 
of his principles he was no statesman and never played 
more than a secondary part in politics. 

Lucan's task is to exalt him from the second rank to 
the first. But it is no easy undertaking, since it was not 
till after the disaster of Pharsalus that he played any 
conspicuous part in the Civil War. He first appears as 
warrant for the justice of the republican cause (i. 128). 
We next see him as the hope of all true patriots at Rome 
(ii. 238). Pompey has fled southward. Cato alone remains 
the representative of all that is noblest and best in Rome. 
He has no illusions as to Pompey's character. He is not 
the leader he would choose for so sacred a cause ; but 
between Pompey and Caesar there can be no wavering. He 
follows Pompey. Not till the ninth book does he reappear 
in the action. Pompey is fallen, and all turn to Cato as 
their leader. The cause is lost, and Cato knows it well ; 
but he obeys the call of duty and undertakes the hopeless 



1 Cp. the epigrams attributed to ISeneca, P. L. M. iv, Anlh. Lat. 
7, 8, 9. 



110 LUCAN IV 

enterprise undismayed. He is a stern leader, but he shares 
his men's hardships to the full, and fortifies them by his 
example. He is in every action what the real Cato only 
was at Utica. On him above all others Lucan has lavished 
all his powers ; and he has succeeded in creating a character 
of such real moral grandeur that, in spite of its hardness 
and austerity, it almost succeeds in winning our affection 
(ii. 380) : 

hi mores, haec duri inmota Catonis [1] 

secta fuit, servare modum finesque tenere 
naturamque sequi patriaeque inpendere vitam 
nee sibi sed toti geuitum se credere mundo. 

Here is a man indeed worthy to be the hero of a republican 
epic, did history permit it. Our chief reason at moments 
there is a temptation to say ' our only reason ' for regretting 
the incompletion of the Pharsalia is that Lucan did not 
live to describe Cato's death. There was a subject which 
was worthy of his pen and would have been a labour of 
love. With what splendour of rhetoric he might have 
invested it can only be conjectured from the magnificent 
passage where Cato refuses to inquire into his fate at 
Ammon's oracle (ix. 566) : 

quid quaeri, Labiene, iubes ? an liber in arniis [2J 

occubuisse velim potius quam regna videre ? 
an sit vita nihil, sed longa ? an differat aetas ? 
an noceat vis ulla bono, fortunaque perdat 



[1] 'Twas his rule 

Inflexible to keep the middle path 
Marked out and bounded ; to observe the laws 
Of natural right ; and for his country's sake 
To risk his life, his all, as not for self 
Brought into being, but for all the world. 

SIR E. RIDLEY. 

[2] What should I ask ? Whether to live a slave 
Is better, or to fill a soldier's grave ? 
What life is worth drawn to its utmost span, 
And whether length of days brings bliss to man ? 
Whether tyrannic force can hurt the good, 
Or the brave heart need quail at Fortune's mood ? 



IV LUCAN 111 

opposita virtute minas, laudandaque velle 

sit satis, et numquaxn successu crescat honestum ? 

scimus, et hoc nobis non altius inseret Hammon. 

haeremus cuncti superis, temploque tacente 

nil facimus non sponte dei ; nee vocibus ullis 

numen eget, dixitque semel nascentibus auctor 

quidquid scire licet, steriles nee legit harenas, 

ut caneret paucis, mersitque hoc pulvere verurn. 

estque dei sedes, nisi terra et pontus et aer 

et caelum et virtus ? superos quid quaerimus ultra '! 

luppiter est quodcumque vides quodcumque moveris. 

sortilegis egeant dubii semperque futuris 

casibus aucipites ; me non oracula certum, 

sed mors certa facit. pavido fortique cadendum est ; 

hoc satis est dixisse louem. 

One Cato will not lend life to an epic, and history, to the 
great loss of art, forbids him to play a sufficiently important 
role. It is unnecessary to comment on the lesser personages 
of the epic ; if the leading characters lack life, the minor 
characters lack individuality as well. 1 Lucan has nothing of 
the dramatic vitalising power that is so necessary for epic. 



Whether the pure intent makes righteousness, 

Or virtue needs the warrant of success ? 

All this I know : not Ammon can impart 

Force to the truth engraven on my heart. 

All men alike, though voiceless be the shrine, 

Abide in God and act by will divine. 

No revelation Deity requires, 

But at our birth, all men may know, inspires. 

Nor is truth buried in this desert sand 

And doled to few, but speaks in every land. 

What temple but the earth, the sea, the sky, 

And heaven and virtuous hearts, hath deity ? 

As far as eye can range or feet can rove 

Jove is in all things, all things are in Jove. 

Let wavering souls to oracles attend, 

The brave man's course is clear, since sure his end. 

The valiant and the coward both must fall 

This when Jove tells me, he has told me all. 

PROF. GOLDWIN SMITH. 



1 The one exception is Curio, see iv. 799. 



112 LUCAN IV 

He is equally defective in narrative power. He can 
give us brilliant pictures as in the lines describing the 
vision of Caesar at the Rubicon 1 or Pompey's last sight 
of Italy. 2 But such passages are few and far between. 
Of longer passages there are not perhaps more than three 
in the whole work where we get any sustained beauty of 
narrative the parting of Pompey and his wife, 3 Pompey's 
dream before Pharsalus, 4 and a description of a Druid 
grove in Southern Gaul. 5 The first of these is noticeable 
as being one of the few occasions on which Lucan shows any 
command of simple pathos unmarred by tricks of tawdry 
rhetoric. The whole episode is admirably treated. The 
speeches of both husband and wife are commendably and 
unusually simple and direct, but the climax comes after 
Cornelia's speech, where the poet describes the moment 
before they part. With the simplest words and the most 
severe economy of diction, he produces an effect such as 
Vergil rarely surpassed, and such as was never excelled 
or equalled again in the poetry of Southern Europe till 
Dante told the story of Paolo and Francesca (v. 790) : 

sic fata relictis [1J 

exsiluit stratis amens tormentaque nulla 

[1] 80 spake she, and leaped frenzied from the couch, loth to put off 



ut ventum est parvi Rubiconis ad undas, 
ingens visa duci patriae trepidantis imago, 
clara per obscuram voltu maestissima noctem 
turrigero canos effundens vertice crines 
caesarie lacera nudisque adstare lacertis 
et gemitu permixta loqui : ' quo tenditis ultra ? 
quo fertis mea signa, viri ? si iure venitis, 
si cives, hue usque licet.' 

propulit ut classem velis cedentibus Auster 
incumbens mediumque rates movere profundum, 
omnis in lonios spectabat navita fluctus ; 
solus ab Hesperia non flexit lumina terra 
Magnus, dum patrios portus, dum litora numquain 
ad visus reditura suos tectumque cacumen 
nubibus et dubios cemit vanescere montes. 
a v. 722-end. * v ii. 6-44, 6 iji. 399.425. 



IV LUC AN 113 

vult differre mora. non maesti pectora Magni 
sustinet ainplexu dulci, non colla tenere, 
extremusque perit tarn longi fructus amoris, 
praecipitantque suos luctus, neuterque recedens 
sustinuit dixisse ' vale ', vitamque per omnem 
nulla fuit tarn maesta dies ; nam cetera damna 
durata iam mente mails firmaque tulerunt. 

It is faulty and monotonous in rhythm, but one would 
gladly have more from Lucan of the same poetic quality, 
even at the expense of the same blemishes. The dream 
of Pompey is scarcely inferior (vii. 7) : 

at nox, felicis Magno pars ultima vitae, [1] 

sollicitos vana decepit imagine somnos. 
nam Pompeiani visus sibi sede theatri 
innumeram effigiem Romanae cernere plebis 
attollique suum laetis ad sidera nomen 
vocibus et plausu cuneos certare sonantes ; 
qualis erat populi facies clamorque faventis, 
olim cum iuvenis primique aetate triumphi 

sedit adhuc Romanus eques ; seu fine bonorum 
anxia Venturis ad tempera laeta refugit, 
sive per ambages solitas contraria visis 
vaticinata quies magni tulit omina planctus, 



the pangs of parting by the least delay. She cannot bear to cast her arms 
about sad Magnus' bosom, or clasp his neck in a last sweet embrace ; and 
thus the last delight, such long love as theirs might know, is cast away : 
they hasten their own agony ; neither as they parted had the heart 
to say farewell ; and while they lived they knew no sadder day than 
this. All other losses they bore with hearts hardened and steeled by 
misery. 

[1] But night, the last glad hours that Magnus' life should know, 
beguiled his anxious slumbers with vain images of joy. He seemed 
to sit in the theatre himself had built, and to behold the semblance 
of the countless Roman multitude, and hear his name uplifted to 
the stars by joyous voices, and all the roaring benches vying in their 
applause. Even so he saw the people and heard their cheers in the 
days of old, when still a youth, in the hour of his first triumph ... he sat 
no more as yet than a knight of Rome ; whether it was that at thy fortune's 
close thy sleep, tormented with the fears of what should be, fled back to 
happier days, or riddling as 'tis wont, foretold the contrary of thy dreams and 



LUCAN IV 

seu vetito patrias ultra tibi cernere sedes 
sic Roniam fortuna dedit. ne rumpite somnos, 
castrorum vigiles, nullas tuba verberet aures. 
crastina dira quies et imagine maesta diurna 
undique funestas acies feret, undique bellum. 

The scene is well and naturally conceived ; there is no rant 
or false pathos ; it is an oasis in a book which, though in 
many ways the finest in the Pharsalia, yet owes its impres- 
siveness to a rhetoric which, for all its brilliance and power, 
will not always bear more than superficial examination. 
The last passage, with its description of the Druid's grove 
near Massilia, 1 is on a different plane. It gives less scope 
to the higher poetical imagination ; it describes a scene 
such as the Silver Age delighted in, 2 a dark wood, whereto 
the sunlight scarce can penetrate ; altars stand there stained 
with dark rites of human sacrifice ; no bird or beast will 
approach it ; no wind ever stirs its leaves ; if they rustle, 
it is with a strange mysterious rustling all their own : there 
are dark pools and ancient trees, their trunks encircled 
by coiling snakes ; strange sounds and sights are there, 
and when the sun rides high at noon, not even the priest 
will approach the sanctuary for fear lest unawares he come 
upon his lord and master. While similar descriptions may 
be found in other poets of the age, there is a strength 
and simplicity about this passage that rivets the attention, 
whereas others leave us cold and indifferent. But Lucan 
does not always exercise such restraint, and such passages 
are as rare as they are welcome. The reason for this is 
obvious : the narrative must necessarily consist in the main 



brought thee omens of mighty woe ; or whether, since ne'er again thou 
mightest see thy father's home, thus even in dreams fortune gave it to 
thy sight. Break not his slumbers, guardians of the camp ; let not the 
trumpet strike his ears at all. Dread shall to-morrow's slumbers be, and, 
haunted by the sad image of the disastrous day, shall bring before his eyes 
naught save war and armies doomed to die. 



1 iii. 399. 

2 Cp. Seneca, Oed. 530 sqq. The description of a grove was part of the 
poetic wardrobe. Cp. Pers. i. 70. 



IV LUCAN 115 

of military movements. In the words of Petronius, 1 that 
is better done by the historians. The adventures on the 
march are not likely as a rule to be peculiarly interesting ; 
there are no heroic single combats to vary and glorify 
the fighting. Conscious of this inevitable difficulty, and 
with all the rhetorician's morbid fear of being common- 
place, Lucan betakes himself to desperate remedies, hyper- 
bole and padding. If he describes a battle, he must invent 
new and incredible horrors to enthral us ; his sea-fight at 
Massilia is a notable instance ; 2 death ceases to inspire 
horror and becomes grotesque. If a storm arises he must 
outdo all earlier epic storms. Vergil had attempted to 
outdo the storms of the Odyssey. Lucan must outdo 
Vergil. Consequently, in the storm that besets Caesar on 
his legendary voyage to Italy in the fisherman's boat 3 
that ' carried Caesar and his fortunes ', strange things 
happen. The boat rocks helplessly in mid-sea 

Its sails in clouds, its keel upon the ground, 

For all the sea was piled into the waves 

And drawn from depths between laid bare the sand. 4 

In the same tempest 

The sea had risen to the clouds 
In mighty mass, had not Olympus' chief 
Pressed down its waves with clouds. 4 

If he is concerned with a march through the African desert, 
he must introduce the reader to a whole host of apocryphal 
serpents, with details as to the nature of their bites. 5 So 
terrible are these reptiles that it is a positive relief to the 
army to enter the region of lions. 6 Before such speci- 
mens as this the hyperbole of Seneca seems tame and insig- 
nificant. 

The introduction of irrelevant episodes would be less 



1 See p. 103. 

2 iii. 509-762. For a still more grotesque fight, cp. vi. 169-262 ; also 
ii. 211-20; iv. 794, 5. 

3 v. 610-53. Cp. also ix. 457-71. 

4 Sir E. Ridley's trans. 6 ix. 619-838. 6 ix. 946, 7, 

I 2 



116 LUC AN IV 

reprehensible were it not that such episodes are for the 
most part either dull or a fresh excuse for bombast or 
(worse still) a display of erudition. 1 He devotes no less 
than 170 lines in the first book to a description of the prodi- 
gies that took place at Rome on the outbreak of the Civil 
War, and of the rites performed to avert their omens. 2 

In the next book a hundred and sixty-six lines are given 
to a lurid picture of the Marian and Sullan proscriptions, 3 
and forty-six to a compressed geography of Italy. 4 In the 
fifth book we are given the tedious story of how a certain 
obscure Appius consulted the Delphian oracle 5 and how 
he fared, merely, we suspect, that Lucan may have an 
opportunity for depicting the frenzies of the Pythian 
prophetess. Similarly, at the close of the sixth book, Pom- 
pey's son consults a necromancer as to the result of the 
war. 6 The scene is described with not a little skill and 
ingenuity, but it has little raison d'etre save the gratification 
of the taste for witchcraft which Lucan shared with his 
audience and his fellow poets. 

Apart from these weaknesses of method and execution, 
Lucan's style is unsuited to epic whether historical or 
legendary. He has not sufficient command of a definitely 
poetical vocabulary to enable him to captivate the reader 
by pure sensuous charm. He is, as Quintilian says, ' magis 
oratoribus quam poetis imitandus.' He cannot shake 
himself free from the influence of his rhetorical training. 
It is a severe condemnation of an epic poet to deny him, 



1 For examples of erudition, cp. ix. loc. cit., where the origin of serpents 
of Africa is given, involving the story of Perseus and Medea, iv. 622 
sqq. The arrival of Curio in Africa is signalized by a long account of the 
slaying of Antaeus by Hercules. 

2 i. 523-end. 3 ii. 67-220. 

4 ii. 392-438. Cp. the geography of Thessaly, coupled with a description 
of its witches, vi. 333-506. 

5 v. 71-236. 

6 vi. 507-830. It is noteworthy, also, that incidents not necessarily 
irrelevant in themselves are treated with a monstrous lack of proportion, 
e.g. the siege of Massilia is not irrelevant ; but it is given 390 lines (iii. 372- 
762), and Lucan forgets to mention that Caesar captured it. 



IV LUCAN 117 

as we have denied, the gifts of narrative and dramatic 
power. Yet much of Lucan is more than readable, to 
some it is even fascinating. He has other methods of meeting 
the difficulties presented by historical epic. The work is 
full of speeches, moralising, and apostrophes. He will 
not let the story tell itself ; he is always harping on its 
moral and political significance. As a result, we get long 
passages that belong to the region of elevated political 
satire. They are not epic, but they are often magnificent. 
It is in them that Lucan's political feeling appears at 
its truest and strongest. 1 The actual fortunes of the repub- 
lican armies, as recounted by Lucan, must fail to rouse the 
emotions of the most ardent anti-Caesarian, and it is doubtful 
whether they would have responded to more skilful treat- 
ment. But in the apostrophes grief and indignation can find 
a voice and stir the heart. They may reveal a monstrous 
lack of the sense of historical proportion. To attribute the 
depopulation of the rural districts of Italy to the slaughter 
at Pharsalus is absurd. That Lucan does this is undeniable, 
but his words have a deeper significance. It was at Phar- 
salus, above all other battles, that the republic fell to ruin, 
and the poet is justified in making it the symbol of that 
fall. 2 And even where the sentiment is at bottom false, 
there is such an impetuosity and vigour in the lines, and 
such a depth of scorn in each epigram, that the reader 
is swept off his balance and convinced against his will. 
We hardly pause to think whether Pharsalus, or even the 
whole series of civil wars, really prevented the frontiers of 
Rome being conterminous with the limits of the inhabited 
globe, when we read such lines as (vii. 419) 

quo latius orbem [1] 

possedit, citius per prospera fata cucurrit. 
omne tibi bellum gentes dedit omnibus annis : 



[1] The wider she lorded it o'er the world, the swifter did she run through 
her fair fortunes. Each war, each year, gave thee new peoples to rule ; 



1 e.g. iv. 799-end, vii. 385-459, 586-96, 617-46, 847-72, viii. 542-60. 
793-end. 2 v ji. 385-459. 



118 LUCAN IV 

te geminuin Titan procedere vidit in axeni ; 
baud multum terrae spatiurn restabat Eoae, 
ut tibi nox, tibi tota dies, tibi curreret aether, 
omniaque errantes stellae Komana viderent. 
sed retro tua fata tulit par omnibus annis 
Emathiae funesta dies, hac luce cruenta 
effectum, ut Latios non horreat India fasces, 
nee vetitos errare Dahas in moenia ducat 
Sarmaticumque premat succinctus consul aratrum, 
quod semper saevas debet tibi Parthia poenas, 
quod fugiens civile nefas redituraque numquam 
libertas ultra Tigrim Khenumque recessit 
ac totiens nobis iugulo quaesita vagatur, 
Germanum Scythicumque bonum, nee respicit ultra 
Ausoniam. 

But this famous apostrophe closes on a truer note with 
six lines of unsurpassed satire (454) 

mortalia nulli [1] 

sunt curata deo. cladis tamen huius habenius 
vindictam, quantam terris dare numina fas est : 
bella pares superis facient civilia divos ; 
fulminibus manes radiisque ornabit et astris, 
inque deum templis iurabit Roma per umbras. 



thee did the sun behold advancing towards either pole ; little remained 
to conquer of the Eastern world ; so that for thee, and thee alone, night 
and day and heaven should revolve, and the planets gaze on naught that 
waa not Rome's. But Emathia's fatal day, a match for all the bygone 
years, has swept thy destiny backward. This day of slaughter was the cause 
that India trembles not before the lictor-rods of Rome, and that no 
consul, with toga girded high, leads the Dahae within some city's wall, for- 
bidden to wander more, and in Sarmatia drives the founder's plough. 
This day was the cause that Parthia still owes thee a fierce revenge, that 
freedom flying from the crimes of citizens has withdrawn behind Tigris 
and the Rhine, ne'er to return, and, sought so oft by us with our life's blood, 
wanders the prize of German and of Scyth, and hath no further care for 
Ausonia. 

[1] No god has a thought for the doings of mortal men : yet for this 
overthrow this vengeance is ours, so far as gods may give satisfaction to 
the earth : civil wars shall raise dead Caesars to the level of the gods 
above ; and Rome shall deck the spirits of the dead with rays and thunder- 
bolts and stars, and in the temples of the gods shall swear by the name of 
shades. 



IV LUC AN 119 

Noblest of all are the lines that close another apostrophe 
on the same subject a little later in the same book (638) 
maius ab hac acie quam quod sua saecula ferrent [1] 

volnus habent populi ; plus est quam vita salusque 
quod perit ; in totum mundi prosternimur aevum, 
vincitur his gladiis omnis quae serviet aetas. 
proxima quid suboles aut quid meruere nepotes 
in regnum nasci ? pa vide num gessimus arma 
teximus aut iugulos ? alieni poena timoris 
in nostra cervice sedet. post proelia natis 
si dominum, Fortuna, dabas, et bella dedisses. 

These are the finest of not a few 1 remarkable expressions 
of Lucan's hatred for the growing autocracy of the principate : 
it is noteworthy that almost all occur in the last seven 
books. They can hardly be regarded as mere abstract 
meditations ; they have a force and bitterness which justify 
us in regarding them as evidence of his changed attitude 
towards Nero. The first three books were published while 
he yet basked in the sunshine of court favours. Then 
came the breach between himself and Nero. His wounded 
vanity assisted his principles to come to the surface. 2 
The speeches, with very few exceptions, 3 scarcely rank 



[1] A deeper wound than their own age might bear was dealt the peoples 
of this earth in this battle : 'tis more than life and safety that is lost : 
for all future ages of the world are we laid low : these swords have van- 
quished generations yet unborn, and doomed them to eternal slavery. 
What had the sons and grandsons of those who fought that day deserved 
that they should be born into slavery ? Did we bear our arms like cowards, 
or screen our throats from death ? Upon our necks is riveted the doom 
that we should live in fear of another. Nay, Fortune, since thou gavest 
a tyrant to those born since the war, thou shouldst have given them also 
the chance to fight for freedom. 



1 There is nothing in these last seven books that can be regarded as in 
any way written to please Nero, save the description of the noble death 
of Domitius Ahenobarbus, Nero's great-great-grandfather (vii. 597-616). 
On the contrary there are many passages which Lucan would hardly have 
written while he was enjoying court favour : e. g. iv. 821-3, v. 385-402, 
vi. 809, vii. 694-6, x. 25-8. 

2 See p. 98. 

3 e. g. the two speeches of Cato quoted above. 



120 LUCAN IV 

with the apostrophes. Like the speeches in the plays of 
Seneca, they are little more than glorified suasoriae. They 
are, for the most part, such speeches as after making the 
most liberal allowance for rhetorical licence no human 
being outside a school of rhetoric could have uttered. 
Caesar's soldiery would have stared aghast had they been 
addressed by their general in such language as Lucan makes 
him use to inspire them with courage before Pharsalus. 
They would have understood little, and cared less, had 
Caesar said (vii. 274) 

civilia paucae [1] 

bella manus facient ; pugnae pars magiia levabit 
his orbem populis Romanumque obteret hostem; 

or (279) 

sitque palam, quas tot duxit Pompeius in urbem [2] 

curribus, unius gentes non esse triumphi. 

They would have laughed at exaggerations such as (287) 

cuius non militis ensem [3] 

agnoscam ? caelumque tremens cum lancea transit, 
dicere non fallar quo sit vibrata lacerto. 

And yet beneath all this fustian there is much that stirs 
the blood. Lines such as (261) 

si pro me patriam ferro flammisque petistis, [4] 

nunc pugnate truces gladiosque exsolvite culpa. 

[1] Not in civil strife 

Your blows shall fall the battle of to-day 
Sweeps from the earth the enemies of Rome. 

SIB E. RIDLEY. 

[2] Make plain to all men that the crowds who decked 
Pompeius' hundred pageants scarce were fit 
For one poor triumph. 

SIB E. RIDLEY. 

[3] When the sword 

Of each of you shall strike, I know the hand : 
The javelin's flight to me betrays the arm 
That launched it hurtling. 

SIB E. RIDLEY. 

[4] If for my sake you sought your fatherland with fire and sword, fight 
fierce to-day, and by victory clear your swords from guilt. No hand is 



IV LUCAN 121 

nulla manus belli mutato iudice pura est. 
lion niihi res agitur, sed vos ut libera sitis 
turba precor, gentes ut ius habeatis in omnes. 
ipse ego privatae cupidus me reddere vitae 
plebeiaque toga modicum compomere civem, 
omnia dum vobis liceant, nihil esse recuso. 
invidia regnate mea; 

or (290) 

quod si signa ducem numquam falleritia vestrum [Ij 

conspicio faciesque truces oculosque minaces, 

vicistis, 

though they are not the words of the historical Caesar, 
have a stirring sincerity and force. But the speeches 
fail because all speak the same artificial language. A 
mutineer can say of Caesar (v. 289) 

Rheni mihi Caesar in undis [2] 

dux erat, hie socius. facinus quos inquinat aequat; 

or threaten with the words (292) 

quidquid gerimus fortuna vocatur. [3] 
nos fatum sciat esse suum. 

The lines are brilliant and worthy of life : in their immediate 
context they are ridiculous. Epigrams have their value, 
however, even when they suit their context ill, and neither 
Juvenal nor Tacitus has surpassed Lucan in this respect, 



guiltless judged by a new arbiter of war. The struggle of to-day does 
naught for me ; but for you, so runs my prayer, it shall bring freedom 
and dominion o'er the world. Myself, I long to return to private life, and, 
even though my garb were that of the common people, to be a peaceful 
citizen once more. So be it all be made lawful for you, there is naught 
I would refuse to be : for me the hatred, so be yours the power. 

[1] Nay, if I behold those signs that ne'er deceived your leader, fierce 
faces and threatening eyes, you are already conquerors. 

[2] Caesar was my leader by the waves of Rhine, here he is my com- 
rade. The stain of crime makes all men equal. 

[3] As fortune's gift 

He takes the victory which our arms have won : 
But we his fortunes are, his fates are ours 
To fashion as we will. 

SIR E. RIDLEY. 



122 LUCAN IV 

or been more often quoted. He is, says Quintilian, sententiis 
clarissimus. Nothing can surpass (iv. 519) 

victurosque dei celant, ut vivere durent, [1] 

felix esse mori. 

or (viii. 631-2) 

mutantur prospera vitae, [2] 

non fit morte miser ; 
or (i. 32) 

alta sedent civilis volnera dextrae; [3] 

or(ix. 211) 

scire mori sors prima viris, sed proxinia cogi. [4] 

Lines such as (i. 281) 

semper nocuit differre paratis, [5] 

or (v. 260) 

quidquid multis peccatur, inultum est [6] 

are commonplace enough in thought but perfect in expres- 
sion. Of a different character, but equally noteworthy, are 
sayings such as iv. 819 

inomentumque fuit mutatus Curio reruin ; [7] 

or (iv. 185) 

usque adeone times, quern tu facis ipse timendum ? [8] 



[1] And the gods conceal from those who are doomed to live how 
happy it is to die. Thus only may they endure to live. 
[2] Life may bring defeat, 

But death no misery. 

SIR E. RIDLEY. 

[3] Deep lie the wounds that civil war hath made. 
[4] Best gift of all 

The knowledge how to die : next, death compelled. 

SIR E. RIDLEY. 
[5] To pause when ready is to court defeat. 

SIR E. RIDLEY. 
[6] The crime is free where thousands bear the guilt. 

SIR E. RIDLEY. 

[7] The change of Curio turned the scale of history. 
[8] Dost fear him so 

Who takes his title to be feared from, thee ? 

SIR E. RIDLEY, slightly altered. 



IV LUCAN 123 

Lucan's gift for epigram is further enhanced by the nature 
of his metre. Ponderous in the extreme, it is ill-suited 
for epic, though in isolated lines its very weight gives 
added force. But he had a poor ear for rhythm : his 
hexameter is monotonous as the iambics of Seneca. There 
is a want of variety in pauses ; he will not accommodate 
his rhythm to circumstances ; line follows line with but 
the slightest rhythmical variation, and there is far too 1 
sparing a use of elision. This failing is in part due to his 
desire to steer clear of the influence of Vergil and strike 
out on a line of his own. Faint echoes of Vergil, it is true, 
occur frequently throughout the poem, but to the untrained 
eye Lucan is emphatically un-Vergilian. His affinity to 
Ovid is greater. Both are rhetorical, and Lucan is indebted 
to Ovid for much mythological detail. And it is probable 
that he owes his smoothness and monotony of metre largely 
to the influence of the Metamorphoses. His ponderosity 
is all his own. 2 

Lucan is the child of his age, but he is almost an isolated 
figure in literature. He has almost every conceivable 
defect in every conceivable degree, from the smallest detail 
to the general conception of his poem. And yet he triumphs 
over himself. It is a hateful task to read the Pharsalia 
from cover to cover, and yet when it is done and the lapse 
of time has allowed the feeling of immediate repulsion to 
evaporate, the reader can still feel that Lucan is a great 
writer. The absurdities slip from the memory, the dreari- 
ness of the narrative is forgotten, and the great passages 
of lofty rhetoric, with their pungent epigram and their high 
political enthusiasm, remain deeply engraven on the mind. 



1 He is, moreover, very careless in his repetition of the same word, 
cp. i. 25, 27 urbibus, iii. 436, 441, 445 silva, &c. ; cp. Haskins, ed. Ixxxi. 
(Heitland's introd.) 

2 He is far less dactylic than Ovid. For the relation between the various 
writers of epic in respect of metre, see Drobisch, Virsiich ub. die Formen 
des lat. Hex. 140. The proportion of spondees in the first four feet of 
hexameters of Roman writers is there given as follows : Catullus 65-8 %, 
Silius 60-6%, Ennius 59-5%, Lucretius 574%, Vergil 56%, Horace 55 %, 
Lucan 54-3 %, Statius 49-7 %, Valerius 46-2 %, Ovid 45-2 %. 



124 LUCAN IV 

It is they that have given Lucan the immortality which he 
promised himself. The Pharsalia is dead, but Lucan lives. 

It is useless to conjecture what might have been the 
fate of such remarkable gifts in a less corrupt age. This 
much, however, may be said, Lucan never had a fair chance. 
The circle in which he moved, the education which he 
received, suffered only his rhetorical talent to develop, 
and to this were sacrificed all his other gifts, his clearness 
of vision, his sense of proportion, his poetical imagination. 
He was spoilt by admiration and his own facility. Moreover, 
Seneca was his uncle : a comparison shows how profoundly 
the elder poet influenced the younger. There is the same 
self-conscious arrogance begotten of Stoicism, the same 
brilliance of wit and absence of humour. Their defects 
and merits alike reveal them as kindred, though Lucan 
stands worlds apart as a poet from Seneca, the ranting 
tragedian. He was but twenty-five when he died. Age 
might have brought a maturity and dignity of spirit which 
would have made rhetoric his servant and not his master, 
and refined away the baser alloys of his character. Even 
as it was he left much that, without being pure gold, yet 
possessed many elements and much of the brilliance of 
the true metal. Dante's judgement was true when he 
set him among the little company of true poets, of which 
Dante himself was proud to be made one. 



CHAPTER V 

PETRONIUS 

THE most curious and in some respects the most remark- 
able work that the Silver Age has bequeathed to us is 
a fragment of a novel, the Satyr icon of Petronius Arbiter. 
Its author is generally identified with Titus Petronius, 
the friend and victim of Nero. Tacitus has described 
him in a passage, remarkable even among Tacitean portraits 
for its extraordinary brilliance. ' His days he passed in 
sleep, his nights in the business and pleasures of life. Indo- 
lence had raised him to fame, as energy raises others, and 
he was reckoned not a debauchee and spendthrift, like 
most of those who squander their substance, but a man 
of refined luxury. And indeed his talk and his doings, 
the freer they were, and the more show of carelessness they 
exhibited, were the better liked for their look of a natural 
simplicity. Yet as proconsul of Bithynia and soon after- 
wards as consul, he showed himself a man of vigour and 
equal to business. Then, falling back into vice or affecting 
vice, he was chosen by Nero to be one of his few intimate 
associates, as a critic in matters of taste (elegantiae arbiter). 
The emperor thought nothing charming or elegant in luxury 
unless Petronius had expressed his approval. Hence 
jealousy on the part of Tigellinus, who looked on him as 
a rival, and even his superior, in the science of pleasure. 
And so he worked on the prince's cruelty, which dominated 
every other passion : charging Petronius with having been 
the friend of Scaevinus, bribing a slave to turn informer, 
robbing him of the means of defence, and hurrying into 
prison the greater part of his domestics. It happened 
at the time that the emperor was on his way to Campania, 
and that Petronius, after going as far as Cumae, was there 
detained. He bore no longer the suspense of fear or of 
hope. Yet he did not fling away life with precipitate haste, 



126 PETRONIUS V 

but having made an incision in his veins and then according 
to his humour bound them up, he again opened them, 
while he conversed with his friends, not in a serious strain 
or on topics that might win him the glory of courage. He 
listened to them as they repeated, not thoughts on the 
immortality of the soul or on the theories of philosophers, 
but light poetry and playful verses. To some of his slaves 
he gave liberal presents, to others a flogging. He dined, 
indulged himself in sleep, that death, even though forced, 
might have a natural appearance. Even in his will he did 
not, as did many in their last moments, flatter Nero or 
Tigellinus, or any other of the men in power. On the 
contrary, he described fully the prince's shameful excesses, 
with the names of his male and female companions and 
their novelties in debauchery, and sent the account under 
seal to Nero. Then he broke his signet-ring, that it might 
not be available to bring others into peril.' l 

There is nothing definitely to bring this ingenious and 
brilliant debauchee into connexion with the Petronius 
Arbiter of the Satyricon. But the character of Titus 
Petronius is exactly in keeping with the tone of the novel ; 
the novelist's cognomen Arbiter, though in itself by no 
means extraordinary, may well have sprung from or given 
rise to the title elegantiae arbiter ; and finally the few 
indications of date in the novel all point to a period not 
far from the reign of Nero. There is the criticism of Lucan, 2 
which certainly loses point if not written during Lucan 's 
lifetime ; there is the criticism of the rhetorical training 
of the day, 3 which finds a remarkable echo in the criticism 
of Vipstanus Messala in the Dialogue of Tacitus, a work 
which, whatever the date of its actual composition, certainly 
refers to a period less than ten years after the death of 
T. Petronius ; there is the style of the work itself ; wherever 
the writer abandons the colloquial Latin, in which so much 
of the work is written, we find a finished diction, whether 



1 Tac. Ann. xvi. 18, 19 (Church and Brodribb's trans.). 
? e ? 118 a. 3 cc, 1-5, 



V PETRONIUS 127 

in prose or verse, which no unprejudiced judge could place 
later than the accession of Trajan, and which has nothing 
in it to prevent its attribution to the reign of Nero. In 
that reign there is but one Petronius to whom we can 
assign the Satyricon, the Petronius immortalized by Tacitus. 1 
Of the work as a whole this is no place to speak. The 
fragments which survive are in the main in prose. But 
the work is modelled on the Menippean satires of Varro, 
and belongs to the same class of writing as the Apocolocyn- 
tosis of Seneca. In the form of a loosely-strung and rambling 
novel we have a satirical commentary on human life ; the 
satire is cynical and pungent, rather than mordant, makes 
no pretence of logic, and proceeds not from a moral sense 
but from a sense of humour. Wild and indecent as Petronius' 
laughter often is, it springs from one who is a real artist, 
possessing a sense of proportion as well as the sense of con- 
trast that is the source and fount of humour. This is most 
strongly evident in that portion of his satire which concerns 
us here, inasmuch as it is directed against contemporary 
literary tendencies. We must beware of fastening on the 
words of the characters in the novel as necessarily expressing 
the thoughts of its author. But it is noteworthy that all 
his literary criticism points in the same direction ; it is 
above all conservative. Through the mouths of Encolpius, 
the dissolute hero of the story, and the rhetorician Aga- 
memnon 2 he denounces the flamboyant rhetoric of the day, 
its remoteness from reality, the lack of sanity and industry 
on the part both of pupil and instructor. ' As boys they 
pass their time at school at what is no better than play, 
as youths they make themselves ridiculous in the forum, 
and, worst of all, when they grow old they refuse to acknow- 
ledge the faults acquired by their education.' Study is 
necessary, and above all the study of good models. Sopho- 
cles, Euripides, Pindar, the great lyricists, Plato, Demo- 



1 The first reference in literature to the Satyricon is in Macrobius, in 
Somn. Scip. i. 2, 8. 

2 cc. 1-5. 



128 PETRONIUS V 

sthenes, Thucydides, Hyperides, all the great classics, these 
are the true models for the young orator. Agamemnon 
cannot restrain himself and even bursts into verse in the 
course of this disquisition on the decadence of oratory : 

artis severae si quis ambit effectus [1] 

mentemque magnis applicat, prius mores 

frugalitatis lege poliat exacta. 

nee curet alto regiam trucem vultu 

cliensve cenas impotentium captet 

nee perditis addictus obruat vino 

mentis calorem, neve plausor in scaenam 

sedeat redemptus histrionis ad rictus. 

sed sive armigerae rident Tritonidis arces, 

seu Lacedaemonio tellus habitata colono 

Sirenumve domus, det primes versibus annos 

Maeoniumque bibat felici pectore fontem. 

mox et Socratico plenus grege mittat habenas 

liber et ingentis quatiat Demosthenis arma. 

hinc Romana manus circumfluat et modo Graio 

exonerata sono mutet suffusa saporem. 

interdum subducta foro det pagina cursum 

et cortina x sonet celeri distincta meatu ; 

dein 2 epulas et bella truci memorata canore 

[1] If any man court success in the lofty art of letters and apply his 
mind to great things, he must first perfect his character by simplicity's stern 
law ; he must care naught for the haughty frown of the fierce tyrant 
that lords it in his palace, nor seek client-like for invitations to the board 
of the profligate, nor deliver himself over to the company of debauchees 
and drown the fire of his understanding in wine, nor sit in the theatre 
the hired applauder of the mouthing actor. But whether the citadel of 
panoplied Minerva allure him with its smile, or the land where the Spartan 
exile came to dwell, or the Sirens' home, let him devote his early years to 
poesy, and let his spirit drink in with happy omen a draught from the 
Maeonian fount. Thereafter, when his soul is full of the lore of the Socratic 
school, let him give himself free rein and brandish the weapons of great 
Demosthenes. Next let the band of Roman authors throng him round, 
and, but newly freed from the music of Greece, suffuse his soul and change 
its tone. Meanwhile, let his pen run its course withdrawn from the forum, 
and let Apollo's tripod send forth a voice rhythmic and swift : next let 
him roll forth in lordly speech the tale of heroes' feasting and wars, set 
forth in fierce strain and lofty language, such as fell from the lips of daunt- 

1 MS. fortuna. 2 MS. dent. 



V PETRONIUS 129 

grandiaque indomiti Ciceronis verba minetur. 
his animum succinge bonis : sic flumine largo 
plenus Pierio defundes pectore verba. 

This is not inspired poetry ; but its advice is sound, 
and its point of view just. Nor is this criticism a mere 
jeu d'esprit ; it is hard to resist the conclusion that the 
author is putting his own views into the mouths of his 
more than shady characters. For, mutatis mutandis, the 
same attitude towards literary art is revealed in the utter- 
ances of the poet Eumolpus. 1 It is a curious fact that while 
none of the characters in Petronius are to be taken seriously, 
their speech at times soars from the reeking atmosphere 
of the brothel and the clamour of the streets to clearer 
and loftier regions of thought, if not of action. The first 
appearance of Eumolpus is conceived in a broadly comic 
vein. ' While I was thus engaged a grey-haired old man 
entered the picture gallery. He had a troubled countenance, 
which seemed to promise some momentous utterance. 
His dress was lamentable, and showed that he was clearly 
one of those literary gentlemen so unpopular with the rich. 
He took his stand by my side. " I am a poet," he said, 
" and no mean one, if any trust is to be placed in wreaths 
of honour, which are so often bestowed even on those 
who least deserve them." " Why, then, are you so ill- 
clad?" I asked. "Just for that very reason. Devotion 
to art never brought any one wealth " 

qui pelago credit magno se faenore tollit ; [1] 

qui pugnas et castra petit, praecingitur auro ; 

vilis adulator picto iacet ebrius ostro, 

et qui sollicitat nuptas, ad praemia peccat : 



less Cicero. Prepare thy soul for joys such as these ; and, steeped in the 
plenteous stream of letters, thou shalt give utterance to the thoughts of 
thy Pierian soul. 

[1] He who entrusts his fortunes to the sea, wins a mighty harvest ; he 
who seeks the camp and the field of war, may gird him with gold : the 
vile flatterer lies drunken on embroidered purple ; the gallant who courts 



1 c. 83. 

BUTLER 



130 PETRONIUS V 

sola pruinosis horret facundia pannis 
atque inopi lingua desertas invocat artes. 1 

' There's no doubt as to the truth of it. If a man has a 
detestation of vice and chooses the paths of virtue, he 
is hated on the ground that his morals are eccentric. No 
one approves of ways of life other than his own. Then 
there are those whose sole care is the acquisition of wealth ; 
they are unwilling that anything should be thought to be 
a superior good to that which they themselves possess. And 
so they persecute lovers of literature with all their might.' 
This vitiorum omnium inimicus then proceeds to tell a story 
which casts a startling light upon his ' eccentric morality '. 
Its undoubted humour can hardly be said to redeem its 
amazing grossness. He has scarcely finished the narration 
of his own shame when he is back again in another world 
the world of letters. He laments the decay of art and 
philosophy. ' The passion for money-making has brought 
ruin in its train. While virtue went bare and was a welcome 
guest, the noble arts flourished, and men vied with one 
another in the effort to discover anything that might be 
of service to mankind.' He quotes the examples of Demo- 
critus, Eudoxus, Chrysippus in the world of science, of 
Myron in art. ' We have given ourselves up to wine and 
women, and take no pains to become acquainted even 
with the arts already discovered. We traduce antiquity 
by teaching and learning its vices only. Where is dialectic ? 
Where is astronomy ? Where is philosophy ? ' He sees 
that Encolpius is not listening, but is absorbed in the con- 
templation of a picture representing the sack of Troy, 
and seizes the opportunity of reciting a poem of his own 
upon the subject. The lines are for the most part neither 
original nor striking ; they form a kind of abstract in 
iambics of the second Aeneid, from the appearance of Sinon 
to the emergence of the Greeks from the Trojan horse. 

the favours of wedded wives, wins wealth by his sin : eloquence alone 
shivers in frosty rags and invokes the neglected arts with pauper tongue. 

1 Cp. Juv. Sat. 7 ; Tac. Dial. 9. 



V PETRONIUS 131 

But the work is finished and elegant, 1 and the simile which 
describes the arrival of the serpents that were to slay Lao- 
coon is not unworthy of a more successful poet than 
Eumolpus is represented to have been : 

ecce alia monstra ; celsa qua Tenedos mare [1] 

dorso replevit, tumida consurgunt freta 
undaque resultat scissa tranquillo minans 2 
qualis silenti nocte remorum sonus 
longe refertur, cum premunt classes mare 
pulsumque marmor abiete imposita gemit. 
respicimus ; angues orbibus geminis ferunt 
ad saxa fluctus, tumida quorum pectora 
rates ut altae lateribus spumas agunt. 

The picture is at once vivid and beautiful, and we feel 
almost regretful at the fate which his recitation brought 
on the unhappy poet. ' Those who were walking in the 
colonnade began to throw stones at Eumolpus as he recited. 
He recognized this method of applauding his wit, covered 
his head with his cloak and fled from the temple. I was 
afraid that he would denounce me as a poet. And so I 
followed him till I came to the sea-shore and was out of 
range. " What do you mean," I said, " by inflicting this 
disease of yours upon us ? You have been less than two 
hours in my company, and you have more often spoken 
like a poet than a man. I'm not surprised that people 
throw stones at you. I'm going to fill my own pockets 
with stones, and the moment you begin to unburden yourself, 



[1] Lo ! a fresh portent ; where the ridge of lofty Tenedos filled the sea, 
there breaks a swelling surge, and the broken waves rebound and threaten 
the calm : as when in the silent night the sound of oars is borne afar, when 
navies burden the main and the smitten deep groans beneath its freight 
of pine. We looked round : the waves bear towards the rocks two coiling 
snakes, whose swelling breasts, like tall ships, drive the water in foam 
along their sides. 



1 c. 89. It has been suggested that this poem is a parody of Nero's 
Troiae halosis I But the poem shows no signs of being a parody. It is 
obviously written in all seriousness. 

2 MS. minor. I suggest minans as a possible solution of the difficulty. 

K 2 



132 PETRONIUS V 

I'm going to break your head." His face revealed a painful 
emotion. "My good youth," said he, "to-day is not the 
first occasion on which I have suffered this fate. Nay, 
I have never entered a theatre to recite, without attracting 
this kind of welcome. But as I don't want to quarrel 
with you, I will abstain from my daily food for the whole 
day." Eumolpus did not keep this promise ; but the poem 
with which he broke it is of small importance and need 
not detain us. 1 It is a little disquisition on the refinements 
of luxury now prevalent, and has but one notable line 
the last 

quidquid quaeritur optimum videtur. [1] 

But later he has another outbreak. Encolpius and his 
friends have been shipwrecked near Croton. On their way 
to the town Eumolpus beguiles the tedium of the climb by 
the criticism of Lucan and the attempt to improve on the 
Pharsalia, which have been discussed in the chapter on Lucan. 
If neither his poetry nor his criticism as a whole are sound, 
they are at least meant seriously. Here, again, we have a 
plea for earnest study, and for the avoidance of mere tricks 
of rhetoric. As for the rhetorician Agamemnon, so for 
Eumolpus, the great poets of the past are Homer and the 
lyric poets ; and nearer home are the ' Roman Vergil ' and 
Horace. If there was nothing else in this passage than 
the immortal phrase ' Horatii curiosa felicitas ', it would 
redeem it from the commonplace. Petronius is a 'classicist' ; 
the friend of Nero, he protests against the flamboyance of the 
age as typified in the rhetorical style of Seneca and Lucan. 
If the work was written at the time when Seneca and Lucan 
first fell from the Imperial favour, such criticism may well 
have found favour at court. If, with the brilliant whim- 
sicality that characterizes all his work, Petronius has placed 
these utterances in the mouth of disreputable and broadly 
comic figures, that does not impair the value or sincerity 



[1] Whatever must be sought for, that seems best. 
1 c. 93. 



V PETRONIUS 133 

of the criticism. Eumolpus' complaint of the decline of 
the arts and the baneful effect of the struggle for wealth 
is no doubt primarily inspired by the fact that he is poor 
and can find no patron nor praise for his verse, but must 
put up with execrations and showers of stones. But that 
does not affect the truth of much that he says, nor throw 
doubt upon the sincerity of Petronius himself. 

The same whimsicality is shown elsewhere in the course 
of the novel. It contains not a few poems which, detached 
from their context, are full of grace and charm, though their 
application is often disgusting in the extreme. Such are 
the hexameters towards the close of the work in which 
Encolpius describes the scene of his unhappy love affair 
with a certain Circe : 

Idaeo quales fudit de vertice flores [1] 

terra parens, cum se concesso iunxit amori 

luppiter et toto concepit pectore flammas : 

emicuere rosae violaeque et molle cyperon, 

albaque de viridi riserunt lilia prato : 

talis humus Venerem molles clamavit in herbas, 

candidiorque dies secreto favit amori (127); 

nobilis aestivas platanus diffuderat umbras [2] 

et bacis redimita Daphne tremulaeque cupressus 

et circum tonsae trepidanti vertice pinus. 

has inter ludebat aquis errantibus amnis 

spumeus et querulo vexabat rore lapillos. 

dignus amore locus : testis silvestris aedon 



[1] As the flowers poured forth by mother earth from Ida's peak, when 
she yielded to Jove's embrace and the god's soul was filled with passionate 
flame ; the rose, the violet, and the soft iris flashed forth, and white 
lilies gleamed from the green meadow ; so shone the earth when it called 
our love to rest upon the soft grass, and the day, brighter than its wont, 
smiled on our secret passion. 

[2] A noble plane tree and the bay tree with its garland of berries, and the 
quivering cypress and the trim pine with its tremulous top, spread a sweet 
summer shade abroad. Amid them a foaming river sported with wandering 
waters and lashed the pebbles with its peevish spray. Meet was the place 
for love, with the woodland nightingale and the town-haunting swallow 



134 PETRONIUS V 

atque urbana Procne, quae circum gramina fusae 
ac molles violas cantu sua furta colebant (131). 

The unpleasing nature of the context cannot obscure the 
fact that here we have genuine poetry of great delicacy and 
beauty. 1 

Of the satirical epigrams contained in the novel little 
need be said. They are not in any way pointless or feeble, 
but they lack the ease and grace, and, it may be added, the 
sting, of the best work of Martial. The themes are hack- 
neyed and suffer from the absence of the personal note. 
But it is at least refreshing to find that Petronius does not 
attempt, like Martial and others, to excuse his obscenity 
on the ground that his actual life is chaste. He speaks out 
frankly. ' Why hide what all men know ? * 

quid me constricta spectatis fronte Catones [1] 

damnatisque novae simplicitatis opus ? 

sermonis puri non tristis gratia ridet, 

quodque facit populus, Candida lingua refert (132). 

A more interesting collection of poems, probably Petronian, 
remains to be discussed. In addition to the numerous frag- 
ments of poetry included in the surviving excerpts from the 
Satyricon, a considerable number of epigrams, attributed 
with more or less certainty to Petronius, are preserved in 
the fragments of the Anthologia Latino,. 2 Immediately 
following on the epigrams assigned to the authorship of 
Seneca, the Codex Vossianus Q. 86 gives sixteen epigrams, 3 
each headed by the word item. Of these two are quoted 
by Fulgentius as the work of Petronius. 4 There is, therefore, 



for witness, that, flitting all about the grass and the soft violets, told of 
their loves in song. 

[1] Why gaze at me, ye Catos, with frowning brow, and damn the fresh 
frankness of my work ? my speech is Latin undefiled, and has grace un- 
marred by gloom, and my candid tongue tells of what all Rome's people do. 



1 Cp. also 128 and the spirited epic fragment burlesquely used in 108. 

2 See p. 36. 

3 Baehrens, P. L. M. iv. 74-89. 

4 Nos. 76 and 86. Cp. Fulg. Mythol i. 1, p. 31 ; Lactant. adStat. Theb. iii. 
661 ; Fulg. Mythol. iii. 9, p. 126. 



V PETRONIUS 135 

especially in view of the fact that they all bear a marked 
family resemblance to one another, a strong presumption 
that all are by the author of the Satyricon. Further, there 
are eleven epigrams 1 published by Binet in his edition of 
Petronius 2 from a MS. originally in the cathedral library 
of Beauvais, but now unfortunately lost. The first of the 
series is quoted by Fulgentius 3 as being by Petronius, and 
there is no reason for doubting the accuracy of Binet or his 
MS. 4 as to the rest. These poems are followed by eight 
more epigrams. 5 the first two of which Binet attributes to 
Petronius on stylistic grounds, but without any MS. au- 
thority. 6 Lastly, four epigrams are preserved by a third MS. 
(Cod. Voss. F. Ill) under the title Petronii. 1 Of these the 
first two are found in the extant portions of the Satyricon. 
The evidence for the Petronian authorship of these thirty- 
seven poems is not conclusive. Arguments based on 
resemblance or divergence in points of style are somewhat 
precarious in the case of an author like Petronius, writing 
with great variety of style on a variety of subjects. But 
there are some very marked resemblances between certain 
of these poems and verses surviving in the excerpts from 
the Satyricon, 6 and the evidence against the Petronian 
authorship is of the slightest. A possible exception may 
be made in the case of the last eight epigrams preserved 
by Binet, though even here Binet is just enough in pointing 
out the resemblance of the first two of these to what is 
admittedly the work of Petronius. But with regard to 
the rest we shall run small risk in regarding them as selected 
from the lost books of the Satyricon. 



1 Baehrens, P. L. M. iv. 90-100. 

2 Poitiers, 1579 A. D. 3 Fulg. Mythol. i. 12, p. 44. 

4 That the attribution to Petronius rests on the authority of the lost MS. 
is a clear inference from Binet's words, cp. Baehrens, P. L. M. iv. 101-8, 
' sequebantur ista, sed sine Petronii titulo, at priores illi duo Phalaecii 
vix alius fuerint quam Petronii.' 

5 Baehrens, P. L. M. iv. 101-8. 6 See note 4. 

7 Petr. cc. 14, 83 ; Baehrens, P. L. M. iv. 120, 121. 

8 Cp. Satyr. 127, 131 ; P. L. M. iv. 75 ; S. 128 ; P. L. M. iv. 121 ; 
S. 108 ; P. L. M. iv. 85 ; 8. 79, iv. 101. 



136 PETRONIUS V 

These poems are very varied in character and as a whole 
reach a higher poetical level than most of those preserved 
in the existing fragments of the Satyricon. 1 The most 
notable features are simplicity and unaffected grace of 
diction coupled with a delicate appreciation of the beauties 
of nature. There is nothing that is out of keeping with the 
classicism on which we have insisted as a characteristic of 
Petronius, there is much that is worthy of the best writers 
of the Augustan age. The five lines in which he describes 
the coming of autumn have much in common with the 
descriptions of nature already quoted from the Satyricon. 
The last line in particular has at once a conciseness and 
a wealth of suggestion that is rare in any post-Ovidian 
poet : 

iam mine algentes autumnus fecerat umbras [1] 

atque hiemem tepidis spectabat Phoebus habenis, 
iam platanus iactare comas, iam coeperat uvas 
adnumerare suas defecto palmite vitis : 
ante oculos stabat, quidquid promiserat aimus. 1 

Equally charming and sincere in tone is the description 
of the delights of the simple life : 

parvula securo tegitur mihi culmine sedes [2] 

uvaque plena mero fecunda pendet ab ulmo. 

dant rami cerasos, dant mala rubentia silvae 

Palladiumque nemus pingui se vertice frangit. 

iam qua diductos potat levis area fontes, 

Corycium mihi surgit olus malvaeque supinae 

et non sollicitos missura papavera somnos. 

[1] Now autumn had brought its cool shades, Phoebus' reins glowed less 
hot and he was looking winterward. The plane was beginning to shed her 
leaves, the vine to count its clusters, and its fresh shoots were withered. 
Before our eyes stood all the promise of the year. 

[2] My cottage is sheltered by a roof that fears no ill ; the grape, burst- 
ing with wine, hangs from the fertile elm ; cherries hang by the bough and 
my orchard yields its rosy apples, and the tree that Pallas loves breaks 
beneath the rich burden of its branches. And now, where the garden 
bed's light soil drinks in the runnels of water, rises for me Corycian kale 
and low-growing mallow, and the poppy that grants easy slumber. More- 

1 P. L. M. iv. 75. 



V PETRONIUS 137 

praeterea sive alitibus contexere fraudem 

seu magis inbelles libuit circumdare cervos 

aut tereti lino pavidum subducere piscem, 

hos tantum novere dolos mea sordida rura. 

i mine et vitae fugientis tempora vende 

divitibus cenis ! me qui manet exitus olim, 

hie precor inveniat consumptaque tempora poscat. 1 

These lines may be no more than an academic exercise 
on a commonplace theme, but there can be no doubt of 
their artistic success. We find the same simplicity in 
Columella, but not the same art. Compare them with the 
work of Petronius' contemporary, Calpurnius Siculus, and 
there is all the difference between true poetry and mere 
poetising. More passionate and more convincing is the 
elegiac poem celebrating the poet's return to the scene of 
former happiness : 

o litus vita mihi dulcius, o mare ! felix, [1] 

cui licet ad terras ire subinde tuas ! 
o formosa dies ! hoc quondam rure solebam 

naidas alterna 2 sollicitare manu. 
hie fontis lacus est, illic sinus egerit algas : 

haec static est tacitis fida cupidinibus. 
pervixi ; neque enim fortuna malignior umquam 

eripiet nobis, quod prior aura dedit. 3 



over, whether 'tis my pleasure to set snares for birds or hem in the timid 
deer, or on fine-meshed net to draw up the affrighted fish, this is all the 
guile known to my humble lands. Go to, now, and waste the flying hours 
of life on sumptuous feasts ! I pray, that my destined end may find me 
here, and here demand an account of the days I have lived. 

