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The Prologue to Avitus' ‘De spiritalis historiae gestis’: Christian Poetry and Poetic License

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 July 2016

Michael Roberts
Michael Roberts*
Affiliation:
Wesleyan University
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Extract

In the dedicatory letter to the De spiritalis historiae gestis, addressed to his brother Apollinaris, bishop of Valence, Avitus of Vienne discusses the peculiar problems raised by Christian poetry (201.16–202.15 Peiper). The implications of this passage have not, I believe, been fully grasped. Let me begin by citing the relevant section of the letter to Apollinaris (201.16–202.9 Peiper).

Quamquam quilibet acer ille doctusque sit, si religionis propositae stilum non minus fidei quam metri lege servaverit, vix aptus esse poemati queat; quippe cum licentia mentiendi, quae pictoribus ac poetis aeque conceditur, satis procul a causarum serietate pellenda sit. In saeculari namque versuum opere condendo tanto quis peritior appellator, quanto elegantius, immo, ut vere dicamus, ineptius falsa texuerit. Taceo iam verba ilia vel nomina, quae nobis nec in alienis quidem operibus frequentare, ne dicam in nostris conscribere licet: quae ad conpendia poetarum aliud ex alio significantia plurimum valent. Quocirca saecularium iudicio, qui aut inperitiae, aut ignaviae dabunt non uti nos licentia poetarum, plus arduum quam fructuosum opus adressi divinam longe discrevimus ab humana existimatione censuram.

Type
Miscellany
Information
Traditio , Volume 36 , 1980 , pp. 399 - 407
Copyright
Copyright © Fordham University Press 

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References

1 Avitus’ remarks in the passage cited are applicable to Christian poetry in general, although they clearly have an immediate relevance to his own poetry. He has already spoken of the particular techniques used in the composition of the De spiritalis historiae gestis (hereafter cited as S. H. G.): ‘qui licet nominibus propriis titulisque respondeant, et alias tamen causas inventa materiae opportunitate perstringunt’ (201.13–14 Peiper). Herein I differ from Reinhart Herzog, Die Bibelepik der lateinischen Spätantike: Formgeschichte einer erbaulichen Gattung I (Theorie und Geschichte der Literatur und der schönen Künste 37; Munich 1975) lv–lvi, who understands Avitus to be referring specifically to the genre of Biblical epic. I quote throughout from Rudolf Peiper's edition Alcimi Ecdicii Aviti Viennensis episcopi Opera quae supersunt, MGH AA 6.2.Google Scholar

2 I am aware of two previous translations of this passage, by Gamber, Stanislas, Le livre de la Genèse dans la poésie latine au V e siècle (Paris 1899) 58–59, and Kartschoke, Dieter, Bibeldichtung: Studien zur Geschichte der epischen Bibelparaphrase von Juvencus bis Otfrid von Weissenburg (Munich 1975) 70–71, both of which I have consulted on difficult points. In particular, in translating the first sentence, and especially the phrase ‘si religionis propositae stilum non minus fidei quam metri lege servaverit,’ I have been unable to avoid a paraphrase. For the sense of religionis propositae, see the second letter to Apollinaris, the dedicatory letter to Avitus’ poem De virginitate (275.1–4 Peiper): ‘libellum vel de religione parentum communium vel de virginibus nostrae familiae familiarius disputantem illis tantummodo legendum dare, quos revera nobis aut vinculum propinquitatis aut propositum religionis adnectit’; and Goelzer, Henri and Mey, Alfred, Le Latin de saint Avil, évěque de Vienne (450?–526?) (Université de Paris, Bibliothèque de la Faculté des lettres 26; Paris 1909) 436–437 (on the sense of religio in Avitus).Google Scholar

3 Noted by Kartschoke, , Bibeldichtung 70, along with the antithesis between divina censura and humana existimatio. This use of serietas is confined to Late Latin. Goelzer, and Mey, , Le Latin de saint Avit 475, compare Ausonius, Cassian, and Sidonius Apollinaris.Google Scholar

4 For a discussion of this passage, citing earlier literature, see Kartschoke, , Bibeldichtung 69–70. I prefer, against Kartschoke, to understand lege metri (line 119) as an ablative of specification, as does Frans Hovingh, Pieter, Claudius Marius Victorius, Alethia: La prière et les vers 1–170 du livre I … (diss. Groningen 1955) 57. For the passage as a Christian formula of modesty, see Thraede, Klaus, ‘Epos,’ Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum 5 (1962) 1028.Google Scholar

