Didactic Literature in the Roman World (Routledge Monographs in Classical Studies) [1 ed.] 9781032456508, 9781032456515, 9781003378051, 1032456507

Table of contents :
Cover
Half Title
Series Page
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Contents
List of Tables
List of Contributors
Introduction
PART I: Teaching Philosophies
1. Lucretius' DRN and Callimachus' Hymn to Zeus: Comparing and Contrasting Didactic Projects
2. Epicurean Codas in Vergil's Georgics
3. Fortunatus et ille: Vergil's Ironic Epicureanism
PART II: Erotodidaxis
4. Idle Hands: The Poetics of Masturbation in the Winter Scenes of Hesiod (Op. 493-563) and Vergil (G. 1.291-310)
5. Animal Love from Vergil: Contesting Marital Propriety in the Age of Augustus
6. The Language of Teaching and Learning in Propertius
PART III: Metadidaxis
7. Buried in Books: Varro's Papia Papae in the Shade of Scholarship
8. Si Est Homo Bulla: Writing between the Lines in Varro's de Rebus Rusticis
9. The Shadows of Archimedes: Intertextual Anxieties in Hyginus Gromaticus' Constitutio Limitum
10. Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts for Problems in Horace's Ars Poetica
Index

Citation preview

Routledge Monographs in Classical Studies

DIDACTIC LITERATURE IN THE ROMAN WORLD Edited by T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt

Didactic Literature in the Roman World

This book collects new work on Latin didactic poetry and prose in the late Republic and early Empire, and it evaluates the varied, shifting roles that literature of teaching and learning played during this period. Instruction was of special interest in the culture and literature of the late Roman Republic and the Age of Augustus, as attitudes toward education found complex, fluid, and multivalent expressions. The era saw a didactic boom, a cottage industry whose surviving authors include Vergil, Lucretius, Ovid, Horace, Cicero, Varro, Germanicus, and Grattius, who are all reexamined here. The contributors to this volume bring fresh approaches to the study of educational literature from the end of the Roman Republic and early Empire, and their essays discover unexpected connections between familiar authors. Chapters explore, interrogate, and revise some aspect of our understanding of these generic and modal boundaries, while considering understudied points of contact between art and education, poetry and prose, and literature and philosophy, among others. Altogether, the volume shows how lively, experimental, and intertextual the didactic ethos of this period is, and how deeply it engages with social, political, and philosophical questions that are of critical importance to contemporary Rome and of enduring interest into the modern world. Didactic Literature in the Roman World is of interest to students and scholars of Latin literature, particularly the late Republic and early Empire, and of Classics more broadly. In addition, the volume’s focus on didactic poetry and prose appeals to those working on literature outside of Classics and on intellectual history. T. H. M. Gellar-Goad is Associate Professor of Classics at Wake Forest University. He specializes in Latin poetry, especially the funny stuff: Roman comedy, Roman erotic elegy, Roman satire, and—if you believe him—the allegedly philosophical poet Lucretius. He is the author of Laughing Atoms, Laughing Matter: Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura and Satire (Michigan 2020), Plautus: Curculio (Bloomsbury 2021), and Masks (Tangent 2023). Christopher B. Polt is Associate Professor of Classical Studies at Boston College. His research centers on Latin poetry of the late Republic and early Empire, and he is the author of numerous articles on Roman comedy, ancient epic, and fable. He is the author of Catullus and Roman Comedy: Theatricality and Personal Drama in the Late Republic (Cambridge 2021).

Routledge Monographs in Classical Studies

Recent titles include: Power and Rhetoric in the Ecclesiastical Correspondence of Constantine the Great Andrew J. Pottenger The War Cry in the Graeco-Roman World James Gersbach Religion and Apuleius’ Golden Ass The Sacred Ass Warren S. Smith Studies in Ancient Greek Philosophy In Honor of Professor Anthony Preus Edited by D. M. Spitzer Personal Experience and Materiality in Greek Religion K.A. Rask A Cognitive Analysis of the Main Apolline Divinatory Practices Decoding Divination Giulia Frigerio Processions and the Construction of Communities in Antiquity History and Comparative Perspectives Edited by Elena Muñiz-Grijalvo and Alberto del Campo Tejedor Didactic Literature in the Roman World Edited by T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt For more information on this series, visit: https://www.routledge.com/Routledge-Monographs-inClassical-Studies/book-series/RMCS

Didactic Literature in the Roman World

Edited by T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt

First published 2024 by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2024 selection and editorial matter, T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt; individual chapters, the contributors The right of T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Gellar-Goad, T. H. M., editor. | Polt, Christopher B., editor. Title: Didactic literature in the Roman world / edited by T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt. Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2024. | Series: Routledge monographs in classical studies | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Identifiers: LCCN 2023008599 (print) | LCCN 2023008600 (ebook) | ISBN 9781032456508 (hardback) | ISBN 9781032456515 (paperback) | ISBN 9781003378051 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Didactic literature, Latin--History and criticism. | Education in literature. | Rome--Intellectual life. | LCGFT: Literary criticism. | Essays. Classification: LCC PA6011 .D53 2024 (print) | LCC PA6011 (ebook) | DDC 871/.0109--dc23/eng/20230607 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023008599 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023008600 ISBN: 978-1-032-45650-8 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-032-45651-5 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-37805-1 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051 Typeset in Times New Roman by KnowledgeWorks Global Ltd.

for Jim O’Hara teacher, mentor, friend THMGG & CBP

Contents

List of Tables List of Contributors Introduction

ix x 1

T. H. M. GELLAR-GOAD AND CHRISTOPHER B. POLT

PART I

Teaching Philosophies

11

1 Lucretius’ DRN and Callimachus’ Hymn to Zeus: Comparing and Contrasting Didactic Projects

13

MICHAEL PASCHALIS

2 Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics

23

ALISON KEITH

3 Fortunatus et ille: Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism

47

PETER HESLIN

PART II

Erotodidaxis 4 Idle Hands: The Poetics of Masturbation in the Winter Scenes of Hesiod (Op. 493–563) and Vergil (G. 1.291–310)

69 71

LEAH KRONENBERG

5 Animal Love from Vergil: Contesting Marital Propriety in the Age of Augustus STEVEN J. GREEN

106

viii Contents 6 The Language of Teaching and Learning in Propertius

119

MELANIE RACETTE-CAMPBELL

PART III

Metadidaxis135 7 Buried in Books: Varro’s Papia Papae in the Shade of Scholarship

137

JOSEPH MCALHANY

8 Si Est Homo Bulla: Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis

148

SARAH CULPEPPER STROUP

9 The Shadows of Archimedes: Intertextual Anxieties in Hyginus Gromaticus’ Constitutio Limitum

167

DEL A. MATICIC

10 Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts for Problems in Horace’s Ars Poetica

179

JAMES J. O’HARA

Index

198

Tables

6.1 6.2 6.3

Docere, discere, and amare in Propertius Docere and discere in Vergil’s Georgics Docere and discere in Ovid’s Ars Amatoria

122 127 129

Contributors

T. H. M. Gellar-Goad is Associate Professor of Classics at Wake Forest University. He specializes in Latin poetry, especially the funny stuff: Roman comedy, Roman erotic elegy, Roman satire, and—if you believe him—the allegedly philosophical poet Lucretius. He is the author of Laughing Atoms, Laughing Matter: Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura and Satire (Michigan 2020), Plautus: Curculio (Bloomsbury 2021), and Masks (Tangent 2023). Steven J. Green is Associate Professor at Yale-NUS College, Singapore, and Honorary Research Fellow in the Department of Greek and Latin at University College London. He specializes in Roman literature and culture of the first centuries BCE and CE. His major publications have so far focused on Ovid, Manilius, Grattius, Roman didactic poetry, and the interaction between Roman literature and religious experience: Ovid Fasti 1: A Commentary (Brill 2004); (eds. with R. Gibson and A. Sharrock) The Art of Love: Bimillennial Essays on Ovid’s Ars Amatoria and Remedia Amoris (Oxford 2006); (ed. with K. Volk) Forgotten Stars: Rediscovering Manilius’ Astronomica (Oxford 2011); Disclosure and Discretion in Roman Astrology: Manilius and his Augustan Contemporaries (Oxford 2014); (ed.) Grattius: Hunting an Augustan Poet (Oxford 2018). Peter Heslin is Professor of Classics and Ancient History at Durham University. He is the author of three monographs: The Transvestite Achilles: Gender and Genre in the Achilleid of Statius (Cambridge 2005); The Museum of Augustus: The Temple of Apollo in Pompeii, The Portico of Philippus in Rome, and Latin Poetry (Getty 2015); and Propertius, Greek Myth, and Virgil: Rivalry, Allegory, and Polemic (Oxford 2018). He has written articles on Latin poetry and its reception, Roman topography and material culture, and digital humanities. He is also the developer of Diogenes, a widely used open-source software package for legacy databases of classical texts. Alison Keith has written extensively about the intersection of gender and genre in Latin literature, and is the author of The Play of Fictions: Studies in Ovid’s Metamorphoses Book 2 (Michigan 1992); Engendering Rome: Women in Latin Epic (Cambridge 2000); Propertius, Poet of Love and Leisure (Duckworth 2008); and a commentary on selections from Latin epic (Bolchazy-Carducci 2012).

Contributors xi Her current projects include a book on Vergil for I. B. Tauris in the series Understanding Classics, a commentary on the fourth book of Ovid’s Metamorphoses for Cambridge University Press, and a SSHRC-funded project on the reception of Ovid’s Metamorphoses in Flavian epic. A past editor of Phoenix, journal of the Classical Association of Canada (2002–2007), and president of the Classical Association of Canada (2010–2012), she is Director of the Jackman Humanities Institute at the University of Toronto, and co-editor (with Jonathan Edmondson) of the Phoenix supplementary series and general editor (with Ingrid Holmberg) of the subseries Phoenix Studies in Gender. Leah Kronenberg is Associate Professor of Classical Studies at Boston University. She is the author of Allegories of Farming from Greece and Rome: Philosophical Satire in Xenophon, Varro, and Virgil (Cambridge 2009) and numerous articles on Latin literature, mostly of the Republican and Augustan eras. Del A. Maticic is Blegen Fellow in Greek & Roman Studies at Vassar College. His research focuses on early imperial Roman literature and cultural history, with special interests especially in space, geography, and dialogues between poetry and philosophy. His dissertation research examines the concept of kosmos and its various Latin translations in Roman poetry and technical literature of the early Roman empire. Joseph McAlhany (Ph.D., Columbia) is Assistant Professor in the Department of History and affiliate faculty in Medieval Studies at the University of Connecticut (Storrs). He has published a translation, Guibert of Nogent: Monodies and On the Relics of the Saint (Penguin 2011, with Jay Rubenstein), and his recent articles and chapters include “Montesquieu’s Geometer & the Tyrannical Spirits of Translation” in Translation and the Intersection of Texts, Contexts and Politics: Historical & Socio-Cultural Perspectives (Palgrave Macmillan, 2017); “Sertorius between Myth & History: The Isles of the Blessed Episode in Sallust, Horace, and Plutarch” (Classical Journal 110, 2016); “Emendations and Elucidations to the Text of Guibert of Nogent’s Monodiae” (Journal of Medieval Latin 25, 2015); and “Crumbs, Thieves, and Relics: Translation and Alien Humanism” (Educational Theory, 2014). He is currently working on a two-volume edition and translation of the collected fragments of Marcus Terentius Varro for the Loeb Classical Library. James J. O’Hara studied at the College of the Holy Cross and the University of Michigan. He has taught at Wesleyan University and the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, where he is George L. Paddison Professor of Latin. He is the author of Death and the Optimistic Prophecy in Vergil’s Aeneid (Princeton 1990); True Names: Vergil and the Alexandrian Tradition of Etymological Wordplay (Michigan, 2nd ed., 2017); Inconsistency in Roman Epic: Studies in Catullus, Lucretius, Vergil, Ovid and Lucan (Cambridge 2007); Vergil: Aeneid Book 4 (Focus 2011); and Vergil: Aeneid Book 8 (Focus 2018). At present, he is working on a book titled Teaching, Pretending to Teach, and the Authority of the Speaker in Roman Didactic and Satire.

xii Contributors Michael Paschalis is Emeritus Professor of Classics at the University of Crete. He is the author of Virgil’s Aeneid: Semantic Relations and Proper Names (Oxford 1997). He has published more than 100 articles and written or (co-)edited 13 books on Hellenistic literature, classical Roman literature, the ancient novel, the literature of late antiquity, the reception of the Classics (in Modern Greek literature and in Italian, English, and French literature), and modern Greek literature. Christopher B. Polt is Associate Professor of Classical Studies at Boston College. His research centers on Latin poetry of the late Republic and early Empire, and he is the author of numerous articles on Roman comedy, ancient epic, and fable. He is the author of Catullus and Roman Comedy: Theatricality and Personal Drama in the Late Republic (Cambridge 2021). Melanie Racette-Campbell received her Ph.D. from the University of Toronto with a dissertation on the construction of masculinity in Propertius, which is being published as articles. She is Assistant Professor of Classics at the University of Winnipeg. She is currently working on a monograph on the “crisis of masculinity” in the age of Augustus. Sarah Stroup is Associate Professor of Classics at the University of Washington, Seattle. Stroup’s research interests center on Latin textual culture of the end of the Republic and early Empire, most specifically Latin prose as expressed through political and philosophical dialogues. Her prior publications include investigations into Cicero’s dialogic project of the mid-50s–mid-40s, Catullus, Cicero, and a Society of Patrons: The Generation of the Text (Cambridge 2010). Stroup’s current project centers on Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis as a dystopian satire exploring the collapse of the Republic and its aftermath.

Introduction T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt

Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas. “Happy is he who has been able to understand the causes of things.” This line, perhaps the most famous of Vergil’s Georgics (2.490), explicitly acknowledges the didactic bearing of the poem in which it appears and places that poem as the latest installment of a Greek and Roman didactic tradition—even as its precise meaning, and the meaning of the lines that follow it, remain a matter of uncertainty, multivalence, and debate. Georgics is the most prominent work of a didactic boom in its day at the end of Rome’s Republic and the beginning of its Empire, a cottage industry whose surviving authors include Vergil, Lucretius, Ovid, Horace, Cicero, Varro, Manilius, Germanicus, and Grattius. Vergil’s line, generally taken to be a reference specifically to Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura, elevates to the highest standing the learner (and thus, implicitly, the teacher) of things and their causes. Indeed, learning and teaching were fundamental to Roman literature from the start. Livius Andronicus, the primus auctor of Latin letters, was first a teacher whose pedagogic experiences profoundly shaped his own writing (Feeney 2016). In turn, literature was fundamental to Roman practices of learning, both popular and elite, both technical and moral (Rawson 1985). Epic—both didactic and narrative—instructed Romans on the rules and roles of gender and empire (Keith 2000). Ennius and Lucilius, two other founding figures of Roman poetry, played around with the role of teacher and the trappings of didactic in their works. Ennius wrote philosophical tracts or parodies and took didactic or pseudo-didactic stances (Epicharmus, Euhemerus, Hedyphagetica) in addition to his historical epic with its implicit lessons for Roman ideology and expansionism; Lucilian satire is deeply engaged with matters of philosophy, literary criticism, and even linguistics (see, e.g., Gellar-Goad 2020: 59–63). Rome’s earliest substantially surviving prose text is Cato’s De Agri Cultura, a literary agricultural manual that claims to teach readers how to manage a successful small farm, but it also offers more subtle instruction in what Cato saw as the ideal Roman’s proper performance of civic virtue and duties to the mores maiorum. Even the Roman comedies of Plautus and Terence engage meaningfully with teaching and learning, from scenes of erotodidaxis in Plautus’ Mostellaria, Cistellaria, and Truculentus to Terence’s Adelphoe, a melodrama on parenting styles and approaches to moral education. In their initial performance context, the plays DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-1

2  T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt function pedagogically, teaching audiences about Roman-ness, Roman values, and Roman hierarchy (Padilla Peralta 2020: 148). Then, as they enter the canon of Roman literature, these plays become touchstones of ethical formation for subsequent authors. Cicero alludes to Adelphoe and other plays while he contemplates publicly, in Pro Caelio, which educational models offered by the Roman stage are best for conveying and enforcing the normative mores for the younger generation. Instruction becomes a special interest in the culture and literature of the late Republic and Augustan periods, as attitudes toward education find complex, fluid, and multivalent expressions. Bloomer (2017) demonstrates how Roman education was a dynamic and often contested space, with teachers and students balancing their interests in abstractions of philosophy and literature with the need to train the next generation of young Roman men to manage their domestic affairs effectively and in keeping with the mos maiorum. As Bloomer persuasively argues, formation of moral character and proper display and performance of education stood front and center in the minds of the Roman elite, and throughout this period, competing modes of instruction and forms of content were contested, as elites sought to find the proper place for novel education in Roman social life. This balancing act also entailed safely adapting new content borrowed from the Greek world to the expectations and needs of traditional Roman culture. This epoch was a time of heightened enthusiasm for Greek learning and teaching, with the importation—both actual and metaliterary—of Greek intellectual capital and Greek didactic texts. As Moatti (1997) points out, Rome’s expansion into Greece and beyond as an increasingly imperialistic society also involved not only exposure to, but also incorporation of the Other. Greek philosophical and rhetorical texts were mined for educational and argumentative techniques, while their content was carefully and selectively adapted to new Roman uses. In a similar vein, Hellenistic didactic works gave Romans novel ways to observe and dissect the larger world, while Greek New Comedy was increasingly incorporated into Roman schools to provide models for proper and improper behavior—a division on which there was not always perfect agreement between Greek and Roman contexts. The suggestions both of Moatti and of O’Rourke (2019) that didactic poetic production flourishes alongside political unsettlement and transformation finds confirmation in the outpouring of didaxis amid the transition between Republic and Principate. This volume collects new work on Latin didactic poetry and prose and evaluates the varied, shifting roles that teaching and learning played in this pivotal period. The contributors bring fresh approaches to the study of educational literature from the end of the Roman Republic and early Empire, and their essays discover unexpected connections between familiar authors. Altogether, the volume shows how lively, experimental, and intertextual the didactic ethos of this period is, and how deeply it engages with social, political, and philosophical questions that are of critical importance to contemporary Rome and of enduring interest into the modern world. While teaching and learning were esteemed in this period—and while didactic verse represents the most familiar incarnation of poetic teaching and learning—this distinct form of literature long lacked recognition as a formal genre (Sider 2014).

Introduction 3 Indeed, its ambiguous status has increasingly attracted the attention of scholars, who struggle to define what sets didactic literature apart (Effe 1977; Dalzell 1996; Volk 2002; Gale 2004). Recent years have also seen the development of frameworks for the philosophical, ethical, and cultural implications of didactic (Nelson 1998; Kronenberg 2009; Gellar-Goad 2020). A new line of inquiry has approached didactic literature from three categories of interest, namely knowledge and the limits thereof; authority and power; and tradition and its formation of genre (Canevaro & O’Rourke 2019: 1, and the essays contained therein). But the boundaries and generic status of didactic remain contested (Itsumi 2008), as have both the relationship between prose and poetic works that claim to teach (Atherton 1998) and student-teacher dynamics in ancient literature and culture (Schiesaro et al. 1994). We might well ask: what motivated ancient poets to become professed teachers and compose defined lessons in such an ill-defined “genre”? If we should even use that term, “genre.” Perhaps didactic is not truly a genre but rather a mode, as Canevaro and O’Rourke argue (2019: 2, 4–5, citing Fowler 1982, 2003; contra, Volk 2002: 42–43; cf. Gellar-Goad 2020: ch. 1 on satire as mode and genre, with a view toward Lucretian didactic). In this volume, we push yet one more step against the overschematization of didactic by putting poetic, prose, and prosimetric texts of the period into dialogue (cf. Hutchinson 2008, 2009). At the same time, we sidestep the energetic, yet ultimately circular, reasoning about and around the subcategories and defining characteristics of didactic (successively rehearsed by, among others, Effe 1977; Dalzell 1996; Toohey 1996, 2005; Volk 2002; Canevaro & O’Rourke 2019: 4–7). Most chapters included in this volume explore, interrogate, and revise some aspect of our understanding of these generic and modal boundaries, while considering understudied points of contact between art and education, poetry and prose, and literature and philosophy, among others. To this end, the volume showcases a range of novel methodologies and theories. Kronenberg, for instance, develops a theory of “poetics of masturbation,” in which autoerotic innuendo reflects the idleness of winter or the productive self-reflexivity of Hellenistic art, while Sarah Culpepper Stroup approaches Varronian dialogue from the frames of cryptology, code-switching, and Easter eggs. Furthermore, both individually and as a collection, our contributors put into conversation texts that usually are siloed off from one another (e.g., Varro from the poets, Vergil from satire). Del A. Maticic, for example, reads the technical work of Hyginus Gromaticus alongside Vergilian didactic to uncover ruminations on empire in a purportedly dry text about land surveying; Alison Keith, going in the other direction, finds important connections in Vergil’s Georgics to the technical work of Philodemus on agricultural villa management. Unlike many collections of work on didactic, ours does not silo poetry away from prose, nor does it let rest the assumption that didactic prose works are merely instructional and nothing more, nothing deeper. Rather, the papers collected here explore a rich world of complexities, inconsistencies, ambiguities, and possibilities in the study of didactic. This volume stems from the Vergilian Society’s 24th annual Symposium Cumanum held in Cuma, Italy, in June 2018. Out of the original 27 participants, we have gathered 10 papers

4  T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt that engage with big questions about Roman didactic practice, in dialogue with one another. Some of the texts here might seem out of place, as not properly “didactic,” or not properly “literary.” Yet the scholars whose work is assembled herein ­demonstrate the relevance of their texts to the questions we address—and the relevance of these questions to a critical period of transition in Roman society. Canevaro and O’Rourke, introducing their own assortment of interventions on Roman didactic, note, “we hope to see beyond the fixed contours of a pre-selected canon and to consider a nexus of strategies and ideas that cluster around this set of texts” (2019: 18). Likewise, while the present collection does not aim to be systematic or comprehensive, the innovative ways in which these individual chapters speak with prior debates and with each other encourage productive reevaluation of the limits of didacticism and the wide range of issues with which it intersects. The book is divided into three parts that focus on distinct issues but are nevertheless interrelated and build upon each other. The first, “Teaching Philosophies”—punning on that most ubiquitous and peculiar of academic job application materials—presents three new looks at familiar loci classici in the flagship didactic poems of the period, Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura and Vergil’s Georgics. Philosophy and didactic poetry are perhaps best viewed as fraternal twins. They may look somewhat alike; they may share characteristics, aims, and activities; they may have some (or much) of the same genetic (or generic) material in them. But they are not identical, and they can frequently come into tension. Philosophers are often interested in teaching, and adopt didactic poses for legitimate purposes, yet philosophers may also take advantage of the presumption of their didactic bona fides in order to engage in tendentious invective. Didactic poets, on the other hand, variously use philosophy as serious subject matter, as playmate, and as straw man (compare Gellar-Goad 2020: 164–184 on “didactic tension” in Roman satire and Lucretius). The chapters in this part examine how Lucretius and Vergil envision the roles that philosophy can or cannot play in the production of poetry. They shed light on the contradictory stances that ancient poets take on the educational value of philosophical discourse, and on the special advantages and limitations posed by verse form. Michael Paschalis opens this part by considering the underexamined relationships and tensions between Lucretius and one of his most important objects of allusion, Callimachus. Though both poets theorize about the educative functions and goals of poetry, they take radically different tacks. Tthe latter repeatedly stresses the novelty of his poetic program and its focus on pointedly small, narrow, and highly learned controversies, while the former deploys the same tropes and language that Callimachus uses in order to emphasize the greatness of his subject matter and the difficulty of his—and Epicurus’—task. Paschalis argues that Lucretius’ allusions to Callimachus not only call attention to the important questions that the Greek poet leaves unexplored, but also polemicizes against Callimachus’ larger vision of poetry’s philosophical value, as convincing lies that, nevertheless, are useful for leading the reader through obscurity to the truth of the universe. Alison Keith and Peter Heslin both return to the famous Vergilian beatitude with which this introduction begins, and to other key passages of georgic didacticism, as they seek to make sense of the passages’ intratextual and intertextual contexts.