[1] shore, O sea, that I love more than life ! Happy is he that may 
straightway visit the lands ye border. O fairest day ! 'Twas here that once 
I was wont to swim and vex the sea-nymphs with my hands' alternate strokes. 
Here is a stream's deep pool, there the bay casts up its seaweed : here 
is a spot that can faithfully guard the secret of one's love. I have lived 
my life to the full ; nor can grudging fortune ever rob me of that which 
her favouring breeze once gave me. 



1 P. L. M. iv. 81. 

2 The MS. is hopelessly corrupt at this point. I suggest naidas alterna 
manu as a possible correction of the MS. lliadas armatas s. manus. 

3 P. L. M. iv. 84. 



138 PETRONIUS V 

But Petronius can attain to equal success in other veins. 

Now we have a fragment in the epic style containing a 

simile at once original and beautiful : 

haec ait et tremulo deduxit vertice canos [1] 

consecuitque genas ; oculis nee def uit imber, 

sed qualis rapitur per vallis improbus amnis, 

cum gelidae periere nives et languidus auster 

non patitur glaciem resoluta vivere terra, 

gurgite sic pleno facies manavit et alto 

insonuit gemitu turbato murmure pectus. 1 

Elsewhere we find him writing in satirical vein of the 
origin of religion, 2 on the decay of virtue, 3 on the hardship 
of the married state 4 : 

' uxor legis onus, debet quasi census amari.' [2] 

nee censum vellem semper amare meum. 

But it is in a love-poem that he reaches his highest 
achievement : 

lecto compositus vix prima silentia noctis [3J 

carpebam et somno lumina victa dabam : 
cum me saevus Amor prensat sursumque capillis 

excitat et lacerum pervigilare iubet. 
' tu famulus meus,' inquit, ' ames cum mille puellas, 

solus, io, solus, dure, iacere potes ? ' 
exsilio et pedibus nudis tunicaque soluta 

omne iter incipio, nullum iter expedio. 

[1] He spake, and rent the white hair on his trembling head and tore his 
cheeks, and his eyes streamed with a flood of tears. As when a resistless 
river sweeps down the valley when the chill snows have melted and the 
languid south wind thaws the earth and suffers not the ice to remain, even 
so his face streamed with a torrent of weeping and his breast groaned loud 
with a confused murmur of sorrow. 

[2] ' One should love one's wife as one loves one's fortune.' Nay, I 
desire not always to love even my fortune. 

[3] I lay on my bed and began to enjoy the silence of the night scarce yet 
begun, and was yielding my wearied eyes to sleep, when fierce Love laid 
hold of me, and, seizing me by the hair, aroused me, tore me, and bade me 
wake. ' Canst thou, my servant,' he cried, ' the lover of a thousand girls, 
lie thus alone, alone, hard-hearted ? ' I leapt from my couch, and barefoot, 
with dishevelled robe, started on my errand, yet never accomplished it. 

1 P. L. M. iv. 85. 2 ib. 76. 3 Ib . 82 . 4 n,. 78. 



V PETRONIUS 139 

nunc propero, nunc ire piget, rursumque redire 

paenitet et pudor est stare via media, 
ecce tacent voces hominum strepitusque viarum 

et volucrum cantus turbaque fida canum : 
solus ego ex cunctis paveo somnumque torumque 

et sequor iraperium, magne Cupido, tuum. 1 

If this is not great poetry, it is at least one of the most 
perfect specimens of conventional erotic verse in all ancient 
literature. If we except a very few of the best poems of 
Propertius, Latin Elegiacs have nothing to show that com- 
bines such perfection of form with such exquisite sensuous 
charm. It breathes the fragrance of the Greek anthology. 

The general impression left by the poetical work of 
Petronius is curiously unlike that left by any Latin poet. 
Sometimes dull, he is never eccentric ; without the origin- 
ality of the greatest artists, he has all the artist's sensibility 
for form. He writes not as one inspired, but as one steeped 
in the best literature. Many were greater stylists, but few 
were endowed with such an exquisite sense of style. As a 
poet he is a dilettante, and his claim to greatness lies in the 
brilliant and audacious humour of his ' picaresque novel '. 
But his verse at its best has a charm and fragrance of its 
own that is almost unique in Latin, and reveals a combina- 
tion of grace and facility, to find a parallel for which among 
writers of the post- Augustan age we must turn to the pages 
of Martial. 



Now I hurry forward, now am loth to go ; now repent me that I have 
returned, and feel shame to stand thus aimless hi mid-street. So the 
voices of men, the murmur of the streets, the song of birds, and the trusty 
watchdogs all are silent ; and I alone dread the slumbers of my couch 
and follow thy behest, great god of love. 



1 P. L. M. iv. 99. Cp. also 92 and 107. 



CHAPTER VI 
MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. 

I 
DIDACTIC POETRY 

ONLY two didactic poems of this period have survived, 
the poem of Columella on gardening, and the anonymous 
work on Mount Etna, setting forth a theory of volcanic 

action. 

i 

THE ' AETNA ' 

The Aetna is a hexameter poem, 646 lines in length. The 
author laments the indifference shown by poets to the 
natural phenomena of his day. They waste their time on 
the description of the marvels of art, the spectacular side 
of human civilization, and the surface-beauties of Nature. 1 
They write trivial epics on the voyage of Argo, the sack of 
Troy, Niobe, Thyestes, Cadmus, Ariadne, the Battle of the 
Giants. 2 They tell of the terrors of the underworld, 3 and 
the loves of the gods : 4 they seek the false rather than the 
true, they neglect the genuine wonders of Nature, the laws 
that govern heavenly and terrestrial phenomena. 

He will be wiser. But there is no need to travel far. He 
will not soar skyward to treat of the stars in their courses, of 
the seasons and signs of the weather, to the neglect of the 
marvels of mother earth. 5 The greatest of miracles is close 
at hand, Etna, the home of eternal fire. Deep in the heart 
of earth dwell two irresistible forces, wind and fire. 6 It is 
their conflict that causes the outbursts of flame and molten 
rock that devastate the slopes of Etna. It is no smithy of 
the gods, no Titan's prison. The causes are natural, water 



1 569 sqq. 

2 17-22, 43 sqq. He falls into the same error himself (203). 

3 76 sqq. 88 sqq. , 5 220 sqq. 6 96 sqq. 



VI DIDACTIC POETRY 141 

and wind and fire. He has seen Etna ; he describes the 
crater, 1 the volcanic rock that can imprison fire, 2 the clouds 
that continually veil the mountain's crest, 3 the flames that 
burst from its summit, the subterranean rumblings, 4 the 
terrors of the lava stream. He concludes with the touching 
story of the Catanian brothers who, neglecting all else, sought 
only to save their aged parents from the flames. Their 
piety had its reward ; they, and they alone, escaped from 
the lava ; their neighbours, who sought to save their chattels 
and their wealth, perished in the stream, encumbered by 
their belongings. 

Of the poet's theory of volcanic action we need not speak ; 
it was the current scientific theory of the day, and has no 
value for us ; nor has the author any claim to originality. 
As to the style and composition of the work, brief comment 
will suffice. We may give the author credit for a real 
enthusiasm, and for a just contempt of the prevailing themes 
that engaged the attention of the minor poets of the day. 
But he has no gifts for poetry. His theme, although it 
gave considerable opportunities for episodic display, was 
one of great difficulty. Much dry scientific detail was 
necessarily required. If Lucretius is sometimes tedious and 
prosaic in spite of the vastness of his theme, the magnifi- 
cence of his moral background, and his inspired enthusiasm, 
what can be expected of a poem on a minor scientific theme 
such as Etna ? Volcanoes can hardly compete with the 
universe as a theme for poetry. The subject is one that 
might have fascinated an Alexandrian poet and found skilful 
treatment at his hands. But the author of the Aetna had 
not the stylistic gifts of the Alexandrian. The actual 
arrangement of his matter is good, but, even when due allow- 
ance is made for the corruption of our text, his obscurity is 
intolerable, his imagery confused, his language cumbrous 
and wooden. He has, moreover, no poetic imagination. 
Aetna, not the poet, provides the fire. Even the beautiful 
story of the Catanian brothers, which forms by far the best 

1 178 sqq. 2 400 sqq. 3 333 sqq. " 294. 



142 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

portion of the poem, never rises to the level of pure poetry. 
It is illumined neither by the fire of rhetoric nor by the 
lambent light of sensuous diction and rich imagination. A 
few lines may be quoted to show its general character (605) : 

Nam quondam ruptis excanduit Aetna cavernis, [1] 

et velut eversis penitus fornacibus ingens 
evecta in longum est rapidis fervoribus unda. 

ardebant agris segetes et mollia cultu 

iugera cum dominis, silvae collesque rubebant. 

turn vero ut cuique est animus viresque rapinae 
tutari conantur opes, gemit ille sub auro, 
colligit ille arma et stulta cervice reponit, 
defectum raptis ilium sua carmina tardant, 
hie velox minimo properat sub pondere pauper. 

. . . haec nullis parsura incendia pascunt, 
vel soils parsura piis. namque optima proles 
Amphinomus fraterque pari sub munere fortes, 
cum iam vicinis streperent incendia tectis, 
aspiciunt pigrumque patrem matremque senecla 
eheu defessos posuisse in limine membra, 
parcite, avara manus, dulces attollere praedas : 
illis divitiae solae materque paterque : 
hanc rapient praedam. mediumque exire per ignem 



[1] For once Etna burst its caves and, glowing with fire, cast forth all that 
its furnaces contained ; a vast wave, swift and hot with fire, streamed 
forth afar. . . . Crops blazed along the fields, rich acres with their masters 
were consumed, forest and hill glowed rosy red. . . . Then each man, 
as he had courage and strength to bear away his goods, strove to protect 
his wealth. One groans beneath a weight of gold, another collects his 
weapons and slings them on his foolish neck. Another, unable to carry 
away what he has snatched up, wastes time in repeating charms, while 
there the poor man moves swift beneath his slender burden. . . . The fire 
feeds on all it meets : nought will it spare, or, if aught it spares, only the" 
pious. For Amphinomus and his brother, the best of sons, brave in the 
toil they shared, when the fires roared loud and were already nigh their 
home, behold their father and their mother fall fainting on the threshold 
fordone with years. Cease, greedy folk, to shoulder the spoil of your 
fortunes that are so dear to you : for these men father and mother are 
their sole wealth ; this only is the spoil that they would save. They 
hasten to escape through the midst of the fire, which itself gave them 



VI DIDACTIC POETRY 143 

ipso dante fidem properant. o maxima rerum 
et merito pietas homini tutissima virtus ! 
erubuere pios iuvenes attingere flammae 
et, quacumque ferunt illi vestigia, cedunt 
felix ilia dies, ilia est innoxia terra, 
dextra saeva tenent, laevaque incendia fervent ; 
ille per obliques ignes fraterque triumphant 
tutus uterque pio sub pondere : suffugit ilia 
et circa geminos avidus sibi temperat ignis, 
incolumes abeunt tandem et sua numina secum 
salva ferunt. illos mirantur carmina vatum, 
illos seposuit claro sub nomine Ditis 
nee sanctos iuvenes attingunt sordida fata, 
securas cessere domus et iura piorum. 

The narrative is clear, and the story delightful. But the 
telling of it, though free from affectation, is dull, prosaic, 
and uninspired. And it must be remembered that this 
passage shows the author in his most favourable aspect. In 
his more technical passages the clearness and simplicity is 
absent, the prosiness and lack of imagination remain, 
nakedly hideous. 

The author of the poem is unknown, the very date is 
uncertain. The conception of the work is Lucretian, but 
in point of style, while full of reminiscences of Lucretius, the 
poem owes most to Vergil, whose hexameter has undoubtedly 
been taken for a model, though it has lost all its music. 
Except in the avoidance of elision there is no trace of the 
influence of Ovid. The poem might easily have been written 



confidence. piety, greatest of all that man may possess, of all virtues 
that which most saves the righteous. The flames blushed to touch the 
pious youths, and yield a path wherever they turn their steps. Blest was 
that day ; the ground they trod was unharmed. The fierce burning holds 
all things on their right and blazes on their left. The brethren move 
triumphant on their path aslant the flame, each saved by his pious burden : 
the fire shuns their path and restrains its greedy hunger where pass the 
twain ; scatheless they escape at length and bear those whom they worship 
to a place of safety. The songs of poets hymn their praise and the under- 
world gives them a glorious resting-place apart, nor does any unworthy 
fate befall these youths that lived so holy. They have passed away to 
dwell among the blessed, and sorrow cometh not nigh their dwelling-place. 



144 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

in the latter half of the reign of Augustus. 1 The obscurity is 
due to the lack, not the excess of art, and the poem has no 
special affinity with the Silver Age. Servius and Donatus, 
indeed, both seem to ascribe the poem to Vergil, 2 while it is 
found in the MSS. which give us the Appendix Vergiliana. 
But there are considerations which have inclined editors to 
place it later, in the reign of Nero, or in the opening years of 
the principate of Vespasian. In one of his letters (Sen. 79) 
Seneca, writing to his friend Lucilius Junior, urges him to 
' describe Etna in his poem, and by so doing treat a topic 
common to all poets'. The fact that Vergil had already 
treated it was no obstacle to Ovid's essaying the task, nor 
was Cornelius Severus deterred by the fact that both Vergil 
and Ovid had handled the theme. Later he adds, ' If I 
know you aright, the subject of Aetna will make your 
mouth water.' Lucilius was procurator in Sicily, and had 
sung the story of the Syracusan nymph Arethusa. 3 It has 
been suggested that he 4 wrote the Aetna. But Lucilius 
was an imitator of Ovid, 5 and Seneca advises him not to 
write a didactic poem on Etna, but to treat it episodically 
(in suo carmine), as Vergil and Ovid 6 had done. It is con- 
ceivable that he may have written a didactic poem 
on the subject, but Seneca's remarks yield absolutely no 
evidence for the fact. 

Others have made Cornelius Severus the author, 7 though 
it is practically certain that his description of the volcano 
must have occurred in his poem On the Sicilian War. 8 But 



1 So Ellis (Corp. Poet. Lat., vol. ii. pref.) ; Baehrens, P. L. M. ii. pp. 29 sqq. 

2 Serv. ad Verg. Aen. praef. Donatus, vita Verg., p. 58R (' Scripsit etiam 
de qua ambigitur Aetnam '). 

3 Sen. Nat. Quaest. iii. 26. 5. He also wrote in verse on philosophical 
subjects ; cp. Sen. Ep. 24. 19-21. 

4 So Wernsdorf, von Jacob, Munro (edd.), Wagler de Aetna quaest. crit., 
Berlin, 1884. 

5 Sen. Nat. Quaest. iv. 2. 2. 6 Sen. Ep. 79. 5. 

7 So many Italian scholars of sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, 
among them Scaliger. 

8 Cornelius Severus wrote a poem on the Sicilian War of Octavian and 
Sext. Pompeius ; cp. Quint, x. 1. 89. 



VI DIDACTIC POETRY US 

the fact that Seneca makes no reference to the existence of 
any learned didactic poem on the subject carries a little more 
weight, and there are marked parallels between Seneca's 
' quaestiones Naturales' and passages in the Aetna. 1 Fur- 
ther, the very badness of the poem makes us hesitate to 
place it in the Augustan period. That age, no doubt, pro- 
duced much bad work as well as good, but a poem so obscure 
and inartistically prosaic as the Aetna was more likely to 
be produced and more likely to survive in an imitative and 
uninspired age such as that which followed on the death of 
Augustus. But for the evidence of Seneca we should place 
the poem in the prosaic reign of Tiberius ; the considera- 
tions adduced from Seneca lead us, though with the utmost 
hesitation, to place it somewhere between 57 and 79 A.D. 2 
Of the lower limit there can be no doubt. The fires of the 
Phlegraean plains are extinct, 3 therefore the poem was 
composed before the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 A. D. 4 The 
question of the authorship of the Aetna has necessarily been 
treated at greater length than the merits of the poem deserve. 
It is a work of small importance ; its chief value is to show 
how low it was possible for Roman didactic poetry to sink. 
In the Aetna it sinks lower than epic in the Punica of Silius 
Italicus. That poem, for all its portentous dullness, shows 
a certain ponderous technical skill and literary facility. 
The author of the Aetna, though clearly a man of culture, is 
never at his ease, the verse is laboured and lacking flexibility, 
and there is no technical dexterity to compensate for a total 



1 Cp. Nat. Quaest. iii. 16. 4, Aetna, 302 and 303. But this may be due 
to the fact that both Seneca and the author of Aetna get their information 
from the same source, perhaps Posidonius ; cp. Sudhaus, introd. to his 
edition, p. 75. 

2 It is not improbable that hi 293 sqq. the poet refers to the mechanical 
Triton shown at the Naumachia on the Fucine Lake at a festival given 
by Claudius in honour of Nero's adoption in 50 A. D. 

3 425-34. 

4 Baehrens would put the lower limit at 63 A. D., the year in which severe 
earthquakes first indicated the reviving activity of Phlegraean fields. 
But earthquakes, though often caused by volcanic action, do not necessarily 
produce volcanoes. 



146 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

absence of genius. The terror and beauty of the mountain 
crowned with snow and fire find no adequate expression in 
these monotonous lines. There remains a conglomerate of 
unoriginal and unsound physical speculation. 

ii 

COLUMELLA 

The Aetna is a Lucretian poem decked out in a Vergilian 
dress. In the tenth book of Columella we have a didactic 
poem modelled on the Georgics of Vergil. The author was 
of Spanish origin, a native of Gades, 1 and the contemporary 
of his great compatriot the younger Seneca. 2 He had served 
in a military capacity in Syria, 3 but his real passion was 
agriculture. His ambition was to write a really practical 
farmers' manual. 4 He had written nine books in prose, 
covering the whole range of farming, from the tillage of the 
soil to the breeding of poultry and cattle, and concluding 
with a disquisition on wild animals and bee-keeping. But 
in the tenth book, yielding to the solicitation of his friend 
Publius Silvinus, 5 he set himself a more exalted task, no 
less than the writing of a fifth Georgic on gardening. Vergil, 
in his fourth Georgic (148), had left the theme of gardens for 
another's singing. Columella takes him at his word. The 
tenth book is manifestly intended as the crown and con- 
clusion of his work. But later he changed his plan. Another 
friend, Claudius Augustalis, 6 demanded a paraphrase, or 

1 viii. 16. 9 ; 10. 185. 

2 iii. 3. 3 'his certe temporibus Nomentana regio celeberrima fama est 
illustris, et praecipue quam possidet Seneca, vir excellentis ingenii atque 
doctrinae '. He is quoted by Pliny, not infrequently. Columella was an 
old man when he wrote ; cp. 12 ad fin. ' nee tamen canis natura dedit 
cunctarum rerum prudentiam '. 

3 Cp. C. I. L. ix. 235 ' L. lunio L. F. Gal. Moderate Columellae Trib. 
mil. leg. VI. Ferratae '. That this refers to the poet is borne out by two 
facts. (1) Gades belonged to the Tribus Galeria. (2) At this date the 
legio VI. Ferrata was stationed in Syria ; cp. Col. ii. 10. 18 ' Ciliciae 
Syriaeque regionibus ipse vidi '. 

4 Cp. i. 1. 7. He speaks as a practical farmer; cp. ii. 8. 5 ; 9. 1 ; 10. 11 ; 
iii. 9. 2 ; 10. 8, &c. He writes primarily for Italy, not for Spain ; cp. iii. 8. 5. 

5 Cp. x. praef. : also ix. 16. 2, which tells us that Gallio, Seneca's brother, 
had added his entreaties. 6 xi. praef. 



VI DIDACTIC POETRY 147 

rather an amplification in prose. This resulted in an eleventh 
book, in which the care of the garden and the duties of the 
milieus are described, while the work was finally concluded 
in a twelfth book setting forth the duties of the villica. 1 

It may be doubted whether Columella was well advised 
when he yielded to the entreaties of his friend Silvinus and 
wrote his tenth book in verse. He had no great poetic 
talent, nor did he possess the sleight of hand of Calpurnius, 
the imitator of the Eclogues. But he possesses qualities 
which render his work far more attractive than that of Cal- 
purnius. He is a genuine enthusiast, with a real love of the 
countryside and a charming affection for flowers. And as 
a stylist he is modest. He makes no attempt at display, 
no contorted striving after originality. His verse is clear 
and simple as his tastes. He is content to follow humbly in 
the footsteps of his great master, the ' starry ' Vergil. 2 He 
imitates and even plagiarizes 3 because he loves, not because 
it is the fashion. He shows no appreciation of the more 
intimate harmonies of the Vergilian hexameter ; like so 
many contemporaries, he realizes neither the value of judi- 
cious elision nor varied pauses ; but his verse, in spite of its 
monotony and lack of life and movement, is not unmelodious. 
The poem is a sober work, uninspired in tone, straight- 
forward and simple in plan. It need not be described in 
detail ; its advice is obvious, setting forth the times and 
seasons to be observed by the gardener, the methods of pre- 
paring the soil, the choice of flowers, with all the customary 
mythological allusions. 4 At its worst, with its tedious lists 
of the names of flowers, it reads like a seedsman's catalogue, 5 



1 He also wrote a treatise against astrologers (cp. xi. 1. 131) and a treatise 
on religious ceremonies connected with agriculture (cp. ii. 21. 5). This 
latter work was perhaps never completed (cp. ii. 21. 6). In any case both 
treatises were lost. There survives a book on arboriculture which is not an 
isolated monograph, but portion of a larger work, at least three books 
long, for it alludes to a ' primum volumen de cultu agrorum ' (ad init.). It 
probably consisted of four books, since Cassiodorus (div. lect. 28) speaks 
of the sixteen books of Columella. 

2 siderei Maronis, 434. Cp. esp. 196 sqq. 
4 Cp. 130 sqq., 320 sqq., 344 sqq. 5 102 sqq. 

L2 



148 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

at its best it is lit up with a quaint humour, a love of colour, 
and a homely yet vivid imagination. Mother earth ' sweet 
earth ' he calls her is highly personified ; that she may be 
adorned anew, her green locks must be torn from their 
tangle by the plough, her old raiment stripped from her, her 
thirst quenched by irrigation, her hunger satisfied with 
fertilizing manure. 1 The garden is to be no rich man's park 
for the display of statues and fountains. Its one statue 
shall be the image of the garden god, its patron and its pro- 
tector. 2 Its splendour shall be the varied hue of its flower- 
beds and its wealth in herbs that serve the use of man : 

verum ubi iam puro discrimine pectita tellus [1] 

deposito squalore nitens sua semina poscet, 

pingite tune varies, terrestria sidera, flores, 

Candida leucoia et flaventia lumina caltae 

narcissique comas et hiantis saeva leonis 

ora feri calathisque virentia lilia canis, 

nee non vel niveos vel caeruleos hyacinthos, 

turn quae pallet humi, quae frondens purpurat auro, 

ponatur viola et nimium rosa plena pudoris (94). 

He loves the return of spring with as deep a love as Vergil's, 
though he must borrow Vergil's language to describe its 
coming and its power. 3 But his painting of its harvest of 
colour is his own : 

quin et odoratis messis iam floribus instat : [2] 

iam ver purpureum, iam versicoloribus anni 
fetibus alma parens pingi sua tempora gaudet. 



[1] But when earth, with parted locks combed clear, gleams, all soilure 
cast aside, and demands the seeds that are her due, call forth the varied hues 
of flowers, earth's constellations, the white snowflake and the marigold's 
golden eyes, the narcissus-petals and the blossom that apes the fierce 
lion's gaping maw ; the lily, too, with calix shining white amid its green 
leaves, the hyacinths white and blue ; plant also the violet lying pale upon 
the ground or purple shot with gold among its leafage, and the rose 
with its deep shamefaced blush. 

[2] Nay, more, the harvest-time draws near for sweet-scented flowers. 
The purple spring has come, and kindly mother earth rejoices that her 
brows are painted bright with all the many-coloured offspring of the year. 

1 45-94. 2 29-34. 3 196 sqq. 



VI DIDACTIC POETRY 149 

iam Phrygiae loti gemmantia lumina promunt 
et coniventis oculos violaria solvunt (255). 

All the glories of an Italian spring are in the lines in which 
a little later he describes the joy of living when the year is 
young, and the wasting heat of summer is still far off, when 
it is sweet to be in the sun and watch the garden with its 
rainbow colours : 

nunc ver egelidum, nunc est mollissimus annus, [1] 

dum Phoebus tener ac tenera decumbere in herba 

suadet et arguto fugientes gramine fontes 

nee rigidos potare iuvat nee sole tepentes, 

iamque Dionaeis redimitur floribus hortus, 

iam rosa mitescit Sarrano clarior ostro. 

nee tarn nubifugo Borea Latonia Phoebe 

purpureo radiat vultu, nee Sirius ardor 

sic micat aut rutilus Pyrois aut ore corusco 

Hesperus, Eoo remeat cum Lucifer ortu, 

nee tarn sidereo fulget Thaumantias arcu 

quam nitidis hilares conlucent fetibus horti (282). 

These are the words of an enthusiast and a poet, and these 
few outbursts of song redeem the poem from dullness. 
There is wafted from his pages the perfume of the country- 
side, and the fresh air breathes welcome amid the hothouse 
cultures of contemporary poets. And he is almost the only 
poet of the age that can be read without a wince of pain. 
He is at least as good a laureate of the garden as Thomson 
of the seasons, and he has all the grace of humility. Even 
when the artist fails us, we love the man. 



Now the Phrygian lotus puts forth its jewelled orbs and the violet beds 
open their winking eyes. 

[1] Now cool spring is come, the gentlest season of the year, while 
Phoebus yet is young and bids us recline in the young herbage, and 'tis sweet 
to drink the rill that flows among the murmuring grass, with waters neither 
icy cold nor warm with the sun's heat. Now, too, the garden is crowned 
with the flowers Dione loves, and the rose ripens brighter than Tyrian 
purple. Not so brightly does Phoebe, Leto's daughter, shine with radiant 
face when Boreas has dispersed the clouds, nor glows hot Sirius so, nor 
ruddy Pyrois, nor Hesperus with shining countenance when he returns as 
the daystar at the break of dawn, not so fair gleams Iris with her starry 
bow, as shines the joyous garden with its bright offspring. 



150 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 



II 

CALPURNIUS SICULUS. THE EINSIEDELN FRAGMENTS 
AND THE 'PANEGYRICUS IN PISONEM' 

It may be said of pastoral poetry, without undue dis- 
respect, that it is the most artificial and the least in touch 
with reality of all the more important forms of poetic 
art. Even in the hands of a master like Theocritus, in- 
vested as it is with an incomparable charm, and distinguished 
in many respects by an astonishing truth and fidelity, it 
is never other than highly artificial. For its birth an age 
was required in which the class whence the majority of 
poets and their audience are drawn had largely lost touch 
with country life, or had at any rate developed ideals that 
can only spring up in town society. This does not imply 
that men have ceased altogether to appreciate the value 
of the country life or the beauty of country surroundings, 
only that they have lost much of their understanding of 
them ; and so their appreciation takes new forms. They 
love the country as a half -forgotten paradise, they fly back 
to it as a refuge from the artificiality of town life, but 
they take much of that artificiality with them. From the 
time of Theocritus pastoral poetry pure and simple has 
steadily declined. Great poems have been written with 
exquisite pastoral elements or even cast in pastoral form. 
But they have never owed their greatness entirely, or even 
chiefly, to the pastoral element. That element has merely 
provided a charming setting for scenes or thoughts that 
have nothing genuinely pastoral about them. 

Of the small amount of pastoral poetry extant in Latin 
it need hardly be said that the Bucolica of Vergil stand 
in a class by themselves. And yet for all their beauty 
they are unsatisfactory to those who know and love Theo- 
critus. Their charm is undeniable, but they are immature 
and too obviously imitative. But Vergil was at least 
country-born and had a deep sympathy for country life. 



VI CALPURNIUS SICULUS 151 

When we come to the scanty relics of his successors and 
imitators we are conscious of a lamentable falling away. 
If Vergil's imitations of Theocritus fail to ring as true as 
their original, what shall be said of the imitators of Vergil's 
imitations ? Even if they had been true poets, their verse 
must have rung false. But the poets with whom we have 
to deal, Calpurnius Siculus and the anonymous author of 
two poems known as the Einsiedeln fragments, were not 
genuine poets. They had little of the intimacy with nature 
and unsophisticated man that was demanded by their self- 
chosen task. That they possessed some real affection for the 
country is doubtless true, but it was not the prime inspira- 
tion of their verse. They had the ambition to write poetry 
rather than the call ; a slight bent towards the country, 
heightened by a vague dissatisfaction and weariness with 
the artificial luxury of Rome, led them to choose pastoral 
poetry. They make up for depth of observation by a 
shallow minuteness. In the seven eclogues of Calpurnius 
may be found a larger assortment of vegetables, of agri- 
cultural implements and operations, than in the Bucolics 
of Vergil, but there is little poetry, pastoral or otherwise. 
The ' grace of all the Muses ' and the breath of the country 
are fled for ever ; the dexterous phrasing of a laborious 
copyist reigns in their stead. 

Of the life of Calpurnius Siculus nothing is known and 
but little can be conjectured. Of his date there can be 
little doubt. We learn from the evidence of the poems 
themselves that they were written in the principate of 
a youthful Caesar (i. 44 ; iv. 85, 137 ; vii. 6), beautiful to 
look upon (vii. 84), the giver of splendid games (vii. 44), the 
inaugurator of an age of peace, liberty and plenty (i. 42-88 ; 
iv passim). This points strongly to the opening of Nero's 
reign. The young Nero was handsome and personally 
popular, and the opening years of his reign (quinquennium 
Neronis) were famous for good government and prosperity. 
But there are two further pieces of internal evidence 
which clinch the argument. A comet is mentioned (i. 77) 
as appearing in the autumn, an appearance which would 



152 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

tally with that of the comet observed shortly before the 
death of Claudius in 54 A.D., while the line 

maternis causam qui vicit lulis (i. 45 

seems clearly to refer to the speech delivered by the young 
Nero for the people of Ilium, 1 from whom the luli, Nero's 
ancestors on the mother's side, claimed to trace their descent. 
It may therefore safely be assumed that the poems were 
written early in the reign of Nero. A most ingenious 
attempt has been made to throw some light on the identity 
of their author. 2 He speaks of himself as Corydon, and 
he has a patron whom he styles Meliboeus. He prays 
that Meliboeus may bring him before Caesar's notice as 
Pollio brought Vergil (iv. 157 sqq. ; also i. 94). It has 
been suggested with some plausibility that Meliboeus is no 
other than C. Calpurnius Piso, the distinguished noble 
round whom in 65 A.D. centred the great conspiracy against 
Nero. The evidence rests on the existence of a poem 
entitled panegyricus in Pisonem, 3 in which a nameless poet 
seeks by his laudations to win Piso for a patron. The 
style of the poem has a marked resemblance to that of 
Calpurnius. If, as is possible, it should be assigned to his 
authorship, it becomes fairly certain that he was a dependent 
of Piso, and the name Calpurnius would suggest that he 
may have been the son of one of his freedmen. 

The eclogues of Calpurnius are seven in number. 4 The 
first is in praise of the Golden Age, with special reference 
to the advent of the young princeps. Though given a 
different setting it is clearly modelled on the fourth eclogue 

1 Tac. Ann. xii. 58. 

2 M. Haupt, Opusc. i. 391 ; Lachm. Comm. on Lucret. 1855, p. 326 
Schenkl (ed. Calp. Sic., p. ix). 

3 Or de laude Pisonis. See Baehrens, Poet. Lat. Min. iii. 1. For the 
question of authorship see p. 159. 

4 It was long believed that there were eleven, but the last four eclogues 
of the collection are shown by their style to be of later date, and there can 
be little doubt that the MSS. which attribute them to Nemesianus of 
Carthage are right. We know of a Nemesianus who lived about 290 A. D. 
and wrote a Cynegetica, a portion of which survives. Comparison with 
these four eclogues shows a marked resemblance of style. 



VI CALPURNIUS SICULUS 153 

of Vergil. The second, describing a contest of song between 
two shepherds before a third as judge, follows Vergil even 
more closely. 1 Parallels might be further elaborated, but 
it is sufficient to say here that only two of the poems show 
any originality, namely, the fifth and the seventh. In the 
former we have the advice given by an aged farmer to his 
son, to whom he is handing over his farm. It is inclined 
to be prosy, but is simple and pleasing in tone, and the 
old countryman may be forgiven if he sometimes seems to 
be quoting the Georgics. The seventh is a more ambitious 
effort. A rustic describes the great games that he has 
seen given in the amphitheatre at Rome. The language, 
though characteristically decadent in its elaboration, shows 
considerable originality. The amphitheatre is, for instance, 
thus described (vii. 30) : 

qualiter haec patulum concedit vallis in orbem [1] 

et sinuata latus resupinis undique silvis 



[1] Even as this vale rounds to a wide circle, and with bending sides and 
slanting woods on every side makes a curved hollow amid the unbroken 



1 Verg. Ed. vii. 1 : 

forte sub arguta consederat ilice Daphnis, 
compulerantque greges Corydon et Thyrsis in unum, 
Thyrsis oves, Corydon distentas lacte capellas, 
ambo florentes aetatibus, Arcades ambo, 
et cantare pares et respondere parati. 

Calp. ii. 1 : 

intactam Crocalen puer Astacus et puer Idas, 
Idas lanigeri dominus gregis, Astacus horti, 
dilexere diu, formosus uterque nee impar 
voce sonans. 

The conclusion is borrowed from Vergil, Ed. iii. 108 : 
non nostrum inter vos tantas componere lites. 
et vitula tu dignus et hie et quisquis amores 
aut metuet dulces aut experietur amaros. 
claudite iam rivos, pueri ; sat prata biberunt. 

Calp. ii. 95-100 : 

' iam resonant frondes, iam cantibus obstrepit arbos : 
i procul, o Doryla, rivumque reclude canali 
et sine iam dudum sitientes irriget hortos ' 
vix ea finierant, senior cum talia Thyrsis, 
' este pares . . .' 



154 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

inter continues curvatur concava montes, 
sic ibi planitiem curvae sinus ambit arenae 
et geminis medium se molibus alligat ovum. 

balteus en gemmis, en illita porticus auro 
certatim radiant ; nee non, ubi finis arenae 
proxima marmoreo praebet spectacula muro, 
sternitur adiunctis ebur admirabile truncis 
et coit in rotulum, tereti qui lubricus axe 
impositos subita vertigine falleret ungues 
excuteretque feras. auro quoque torta refulgent 
retia, quae totis in arenam dentibus extant, 
dentibus aequatis : et erat (mihi crede, Lycota, 
si qua fides) nostro dens longior omnis aratro. 

In its defence it may be urged that the very nature of 
the subject demands elaboration, and that the resulting 
picture has the merit of being vivid despite its elaborate 
ingenuity. It is in this poem that Calpurnius is seen at 
his best. Elsewhere his love for minute and elaborate 
description is merely wearisome. It would be hard, for 
instance, to find a more tiresomely circuitous method of 
claiming to be an authority on sheep-breeding than (ii. 36) 

me docet ipsa Pales cultum gregis, ut niger albae [1] 
terga maritus ovis nascenti mutet in agna 
quae neque diversi speciem servare parentis 
possit et ambiguo testetur utrumque colore. 



hills, so there the circle of the curving arena surrounds its level plain 
and locks either side of its towering structure into an oval about itself. . . . 
See how the gangway's parapet studded with gems and the colonnade 
plated with gold vie with each other's brightness ; nay more, where the 
arena's bound sets forth its shows close to the marble wall, ivory is over- 
laid in wondrous wise on jointed beams and is bent into a cylinder, which, 
turning nimbly on its trim axle, may cheat with sudden whirl the wild 
beast's claws and cast them from it. Nets, too, of twisted gold gleam forth, 
hung out into the arena on tusks in all their length and of equal size, and 
believe me, Lycotas, if you can each tusk was longer than our plough- 
share. 

[1] Pales herself teaches me how to breed my flocks and tells me how the 
black ram transforms the fleece of the white ewe in the lamb that comes 
to birth, that cannot reproduce the colour of its sire, so different from 
that of its dam, and by its ambiguous hue testifies to either parent. 



VI CALPURNIUS SICULUS 155 

It is difficult to give a poetic description of the act of 
rumination, but 

et matutinas revocat palearibus herbas (iii. 17) [1] 

is needlessly grotesque. And the vain struggle to give 
life to old and outworn themes leads to laboured lines 
such as (iii. 48) 

non sic destricta marcescit turdus oliva, [2] 

non lepus extremas legulus cum sustulit uvas, 
ut Lycidas domina sine Phyllide tabidus erro. 

Calpurnius yields little to compensate for such defects. He 
meanders on through hackneyed pastoral landscapes haunted 
by hackneyed shepherds. It is only on rare occasions that 
a refreshing glimmer of poetry revives the reader. In 
lines such as (ii. 56) 

si quis mea vota deorum [3] 

audiat, huic soli, virides qua gemmeus undas 
fons agit et tremulo percurrit lilia rivo 
inter pampineas ponetur faginus ulmos ; 

or, in the pleasant description of the return of spring (v. 16), 

vere novo, cum iam tinnire volucres [4] 

incipient nidosque reversa lutabit hirundo, 
protinus hiberno pecus omne movebis ovili. 
tune etenim melior vernanti germine silva 
pullat et aestivas reparabilis incohat umbras, 
tune florent saltus viridisque renascitur annus, 1 

[1] And recalls to its dewlaps the grass of its morning's meal. 

[2] Not so does the thrush pine when the olives are plucked, not so does 
the hare pine when the vintager has gathered the last grapes, as I, Lycidas, 
droop while I roam apart from my mistress Phyllis. 

[3] If any of the gods hear my prayer, to his honour, and his alone, 
shall his beechwood statue be planted amid my vine-clad elms, where the 
jewelled stream rolls its green wave and with rippling water runs through 
the lilies. 

[4] When spring is young and the birds begin to pipe once more, and 
the swallow returns to plaster its nest anew, then move all your flock from 
its winter fold. For then the wood sprouts in fresh glory with its spring 
shoots and builds anew the shades of summer, then all the glades are bright 
with flowers and the green year is born again. 

1 Cp. also v. 50 sqq. 



156 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

we seem to catch a glimpse of the real countryside ; but 
for the most part Calpurnius paints little save theatrical 
and maniere miniatures. Of such a character is the clever 
and not unpleasing description of the tame stag in the 
sixth eclogue (30). He shows a pretty fancy and no more. 

The metre is like the language, easy, graceful, and cor- 
rect. But the pauses are poorly managed ; the rhythm is 
unduly dactylic ; the verse trips all too lightly and becomes 
monotonous. 

The total impression that we receive from these poems 
is one of insignificance and triviality. The style is perhaps 
less rhetorical and obscure than that of most writers of 
the age ; as a result, these poems lack what is often the 
one saving grace of Silver Latin poetry, its extreme clever- 
ness. To find verse as dull and uninspired, we must turn 
to Silius Italicus or the Aetna. 

The two short poems contained in a MS. at Einsiedeln 
and distinguished by the name of their place of provenance 
are also productions of the Neronian age. The first, in the 
course of a contest of song between Thamyras and Ladas, 
with a third shepherd, Midas, as arbiter, sets forth the 
surpassing skill of Nero as a performer on the cithara. 1 
The second celebrates the return of the Golden Age to the 
world now under the beneficent guidance of Nero. Neither 
poem possesses the slightest literary importance ; both are 
polished but utterly insipid examples of foolish court flat- 
tery. The author is unknown. An ingenious suggestion 2 
has been made that he is no other than Calpurnius Piso, 
the supposed Meliboeus of Calpurnius Siculus. The second 
of these eclogues begins, ' Quid tacitus, Mystes ? ' The fourth 
eclogue of Calpurnius Siculus begins (Meliboeus loquitur), 
' Quid tacitus, Corydon ? ' Is Meliboeus speaking in person 
and quoting his own poem ? It may be so, but the evidence 
is obviously not such as to permit any feeling of certainty. 

1 See Baehrens, Poet. Lat. Min. vol. iii. p. 60. The first poem is un- 
finished, the award of Midas being missing. 

2 Biicheler, Bhein. Mus. xxvi, p. 235. 



VI CALPURNIUS SICULUS 157 

But it is at least probable that the poet had access to 
the court and had been praised by Nero. Such is the most 
plausible interpretation of a passage in the first eclogue, 
where Ladas, in answer to Thamyras, who claims the prize 
on the ground that his song shall be of Caesar, replies 
(16, 17): 

et me sidereo respexit Cynthius ore [1] 

laudatamque chelyn iussit variare cauendo. 1 

Whether the author be Piso or another, the poems do 
him small credit. 

The Panegyricus in Pisonem remains to be considered. 
Attributed to Vergil by one MS., 2 to Lucan by another, 3 
the poem is certainly by neither. Quite apart from stylistic 
evidence, which is convincing against its attribution to 
Lucan, it is almost certain that the name of Lucan has 
been wrongly inserted for that of Vergil. That it is not by 
Vergil would be clear from the very inferior nature of the 
verse, but it can further be shown that the Piso addressed 
is the Calpurnius Piso of the reigns of Claudius and Nero 
to whom we have alluded above. If the account of Piso 
given by Tacitus be compared with the characteristics 
described in the Panegyricus, it will be found that both alike 
refer in strong terms to his eloquence in the law courts 
so readily exercised in defence of accused persons, and 
also to his affability and capacity for friendship. 4 Further, 
we have the evidence of a scholium on Juvenal as to his 



[1] On me, too, has the Cynthian god cast his starry glance and bidden 
me accompany the lyre he praised with diverse song. 



1 So Biicheler, loc. cifc. respexit is a mere conjecture : corrumpit, the MS. 
reading, is meaningless, and no satisfactory alternative has been suggested. 
The lines may merely refer to Apollo, but et me suggests strongly that 
Ladas retorts, ' I, too, have Caesar's favour.' Cp. L. 37, where hie vester 
Apollo est ! clearly refers to Nero. 

2 In a MS. at Lorsch, now lost ; but used by Sechard for his edition of 
Ovid, Basle, 1527. 

3 In Parisinus 7647 (Florileg.). See Baehrens, P.L.M. i, p. 222. 

4 Tac. Ann. xv. 48 ' facundiam tuendis civibus excrcebat, largitionem 
adversum amicos et ignotis quoque comi sermone et congressu.' 



158 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

skill in the game of draughts. 1 He played so well that 
crowds would throng to see him. One of the chief points 
mentioned in the Panegyricus is the skill of Piso at the 
same game. 2 Nor is it a mere casual allusion ; on the 
contrary, the writer treats this portion of his eulogy with 
even greater elaboration than the rest. There can, there- 
fore, be little doubt as to the date of the poem. It is 
addressed to Calpurnius Piso after his rise to fame (i.e. 
during the latter portion of the principate of Claudius, 
or during the earlier part of the reign of Nero). The poet 
prays that Piso may be to him what Maecenas was to 
Vergil. It is hardly possible for a poem of this type to 
possess any real interest for others than the recipient of 
the flattery and its author. But in this case the poet 
has done his work well. The flattery never becomes out- 
rageous and is expressed in easy flowing verse and graceful 
diction. At times the language is genuinely felicitous. 
Any great man might be proud to receive such a tribute 

as (129) 

tu mitis et acri [1] 

asperitate carens positoque per omnia fastu 
inter ut aequales unus numeraris amicos, 
obsequiumque doces et amorem quaeris amando. 

There is, moreover, little straining after effect and little 
real obscurity. The difficulties of the description of Piso's 
draught-playing are due to our ignorance of the exact 
nature of the game. 3 The actual language is at least as 
lucid as Pope's famous description of the game of ombre 
in The Rape of the Lock. The verse is of the usual post- 
Augustan type, showing strongly the primary influence of 
Vergil modified by the secondary influence of Ovid. It is 



[1] Mild is thy temper and free from sharp harshness. Thou layest aside 
thy pride in thy every act, and among thy friends thou art counted a friend 
and equal, thou teachest men to follow thee and seekest to be loved by 
loving. 



1 Schol. Vail, ad luv. v. 109 ' in latrunculorum lusu tarn perfectus et 
callidus, ut ad eum ludentem concurreretur.' 

2 Cp. 11. 190 sqq. 



VI . CALPURNIUS SICULUS 159 

light and easy and not ill-suited to its subject. It has 
distinct affinities, both in metre and diction, with the verse 
of Calpurnius Siculus, and may be by the same hand ; 
but the resemblance is not so close as to afford anything 
approaching positive proof. Minor poets, lacking all in- 
dividuality, the victims and not the controlling forces of 
the tendencies of the age, are apt to resemble one another. 
There are, however, two noteworthy passages which point 
strongly to the identity of the author of the Panegyricus 
with the Bucolic poet. The former, addressing Piso as his 

patron (246), says : 

mea vota [1] 

si mentem subiere tuam, memorabilia olim 
tu mihi Maecenas tereti cantabere versu. 

The latter, addressing his patron Meliboeus and begging 
him to commend him to Caesar, exclaims (iv. 152) : 

o mihi quae tereti decurrent carmina versu [2] 

tune, Meliboee, meum si quando montibus istis (i.e. at Rome) 
dicar habere larem. 

Is it a mere coincidence, a plagiarism, or a direct allu- 
sion ? There is no certainty, but the coincidence is to 
say the least suggestive. If the identity of authorship 
be assumed as correct, it is probable that the eclogues 
are the later production. To place one's patron among 
the dramatis personae of an eclogue argues a nearer intimacy 
than the writing of a formal panegyric. That the poet 
is more at home as a panegyrist than as a writer of idylls 
does not affect the question. In such an age such a result 
was to be expected. 



[1] If my prayers reach thy mind, thou shalt be sung of as Maecenas in 
my slender verse, and future ages shall tell of thy glory. 

[2] how shall my songs trip in slender verse then, Meliboeus, if ever 
men shall say of me ' He has a house on yonder mountain '. 



160 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

III 
THE ILIAS LATINA 

Latin poetry may almost be said to have begun with 
Livius Andronicus' translation of the Odyssey into the rude 
Saturnian metre. This translation had great vogue as a 
school book. But the Iliad remained untranslated, and 
it was only natural that later authors should try their 
hand upon it. Translations were produced in Republican 
times by Cn. Matius 1 and Ninnius Crassus, 2 but neither 
work attained to any popularity. 

With the growth of the knowledge of Greek and its 
increasing use as a medium of instruction in the schools on 
the one hand, and the appearance of Vergil and the rise of 
the Aeneas saga on the other, the demand for a translation 
of the Iliad naturally became less. The Silver Age arrived 
with the problem unsolved. It was a period when writers 
abounded who would have been better employed on trans- 
lation than on any attempt at original work. Further, in 
spite of the general knowledge of Greek, a translation of 
Homer would have its value in the schools both as a hand- 
book for the subject-matter and as a ' crib '. 

Three works of the kind seem to have been produced 
between the reigns of Tiberius and Nero. 

Attius Labeo 3 translated not only the Iliad but also the 
Odyssey into hexameters. But it was a poor performance. 
It was a baldly literal translation, paying small attention 
to the meaning of the original. 4 Persius pours scorn upon 



1 Baehrens, Fragm. Poet. Rom. p. 281. 

2 Priscian, Gr. Lot. i. 478. 

3 Persius derides a certain Labeo (i. 4) and a writer named Attius (i. 50) 
for his translation of Iliad. On this last passage the scholiast says, ' Attius 
Labeo poeta induct us fuit illorum temporum, qui Iliadem Homeri foedis- 
sime composuit.' The names are found combined in an inscription from 
Corinth, Joh. Schmidt, Mitt, des deutsch. archdol. Inst. in Athen, vi (1882), 
p. 354. 

4 Schol. ad Pers. i. 4 (p. 248, Jahn). 



VI THE ILIAS LATINA 161 

it, and one verse has survived to confirm our worst sus- 
picions 1 

crudum manduces Priamum Priamique pisinnos. 

Polybius, the well-known freedman of Claudius, also 
produced a work, which is praised by Seneca as having 
introduced Homer and Vergil to a yet larger public than 
they already enjoyed, and as preserving the charm of the 
original in an altered form. 2 As Polybius had dealt with 
Vergil as well as Homer, it may be conjectured that the 
work praised by Seneca was a prose paraphrase. Lastly, 
there is the Ilias Latina, which has been preserved to the 
present day. It is written in graceful hexameter verse, and 
is an abridgement rather than a translation. It consists 
of 1,070 lines, of which the first five books in fact claim a 
little more than half. The author wearied of his task and 
finished off the remaining nineteen books in summary 
fashion. While the twenty-second occupies as much as 
sixty lines, the abridgements of the thirteenth and seven- 
teenth are reduced to a meagre seven and three lines 
respectively. 

That such work is of small importance is obvious. It 
must have been useless from its birth save as a handbook 
for the schools, and even for this purpose its value must 
have been greatly impaired by its lack of proportion. 
Its survival can only be accounted for on the assumption 
that it was written and employed as a textbook. In fact, 
during the Middle Ages, when the original was a sealed 
book, there is definite evidence that it was so used. 3 The 
work is trivial, but might well have been worse. The 
language is clear and often vigorous, and there is an easy 
grace about the verse which shows that the author was a 
man of culture, knowing his Vergil well and his Ovid better. 
The date cannot be proved with certainty, but there can 
be no doubt that it was written before the death of Nero. 



1 Schol. ad Pers. i. 4, ex cod. lo. Tillii Brionensis episc., cited by El. 
Vinetus. 2 ge n . ad Pdyb. de Cons. viii. 2, and xi. 5. 

3 Vualtherus Spirensis Vs. 93. X cent. (ed. Harster, Munich, 1878, p. 22). 
Eberhard Bethunensis, Labyr. Tract, iii. 45. 

BXJTLEB 



162 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

The lines (899), 

quern (Aenean) nisi servasset magnarum rector aquarum [1] 
ut profugus laetis Troiam repararet in arvis, 
augustumque genus claris submitteret astris, 
non carae gentis nobis mansisset origo, 

can only have been written under the Julian Dynasty. 

The work is clearly post-Ovidian and must therefore 
be attributed to the principates of Tiberius, Gaius, Claudius, 
or Nero. Further evidence of date is entirely wanting. 
No meaning can be attached to the heading Pindarus found 
in certain MSS. 1 There is, however, an interesting though 
scarcely more fruitful problem presented by the possible 
existence of two acrostics in the course of the poem. 2 The 
initial letters of the first nine lines spell the name ' Italices ', 
while the last eight lines yield the word ' scqipsit '. Baehrens, 
by a not very probable alteration in the eighth line, pro- 
cures the name 'Italicus', while a slighter and more natural 
change yields 'scripsit' at the close. 3 Further, a late MS. 
gives Bebius Italicus as the name of the author. 4 On these 



[1] Unless the ruler of the mighty deep had preserved Aeneas to found 
in exile a new Troy in happier fields, and beget a line of princes to shine 
among the stars, the stock of the race we love would not have endured 
to bless us. 



1 This apparent confusion between Homer and Pindar is first found 
in Benzo, episc. Albensis (Monum. Germ. xi. 599) circa 1087. In Hugo 
Trimbergensis (thirteenth century) Pindar is the translator : ' Homero, 
quern Pindarus philosophus fertur transtulisse.' Cp. L. Miiller, Philol. xv, 
p. 475. So, too, in Cod. Vat. Reg. 1708 (thirteenth and fourteenth cen- 
turies) ; in Vat. Pal. 1611 (end of fourteenth century), he is styled Pan- 
darus. See Baehrens, P. L. M. iii. 4. 

2 Seyffert, in Munk, Geschichte der Rom. Litt. ii, p. 242. Biicheler, Rhein. 
Mus. 35 (1880), p. 391. 

3 Baehrens (P. L. M. iii) reads (7) ut primum tulerant for ex quo pertulerant. 
The corruption is unlikely, especially since the corresponding line in the 
Iliad (i. 6) begins e' ov. In line 1065, for quam cernis paucis . . . remis, 
he reads remis quam cernis . . . paucis, a distinct improvement. Some of 
those who retain MSS. in (7) attempt to explain Italice as a vocative or 
adverb. But ex nihilo nihil fit. For a summary of these unprofitable and 
generally absurd speculations, cp. Schanz, Gesch. Rom. Lit. 394. 

4 Vindobon. 3509 (fifteenth or sixteenth centuries). 



VI THE ILIAS LATINA 163 

grounds the poem has been attributed to Silius Italicus. 
But Martial makes no reference to the existence of this 
work in any of his references to Silius, and indeed suggests 
that Silius only took to writing poetry after his withdrawal 
from public life. 1 This would make the poem post-Neronian, 
which, as we have seen, is most improbable. Further, the 
style of the verse is very different from that of the Punica. 
When, over and above these considerations, it is remembered 
that the acrostics can only be produced by emendation of 
the text, the critic has no course open to him but to abandon 
the attribution to Silius and to give up the problem of the 
acrostics as an unprofitable curiosity of literature. 



IV 
LOST MINOR POETS 

In addition to the poets of whom we have already treated 
as writing under the Julian Dynasty there must have been 
many others of whom chance or their own insignificance 
has deprived us. But few names have survived, 2 and only 
two of these lost poets merit mention here, the erotic poet 
Lentulus Gaetulicus and the lyric writer Caesius Bassus. 

