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The Text of Lucretius 2.1174

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Mark Possanza
Mark Possanza
Affiliation:
University of Pennsylvania
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Extract

The phrase ire ad scopulum has long been the victim of a conspiracy of silence. The caput coniurationis, one might say, is an editorial prejudice against the transmitted text born of a rather misguided enthusiasm for Vossius' conjecture capulum. That conjecture has been a reliable fixture in the modern Lucretian vulgate since Havercamp first printed it in his text of the de rerum natura (Leiden, 1725). Before the publication of Havercamp's edition, however, scholars had not baulked at the transmitted text, rightly glossing it as a nautical metaphor for ‘ruin, destruction’: in the words of Lambinus (Paris, 1565), ‘ad interitum: translatum a navi, quae infligitur scopulo’. But after the appearance of Havercamp's edition editors and commentators strangely refused to give due consideration to the reading of the manuscripts, ignoring it for no better reason than a presumption of error. I propose, therefore, in the following discussion to expose the fallacious reasoning that undergirds such a presumption and to vindicate ire ad scopulum.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 40 , Issue 2 , December 1990 , pp. 459 - 464
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1990

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References

1 For the text of these lines in O, Q and V consult the facsimiles in Chatelain's, É.La paléographie des classiques latins (Paris, 1884–1900)Google Scholar: O(LVII), Q(LVIII), V(LX).

2 Vossius' conjecture was first published in the Variae Lectiones of the Tonson, edition (London, 1712), p. 263Google Scholar folio, p. 344 quarto. The primary meaning of capulus is ‘handle’, especially of a sword: it can also mean ‘bier’ or ‘coffin’. The interpretation of ire ad capulum as ‘to go to the grave’ carries with it the assumption that the word can be used metonymically (concrete object for abstract concept). More on this point will follow.

3 Wakefield (London, 1798–9) writes ‘unde librarii facilius efficerent dictionem pervagatam scopulum quam rariorem et elegantissimam, capulum dico.’ It should be noted that Havercamp and Wakefield mistakenly believed that copulum was the reading of O and Q: they were misled by false reports of the MSS. readings given in the Tonson edition (above n. 2). Capulus is rarior only in the sense that in literary texts it does not occur frequently with the meaning ‘bier’. The fact that it was used as a scholiastic gloss on feretrum (a point which will be discussed presently) indicates that it was not obscure in meaning.

4 Wakefield's comment is representative of the editorial prejudice against ad scopulum: 'metaphora navis, ad scopulum appropinquantis et fracturam subiturae, eleganti utcunque ingenio per se conveniat, minus congruit indoli sermonis, quo locus integer constantissime coloratus est, vocabula scilicet, paulatim tabescere, spatio vetusto, defessa aetatis, cum notione vetuli, ita gradatim marcentis et senescentis ut in dies faucibus sepulcri immergendus ire videtur, amicissime conspirant.

5 ‘Criticism of the text of Lucretius with suggestions for its improvement: Part 1, Books I–III’, UCPCP 3 (1916), 1–46, p. 28Google Scholar.

6 ‘Corruption in the manuscripts of Lucretius’, UCPCP 2 (1914), 237–53, p. 250Google Scholar: (the correct reading is given to the left of the bracket), 1.103 desciscere] diciscere Qac; 1.984 spatium] catium Q; 3.214 ad speciem] ad peciem V; 3.336 uiscera] uicera OacCV; 3.719 uiscere] uicere OQ; 3.1018 conscia] concia Qac; 4.811 noscere] nocere OQ; 5.1234 fascis] facis Oac; 6.393 conscius] concius OacQ; 6.736 descendere (Lambinus)] decedere OQ; 6.793 spumas (Lambinus)] pumos OQU; 6.820 spatium] patium OQacU; 6.1041 sumpsit] umpsit OacU.

7 The following statement of F. Olivier is without foundation: ‘le copulum de Q* [i.e. before correction] est devenu scopulum dans OQ1 [i.e. after correction] et scopullum dans V’; ‘En relisant Lucrèce’, MH 10 (1953), 39–67, p. 50Google Scholar. In the presentation of the MSS. evidence editors usually contrive to mislead the reader into inferring that copulum of Qac provides manuscript support for capulum. A notable exception is K. Müller (Zürich, 1975).

