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The Earliest Narrative Poetry of Rome

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Ethel Mary Steuart
Ethel Mary Steuart
Affiliation:
The University, Edinburgh
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Extract

Despite the discredit into which the once famous theory of Niebuhr has long sincefallen, it is beginning to appear, both to historians and to students of literature, that Epic poetry was in full process of evolution at Rome before Livius Andronicus was inspired to translate the Odyssey. There is, indeed, ample evidence to warrant such a belief; our authorities may most conveniently be considered in two main divisions. The first calls for no more than the barest mention, for it is concerned with those Naeniae and Cantus Conuiuiales the existence of which is not seriously challenged by even the most conservative criticism. They are well attested, and the evidence for their extreme antiquity is familiar to every reader of Cicero. In passing we may mention also Saturnian epitaphs like those of the Scipios, and the Tituli Triumphales set up in the Capitol. Typical lines are: Fundit, fugat, prosternit maximas legiones, from the inscription of M'Acilius Glabrio, and Summas opes qui regum regias refregit (which, however, Diomedes appears to quote as from Naevius).

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 15 , Issue 1 , January 1921 , pp. 31 - 37
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1921

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References

page 31 note 1 See, for example, the latest volume of de Sanctis, Storia dei Rotnani.

page 31 note 2 The most important passages where these songs are mentioned are as follows: (1) Cic.Tusc. I. 11. 3 ‘Sero igitur a nostris poetae uel cogniti uel recepti. Quamquam est in Originibus solitos esse in epulis canere conuiuas ad tibicinem de clarorum hominum uirtutibus.’ (2) Id. Tusc. IV. 11 ‘Grauissimus auctor in Originibus dixit Cato morem apud maiores hunc epularum fuisse ut deinceps qui accubarent, canerent ad tibiam clarorum uirorum laudes atque uirtutes.’ (3) Id. Brut. XIX. 75 ‘Atque utinam exstarent ilia carmina quae multis saeculis ante suam aetatem in epulis esse cantitata a singulis conuiuis de clarorum uirorum laudibus in Originibus scriptum reliquit Cato.’ (4) Varro ap. Non. Marcell. p. 78 ‘In conuiuiis pueri modesti ut cantarent carmina antiqua, in quibus laudes erant maiorum et assa uoce et cum tibicine.’ (5) Val. Max. II. 1.10 ‘Maiores natu in conuiuiis ad tibias egregia superiorum opera carmine comprehensa pangebant, quo ad ea imitanda iuuentutem alacriorem redderent.’ (6) Cic. de Legg. II. 24. 62 ‘Honoratorum uirorum laudes in contione memorentur, easque etiam cantus ad tibicinem prosequatur, cui nomen neniae. (7) Varro ap. Non. p. 145 ‘Ibi a muliere quae optuma uoce esset perquam laudari; dein neniam cantari solitam ad tibias et fides.’ (8) Id. p. 66 ‘Praeficae dicebantur apud ueteres quae adhiberi solerent funeri mercede conductae, ut et flerent et fortia facta laudarent.’ Cf. also Tac. Ann. III. 5 (on the funeral of Germanicus) ‘ubi ilia ueterum instituta, propositam toro effigiem, meditata ad memoriam uirtutis carmina, et laudationes et lacrimas.’ Of course this evidence is not all of equal value. Valerius Maximus, perhaps, does not count for much, but Varro is not to be lightly dismissed, and Cato is even more important. He is not likely to have made such a statement without good ground, more especially as it tended to give an air of antique dignity to that art of poetry which he personally despised.

page 32 note 1 Keil, , G.L. I. p. 288Google Scholar.

page 32 note 2 P. 325, Müller.

page 32 note 3 p. 131, Mūller.

page 32 note 4 Fasti III. 385 sqq.

page 32 note 5 Atilius for Atillus†t is accepted by all editors (except Thewrewk).

page 32 note 6 The text given is that of O. Müller. Lindsay (following Thewrewk) reads ‘scrip>tum est in car<mine…>’ simply (p. 156, Lindsay).

page 33 note 1 I. 12.

page 33 note 2 I. 79. A. R.

page 33 note 3 Ch. 5.

page 33 note 4 This appears to be the general opinion of the critics. See such statements as those of De Ville de Mirmont (ÉEtudes sur I'Ancienne Poésie latine, p. 401).

page 35 note 1 L.L. VII. 28. The words missing after quod est may have conveyed invaluable information as to authorship or date. The reading given is that supported by MSS. authority. The latest editors of Varro have reverted to it, discarding the many unnecessary emendations made by Merula and his successors which served no purpose but to obscure the metre.

page 35 note 2 F. P. R. p. 53.

page 36 note 1 Such a title as Hectoris Lytra is, of course, no parallel to Carmen Nelei.

page 36 note 2 See Am. Jour. Phil. vol. XIV. 1893Google Scholar.

page 36 note 3 Allowing the ‘half-elision’ tĕ in, and the resolution of – into υυ which makes the word group in-gremium equivalent to castigor.

page 36 note 4 If we could suppose an original four-syllable second colon, the line would be a Saturnian as it stands. Two lines of Livius suggest the possibility of such a form. They are: Carnis uinumquequod libant ‖ anclabatur (which seems a better divisionof the line than that generally adopted carnis uinumque quod ‖ libant anclabatur and A tque escas habeamus ‖ mentionem (where rursus is generally supplied on the supposition that it is atranslation of Od. IV. 213. But it may equally well come from Od. X. 177 where there is no ⋯ξα⋯τις; The first of these is practically identical, both accentually and quantitatively, with our line.