Alexander Helios and the Golden Age1

W. W. Tarn

doi:10.2307/296819

Alexander Helios and the Golden Age1

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 September 2012

W. W. Tarn

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Vergil's fourth Eclogue, foretelling a child whose coming would usher in the golden age, has often been supposed to be based upon eastern material; and it has even been suggested that, in the period of Roman history which ended with Octavian's final success at Actium, both East and West alike were expecting the Roman world to pass under the rule of one man, whether a Roman or a king from the east, to be followed by the birth of a child with whom should come the final kingdom of peace. But the ideas of the East in this matter have been deduced from western and Jewish material; and I hope in this paper to do a little toward ascertaining the view of the Greek East from a contemporary Greek document which has never been seriously examined, and considering its relation to the ideas of Vergil. I can only do a little, for most of the material vanished when Augustus later burnt 2,000 prophecies; but the secondary historians from whom we derive our current ideas of the East in the crucial years before Actium are so extraordinarily tendencious that every scrap of contemporary material, outside the circle of the victors' version, must be of value. My aim is to treat the matter solely from the historical standpoint; and the name of the boy Alexander Helios, son of Cleopatra and Antony, in whom East and West met, will serve to unite the two aspects of what I have to say.

Type: Research Article
Information: The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 22 , Issue 2 , 1932 , pp. 135 - 160

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/296819 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright ©W. W. Tarn 1932. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

^{page 135 note 2} Weber, W., Der Prophet und sein Gott, 1925, p. 60.Google Scholar Cf. Norden, E., N J Kl. Alt. xxxi (1913), p. 656Google ScholarSq.

^{page 137 note 1} Rzach, PW II A.2, col. 2131.

^{page 137 note 2} Geffcken, , Komposition und Entstehungszeit der Oracula Sibyllina, 1902, pp. 8Google Scholarsq.; E. Norden, op. cit. p. 657; W. Weber, op. cit. p. 58. Pincherle, A., Gli oracoli sibillini giudaici, 1922, pp. xviGoogle Scholarsq., alone calls it Jewish, but gives no reasons. It has been suggested to me that the allusion to shearing Rome's hair may show that the author was familiar with the story of Samson (and was therefore a Hellenized Jew). I can see no resemblance myself to the Samson story; Rome's hair is cut often, not once for all, and it does not deprive Rome of her strength, as she still has to be overthrown. On the other hand, cutting a woman's hair was a known form of degradation in Greece; e.g. Menander, Perikeiromene. In any case a Jewish author seems impossible, for the reason given p. 138, n. 4.

^{page 137 note 3} Geffcken, ad loc.; Norden, l.c.; Lanchester, H. C. O. in Charles', Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the O.T., ii, p. 372.Google Scholar Weber, op. cit. p. 59, n. 1, inclines to negative any particular historical application. Apparently many prophecies of the revenge of Asia upon Rome once existed, like the oracle of Hystaspes (whatever its date); see Windisch, H., Die Orakel von Hystaspes, 1929, p. 52Google Scholar; Cumont, F., Rev. de l'hist. des religions ciii, 1931, pp. 65, 71–2.Google Scholar

^{page 137 note 4} See Rose, H. J., CQ xviii, 1924, p. 116Google Scholar: most accounts of the golden age leave the transition to the reader's imagination.

^{page 138 note 1} On Pseudo-Ecphantus, see Goodenough, E. R., The Political Philosophy of Hellenistic Kingship, Yale Classical Studies I, 1928, pp. 75Google Scholarsqq.; I agree that the Stobaeus fragments must be Hellenistic. The passage to which I refer, part of Stobaeus IV, vii, 64 (p. 275 Wachsmuth), is translated in full, PP. 83–4.

^{page 138 note 2} References, Tarn, Hellenistic Civilisation,² p. 84; add IG xi, iv, 1052.

^{page 138 note 3} In Roman law Antony could not legally marry a foreigner, and his marriage to Cleopatra by the Macedonian rite meant nothing at all. To every one east of the Adriatic it was a valid marriage.

^{page 138 note 4} The metaphor is common in the Hebrew prophets; e.g. Is. 51, 21, Jerusalem; Jer. 25, 27 (32, 27 lxx), all nations; ib. 48, 26 (31, 26 lxx), Moab; Nahum 3, 11, Nineveh. It might be suggested again (p. 137, n. 2) that the writer was a Hellenized Jew, but I think the Homonoia part of the prophecy makes this impossible; its outlook is so entirely and peculiarly Greek. It is a metaphor any one might easily think of for himself.