8 The most important contribution to the defence of ad scopulum is DeGraf's, T. ‘A Note on Lucretius 2.1174’, CW 37 (1943–1944), 135–6Google Scholar. She rightly points out that the scopulus-metaphor has ample precedent in Cicero's writings and that the poet's choice of this metaphor can be explained with reference to Epicurean physics, viz. the destruction of material objects by atomic bombardment (see above). K. Buchner delivered a rather ineffectual defence ofad scopulum in ‘Präludien zu einer Lukrezausgabe’, Hermes 84 (1956), 198–233, pp. 212–13Google Scholar= Studien zur römischen Literatur: I, Lukrez und Vorklassik (Wiesbaden, 1964), pp. 136–7Google Scholar. Most recently B. Segura Ramos (‘Ad Luc. d.r.n. 11.1173–1174’, Faventia 4 (1982), 97–9)Google Scholar has suggested that Georgics 1.201–3 (boat and oarsman pulled downstream by the current) is an allusion to and development of the.scopulus-metaphor in Lucretius 2.1174, since the larger context of the Vergilian passage mentions deterioration as a natural and universal condition: sic omnia fatis/ peius ruere ac retro sublapsa referri (199–200). The author concudes that it is practically certain that Vergil read ad scopulum. Against this argument it should be noted that here Vergil is unquestionably indebted to Lucretius 5.206–17 (the constant battle of cultivation, with a nautical image introduced at 222), and not to the end of Book 2. Moreover Georgics 1.199–200 bears a stronger resemblance to Lucretius 2.508–9, cedere item retro possent in deteriores/ omnia sic partis, ut diximus in meliores (with customary Vergilian alteration of sense and context) than to 2.1173, omnia paulatim tabescere. The author does, however, rightly stress that ire ad capulum = ‘to go to the grave’ is unparalleled. I see nothing to recommend Salmasius’ interpretation, revived by Bergk, (Jahrb.f. cl. Phil. 83 (1861), p. 500Google Scholar = Kl. Schr. (Halle, 1884), i. 274)Google Scholar, that scopulus = meta, paruus scopus: he quotes Suetonius’ Life of Domitian 19, ‘nonnumquam in pueri procul stantis praebentisque pro scopulo dispansam dextrae manus palmam, sagittas tanta arte direxit.’ See OLD s.v. scopulus 2.

9 Most informative on this point are Forcellini's Lexicon Totius Latinitatis, Otto's, A.Die Sprichworter und sprichwortlichen Redensarten der Romer (Leipzig, 1890, repr. Hildesheim, 1962), pp. 313–14Google Scholar and Lewis and Short's A Latin Dictionary. Cf. also Fantham, E., Comparative Studies in Republican Latin Imagery (Toronto, 1972), p. 23 n. 13Google Scholar. Note also the metaphorical use of naufragium (naufragus), uadum, fretus, and gurges.

10 Additional parallels: Plautus, Merc. 197, Mos. 677; Incerti auctoris (Ribbeck) TRP 2 p. 255, 139–40 [with these three passages compare Corpus Paroemiographorum Graecorum ed. von Leutsch, E. L., Schneidewin, F. G. (Gottingae, 1839–1851, repr. Hildesheim, 1958), i. 65, no. 29]Google Scholar; Terence, , Phor. 689Google Scholar, qui te ad scopulum e tranquilo auferat [a poorly attested variant for the unanimous testimony of the MSS. quodquidem recte curatum uelis] Livy 38.10.6; Ovid, ex Pont. 4.14, 21–2; Trist. 2.15–16; Val. Max. 3.7.9; Anth. Lot. 1.407, 1–2 (Riese) = 403 (Shackleton Bailey); Paneg. Lat. 4.27.2. From the Ciceronian passages and those quoted above it is clear that scopulus can be used by itself, as in 2.1174, with a verb of motion to mean ‘headed for destruction’ or it can be modified by a dependent genitive indicating what is destroyed (scopuli rei publicae) or a genitive defining the source of ruin (scopulus libidinis).