Gnaeus Cornelius Lentulus Gaetulicus was consul in 
26 A. D., 3 and for ten years was legatus in Upper Germany, 
where his combination of firmness and clemency won him 
great popularity. 4 He conspired against Caligula while 
holding this command, and was put to death. 5 Pliny the 
younger speaks of him as the writer of sportive and lascivious 
erotic verse, and Martial writes of him in very similar 
terms. 6 His mistress was named Caesennia, and was herself 
a poetess. 7 It is possible that the poems in the Greek 

1 Mart. vii. 63. 

2 Vagellius, Sen. N. Q. vi. 2. 9. Antistius Sosianus, Tac. Ann. xiii. 28. 
C. Montanus, ib. xvi. 28. 29. Lucilius junior, see p. 144. 

3 Tac. Ann. iv. 46 ; C. /. L. ii. 2093. 

4 Dion. lix. 22 ; Tac. Ann. vi. 30. 

5 Dion. loc. cit. ; Suet. Claud. 9. 

6 Plin Ep. v. 3. 5 ; Mart, i. praef. ' Ap. Sid. Ep. ii. 10. 0. 

M 2 



164 MINOR POETRY, 14-70 A.D. VI 

Anthology under the title FatrouAiKoi) l may be from his pen, 
but the only fragment of his Latin poems which survives is 
from a work in hexameters, and describes the geographical 
situation of Britain. 2 

More important is the lyric poet Caesius Bassus, * whose 
loss is the more to be regretted because of the very scanty 
remains of Roman lyric verse that have survived to 
modern times. Statius attempted with but indifferent 
success to imitate the Sapphics and Alcaics of Horace, 
while the plays of Seneca provide a considerable quantity 
of lyric choruses of varying degrees of merit. But of lyric 
writers pure and simple there is scarcely a trace. That 
they existed we know from Quintilian. If we may trust 
him, certain of his contemporaries 4 attained to considerable 
distinction in this branch of poetry that is to say, they 
surpassed all Roman lyric poets subsequent to Horace. 
But when all is said, it is scarcely possible to go beyond 
Quintilian's emphatic statement, that of Roman lyricists 
Horace alone repays reading. If any other name deserves 
mention it is that of Caesius Bassus, but he is inferior 
to Quintilian's own contemporaries. Caesius Bassus is 
best known to us as the editor of the satires of Persius. 
The sixth satire is actually addressed to him : 

admovit iam bruma foco te, Basse, Sabino ? [1] 

iamne lyra et tetrico vivunt tibi pectine chordae ? 
mire opifex numeris veterum primordia vocum 
atque marem strepitum fidis intendisse Latinae, 



[1] Has winter made you move yet to your Sabine fireside, dear Bassus ? 
Are your lyre and its strings and the austere quill that runs over them 
yet in force ? Marvellous artist as you are at setting to music the primitive 
antiquities of our language, the manly utterance of the Latian harp, and 



1 v. 16 ; vi. 190, 331 ; vii. 71, 244, 245, 275, 354 ; xi. 409. 

2 Baehrens, Poet. Bom. Fragm. p. 361. 

3 Quint, x. 1.96 ' at lyricorum Horatius fere solus legi dignus : ... si 
quern adicere velis, is erit Caesius Bassus, quern nuper vidimus ; sed eum 
longe praecedunt ingenia viventium '. 

4 e. g. perhaps Martial, Sulpicia, and some of Pliny's poet friends, see 
pp. 170 sqq. 



VI LOST MINOR POETS 165 

mox iuvenes agitare iocos et pollice honesto 
egregius lusisse senex. 1 

The only information yielded by this passage is that 
Bassus had a Sabine villa, that he was already advanced 
in years, that he affected 'the simple and manly versification 
of antiquity ', and that he dealt also with erotic themes. 
But few other facts are known to us. He wrote a treatise 
on metre a portion of which has been preserved to the 
present day, 2 and he perished at his Campanian villa in 
79 A. D., during the great eruption of Vesuvius. 3 The 
fragments of verse enshrined in his metrical treatise suggest 
that he wrote in a large variety of metres, 4 but they may 
be no more than examples invented solely to illustrate 
metres unfamiliar in Latin. The one quotation that is 
explicitly made from his lyrical poems is, curiously enough, 
a hexameter line. As to his literary merits or defects, it is 
now impossible even to guess. 



then showing yourself excellent in your old age at wakening young loves 
and frolicking over the chords with a virtuous touch. 

CONINGTON. 



1 See p. 80. 

2 See Teuffel and Schwabe, Hist. Rom. Lit. 304 ; Schanz, Gesch. Rom. 
Lit. 384 a. 

3 Schol. Per s. vi. 1. 

4 Ithyphallicum, Archebulium, Philicium, Paeonicum, Proceleusma- 
ticum, Molossicum. Baehrens, Poet. Rom. Fragm. p. 364. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE EMPERORS FROM VESPASIAN TO TRAJAN 
AND MINOR POETS 



THE EMPERORS AND POETS WHOSE WORKS 
ARE LOST 

AFTER the death of Nero and the close of the Civil War 
a happier era, both for literature and the world at large, 
was inaugurated by the accession of Vespasian in 69 A.D. 
A man of low birth and of little culture, he yet had a true 
appreciation of art and literature. Of his own writing we 
know nothing save that he left behind him memoirs. 1 But 
we have abundant evidence that he showed himself a liberal 
patron of the arts. He gave rich rewards to poets and 
sculptors, 2 effected all that was possible to repair the great 
loss of works of art occasioned by the burning of the Capitol, 3 
and did what he could for the stage, perhaps even attempting 
to revive the legitimate drama. 4 Above all, he set aside 
a large sum annually for the support of Greek and Latin 
professors of rhetoric, 5 the first instance in the history of 
Rome of State endowment of education. Against this we 
must set his expulsion from Italy of philosophers and 
astrologers, an intemperate and presumably ineffective act, 
prompted by reasons of State and probably without any 
appreciable influence on literature. 6 His sons, however, 
had received all the advantages of the highest education. 
Of Titus' (79-81 A.D.) achievements in literature we have 
no information save that he aspired to be both orator and 



1 Joseph, vita 65. 

2 Suet. Vesp. 17, 18. 3 Ib. 8. 
4 Ib. 19 ' vetera quoque acroamata revocaverat '. 5 Ib. 18. 

6 Dion. Ixvi. 13, in 71 A.D. That this act was ineffectual is shown by 
Domitian's action hi 89-93 A. D. 



VII POETS WHOSE WORKS ARE LOST 167 

poet. The language used in praise of his efforts by Pliny 
the elder, our one authority on this point, is so extravagant 
as to be virtually meaningless. 1 Of the literary exploits 
of his brother Domitian (81-96 A.D.) there is more to be 
said. It pleased him to lay claim to distinction both in 
prose and verse. 2 His only prose work of which any record 
remains was a treatise on the care of the hair; 3 his own 
baldness rankled in his mind and turned the calvus Nero 
of Juvenal into a hair specialist. As to his poems it is 
almost doubtful if he ever wrote any. He professed an 
enthusiasm for poetry, an art which, according to Suetonius, 
he had neglected in his youth and despised when he came to 
the throne. But Quintilian, Valerius Flaccus, and Martial 4 
all load him with praise of various degrees of fulsomeness, 
though, reading between the lines of Quintilian, it is easy 
to see that Domitian's output must have been exceedingly 
small. The evidence of these three authors goes to show 
that he had contemplated, perhaps even begun, an epic on 
the achievements of his brother Titus in the Judaic War. 
Whether these caelestia carmina belli, as Martial calls them, 
ever existed, save in the imagination of courtiers and servile 
poets, there is nothing to show. If they did exist there 
seems no reason to regret their loss. 

Domitian's chief service to literature, if indeed it was a 
true service, was the establishment of the Agon Capitolinus 
in 86, a quinquennial festival at which prizes were awarded 
not only for athletics and chariot-racing, but for declama- 
tions in verse and prose, 5 and the institution of a similar, 
though annual, contest at his own palace on the Alban Mount, 
which took place as often as the great festival of Minerva, 
known as the Quinquatria, came round. 6 But his interest 
in literature was only superficial ; he had no originality and 



1 Plin. N. H. praef. 5 and 11. 

2 Suet. Dom. 2 ; Tac. Hist. iv. 86 ; Quint, x. 1. 91. 

3 Suet. Dom. 18. 

4 Quint, loc. cit. ; Val. PI. i. 12 ; Mart. v. 5. 7. 

5 Suet. Dom. 4. 

6 Stat, Silv. iv. 2. 65, v. 3. 227. 



168 EMPERORS AND MINOR POETS, 70-117A.D. VII 

read nothing save the memoirs and edicts of Tiberius. 1 His 
capricious cruelty extended itself to artists and authors ; 2 
twice (in 89 and 93 A.D.), following his father's example, he 
banished philosophers and astrologers from Rome ; 3 the 
crime of having written laudatory biographies of the Stoics 
Thrasea and Helvidius Priscus brought Arulenus Rusticus 
and Herennius Senecio to their deaths. 4 But Domitian's 
tyranny had little effect on belles-lettres, however adverse it 
may have been to free-spoken philosophy, rhetoric, or history. 
Valerius Flaccus, Silius, Statius, and Martial, all wrote 
during his reign, and the works of the last-named poet and 
Quintilian give ample evidence of widespread literary 
activity. The minor poet replenished the earth, and the 
prizes for literature awarded at the Agon Capitolinus and the 
festival of the Alban Mount must have been a real stimulus 
to writing, even though the type of literature produced by 
such a stimulus may have been scarcely worth producing. 
The worst feature of the poetry of the time is the almost 
incredibly fulsome flattery to which the tyranny of Domitian 
gave rise. As a compensation we have in the two succeeding 
reigns the biting satire of Juvenal and Tacitus, rendered all 
the keener by its long suppression under the last of the 
Flavian dynasty. 

But, however impossible it may have been to write really 
effective satire during the Flavian dynasty, of poets there 
was no lack. It was, moreover, under the Flavians that 
there sprang up that reaction towards a saner style to which 
we have already referred as finding its expression in the 
Ciceronianism of Quintilian, and to a lesser degree in the 
Vergilianism of Valerius, Statius, and Silius. Of lesser 
luminaries there were enough and to spare. Serranus and 
Saleius Bassus are both warmly commended by Quintilian 

1 Suet. Dom. 20. This may have been creditable to him as ruler of 
the empire, though Suetonius undoubtedly wishes us to regard Tiberius' 
memoirs as a manual of tyranny. 

2 Suet. Dom. 10. 

3 Suet. loc. cit. ; Hieronym. ad ann. 89 and 95 A. D. The latter date is 
wrong : cp. Mommsen, Hermes, iii (1869), p. 84. 

4 Tac. Agr. 2. 



VII POETS WHOSE WORKS ARE LOST 169 

for their achievements in Epic. The former died young, 
before his powers had ripened to maturity, but showed 
great soundness of style and high promise. 1 Of Saleius 
Quintilian 2 says, ' He had a vigorous and poetic genius, but 
it was not mellowed by age.' That is to say, he died young, 
like Serranus. In the Dialogus of Tacitus he is spoken of 
as the best of men and the most finished of poets. He won 
Vespasian's favour and received a gift from him of five 
hundred thousand sesterces. His poems brought him no 
material profit ; both Tacitus and Juvenal emphasize this 
point : 

contentus fama iaceat Lucanus in hortis 

marmoreis ; at Serrano tenuique Saleio 

gloria quantalibet quid erit, si gloria tantum est. 3 

Statius' father, a distinguished teacher of rhetoric at 
Naples, had written a poem on the burning of the Capitol 
in 69 A.D., and was only prevented by death 4 from singing 
the great eruption of Vesuvius. Arruntius Stella of Pata- 
vium, 5 the friend of Statius and Martial, wrote elegies to 
his wife Violentilla. Turnus, 6 like Juvenal the son of a 
freedman, attained considerable success as a satirist, while 
the two distinguished soldiers, Verginius Rufus 7 and Ves- 
tricius Spurinna, 8 wrote light erotic verse and lyrics 
respectively. In addition to these there are a whole host 
of minor poets mentioned by Statius and Martial. In fact 
the writing of verse was the most fashionable occupation for 
the leisure time of a cultivated gentleman. 

With Nerva and Trajan the happiest epoch of the princi- 
pate set in. Nerva (96-98 A. D.) sprung from a line of dis- 
tinguished jurists, was celebrated by Martial as the Tibullus 



1 Quint, x. 1. 89. There is no clear indication of his date, but he is 
coupled with Saleius Bassus by Juvenal (vii. 80), a fact which suggests 
that he belonged to the Flavian period. 

2 x. 1. 90. 3 Juv. vii. 79. Stat. Silv. v. 3 . 

5 Stat. Silv. i. 2. 253 ; Mart. iv. 6. 4, i. 7, vii. 14. 

6 Schol. Vail, ad luv. i. 20 ; Mart. xi. 10 ; Rut. Nam. i. 603 ; Schol. 
luv. i. 71. For his brother Scaevus Memor see p. 30. 

? Plin. Ep. v. 3. 5, vi. 10. 4. 8 ib. iii. 1. H, ii. 7. 1 



170 EMPERORS AND MINOR POETS, 70-117 A.D. VII 

of his time, 1 and is praised by the younger Pliny for the 
excellence of his light verses. 2 Trajan, his successor (98- 
117 A. D.), though a man of war, rather than a man of letters, 
wrote a history of the Dacian wars, 3 and possessed as his 
letters to Pliny testify a remarkable power of expressing 
himself tersely and clearly. He was, like Vespasian, a 
generous patron to rhetoric and education, 4 and the founder 
of the important library known as the Bibliotheca Ulpia. 5 
But the great service which he and his predecessor rendered 
to literature was, as Pliny and Tacitus bear eloquent witness, 
the gift of freedom. This did more for prose than for poetry, 
save for one important fact it was the means of enriching 
the world with the satires of Juvenal. If the quantity of 
the literature surviving from the principates of Nerva and 
Trajan is small, its quality is unmistakable. Pliny the 
younger, Tacitus, and Juvenal form a trio whose equal is 
to be found at no other period of the post-Augustan princi- 
pate, while the letters of Pliny give proof of the existence of 
a highly cultivated society devoted to literature of all kinds. 
Poets were numerous even if they were not good. Few 
names, however, survive, and those have but the slightest 
interest for us. It will suffice to mention three of them : 
Passennus Paulus, Sentius Augurinus, and the younger 
Pliny. With the dramatic poets, Pomponius Bassulus and 
Vergilius Romanus, we have already dealt. 6 Pliny shall 
speak for himself and his friends. 

' Passennus Paulus,' he writes, 7 ' a distinguished Roman 
knight of great learning, is a writer of elegies. This runs in 
the family ; for he is a fellow townsman of Propertius and 
indeed counts him among his ancestors.' In a later letter 8 
he speaks with solicitude of his failing health, and goes on 

i Mart. viii. 70. 7. 2 Plin. Ep. v. 3. 5. 

3 Priscian, Gr. Lat. ii, p. 205, 6. 

4 Plin. Paneg. 47 ; Ep. iii. 18. 5. 

5 Dion. Ixviii. 16 ; Gellius xi. 17. 1. 

6 See p. 25. Other names are Octavius Rufus, Plin. Ep. i. 7 ; Titinius 
Capito, C. I. L. 798, Plin. Ep. i. 17. 3 ; viii. 12. 4 ; Caninius Rufus, Plin. 
Ep. viii. 4. 1 ; Calpurnius Piso, Plin. Ep. v. 17. 1. 

7 Ep. vi. 15. 8 Ep. ix. 22. 



VII POETS WHOSE WORKS ARE LOST 171 

to describe the characteristics of his work. ' In his verse he 
imitates the ancients, paraphrases them, and reproduces 
them, above all Propertius, from whom he traces his descent. 
He is a worthy scion of the house, and closely resembles his 
great ancestor in that sphere in which he of old excelled. 
If you read his elegies you will find them highly polished, 
possessed of great sensuous charm, and quite obviously 
written in the house of Propertius. He has lately betaken 
himself to lyric verse, and imitates Horace with the same 
skill with which he has imitated Propertius. Indeed, if 
kinship counts for anything in the world of letters, you 
would deem him Horace's kinsman as well. ' Pliny concludes 
with a warm tribute to Passennus' character. The picture 
is a pleasant one, but it is startling and significant to find 
Pliny awarding such praise to one who was frankly imitative, 
if he was not actually a plagiarist. 1 

Pliny is not less complimentary to Sentius Augurinus. 
' I have been listening,' he writes, 2 ' to a recitation given by 
Sentius Augurinus. It gave me the greatest pleasure, and 
filled me with the utmost admiration for his talent. He calls 
his verses " trifles " (poematia). Much is written with great 
delicacy, much with great elevation of style ; many of the 
poems show great charm, many great tenderness ; not a few 
are honey-sweet, not a few bitter and mordant. It is some 
time since anything so perfect has been produced.' The 
next clause, however, betrays the reason, in part at any rate, 
for Pliny's admiration. In the course of his recitation he 
had produced a small hendecasyllabic poem in praise of 
Pliny's own verses. Pliny proceeds to quote it with every 
expression of gratification and approval. It is certainly 
neatly turned and well expressed, but it is such as any culti- 
vated gentleman who had read his Catullus and Martial 
might produce, and can hardly have been of interest to any 



1 Gaius Passennus Paulus Propertius Blaesus was his full title. He 
derives his chief interest from the fact that the inscription at Assisi which 
preserves his name is our most conclusive evidence for the birthplace of 
Propertius. Haupt, opusc. i. p. 283, Leipz. (1875). 

2 Ep. iv. 27. 



172 EMPERORS AND MINOR POETS, 70-117 A.D. VII 

one save Augurinus and Pliny. Pliny was, in fact, with all 
his admirable gifts, one of the principal and most amiable 
members of a highly cultivated mutual admiration society. 
He was a poet himself, though only a few lines of the poems 
praised by Augurinus have survived to undergo the judge- 
ment of a more critical age. Pliny has, however, given an 
interesting little sketch of his poetical career in the fourth 
letter of the seventh book. ' I have always had a taste for 
poetry,' he tells his friend Pontius ; ' nay, I was only four- 
teen when I composed a tragedy in Greek. What was it like? 
you ask. I know not ; it was called a tragedy. Later, 
when returning from my military service, I was weather- 
bound in the island of Icaria, and wrote elegiac poems in 
Latin about that island and the sea, which bears the same 
name. I have occasionally attempted heroic hexameters, 
but it is only quite recently that I have taken to writing 
hendecasyllables. You shall hear of their origin and of the 
occasion which gave them birth. Some writings of Asinius 
Gallus were being read aloud to me in my Laurentine 
villa ; in these works he was comparing his father with 
Cicero ; we came upon an epigram of Cicero dedicated to 
his freedman Tiro. Shortly after, about noon for it was 
summer I retired to take my siesta, and finding that I 
could not sleep, I began to reflect how the very greatest 
orators have taken delight in composing this style of verse, 
and have hoped to win fame thereby. I set my mind to it, 
and, quite contrary to my expectations after so long desue- 
tude, produced in an extremely short space of time the 
following verses on that very subject which had provoked 
me to write.' 

Thirteen hexameter verses follow of a mildly erotic 
character. They are not peculiarly edifying, and are 
certainly very far from being poetry. He continues : 

' I then turned my attention to expressing the same 
thoughts in elegiac verse ; I rattled these off at equal speed, 
and wrote some additional lines, being beguiled into doing so 
by the fluency with which I wrote the metre. On my return 
to Rome I read the verses to my friends. They approved. 



VII POETS WHOSE WORKS ARE LOST 173 

Then in my leisure moments, especially when travelling, 
^attempted other metres. Finally, I resolved to follow the 
example of many other writers and compose a whole separate 
volume in the hendecasyllabic metre ; nor do I regret having 
done so. For the book is read, copied, and even sung ; even 
Greeks chant my verses to the sound of the cithara or the 
lyre ; their passion for the book has taught them to use the 
Latin tongue.' It was this volume of hendecasyllables 
about which Pliny displays such naive enthusiasm that led 
Augurinus to compare Pliny to Calvus and Catullus. Pliny's 
success had come to him comparatively late in life ; but it 
emboldened him to the composition of another volume of 
poems x in various metres, which he read to his friends. He 
cites one specimen in elegiacs 2 which awakens no desire for 
more, for it is fully as prosy as the hexameters to which we 
have already referred. Of the hendecasyllables nothing sur- 
vives, but Pliny tells us something as to their themes and the 
manner of their composition. 3 ' I amuse myself by writing 
them in my leisure moments at the bath or in my carriage. 
I jest in them and make merry, I play the lover, I weep, 
I make lamentation, I vent my anger, or describe something 
or other now in a pedestrian, now in a loftier vein.' As this 
little catalogue would suggest, these poems were not always 
too respectable. The good Pliny, like Martial, thinks it 
necessary to apologize 4 for his freedom in conforming to the 
fashionable licence of his age by protesting that his muse 
may be wanton, but his life is chaste. We can readily believe 
him, for he was a man of kindly heart and high ideals, whose 
simple vanity cannot obscure his amiability. But it is 
difficult to believe that the loss of his poetry is in any way 
a serious loss to the world. 5 We have given Pliny the poet 
more space than is his due ; our excuse must be the interest 
of his engaging self-revelations. 

In spite of Pliny's enthusiasm for his poet friends, there is 

1 viii. 21. 14. 2 vii. 9. 10. 3 iv. 14. 2. * j v . 14. 4. 

5 He also translated the Greek epigrams of Arrius Antoninus. Cp. Ep. 
iv. 3. 3, and xviii. 1. One of these translations is preserved, Bachrens, 
P.L.M. iv. 112. 



174 EMPERORS AND MINOR POETS, 70-117 A.D. VII 

no reason to suppose that the reign of Trajan saw the produc- 
tion of any poetry, save that of Juvenal, which even ap- 
proached the first rank. With the accession of Hadrian we 
enter on a fresh era, characterized by the rise of a new prose 
style and the almost entire disappearance of poetry. Rome 
had produced her last great poet. The Pervigilium Veneris 
and a few slight but beautiful fragments of Tiberianus are all 
that illumine the darkness till we come upon the interesting 
but uninspired elegiacs of Rutilius Namatianus, the curiously 
uneven and slipshod poetry of Ausonius, and the graceful, 
but cold and lifeless perfection of the heroic hexameters of 
Claudian. 

II 
SULPICIA 

Poetesses were not rare at Rome during the first century 
of our era ; the scribendi cacoethes extended to the fair sex 
sufficiently, at any rate, to evoke caustic comment both from 
Martial 1 and Juvenal. 2 By a curious coincidence, the only 
poetesses of whose work we have any record are both named 
Sulpicia. The elder Sulpicia belongs to an earlier age ; she 
formed one of the Augustan literary circle of which her uncle 
Messala was the patron, and left a small collection of elegiac 
poems addressed to her lover, and preserved in the same 
volume as the posthumous poems of Tibullus, to whose 
authorship they were for long attributed. 3 

The younger Sulpicia was a contemporary of the poet 
Martial, and, like her predecessor, wrote erotic verse. Frank 
and outspoken as was the earlier poetess, in this respect at 
least her namesake far surpassed her. For the younger 
Sulpicia's plain-speaking, if we may judge from the comments 
of ancient writers 4 and the one brief fragment of her love- 

1 ii. 90. 9. 2 i n the sixth Satire. 

3 See Schanz, Gesch. Rom. Lit. 284. 

4 Apoll. Sid. ix. 261 ' quod Sulpiciae iocos Thalia scripsit blandiloquuin 
suo Caleno '. Auson. Cento. Nupt., 4 ' meminerint prurire opusculuru 
Sulpiciae, frontem caperare '. Fulgentius, Mythol. 1 (p. 4, Hehn.) ' Sul- 
picillae procacitas ' 



VII SULPICIA 175 

poems that has survived, 1 was of a very different character 
and must at least have bordered on the obscene. But her 
work attracted attention ; her fame is associated with her 
love for Calenus, a love that was long 2 and passionate. 
She continued to be read even in the days of Ausonius and 
Sidonius Apollinaris. Martial compares her with Sappho, 
and her songs of love seem to have rung true, even though 
their frankness may have been of a kind generally associated 
with passions of a looser character. 3 If, as a literal inter- 
pretation of Martial 4 would lead us to infer, Calenus was 
her husband, the poems of Sulpicia confront us with a 
spectacle unique in ancient literature a wife writing love- 
poems to her husband. Her language came from the heart, 
not from book-learning ; she was a poetess such as Martial 
delighted to honour. 

omnes Sulpiciam legant puellae, [1] 

uni quae cupiunt viro placere ; 

omnes Sulpiciam legant mariti, 

uni qui cupiunt placere nuptae. 

non haec Colchidos adserit furorem, 

diri prandia nee refert Thyestae ; 



[1] Read your Sulpicia, maidens all, 

Whose husband shall your sole love be ; 
Read your Sulpicia, husbands all, 
Whose wife shall reign, and none but she. 
No theme for her Medea's fire, 
Nor orgy of Thyestes dire; 



1 Schol. Vail, ad luv. vi. 537, unde ait Sulpicia : 

si me cadurcis dissolutis fasciis 
nudam Caleno concubantem proferat. 

2 Mart. x. 38. 9 : 

vixisti tribus, o Calene, lustris : 

aetas haec tibi tota computatur 

et solos numeras dies mariti. 

The first edition of Martial, Book x, was probably published in 95 A. D. 
If Sulpicia married Calenus at the age of 18-25, her birth will therefore 
fall between 55 and 62 A. D. 

3 Cp. Mart. x. 38. 4-8. 

4 Cp. Mart. x. 38. 9-11. It is, of course, possible that mariti is a 
euphemism. 



176 EMPERORS AND MINOR POETS, 70-117 A.D. VII 

Scyllam, Byblida nee fuisse credit : 
sed castos docet et probos amores, 
lusus delicias facetiasque. 
cuius carmina qui bene aestimarit, 
nullam dixerit esse nequiorem, 
nullam dixerit esse sanctiorem. 1 

Although the thought of what procacitas 2 may have 
meant in a lady of Domitian's reign raises something of a 
shudder, and although it is to be feared that Martial, when 
he goes on to say (loc. cit.) 

tales Egeriae iocos fuisse [1] 

udo crediderim Numae sub antro, 

had that in his mind which would have scandalized the pious 
lawgiver of Rome, we may yet regret the loss of poems 
which, if Martial's language is not merely the language of 
flattery, may have breathed a fresher and freer spirit than 
is often to be found in the poets of the age. Catullus and 
Sappho would seem to have been Sulpicia's models, but her 
poems have left so little trace behind them that it is impos- 
sible to speak with certainty. As to their metre we are 
equally ill-informed. The fragment of two lines quoted 
above is in iambic senarii. If we may believe the evidence 3 
of a satirical hexameter poem attributed to Sulpicia, she 
also wrote in hendecasyllables and scazons. The genuine- 
ness of this poem is, however, open to serious doubt. It 
consists of seventy hexameters denouncing the expulsion of 
the philosophers by Domitian, and is known by the title of 

Scylla and Byblis she'd deny, 

Of love she sang and purity, 

Of dalliance and frolic gay ; 

Who should have well appraised her lay 

Had said none were more chaste than she, 

Yet fuller none of amorous glee. 

A. E. STREET. 
[1] Such sport I ween Egeria gave 

To Numa in his spring-drenched cave. 

A. E. STREET. 

i Mart. x. 35. 1. 2 g^ Ap . Sid . i oc . cit 

3 Sulp. Sat., lines 4, 5. 



VII SULPICIA 177 

Sulpiciae satira. 1 That it purports to be by the poetess 
beloved of Calenus is clear from an allusion to their passion. 2 
Serious doubts have, however, been cast upon its genuine- 
ness. It is urged that the work is ill-composed, insipid, and 
tasteless, and that it contains not a few marked peculiarities 
in diction and metre, together with more than one historical 
inaccuracy. The inference suggested is that the poem is 
not by Sulpicia, but at least two centuries later in date. It 
may readily be admitted that the poem is almost entirely 
devoid of any real merit, that its diction is obscure and 
slovenly, its metre lame and unimpressive. But the critics 
of the poem are guilty of great exaggeration. 3 Many of its 
worst defects are undoubtedly due to the exceedingly corrupt 
state of the text ; further, it is hard to see what interest a 
satire directed against Domitian would possess centuries 
after his death, nor is it easy to imagine what motive could 
have led the supposed forger to attribute his work to Sulpicia. 

1 fiaph. Volaterr. comment, urban, (fol. Ivi, 1506 A. D.), 'hie (sc. at 
Bobbio) anno 1493 huiuscemodi libri reperti sunt. Rutilius Namatianus. 
Heroicum Sulpici carmen.' The first edition was published in 1498, with 
the title Sulpitiae carmina quae fuit Domitiani temporibus : nuper a Georgia 
Merula Allexandrino, cum aliis opusculis reperta. queritur de statu reipub- 
licae et temporibus Domitiani. The MS. is now lost. 

2 Cp. line 62. Domitian's edict seems to have threatened the security 
of Calenus. In the lines which follow, Domitian's death and overthrow 
are foretold. The poem, therefore, if genuine, must have been published 
soon after Domitian's assassination in 96, though it may have been com- 
posed in part during his lifetime. 

3 The work is generally rejected as spurious. Baehrens (P. L. M. v. 
p. 93, and de Sulpiciae quae vocatur satira, Jena, 1873) holds that the work 
is contemporary with Ausonius. Boot (de Sulpiciae quae fertur satira, 
Amsterdam, 1868) goes further, and regards the work as a renaissance 
forgery. He is followed by Biicheler. But there is no reason to doubt the 
existence of the Bobbian MS. The metrical difficulties can be remedied 
by emendation, palare for palari (43) is a solecism, but many verbs are 
found in both active and deponent forms, and palare may be a slip, or even 
an invention by analogy, captiva (52) does not = the Italian cattiva or 
the French chetive. The most that we can say is that the work shows no 
resemblance to any extant contemporary literature. That does not 
necessarily prove it to be of later date. The problem cannot be answered 
with certainty. On the whole, to us the difficulty of supposing it to be 
a late forgery seems greater than the difficulty of supposing it to be by 
Sulpicia. 

BUTLER |jf 



178 EMPERORS AND MINOR POETS, 70-117 A.D. VII 

The balance of probability inclines, though very slightly, in 
favour of the view that the work is genuine. This is unfor- 
tunate ; for the perusal of this curious satire on the hypo- 
thesis of its genuineness appreciably lessens our regret for the 
loss of Sulpicia's love poetry and arouses serious suspicion 
as to the veracity of Martial. It must, however, in justice be 
remembered that it does not follow that Sulpicia was neces- 
sarily a failure as a lyric writer because she had not the 
peculiar gift necessary for satire. The absence of the 
training of the rhetorical schools from a woman's education 
might well account for such a failure. At the worst, Sulpicia 
stands as an interesting example of the type of womanhood 
at which Juvenal levelled some of his wildest and most ill- 
balanced invective. 



CHAPTER VIII 

VALERIUS FLACCUS 

THE political tendency towards retrenchment and reform 
that marks the reign of Vespasian finds its literary 
parallel in a reaction against the rhetoric of display that 
culminated in Seneca and Lucan. This movement is most 
strongly marked in the prose of Quintilian and the Dialogue 
of Tacitus, but finds a faint echo in the world of poets as 
well. The three epic poets of the period Valerius Flaccus, 
Statius, and Silius Italicus though they, too, have suffered 
much from their rhetorical training, are all clear followers 
of Vergil. They, like their predecessors, find it hard to 
say things naturally, but they do not to the same extent 
go out of their way with the deliberate intention of saying 
things unnaturally. 1 We may condemn them as phrase- 
makers, though many a modern poet of greater reputation 
is equally open to the charge. But their phrase-making 
has not the flamboyant quality of the Neronian age. If it 
is no less wearisome, it is certainly less offensive. They do 
not lack invention ; their mere technical skill is remarkable ; 
they fail because they lack the supreme gifts of insight and 
imagination. 

Valerius Flaccus chose a wiser course than Lucan and 
Silius Italicus. He turned not to history, but to legend, 
for his theme ; and the story of the Argonauts, on which 
his choice lighted, possessed one inestimable advantage. 
Well-worn and hackneyed as it was, it possessed the secret 
of eternal youth. ' Age could not wither it nor custom 
stale its infinite variety.' The poorest of imitative poet- 
asters could never have made it wholly dull, and Valerius 
Flaccus was more than a mere poetaster. 

Of his life and position little is known. His name is 

1 An exception must be made of the Silvae of Statius. 

N 2 



180 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

given by the MSS. as Gains Valerius Flaccus Setinus Balbus. 1 
The name Setinus suggests that he may have been a native 
of Setia. As there were three Setias, one in Italy and two 
in Spain, this clue gives us small help. It has been suggested 2 
that the peculiarities of his diction are due to his being of 
Spanish origin. But we have no evidence as to the nature 
of Spanish Latin, while the authors of known Spanish birth, 
who found fame in the Silver Age Seneca, Lucan, Martial, 
Quintilian, Columella show no traces of their provenance. 
No more helpful is the view that he is one Flaccus of 
Patavium, the poet-friend to whom two of Martial's epigrams 
are addressed. 3 For Martial's acquaintance was poor and 
is exhorted to abandon poetry as unlucrative, whereas 
Valerius Flaccus had some social standing and, not improb- 
ably, some wealth. From the opening of the Argonautica we 
learn that he held the post of quindecimvir sacris faciundis* 
But there our knowledge of the poet ends, save for one 
solitary allusion in Quintilian, the sole reference to Valerius 
in any ancient writer. In his survey of Latin literature 5 
he says multum in Valeria Flacco nuper amisimus. The 
work of Quintilian having been published between the 
years 93 and 95 A. D., the death of Valerius Flaccus may 
be placed about 90 A.D. 

The poem seems to have been commenced shortly after 
the capture of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. At the opening of 
the first book 6 Valerius addresses Vespasian in the con- 
ventional language of courtly flattery with appropriate 
reference to his voyages in northern seas during his service 
in Britain, a reference doubly suitable in a poem which 
is largely nautical and geographical. He excuses himself 
from taking the obvious subject of the Jewish war on the 

1 Or Balbus Setinus. 

2 Schenkl, Stud, zu V. F. 272. 3 Mart. i. 61 and 76. 

4 i. 5: 

Phoebe mone, si Cymaeae mihi conscia vatis 
stat casta cortina domo. 

In Cymaeae vatis there is an allusion to the custody of the Sibylline 
books. 

5 x. 1. 90. 6 i, 7-12. 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 181 

ground that that theme is reserved for the inspired pen of 
Domitian. It is for him to describe Titus, his brother, dark 
with the dust of war, launching the fires of doom and dealing 
destruction from tower to tower along the ramparts of 
Jerusalem. 1 The progress of the work was slow. By the 
time the third book is reached we find references to the 
eruption of Vesuvius that buried Pompeii and Herculaneum 
in 79 A. D., 2 while in the two concluding books there seem 
to be allusions to Roman campaigns in the Danube lands, 
perhaps those undertaken by Domitian in 89 A. D. 3 At 
line 468 of the eighth book the poem breaks off suddenly. 
It is possible that this is due to the ravages of time or to 
the circumstances of the copyist of our archetype, but 
consideration of internal evidence points strongly to the 
conclusion that Valerius died with his work uncompleted. 

Not only do the words of Quintilian (1. c.) suggest a poet 
who left a great work unfinished, but the poem itself is full 
of harshnesses and inconsistencies of a kind which so slow 
and careful a craftsman would assuredly have removed had 
the poem been completed and received its final revision. 4 



1 i. 13, 14 : 

Solymo nigrantem pulvere fratrem 
spargentemque faces et in omni turre furentem. 
Domitian pretended to be a poet and connoisseur of poetry. See p. 167. 

2 iii. 207 : 

ut mugitor anhelat 
Vesvius, attonitas acer cum suscitat urbes 

3 vii. 645 ; viii. 228. If these allusions be to events of 89 A.D. they 
point to the view that the last two books were composed shortly before 
the poet's death, and confirm the opinion that the Argonautica was never 
finished. 

4 A few instances will suffice. In iii. 302 Jason asserts that seers had 
prophesied his father's death ; this is nowhere else mentioned ; on the 
contrary, at the beginning of the second book, it is specially told us that 
Juno concealed from Jason the fact of his father's death, while in vii. 494 
Jason speaks of him as still alive. In vii. 394 Venus is represented as 
leaving Medea in terror at the sound of her magic chant, while five lines 
later it is implied that she is still holding Medea's hand. In viii. 24 Jason 
goes to the grove of Mars to meet Medea and to steal the fleece of gold ; 
but no arrangement to this effect has been made between Jason and Medea 
at their previous meeting (vii. 516). Instances might be multiplied. See 



182 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

These blemishes leave us little room for doubt. The poem 
that has come down to us is a fragment lacking the limae 
labor. Like the Thebais of Statius and the Aeneid itself, the 
work was probably planned to fill twelve books. The poem 
breaks off with the marriage of Medea and Jason on the Isle 
of Peuce at the mouth of the Danube, where they are over- 
taken by Medea's brother Absyrtus, who has come in anger 
to reclaim his sister and take vengeance on the stranger who 
has beguiled her. It is clear that the Argonauts 1 were, as 
in Apollonius Bhodius, to escape up the Danube and reach 
another sea. In Apollonius they descended from the head 
waters of the Danube by some mythical river to the Adriatic ; 
it is in the Adriatic that Absyrtus is encountered and slain ; 
it is in Phaeacia that Jason and Medea are married. In 
Valerius both these incidents take place in the Isle of Peuce, 
at the Danube's mouth. The inference is that Valerius 
contemplated a different scheme for his conclusion. It has 
been pointed out 2 that a mere ' reproduction of Apollonius' 
episodes could not have occupied four books '; and it is sug- 
gested that Valerius definitely brought his heroes into relation 
to the various Italian places 3 connected with the Argonautic 
legend, while he may even, as a compliment to Vespasian, 4 
have brought them back ' by way of the North Sea past 
Britain and Gaul '. This ingenious conjectural reconstruc- 
tion has some probability, slight as is the evidence on which 
it rests. Valerius was almost bound to give his epic a 
Roman tinge. More convincing, however, is the suggestion 
of the same critic 5 that the poem was designed to exceed 



Schenkl, op. cit. 12 sqq. ; Summers' Study of Argonautica of Valerius 
Flaccus, p. 2 sqq. The inconsistency which makes the Argo to be at once 
the first ship and to meet many other ships by the way is perhaps the most 
glaring, but its rectification would have involved very radical alterations. 

1 Cp. viii. 189 : 

inde sequeniur 

ipsius amnis iter, donee nos flumine certo 
perferat inque aliud reddat mare. 

2 Summers, op. cit. 6. 

3 e. g. Argous Portus, Gales, the portico of the Argonauts at Rome. 

4 i. 7-12. 5 Summers, p. 7. 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 183 

the scope of the epic of Apollonius and to have included the 
death of Pelias, the malignant and usurping uncle, who, to 
get rid of Jason, compels him to the search of the golden 
fleece. To the retribution that came upon him there are 
two clear references 1 and only the design to describe it 
could justify the introduction of the suicide of Jason's 
parents at the outset of the first book, a suicide to which 
they are driven to avoid death at the hands of Pelias. 

The scope of the unwritten books is, however, of little 
importance in comparison with the execution of the existing 
portion of the poem. The Argonaut Saga has its weaknesses 
as a theme for epic. It is too episodic, it lacks unity and 
proportion. Save for the struggle in Colchis and the loves 
of Jason and Medea, there is little deep human interest. 
These defects, however, find their compensation in the variety 
and brilliance of colour, and, in a word, the romance that 
is inseparable from the story. The scene is ever changing, 
each day brings a new marvel, a new terror. Picturesque- 
ness atones for lack of epic grandeur. For that reason the 
theme was well suited to the Silver Age, when picturesque- 
ness and rich invention of detail predominated at the expense 
of poetic dignity and kindling imagination. In many ways 
Valerius does justice to his subject, in spite of the initial 
difficulty with which he was confronted. Apollonius Rhodius 
had made the story his own ; Varro of Atax had translated 
Apollonius : both in its Greek and Latin forms the story 
was familiar to Roman readers. It was hard to be original. 

Much as Valerius owes to his greater predecessor, he yet 
succeeds in showing no little originality in his portrayal of 
character and incident, and in a few cases in his treatment 
of plot. 2 In one particular indeed he has markedly improved 

1 i. 806 ; ii. 4. 

2 Valerius was no slavish imitator of Apollonius. Some of his incidents 
are new, such as the rescue of Hesione (ii. 450 sqq.). Many of the incidents 
in Apollonius are omitted (e. g. Stymphalian birds, A. R. ii. 1033, and the 
encounter with the sons of Phrixus, A. R. ii. 1093). Other incidents 
receive a fresh turn. In both poets the Argonauts see traces of the doom 
of Prometheus. But in A. he is still being devoured, in V. he is being 
freed by Hercules amid an earthquake. Again V. often expands or con- 



184 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

on his model ; he has made Jason, the hero of his epic, a 
real hero ; conventional he may be, but he still is a leader of 
men. In Apollonius, on the other hand, he plays a curiously 
inconspicuous part ; he is, in fact, the weakest feature of 
the poem ; he is in despair from the outset, and at no point 
shows genuine heroic qualities ; he is at best a peerless 
wooer and no more. Here, however, he is exalted by the 
two great battles of Cyzicus and Colchis ; it is in part his 
prowess in the latter battle that wins Medea's heart. In 
this connexion we may also notice a marked divergence from 
Apollonius as regards the plot. Aeetes has promised Jason 
the fleece if he will aid him against his brother Perses, who 
is in revolt against him with a host of Scythians at his back. 
Jason aids him, does prodigies of valour, and wins a glorious 
victory. Aeetes refuses the reward. This act of treachery 
justifies Jason in having recourse to Medea's magic arts and 
in employing her to avenge him on her father. In Apollonius 
we find a very different story. The sons of Phrixus, who, 
to escape the wrath of Aeetes, have thrown in their lot with 
the Argonauts, urge Jason to approach Medea ; they them- 
selves work upon the feelings of their mother, Chalciope, 
till she seeks her sister Medea already in love with Jason 
and only too ready to be persuaded and induces her to 
save her nephews, whose fate is bound up with that of the 
strangers. This incident is wholly absent from Valerius 
Flaccus, with the result that the loves of Jason and Medea 



tracts an incident related by A. E. g. Contraction: The launching of Argo, 
V. F. i. 184-91 ; A. B. i. 362-93. Expansion : The story of Lemnos 
V. ii. 72-427 ; A. i. 591-884 : here there is not much difference in length, 
but V. tells us much more. The visit to Cyzicus, V. iii. 1-361 ; A. i. 947- 
1064 : note also that in V. the purification of the Argonauts, 362-459, 
takes the place of the irrelevant founding of the temple of Bhea on Dindy- 
mus, A. i. 1103 sqq. The debate as to whether to abandon Hercules, who 
has gone in search of Hylas, V. iii. 598-714 ; in A. the Argonauts sail 
without noticing the absence of Hercules and Hylas, and the debate takes 
place at sea, A. i. 1273-1325. As a rule, however, V. is longer than A., 
partly owing to longer descriptions, partly owing to the greater compli- 
cation of the plot at Colchis. On the other hand, there is much imitation 
of A. Cp. V. F. i. 255 ; A. R. i. 553 ; V. F. iii. 565-97 ; A. i. 1261-72; 
V. F. iv. 733 ; A. ii. 774 ; V. F. v. 73-100 ; A. ii. 911-929. 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 185 

assume a somewhat different character. Jason's conduct 
becomes more natural and dignified. Medea, on the other 
hand, is shown in a less favourable light. In the Greek 
poet she has for excuse the desire to save her sister from 
the loss of her sons, which gives her half a right to love 
Jason. In the Latin epic she is without excuse, unless, 
indeed, the hackneyed supernatural machinery, 1 put in 
motion to win her for Jason, can be called an excuse. This 
crude employment of the supernatural leaves Valerius small 
room for the subtle psychological analysis wherein the 
Greek excels, and this, coupled with the love of the Silver 
Age for art magic, tends to make Medea as in Seneca 
a sorceress first, a woman after. In Apollonius she is bar- 
baric, unsophisticated, a child of nature ; in Valerius she 
is a figure of the stage, not without beauty and pathos, 
but essentially melodramatic. 

But Apollonius had concentrated all his powers upon 
Medea, and dwarfs all his other characters, Jason not 
excepted. It is Medea alone that holds our interests. The 
little company of heroes embarked on unsailed seas and 
beset with strange peril are scarcely more than a string of 
names, that drop in and out, as though the work were a 
ship's log rather than an epic. In Valerius, though he 
attempts no detailed portraiture, they are men who can at 
least fight and die. He has, in a word, a better general 
conception as to how the story should be told ; he is less 
perfunctory, and strives to fill in his canvas more evenly, 
whereas Apollonius, although by no means concise, leaves 
much of his canvas covered by sketches of the slightest 
and most insignificant character. In the Greek poem, though 
half the work is consumed in describing the voyage to 
Colchis, the first two books contain scarcely anything of 
real poetic interest, if we except the story of Phineus and 



1 In Apollonius the aid of Aphrodite and Eros is requisitioned to make 
Medea fall in love with Jason, but there is no further conventional super- 
natural interference. In Valerius, Juno (v. 350, vi. 456-660, vii. 153-90) 
kindles Medea's passion with Venus's aid. In vii. 190 sqq., Venus goes in 
person. 



186 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

the Harpies, a few splendid similes, and two or three descrip- 
tive passages, as brief as they are brilliant. In Valerius, 
on the contrary, there is abundance of stirring scenes and 
rich descriptive passages before the Argonauts reach their 
goal. His superiority is particularly noticeable at the outset 
of the poem. Apollonius plunges in medias res and fails to 
give an adequate account of the preliminaries of the expe- 
dition. He has no better method of introducing us to his 
heroes than by giving us a dreary catalogue of their names. 
Valerius, too, has his catalogue, but later ; we are not choked 
with indigestible and unpalatable fare at the very opening 
of the feast. And though both authors take five hundred 
lines to get their heroes under way, Valerius tells us far 
more and in far better language ; Apollonius does not find 
his stride till the second book, and forgets that it is neces- 
sary to interest the reader in his characters from the very 
beginning. 

But though in these respects Valerius has improved on 
his predecessor, and though his work lacks the arid wastes 
of his model, he is yet an author of an inferior class, and 
comes ill out of the comparison. For he has little of the 
rich, almost oriental, colouring of Apollonius at his best, 
lacks his fire and passion, and fails to cast the same glamour 
of romance about his subject. While the Dido and Aeneas 
of Vergil are in some respects but a pale reflection of the 
Medea and Jason of Apollonius, the loves of Jason and 
Medea in Valerius are fainter still. His heroine is not the 
tragic figure that stands out in lines of fire from the pages 
of Apollonius. His lovers' speeches have a certain beauty 
and tenderness of their own, but they lack the haunting 
melody and the resistless passion that make the Rhodian's 
lines immortal. . And while to a great extent he lacks the 
peculiar merits of the Greek, 1 he possesses his most serious 
blemish, the blemish that is so salient a characteristic of 
both Alexandrian and Silver Latin literature, the passion 



i 



As evidence for Apollonius' superiority cp. V. F. v. 329 sqq. ; A. R. iii. 
616 sq. ; V. F. vii. 1-25 ; A. R. iii. 771 sq. ; V. F v. 82-100 ; A. R. ii. 
911-21. 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 187 

for obscure learning. A good example is the huge, though 
most ingenious, catalogue of the tribes of Scythia at the 
opening of the sixth book, with its detailed inventory of 
strange names and customs, and its minute descriptions of 
barbaric armour. His love of learning lands him, moreover, 
in strange anachronisms. We are told that the Colchians 
are descended from Sesostris ; l the town of Arsinoe is spoken 
of as already in existence ; Egypt is already connected with 
the house of Lagus. 2 

In addition, Valerius possesses many of the faults from 
which Apollonius is free, but with which the post- Augustan 
age abounds. The dangerous influence of Seneca has, it is 
true, decayed ; we are no longer flooded with epigram or 
declamatory rhetoric. Rhetoric there is, and rhetoric that 
is not always effective ; 3 but it is rather a perversion of the 
rhetoric of Vergil than the descendant of the brilliant rant 
of Lucan and Seneca. From the gross lack of taste and 
humour that characterizes so many of his contemporaries he 
is comparatively free, though his description of the historic 
' crab ' caught by Hercules reaches the utmost limit of 

absurdity : 

laetus et ipse [1] 

Alcides : Quisnain hos vocat in certamina fluctus ? 
dixit, et, intortis adsurgens arduus undis, 
percussit subito deceptum fragmine pectus, 
atque in terga ruens Talaum fortemque Eribotem 
et longe tantae securum Amphiona molis 
obruit, inque tuo posuit caput, Iphite, transtro- (iii. 474-80.) 

[1] Alcides gladdened in his heart and cried : ' Who challenges these 
waves to combat ? ' and as he rose against those buffeting waves, sudden 
with broken oar he smote his baffled breast, and, falling headlong back, 
o'erthrows Talaus and brave Eribotes and far-off Amphion, that never 
feared so vast a bulk should fall on him, and laid his head against thy 
thwart, O Iphitus. 

1 v. 418. Cp. Apollon. iv. 272 ; Herod, ii. 103 ; Strab. xvi. 4. 4 ; Plin. 
N. H. xxxiii. 52. 

2 vi. 118. Cp. also v. 423: 

Arsinoen illi tepidaeque requirunt 
otia laeta Phari. 

3 Cp. vii. 35 sqq. 



188 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

This unheroic episode is a relic of the comic traditions 
associated with Hercules, traditions which obtrude them- 
selves from time to time in serious and even tragic surround- 
ings. 1 Apollonius describes the same incident 2 with the quiet 
humour that so strangely tinges the works of the pedants 
of Alexandria. Valerius, on the other hand, has lost touch 
with the broad comedy of these traditions, and his attempt 
to be humorous only succeeds in making him ridiculous. 3 

His worst fault, however, lies in his obscurity and pre- 
ciosity of diction. The error lies not so much in veiling 
simple facts under an epigram, as in a vain attempt to imitate 
the ' golden phrases ' of Vergil. The strange conglomeration 
of words with which Valerius so often vexes his readers 
resembles the ' chosen coin of fancy ' only as the formless 
designs of the coinage of Cunobelin resemble the exquisite 
staters of Macedon from which they trace their descent. It 
requires more than a casual glance to tell that (i. 411) 

it quern fama genus non est decepta Lyaei 
Phlias inmissus patrios de vertice crines 

means that Phlias was ' truly reported the son of Bacchus 
with streaming locks like to his sire's ' ; or that (vi. 553) 
Argus utrumque ab equis ingenti porrigit arvo 

signifies no more than that the victims of Argus covered 
a large space of ground when they fell. 4 How miserable is 
such a phrase compared with the KCITO /ze'ya? jUfyaAaxm 
of Homer ! And though there is less serious obscurity, 
nothing can be more awkward than the not infrequent inver- 
sion of the natural order of words that we find in phrases 
such as nee pereat quo scire malo (vii. 7). 5 

1 As, for instance, in the Alcestis of Euripides and Callimachus' Hymn 
to Artemis. 

2 A. R. i. 1167 8ri TOT' dvox\ia>v TfTprj^oros otS/xaros O\KOVS \ pfcraodtv 
a(i> fptTfiov' drop rpixpos XXo p.fv avrbs | OjU^Jco ^e/jair e^uiv 7Tre SOLIDS, 
n\Xo 8f TTOVTOS | K\V( TToXippodioKTi (j)po)v. ava 6' f(TO fiyi) [ irairTaij>uv' 
^fTpfff yap drjdeov ypffieovtrai. 

3 Cp. also V. F. iv. 682-5 ; viii. 453-7. 

For obscurity cp. also iii. 133-7, 336-7 ; vii. 55. 

5 Valerius is fond of such inversions, especially in the case of particles, 
pronouns, &c. ; cp. v. 187 iuxta ; ii. 150 sed ; vi. 452 quippe; vi. 543 sed. 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 189 

Of mere preciosity and phrase-making without any 
special obscurity examples abound. 1 Pelion sinks below 
the horizon (ii. 6) 

iamque fretis summas aequatum Pelion ornos. 

A fight at close quarters receives the following curious 
description (ii. 524) 

iam brevis et telo volucri non utilis aer. 

A spear flying through the air and missing its mark is a volnus 
raptum per auras (iii. 196). More startling than these is the 
picture of a charge of trousered barbarians (vi. 702) 
improba barbaricae procurrunt tegmina plantae. 

One more peculiarity remains to be noticed. Here and 
there in the Argonautica we meet with a strange brevity 
and compression resulting not from the desire to produce 
phrases of curious and original texture, but rather from a 
praiseworthy though misdirected endeavour to be concise. 
The most remarkable example is found in the first book, 
where Mopsus, the official prophet of the expedition, falls 
into a trance and beholds a vision of the future (211) : 

heu quaenam aspicio ! nostris modo concitus ausis [1] 
aequoreos vocat ecce deos Neptunus et ingens 
concilium, fremere et legem defendere cuncti 
hortantur. sic amplexu, sic pectora fratris, 
luno, tene ; tuque o puppem ne desere, Pallas : 
nunc patrui nunc flecte minas. cessere ratemque 
accepere mari. per quot discrimina rerum 
expedior ! subita cur pulcher harundine crines 
velat Hylas ? unde urna umeris niueosque per artus 
caeruleae vestes ? unde haec tibi volnera, Pollux ? 



[1] Alas ! what do I see ! Even now, stirred by our daring, lo ! Neptune 
calls the gods to a vast conclave. They murmur, and one and all urge him 
to defend his rights. Hold as thou boldest now, Juno, hold thy brother hi 
thine embrace : and thou, Pallas, forsake not our ship : now, even now, ap- 
pease thy brother's threats. They have yielded: they give Argo entrance to 
the sea. Through what perils am I whirled along ! Why does fan 1 Hylas veil 
his locks with a sudden crown of reeds ? Whence comes the pitcher on hia 
shoulder and the azure raiment on his limbs of snow ? Whence, Pollux, 



Cp. i. 436-8 ; ii. 90 ; iii. 434 ; vi. 183, 260-4, 



190 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

quantus io tumidis taurorum e naribus ignis ! 
tollunt se galeae sulcisque ex omnibus hastae 
et iam iamque umeri. quern circum vellera Martem 
aspicio ? quaenam aligeris secat anguibus auras 
caede madens ? quos ense ferit ? miser eripe parvos, 
Aesonide. cerno et thalamos ardere iugales. 