Introduction 5 Each scholar meets with very different results. Keith identifies close connections the farming project of Vergil’s Georgics exhibits with the treatise On Property Management (Πεϱὶ οἰϰονομίας) by Philodemus, who was both Vergil’s contemporary and an influential Epicurean philosopher, as well as with Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura. As Keith notes, the closing of the fourth book of Georgics has long been recognized as containing a distinctly Epicurean tone and themes, and she focuses particularly on the closing passages of the other three books to show a more consistent set of philosophical goals and approaches than has been recognized so far in scholarship. Keith argues that Vergil alludes pointedly to Lucretius in his depiction of Augustus (in both Eclogues and Georgics) as cosmic savior who has brought otium to the world, in much the same way as Epicurus did when he shared his philosophy with humanity. She also shows the connections that Vergil draws between the perceptive and knowledgeable farmer and the ideal philosopher “who could understand the causes of the universe,” as well as the shared suffering of the non-human animals who die in the Noric plague in Georgics and the humans whose illness and deaths close out Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura with the Athenian plague scene. Heslin, meanwhile, argues for an ironic Epicureanism in Georgics, an acknowledgment that totalizing Epicurean assertions about the good life are necessarily incomplete. After tracing the purposeful contradictions present in Philodemus’ and Horace’s representations of themselves as Epicureans in their work, he offers a careful rereading of Vergil’s depiction in Georgics of the farmer who has attained Epicurean happiness. He argues that, throughout this passage, Vergil puts the farmer and the ideal Epicurean philosopher on equal footing, leaving open the possibility that there is more than one path toward the ataraxia that Epicurus’ followers claim can be attained only by following their school’s tenets and way of life. The farmer has stumbled accidentally upon Epicureanism—or, at least, its benefits—without any need for philosophical instruction, and in doing so, the farmer stands as proof that Epicureanism is superfluous. Heslin closes by suggesting that Vergil was himself trying to reconcile two elements that had long been at odds in Epicureanism: poetry, which can help us perceive all the possibilities of the universe but is inherently full of paradox, and philosophy, which strives for self-consistency but can never completely encompass every scenario in life. In some ways, Keith’s and Heslin’s chapters are themselves examples of this approach: while they disagree, they nevertheless present two possibilities that can coexist while contradicting one another. Philosophy is about attaining the good life, and Lucretius’ poem holds out freedom from anxiety (ataraxia) as its ideal path thereto. But other didactic poets teach alternatives to the Epicurean visions in De Rerum Natura and Georgics, and instead focus on other forms of care. So the second part, “Erotodidaxis,” travels to the borderlands between poetry of learning and poetry of love. Sexual and erotic teaching shows up in some unexpected ways in the agricultural and animal contexts of ancient didactic, while didacticism makes creative appearances in Latin love poetry. The chapters in this part consider different aspects of the coded language and indirect techniques that Roman poets employ to teach their students about “the birds

6  T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt and the bees,” sometimes while talking about actual birds and bees. Whereas Vergil’s and especially Lucretius’ texts regularly problematize the erotic as undesirable or downright harmful (see, e.g., Polt 2021: 91–107), elsewhere we see the themes of love and sex being played up as central to an examined life. Even in Vergil, Leah Kronenberg’s chapter shows, erotic and autoerotic intercourse can be aesthetically (re)productive, while the didactics of Vergil’s Georgics are literarily (re)productive for Propertius, as Melanie Racette-Campbell demonstrates. Kronenberg examines how Hesiod and Vergil employ metaphors of masturbation and even autofellatio to teach two different lessons about the value of idle hands and “idle” poetry. Hesiod’s narrator in Works and Days warns against laziness during the winter, which could result in having to squeeze a swollen foot (or masturbate a penis) and suffer with empty hopes (or nonreproductive ejaculation), a sexual-agricultural synchrony of unproductivity or infertility. In Vergil’s Georgics, on the other hand, winter idleness forms a Hellenistic hinge between Hesiodic and Aratean sections of Book 1, and associates autoerotic activity with productivity, utility, and artistic activity. Steven J. Green expands the implications of erotic didactic metaphor to explore the ethical implications of instructions on animal mating in Grattius and Ovid. Green examines how such instruction functions as commentary on Augustan moral legislation and sexual mores in the Principate. By tracing in detail how Vergil, Grattius, Ovid, and Germanicus use animals to stand in metaphorically for erotic relations in the human world, he shows that didactic poets writing during and after Augustus’ reign used their content to contest developments in Roman social norms and laws. Green argues that each of these authors overlays distinctly human relationship concepts, such as marriage, fidelity, and adultery, onto a variety of non-human animals and, in the process, expands their sexual advice—as well as Augustan attempts to control sexuality—into the world, beyond that of the Roman citizens to which it ostensibly applied. Melanie Racette-Campbell closes the part by analyzing the specific language of instruction in Propertius’ erotic elegies and how they respond to prior agricultural didactic in Vergil’s Georgics. Propertius grants verbs of teaching and learning (particularly discere and docere) a special status in his poetry, a status distinct both from his didactic predecessor Vergil and from his elegiac-didactic successor Ovid. The Propertian lover is generally not the instructor but rather the subject of ­instruction, which is carried out more commonly by Amor or the beloved Cynthia herself. Teaching in Propertius matches the broader trajectory of his four books: the Monobiblos is where the speaker learns the rules of the elegiac game, then Books 2 and 3 extend and complicate the didactic picture, while the final book throws teaching right into the tension between Roma and Amor, between elegy and higher genres, with Cynthia’s specter looming over it all in the end. Kronenberg’s chapter shows us how the erotics of didactic poetry can be metapoetic, cloaking an artistic message in sexual language and innuendo. Yet even beyond the sexy stuff, much Roman didactic engages explicitly or implicitly with questions of poesy, with insistent sociopolitical issues, with esoteric understandings of text. The third part of this book, “Metadidaxis,” digs beneath the surface

Introduction 7 of key didactic texts to find hidden programs, double meanings, and literary commentary that, taken together, undermine a stable sense of “didactic” as a genre. As Vergil’s Georgics uses the erotics of masturbatory farmers or animals in rut to make points on aesthetics and social change, so do authors responding to Georgics (from Varro to Grattius to Columella to Hyginus Gromaticus) use agriculture to talk about more than agriculture. The papers in this final part reorient readers of Roman didactic prose and poetry to subtexts of imperial and civic crisis. Joseph McAlhany and Sarah Culpepper Stroup offer rereadings of two key works by Marcus Terentius Varro, whom Quintilian called “the most learned man in Rome” (Institutio Oratoria 10.1.95). They uncover a Varro much more engaged with contemporary crises than one might expect. McAlhany’s exploration of the fragments of Varro’s Menippean Satires highlights Varro’s bookish and withdrawn persona, which conceals the polymath’s didactic interests in the anxieties of his day and age. Too often, McAlhany argues, editors and emenders have imposed their received notions of an antiquarian Varro onto the text of the satiric Varro. In their hunt for the antiquarian’s precision, he says, they totally miss the point—the satirist’s ambiguity. Intertexts exhibited by surviving fragments of the Varronian satire Papia Papae with Catullus, with Varro’s own de Re Rustica, and with the agricultural poem of Columella book 10 reveal that Varro, the satirist, is artfully playing with poetic commonplaces, with ecphrastic techniques, and with agricultural metaphor. Stroup, meanwhile, reexamines Varro’s didactic De Re Rustica, arguing that his fundus acts metaphorically as a meditation on how to govern in ungovernable times. The text, Stroup demonstrates, has much more going on than suggested by its received image as a mere agricultural handbook, a misperception produced by a long history of scholarly neglect of the text’s deeper workings. Stroup’s reading, and her careful parsing of the text’s “sophisticated cryptology and skillful codeswitching,” demonstrate how Varro’s treatise becomes a lament and an attempt to rectify a State that has fallen into disrepair in the midst of civil war, triumvirates, and the looming fall of the Republic. Through Stroup’s rumination on the dialogue genre, Cicero’s interventions in it, and Cicero’s cultivation of “agri cultura” as a metaphor for statecraft (what we might call “the scythe of state”), we see a Varro who uses the didactic pose to reflect on political and social turmoil, on the death of the Republic’s true voice—Cicero—and on the likely death of the Republic with him. De Re Rustica does not teach farming, but rather “how to read and write between the lines.” In an examination of the treatises of imperial agrimensores, Del A. Maticic reveals Hyginus Gromaticus’ ostensibly dry and technical Constitutio Limitum as not only engaged with prior agricultural didactic, such as Vergil’s Georgics, but also reflecting upon the Roman imperial project and the ethical implications of redelineating the world’s traditional boundaries. This work stands apart from other agrimensorial treatises for its literary references—specifically, allusions in its discussion of sundials to Archimedes, Vergil, and Lucan—and Maticic finds in the allusions a subversive element that acknowledges the violence of the Roman wars underpinning the work of the imperial surveyor. As Maticic trenchantly argues,

8  T. H. M. Gellar-Goad and Christopher B. Polt “Hyginus’ allusivity is not only a rhetorical device of the text, but also a way of complicating the poetic and ideological dynamics in the text.” James J. O’Hara gives Horace a swift kick in the Ars and questions the purpose of the familiar Epistula ad Pisones: is this a teaching text, or a satire of one, and if the former, what exactly is it trying to teach? Starting from the unresolved inconsistency between the poem’s opening call for unity in art and the poem’s own disunity or heterogeneity, O’Hara focuses on the profound moments of unclear instruction offered by the didactic persona, who delivers nostrums that would seem to disqualify Horace’s own poetry as being inartful. O’Hara’s careful rereadings and adducement of new and overlooked evidence from ancient literary criticism will prompt scholars to exercise caution before taking Ars Poetica at face value. A primary goal of this volume is to add further nuance and complexity to ongoing conversations about what it means to be a teacher and a student, both in antiquity and today, and to interrogate the various incarnations that education takes as Roman authors experiment with and test the boundaries of education. In this period of crisis and turmoil—the vague pronoun “this” can productively refer either to the late Republic and Augustan Age or to the early twenty-first century—didactic literature ever seems to be doing more than “just” teaching, to be teaching something other than what it claims to. The essays we present here involve reading between the lines, rejecting the premise of the question, probing the holes in the argument, finding the context clues and background connections that point to the real matter at hand. All these interpretive moves are ones that we need in order to understand didactic, that didactic teaches us in the process of reading it, and that didactic uses to confront the societies in which it is written, read, and received. Works Cited Atherton, C., ed. 1998. Form and Content in Didactic Poetry. Bari: Levante. Bloomer, W. M. 2017. The School of Rome: Latin Studies and the Origins of Liberal Education. Berkeley: University of California Press. Canevaro, L. G., and D. O’Rourke, eds. 2019. Didactic Poetry of Greece, Rome and Beyond: Knowledge, Power, Tradition. Swansea: Classical Press of Wales. Dalzell, A. 1996. The Criticism of Didactic Poetry: Essays on Lucretius, Virgil, and Ovid. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Effe, B. 1977. Dichtung und Lehre. Untersuchungen zur Typologie des antiken Lehrgedichts. Munich: Beck. Feeney, D. 2016. Beyond Greek: The Beginnings of Latin Literature. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. Fowler, A. 1982. Kinds of Literature: An Introduction to the Theory of Genres and Modes. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. Fowler, A. 2003. “The Formation of Genres in the Renaissance and After.” New Literary History 34: 185–200. Gale, M., ed. 2004. Latin Epic and Didactic Poetry: Genre, Tradition and Individuality. Swansea: Classical Press of Wales. Gellar-Goad, T. H. M. 2020. Laughing Atoms, Laughing Matter: Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura and Satire. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

Introduction 9 Hutchinson, G. O. 2008. “Structuring Instruction: Didactic Poetry and Prose.” In Talking Books: Readings in Hellenistic and Roman Books of Poetry, ed. G. O. Hutchinson. ­Oxford: Oxford University Press. 228–250. Hutchinson, G. O. 2009. “Read the Instructions: Didactic Poetry and Didactic Prose.” CQ 59: 175–190. Itsumi, K. 2008. “Didactic Poetry: A Generic Tradition?” Journal of Classical Studies 56: 1–13. Keith, A. 2000. Engendering Rome: Women in Latin Epic. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kronenberg, L. 2009. Allegories of Farming from Greece and Rome: Philosophical Satire in Xenophon, Varro and Virgil. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Moatti, C. 1997. La raison de Rome. Naissance de l’esprit à la fin de la République (IIe–Ier siècle avant Jésus-Christ). Paris: Des Travaux. Nelson, S. 1998. God and the Land: The Metaphysics of Farming in Hesiod and Vergil, with a Translation of Hesiod’s Works and Days by David Grene. New York: Oxford University Press. O’Rourke, D. 2019. “Knowledge is power: dynamics of (dis)empowerment in didactic ­poetry.” Canevaro & O’Rourke (2019) 21–52. Padilla Peralta, D. 2020. Divine Institutions: Religions and Community in the Middle Roman Republic. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Polt, C. B. 2021. Catullus and Roman Comedy: Theatricality and Personal Drama in the Late Republic. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rawson, E. 1985. Intellectual Life in the Late Roman Republic. London: Johns Hopkins University Press. Schiesaro, A., P. Mitsis, and J. S. Clay, eds. 1994. Mega nêpios. Il destinatario nell’epos didascalico. The Addressee in Didactic Epic. Pisa: Giardini. Sider, D. 2014. “Didactic Poetry: The Hellenistic Invention of a Pre-Existing Genre.” In Hellenistic Studies at a Crossroads: Exploring Texts, Contexts and Metatexts, edd. R. Hunter et al. Berlin: de Gruyter. 13–29. Toohey, P. 1996. Epic Lessons: An Introduction to Ancient Didactic Poetry. London: Routledge. Toohey, P. 2005. “Periodization and Didactic Poetry.” In Wissensvermittlung in dichterischer Gestalt, eds. M. Horster and C. Reitz. Stuttgart: Steiner. 15–26. Volk, K. 2002. The Poetics of Latin Didactic: Lucretius, Vergil, Ovid, Manilius. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Part I

Teaching Philosophies

1

Lucretius’ DRN and Callimachus’ Hymn to Zeus Comparing and Contrasting Didactic Projects Michael Paschalis

Beginning with E. J. Kenney’s influential article Doctus Lucretius (1970), the prevailing opinion that Lucretius remained untouched by Alexandrian and neoteric influence has gradually been changing. Direct or mediated, Alexandrian literary influence has been detected in more than one area of De Rerum Natura (DRN), from specific intertexts to literary topoi, puns and etymological wordplay, acrostics, and structural correspondences.1 This chapter considers how Lucretius can be seen to allude to Callimachus’ Hymn to Zeus both thematically and lexically, explicating the tensions the Roman poet creates in his modification of Callimachean goals and approaches to teaching. In DRN 4.1–5, Lucretius declares the originality and priority of his work by means of three metaphors: untrodden path, untouched springs, and fresh flowers for a garland:2 auia Pieridum peragro loca nullius ante trita solo. iuuat integros accedere fontis atque haurire, iuuatque nouos decerpere flores insignemque meo capiti petere inde coronam unde prius nulli uelarint tempora musae; I traverse the distant haunts of the Pierides, never trodden before by the foot of man. ’Tis my joy to approach those untasted springs and drink my fill, ’tis my joy to pluck new flowers and gather a glorious coronal for my head from spots whence before the muses have never wreathed the forehead of any man. (Trans. C. Bailey) The first two metaphors have a Callimachean flavor, especially when viewed in combination.3 They recall the Prologue to the Aetia (fr. 1.1.25–28), the sphragis of the Hymn to Apollo (110–112), as well as Epigr. 28.1–4: πρὸς δέ σε] καὶ τόδ᾽ ἄνωγα, τὰ μὴ πατέουσιν ἅμαξαι   τὰ στείβε]ιν, ἑτέρων ἴχνια μὴ καθ᾽ ὁμά δίφρον ἐλ]ᾶ̣ν μηδ᾽ οἷμον ἀνὰ πλατύν, ἀλλὰ κελεύθους ἀτρίπτο]υ̣ς, εἰ καὶ στε[ι]ν̣οτέρην ἐλάσεις. DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-3

14  M. Paschalis Besides, I also urge you to go where big waggons never go,   to drive your chariot not in the same tracks as others and not along a wide road, but along untrodden paths,   even if you will drive it along a more narrow one. (Trans. A. Harder) Δηοῖ δ’ οὐκ ἀπὸ παντὸς ὕδωρ φορέουσι μέλισσαι, ἀλλ’ ἥτις καθαρή τε καὶ ἀχράαντος ἀνέρπει πίδακος ἐξ ἱερῆς ὀλίγη λιβὰς ἄκρον ἄωτον. Not from any sources do bees carry water to Demeter, but from what comes up pure and undefiled from a holy fountain, a small drop, the choicest of waters. (Trans. S. Stephens) ᾿Εχθαίρω τὸ ποίημα τὸ κυκλικόν, οὐδὲ κελεύθῳ   χαίρω, τίς πολλοὺς ὧδε καὶ ὧδε φέρει· μισέω καὶ περίφοιτον ἐρώμενον, οὐδ’ ἀπὸ κρήνης   πίνω· σικχαίνω πάντα τὰ δημόσια. I hate recycled poetry, and get no pleasure   from a road crowded with travellers this way and that. I can’t stand a boy who sleeps around, don’t drink   at public fountains, and loathe everything vulgar. (Trans. F. Nisetich) There is a paradox, however, in the fact that the pursuits for which Lucretius claims absolute novelty in Callimachean terms—the grand subject matter (magnis doceo de rebus), the passionate dedication to the task, and the ambitious mission of his teaching aiming at the liberation of man’s mind from religion—are prominently non-Callimachean (DRN 4.6–9): primum quod magnis doceo de rebus et artis religionum animum nodis exsoluere pergo, deinde quod obscura de re tam lucida pango carmina, musaeo contingens cuncta lepore. First because I teach about great things, and hasten to free the mind from the close bondage of religion, then because on a dark theme I trace verses so full of light, touching all with the Muses’ charm. This aesthetic inconsistency is not limited to DRN. The application of Callimachean metaphors to non-Callimachean contexts or, to put it differently, the combination of Callimachean metaphors with non-Callimachean subject matter, is not

Lucretius’ DRN and Callimachus’ Hymn to Zeus  15 uncommon in Rome.4 When “Alexandrian technique is placed at the service of national, civic poetry,” we may end up with an inherently contradictory outcome. A classic example is Georgics 4.5 Ideally the treatment of the society of tiny bees thematizes the Callimachean aesthetic principles of λεπτότης and πόνος (in tenui labor, 6); but by seeking no little glory for himself (at tenuis non gloria, 6), by assigning magnanimos duces (3) to the smallest of creatures, by involving them in proelia, and by endowing them with Roman moral, political, and social values, the poet creates inherently incongruous situations. These find an emblematic expression in ingentis animos angusto in pectore uersant (“they have great hearts in tiny breasts,” 83) and metaphorically in the equation of tiny bees with giant Cyclopes (170–178), a disparity that Vergil portrays as ironic (si parua licet componere magnis, “if we may compare small things with great,” 176) and may be perceived as having a comic side. Inspiration for the comparison of bees to Cyclopes was derived from the visit of young Artemis and her nine-year-old nymphs to the workshop of the Cyclopes in Callimachus’ Hymn to Artemis (46–85).6 But whereas Callimachus reduces the divine to the level of everyday life, Vergil does the exact opposite: he retains the elevated status of the divine and raises the bees to it. It is not surprising, therefore, that scholars have seen a serious intent in the simile and in general have discussed similarities and differences between the society of bees and Roman society.7 Less common is the view that Georgics 4 is a parody.8 As regards DRN, J. K. Newman has pointed out the “paradox” of Ennius and Homer being praised in Alexandrian terms and of Lucretius using Alexandrian metaphors in speaking of his own poetics, as when he introduces the topic of sleep (DRN 4.907–911):9 nunc quibus ille modis somnus per membra quietem inriget atque animi curas e pectore soluat, suauidicis potius quam multis uersibus edam; paruus ut est cycni melior canor, ille gruum quam clamor in aetheriis dispersus nubibus austri. Now in what ways this sleep floods repose over the limbs, and lets loose the cares of the mind from the breast, I will proclaim in verses of sweet discourse, rather than in many; even as the brief song of the swan is better than the clamour of cranes, which spreads abroad among the clouds of the south high in heaven. If the Callimachean metaphors in the passage above are viewed at the level of micro-narrative, they sound appropriate, but not if placed in the overall context of the lengthy and ideologically ambitious DRN. Actually, in the Proem to Book 4, where we have seen Lucretius claiming novelty and priority for his work, the grand subject matter (magnis de rebus) clashes, in the immediate context, with the λεπτότης originally associated with the use of the aesthetic metaphors employed. Callimachus had notoriously used μέγας, a cognate of magnus, to express his dislike for grand and lengthy subjects. Besides “μέγα βιβλίον, μέγα κακόν” (Athen.

16  M. Paschalis Epit. p. 72a = fr. 465 Pf., “a big book is a big evil”), which became the motto of Alexandrian poetics, Aetia 1.1.19–20 and Hymn to Apollo 108–109 are the bestknown instances: μηδ’ ἀπ’ ἐμεῦ διφᾶτε μέγα ψοφέουσαν ἀοιδήν   τίκτεσθαι· βροντᾶν οὐκ ἐμόν, ἀλλὰ Διός. Do not expect a loudly thundering song to be born from me:   thundering is not my job, but is the work of Zeus. Ἀσσυρίου ποταμοῖο μέγας ῥόος, ἀλλὰ τὰ πολλὰ λύματα γῆς καὶ πολλὸν ἐφ’ ὕδατι συρφετὸν ἕλκει. The flow of the Assyrian river is vast, but it draws along much refuse from the land and much garbage on its waters. Elsewhere Callimachus may employ μέγας in a positive sense. I refer to the praise of Zeus in the homonymous hymn, with which the Roman poet, according to Brown (1982), may have been familiar. The Hymn to Zeus opens as follows (1–9): Ζηνὸς ἔοι τί κεν ἄλλο παρὰ σπονδῇσιν ἀείδειν λώϊον ἢ θεὸν αὐτόν, ἀεὶ μέγαν, αἰὲν ἄνακτα, Πηλαγόνων ἐλατῆρα, δικασπόλον Οὐρανίδῃσι; πῶς καί νιν, Δικταῖον ἀείσομεν ἠὲ Λυκαῖον; ἐν δοιῇ μάλα θυμός, ἐπεὶ γένος ἀμφήριστον. Ζεῦ, σὲ μὲν Ἰδαίοισιν ἐν οὔρεσί φασι γενέσθαι, Ζεῦ, σὲ δ’ ἐν Ἀρκαδίῃ· πότεροι, πάτερ, ἐψεύσαντο; “Κρῆτες ἀεὶ ψεῦσται”· καὶ γὰρ τάφον, ὦ ἄνα, σεῖο Κρῆτες ἐτεκτήναντο· σὺ δ’ οὐ θάνες, ἐσσὶ γὰρ αἰεί. Would anything else be better to hymn at libations of Zeus than the god himself, ever great, ever lord, router of the Titans, dispenser of justice for the sons of Uranus? But how shall we hymn him, as Dictaean or Lycaean? My heart is in doubt, for the birth is contested. Zeus, some say you were born in the Idaean mountains; Zeus, others say in Arcadia. Which of them is telling falsehoods, father? “Cretans always lie.” And indeed, Lord, the Cretans built a tomb for you; but you are not dead, you live forever. (Trans. S. Stephens) This positive use of μέγας invites an aesthetic comparison between Callimachus’ Hymn to Zeus and Lucretius’ DRN. Comparing a literary hymn with a didactic-­ philosophical epic may sound peculiar, even if one takes into consideration the hymnic beginnings of the DRN. What matters in this analysis is that Callimachus’ hymn,

Lucretius’ DRN and Callimachus’ Hymn to Zeus  17 like all of Callimachus’ poetry, is didactic in its own Hellenistic fashion: the hymn is prominently etiological and, as a matter of fact, it is composed of a series of aetia. In the opening lines, Callimachus makes it perfectly clear that the primary goal of the hymn is to investigate and establish Zeus’ place of birth (later, the manner of his accession comes up, as well) and to have his audience share this knowledge.10 Not only is the subject of the hymn “grand,” as it concerns the king of the gods, but its “grandness” is also indicated in a programmatic fashion at the very beginning of the hymn: Callimachus introduces Zeus as “ever great, ever lord” (ἀεὶ μέγαν, αἰὲν ἄνακτα). In what follows, however, the poet conspicuously contradicts the readers’ expectations raised by the three introductory lines. Specifically, the main topic of the hymn turns out not to be, as the poet proceeds to explain, Zeus’ struggle for achieving greatness or the majesty of his rule, but the philological dispute concerning the place of his birth—Crete or Arcadia. Also, on three occasions—in the beginning, toward the middle, and in the epilogue of the hymn—Callimachus ­deliberately avoids telling the readers the story behind Zeus’ accession to the throne. The treatment of Zeus’ greatness would thus turn out to be a counterexample to Lucretius’ teaching of magnae res. Viewed from a different angle, the Hymn to Zeus would constitute the reverse analogue of DRN: the treatment of the subject itself is perfectly Callimachean, but the use of μέγας to describe it clashes with Callimachean rejection of a grand subject matter, just as Lucretius uses Callimachean metaphors to describe a grand subject matter. In the passage quoted above, the attention of the reader is drawn not to the event of Zeus’ victory over the Titans (“router of the Titans”) but to the rare word that suggests their origin: they are called Πηλαγόνες, “Mud-born,” for being sons of Gaia. The main aetion of the hymn involves Zeus’ place of birth and concomitant questions; there are also several other aetia, such as how the rivers in Arcadia were born and how the “Omphalian plain” in Crete received its name, as well as numerous allusive etymologies of other names. Around the middle of the hymn, Callimachus protests that the story about Zeus and his brothers’ casting lots for sky, sea, and underworld is not true because Zeus actually gained the rule of the sky through his great deeds, force, and might. His might is confirmed by his patronage of the eagle, king of birds, and of earthly rulers, but not a single word is spoken about the gods’ struggle with the Titans and other battles that won him the throne (60–69): δηναιοὶ δ’ οὐ πάμπαν ἀληθέες ἦσαν ἀοιδοί· φάντο πάλον Κρονίδῃσι διάτριχα δώματα νεῖμαι· τίς δέ κ’ ἐπ’ Οὐλύμπῳ τε καὶ Ἄϊδι κλῆρον ἐρύσσαι, ὃς μάλα μὴ νενίηλος; ἐπ’ ἰσαίῃ γὰρ ἔοικε πήλασθαι· τὰ δὲ τόσσον ὅσον διὰ πλεῖστον ἔχουσι. ψευδοίμην, ἀΐοντος ἅ κεν πεπίθοιεν ἀκουήν. οὔ σε θεῶν ἑσσῆνα πάλοι θέσαν, ἔργα δὲ χειρῶν, σή τε βίη τό τε κάρτος, ὃ καὶ πέλας εἵσαο δίφρου. θήκαο δ’ οἰωνῶν μέγ’ ὑπείροχον ἀγγελιώτην σῶν τεράων· ἅ τ’ ἐμοῖσι φίλοις ἐνδέξια φαίνοις.

18  M. Paschalis Ancient poets are not always completely truthful: they claim that a lot assigned homes in a threefold division to the sons of Cronus, but who would cast lots for Olympus and Hades, unless he were utterly foolish? For one casts lots, it seems, for things that are of equal value, but these are very far apart. I would tell fictions of the sort that would persuade the ear of the listener. Lots did not make you king of the gods, but the deeds of your hands; your force and might, which you have set beside your throne. And you made the most distinguished of birds the messenger of your omens (may those omens you show to my friends be favorable). In the epilogue of the hymn, singing of Zeus’ violent deeds is still a desideratum. The story is alluded to but is not told, and we now hear from the poet’s lips that it cannot be told by humans. The formula employed here provides a plausible excuse for avoiding the subject and anticipates Roman poetic recusatio (92–93):         τεὰ δ’ ἔργματα τίς κεν ἀείδοι; οὐ γένετ’, οὐκ ἔσται· τίς κεν Διὸς ἔργματ’ ἀείσει;         Who would sing of your deeds? There has not been, there will not be; who shall sing of the deeds of Zeus? Despite Alan Cameron’s argument that the object of Callimachus’ polemic was not epic but elegy, it is abundantly clear that Callimachus avoids or downplays epic themes, like battles, and transforms heroic figures, like Theseus in Hecale, into attentive listeners of stories told by an old woman, who eventually receives all the distinction commonly reserved for the epic hero (Theseus gives her name to the local deme and founds a shrine of Zeus Hekaleios).11 The poet of DRN does the exact opposite: he introduces battles in his philosophical didactic poem and metaphorically establishes the philosopher Epicurus as a heroic figure.12 Gian Biagio Conte has compared Epicurus’ battle with personified religio in 1.62–79 to an epic duel: he cites, in this respect, Iliad 17.166–168, in which Glaucus reproaches Hector for refusing to fight Ajax:13 ἀλλὰ σύ γ’ Αἴαντος μεγαλήτορος οὐκ ἐτάλασσας στήμεναι ἄντα κατ’ ὄσσε ἰδὼν δηΐων ἐν ἀϋτῇ, οὐδ’ ἰθὺς μαχέσασθαι, ἐπεὶ σέο φέρτερός ἐστι. But you don’t dare stand up to Ajax in the thick of battle, look that brave warrior in the eye, or confront him one on one, since he’s a better man than you. (Trans. I. Johnston) humana ante oculos foede cum uita iaceret in terris oppressa graui sub religione quae caput a caeli regionibus ostendebat

Lucretius’ DRN and Callimachus’ Hymn to Zeus  19 horribili super aspectu mortalibus instans, primum Graius homo mortalis tollere contra est oculos ausus primusque obsistere contra, quem neque fama deum nec fulmina nec minitanti murmure compressit caelum, sed eo magis acrem irritat animi uirtutem, effringere ut arta naturae primus portarum claustra cupiret. When the life of man lay foul to see and groveling upon the earth, crushed by the weight of religion, which showed her face from the realms of heaven, lowering upon mortals with dreadful mien, ’twas a man of Greece who dared first to raise his mortal eyes to meet her, and first to stand forth to meet her: him neither the stories of the gods nor thunderbolts checked, nor the sky with its revengeful roar, but all the more spurred the eager daring of his mind to yearn to be the first to break through the close-set bolts upon the doors of nature. Given the cosmic nature of the battle in Lucretius, the monstrosity of religio, the achievement of Epicurus’ triumph (namely, the truth about the nature of the universe), as well as the envisaged establishment of a new order of things, the learned reader may be reminded of what Callimachus has deliberately left out in the Hymn to Zeus: the battles with the Titans and Gaia’s other monstrous children, Typhon and Echidna, whom Zeus had to fight in order to achieve and consolidate his power and a new divine order. Epicurus’ battles against metus, cura, and dolor recur elsewhere in DRN. In the proem to book 5, he is deemed far superior to the monster-fighter Hercules, another element reminding the reader of Zeus’ struggles with the children of Gaia. In the same proem, Epicurus is described as an all-powerful deity who was able to subdue human passion and vices and revealed to mankind “the entire nature of things” (omnem rerum naturam, 54). On the whole, while Callimachus enlightens the reader about rare myths and sophisticated origins of things and names within the context of his λεπταλέα τέχνη, Lucretius adopts Callimachean language to teach the truth about the grand subject of “the nature of things,” which was ­revealed to mankind thanks to the epic battles of heroic Epicurus. Using Alexandrian terms, Lucretius proudly proclaims his successful efforts in achieving clarity out of a dark theme (quod obscura de re tam lucida pango | carmina, 1.933–934 = 4.7–8, where pango may suggest Hellenistic and Neoteric πόνος | labor). Dispelling fiction and false ideas is the primary goal of his teaching. What about Callimachus? The poet sets out to “clarify” two mythological issues, namely Zeus’ place of birth (Crete or Arcadia) and the manner of his ­accession to the throne (by lot or by force). The two questions concern philological disputes, not philosophical debates and the salvation of humankind, as in Lucretius. Especially through the subtle and skillful use of etiology, the poet dismisses claims to the Cretan birth of Zeus but, at the same time, he works out a suspicious compromise: he recounts the god’s birth and bath in Arcadia but has the infant transferred to Crete immediately afterword.14 So much for clarity! There is a probable manipulation of evidence here favoring the rare version of Zeus’ place of birth in a typical Alexandrian fashion.