5 For this passage see Koster, Severin, Antike Epostheorien (Palingenesia 5; Wiesbaden 1970) 8–9. The idea of poetic falsehood runs through the whole of ancient poetics (ibid. passim). Google Scholar

6 The passage begins: τος μὲν γὰϱ ποιητας πολλοὶ δέδονται ϰόσμοι. On this passage see ibid. 83–84, and Georg Fraustadt, Encomiorum in litteris graecis usque ad romanam aetatem historia (diss. Leipzig 1909) 57–63.Google Scholar

7 For the nature of poetic vocabulary see Aristotle, Rhetoric 3.7.11 1408b (cf. Poetics 21.4–6 1457b); Cicero, Orator 60.202; Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Comp. 25; Quintilian 4.1.58, 10.1.28; Theon, Progymnasmata 81.8–10 Spengel 2); Tryphon, Πεϱὶ τϱόΠ&Ων (191.18–22 Spengel 3); Marcellinus, V. Thuc. 41.Google Scholar

8 Cicero's description of epideictic oratory, the style of the Sophists, is in the Isocratean tradition (Orator 19.65): ‘Hoc differunt quod, cum sit his propositum non perturbare animos, sed placare potius nec tam persuadere quam delectare, et apertius id faciunt quam nos et crebrius, concinnas magis sententias exquirunt quam probabilis, a re saepe discedunt, intexunt fabulas, verba altius transferunt eaque ita disponunt ut pictores varietatem colorum, paria paribus referunt, adversa contrariis, saepissimeque similiter extrema definiunt.’Google Scholar

‘Intexunt fabulas’ refers to licentia in content; ‘verba altius transferunt,’ to licentia in style. Cicero is talking here of epideictic oratory, but it was Isocrates’ achievement to win for the display speech the freedom traditionally granted poetry in the incorporation of fictitious narrative and the employment of highly colored language and bold stylistic effects (cf. Isocrates, Apodosis 45–47).

Quintilian (10.1.28) speaks not only of the poet's libertas verborum and licentia figurarum (stylistic licentia), but also of his freedom of invention (licentia in content) by which he hopes to make his work attractive to the reader: ‘eamque [sc. voluptatem] fingendo non falsa modo sed etiam quaedam incredibilia sectatur.’

For a collection of references to poetic licentia in Greek and Latin literature, but one which unfortunately does not distinguish between content and style, see John E. B. Mayor, ‘On Licentia Poetica (ποιητιϰὴ ἐξονσཷα or ᾰδεια),’ Journal of Philology 8 (1879) 260–262.

9 This has been noted by Van der Nat, P. G., Divinus vere poeta: Enige Beschouwingen over Ontstaan en Karakter der Christelijke Latijnse Poëzie (Leiden 1963) 18–20. Lactantius laid the theoretical foundation for Christian Latin poetry, as Van der Nat has shown: ibid. 19–20, and ‘Zu den Voraussetzungen der christlichen lateinischen Literatur: Die Zeugnisse von Minucius Felix und Laktanz,’ in Christianisme et formes littéraires de l'antiquité tardive en Occident (Fondation Hardt, Entretiens sur l'antiquité classique 23; Vandœuvres 1976) 191–225.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10 Juvencus’ Praefatio is discussed by Van Der Nat, P. G., ‘Die Praefatio der Evangelienparaphrase des Iuvencus,’ in Romanitas et Christianitas, Studia Iano Henrico Waszink … oblata (Amsterdam 1973) 249–257, and Franz Quadlbauer, ‘Zur “Invocatio” des Iuvencus,’ GB 2 (1974) 189–212. I have found it unnecessary to adopt the emendation of Roberto Palla, ‘Aeterna in Saecula in Giovenco, Praefatio 17,’ Studi classici e orientali 26 (1977) 277–282 (aeterna for aeternae in line 17).Google Scholar

11 E.g., Witke, Charles, Numen litterarum: The Old and the New in Latin Poetry from Constantine to Gregory the Great (Mittellateinische Studien und Texte 5; Leiden 1971) 183: ‘Avitus is here rejecting the use of pagan mythology's Apollo and company’; Herzog, Die Bibelepik lvi, ‘jedes merveilleux épique … sei unstatthaft.’Google Scholar

For the sense of licentia mentiendi / mendacia poetarum in Christian authors see Thraede, ‘Epos’ 1007–1010. For other references in the Christian poets, see Thraede, ‘Untersuchungen zum Ursprung und zur Geschichte der christlichen Poesie I,’ Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum 4 (1961) 123 nn. 63–64. The charge is a commonplace of patristic literature; see Harald Hagendahl, Latin Fathers and the Classics: A Study on the Apologists, Jerome and Other Church Fathers (Studia Graeca et Latina Gothoburgensia 6; Göteborg 1958) 220, 231–232, and Augustine and the Latin Classics (Studia Graeca et Latina Gothoburgensia 20; Göteborg 1967) 389–402.