These lines form a kind of abridgement or precis of the 
whole Argonautica, or even more, for we can hardly believe 
that the scheme of it included the murder of Medea's children 
and her vengeance on the house of Creon. 1 They are also 
far too obscure to be interesting to any save a highly-trained 
literary audience, while their extreme compression could 
only be justified by their having been primarily designed for 
recitation in a dramatic and realistic manner with suitable 
pauses between the different visions. 2 A yet worse and less 
excusable example of this peculiar brevity is the jerky and 
prosaic enumeration of Medea's achievements in the black 
art (vi. 442) 

mutat agros fluviumque vias ; suus alligat ingens [1] 

cuncta sopor, recoquit fessos aetate parentes, 
datque alias sine lege colus. 

The attempt to be concise and full 3 at one and the same 
time fails, and fails inevitably. 

But for all these faults Valerius Flaccus offends less than 
any of the Silver Latin writers of epic. He rants less and 
he exaggerates less ; above all, he has much genuine poetic 

come these wounds of thine ? Ah ! what a flame streams from the wide- 
spread nostrils of the bulls. Helmets and spears rise from every furrow, 
and now see ! shoulders too ! What warfare for the fleece do I see ? Who 
is it cleaves the air with winged snakes, reeking with slaughter ? Whom 
smites she with the sword ? Ah ! son of Aeson, hapless man, save thy 
little ones. I see, too, the bridal chamber all aflame. 

[1] She changes crops of fields and course of rivers. [At her bidding] 
deep clinging slumber binds all things ; fathers outworn with age she seethes 
to youth again, and to others she gives new span of life against fate's 
ordinance. 



1 See p. 183. 

2 The passage may conceivably be only a rough draft, cp p. 197 note, 

3 Cp. also i. 130-48, 251-4. 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 191 

merit. He has been strangely neglected, both in ancient l and 
modern times, and unduly depreciated in the latter. There 
has been a tendency to rank him with Silius Italicus, whereas 
it would be truer criticism to place him close to Statius, and 
not far below Lucan. He is more uneven than the former, 
has a far less certain touch, and infinitely less command of 
his instrument. He has less mastery of words, but a more 
kindling and penetrating imagination. His outlines are less 
clear, but more suggestive. He has less rhetoric ; beneath 
an often obscure diction he reveals a greater simplicity and 
directness of thought, and he has been infinitely more happy 
in his theme. Only the greatest of poets could achieve a 
genuine success with the Theban legend, only the worst of 
poets could reduce the voyage of t"he Argonauts to real 
dullness. On the other hand, in an age of belles-lettres such 
as the Silver Age, and by the majority of scholars, whose 
very calling leads them to set a perhaps abnormally high 
value on technical skill, Statius is almost certain to be pre- 
ferred to Valerius. About the relative position of Lucan 
there is no doubt. He is incomparably the superior of 
Valerius, both in genius and intellect. But Valerius never 
sins against taste and reason to the same extent, and though 
he has less fire, possesses a finer ear for music and rhythm, 
and more poetic feeling as distinct from rhetoric. Vergil was 
his master ; it has been said with a little exaggeration that 
Valerius stands in the same relation to Vergil as Persius to 
Horace. This statement conveys but a half-truth. Valerius 
is as superior to Persius in technique as he is inferior in 
moral force and intellectual power. He is, however, full of 
echoes from Vergil, 2 and if his verse has neither the ' ocean 



1 There is little evidence that he had any influence on posterity, though 
there may be traces of such influence in Hyginus and the Orphic Argo- 
nautica. Of contemporaries Statius and Silius seem to have read him and 
at times to imitate him. See Summers, pp. 8, 9. Blass, however ( J. /. Phil, 
und Pad. 109, 471 sqq.), holds that Valerius imitates Statius. 

2 Cp. V. F. i. 833 sqq. ; Aen. vi. 893, 660 sqq., 638 sqq. ; V. F. i. 323 ; 
A. viii. 560 sqq. ; V. F. vi. 331 ; A. ix. 595 sqq. ; V. F. iii. 136 ; A. xii. 
300 sqq. ; V. F. viii. 358 ; A. x. 305 ; V. F. vi. 374 ; A. xi. 803. See 
Summers, pp. 30-3. His echoes from Vergil are perhaps more obvious 



192 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

roll ' of the greater poets, nor the same tenderness, he yet 
has something of the true Vergilian glamour. But he has 
weakened his hexameter by succumbing to the powerful 
influence of Ovid. His verse is polished and neat to the 
verge of weakness. Like Ovid, he shows a preference for the 
dactyl over the spondee, shrinks from elision, and does not 
understand how to vary his pauses. 1 Too many lines close 
with a full-stop or colon, and where the line is broken, the 
same pause often recurs again and again with wearisome 
monotony. In this respect Valerius, though never mono- 
tonously ponderous like Lucan, compares ill with Statius. 
As a compensation, his individual lines have a force and 
beauty that is comparatively rare in the Thebais. The poet 
who could describe a sea-cave thus (iv. 179) 

non quae dona die, non quae trahat aetlieris ignem ; [1] 
infelix domus et sonitu tremibunda profundi, 

is not to be despised as a master of metre. And whether 
for picturesqueness of expression or for beauty of sound, 
lines such as (iii. 596) 

rursus Hylan et rursus Hylan per longa reclamat [2] 

avia ; responsant silvae et vaga certat imago, 

or (i. 291) 

quis tibi, Phrixe, dolor, rapido cum concitus aestu [3] 

respiceres miserae clamantia virginis ora 
extremasque manus sparsosque per aequora crines ! 

[1] That receiveth never daylight's gifts nor the h'ght of the heavenly 
fires, the home of gloom all a-tremble with the sound of the deep. 
[2] ' Hylas', and again ' Hylas ', he calls through the long wilderness; 
the woods reply, and wandering echo mocks his voice. 

[3] Phrixus, what grief was thine when, swept along by the swirling 
tide, thou lookedst back on the hapless maiden's face as she cried for 
thine aid, her sinking hands, her hair streaming o'er the deep. 

in some respects than similar echoes in Statius, owing to the fact that he 
had a more Vergilian imagination than Statius, and lacked the extreme 
dexterity of style to disguise his pilferings. But in his general treatment 
of his theme he shows far greater originality ; this is perhaps due to the 
fact that the Argonaut saga is not capable of being ' Aeneidized ' to the 
same extent as the Theban legend. But let Valerius have his due. He is 
in the main unoriginal in diction, Statius in composition. 
1 Cp. Summers, p. 49, See also note, p. 123. 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 193 

are not easily surpassed outside the pages of Vergil. But 
it is above all on his descriptive power that his claim to con- 
sideration rests. 1 For it is there that he finds play for his 
most remarkable gifts, his power of suggestion of mystery, 
and his keen sense of colour. These gifts find their most 
striking manifestation in his description of the Argonauts' 
first night upon the waters. They 

were the first that ever burst 
Into that silent sea. 

All is strange to them. Each sight and sound has its 
element of terror : 

auxerat hora metus, iam se vertentis Olympi [1] 

ut faciem raptosque simul montesque locosque 

ex oculis circumque graves videre tenebras. 

ipsa quies rerum mundique silentia terrent 

astraque et effusis stellatus crinibus aether. 

ac velut ignota captus regione viarum 

noctivagum qui carpit iter non aure quiescit, 

non oculis, noctisque metus niger auget utrimque 

campus et occurrens umbris maioribus arbor, 

baud aliter trepidare viri (ii. 38). 

There are few more vivid pictures in Latin poetry than 
that of the benighted wanderer lost on some wide plain 
studded with clumps of trees that seem to throng upon him 
in the gloom, seen greater through the darkness. Not less 
imaginative, though less clear cut and precise, is his picture 
of the underworld in the third book : 



[1] The dark hour deepened their fears when they saw heaven's vault 
wheel round, and the peaks and fields of earth snatched from their view, 
and all about them the horror of darkness. The very stillness of things and 
the deep silence of the world affright them, the stars and heaven begemmed 
with streaming locks of gold. And as one benighted in a strange place 'mid 
paths unknown pursues his devious journey through the night and finds rest 
neither for eye nor ear, but all about him the blackness of the plain, and 
the trees that throng upon him seen greater through the gloom, deepen 
his terror of the dark even so the heroes trembled. 



1 Cp. beside the passages quoted below iii. 558 sqq., 724, 5 ; iv. 16-50, 
230, 1 ; v. 10-12 ; vii. 371-510, 610, 648-53. 

BUTLER Q 



194 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

est procul ad Stygiae devexa silentia noctis [1] 

Cimmerium domus et superis incognita tellus, 

caeruleo tenebrosa situ, quo flammea numquam 

Sol iuga sidereos nee mittit luppiter annos. 

stant tacitae frondes inmotaque silva comanti 

horret Averna iugo ; specus umbrarumque meatus 

subter et Oceani praeceps fragor arvaque nigro 

vasta metu et subitae post longa silentia voces (iii. 398). 

It is a more theatrical underworld than that of Vergil, and 
the picture is not clearly conceived, but its very vagueness 
is impressive. The poet gives us, as it were, the scene for 
the enactment of some dim dream of terror. He is equally 
at home in describing the happy calm of Elysium. Though 
the picture lacks originality, it has no lack of beauty : 

hie geminae infernum portae, quarum altera dura [2] 

semper lege patens populos regesque receptat ; 

ast aliam temptare nefas et tendere contra ; 

rara et sponte patet, siquando pectore ductor 

volnera nota gerens, galeis praefixa rotisque 

cui domus aut studium mortales pellere curas, 

culta fides, longe metus atque ignota cupido ; 

seu venit in vittis castaque in veste sacerdos. 

quos omnes lenis plantis et lampada quassans 

progenies Atlantis agit. lucet via late 



[1] Far hence by the deep sunken silence of the Stygian night lies the 
Cimmerians' home, a land unknown to denizens of upper air, all dark with 
gloomy squalor. Thither the sun hath never driven his flaming car nor 
Jupiter sent forth his starry seasons. Silent are the leaves of its groves, 
and all along its leafy hill bristles unmoved Averaus' wood: thereunder 
are caverns, and the shades go to and fro ; there Ocean plunges roaring 
to its fall, there are plains with dark fear desolate, and after long 
silences sudden voices thunder out. 

[2] Here lie the twin gates of Hell, whereof the one is ever open by stern 
fate's decree, and through it march the peoples and princes of the world. 
But the other may none essay nor beat against its bars. Rarely it opens 
and untouched by hand, if e'er a chieftain comes with glorious wounds 
upon his breast, whose halls were decked with helm and chariots, or 
who strove to cast out the woes of mankind, who honoured truth and bade 
farewell to fear and knew no base ambition. Then, too, it opens when 
some priest comes wearing sacred wreath and spotless robe. All such the 
child of Atlas leads along with gentle tread and waving torch. Far shines 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 195 

igne dei, donee silvas et amoena piorum 
deveniant camposque, ubi sol totumque per annum 
durat aprica dies thiasique cnorique virorum 
carminaque et quorum populis iam nulla cupido (i. 833). 

Many lines might be quoted that startle us with their 
unforeseen vividness or some unexpected blaze of colour ; 
when the fleece of gold is taken from the tree where it had 
long since shone like a beacon through the dark, the tree 
sinks back into the melancholy night, 

tristesque super coiere tenebrae (viii. 120). 

At their bridal on the desolate Isle of Peuce under the 
shadow of approaching peril, Jason and Medea gleam star- 
like amid the company of heroes (viii. 257) : 

ipsi inter medios rosea radiante iuventa [1] 

altius inque sui sternuntur velleris auro. 

This characteristic is most evident in the similes over 
which Valerius, like other poets of the age, would seem to 
have expended particular labour. He scatters them over 
his pages with too prodigal a hand, and they suffer at times 
from over-elaboration and ingenuity. 1 Desire for originality 
has led him to such startling comparisons as that between a 
warrior drawn from his horse and a bird snared by the limed 
twig of the fowler, 2 surely as inappropriate a simile as was 



the road with the fire of the god until they come to the groves and plains, 
the pleasant mansions of the blest, where the sun ceases not, nor the warm 
daylight all the year long, nor dancing companies of heroes, nor song, 
nor all the innocent joys that the peoples of the earth desire no more. 

[1] Themselves in their comrades' midst, bright with the rosy glow of 
youth, above them all, lie on the fleece of gold that they had made their 



1 One is tempted at times to account for the profusion and lack of 
spontaneity of similes in poets of this age by the supposition that they 
kept commonplace books of similes and inserted them as they thought fit. 

2 vi. 260 : 

qualem populeae fidentem nexibus umbrae 
siquis avem summi deducat ab acre rami, 
ante manu tacita cui plurima crevit harundo ; 
ilia dolis viscoque super correpta sequaci 
inplorat ramos atque inrita concitat alas. 

O 2 



196 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

ever framed. More distressing still is the maudlin pathos of 
the simile which likens Medea to a dog on the verge of mad- 
ness. 1 But such gross aberrations are rare ; against them 
may be set some of the freshest and most beautiful similes 
in the whole range of Latin poetry. The silence that follows 
on the wailing of the women of Cyzicus is like the silence of 
Egypt when the birds that wintered there have flown to 
more temperate lands. ' And now they had paid due 
honour to their ashes ; with weary feet, wives with their 
babes wandered away and the waves had rest, the waves 
long torn by their wakeful lamentation, even as when the 
birds in mid-spring have returned to the north that is their 
home, and Memphis and their yearly haunt by sunny Nile 
are dumb once more ' 

qualiter Arctos 

ad patrias avibus medio iam vere revectis 
Memphis et aprici static silet annua Nili (iii. 358). 

The beauty of Medea among her Scythian maidens is likened 
to that of Proserpine leading her comrades over Hymettus' 
hill or wandering with Pallas and Diana in the Sicilian 
mountains 

altior ac nulla comitum certante, prius quam [1] 

palluit et viso pulsus decor omnis Averno (v. 346). 

The relief of the Argonauts, when at last they reach haven 
after their fearful passage of the Symplegades, is like that of 
Theseus and Hercules, when they have forced a way through 
the gates of hell to the light of day once more. 2 Most 
remarkable of all is the strange accumulation of similes that 

[1] Taller than all her comrades and fairer than them all or ever she 
turned pale, and at the sight of Hell all beauty was banished from her face. 



1 vii. 124 : 

sic adsueta toris et mensae dulcis erili, 
aegra nova iam peste canis rabieque futura, 
ante fugam totos lustrat queribunda penates. 

2 iv. 699 : 

discussa quales formidine Averni 
Alcides Theseusque comes pallentia iungunt 
oscula vix primas amplexi luminis oras. 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 197 

describe the meeting of Jason and Medea. Medea is going 
through the silent night chanting a song of magic, whereat all 
nature trembles. At last, when she has come ' to the shadowy 
place of the triune goddess ', Jason shines forth before her 
in the gloom, ' as when in deepest night panic bursts on herd 
and herdsman, or shades meet blind and voiceless in the 
deep of Chaos ; even so, in the darkness of the night and of 
the grove, the two met astonied, like silent pines or motion- 
less cypress, ere yet the whirling breath of the south wind 
has caught and mingled their boughs ' l 

obvius ut sera cum se sub nocte magistris 

inpingit pecorique pavor, qualesve profundura 

per chaos occurrunt caecae sine vocibus umbrae ; 

-haut secus in mediis noctis nemorisque tenebris 

inciderant ambo attoniti iuxtaque subibant, 

abietibus tacitis aut immotis cyparissis 

adsimiles, rapidus nondum quas miscuit Auster (vii. 400). 

These similes suffer from sheer accumulation. 2 Taken 
individually they are worthy of many a greater poet. 

In his speeches Valerius is less successful, though rarely 
positively bad. But with few exceptions they lack force 
and interest. At times, however, his rhetoric is effective, as 
in the speech of Mopsus (iii. 377), where he sets forth the 
punishment of blood-guiltiness, or in the fierce invective in 
which the Scythian, Gesander, taunts a Greek warrior with 
the inferiority of the Greek race (vi. 323 sqq.). This latter 

1 This yimilc ia a free translation from Apollonius, iii. 966 rw 8' 
iii-p KOI avavboi ((peoTacrav dXXijXotcrti', | T) Spti<7tV, fj ftaKpfjaiv (fi.86p.evoi 
(\a.Tri<TtVt I at re Trapacrcrov fKr)\oi eV ovpftrtv fppifavrat, | vrjvtfjiiT)' fiera 8' avris 
viro pnrr)s dve/Jioio Kii^vfJLtvai 6(iu8r](rav dirtipirov' Sts apn rwye | /ueXXof aXty 
<pdfya<r6at vno nvotfjaiv"Epoi)Tns. Valerius has compressed the last three 
lines into rapidus nondum quas miscuit Auster. The effective miscuit 
conveys nearly as much as the longer and not less beautiful version in 
the Greek. 

2 This accumulation is probably due to the lack of revision, obvius . . . 
pavor fits the context ill and is curiously reminiscent of 1. 392 ('iam stabulis 
gregibusque pavor strepitusque sepulcris inciderat'), while 11. 400-2 would 
probably have been considerably altered had the poem undergone its final 
correction. There are other indications of the unfinished character of the 
work to be found in this passage (p. 181, note). 



198 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

speech is closely modelled on Vergil (A. ix. 595 sqq.), and 
although it is somewhat out of place in the midst of a battle, 
is not wholly unworthy of its greater model. But it is to 
the speeches of Jason and Medea that we naturally turn to 
form the estimate of the poet's mastery of the language of 
passion. These speeches serve to show us how far he falls 
below Vergil (A. iv) and Apollonius (bk. iii). They offer 
a noble field for his powers, and it cannot be said that he 
rises to the full height of the occasion. On the other hand, 
he does not actually fail. There is a note of deep and 
moving appeal in all that Medea says as she gradually 
yields to the power of her passion, and the thought of her 
father and her home fades slowly from her mind. 

[1] "'Why,'" she cries (vii. 438), '"why, I beseech thee, 
Thessalian, earnest thou ever to this land of ours ? Whence 
hadst thou any hope of me ? And why didst thou seek these 
toils with faith in aught save thine own valour ? Surely hadst 
thou perished, had I feared to leave my father's halls aye, 
and so surely had I shared thy cruel doom. Where now is 
thy helper Juno, where now thy Tritonian maid, since I, the 
queen of an alien house, have come to help thee in thy need ? 
Aye, even thyself thou marvellest, methinks, nor any more 
does this grove know me for Aeetes' daughter. Nay, 'twas 
thy cruel fate overcame me ; take now, poor suppliant, these 
my gifts, and, if e'er again Pelias seek to destroy thee and 
send thee forth to other cities, ah ! put not too fond trust 
in thy beauty! " Yet again, before she puts the saving 

[1] quid, precor, in nostras venisti, Thessale, terras ? 
unde mei spes ulla tibi ? tantosque petisti 
cur non ipse tua fretus virtute labores ? 
nempe, ego si patriis timuissem excedere tectis, 
occideras ; nempe hanc animam sors saeva manebat 
funeris. en ubi luno, ubi nunc Tritonia virgo, 
sola tibi quoniam tantis in casibus adsum 
externae regina domus ? miraris et ipse, 
credo, nee agnoscunt hae nunc Aeetida silvae. 
sed fatis sum victa tuis ; cape munera supplex 
nunc mea ; teque iterum Pelias si perdere quaeret, 
inque alios casus alias si mittet ad urbes, 
heu formae ne crede tuae. 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 199 

charms into his hands, she appeals to him (452) : [1] ' " If 
thou hast any hope of safety from these goddesses, that are 
thine helpers, or if perchance thine own valour can snatch thee 
from the jaws of death, even now, I pray thee, stranger, let 
me be, and send me back guiltless to my unhappy sire." 
She spake, and straightway for now the stars outworn sank 
to their setting, and Bootes in the furthest height of heaven 
had turned him towards his rest straightway she gave the 
charms to the young hero with wailing and with lamentation, 
as though therewith she cast away her country and her own 
fair fame and honour.' And then, 'when her guilt was 
accomplished and the blush of shame had passed from her 
face for evermore,' she saw as in a vision (474) ' the Minyae 
spreading their sails for flight without her. Then in truth 
bitter anguish laid hold of her spirit, and she grasped the 
right hand of the son of Aeson and humbly spake : " Remem- 
ber me, I pray, for I, believe me. shall forget thee never. 
When thou art hence, where on all the vault of heaven shall 
I bear to gaze ? Ah ! do thou too, where'er thou art, through 
all the years ne'er let the thought of me slip from thy heart. 
Remember how thou stood'st to-day, tell of the gifts I gave, 



[1] si tamen aut superis aliquam spem ponis in istis, 
aut tua praesenti virtus educere leto 
si te forte potest, etiam nunc deprecor, hospes, 
me sine, et insontem misero dimitte parenti. 
dixerat ; extemploque (etenim matura ruebant 
eidera, et extremum se flexerat axe Booten) 
cum gemitu et multo iuveni medicamina fletu 
non secus ac patriam pariter famamque decusque 
obicit. ille manu subit, et vim conripit omnem. 

inde ubi facta nocens, et non revocabilis umquam 
cessit ab ore pudor, ...... 

pandentes Minyas iam vela videbat 
se sine, turn vero extreme percussa dolore 
adripit Aesoniden dextra ac submissa profatur : 
sis memor, oro, mei, contra memor ipsa manebo, 
crede, tui. quando hinc aberis, die quaeso, profundi 
quod caeli spectabo latus ? sed te quoque tangat 
cura mei quocumque loco, quoscumque per annos ; 
atque huno te meminisse velis, et nostra fateri 



200 VALERIUS FLACCUS VIII 

and feel no shame that thou wast saved by a maiden's 
guile. Alas ! why stream no tears from thine eyes ? Knowest 
thou not that the death I have deserved waits me at my 
father's hand ? For thee there waits a happy realm among 
thine own folk, for thee wife and child ; but I must perish 
deserted and betrayed." ' l 

All this lacks the force and passion of the corresponding 
scene in Apollonius. This Medea could never have cried, 
' I am no Greek princess, gentle-souled,' 2 nor have prayed 
that a voice from far away or a warning bird might reach 
him in lolcus on the day when he forgot her, or that the 
stormwind might bear her with reproaches in her eyes to 
stand by his hearth-stone and chide him for his forgetfulness 
and ingratitude. The Medea of Apollonius has been softened 
and sentimentalized by the Roman poet. Valerius knows 
no device to clothe her with power, save by the narration 
of her magic arts (vii. 463-71 ; viii. 68-91). Yet she has 
a charm of her own ; and it needed true poetic feeling to 
draw even the Medea of Valerius Flaccus. 

In no age would Valerius have been a great poet, but 
under happier circumstances he would have produced work 
that would have ranked high among literary epics. As it is, 
there is no immeasurable distance between the Argonautica 
and works such as the Gerusalemme liber ata, or much of The, 
Idylls of the King. He is a genuine poet whose genius was 

munera ; servatum pudeat nee virginis arte. 
hei mihi, cur nulli stringunt tua lumina fletus ? 
an me mox merita morituram patris ab ira 
dissimulas ? te regna tuae felicia gentis, 
te coniunx natique manent ; ego prodita obibo. 



1 Cp. also viii. 10, where Medea bids farewell to her home. '0 my 
father, would thou mightest give me now thy last embrace, as I fly to 
exile, and mightest behold these my tears. Believe me, father, I love not 
him I follow more than thee : would that the stormy deep might whelm 
us both. And mayest thou long hold thy realm, grown old in peace and 
safety, and mayest thou find thy children that remain more dutiful 
than me.' 

2 Ap. Rh. iii. 1105 sqq. ; cp. also Murray on Apollonius in his History 
of Greek Literature, p. 382. 



VIII VALERIUS FLACCUS 201 

warped by the spirit of the age, stunted by the inherent 
difficulties besetting the Roman writer of epic, overweighted 
by his admiration of his two great predecessors, Ovid and 
Vergil. He is obscure, he is full of echoes, he staggers 
beneath a burden of useless learning, he overcrowds his 
canvas and strives in vain to put the breath of life into bones 
long dry; in addition, his epic suffers from the lack of the 
reviser's hand. And yet, in spite of all, his characters are 
sometimes more than lay-figures, and his scenes more than 
mere stage-painting. He has the divine fire, and it does not 
always burn dim. Others have greater cunning of hand, 
greater force of intellect, and have won a higher place in the 
hierarchy of poets. He though, like them, he lacks the 
' fine madness that truly should possess a poet's brain ' yet 
gives us much that they cannot give, and sees much that 
they cannot see. With Quintilian, though with altered 
meaning, we too may say multum in Valeria Flacco amisimus. 



CHAPTER IX 
STATIUS 

OUR information as to the life of P. Papinius Statius is 
drawn almost exclusively from his minor poems entitled the 
Silvae. He was born at Naples, his father was a native of 
Velia, came of good family, 1 and by profession was poet and 
schoolmaster. The father's school was at Naples, 2 and, if 
we may trust his son, was thronged with pupils from the 
whole of Southern Italy. 3 He had been victorious in many 
poetic contests both in Naples and in Greece. 4 He had 
written a poem on the burning of the Capitol in 69 A. D., had 
planned another on the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 A. D., but 
apparently died with the work unfinished. 5 It was to his 
father that our poet attributed all his success as a poet. 
It was to him he owed both education and inspiration, as the 
Epicedion in patrem bears pathetic witness (v. 3. 213) : 

sed decus hoc quodcumque lyrae primusque dedisti [1] 
non volgare loqui et famam sperare sepulcro. 

The Thebais was directly due to his prompting (loc. cit., 233): 

te nostra magistro [2] 

Thebais urgebat priscorum exordia vatum ; 
tu cantus stimulate meos, tu pandere facta 
heroum bellique modos positusque locorum 
monstrabas. 



[1] Thou wert the first to give this glory, whate'er it be, that my lyre 
hath won ; thine was the gift of noble speech and the hope that my tomb 
should be famous. 

[2] At thy instruction my Thebais trod the steps of elder bards; thou 
taughtest me to fire my song, thou taughtest me to set forth the deeds 
of heroes and the ways of war and the position of places. 



1 SUv. v. 3. 116 sqq. 

2 Ib. 146 sqq. 3 jb. 163. 4 ib. 141. 

5 Ib. 195-208. This passage suggests that the elder Statius died soon 
after 79 A. D. On the other hand, he probably lived some years longer 



IX STATIUS 203 

The poet-father lived long enough to witness his son well 
on the way to established fame. He had won the prize for 
poetry awarded by his native town, the crown fashioned of 
ears of corn, chief honour of the Neapolitan Augustalia. 1 
Early in the reign of Domitian he had received a high price 
from the actor Paris for his libretto on the subject of Agave, 2 
and he had already won renown by his recitations at Rome, 3 
recitations in all probability of portions of the Thebais 4 
which he had commenced in 80 A. D. 5 But it was not till 
after his father's death that he reached the height of his 
fame by his victory in the annual contest instituted by 
Domitian at his Alban palace, 5 and by the completion and 
final publication in 92 A. D. of his masterpiece, the Thebais. 6 
This poem was the outcome of twelve years' patient labour, 
and it was on this that he based his claim to immortality. 6 
He had now made himself a secure position as the foremost 
poet of his age. His failure to win the prize at the quin- 
quennial Agon Capitolinus in 94 A. D. caused him keen morti- 
fication, but was in no way a set-back to his career. 7 By 
this time he had already begun the publication of his Silvae. 
The first book was published not earlier than 92 A. D., 8 the 
second and third between that date and 95 A. D. The fourth 
appeared in 95 A.D., 8 the fifth is unfinished. There is no 



as the Thebais, inspired and directed by him, was not begun till 
80 A.D. He must, however, have died before 89 A.D., the earliest date 
assignable to Statius' victory at the Alban contest. 

1 Silv. v. 3. 225. 

2 Juv. vii. 86. Paris had fallen from imperial favour by 83 A.D. 
Dio. Ixvii. 3. 1. 

3 Silv. v. 3. 215. 4 Juv. vii. 82. 

5 Silv. v. 3. 227. The subject of his prize recitation was the triumph 
of Domitian over the Germans and Dacians ; i. e. after 89 A. D. 

6 Praef. Silv. i. ' pro Thebaide quamvis me reliquerit timeo.' The first 
book of the Silvae was published in 92 A. D. For the time taken for its 
composition and the poet's anticipations of immortality see Th. xii. 811 sqq. 

7 Silv. iii. 5. 28, v. 3. 232. The Agon Capitolinus was instituted in 
86 A. D. The contests falling in Statius' lifetime are those of 86, 90, 94 A. D. 
As his failure is always mentioned after the Alban victory, 94 A. D. would 
seem the most probable date. 

8 Rut Hi us Gallic us had just died when the first book was published ; 



204 STATIUS IX 

allusion to any date later than 95 A.D., no indication that the 
poet survived Domitian (d. 96 A. D.). These facts, together 
with the fragmentary state of his ambitious Achilleis, begun 
in 95 A.D., 1 point to Statius having died in that year, or at 
least early in 96 A. D. He left behind him, beside the works 
already mentioned, a poem on the wars of Domitian in 
Germany, 2 and a letter to one Maximus Vibius, which may 
have served as a preface to the Thebais? He had spent the 
greater portion of his life either at Rome, Naples, or in the 
Alban villa given him by Domitian. In his latter years he 
seems to have resided almost entirely at Rome, though he 
must have paid not infrequent visits to the Bay of Naples. 4 
But in 94 A. D., whether through failing health or through 
chagrin at his defeat in the Capitoline contest, he retired 
to his native town. 5 He had married a widow named 
Claudia, 6 but the union was childless ; towards the end of 
his life he adopted the infant son of one of his slaves, 7 and 
the child's premature death affected him as bitterly as 
though it had been his own son that died. Of his age we 
know little ; but in the Silvae there are allusions to the 



cp. Praef., bk. i. This took place in 92 A. D. ; cp. C. 7. L. v. 6988, vi. 1984. 
8. Silv. iv. 1 celebrates Domitian's seventeenth consulate (95 A. D.). 

1 Such at least is a legitimate inference from the fact that it is not 
mentioned before the fourth and fifth books of the Silvae ; cp. iv. 4. 94, 
iv. 7. 23, v. 2. 163. 

2 Written probably in 95 A.D. Statius promises such a work in 
Silv. iv. 4. 95. Four lines are quoted from it in G. Valla's scholia on 
Juv. iv. 94: 

lumina : Nestorei mitis prudentia Crispi 
et Pabius Veiento (potentem signat utrumque 
purpura, ter memores implerunt nomine fastos), 
et prope Caesareae confinis Acilius aulae. 

3 Praef. Silv. iv ' Maximum Vibium et dignitatis et eloquentiae nomine 
a nobis diligi satis eram testatus epistula quam ad ilium de editione 
Thebaidos meae publicavi.' 

4 Witness poems such as the Villa Surrentina Pollii. Silv. ii. 2. 3, 1. 

5 Silv. iii. 5. 13. 

6 Praef. Silv. iii. and iii. 5. He was married soon after beginning the 
Thebais, i. e. about 82 A. D. (cp. S. iii. 5. 35). Claudia had a daughter by 
her first husband, iii. 5. 52-4. 

7 v. 5. 72-5. 



IX STATIUS 205 

approach of old age and the decline of his physical powers. 1 
He can scarcely have been born later than 45 A.D., and may 
well have been born considerably earlier. His life, as far 
as we can judge, was placid and uneventful. The position 
of his father seems to have saved him from a miserable 
struggle for his livelihood, such as vexed the soul of Martial. 2 
There is nothing venal about his verse. If his flattery of 
the emperor is fulsome almost beyond belief, he hardly 
overstepped the limits of the path dictated by policy and 
the custom of the age ; his conduct argues weakness rather 
than any deep moral taint. In his flattery towards his 
friends and patrons his tone is, at its worst, rather that of 
a social inferior than of a mere dependent. 3 And under- 
lying all the preciosity and exaggeration of his praises and 
his consolations, there is a genuine warmth of affection that 
argues an amiable character. And this warmth of feeling 
becomes unmistakable in the epicedia on his father and his 
adopted son, and again in the poem addressed to his wife. 
The feeling is genuine, in spite of the suggestion of insincerity 



1 iii. 5. 13, iv. 4. 69, v. 2. 158. It is worth noting how late in life all his 
best work was done, i. e. 80-95 A. D. 

2 The well-known passage of Juvenal, vii. 86 ('cum fregit subsellia versu, | 
esurit, intactam Paridi nisi vendit Agaven '), as has been pointed out, is 
only Juvenal's exaggerated way of saying that the Thebais brought Statius 
no material gain. The family was not, however, rolling in wealth ; cp. 
v. 3. 116 sqq. 

3 His friendships do not throw much light on his life, though they show 
that he moved in high circles. Rutilius Gallicus (i. 4) had had a distin- 
guished career and rose to be praefectus urbis ; Claudius Etruscus (i. 5), 
originally a slave from Smyrna, had risen to the imperial post a rationibus ; 
Abascantus (v. 1) held the office known as ab epistulis; Plotius Grypus 
(iv. 9) came of senatorial family ; Crispinus (v. 2) was the son of Vettius 
Bolanus, Governor of Britain and afterwards of Asia ; Vibius Maximus 
(iv. 7) became praefect of Egypt under Trajan ; Polla Argentaria (ii. 7) was 
the widow of Lucan ; Arruntius Stella (i. 2) was a poet, and rose to the 
consulship. Most of these persons must have been possessed of strong 
literary tastes. Some are mentioned by Martial, e.g. Stella, Claudius 
Etruscus, Polla Argentaria. Atedius Melior and Novius Vindex were also 
friends of the two poets. Both must have moved in the same circles, yet 
neither ever mentions the other. They were probably jealous of one 
another and on bad terms. 



206 STATIUS IX 

created by the artificiality of his language. No less note- 
worthy is his enthusiasm for the beauties of his birthplace, 
which shines clear through all the obscure legends beneath 
which he buries his topography. 1 These qualities, if any, 
must be set against his lack of intellectual power ; his mind 
is nimble and active, but never strong either in thought or 
emotion : of sentiment he has abundance, of passion none. 
Considering the corruption of the society of which he consti- 
tuted himself the poet, and of which there are not a few 
glimpses in the Silvae, despite the tinselled veil that is thrown 
over it, the impression of Statius the man is not unpleasing : 
it is not necessary to claim that it is inspiring. 

Of Statius the poet it is harder to form a clear judgement. 
His masterpiece, the Thebais, from the day of its publication 
down to comparatively recent times, possessed an immense 
reputation. 2 Dante seems to regard him as second only to 
Vergil ; and it was scarcely before the nineteenth century that 
he was dethroned from his exalted position. Before the verdict 
of so many ages one may well shrink from passing an unfavour- 
able criticism. That he had many of the qualifications of a 
great poet is undeniable ; his technical skill is extraordinary ; 
his variety of phrase is infinite ; his colouring is often bril- 
liant. And even his positive faults, the faults of his age, the 
crowding of detail, the rhetoric, the bombast, offend rather 
by their quantity than quality. Alone of the epic 3 writers 
of his age he rarely raises a derisive laugh from the irreverent 
modern. Again, his average level is high, higher than that 
of any post-Ovidian poet. And yet that high level is due 
to the fact that he rarely sinks rather than that he rises to 

1 e. g. ii. 2. Cp. also i. 3. 64-89. 

2 Dante regards him also as a Christian. This compliment was paid 
by the Middle Ages to not a few of the great classical authors. It was not 
even a fatal obstacle to have lived before the birth of Christ. Cicero, for 
instance, was believed to have been a Christian. The description of the 
Altar of Mercy at Athens (Th. xii. 493) has been regarded as a special 
reason for the Christianizing of Statius : cp. Verrall, Oxford and Cambridge 
Review, No. 1 ; Arturo Graf, Roma nella memoria del medio evo, vol. ii, 
ch. 17. 

3 This statement does not, however, apply to the Silvae. 



IX STATIUS 207 

sublime heights. His brilliant metre, always vivacious and 
vigorous, seldom gives us a line that haunts the memory ; 
and therefore, though its easy grace and facile charm may 
for a while attract us, we soon weary of him. He lacks 
warmth of emotion and depth of colour. In this respect he 
has been not inaptly compared to Ovid. Ovid said of Calli- 
machus quamvis ingenio non valet, arte valet. 1 Ovid's detrac- 
tors apply the epigram to Ovid himself. This is unjust, but 
so far as such a comprehensive dictum can be true of any 
distinguished writer, it is true of Statius. 

Scarcely inferior to Ovid in readiness and fertility, he 
ranks far below the earlier writer in all poetic essentials. 
Ovid's gifts are similar but more natural ; his vision is 
clearer, his imagination more penetrating. ' The paces of 
Statius are those of the manege, not of nature '; 2 he loses 
himself in the trammels of his art. He lacks, as a rule, the 
large imagination of the poet ; and though his detail may 
often please, the whole is tedious and disappointing. Meri- 
vale sums him up admirably : 2 ' Statius is a miniature 
painter employed on the production of a great historic 
picture : every part, every line, every shade is touched and 
retouched ; approach the canvas and examine it with 
glasses, every thread and hair has evidently received the 
utmost care and taken the last polish ; but step backwards 
and embrace the whole composition in one gaze, and the 
general effect is confused from want of breadth and largeness 
of treatment.' 

He was further handicapped by his choice of a subject. 3 



1 Ov. Am. i. 15. 14. 2 Merivale, Rom. Emp. viii. 80, 1. 

3 The sources for his story were the old Cyclic poem, the later epic of 
Antimachus, the plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, that draw 
their plots from the Theban cycle of legend. The material thus given 
him he worked over in the Vergilian manner, remoulding incidents or 
introducing fresh episodes in such a fashion as to provide precise parallels 
to many episodes in the Aeneid. He also drew certain hints from the 
Phoenissae and Oedipus of Seneca : for details see Legras, Etude sur la 
Thebaide de Stace, part i, ch. 2, part ii, chh. 1 and 2. The subject had 
been treated also by one Ponticus, the friend of Propertius (Prop. i. 7. 1, 
Ov. Tr. iv. 10. 47) and possibly by Lynceus (Prop. ii. 34). 



208 STATIUS IX 

The Theban legend is unsuitable for epic treatment for 
more reasons than one. In the first place the story is un- 
pleasant from beginning to end. Horror accumulates on 
horror, crime on crime, and there are but three characters 
which evoke our sympathy, Oedipus, Jocasta, and Antigone. 
These characters play only subsidiary parts in the story of 
the expedition of the Seven against Thebes, round which the 
Theban epic turns. The central characters are almost of 
necessity the odious brothers Eteocles and Polynices : 
Oedipus appears only to curse his sons. Antigone and 
Jocasta come upon the scene only towards the close in a 
brief and futile attempt to reconcile the brothers. The deeds 
and deaths of the Argive chiefs may relieve the horror and 
at times excite our sympathy, but we cannot get away from 
the fact that the story is ultimately one of almost bestial 
fratricidal strife, darkened by the awful shadow of the woes 
of the house of Labdacus. The old Greek epic assigned great 
importance to the character of Amphiaraus 1 persuaded by 
his false wife, Eriphyla, to go forth on the enterprise that 
should be his doom ; it has even been suggested that he 
formed the central character of the poem. If this suggestion 
be true and its truth is exceedingly doubtful we are con- 
fronted with what was in reality only a false shift, the 
diversion of the interest from the main issues of the story 
to a side issue. The Iliad cannot be quoted in his defence ; 
there we have an episode of a ten years' siege, which in itself 
possesses genuine unity and interest. But the Theban epic 
comprises the whole story of the expedition of the seven 
chieftains, and it is idle to make Amphiaraus the central 
figure. In any case the prominence given to the fortunes of 
the house of Labdacus by the great Greek dramatists, and 
the genius with which they brought out the genuinely 



1 Legras, Les Legendes Theb., ch. iii. 4. The 'Anfaapdov egeXams men- 
tioned by Suidas s.v. "Op.Tjpos is sometimes identified with the Thebais ; 
but it is more probably merely the title of a book of that epic. Still the 
fact that the 'A/i<|>. eeA. is given such prominence by Suidas does lend 
some support to the view that he was the chief character of the epic. He 
is certainly the most tragic figure. 



IX STATIUS 209 

dramatic issues of the legend, had made it impossible for 
after-comers to take any save the Labdacidae for the chief 
actors in their story. And so from Antimachus onward 
Polynices and Eteocles are the tragic figures of the epic. 

To give unity to this story all our attention must be con- 
centrated on Thebes. The enlistment of Adrastus in the 
cause of Polynices must be described, and following this the 
gathering of the hosts of Argos. But when once the Argive 
demands are rejected by Thebes, the poet's chief aim must 
be to get his army to Thebes with all speed, and set it in 
battle array against the enemy. Once at Thebes, there is 
plenty of room for tragic power and stirring narrative. 
First comes the ineffectual attempt of Jocasta to reconcile 
her scarce human sons ; then comes the battle, with the 
gradual overthrow of the chieftains of Argos, the turning of 
the scale of battle in favour of Thebes by the sacrifice of 
Menoeceus, and last the crowning combat between the 
brothers. There, from the artistic standpoint, the story 
finds its ending. It could never have been other than for- 
bidding, but it need not have lacked power. Unfortunately, 
precedent did not allow the story to end there. The Thebans 
forbid burial to the Argive dead ; Antigone transgresses the 
edict by burying her brother Polynices, and finds death the 
reward of her piety ; Theseus and the Athenians come to 
Adrastus' aid, defeat the Thebans, and bury the Argive dead, 
while as a sop to Argive feeling they are promised their 
revenge in after years, when the children of the dead have 
grown to man's estate. If it were felt that the deadly 
struggle between the two brothers closed the epic on a note 
of unrelieved gloom and horror, there was perhaps some- 
thing to be said for introducing the story of Antigone's self- 
sacrifice, and closing on a note of tragic beauty. Unhappily, 
the story of Antigone involved the introduction of material 
sufficient for one, if not two fresh epics in the legend of the 
Athenian War and the triumphant return of Argos to 
the conflict. Antimachus 1 fell into the snare. His vast 



1 Porphyr. ad Hor. A. P. HO. 

BUTLEB p 



210 STATIUS IX 

Thebais told the whole story from the arrival of Polynices 
at Argos to the victory of the Epigoni. Nor was he content 
with this alone, but must needs clog the action of his poem 
with long descriptions of the gathering of the host at Argos, 
and of their adventures on the march to Thebes. And so it 
came about that he consumed twenty-four books in getting 
his heroes to Thebes ! 

The precedent of Antimachus proved fatal to Statius. He 
did not, it is true, run to such prolixity as his Greek prede- 
cessor ; he eliminated the legend of the Epigoni altogether, 
only alluding to it once in vague and general terms ; he 
succeeded in getting the story, down to the burial of the 
Argive dead, within the compass of twelve books of not 
inordinate length. But it is possible to be prolix without 
being an Antimachus, and the prolixity of Statius is quite 
sufficient. The Argives do not reach Thebes till half-way 
through the seventh book, 2 the brothers do not meet till 
half-way through the eleventh book. The result is that the 
compression of events in the last 300 lines of the eleventh 
book and in the last book is almost grotesque ; for these 
1,100 lines contain the death of Jocasta, the banishment of 
Oedipus, the flight of the Argives, the prohibition to bury 
the Argive dead, the arrival of the wives of the vanquished, 
the devotion of Antigone and Argia, the wife of Polynices, 
their detection and sentencing to death, the arrival of the 
Athenians under Theseus, the defeat and death of Creon, and 
the burial of the fallen. The effect is disastrous. As we 
have seen, this appendix to the main story of the feud 
between the brothers cannot form a satisfactory conclusion 
to the story. Treated with the perfunctory compression 
of Statius, it becomes flat and ineffective ; even the reader 
who finds Statius at his best attractive is tempted to throw 
down the Thebais in disgust. 

It is perhaps in his concluding scenes that we see Statius 
at his worst, but his capacity for irrelevance and digression is 



1 Vergil had given six books to the wanderings of Aeneas ; Statius must 
give six to the preparation and march of the Thebans ! 



IX STATIUS 211 

an almost equally serious defect. That he should use the 
conventional supernatural machinery is natural and per- 
missible, though tedious to the modern reader, who finds it 
hard to sympathize with outworn literary conventions. 
But there are few epics where divine intervention is carried 
to a greater extent than in the Thebais. 1 And not content 
with the intervention of the usual gods and furies, on two 
occasions Statius brings down frigid abstractions from the 
skies in the shape of Virtus 2 and Pietas. 3 Again, while au- 
guries and prophecies play a legitimate part in such a work, 
nothing can justify, and only the passion of the Silver Age 
for the supernatural can explain, the protraction of the scenes 
of augury at Thebes and Argos to 114 and 239 lines respec- 
tively. Equally disproportionate are the catalogues of the 
Argive and the Theban armies, making between them close 
on 400 lines. 4 Nor is imitation of Vergil the slightest justi- 
fication for introducing a night-raid in which Hopleus and 
Dymas are but pale reflections of Nisus and Euryalus, 5 for 
expending 921 lines over the description of the funeral rites 
and games in honour of the infant Opheltes, 6 or putting the 
irrelevant history of the heroism of Coroebus in the mouth 
of Adrastus, merely that it may form a parallel to the tale of 
Hercules and Cacus told by Evander. 7 Worst of all is the 
enormous digression, 8 consuming no less than 481 lines, where 
Hypsipyle narrates the story of the Lemnian massacre. 



1 See Legras, op. cit., pp. 183 ff. 2 x. 632. 

3 xi. 457. Cp. also the strange and stilted description of the cave of 
sleep, x. 84, where Quies, Oblivio, Ignavia, Otium, Silentium, Voluptas, 
and even Labor and Amor are to be found. But with the exception of 
Amor these abstract personages are inventions of Statius. Virtus and 
Pietas had temples at Rome. 

4 iv. 32-308 ; vii. 250-358. 

5 x. 262^48. 

6 vi. 1-921. Two other funerals are to be found, iii. 114-217, xii. 22-104. 

7 Th. i. 557 sqq. ; Verg. Aen. viii. 190 sqq. 

8 v. 17-498 : with this compare the version of the story given by 
Valerius Flaccus, ii. 78-305 ; except hi point of brevity there is little to 
choose between the two versions. But it is not a digression in Valerius, 
and it is told at less inordinate length. The versions differ much in 
detail, and Statius owes little or nothing to Valerius. 

P 2 



212 STATIUS IX 

And yet this is hardly more than a digression in the midst of 
a digression. The Argive army are marching on Thebes. 
Bacchus, desirous to save his native town, causes a drought 
in the Peloponnese. The Argives, on the verge of death, and 
maddened with thirst, come upon Hypsipyle, the nurse of 
Opheltes, the son of Lycurgus, King of Nemea. Hypsipyle 
leaves her charge to show them the stream of Langia, which 
alone has been unaffected by the drought, and so saves the 
Argive host. She then at enormous length narrates to 
Adrastus the story of her life, how she was daughter of 
Thoas, King of Lemnos, and how, when the women of 
Lesbos slew their mankind, she alone proved false to their 
hideous compact, and saved her father. After describing 
the arrival of the Argonauts at Lemnos, and her amour with 
Jason, to whom she bore two sons, she tells how she was 
banished from Lesbos on the discovery that Thoas, her 
father, still lived, how she was captured by pirates, and 
twenty long years since sold into slavery to Lycurgus. This 
prodigious narration finished, it is discovered that a serpent 
sacred to Jupiter has killed Opheltes. Lycurgus, hearing 
the news, would have slain Hypsipyle, but she is protected 
by the Argives whom she has saved. Then follows the 
burial of Opheltes henceforth known as Archemorus and 
his funeral games. 

Now it is not improbable that the story of Opheltes and 
Hypsipyle occurred in the old cyclic poem. 1 But that 
scarcely justifies Statius in devoting the whole of the fifth 
and sixth books and some 200 lines of the fourth to the 
description of an episode so alien to the main interest of the 
poem. But if we cannot justify these copious digressions and 
irrelevances we can explain them. The Thebais was written 
primarily for recitation ; many of these episodes which are 
hopelessly superfluous to the real story are admirably de- 
signed for the purpose of recitation. The truth is that 

1 Cp. Legras, Les legendes Thebaines, ch. ii. 4, Welcker, Ep. Cyd. ii. 350. 
The story was well known. Aeschylus probably treated it in his Ne/u'a, 
Euripides certainly in his 'Y\^i7ri;X>;. The legend gives the origin of the 
Nenican games. 



IX STATIUS 213 

Statius had many qualifications for the writing of epyllia, few 
for writing epic on a large scale. He has therefore sacrificed 
the whole to its parts, and relies on brilliance of description 
to catch the ear of an audience, rather than on sustained 
epic dignity and ordered development of his story. But 
although he cannot give real unity to his epic, he succeeds, 
by dint of his astonishing fluency and his mastery over his 
instrument, in giving a specious appearance of unity. The 
sutures of his story are well disguised and his inconsistencies 
of no serious importance. He fails as an epic writer, but 
he fails gracefully. 

It is, however, possible for an epic to be structurally 
ineffective and yet possess high poetic merit. Statius' 
episodes do not cohere ; how far have they any splendour 
in their isolation ? The answer to the question must be on 
the whole unfavourable. The reasons for this are diverse. 
In the first place the characters for the most part fail to 
live. Statius can give us a vivid impression of the outward 
semblance of a man ; we see Parthenopaeus and Atys, we 
see Jocasta and Antigone, we see the struggle of Eteocles and 
Polynices vividly enough. But we see them as strangers, 
standing out, it is true, from the crowd in which they move, 
but still wholly unknown to us. We cannot differentiate 
Polynices and Eteocles save that the latter, from the very 
situation in which he finds himself, is necessarily the more 
odious of the two ; Polynices would have shown himself the 
same, had the fall of the lot given him the first year of 
kingship. Jocasta and Antigone, Creon and Menoeceus, 
Hypsipyle and Lycurgus, play their parts correctly enough, 
but they do not live, nor people our brain with moving 
images. We are told that they behaved in such and such a 
way under such and such circumstances ; we are told, and 
admit, that such conduct implies certain moral qualities, 
but Statius does not make us feel that his characters possess 
such qualities. The reason for this lies partly in the fact 
that they all speak the same brilliant rhetoric, 1 partly in the 



1 The speeches in the Thebais, though they lack variety, are almost 



214 STATIUS IX 

fact that Statius lacks the direct sincerity of diction that is 
required for the expression of strong and poignant emotion. 
Anger he can depict ; anger suffers less than other emotions 
from rhetoric. Hence it is that he has succeeded in draw- 
ing the character of Tydeus, whose brutality is redeemed 
from hideousness by the fact that it is based on the most 
splendid physical courage, and fired by strong loyalty to his 
comrade and sometime foe Polynices. His accents ring 
true. When he has gone to Thebes to plead Polynices' 
cause, and his demands have been angrily refused by Eteocles, 
who concludes by saying (ii. 449), 

nee ipsi, [1] 

si modo notus amor meritique est gratia, patres 

reddere regna sinent, 

Tydeus will hear no more, but breaks in with a cry of 

fury (ii. 452) : 

' reddes,' [2] 

ingeminat ' reddes ; non si te ferreus agger 
ambiat aut triplices alio tibi carmine muros 
Amphion auditus agat, nil tela nee ignes 
obstiterint, quin ausa luas nostrisque sub armis 
captivo moribundus humum diademate pulses, 
tu merito ; ast horum miseret, quos sanguine viles 
coniugibus natisque infanda ad proelia raptos 
proicis excidio, bone rex. o quanta Cithaeron 
funera sanguineusque vadis, Ismene, rotabis ! 
haec pietas, haec magna fides ! nee crimina gentis 

always exceedingly clever and quite repay reading ; see esp. i. 642 ; 
iii. 59, 151, 348 ; iv. 318 ; vi. 138 ; vii. 497, 539 ; ix. 375 ; xi. 155, 677, 708. 

[1] Nor will the fathers of the city, if they but know the love I bear them 
or if they have aught of gratitude, allow me to give back the kingship. 

[2] ' Thou shalt give it back,' he cries, ' thou shalt give it back. Though 
thou wert girdled with a wall of bronze, or Amphion's voice be heard and 
with a new song raise triple bulwarks about thee ; fire and sword should 
not save thee from the doom of thy daring, and, struck down by our swords, 
thy diadem should smite the ground as thou fallest dying, our captive. 
Thus shouldst thou have thy desert ; but these I pity, whose blood thou 
ratest lightly, and whom thou snatchest from their children and their 
wives to give them over to death, thou virtuous king. What vast slaughter, 
Cithaeron, and thou, Ismenus, shalt thou see whirl down thy blood-stained 
shallows. This is thy piety, this thy true faith ! nor marvel I at the 



IX STATIUS 215 

mira equidem duco : sic primus sanguinis auctor 
incestique patrum thalami ; sed fallit origo : 
Oedipodis tu solus eras, haec praemia morum 
ac sceleris, violente, feres ! nos poscimus annum ; 
sed moror.' haec audax etiamnum in limine retro 
vociferans iam tune impulsa per agmina praeceps 
evolat. 

As he is here, so is he always, unwavering in decision, 
prompt of speech and of action. Caught in ambush, ill- 
armed and solitary, by the treacherous Thebans, as he 
returns from his futile embassy, he never hesitates ; he 
seizes the one point of vantage, crushes his foes, and when 
he speaks, speaks briefly and to the point. He spares the 
last of his fifty assailants and sends him back to Thebes 
with a message of defiance, brief, natural, and manly 
(ii. 697) : 

quisquis es Aonidum, quern crastina munere nostro [1J 

manibus exemptum mediis Aurora videbit, 

haec iubeo perferre duel : cinge aggere portas, 

tela nova, fragiles aevo circum inspice muros, 

praecipue stipare viros densasque memento 

multiplicare acies ! fumantem hunc aspice late 

ense meo campum : tales in bella venimus. 

On his return to Argos he bursts impetuously into the 
palace, crying fiercely for war. 1 When Lycurgus would slay 
Hypsipyle for her neglect of her nursling, he saves her. 2 She 

crimes of such a race : 'twas for this that thou hadst such an author of 
thy being, for this thy father's marriage -bed was stained with incest. But 
thou art deceived as to thine own birth and thy brother's ; thou alone 
wast begotten of Oedipus, that shall be the reward for thy nature and 
thy crime, fierce man. We ask but for a year ! But I tarry over long.' 
These words he shouted back at him while he still lingered on the threshold ; 
then headlong burst through the crowd of foemen and sped away. 