20  M. Paschalis As regards the question of Zeus’ accession to the throne, the poet contests the truthfulness of ancient poets (δηναιοὶ δ’ οὐ πάμπαν ἀληθέες ἦσαν ἀοιδοί, 60) because they claimed that he won it by lot, and promises to tell convincing lies (ψευδοίμην, ἀΐοντος ἅ κεν πεπίθοιεν ἀκουήν, 65). Poetry had been officially represented as the art of fiction since the Muses told the poet of the Theogony ἴδμεν ψεύδεα πολλὰ λέγειν ἐτύμοισιν ὁμοῖα (“we know how to tell many lies that sound truthful,” 27); Callimachus rephrases the Hesiodic line by claiming that what matters is not whether the poet lies, but whether he lies convincingly.15 Lucretius is undoubtedly polemicizing against these views when he pronounces upon the nature and function of poetry (1.934–950). The charm of poetry, he claims, is not an end to itself, where truth and fiction are indistinguishable, but a means to an end, which is clarity and truth: it is only intended to lure an audience into learning the truth about the nature of things, just as a physician places honey on the lip of the cup to deceive children into drinking a bitter medicine (DRN 1.931–942): primum quod magnis doceo de rebus et artis religionum animum nodis exsoluere pergo, deinde quod obscura de re tam lucida pango carmina, musaeo contingens cuncta lepore. id quoque enim non ab nulla ratione uidetur; sed ueluti pueris absinthia taetra medentes cum dare conantur, prius oras pocula circum contingunt mellis dulci flauoque liquore, ut puerorum aetas improuida ludificetur labrorum tenus, interea perpotet amarum absinthi laticem deceptaque non capiatur, sed potius tali pacto recreata ualescat; First because I teach about great things, and hasten to free the mind from the close bondage of religion, then because on a dark theme I trace verses so full of light, touching all with the muses’ charm. For that too is seen to be not without good reason; but even as healers, when they essay to give loathsome wormwood to children, first touch the rim all round the cup with the sweet golden moisture of honey, so that the unwitting age of children may be beguiled as far as the lips, and meanwhile may drink the bitter draught of wormwood, and though charmed may not be harmed, but rather by such means may be restored and come to health. Notes 1 See, for instance, Gale (2007, 70–72), Farrell (2008), Gale (2001). 2 The lines are repeated from DRN 1.926–930. 3 Cf. Kenney (1970), Brown (1982), Graca (1989, 67–70), Donohue (1993, 35–48), Volk (2002, 87–88). Knox (1999) doubts that Lucretius was inspired by Callimachus. Cf.

Lucretius’ DRN and Callimachus’ Hymn to Zeus  21

4 5 6 7 8

9 10 11 12 13 1 4 15

also Nethercut (2020) 142, 144: “Lucretius recycles Empedocles’ irrigation motif only to strip the image of any metaphorical associations. … It is not Ennian water, Callimachean water, or Empedoclean water; and so, we should perhaps wonder, it may not even function as a source of inspiration.” Studies of Callimachean influence on Roman poetry, such as Wimmel (1960) or Hunter (2006), do not, as a rule, treat this aspect of the subject. A significant exception is Cody (1976). Newman (1967, 12). Mynors (1990, 280–281); Thomas (1988, 179). See, for instance, Griffin (1979), Miles (1980), Batstone (1997), and Morley (2007). For instance, Harrison (2007, 156–160) places Georgics 4 in the mock epic tradition: “Georgics 4 is (amongst other things) to be the Vergilian equivalent of the Battle of Frogs and Mice in the Homeric poetic career as constructed in Rome, the mock-epic prelude to Vergil’s Iliad.” Newman (1986, 111–112). Cf. Racette-Campbell’s contribution in the present volume on the didactic relation ­between Virgil’s Georgics and the function of amatory teaching and learning in Propertius’ elegies. Cameron (1995). For a good discussion of this subject, see Graca (1989). Conte (1994, 2). For the epic features of De Rerum Natura, see, among others, West (1969) and Gale (1994, 99–128). Hopkinson (1984). Interpretations (and translations) of the Muses’ statement diverge widely; for a brief survey, see Pucci (2009, 42–43).

Works Cited Batstone, W. 1997. “Virgilian Didaxis: Value and Meaning in the Georgics.” In The Cambridge Companion to Virgil, ed. C. Martindale. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 125–144. Brown, R. D. 1982. “Lucretius and Callimachus.” ICS 7: 77–97. Cameron, A. 1995. Callimachus and His Critics. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Cody, J. V. 1976. Horace and Callimachean Aesthetics. Brussels: Latomus. Conte, G. B. 1994. Genres and Readers. G. W. Most, trans. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Donohue, H. 1993. The Song of the Swan: Lucretius and the Influence of Callimachus. Lanham: University Press of America. Farrell, J. 2008. “The Six Books of Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura: Antecedents and Influence.” Dictynna 5: 115–139. Gale, M. R. 1994. Myth and Poetry in Lucretius. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gale, M. R. 2001. “Etymological Wordplay and Poetic Succession in Lucretius.” CP 96: 168–172. Gale, M. R. 2007. “Lucretius and Previous Poetic Traditions.” In The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius, eds. S. Gillespie and P. Hardie. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 59–75. Graca, C. 1989. Da Epicuro a Lucrezio: il maestro ed il poeta nei proemi del De rerum natura. Amsterdam: Hakkert. Griffin, J. 1979. “The Fourth Georgic, Virgil, and Rome.” G&R 26: 61–80. Harrison, S. J. 2007. Generic Enrichment in Vergil and Horace. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

22  M. Paschalis Hopkinson, N. 1984. “Callimachus’ Hymn to Zeus.” CQ 34: 139–148. Hunter, R. 2006. The Shadow of Callimachus: Studies in the Reception of Hellenistic Poetry at Rome. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kenney, E. J. 1970. “Doctus Lucretius.” Mnemosyne 23: 366–392. Knox, P. E. 1999. “Lucretius on the Narrow Road.” HSCP 99: 275–287. Miles, G. B. 1980. Virgil’s Georgics: A New Interpretation. Berkeley: University of California Press. Morley, N. 2007. “Civil War and Succession in Roman Beekeeping.” Historia 56: 462–470. Mynors, R. A. B. 1990. Virgil: Georgics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Nethercut, J. S. 2020. Ennius Noster. Lucretius and the Annales. New York: Oxford University Press. Newman, J. K. 1967. The Concept of Vates in Augustan Poetry. Brussels: Lotamus. Newman, J. K. 1986. The Classical Epic Tradition. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press. Pucci, P. 2009. “The Poetry of the Theogony.” In Brill’s Companion to Hesiod, eds. F. Montanari, A. Rengakos and C. Tsagalis. Leiden and Boston: Brill. 37–70. Thomas, R. F. 1988. Virgil: Georgics, 2 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Volk, K. 2002. The Poetics of Latin Didactic: Lucretius, Vergil, Ovid, Manilius. Oxford: Oxford University Press. West, D. 1969. The Imagery and Poetry of Lucretius. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Wimmel, W. 1960. Kallimachos in Rom: Die Nachfolge seines apologetischen Dichtens in der Augusteerzeit. Wiesbaden: Steiner.

2

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics Alison Keith

Scholars have frequently investigated Vergil’s Georgics for evidence of philosophical engagement, especially in support of or opposition to Epicurean precepts.1 Analysis of the fourth Georgic in particular has consistently identified a distinctively Epicurean worldview in the garden of the old man of Tarentum and the famous sphragis to the poem at the end.2 This study, too, pursues an Epicurean reading of the Georgics, but with a focus on the concluding passages of Georgics 1–3. I argue that the codas of Georgics 1–3, like that of Georgics 4, present an internally consistent view of Vergil’s farming project as an instance of Epicurean estate management, in close conversation with Philodemus’ more or less contemporary treatise on property management, Περὶ οἰκονομίας (De oeconomia), which is part of his multivolume work On vices and their corresponding virtues. Throughout my discussion I adduce parallels not only from Philodemus but also from the De Rerum Natura (DRN) of Vergil’s Roman predecessor Lucretius and the De Morte of Vergil’s best friend Varius, as well as from the works of Epicurus himself (341–270 bce), as they are cited in our sources.3 Vergil’s interest in philosophy has long been recognized, beginning with the ancient biographical tradition.4 Thus Probus reports that Vergil “lived for several years in wealthy leisure, as a follower of the sect of Epicurus, enjoying outstanding harmony and friendship with Quintilius, Tucca and Varius” (uixit pluribus annis … liberali in otio secutus Epicuri sectam, insigni concordia et familiaritate usus Quintili, Tuccae et Vari). This report of Vergil’s Epicurean friendships has been confirmed by the discovery at Herculaneum of papyrus fragments that document our poet as one of the four addressees of (at least three of the ten books in) Philodemus’ On Vices (PHerc. 253 fr. 12.4, title unknown; PHerc. 1082.11.3, “On Flattery”; P.Herc. Paris 2, “On Calumny”).5 Dated to the middle of the first century bce, the books consistently address the four friends in the same order (P.Herc. Paris 2): ὦ Πλώτιε και Οὐά|ρ[ι]ε καὶ Οὐεργ[ί]λιε καὶ Κοιντ[ί|λιε. (“O Plotius and Varius, Vergil, and Quintilius”; Armstrong 2014: 97–100). The evidence of Horace’s first book of Sermones, published in 35 bce just as Vergil was embarking on the composition of the Georgics, supplements the documentary evidence and confirms Vergil’s standing as an integral member of this community of Epicurean students,6 inviting DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-4

24  A. Keith us to reread the Georgics with renewed attention to its possible articulation of Epicurean principles.7 The Cosmic Savior We may begin by considering the characterization of Octavian as a cosmic savior at the end of the first Georgic (1.500–501): hunc saltem euerso iuuenem succurrere saeclo | ne prohibete (“at least do not prevent this youth from bringing succor to a world in ruins”). The divine youth invoked by Vergil here is Octavian, explicitly named as Caesar three lines later (1.503), in the same pattern of prayer as that offered by Horace in C. 1.2, who likewise glosses iuuenem (C. 1.2.41) with the name of Caesar (1.2.52; Mynors 1991: 96 ad loc.). The prayer at the conclusion of G. 1 closely recalls the opening movement of the book, especially Vergil’s invocation of the triumvir among the deities to whom he appeals in the proem (1.24–42), and links the finale of the book to that of the sphragis of G. 4. There, the poet also names Caesar and celebrates his armed exploits at the edge of the Roman empire (Scodel and Thomas 1984), as the Euphrates goes from threatening war (hinc mouet Euphrates, illinc Germania bellum, G. 1.509) to the very site of Caesar’s military operations (Caesar dum magnus ad altum | fulminat Euphraten bello, G. 4.560–561). The contrast in the poem’s sphragis between the poet’s Epicurean posture and the triumvir’s military successes could hardly be greater (G. 4.559–64): haec super aruorum cultu pecorumque canebam et super arboribus, Caesar dum magnus ad altum fulminat Euphraten bello uictorque uolentis per populos dat iura uiamque adfectat Olympo. illo Vergilium me tempore dulcis alebat Parthenope studiis florentem ignobilis oti, carmina qui lusi pastorum audaxque iuuenta, Tityre, te patulae cecini sub tegmina fagi. I sang this song about the cultivation of fields, flocks and trees, while great Caesar thundered at the deep Euphrates in war and in victory gave laws to willing nations and opened a path to Olympus. At that time, sweet Naples nourished me, flourishing in the pursuits of inglorious leisure—Vergil, who sported shepherds’ songs and, in my youth, boldly sang of you, Tityrus, ­beneath the canopy of a spreading beech tree. Vergil’s posture of “inglorious leisure” (ignobilis oti, 465) during his composition of the poem accords with the Epicurean precepts of living “unknown” (λάθε βιώσας) in untroubled serenity (ἀταραξία) and confirms the biographical tradition that, in adulthood, the poet lived in Epicurean retirement (secessu, VSD 13).8 By contrast, Octavian’s espousal of political and military pursuits, in the codas to both Books 1 and 4, represents him as the antithesis of Epicurean principles. How might

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  25 we reconcile Vergil’s consistent presentation of Octavian as a seasoned military campaigner with an Epicurean profile? We may begin by considering Vergil’s invocation of the same youthful savior in the first eclogue (B. 1.6–10, 42–45):9 o Meliboee, deus nobis haec otia fecit. namque erit ille mihi semper deus, illius aram saepe tener nostris ab ouilibus imbuet agnus. ille meas errare boues, ut cernis, et ipsum ludere quae uellem calamo permisit agresti… 10 hic illum uidi iuuenem, Meliboee, quotannis bis senos cui nostra dies altaria fumant. hic mihi responsum primus dedit ille petenti: ‘pascite ut ante boues, pueri; summittite tauros.’45 O Meliboeus, a god gave us this leisure. For he will always be a god to me, and a tender lamb from our sheepfold will often stain his altar. He allowed my cattle to roam, as you see, and me to play what I wished on the rustic pipe.… Here I saw that youth, Meliboeus, for whom our altars will smoke [with sacrificial offerings] twelve days every year. Here he first gave a response to my petition: “pasture your cattle as before, boys; rear your bulls.” Here, Tityrus characterizes Octavian as the savior of his farm and, forever after, a divinity worthy of his repeated worship. In his herdsman’s programmatic statement to Meliboeus (Buc. 1.6–7), Vergil reveals a deep familiarity with, and profound sympathy for, the Epicurean project as Lucretius formulates it. The peace in which Tityrus lives, literally “leisure” (otia, Buc. 1.6), has overtones of the tranquility (ἀταραξία) sought by the Epicureans, not least because it has a precise referent in Lucretius’ phrase otia dia, “divine leisure,” in his account of the origins of music (Lucr. 5.1384–1387): inde minutatim dulcis didicere querelas, tibia quas fundit digitis pulsate canentum, 1385 auia per nemora ac siluas saltusque reperta, per loca pastorum deserta atque otia dia. Then, little by little, they learned the sweet notes that ripple from the plaintive pipe as the player’s fingers strike the stops—the pipe invented in pathless woods and forests and forest glades, in the solitary spots where shepherds rest in the open air. (tr. Smith)10 Moreover, the way the fortunate herdsman Tityrus here phrases his debt to this unnamed god for the gift of leisure alludes specifically to the proem of Lucretius’ fifth book, where the didactic poet invokes Epicurus as a famous god (deus ille fuit,

26  A. Keith deus) who has redeemed human life from storms and darkness to set it in tranquility (in tam tranquillo) and bright light (Lucr. 5.7–12): nam si, ut ipsa petit maiestas cognita rerum, dicendum est, deus ille fuit, deus, inclute Memmi, qui princeps uitae rationem inuenit eam quae nunc appellatur sapientia, quique per artem 10 fluctibus e tantis uitam tantisque tenebris in tam tranquillo et tam clara luce locauit. For if we are to speak as the majesty of his revelations demands, a god he was, a god, illustrious Memmius, who first discovered that principle of life which is now identified with wisdom, and who by his genius saved life from such mighty waves and such deep darkness and moored it in such calm and so brilliant a light. (tr. Smith) Peter Bing (2016) has shown that Tityrus’ god, “who ‘created for us haec otia’ … reads almost as a gloss on Lucretius’ conception of a deity who set life in tam tranquillo.” Just as Lucretius asserts his personal belief in Epicurus’ divinity (DRN 5.19), so, too, does Vergil’s herdsman proclaim that the youth “will always be a god to [him]” (Buc. 1.7). Even the detail of Tityrus’ altars smoking every month for the god (1.42–43) may have an Epicurean point, if we recall the tradition of a monthly meal shared in memory of Epicurus, with which Vergil would have been familiar from his experience of the Epicurean communities on the Bay of Naples.11 However, if there is an Epicurean valence in Vergil’s use of deus and otium in the first eclogue, the poet has left it implicit by withholding the name of the god Tityrus worships, even though Meliboeus specifically inquires into the god’s identity (Buc. 1.18): sed tamen iste deus qui sit, da, Tityre, nobis (“but still, tell me Tityrus, who this god of yours may be”). A tradition as old as Servius saw the future emperor Augustus in the unnamed god Octavian, and this identification is widely accepted today (also by me).12 Scholars have preferred to interpret the passage in the light of triumviral history rather than Epicurean philosophy, but it may be possible to unite historical allegoresis with philosophical point, if due weight is given to Tityrus’ emphasis on the god’s youth. For the polymath Varro, Cicero’s contemporary and the author of a treatise on farming13 from which Vergil drew extensively in the Georgics, seems to have derived the noun iuuenis from the verb iuuo (“help”) in his study of Latin etymologies, De Lingua Latina (45/44 bce). The etymology is explicitly preserved both by the thirdcentury-ce grammarian Censorinus (14.2: in tertio gradu qui erant usque quinque et quadraginta annos, iuuenis appellatos, eo quod rem publicam in re militari possent iuuare, “In the third rank are those who were up to forty-five years of age, called ‘iuuenes’ from the fact that they can help the state in the military sphere”) and also by Isidore, the seventh-century-ce Bishop of Seville (Orig. 11.2.16: iuuenis uocatus, quod iuuare posse incipit, “a youth is so called because he is starting to be able to

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  27 help”).14 This is also the very etymology that Vergil underlines, again in connection with the youth Octavian, at the end of the first Georgic, where the poet entreats the gods “not to prevent this youth from helping [iuuenem succurere] a world in ruins” (G. 1.500–501, quoted above).15 The etymology is underlined by the juxtaposition of the words side by side, in the style of a learned gloss.16 Moreover, this is precisely the same etymology as that of the Greek noun ἐπίκουρος (“helper”), which was the name of the founder of Epicureanism (Clay 2009: 11). In the Bucolics, Tityrus’ unnamed deity enters the collection doubly marked as an Epicurean savior—by both Lucretian allusion and his youth—and Vergil reprises this characterization in application to the same divine youth, Octavian, at the end of the first Georgic.17 Scholars may have been reluctant to see a political point in the Epicurean color of the divine youth’s representation in the first eclogue and the finale of the first Georgic because Diogenes Laertius reports Epicurus’ notorious advice to his followers to avoid politics (D.L. 10.119): οὐδε πολιτεύσεσθαι, ὡς ἐν τῇ πρώτῃ Περὶ βίων (“nor will [the wise man] participate in civic life, as he says in Book one of On Ways of Life”).18 But there is increasing recognition that Epicurus himself allowed for exceptions to the rule, and we also have compelling evidence of Epicurean philosophical engagement among Roman politicians of Vergil’s time.19 Prominent Roman adherents of the sect included Piso,20 Caesar’s father-in-law and Philodemus’ patron, and also Caesar’s assassin Cassius,21 whose conversion to Epicureanism (probably in 48) was deprecated by Cicero in a series of letters expressing his objections to Epicurean doctrine (ad Fam. 5.16–19; Gilbert 2015: chh. 4–5). Cicero’s abundant correspondence amply illustrates how philosophically engaged politicians were accustomed to articulate their political decisions, at least in part, in terms of their ethical commitments (Griffin 1989; Gilbert 2015). It is by no means anachronistic, therefore, to see similar political significance in the Epicurean tonality not only of Tityrus’ response to Meliboeus in the first eclogue, but also of the poet-preceptor’s prayer to the gods at the end of the first Georgic. Both passages draw on a complex of Lucretian passages to characterize the deity as a contemporary Epicurean savior, and thereby to sketch both the bucolic singer and the georgic poet as adherents of the young Caesar in that role.22 The Epicurean provenance of this lexicon is further confirmed by Diogenes Laertius’ report of the abuse directed at Epicurus himself for “shamelessly flattering Mithras, Lysimachus’ administrator, by calling him ‘Healer and Lord’ in his letters” (D.L. 10.4: Μιθρῆν τε αἰσχρῶς κολακεύειν τὸν Λυσιμάχου διοικητήν, ἐν ταῖς ἐπιστολαῖς Παιᾶνα καὶ Ἄνακτα καλοῦντα). Epicurus’ use of the god Apollo’s titles “Healer and Lord” in application to Mithras in their correspondence offers a strikingly apposite model for Vergil’s invocation of the Apolline youth Octavian as an Epicurean savior in his own early verse. The Good Life Another passage that has attracted a good deal of attention in the debate about Vergil’s philosophical engagement is the comparison of the lives of the philosopher and farmer at the end of the second Georgic (2.458–540). This part of the

28  A. Keith poem has long been seen to contain numerous points of contact with Lucretius,23 and these intertextual cues must inform any interpretation of the hierarchy of ways of life at the heart of the passage, where the georgic poet identifies the best life as that of the poet of natural philosophy (G. 2.490–492): felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas | atque metus omnis et inexorabile fatum | subiecit pedibus strepitumque Acherontis auari (“blessed is he who could understand the causes of the universe and trampled beneath his feet all fears and relentless fate and the howl of greedy Acheron”). Many commentators have seen in this beatitude a reference specifically to Lucretius,24 since Vergil’s language is heavily indebted to the Epicurean poet. Indeed, the philosopher who could account for the origins of the universe sounds very much like the great Latin exponent of Epicurean doctrine of the previous generation, who set out Epicurus’ salvific precepts in Latin verses, from which Vergil repeatedly draws in this passage (DRN 3.1071–1075, 5.1185).25 For Lucretius’ aim was precisely to trample beneath his feet the superstitious fear of death engendered by religio (1.78–79, 3.35–40) and thus, following Epicurus, to liberate us to enjoy the life of pleasure exemplified by the Epicurean gods. If the philosopher’s life is supremely blessed, however, Vergil asserts that the farmer’s too is highly fortunate (G. 2.493–494): fortunatus et ille deos qui nouit agrestis | Panaque Siluanumque senem Nymphasque sorores (“fortunate, too, is that man who knows the country gods—Pan and old man Siluanus, and the sister nymphs”). The sincerity of this praise has been called into question because Vergil here draws on a passage in which Lucretius explains credence in the gods as arising from primitive men’s fear of natural phenomena and he derides their superstition, including rustic belief in Pan and the nymphs (DRN 4.580–589): haec loca capripedes satyros nymphasque tenere 580 finitimi fingunt et faunos esse loquuntur quorum noctiuago strepitu ludoque iocanti adfirmant uulgo taciturna silentia rumpi chordarumque sonos fieri dulcisque querelas, tibia quas fundit digitis pulsata canentum, 585 et genus agricolum late sentiscere, cum Pan pinea semiferi capitis uelamina quassans unco saepe labro calamos percurrit hiantis, fistula siluestrem ne cesset fundere musam. Such places are fancied by local people to be the haunts of nymphs and goatfooted satyrs, and to be the homes of fauns, by whose night-pervading clamor and frolicsome revelry the still silence is, they say, often broken; sounds of strings are heard, and sweet notes ripple from the plaintive pipe as the players’ fingers strike the stops. They relate also that the rustic folk far and wide perceive the sound, when Pan, shaking the sprays of pine that shadow his half-bestial head, time and again runs over the hollow reeds with pursed lips, making a ceaseless stream of sylvan music flow from his pipe.

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  29 Vergil’s pointed allusion to this passage in DRN 4 undoubtedly confirms that his farmer is no Epicurean philosopher-poet. Yet it does not necessarily follow that the farmer cannot live according to Epicurean principles. Indeed, I believe that we can integrate Vergil’s praise of the farmer’s knowledge of rustic gods within the ambit of an Epicurean worldview, even though the georgic poet invokes the very rustic divinities (deos agrestis, G. 2.493) who appear in Lucretius’ derisive account of the gods imagined by the genus agricolum (DRN 4.586).26 For while Lucretius’ implacable hostility to religion is engendered by the entirely praiseworthy goal (in the Epicurean worldview) of ridding mankind of the miseries caused by erroneous belief in the gods (as specified, e.g., at 1.62–135, 5.1194–1240), Epicurus himself was celebrated for his piety to the gods (D.L. 10.10): τῆς μὲν γὰρ πρὸς θεοὺς ὁσιότητος καὶ πρὸς πατρίδα φιλίας ἄλεκτος ἡ διάθεσις (“his piety to the gods and love for his country were too great for words”). Indeed, Diogenes Laertius (10.27) records a treatise “On Piety” among the great man’s writings, and his disciple Philodemus wrote a treatise of the same name, fragments of which survive.27 In the extant fragments, Philodemus upholds the canonical Epicurean position that the gods exist (thereby arguing against the charge, often leveled against the sect, of atheism) by reference to the authority of Epicurus and Metrodorus, whose belief in the gods’ immortality is proven by their exhortation to observe cult ritual. Diogenes Laertius also reports the Epicurean injunction that the wise man “will enjoy himself more than others at state festivals” (10.120a, μᾶλλον τε εὐφρανθήσεσθαι τῶν ἄλλων ἐν ταῖς θεωρίαις), “on the grounds,” as Monica Gale has acutely observed, “that the gods (if approached in the correct frame of mind) provide us with an inspiring example of perfect peace and tranquility, even if they do not respond directly to prayer or worship.”28 It is especially noteworthy that Vergil specifically couches his comparison of the farmer’s life to the philosopher’s in a ranked order: happiest is the philosopher (G. 2.490–492), fortunate too (i.e., next best) is the farmer (G. 2.493–494).29 The question of what makes for a happy life was the central focus of ancient philosophical disputation and debate at least from the time of Solon, according to Herodotus (1.30.2–33), who reports the Athenian sage’s discussion with Croesus about how to rank different ways of life according to a theoretical calculus of happiness (1.31.1). In the developed Greek philosophical tradition, it is unusual for any life except that of the philosopher to stand at the top of the hierarchy, and in this respect the poetpreceptor of the Georgics appears to toe a conventional line. The ranking expressed in the beatitudes, moreover, is fully consistent with the georgic poet’s preferential articulation of the lives of farmer and philosopher at the outset of the closural movement of the second Georgic, which opens with an ecstatic statement of the fortunate lot of the farmer (2.458–459: o fortunatos ­nimium, sua si bona norint, | agricolas!, “o too fortunate—if they knew their own blessings—farmers!”) before proceeding to express a preference for the lot of the poet of natural philosophy (2.475–489): me uero primum dulces ante omnia Musae, 475 quarum sacra fero ingenti percussus amore, accipiant caelique uias et sidera monstrent,

30  A. Keith defectus solis uarios lunaeque labores; unde tremor terris, qua ui maria alta tumescent obicibus ruptis rursusque in se ipsa resident, 480 quid tantum Oceano properent se tingere soles hiberni, uel quae tardis mora noctibus obstet. sin has ne possim naturae accedere partis frigidus obstiterit circum praecordia sanguis, rura mihi et rigui placeant in uallibus amnes, 485 flumina amem siluasque inglorius… But as for me, first may the Muses, sweet before all things, whose sacred emblems I bear, struck with huge love, receive me, and show me heaven’s paths and the stars, the sun’s various eclipses, the moon’s labors; whence comes a trembling in the earth, by what force the deep seas swell and, their barriers burst, subside again back upon themselves, why winter suns hasten so to dip themselves in Ocean, or what delay obstructs slow nights. But if the blood round my heart runs cold and prevents me from being able to reach the realms of nature, let me delight in the countryside and the running streams in the valleys; let me love the rivers and the woods, though I be without renown. In this latter passage, Vergil encapsulates, in Lucretian language, the themes of natural philosophy set out according to Epicurean principles in the last two books of DRN—astronomy, seismology, storms at sea or the tides, and variations in the lengths of day and night.30 Even the georgic poet’s concern that he may fail in his aspiration to compose a DRN is couched in the language of Epicurean commitment in his self-exhortation to “take pleasure” (2.485) in the countryside, with its streams and rivers, valleys and woods (a landscape repeatedly eulogized by Lucretius, DRN 2.24–36, 5.1392–1396, quoted below). He accepts, moreover, that his failure may result in a life “without renown” (inglorius, G. 2.486),31 yet one that can also, paradoxically, be reconciled to one of Epicurean commitment. For the adjective inglorius (2.486) bears an Epicurean valence in its reminiscence of the master’s injunction to “live unknown” (λάθη βιώσας) and his recommendation to withdraw from society into retirement (KD 14 apud D.L. 10.143):32 Tῆς ἀσφαλείας τῆς ἐξ ἀνθρώπων γενομένης μέχρι τινὸς δυνάμει τε ἐξερειστικῇ καὶ εὐπορίᾳ εἰλικρινεστέρα γίνεται ἡ ἐκ τῆς ἡσυχίας καὶ ἐκχωρήσεως τῶν πολλῶν ἀσφάλεια (“the purest security is that which comes from a quiet life and withdrawal from the many, although a certain degree of security arising from other men does come by means of the power to repel [attacks] and by means of prosperity”). The poet-preceptor represents himself doing exactly this in the sphragis to the Georgics (4.564–565: illo Vergilium me tempore dulcis alebat | Parthenope studiis florentem ignobilis oti, “at that time sweet Parthenope nurtured me, Vergil, rejoicing in the pursuits of inglorious ease”), and the biographical tradition confirms his preference for living “in retirement” in Campania and Sicily (VSD 13: secessu Campaniae Siciliaeque plurimum uteretur).33 Thus, the georgic poet’s initial contrast between the two modes of life of farming and natural philosophy (2.458–474,