^{page 138 note 5} Horace, Odes I, 37, 14; Plut. Ant. 29. I am considering the actual accusation elsewhere (CAH x).

^{page 138 note 6} See Rzach, Επιτύμβιον Swoboda, p. 241.

^{page 139 note 1} We are dealing with a writer of little skill in presenting what he has to say; note e.g. in 368–70 the clumsy omission of the second ἔσσεται and the anti-climax in 379–80, where after murder and war he brings in burglary.

^{page 139 note 2} It would be of great importance, if Cleopatra really coined in Antioch, the capital of Roman Syria, as held by J. N. Svoronos, Τὰ νομίσματα τοῦ Κράτους τῶν Πτολεμαίων iv, p. 389; but this has been doubted, see Regling, K., Z.f.Num. xxv, 1906, p. 397.Google Scholar

^{page 139 note 3} I quote these throughout from Werner Peek, Der Isisbymnus von Andros und verwandte Texte, 1930. Our versions of the ‘hymn’ all ultimately represent one original, the stele at Memphis.

^{page 139 note 4} E.g. her dress and her championship of other women. Further in CAH x.

^{page 139 note 5} Andros 1. 6.

^{page 139 note 6} Cyme 26, 27.

^{page 139 note 7} Cyme 34, ἐγὼ τὸν ἀδίκως ἐπιβουλεύοντα ἄλλοις ύποχείριον τῶ(ι) ἐπι[λ]ενομένω(ι) παρέὃωκα. Cf. 35, ὲγὼ τοῖς ἄδικα πράσσουσιν τειμωρίαν έπιτίθημι

^{page 139 note 8} Cyme 48.

^{page 139 note 9} H. Fränkel's reading of Andros, 1. 158, GGA 1930, p. 128, ῏Ισις ὲγὼ πολέμω κρυει ον νεφυς ἔρκεσι(ν εἴργω) see Nock, A. D., JEA xvii (1931), p. 120.Google Scholar

^{page 139 note 10} Cyme 4 = Ios 3: ἐγὼ νόμους ἀνθρώποις ἐθέμην καὶ ἐνομοθέτησα ἂ οὐθεὶς

^{page 139 note 11} Cyme 28 = Ios 24: ἐγὼ τό δίκαιον ἰσχυρότερον χρυσίου καὶ ἀργυρίου ἐποίησα; see Andros 1. 105, and cf. Cyme 16 (=Ios 13) and 38.

^{page 140 note 1} But not actually un-Greek; cf. Bion's pity for a tortured frog, Tarn, , Antigonos Gonatas, p. 239Google Scholar.

^{page 140 note 2} On this see Tarn, Hellenistic Civilisation,² pp. 73 sq., 84, 113, 116. For the classical period, H. Kramer, Quid valeat ὁμόνοια in litteris graecis, 1915.

^{page 140 note 3} Tarn, , CAH vi, p. 437Google Scholar; (i.e. Plut, de fort. Alex. 330 E and Alex. 27). See however Wilcken, U., Alexander der Grosse, p. 207Google Scholar. I hope to treat the whole subject elsewhere.

^{page 140 note 4} Diod. ii, 58, I, τὴν ὀαόνοιαν περὶ πλείστου ποιονους. On this Utopia see Poehlmann, Cesch.d.sozialen Frage und d. Sozialismus in d. ant. welt, 3rd ed. by F. Oertel, i, pp. 404–6.

^{page 140 note 5} Poehlmann, l.c. on the Ηλιοπολῖται. Oertel, l.c. ii, 570, suggests that we do not really know whether Aristonicus meant to set up a definitely socialistic State. This is true, but I agree in principle with Poehlmann; I think Aristonicus was using Iambulus as an inspiration to his followers, whatever details might have to be modified in practice. Cf. G. Cardinali in Beloch's Saggi, p. 269.

^{page 141 note 1} Even without the definite dating it is now obvious that the despoina-prophecy can have nothing to do with Mithridates.

^{page 141 note 2} See the present writer in CAH x (forthcoming).

^{page 141 note 3} Beside the literature, this fear is publicly recorded: CIL I, 2nd ed., ‘Fasti Fratrum Arvalium,’ p. 214 and ‘Fasti Amiterni,’ p. 244, under August I; ‘q.e.d. (quod eo die) Imp. Caes. rem public, tristiss. periculo liberavit.’

^{page 141 note 4} The defeat of Crassus and of Antony by an Asiatic power may have counted for something in this fear.