[1] Whoe'er thou art of the Aonides, whom to-morrow's dawn shall see 
saved from the world of the dead by my boon, I bid thee bear this message 
to thy chief : ' Raise mounds about the gates, forge new weapons, look 
to your walls that crumble with years, and above all be mindful to marshal 
thick and multiply thine hosts ! Behold this plain smoking with the work 
of my sword. Such men are we when we enter the field of battle.' 

I iii. 348. 2 v. 660. 



216 STATIUS IX 

has preserved the Argive army, and Tydeus, if he never 
forgives an enemy, never forgets a friend. He alone defeats 
the entreaties of Jocasta J and launches the hosts of Argos 
into battle ; and when his own doom is come, he dies as he 
had lived, impiger, iracundus, inexorabilis ; he has no 
thought for himself ; he cares nought for due burial (viii. 
736): 

non ossa precor referantur ut Argos [1] 
Aetolumve larem ; nee enim mihi cura supremi 
funeris : odi artus fragilemque hunc corporis usum, 
desertorem animi. 

His one thought is for vengeance on the dead body of the 
man who has slain him 2 and for the victory of his comrades 
in arms. 

Only one other of the heroes has any real existence, the 
prophet Amphiaraus. Statius does not give him the promi- 
nence that he held in the original epic, and misses a noble 
opportunity by almost ignoring the dramatic story of 
Eriphyla and the necklace that won her to persuade her 
husband to go forth to certain death. But the heroic warrior 
priest of Apollo, who knows his doom and yet faces it fear- 
lessly, could not fail to be a picturesque figure, and at least 
in the hour of his death Statius has done him full justice. 
Apollo, disguised as a mortal, mounts the chariot of Am- 
phiaraus and drives him through the midst of the battle, 
dealing destruction on this side and that (vii. 770) : 

tandem se famulo summum confessus Apollo [2] 

' utere luce tua longamque ' ait, ' indue famam, 



[1] I ask not that my bones be borne home to Argos or Aetolia; 1 care 
not for my last rites of funeral ; I hate these limbs and this frail tene- 
ment, my body, that fails my spirit in its hour of need. 

[2] At length Apollo revealed himself to his servant. ' Use,' he said, ' the 
light of life that is left thee and win an age of fame while thy doom still 



1 vii. 538. 

2 viii. 751. Tydeus bites the severed head of Melanippus to the brain, 
thereby losing the gift of immortality that Pallas was hastening to bring 
him. The incident is revolting, but Statius has merely followed the old 
legend recorded by Aesch. Sept. 587 ; Soph. Fr. 731 ; Eurip. Fr. 357. 



IX STATIUS 217 

dum tibi me iunctum mors inrevocata veretur. 
vincimur : immites scis nulla revolvere Parcas 
stamina ; vade, diu populis promissa voluptas 
Elysiis, certe non perpessure Creontis 
imperia aut vetito nudus iaciture sepulcro.' 
ille refert contra, et paulum respirat ab armis : 
' olim te, Cirrhaee pater, peritura sedentem 
ad iuga (quis tantus miseris honor ?) axe trementi 
sensimus ; instantes quonam usque morabere manes ? 
audio iam rapidae cursum Stygis atraque Ditis 
flumina tergeminosque mali custodis hiatus, 
accipe commissum capiti decus, accipe laurus, 
quas Erebo deferre nefas. nunc voce suprema, 
si qua recessuro debetur gratia vati, 
deceptum tibi, Phoebe, larem poenasque nefandae 
coniugis et pulchrum nati commendo furorem.' 
desiluit maerens lacrimasque avertit Apollo. 

An earthquake shakes the plain ; the warriors shrink from 
battle in terror at the thunder from under-ground ; when 

(816)- 

ecce alte praeceps humus ore prof undo [1] 
dissilit, inque vicem timuerunt sidera et umbrae, 
ilium ingens haurit specus et transire parantes 
mergit equos ; non arma manu, non frena remisit : 



unrepealed shrinks back in awe of me. The foemen conquer : thou 
knowest the cruel fates never unravel the threads they weave : go forward, 
thou, the promised darling of the peoples of Elysium ; for surely thou 
shalt ne'er endure the tyranny of Creon, or he naked, denied a grave.' 
He answered, pausing awhile from the fray: ' Long since, lord of Cirrha, 
the trembling axle told me that 'twas thou sat'st by my doomed steeds. 
Why honourest thou a wretched mortal thus ? How long wilt thou delay 
the advancing dead ? Even now I hear the course of headlong Styx, 
and the dark streams of death, and the triple barking of the accursed 
guard of hell. Take now thine honours bound about my brow, take 
now the laurel crown I may not bear down unto Erebus : now with 
my last utterance, if aught of thanks thou owest thy seer that now 
must pass away, to thee I trust my wronged hearth, the doom of my 
accursed wife, and the noble madness of my son (Alcmaeon).' Apollo 
leapt from the car in grief and strove to hide his tears. 

[1] Lo ! the earth gaped sheer and deep with vast abyss, and the stars of 
heaven and the shades of the dead trembled with one accord : a vast 
chasm drew him down and swallowed his steeds as they made ready to 



218 STATIUS IX 

sicut erat, rectos defert in Tartara currus 
respexitque cadens caelum campumque coire 
ingemuit, donee levior distantia rursus 
miscuit arva tremor lucemque exclusit Averno. 

Here we see Statius at his highest level, whether in point of 
metre, diction, or poetic imagination. 

Of the other characters there is little to be said. For all 
the wealth of detail that Statius has lavished on them, they 
are featureless. Adrastus is a colourless and respectable 
old king, strongly reminiscent of Latinus. Capaneus and 
Hippomedon are terrific warriors of gigantic stature and 
truculent speech, but they are wholly uninteresting. Argia 
and Jocasta are too rhetorical, Antigone too slight a figure 
to be really pathetic ; Oedipus can do little save curse, 
which he does with some rhetorical vigour ; but the gift of 
cursing hardly makes a character. Parthenopaeus, however, 
is a pathetic figure ; he is an Arcadian, the son of Atalanta, 
a mere boy whom a romantic ambition has hurried into 
war ere his years were ripe for it. His dying speech is 
touching, though it errs on the side of triviality and mere 
prettiness (ix. 877) : 

at puer infusus sociis in devia campi [1] 

tollitur (heu simplex aetas !) moriensque iacentem 
flebat equum ; cecidit laxata casside vultus, 
aegraque per trepidos exspirat gratia visus, 

ibat purpureus niveo de pectore sanguis. 
tandem haec singultu verba incidente profatur : 
' labimur, i, miseram, Dorceu, solare parentem. 



leap the gulf : he loosed not the grip on rein or spear, but, as he was, 
carried his car steadfast to Tartarus, and, as he fell, gazed up to heaven 
and groaned to see the plain close above him, till a lighter shock once more 
united the gaping fields and shut out the light from hell. 

[1] But the boy fell into his comrades' arms and they bore him to a place 
apart. Alas for his tender years ! As he died, he wept for his fallen horse : 
his face drooped as they unbound his helmet, and a fading grace passed 
faintly o'er his quivering visage. ... 

The purple blood flowed from his breast of snow. At length he spake 
these words through sobs that checked his utterance : ' My life is falling 
from me ; go, Dorceus, comfort my unhappy mother : she indeed, if care 



IX STATIUS 219 

ilia quidem, si vera ferunt praesagia curae, 

aut somno iam triste nefas aut omine vidit. 

tu tamen arte pia trepidam suspende diuque 

decipito ; neu tu subitus neve arma tenenti 

veneris, et tandem, cum iam cogere fateri, 

die : " Merui, genetrix, poenas invita capesse ; 

arma puer rapui, nee te retinente quievi, 

nee tibi sollicitae tandem inter bella peperci. 

vive igitur potiusque animis irascere nostris, 

et iam pone metus. frustra de colle Lycaei 

anxia prospectas, si quis per nubila longe 

aut sonus aut nostro sublatus ab agmine pulvis : 

frigidus et nuda iaceo tellure, nee usquam 

tu prope, quae vultus efflantiaque ora teneres. 

hunc tamen, orba parens, crinem " dextraque secandum 

praebuit " hunc toto capies pro corpore crinem, 

comere quern frustra me dedignante solebas. 

huic dabis exsequias, atque inter iusta memento, 

ne quis inexpertis hebetet mea tela lacertis 

dilectosque canes ullis agat amplius antris. 

haec autem primis arma infelicia castris 

ure, vel ingratae crimen suspende Dianae." : 

When we have said that Parthenopaeus is almost too 



and sorrow can give foreknowledge, has seen my woeful fate in dreams 
or through some omen ; yet do thou with loving art keep her terrors in 
suspense and long hold back the truth ; and come not upon her suddenly, 
nor when she hath a weapon in her hands ; but when at last the truth 
must out, say: " Mother, I deserved my doom ; I am punished, though my 
punishment break thy heart. I rushed to arms too young, and abode not 
at home when thou wouldst restrain me : nor had I any pity for thine 
anguish in the day of battle. Live on then, and keep thine anger for my 
headstrong courage and fear no more for me. In vain thou gazest from 
the Lycaean height, if any sound perchance may be borne from far to 
thine ear through the clouds, or thine eye have sight of the dust raised 
by our homeward march. I he cold upon the bare earth, and thou art 
nowhere nigh to hold my head as my lips breathe farewell. Yet, childless 
mother, take this lock of hair" and in his right hand he stretched it out 
to be cut away "take this poor lock in place of my whole body, this lock 
of that hair which thou didst tire in my despite. To it shalt thou give 
due burial and remember this also as my due ; let no man blunt my spears 
with unskilful cast, nor any more drive the hounds I loved through any 
caverned glen. But this mine armour, whose first battle hath brought 
disaster, burn thou, or hang it to be a reproach to Dian's ingratitude." ' 



220 STATIUS IX 

young to have been accepted as a leader, or have performed 
the feats of war assigned to him, we have said all that can 
be said against this beautiful speech. Parthenopaeus is for 
the Thebais what Camilla is for the Aeneid, though he 
presents at times hints both of Pallas and Euryalus. But 
he is little more than a child, and fails to carry the convic- 
tion or awaken the deep emotion excited by the Amazon 
of Vergil. 1 

Statius then, with a few striking exceptions, fails in his 
portrayal of life and character. On the whole one says it 
with reluctance in view of his brilliant variety, his boundless 
invention, his wealth of imagery the same is true of his 
descriptions. The picture is too crowded ; he has not the 
unerring eye for the relevant or salient points of a scene. 
Skilful and faithful touches abound, but, as in the case of 
certain pre-Raphaelite pictures, extreme attention to detail 
causes him to miss the full scenic effect. He is not suffi- 
ciently the impressionist ; he cannot suggest a point in 
which he presents a strong contrast to Valerius Flaccus. 
And too many of his incidents, in spite of ingenious variation 
of detail, are but echoes of Vergil. The foot-race and the 
archery contest at the funeral games of Archemorus, together 
with the episode of Dymas and Hopleus, 2 to which we have 

1 Cp. in this context Atalanta's beautiful lament on his departure for 
the war, iv. 318. 

2 Every book, however, abounds in echoes of Vergil, both in matter and 
diction ; e.g. Aen. vii. 475, Allecto precipitates the war by making Ascanius 
kill a tame stag. Theb. vii. 562, an Erinnys brings about the war by 
causing the death of two pet tigers sacred to Bacchus. Aen. xi. 591, Diana 
orders one of her nymphs to kill the slayer of Camilla. Theb. ix. 665, she 
tells Apollo that the slayer of Parthenopaeus shall perish by her arrows, 
for which see Th. ix. 875. Cp. also Th. ii. 205 ; Aen. iv. 173, 189 ; 
Th. ii. 162 ; Aen. xi. 581. The passage previously referred to concerning 
the exploits of Dymas and Hopleus is especially noteworthy as openly 
challenging comparison with Vergil ; cp. x. 445. For verbal imitations 
cp. Aen. v. 726, 7 ; Th. ii. 115; Aen. i. 106 ; Th. v. 366 ; Aen. vii. 397; 
Th. iv. 379, &c. It is no defence to urge that the ancients held different 
views on plagiarism, that Vergil and Ovid pilfered from their predecessors. 
For they made their appropriations their own, and set the stamp of their 
genius upon what they borrowed. And, further, the process of borrow- 
ing cannot continue indefinitely. The cumulative effect of progressive 



IX STATIUS 221 

already referred, are perhaps the most marked examples of 
this unfortunate characteristic. We are continually saying 
to ourselves as we read the Thebais, ' All this has been before ! ' 
We weary at times of the echoes of Homer in Vergil, and the 
combats that stirred us in the Iliad make us drowsy in the 
Aeneid. Homer knew what fighting was from personal 
experience, or at least from being in touch with warriors who 
had killed their man. Vergil had come no nearer these things 
than ' in the pages of a book '. Statius is yet one remove 
further from the truth than Vergil. He is tied hand and 
foot by his intimate acquaintance with previous poetic 
literature. If he is less the victim of the schools of rhetoric 
than many post-Augustan writers, he is more than most the 
victim of the poetic training of the schools. But with alJ 
these faults there are passages which surprise us by their 
effectiveness. It would be hard to imagine anything more 
vigorous and exciting than the fight of Tydeus ambushed 
by his fifty foes. The opening passage is splendidly success- 
ful in creating the requisite atmosphere (ii. 527) : 

coeperat umenti Phoebum subtexere palla [1] 

Nox et caeruleam terris infuderat umbram. 
ille propinquabat silvis et ab aggere celso 
scuta virum galeasque videt rutilare comantes, 
qua laxant rami nemus adversaque sub umbra 
flammeus aeratis lunae tremor errat in armis. 
obstipuit visis, ibat tamen, horrida tantum 
spicula et inclusum capulo tenus admovet ensem. 
ac prior ' unde, viri, quidve occultatis in armis ? ' 



[1] Night began to shroud Phoebus with her humid pall and shed her blue 
darkness o'er the earth. He drew nigh the forest, and from a high knoll 
espied the gleam of warriors' shields and plumed helmets, where the boughs 
of the wood left a space, and in the shadow before him the quivering fire 
of the moonbeam played o'er their brazen armour. Dumbstruck at what he 
saw, he yet pursued his way, only he made ready for the fight his bristling 
javelins and the sword sheathed to its hilt. He was the first to speak : 
' Whence come ye ? ' he asked, in fear, yet haughty still. ' And why hide 



plagiarism is distressing. For Statius' imitation of other Latin poets, 
notably Lucan, Seneca, and Ovid, see Lcgras, op. cit., i. 2. Such imitations, 
though not very rare, are of comparatively small importance. 



222 STATIUS IX 

non humili terrore rogat. nee reddita contra 
vox, fidamque negant suspecta silentia pacem. 

The fight that follows, though it occupies more than 160 
lines, is intensely rapid and vigorous ; indeed it is the one 
genuinely exciting combat in Latin epic, and forms a refresh- 
ing contrast to the pseudo-Homeric or pseudo-Vergilian 
combats before the walls of Thebes. In no other portion 
of the Thebais does Statius attain to such success, with the 
exception of the passage already quoted descriptive of the 
death of Amphiaraus. But there are other passages of 
sustained merit, such as the vigorous description of the 
struggle of Hippomedon with the waters of Ismenus and 
Asopus. 1 While it is not particularly interesting to those 
acquainted with the corresponding passage in the Iliad, it 
would be unjust to deny the gifts of vigour and invention 
to the Latin poet's imitation. 

It is, however, rather in smaller and more minute pictures 
that Statius as a rule excels. The picture of the baby 
Opheltes left by his nurse is pretty enough (iv. 787) : 

at puer in gremio vernae telluris et alto [1] 

gramine nunc faciles sternit procursibus herbas 
in vultum nitens, caram modo lactis egeno 
nutricem plangore ciens iterumque renidens 
et teneris meditans verba inluctantia labris 
miratur nemorum strepitus aut obvia carpit 
aut patulo trahit ore diem nemorisque malorum 
inscius et vitae multum securus inerrat. 

Fine, too, in a different way is the sinister picture of 
Eteocles left sole king in Thebes (i. 165) : 

ye thus armoured for the fray ? ' There came no answer, and their ominous 
silence told him no peace nor loyalty was there. 

[1] But the child, lying face downward in the bosom of the vernal earth, 
now as he crawls hi the deep herbage lays low the yielding grass ; now cries 
for his loved nurse athirst for milk, and then, all smiles again, with infant 
lips frames words in stumbling speech, marvels at the sounds of the 
woods, gathers what lies before him, or open-mouthed drinks in the day ; 
and knowing naught of the dangers of the woods, with ne'er a care in life, 
roams here and there. 



1 i 



ix. 315 sqq. 



IX STATIUS 223 

quis tune tibi, saeve, [1] 

quis fuit ille dies, vacua cum solus in aula 
respiceres ius omne tuum cunctosque minores 
et nusquam par stare caput ? 

Less poetical, but scarcely less effective, is the description 

of the compact between the brothers (i.138) : 

alterni placuit sub legibus anni [2] 

exsilio mutare ducem. sic iure maligno 
fortunam transire iubent, ut sceptra tenentem 
foedere praecipiti semper novus angeret heres. 
haec inter fratres pietas erat, haec mora pugnae 
sola nee in regem perduratura secundum. 

But far beyond all other portraits in Statius is the descrip- 
tion of Jocasta as she approaches the Argive camp on her 
mission of reconciliation (vii. 474) : 

ecce truces oculos sordentibus obsita canis [3] 

exsangues locasta genas et bracchia planctu 
nigra ferens ramumque oleae cum velleris atri 
nexibus, Eumenidum velut antiquissima, portis 
egreditur magna cum maiestate malorum. 

In this last line we have one of the very few lines in Statius 
that attain to real grandeur. In the lack of such lines, and 
in the lack of real breadth of treatment lies Statius' chief 
defect as a narrator. All that dexterity can do he does ; 
but he lacks the supreme gifts, the selective eye and the 
penetrating imagination of the great poet. 

[1] Ah ! what a day was that for thee, fierce heart, when, sitting alone 
amid thy courtiers, thy brother gone from thee, thou sawest thyself 
enthroned above all men, with all things in thy power, without a peer. 

[2] It was resolved that in alternate years the king should quit his throne 
for exile. Thus with baneful ordinance they bade fortune pass from one 
to the other, that he who held the sceptre on these brief terms should ever 
be vexed by the thought of his successor's coming. Such was the brothers' 
love, such the sole bond that kept them from conflict, a bond that should 
not last till the kingship changed. 

[3] Lo ! Jocasta, her white hair streaming unkempt over her wild eyes, 
her cheeks all pale, her arms bruised by the beating of her anguished hands, 
bearing an olive-branch hung with black wool, came forth from the gates 
in semblance like to the eldest of the Eumenides, in all the majesty of her 
many sorrows. 



224 STATIUS IX 

Of his actual diction and ornament little need be said. 
Without being precisely straightforward, he is not, as a rule, 
obscure. But his language gradually produces a feeling of 
oppression. He can be read in short passages without this 
feeling ; the moment, however, the reader takes his verse in 
considerable quantities, the continued, though only slight, 
over-elaboration of the work produces a feeling of strain. 
Throughout there runs a vein of artificiality which ultimately 
gives the impression of insincerity. He can turn out phrases 
of the utmost nicety. Nothing can be more neatly turned 
than the description of the feelings of Antigone and Ismene 
on the outbreak of the war (viii. 614) : 

nutat utroque timor, quemnam hoc certamine victura, [1] 
quern vicisse velint : tacite praeponderat exsul ; 

or than the line describing the parting of the Lemnian 
women from the Argonauts, their second husbands (v. 478) : 

hen. iterum gemitus, iterumque novissima nox est. [2] 

But this neatness often degenerates into preciosity, bellator 
campus means a field suitable for battle (viii. 377). Nisus, the 
king of Megara, with the talismanic purple lock, becomes 
a senex purpureus (i. 334) ; an embrace is described by the 
words alterna pectora mutant (v. 722) ; a woman nearing 
her time is one iustos cuius pulsantia menses vota tument 
(v. 115). We have already noted a similar tendency in 
Valerius Flaccus ; such phrase-making is not a badge of 
any one poet, it is a sign of the times. In the case of Statius 
there is perhaps less obscurity and less positive extravagance 
than in any of his contemporaries, but whether as regards 
description or phrase-making, there is always a suspicion 
of his work being pitched if the phrase is permissible 
a tone too high. This is, perhaps, particularly noticeable in 
his similes. They are very numerous, and he has obviously 



[1] Their fears incline this way and that : whom would they have the 
conqueror in the strife, whom the vanquished ? All unconfessed the exile 
has their prayers. 

[2] Alas! once more the hour of lamentation is near, once more is come 
the last night of wedded sleep. 



IX BTATIUS 225 

expended great trouble over them. But, with very few 
exceptions, they are failures. The cause lies mainly in their 
lack of variety. There are, for instance, no less than sixteen 
similes drawn from bulls, twelve from lions, six from tigers.* 
None of these similes show any close observance of nature, 
and in any case the poetic interest of bulls, lions, and tigers 
is far from inexhaustible. It is less reprehensible that 
twenty similes should be drawn from storms, which have a 
more cogent interest and greater picturesque value. But 
even here Statius has overshot the mark. This lack of 
variety testifies to a real dearth of poetic imagination, and 
this failing is noticeable also in the execution. There is 
rarely a simile containing anything that awakens either 
imagination, emotion, or thought. Still, to give Statius 
his due, there are exceptions, such as the simile comparing 
Parthenopaeus, seen in all his beauty among his comrades, 
to the reflections of the evening star outshining the reflections 
of the lesser stars in the waveless sea (vi. 578): 

sic ubi tranquillo perlucent sidera ponto [1] 

vibraturque fretis caeli stellantis imago, 
omnia clara nitent, sed clarior omnia supra 
Hesperus exsertat radios, quantusque per altum 
aethera, caeruleis tantus monstratur in undis. 

The comparison is a little strained and far-fetched. The 
reflection of stars in the sea is not quite so noticeable or 
impressive as Statius would have us believe. But there is 
real beauty both in the conception and the execution of the 
simile. Of more indisputable excellence is the comparison 
in the eleventh book (443), where Adrastus, flying from 
Thebes in humiliation and defeat, is likened to Pluto, when 



[1] So when the stars are glassed in the tranquil deep and the reflection 
of the starry sky quivers in the waves, all the stars shine clear, but clearer 
than all doth Hesperus send forth his rays ; and as he gleams in the high 
heavens, even so bright do the blue waters show him forth. 



1 Statius is imitating early Greek epic. That might excuse him if these 
similes possessed cither truth or beauty. 



Bt'TLEK 



226 STATIUS IX 

he first entered on his kingdom of the underworld, his lord- 
ship over the strengthless dead 

qualis [1] 

demissus curru laevae post praemia sortis 
vunbrarum custos mundique novissimus heres 
palluit, amisso veniens in Tartara caelo. 

The picture is Miltonic, and Pluto is for a brief moment 
almost an anticipation of the Satan of Paradise Lost. 

The metre, like that of Valerius Flaccus, draws its primary 
inspiration from Vergil, but has been strongly influenced 
by the Metamorphoses of Ovid. There are fewer elisions 
in Statius than in Vergil, and more dactyls. 1 He is, however, 
less dactylic than Valerius Flaccus and Ovid. In his man- 
agement of pauses he is far more successful than any epic 
writer, with the exception of Vergil. As a result, he is far 
less monotonous than Ovid, Lucan, or Valerius. The one 
criticism that can be levelled against him is that his verse, 
while possessing rapidity and vigour, is not sufficiently 
adapted to the varying emotions that his story demands, and 
that it shows a consequent lack of nobility and stateliness. 
For the Silvae his metre is admirably adapted. It is light 
and almost sprightly, and the poet can let himself go. He 
was not blind to the requirements of the epic metre even 
if he did not satisfy them, and in his lighter verse there is 
a notable increase of fluency and ease. 

The Thebais is a work whose value it is difficult to estimate. 
Its undeniable merits are never quite such that we can ac- 
cord it whole-hearted praise ; its cleverness commands our 
wonder, while its defects are not such as to justify a sweeping 
condemnation. But it must be remembered that epic must 
be very good if it is to avoid failure, and it is probable that 
there are few works on which such skill and labour have been 



[1] Even as the warden of the shades, the third heir of the world, when he 
entered on the realm that the unkind lot had given him, leapt from his 
car and turned pale, for heaven was lost and he was at the gate of hell. 



1 See p. 123, note. 



IX STATIUS 227 

expended without any proportionate success. An attempt 
has been made in the preceding pages to indicate the main 
reasons for the failure of the Thebais. One more reason may 
perhaps be added here. Over and above the poet's lack of 
originality and the highest poetic imagination, over and 
above his distracting echoes and his artificiality, there is a 
lack of moral fire and insight about the poem. Statius gives 
us but a surface view of life. He had never plumbed the 
depths of human passion nor realized anything of the mystery 
of the world. His reader never derives from him the 
consciousness, that he so often derives from Vergil, of a 
' deep beyond the deep, and a height beyond the height '. 
He has neither the virtues of the mystic nor of the realist. 
Ultimately, life is for him a pageant with intervals for 
sentimental threnodies and rhetorical declamation. 

The same qualities characterize the Achilleis and still 
more the Silvae. The Achilleis was to have comprised the 
whole life of Achilles. Only the first book and 167 lines of 
the second were composed. They tell how Thetis endea- 
voured to withhold Achilles from the Trojan War by dis- 
guising him as a girl and sending him to Scyros, how he 
became the lover of Deidamia, the king's daughter, was dis- 
covered by the wiles of Ulysses, and set forth on the expedi- 
tion to Troy. The fragment is not unpleasant reading, but 
contains little that is noteworthy. 1 The style is simpler, 
less precious, and less rhetorical than that of the Thebais. 
But it lacks the vigour as well as many of the faults of the 
earlier poem. There is nothing to make us regret that the 
poet died before its completion ; there is something to be 
thankful for in the fact that he did not live to challenge 
direct comparison with Homer. 

The Silvae, on the other hand, is a work of considerable 
interest. The meaning of the word silva, in the literary 
sense, is ' raw material ' or ' rough draft '. It then came to 
be used to mean a work composed at high speed on the spur 



1 i. 841-85 gives a good idea of the Achilleis at its best. The passage 
describes the unmasking of the disguised Achilles. 

Q2 



228 STATIUS IX 

of the moment, differing in fact but little from an improvisa- 
tion. 1 That these poems correspond to this definition will 
be seen from Statius' preface to book i : ' hos libellos, qui 

mihisubitocaloreetquadamfestinandivoluptatefluxerunt 

Nullum ex illis biduo longius tractum, quaedam et in singulis 
diebus effusa.' There are thirty-two poems in all, divided 
into five books. The fifth is incomplete ; and, if we may 
judge from the unfinished state of its preface, was published 
after the author's death. The poems are extremely varied 
in subject, and to a lesser degree in metre, hendecasyllables, 
alcaics, and sapphics being found as well as hexameters. 
They comprise poems in praise of the appearance and the 
achievements of Domitian, 2 consolations to friends and 
patrons for the loss of relatives or favourite slaves, 3 lamenta- 
tions of the poet or his friends for the death of dear ones, 4 
letters on various subjects, 5 thanksgivings for the safety of 
friends, 6 and farewells to them on their departure, 7 descrip- 
tions of villas and the like built by his acquaintances, 8 an 
epithalamium, 9 an ode commemorating the birthday of 
Lucan, 10 the description of a statuette of Hercules, 11 poems on 
the deaths of a parrot and a lion, 12 and a remarkable invoca- 
tion to Sleep. 13 One and all, these poems show abnormal 
cleverness. These slighter subjects were far better suited 
to the poet's powers. His miniature painting was in place, 
his sprightly and dexterous handling of the hexameter and 
the hendecasyllable could be more profitably employed. 
Yet here, too, his artificiality is a serious blemish, his lamen- 
tations for the loss of the pueri delicati of friends do not, and 
can hardly be expected to, ring true, and the same blemish 
affects even the poems where he laments his own loss. 
Further, the poems addressed to Domitian are fulsome to the 
verge of nausea ; 14 the beauty of the emperor is such that 



1 Quint, x. 3. 17. 

2 Silv. i. 1. 6 ; iii. 4 ; iv. 1. 2, 3. 3 ii. 1. 6 ; iii. 3. * v . i. 3, 5. 
6 iii. 5 ; iv. 4. 5, 7 ; v. 2. 6 i. 4. 7 m 2. 

8 i. 3. 5 ; ii. 2 ; iii. 1. i. 2. > ii. 7. 

11 iv. 6. 12 ii. 4. 5. 13 v. 4. 

14 Cp. also the extravagant dedication of the Thebais- 



IX STATIUS 229 

all the great artists of the past would have vied with one 
another in depicting his features ; his eyes are like stars ; his 
equestrian statue is so glorious that at night (i. 1. 95) 

cum superis terrena placent, tua turba relicto [1] 

labetur caelo miscebitque oscula iuxta. 

ibit in amplexus natus fraterque paterque 

et soror : una locum cervix dabit omnibus astris. 

The poem on the emperor's sexless favourite, Earinus, can 
scarcely be quoted here. Without being definitely coarse, 
it succeeds in being one of the most disgusting productions 
in the whole range of literature. The emperor who can 
accept flattery of such a kind has certainly qualified for 
assassination. The lighter poems are almost distressingly 
trivial, and it is but a poor excuse to plead that such triviality 
was imposed by the artificial social life of the day and the 
jealous tyranny of Domitian. Moreover, the tendency to 
preciosity, which was kept in check in the Thebais by the 
requirements of epic, here has full play. The death of a boy 
in his fifteenth year is described as follows (ii. 6, 70) : 

vitae modo cardine adultae [2] 

nectere temptabat iuvenum pulcherrimus ille 
cum tribus Eleis unam trieterida lustris. 

Writers of elegiac verse are addressed as (i. 2. 250) 

' qui nobile gressu [3] 

extremo fraudatis opus '. 

A new dawn is expressed by an astounding periphrasis 
(iv. 6. 15) : 



[1] When heaven takes its joy of earth, thy kin shall leave heaven and 
glide down to earth and kiss thee face to face. Thy son and sister, thy 
brother and thy sire, shall come to thy embrace ; and about thy sole neck 
shall all the stars of heaven find a place. 

[2] Come now to the turning- point where boyhood becomes manhood, he, 
the fairest of youths, was on the point of linking three olympiads (twelve 
years) with a space of three years. 

[3] Ye that cheat the noble march of your verse of its last stride. 



230 STATIUS IX 

ab Elysiis prospexit sedibus alter [1] 

Castor et hesternas risit Tithonia mensas. 

There is, in fact, no limit in these poems to Statius' luxuriance 
in far-fetched and often obscure mythological allusions. 
In spite, however, of such cardinal defects as these, the Silvae 
present a brilliant though superficial picture of the cultured 
society of the day and contain much that is pretty, and 
something that is poetic. 1 Take, for instance, the poem 
in which the poet writes to console Atedius Melior for the 
death of his favourite Glaucias, a puer delicatus. The work 
is hopelessly clever and hopelessly insincere. Statius exag- 
gerates at once the charms of the dead boy and the grief of 
Atedius and himself. But at the conclusion he works up 
an old commonplace into a very pretty piece of verse. He 
has been describing the reception of Glaucias in the under- 
world (ii. 1. 208): 

hie finis rapto ! quin tu iam vulnera sedas [2] 

et tollis mersum luctu caput ? omnia functa 

aut moritura vides : obeunt noctesque diesque 

astraque, nee solidis prodest sua machina terris. 

nam populos, mortale genus, plebisque caducae 

quis fleat interitus ? hos bella, hos aequora poscunt ; 

his amor exitio, furor his et saeva cupido, 

ut sileam morbos ; hos ora rigentia Brumae, 



[1] Castor in turn looked forth from the halls of Elysium and Tithonus' 
bride made merry over yesterday's feasts. [Castor and Pollux lived on 
alternate days.] 

[2] Such is the rest thy lost darling has won. Come, soothe thine anguish 
and lift up thy head that droops with woe. Thou seest all things dead or soon 
to die. Day and night and stars all pass away, nor shall its massive fabric 
save the world from destruction. As for the tribes of earth, this mortal race, 
and the death of multitudes all doomed to pass away, why bewail them ? 
Some war, some ocean, demands for its prey : some die of love, others of 
madness, others of fierce desire, to say naught of pestilence : some winter's 



1 It is hard to select from the Silvae. Beside those poems from which 
quotations are given, iii. 5, v. 3 and 5 are best worth reading. But the 
average level is high. The Sapphic and Alcaic poems (iv. 5 and 7) and the 
hexameter poems in praise of Domitian (i. 1, iii. 4, iv. 1 and 2) are the 
least worth reading. 



IX STATIUS 231 

illos implacido letalis Sirius igni, 

hos manet imbrifero pallens Autumnus hiatu. 

quicquid init ortus, finem timet. ibimus omnes, 

ibimus : immensis urnam quatit Aeacus ulnis. 

ast hie quern gemimus, felix hominesque deosque 

et dubios casus et caecae lubrica vitae 

effugit, immunis fatis. non ille rogavit, 

non timuit meruitve mori : nos anxia plebes, 

nos miseri, quibus unde dies suprema, quis aevi 

exitus incertum, quibus instet fulmen ab astris, 

quae nubes fatale sonet. 

There is nothing great about such work, but it is a neat 
and elegant treatment of a familiar theme, while the phrase 
non ille rogavit, non timuit meruitve mori has a pathos worthy 
of a better cause. 1 Far more suited, however, to the genius 
of Statius, with its lack of inspiration, its marvellous polish, 
and its love of minutiae, are the descriptions of villas, temples, 
baths, and works of art in which he so frequently indulges. 
The poem on the statuette of Hercules (ii. 6) is a wonder of 
cunning craftsmanship, the poems on the baths of Etruscus, 
the villa of Vopiscus at Tibur, and of Pollius at Surrentum, 



freezing breath, others the baleful Sirius' cruel fire, others again pale 
autumn, gaping with rainy maw, awaits for doom : all that hath birth 
must tremble before death : we all must go, must go : Aeacus shakes the 
urn of fate in his vast arms. But this child, whom we bewail, is happy, 
and has escaped the power of men and gods, the strokes of chance, and 
the slippery paths of our dark life : fate cannot touch him : he did not 
ask, nor fear, nor deserve to die. But we poor anxious rabble, we miserable 
men, know not whence our last day shall come, what shall be the end of 
life, for whom the thunderbolt shall bring death from the starry sky, nor 
what cloud shall roar forth our doom. 



1 The poem on the death of his father (v. 3) shows genuine depth of 
feeling, but its elaborate artificiality is somewhat distressing, considering 
the theme. (The same is true to a less degree of v. 5.) V. 3 must be, in 
portions at any rate, the earliest of the Silvae, for (1. 29) the poet states 
that his father has been dead but three months. But it records (11. 219-33) 
events which took place long after that time (i. e. victory at Alba and 
failure at Agon Capitolinus). The poem must have been rewritten in 
part, 11. 219-33 at least being later additions. The inconsistency between 
these lines and line 29 is probably due to the poet having died before 
revising bk. v for publication. 



232 STATIUS IX 

for all their exaggeration and affectation, reveal a genuine 
love for the beauties of art and nature. It is true that he 
shows a preference for nature trimmed by the hand of 
man. but his pleasure is genuine and its expression often 
delicate. Who would not delight to live in a house such 
as Pollius had built at Sorrento (ii. 2. 45) ? 

haec domus ortus [1] 

aspicit et Phoebi tenerum iubar ; ilia cadentem 
detinet exactamque negat dimittere lucem, 
cum iam fessa dies et in aequora mentis opaci 
umbra cadit vitreoque natant praetoria ponto. 
haec pelagi clamore fremunt, haec tecta sonoros 
ignorant fluctus terraeque silentia malunt. 

quid mille revolvam 

culmina visendique vices ? sua cuique voluptas 
atque omni proprium thalamo mare, transque iacentem 
Nerea diversis servit sua terra fenestris. 

We cannot, perhaps, share his enthusiasm in the minute 
description that follows of the coloured marbles used in the 
decoration of the house, and his panegyric of Pollius leaves 
us cold, but we quit the poem with a pleasant impression 
of the Bay of Naples and of the poet who loved it so well. 
It recalls in its way the charming, if over-elaborate and 
exaggerated, landscapes of the younger Pliny in his letters 
on the source of the Clitumnus and on his Tuscan and Lauren- 
tine villas. 1 But it is in two poems of a very different kind 
that the Silvae reach their high-water mark. The Genethliacon 



[1] One chamber looks to the east and the young beam of Phoebus ; one 
stays him as he falls and will not part with the expiring light, when the 
day is outworn and the shadow of the dark mount falls athwart the deep, 
and the great castle swims reflected in the glassy sea. These chambers 
are full of the sound of ocean, those know not the roaring waves, but rather 
love the silence of the land. . . . Why should I recount thy thousand 
roofs and every varied view ? Each has a joy that is its own : each 
chamber has its own sea, and each several window its own tract of land 
seen across the sea beneath. 

1 viii. 8 ; ii. 17 ; v. 6. 



IX STATIUS 233 

Lucani, despite its artificial form and the literary conventions 
with which it is overloaded, reveals a genuine enthusiasm for 
the dead poet, and is couched in language of the utmost 
grace and verse of extraordinary melody ; the hendeca- 
syllables of Statius lack the poignant vigour of the Catullan 
hendecasyllables, but they have a music of their own which 
is scarcely less remarkable. 1 The lament of Calliope for her 
lost nursling will hold its own with anything of a similar 
kind produced by the Silver Age (ii. 7. 88) : 

' o saevae nimium gravesque Parcae ! [1] 

o numquam data longa fata sumrais ! 

cur plus, ardua, casibus patetis ? 

cur saeva vice magna non senescunt ? 

sic natum Nasamonii Tonantis 

post ortus obitusque fulminates 

angusto Babylon premit sepulcro. 

sic fixum Paridis manu trementis 

Peliden Thetis horruit cadentem. 

sic ripis ego murmurantis Hebri 

non mutum caput Orpheos sequebar 

sic et tu (rabidi nefas tyranni !) 

iussus praecipitem subire Lethen, 

dum pugnas canis arduaque voce 

das solatia grandibus sepulcris, 

(o dirum scelus ! o scelus !) tacebis.' 

sic fata est leviterque decidentes 

abrasit lacrimas nitente plectro. 

[1] 'Ah ! fates severe and all too cruel ! O life that for our noblest ne'er 
is long ! Why are earth's loftiest most prone to fall ? Why by hard fate do 
her great ones ne'er grow old ? Even so the Nasamonian Thunderer's son 
like lightning rose, like lightning passed away, and now is laid in a narrow 
tomb at Babylon. So Thetis shuddered, when the son of Peleus fell trans- 
fixed by Paris' coward hand. So I, too, by the banks of murmuring 
Hebrus followed the head of Orpheus that could not cease from song. 
So now must thou out on the mad tyrant's crime ! go down untimely 
to the wave of Lethe, and while thou singest of war and with lofty strain 
givest comfort to the sepulchres of the mighty, infamy, O monstrous 
infamy ! art doomed to sudden silence.' So spake she, and with gleaming 
quill wiped away the tears that gently fell. 

1 With Statius, as with Martial, the hendecasyllable always begins 
with a spondee. The Alcaics of iv. 5 and Sapphics of iv. 7 call for no 



234 STATIUS IX 

But' more beautiful as pure poetry, and indeed unique in 
Latin, is the well-known invocation to Sleep (v. 4) : 

crimine quo merui iuvenis, 1 placidissime divum, [1] 

quove errore miser, donis ut solus egerem, 

Somne, tuis ? tacet omne pecus volucresque feraeque 

et simulant fessos curvata cacumina somnos, 

nee trucibus fluviis idem sonus ; occidit horror 

aequoris, et terris maria acclinata quiescunt. 

septima iam rediens Phoebe mihi respicit aegras 

stare genas ; totidem Oetaeae Paphiaeque revisunt 

lampades et totiens nostros Tithonia questus 

praeterit et gelido spargit miserata flagello. 

unde ego sufficiam ? non si mihi lumina mille 

quae sacer alterna tantum statione tenebat 

Argus et haud umquam vigilabat corpore toto. 

at nunc hens ! aliquis longa sub nocte puellae 

bracchia nexa tenens ultro te, Somne, repellit : 

inde veni ! nee te totas infundere pennas 

luminibus compello meis (hoc turba precetur 



[1] By what crime, Sleep, most gentle of gods, or by what error, have 
I, that am young, deserved woe's me ! that I alone should lack thy 
blessing ? All cattle and birds and beasts of the wild he silent ; the curved 
mountain ridges seem as though they slept the sleep of weariness, and wild 
torrents have hushed their roaring. The waves of the deep have fallen 
and the seas, reclined on earth's bosom, take their rest. Yet now Phoebe 
returning gazes for the seventh time on my sleepless weary eyes. For the 
seventh time the lamps of Oeta and Paphos (i. e. Hesperus and Venus) 
revisit me, for the seventh time Tithonus' bride sweeps over my complaint 
and all her pity is to touch me with her frosty scourge. How may I find 
strength to endure ? I needs must fault, even had I the thousand eyes 
which divine Argos kept fixed upon his prey in shifting relays (so only 
could he wake, nor watched he ever with all his body). But now woe's 
me ! another, his arms locked about his love, spurneth thee from him 
all the long night. Leave him, O Sleep, for me. I bid thee not sweep 
upon my eyes with all the force of thy fanning pinions. That is the prayer 



special comment. They are closely modelled on Horace. The two poems 
fail because they are prosy and uninteresting, not through any fault of 
the metre, but it may be that Statius felt his powers hampered by an 
unfamiliar metre. 

1 If iuvenis be taken to refer to Statius, the poem must be an early work 
or depict an imaginary situation. The alternative is to take it as a vocative 
referring to Sleep. 



IX STATIUS 235 

laetior) : extreme me tange cacumine virgae 
(sufficit) aut leviter suspense poplite transi. 

Here Statius far surpasses himself. Had all else that he 
wrote been merely mediocre, this one short poem would 
have given him a claim on the grateful memory of posterity. 
The note it strikes is one that has never been heard before 
in Latin poetry and is never heard again. We have wavered 
before as to Statius' title to the name of true poet ; this 
should turn the balance in his favour. Great he is not for 
a moment to be called ; Lucan, with all his faults, stands 
high above him ; Valerius Flaccus, aided largely by his 
happier choice of subject, is in some respects his superior ; 
but for finish, dexterity, and fluency, Statius is unique among 
the post-Augustans. Just as an actor who has acquired 
a perfect mastery of all the tricks and technique of the 
stage may sometimes cheat us into believing him to be a 
great actor, though in reality neither intellect, presence, nor 
voice qualify him for such high praise, so it is with Statius. 
His facility and cunning workmanship hold us amazed, 
and at times the reader is on the verge of yielding up his 
saner judgement before such charm. But the revulsion of 
feeling comes inevitably. Statius had not learned the art 
of concealing his art. The unreality of his work soon 
makes itself felt, and his skill becomes in time little better 
than a weariness and a mockery. 



of happier souls than I. Touch me only with the tip of thy wand that 
shall suffice or lightly pass over my head with hovering feet. 



CHAPTER X 

SILIUS ITALICUS 

TITUS CATIUS SILIUS ITALICUS x is best known to us as the 
author of the longest and worst of surviving Roman epics. 
But by a strange irony of fate we have a fuller knowledge 
of his life and character than is granted us in the case of any 
other poet of the Silver Age, with the exception of Seneca 
and Persius. His social position, his personal character, 
his cultured and artistic tastes, rather than any merit 
possessed by his verse, have won him a place in the picture- 
gallery of Pliny the younger. 2 We would gladly sacrifice 
the whole of the ' obituary notice ' transmitted to us by 
the kindly garrulity of Pliny, for a few more glimpses into 
the life of Juvenal, or even of Valerius Flaccus, but the 
picture is interesting and even attractive, and awakens 
feelings of a less unfriendly nature than are usually enter- 
tained for the plodding poetaster who had the misfortune 
to write the seventeen books of Punica. 

Silius was born in the year 25 or 26 A.D. 3 ; of his family 
and place of birth we know nothing. 4 He first appears in 
the unpleasing guise of a ' delator ' in the reign of Nero, in 
the last year of whose principate he filled the position of 
consul (68 A.D.). 

In the 'year of the four emperors' (69 A.D.) he is found 



1 C. I. L. vi. 1984. 9, in the 'fasti sodalium Augustalium Claudialium'. 
In MSS. Pliny and Tacitus, he is Silius Italicus, in Martial simply Silius 
or Italicus. 

2 Plin. Ep. iii. 7. In the description of his life which follows, Pliny is 
the authority, where not otherwise stated. 

3 Pliny writes in 101 A.D. to record Silius' death. Sih'us was over seventy- 
five when he died. 

4 Italicus might suggest that he came from the Spanish town of Italica. 
But Martial, who addresses him in several epigrams of almost servile 
flattery, would surely have claimed him as fellow-countryman had this 
been the case. 



X SILIUS ITALICUS 237 

as the friend and counsellor of Vitellius ; l his conduct, we are 
told, was wise and courteous. He subsequently won renown 
by his admirable administration of the province of Asia, and 
then retired from the public gaze to the seclusion of a life of 
study. 2 The amiability and virtue which marked the leisure 
of his later years wiped out the dark stain that had be- 
smirched his youth. ' Men hastened to salute him and to 
do him honour. When not engaged in writing, he would 
pass the day in learned converse with the friends and 
acquaintances no mere fortune-hunters who continually 
thronged the chambers where he would lie for long hours 
upon his couch. His verses, which he would sometimes sub- 
mit to the judgement of the critics by giving recitations, 
show diligence rather than genius. The increasing infirmities 
of age led him to forsake Rome for Campania ; not even the 
accession of a new princeps induced him to quit his retire- 
ment. It is not less creditable to Caesar to have permitted 
than to Silius to have ventured on such a freedom. He was 
a connoisseur even to the verge of extravagance. He had 
several country houses in the same district, and often 
abandoned those which he already possessed, if some new 
house chanced to catch his fancy. He had a large library, 
and a fine collection of portraits and statues, and was an 
enthusiastic admirer of works of art which he was not 
fortunate enough to possess. He kept Vergil's birthday with 
greater care than his own, especially when he was at Naples, 
where he would visit the poet's tomb with all the veneration 



1 Pliny, loc. cit. ; Tac. Hist. iii. 65. 

2 His poem was already planned in 88 ; cp. Mart. iv. 14 (published 
88 A. D.). Some of it was already written in 92 ; cp. leg is, M. vii. 62 (pub- 
lished 92 A. D.). But the allusion to Domitian, iii. 607, must have been 
inserted after that date, while xiv. 686 points to the close of Nerva's 
principate. Statius, Silv. iv. 7. 14 (published 95 A. D.) seems to imitate 
Silius : 

Dalmatae montes ubi Dite viso 
pallidus fossor redit erutoque 
concolor auro. 

Sil. i. 233 'ct redit infelix effosso concolor auro.' The last five books, 
compressed and markedly inferior to i-xii, may have been left unre vised. 



238 SILIUS ITALICUS X 

due to the temple of a god.' He died 1 in his Neapolitan 
villa of self -chosen starvation. His health had failed him. 
He was afflicted by an incurable tumour, and ran to meet 
death with a fortitude that nothing could shake. ' His life 
was happy and prosperous to his last hour ; his one sorrow 
was the death of his younger son ; the elder (and better) of 
his sons, who survives him, has had a distinguished career, 
and has even reached the consulate.' From Epictetus 2 we 
gather, what we might infer from the manner of his death, 
that he was a Stoic. From Martial, 3 who addresses him in 
the interested language of flattery as the leading orator of 
his day, and as the maker of immortal verse, we learn 
that he was the proud possessor of the Tusculan villa of 
Cicero, and that he actually owned the tomb of the poet 
whom he loved so well. 

Silius' life is more interesting than his verse. Like Lucan, 
he elected to write historical epic, and in his choice of a sub- 
ject was undoubtedly wiser than his younger contemporary. 
For instead of selecting a period so dangerously recent as 
the civil strife in which the republic perished, he went back 
to the Second Punic War, to a time sufficiently remote to 
permit of greater freedom of treatment and to enable him 
to avoid the peril of unduly republican ecstasies. In making 
this choice he was in all probability influenced by his rever- 
ence for Vergil. He, too, would sing of Rome's rise to 
greatness, would write a truly national epic on the great 
theme which Vergil so inimitably foreshadowed in the dying 
words of the Carthaginian queen, would link the most stirring 
years of Rome's history with the past, just as Vergil had 



1 In 101 A. D. at the age of seventy-five. 2 Epict. diss. iii. 8. 7. 

3 Mart. xi. 48 : 

Silius haec magni celebrat monumenta Maronis, 

iugera facundi qui Ciceronis habet. 
heredem dominumque sui tumulive larisve 

non alium mallet nee Maro nee Cicero. 

That it was the Tusculanum and not the Cumanum of Cicero that Silius 
possessed is an inference from C. I. L. xix. 2653, found at Tusculum : 
' D.M. Crescenti Silius Italicus Collegium salutarem.' 



X SILIUS ITALICUS 

linked the epic of Rome's founder to the greatness of the 
years that were to come. Ennius had been before him, but 
he might well aspire to remodel and develop the rude anna- 
listic work of the earlier poet. 1 The brilliant history of 
Livy, with its vivid battle-scenes and its sonorous speeches, 
was a quarry that might provide him with the richest 
material. Unhappily, less wise than Lucan, he made the 
fatal mistake of adopting the principles set forth by Eumol- 
pus, the dissolute poet in the novel of Petronius. 2 

The intrusion of the mythological method into historical 
epic is disastrous. It is barely tolerable in the pseudo- 
historical epic of Tasso. In the military narrative of Silius 
it is monstrous and insufferable. His reverence for Vergil 
led him to control, or attempt to control, every action of 
the war by divine intervention. 

Juno reappears in her old role as the implacable enemy of 
Rome. It is she that kindles Hannibal's hatred for Rome, 
causes the outbreak of the war, 3 and, disguised as the lake-god 
Trasimenus, spurs him on to Rome. 4 It is at her instigation 
that Anna Perenna kindles him to fresh effort by the news 
that Fabius Cunctator is no longer in command against him, 5 
that Somnus moderates his designs after Cannae. 6 It is Juno 
that conceals the Carthaginian forces in a cloud at Cannae, 7 
and that rescues Hannibal from the fury of Scipio at Zama. 8 
Against Juno is arrayed Venus, the protector of the sons of 
Aeneas. She persuades her husband Vulcan to dry up the 
Trebia, whose flood threatens the Romans with yet greater 
disaster than they have already suffered, 9 she unnerves and 
demoralizes the Punic army by the luxury of Capua. 10 
Minerva and Mars play minor parts, the former favouring 
Carthage, the latter Rome. 11 Nothing is gained by this 
dreary and superannuated mechanism, while the poem is 
yet further hampered by the other encumbrances of epic 
commonplace. 



1 Enn. Ann. vii, viii, ix. 2 g ee p> 103. a i. 55. * i v . 727. 

5 viii. 28. 6 x. 349. 7 ix. 484. 8 xvii. 523. 

9 iv. 675. 10 xi. 387. n ix. 439. 



240 SILIUS ITALICUS X 

The Thebais of Statius is full of episodes that only find 
a place because Vergil had borrowed similar episodes from 
Homer. But the Thebais is a professedly mythological epic, 
and Statius commands a light touch and brilliant colours. 
The reader merely groans when the heavy-handed Silius 
introduces his wondrously engraven shield, 1 his funeral 
games, 2 his Amazon, 3 his dismal catalogues, 4 his Nekuia. 5 
In the latter episode, he even introduces the Vergilian Sibyl 
of Cumae ; it is a redeeming feature that Scipio does not 
make a ' personally conducted tour ' through the nether 
world ; such a direct challenge to the Sixth Aeneid was 
perhaps impossible for so true a lover of Vergil as Silius. 
The Homeric method of necromancy is wisely preferred, 
and the Sibyl reveals the past and future of Rome as the 
spirits pass before them. But there are no illuminating 
flashes of imagination ; the best feature of the episode is 
an uninspired and frigid appropriateness. Nothing serves 
better than the failure of Silius to show at once the daring 
and the genius of Vergil, when he ransacked the wealth of 
Homer and 

from a greater Greek 

Borrowed as beautifully as the moon 

The fire o' the sun. 

Apart from these unintelligent plagiarisms and vexatious 
absurdities, the actual form and composition of the work 
show some skill. The poet passes from scene to scene, from 
battle to battle, with ease and assurance in the earlier books. 
It is only with the widening of the area of conflict that the 
work loses its connexion. The earlier and less important 
exploits of the elder Scipios were wisely dismissed in a few 
words. 6 The poet avoided the mistake of undue scrupulosity 
in respect of chronology and makes no attempt to pose as 
a scientific military historian. But it is a serious defect 
that he should fail to show the significance of the successful 



1 ii. 395. 2 xv i. 288. 3 ii, 56. 

4 iii. 222 and viii. 356. 5 xiii. 395. 

6 e. g. the Funeral Games, the choice of Scipio (xv. 20), the Nekuia. 



X SILIUS ITALICUS 241 

' peninsular campaign ' of the younger Scipio. Here, as in 
the descriptions of the siege of Syracuse, the reader is 
haunted by the feeling that these great events are regarded 
as merely episodic. Even the thrilling march of Hasdrubal, 
ending in the dramatic catastrophe of the Metaurus, is 
hardly given its full weight. There is more true historical 
and dramatic appreciation in Horace's 

Karthagini iam non ego nuntios 
mittam superbos : occidit, occidit 
spes omnis et fortuna nostri 
nominis Hasdrubale interempto 

than in all the ill-proportioned verbiage of Silius. The 
task of setting forth the course of a conflict that flamed all 
over the Western Mediterranean world was not easy, and 
Silius' failure was proportionately great. Nay if it be 
not merely the hallucination of a weary reader he seems to 
have tired of his task. The first twelve books take us 
no further than Hannibal's appearance before the walls of 
Rome, and the war is summarily brought to a close in the 
last five books, although these, it should be noted, are by 
no means free from irrelevant matter. The last three books 
above all are jejune and perfunctory, and it has been sug- 
gested that they lack the final revision that the rest of the 
work had received. Be this as it may, the result of the 
inadequate treatment of the close of the war is that the 
reader lays down the poem with no feeling of the greatness 
of Rome's triumph. 