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  31 themselves amenable to interpretation as two competing poetic vocations) leads directly into the two beatitudes, which restate, in inverted order, the same comparative value (2.490–494). The emphatic repetition with variation confirms the georgic poet’s acceptance of the secondary standing of the farmer (and poetry about farming) in this hierarchy and should therefore be interpreted neither as ironic nor as a disavowal of natural philosophy as the proudest pursuit of humankind.34 Rather, I believe that we can map Vergil’s verdict onto the Epicurean ethical ideal articulated by his teacher Philodemus in his treatise On Property Management, which responds to the long tradition of philosophical inquiry into the ethical and practical dimensions of administering property.35 There he assesses traditional sources of income according to the Epicurean hedonistic calculus (coll. 22.6–23.36), in order to determine which life it might be appropriate for the Epicurean to pursue.36 Philodemus argues against the conventional view, especially relevant in the context of Rome’s Mediterranean hegemony, that the best way of life is military, regarding it instead as the choice of unwise and vainglorious men (22.17–28). While he does not reject equestrian arts out of hand, he implies that an equestrian way of life is strenuous and laborious, and thus the antithesis of the ideal Epicurean life; he is also highly critical of making money from mines (col. 23.1–7). Philodemus accepts other sources of income with varying degrees of enthusiasm,37 including that of the estate owner’s way of life, of which he is extremely laudatory (col. 23.7–18): ταλαίπωρον δὲ καὶ | τὸ ῾γεωργο[ῦν]τ᾽ αὐτὸν οὕτως | ὥστε αὐτουργεῖν᾽· τὸ δ᾽῾ἄλλων, | ἔχοντα γῆν᾽ κατὰ σπουδαῖ|ον· ἥκιστα γὰρ ἐπιπλοκὰς ἔ|χει πρὸς ἀνθρώπους, ἐξ ὦν | ἀηδίαι πολλαὶ παρακολου|θοῦσι, καὶ διαγωγὴν ἐπιτερ-|πῆ καὶ μετὰ φίλων ἀναχώρη|σιν εὔσχολον καὶ παρὰ τοῖς | σώφροσι]ν εὐσχημονεστά|την πρόσοδον. “Cultivating the land oneself in a manner involving work with one’s own hands” is also wretched, while [cultivating it] “using other workers if one is a landowner” is appropriate for the good man. For it brings the least possible involvement with men from whom many disagreeable things follow, and a pleasant life, a leisurely retreat with one’s friends, and a most dignified income to [those who are moderate]. At the climax of the passage, however, Philodemus emphasizes that the best life is that of the philosopher (23.22–36, tr. Tsouna 2012): πρῶτον δὲ | καὶ κάλλιστον ἀπὸ λόγων | φιλο[σό]φων ἀνδράσιν δεκτι|κοῖς μεταδιδομέν[ων] ἀν|τιμεταλαμβάνειν εὐχάρι|σστο[ν ἅμ]α μετὰ σεβασμοῦ | παντ[ός], ὡς ἐγένετ᾽ Ἐπικο[ύ] | ρωι, λο[ιπὸ]ν δὲ ἀληθινῶν καὶ | ἀφιλο[ν] ε[ί]κων καὶ [σ]υ[λ]λήβδη[ν] | εἰπεῖν [ἀτ]αράχων, ὡς τό γε δι|ὰ σοφ[ιστι] κῶν καὶ ἀγωνιστι[κ]ῶν ο[ὐδέν] ἐστι βέλτιον τοῦ | διὰ δη[μοκ]οπικῶν καὶ συκο|φαντικ[ῶν].38 However, the first and noblest thing is to receive back thankful gifts with all reverence in return for philosophical discourses shared with men capable of

32  A. Keith understanding them, as happened to Epicurus, and, [moreover], discourses that are truthful and free of strife and, [in short], serene, since in fact the acquisition of an income through [sophistical] and contentious speeches is [in no way] better than its acquisition through demagogical and slandering ones. To rank the philosopher at the apex of the hierarchy of ways of life was conventional in classical antiquity, but Philodemus’ exaltation of philosophy-teaching as the first and best source of moneymaking innovates within this tradition, and has been read in close conjunction with his concomitant praise of the landowner, who makes the philosophy teacher’s life possible. Thus, Voula Tsouna has suggested that we should think of the landowner as “a gracious host who offers his country property as a peaceful retreat where philosophy flourishes and true enjoyment is attained” (2012: xl). On such a reading, Vergil can be seen to accept, indeed to echo, Philodemus’ ranking of the relative dignity of the two ways of life in his own assessment of the natural philosopher’s life as the happiest, but one which is closely followed by that of the gentleman farmer, whom Philip Thibodeau has shown to be the exemplary addressee of the Georgics, implicit in the figure of Maecenas, the poem’s named addressee (2011: passim, esp. ch. 1–3). Indeed, Vergil’s idealization of the leisure enjoyed on broad estates in this section of the book (latis otia fundis, 2.468) presupposes the poem’s addressee as a wealthy landowner and gentleman farmer of the vast holdings called latifundia by the wealthy Roman elite.39 The poet’s extended praise of the farmer’s life (G. 2.467–474, 2.513–540) thus invites interpretation as a poetic elaboration of the idyllic vision of that life offered by Philodemus in On Property Management. Moreover, within this Philodemean hierarchical framework, Vergil draws on contemporary Latin stylizations of Epicurean ethics, both in Lucretius’ DRN and in his friend L. Varius Rufus’ De Morte.40 The fortunate farmer’s knowledge of Lucretius’ agricultural gods (G. 2.493–494) is balanced by his disavowal of Roman politics, civil war, and the avarice and ambition that fuel both (2.495–499): illum non populi fasces, non purpura regum 495 flexit et infidos agitans discordia fratres, aut coniurato descendens Dacus ab Histro, non res Romanae perituraque regna; neque ille aut doluit miserans inopem aut inuidit habenti. Neither elected office nor the purple of kings bends him, and the civil discord leading brothers to betray their faith or the Dacian moving down from the Danube sworn to war, nor Roman politics nor kingdoms doomed to fall; though pitying the poor man, he is untroubled, nor does he envy the wealthy man. The elected office (2.495) unknown to Vergil’s farmer recalls Lucretius’ picture of the hell that electoral ambition makes for the would-be politician (DRN 3.996–997): qui petere a populo fasces saeuasque secures | imbibit et semper uictus tristisque recedit (“[Sisyphus is] the man who imbibes a desire to seek elected office  and

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  33 imbibes the savage axes and, always defeated, returns home unhappily”). As Epicurus pithily exhorts his adherents (VS 67): Ἐλεύθερος βίος οὐ δύναται κτήσασθαι χρήματα πολλὰ διὰ τὸ πρᾶγμα ῥᾴδιον εἶναι χωρὶς θητείας ὄχλων ἢ δυναστῶν (“a free life cannot acquire great wealth, because the task is not easy without slavery to the mob or those in power”). Indeed, as Epicurus explains (SV 53), “one should envy no one, for the good are not worthy of envy, and the more good fortune the wicked have, the more they spoil it for themselves.” (οὐδενὶ φθονητέον· ἀγαθοὶ γὰρ οὐκ ἄξιοι φθόνου, πονηροὶ δὲ ὅσῳ ἂν μᾶλλον εὐτυχῶσι, τοσούτῳ μᾶλλον αὐτοῖς λυμαίνονται.) Just so, Vergil shows the politician suffering because of his misguided ethics (2.505–507): hic petit excidiis urbem miserosque penatis, | ut gemma bibat et Sarrano dormiat ostro; | condit opes alius defossoque incubat auro (“this one seeks to visit city and wretched homes with destruction, in order to drink from a jeweled cup and sleep on Tyrian purple; another hoards his wealth and sleeps above his buried gold”). In this depiction of the avarice that animates the ambitious politician, Vergil rehearses his friend Varius’ memorable portrait in De Morte (“On Death, a quintessentially Epicurean topic)41 of a politician selling the state’s land and laws to the highest bidder (frr. 147–148 Hollis):42 uendidit hic Latium populis, agrosque Quiritum | eripuit; fixit leges pretio atque refixit. | incubet ut Tyriis atque ex solido bibat auro (“this man has sold Latium to the people, and stolen the citizens’ farms; he fixed and re-fixed laws for a price, in order to recline on Tyrian purple and drink from solid gold”). Later in the passage, moreover, Vergil extolls the idyllic life of the farmer whose “sweet children hang on his neck with kisses,” in an image that confirms “the modesty that his chaste household preserves” (G. 2.523–524, interea dulces ­pendent circum oscula nati, | casta pudicitiam seruat domus), drawing on Lucretius’ ­description of all that the deceased do not miss at death (DRN 3.894–896): iam iam non domus accipiet te laeta, neque uxor | optima nec dulces occurrent oscula nati | praeripere (“‘never again,’ mourners say, ‘will your household receive you with joy; never again will the best of wives welcome you home; never again will your dear children race for the prize of your first kisses’”). Even Vergil’s reference at the outset of the passage, to the “easy living the most righteous earth pours forth from the ground” (G. 2.460, fundit humo facilem uictum iustissima tellus) for the benefit of the fortunate farmer, may lend itself to Epicurean interpretation. Though the phrase has occasioned consternation among commentators, who worry that it contradicts Vergil’s statement in the first Georgic that “father Jupiter himself decreed the path of the farmer to be far from easy” (1.121–122, pater ipse colendi | haud facilem esse uiam uoluit),43 the sentiment adapts Epicurus’ key doctrine of the relative ease of the acquisition of natural wealth (KD 15): Ὁ τῆς φύσεως πλοῦτος καὶ ὥρισται καὶ εὐπόριστός ἐστιν· ὁ δὲ τῶν κενῶν δοξῶν εἰς ἄπειρον ἐκπίπτει (“nature’s wealth is both limited and easy to procure; but the wealth of groundless opinions vanishes into thin air”).44 Epicurus’ view of natural wealth can be partially supplemented by reference to Philodemus’ discussion, in his treatise On Property Management, of Metrodorus’ refinement of the Epicurean principle that the happy life is free from toil and care. Philodemus (quoting from Metrodorus’ lost treatise On Wealth) accepts the

34  A. Keith Epicurean premise that the acquisition and management of wealth entail continuous mental attention and often physical labor (i.e., care and toil), but he follows his modification of the principle to articulate the view that rational calculation according to the Epicurean hedonistic calculus shows that the possession and administration of wealth enable one to live more pleasantly than does its absence (coll. 13–15). Philodemus’ careful recalibrations shed light on the philosophical modality of ­labor in the Georgics. Vergil introduces unrelenting toil as a central feature of the farmer’s life (1.145–159), and his characterization of labor as troublesome is fully consistent with the Epicurean principle that work is unpleasant and therefore should be avoided.45 Nonetheless, the georgic poet shows that due a­ ttention to agricultural labor can result in the farmer’s enjoyment of the very felicity that Philodemus accepts as the goal of Epicurean estate management (2.513–518): agricola incuruo terram dimouit aratro: hic anni labor, hinc patriam paruosque nepotes sustinet, hinc armenta boum meritosque iuuencos. 515 nec requies, quin aut pomis exuberet annus aut fetu pecorum aut Cerealis mergite culmi, prouentuque oneret sulcus atque horrea uincat. Meanwhile, the husbandman has cleared the soil with crooked plow; hence comes his year’s work, hence he sustains his country and small grandsons, hence his herds of cows and faithful bullocks. He has no rest, but the season teems either with fruits, or with increase of the herds, or with the sheaves of Ceres’ corn, loading the furrows with its yield and bursting the barns. The farmer’s abundance (exuberet annus, 516) depends on his ceaseless care and labor (labor, 514; nec requies, 516), both of which are, on the face of it, antithetical to the professed Epicurean pursuit of pleasure. Monica Gale has well discussed the tensions that emerge in this passage (and other passages) through Vergil’s juxtaposition—in a Lucretian lexicon—of the desirable “easy livelihood” (facilem uictum, 2.460) and “untroubled peace” (secura quies, 467) of Epicurean philosophy with the unremitting “annual labor” (anni labor, 514) “without rest” (nec requies, 516) deprecated by that hedonistic sect.46 Yet an exclusive focus on Lucretius obscures the noisy plurality of competing contemporary voices that amplify Vergil’s commentary on Epicurean values in this passage. In his praise of the lives of both philosopher and farmer, Vergil synthesizes the views of Epicurus, Metrodorus, and their Italian followers Philodemus, Lucretius, and Varius across a wide array of lexical, ethical, and thematic points of contact. Plague and Death The conclusion of the third Georgic has long been recognized as engaging very closely with Lucretius’ account of the Athenian plague at the end of DRN. Joseph Farrell has described Vergil’s account of the Noric cattle plague as narrowly

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  35 reworking, “not only verbally, but structurally and thematically as well,”47 Lucretius’ account of the plague at Athens in DRN 6, and he has accordingly argued that Vergil conceived of the third Georgic in its entirety as an imitation of DRN 6 in its entirety (1991: 169–206). Monica Gale calls Georgics 3 “a kind of DRN in miniature, with its two programmatic proems and its central digression on the power of amor,” and she notes that the Lucretian “parallels culminate in the Noric cattle plague at the end of the book, which is Virgil’s closest and most sustained imitation of any Lucretian passage” (2000: 45).48 Vergil’s emphasis on animal husbandry in Georgics 3 dictates his description of the progression of the Noric plague from livestock to wild animals (G. 3.494–497) and thence, in the concluding lines of the book, to humankind (G. 3.563–566), which constitute the focus of Lucretius’ plague narrative. As a whole, moreover, Vergil’s account of the Noric plague rehearses in miniature the movement of Lucretius’ description of the plague at Athens: etiology (V. G. 3.478–481 ~ Lucr. DRN 6.1090–1144), symptomology (V. G. 3.482–485 ~ Lucr. DRN 6.1145–1198), epidemiology (V. G. 3.486–547 ~ Lucr. DRN 6.1215–1286). Nor is it only the progression of the plague that Vergil borrows from Lucretius. A host of scholars has charted the abundance of not only Vergil’s lexical borrowings from, but also his metrical debts to, his Lucretian model.49 As Farrell emphasizes: “At bottom … [Vergil’s] ‘plague’ is almost a cento of Lucretian ideas, images, and diction” (1991: 86). The scholarly debate that the passage has generated has focused on the affective tone of Vergil’s plague narrative and the ethical import of its placement at the end of the third book. Yet it is important to recognize, in this regard, that Vergil’s account of the plague at Noricum participates in the same ethical tradition as Lucretius’ description of the Athenian plague. This ethical dimension emerges particularly forcefully at critical points in the passage. Vergil’s initial emphasis on the futility of religion in the face of the plague in his opening vignette of a sacrificial bullock falling dead at the altar from the disease (G. 3.486–493) is fully consistent with Lucretius’ message. Vergil draws especially closely here on Lucretius’ description of the sacrifice of Iphigenia at the outset of the poem (DRN 1.84–101), by which he illustrates the dreadful “evils religio has inspired” among men (tantum religio potuit suadere malorum, 1.101).50 Thus, the Vergilian bull, with “the woollen fillet’s snowy band passed round its brow” (lanea dum niuea circumdatur infula uitta, G. 3.487), recalls Lucretius’ portrait of Iphigenia wearing the “fillet passed round her maidenly locks” (DRN 1.87, cui simul infula uirgineos circumdata comptus). Like Iphigenia, who “stands before the altars” (ante aras adstare, 1.89) “trembling” (tremibunda, 1.95), Vergil’s unfortunate victim “stands at the altars” (stans hostia ad aram, G. 3.486) “condemned to death” (moribunda, 3.488). Agamemnon’s attendants conceal the sacrificial knife from Iphigenia (ferrum celare ministros, DRN 1.90), just as Vergil’s ritual attendants watch the sacrificial victim fall before they can even slaughter it (inter cunctantis cecidit moribunda ministros, G. 3.488). As Gale observes, “the allusion[s] contribute to the horror of the passage, and to the humanization of the victim” (2000: 108). Other details of the Vergilian scene are adapted from Lucretius’ highly emotive description in DRN 2 of a mother cow searching for her lost calf, already dead,

36  A. Keith having been killed in ritual sacrifice (2.352–354): nam saepe ante deum uitulus delubra decora | turicremas propter mactatus concidit aras | sanguinis exspirans calidum de pectore flumen (“for often a bullock, sacrificed before the gods’ shrines, has fallen beside the incense-burning altars, breathing out a warm stream of blood”). The vain death of the sacrificial bull evokes Lucretius’ repeated expressions of hostility to religio throughout DRN (G. 3.489–493, cf. Gale 2000: 109–111): aut si quam ferro mactauerat ante sacerdos, inde neque impositis ardent altaria fibris, nec responsa potest consultus reddere uates, ac uix suppositi tinguntur sanguine cultri summaque ieiuna sanie infuscatur harena. Or if, before that, the priest had sacrificed the bull with his iron knife, then neither did the altars blaze when the entrails were laid on them, nor was the seer, when consulted, able to return oracular responses; and scarcely were the knives, laid beneath the victim’s neck, stained with blood; only the surface of the sand is stained with thin gore. Vergil’s pathetic scene, standing at the beginning of his account of the plague at Noricum, sounds a distinctly Lucretian note throughout. By condensing Lucretius’ most emotional passages about the evils to which religio drives mankind in his opening plague vignette, Vergil underlines the futility of our recourse to empty ritual in extremis. By humanizing the animal deaths he records in the plague narrative, moreover, the georgic poet confirms the human ethical framework through which it should be interpreted.51 Thus, the futile sacrifice at the outset of the passage leads directly to the plague’s spread among sacrificial cattle, who “yield up their sweet breath at full stalls” (G. 3.495, et dulcis animas plena ad praesepia reddunt), just as Lucretius’ Athenians “yielded up their life” (DRN 6.1198, reddebant … uitam) as plague gripped the city. The Noric cattle plague then infects the “fawning dogs” (G. 3.496, hinc canibus blandis rabies uenit), whom Lucretius identifies as the most hard-hit demographic in ancient Athens after the human population (DRN 6.1222–1223): cum primis fida canum uis | strata uiis animam ponebat in omnibus aegre (“the chief sufferers were the faithful dogs: they lay stretched in every street and reluctantly relinquished the life that the violence of the plague wrenched from their limbs”).52 Vergil’s swine suffer from the human symptoms of a “gasping cough” and “swollen throats” (G. 3.496–497, et quatit aegros | tussis anhela sues ac faucibus angit obesis), which afflict the Athenians in Lucretius (DRN 6.1188–1189): tenuia sputa minuta … | … per fauces rauca uix edita tussi (“the saliva thin and scanty … expectorated with difficulty by a raucous cough”). Lucretius’ plague lexicon similarly pervades Vergil’s extended description of the death of a prize racehorse (G. 3.498–514), again with “the effect of presenting the horse in very human terms” (Thomas 1988: 2.135 ad 501–502), and thereby inviting ethical reflection on the worth of glory in the midst of death and disease. In

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  37 the early stages of the disease, the horse’s “skin becomes dry and hard to the touch, resisting the handler” (G. 3.501–502, aret | pellis et ad tactum tractanti dura resistit), just as, in Athens, the human victim’s “skin grew cold and hard” at the final hour (DRN 6.1194–1195, frigida pellis | duraque). In his recourse to clinical symptomology in describing the disease (G. 3.503: haec ante exitium primis dant signa diebus, “they gave these signs in the first days before their death”), Vergil also echoes Lucretius (DRN 6.1182, multaque praeterea mortis tum signa dabantur, “then numerous symptoms of death appeared as well”).53 The georgic poet emphasizes the horse’s quasi-human suffering in his application of Lucretian phraseology to his symptoms. The stallion’s “eyes blaze” (G. 3.505, uero ardentes oculi) like the Athenian plague-sufferer, whose eyes gleam red (DRN 6.1146, et duplices oculos suffusa luce rubentis); he “draws deeps breaths” (G. 3.505–506, attractus ab alto | spiritus) like Lucretius’ victim (DRN 6.1186, creber spiritus aut ingens raroque coortus, “breath rapid or ponderous and slow”); he even “strains his flanks with moaning and drawn out gasping” (G. 3.506–507, interdum gemitu grauis, imaque longo | ilia singultu tendunt) like the dying Athenian “mixing complaints with moaning, and wracked by a convulsive gasping” (DRN 6.1159–60, et gemitu commixta querela. | singultusque frequens); until “black blood runs from his nostrils and his tongue blocks his throat” (G. 3.507–508, it naribus ater | sanguis, et obsessas fauces permit aspera lingua), like the Athenian plague victims, whose “purulent blood issues from choked nostrils” (DRN 6.1203, corruptus sanguis expletis naribus ibat) and whose “tongue—heavy to move and rough to touch—oozed with blood” (DRN 6.1149–1150, lingua cruore | debilitata … motu grauis, aspera tactu). Just when a treatment appears to offer hope for the steed’s recovery, “soon even this led to death” (G. 3.511, mox erat hoc ipsum exitio), as was also the case in Lucretius’ account of the Athenian plague, where the treatment that works for some “proved poison to others and caused their death” (DRN 6.1229, hoc aliis erat exitio letumque parabat). Vergil’s racehorse finally succumbs “under the sickness of death by tearing its limbs apart with its own teeth” (G. 3.512–514, ipsique suos iam morte sub aegra | … | discissos nudis laniabant dentibus artus),54 an end that Richard Thomas has proposed was “suggested by the plague-victim’s self-­ dismemberment” in Lucretius’ harrowing account of the Athenian plague’s effect on the morale of its victims (DRN 6.1206–1211; 1988: 2.137). Vergil retains Lucretius’ emotional intensity in this passage, with a proverbial appeal to the gods at the climax of the racehorse’s death (G. 3.513): di meliora piis, erroremque hostibus illum! (“gods grant a better end to the pious, that madness to our enemy”). While inconsistent with Lucretius’ rejection of divine intervention, Vergil’s employment of this proverbial expression recalls his own programmatic injunction to religious devotion in the first Georgic (in primis uenerare deos, 1.338) and aligns the passage with the ethical focus on piety in Epicurus and Philodemus.55 A similarly gruesome death next undoes the plowman’s yoked team, as one of his oxen “drops dead, spurting blood mixed with foam and heaving a dying groan” (G. 3.516–517, concidit et mixtum spumis uomit ore cruorem | extremosque ciet gemitus). In his vivid picture of the plow-ox’s death, Vergil unites Lucretius’ emotive depiction of the pathetic death of the sacrificial calf at the altar (DRN 2.353–354,

38  A. Keith quoted above) with his clinical treatment of the symptomology of an epileptic fit (3.489, concidit et spumas agit, cf. 6.793). In its death throes, the ox can find no succor in the pastoral world of cool valleys and natural lakes (G. 3.520–522): non umbrae altorum nemorum, non mollia possunt | prata mouere animum, non qui per saxa uolutus | purior electro campum petit amnis (“no shade from high groves, no soft meadows can move his spirit, no stream running clearer than amber over the rocks and seeking the plain”). Yet the ox’ natural habitat is precisely the felicitous countryside of the previous book’s fortunate farmer (2.467–471): at secura quies et nescia fallere uita diues opum uariarum, at latis otia fundis, speluncae uiuique lacus, at frigida tempe mugitusque boum mollesque sub arbore somni 470 non absunt… Yet they enjoy serenity free from disturbance and a life innocent of deception and rich in diverse resources; yet they enjoy leisure on broad estates, caves, and natural lakes; yet they enjoy cool valleys, the lowing of cattle, and soft sleep beneath a tree. In the reversal of the farmer’s georgic felicity with the death of his plow-ox, Vergil has often been thought to undermine Epicurean ethics. Yet such a reversal is also the hallmark of Lucretius’ description of the plague at Athens which, at the end of DRN, destroys the civilization celebrated as the zenith of human achievement at the outset. Indeed, the Lucretian cast of Vergil’s plague is further focused by Macrobius’ comparison (Saturn. 6.2.6) of this very passage to Lucretius’ emotional description of the sacrificed calf’s mother in a desperate search for her missing offspring (DRN 2.361–363): nec tenerae salices atque herbae rore uigentes | fluminaque illa queunt summis labentia ripis | oblectare animum subitamque auertere curam (“tender willow shoots, and grass freshened by dew, and those familiar streams brimming their banks as they slide by, fail to soothe her mind and remove the pang of anguish”). Furthermore, the georgic poet himself sounds an Epicurean moral here, at the very center of his description of the Noric cattle plague, in his lament over the plow-ox, dead despite the simple felicity of its life (G. 3.525–530): quid labor aut benefacta iuuant, quid uomere terras 525 inuertisse grauis? atqui non Massica Bacchi munera, non illis epulae nocuere repostae: frondibus et uictu pascuntur simplices herbae, pocula sunt fontes liquidi atque exercita cursu flumina, nec somnos abrumpit cura salubris. 530 What good do his labor and services do? Or his having turned the heavy earth with the plowshare? And yet no Massic gifts of Bacchus harmed them, no

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  39 feasts, often renewed, harmed them. They feed on leaves and simple grass for their sustenance; their cups are clear springs and rivers racing in their course, and no care interrupts their healthy sleep. Attributing human labor aut benefacta (3.525) to the unfortunate ox, Vergil assimilates the animal to the fortunate farmer of the second Georgic, who enjoys the natural delights of the countryside (2.467–471, quoted above), without knowledge of the evils of urban luxury (2.461–466). The healthy life enjoyed by Vergil’s plowoxen likewise distinguishes them from the men of worldly ambition repeatedly excoriated by Lucretius (DRN 2.24–36 [2.29–33 = 5.1392–1396]). As Lucretius caustically observes of the human world, and Vergil here documents in the animal realm, “fevers quit the body no more quickly” (nec calidae citius decedent corpore febres, DRN 2.34), “whether” one indulges in luxurious living (textilibus si in picturis ostroque rubenti | iacteris, DRN 2.35–6) or toils in the farmer’s field (G. 3.525–30). The devastation of both farming and piety closes the book, with the loss of sacrificial bullocks and plow oxen (G. 3.531–533). Men are reduced to substituting wild oxen for sacrifice and plowing, and finally to tilling the earth with hoes (rastris, 3.534) and even their own nails (ipsis | unguibus, 3.534–535) as all animal life, both domestic and wild, perishes (3.535–555). The desolation Vergil documents in this passage returns the Norici to the primitive state of early man described by Lucretius in his anthropology (DRN 5.931–959),56 in a perverse evocation of the mythical golden age, when sheep were safe from wolves and deer from hunting dogs (G. 3.537–540), as all living things contract the disease and perforce quit their conventional pursuits.57 Vergil emphasizes the impotence of medical practitioners (3.549–550), as had Lucretius before him (DRN 6.1179), and depicts disease (morbus) and fear (metus, G. 3.552), the twin scourges of Lucretius’ plague (DRN 6.1206–1211, quoted above; 6.1230–1234), roaming unchecked, driven by the fury Tisiphone, who “bears her head aloft” (G. 3.553, caput altius effert) like Lucretius’ religio, “displaying her head from the celestial regions” (DRN 1.64, quae caput a caeli regionibus ostendebat). The final image of “heaps of dead cattle, piled up at their stalls, their corpses rotten with putrid gore” (G. 3.556–557, iamque cateruatim dat stragem atque aggerat ipsis | in stabulis turpi dilapsa cadauera tabo)58 evokes the horrifying climax of Lucretius’ account of the Athenian plague (DRN 1262–1263): omnia complebant loca tectaque; quo magis aestu | confertos ita aceruatim mors accumulabat (“they filled every space and building; and their being stuffed together in the stifling heat made them an easier prey to death, which piled them up in heaps”). Until they learn to bury every part of the plague-ridden victims (G. 3.558–562), the Norici themselves contract the infection from the beasts’ diseased corpses (3.564–566): ardentes papulae atque immundus olentia sudor | membra sequebatur, nec longo deinde moranti | tempore contactos artus sacer ignis edebat (“fevered blisters and foul sweat ran along his reeking limbs, nor did the accursed fire allow him to linger any length of time after that before consuming his stricken extremities”). The cattle plague manifests itself in humans as erysipelas (cellulitis), for which the Latin term