^{page 141 note 5} They might connect them with the well-known prophecy of the ‘mad praetor’ in the second century B.C. (Phlegon, Mir. 32) that a great army would come out of Asia from where the sun rises and enslave Rome. Vergil alludes to the dreaded uprising of Asia when he makes the whole continent—Bactria, India, Sabaea—follow Antony and Cleopatra to Actium, Aen. viii, 685–8, 705–6; this shows that some Romans thought that Cleopatra had considered such a rising.

^{page 141 note 6} 46. αὐτὰρ ὲπεὶ Ῥώμη καὶ Αἰγύπτου βασιλεύσει

47. εἴσετι δηθύνουσα, τότ᾿ ἂρ βασιλεία μεγίστη

48. ἀθανάτου βασιλῆος ἐπ᾿ ἀνθρώποισι φανεῖται.

51. καὶ τότε Λατίνων ἀπαραίτητος χόλος ἀνδρῶν.

52. τρεῖς Ῥώμην οἰκτρῇ μοίρῃ καταδηλήσονται.

53. πάντες δ᾿ ἄνθρωποι μελάθροις ἰδίοισιν ὀλοῦνται,

54. ὅπποτ ἂν οὐρανόθεν πύρινος ῥεύσῃ καταράκτης.

49. ἤξει δ᾿ ἁγνὸς ἄναξ πάσης γῆς σκῆπτρα κρατήσων

50. εἰς αὶῶνας ἅπαντας ὲπειγομένοιο χρόνοιο.

It seems obvious that 11. 49–50 (the Messiah) must come after 54.

^{page 141 note 7} That τρεῖς (three men) is tres viri seems to me certain. Some fanciful explanations are cited by Lanchester, op. cit. p. 371.

^{page 142 note 1} In l. 47 the MSS. give εἰς ἕν διθύνουσα, εἰς ἒν δήθυνουσα and εἰς ἕν ἰθύνουσα. Geffcken's εἴσετι δήθυνουσα must be right, because (a) the triumvirate still exists, which puts out of court Rzach's αἰέν γʼ εὐθύνουσα and (b) the reference to Roman rule over Egypt shows we are not far from 30 B.C., but before it; for once Roman rule was well established it could not in itself be used as a date.

^{page 142 note 2} P-W, A. ii, 2, col. 2131.

^{page 142 note 3} Bousset, W., Die Religion des Judentums, pp. 289, 322Google Scholar.

^{page 142 note 4} 75. καὶ τότε δὴ κόσμος ὑπὸ ταῖς παλαμῇσι γυναικὸς

ἔσσεται ἀρχόμενος καὶ πειθόμενος περὶ πάντων.

ἔνθ᾿ ὁπόταν κόσμου πάντος χήρη βασιλεύσῃ κ.τ.λ.

^{page 142 note 5} On χήρη see Rzach, Mélanges Nicole, p. 498. The widow of iii, 77, has generally been taken to mean Cleopatra. Lanchester op. cit. calls her Rome (why widow?); Rzach, P-W ii, A.2, col. 2131, calls her the woman of Revelations, though he has just said (col. 2129) that nothing in Sibyll, iii is post-Christian.

^{page 143 note 1} Note that in 1. 373 what is now to come to men from the stars is Law, for which Isis stood (p. 139, n. 10).

^{page 143 note 2} Apul. xi, 6, 15; so the Isis-hymn, Cyme 55, ἐγὼ τὸ ἱμαρμένον νικῶ, 56 ἐμοῦ τὸ εἱμαρμένον ἀκουει.

^{page 143 note 3} Rzach, P-W ii, A. 2, col. 2140.

^{page 143 note 4} F. X. Kugler in Sibyllinischer Sternkampf und phaethon, 1927, explained this poem from normal astronomical events, a view strongly criticised by Gvndel, W., Gnomon, 1928, pp. 449–50Google Scholar, who thinks it is drawn entirely from Hellenistic astrology. (I owe these references to Mr. Nock). But Gundel's view, however well founded, will not, I think, explain the particular difficulties I am considering.

^{page 143 note 5} So the MSS. and Geffcken. Rzach's conjecture ὅμον is thoroughly bad.

^{page 143 note 6} On the reading see Rzach in Έπιτύμβιον Swoboda, p. 249.

^{page 143 note 7} Nilsson, P-W i A. 2, col. 1708.

^{page 143 note 8} CIG 3083.

^{page 144 note 1} Nock, A. D., JHS xlviii, 1928, pp. 33–6Google Scholar; W. Headlam and A. D. Knox on Herodas iv, 57.