Yet even with these faults of composition, a genuine poet 
might have wrought a great work from the rough ore of 
history. The scene is thronged with figures as remarkable and 
inspiring as history affords. There is the fierce irresistible 
Hannibal, the sagacious Fabius, the elder Scipios, tragic 
victims of disaster, the younger Scipio, glorious with the light 
of victory as the clouds of defeat are rolled away, Hasdrubal 
hurled to ruin at the supreme crisis of the war, Marcellus 
the victorious, beleaguered l and beleaguerer, the ill-starred 

i At Nola. 

BUTLER T> 



242 SILIUS ITALICUS X 

Paulus, the Senate of Rome that thanked the fugitive Varro 
because he had not despaired of the republic, 1 and above all 
the gigantic figure of Rome herself, unshaken, indomitable, 
triumphant. These are no dry bones that the breath of the 
poet alone should make them live. They breathe immortal 
in the prose of Livy, in the verse of Silius they are vain 
' shadows of men foredone '. The Hannibal of Silius is not 
the dazzling villain of Livy, the incarnation of military 
daring and ' Punic faith '. Mistaken patriotism does not 
lead Silius to blacken the character of Rome's great antago- 
nist ; he strives to do him justice ; he is as true a patriot, 
as chivalrous 2 a warrior, as any of the Roman leaders. But 
he does not live ; he is merely the stock warrior of epic, and 
his exploits fail to compel belief. 

Fabius, the least romantic, though not the least interesting 
figure in the war, stands forth more clearly. The prosaic 
Silius is naturally most successful with his most prosaic 
hero. The younger Scipio is the embodiment of pietas, an 
historical Aeneas, without his prototype's most distressing 
weaknesses, but with all his dullness, and lacking the halo of 
legend and the splendour of the founder of the race to glorify 
him. Paulus has the merit of true courage, and his conscious- 
ness of his colleague's folly invests him with a certain pathos. 
He makes the best death of any Silian warrior, and deserves 
the eulogy passed on him by Hannibal. The rest are lay- 
figures, with even less individuality and life. Silius failed 
to depict character. He fails, too, to show any true sense of 
the political greatness of Rome. The genius of Rome 
and the genius of Carthage are never confronted or con- 
trasted ; the greatness of Rome in defeat, the scenes of Rome 
agonizing in the grip of unexpected disaster, are never 
brought home to the reader with the least degree of vividness. 



1 Cp. x. 628 ' quod . . . Laomedontiadum non desperaverit urbi '. The 
tasteless Laomedontiadum as a learned equivalent for Romanorum is 
characteristic. Silius has the Aeneid in his mind when he chooses this 
word : his literary proclivities lead him astray ; where he should be most 
strong he is most feeble. 

2 Vide infra for his treatment of Paulus' dead body after Cannae. 



X SILIUS ITALICUS 243 

The great battles are described at tedious length l and ren- 
dered ridiculous by the lavish introduction of Homeric single 
combats. If Silius is rarely bombastic or rendered absurd 
by the grossness of his exaggeration, he yet fails to see what 
Lucan saw plainly that for the author of a military his- 
torical epic, it is the issues of the war, big with the fate of 
generations to come, the temper of the combatants, the 
character of the chief actors, that are the really interesting 
elements. Almost alone of Silver Latin poets he shows no 
real gifts of rhetoric and epigram, no virtuosity of diction, 
no brilliance of description. We lack the declamation of 
Lucan, the apostrophes on the issues of the war, the vivid 
character-sketches of the generals, the political enthusiasm, 
the thunder of the oratory of general and statesman. The 
battle-speeches of Livy, whose glow and vigour half atone 
for their theatricality, have been made use of by Silius, but 
find only a feeble echo in his lifeless verse. Nothing stands 
out sharply defined; the epic lacks impetus and has no 
salient points ; outlines are blurred in an unpoetic haze. 
The history of Tacitus has been described as history ' seen 
by lightning flashes '. Such should be the history of his- 
torical epic. In its stead Silius presents us with a confused 
welter of archaistic battle, learned allusion, and epic com- 
monplace. 

'Aequalis liber est, Cretice, qui malus est,' cries Martial 2 
to a friend. The epigram would apply to the Punica. 
There is scarcely a passage in the whole work that reveals 
genuine poetic imagination. Silius is free from many of 
the faults of his contemporaries, the faults that spring 
from aspirations towards originality. He is content to be 
an imitator. In his style, as in his composition, Vergil is 
an obsession. But the echoes are muffled or unmusical. 
Gifted with ease and fluency and for his age comparative 
lucidity of diction, Silius has no true ear for music, nor true 
eye for beauty. His verse moves naturally but heavily. 



1 Trebia, iv. 480-703 ; Trasimene, v. 1-678 ; Cannae, ix. 178 x. 578. 

2 Mart. vii. 90. 

H 2 



244 SILIUS ITALICUS X 

He is the most spondaic poet 1 of his age, and the spondaic 
rhythm is not alleviated by artistic variety of pause or 
judicious use of elision. Lucan is heavy, but he hits hard 
and is weighty in the best sense. Silius rolls on lumbering 
and unperturbed, never rising or falling. He has all the 
faults of Ovid, and, in spite of his laboured imitation, none 
of the merits of Vergil. Nothing can kindle him. The 
most heroic and the most tragic of all the stories of the 
struggle for the empire of the western world is that of 
Regulus, the famous captive of Carthage in the first Punic 
War. 2 The episode is skilfully and naturally introduced. 
The story is told by an aged veteran of the first Punic War 
to a descendant of Regulus, who has fled wounded from the 
rout of Trasimene. Silius succeeds in making one of the 
noblest stories in history lifeless and dull. The narration 
opens with the description of a melodramatic struggle be- 
tween Regulus and a monstrous serpent in Africa, scarcely 
an harmonious prelude for the simple and solemn climax 
of the hero's life, his return to his home to fix ' the Senate's 
wavering will ', his departure unmoved to Carthaginian 
captivity, with the certainty of death and torture before 
him. Silius treats this tragic episode simply and severely ; 
there is nothing to offend the taste, but there is equally 
nothing to move the heart ; the description is merely 
dull ; it lacks the fire of life and the finer imagination. 
Here, again, we turn for relief to Horace with his brief but 

incomparable 

atqui sciebat quae sibi barbarus 

tortor pararet, non aliter tamen 

dimovit obstantes propinquos 

et populum reditus morantem 
quam si clientum longa negotia 
diiudicata lite relinqueret, 
tenden s Venefranos in agros 
aut Lacedaemonium Tarentum (iii. 5. 49). 

Take the corresponding passage in Silius. Regulus con- 
cludes his speech to the Senate as follows (vi. 485) : 

1 See p. 123, note. 2 Bk. vi. 



X SILIUS ITALICUS 245 

exposcunt Libyes nobisque dedere [1] 

haec referenda, pari libeat si pendere bellum 
foedere et ex aequo geminas conscribere leges, 
sed mihi sit Stygios ante intravisse penates 
talia quam videam ferientes pacta Latinos, 
haec fatus Tyriae sese iam reddidit irae, 
nee monitus spernente graves fidosque senatu 
Poenorum dimissa cohors. quae maesta repulsa 
ac minitans capto patrias properabat ad oras. 
prosequitur volgus, patres, ac planctibus ingens 
personat et luctu campus, revocare libebat 
interdum et iusto raptum retinere dolore. 

Criticism is needless. One passage is in the grand style, the 
other is not ; one is mere verse-making, the other the purest 
poetry. Silius has nothing of curiosa felicitas or even of 
the more common gift of vague sensuous charm. Even 
on such hackneyed themes as the choice of Hercules, with 
Scipio playing the part of Hercules, he fails to rise to the 
conventional prettiness of which even a Calpurnius Siculus 
would have been capable. Virtue and pleasure are ren- 
dered equally unattractive, and we pity Scipio for having 
to make the choice. With the other poets of the age it 
is easy to select passages to illustrate their characteristic 
merits and defects. But from the dull monotony of 
Silius it is hard to choose. He does not read well even 
in selections. Apart from the general absurdity of the 
conception of the poem he is rarely grotesque. His taste is 
chastened by his love of Vergil, and the absence of genuine 
rhetorical power saves him from dangerous exuberance. 

[1] ' The Libyans ask whether you will cease from war on equal terms 
and draw up a treaty wherein each side keeps its own. They bid me bring 
back your reply. But may I sooner enter the gates of hell than see the 
Latins make such a compact ! ' He spake, and yielded himself back once 
more to the mercies of the Tyrian's hate : the Senate spurned not his words 
of weight, his loyal warning. The Punic embassy was dismissed. Cast 
down at their rebuff, and threatening their captive, they hastened home- 
ward to their native shores. The people, the fathers, follow them : the whole 
vast plain resounds with weeping and beating of breasts, and ever and 
again they strove to recall the hero and with just grief to retain him as 
he was snatched away from them. 



246 SILIUS ITALICUS X 

The tricks of rhetoric are there, but the edge of his wit is 
dull, and he has no speed nor energy. For similar reasons 
he never attains sublimity. There are faint traces of the 
Bomana gravitas in lines such as 

iamque tibi veniet tempus quo maxima rerum [1] 

nobilior sit Roma malis (iii. 584). 

The idea that the trials of Rome shall be as a ' refiner's fire ' 
has a certain grandeur, but the expression of the idea is 
commonplace. The same is true of the elaboration of the 
Vergilian par cere subiectis, where the poet describes Mar- 
cellus' clemency to the vanquished Syracusans, and makes 
brief allusion to the unhappy death of Archimedes (xiv. 
673): 

sic parcere victis [2] 

pro praeda fuit et sese contenta nee ullo 

sanguine pollutis plausit Victoria pennis. 

tu quoque ductoris lacrimas, memorande, tulisti, 

defensor patriae, meditantem in pulvere formas 

nee turbatum animi tanta feriente ruina. 

To find Silius at bis best not a very exalted best we 
must turn to the passage where he depicts the feelings of 
Hannibal on finding the body of Paulus on the field of 
Cannae (x. 513) : 

quae postquam aspexit, geminatus gaudia ductor [3] 

Sidonius ' Fuge, Varro,' inquit ' fuge, Varro, superstes, 
dum iaceat Paulus. patribus Fabioque sedenti 
et populo consul totas edissere Cannas. 
concedam hanc iterum, si lucis tanta cupido est, 



[1] And the time shall come when Rome, the greatest thing in all the 
world, shall be yet more ennobled by her woes. 

[2] So mercy toward the conquered took the place of rapine, and Victory 
was content with herself and clapped her wings unstained by any blood. 
Thou, too, immortal sage, defender of thy country, didst win the meed 
of the conqueror's tears, thou whom ruin smote down, all unmoved, as 
thou broodedst o'er figures traced in the dust. 

[3] When this he saw, the Sidonian chief was filled with double joy and 
cried, ' Fly, Varro, fly and survive defeat ; enough that Paulus lieth low ! 
Go, consul, tell all the tale of Cannae to the fathers, to laggard Fabius, 
to the people. If so thou long'st to live, I will grant thee, Varro, to flee 



X SILIUS ITALICUS 247 

concedam tibi, Varro, fugam. at, cui fortia et hoste 
me digna baud parvo caluerunt corda vigore, 
funere supremo et tumuli decoretur honore. 
quantus, Paule, iaces ! qui tot mihi milibus unus 
maior laetitiae causa est. cum fata vocabunt, 
tale precor nobis salva Karthagine letum.' 

' i decus Ausoniae, quo fas est ire superbas (572) 

virtute et factis animas. tibi gloria leto 

iam parta insigni. nostros Fortuna labores 

versat adhuc casusque iubet nescire futures.' 

haec Libys, atque repens crepitantibus undique flammis 

aetherias anima exultans evasit in auras. 

The picture of the soul of Paulus soaring heavenward from 
the funeral pyre, exultant at the honour paid him by his 
great foe, is the nearest approach to pure poetic imagination 
in the whole weary length of the Punica. 1 But the pedes- 
trian muse of Silius is more at home in the ingenious descrip- 
tion of the manoeuvres and counter-manoeuvres of Fabius 
and Hannibal in the seventh book ; the similes with which 
the passage closes are hackneyed, but their application is 
both new and clever : 

(vii. 91) iam Fabius tacito procedens agmine et arte [1] 

bellandi lento similis, praecluserat omnes 



once more as thou fleest to-day. But let him, whose heart was bold and 
worthy to be my foe, and all aflame with mighty valour, be honoured with 
the last rites of burial and all the honour of the tomb. How great, Paulus, 
art thou in the death ! Thy fall alone gives greater cause for joy than the 
fall of so many thousands. Such, when the fates shall summon me, such 
I pray be my fate, so Carthage stand unshaken.' . . . ' Go, Ausonia's glory, 
where the souls of those whom valour and noble deeds make proud may 
go. Thou hast won great glory by thy death. For us, Fortune still tosses 
us too and fro in weltering labour and forbids us to see what chance the 
future hath in store.' So spake the Libyan, and straightway from the 
crackling flame the exulting spirit soared skyward through the air. 

[1] Now Fabius advanced, leading his host in silence and such was his 
cunning like to a laggard in war ; so closed he all the paths whereby 



1 xii. 212-67, where the death of Cinyps clad in Paulus' armour is 
described, are pretty enough, but too frankly an imitation of Vergil to be 
worth quoting. The simile 247-50 is, however, new and quite picturesque. 



248 SILIUS ITALICUS X 

fortunaeque hostique vias. discedere signis 

hand licitum summumque decus, quo tollis ad astra 

imperil, Komane, caput, parere docebat 

(123) cassarum sedet irarum spectator et alti 
celsus colle iugi domat exultantia corda 
infractasque minas dilato Marte fatigat 
sellers cunctandi Fabius, ceu nocte sub atra 
munitis pastor stabulis per ovilia clausum 
impavidus somni servat pecus : effera saevit 
atque impasta truces ululatus turba luporum 
exercet morsuque quatit restantia claustra. 
inritus incepti movet inde atque Apula tardo 
arva Libys passu legit ac nunc valle residit 
conditus occulta, si praecipitare sequentem 
atque inopinata detur circumdare fraude ; 
nunc nocturna parat caecae celantibus urabris 
furta viae retroque abitum fictosque timores 
adsimulat, turn castra citus deserta relicta 
ostentat praeda atque invitat prodigus hostem : 
qualis Maeonia passim Maeandrus in ora, 
cum sibi gurgitibus flexis revolutus oberrat. 
nulla vacant incepta dolis : simul omnia versat 
miscetque exacuens varia ad conamina mentem, 



fortune or the foe might fall on him. No soldier might quit the standards, 
and he taught that the height of glory, even that glory, Roman, that raises 
thine imperial head to the stars, was obedience. . . . Fabius sits high 
on the mountain slopes watching the foeman's rage and tames his im- 
petuous ardour, humbles his threats, and, with skilful delay, postpones the 
day of battle and wears out his patience : as when through the darkness of 
the night a shepherd, fearless and sleepless in his well-guarded byre, keeps 
his flock penned within the fold : without, the wolf-pack, fierce and 
famished, howls fiercely, and with its teeth shakes the gates that bar its 
entrance. Baffled in his enterprise, the Libyan departs thence and slowly 
marches across the Apulian fields and pitches his camp deep in a hidden 
vale, if perchance he may hurl the Roman to ruin as he follows in his 
track and surround him by hidden guile. Now he prepares a midnight 
ambush in some dark pass beneath the shelter of the gloom, and falsely 
feigns retreat and fear ; then, swiftly leaving his camp and booty, he displays 
them to the foe, and lavishly invites a raid. Even as on Maeonian shores 
Maeander with winding channel turns upon himself and wanders far and 
wide, now here, now there. Naught he attempts, but has some guile in it. 
He weighs every scheme, sharpens his mind for divers exploits, and blends 



X SILIUS ITALICUS 249 

sicut aquae splendor radiatus lampade soils 
dissultat per tecta vaga sub imagine vibrans 
luminis et tremula laquearia verberat umbra. 

There is in this passage nothing approaching real excellence, 
but its dexterity may reasonably command some respect. 
It is dexterity of which Silius has little to show. He is well- 
read in history and its bastard sister mythology. At his 
best he can string together his incidents with some skill, and 
he makes use of his learning in the accepted fashion of his 
day. 1 The poem is deluged with proper names and learned 
aetiology, though he has no conception of that magical use 
of proper names and legendary allusions which is the secret 
of the masters of literary epic. 2 

But the absence of any true poetic genius makes him the 
most tedious of Latin authors, and his unenviable reputation 
is well deserved. For the poetry of the struggle with 
Carthage for the 

plumed troops and the big wars 
That make ambition virtue, 

for ' all quality, pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious 
war ', we must go to the inspired prose of Livy. 

And yet it is well that the Punica should have been pre- 
served. It is well to know that as France has its Henriade 
and England its Madoc, so Rome had its Punica. It 
is our one direct glimpse into the work of that cultured 
society, devastated by the 'scribendi caccethes', as Juvenal 
puts it, or, from the point of view of the facile Pliny, adorned 
by the number of its poets. 3 The Punica have won an 
immortality far other than that prophesied for them by 



contrivance with contrivance, even as the gleam of water lit by the sun's 
torch dances through a house quivering, and the reflected beam goes 
wandering and lashes the roof with tremulous reflection. 



1 Sights of Naples, xii. 85 ; Tides at Pillars of Hercules, iii. 46 ; Legend 
of Pan, xiii. 313 ; Sicily, xiv. 1-50 ; Fabii, vii. 20 ; Anna Percnna, viii. 50 ; 
Bacchus at Falernum, vii. 162 ; Trasiinenus, v. ad init. 

2 Sec note on p. 13. 3 Plin. Ep. i. 13. 



250 SILIUS ITALICUS X 

Martial, 1 but they show us the work of a cultured Roman 
gentleman of his day, who, if he had small capacity, had 
a high enthusiasm for letters, who had diligence if he had 
not genius, and was possessed by a love for the supreme 
poet in whose steps he followed, a passion so sincere that 
it may win from his scanty readers at least a partial forgive- 
ness for the inadequacy of his imitation and for the suffering 
inflicted on all those who have essayed the dreary adventure 
of reading the seventeen books that bear his name. 



1 Mart. vii. 63. 



CHAPTER XI 

MARTIAL 

MARCUS VALERIUS MARTIALIS, like Quintilian, Seneca, and 
Lucan, was a Spaniard by birth, and, unlike those writers, 
never became thoroughly reconciled to life at Rome. He 
was born at Bilbilis, 1 a small town of Hispania Tarraconensis. 
The exact year of his birth is uncertain ; but as the tenth 
book of his epigrams, written between 95 and 98 A. D., con- 
tains a reference (24) to his fifty-seventh birthday, he must 
have been born between 38 and 41 A.D. His birthday was 
the 1st of March, a fact to which he owes his name Martialis. 2 
Of the position of his parents, Valerius Fronto and Flaccilla, 3 
we have no evidence. That they were not wealthy is clear 
from the circumstances of their son. But they were able 
to give him a regular literary education, 4 although, unlike 
his fellow-countrymen whom we have mentioned above, 
he was educated in his native province. But the life of a 
provincial did not satisfy him. Conscious, perhaps, of his 
literary gifts, he went, in 64 A.D., 5 like so many a young 
provincial, to make his fortune at Rome. There he attached 
i himself as client to the powerful Spanish family of the Senecas, 
and found a friendly reception also in the house of Calpurnius 
Piso. 6 But fortune was against him ; as he was congratu- 
lating himself on his good luck in starting life at Rome under 
such favourable auspices, the Pisonian conspiracy (65 A.D.) 
failed, and his patrons fell before the wrath of Nero. 7 His 



1 On the modern Cerro de Bambola near the Moorish town of El Cala- 
tayud. 

2 Cp. ix. 52, x. 24, xii. 60. 3 Cp. v. 34. * j x . 73. 7. 

5 In x. 103. 7, written in 98 A. D., he tells us that it is thirty-four years 
since he left Spain. 

6 iv. 40, xii. 36. f 

7 He is found rendering poetic homage to Polla, the wife of Lucan, as 
late as 96 A. D., x. 64, vii. 21-3. For his reverence for the memory of 
Lucan, cp. i. 61. 7 ; vii. 21, 22 ; xiv. 194. 



252 MARTIAL XI 

career must be commenced anew. Of his life from this point 
to the reign of Domitian we know little. But this much is 
certain, that he endured all the indignities and hardships 
of a client's life, 1 and that he chose this degrading career in 
preference to the active career of the Roman bar. He had 
no taste for oratory, and rejected the advice of his friend 
Gaius 2 and his distinguished compatriot Quintilian to seek 
a livelihood as an advocate or as a politician. ' That is not 
life ! ' he replies to Quintilian : 

vivere quod propero pauper nee inutilis amiis, 
da veniam : properat vivere nemo satis. 

differat hoc patrios optat qui vincere census 
atriaque immodicis artat imaginibus (ii. 90. 3). 

His ideals and ambitions were low, and his choice had, as 
we shall see, a degrading effect upon his poetry. He chose 
rather to live on such modest fortune as he may have pos- 
sessed, on the client's dole, and such gifts as his complimen- 
tary epigrams may have won from his patrons. These gifts 
must have been in many cases of a trifling description, 3 but 
they may occasionally have been on a more generous scale. 
At any rate, by the year 94 A. D., we find him the possessor 
of a little farm at Nomentum, 4 and a house on the Quirinal. 5 
Although he must presumably have written a considerable 
quantity of verse in his earlier years, it is not till 80 A. D. that 
he makes an appearance on the stage of literature. In that 
year the Flavian amphitheatre was consecrated by the 
Emperor Titus, and Martial celebrated the fact by the 
publication of his first book, the Spectaculorum Liber. It is 
of small literary value, but it was his first step on the ladder 
of fame. Titus conferred on him the ius trium liberorum, 



1 Cp. his regrets for the ease of his earlier clienthood and the generosity 
of the Senecas, xii. 36. 

2 ii. 30 ; cp. 1. 5 : 

is mihi ' dives eris, si causas egeris ' inquit. 
quod peto da, Gai : non peto consilium. 

3 Vide his epigrams passim. 

4 xiii. 42, xiii. 119. Perhaps the gift of Seneca, cp. Friedlander on 
Mart. i. 105. 5 i x . 18> i x . 97. 7, x . 53. 9. 



XI MARTIAL 253 

although he seems not to have entered on the enjoyment 
of this privilege till the reign of Domitian. 1 He thus first 
came in touch with the imperial circle. From this time 
forward we get a continual stream of verse in fulsome praise 
of Domitian and his freedman. But his flattery met with 
small reward. There are many poems belauding th e princeps , 
but few that thank him. The most that he acquired by his 
flattery was the honorary military tribunate and his elevation 
to the equestrian order. 2 Of material profit he got little, 3 
save such as his improved social position may have conferred 
on him indirectly. 

Four years after the publication of the Spectaculorum 
Liber (i.e. later in 84 and 85) 4 he published two books, the 
thirteenth and fourteenth, composed of neat but trifling 
poems on the presents (Xenia and Apophoreta) which it was 
customary to give at the feast of the Saturnalia. From this 
point his output was continuous and steady, as the following 
table will show : 5 

I, II. 85 or early in 86. 



III. 87 or early in 

IV. December (Saturnalia) 88. 
V. Autumn, 89. 

VI. Summer or Autumn, 90. 
VII. December, 92. 



VIII. 93. 

IX. Summer, 94. 
X. 1. December, 95. 
X. 2. 98. 

XL 97. 
XII. Late in 101. 



1 Such is the most plausible interpretation of iii. 95. 5, ix. 97. 5 : 

tribuit quod Caesar uterque 
ius mihi natorum (uterque, i.e. Titus and Domitian). 

2 iii. 95, v. 13, ix. 49, xii. 26. 3 iii. 95. 11, vi. 10. 1. 

4 xiii. 4 gives Domitian his title of Germanicus, assumed after war with 
Chatti in 84 ; xiv. 34 alludes to peace ; no allusion to subsequent wars. 

5 I, II. Perhaps published together. This would account for length of 
preface. II. Largely composed of poems referring to reigns of Vespasian 
and Titus. Reference to Domitian's censorship shows that I was not 
published before 85. There is no hint of outbreak of Dacian War, which 
raged in 86. 

III. Since bk. IV contains allusion to outbreak of revolt of Antonius 
Saturninus towards end of 88 (11) and is published at Rome, whereas III 
was published at Cornelii forum (1), III probably appeared in 87 or 88. 

IV. Contains reference to birthday of Domitian, Oct. 24 (1. 7), and 
seems then to allude to ludi saeculares (Sept. 88). Reference to snowfall 



254 MARTIAL XI 

His life during this period was uneventful. He lived 
expensively and continually complains of lack of funds and 
of the miseries of a client's life. Once only (about 88) the 
discomfort of his existence seems to have induced him to 
abandon Rome. He took up his residence at Forum 
Cornelii, the modern Imola, but soon returned to Rome. 1 
It was not till 98 that he decided to leave the capital for 
good and to return to his Spanish home. A new princeps 
was on the throne. Martial had associated his work too 
closely with Domitian and his court to feel at his ease with 



at Rome (2 and 13) suggests winter. Perhaps therefore published in 
Saturnalia of 88. 

V. Domitian has returned to Italy (1) from Dacian War, but there is 
no reference to his triumph (Oct. 1, 89 A. D.). Book therefore probably 
published in early autumn of 89. 

VI. Domitian has held his triumph (4. 2 and 10. 7). Julia (13) is dead 
(end of 89). Book probably published in 90, perhaps in summer. Fried- 
lander sees allusion to Agon Capitolinus (Summer, 90) in vi. 77. 

VII. 5-8 refer to Domitian's return from Sarmatic War. He has not 
yet arrived. These epigrams are among last in book. He returned in 
January 93. His return was announced as imminent in Dec. 92. 

VIII. 21 describes Domitian's arrival ; 26, 30, and others deal with 
festivities in this connexion. 65 speaks of temple of Fortuna Redux 
and triumphal arch built in Domitian's honour. They are mentioned as 
if completed. 66 speaks of consulate of Silius Italicus' son beginning 
Sept. 1, 93. 

IX. 84 is addressed to Appius Norbanus Maximus, who has been six 
years absent from Rome. He went to Upper Germany to crush Antonius 
Saturninus in 88. 35 refers to Agon Capitolinus in summer of 94. 

X. Two editions published. We possess later and larger. Cp. x. 2. 
70. 1 suggests a year's interval between IX and X. X, ed. 1 was therefore 
perhaps published in Dec. 95. X, ed. 2 has references to accession of Trajan, 
Jan. 25, 98 A. D. (6, 7 and 34). Martial's departure for Spain is imminent. 

XI. 1 is addressed to Parthenius, executed in middle of 97 A. D. xii. 5 
refers to a selection made from X and XI, perhaps from presentation to 
Nerva ; cp. xii. 11. 

XII. In preface Martial apologizes for three years' silence (1. 9) from 
publication of X. ed. 2. xii. 3. 10 refers to Stella's consulship, Oct. 101 or 102. 
Three years' interval points to 101. It was published late in the year ; 
cp. 1 and 62. Some epigrams in this book were written at Rome. But 
M. says that it was written paucissimis diebu-s. This must refer only to 
Spanish epigrams, or the book must have been enlarged after M.'s death. 

For the whole question see Friedlander Introd., pp. 50 sqq. 
1 iii, 1 and 4, 



XI MARTIAL 255 

Nerva. He sent the new emperor a selection from his tenth 
and eleventh books, which we may, perhaps, conjecture to 
have been expurgated. He denounced the dead Domitian 
in a brilliant epigram which may have formed part of that 
selection, but which has only been preserved to us by the 
scholiast on Juvenal (iv. 38) : 

Flavia gens, quantum tibi tertius abstulit heres ! [1] 

paene fuit tanti non habuisse duos. 

But he felt that times were changed and that there was no 
place now for his peculiar talent for flattery (x. 72. 8) : 

non est hie dominus sed imperator, [2] 

sed iustissimus omnium senator, 

per quern de Stygia domo reducta est 

siccis rustica Veritas capillis. 

hoc sub principe, si sapis, caveto 

verbis, Koma, prioribus loquaris. 

Let flattery fly to Parthia. Rome is no place for her 
(ib. 4). Martial had made his name : he was read far and 
wide throughout the Empire. 1 He could afford to retire from 
the city that had given him much fame and much pleasure, 
but had balanced its gifts by a thousand vexations and indig- 
nities. Pliny assisted him with journey-money, and after 
a thirty-four years' sojourn in Italy he returned to Bilbilis 
to live a life of dolce far niente. The kindness of a wealthy 
friend, a Spanish lady named Marcella, 2 gave him an estate 



[1] How much thy third has wronged thee, Flavian race ! 

'Twere better ne'er to have bred the other brace. ANON. 

[2] an emperor 

Is ours, no master as of yore, 

Himself the Senate's very crown 

Of justice, who has called from down 

In her deep Stygian duress 

The hoyden Truth, with tangled tress. 

Be wise, Rome, see you shape anew 

Your tongue ; your prince would have it true. 

A. E. STREET. 



1 Cp. xi. 3. 

2 xii. 21, xii. 31. There is no reason to suppose with some critics that 
she was his wife. 



256 MARTIAL XI 

on which he lived in comfort, if not in affluence. He published 
but one book in Spain, the twelfth, written, he says in the 
preface, in a very few days. He lived in peace and happi- 
ness, though at times he sighed for the welcome of the public 
for whom he had catered so long, 1 and chafed under the lack 
of sympathy and culture among his Spanish neighbours. 2 
He died in 104. ' Martial is dead,' says Pliny, ' and I am 
grieved to hear it. He was a man of genius, with a shrewd 
and vigorous wit. His verses are full of point and sting, and 
&s frank as they are witty. I provided him with money for 
his journey when he left Rome ; I owed it to my friendship 
for him, and to the verses which he wrote in my honour ' 
then follows Mart. x. 20 ' Was I not right to speed him on 
his way, and am I not justified in mourning his death, seeing 
that he wrote thus concerning me ? He gave me what he 
could, he would have given more had he been able. And yet 
what greater gift can one man give another than by handing 
down his name and fame to all eternity. I hear you say 
that Martial's verses will not live to all eternity ? You may 
be right ; at any rate, he hoped for their immortality when 
he wrote them ' (Plin. Ep. iii. 21). 

Of Martial's character we shall have occasion to speak 
later. There is nothing in the slight, but generous, tribute 
of Pliny that has to be unsaid. 

Of the circles in which he moved his epigrams give us 
a brilliant picture ; of his exact relations with the persons 
whom he addresses it is hard to speak with certainty. Many 
distinguished figures of the day appear as the objects of his 
flattery. There are Spaniards, Quintilian, Lucinianus Mater- 
mis and Canius Rufus, all distinguished men of letters, the 
poets Silius Italicus, Stertinius Avitus, Arruntius Stella, the 
younger Pliny, the orator Aquilius Regulus, Lentulus Sura, 
the friend of Trajan, the rich knights, Atedius Melior, and 
Claudius Etruscus, the soldier Norbanus, and many others. 
With Juvenal also he seems to have enjoyed a certain 



1 xii. praef. ' civitatis aures quibus adsueveram quaere.' 

2 Ib. ' accedit his municipalium robigo dentium,' 



XI MARTIAL 257 

intimacy. Statius he never mentions, although he must 
have moved in the same circles. 1 His intimates as might 
be expected are for the most part, as far as we can guess, 
of lower rank. There are the centurions Varus and Pudens, 
Terentius Priscus his compatriot, Decianus the Stoic from 
the Spanish town of Emerita, the self-sacrificing Quintus 
Ovidius, Martial's neighbour at Nomentum and a fellow- 
client of Seneca, and, above all, Julius Martialis. His enemies 
and envious rivals are attacked and bespattered with filth in 
many an epigram, but Martial, true to his promise in the 
preface to his first book, conceals their true names from us. 
Of his vie intime he tells us little. As far as we may 
judge, he was unmarried. It is true that several of his epi- 
grams purport to be addressed to his wife. But two facts 
show clearly that this lady is wholly imaginary. Even 
Martial could not have spoken of his wife in such disgusting 
language as, for instance, he uses in xi. 104, while in another 
poem (ii. 92) he clearly expresses his intention not to marry : 

natorum mihi ius trium roganti 
Musarum pretium dedit mearum 
solus qui poterat. valebis, uxor, 
non debet domini perire munus. 

The honorary ius trium liberorum had given him, he says, 
all that marriage could have brought him. He has no 
intention of making the emperor's generosity superfluous 
by taking a wife. He preferred the untrammelled life of a 
bachelor. So only could he enjoy the pleasures which for 
him meant ' life '. He is neither an impressive nor a very 
interesting figure. He has many qualities that repel, even 
if we do not take him too seriously ; and though he may have 
been a pleasant and in many respects most amiable com- 
panion, he has few characteristics that arrest our attention 
or compel our respect. More will be said of his virtues and 
his vices in the pages that follow. It is the artist rather 
than the man that wakens our interest. 



1 See p. 271. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that this silence was 
due to dislike or jealousy. 

BUTLBR 



258 MARTIAL XI 

In Martial we have a poet who devoted himself to the 
one class of poetry which, apart from satire, the conditions 
of the Silver Age were qualified to produce in any real 
excellence the epigram. In a period when rhetorical 
smartness and point were the predominant features of 
literature, the epigram was almost certain to flourish. But 
Roman poets in general, and Martial in particular, gave a 
character to the epigram which has clung to it ever since, 
and has actually changed the significance of the word itself. 

In the best days of the Greek epigram the prime considera- 
tion was not that a poem should be pointed, but that it 
should be what is summed up in the untranslatable French 
epithet lapidaire ; that is to say, it should possess the 
conciseness, finish, and relevance required for an inscription 
on a monument. Its range was wide ; it might express the 
lover's passion, the mourner's grief, the artist's skill, the 
cynic's laughter, the satirist's scorn. It was all poetry in 
miniature. Point is not wanting, but its chief characteristics 
are delicacy and charm. ' No good epigram sacrifices its 
finer poetical substance to the desire of making a point, and 
none of the best depend on having a point at all.' 1 Trans- 
planted to the soil of Italy the epigram changes. The less 
poetic Roman, with his coarse tastes, his brutality, his ten- 
dency to satire, his appreciation of the incisive, wrought it to 
his own use. In his hands it loses most of its sensuous and 
lyrical elements and makes up for the loss by the cultivation 
of point. Above all, it becomes the instrument of satire, 
stinging like a wasp where the satirist pure and simple uses 
the deadlier weapons of the bludgeon and the rapier. 

The epigram must have been exceedingly plentiful from 
the very dawn of the movement which was to make Rome 
a city of belles-lettres. It is the plaything of the dilettante 
litterateur, so plentiful under the empire. 2 Apart from the 
work of Martial, curiously few epigrams have come down to 
us ; nevertheless, in the vast majority of the very limited 

1 Mackail, Greek Anthol., Introd., p. 5. 

2 Domitius Marsus was famous for his epigrams, as also Calvus, Gactu- 
licus. Pedo, and others. 



XI MARTIAL 259 

number we possess the same Roman characteristics may be 
traced. In the non-lyrical epigrams of Catullus, in the 
shorter poems of the Appendix Vergiliana, there is the same 
vigour, the same coarse humour, the same pungency that 
find their best expression in Martial. Even in the epigrams 
attributed to Seneca in the Anthologia Latina, 1 something of 
this may be observed, though for the most part they lack 
the personal note and leave the impression of mere juggling 
with words. It is in this last respect, the attention to 
point, that they show most affinity with Martial. Only the 
epigrams in the same collection attributed to Petronius 2 
seem to preserve something of the Greek spirit of beauty 
untainted by the hard, unlovely, incisive spirit of Rome. 

Martial was destined to fix the type of the epigram for 
the future. For pure poetry he had small gifts. He was 
endowed with a warm heart, a real love for simplicity of 
life and for the beauties of nature. But he had no lyrical 
enthusiasm j and was incapable of genuine passion. He 
entered heart whole on all his amatory adventures, and left 
them with indifference. Even the cynical profligacy of 
Ovid shows more capacity for true love. At their best 
Martial's erotic epigrams attain to a certain shallow pretti- 
ness, 3 for the most part they do not rise above the porno- 
graphic. And even though he shows a real capacity for 
friendship, he also reveals an infinite capacity for cringing 
or impudent vulgarity in his relations with those who were 
merely patrons or acquaintances. His needy circumstances 
led him, as we shall see, to continual expressions of a peevish 
mendicancy, while the artificiality and pettiness of the life 
in which he moved induced an excessive triviality and 
narrowness of outlook. 

He makes no great struggle after originality. The slight- 
ness of his themes and of his genre relieved him of that 

1 See p. 36. 2 See p. 134. 

3 The best of his erotic poems is the pretty vi. 34, but it is far from 
original ; cp. the last couplet : 

nolo quot (sc. basia) arguto dedit cxorata Catullo 
Lesbia : pauca cupit qui numerare potest. 

S 2 



260 MARTIAL XI 

necessity. Some of his prettiest poems are mere variations 
on some of the most famous lyrics of Catullus. 1 He pilfers 
whole lines from Ovid. 2 Phrase after phrase suggests some- 
thing that has gone before. But his plagiarism is effected 
with such perfect frankness and such perfect art, that it 
might well be pardoned, even if Martial had greater claims 
to be taken seriously. As it is, his freedom in borrowing 
need scarcely be taken into account in the consideration 
of our verdict. At the worst his crime is no more than petty 
larceny. With all his faults, he has gifts such as few poets 
have possessed, a perfect facility and a perfect finish. Alone 
of poets of the period he rarely gives the impression of 
labouring a point. Compared with Martial, Seneca and 
Lucan, Statius and Juvenal are, at their worst, stylistic 
acrobats. But Martial, however silly or offensive, however 
complicated or prosaic his theme, handles his material with 
supreme ease. His points may often not be worth making ; 
they could not be better made. Moreover, he has a perfect 
ear ; his music may be trivial, but within its narrow limits 
it is faultless. 3 He knows what is required of him and he 
knows his own powers. He knows that his range is limited, 
that his sphere is comparatively humble, but he is proud to 



1 Cp. Cat. 5 and 7 ; Mart. vi. 34 ; Cat. 2 and 3 ; Mart. i. 7 and 
109 (it is noteworthy that this last poem has itself been exquisitely 
imitated by du Bellay in his poem on his little dog Peloton). 

2 Cp. Ov. Tr. ii. 166 ; Mart. vi. 3. 4 ; Ov. F. iii. 192 ; Mart. vi. 16. 2 ; 
Ov.A.i. 1. 20; Mart. vi. 16. 4; Ov. Tr. i. 5. 1, iv. 13. 1; Mart. i. 15. 1. 
His imitations of other poets are not nearly so marked. There are a good 
many trifling echoes of Vergil, but little wholesale borrowing. A very 
large proportion of the parallel passages cited by Friedlander are unjust 
to Martial. No poet could be original judged by such a test. 

3 There is little of any importance to be said about Martial's metre. 
The metres most often employed are elegiac, hendecasyllabic, and the 
scazon. In the elegiac he is, on the whole, Ovidian, though he is naturally 
freer, especially in the matter of endings both of hexameter and penta- 
meter. He makes his points as well, but is less sustainedly pointed. 
His verse, moreover, has greater variety and less formal symmetry than 
that of Ovid. On the other hand his effects are less sparkling, owing to 
his more sparing use of rhetoric. In the hcndecasyllable he is smoother 
and more polished. It invariably opens with a spondee. 



XI MARTIAL 261 

excel in it. He has the artist's self-respect without his 
( vanity. 

His themes are manifold. He might have said, with 
even greater truth than Juvenal, ' quidquid agunt homines, 
nostri est farrago libelli.' He does not go beneath the sur- 
face, but almost every aspect of the kaleidoscopic world of 
Rome receives his attention at one time or another. His 
; attitude is, on the w^olej^satirical, though his satire is not 
. inspired by deep or sincere indignation. He is too easy in 
' his morals and too good-humoured by temperament. He 
is often insulting, but there is scarcely a line that breathes 
fierce resentment, while his almost unparalleled obscenity 
precludes the intrusion of any genuine earnestness of moral 
scorn in a very large number of his satiric epigrams. On 
these points he shall speak for himself ; he makes no exact- 
ing claims. 

' I hope,' he says in the preface to his first book, ' that 
I have exercised such restraint in my writings that no one 
who is possessed of the least self-respect may have cause to 
complain of them. My jests are never outrageous, even 
when directed against persons of the meanest consideration. 
My practice in this respect is very different from that of early 
writers, who abused persons without veiling their invective 
under a pseudonym. Nay more, their victims were men of 
the highest renown. My jeux d' 'esprit have no arrures- 
pensees, and I hope that no one will put an evil interpreta- 
tion on them, nor rewrite my epigrams by infusing his own 
malignance into his reading of them. It is a scandalous 
injustice to exercise such ingenuity on what another has 
written. I would offer some excuse for the freedom and 
frankness of my language which is, after all, the language 
of epigram if I were setting any new precedent. But all 
epigrammatists, Catullus, Marsus, Pedo, Gaetulicus, have 
availed themselves of this licence of speech. But if any one 
wishes to acquire notoriety by prudish severity, and refuses 
to permit me to write after the good Roman fashion in so 
much as a single page of my work, he may stop short at the 
preface, or even at the title. Epigrams are written for such 



262 MARTIAL XI 

persons as derive pleasure from the games at the Feast of 
Flowers. Cato should not enter my theatre, but if he does 
enter it, let him be content to look on at the sport which 
I provide. I think I shall be justified in closing my preface 
with an epigram 

To CATO 

Once more the merry feast of Flora's come, 
With wanton jest to split the sides of Rome ; 
Yet come you, prince of prudes, to view the show. 
Why come you ? merely to be shocked and go ? ' 

He reasserts the kindliness of his heart and the excellence 
of his intentions elsewhere : 

hunc servare modum nostri novere libelli ; [1] 

parcere personis, dicere de vitiis (x. 33). 

Malignant critics had exercised their ingenuity in the manner 
which he deprecated. 1 Worse still, libellous verse had been 
falsely circulated as his : 

quid prodest, cupiant cum quid am nostra videri [2] 

si qua Lycambeo sanguine tela madent, 

vipereumque vomant nostro sub nomine virus 

qui Phoebi radios ferre diemque negant ? (vii. 12. 5). 

In this respect his defence of himself is just. When he 
writes in a vein of invective his victim is never mentioned 
by name. And we cannot assert in any given case that his 
pseudonyms mask a real person. He may do no more than 
satirize a vice embodied and typified in an imaginary per- 
sonality. 

[1] For in my verses 'tis my constant care 

To lash the vices, but the persons spare. 

HAY. 
[2] But what does't avail, 

If in bloodfetching lines others do rail, 
And vomit viperous poison in my name. 
Such as the sun themselves to own do shame? 

ANON., 1695. 



Cp. vii. 72. 12, x. 3. 



XI MARTIAL 263 

He is equally concerned to defend himself against the 
obvious charges of prurience and immorality : 

innocuos censura potest permittere lusus : [1] 

lasciva est nobis pagina, vita proba l (i. 4. 7). 

This is no real defence, and even though we need not take 
Martial at his word, when he accuses himself of the foulest 
vices, there is not the slightest reason to suppose that 
chastity was one of his virtues. In Juvenal's case we have 
reason to believe that, whatever his weaknesses, he was a 
man of genuinely high ideals. Martial at his best shows 
himself a man capable of fine feeling, but he gives no evidence 
of moral earnestness or strength of character. On the other 
hand, to give him his due, we must remember the standard 
of his age. Although he is lavish with the vilest obscenities, 
and has no scruples about accusing acquaintances of every 
variety of unnatural vice, it must be pointed out that such 
accusations were regarded at Rome as mere matter for 
laughter. The traditions of the old Fescennina locutio sur- 
vived, and with the decay of private morality its obscenity 
increased. Caesar's veterans could sing ribald verses unre- 
buked at their general's triumph, verses unquotably obscene 
and casting the foulest aspersions on the character of one 
whom they worshipped almost as a god. Caesar could invite 
Catullus to dine in spite of the fact that such accusations 
formed the matter of his lampoons. Catullus could insert 
similar charges against the bridegroom for whom he was 
writing an epithalamium. The writing of Priapeia was 
regarded as a reputable diversion. Martial's defence of his 
obscenities is therefore in all probability sincere, and may 
have approved itself to many reputable persons of his day. 
It was a defence that had already been made in very similar 
language by Ovid and Catullus, 2 and Martial was not the 

[1] Let not these harmless sports your censure taste ! 
My lines are wanton, but my life is chaste. 

ANON., seventeenth century. 

1 Cp. vii. 12. 9, iii. 99. 3. 

2 Oatull. xvi. 5 ; Ov. Tr. ii. 354 ; Apul. A jK>l. 11 ; Auson. 28, cento nvp. ; 
Plin. Kp. vii. 8. 



264 MARTIAL XI 

last to make it. But the fact that Martial felt it necessary 
to defend himself shows that a body of public opinion 
even if not large or representative did exist which refused 
to condone this fashionable lubricity. Extenuating circum- 
stances may be urged in Martial's defence, but even to have 
conformed to the standard of his day is sufficient condemna- 
tion ; and it is hard to resist the suspicion that he fell below 
it. His obscenities, though couched in the most easy and 
pointed language, have rarely even the grace if grace it 
be of wit ; they are puerile in conception and infinitely 
disgusting. 

It is pleasant to turn to the better side of Martial's charac- 
ter. No writer has ever given more charming expression to 
his affection for his friends. It is for Declaims and Julius 
Martialis that he keeps the warmest place in his heart. In 
poems like the following there is no doubting the sincerity 
of his feeling or questioning the perfection of its expres- 
sion : 

si quis erit raros inter numerandus amicos, [1] 

quales prisca fides famaque novit anus, 

si quis Cecropiae madidus Latiaeque Minervae 
artibus et vera simplicitate bonus, 

si quis erit recti custos, mirator honesti, 
et nihil arcano qui roget ore deos, 

si quis erit magnae subnixus robore mentis : 
dispeream si non hie Decianus erit (i. 39). 

Even more charming, if less intense, is the exhortation to 
Julius Martialis to live while he may, ere the long night 
come that knows no waking : 



[1] Is there a man whose friendship rare 

With antique friendship may compare ; 
In learning steeped, both old and new, 
Yet unpedantic, simple, true ; 
Whose soul, ingenuous and upright, 
Ne'er formed a wish that shunned the light, 
Whose sense is sound ? If such there be, 
My Decianus, thou art he. 

PROFESSOR GOLDWTN SMITH 



XI MARTIAL 265 

o mihi post nullos, lull, memorande sodales, [I] 

si quid longa fides canaque iura valent, 
bis iam paene tibi consul tricensimus instat, 

et numerat paucos vix tua vita dies, 
non bene distuleris videas quae posse negari, 

et solum hoc ducas, quod fuit, esse tuum. 
exspectant curaeque catenatique labores : 

gaudia non remanent, sed fugitiva volant, 
haec utraque manu complexuque adsere toto : 

saepe fluunt imo sic quoque lapsa sinu. 
non est, crede mihi, sapientis dicere ' vivam '. 

sera nimis vita est crastina : vive hodie (i. 15). 

Best of all is the retrospect of the long friendship which 
has united him to Julius. It is as frank as it is touching : 

triginta mihi quattuorque messes [2] 

tecum, si memini, fuere, luli. 

quarum dulcia mixta sunt amaris 

sed iucunda tamen fuere plura ; 

et si calculus omnis hue et illuc 

diversus bicolorque digeratur, 

vincet Candida turba nigriorem. 



[1] Friend of my heart and none of all the band 

Has to that name older or better right : 
Julius, thy sixtieth winter is at hand, 

Far-spent is now life's day and near the night. 
Delay not what thou would'st recall too late ; 

That which is past, that only call thine own : 
Cares without end and tribulations wait, 

Joy tarrieth not, but scarcely come, is flown. 
Then grasp it quickly firmly to thy heart, 

Though firmly grasped, too oft it slips away ; 
To talk of living is not wisdom's part : 

To-morrow is too late : live thou to-day ! 

PROFESSOR GOLDWIN SMITH. 
[2] My friend, since thou and I first met, 

This is the thirty-fourth December ; 
Some things there are we'd fain forget, 

More that 'tis pleasant to remember. 
Let for each pain a black ball stand, 

For every pleasure past a white one, 
And thou wilt find, when all are scanned, 

The major part will be the bright one. 



266 MARTIAL XI 

si vitare voles acerba quaedam 

et tristes animi cavere morsus, 

nulli te facias nimis sodalem : 

gaudebis minus et minus dolebis (xii. 34) - 1 

He does not pour the treasure of his heart at his friend's 
feet, as Persius does in his burning tribute to Cornutus. 
He has no treasure of great price to pour. But it is only 
natural that in the poems addressed to his friends we should 
find the statement of his ideals of life : 

vitam quae faciunt beatiorem, [1] 

iucundissime Martialis, haec sunt : 

res non parta labore sed relicta ; 

non ingratus ager, focus perennis ; 

lis numquam, toga rara, mens quieta ; 

vires ingenuae, salubre corpus ; 

prudens simplicitas, pares amici, 

convictus facilis, sine arte mensa ; 

nox non ebria sed soluta curis. 



He who would heartache never know, 

He who serene composure treasures, 
Must friendship's chequered bliss forego ; 

Who has no pain hath fewer pleasures. 

PROFESSOR GOLDWIN SMITH. 
[1] What makes a happy life, dear friend, 

If thou would'st briefly learn, attend 
An income left, not earned by toil ; 
Some acres of a kindly soil ; 
The pot unfailing on the fire ; 
No lawsuits ; seldom town attire ; 
Health ; strength with grace ; a peaceful mind ; 
Shrewdness with honesty combined ; 
Plain living ; equal friends and free ; 
Evenings of temperate gaiety ; 



1 We might also quote the beautiful 

extra fortunam est quidquid donatur amicis : 
quas dederis solas semper habebis opes (v. 42). 

What thou hast given to friends, and that alone, 
Defies misfortune, and is still thine own. 

PROFESSOR GOI/DWIN SMITH. 

But the needy poet may have had some arritre-pensee. We do not 
know to whom the poem is addressed. 



XT MARTIAL 267 

non tristis torus ct tamen pudicns ; 
somnus qui faciat breves tenebras : 
quod sis esse velis nihilque mails ; 
summum nee metuas diem nee optes (x. 47). 

This exquisite echo of the Horatian ' beatus ille qui procul 
negotiis ' sets forth no very lofty ideal. It is frankly, though 
restrainedly, hedonistic. But it depicts a life that is full 
of charm and free from evil. Martial, in his heart of hearts, 
hates the Rome that he depicts so vividly. Rome with its 
noise, its expense, its bustling snobbery, its triviality, and 
its vice, where he and his friend Julius waste their days : 

nunc vivit necuter sibi, bonosque [1] 

soles effugere atque abire sentit, 

qui nobis pereunt et imputantur (v. 20. 11). 

He longs to escape from the world of the professional 
lounger and the parasite to an ampler air, where he can 
breathe freely and find rest. He is no philosopher, but it is 
at times a relief to get away from the rarified atmosphere and 
the sense of strain that permeates so much of the aspira- 
tions towards virtue in this strange age of contradictions. 

Martial at last found the ease and quiet that his soul 
desired in his Spanish home : 

hie pigri colimus labore dulci [2] 

Boterdum Plateamque (Celtiberis 

haec sunt nomina crassiora terris) : 

ingenti fruor inproboque somno 



A wife discreet, yet blythe and bright ; 
Sound slumber, that lends wings to night. 
With all thy heart embrace thy lot, 
Wish not for death and fear it not. 

PROFESSOR GOLDWIN SMITH. 
[1] Dead to our better selves we see 

The golden hours take flight, 
Still scored against us as they flee. 
Then haste to live aright. 

PROFESSOR GOLDWIN SMITH. 
[2] Busy but pleas'd and idly taking pains, 

Here Lewes Downs I till and Ringmer plains, 
Names that to each South Saxon well are known, 
Though they sound harsh to powdered beaux in town. 



268 MARTIAL XI 

quern nee tertia saepe rumpit hora, 
et totum mihi nunc repono quidquid 
ter denos vigilaveram per annos. 
ignota est toga, sed datur petenti 
rupta proxima vestis a cathedra, 
surgentem focus excipit superba 
vicini strue cultus iliceti, 

sic me vivere, sic iuvat perire. (xii. 18. 10). 

Martial has a genuine love for the country. Born at a 
time when detailed descriptions of the charms of scenery 
had become fashionable, and the cultivated landscape at 
least found many painters, he succeeds far better than any 
of his contemporaries in conveying to the reader his sense 
of the beauties which his eyes beheld. That sense is limited, 
but exquisite. It does not go deep ; there is nothing of the 
almost mystical background that Vergil at times suggests ; 
there is nothing of the feeling of the open air and the wild 
life that is sometimes wafted to us in the sensuous verse of 
Theocritus. But Martial sees what he sees clearly, and he 
describes it perfectly. Compare his work with the affected 
prettiness of Pliny's description of the source of the Clitumnus 
or with the more sensuous, but over-elaborate, craftsman- 
ship of Statius in the Silvae. Martial is incomparably their 
superior. He speaks a more human language, and has a far 
clearer vision. Both Statius and Martial described villas 
by the sea. We have already mentioned Statius' descrip- 
tion of the villa of Pollius at Sorrento ; Martial shall speak 
in his turn : 



None can enjoy a sounder sleep than mine ; 

I often do not wake till after nine ; 

And midnight hours with interest repay 

For years in town diversions thrown away. 

Stranger to finery, myself I dress 

In the first coat from an old broken press. 

My fire, as soon as I am up, I see 

Bright with the ruins of some neighbouring tree. 

Such is my life, a life of liberty ; 

So would I wish to live and so to die. HAY. 



XI MARTIAL 269 

o temperatae dulce Formiae litus, [1J 

vos, cum sever! fugit oppidura Martis 
et iiiquietas fessus exuit curas, 
Apollinaris omnibus locis praefert. 

hie summa leni stringitur Thetis vento : 
uec laiiguet aequor, viva sed quies pouti 
pictani phaselon adiuvante fert aura, 
sicut puellae non amantis aestatem 
inota salubre purpura venit frigus. 
uec saeta longo quaerit in mari praedam, 
sed a cubili lectuloque iactatam 
spectatus alte lineam trahit piscis. 

frui sed istis quando, Roma, permittis ? 

quot Formianos imputat dies annus 

negotiosis rebus urbis haerenti ? 

o iaiiitores vilicique felices ! 

dominis parantur ista, serviunt vobis l (x. 30). 

j These are surely the most beautiful scazons 2 in the Latin 



[1] O strand of Formiae, sweet with genial air, 

Who art Apollinaris' chosen home 
When, taking flight from his task-mistress Rome, 
The tired man doffs his load of troubling care. 