40  A. Keith was “the accursed fire” (erysipelas est quem Latini sacrum ignem appellant, Isid. Orig. 4.8.4), introduced by Lucretius into Latin literature (DRN 6.660–661: existit sacer ignis et urit corpore serpens | quamcumque arripuit partem, “the accursed fire breaks out and creeps over the body, inflaming every part it attacks as it crawls across the frame”). Vergil draws the reference here, however, from Lucretius’ symptomology of the Athenian plague, where the disease ominously recurs (6.1165–1167): sed potius tepidum minibus proponere tactum | et simul ulceribus quasi inustis omne rubere | corpus, ut est per membra sacer dum diditur ignis (“rather [the surface of the body] felt tepid to the touch, though at the same time it was all red with ulcerous scars, as is the case when the accursed fire spreads over the limbs”). These lexical and thematic findings are well known, but it is worth emphasizing how pervasive Epicurean ethical sentiment is as well throughout the conclusion of the third Georgic. The cosmic and civic devastation on display in Vergil’s Noric plague narrative is systematically underpinned by the Epicurean logic of Lucretius’ account of the Athenian plague in DRN 6. This is also the ethical worldview that animates the endings of the first and second Georgics, as we have seen, and likewise dominates the concluding sphragis of the fourth (Freer 2019). Vergil’s debts throughout Georgics 1–3, not only to the Latin lexicon of Epicureanism developed by Lucretius and Varius Rufus but also to the materialist ethics and sociocultural themes articulated by Epicurus and Philodemus, are visible in his invocation of the divine savior at the end of the first Georgic, his idyllic representation of the blessed Epicurean life of the farmer at the end of the second, and his linked portrayals of the futility of religion and the inevitability of death at the end of the third. If the georgic poet eschews discussion of the material basis of the universe, it is not because he rejects Epicurean physics, but because his didactic project in the Georgics is ethical in nature, subtended by Lucretius’ powerful exposition of Epicurus’ physical principles in DRN.59 Monica Gale has persuasively argued that Epicurean physics also undergird the whole of the argument of the fourth Georgic, where “the miniature world of Virgil’s bees has parallels with the miniature world of Lucretius’ atoms” and “the conclusion [of the book] seems to reassert the Lucretian notion that birth and death are interdependent, that decay and destruction must be accepted as the inevitable complement of creation and growth” (Gale 2000: 49, 56). Acceptance of this physical framework allows Vergil—like his Epicurean teacher Philodemus and his Roman contemporaries Varius and Horace—to focus in the Georgics on the most pressing ethical issue of the day, and one that he had repeatedly explored already in the Bucolics, viz., how to manage a farm in a world racked by civil war, relentless toil, disease, and death. Notes 1 Epicurean readings are offered by Paratore (1939); Alfonsi (1959); La Penna (1977); Gigante and Capasso (1989); Gigante (2004); Davis (2012) 163–170; and Freer (2019). Vergil’s intertextual relationship with Lucretius in the Georgics is the focus of another set of interpretations, which are skeptical of his Epicurean commitment: see Freudenberg (1987); Farrell (1991) 169–206; Schäfer (1996); Gale (2000). By contrast, Morgan (1999) argues that Vergil espouses a Stoic line in the Georgics.

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  41 2 See, for example, La Penna (1977); Johnson (2004); Davis (2012) 163–170; Freer (2019). 3 I use the text of Mynors (1969) for Vergil’s Georgics; translations are my own, though I have sometimes consulted Fairclough rev. Goold (1999). For Lucretius, I use the text of Bailey (1928) and the translation of Smith (2001). On Lucretius and Philodemus, see Beer (2008). 4 DSV reports that, amid the rest of his studies, he was particularly interested in medicine and mathematics (both branches of the study of philosophy in antiquity), especially the latter (Verg. 15), and that, after finishing the Aeneid, he planned to devote the rest of his life to the study of philosophy (35). Servius’ reference to Vergil’s studies at Naples (ad Aen. 1) also probably implies philosophical pursuits, for Naples—like Campania more generally—was a storied bastion of Greek culture in Italy, including, especially, philosophical study. On Vergil’s continuing interest in philosophy throughout his life, see Farrell (2014) 61–90, with further bibliography. 5 Gigante and Capasso (1989); Gigante (2004) 92–95; Blank (2019). 6 Hor. Serm. 1.5.40 (Plotius et Varius Sinuessae Vergiliusque), 1.10.81 (Plotius et Varius, Maecenas Vergiliusque); see Sider (1997) 19–23. 7 Cf. Yona (2018), an analysis of Horace’s engagement with Epicurean ethics in his two books of Sermones. 8 On Epicurean philosophy in G. 4.559–66, see Freer (2019). 9 My discussion here rehearses Keith (2020) 35–37. 10 It must be noted, however, that Vergil’s bucolic collection shows an uneasy awareness of the fragility of ataraxia in the troubled period after the assassination of Caesar. 11 Davis (2012) 28. Commentators have preferred to compare the monthly celebration of the king’s birthday in Hellenistic ruler cult (e.g., Clausen 1994: 48–49, with further bibliography), but Epicurus made provisions in his will for his own monthly commemoration in cult, and his adherents duly followed the practice for centuries after his death: on the monthly banquets, instituted in Epicurus’ will (D.L. 10.16–22), see Clay (2009) 22–25. The Epicurean tradition of a shared meal may also be reflected in the ending of Buc. 1, where Tityrus shares his simple fare with Meliboeus (Buc. 1.80–81): mitia poma, | castaneae molles et pressi copia lactis (“gentle fruits, soft chestnuts, and an abundance of cheese”). Cf. Philodemus’ Epigr. 27 (Sider), an invitation poem addressed to the Epicurean master’s patron Piso, on the occasion of the “Feast of the Twentieth.” 12 See, for example, Coleman (1977) 20 and 80 ad Buc. 1.42; Clausen (1994) ad Buc. 1.42; Cucchiarelli (2012) ad Buc. 1.42; Büchner (1955) 1184, 1185; Tarrant (1997) 174; Breed (2014) 398. Mayer (1983) and Cairns (2008) are rare dissenters from the chorus. 13 See the chapters by McAlhany and Stroup in this volume. 14 Maltby (1991) 320 s.v. iuuenis; cf. O’Hara (1996) ad G. 1.500. 15 Tentatively accepted by O’Hara (1996: 266 ad G. 1.500) for this passage at the end of the first Georgic, though the iuuenem of Buc. 1.42 receives no discussion. 16 Vergil’s paronomastic gloss is a typical features of Vergilian etymological wordplay: see O’Hara (1996) 59–63, category 2.1, “Paronomasia.” 17 For extended interpretation of Epicurean philosophy in the Bucolics, see Davis (2012). 18 I cite Diogenes Laertius from Dorandi (2013); translations are adapted from Mensch (2018). Translations of Epicureana are from Inwood and Gerson (1994). For the sentiment attributed to Epicurus at D.L. 10.119, cf. KD 6, 7, 14, 39, 40; VS 58, 81. Epicurus’ prohibition of a political career has engendered much discussion among both ancients and moderns: the state of the question has been set on a whole new footing by Roskam (2007) 29–66, treating qualifications of the principle at 49–66. 19 Momigliano (1941); Castner (1988); Griffin (1989); Benferhat (2005); Sedley (2009); Fish and Sanders (2011); Gilbert (2015). 20 On L. Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus (cos. 58, procos. Macedonia 57–55, cos. 50), see Castner (1988) 16–23. 21 On C. Cassius Longinus (quaest. 54, proquaest. 53–51, trib. 49, pr. 44, d. 42 bce), see Castner (1988) 24–31.

42  A. Keith 22 Space precludes full discussion of the relationship between Vergil’s representation of “Caesar” as an Epicurean savior at the end of the first Georgic and the passage “on signs” that precedes it (G. 1.351–497). For Epicurean discussion of the evidentiary basis of, and rational approach to, signs (a perennial topic of discussion by the philosophical schools), see De Lacy and De Lacy (1978); Sedley (1982); Barnes (1988); Long (1988); Schofield (1996); Allen (2001); Wittwer (2007). 23 On Vergilian allusion to Lucretius in Georgics 2, see especially Merrill (1918); Paratore (1939); Farrington (1963); Hardie (1986) 33–51; Farrell (1991) 187–199; Schäfer (1996); Gale (2000); Kronenberg (2000); and the commentaries of Thomas (1988) and Mynors (1991) ad locc. For reasons adumbrated in my discussion of this passage, I do not share the view of many commentators that Vergil’s allusions to Lucretius are polemical. The discussion follows that of Keith (2020) 63–67. For a different view, see Heslin in this volume. 24 Munro ad DRN 1.78; Mynors (1990) 169 ad G. 2.490; see, contra, Thomas (1988) 1.253 ad G. 2.490. 25 Vergil’s adoption of a Lucretian lexicon here is well discussed by Gale (2000) 163. 26 Contra Mynors (1990) 169 ad G. 2.494. 27 On Philodemus’ treatise On Piety, see Obbink (1996); on Philodemus’ theology, see ­Essler (2011). 28 Gale (2000) 104; by way of textual evidence, she adduces (in addition to D.L. 10.120) Epic. fr. 387 Us., Ep. Men. 123–124; Cic. N.D. 1.49; Philod. Piet. 1.765–772 Obbink; Diog. Oen. fr. 19 coll. ii.12–ii.14 Smith. 29 For the use of felix and fortunatus to rank different lifestyles in Vergil’s the Bucolics and Georgics, see Keith (2020) 67–68. 30 See the commentaries of Thomas (1988a) and Mynors (1991) on the passage. 31 Here I agree fully with Mynors (1990) 166 ad G. 2.475 that “V. is not asking [the Muses] to make him an astronomer or a physicist. He would like above all things, as a poet, to write de rerum natura, by which he no doubt means, to be a second Lucretius. His prayer is a far wider and deeper version of Aratus 16–18… That is the way to the glory of Lucretius, and of Empedocles, and of Orpheus; rustic themes leave a man inglorius (486) and ignobilis (4.564).” 32 Plut. Lάθη βιώσας 1128–1129. On the doctrine, and the misunderstandings it has engendered, see Roskam (2007). For the Epicurean valence of the sphragis, see Davis (2012) 166; Freer (2019) 80. 33 One of the referees reminds me that, in the proem to G. 3, the poet rejects his acquiescence in the humble life of leisure out of the limelight, espoused in the codas of G. 2 and 4, to fashion himself as hungry for fame and eager to raise his verse to epic heights (G. 3.7–39). We should recall, however, that at the end of that proem, he defers his literary ambitions to a future date, “soon,” when he “will gird himself to celebrate Caesar’s battles” (mox tamen ardentis accingar dicere pugnas | Caesaris, 3.46–47). Had Vergil not gone on to write the Aeneid, posterity would surely have interpreted the uncharacteristically grand plans avowed in this passage as another essay in the recusatio form; cf. B. 6.1–5. 34 Cf. Mynors (1990) 169 ad G. 2.490, who notes that these lines do not “invalidate what [the poet] has said in 475–482 about his first choice; and very lucky he rightly considers himself to have such an acceptable second-best.” In this regard, I would take issue with the views of Heslin, as stated in this volume. 35 On the tradition in which both Philodemus and Vergil write, as also Xenophon, Theophrastos and Varro, see Kronenberg (2009); Tsouna (2012) xiii–xxxvii. 36 Tsouna (2012: xxxix) summarizes Philodemus’ argument: “It would be ‘crazy’ for the philosopher to make a living by working himself at mining, and it would be ‘unfortunate’ to do so by having his [slaves] work at mining. The former is rejected outright on account of the hedonistic calculus, whereas the latter is merely discouraged, probably in the name of Epicurean philanthropy… He adopts a comparable attitude toward

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  43 agriculture: working the land in person cannot be justified in hedonistic terms, but earning an income as a landowner through the agricultural labor of one’s [slaves] is highly recommended as ‘a most dignified’ (εὐσχημονεστάτην, xxiii.17–18) source of income.” 37 Two other sources of income are identified as legitimate on the basis of the hedonistic calculus: rentals and the skilful work of slaves. Both were traditionally considered ungentlemanly ways of making money, but Philodemus allows the Epicurean to obtain revenues from both (xxiii.18–22). 38 Sarah McCallum, per litteras, connects Philodemus’ defensive distinction between philosophy, on the one hand, and such money-making pursuits as oratory and warfare, on the other, to Vergil’s illustration of the ideal of the (Epicurean) farmer’s life by contrast to the mercenary pursuits of soldiers and politicians (G. 2.495–512). 39 See OLD, s.v. latifundium, with references to V. Max. 4.4.7; Sen. Ep. 89.20; and Plin, Nat. 18.35. 40 Readers interested in the specifics should consult the commentaries of Thomas (1988) and Mynors (1990), as well as the synthetic works of Paratore (1939); Farrell (1991) 188–206; Schäfer (1996); Gale (1991, 1995, and especially 2000). 41 Cf. Epicurus, On Theories of Disease and Death (D.L. 10.28; cf. P.Herc. 1012 col. 38); DRN 3; and Philodemus, On Death. 42 On Varius, see Hollis (1996) and (2007) 263–267. 43 Thomas (1988) 1.246 ad G. 2.459–460; Mynors (1990) 162 ad G. 2.458–460. 44 On the contradictions, see also Thibodeau (2011) 106–107, who well distinguishes the perspective of “starving peasant” from the “prosperous landowner” addressed in the Georgics. 45 See, e.g., Phil. De oec. col. 11: “That it is appropriate to have to distribute the tasks so as not to endanger all the possessions at once is, of course, good advice for an ordinary person. But the philosopher, properly speaking, does not work, nor, if he ever works, does he seem to put everything at risk so as [to need exhortation] not to do it.” Cf. Epic. Ep. Men. 128; DRN 3.59–64, 5.1430–1433; and see further Gale (2000) 147–152. 46 Gale (2000) 171, the culmination of discussions spanning 78–88, and especially 143–173, primarily focused on Vergil’s Lucretian intertextuality. 47 Farrell (1991) 190, with full bibliography; cf. his nuanced discussion of the relationship between Lucretius’ plague narrative at the end of DRN 6 and Vergil’s “plague of Noricum” at the end of G. 3 (1991: 84–94). 48 Gale (2000) 45. 49 Harrison (1979) is the most comprehensive study. Cf. Merrill (1918); West (1979); Thomas (1988) 2.134–146; Mynors (1990) 252–257 ad locc.; Farrell (1991) 84–94; Gale (1991); Schäfer (1996) 115–127. 50 See Thomas (1988) 2.132–133 and Mynors (1990) 252 ad G. 3.486–493; cf. Gale (2000) 109 n. 166. 51 Cf. Liebeschuetz (1965); Mynors (1990) 251–257; Gale (1991) and (2000) 88–112. See, contra, Thomas (1988) 2.134 ad G. 3.498–514. 52 Vergil draws his characterization of the “fawning dogs” (canibus blandis, G. 3.496) from another Lucretian context, his discussion of dreams (DRN 4.997): catulorum blanda propago (“the fawning breed of dogs”). 53 As Thomas (1988) 2.136 ad loc. suggests, Vergil’s reference here to signa links the end of the third Georgic to the end of the first (see above, n. 23). Lucretius (and Varius) may well have had recourse to Epicurus’ treatise On Theories of Disease and Death (cited by D.L. 10.28; cf. P.Herc. 1012 col. 38) in their treatments of plague and death. 54 Lucretius coins the Latin phrase “bared teeth” (DRN 5.1064, duros nudantia dentes) that Vergil here employs (nudis dentibus, G. 3.514). 55 Cf. n. 28. 56 Macrobius (Saturn. 6.1.64) compares the fontes liquidi, from which the plow-oxen drink in their simple felicity (G. 3.529), to the “streams and springs which slake primitive man’s thirst” in Lucretius (DRN 5.945, at sedare sitim fluuii fontesque uocabant).

44  A. Keith 57 Vergil includes in the general desolation “the race of swimmers” (genus omne natantum, 3.541), a poeticism for fish that Thomas (1988: 2.142 ad loc.) identifies as “a somewhat bold extension of Lucretius” (DRN 2.342–343, genus humanum mutaeque natantes | squamigerum pecudes). The georgic poet also derives the destruction of birdlife (G. 3.546–547) from Lucretius’ account of Lake Avernus’ deadly effect on the birds that fly over it (DRN 6.741–746). 58 Vergil’s lexicon is intensely Lucretian here: iamque cateruatim dat stragem (G. 3.556, “and now, in droves, the disease heaps on slaughter”) recalls the beginning of the Athenian plague (DRN 6.1144, cateruatim morbo mortique dabatur, “in droves they succumbed to disease and death”); aggerat (G. 3.556, “piles up in heaps”) develops Lucretius’ picture of piles of the dead (DRN 6.1262–1263, quoted in the text); and cadauera (G. 3.557), the clinical term for corpse, recalls Lucretius’ use of the word early in his plague narrative (DRN 6.1155, rancida quo perolent proiecta cadauera ritu, “they reeked with a stench similar to that given off by carcasses that have been thrown out and left to rot”). 59 Thus Farrell (1991: 196–197) argues that the Georgics implicitly accepts the Epicurean paradox that “beneath the superficial variety of things lies a fundamental sameness” in the building blocks of atoms and void.

Works Cited Alfonsi, L. 1959. “L’epicureismo nella storia spiritual di Virgilio.” In Epicurea in memoriam Hectoris Bignone: miscellanea philological, ed. E. Bignone. Genoa: Istituto di filologia classica. 167–178. Allen, J. 2001. Inference from Signs: Ancient Debates about the Nature of Evidence. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Armstrong, D. 2014. “Horace’s Epicurean Voice in the Satires.” In The Philosophizing Muse: The Influence of Greek Philosophy on Roman Poetry, eds. M. Garani and D. Konstan. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars. 91–127. Barnes, J. 1988. “Epicurean Signs.” OSAP (Supplementary Volume): 91–134. Beer, B. 2008. Lukrez und Philodem: poetische Argumentation und poetologischer Diskurs. Basel: Schwabe. Bing, P. 2016. “Epicurus and the Iuuenis at Virgil’s Eclogue 1.42.” CQ 66.1: 172–179. Blank, D. 2019. “Philodemus.” In Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. E.N. Zalta. . Castner, C. J. 1988. Prosopography of Roman Epicureans from the Second Century B.C. to the Second Century A.D. Frankfurt am Main: Lang. Davis, G. 2012. Parthenope: The Interplay of Ideas in Vergilian Bucolic. Leiden: Brill. De Lacy, P. H., and E. A. De Lacy 1978. Philodemus On Methods of Inference (La scuola di Epicuro 1). Naples: Bibliopolis. Dorandi, T., ed. 2013. Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Essler, H. 2011. Glückselig und unsterblich. Epikureische Theologie bei Cicero und Philodem. Mit einer Edition von PHerc. 152|157, Kol. 8–10. Basel: Schwabe. Fairclough, H. R., and G. P. Goold 1999. Virgil: Eclogues, Georgics, Aeneid 1–6. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Farrell, J. 1991. Vergil’s Georgics and the Traditions of Ancient Epic. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ———. 2014. “Philosophy in Vergil.” In The Philosophizing Muse: The Influence of Greek Philosophy on Roman Poetry, eds. M. Garani and D. Konstan. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars. 61–90.

Epicurean Codas in Vergil’s Georgics  45 Farrington, B. 1963. “Polemical Allusions to the De Rerum Natura of Lucretius in the Works of Vergil.” In Geras. Studies Presented to George Thomson, eds. L. Varcl and R. F. Willetts. Prague: Charles University. 87–94. Fish, J., and K. R. Sanders, eds. 2011. Epicurus and the Epicurean Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 2019. “Virgil’s Georgics and the Epicurean Sirens of Poetry.” In Reflections and New Perspectives on Virgil’s Georgics, eds. B. Xinyue and N. W. Freer. London: Blomsbury. 79–90. Freudenberg, K. 1987. “Lucretius, Vergil, and the ‘Causa Morbi.’” Vergilius 33: 59–74. Gale, M. 1991. “Man and Beast in Lucretius and the Georgics.” CQ 41: 414–426. ———. 1995. “Virgil’s Metamorphoses: Myth and Allusion in the Georgics.” PCPS 41: 36–61. ———. 2000. Virgil on the Nature of Things: The Georgics, Lucretius and the Didactic Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gigante, M. 2004. “Vergil in the Shadow of Vesuvius.” In Vergil, Philodemus, and the Augustans, eds. Armstrong, D., et al. 2004. Austin: University of Texas Press. 85–99. Gigante, M., and M. Capasso 1989. “Il Ritorno Di Virgilio a Ercolano.” SIFC 7: 3–6. Hardie, P. 1986. Cosmos and Imperium. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Harrison, E. L. 1979. “The Noric Plague in Virgil’s Third Georgic.” PLLS 2: 1–65. Hollis, A. S. 1996. “Virgil’s Friend Varius Rufus.” PVS 22: 19–33. ———, ed. 2007. Fragments of Roman Poetry c.60 BC—AD 20. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Inwood, B., and L. P. Gerson 1994. The Epicurus Reader. Selected Writings and Testimonia. Indianapolis: Hackett. Johnson, W. R. 2004. “A Secret Garden: Georgics 4.116–148.” In Armstrong, D., et al. Vergil, Philodemus, and the Augustans. Austin: University of Texas Press. 75–83. Keith, A. 2020. Virgil. London: Bloomsbury. Kronenberg, L. J. 2000. “The Poet’s Fiction: Virgil’s Praise of the Farmer, Philosopher, and Poet at the End of Georgics 2.” HSCP 100: 341–360. ———. 2009. Allegories of Farming from Greece and Rome: Philosophical Satire in Xenophon, Varro, and Virgil. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. La Penna, A. 1977. ‘Senex Corycius.” In Atti del convegno Virgiliano sul bimillenario delle Georgiche 1975. Naples: Istituto universitario orientale. 37–66. Liebeschuetz, W. 1965. “Beast and Man in the Third Book of Virgil’s Georgics.” G&R 12: 64–77. Long, A. A. 1988. “Reply to Jonathan Barnes, ‘Epicurean Signs.’” OSAP (Supplementary Volume): 135–144. Maltby, R. 1991. A Lexicon of Ancient Latin Etymologies. Leeds: Cairns. Mensch, P. 2018. Lives of the Eminent Philosophers. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Merrill, W. A. 1918. “Parallels and Coincidences in Lucretius and Vergil.” UniCalPubl ClassPhil 3.3: 135–247. Morgan, L. 1999. Patterns of Redemption in Virgil’s Georgics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mynors, R. A. B., ed. 1969. P. Vergilii Maronis Opera. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ———, ed. 1990. Virgil, Georgics, edited with a commentary. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Obbink, D., ed. 1996. Philodemus, On Piety Part I. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Paratore, E. 1939. “Spunti lucretiani nelle ‘Georgiche.’” A&R 41: 177–202. Roskam, G. 2007. ‘Live unnoticed’ (Λάθη βιώσας): on the vicissitudes of an Epicurean doctrine. Leiden: Brill.

46  A. Keith Schäfer, S. 1996. Das Weltbild der Vergilischen Georgika in seinem Verhältnis zu De Rerum Natura des Lukrez. Frankfurt am Main: Lang. Schofield, M. 1996. “Epilogismos: an Appraisal.” In Rationality in Greek Thought, eds. M. Frede and G. Striker. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 221–237. Scodel, R. S., and R. F. Thomas. 1984. “Virgil and the Euphrates.” AJP 105.3: 339. Sedley, D. N. 1982. “On Signs.” In Science and Speculation: Studies in Hellenistic Theory and Practice, eds. J. Brunschwig, et al. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 239–272. ———. 2009. “Epicureanism in the Roman Republic.” In The Cambridge Companion to Epicureanism, ed. J. Warren. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 29–45. Smith, M. F.ed. 2001. Lucretius, On the Nature of Things. Indianapolis: Hackett. Thibodeau, P. 2011. Playing the Farmer: Representations of Rural Life in Vergil’s Georgics. Berkeley: University of California Press. Thomas, R. F., ed. 1988. Virgil, Georgics, 2 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tsouna, V. 2012. Philodemos, On Property Management. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. West, D. 1979. “Two Plagues: Virgil, Georgics 3.478–566 and Lucretius 6.109–1286.” In Creative Imitation and Latin Literature, eds. D. A. West and A. J. Woodman. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 71–88. Wittwer, R. 2007. “Noch einmal zur subscription von Philodems sogenanntem De signis: P.Herc. 1065.” In B. Palme, ed. Akten de 23. internationalen Papyrologenkongresses, Wien, 22.–28. Juli 2001. Vienna: Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.