^{page 144 note 2} Nock, op. cit., p. 34.

^{page 144 note 3} The usual explanation; but Newell, E. T., The Coinages of Demetrius Poliorcetes, 1927, p. 72Google Scholar, sees in the horns Demetrius as son of Poseidon ταύρεος. Cf. now Nock, A. D., αύνναος θεύς, Harvard Studies in Class. Phil, xli (1930), p. 61Google Scholar, an unpublished inscription which shows a combined Dionysia-Demetrieia at Athens. One might have expected Antony to be the Lion rather than the Bull, as he is in Sibyll, xi, 290 (see p. 150); but in fact, in oracle literature, the Lion also means Alexander (P. Oslcenses ii, no. 14, I. 9; see Crönert, , Symb. Osl. vi, p. 57Google Scholar), and so could not be used for Antony unless, as in xi, 290, the context rendered it free from ambiguity. I say ‘oracle literature’ because Körte, A., Archiv x, p. 25Google Scholar, thinks that P. Osl. ii, 14 is not proved to be Sibylline.

^{page 144 note 4} The word παρθένος is of course not inconsistent with marriage and motherhood; for a Sibylline parallel see iii, 357, παρθένε .... γάμοισιν οίνωθεῖσα The word would not in itself suggest Cleopatra, as Mr. Nock pointed out; it depends on the New Bull; but if the New Bull be Antony, there is no other constellation Cleopatra could be.

^{page 144 note 5} Pseudo-Callisthenes, 1, 12, 8, ed. Kroll. See on this Weber, op. cit. p. III; Boll, F., ‘Sulla quarta ecloga di Vergilio’, Mem. Acad. Sc. dell' Instituto di Bologna, v–vii, 1920–1923, pp. 18–22.Google Scholar

^{page 144 note 6} The concluding words, ἔ μεινε δ' ἀνάστερος αἰθήρ might have the same meaning as I have suggested for ϕεύξετ' ἀνάγκη in the despoina-prophecy, the end of the rule of the stars.

^{page 144 note 7} Die Geburt des Kindes, 1925, ch. viii,—a brilliant and suggestive work.

^{page 144 note 8} Corssen, P., Philol. lxxxi, 1926, pp. 38–40.Google Scholar

^{page 144 note 9} Sethe, K., Gött. Nachr. 1920, p. 38.Google Scholar

^{page 144 note 10} Nock, A. D., ‘A document of popular Gnosis,’ to be published in Archiv f. Religionswissenschaft, probably 1933.Google Scholar

^{page 144 note 11} Corssen l.c. p. 38.

^{page 145 note 1} The latest advocate of Mommsen's impossible 36, Carcopino, J., Virgile et le mystère de la iv^e Églogue, 1930, can find no better argument (pp. 164sq.)Google Scholar than that Cleopatra Selene must have been married at 16, not at 20. Some Macedonian princesses, e.g. Ptolemais and Berenice III, were far older than 20 when they married.

^{page 145 note 2} Jeanmaire, H., Le Messianisme de Virgile, 1930, p. 183Google Scholar, makes Antony visit Cleopatra in Egypt in 38, citing Jos. Ant. xiv, 447. But ‘Egypt’ in this passage is only a slip for ‘Athens,’ as I think every one else has seen.

^{page 145 note 3} Octavian himself regarded her as the counter part of Ptolemy II; Tarn, , JRS xxi, 1931, p. 180.Google Scholar

^{page 145 note 4} Plut. Ant. 36, at the time of the wedding present and of the execution of Antigonus, παῖδας έξ αὐτῆς διδύμους ἀνελόμενος καὶ προσαγορεύσας τὸν μέν Άλέξανδρον τὴν δὲ κλεοπάτραν, ἔπίκλησιν δὲ τὸν μὲν ʿΉλιον τὴν δὲ Σελήνην.

^{page 145 note 5} Also conclusive against Josephus' spreading out of the territorial gifts, which was defended by Dobiáš, J. in Listy filologické xlix, 1922, pp. 183, 257Google Scholar (summary in French, in Rev. d. travaux scient. tchéchoslovaques iv–vi, 1922–1924, p. 262).Google Scholar

^{page 146 note 1} καὶ τότ' ἀπ' ἠελίοιο θεὸς πέμψει βασιλῆα δς πᾶσαν γαῖαν πούσει πολέμοιο κάκοιο

^{page 146 note 2} Boll, op. cit. p. 7, n. 5.