12 The sentence is parenthetical, introduced in the form of a praeteritio (taceo iam …). It is thereby nonetheless seriously intended.Google Scholar

13 The reference is to Gal 4.24.Google Scholar

14 Cf. De Trinitate 15.9.15 (CCL 50.481.19–20), ‘Quid ergo est allegoria nisi tropus ubi ex alio aliud intellegitur?’ For Contra mendacium 10.24, see Ulrich Schindel, Die lateinischen Figurenlehren des 5. bis 7. Jahrhunderts und Donats Vergilkommentar, Abh. Akad. Göttingen, 3. Folge, Nr. 91 (1975) 78–80. Augustine's definition of allegory in C. mend. 10.24 (where the term allegoria is not mentioned) is mistakenly applied to metaphor in the Liber de vitiis et virtutibus orationis of ‘Isidorus iunior’ (220 Schindel).Google Scholar

15 E.g., Charisius, (363.23–24 Barwick), ‘allegoria est oratio aliud dicens aliud significans per obscuram similitudinem <aut> contrarium’ (cf. Diomedes 461.31–32 Keil 1); Donatus (401.26 Keil 4), ‘allegoria est tropus, quo aliud significatur quam dicitur’; Isidore 1.37.22, ‘allegoria est alieniloquium. Aliud enim sonat, et aliud intelligitur’; cf. Quintilian 8.6.44, ‘allegoria … aliud verbis, aliud sensu ostendit.’+contrarium’+(cf.+Diomedes+461.31–32+Keil+1);+Donatus+(401.26+Keil+4),+‘allegoria+est+tropus,+quo+aliud+significatur+quam+dicitur’;+Isidore+1.37.22,+‘allegoria+est+alieniloquium.+Aliud+enim+sonat,+et+aliud+intelligitur’;+cf.+Quintilian+8.6.44,+‘allegoria+…+aliud+verbis,+aliud+sensu+ostendit.’>Google Scholar

16 Cf. Charisius, (359.27–28 Barwick), ‘metonymia est dictio ab aliis significationibus ad aliam proximitatem translata’; Sacerdos (467.7–8 Keil 6), ‘metonymia est oratio ab aliqua propria significatione ad propriam proximitatis interpretatione descendens’; Isidore (1.37.8), ‘metonymia, transnominatio ab alia significatione ad aliam proximitatem translata.’ Cicero (Or. 27.92–93) defines metonymic expressions as those ‘in quibus pro verbo proprio subicitur aliud quod idem significat.’Google Scholar

17 Cf. Quintilian, 8.6.9 ‘in rebus animalibus aliud pro alio ponitur’; Augustine, C. mend. 10.24 (CSEL 41.499.15–16) ‘de re propria ad rem non propriam verbi alicuius usurpata translatio.’Google Scholar

18 Cf. Quintilian, 8.6.29–30 ‘antonomasia, quae aliquid pro nomine ponit.’Google Scholar

19 Prudentius does use the metonymy Mars for bellum in the Psychomachia, but significantly only in the speeches of Ira (line 118), Superbia (line 215), and Avaritia (line 549).Google Scholar

20 For instance, Gamber, , Le livre de la Genèse 176–177; Hagendahl, , Latin Fathers 382–389; Hudson-Williams, A., ‘Virgil and the Christian Latin Poets,’ Papers of the Virgil Society 6 (1966–1967) 14; Witke, , Numen litterarum 147. Hagendahl cites many examples.Google Scholar

21 Gamber, , Le livre de la Genèse 177. Cf. Goelzer, and Mey, , Le Latin de saint Avit 410 n. 2 (‘un caprice de lettré’); Losgar, Georg, Studien zu Alcimus Avitus’ Gedicht: De spiritalis historiae gestis (diss. Neuburg a. D. 1903) 31.Google Scholar

22 As Schippers, , Avitus: De mundi initio (diss. Amsterdam 1945) 18 n. 4, notes, ‘Av. IV 101 iusso terrore tonanti heeft betrekking op Juppiter. — Goelzers opinie [cited above] … is, gezien het veelvuldig gebruik bij Dracontius e.a., onjuist.’Google Scholar

