Post-Augustan Poetry From Seneca to Juvenal Part 42

464. Cp. Mart. x. 38. 4-8.

465. Cp. Mart. x. 38. 9-11. It is, of course, possible that _mariti_ is a euphemism.

466. Mart. x. 35. 1.

467. See Ap. Sid. loc. cit.

468. Sulp. _Sat._, lines 4, 5.

469. _Raph. Volaterr. comment. urban._ (fol. lvi. 1506 A.D.), 'hic (sc.

at Bobbio) anno 1493 huiuscemodi libri reperti sunt. Rutilius Namatia.n.u.s. Heroic.u.m Sulpici carmen.' The first edition was published in 1498, with the t.i.tle _Sulpitiae carmina quae fuit Domitiani temporibus: nuper a Georgio Merula Allexandrino, c.u.m aliis opusculis reperta. queritur de statu reipublicae et temporibus Domitiani_. The MS. is now lost.

470. 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 a.s.sa.s.sination in 96, though it may have been composed in part during his lifetime.

471. The work is generally rejected as spurious. Bachrens (_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 Bucheler. 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 a.n.a.logy. _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.

472. An exception must be made of the _Silvae_ of Statius.

473. Or Balbus Setinus.

474. Schenkl, _Stud, zu V. F._ 272.

475. Mart. i. 61 and 76.

476. 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.

477. x, 1. 90.

478. i. 7-12.

479. 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.

480. iii. 207:

ut mugitor anhelat Vesvius, attonitas acer c.u.m suscitat urbes

481. 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.

482. A few instances will suffice. In iii. 302 Jason a.s.serts 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 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 s.h.i.+p and to meet many other s.h.i.+ps by the way is perhaps the most glaring, but its rectification would have involved very radical alterations.

483. Cp. viii. 189:

inde sequemur ipsius amnis iter, donec nos flumine certo perferat inque aliud reddat mare.

484. Summers, op. cit. 6.

485. e.g. Argous Portus, Cales, the portico of the Argonauts at Rome.

486. i. 7-12.

487. Summers, p. 7.

488. i. 806; ii. 4.

489. 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 contracts an incident related by A. E.g. Contraction: The launching of _Argo_, V.F. i. 184-91; A.R. 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 Rhea on Dindymus, 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 complication 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.

490. In Apollonius the aid of Aphrodite and Eros is requisitioned to make Medea fall in love with Jason, but there is no further conventional supernatural interference. In Valerius, Juno (v. 350, vi. 456-660, vii.

153-90) kindles Medea's pa.s.sion with Venus's aid. In vii, 190 sqq., Venus goes in person.

491. 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.

492. v. 418. Cp. Apollon. iv. 272; Herod, ii. 103; Strab. xvi. 4. 4; Plin. _N.H._ x.x.xiii, 52.

493. vi. 118. Cp. also v. 423:

Arsinoen illi tepidaeque requirunt otia laeta Phari.

494. Cp. vii. 35 sqq.

495. As, for instance, in the _Alcestis_ of Euripides and Callimachus'

Hymn to Artemis.

496. A.R. i. 1167 [Greek: d_e tot anochliz_on tetr_echotos oidmatos olkous messothen axen eretmon atar tryphos allo men autos amph_o chersin ech_on pese dochmios, allo de pontos klyze palirrothioisi pher_on. ana d' hezeto sig_e paptain_on cheires gar a_etheon _eremeousai].

497. Cp. also V.F. iv. 682-5; viii. 453-7.

498. For obscurity cp. also iii. 133-7, 336-7; vii. 55.

499. Valerius is fond of such inversions, especially in the case of particles, p.r.o.nouns, &c.; cp. v. 187 _iuxta_; ii. 150 _sed_; vi. 452 _quippe_; vi. 543 _sed_.

500. Cp. i. 436-8; ii. 90; iii. 434; vi. 183, 260-4.