^{page 146 note 3} Text: Wilcken, U., Herm. xl, 1905, p. 546Google Scholar; Reitzensten, R. and Schaeder, H. H., Studien zum antiken Synkretismus aus Iran und Griechenland, 1926, p. 40.CrossRef Google Scholar

^{page 146 note 4} The papyrus has μεθηρμενενμένη κατὰ τὸ δυνατόν Mr. Nock pointed out to me that this need not be taken too literally; e.g. Josephus says of his Antiquitates ἐκ τῶν ἱερῶν γραμμάτων μεθηρμήνεκα (c. AP. i, 54) though he used the LXX and included much other material. But the ideas of the oracle are supposed to be Egyptian.

^{page 146 note 5} Raccolta Lumbroso, 1925, p. 273Google Scholar.

^{page 146 note 6} Tarn, , JEA xv 1929, p. 11.Google Scholar

^{page 146 note 7} Έπὶ τέλει δὲ τούτων ϕυλλοροήσει might then refer to Pherecrates (Athen. 269 D=Kock i, P. 182):

τὰ δὲ <δὴ> δένδρη τἀν τοῖς ὄρεσιν χορδαῖς ὀπταῖς ἐριϕείοις

ϕυλλοροήσει καὶ τευθιδίοις ἁπαλοῖσι κίχλαις τ΄ ἀναβράστοις.

Norden's ϕυλλοϕορήσει is usually adopted, but trees putting out leaves have nothing to do with prosperity; they do it every year, good or bad. At the same time I doubt if the prophet could assume that his readers would know Pherecrates or take the allusion to the trees dropping sausages and field-fares ready cooked.

^{page 146 note 8} Proclus I, 30 D, ἐν τῷ ἀδύτῳ τῆς θεοῦ Plut. Mor. 354 C. says it was on her throne at Sais, but omits these words.

^{page 147 note 1} I do not know whether the similar coins of Ptolemy V as a child are merely copies or imply that Arsinoe III was Isis.

^{page 147 note 2} Diod. ii, 59, 7, of the gods onour most τὸν ἥλιον, οὗ τάς τε νήσους καὶ ἐαυτοὺς προσαγορεύουσιν.

^{page 147 note 3} Diod. ii, 55, 4.

^{page 147 note 4} FHG ii, p. 498, fr. 4, the cycle called νῆρος.

^{page 147 note 5} Jos. Ant. i, 106.

^{page 148 note 1} Goodenough, op. cit. pp. 82, 85, 97.

^{page 148 note 2} Nock, A. D., Early Gentile Christianity, pp. 71–2Google Scholar (in A. E. J. Rawlinson, Essays on the Trinity and the Incarnation).

^{page 148 note 3} All these instances are taken from Dölger, F. J., Die Sonne der Gerechtigkeit und der Schwarze, 1918, § § 12 and 13, pp. 83–99.Google Scholar Mr. Nock referred me to this book.

^{page 148 note 4} Grueber, H. A., Coins of the Roman Republic in the British Museum, 1910, ii, pp. 486 and 398 no. 60.Google Scholar

^{page 148 note 5} Arnim, Stoic vet. fr. i, 499 (Cleanthes), τὸ ἡγεμονικὸν τοῦ κόσμου; Phylarchus on Emesa, Athen. 693 E, F. Cf. the Orphic phraseology δεσπότης κόσμου and κοσμοκράτωρ cited by Rapp, s.v. ‘Helios’ in Roscher, p. 2024.

^{page 149 note 1} Cumont, F., Mem. de la délégation en Perse xx, 1928, p. 89Google Scholar, no. 6, Herodorus' Ode to Apollo.

^{page 149 note 2} De Rep. vi, 17, 17, ‘sol…. mens mundi et temperatio’, the organising principle.

^{page 149 note 3} Grueber op. cit. i, p. 525, no. 4044; c. 46 B.C. (On the coins ib. pp. 578, 585, the Sun only refers to the ancient history of the Sabines.)

^{page 149 note 4} Syll.³ 798.

^{page 149 note 5} Alföldi, A., Hermes lxv, 1930, p. 374Google Scholar, thinks that these coins certainly refer to a new world-period. I think this goes too far.

^{page 149 note 6} Servius on Vergil, Ecl. iv, 1. 4.

^{page 149 note 7} Grueber ii, p. 495.

^{page 149 note 8} Grueber i, pp. 529, 546; cf. also for the globe pp. 523, 543, 551. Alföldi loc. cit. p. 370 refers this type to the blessings the world-ruler shall bring to men; Grueber calls it ‘emblems of power.’ Caesar in 46 had been portrayed at Rome with the οἰκουμένη (doubtless the globe) under his feet, Dio xliii, 14, 6; 21, 2.