11 Perhaps it would not be amiss to quote Simonides 522 (Page PMG): π⋯ντα γ⋯ρ μ⋯αν ἱκνεῖται δασπλ⋯τα Х⋯ρυβδιν, / αἱ μεγ⋯λαι τ’ ὐρετα⋯ κα⋯ ⋯ πλο⋯τος.

12 See Otto, , Sprichwörter (above, n. 9)Google Scholar.

13 Cf. 1.219–20, 2.215–20, 244–9; Epicurus, , Letter to Herodotus 41Google Scholar, 73 and Principal Doctrines ii.

14 DeGraff (above n. 8), pp. 135–6.

15 If one is bothered by paulalim, one need only recall that the process of decay may extend over a long period of time but once a material object is overcome by internal decomposition and external bombardment (i.e. fully exhausted, defessa), the actual destruction of the object occurs quickly. For example, the world itself has long been in a state of decline as evidenced by the failing fertility of the earth (2.1150–67), but at some point in the future it will suffer complete destruction: ‘sic igitur magni quoque circum moenia mundi/expugnata dabunt labem putrisque ruinas’ (1144–5).

16 See ThLL s.v.

17 Bailey, [Oxford, 1950 (vol. 2, p. 983)] is mistaken when he says ‘Paul.-Festus and Nonius explain capulum as sarcophagum, id est sepulcrum’Google Scholar.

18 One gathers from Munro's note (London, 18864) that he felt that in the passages quoted by Nonius capulus means ‘bier’ and that only in Apuleius (Met. 4.18, 10.12) does it unquestionably mean ‘coffin’. Bailey too recognized that ‘[capulus] appears literally to mean “a bier”…and that meaning is really inappropriate here’. See also the comments of F. Olivier (above, n. 7), p. 50 and Segura Ramos (above, n. 8), pp. 97–8.

19 Both Lachmann (Berlin, 1850) and Munro quote Statius' Theb. 3.362 in the following form: dum capulo nondum manus excidit. This is the reading of all the MSS. with the exception of the P(uteaneus) [Parisinus 8051]. Later editors returned to the reading of P: nunc, socer, haec dum non manus excidit; Mueller, O. (Leipzig, 1870)Google Scholar, H. W. Garrod (Oxford, 1906), A. Klotz, T. C. Klinnert (Leipzig, 1973), D. E. Hill (Leiden, 1983). The reading of P is also preferred by Snijder, H., P. Papinius Statius, Thebaid, A Commentary on Book III (Amsterdam, 1968)Google Scholar. Capulo is probably a conjecture introduced under the influence of dum funera portant in the previous line because the meaning of haec manus excidit was not understood, as Klotz suggests apud appar P's text becomes very hard to explain if one assumes that the text of the other MSS. is genuine. And even if capulo is the genuine text, Statius is likely to have used it, as does his master Vergil, with the meaning manubrium, as Hill suggests in his apparatus.

20 I understand si Perusina tibi patriae sunt nota sepulcra (Prop. 1.22.3) to mean ‘Perusia, grave of our countrymen’ (Camps' translation (Cambridge, 1961)). Cf. Lucretius 5.259, Catullus68.89, Horace, Sat. 1.8.10, Livy 31.29.11, Alcestis Barcinonensis 71, 81 (ed. Marcovich, M. (Leiden, 1988))Google Scholar: in all o f these passages sepulcrum has its literal meaning. I see no reason to follow J. Svennung wh o gives sepulcrum in Catullus 68.89 the added meaning ‘Verderben’ (Catulls Bildersprache (Lund, 1945), p. 114)Google Scholar. Bustum can be used metaphorically t o mean ‘destruction’, a natural extension of its proper function in the funeral ritual. A bier, on the other hand, is rather benign by comparison.

21 Cf. in Greek the use of τὺμβος and τυμβογ⋯ρων.

22 Ad Her. 4.43, Cicero, de orat. 3.167 and Quintilian 8.6.24.

23 ‘But not all acceptable Latin is attested’, as Brink, C. O. has reminded us; Horace on Poetry: The Ars Poetica (Cambridge, 1971), p. 100Google Scholar. In this instance, however, we are dealing with an anomaly introduced into the text by conjecture.

I want to thank my colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania, especially Professor Joseph Farrell, for their thoughtful questions which helped me to clarify my views on several points.