Here the sea's bosom quivers hi the wind ; 

Tis no dead calm, but sweet serenity, 

Which bears the painted boat before the breeze, 

As though some maid at pains the heat to ban, 

Should waft a genial zephyr with her fan. 

No fisher needs to buffet the high seas, 

But whiles from bed or couch his line he casts, 

May see his captive in the toils below. 

But, niggard Rome, thou giv'st how grudgingly ! 
What the year's tale of days at Formiae 
For him who tied by work in town must stay '! 
Stewards and lacqueys, happy your employ, 
Your lords prepare enjoyment, you enjoy. 

A. E. STREET. 



1 Cp. the description of the villa of Faustinus, iii. 58. 

2 Their only rival is the famous Sirinio poem of Catullus. 



270 MARTIAL XI 

tongue ; the metre limps no more ; a master-hand has 
wrought it to exquisite melody ; the quiet undulation of the 
sea, the yacht's easy gliding over its surface, live before us 
in its music. Even more delicate is the homelier description 
of the gardens of Julius Martialis on the slopes of the Jani- 
culum. It is animated by the sincerity that never fails 
Martial when he writes to his friend : 

luli iugera pauca Martialis [1] 

hortis Hesperidum beatiora 

longo laniculi iugo recumbunt : 

lati collibus imminent recessus 

et planus modico tumore vertex 

caelo perfruitur sereniore 

et curvas nebula tegente valles 

solus luce nitet peculiar! : 

puris leniter admoventur astris 

celsae culmina delicata villae. 

hinc septem dominos videre montes 

et totam licet aestimare Komain, 

Albanos quoque Tusculosque colles 

et quodcumque iacet sub urbe frigus (iv. 64). 

Such a picture is unsurpassed in any language. 1 Statius, 
with all his brilliance, never came near such perfect success ; 

[1] Martial's few acres, e'en more blest 

Than those famed gardens of the West, 

Lie on Janiculum's long crest ; 

Above the slopes wide reaches hang recessed. 

The level, gently swelling crown 

Breathes air from purer heavens blown ; 

When mists the hollow valleys drown 

'Tis radiant with a light that's all its own. 

The clear stars almost seem to lie 

On the wrought roof that 's built so high ; 

The seven hills stand in majesty, 

And Rome is summed in one wide sweep of eye. 

Tusculan, Alban hills unfold, 

Each nook which holds its store of cold. 

A. E. STREET. 



1 Even Tennyson's remarkable poem addressed to F. D. Maurice fails 
to reach greater perfection. 



XI MARTIAL 271 

he lacks sincerity ; he can juggle with words against any one, 
but he never learned their truest and noblest use. 

There are many other themes beside landscape painting 
in which ihe_Silvm of Statius challenge comparison with the 
epigrams of Martial. Both use the same servile flattery 
to the emperor, both celebrate the same patrons, 1 both 
console their noble friends for the loss of relatives, or 
favourite slaves; both write propemptica. Even in the 
most trivial of these poems, those addressed to the emperor, 
Statius is easily surpassed by his humbler rival. His 
inferiority lies largely in the fact that he is more ambitious. 
He wrote on a larger scale. When the infinitely trivial 
is a theme for verse, the epigrammatist has the advantage 
of the author of the more lengthy Silvae. Perfect neatness 
vanquishes dexterous elaboration. Moreover, if taste can be 
said to enter into such poems at all, Martial errs less grossly. 
Even Domitian one might conjecture may have felt that 
Statius' flattery was ' laid on with a trowel '. Martial may 
have used the same instrument, but had the art to conceal 
it. 2 There are even occasions where his flattery ceases to 
revolt the reader, and where we forget the object of the 
flattery. In a poem describing the suicide of a certain 
Festus he succeeds in combining the dignity of a funeral 
laudatio with the subtlest and most graceful flattery of the 
princeps : 

indigiias premeret pestis cum tabida fauces, [1] 

inque suos voltus serperet atra lues, 
siccis ipse genis flentes hortatus amicos 

decrevit Stygios Festus adire lacus. 



[1] When the dire quinsy choked his guiltless breath, 

And o'er his face the blackening venoin stole, 
Festus disdained to wait a lingering death, 

Cheered his sad friends and freed his dauntless soul. 



1 e. g. Arruntius Stella and Atedius Melior. Cp. p. 205. 

2 Cp. the poeins on the subject of Earinus, Mart. ix. 11, 12, 13, and 
esp. 16 ; Stat. Silv. iii. 4. 



272 MARTIAL XI 

nee taineii obscuro pia polluit ora veiieno 

aut torsit lenta tristia fata fame, 
sanctam Komana vitam sed morte peregit 

diinisitque anirnam nobiliore via. 
hanc mortem fatis magni praeferre Catonis 

fama potest ; huius Caesar amicus erat (i. 78). 

The unctuous dexterity of Statius never achieved such a 
master-stroke. 

So, too, in laments for the dead, the superior brevity and 
simplicity of Martial bear the palm away. Both poets 
bewailed the death of Glaucias, the child favourite of 
Atedius Melior. Statius has already been quoted in this 
connexion ; Martial's poems on the subject, 1 though not quite 
among his best, yet ring truer than the verse of Statius. 
And Martial's epitaphs and epicedia at their best have in 
their slight way an almost unique charm. We must go to 
the best work of the Greek Anthology to surpass the epitaph 
on^Erption (v. 34) : 

hanc tibi, Fronto pater, genetrix Flaccilla, puellam [1] 

oscula commendo deliciasque meas, 
parvola ne nigras horrescat Erotion umbras 

oraque Tartarei prodigiosa canis. 
inpletura fuit sextae modo frigora brumae, 

vixisset totidem ni minus ilia dies. 



No meagre famine's slowly-wasting force, 

Nor hemlock's gradual chillness he endured, 
But like a Roman chose the nobler course, 

And by one blow his liberty secured. 
His death was nobler far than Cato's end, 
For Caesar to the last was Festus' friend. 

HODGSON (slightly altered). 
[1] Fronto, and you, Flaccilla, to you, my father and mother, 

Here I commend this child, once my delight and my pet, 
So may the darkling shades and deep-mouthed baying of hellhound 

Touch not with horror of dread little Erotion dear. 
Now was her sixth year ending, and melting the snows of the winter, 
Only a brief six days lacked to the tale of the years. 



Mart. vi. 28 and 29. 



XI MARTIAL 273 

inter tan? veteres ludat lasciva patronos 

et nomen blaeso garriat ore meum. 
mollia non rigidus caespes tegat ossa nee illi, 

terra, gravis fueris : non fuit ilia tibi. 

Another poem on a like theme shows a different and more 
fantastic, but scarcely less pleasing vein (v. 37) : 

puella senibus dulcior mihi cycnis, [1] 

agna Galaesi mollior Phalantini, 

concha Lucrini delicatior stagni, 

cui nee lapillos praeferas Erythraeos 

nee modo politum pecudis Indicae dentem 

nivesque primas liliumque non tactum ; 

quae crine vicit Baetici gregis vellus 

Rhenique nodos aureamque nitellam ; 

fragravit ore quod rosarium Paesti, 

quod Atticarum prima mella cerarum, 

quod sucinorum rapta de manu gleba ; 

cui conparatus indecens erat pavo, 



Young, amid dull old age, let her wanton and frolic and gambol, 

Babble of me that was, tenderly lisping my name. 
Soft were her tiny bones, then soft be the sod that enshrouds her, 
Gentle thy touch, mother Earth, gently she rested on thee ! 

A. E. STREET. 
[1] Little maiden sweeter far to me 

Than the swans are with their vaunted snows, 
Maid more tender than the lambkins be 

Where Galaesus by Phalantus flows ; 
Daintier than the daintiest shells that lie 

By the ripples of the Lucrine wave ; 
Choicer than new-polished ivory 

That the herds in Indian jungles gave ; 
Choicer than Erythrae's marbles white, 
Snows new-fallen, lilies yet unsoiled : 
Softer were your tresses and more bright 

Than the locks by German maidens coiled : 
Than the finest fleeces Baetis shows, 

Than the dormouse with her golden hue : 
Lips more fragrant than the Paestan rose, 

Than the Attic bees' first honey-dew, 
Or an amber ball, new-pressed and warm ; 

Paled the peacock's sheen in your compare ; 
BCTLEB 



274 MARTIAL XI 

inamabilis sciurus et frequens phoenix, 
adhuc recent! tepet Erotion busto, 
quam pessimorum lex amara fatorum 
sexta peregit hieme, nee tamen tota, 
nostros amores gaudiumque lususque. 

Through all the playful affectations of the lines we get the 
portrait of a fairy-like child, light-footed as the squirrel, 
golden-haired and fair as ivory or lilies. 1 Martial was a 
child-lover before he was a man of letters. 

Beautiful as these little poems are, there is in Martial 
little trace of feeling for the sorrows of humanity in general. 
He can feel for his intimate friends, and his tears are ready 
to flow for his patron's sorrows. But the general impression 
given by his poetry is that of a certain hardness and lack of 
feeling, of a limited sympathy, and an unemotional tem- 
perament. It is a relief to come upon a poem such as 
that in which he describes a father's poignant anguish for 
the loss of his son (ix. 74) : 

effigiem tantum pueri pictura Camoni [1] 

servat, et infantis parva figura manet. 

florentes nulla signavit imagine voltus, 
dum timet ora pius muta videre pater. 

or to find a sudden outbreak of sympathy with the sorrows 
of the slave (Hi. 21) : 



E'en the winsome squirrel lost his charm, 
And the Phoenix seemed no longer rare. 
Scarce Erotion's ashes yet are cold ; 

Greedily grim fate ordained to smite 
E'er her sixth brief winter had grown old 
Little love, my bliss, my heart's delight. 

A. D. INNES. 

[1] Here as in happy infancy he smiled 

Behold Camonus painted as a child; 
For on his face as seen in manhood's days 
His sorrowing father would not dare to gaze. 

W. S. B. 



1 The remaining lines of the poem are tasteless and unworthy of the 
portion quoted, and raise a doubt as to the poet's sincerity in the particular 
case. But this does not affect his general sympathy for childhood. 



XI MARTIAL 275 

proscriptum famulus servavit fronte notata, [1] 

non fuit haec domini vita sed invidia. 1 

Of the gravitas or dignity of character specially associated 
with Rome he shows equally few traces. His outlook on 
life is not sufficiently serious, he shows little interest in 
Rome of the past, and has nothing of the retrospective note 
so prominent in Lucan, Juvenal, or Tacitus; he lives in 
and for the present. He writes, it is true, of the famous 
suicide of Arria and Caecina Paetus, 2 of the death of 
Portia the wife of Brutus, 3 of the bravery of Mucius 
Scaevola. 4 But in none of these poems does he give us 
of his best. They lack, if not sincerity, at least enthu- 
siasm ; emotion is sacrificed to point. He is out of 
sympathy with Stoicism, and the suicide doctrinaire does 



[1] When scarred with cruel brand, the slave 

Snatched from the murderer's hand 
His prescript lord, not life he gave 
His tyrant, but the brand. 

PROFESSOR GOLDWIN SMITH. 



1 i. 101 provides an instance of Martial's sympathy for his own slaves. 
Cp. L 5 : 

ne tamen ad Stygias famulus descenderet umbras, 

ureret implicitum cum scelerata lues, 
cavimus et domini ius omne remisimus aegro ; 

munere dignus erat convaluisse meo. 
sensit deficiens mea praemia meque patronum 

dixit ad infernas liber iturus aquas. 

2 i. 13. 3 i. 42. 

4 i. 21. He is perhaps at his best on the death of Otho (vi. 32) : 
cum dubitaret adhuc belli civilis Enyo 

forsitan et posset vincere molh's Otho, 
damnavit multo staturum sanguine Martem 

et fodit certa pectora tota manu. 
sit Cato, dum vivit, sane vel Caesare maior : 

dum moritur, numquid maior Othone fuit ? 

When doubtful was the chance of civil war, 

And victory for Otho might declare ; 

That no more Roman blood for him might flow, 

He gave his breast the great decisive blow. 

Caesar's superior you may Cato call : 

Was he so great as Otho in his fall ? HAY. 

T 2 



276 MARTIAL XI 

not interest him. ' Live while you may ' is his motto, 
'and make the best of circumstances.' It is possible to 
live a reasonably virtuous life without going to the lengths 
of Thrasea : 

quod magni Thraseae consummatique Catonis [1] 

dogmata sic sequeris salvus ut esse velis, 

pectore nee nudo strictos incurris in enses, 
quod fecisse velim te, Deciane, facis. 

nolo virum facili redimit qui sanguine famam ; 
hunc volo, laudari qui sine morte potest (i. 8). 

The sentiment is full of common sense, but it is undeniably 
unheroic. Martial is not quixotic, and refuses to treat life 
more seriously than is necessary. Our complaint against him 
is that he scarcely takes it seriously enough. It would be 
unjust to demand a deep fund of earnestness from a pro- 
fessed epigrammatist dowered with a gift of humour and a 
turn for satire. But it is doing Martial no injustice to style 
him the laureate of triviality. For his satire is neither genial 
nor earnest. His kindly temper led him to avoid direct 
personalities, but his invective is directed against vice, not 
primarily because it is wicked, but rather because it is gro- 
tesque or not comme il faut. His humour, too, though often 
sparkling enough, is more often strained and most often 
filthy. Many of his epigrams were not worth writing, by 
whatever standard they be judged. 1 The point is hard to 
illustrate, since a large proportion of his inferior work is 
fatuously obscene. But the following may be taken at 
random from two books : 



[1] That you, like Thrasea or Cato, great, 

Pursue their maxims, but decline their fate ; 

Nor rashly point the dagger to your heart ; 

More to my wish you act a Roman's part. 

I like not him who fame by death retrieves, 

Give me the man who merits praise and lives. HAY. 



1 It is to be noted that even in the most worthless of his epigrams he 
never loses his sense of style. If childish epigrams are to be given to the 
world, they cannot be better written. 



XI MARTIAL 277 

Eutrapelus toiisor dum circuit ora Luperci [1] 

expingitque genas, altera barba subit (vii. 83). 
invitas ad aprum, ponis mihi, Gallice, porcura. [2] 

hybrida sum, si das, Gallice, verba mihi (viii. 22). 
pars maxillarum tonsa est tibi, pars tibi rasa est, [3] 

pars volsa est. unum quis putet esse caput ? (viii. 47). 
tres habuit dentes, pariter quos expuit omnes, [4] 

ad tumulum Picens dum sedet ipse suum ; 
collegitque sinu fragmenta novissima laxi 

oris et adgesta contumulavit humo. 
ossa licet quondam defuncti non legat heres : 

hoc sibi iam Picens praestitit officium (viii. 57). 
summa Palatini poteras aequare Colossi, [5] 

si fieres brevior, Claudia, sesquipede (viii. 60). 

Without wishing to break a butterfly on the wheel, we may 
well quote against Martial the remark made in a different 
context to a worthless poet : 

tanti non erat esse te disertum (xii. 43). [6J 

There is much also which, without being precisely pointless 
or silly, is too petty and mean to be tolerable to modern 
taste. Most noticeable in this respect are the epigrams in 
which Martial solicits the liberality of his patrons. The 
amazing relations existing at this period between patron 
and client had worked a painful revolution in the manners 
and tone of society, a revolution which meant scarcely less 

[1] Eutrapelus the barber works so slow, 

That while he shaves, the beard anew does grow. 

ANON., 1695. 

[2] You invite me to partake of a wild boar, you s~t before me a 
home-grown pig. I'm half-boar, half-pig, if you can cheat me thus. 

[3] Part of your jaws is shaven, part clipped, part has the hair pulled 
out. Who'd think you'd only one head ? 

[4] Picens had three teeth, which he spat out altogether while he was 
sitting at the spot he had chosen for his tomb. He gathered in his robe the 
last fragments of his loose jaw and interred them in a heap of earth. His 
heir need not gather his bones when he is dead, Picens has performed 
that office for himself. 

[5] Had you been eighteen inches shorter, Claudia, you would have 
been as tall as the Colossus on the Palatine. 

[6] 'Twas scarce worth while to be thus eloquent. 



278 MARTIAL XI 

than the pauperization of the middle class. The old sacred 
and almost feudal tie uniting client and patron had long 
since disappeared, and had been replaced by relations of a 
professional and commercial character. Wealth was con- 
' centrated in comparatively few hands, and with the decrease 
of the number of the patrons the throng of clients proportion- 
ately increased. The crowd of clients bustling to the early 
morning salutatio of the patronus, and struggling with one 
another for the sportula is familiar to us in the pages of 
Juvenal and receives fresh and equally vivid illustration 
from Martial. The worst results of these unnatural relations 
were a general loss of independence of character and a 
lamentable growth of bad manners and cynical snobbery. 
The patron, owing to the increasingly heavy demands upon 
his purse, naturally tended to become close-fisted and stingy, 
the needy client too often was grasping and discontented. 
The patron, if he asked his client to dine, would regale him 
with food and drink of a coarser and inferior quality to that 
with which he himself was served. 1 The client, on the other 
hand, could not be trusted to behave himself ; he would steal 
the table fittings, make outrageous demands on his patron, 
and employ every act of servile and cringing flattery to 
improve his position. 2 The poor poet was in a sense doubly 
dependent. He would stand in the ordinary relation of 
cliens to a patronus, and would be dependent also for his 
livelihood on the generosity of his literary patrons. For, in 
spite of the comparative facilities for the publication and 
circulation of books, he could make little by the public sale 
of his works, and living at Rome was abnormally expensive. 
The worst feature of all was that such a life of servile depen- 
dence was not clearly felt to be degrading. It was disliked 
for its hardship, annoyance, and monotony, but the client too 
often seems to have regarded it as beneath his dignity to 
attempt to escape from it by industry and manly indepen- 
dence. 



1 Cp. Juv. 5 ; Mart, iii. 60, vi. 11, x. 49 ; Plin. Ep. ii. 6. 

2 v. 18. 6. 



XI MARTIAL 279 

As a result of these conditions, we find the pages of Martial 
full of allusions to the miserable life of the client. His skill 
does not fail him, but the theme is ugly and the historical 
interest necessarily predominates over the literary, though 
the reader's patience is at times rewarded with shrewd 
observations on human nature, as, for instance, the bitter 
expression of the truth that ' To him that hath shall be 
given ' 

semper pauper eris, si pauper es, Aemiliane ; [1] 

dantur opes nullis mine nisi divitibus (v. 81); 

or the even more incisive 

pauper videri Cinna vult : et est pauper (viii. 19). 

But we soon weary of the continual reference to dinners and 
parasites, to the snobbery and indifference of the rich, to 
the tricks of toadyism on the part of needy client or legacy 
hunter. It is a mean world, and the wit and raillery of 
Martial cannot make it palatable. Without a moral back- 
ground, such as is provided by the indignation of Juvenal, the 
picture soon palls, and the reader sickens. Most unpleasing 
of all are the epigrams where Martial himself speaks as client 
in a language of mingled impertinence and servility. His 
flattery of the emperor we may pass by. It was no doubt 
interested, but it was universal, and Martial's flattery is 
more dexterous without being either more or less offensive 
than that of his contemporaries. His relations towards less 
exalted patrons cannot be thus easily condoned. He feels 
no shame in begging, nor in abusing those who will not give 
or whose gifts are not sufficient for his needs. His purse 
is empty ; he must sell the gifts that Regulus has given 
him. Will Regulus buy ? 

aera domi non sunt, superest hoc, Kegule, soluni [2] 
ut tua vendamus munera : numquid emis ? (vii. 16). 



[1] Poor once and poor for ever, Nat, I fear, 

None but the rich get place and pension here. 

N. B. HALHEAD. 

[2] I have no money, Regulus, at home. Only one thing is left to do 
sell the gifts you gave me. Will you buy ? 



280 MARTIAL XI 

Stella has given him some tiles to roof his house ; he would 
like a cloak as well : 

cum pluvias madidumque lovem perferre negaret [1] 

et rudis hibernis villa nataret aquis, 
plurima, quae posset subitos effundere nimbos, 

muneribus venit tegula missa tuis. 
horridus ecce sonat Boreae stridore December : 

Stella, tegis villam, non tegis agricolam (vii. 36). 1 

This is not the way a gentleman thanks a friend, nor can 
modern taste appreciate at its antique value abuse such 

as 

primum est ut praestes, si quid te, China, rogabo ; [2] 

illud deinde sequens ut cito, Cinna, neges. 
diligo praestantem ; non odi, Cinna, negantem : 
sed tu nee praestas nee cito, Cinna, negas (vii. 43). 

The poet's poverty is no real excuse for this petulant mendi- 
! cancy. 2 He had refused to adopt a profession, 3 though pro- 
fessional employment would assuredly have left him time 
for writing, and no one would have complained if his output 
had been somewhat smaller. Instead, he chose a life which 
, involved moving in society, and was necessarily expensive. 
We can hardly attribute his choice merely to the love of his 

[1] When my erased house heaven's showers could not sustain, 
But flooded with vast deluges of rain, 
Thou shingles, Stella, seasonably didst send, 
Which from the impetuous storms did me defend : 
Now fierce loud-sounding Boreas rocks doth cleave, 
Dost clothe the farm, and farmer naked leave ? 

ANON., 1695. 

[2] The kindest thing of all is to comply : 
The next kind thing is quickly to deny. 
I love performance nor denial hate : 
Your ' Shall I, shall I ? ' is the cursed state. 



1 This is doubly offensive if addressed to the poor Cinna of viii. 19. 
Cp. the similar vii. 53, or the yet more offensive viii. 33 and v. 36. 

2 More excusable are poems such as x. 57, where he attacks one Gaius, 
an old friend (cp. ii. 30), for failing to fulfil his promise, or the exceedingly 
pointed poem (iv. 40) where he reproaches Postumus, an old friend, for 
forgetting him. Cp. also v. 52. 

3 See p. 252. 



XI MARTIAL 281 

art. If he must beg, he might have done so with better 
taste and some show of finer feeling. Macaulay's criticism 
is just : ' I can make large allowance for the difference of 
manners ; but it can never have been comme il faut in any 
age or nation for a man of note an accomplished man a 
man living with the great to be constantly asking for 
money, clothes, and dainties, and to pursue with volleys of 
abuse those who would give him nothing.' 

In spite, however, of the obscenity, meanness, and exag- 
gerated triviality of much of his work, there have been few 
poets who could turn a prettier compliment, make a neater 
jest, or enshrine the trivial in a more exquisite setting. Take 
the beautifully finished poem to Flaccus in the eighth book 
(56), wherein Martial complains that times have altered since 
Vergil's day. ' Now there are no patrons and consequently 
no poets ' 

ergo ego Vergilius, si munera Maecenatis [1J 

des mihi ? Vergilius non ero, Marsus ero. 

Here, at least, Martial shows that he could complain of his 
poverty with decency, and speak of himself and his work 
with becoming modesty. Or take a poem of a different type, 
an indirect plea for the recall of an exile (viii. 32) : 

aera per taciturn delapsa sedentis in ipsos [2] 

fluxit Aratullae blanda columba sinus, 
luserat hoc casus, nisi inobservata maneret 

permissaque sibi nollet abire fuga. 
si meliora piae fas est sperare sorori 

et dominum mundi flectere vota valent, 
haec a Sardois tibi forsitan exulis oris, 

fratre reversuro, nuntia venit avis. 



[1] Shall I then be a Vergil, if you give me such gifts as Maecenas 
gave ? No, 1 shall not be a Vergil, but a Marsus. 

[2] A gentle dove glided down through the silent air and settled even in 
Aratulla's bosom as she was sitting. This might have seemed but the sport 
of chance had it not rested there, though undetained, and refused to 
part even when flight was free. If it is granted to the loving sister to hope 
for better things, and if prayers can move the lord of the world, this bird 
perchance has come to thee from Sardinia's shore of exile to announce 
the speedy return of thy brother. 



282 MARTIAL XI 

Nothing could be more conventional, nothing more perfect 
in form, more full of music, more delicate in expression. 
The same felicity is shown in his epigrams on curiosities 
of art or nature, a fashionable and, it must be confessed, 
an easy theme. 1 Fish carved by Phidias' hand, a lizard 
cast by Mentor, a fly enclosed in amber, are all given 
immortality : 

artis Phidiacae toreuma clarum [1] 

pisces aspicis : adde aquam, natabunt (iii. 35). 

inserta phialae Mentoris manu ducta [2] 

lacerta vivit et timetur argentum (iii. 41). 

et latet et lucet Phaethontide condita gutta, [3J 

ut videatur apis nectare clusa suo. 
dignum tantorum pretium tulit ilia laborum : 

credibile est ipsam sic voluisse mori (iv. 32). 

Always at home in describing the trifling amenities of life, 
he is at his best equally successful in dealing with its trifling 
follies. An acquaintance has given his cook the absurd 
name of Mistyllos in allusion to the Homeric phrase /uorvAAoV 
T apa raAAa. Martial's comment is inimitable : 

si tibi Mistyllos cocus, Aemiliane, vocatur, 
dicatur quare non Taratalla mihi ? (i. 50). 

He complains of the wine given him at a dinner-party with 
a finished whimsicality : 

[1] These fishes Phidias wrought : with life by him 

They are endowed : add water and they swim. 

PROFESSOR GOLDWIN SMITH. 
[2] That lizard on the goblet makes thee start. 

Fear not : it lives only by Mentor's art. 

PROFESSOR GOLDWIN SMITH. 
[3] Here shines a bee closed in an amber tomb, 

As if interred in her own honey-comb. 

A fit reward fate to her labours gave ; 

No other death would she have wished to have. MAY. 



1 Cp. the elaborate and long-winded poem of Statius on a statuette of 
Hercules (Silv. iv. 6) with Martial on the same subject, ix. 43 and 44. 



XI MARTIAL 283 

potavi modo consulare vinum. [1] 

quaeris quam vetus atque liberale '! 

Frisco consule conditum : sed ipse 

qui ponebat erat, Severe, consul (vii. 79). 

Polycharmus has returned Caietanus his lOU's. ' Little 
good will that do you, and Caietanus will not even be 
grateful ' : 

quod Caietano reddis, Polycharme, tabellas, [2J 

milia te centum nura tribuisse putas ? 
' debuit haec ' inquis. tibi habe, Polycharme, tabellas 

et Caietano milia crede duo (viii. 37). 

Chloe, the murderess of her seven husbands, erects monu- 
ments to their memory, and inscribes fecit Chloe on the 
tombstones : 

inscripsit tumulis septem scelerata virorum [3] 

' se fecisse ' Chloe. quid pote simplicius ? (ix. 15). 

Vacerra admires the old poets only. What shall Martial 

miraris veteres, Vacerra, solos [4] 

nee laudas nisi mortuos poetas. 

ignoscas petimus, Vacerra : tanti 

non est, ut placeam tibi, perire (viii. 69). 

All this is very slight, merae nugae ; but even if the 
humour be not of the first water, it will compare well with 
the humour of epigrams of any age. Martial knows he is 
not a great poet. 1 He knows, too, that bis work is uneven : 

[1] I have just drunk some consular wine. How old, you ask, and 
how generous ? It was bottled in Priscus' consulship : and he who set it 
before me was the consul himself. 

[2] In giving back Caietanus his lOU's, Polycharmus, do you think you 
are giving him 100,000 sesterces ? ' He owed me that sum,' you say. 
Keep the lOU's and lend him two thousand more ! 
[3] On her seven husbands' tombs she doth impress 

' This Chloe did.' What more can she confess ? WRIGHT. 

[4] Vacerra lauds no living poet's lays, 

But for departed genius keeps his praise. 
I, alas, live, nor deem it worth my while 
To die that I may win Vacerra's smile. 

PROFESSOR GOLD WIN SMITH. 
1 Cp. viii. 3 and 50. 



284 MARTIAL XI 

iactat inaequalem Matho me fecisse libellum : [1] 

si verum est, laudat carmina nostra Matho. 

aequales scribit libros Calvinus et Vmber : 

aequalis liber est, Cretice, qui malus est (vii. 90). 

If there are thirty good epigrams in a book, he is satisfied 
(vii. 81). His defence hardly answers the question, 'Why 
publish so many ? ' but should at least mollify our judge- 
ment. Few poets read better in selections than Martial, 
and of few poets does selection give so inadequate an idea. 
For few poets of his undoubted genius have left such a large 
bulk of work which, in spite of its formal perfection, is 
morally repulsive or, from the purely literary standpoint, 
uninteresting. But he is an important figure in the history 
of literature, for he is the father of the modern epigram. 
Alone of Silver Latin poets is he a perfect stylist. He has 
the gift of felicitas to the full, but it is not curiosa. Inferior 
to Horace in all other points, he has greater spontaneity. 
And he is free from the faults of his age. He is no virtuoso, 
eaten up with self-conscious vanity ; he attempts no impos- 
sible feats of language ; he is clear, and uses his mythological 
and geographical knowledge neatly and picturesquely ; but 
he makes no display of obscure learning. ' I would please 
schoolmasters,' he says, ' but not qua schoolmasters ' (x. 
21. 5). So, too, he complains of his own education : 

at me litterulas stulti docuere parentes : [2J 

quid cum grammaticis rhetoribusque mihi ? (ix. 73. 7). 

As a result, perhaps, of this lack of sympathy with the 
education of his day, we find that, while he knows and 
admires the great poets of the past, and can flatter the rich 
poetasters of the present, his bent is curiously unliterary. 
He gives us practically no literary criticism. It is with the 
surface qualities of life that he is concerned, with its pleasures 



[1] Matho makes game of my unequal verse ; 

If it 'a unequal it might well be worse. 

Calvinus, Umber, write on one dead level, 

The book that 's got no up and down 's the devil ! 
[2] My learning only proves my father fool ! 

Why would he send me to a grammar school ? HAY. 



XI MARTIAL 285 

and its follies, guilty or innocent. He has a marvellously 
quick and clear power of observation, and of vivid presenta- 
tion. He is in this sense above all others the poet of his 
age. He either does not see or chooses to ignore many of the 
best and most interesting features of his time, but the 
picture which he presents, for all its incompleteness, is wider 
and more varied than any other. We both hate him and 
read him for the sake of the world he depicts. ' Ugliness is 
always bad art, and Martial often failed as a poet from his 
choice of subject.' x There are comparatively few of his 
poems which we read for their own sake. Remarkable as 
these few poems are, the main attraction of Martial is to be 
found not in his wit or finish, so much as in the vividness with 
which he has portrayed the life of the brilliant yet corrupt 
society in which his lot was cast. It lives before us in all 
its splendour and in all its squalor. The court, with its 
atmosphere of grovelling flattery, its gross vices veiled and 
tricked out in the garb of respectability ; the wealthy 
official class, with their villas, their favourites, their circle of 
dependants, men of culture, wit, and urbanity, through all 
which runs, strangely intermingled, a vein of extreme coarse- 
ness, vulgarity, and meanness ; the lounger and the reciter, 
the diner-out and the legacy-hunter ; the clients struggling 
to win their patrons' favour and to rise in the social scale, 
enduring the hardships and discomfort of a sordid life un- 
illumined by lofty ideals or strength of will, a life that under 
cold northern skies would have been intolerable ; the freed- 
man and the slave, with all the riff-raff that support a para- 
sitic existence on the vices of the upper classes ; the noise and 
bustle of Rome, its sleepless nights, its cheerless tenements, 
its noisy streets, loud with the sound of traffic or of revelry ; 
the shows in the theatre, the races in the circus, the inter- 
change of presents at the Saturnalia; the pleasant life in 
the country villa, the simplicity of rural Italy, the sights and 
sounds of the park and the farm-yard ; and dimly seen 
beyond all, the provinces, a great ocean which absorbs from 



Bridge and Lake, Introd., Select Epigrams of Martial. 



286 MARTIAL XI 

time to time the rulers of Rome and the leaders of society, 
and from which come faint and confused echoes of frontier 
wars ; all are there. It is a great pageant lacking order and 
coherence, a scene that shifts continually, but never lacks 
brilliance of detail and sharply defined presentment. Martial 
was the child of the age ; it gave him his strength and his 
weakness. If we hate him or despise him, it is because he is 
the faithful representative of the life of his times ; his gifts 
we cannot question. He practised a form of poetry that 
at its best is not exalted, and must, even more than other 
branches of art, be conditioned by social circumstance. 
Within its limited sphere Martial stands, not faultless, but 
yet supreme. 



CHAPTER XII 

JUVENAL 

OUR knowledge of the life of the most famous of Roman 
satirists is strangely unsatisfactory. Many so-called lives 
of Juvenal have come down to us, but they are confused, 
contradictory, inadequate, and unreliable. 1 His own work 
and allusions in other writers help us but little in our attempt 
to reconstruct the story of the poet's life. 

Only by investigating the dates within which the satires 
seem to fall is it possible to arrive at some idea of the dates 
within which falls the life of their author. The satires were 
published in five books at different times. The first book 
(1-5), which is full of allusions to the tyranny of Domitian, 
cannot have been published before 100 A. D., since the first 
satire contains an allusion to the condemnation of Marius 
Priscus, 2 which took place in that year. The fifth book 
(13-16) must, from references in the thirteenth and fifteenth 3 
satires to the year 127, have been published not much later 
than that date. The publication of the satires falls, there- 
fore, between 100 and 130. 

With these data it is possible to approach the question of 
the dates of Juvenal's birth and death. The main facts to 
guide us are the statements of the best of the biographies 
that he did not begin to write satire till on the confines of 
middle age, that even then he delayed to publish, and that he 
died at the age of eighty. 4 The inference is that he was 

1 The ancient biographies of the poet all descend from the same source : 
their variations spring largely from questionable or absurd interpretations 
of passages in the satires themselves. The best of them, if not their actual 
source, is the life found at the end of the codex Pithoeanus, the best of the 
MSS. of Juvenal. It was in all probability written by the author of the 
scholia Pithoeana to whom Valla, on the authority of a MS. now lost, 
gave the name of Probus and dates from the fourth or fifth century. 

2 L. 41. Cp. Plin. Ep. ii. 11. 

3 xiii. 17 ' sexaginta annos Fonteio consule natus '. xv. 27 ' nuper 
consule lunco '. 

4 Vita 1 (O. Jahn ed.): la (Diirr, Das Leben Juvenals). A life contained 



288 JUVENAL . XII 

born between 50 and 60 A. D., and died between 130 and 
140 A. D. 1 

As to the facts of his life we are on little firmer ground. 
But concerning his name and birthplace there is practical 
certainty. Decimus Junius Juvenalis 2 was born at Aqui- 
num, 3 a town of Latium, and is said to have been the son or 
adopted son of a rich freedman. His education was of the 
usual character, literary and rhetorical, and was presumably 
carried out at Rome. 4 He acquired thus early in youth a 
taste for rhetoric that never left him. For he is said to 
have practised declamation up till middle age, not with a 
view to obtaining a position as professor of rhetoric or as 
advocate, but from sheer love of the art. 5 It is probable that 
he combined his passion for rhetoric with service as an 
officer in the army. Not only does he show considerable 
intimacy in his satires with a soldier's life, 6 but interesting 
external evidence is afforded by an inscription discovered 
near Aquinum. It runs : 

GERE&l . SACRVM 
D. /FNIVS . IVVENALIS 
TRIE . COH . I . DELMATARVM 
II . VIR . QVINQ . FLAMEN 

DIVI . VESPASIANI 
VOVIT . DEDICAV/rgVE 
SVA PEC. 7 

in Cod. Barberin. viii. 18 (fifteenth century), says lunius luvenalis Aquinas 
lunio luvenale patre, matre vero Septumuleia ex Aquinati municipio, Claudia 
Nerone et L. Antistio consulibus (55 A. D.) natus est ; sororem habuit Septu- 
muleiam, quae Fuscino nupsit. This may be mere invention on the part 
of a humanist of the fifteenth century. The life contains many improba- 
bilities and the MS. is of suspiciously late date. But see Dtirr, p. 28. 

1 Vitae 2 and 3 ' oriundus temporis Neronis Claudii imperatoris '. 
Vit. 4 ' decessit sub Antonino Pio '. 

2 So Cod. Paris. 9345; Vossian. 18 and 64; Bodl. (Canon Lat. 41); 
Schol. Pith, ad vit. 1. 

3 So all ancient biographies except 1. In Sat. iii, Umbricius, 
addressing Juvenal, speaks of tuum Aquinum: cp. also the inscription 
found near Aquinum and quoted later. 

* This is only conjecture, but the son of a rich citizen of Aquinum 

would naturally be sent to Rome for his education. For his rhetorical 
education cp. i. 15-17. 5 Vita 1. 

6 Cp. especially the whole of xvi ; also i. 58, ii. 165, iii. 132, vii. 92, 
xiv. 193-7. 7 C. I. L. x. 5382. 



XII JUVENAL 289 

If this inscription refers, as well it may, to the poet, it will 
follow that he served as tribune of the first Dalmatian cohort, 
probably in Britain, 1 held high municipal office in his native 
town, and was priest of the deified Vespasian. But the 
praenomen is wanting in the original, and the inscription 
may have been erected not by the satirist but by one of his 
kinsfolk. That he spent the greater portion of his life at 
Rome is evident from his satires. Of his friends we know 
little. Umbricius, Persicus, Catullus, and Calvinus 2 are 
mere names. Of Quintilian 3 he speaks with great respect, 
and may perhaps have studied under him ; of Statius he 
writes with enthusiasm, but there is no evidence that he had 
done more than be present at that poet's recitations. 4 Mar- 
tial, however, was a personal friend, and writes affectionately 
of him and to him in three of his epigrams. 5 Unlike Martial, 
whose life was a continual struggle against poverty, Juvenal, 
though he had clearly endured some of the discomforts and 
degradations involved by a client's attendance on his rich 
patronus, was a man of some means, possessing an estate at 
Aquinum, 6 a country house at Tibur, 7 and a house at Rome. 8 
At what date precisely he began to write is uncertain. We 
are told that his first effort was a brief poem attacking the 
actor Paris, which he afterwards embodied in the seventh 
satire. But it was long before he ventured to read his satires 
even to his intimate friends. 9 This suggests that portions, 
at any rate, of the satires of the first book were composed 
during the reign of Domitian. 10 Juvenal had certainly 
every reason for concealing their existence till after the 
tyrant's death. The first satire was probably written later 
to form a preface to the other four, and the whole book may 
have been published in 101. It is noteworthy, however, 
that Martial, writing to him in that year, mentions merely 



1 0. I. L. vii, p. 85; Hubner, Rhein. Mm. xi (1857), p. 30; Hermes, 
xvi (1881), p. 566. 

2 Satt. 3, 11, 12, 13. Trcbius in 5 is perhaps an imaginary character. 

3 vi. 75, 280, vii. 186. 4 vii. 82. 5 Mart. vii. 24, 91, xii. 18. 
6 vi. 57. 7 xi. 65. xi. 190, xii. 87. Vila 1. 

10 There arc, however, allusions to Doinitian as dead in ii. 29-33, iv. 153. 
BUTLEB 



290 JUVENAL XII 

his gifts as a declaimer, and seems not to know him as a 
satirist. The second book, containing only the sixth satire, 
was probably published about 116, since it contains allusions 
to earthquakes in Asia and to a comet boding ill to Parthia 
and Armenia (11. 407-12). Such a comet was visible in 
Rome in the autumn of 115, on the eve of Trajan's campaign 
against Parthia, while in December an earthquake did great 
damage to the town of Antioch. The third book (7-9) opens 
with an elaborate compliment to Hadrian as the patron of 
literature at Rome. As Hadrian succeeded to the principate 
in 117 and left Rome for a tour of the provinces in 121, this 
book must fall somewhere between our dates. The fourth 
book (10-12) contains no indication as to its date, but must 
lie between the publication of the third book and of the fifth 
(after 127). Beyond these facts it is hardly possible to go in 
our reconstruction of the poet's life. As far as may be judged 
it was an uneventful career save for one great calamity. 
The ancient biographies assert that Juvenal's denuncia- 
tion of actors embodied in the seventh satire offended an 
actor who was the favourite of the princeps. They are sup- 
ported by Apollinaris Sidonius, 1 who speaks of Juvenal as 
the ' exile-victim of an actor's anger ', and by Johannes 
Malala. 2 The latter writer, with certain of the ancient 
biographies, identifies the actor with Paris, the favourite of 
Domitian ; others, again, say that the poet was banished by 
Nero 3 a manifestly absurd statement others by Trajan, 4 
while our best authority asserts that he was eighty years old 
when banished, and that he died of grief and mortification. 5 
The place of exile is variously given. Most of the biographies 
place it in Egypt, the best of them asserting that he was given 
a military command in that province. 5 Others mention 
Britain, 6 others the Pentapolis of Libya. 7 Amid such dis- 



1 Ap. Sid. ix. 269. 

2 Joh. Mai. Chron. x, p. 341, Chilm. 

3 Vita 7. Schol. ad vii. 92. * yita 6. 

5 Vitae 1, 2, 4, 7. Perhaps an inference from 8at. xv. 45. 

6 Vitae 5 and 6. If the inscription (sec p. 288) refers to the poet, this view 
has further support. 7 Joh. Mai., loc. cit. 



XII JUVENAL 291 

crepancies it is impossible to give any certain answer. But 
it is certain that the actor who caused Juvenal's banishment 
was not Paris, who was put to death by Domitian as early 
as 83, and almost equally certain that Domitian is guiltless 
of the poet's exile. It is, however, possible that he was 
banished by Trajan or Hadrian, though it would surprise us 
to find Trajan, for all the debauchery of his private life, so 
far under the influence of an actor 1 as to sacrifice a Roman 
citizen to his displeasure ; while as regards Hadrian it is 
noteworthy that the very satire said to have offended the 
ixintomimus contains an eloquent panegyric of that emperor. 
Further, it is hard to believe the story that Juvenal was 
banished to Egypt at the advanced age of eighty under the 
pretext of a military command. The problem is insoluble. 2 
The most that can be said is that the persistence of the 
tradition gives it some claim to credibility, though the details 
handed down to us are wholly untrustworthy, and probably 
little better than clumsy inferences from passages in the 
satires. 

The scope of Juvenal's work and the motives that spur 
him are set forth in the first satire. He is weary of the 
deluge of trivial and mechanical verse poured out by the 
myriad poetasters of the day : 

Still shall I hear and never quit the score, 

Stunned with hoarse Codrus' Theseid, o'er and o'er ? 

Shall this man's elegies and t'other's play 

Unpunished murder a long summer's day ? 

. . . since the world with writing is possest, 

I'll versify in spite ; and do my best 

To make as much waste-paper as the rest. 3 



1 Trajan had, however, a favourite in the pantvmimus JPylades. Dio. 
Cass. Ixviii. 10. 

2 The simplest suggestion is that Juvenal was at some time banished, 
that the reason for his banishment was forgotten and supplied by con- 
jecture. Cp. Friedlander's ed., p. 44. There is no real evidence to prove 
that Juvenal was ever hi Egypt or Britain. His topography in Sat. xv is 
faulty, and allusion to the oysters of Richborough (oslrea Rulupina, iv. 141) 
would be possible even in a poet who had never visited Britain. 

3 i. 1-3, 17, 18 (Dryden's translation). 

U 2 



292 JUVENAL XII 

He will write in a different vein from his rivals. Satire 
shall be his theme. In such an age, when virtue is praised 
and vice practised, the age of the libertine, the parvenu, 
the forger, the murderer, it is hard not to write satire. 
' Facit indignatio versum ! ' l he cries. 'All the daily life of 
Rome shall be my theme ' : 

quidquid agunt homines votuin timor ira voluptas [1] 

gaudia discursus nostri est farrago libelli. 2 

Never was vice so rampant ; luxury has become monstrous ; 
the rich lord lives in pampered and selfish ease, while those 
poor mortals, his clients, jostle together to receive the paltry 
dole of the sportula ; that is all the help they will get from 
their patron : 

No age can go beyond us ; future times 

Can add no further to the present crimes. 

Our sons but the same things can wish and do ; 

Vice is at stand and at the highest flow. 

Then, Satire, spread thy sails, take all the winds that blow. 3 

And yet the satirist must be cautious ; the days are past 
when a Lucilius could lash Rome at his will : 

When Lucilius brandishes his pen 
And flashes in the face of guilty men, 
A cold sweat stands in drops on every part, 
And rage succeeds to tears, revenge to smart. 
Muse, be advised ; 'tis past considering time, 
When entered once the dangerous lists of rhyme : 
Since none the living villains dare implead, 
Arraign them in the persons of the dead. 4 

No better preface has ever been written ; it gives a perfect 
summary of the motives, the objects, and the methods of the 
poet's work in language which for vigour and brilliance he 



[1] What human kind desires and what they shun, 
Rage, passion, pleasure, impotence of will, 
Shall this satirical collection fill. DRYDEN. 



i i. 79. 2 Ib. 85. 

3 Ib. 147-50. 4 i. 165-71. 



XIT JUVENAL 293 

never surpassed. The closing lines show us his literary 
parentage. It is Lucilius who inspires him ; it is the fierce 
invective of the father of Roman satire that appeals to him. 
Lucilius had scourged Rome, when the inroads of Hellenism 
and oriental luxury, the fruits of foreign conquest, were 
beginning to make themselves felt. To Juvenal it falls to 
denounce the triumph of these corroding influences. He 
has nothing of the almost pathetic philosophic detachment of 
Persius, nor of the easy-going compromise of Horace. He 
does not palter with problems of right and wrong, nor hesitate 
over his moral judgements ; casuistry is wholly alien to his 
temper. It is indignation makes the verse, and from 
this fact, together with his rhetorical training, his chief 
merits and his chief failings spring. He introduces no 
novelty into satire save the almost unvarying bitterness and 
ferocity of his tone. Like Horace and Persius, he employs 
the dactylic hexameter to the exclusion of other metres, 
while, owing in the main to his taste for declamation, he is 
far more sparing in the use of the dialogue-form than either 
of his predecessors. 

Before further discussing his general characteristics, it 
is necessary to take a brief survey of the remaining satires. 
The second and ninth are savage and, as was almost inevi- 
table, obscene denunciations of unnatural vice. In the third, 
the most orderly in arrangement and the most brilliant in 
execution of all his satires, he describes all the dangers and 
horrors of life at Rome. Umbricius, a friend of the poet, is 
leaving the city. It is no place for a man of honour ; it has 
become a city for Greeks ; the worthless and astute Graeculi;s 
is everywhere predominant, and, stained though he be with 
a thousand vices, has outwitted the native-born, and, by the 
arts of the panderer and the flatterer, has made himself their 
master. The poor are treated like slaves. Houses fall, or 
are burned with fire. Sleep is impossible, so loud with 
traffic are the streets. By day it is scarcely safe to walk 
abroad for fear of being crushed by one of the great drays 
that throng the city ; by night there are the lesser perils of 
slops and broken crockery cast from the windows, the 



294 JUVENAL XII 

greater perils of roisterers and thieves. Rome is no place 
for Umbricius. He must go. 

The fourth satire opens with a violent attack on the 
parvenu Egyptian Crispinus, so powerful at the court of 
Domitian, and goes on by a somewhat clumsy transition to 
tell the story of the huge turbot caught near Ancona and 
presented to the emperor. So large was it that a cabinet 
council must needs be called to decide what should be done 
with it. This affords excuse for an inimitable picture of 
Domitian's servile councillors. At last it is decided that 
the turbot is to be served whole and a special dish to be 
constructed for it. ' Ah ! why,' the poet concludes, ' did not 
Domitian devote himself entirely to such trifles as these ? ' 

In the fifth satire Juvenal returns to the subject of the 
hardships and insults which the poor client must endure. 
He pictures the host sitting in state with the best of every- 
thing set before him and served in the choicest manner, 
while the unhappy client must be content with food and 
drink of the coarsest kind. Virro, the rich man, does this 
not because he is parsimonious, but because the humiliation 
of his client amuses his perverted mind. But the satirist 
does not spare the client, whose servile complaisance leads 
him to put up with such treatment. ' Be a man ! ' he cries, 
' and sooner beg on the streets than degrade yourself thus.' 

The sixth satire, the longest of the collection, is a savage 
denunciation of the vices of womankind. The various types 
of female degradation are revealed to our gaze with merciless 
and often revolting portrayal. The unchastity of woman 
is the main theme, but ranked with the adulteress and the 
wanton are the murderess of husband or of child, the tor- 
turer of the slave, the client of the fortune-teller or the 
astrologer, and even the more harmless female athlete and 
blue-stocking. For vigour and skill the satire ranks among 
Juvenal's best, but it is marred by wanton grossness and at 
times almost absurd exaggeration. 

The seventh satire deals with the difficulties besetting 
a literary career. It opens with a dexterous compliment to 
Hadrian ; the poet qualifies his complaints by saying that 



XII JUVENAL 295 

they apply only to the past. The accession of Hadrian has 
swept all the storm-clouds from the author's sky. But in 
the unhappy days but lately passed away, the poet's lot was 
most miserable. His work brings him no livelihood ; his 
patron's liberality goes but a little way. The historian is in 
no less parlous plight. The advocate makes some show of 
wealth, but it is, as a rule, the merest show ; only the man 
already wealthy succeeds at the bar ; many a struggling 
lawyer goes bankrupt in the struggle to advertise himself 
and push his way. The teacher of rhetoric and the school- 
master receive but a miserable fee, yet they have all the 
drudgery of discipline and all the responsibility of moulding 
the characters of the young placed upon their shoulders. 
They are expected to be omniscient, and yet they starve. 

The eighth satire treats the familiar theme that without 
virtue birth is of small account. Many examples of the 
degeneracy of the aristocracy are given, some trivial, some 
grave, but above all the satirist denounces the cruelty and 
oppression of nobly-born provincial governors. He con- 
cludes in his noblest vein in praise of the great plebeians of 
the past, Cicero, Marius, the Decii, and Servius Tullius. It 
is in deeds, not in titles, that true nobility lies. Better 
be the son of Thersites and possess the valour of Achilles, 
than live the life of a Thersites and boast Achilles for 
your sire. 

The eighth satire may be regarded as the presage of a 
distinct change of type. Instead of the vivid pictures of 
Roman life and the almost dramatic representation of vice 
personified, Juvenal seems to turn for inspiration to the 
scholastic declamation which had fascinated his youth. 
Moral problems are treated in a more abstract way, and 
the old fierce onset of indignation, though it has by no 
means disappeared, seems to have lost something of its 
former violence. There are also traces of declining powers, 
a greater tendency to digression, a lack of concentration 
and vigour, and even of dexterity of language. But the 
change is due in all probability not merely to advance in 
years nor to the calming and mellowing influence of old age, 



296 JUVENAL XII 

but also to a change that was gradually passing over the 
Roman world. The material for savage satire was appre- 
ciably less. Evil in its worst forms had triumphed under 
Domitian. With Nerva, Trajan, and Hadrian virtue began 
slowly and uncertainly to reclaim part of her lost dominions. 
The fourth book opens with the famous tenth satire on 
the vanity of human wishes. What should man pray for ? 
The theme is hackneyed and the treatment shows no special 
originality. But the thought is elevated, the rhetoric 
superb, and the verse has a resounding tread such as is only 
found in Persius and Juvenal among the later poets of Rome. 
' What shall man pray for ? ' Power ? Think of Sejanus, 
Pompey, Demosthenes, Cicero ! To each one greatness 
brought his doom. Think of Hannibal and Alexander, how 
they, and with them all their high schemings, came to die ; 
Long life ? What ? Should we pray to outlive our bodily 
powers, to bewail the death of our nearest and dearest, to 
fall from the high place where once we stood ? Beauty ? 
Beauty is beset by a thousand perils in these vile days, and 
rarely do beauty and chastity go hand in hand. Rather 
than pray for boons like these, ' entrust thy fortune to the 
gods above,' or, if pray thou must, 

stand confined 

To health of body and content of mind ; 
A soul that can securely death defy, 
And count it nature's privilege to die ; 
Serene and manly, hardened to sustain 
The load of life and exercised in pain : 
Guiltless of hate and proof against desire, 
That all things weighs and nothing can admire ; 
That dares prefer the toils of Hercules, 
To dalliance, banquet, and ignoble ease. 
The path to peace is virtue ; what I show, 
Thyself may freely on thyself bestow ; 
Fortune was never worshipped by the wise, 
But, set aloft by fools, usurps the skies. 1 

In the eleventh satire we drop from these splendid heights 
1 x. 356-66 (Dryden's translation). 



XII .JUVENAL 297 

of rhetoric to a declamatory invitation to dinner, which 
affords occasion for a denunciation of the extravagant indul- 
gence in the pleasures of the table and for the praise of the 
good old days when Romans clave to the simple life. The 
dinner to which Juvenal invites his friend will be of simple 
fare simply served 

You'll have no scandal when you dine, 
But honest talk and wholesome wine. 

And instead of lewd dance and song, a slave shall read aloud 
Homer and Homer's one rival, Vergil. 

The twelfth satire opens with a thanksgiving for the escape 
of a friend, Catullus, from a great storm at sea, and ends 
with a denunciation of legacy hunters, the connecting link 
between these somewhat remote themes being that Juvenal, 
at any rate, is disinterested in his joy at his friend's escape. 

The thirteenth and fourteenth satires deal with more 
abstract themes, the pangs of the guilty conscience and 
the importance of parental example. In the first, Juvenal 
consoles his friend, Calvinus, who has been defrauded of 
a sum of money. The loss, he says, is small, and, after all, 
honesty is rare nowadays. Men have so little care for the 
gods that they shrink from no perjury. Besides, what is 
such loss compared with the many worse crimes that darken 
life. Why thirst for revenge ? It is the doctrine of the 
common herd. Philosophy teaches otherwise. The torment 
of conscience will be a worse penalty than any you can 
inflict, and at last justice will claim its own. In the next 
satire, to emphasize the value of parental example, the 
poet illustrates his point from the vice of avarice, and 
finally, forgetting his original theme, lashes the avaricious 
man in words such as would never suggest that the question 
of parental example had been raised at all. It is noteworthy 
that throughout these two satires the poet draws his illus- 
trations from the themes of the schools rather than from 
the scenes of contemporary life. 