^{page 149 note 9} On a coin of Alexander II of Syria, and often on those of the Maccabees; not of course on a globe.

^{page 149 note 10} Mattingly, H., Coins of the Roman Empire in the British Museum, i, pp. 290 n., 302Google Scholar, 304 n. Mr. Last called my attention to this.

^{page 149 note 11} Grueber i, p. 582, no. 4726.

^{page 149 note 12} Athen, iv, 147E–148C=F. Gr. Hist, ii, p. 927.

^{page 150 note 1} Grueber ii, pp. 502 sq.

^{page 150 note 2} von Bahrfeldt's, M. scheme is given in JId'AN xii, 1910, pp. 89, 93Google Scholar, and Die römische Goldprägung während der Republik und unter Augustus, 1923, p. 48. He puts Antony's second Imperatorship after Philippi (Grueber's first), iterum being dropped in use (which I do not understand), and the third at the end of 39 (Grueber's second). I agree with Grueber; Philippi must be the first (Imp. alone on the coins), with the second at the end of 39 and the third after Gindarus in 38 (for this was quite a new Parthian invasion). But for dating Antony's cistophori it is immaterial whether the change in his style at the end of 39 be the second or the third.

^{page 150 note 3} Jeanmaire (op. cit.) starts from the position that Antony was Dionysus in 41 when he met Cleopatra in Cilicia. This was quite certainly not the case.

^{page 150 note 4} Grueber ii, p. 506.

^{page 150 note 5} Ib, p. 505; Bahrfeldt JId'AN xii, p. 94, who decides for Imp. ter.

^{page 150 note 6} References in Grueber, ii, p. 395 n.

^{page 150 note 7} xi, 290:

ἔσσῃ δ‵ οὔκετι χήρα, συνοικήσεις δὲ λέοντι ἀνδροβόρῳ ϕοβερῶ τε ὲνυαλίῳ πολεμιστῇ.

^{page 151 note 1} Since Virgil's Messianic Eclogue, 1907, by J. B. Mayor, W. Warde Fowler, and R. S. Conway, the principal studies, I think, are the works of Norden, Weber, Boll, Carcopino, and Jeanmaire, already cited; Corssen, P. in Philol. lxxxi, 1926, p. 26Google Scholar; Weinreich's, O. review of Norden and Boll in phil. Woch. 1924, p. 890Google Scholar; Slater, D. A., ‘Was the Fourth Eclogue written to celebrate the marriage of Octavia to Mark Antony?’ CR xxvi (1912), p. 114Google Scholar; Herrmann, L., Les masques et les visages dans les Bucoliques de Virgile, 1930Google Scholar, ch. v. Studies on special points will be cited in their place; but I cannot notice things like mathematical schemes.

^{page 151 note 2} By Carcopino, op. cit. See his criticism generally of the 41/0 dating.

^{page 151 note 3} Cf. Weinreich, loc. cit. p. 898. Carcopino's criticism, pp. 124–133, is pertinent.

^{page 151 note 4} Details in Nilsson, Ludi Saeculares in P-W 1 A.2 (1920).

^{page 151 note 5} So Sudhaus, S., Rh. Mus. lvi, 1901, pp. 38–42Google Scholar; Nilsson op. cit. col. 1710.

^{page 152 note 1} Pollio could hardly have been inaugurated on January ist, or till a good deal later, because of the Perusine war; see Bennett, H., AJP li, 1930, p. 330.Google Scholar

^{page 152 note 2} See on its history Jahn, P. in Bursian-Körte's, Jahresbericht vol. cxcvi, 1923, p. 233.Google Scholar Since then Corssen, loc. cit. p. 68, has taken the opposite view to Jeanmaire, as has Anderson, A. R., Harvard Studies in Class. Philology, xxxix (1928), p. 47.Google Scholar

^{page 152 note 3} His (later) campaign in Illyria does not come in question.

^{page 152 note 4} Some suggestions of resemblance between the two poems had been made before: Mayor, J. B. in Virgil's Messianic Eclogue p. 126Google Scholar; Garrod, H. W., CR xxii, 1908, p. 150.Google Scholar Herrmann, op. cit., who discusses the resemblance, denies (p. 93) that the Eclogue is an epithalamium, but that is part of his Marcellus theory (see post).

^{page 152 note 5} Boll, op. cit. p. 17, n. 1; Corssen, op. cit. p. 61.