3

Fortunatus et ille Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism1 Peter Heslin

As Alison Keith demonstrated in the previous chapter, evidence emerging from the Herculaneum papyri in recent decades has confirmed and clarified Vergil’s personal connection with an Epicurean circle around the bay of Naples—a connection that was already known from Horace, the appendix Vergiliana, and Servius.2 The biographical data indicate strongly that Vergil was an intimate member of a prominent group of Epicureans, and our increasing knowledge of the work of Philodemus has helped us to understand better the philosophical background to Vergil’s poetry.3 We can see Vergil the Epicurean more clearly than ever. Yet it remains difficult to reconcile the poet’s biography with significant aspects of the Aeneid that flatly contradict the tenets of Epicurean philosophy. Many, perhaps most readers would deny that this is any kind of problem at all. Vergil was a poet, not a philosopher, and he made no claim to espouse any sort of doctrine in his work. His personal study of Epicureanism would have involved serious engagement with its critics from rival schools, which easily explains his evident familiarity with a broad range of competing philosophical ideas. But the Aeneid presents a world bound fast by destinies both individual and national, riven by the interventions of gods, and underpinned by a conception of human life in which souls exist both before and after death. Is this not a peculiar fiction to have been authored by an adherent of Epicureanism? It is true, of course, that Vergil was constrained by the conventions of the epic genre, but he might have minimized those aspects that ran counter to his own beliefs rather than amplifying them. The underworld that Aeneas visits is many times harder to reconcile with Epicurean ideas than the one experienced by Odysseus. All of these apparent contradictions can, of course, be successfully resolved by a variety of interpretive strategies. But the question remains: how did Vergil’s contemporaries understand these superficial features of his epic in the light of what they knew of Vergil’s life, friendships, and cultural ambit? In a recent monograph, Matthew Gorey usefully surveys how previous scholars have tried to interpret the relationship between the Aeneid and Epicurean doctrine (2021: 3–11). He identifies three approaches. In his first group, he puts those whom he criticizes for minimizing the philosophical significance of those aspects of the Aeneid that seem to conflict with Epicureanism by treating these features as “ornamental” and as operating on the level of poetics rather than philosophy. The second school comprises those few scholars who have tried, without much success, to DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-5

48  P. Heslin construct a coherent Epicurean reading of the Aeneid as a whole. The third school, with which Gorey himself identifies, belongs to those who understand Vergil to be engaged in a full-blooded polemic against Epicureanism in general and Lucretius in particular. At the end of his book, Gorey discusses the biographical evidence connecting Vergil to Epicurean circles and rightly acknowledges that it is too strong to be dismissed out of hand (2021: 153–154). He therefore suggests that the presence of strong anti-Epicurean elements in the Aeneid “renders the notion of Vergil as a committed Epicurean in his later years extremely unlikely” and, in his view, “points at a rejection of core tenets of Epicurean cosmology.” This idea that Vergil must have broken with Epicurean orthodoxy at some later point in his life is an old chestnut.4 Not only is there no trace of such a palinode in the biographical tradition, however, but also the posthumous revision of the Aeneid was entrusted by Vergil to two of his oldest and most deeply Epicurean friends, Varius Rufus and Plotius Tucca.5 It is hard to imagine that they would have been given this commission—or that they would have accepted it—if the Aeneid were a work of apostasy. Given that we regard the ancient biographers of the poets as unscholarly for inventing biographical details out of whole cloth in order to support their interpretation of the poetry, we should try to refrain from doing the same ourselves. In the light of the evident contradiction between the superficial features of Vergil’s life and his great work, perhaps we should look to the poet’s own words for guidance on how to navigate the problem. As it happens, there is a famous passage from the end of Book 2 of the Georgics where the poet discusses his Epicureanism in propria persona. At this point in time, he already knew that he was going to write the Aeneid, or something like it, for he gives us a prospectus for the future epic at the start of the next book of the Georgics. In that passage from the end of Georgics 2, he praises the Epicurean sage for having liberated himself from fear and belief in fate and in Hell (2.490–492). Yet the Aeneid is firmly in the grip of the latter two. I believe that Vergil was, at this point, already thinking about the contradictions that would arise when writing his epic and that he gave us a strong hint in this passage as to how we should separate the personal beliefs of the poet from the world conjured up in his poetry. My claim is that Vergil’s discussion of the happy life of the farmer at the end of the second book of the Georgics is both a paean to Epicureanism and also a critique of its claim to universal applicability. Indeed, it is a rebuttal to the totalizing claims of philosophical discourse in general and opens up a space for poetry to assert its own independent claims upon truth. My aim is not to minimize the significance or seriousness of philosophical discourse for Vergil or for elite Romans more generally; it is to demonstrate how Vergil could be a deeply committed Epicurean on a personal level while writing poetry that denied the universal validity of its doctrines: what was true for Vergil did not have to be true for everyone. Vergil’s tactic was to frame his personal attachment to Epicureanism in an ironic fashion. In doing this, he was following the footsteps of his teacher, Philodemus, who also had already used irony to negotiate the problem of reconciling his poetic activity with his allegiance to the Garden. Horace also infused his discussions of Epicureanism with a profound sense of irony. These three

Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism  49 poets used diverse ironic modes to negotiate the gap between the absolutes and certainties of Epicurean discourse and the ambiguities of the world of poetry, so it will be useful to look briefly at Philodemus and Horace before turning to Vergil. Poetic Irony in Philodemus and Horace We begin with Philodemus, whose occasionally ribald poetry does not exhibit an obvious alignment with the philosophy he espoused in his many prose works. This apparent contradiction—a serious Epicurean philosopher writing about wine, women, and song—is exploited by Cicero in his lampoon of Philodemus’ patron, Piso. After describing the most delightful verses (delicatissimis uersibus, Pis. 71.1) that Philodemus had written about Piso’s debaucheries, Cicero concludes that it was Piso’s depraved company which induced him to write in a manner unworthy of a philosopher.6 Cicero plays to the gallery by representing Philodemus as indulging in abject dissipation in his poems when, as he says, a philosopher ought to write about ethics and virtue. This is polemical, of course, but Cicero, with his thorough knowledge of Epicurean doctrine, was surely also making a more subtle point: that the sort of passions Philodemus writes about in his erotic epigrams are not obviously compatible with Epicurean teaching. Epicurus seems to have accepted at most that poetry could provide harmless pleasure to the sage, who was well equipped to withstand its allurements.7 In his own literary criticism, Philodemus argues that good may be found even in poetry full of dangerous lies, such as the Homeric epics, provided that it is interpreted in the correct philosophical manner (see Asmis 1991). In keeping with this hermeneutic method, Philodemus’ own poetry requires careful interpretation in order reconcile Epicurean teaching with its apparently heterodox content. The solution to the problem of understanding Philodemus’ apparently off-message epigrams has been given by Sider, who argues that, in these works, the poet presents the persona of an “imperfect Epicurean,” struggling toward enlightenment:8 With this technique, Philodemus allows himself to be the butt of Epicurean criticism, avoiding in his poetry what he practices in his prose, the preaching of Epicurean doctrine. Or should we rather say, pretending to avoid such preaching? Poetic irony is produced when Philodemus’ epigrams are read against his own orthodoxy, as when he “wrestl[es], sometimes successfully and sometimes not, with the excessive passions of love and the fear of death” (Sider 1996: 34). And so, moving from Philodemus, who pretended ironically in his poetry that he was not an Epicurean, we come to Horace, who pretended ironically in his poetry that he was an Epicurean. Philodemus’ ironic poetic persona, which opened up a space between the speaking voice in the poetry and in the philosophy and between both of these and the voice of the real Philodemus, was surely a major influence on Horace, whose self-presentation is never without irony.9 Horace’s poetry is full of Epicurean morals, but he adapts themes from a large array of other philosophical

50  P. Heslin schools as well (see Moles 2002). Horace famously advertises his eclecticism in a programmatic passage at the start of his first book of Epistles: “I am not bound to parrot the words of any teacher.”10 Only three poems later, Horace jokingly professes to be an Epicurean, but we have been forewarned not to take any such professions of allegiance seriously, and the humor of the claim is self-evident. Epistles 1.4 is addressed to a poet named Albius, and since an earlier poem from the Odes (1.33) was addressed to an Albius who was writing elegy, the contemporary reader would inevitably have connected this figure with the elegist Tibullus.11 Horace advises Albius to enjoy the blessings of each day as it comes and concludes by calling himself a “a pig from Epicurus’ herd” (16), playing on the vulgar caricature of Epicureans as gluttons and Horace’s own self-representation elsewhere as short and fat.12 Horace’s self-deprecation sets in tactful relief the absurdity that a man of Tibullus’ outrageous good fortune should write such unhappy verses. Horace pretends to be an Epicurean in order to contrast his own self-sufficient contentment with the anti-Epicurean genre of elegy, which delights in wallowing in the extremes of passion and voluntary suffering.13 In the other poem where Horace poses as a (reformed) Epicurean, the target of the humor is not Tibullus but Lucretius. In Odes 1.34, he claims to have had a sudden religious conversion. He looks back upon a period of life in which he had failed in devotion to the traditional gods, having been caught up in the errors of an insane philosophy (insanientis … sapientiae), which, in the context of the rest of the poem, must be Epicureanism. The event that turned Horace away from following Epicurus and brought him back to conventional religion was an experience of seeing a bolt of lightning coming out of a blue sky. The overwrought bombast of this account makes the poem very funny, but it has a serious point (Nisbet and Hubbard 1970: 377). Lucretius, of course, had dwelled at extraordinary length in his sixth book (DRN 6.80–422) upon the argument that the random dispersal of thunderbolts and inevitably cloudy skies that accompany them are proof that they do not come from Jupiter. From the point of view of Lucretius, the event that Horace observed is an absolute impossibility.14 In that sense, Horace’s abandonment of Epicureanism in the light of his (fictional) experience is perfectly rational: his own senses have told him that Lucretius must be wrong, and Lucretius himself tells us that the senses do not lie (DRN 4.499). The point of this highly theatrical conversion narrative is to demonstrate the limitations of Lucretius’ method of teaching. Horace displays a great deal of interest throughout his poetry in Epicurean ethics and its advice on how to live a ­rewarding and full life, but he is not interested in their physics (Fraenkel 1957: 255). This stands in utter contrast to Lucretius, whose poem is almost entirely ­focused on physical phenomena. Lucretius repeatedly promises us that the benefit of understanding the world in his way is a life free from fear. But he is remarkably silent on how one should lead one’s life beyond that. Lucretius’ presentation of ethics is almost entirely negative, even though Epicureanism had no shortage of positive recommendations on how to live. Given that Horace’s philosophical interests are focused on ethics rather than physics, one could imagine that he might not find himself in sympathy with

Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism  51 Lucretius’ imbalanced exposition of Epicurean doctrine.15 This ode is, I argue, a parody of Lucretius’ priorities. By dramatizing, via a pseudo-autobiographical narrative, the ridiculous situation of a man who has based his ideas about the good life upon observations of the vagaries of meteorological phenomena rather than the follies and merits of mankind, Horace demonstrates the absurdity of Lucretian protreptic. Who would look to the weather for reliable evidence on how to live wisely? Elsewhere, Horace describes how his father taught him practical ethics via a more sensible method: by pointing out men exhibiting concrete examples of vice and virtue (Serm. 1.4.103–131). Horace dramatizes the brittleness of Epicurean physics as a foundation for the ethical superstructure built upon it: one unexpected observation can bring the whole edifice crashing down. The interlocking logic of a comprehensive philosophical system may be pleasing to those who require a totalizing account of the world, but its rigidity is also a great weakness, for if experience compromises the validity of one part, it compromises the whole. By contrast, Horace’s eclectic, poetic, non-systematic method of reflecting upon life from experience, without adhering to any one school, imitates and accommodates the inconsistency and unpredictability of the world. Horace’s poem is a thought experiment staged as an autobiographical drama. He wonders what would happen if an orthodox Epicurean encountered a phenomenon that his philosophy holds to be impossible. As we will now see, Vergil had proposed a similar thought experiment in the Georgics a few years earlier, but he had much more at stake. Horace’s readers know that Epicureanism is a mask he puts on when it is rhetorically convenient, because he already told us quite clearly that he was not an adherent of any philosophical school and because there is no extra-­ textual biographical indication of any such affiliation. Vergil is ­different. Philodemus addressed him publicly as a member of his philosophical circle, so when Vergil speaks about his personal relationship with Epicureanism, the biographical context renders it a much more serious matter. Vergil’s Happy Farmer In the preceding chapter, Alison Keith discusses “the hierarchy of ways of life” between the philosopher and the farmer that Vergil posits near the end of the second book of the Georgics.16 I am in agreement that Vergil draws heavily on Epicurean thinking in his depiction of the happy farmer and that those sources do posit a hierarchy in which the philosopher sits at the apex. Philosophers in antiquity naturally presupposed the superiority of the philosophical life, but I think Vergil is doing something different here: he is invoking that well-established hierarchy in order to destroy it. I maintain that he presents the philosopher and the farmer to be equals in happiness; as Gale says of the same passage (2000: 245): “Two incompatible world-views are simply juxtaposed, without any indication that one is superior to or more satisfying than the other.”17 Furthermore, I argue that Vergil’s juxtaposition of the blessings of the Epicurean and the farmer is a formal paradox: if you accept the precepts of Epicurus, the perfect happiness of the farmer ought to be impossible. If one proposition is true, the other must be false. If the farmer has already attained

52  P. Heslin a level happiness equal to that of the sage, what use does he have for philosophy? This irony enables Vergil to profess Epicureanism as a personal creed while simultaneously demonstrating that it is neither true nor necessary for everyone. Vergil undermines the hierarchy that puts the philosopher on top of the farmer by demonstrating, throughout the entire concluding sections of Book 2 of the Georgics, that the blessings of the farmer are essentially indistinguishable from that of the Epicurean sage: he confounds the two figures entirely. These passages at the end of the book are often considered a set of loosely related vignettes, in the middle of which Vergil makes an unrelated digression on his choice of subject matter and expresses an ostensible aspiration to follow in the footsteps of Lucretius. In reality, however, these four passages comprise a carefully constructed unity: 1 2 3 4

praise of the farmer’s life (o fortunatos nimium …, 458–474) Vergil’s choice of subject matter (me uero primum …, 475–489) the Epicurean and the farmer (felix qui potuit …, 490–512) the farmer’s year and early Rome (agricola incuruo terram …, 513–542)

These four passages are unified by the theme of celebrating the happy life of the farmer in terms that are drawn from the blessings of the philosophical life. Many readers have been puzzled by Vergil’s offering such an unrealistically positive, one-sided view of farming here, especially since it contradicts the emphasis on toil and hardship that runs through much of the rest of the work. But this picture is not meant to be realistic. It is an artificial construct designed to prompt a set of theoretical questions. Like Horace’s pretended conversion narrative, it is a thought experiment. Vergil asks: if someone is already happy, do they need Epicureanism? If there are other sound and durable routes to happiness, what does that mean for the universal truth of Epicurean doctrine? If the rustic gods, Pan and the nymphs, whom Lucretius had ridiculed, are earnestly believed in and worshipped by people who are as tranquil and free from care as Epicurean sages, does the logic of Epicurean theology indicate that those gods are real? Let us take each of these four passages in turn. Praise of the Farmer’s Life (o fortunatos nimium …, 458–474) After all of the hardships faced by the farmer throughout the Georgics, this turn near the end of Book 2 takes us by surprise. Here, suddenly, we find the farmer’s life presented as a carefree idyll, a relic of the Golden Age (458–460): O fortunatos nimium, sua si bona norint, agricolas! Quibus ipsa procul discordibus armis fundit humo facilem uictum iustissima tellus. O farmers, happy beyond measure, could they but know their blessings! For them, far from the clash of arms, most righteous Earth, unbidden, pours forth from her soil an easy sustenance.

Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism  53 Elsewhere in the Georgics we are firmly in the Age of Iron, so the idea that the Earth pours forth its bounty easily is unexpected, but this sets the tone for the remainder of the book. Vergil now gives a list of the things the farmer’s life is free from: greeting a crowd of clients at the crack of dawn, an expensively decorated house, fancy clothes, and other frivolous luxuries (461–466). As Mynors says, these tropes derive from “Hellenistic popular moral philosophy” (1990: ad 461). The farmer escapes these evils, but does so unwittingly and by default, whereas the sage rejects them consciously by act of will. Here we have the first hint that Vergil is collapsing the distinction between the farmer’s blessings and those enjoyed specifically by the Epicurean. The rejection of the ritual of the morning salutatio, and with it the traditional world of Roman hierarchical social relations, seems particularly aligned with the teachings of that school, for the Epicurean sage withdraws from the political obligations of the Roman patron in order to live with like-minded friends. The sage also rejects, of course, the vices of ambition and greed that lead one to value the external trappings of wealth. After that negative list of troubles is avoided, Vergil then turns to a list of the positive blessings enjoyed by the farmer (467–474), the first two of which are “rest free from anxiety” (secura quies) and “a life innocent of guile” (nescia fallere uita, 467). If we read these phrases in a philosophical frame of mind, the first one looks very much like Epicurean ἀταραξία, and the second looks like παρρησία.18 One might object that this list of the farmer’s blessings also includes sacra deum. But Epicurus encouraged the practice of conventional cult for the purposes of social order and receptivity to the image of divine tranquility (Summers 1995: 32; Johnston 2004: 161). This conflation of the blessings of the farmer and the blessings of the Epicurean becomes much more obvious in retrospect, after one has read the explicit reference to Epicurean philosophy in the subsequent section. Vergil’s Choice of Subject Matter (me uero primum …, 475–489) Vergil now makes a digression on the subject of his own relationship to philosophy, which culminates in his famous expression of admiration for Epicureanism and for Lucretius. Vergil begins by asking the Muses to accept him as their own and show him the mysteries of the physical universe (475–482). This seems to adumbrate a turn toward the physical and cosmological didactic material of ­Lucretius and Aratus. So far, there is nothing to suggest irony. But then, Vergil seems to confess that, sadly, he may not have sufficient talent for this ambition. Vergil worries that he may not be intelligent enough to follow in the footsteps of Lucretius: “But if the chill blood about my heart bars me from reaching those realms of nature….”19 If not, he can always fall back upon the rustic subject matter of the Eclogues and the Georgics as an inferior choice (485–489). Did Vergil really believe he was too stupid to write about natural philosophy? Mynors seems to think so: “very lucky he rightly considers himself to have such an acceptable second best” (1990: ad 2.490). Does Vergil really think his subject matter is inferior? Has he resigned himself to being a second-rate poet? Of course not. Vergil was already far more famous than Lucretius ever was, and he could make

54  P. Heslin an ironic claim of inferiority precisely because there was no worry that anyone would believe it for a moment. In the poetic gesture of recusatio, the poet demurs on grounds of incapacity from a genre conventionally deemed to be more prestigious. In all such gestures, the modesty is utterly false. The poet is really saying that the allegedly superior genre is boring and played out; the poet thereby stakes an implicit claim of superiority for his own talent and for his preferred genre under the pretense of modesty and respect for an allegedly higher form of verse. Vergil’s near-quotation of the title of Lucretius’ epic in the next line (rerum cognoscere causas, 490) makes it clear that Vergil is engaging with the De Rerum Natura.20 Vergil politely acknowledges the excellence of Lucretius in his domain and declines to follow in his footsteps by making an insincere excuse of insufficient talent. Vergil attributes higher prestige to the kind of poetry written by Lucretius because of the conventional superiority of philosophy to other intellectual disciplines in antiquity. Philosophy was the king of discourses, so philosophical poetry ought to be the highest form of poetry. But clearly Vergil does not think this is the case; he genuflects toward that hierarchy in these lines as he begins to undermine it. When Vergil accepts, with tongue in cheek, that his verse will never attain the heights of natural philosophy, he begins to carve out a space to do something quite different from Lucretius: a space where poetry will no longer be subordinate to philosophy. The Epicurean and the Farmer (felix qui potuit …, 490–512) The next lines are some of the most famous and contested in the poem (490–494): felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas atque metus omnis et inexorabile fatum subiecit pedibus strepitumque Acherontis auari: fortunatus et ille deos qui nouit agrestis Panaque Siluanumque senem Nymphasque sorores. Blessed is he who has succeeded in learning the laws of nature’s working, has cast beneath his feet all fear and fate’s implacable decree, and the howl of insatiable Death. But happy, too, is he who knows the rural gods, Pan and aged Silvanus and the sisterhood of the Nymphs. The relationship between the two figures, felix qui and fortunatus ille, is controversial. Coming right after Vergil’s supposed confession of inadequacy before the challenge of natural philosophy, these lines have often been interpreted along the same lines: as putting the second figure, the rustic, subordinate to the first, the philosopher, as Alison Keith does in the preceding chapter. But I think that interpretation fails to appreciate the irony of Vergil’s mock protestation of inferiority in the previous lines, and I do not think the text supports a hierarchy of value here. The first person is felix, the second is fortunatus. This points to a parity of happiness, though in two different modalities. Most of the TLL entry for felix sits under the general heading of spectat ad fortunae

Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism  55 fauorem (III), and there are many passages (including our own, 6.1.439.79–80) under the specific subheading of i. q. fortunatus (III.A.1.a, 6.1.439.54–440.31). Conversely, it defines fortunatus as i. q. fortuna affectus, felix, beatus (6.1.1196.6–7), including our passage (6.1.1196.47). The adjectives are synonyms, and in this context they mean exactly the same thing.21 This interpretation is consistent with the passages that come before and after, in which Vergil maintains a careful ambiguity between the blessings of the Epicurean and the farmer; he underlines the interchangeability, in all respects except for self-awareness, of the kinds of happiness shared by them both.22 As Klingner says of these lines, “Der Bauer ist ein Weiser im kleinen, der in seiner Daseinsart das besitzt, was die Philosophie dem Menschen auf dem Wege über die Wissenschaft zu verschaffen verspricht” (1931: 175). With the words felix qui, Vergil does not mean just Lucretius, but also Lucretius’ readers and potentially all devotees of Epicureanism. Who, then, is the other person (ille), who is fortunatus? Many readers think that fortunatus … ille cannot refer to any kind of farmer, and it is true that these lines give a very different view of farming than we get in some other books of the Georgics; but it is perfectly consistent with the idealized, unrealistic view of the blessed life of the farmer found throughout the entire concluding part of Book 2. In light of the subject matter of the Georgics, it seems perverse to identify the rustic fortunatus ille as anything other than a farmer. Despite the claims of some, is not true that the divinities mentioned here refer unambiguously to bucolic world of the Eclogues.23 Pan, Silvanus, and the Dryad nymphs are all invoked by Vergil in the opening prayer of the Georgics (1.10–20). The shepherd and the farmer worship the same gods of the countryside. Just as the meaning of the felix qui clause can be extended beyond Lucretius to include his ideal readers, so too can the fortunatus ille clause be expanded to mean Vergil’s ideal readers in the Georgics, who are, as he has told us before, farmers (ignaros … agrestis, 1.41; agricolae, 2.36). This is confirmed by the way the word fortunatus here echoes the earlier emphatic line that begins the concluding section of Book 2 on the happy farmer: o fortunatos nimium … agricolas! (458–459; quoted above). The word fortunatus thus signals that Vergil is returning to the topic of the happy farmer after his short digression on philosophy and poetics. After juxtaposing two fortunate types of people, the felix Epicurean and the fortunatus farmer, Vergil goes on to list the blessings enjoyed by “him” (illum, 495). Most scholars take illum to recapitulate the reference to fortunatus ille (i.e., the farmer, on my reading), but it could also mean “the former of the two just mentioned” (i.e., the Epicurean).24 In the entire passage that follows, there is, once again, a carefully constructed ambiguity that makes it possible for illum to refer logically either to the rustic farmer or to the Epicurean (495–502), neither of whom is troubled by desire for political office or the trappings of power, nor by foreign affairs or military expeditions. Then Vergil enumerates, in a kind of priamel, a list of unfortunate people who are caught up in a lust for glory (503–512).25 This catalogue of fools further emphasizes the similarity of the contentment enjoyed by the Epicurean and the farmer by contrasting them with the turbulent and greedy.26 The only difference is that the Epicurean refrains from these deeds consciously and with volition, whereas the farmer’s serenity is a consequence of his lack of temptation.

56  P. Heslin The Farmer’s Year and Early Rome (agricola incuruo terram …, 513–542) Vergil began the concluding part of Book 2 with the exclamation o fortunatos … agricolas! (458–459). He repeated the adjective in the passage beginning fortunatus et ille (493); he now marks his full return to the theme of the blessed life of the farmer by picking up the accompanying noun, as the next section begins with the word agricola (513). Vergil proceeds to describe the different labors and rewards of the changing seasons (514–522). Not all readers agree that Vergil has returned to the same subject of the happy farmer as before; they look at the presence of labor here and say that this cannot be the Golden Age described earlier.27 Earlier, Vergil had said that the Earth “pours forth from her soil an easy sustenance” (fundit humo facilem uictum, 460), but that does not mean without toil; the men he described there were still farmers (agricolas, 459). They must therefore have done work; it was just easy and productive. The picture Vergil presents here of the bounty of the land confirms that we are still in the realm of the happy farmer; even winter is productive in its way. The recurrence of the Golden Age imagery intensifies as we move on. Vergil next paints a famous idyll of family life in the countryside (523–531). The farmer enjoys the kisses of his children and the simple pleasures of a plain country life. On festive days, he pours a libation to Bacchus, relaxes on the grass, and enjoys a bit of sport. Vergil then connects this contemporary tableau to the idealized Roman past (532–540), concluding by comparing the life of those early Romans with the Golden Age of Saturn, before the discovery of war. This returns us, by ring composition, to the Golden-Age theme with which we started (procul discordibus armis … iustissima tellus, 459–460). So, the entire closing part of Book 2 is a unity, connected by the thread of the happy farmer, whose blessings are repeatedly described so as to make them indistinguishable in their outcome, if not in their genesis, from those enjoyed by the Epicurean philosopher. In the middle, Vergil discusses his own relationship with philosophy and then explicitly compares the happy life of the felix Epicurean sage and the fortunatus farmer, describing in detail the good fortune of the latter in a way that would apply equally to the former. It remains to ask why Vergil would present such a grossly unrealistic and onesided view of the farmer’s lot, a view which is explicitly contradicted by large parts of the rest of the poem. Vergil is doing something more important than indulging in poetic exaggeration in this long digression of 85 lines at the end of Book 2. In fact, he has carefully constructed a sophisticated philosophical paradox which permits him to explain how he, despite being a committed Epicurean, has no obligation to write like one. Vergil’s Incompleteness Theorem If Vergil had simply projected his vision of rustic innocence back to the Golden Age at the dawn of history, it would have been unsurprising and uncontroversial. Many schools of ancient philosophy imagined that the primitive state of mankind was blameless and that life then was better in many ways than in the

Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism  57 contemporary world. The idea of an innocent Golden Age can be found in Plato (Laws 679), Seneca (Ep. Mor. 90), and even Lucretius (5.925–1010). But Vergil is speaking of the contemporary farmer. He connects the contemporary farmer with the Golden Age, saying that they both enjoy the same life (hanc … u­ itam, 532 and hanc uitam, 538), but he does this to illustrate the continuity of the Golden Age into the present day. This flatly contradicts both Hesiod and the philosophers, who invoke the Golden Age to assert a radical rupture with the present, as the starting point for a narrative of decline. But for Vergil, at least at the end of Book 2, the coming of toil and agriculture into the world does not necessarily entail a loss of happiness for farmers, who are isolated from the world’s emerging wickedness. For Epicureans, farmers in the contemporary world are quintessentially unhappy and misfortunate people. Epicurus said that the wise person should enjoy the countryside (φιλαγρήσειν, Diog. Laert. 10.120), but that is quite different from toiling in it. In his treatise on property management, Vergil’s friend Philodemus writes (De oec. XXIII.7–11):28 ταλαίπωρον δὲ καὶ τὸ γεωργο[ῦν]τ’ αὐτὸν οὕτως ὥστε αὐτουργεῖν· τὸ δ’ ἄλλων, ἔχοντα γῆν’ κατὰ σπουδαῖον. Cultivating the land oneself in a manner involving work with one’s own hands is also wretched, while (cultivating it) using other workers if one is a landowner is appropriate for the good man. The act of farming is brutal and degrading, unless you have slaves to do the actual work, thus permitting you to live like a philosopher off the sweat of others. The Georgics, famously, is completely innocent of the practice of slavery, so Vergil is not thinking of this kind of agriculture, which is for the benefit of an elite.29 Rather, it is quite clear that Vergil’s tiller of the earth gets joy out of precisely those menial labors that Philodemus deems wretched. Vergil’s happy farmer, according to Philodemus, should not exist. The paradox goes much further. We saw how Vergil structures his discussion of the blessings of the farmer such that many of them are identical to the blessings enjoyed by an Epicurean sage. They both enjoy a species of ἀταραξία: one is felix and the other is fortunatus. There are differences in how they get there, of course, but the end result is as close to identical as two synonyms can be. This, too, is an Epicurean impossibility. The only way to achieve the peace of mind enjoyed by the sage is via the hard road of philosophy. It is a fundamental tenet of Epicureanism that the thoughts of others are disordered, especially by fear of death, and that their sect offers the only cure. If it were possible to be securely, properly happy in some other way, Epicureanism, by its own lights, would be superfluous. It depends for its legitimacy, more than any other philosophy, on its therapeutic claim to produce true, lasting, deep happiness. Vergil’s representation of the simple, traditional life of a farmer as an alternative road to a similar standard of happiness—even if it is of a different kind—is a direct challenge to the universalizing claims of the Garden.