In the fifteenth satire, however, he returns to depict and 
discuss actual occurrences, but in how altered and strange a 



298 JUVENAL XII 

manner. His theme is a case of cannibalism in Egypt, 1 the 
result of a collision between religious fanatics of neighbouring 
townships. The aged poet spurs himself into one last fury 
against the hated Oriental, regardless of the fact that the 
denunciation of cannibalism to a civilized audience must 
necessarily be insipid. Last comes a fragment expatiating 
bitterly on the shameful advantages of a military career. The 
unhappy civilian assaulted by a soldier cannot get redress, for 
the case must be heard in camp before a bench of soldiers. 
The soldier, on the other hand, can get summary settlement 
of all his disputes, and alone of Romans is exempt from the 
patria potestas, can control his earnings and bequeath them 
to whom he will. At this point the satire breaks off abruptly, 
and we have no means of judging the extent of the loss. It 
is a striking reversion to his earlier manner. Once more the 
satire takes the form of a series of sketches from actual life. 
Both of these satires, notably the fifteenth, show a marked 
falling off alike in style and matter. Both, in fact, have 
been branded as spurious, the latter from times as early 
as those of the scholia. But there is no real ground for 
such a suspicion. Both satires have all the characteristics 
of Juvenal, excepting only the vigour and brilliance of his 
earlier days. No poet's powers are proof against the advance 
of old age, and there is no vein of poetry more exhausting 
or more easily exhausted than satire. And, as has already 
been remarked, there are signs of a falling away before these 
satires are reached. Even the famous tenth satire, for all 
its indisputable greatness, does not demand or reveal such 
special gifts of style and observation as the first and third. 
It is less in touch with actual life : it is a theme from the 
schools, and the illustrations, effective as they are, are as 
trite as the theme itself. Were it his only work, the tentli 
satire would give Juvenal high rank among Roman poets : 



1 There is nothing in this satire to suggest that Juvenal had. or had not 
visited Egypt. The legend of his banishment to Egypt may be true, but 
it is quite as likely that this satire caused the scholiast to localize his 
traditional exile in Egypt. The theme of cannibalism was sometimes 
dealt with by the rhetoricians. Cp. Quintilian, Ded. 12. 



XII JUVENAL 299 

it will always, thanks to the brilliance of its rhetoric and 
the wide applicability of its moral, be his most popular 
work : it is not his highest achievement. 

It will have been obvious from this brief survey that the 
themes chosen by Juvenal are for the most part of a common- 
place nature. It could hardly be otherwise. Satire, to be 
effective, must choose obvious themes. But in some respects 
the treatment of them is surprisingly commonplace. There is 
little freshness or originality about Juvenal's way of think- 
ing. His morality is neither satisfying nor profound. His 
ideal is the old narrow Roman republican ideal of a chaste, 
vigorous, and unluxurious life, wherein publicity is for man 
alone, while woman is confined to the cares of the family 
and the household ; the ideal of a society wholly Italian 
and free-born, untainted by the importations of Greece and 
Asia ; of a state stern and exclusive, though just and 
merciful, sparing the subject and beating down the proud. 
The nobility of this ideal is not to be denied, but it is inade- 
quate because it is wholly unpractical. There is no denying 
that the emancipation of women had led to gross evils, some 
of them imperilling the very existence of the State ; nor 
can it be doubted that much of the Greek influence had 
been wholly for the bad, and that in many cases the intro- 
duction of the cults of the East served merely to cloak 
debauchery. The rich freedman, also, for whom Juvenal re- 
serves his bitterest shafts, was often of vicious and degraded 
character and had risen to power by repulsive means. But 
there is another side to the picture, the existence of which 
Juvenal sometimes, by his vehemence, seems to deny. The 
freedman class supplied some of the most valuable of civil 
servants, and many must have been worthy of their emanci- 
pation and of their rise to power. 1 There was a higher 
Hellenism, which Juvenal ignored. The intellectual move- 
ments of the Empire still found their chief source in Greece, 
and the great Sophistic movement was already setting in, 

1 e.g. Claudius Etruscus, who held the imperial secretaryship of finance 
under Nero and Vespasian, and Abascantus, the secretary ab epistulis to 
Domitian. Stat. Silv. iii. 3, v. 1. 



300 JUVENAL XII 

as a result of which Greek literature was to revive and the 
Greek language to supersede the Latin as the chief vehicle 
of literary expression even at Rome itself. The greater 
freedom accorded to women had its compensations ; in 
spite of Juvenal, woman does not become worse or less 
attractive because she is cultured and well educated, and if 
there was much dissipation and debauchery in the high 
society of his day, even high society contained many noble 
women of fine intellect and pure character. The spread of 
Roman citizenship and the breaking down of the old exclu- 
sive tradition were potent factors for good in the history of 
civilization. It may be urged in Juvenal's defence that satire 
must necessarily deal with the darker side of life, that his 
silence as to the better and more hopeful elements in society 
does not mean that he ignored them, and that it is absurd 
to attack a satirist because he is not a scientific social his- 
torian. All this is true ; but it is possible to have plenty 
of material for the bitterest satire and to indict gross and 
rampant vice without leaving the impression that the life 
of the day has no redeeming elements, without generalizing 
extravagantly from the vices of one section of society, even 
though that section be large and influential. The weakness 
of Juvenal is that he is too retrospective, both in his praise 
and in his blame. He dare not satirize the living, but will 
attack the dead. But it would be wrong to assume that in 
the dead he always attacks types of the living. There is 
always the impression that he is in reality attacking the 
first century rather than the second, the reigns of Nero and 
Domitian rather than the society governed by Trajan and 
Hadrian. He had lived through a night of terror and would 
not recognize the signs of a new dawn. Directing his atten- 
tion too exclusively on Rome itself and on the past, he forgets 
the larger world and the future hope. It is to the impossible 
Rome of the past that he turns his eyes for inspiration. 
Hence comes his hatred, often merely racial, for Greek and 
Asiatic importations, 1 hence his dislike and contempt for 

1 For a fine picture of the exclusive Roman spirit, cp. Le procurateur de 
Judee, by Anatole France in IS Htm de nacre. 



XII JUVENAL 

the new woman. Moreover, he had lived on the fringe of 
high society and not in it ; he had drunk in the bitterness 
of the client's life, and had lived in the enveloping atmo- 
sphere of scandal that always surrounds society for those 
who are excluded from it. A man of an acrid and jealous 
temperament, easily angered and not readily appeased, he 
yields too lightly and indiscriminately to that indignation, 
which, he tells us, is the fountain-head of all he writes. 
Satire should be something more than a wild torrent sweep- 
ing away obstacles great and small with one equal violence ; 
it should have its laughing shallows and its placid deeps. 
But Juvenal's laughter rings harsh and wild, and wounds 
as deeply as his invective ; he drives continually before 
the fierce gale of his spirit, and there are no calm havens 
where he may rest and contemplate the ideal that so much 
denunciation implies. He knows no gradations : all failings 
suffer beneath the same remorseless lash. The consul 
Lateranus has a taste for driving : bad taste, perhaps, yet 
hardly criminal. But Juvenal thunders at him as though 
he were guilty of high treason (viii. 146) : 

praeter maiorum cineres atque ossa volucri [1] 

carpento rapitur pinguis Lateranus, et ipse, 
ipse rotam adstringit sufflamine mulio consul, 
nocte quidem, sed Luna videt, sed sidera testes 
intendunt oculos. nnitum tempus honoris 
cum iuerit, clara Lateranus luce flagellum 
sumet et occursum numquam trepidabit amici 
iarn senis. 



[1] See ! by his great progenitor's remains 

Fat Lateranus sweeps, with loosened reins. 

Good Consul ! he no pride of office feels, 

But stoops, himself, to clog his headlong wheels. 

' But this is all by night,' the hero cries, 

Yet the moon sees ! yet the stars stretch their eyes 

Full on your shame ! A few short moments wait, 

And Damasippus quits the pomp of state : 

Then, proud the experienced driver to display, 

He mounts the chariot in the face of day, 

Whirls, with bold front, his grave associate by, 

And jerks his whip, to catch the senior's eye. 



JUVENAL XII 

Elsewhere (i. 55-62) the ' horsy ' youth is spoken of as 
worse than the husband who connives at his wife's dis- 
honour and pockets the reward of her shame. Among 
the monstrous women of the sixth satire we come with 
a shock of surprise upon the learned lady (434) : 

ilia tamen gravior, quae cum discuinbere coepit [1] 

laudat Vergilium, periturae ignoscit Elissae, 
committit vates et comparat, inde Maronem 
atque alia parte in trutina suspendit Homerum. 

She figures strangely among the poisoners and adulteresses. 
Juvenal is misogynist by temperament as well as by con- 
viction. Nero is a matricide like Orestes, but 

in scaena numquam cantavit Orestes, [2] 

Troica non scripsit. quid enim Verginius armis 
debuit ulcisci magis aut cum Vindice Galba, 
quod Nero tarn saeva crudaque tyrannide fecit ?(viii. 220). 

It is almost a crime to be a foreigner. The Greek is a liar, 
a base flatterer, a monster of lust, a traitor, a murderer. 1 
The Jew is the sordid victim of a narrow and degrading 
superstition. 2 The Oriental is the defilement of Rome ; 
worst of all are the Egyptians ; 3 they even eat each other. 
The freedman, the nouveau riche, the parvenu* are hated 
with all a Roman's hatred. The old patriotism of the city 
state is not yet merged in the wider imperialism. It is bitter 
to hear one of alien blood say ' Civis Romanus sum '. 



[1] But of all plagues the greatest is untold ; 

The 'book-learned wife, in Greek and Latin bold; 

The critic dame, who at her table sits, 

Homer and Virgil quotes and weighs their wits, 

And pities Dido's agonizing fits. DRYDEN. 

[2] Besides, Orestes in his wildest mood 

Sung on no public stage, no Troics wrote. 

This topped his frantic crimes ! This roused mankind ! 

For what could Galba, what Virginius find, 

In the dire annals of that bloody reign, 

Which called for vengeance in a louder strain ? 



1 iii. 60-125. 2 xiv. 96 sqq . 

3 i. 130 sqq , and the whole of xv. Above all, he hates the Egyptian 
Crispinus, cp. iv. 2. * i. 102 sqq. 



XII JUVENAL 303 

This strange violence and lack of proportion are due in 
part to the poet's rhetorical training, which had warped 
still further a naturally biased temperament. He had 
been taught and loved to use the language of hyperbole. 
And he had lived through the principate of Domitian ; it 
was that above all else which made him cry difficile est 
saturam non scribere. To this same tendency to exaggeration 
may be in part attributed the extreme grossness of so much 
of his work. It is true that vices flaunted themselves before 
his eyes that it would be hard to satirize without indecency. 
There is excuse to some extent for the second, sixth, and 
ninth satires. But even there Juvenal oversteps the mark 
and is often guilty of coarseness for coarseness' sake. It is 
easy to plead the custom of the age, 1 but it is doubtful 
whether such pleading affords any real palliation for a writer 
who sets out to be a moralist. It is easy in an access of 
admiration to say that Juvenal is never prurient : but it 
is hard to be genuinely convinced that such a statement is 
true, or that Juvenal's coarseness is never more than mere 
plain speaking. 2 

For not a few readers, this tenseness of language, this 
violence of judgement, and this occasional unclean handling 
of the unclean, make Juvenal an exhausting and a depressing 
poet to read in any large quantity at a time. Worse still, 
they lead the reader at times to harbour doubts as to the 
genuineness of Juvenal's indignation. Such doubts are not 
in reality justifiable. Juvenal sometimes goads himself into 
inappropriate frenzies and sometimes betrays a suspiciously 
close acquaintance with the most disgusting details of the 
worst vices of the age. But though he had something of 
the unreality of the rhetorician, and though his character 
may, perhaps, not have been free from serious blemish, he 
is never a hypocrite ; nor, though he paints exclusively the 
darkest side of society, is there the least reason to accuse 

1 For the tradition of coarseness sec chapter on Martial, p. 263. 

2 It has been pointed out that the epigrams of Martial addressed to 
Juvenal are disfigured by gross obscenities. It is, however, a little unfair 
to make Juvenal responsible for his friend's observations, 



JUVENAL XII 

him of culpable misrepresentation of actual facts. He has 
selected the material most suited to his peculiar genius : 
we may complain of his principle of selection, and of his 
tendency to generalize. There our criticism must end. 

These defects are largely the defects of his qualities and 
may be readily forgiven. We have Pliny the younger and 
the inscriptions to modify his sombre picture. When all is 
said, Juvenal had a matchless field for satire and matchless 
gifts, against which his defects will not weigh in the balance 
for a moment. His unrivalled capacity for declamation, 
for mordant epigram and scathing wit, more than compen- 
sate for his often ill-balanced ferocity ; the extraordinary 
vividness of his pictures of the life of Rome makes up for 
lack of perspective and proportion, the richness and variety 
of his imagination for its too frequent superficiality, the 
vigour and trenchancy of his blows for the absence of the 
rapier thrust, the fervour of his teaching for its lack of 
breadth and depth. These qualities make him the greatest 
of the satirists of Rome, if not of the world. 

It is, perhaps, his vividness that makes the most imme- 
diate impression. It would be hard to find in any literature 
a writer with such a power to make the scenes described 
live before his readers. The salient features of a scene or 
character are seized at once. 1 There is no irrelevant detail ; 
the picture may be crowded, but it is never obscure ; if 
there is a fault it is that the colouring is sometimes too 
crude and glaring to please. But before such word-paint- 
ing as the description of Domitian's privy council criticism 
is dumb : 

nee melior vultu quamvis ignobilis ibat [1] 

Eubrius, offensae veteris reus atque tacendae. 



[1J Rubrius, though not, like these, of noble race, 
Followed with equal terror in his face ; 



1 The (sixth satire abounds throughout its great length with sketches 
of the most appalling clearness and power, though they tend to crudeness 
of colour and are few of them suitable for quotation. 



XII JUVENAL 305 

Montani quoque venter adest abdomine tardus, 

et matutino sudans Crispinus amomo 

quantum vix redolent duo funera, saevior illo 

Pompeius tenui iugulos aperire susurro, 

et qui vulturibus servabat viscera Dacis 

Fuscus marmorea meditatus proelia villa, 

et cum mortifero prudens Veiento Catullo, 

qui numquam visae flagrabat amore puellae, 

grande et conspicuum nostro quoque tempore monstrum, 

caecus adulator, dirusque a ponte satelles 

dignus Aricinos qui mendicaret ad axes 

blandaque devexae iactaret basia raedae (iv. 104). 

Figure after figure they live before us, till the procession 
culminates with the crowning horror of the blind delator, 
L. Valerius Catullus Messalinus. Equally vivid is Juvenal's 
description of places. There is the rude theatre of the 
country town with its white-robed audience en neglige : 

ipsa dierum [1] 

festorum herboso colitur si quando theatro 
maiestas tandemque redit ad pulpita notum 

Montanus' belly next, and next appeared 
The legs on which that monstrous pile was reared. 
Crispinus followed, daubed with more perfume, 
Thus early ! than two funerals consume. 
Then bloodier Pompey, practised to betray, 
And hesitate the noblest lives away. 
Then Fuscus, who in studious pomp at home, 
Planned future triumphs for the arms of Rome. 
Blind to the event ! those arms a different fate, 
Inglorious wounds and Dacian vultures wait. 
Last, sly Veiento with Catullus came, 
Deadly Catullus, who at beauty's name 
Took fire, although unseen : a wretch, whose crimes 
Struck with amaze even those prodigious times. 
A base, blind parasite, a murderous lord, 
From the bridge-end raised to the council-board, 
Yet fitter still to dog the traveller's heels, 
And whine for alms to the descending wheels. GIFFOED. 
[1] Some distant parts of Italy are known, 

Where none but only dead men wear a gown, 

On theatres of turf, in homely state, 

Old plays they act, old feasts they celebrate ; 



306 JUVENAL XTI 

exodium, cum personae pallentis hiatum 
in gremio matris formidat rusticus infans, 
aequales habitus illic similesque videbis 
orchestram et populum, clari velamen honoris 
sufficiunt tunicae summis aedilibus albae (iii. 172). 

There is the poor gentleman's garret high on the topmost 
story of some tottering insula, close beneath the tiles, where 
the doves nest : 

lectus erat Codro Procula minor, urceoli sex [1] 

ornamentum abaci nee non et parvulus infra 
cantharus, et recubans sub eodeni marmore Chiro 
iamque vetus graecos servabat cista libellos, 
et divina opici rodebant carmina mures (iii. 203). 

There is the hurrying throng of the streets of Rome with 
all its dangers and discomforts : 

nobis properantibus opstat [2] 
unda prior, magno populus premit agmine lumbos 
qui sequitur ; ferit hie cubito, ferit assere duro 
alter, at hie tignum capiti incutit, ille metretam. 



The mimic yearly gives the same delights ; 

And in the mother's arms the clownish infant frights. 

Their habits (undistinguished by degrees) 

Are plain alike ; the same simplicity 

Both on the stage and in the pit you see. 

In his white cloak the magistrate appears ; 

The country bumpkin the same livery wears. DRYDEN. 

[1] Codrus had but one bed, so short to boot, 

That his short wife's short legs go dangling out ; 

His cupboard's head six earthen pitchers graced, 

Beneath them was his trusty tankard placed ; 

And to support this noble plate, there lay 

A bending Chiron cast from honest clay ; 

His few Greek books a rotten chest contained, 

Whose covers much of mouldiness complained ; 

Where mice and rats devoured poetic bread, 

And on heroic verse luxuriously were fed. DRYDEN. 

[2] The press before him stops the client's pace ; 

The crowd that follows crush his panting sides, 

And trip his heels ; he walks not but he rides. 

One elbows him, one jostles in the shoal, 

A rafter breaks his head or chairman's pole ; 



JUVENAL 307 

pinguia crura luto, planta mox undique magna 

calcor et in digito clavus mihi militis haeret. 

nonne vides quanto celebretur sportula fumo ? 

centum convivae, sequitur sua quemque culina. 

Corbulo vix ferret tot vasa ingentia, tot res 

inpositas capiti, quas recto vertice portat 

servulus infelix et cursu ventilat ignem. 

scinduntur tunicae sartae modo, longa coruscat 

serraco veniente abies, atque altera pinum 

plaustra vehunt, nutant alte populoque rainantur (iii. 243). 

Even in the later satires, where with the advance of age 
this pictorial gift begins to fail him and he tends to rely 
rather on brilliant rhetorical treatment of philosophical 
commonplaces, there are still flashes of the old power. The 
well-known description of the fall of Sejanus in the tenth 
satire is in his best manner, while even the humbler picture 
of the rustic family of primitive Rome in the fourteenth 
satire shows the same firmness of touch, the same eye for 
vivid and direct representation : 

saturabat glaebula talis [1] 

patrem ipsum turbamque casae, qua feta iacebat 
uxor et infantes ludebant quattuor, unus 



Stockinged with loads of fat town dirt he goes, 
And some rogue-soldier with his hob-nailed shoes 
Indents his legs behind in bloody rows. 

See, with what smoke our doles we celebrate ! 
A hundred guests invited walk in state ; 
A hundred hungry slaves with their Dutch -kitchens wait : 
Huge pans the wretches on their heads must bear, 
Which scarce gigantic Corbulo could rear ; 
Yet they must walk upright beneath the load, 
Nay run, and running blow the sparkling flames abroad, 
Their coats from botching newly brought are torn. 
Unwieldy timber-trees in waggons borne, 
Stretched at their length, beyond their carriage lie, 
That nod and threaten ruin from on high. DRYDEN. 

[1] For then the little glebe, improved with care, 
Largely supplied with vegetable fare, 
The good old man, the wife in childbed laid, 
And four hale boys, that round the cottage played, 



308 JUVENAL XII 

vemula, tres domini, sed magnis fratribus horum 
a scrobe vel sulco redeuntibus altera cena 
amplior et grandes fumabant pultibus ollae (166). 

His handling of the essential weapons of satire, scathing 
epigram, and impetuous rhetoric, contribute equally to his 
success. He has the capacity of branding a character with 
eternal shame in a few terse trenchant lines. Who can 
forget the Greek adventurer of the third satire ? 

grammaticus rhetor geometres pictor aliptes [1] 

augur schoenobates medicus magus, omnia novit 
Graeculus esuriens ; in caelum miseris, ibit (iii. 76) ; 

or the summary of Domitian's reign with which he dates 
the story of the gigantic turbot ? 

cum iam semianimum laceraret Flavius orbem [2] 

ultimus et calvo serviret Koma Neroni (iv. 37) ; 

or the curse upon the legacy-hunter Pacuvius ? 

vivat Pacuvius quaeso vel Nestora totum, [3] 

possideat quantum rapuit Nero, montibus aurum 
exaequet, nee amet quemquam nee ametur ab ullo (xii. 128). 

Not less mordant in a different way is the savage and 
sceptical melancholy of the conclusion of the second satire, 
where he contrasts the degenerate Roman, tainted by the 



Three free-born, one a slave : while, on the board, 

Huge porringers, with wholesome pottage stored, 

Smoked for their elder brothers, who were now, 

Hungry and tired, expected from the plough. GIFFORD. 

[1] A cook, a conjurer, a rhetorician, 
A painter, pedant, a geometrician, 
A dancer on the ropes and a physician ; 
All things the hungry Greek exactly knows, 
And bid him go to heaven, to heaven he goes. DRYDEN. 

[2] When the last Flavius, drunk with fury, tore 
The prostrate world, which bled at every pore, 
And Rome beheld, in body as in mind, 
A bald-pate Nero rise to curse mankind. GIFFORD. 

[3] Health to the man ! and may he thus get more 
Than Nero plundered ! pile his shining store 
High, mountain high : in years a Nestor prove, 
And, loving none, ne'er know another's love ! GIFFORD. 



XII JUVENAL 309 

foulest lusts, with the noble Romans of the past, and even 
with the barbarians, newly conquered, on the confines of 
empire (149) : 

esse aliquos manes et subterranea regna [1] 

et contum et Stygio ranas in gurgite nigras 
atque una transire vadum tot milia cumba 
nee pueri credunt, nisi qui nondum acre lavantur. 
sed tu vera puta : Curius quid sentit et ambo 
Scipiadae, quid Fabricius manesque Camilli, 
quid Cremerae legio et Cannis consumpta iuventus, 
tot bellorum animae, quotiens hinc talis ad illos 
umbra venit ? cuperent lustrari, si qua darentur 
sulpura cum taedis et si foret umida laurus. 
illic heu miseri traducimur. anna quidem ultra 
litora luvernae promovimus et modo captas 
Orcadas ac minima contentos nocte Britannos, 
sed quae nunc populi fiunt victoris in urbe, 
non faciunt illi quos vicimus. 



[1] That angry Justice formed a dreadful hell, 
That ghosts in subterranean regions dwell, 
That hateful Styx his sable current rolls, 
And Charon ferries o'er unbodied souls, 
Are now as tales or idle fables prized ; 
By children questioned and by men despised. 
Yet these, do thou believe. What thoughts, declare, 
Ye Scipios, once the thunderbolts of war ! 
Fabricius, Curius, great Camillus' ghost ! 
Ye valiant Fabii, in yourselves an host ! 
Ye dauntless youths at fatal Cannae slain ! 
Spirits of many a brave and bloody plain ! 
What thoughts are yours, whene'er with feet unblest, 
An unbelieving shade invades your rest ? 
Ye fly, to expiate the blasting view ; 
Fling on the pine-tree torch the sulphur blue, 
And from the dripping bay dash round the lustral dew. 
And yet to these abodes we all must come, 
Believe, or not, these are our final home ; 
Though now lerne tremble at our sway, 
And Britain, boastful of her length of day ; 
Though the blue Orcades receive our chain, 
And isles that slumber in the frozen main. 
But why of conquest boast ? the conquered clinics 
Are free, O Home, from thy detested crimes. 



310 JUVENAL XII 

In the same bitter spirit, Umbricius is made to cry : 

quid Romae faciam ? mentiri nescio ; librum, [1] 

si malus est, nequeo laudare et poscere ; motus 

astrorum ignore ; funus promittere patris 

nee volo nee possum ; ranarum viscera numquani 

inspexi ; ferre ad nuptam quae mittit adulter, 

quae mandat, norunt alii ; me nemo ministro 

fur erit, atque ideo nulli conies exeo tamquam 

mancus et extinctae, corpus non utile, dextrae (iii. 41). 

This bitterness Juvenal seasons at times with saturnine 
jests of a type that is all his own. Virro gives rancid oil 
to his poor guests as dressing to their salad : 

illud enim vestris datur alveolis quod [2] 

canna Micipsarum prora subvexit acuta, 
propter quod Romae cum Boccare nemo lavatur, 
quod tutos etiam facit a serpentibus atris (v. 88). 

When the blind delator, Catullus Messalinus, is summoned 
to give his advice concerning the gigantic turbot : 

nemo magis rhombum stupuit ; nam plurima dixit [3J 
in laevom conversus, at illi dextra iacebat 



[1] What 's Rome to me, what business have I there ? 

I who can neither lie nor falsely swear ? 

Nor praise my patron's undeserving rhymes, 

Nor yet comply with him nor with his times ? 

Unskilled in schemes by planets to foreshow, 

Like canting rascals, how the wars will go ; 

I neither will nor can prognosticate 

To the young gaping heir his father's fate ; 

Nor in the entrails of a toad have pried, 

Nor carried bawdy presents to a bride : 

For want of these town-virtues, thus alone 

I go conducted on my way by none ; 

Like a dead member from the body rent, 

Maimed and unuseful to the government. DKYDEN. 

[2] Such oil to you is thrown, 

Such rancid grease, as Afric sends to town ; 

So strong that when her factors seek the bath, 

All wind and all avoid the noisome path. GIFFORD. 

[3] None dwelt so largely on the turbot's size, 

Or raised with such applause his wondering eyes ; 

But to the left (0 treacherous want of sight) 

He poured his praise ; the fish was on the right. 



XII JUVENAL 311 

belua. sic pugnas Cilicis laudabat et ictus 
. et pegma et pueros hide ad velaria raptos (iv. 119). 

Grimmest of all is the jest on the mushrooms set before 
Virro : 

vilibus ancipites fungi ponentur amicis, [1] 

boletus domino, sed quales Claudius edit 

ante ilium uxoris, post quern nihil amplius edit (v. 146). 

But Juvenal is not always bitter, nor always angry. His 
indignation is never absent, but takes at times a graver 
and a nobler tone. At times he preaches virtue directly, 
instead of doing so indirectly through the denunciation of 
vice. He has no new secret of morality to reveal, no fresh 
lights to throw upon problems of conduct ; his advice is 
obvious and straightforward ; neither in form nor matter is 
there anything paradoxical. He was no student of philo- 
sophy, 1 though naturally familiar with the more important 
philosophic creeds and disposed by temperament to fall in 
with the views of the stern Stoic school. The conclusion 
of the tenth satire quoted above owes much to the Stoics. 
' Leave the ordering of your fortunes to the powers above. 
Man is dearer to them than to himself. The wise man is 
free from all desire, all anger and all fear of death.' 2 
' Revenge is an unworthy and degrading passion. ' 3 ' Fate 4 
and the revolution 5 of the stars in heaven rule all with 
unchanging law.' All these maxims have their counterpart 



Thus would he at the fencer's matches sit, 
And shout with rapture at some fancied hit ; 
And thus applaud the stage machinery, where 
The youths were rapt aloft and lost in air. GUTORD. 

[1] You champ on spongy toadstools, hateful treat ! 
Fearful of poisons in each bit you eat : 
He feasts secure on mushrooms, fine as those 
Which Claudius for his special eating chose, 
Till one more fine, provided by his wife, 
Finished at once his feasting and his life ! GIFFORD. 



1 xiii. 120 sqq. 2 x. 346 sqq. 3 xiii. 180. 

4 ix. 32, xii. 63. 5 vii. 194 sqq., ix. 33. 



312 JUVENAL XII 

in the Stoic creed. But there is no need of the philosophy 
of the schools to guide man to the paths of virtue. 

numquam aliud natura, aliud sapientia dicit (xiv. 321). [Ij 

Philosophy has its value, but the good man is no less good 
for not being a philosopher : 

magna quidem, sacris quae dat praecepta libellis, [2J 

victrix fortunae sapientia, ducimus autem 
hos quoque felices, qui ferre incommoda vitae 
nee iactare iugum vita didicere magistra (xiii. 19). 

He agrees with the Stoics just because their practical teaching 
harmonizes so entirely with the old virtus Romano, that is 
his ideal. 

No more profound are his religious views : he hates the 
alien cults that work as insidious poison in the life of Rome ; 
he rejects the picturesque legends of the after world, bred 
of the fertile imagination of the Greeks. But he is no 
unbeliever : 

separat hoc nos [3] 

a grege mutorum, atque ideo venerabile soli 
sortiti ingeniuin divinorumque capaces 
atque exercendis pariendisque artibus apti 
sensum a caelesti demissum traximus arce, 
cuius egent prona et terram spectantia. muudi 



[1] Nature and wisdom never are at strife. GIFFORD. 

[2] Wisdom, I know, contains a sovereign charm, 

To vanquish fortune or at least disarm : 

Blest they who walk in her unerring rule ! 

Nor those unblest who, tutored in life's school, 

Have learned of old experience to submit, 

And lightly bear the yoke they cannot quit. GLFFORD. 

[3] This marks our birth 

The great distinction from the beasts of earth ! 

And therefore gifted with superior powers 

And capable of things divine 'tis ours 

To learn and practise every useful art ; 

And from high heaven deduce that better part, 

That moral sense, denied to creatures prone 

And downward bent, and found with man alone ! 



XII JUVENAL 313 

principle indulsit communis conditor illis 

tantum animas, nobis animum quoque, mutuus ut nos 

adfectus petere auxilium et praestare iuberet (xv. 142). 

God is over all and guides and guards the world, and has 
ordained torment of conscience and slow retribution for sin. 1 
Yet Juvenal does not definitely reject the gods of his native 
land ; nor do these exalted beliefs cause him to refuse 
sacrifice to Jupiter, Juno, Minerva, and his household gods. 2 
It is the creed, not of a theologian, but of a man with high 
ideals, a staunch patriotism, and a deep reverence for the 
past. 

But this lack of profundity and philosophical training 
does not, as may be inferred from passages already quoted, 
prevent him from being intensely effective as a moral 
teacher. His platitudes are none the worse for not having 
a Stoic label and all the better for their simplicity and 
directness of expression. They do not reveal the hunger 
and thirst after righteousness that breathe from the lines 
of Persius, but they have at least an equal appeal to the 
plain man, and they are matchlessly expressed. His plead- 
ing against revenging the wrong done, if not on the very 
highest moral plane, possesses a grave dignity and beauty 
that brings it straight home to the heart : 

at vindicta bonum vita iucundius ipsa. [1] 

nernpe hoc indocti, quorum praecordia nullis 
interdum aut levibus videas flagrantia causis. 



For He, who gave this vast machine to roll, 
Breathed life in them, in us a reasoning soul : 
That kindred feelings might our state improve, 
And mutual wants conduct to mutual love. GIFFOKD. 
[1] ' Revenge,' they say, and I believe their words, 
' A pleasure sweeter far than life affords.' 
Who say ? The fools, whose passions prone to ire 
At slightest causes or at none take fire. 
Chrysippus said not so ; 



xiii. 192-249. 2 xii. 3-0, 89 sqq. 



314 JUVENAL XII 

Chrysippus non dicet idem nee mite Thaletis 

ingenium dulcique senex vicinus Hymetto, 

qui partem acceptae saeva inter vincla cicutae 

accusatori nollet dare, plurima felix 

paulatim vitia atque errores exuit omnes, 

prima docet rectum sapientia. quippe minuti 

semper et infirmi est animi exiguique voluptas 

ultio. continue sic collige, quod vindicta 

nemo magis gaudet quam femina. cur tameu hos tu 

evasisse putes, quos diri conscia facti 

mens habet attonitos et surdo verbere caedit 

occultum quatiente animo tortore flagellum ? 

poena autem vehemens ac multo saevior illis 

quas et Caedicius gravis invenit et Rhadamanthus, 

nocte dieque suum gestare in pectore testem (xiii. 180). 

The same characteristics mark his praise of nobility of 
character as opposed to nobility of birth : 

tota licet veteres exornent undique cerae [1] 

atria, nobilitas sola est atque unica virtus. 



Nor Thales, to our frailties clement still ; 
Nor that old man, by sweet Hymettus' hill, 
Who drank the poison with unruffled soul, 
And, dying, from his foes withheld the bowl. 
Divine philosophy ! by whose pure light 
We first distinguish, then pursue the right, 
Thy power the breast from every error frees 
And weeds out every error by degrees : 
Illumined by thy beam, revenge we find 
The abject pleasure of an abject mind, 
And hence so dear to poor, weak womankind. 
But why are those, Calvinus, thought to 'scape 
Unpunished, whom in every fearful shape 
Guilt still alarms, and conscience ne'er asleep 
Wounds with incessant strokes ' not loud but deep ', 
While the vexed mind, her own tormentor, plies 
A scorpion scourge, unmarked by human eyes ? 
Trust me, no tortures which the poets feign, 
Can match the fierce, the unutterable pain 
He feels, who night and day, devoid of rest, 
Carries his own accuser in his breast. GIFFORD. 

[1] Fond man, though all the heroes of your line 

Bedeck your halls, and round your galleries shine 



XII JUVENAL 315 

Paulus vel Cossus vel Drusus moribus esto, 
hos ante effigies maiorum pone tuorum, 
praecedant ipsas illi te consule virgas. 
prima mihi debes anima bona. sanctus haberi 
iustitiaeque tenax factis dictisque mereris ? 
adgnosco procerem ; salve Gaetulice, seu tu 
Silanus, quocumque alio de sanguine, rarus 
civis et egregius patriae contingis ovanti (viii. 19). 

This is rhetoric, but rhetoric of the noblest kind. Of pure 
poetry there is naturally but little in Juvenal. Neither 
his temperament nor his subject would admit it. He had 
too keen an eye for the hideous and the grotesque, too 
strong a passion for the declamatory style. Hence it is 
rather his brilliant sketches of a vicious society, his fiery 
outbursts of rhetoric, his striking sententiae that primarily 
impress the reader : 

expende Hannibalem : quot libras in duce summo [1] 
invenies ? (x. 147). 

finem animae quae res humanas miscuit olim, [2] 

non gladii, non saxa dabunt nee tela, sed ille 
Cannarum vindex et tanti sanguinis ultor 



In proud display : yet take this truth from me, 
' Virtue alone is true nobility.' 
Set Cossus, Drusus, Paulus, then, in view, 
The bright example of their lives pursue ; 
Let these precede the statues of your race, 
And these, when consul, of your rods take place, 

give me inborn worth ! Dare to be just, 
Firm to your word and faithful to your trust. 
Then praises hear, at least deserve to hear, 

1 grant your claim and recognize the peer. 
Hail from whatever stock you draw your birth, 
The son of Cossus or the son of Earth, 

All hail ! in you exulting Rome espies 

Her guardian power, her great Palladium rise. GIFFORD. 
[1] Great Hannibal within the balance lay, 

And count how many pounds his ashes weigh. DRYDEN. 
[2] What wondrous sort of death has heaven designed 

For so untamed, so turbulent a mind ? 

Nor swords at hand, nor hissing darts afar, 

Are doomed to avenge the tedious bloody war ; 



316 JUVENAL Xii 

anulus. i demens et saevas curre per Alpes, 
ut pueris placeas et declamatio fias (x. 163). 
nemo repente fuit turpissimus (ii. 83). [1] 

summum crede nefas animam praeferre pudori [2] 

et propter vitam vivendi perdere causas (viii. 83). 
si natura negat, facit indignatio versum (i. 79). 
It is lines such as these that first rise to the mind at the 
mention of Juvenal. But he was no mere declaimer. Here 
and there we may find phrases of the purest poetry and 
of the most perfect form. Far above all others come the 
wonderful lines of the ninth satire : 

festinat enim decurrere velox [3] 
flosculus angustae miseraeque brevissima vitae 
portio ; dum bibimus, dum serta unguenta puellas 
poscimus, obrepit non intellecta senectus (ix. 126). 
Of a very different character, but of a beauty that is nothing 
less than startling in its sombre surroundings, is the blessing 
that he invokes on the good men of old who ' enthroned 
the teacher in the revered parent's place '. 

di maiorum umbris tenuem et sine pondere terrain [4] 
spirantesque crocos et in urna perpetuum ver, 

But poison drawn through a ring's hollow plate, 

Must finish him a sucking infant's fate. 

Go, climb the rugged Alps, ambitious fool, 

To please the boys, and be a theme at school. DRYDEN. 
[1] For none become at once completely vile. GIFFORD. 

[2] Think it a crime no tears can e'er efface, 

To purchase safety with compliance base, 

At honour's cost a feverish span extend, 

And sacrifice for life, life's only end ! GIFFORD. 

[3] For youth, too transient flower ! of life's short day 

The shortest part, but blossoms to decay. 

Lo ! while we give the unregarded hour 

To revelry and joy in Pleasure's bower, 

While now for rosy wreaths our brow to twine, 

While now for nymphs we call, and now for wine, 

The noiseless foot of time steals swiftly by, 

And, ere we dream of manhood, age is nigh ! GIFFORD. 

[4] Shades of our sires ! sacred be your rest, 

And lightly lie the turf upon your breast ! 

Flowers round your urns breathe sweets beyond compare, 

And spring eternal shed its influence there ! 



XII JUVENAL 317 

qui praeceptorem sancti voluere parentis 
esse loco (vii. 207). 

The sensuous appeal of the ' fragrant crocus and the spring 
that dies not in the urn of death ' is unique in Juvenal. 
This slender stream of definitely poetic imagination reveals 
itself suddenly and unexpectedly in strange forms and 
circumstances. At the close of the passage in the third 
satire describing the perils of the Roman streets, Juvenal 
imagines the death of some householder in a street accident. 
All is bustle and business at home in expectation of his 
return : 

domus interea secura patellas [1] 

iam lavat et bucca foculum excitat et sonat unctis 
striglibus et pleno componit lintea guto. 
haec inter pueros varie properantur, at ille 
iam sedet in ripa taetrumque novicius horret 
porthmea nee sperat caenosi gurgitis alnum 
infelix nee habet quern porrigat ore trientem (iii. 261). 

Out of the grotesque there gradually looms the horror of 
death and the friendless ghost sitting lost and homeless 
by the Stygian waters. 

That there is small scope in his work for such distinctively 
poetic imagination is not Juvenal's fault, nor can we com- 
plain of its absence. But hi technical accomplishment he 
shows himself a writer of the first rank. His treatment 
of the hexameter exactly suits his declamatory type of 
satire. The conversational verse of Horace, with its easy- 



You honoured tutors, now a slighted race, 
And gave them all a parent's power and place. GIFFORD. 
[1] Meantime, unknowing of their fellow's fate, 

The servants wash the platter, scour the plate, 

Then blow the fire with puffing cheeks, and lay 

The rubbers and the bathing-sheets display, 

And oil them first, each handy in his way. 

But he for whom this busy care they take, 

Poor ghost ! is wandering by the Stygian lake ; 

Affrighted by the ferryman's grim face, 

New to the horrors of the fearful place, 

His passage begs, with unregarded prayer, 

And wants two farthings to discharge his fare. DRYDEN. 



318 JUVENAL XII 

going rambling gait, was unsuitable for the thunders of 
Juvenal's rhetoric. Something more massive in structure, 
more vigorous hi movement, was needed as the vehicle of 
so much rhetoric and invective. The delicate tripping 
hexameter of contemporary epic was equally unsuitable. 

Unlike the majority of post-Augustan poets, Juvenal is 
almost untouched by the Ovidian influence. As far as his 
metre has any ancestry, it is descended from the Vergilian 
hexameter, though with the licence of satire it claims greater 
liberty in its treatment of pauses and of elision. The post- 
Augustan poet with whom in this respect Juvenal has 
greatest affinity is Persius. For vigour and variety he far 
surpasses all other poets of the age ; while even Persius, 
although at his best and in his more declamatory passages 
he is at least Juvenal's equal, does not maintain the same 
level of excellence, and his more frequent employment of the 
traditional dialogue of satire gives him fewer opportunities 
for striking metrical effect. 

As regards his diction Juvenal is equally remarkable. 
He has suffered little from the schools of rhetoric and has 
gained much. He is pointed and clear, without being 
either obscure x or mechanical. There is no vain striving 
after antithesis and no epigram for epigram's sake. Gro- 
tesque he is not seldom, but the grotesqueness is deliberate 
and effective, and no mere affectation. 

His one serious weakness is his lack of constructive 
power and his incapacity to preserve due proportion between 
the parts of his satires. The most glaring instances of 
this failing are to be found in the fourth, twelfth, and 
fourteenth satires, but except the third there is hardly 
a satire that can be regarded as wholly successful in point 
of construction. This defect, it may be admitted, is less 
serious in satire than in almost any other branch of litera- 
ture. Such discursiveness was justified by the tradition 

1 Such obscurity as he presents is due almost entirely to the fact that 
we have lost the key to his topical allusions. He has a strong affection for 
ingenious periphrases (e.g. v. 139, vj, 159, x. 112, xii. 70), but they are as 
a rule effective and amusing. 



XII JUVENAL 319 

and by the inherent nature of satire. But Juvenal offends 
in this respect beyond due reason, and only his extra- 
ordinary merits in other directions save him from the 
penalties of this failing. 

Juvenal is the last of the poets of the Silver Age, and 
the only one of them to whom the epithet ' great ' can 
reasonably be applied. He is no faultless writer, but he 
has genius and power, and has risen superior to the besetting 
sins of the age. He is a rhetorician, it is true, but he chose 
a form of literature where his rhetoric could have legitimate 
play. But he is no plagiarist or imitator ; though, as in 
any other poet, we may find in him many traces and even 
echoes of his predecessors, he is in the best sense original. 
He is never a mere juggler in words and phrases, he is a true 
artist. Form and matter are indissolubly welded and inter- 
fused one with another. And this is because, unlike other 
writers of the age, he has something to say. He is poet 
by inspiration, not by profession. His excessive pessimism, 
his tendency to bias and exaggeration, cannot on the worst 
estimate obscure his merits either as artist or moralist. 
His picture of society has large elements of truth, and we 
can no more blame him for his tendency to caricature than - 
we can blame Hogarth. Satire, especially the satire of 
declamatory invective, must be one-sided, and the satirist 
must select the features of life which he desires to denounce. 
And if this leads us at times into unpleasant places and 
among unpleasant people unpleasantly described, that does 
not justify us in denouncing the satirist. It must be 
remembered that the true satirist is not likely to be a man 
of perfect character. He must have seen much and ex- 
perienced much ; if his character has in the process become 
not merely unduly embittered, but perhaps somewhat 
smirched, these failings may be redeemed by other qualities. 
And in the case of Juvenal they are so redeemed. 

He has not the lucid judgement of Horace nor the pure 
fervour of Persius. He is more positive than the former, 
more negative than the latter. But he has lived in a sense 
in which Persius never had, and possesses the gift of direct 



320 JUVENAL XII 

and lucid expression ; therefore, when he strikes, he strikes 
home. He cannot, like Horace, ' play about the hearts 
of men,' he will have nothing of compromise, he cannot 
and will not adapt himself to his environment. The doctrine 
of wfev ayav, the aurea mediocritas, have no attractions 
for him. Hence his ideal is often unpractical ; ' the times 
were out of joint,' and Juvenal was not precisely the man 
to ' set them right '. But at least he sets forth an ideal, 
that any honest man must admit to be noble. It is pre- 
cisely because he is no casuist, because he hits hard and 
unsparingly, and is translucently honest, and because his 
weapon is the most fervid and trenchant rhetoric, that 
Juvenal is the most quoted and one of the most popular 
of Latin poets. He has contributed little to the thought 
of the world, but he has taught men to hate iniquity. He 
does not rise to the height of such an immortal saying as 

virtutem videant intabescantque relicta; 

he is no philosopher, and his ideals have neither the exalta- 
tion nor the stimulating power of the Stoic ideal. But he 
unveils vice and folly, so that men may fly from their utter 
hideousness, in such burning words as it has fallen to few 
poets to utter. He is ' dowered with the hate of hate, 
the scorn of scorn ' ; had he possessed also the ' love of 
love ', he might have reached greater heights of pure poetry, 
but he would not have been Juvenal, and the world would 
have been the loser. 



INDEX OF NAMES 



Abascantus 205 n, 299 n. 

Accius 12, 71, 89. 

Aeschylus 207 n, 212 n, 216 n. 

Aetna 140-6, 156. 

Afranius 12, 25. 

Agrippina 25, 74, 76. 

Antimachus 207 n, 209, 210. 

Antistius Sosianus 163 n, 164. 

Apollonius Rhodius 182 sqq. 

Aquilius Regulus 256. 

Arria 81, 275. 

Arrius Antoninus 173 w. 

Arulenus Rusticus 168. 

Asellius Sabinus 3. 

Asinius Pollio 18. 

Atedius Melior 205 n, 230, 256, 272. 

Attalus 32. 

Attius Labeo 160. 

Ausonius 174, 175. 

Bassus, Caesius 80-2, 163-5. 
Bassus, Saleius 19, 168, 169. 
Bathyllus 27. 

Caecilius 12. 

Caesar, C. Julius 103 sqq., 263. 

Caesennia 163. 

Calenus 175. 

Caligula 4, 5, 31, 163. 

Callimachus 207. - 

Calpurnius Piso 35, 99, 152, 156-9, 

251. 

Calpurnius Siculus 137, 150-9, 245. 
Calpurnius Statura 80. 
Calvinus 289. 
Carinas Secundus 4. 
Cassius Rufus 256. 
Cato 37, 38, 58, 101, 103 sqq., 262. 
Catullus, C. Valerius 2, 123 n, 176, 

260, 261, 263. 

Catullus (writer of mimes) 24. 
Catullus (friend of Juvenal) 289, 297. 
Cicero 58, 172, 238. 
Claudia 204. 
Claudianus 174. 
Claudius 5, 25, 32, 36, 63. 
Claudius Agathurnus 80. 
Claudius Augustalis 146. 
Claudius Etruscus 205 n, 231, 256, 

299 n. 

Clutorius Priscus 3. 
Codrus 291. 
Columella 137, 146-9, 180. 



Cornelius Severus 144. 
Cornutus 6, 79-82, 94, 95, 97, 267. 
Cremutius Cordus 2, 101. 
Crispinus (1) 205 n. 

(2) 294. 

Curiatius Maternus 30. 

Decianus 257, 264. 
Demosthenes 128. 
Domitianus 19, 21, 25, 168, 176, 181, 

203, 204, 228, 229, 252, 271, 287, 

293, 296, 303, 305. 

Earinus 229. 

Einsiedeln Fragments 151, 156, 157. 
Ennius 12, 23. 
Epictetus 70, 238. 
Erotion 272. 
Euphorion 3. 

Euripides 45, 46, 74, 127, 207 n, 212n, 
21671. 

Faustus 30. 

Flaccilla 251, 272. 

Flaccus (father of Persius) 79. 

Flaccus of Patavium 180, 281. 

Fronto (rhetorician) 35. 

Fronto (father of Martial) 251, 272. 

Fulgentius 134, 135. 

Fulvia Sisennia 79. 

Gaetulicus 163, 259, 261. 
Galba 25. 

Gallic L. lunius 31. 
Glaucias 230, 272. 

Hadrianus 290, 291, 294, 296. 

Hecato 43 n. 

Helvidius Priscus 168. 

Herennius Senecio 168. 

Hesiod 12. 

Homer 4, 12, 160, 161, 188, 221, 227- 

Horatius 10-12, 71, 83, 84, 89, 91, 

92, 123 n, 171, 191, 241, 244, 284, 

293, 317, 320. 
Hyperides 128. 

Hi as Latina 22, 160-3. 

Italicus, Babius 163. 

lulius Martialis 257, 264, 265, 270. 

luvenalis 21, 22, 91, 92, 121, 168, 169, 
170, 174, 236, 245, 256, 260, 261, 
263, 275, 278, 279, 287-320. 



322 



INDEX OF NAMES 



Labienus 4. 

Latro 15 n. 

Lentulus Sura 256. 

Livilla 32, 33. 

Livius Andronicus 160. 

Livius, T. 4, 239, 242, 245. 

Lucanus 7, 8, 20-2, 28, 31, 80, 94, 97- 
124, 132, 179, 180, 187, 192, 221 , 
226, 229, 233, 235, 238, 239, 243, 
244, 251, 260, 275. 

Lucian 27. 

Lucilius Junior 144, 163 n. 

Lucilius (satirist) 10, 83, 89, 293. 

Lucinianus Maternus 256. 

Lucretius 123 n, 140, 143. 

Lynceus 207 n. 

Macrinus 80, 82. 

Marcella 255. 

Marius Priscus 287. 

Marsus, Domitius 259, 261, 281. 

Martialis 8 n, 134, 139, 163, 167, 169, 

173-6, 180, 204, 238, 243, 250, 

251-86, 289. 
Matins, Cn. 160. 
Maximus Vibius 204, 205. 
Mela, M. Annaeus 31, 36, 97. 
Meliboeus 152, 156-9. 
Memor, Scaevus 30. 
Menander 12. 

Messala, Vipstanus 16, 126. 
Montanus, Gurtius 163 n. 
Mummius 24 n. 
Musonius Rufus 8. 

Naevius 12. 

Nero 6-8, 19, 20, 28, 33, 41, 43, 74-6, 
89 n, 97, 98, 101, 102, 119, 125-7, 
131 n, 132, 144, 151, 236, 251, 290, 
291, 302. 

Nerva 21, 169, 170, 255, 296. 

Ninnius Crassus 160. 

Norbanus 256. 

Novatus, M. Annaeus 31, 36. 

Novius Vindex 205 n. 

Octavia 40, 41, 74-8. 

Ovidius 11, 12, 17 n, 29, 46, 71, 112, 

123 n, 143, 144, 161, 192, 207, 221 n, 

226, 259, 260, 263. 

Paccius 30. 

Pacuviusl2, 23, 71,89. 

Paris, 28, 203, 291. 

Parthenius 8. 

Passennus Paulus Propertius Blaesus 

170, 171. 

Passienus, Crispus 36. 
Patronius Aristocrates 80. 
Pedo, Albinovanus 259 n, 261. 



Persicus 289. 

Persius 20-2, 79-96, 160, 164, 191, 

236, 267, 293, 318, 319. 
Pervigilium Veneris 174. 
Petronius Arbiter 16 n, 20, 103, 125- 

39, 239, 259. 
Phaedrus 3. 
Pindar 127. 
Piso, see Calpurnius. 
Pisonem, Panegyricus in 156-9. 
Plato 127. 
Plautus 12, 23. 
Plinius (the younger) 20, 25, 163, 

170-3, 232, 236, 245, 255, 268, 305. 
Plotius Grypus 205 n. 
Plutarch 94. 

Polla, Argentaria 100, 205 n. 
Pollius 231, 268. 
Polybius 4, 32, 161. 
Pompeius 37, 101, 102 sqq. 
Pomponius Bassulus 25, 170. 
Pomponius Secundus 29. 
Ponticus 207 n. 
Probus 79. 

Propertius 139, 170, 171. 
Pudens (friend of Martial) 257 
Pudens L. Valerius (boy-poet) 14 n. 
Pylades(l)27. 

- (2) 291. 

Quintilianus 12, 16, 20, 25, 29, 35, 116, 
164, 167-9, 179, 180, 251, 252, 256. 
Quintus Ovidius 257. 

Remmius Palaemon 17 n, 79. 
Rhianus 3. 
Rubrenus Lappa 30. 
Rutilius Gallicus 205 n. 
Rutilius Namatianus 174. 

Sappho 176. 

Scaurus, Mamercus 2. 

Seneca (the elder) 15, 31, 97. 

Seneca (the younger) 4, 5, 20, 31-78, 
93, 94. 97, 115, 124, 132, 134, 144, 
145, 161, 164, 179, 180, 185-7, 
207 , 221 n, 236, 251, 259, 260. 

Sentius Augurinus 170, 171. 

Serranus 168, 169. 

Servilius Nonianus 80. 

Severus, Cassius 4. 

Silius Italicus 20, 102, 123 n, 145, 
156, 163, 168, 179, 191, 236-50, 256. 

Silvinus 146. 

Sophocles 47 n, 127, 207 n, 216 n. 

Sotion 32. 

Statius (the elder) 169, 202, 203. 

Statius (the younger) 8 n, 20, 22, 28, 
100, 123 n, 164, 167-9, 179, 191, 
192, 202-35, 240, 260, 268, 270-2. 



INDEX OF NAMES 



323 



Stella, Arruntius 169, 205 n, 256, 

280. 

Stertinius Avitus 256. 
Sulpicia (the elder) 174. 
Sulpicia (the younger) 174-8. 
Sulpicius Maximus 14 n. 



Tacitus 20, 21, 121, 125, 127, 168, 169, 

170, 179, 243, 275. 
Terentius 23. 
Theocritus 150, 268. 
Thrasea 34, 80, 168. 
Thucydides 128. 
Tiberianus 174. 
Tiberius 2-4, 25, 102. 
Tibullus 174. 
Titus 167, 181, 252. 
Traianus 21, 127, 169, 170, 256, 290, 

291, 296. 
Triarius 15 n, 
Turnus 30, 169. 



Umbricius 289, 293, 294 

Vacca 97. 

Vagellius 163 n. 

Valerius Flaccus 20, 123 n, 167, 168, 
179-201, 212 n, 220, 226, 235, 236. 

Varius 29. 

Varro (Atacinus) 183. 

Varro (Reatinus) 127. 

Varus 257. 

Vergilius Maro 4, 11, 12, 17 n, 20, 101, 
102, 115, 123 n, 130, 143, 144, 146, 
147, 149, 150, 151, 153, 161, 179, 
186, 187, 191, 193, 194, 198, 207 n, 
210, 211, 220 n, 221, 226, 227, 237, 
238-40, 243-5, 281. 

Vergilius Romanus 25, 170. 

Verginius Flavus 7. 

Verginius Rufus 169. 

Vespasianus 144, 166, 169, 170, 180. 

Vestricius Spurinna 169. 

Vopiscus 231. 



OXFORD 

PRINTED AT THE CLARENDON PRESS 

BY HORACE HART, M.A. 
PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY 



from which it was borrowed