^{page 153 note 1} Herrmann, , Masques et visages, p. 92Google Scholar; Rev. Arch. xxxiii (1931), p. 47.

^{page 153 note 2} The latest advocate is Carcopino, op. cit.

^{page 153 note 3} It is difficult to make out who has advocated this boy. Jeanmaire, op. cit. p. 29, and Piganiol, A., La conquète romaine 1927, p. 432Google Scholar, certainly do. Eisler is often said to have done so in an unpublished lecture in 1906, but if Jeanmaire's version of it (p. 15) be right, this is not so. I thought myself that Norden (pp. 143–5) meant this; but Weinreich, op. cit. p. 906, and Corssen, op. cit. p. 61 (if I understand them aright) think he did not, and German is their own language.

^{page 153 note 4} The latest advocate is Herrmann, , Masques et visages, pp. 92Google Scholarsqq.; Rev. Ét. Lat. viii, 1930, pp. 211 214.

^{page 154 note 1} On this point the criticism of Herrmann's view by Faider, P., Rev. belge de philol. et d'histoire ix (1930), pp. 787Google Scholarsqq., is fully justified. (Mr. Last kindly gave me this reference.) See also Kroll, W., Gnomon vi, 1930, p. 520.Google Scholar Apart from this, Herrmann has been misled by following Dio (see p. 157, n. 6), and gets in such a tangle that he finally concludes (Rev. Ét. Lat. viii, p. 221) that the birth of Marcellus and Octavia's marriage to Antony were ‘presque simultanés.’ Poor Octavia! Herrmann's later article, Rev. Arch, xxxiii, p. 47, adds nothing.

^{page 154 note 2} Recent instances are Fitzler-Seeck, Julius 132 in P-W; Wili, W., Vergil, 1930, p. 42Google Scholar; Deubner, L., Gnomon 1925, p. 168Google Scholar; E. Fraenkel, ib. 1930, p. 513; Stroux, J., Philol. lxxxiv, 1929, p. 247.Google Scholar It represents the line of least resistance.

^{page 154 note 3} Read for example pp. 29, 37, 39, and 84 of Virgil's Messianic Eclogue.

^{page 154 note 4} Weinreich, op. cit. p. 906, and Corssen, op. cit. p. 61, supply examples of how this works; Corssen calls Antony a renegade Roman, in 40!

^{page 154 note 5} Virgil's Messianic Eclogue, p. 58. I note that 10 months (instead of 9) was nothing mystical, as sometimes supposed, but the normal Latin expression: Fabia, P., Rev. Ét. Anc. xxxiii, 1931, p. 33.Google Scholar So δεκάμηνον βρέϕος is normal in the Isis-hymn, Cyme 18 ═ Ios 15; Andros 1.37 shows that lunar months are of course meant. Doubtless women had, for obvious reasons, reckoned by lunar months from time immemorial.

^{page 155 note 1} Class. Phil, xi, 1916, p. 334; not invalidated by Carcopino's criticism, op. cit. p. 88.

^{page 155 note 2} Augustus' grandson Gaius: IG iii, I, p. 496, n. 444a.

^{page 155 note 3} Cf. Rose, H. J., CQ xviii, 1924, pp. 113Google Scholar, 117, and Weber, op. cit. p. 142.

^{page 155 note 4} No doubt Greeks would see little difficulty in calling some one the child both of his human parents and of a god; but would this apply to the ordinary Roman in 40 B.C.?

^{page 155 note 5} Atque iterum ad Troiam magnus mittetur Achilles.

^{page 155 note 6} Boll, p. 13, makes Achilles ═ the child ═ Alexander, with which I agree.

^{page 155 note 7} Virgil's Messianic Eclogue, pp. 75–7.

^{page 155 note 8} Boll, op. cit. p. 16, comparing Pindar, Nem. i, 71; Corssen, op. cit. 50.

^{page 156 note 1} Theoc. xxiv, 1. 31. Possibly too the fragment of a Heracles poem given by Körte, Archiv x, p. 24: ὁ] δ' εἰς ἐμέ μειδιάασκε.

^{page 156 note 2} Anderson, op. cit. p. 50, adduces a striking comparison between 11. 50 sq. of the Eclogue and Julius Valerius on the birth of Alexander.

^{page 156 note 3} Plut. Pomp. 38, 46, Cras. 16; App. Mith. 117. See generally Anderson, op. cit. pp. 37 sqq. Plut. Caes. 58 is from the Alexander-legend.