23 Peiper notes the parallel with Vergil, Aeneid 2.31: donum exitiale (of the Trojan horse).Google Scholar

24 For dulcis coniunx see 2.151 praedulcis coniunx (said of Adam by the devil in his speech of temptation to Eve) and Vergil, Aeneid 2.777 o dulcis coniunx. Google Scholar

25 I take numinibus to be a poetic equivalent of deis (so Peiper, , Index verborum 264). It is worth noticing how the crucial qualification numinibusque parem is incorporated into the structure of the speech. The poet uses synonymic amplification to expand on the expresssion similem summo … tonanti, i.e., parem is synonymous with similem. The word order is chiastic (ABBA). Such synonymic amplification is a common paraphrastic technique, often used to create the syntactical framework for significant detail. I give many examples in my dissertation, ‘The Hexameter Paraphrase in Late Antiquity: Origins and Applications to Biblical Texts’ (Urbana 1978).Google Scholar

26 This is especially true of the devil in Book 2 (42–44, 89–116, 145–160, 185–203, 412–421) and the Pharaoh in Book 5 (48–66, 605–608, 672–675). Eve's speech to Adam is Avitus’ invention. There is no equivalent in the Biblical text (Gen. 3.6 ‘et comedit deditque viro suo, qui comedit’).Google Scholar

27 Van der Nat, , Divinus vere poeta 23.Google Scholar

28 Ps.-Apollinarius, Μετάϕϱασις το ψαλτϱος 17.8 : Ταϱταϱίων … βεϱέθϱων (= Ps. 17.6 ᾅδον); Nonnus, Μεταβολὴ το ϰατὰ Ἰωάννην ἁγίον εὐαγγελίον 11.163: ἐξ Ἄϊδος νόστησε and 11.165: Ἀΐδης … παϱὰ γείτο&nuι Λήθη (corresponding to John 11.44).Google Scholar

29 Laudes Dei 1.1, 19, 94, 228, 397, 674, 685; 2.173, 229, 249, 346, 680; 3.215, 240, 717; Satisfactio 149 (ed. Vollmer, , Fl. Merobaudis Reliquiae, Blosii Aemilii Dracontii Carmina, Eugenii Toletani episcopi Carmina , MGH AA 14.419).Google Scholar

30 Manitius, Max, ‘Zu spätlateinischen Dichtern I,’ Zeitschrift für die österreichischen Gymnasien 37 (1886) 244–250, and, more fully, Schippers, Avitus: De mundi initio 7–24. Vollmer, , Reliquiae, ix, had already discounted the evidence of Manitius. Despite Schippers’ fuller conspectus of supposed reminiscences, I find the evidence still less than conclusive.Google Scholar

31 The importance of this is rightly stressed by Kartschoke, , Bibeldichtung 72. Pierre Riché, Education and Culture in the Barbarian West, Sixth Through Eighth Centuries, tr. Contreni, John J. (Columbia, s.c. 1976) 96–98, notes parallels in Sidonius and Ennodius, and a fifth-century canon to the effect that bishops should not read the pagan authors (Statuta ecclesiae antiqua 5). The prohibition can rarely have been observed to the letter, but it does reflect a feeling that preoccupation with classical authors was incompatible with episcopal status. The S. H. G. was published in or about the year 507. When it was written cannot be precisely established. The most likely date is the last decade of the fifth century, i.e., after Avitus had become bishop of Vienne. Avitus’ interest in literary matters certainly continued after he assumed the episcopate (cf. Ep. 57; 85–87 Peiper).Google Scholar

32 There is much that is conventional in this passage — the contrast between mensuram syllabarum and mensurata fidei adstructione recalls the dedicatory letter to the S. H. G. — but the emphasis on clerical obligations seems to reflect a continuing preoccupation.Google Scholar

33 On this see especially Peter Norbert Frantz, Avitus von Vienne (ca. 490–518) als Hierarch und Politiker (diss. Greifswald 1908).Google Scholar

34 So Homeyer, Helene, ‘Der Dichter zwischen zwei Welten: Beobachtungen zur Theorie und Praxis des Dichters im frühen Mittelalter,’ Antike und Abendland 16 (1970) 143.Google Scholar

35 Note the use of the verb licet (202.6 Peiper).Google Scholar

36 See Hagendahl, , Latin Fathers 388–389.Google Scholar