^{page 156 note 4} Mr. Nock suggested to me that possibly the poem when published may have contained some thing which was afterwards omitted (say something about Antony, cut out after his death), just as the fourth Georgic once ended with praise of Cornelius Gallus, cut out after his fall; see Servius on Ecl. 10, 1, and thereon Schanz, M., Gesch. d. röm. Literatur, 3rd ed. 1911, 11, i, pp. 56–8.Google Scholar

^{page 156 note 5} Most recently Wagenvoort, H., Vergil's vierte Ekloge und das Sidus Julium, 1929, p. 6Google Scholar; Faider, op. cit. p. 790; Bennett, H., AJP li, p. 340Google Scholar; Wili, op. cit. p. 42.

^{page 156 note 6} See Virgil's Messianic Eclogue, pp. 14, 29, 59, 81.

^{page 157 note 1} See Gundel, W. in Boll, and Bezold, , Sternglaube und Sterndeutung, 3rd ed. 1926, pp. 153–4Google Scholar; cf. Weber, p. III, Corssen. p. 43. Vergil's magni menses = gestation.

^{page 157 note 2} List given by Gundel, , Philol. lxxxi (1926), p. 318Google Scholar note (discussing Augustus' horoscope).

^{page 157 note 3} Church, J. E. Jr, collected the relevant passages in univ. of Nevada Studies i, no. 2 and Class. Phil. vi, 1911, p. 78.Google Scholar

^{page 157 note 4} L. 17, pacatumque reget patriis virtutibus orbem.

^{page 157 note 5} This suggestion of personification may be supported by the personified cornuacopiae on a coin of Tiberius (Mattingly, op. cit. pl. xxiv, 6), where they contain the twin sons of Drusus and Livilla; by those in a statue-group figured by E. Pottier, Cornucopia in Dar. Sag., fig. 1966, where they contain the busts of (?) Antoninus Pius and Faustina; and above all by the crossed cornuacopiae with the heads of capricorns, Augustus' sign, on two altars of his reign, which K. Lehmann Hartleben (Röm. Mitt. xlii, 1927, p. 163, see plates 20, 21) definitely connects (p. 176) with Antony's coin.

^{page 157 note 6} Plut. Ant. 33 (before she went to Athens with Antony); see Kromayer, J., Hermes xxix, pp. 561–2.Google Scholar Her marriage was early in November 40 at latest, directly Octavian and Antony reached Rome, App. v, 278. There is a strange statement in Dio xlviii, 31, 4 that her posthumous child by Marcellus (i.e. Marcella 2) was not yet born at the time of the treaty; this cannot stand against Appian and Plutarch, and is merely a deduction by Dio (or his source) from the dispensation of the Senate allowing her to marry though ten months had not elapsed since her husband's death. The reason the Senate could give a dispensation was precisely because Marcella had been born.

^{page 158 note 1} It has been suggested that Vergil's phraseology was later applied to Augustus, and possibly even rehandled for this purpose: Mattingly, H., CR xliv, 1930, p. 59.Google Scholar I cannot follow the suggestion of rehandling; but the later application to Augustus seems probable. Ribezzo, Fr., ‘Millenario cumano e messianismo cesareo,’ Riv. Indo-gr.-ital. xiv (1930), p. 137Google Scholar, would apply it to Augustus from the start.

^{page 158 note 2} The Isis-hymn, Cyme 14 = Ios 11: ἐγὼ ἡλίου καὶ σελήνης πορείαν συνέταξα.

^{page 158 note 3} CIL iii, Supp. 2, 14386 d.

^{page 159 note 1} Most recently CRAc.Inscr. 1930, pp. 216–220.

^{page 159 note 2} Preserved in Eusebius, ii, p. 140, Schoene, and Zonaras, x, 31 (531); Zonaras may be from Livy through Dio.

^{page 159 note 3} A theory of two redazioni, to reconcile the real and the ideal, was put forward in 1901 by R. Sabbadini in a short note in Riv. di fil. xxix, p. 257; but his actual suggestion (poem written after the peace of Brundisium, revised because of the birth of Asinius Gallus) is impossible.

^{page 160 note 1} Best done, with a wealth of detail, by Weber, pp. 60 sqq.

^{page 160 note 2} Tenney Frank, loc. cit. p. 334.

^{page 160 note 3} They are: 1–3; 4–10; 11–17; 18–25; 37–45; 46–52; 53–59; 60–3.

^{page 160 note 4} Corssen gives several, op. cit. pp. 35, 62. I am not considering this matter.

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Alexander Helios and the Golden Age1

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