58  P. Heslin Is it possible to be an accidental Epicurean? That is, can one fall into the blessed life of the sage without meaning to? Followers of the sect might well allow that one could, for a short period, but they would insist that any such non-philosophical happiness must be a fragile thing, easily shaken by misfortune. But Vergil insists upon the durability of the happiness of the farmer. He describes the changing of the seasons (514–522), each of which brings its own benefits. The farmer must work year-round (hic anni labor, 514), but he is rewarded year-round. There is no fear of want. In the fictional world of this section of the poem, there are no failed harvests, no illnesses, no natural disasters. It is a world into which death must surely come, but it does not seem to induce any irrational fear. The Epicurean has cast fear of death under his feet, but the farmer seems never to have been particularly afflicted with it in the first place. Living his life in harmony with the rhythms of nature, the happy farmer does not suffer from the mal de la civilisation for which philosophy is the cure. The opposite extremity of life from that of the happy farmer is that of the plague as described by Lucretius, which Vergil defers to the end of the subsequent book of the Georgics. But in the gauzy reverie at the end of Book 2, the world does not send the farmer any challenges that he is unable to meet with his own resources. The mild exaggerations of the laudes Italiae (2.136–176) earlier in the book are nothing in comparison to this. The storms in the first book, the plague at the end of the next book, and the difficulties of farming that Vergil stresses elsewhere in the work show that the poet is perfectly aware of the farmer’s struggle, so we know that this idyll is based upon false premises. Vergil is perfectly capable of painting a verisimilar, yet still positive, depiction of country life. His account of the garden of the old Corycian in Book 4 is attractive without being unrealistic. It describes a man eking out both sustenance and beauty through perseverance in an unpromising and stinting location. That garden has rightly been viewed by many scholars as an allegory for Epicureanism (see Johnson 2004). But the end of Book 2 is pure fantasy. What, then, is the purpose of this fantasy? It is analogous to Horace’s physically impossible bolt from the blue in Ode 1.34: a paradox, entirely fictional, that is designed to expose a theoretical limitation in Epicurean doctrine. Vergil posits the existence of the happy farmer in order to illustrate the hypothesis that there may exist people for whom Epicureanism is entirely superfluous. If the goal of life is really to live in a state of imperturbability, and if you already occupy that state by default, you have no need for any philosophy. Indeed, it might be very harmful. The wormwood of Lucretius’ doctrine is harsh medicine, which is why he needs to honey the cup. Epicureanism is chemotherapy for the soul; why would you give it to someone who is not ill?30 What doctor would make someone sick just to prove that the cure is effective? Are those who have recovered from an illness healthier than those who were never sick? The happy farmer, his native disposition robust against all the ills he meets in his own world, would need to be dragged artificially into a state of knowledge about his own misery before he would need further philosophical knowledge to pull him out again.

Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism  59 Vergil makes this point explicitly at the outset (458–459): O fortunatos nimium, sua si bona norint, agricolas! O farmers, happy beyond measure, could they but know their blessings! Here, the happiness of the farmer stands in an inverse relation to his self-­knowledge. The word nimium very often means nothing more than “extremely.” In that case, Vergil is saying something like “farmers would be supremely happy if only they knew their blessings.” But the fundamental sense of nimium is “too much.” The meaning can also be “farmers would be excessively happy (in a sense of damaging superfluity) if they knew their blessings.” Striving too much for happiness can lead to having none at all. Vergil asserts that the happiness of the farmer is conditioned upon a lack of self-awareness, and that it might be in danger of breaking down ­under conditions of too much self-knowledge. For some, Epicurean philosophy leads from misery to happiness; for the innocent, it may lead from blissful ignorance to well-educated misery. Does any of this matter, given that Vergil’s one-sided portrait of the happy farmer is so unrealistic? If the perfect happiness of the farmer is unattainable in the real world, how can it pose any challenge to Epicurean doctrine? Vergil’s fundamental point here is to demonstrate that Lucretius’ depiction of the human condition in the state of nature as one of abject alienation is equally one-sided and unrealistic. Is it true that all those who do not follow Epicurus are doomed to a miserable life oppressed by a constant fear of death? Lucretius’ expectation that non-Epicureans experience a life of terror and misery is just as extreme and artificial a construct as the world of the happy farmer. In reality, few of us occupy either of these opposite poles of existence for very long; we oscillate between the two from day to day and hour to hour. Sometimes we feel at one with nature, other times we feel utterly alienated from it. Vergil’s point here is not to dispute the efficacy of Epicureanism for those (like himself) who need it, but to demonstrate that it depends for its universalizing claims upon a notion of human wretchedness that is just as extreme and unrealistic as his own portrait of the happy farmer. What Vergil contests is Epicureanism’s claims to be a complete account of the world and a universal prescription for its people. For such purposes, it does not matter that Vergil’s scenario is artificial and has little practical relevance to the real world of the Roman farmer. It functions like a formal paradox which exposes the limitations of a philosophical system that makes an untenable claim of completeness and consistency. Gödel showed that Russell’s system of logic was incomplete, just as Russell had previously done to Frege’s system. Both Gödel’s and Russell’s paradoxes are entirely artificial constructs, but they are devastating to claims that one can construct a complete and self-consistent logical system. Nevertheless, we happily go on using set theory and propositional logic, even though we know they are not perfect. So too with Vergil. He is not contesting the importance and value of Epicurean thought for many people who need it, particularly himself. The existence of people who are healthy

60  P. Heslin does not undermine the value of medicine to those who are ill. But the idea of the hypothetical happy farmer is enough to undermine the Epicurean claims absolute relevance for everyone everywhere and always, for we all can recognize some ­element of the happy farmer, however small, within us from time to time. The structure of the paradox Vergil creates may be seen with particular clarity in the way he treats the farmer’s gods (2.493–494): fortunatus et ille deos qui nouit agrestis Panaque Siluanumque senem Nymphasque sorores. But happy, too, is he who knows the rural gods, Pan and aged Silvanus and the sisterhood of the Nymphs. Vergil’s juxtaposition of the happiness of the philosopher and the farmer mostly concerns ethics, but here he takes a detour into theology. The farmer “knows” the rural gods such as Pan. But for Lucretius, in a passage Vergil clearly alludes to here, Pan and the satyrs and nymphs are mere fairy tales created to explain the phenomenon of the echo.31 The farmer’s knowledge of these divinities ought, therefore, to be entirely false. Epicurean doctrine did, of course, allow for the existence of the great gods, but not for local gods such as these. Epicurean gods existed beyond the sublunary realm, perfect and imperturbable. If there were no way at all for us to communicate with or have any reliable knowledge of those gods, the Epicurean position would be functionally indistinguishable from radical agnosticism. To avoid that trap, they imagined a tenuous connection between our world and theirs. Despite their distance from us, we must have some means of true knowledge about them, which has become mixed with many falsehoods. As Epicurus said, “For truly there are gods, and knowledge of them is evident … the utterances of the multitude about the gods are not true intuitions but false suppositions.”32 Some modern scholars, the realists, reconstruct Epicurean doctrine as holding that the gods transmit tenuous simulacra in the manner of ordinary perceptible objects, that some of these cross over from the intermundia, and that our subconscious perception of these simulacra causes us to form correct intuitions (προλήψεις) about them (see Konstan 2011). Others, the idealists, hold that our intuitions about the gods are innate or culturally transmitted and that it is the act of our cognition about them which creates the gods in this world (see Sedley 2011; Eckerman 2019). Fortunately for our purposes, it does not matter much whether the realist or idealist view of Epicurean theology is correct, because Vergil is engaged in a polemic with Epicurean ideas on the other side of the question— how our misguided suppositions (ὑπολήψεις) about the gods are formed, not our true intuitions—and that is an area in which the evidence is clearer. Lucretius gives a vivid account of how these false suppositions first arose. Primitive mankind did have true visions of wondrous beings but, through terror and ignorance, they wrongly attributed natural processes to them.33 Thus, true intuitions about the beauty, power, and blessedness of the gods have become corrupted by connecting them with the workings of this world, of which, in truth, they take

Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism  61 no part. How, then, can we analyze Vergil’s claim that the farmer is happy in his knowledge of the rural gods? These divinities show nothing of the eternal, changeless perfection of the Epicurean gods. On the contrary, they are intimately connected with the natural world. The Nymphs die, though they live a long time, and Pan is a hybrid creature, like the Centaurs, of the sort that Lucretius dismisses as absurd.34 The knowledge that the farmer has of these gods, therefore, should have nothing of true intuition about it, only false supposition generated by fear. And that negative cognition should be evident in the fearful, disturbed mindset and behavior of the individual who believes in such nonsense. Belief in rustic gods should therefore be a diagnostic feature of a disordered mind. Yet Vergil’s happy farmer is clearly not crippled by fear. Such gods cannot be a projection of fear about the natural world, because in the artificial idyll at the end of Book 2, the world holds no such threats. If these gods are projections of the farmer’s experience of nature, it is of a positive and benign sort. Once again, Vergil’s point is not to claim that the natural world is really always like this; it is to demonstrate that Lucretius’ view of the genesis of beliefs about the gods is predicated upon an equally extreme and tendentious representation of the world, but in the opposite direction. Are all ideas about the gods that do not pertain to their eternal imperturbability necessarily born of terror? Are all local religious beliefs misbegotten? Is it only the negative aspects of the natural world that can inspire projections of divinity? Epicurus and Lucretius are mainly concerned with the great gods of Olympus, but Vergil is concerned with local gods. Hence, once again, he is not arguing that Epicurean doctrine is wrong, but rather that it is not a complete account of mankind’s beliefs about the gods. The happy farmer lives in harmony with these beneficent and tutelary minor divinities who embody the positive aspects of nature, just as he lives in harmony with nature itself. These small-scale but true intuitions of the numinous (προλήψεις) drawn from the natural world—the gods the farmer knows—cannot be expressed in the Epicurean system. In demonstrating the limits of Epicurean philosophy, Vergil opens up a space for poetry as an autonomous discourse. Lucretius made poetry the handmaid of philosophy, but Vergil is more ambitious for his work. By showing that Epicureanism is an incomplete description of the world, that there are things it cannot explain, Vergil suggests that poetry can access aspects of the world that philosophy cannot. The world is not consistent. It is full of paradoxes. It is not always amenable to a rigid framework of analysis. Human experience is varied and strange. There is not one formula for happiness. Vergil frames a vast area of experience—the rhythms of nature, the sense of meaning given by ancient traditions of life, the perception of the numinous in the quotidian—where Epicurean philosophy has no power to prescribe or to pronounce. Vergil, the Post-Modern Ironist When Horace pretended to be an Epicurean and Philodemus pretended not to be one, both were employing a kind of poetic irony. But the irony that Vergil is putting into practice here is of a fundamentally different kind. Horace pretended to be Lucretius’ ideal reader in order to demonstrate the fragility of Lucretian protreptic.

62  P. Heslin Like Horace, Vergil is exposing one of the limitations of Lucretius’ system, but is doing so in the voice of an author known to be a genuine disciple of Epicurus. Vergil acknowledges his own commitment to Epicurean philosophy (me uero primum …) and lists the benefits that accrue to its followers, including, presumably, himself (felix qui potuit …). But he also allows that it is not the only route to a functionally equivalent level of tranquility (fortunatus et ille …). Is it possible to be a faithful adherent to a sect that claims universal validity while discounting those totalizing claims? To pose the question on a societal level: can people coexist peacefully when they adhere to different sects that make incompatible claims to the truth? These questions are discussed at length in Richard Rorty’s Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity. Rorty is deeply suspicious of absolute claims to truth, and in this book, he is concerned with how people with different absolutist belief systems or none can get along. His answer is to invoke a philosophical mode of irony (1989: xv): I use “ironist” to name the sort of person who faces up to the contingency of his or her most central beliefs and desires—someone sufficiently historicist and nominalist to have abandoned the idea that those central beliefs and ­desires refer back to something beyond the reach of time and chance. This is a species of philosophical irony rather than the poetic irony of Philodemus and Horace: it is the ability to understand the contingency of one’s own beliefs and acknowledge that others in different circumstances may have found alternative truths to which they are equally committed. Philosophical irony is the ability to be fully invested in a belief system while being aware of the personal and contingent nature of all such belief. Many philosophers would say that this ironic mode of belief is no true belief at all. But not all disciples of a philosophical sect are obliged to think like philosophers, just as not all followers of a religion are theologians. It is hard to reconstruct what being an Epicurean meant to an average Roman adherent of the sect who did not philosophize publicly, for our surviving sources are dominated by sectarian polemics. To read Philodemus’ prose works is to ­imagine that being an Epicurean meant engaging in constant point-scoring against rival schools. That might have been a necessary posture for someone who was a prominent teacher, but it would be rash to assume that it reflects the views of those whose philosophy was a more private affair. The priest in the pulpit and the various members of the congregation may have different views of what commitments are entailed when they recite their creed together. For some parishioners, it may be an absolute declaration of epistemic certainty, while for others, it may be more of a statement of trust combined with a comforting ritual of community and a declaration of social identity. In other words, we know much more about the aspects of ancient philosophy that correspond to theology than we do about those that correspond to religion. To a philosopher, it may seem absurd that someone should hold a worldview in which Epicureanism and Stoicism are equally valid for those who find value in them. But Vergil was, of course, not a philosopher. And one of the main purposes

Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism  63 of the Georgics was to liberate Latin poetry from the subjugation to philosophical discourse that Lucretius had established.35 Vergil did not argue for this directly, for doing so would require fighting philosophy on its own terrain. Instead, he made his points as a poet would, obliquely and by presenting paradoxes and aporias that require the reader to intervene with an interpretation. He does not attempt to reconcile the idyll of the happy farmer at the end of Book 2 with the plague at the end of Book 3. Both are simply presented as the opposing poles of experience between which mankind somehow has to negotiate a tolerable life. No effort is made to reconcile these opposites as part of a grand explanatory scheme. For the philosopher, such tolerance of contradiction may be intolerable, but for the poet, who studies the particular rather than the general, it is a strength that poetry can accommodate the paradoxical and often unaccountable nature of life in all of its messiness. Vergil sets up a distinction between philosophy, which aspires to self-­consistency but (as the happy farmer paradox shows) can never be complete, and poetry, which strives for a more complete view of the world by tolerating such paradoxes, thereby failing to achieve self-consistency. Poetry, which embraces self-contradiction rather than treating it as a flaw in the system, is always partial rather than totalizing, idiosyncratic rather than systematic, particular rather than universal, intuitive rather than rational. It proceeds by methods of allusion and juxtaposition to make implicit inductive claims from particular observations rather than by making ­explicit deductive arguments from general principles; ambiguity is a mechanism for generating meaning rather than an obstacle to it. This conception of poetry as an intellectual discourse with its own rules rather than mere versification is what was at stake when Vergil freed Latin hexameter verse from the position of handmaid to philosophy into which Lucretius had put it, without, however, reverting to an antiphilosophical anti-intellectualism. Vergil’s poem is didactic, but what it teaches is an acceptance of contradiction, confusion and uncertainty as the lot of humankind. A side effect of Vergil’s efforts to distinguish his conception of poetry from ­Lucretius’ by detaching the Georgics from any kind of comprehensive philosophical system is that it seems to cultivate a deliberate policy of self-contradiction. This  is one of the reasons the poem tends to resist unified interpretation. Many readers who focus on one aspect of the poem are forced to downplay conflicting features. Accordingly, other readers have grown wary of trying to extract a single meaning from the text’s contradictions. A recent discussion of the text by Kronenberg highlights the fragmentation of the voice of the narrator: “The Georgics reveals the failures of systems of knowledge and forces the reader to grapple with and understand these failures through techniques of irony and parody” (2009: 15). I agree that Vergil is acutely aware of the limitations in prosaic modes of knowledge like philosophy and science: their systematic nature is their strength, but it is also their weakness, for the world does not always submit to systematization. I would not conclude, however, that we therefore have to interpret Vergil’s voice in this work as splintered. Rather, perhaps we should say that it is the world and human experience within it that are incoherent, and that poetry, being a more supple vehicle than philosophy, is better suited to capture accurately the contradictory aspects of existence.36

64  P. Heslin When Vergil says fortunatus et ille, he allows that his own personal route to happiness via philosophy and the teachings of Epicurus may not be right for everyone. He thus demonstrates the difference between being an Epicurean and being an Epicurean polemicist. His creation of the happy farmer paradox shows that he clearly saw the limitations of his own sect, or of any one sect, and of the rigidity of philosophical doctrine. So it follows that, when Vergil integrates Stoic and other elements into the Aeneid, he is not making a reluctant concession to the heterogeneous nature of his audience.37 Rather, he does this out of genuine sympathy and respect for those who have different values. This breadth of solidarity with those of different beliefs explains much of Vergil’s enduring appeal. One of the most distinctive features of his poetry is the way it has attracted people of vastly different ideologies: pagans, Christians, royalists, and revolutionaries have all had their Vergil. A significant part of Vergil’s genius was to have succeeded in freeing himself of his own ideological baggage so completely that he transcended the contingencies of his own time and place. Notes 1 For their very helpful comments on this project, I am grateful to George Boys-Stones, Nathan Gilbert, Esther Meijer, and an anonymous reviewer. 2 Keith in this volume (23–46); see also Stok (2010: 116) on Suetonius’ apparent suppression of this aspect of Vergil’s biography. On the prosopography of Roman Epicureanism see now Gilbert (2015, especially 68–71 on Vergil). 3 See the essays in Armstrong et al. (2004). 4 For this suggestion, see Minyard (1985) 77–79 and Wigodsky (2004) 223. 5 On the biographical evidence, see Stok (2010: 110–112, 117–118), who inclines to the view that, in Suetonius’ original biography of Vergil, the revision was entrusted to Varius alone. 6 In hanc consuetudinem scribendi induxit philosopho ualde indignam (71.9). Nisbet (1987: ad loc.) notes that “delicatissimis hints at impropriety.” 7 See Sider (1996) 30 with n. 30. 8 See Sider (1987) and (1995); the quotation is from (1995) 55–56. 9 Horace names Philodemus and imitates two of his epigrams in Satires 1.2. Whether he ever met him is unknown: see Tsakiropoulou-Summers (1998). On Philodemus’ influence on Horace, see Yona (2018). 10 Nullius addictus iurare in uerba magistri, Ep. 1.1.14, on which see Fraenkel (1957) 255 and Moles (2002) 141–151. 11 On the connections between the two poems, see Putnam (1972). 12 Tsakiropoulou-Summers (1998) 26; Moles (1995) further suggests a pun here on Horace’s cognomen Flaccus. 13 On Horace’s opposition to the elegiac worldview, see Heslin (2011) 63–64. 14 Denique cur numquam caelo iacit undique puro | Iuppiter in terras fulmen sonitusque profundit? (DRN 6.400–401). 15 Compare the way Horace implicitly criticizes the obtuseness of Iccius, who has been wasting his time studying physics instead of ethics, in Ep. 1.12. 16 Keith in this volume (23–46); see also Keith (2020) 67–68. The text of the Georgics is from Mynors’ OCT; the translation is lightly adapted from Fairclough. 17 I prefer this formulation to an earlier passage in the same book, where there is a hint of hierarchy (2000: 112): “In the absence of any absolute certainty, the farmer’s humble piety is nevertheless held up for admiration: if it is impossible to attain the happy state of

Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism  65 the philosopher, who has trampled fear beneath his feet, still, ‘that man too is fortunate who knows the rustic gods, etc.’” Gale’s twin observations that the life of the farmer is incompatible with that of the Epicurean sage and that Vergil does not privilege one over the other are fundamental for understanding the philosophical paradox that is being constructed here. 18 Lucretius uses the phrase secura quies twice of the peaceful release of death (3.211 and 3.939). Quies is particularly associated with recusal from politics (OLD s.v. 6b); Nepos uses it of the Epicurean Atticus (Att. 7.3) and Cicero of Pythagoras, Democritus, and Anaxagoras (de Orat. 3.56). Philodemus wrote a treatise περὶ παρρησίας, an important subject in Epicurean doctrine. 19 Sin has ne possim naturae accedere partis | frigidus obstiterit circum praecordia sanguis (483–484). On the Empedoclean link between the intellect and the blood around the heart, see Thomas (1988) ad loc. and Nappa (2002). 20 For a different view, see Thomas (1988) 2.490. 21 For the opposite claim, see Clay (1976) 239; Thomas (1988: 254) takes felix as meaning “blessed” and therefore superior to fortunatus as “happy.” 22 See Kronenberg (2009) 141–142: “what the felix and the fortunatus share with each other and with the farmer of this passage is an ability to conquer death and destruction and find happiness and meaning in life.” 23 Neither Thomas (1988) nor Mynors (1990) accepts that ille refers to the farmer; both see the gods invoked here as pointing instead to pastoral, though both acknowledge their presence at the start of the Georgics. 24 Both Thomas (1988) and Mynors (1990) take these lines to refer only to fortunatus ille, which for them means a pastoral figure or countryman rather than specifically a farmer. Kronenberg (2000: 349) argues that illum refers to the poet. 25 On the links of this passage with the priamel, see Thomas (1988) ad loc. 26 On the reminiscence here of Varius’ Epicurean De Morte, see Keith in this volume (32–33). 27 When discussing the blessed agricolae earlier, Mynors (1990: ad 458–474) says, “In 513ff. we shall find quite another story.” Thomas (1988: ad 514) says more justly, “there is initially an absence of language suggesting golden age spontaneity (unlike 459–460, 500–501). But stress is soon placed on the unstinting beneficence of nature … and the finale of the passage (532–540) states what has been implied since 458, that this existence is in essence Saturnian.” 28 Tsouna (2012) 62–63 with 100, n. 65. 29 For a different interpretation of this passage in the light of the Georgics, see Keith in this volume (32), who perhaps allows a slippage between the “landowner” or “gentleman farmer” whose slaves work the land and the kind of farmer that Vergil depicts, who does the work for himself and gets his hands dirty. 30 On the importance of the “medical analogy” in the Epicurean tradition, see Tsouna (2009). 31 See DRN 4.580–594, esp. haec loca capripedes Satyros Nymphasque tenere | finitimi fingunt et Faunos esse locuntur (580–581) and genus agricolum late sentiscere, cum Pan … (586). See also Keith in this volume (28). 32 θεοὶ μὲν γὰρ εἰσίν· ἐναργὴς γὰρ αὐτῶν ἐστιν ἡ γνῶσις … οὐ … προλήψεις εἰσὶν ἀλλ’ ὑπολήψεις ψευδεῖς αἱ τῶν πολλῶν ὑπὲρ θεῶν ἀποφάσεις (ad Men. 2). 33 DRN 5.1161–1193, on which see Bailey (1949) 1.66–68. 34 DRN 4.732–743 and 5.878–924; and cf. Pan…semiferi capitis, DRN 4.586–587. 35 This is, of course, to take Lucretius’ programmatic declarations about his poetry serving as handmaid to philosophy at face value, as I have done throughout. I do not read Lucretius as an ironist, at least not to that extent. 36 Thus Nappa (2005) 10: “Vergil does not attempt to convey information, especially not a simple message that can be given verbal form. Rather, he tries to transmit a recognition of the problems of the human condition, and he hopes to inspire individual readers to develop whatever philosophical armature they can in order to cope with them.”

66  P. Heslin 37 Wigodsky (2004: 225), for example, concludes that Vergil includes such elements because “any given Roman reader might turn out to be ‘a Stoic or something worse,’” borrowing the words of Long (1974) 61.

Works Cited Armstrong, D., J. Fish, P. Johnston, and M. Skinner, eds. 2004. Vergil, Philodemus, and the Augustans. Austin: University of Texas Press. Asmis, E. 1991. “Philodemus’s Poetic Theory and ‘On the Good King According to Homer.’” ClAnt 10: 1–45. Bailey, C., ed. 1949. Titi Lucreti Cari De Rerum Natura Libri Sex. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Clay, J. S. 1976. “The Argument at the End of Vergil’s Second Georgic.” Philologus 120: 232–245. Eckerman, C. 2019. “Lucretius on the Divine.” Mnemosyne 72: 284–299. Fraenkel, E. 1957. Horace. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Gale, M. R. 2000. Virgil on the Nature of Things: The Georgics, Lucretius and the Didactic Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gilbert, N. 2015. Among Friends: Cicero and the Epicureans. Diss. University of Toronto. Heslin, P. 2011. “Metapoetic Pseudonyms in Horace, Propertius and Ovid.” JRS 101: 51–72. Johnson, W. R. 2004. “A Secret Garden: Georgics 4.116–148.” In Vergil, Philodemus, and the Augustans, edd. D. Armstrong, J. Fish, P. Johnston and M. Skinner. Austin: University of Texas Press. 75–83. Johnston, B. 2004. “Piety in Virgil and Philodemus.” In Vergil, Philodemus, and the Augustans, eds. D. Armstrong, J. Fish, P. Johnston and M. Skinner. Austin: University of Texas Press. 159–173. Keith, A. 2020. Virgil. London:Bloomsbury. Klingner, F. 1931. “Über das lob des Landlebens in Virgils Georgica.” Hermes 66: 159–189. Konstan, D. 2011. “Epicurus on the Gods.” In Epicurus and the Epicurean Tradition, eds. J. Fish and K. R. Sanders. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 53–71. Kronenberg, L. 2000. “The Poet’s Fiction: Virgil’s Praise of the Farmer, Philosopher, and Poet at the End of Georgics 2.” HSPh 100: 341–360. ———. 2009. Allegories of Farming from Greece and Rome: Philosophical Satire in Xenophon, Varro, and Virgil. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Long, A. A. 1974. Hellenistic Philosophy: Stoics, Epicureans, Sceptics. London: Bristol Classical Press. Mayer, R., ed. 1994. Horace, Epistles: Book 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Minyard, J. D. 1985. Lucretius and the Late Republic: An Essay in Roman Intellectual History. Leiden: Brill. Moles, J. 1995. Review of Mayer (1994). Bryn Mawr Classical Review 1995.02.37. ———. 2002. “Poetry, Philosophy, Politics and Play: Epistles 1.” In Traditions and Contexts in the Poetry of Horace, eds. A. Woodman and D. Feeney. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 141–157. Mynors, R. A. B. 1990. Virgil: Georgics. Oxford: Clarendon. Nappa, C. 2002. “Cold-Blooded Virgil: Bilingual Wordplay at Georgics 2.483–9.” CQ 52: 617–620. ———. 2005. Reading after Actium: Vergil’s Georgics, Octavian, and Rome. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Nisbet, R. G. M. 1987. In L. Calpurnium Pisonem Oratio. Oxford: Clarendon. Nisbet, R. G. M., and M. Hubbard 1970. A Commentary on Horace: Odes, Book I. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Vergil’s Ironic Epicureanism  67 Putnam, M. 1972. “Horace and Tibullus.” CP 67: 81–88. Rorty, R. 1989. Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sedley, D. 2011. “Epicurus’ Theological Innatism.” In Epicurus and the Epicurean Tradition, edd. J. Fish and K.R. Sanders. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 29–52. Sider, D. 1987. “The Love Poetry of Philodemus.” AJP 108: 310–324. ———. 1995. “The Epicurean Philosopher as Epicurean Poet.” In Philodemus and Poetry: Poetic Theory and Practice in Lucretius, Philodemus and Horace, D. Obbink, ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 42–57. ———, ed. 1996. The Epigrams of Philodemos. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Stok, F. 2010. “The Life of Vergil before Donatus.” In A Companion to Vergil’s Aeneid and its Tradition, eds. J. Farrell and M. C. J. Putnam. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. Summers, K. 1995. “Lucretius and the Epicurean Tradition of Piety.” CP 90: 32–57. Thomas, R. F., ed. 1988. Virgil: Georgics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tsakiropoulou-Summers, A. 1998. “Horace, Philodemus and the Epicureans at Herculaneum.” Mnemosyne 51: 20–29. Tsouna, V. 2009. “Epicurean Therapeutic Strategies.” In The Cambridge Companion to Epicureanism, eds. J. Warren. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 249–265. ———, ed. 2012. Philodemus: On Property Management. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. Wigodsky, M. 2004. “Emotions and Immortality in Philodemus On the Gods 3 and the Aeneid.” In Vergil, Philodemus, and the Augustans, eds. D. Armstrong, J. Fish, P. Johnston and M. Skinner. Austin: University of Texas Press. 211–228. Yona, S. 2018. Epicurean Ethics in Horace: The Psychology of Satire. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Part II

Erotodidaxis

4

Idle Hands The Poetics of Masturbation in the Winter Scenes of Hesiod (Op. 493–563) and Vergil (G. 1.291–310) Leah Kronenberg

The didactic purpose of Hesiod’s artful description of the farmer’s winter in Works and Days (493–563) is notoriously elusive.1 Indeed, the didactic content of Hesiod’s winter passage can be boiled down to the advice to dress warmly, avoid the rain, and adjust food rations for both oxen and people (536–563). Before this advice, Hesiod presents general injunctions against being lazy and unproductive in the winter season (493–503), as well as several riddling tableaux of animals and humans reacting to the cold weather (504–535).2 These sections are the ones that scholars have struggled to explain, both in terms of their specific meaning, since so much of the language and imagery is obscure, and in terms of their overall purpose within Hesiod’s work.3 In this chapter, I propose a new way of making sense of the cryptic imagery in Hesiod’s winter scene and connecting it thematically to the work as a whole. My analysis builds on the work of scholars who have detected sexual double entendres and imagery throughout the passage. Previous analyses of the sexual images have tended to focus narrowly on the linguistic meaning of obscure words and phrases (particularly of the “boneless one” in Op. 524) and have not attempted to connect them in order to find deeper, thematic meaning.4 In this chapter, I will unite these sexual images into a “poetics of masturbation”: I argue that Hesiod associates the winter with a lack of fertility and procreation in the natural world, and that the human reflex of that association is non-procreative, autoerotic activity. This activity is both symbolic and literal in that it represents what lazy people might do when they are trapped inside and trying to stay warm, but it also symbolizes the dangers of idleness and the lack of productivity in winter.5 In the second part of this article, I will examine Vergil’s own winter scene in Georgics 1.291–310 and demonstrate that Vergil acknowledges the sexual double entendres in Hesiod’s winter scene. However, Vergil flips the connotations of this autoerotic activity and associates it not with lack of productivity and idleness but with positive, artistic activity, which he further associates with a Hellenistic aesthetic. Ultimately, I argue that Vergil uses his winter scene to help define his brand of didactic poetry: poetry that does not just celebrate utility but also embraces flagrantly unuseful artistic creation.

DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-7

72  L. Kronenberg Hesiod’s Winter The Idle Man with Swollen Foot

Hesiod’s introduction to winter immediately focuses on the destructive temptation of idle behavior during this season and subtly associates that behavior with masturbation (493–497): Πὰϱ δ’ ἴθι χάλϰειον θῶϰον ϰαὶ ἐπαλέα λέσχην ὥϱῃ χειμεϱίῃ, ὁπότε ϰϱύος ἀνέϱα ἔϱγων ἰσχάνει, ἔνθα ϰ’ ἄοϰνος ἀνὴϱ μέγα οἶϰον ὀϕέλλοι, μή σε ϰαϰοῦ χειμῶνος ἀμηχανίη ϰαταμάϱψῃ σὺν πενίῃ, λεπτῇ δὲ παχὺν πόδα χειϱὶ πιέζῃς.6 In wintertime, pass by the seat of the bronzesmith and warm hangout, when cold keeps man from his work; for even then the industrious man can greatly benefit his household, lest the helplessness of destructive winter overtake you with poverty and you squeeze a swollen foot with thin hand. As commentaries note, ancient sources link hunger and swollen feet,7 but several modern readers have suspected that an obscene meaning lurks beneath the surface and that the “foot” being squeezed by the hand is in fact the penis—a common double entendre.8 In fact, nearly every word in line 497 can have a sexual meaning: in addition to the sexual valence of “foot,” and the obvious relevance of “swollen” and “hand” to masturbation, λεπτῇ (“thin,” but also “peeled, husked”) is derived from λέπειν (“to strip off the rind, husk, peel, bark”), a verb that, like glubere (“to peel off the bark, husk”) in Latin, can refer to masturbation (in the middle voice) or to other sexual “peeling back” of the foreskin,9 while πιέζειν (“to press”) can be used of sexual penetration (Henderson 1991: 138, 176). The sexual subtext of this passage, then, contains Hesiod’s warning not only against hunger but also against the sort of idle behavior that leads to hunger, namely masturbating instead of doing useful work. Empty Hope

Hesiod’s further description of the idle man in lines 498–501 uses more sexual subtexts to present masturbation not only as the literal preoccupation of the idler but also as a metaphor for a lack of productivity and procreation or fertility in winter (498–501): πολλὰ δ’ ἀεϱγὸς ἀνήϱ, ϰενεὴν ἐπὶ ἐλπίδα μίμνων, χϱηίζων βιότοιο, ϰαϰὰ πϱοσελέξατο θυμῷ. ἐλπὶς δ’ οὐϰ ἀγαθὴ ϰεχϱημένον ἄνδϱα ϰομίζει, ἥμενον ἐν λέσχῃ, τῷ μὴ βίος ἄϱϰιος εἴη. Often the idle man, waiting on empty hope and in need of a livelihood, berates his thumos (or meditates evils in his thumos). That hope is not good that tends to a man in need, lounging about in a hall, who has no secure livelihood.

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  73 In this passage, Hesiod returns to the concept of “hope” for the first time since introducing the notorious elpis that remained in Pandora’s jar (Op. 96). While there have been many different interpretations of the elpis in Pandora’s jar (and of the jar itself),10 I find persuasive those which interpret the elpis in the jar, at least on one level of meaning, as the potential for procreation or the hope for a child.11 As Froma Zeitlin argues, “References in other texts to the child as the Elpis, or hope, of the household provide a strong argument for this identification. But a more precise indication is the fact that later medical and philosophical texts associate and even correlate the womb with a container or jar.”12 It certainly makes sense in the context of Works and Days that the one good that Pandora and her female race can bring men is the hope of children—the counterbalance to all the evils that women, in the Hesiodic view, bring to the world.13 But whatever the meaning of Pandora’s elpis, I argue that elpis can have an erotic meaning connected to the hope for a child, namely “seed,” “semen,” or, more loosely, “erotic desire” or “arousal.”14 To better support this meaning in Hesiod, I will first consider some others texts in which elpis has erotic connotations. For instance, in Bacchylides fr. 20B Maehler, elpis is associated with Aphrodite and described as having a physical, erotic effect on men: ὁϱμαίνω τι πέμπ[ειν χϱύσ εον ̣ Μουσᾶν Ἀλεξάνδϱωι πτεϱόν ̣ ϰαὶ συμποσ ̣[ίαι]σιν ἄγαλμ’ [ἐν] εἰϰάδεσ [σιν, ̣ εὖτε νέων ἁ[παλὸν] ⌊γλυϰεῖ’ ἀ⌋νάγϰα σευομενᾶν ϰ ⌊υλίϰων ̣ θάλπη⌋σι θυμόν, Κύπϱιδός τ’ ἐλπ ⌊ὶς ̣ αιθύσσηι ϕϱέ⌋νας, ἀμμειγνυμέν ⌊α ̣ Διονυσίοισι⌋ δώϱοις· ἀνδϱάσι δ’ ὑψο⌊τάτω πέμπει⌋ μεϱίμν ⌊ας· ̣ αὐτίϰ ⌊α⌋ ̣ μὲν π⌊ολίων ϰϱάδ⌋ε μ̣ να ̣ ⌊λύει, πᾶσ⌊ι δ’ ἀνθϱώποις μοναϱ⌋χήσ⌊ειν δοϰεῖ· I am eager to send a golden wing of the Muses and an adornment for drinking parties on the twentieth of the month, when the sweet compulsion of the speeding cups warms the soft thymos of the young, and the elpis of Cypris, mixed with the gifts of Dionysus, darts through their phrenes [and sets them aglow/aflutter]. It sends men’s thoughts soaring on high: straightaway he’s undoing the headbinders of cities, and he fancies he will be monarch of the whole world. (Tr. D. Cairns) Cairns’ analysis underscores the physical, sexual properties of elpis in this passage: “It is wine that unleashes both sexual elpis and the extravagant desires for conquest and monarchy, and the erotic aspect of elpis remains in the image of ‘undoing the headbinder’ as a metaphor for the capture of a city.” He further notes on the image of elpis coursing through the phrenes of the young, “This is perhaps the closest we get to an image of elpis as a sudden, irruptive, phenomenologically passive

74  L. Kronenberg experience of the sort that is figured by the metaphors used of more prototypical emotions” (2016: 37–38). While Cairns stops short of equating this sexualized, “irruptive” elpis with semen, it is easy to imagine that it is not just men’s “thoughts” that are “soaring on high” at this symposium.15 Another erotic use of elpis is found in the second stasimon of Sophocles’ Antigone, in which the chorus meditates on the destructive power of atē, which is closely linked with elpis (615–619): Ἁ γὰϱ δὴ πολύπλαγϰτος ἐλπὶς πολλοῖς μὲν ὄνασις ἀνδϱῶν, πολλοῖς δ’ ἀπάτα ϰουϕονόων ἐϱώτων· εἰδότι δ’ οὐδὲν ἕϱπει, πϱὶν πυϱὶ θεϱμῷ πόδα τις πϱοσαύσῃ. For indeed wide-ranging elpis is a delight for many men, but for many it is a deception arising from insubstantial passions. It sneaks up on one who knows nothing, until he burns his foot in the hot fire. Like the elpis in the Bacchylides passage discussed above, Sophocles’ elpis seems synonymous with erotic desire and is accompanied by sexual imagery. The adjective πολύπλαγϰτος is reminiscent of similar adjectives used to describe a promiscuous love, such as in the phrase γυναῖϰα πεϱίδϱομον (“woman who gets around”) in Theognis (581) or πεϱίϕοιτον ἐϱώμενον (“roaming beloved”) in Callimachus (Ep. 30.3 Pf.; see also 39.2 Pf.).16 The meaning of lines 618–619 is controversial, but Hesiod can help point us in the right direction. Instead of adducing fire-walking rituals or metaphors, as other scholars have done,17 we could consider whether “foot” here, too, connotes “penis” and “fire” connotes the fire of love or a woman. The association of fire with female sexuality is familiar from Hesiod: in Theogony, woman is literally a “gift” in exchange for fire (570); in Works and Days, female sexuality is associated with the fiery heat of the dog star (586–587) and the bad wife “singes her husband, though strong, without a torch” (ἥ τ’ ἄνδϱα ϰαὶ ἴϕθιμόν πεϱ ἐόντα | εὕει ἄτεϱ δαλοῖο, 704–705).18 Thus, perhaps the chorus of Antigone is warning not just of the dangers of deceptive hopes and man’s tendency to learn only through suffering, but also of the dangers specifically of sexual desire, which leads to erotic disaster. Some possible wordplay in these lines might hint at the central figure to suffer from erotic disaster in Antigone’s family, namely Oedipus himself,19 whose name suggests both “knowing-” and “swollen-” “foot/penis”: εἰδότι … | πόδα (618–619).20 On both the surface, moralizing level, and the level of the underlying sexual subtext, then, Sophocles could be looking back to Hesiod’s idle man with swollen foot and empty hopes—a possibility that becomes more likely when Hesiod himself invokes the riddle of the Sphinx in another foot-related image (Op. 533), which I will discuss in detail below.21 Sophocles may also be alluding to Solon fr. 13.33–36 West (“Elegy to the Muses”), in which Solon gives a similar warning about human beings learning only from suffering and enjoying “empty hopes” (ϰούϕαις ἐλπίσι)—a poem that

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  75 itself has been called “Solon’s own comment on the Works and Days.”22 Mark Griffith cites Solon’s passage as a general parallel to these lines from Antigone,23 but I wonder if, again, Sophocles is making a more pointed allusion to Hesiod via Solon: instead of applying the adjective ϰοῦϕος (“light, empty”) to elpis, as Solon had done, possibly in reference to Hesiod’s own use of ϰενός (“empty”) with elpis in Op. 498, Sophocles uses it of erōs, and instead applies to elpis a word that might be better suited to erōs or an object of erōs (πολύπλαγϰτος). Perhaps the switch in these adjectives acknowledges the underlying connection between elpis and erōs, not only in this choral ode but also in Hesiod’s depiction of the idle man of winter. To return now to Hesiod: the idle man who waits on empty hope, lounging around and in need of livelihood, does, on the surface, read like Solon’s man who delights in empty hopes (ϰούϕαις ἐλπίσι, 13.36) and thinks he will acquire money when he is poor (13.41–42). But I would argue that the “empty hope” of the idle man squeezing his “swollen foot” relates also to the more figurative connection in Hesiod and other texts between “hope,” erotic desire, and seed/semen. Specifically, I argue that the idle man’s “empty hope” could refer to the spilled or wasted and useless seed of the masturbator, seed that will not be used for procreation, and thus ties into larger concerns with productivity and fertility in Hesiod.24 Scythinus (AP 12.22, date unknown) uses similar language to describe masturbation: deprived of the opportunity to touch his beloved, the speaker must lie awake at night “using my hands to fight with an empty love” (τῇ ϰενεῇ Κύπϱιδι χειϱομαχῶν) (12.22.8). Meleager provides an even closer parallel in his description of an erotic dream in which he embraces a youth: “Pressing my breast to his tender flesh, we culled empty hopes” (ἐγὼ δ’ ἁπαλῷ περὶ χρωτὶ | στέρνα βαλὼν κενεὰς ἐλπίδας ἐδρεπόμαν, AP. 12.125). Meleager’s verb ἐδρεπόμαν implies fulfillment of sexual desire (and nocturnal emission?), though the phrase κενεὰς ἐλπίδας makes clear the ultimately futile nature of the erotic activity because of the lack of physical contact with his beloved.25 Hesiod’s idle man is also described with language similar to that used to describe the sexually impotent man—a state that is often accompanied by masturbatory activity in an attempt to induce arousal.26 Indeed, the impotent man is frequently described with words akin to ἀεϱγός (Hes. Op. 498) in Greek and Latin.27 The impotent penis is also described as dead, half-dead, or not breathing/not alive—or, to use Hesiod’s phrase, “in need of life/livelihood” (χϱηίζων βιότοιο, Op. 499).28 Most striking, though, is the similarity between the idle man’s address of “bad things” to his own thumos (ϰαϰὰ πϱοσελέξατο θυμῷ, 499)29 and the topos of the impotent lover berating his own penis,30 one of the possible meanings of thumos. The earliest attested use of thumos for penis is found in Hipponax fr. 10 (fr. 30.1 Degani),31 while the most explicit erotic use of thumos appears in Rufinus, the epigrammatist of Neronian (or later) date (AP 5.47; 18 Page): Πολλάϰις ἠϱασάμην σε λαβὼν ἐν νυϰτί, Θάλεια,   πληϱῶσαι θαλεϱῇ θυμὸν ἐϱωμανίῃ· νῦν δ’, ὅτε μοι γυμνὴ γλυϰεϱοῖς μελέεσσι πέπλησαι,

76  L. Kronenberg   ἔϰλυτος ὑπναλέῳ γυῖα ϰέϰμηϰα ϰόπῳ. θυμὲ τάλας, τί πέπονθας; ἀνέγϱεο μηδ’ ἀπόϰαμνε,   ζητήσεις ταύτην τὴν ὑπεϱευτυχίην. Often I prayed, Thalia, to take you at night and fill up my thumos with mad passion. But now, when you are near me naked with your sweet limbs, I am soft and weary in my limbs with drowsy toil. O wretched thumos, what has happened to you? Wake up and do not fail me. You will long for this extreme good fortune! With this poem, Rufinus is invoking and linking two types of poems: impotence poems and poems of self-address to the soul/thumos or heart/kradiē, in which the soul/ heart is provided with encouragement, or in which the speaker generally bemoans his fate.32 Given the semantic slippage between thumos/soul and thumos/penis and the similar types of sentiments—words of frustration and encouragement—­ addressed to each one, it is easy to see how a satirical and erotic poet like Rufinus could link them.33 However, I believe the erotic sense of thumos is present as a double meaning as early as Hesiod in our passage about the idle man in winter. In associating masturbation and impotence in this subtle, suggestive manner with “winter man,” Hesiod is not necessarily making a physiological, scientific point about the sexual state of men in the winter, as he does in his description of the impotence of men during the dog days of summer, which is contrasted with the increased lust of women (Op. 586–587). In the Greek tradition in general, we do not have a consistent notion of what happens to male and female sexuality in winter. Only Aristotle pictures the situation in winter as the opposite of that in the dog days of summer, with men more inclined toward sex and women opposed to it (HA 542a32).34 Yet this assumption does not prevent him from elsewhere calling winter the customary time when married couples procreate (Pol. 1335a38–40).35 What is striking about Hesiod’s winter scene, however, is the complete absence of any image of fertility or procreative sex. I argue that the point of Hesiod’s sexual imagery in this scene—imagery that connotes both masturbation and impotence— is precisely to underscore the threat posed by winter to fertility and productivity of all sorts. The Penetrating Wind and Desolate Winter

In the next section, Hesiod changes his focus from the human to the natural world, as he describes the cold North Wind blowing across the earth, piercing through the skin and coats of animals (504–518). Several scholars have pointed to the sexual imagery of these lines, particularly of the penetrating actions of the North Wind, but what is clear is that this “sexual” behavior does not lead to fertility and procreation.36 Though the earth is still described with its traditional epithet “all-­ nourishing” (πουλυβοτείϱῃ, 510), this adjective only serves to emphasize that the earth is anything but “nourishing” in winter and is simply the setting in which the oak and fir trees bend their heads down under the impact of the howling wind

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  77 (509–510). The fact that shivering animals cover their genitals with their tails (512) further underscores the non-procreative imagery.37 While Hesiod’s presentation of the natural world is relatively clear thus far, we return to more riddling territory again when Hesiod brings the human world back into his winter landscape (518–535): τϱοχαλὸν δὲ γέϱοντα τίθησιν ϰαὶ διὰ παϱθενιϰῆς ἁπαλόχϱοος οὐ διάησιν, ἥ τε δόμων ἔντοσθε ϕίλῃ παϱὰ μητέϱι μίμνει, οὔπω ἔϱγα ἰδυῖα πολυχϱύσου Ἀϕϱοδίτης, εὖ τε λοεσσαμένη τέϱενα χϱόα ϰαὶ λίπ’ ἐλαίῳ χϱισαμένη μυχίη ϰαταλέξεται ἔνδοθι οἴϰου, ἤματι χειμεϱίῳ, ὅτ’ ἀνόστεος ὃν πόδα τένδει ἔν τ’ ἀπύϱῳ οἴϰῳ ϰαὶ ἤθεσι λευγαλέοισιν· οὐ γάϱ οἱ ἠέλιος δείϰνυ νομὸν ὁϱμηθῆναι, ἀλλ’ ἐπὶ ϰυανέων ἀνδϱῶν δῆμόν τε πόλιν τε στϱωϕᾶται, βϱάδιον δὲ Πανελλήνεσσι ϕαείνει. ϰαὶ τότε δὴ ϰεϱαοὶ ϰαὶ νήϰεϱοι ὑληϰοῖται λυγϱὸν μυλιόωντες ἀνὰ δϱία βησσήεντα, ϕεύγουσιν, ϰαὶ πᾶσιν ἐνὶ ϕϱεσὶ τοῦτο μέμηλεν, οἷ σϰέπα μαιόμενοι πυϰινοὺς ϰευθμῶνας ἔχουσι ϰὰϰ γλάϕυ πετϱῆεν· τότε δὴ τϱίποδι βϱοτῷ38 ἶσοι, οὗ τ’ ἐπὶ νῶτα ἔαγε, ϰάϱη δ’ εἰς οὖδας ὁϱᾶται· τῷ ἴϰελοι ϕοιτῶσιν, ἀλευόμενοι νίϕα λευϰήν. [The force of the North Wind] makes the old man bent over39 but does not blow through the soft-skinned maiden, who stays next to her dear mother within the house, not yet knowing the works of golden Aphrodite; having washed her tender skin well and anointing herself richly with oil, she lies down deep within her house on a winter day, when the boneless one gnaws his foot, in his fireless house and wretched abodes. For the sun does not show him a pasture to reach for, but wanders over the people and city of dark men and shines more slowly for all the Greeks. Then the horned and hornless forest-dwellers, mournfully gnashing their teeth throughout the thickets of the woods, flee, and this alone is a care to them, seeking shelter and having well-covered hiding places in a rocky hollow. Then, they are like the threefooted man, whose back is broken, and head looks to the ground. Like him, they go back and forth, avoiding the white snow. I hope to show that Hesiod’s oracular and obscure images help to clarify one another. In particular, the imagery of the male creatures—the bent over old man (518), the “boneless one” gnawing its foot (524–526), and the animals who are like the three-legged mortal whose head is facing the ground (533–535)—are arguably all depicted in the same bent over pose. This pose is further reinforced by the earlier imagery of the trees bending their heads to the ground under the force of

78  L. Kronenberg the wind (509–510). The “bent over” position is a frequent signal of sexual activity, and particularly of non-procreative sex, such as fellatio, anal sex, or sex with prostitutes.40 One important difference between the bent-over figures in the winter scene and other characters that are described as engaged in sex acts by words such as ϰύβδα or ϰύπτω is that that these latter figures are always either “bending over” someone else or “being bent over” by somebody. I argue that Hesiod’s solitary, stooped-over figures are, once again, engaging in autoerotic activity, though this time Hesiod does not mention the hand but depicts the head bending down—a pose that elsewhere suggests fellatio and, in this instance, perhaps autofellatio. The Boneless One

To support this seemingly outrageous claim, it is easiest to start with the “boneless one” (Op. 524–526), since I am not the first to read it as a sexual image.41 Modern scholars debate what creature Hesiod intended to depict with his kenning of the “boneless one,” as well as the meaning of the verb τένδει (524), though ancient commentators are unanimous in their belief that Hesiod has depicted an octopus gnawing on or eating his foot—a behavior attributed to octopuses in the ancient world.42 Troubled by the sudden intrusion of marine life into Hesiod’s winter landscape (and by the shaky linguistic explanation of τένδει by the ancients), some modern scholars have preferred to interpret the “boneless one” as a double of Hesiod’s kenning for the snail in line 571 (ϕεϱέοιϰος, “house carrier”).43 Others, however, have followed the lead of Calvert Watkins in suspecting that, once again, Hesiod’s use of “foot” is not so innocent, and that the “boneless one” presents us with another sexual image, though the exact nature of the image depends on the meaning of τένδει and on the relationship between the “boneless one” and the “foot.”44 Of course, we do not need to choose between interpreting the “boneless one” as an animal or a sexual/human image: I think it is both, and Hesiod’s “riddle” has both an innocent and obscene solution, as ancient riddles frequently do.45 The “innocent” solution accepted by all ancient readers of Hesiod—that he has depicted an “octopus gnawing its foot”—seems the most convincing to me. While it is not impossible for Hesiod to use two different kennings for the same animal (i.e., if ἀνόστεος and ϕεϱέοιϰος were both to mean “snail”), he does not do so elsewhere.46 In addition, while ἀνόστεος is used of both the snail and the octopus in other Greek texts,47 the reference to the “foot” of the boneless one tilts us in the direction of the octopus, whose primary characteristic is its many feet (cf. πολύπους, “octopus”), whereas the snail is called “footless” (ἄπουν, Athen. 10.455e) in the same passage of Athenaeus in which it is labeled ἀνόστεον. Athenaeus preserves two different riddling descriptions of the snail (10.455e and 2.63b)48 and locates such riddles in the context of the symposium. The symposium may also have been the context for many of Hesiod’s riddling passages,49 and riddles with a secondary sexual meaning would be perfectly at home at the symposium. The octopus is a creature associated with sex in the ancient mind,50 and the action of eating its own foot is a perfect image to suggest autofellatio, an autoerotic

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  79 activity that pairs nicely with the other autoerotic use of “foot” in line 497.51 Artemidorus’ Oneirocritica discusses the symbolic meaning of dreaming about autofellatio and associates it with poverty, hunger, and illness, as well as with thinness, since only the very thin are capable of doing the required bending (Oneir. 1.80).52 Hesiod’s use of “boneless” could indicate the seemingly boneless structure of the man acrobatic enough to perform autofellatio. My interpretation of “boneless” has the advantage of solving the conundrum posed by Ercolani, who protests that it makes no sense for the phallus (“the boneless one”) to eat its own phallus (“foot”).53 I would also add that the “fireless house” and “wretched abodes” (Op. 525) of the octopus in the sea might, on a sexual level, connote the mouth of the self-fellator. Artemidorus likens the mouth of the self-fellator metaphorically to a tomb, since it “destroys what it takes in” (Oneir. 1.80), but it is also easy to see it metaphorically as a place that is cold (“fireless”) and wretched (or “moist,” if ancient commentators are correct to define λευγαλέος as “moist”).54 Thus, Hesiod has cleverly created a double of his idle, masturbating man with a riddling kenning that pairs animal behavior with human and reinforces the connection between winter and non-procreative sexual behavior.55 The Bent and Three-Legged Man

Surrounding the description of the “boneless one” are two depictions of stoopedover old men (Op. 518, 533–535), each of which helps to clarify the other: the enigmatic τϱοχαλόν (“bent [?] like a wheel,” 518) is clarified by the unambiguous bent-over position of the old man in line 534, while the riddling τϱίποδι βϱοτῷ (“three-legged man,” 533) is clarified by the unambiguous reference to an old man (γέϱοντα) in line 518. Yet even if a reader agrees that both images depict the same thing—an old man stooped over—where is the sexual imagery? Once again, suspicion falls on Hesiod’s use of “foot” in line 533. While most commentators note the riddling character of the “three-footed/­ legged man” and the similarity to the riddle of the Sphinx, only Joshua Katz has argued for an erotic level of meaning: “[T]he riddle [of the Sphinx] has a number of erotic interpretations, one of which is almost certainly alluded to already in Hesiod’s τϱίποδι βϱοτῷ ἶσοι.”56 Katz goes on to quote one of these erotic interpretations of the riddle, found in a recently discovered epigram of the 1st-century-ce epigrammatist Nicarchus (P. Oxy. 4502 fr. 4), in which the answer is not man, but “pathic man,” who has two feet when he stands, four feet when he is supporting himself bent over to the ground with his hands, and three feet with his phallus (Katz 2006: 180–181). While this epigram is late, and some of the words in the crucial line mentioning the τϱίπους are uncertain, most commentators agree that the above interpretation is the likeliest one, and they cite parallels such as the description of Priapus as “three-legged” (τϱισϰελής) in Theocritus (AP 9.437.3).57 In addition, Nicarchus is not the only poet to play on the riddle of the Sphinx and sexual positions: the comic poet Anaxilas (fourth century bce), in a fragment preserved by Athenaeus, plays on the similarity of hetaeras to various mythical creatures, including the Sphinx, due to their penchant for speaking in riddles, and

80  L. Kronenberg gives the following as an example of their riddling words (Athen. 13.558d, fr. 22.25–26 Kock):58 εἶτα τετϱάπους μοι γένοιτο, ϕησί, †τήνπϱος† ἢ θϱόνος· εἶτα δὴ τϱίπους τις, εἶτα, ϕησί, παιδίσϰη δίπους. And one says, “Let me have a four-footed [bed?] or chair; and another, “let me have a tripod,” and another, “a two-footed little girl.” Jeffrey Henderson interprets the lines as euphemisms “for positions in which a woman is penetrated while on all fours,” and Laura McClure concludes, “Here the hetaera…recasts the riddle solved by Oedipus…into an obscene advertisement of her sexual expertise.”59 Thus, Hesiod’s “three-footed” man—or a man with an erect phallus, who is bending his head towards the ground and appearing in close proximity to Hesiod’s self-eating octopus—looks suspiciously like another reference to autofellatio.60 Yet what does it mean to compare animals seeking shelter in the cold weather to the three-footed man, as Hesiod does in lines 529–535? Ingrid Waern suggests that the “solution of the kenning is that animals… curl up to protect themselves against the bitter cold and thus resemble and [sic] old man bent and leaning on his stick” (1951: 119). I would slightly amend this solution to suggest that the animals are curled up and licking their genitals like the self-fellating man. Such behavior is natural in the animal world, of course, and so part of the wit of the passage is that normal animal behavior is compared to scandalous human behavior, possibly even with the implication that humans learned such behavior from animals. At least, this suggestion would fit with the theory of Artemidorus, who argues that every creature has a natural sexual position, which, for human beings, is the σχῆμα τὸ πϱόσχϱωτα (“the body-to-body position”), and that humans learn other positions from animals, such as mounting from behind like four-legged creatures (Oneir. 1.79), a position that they utilize when they give in to “lust and licentiousness” (ὕβϱει ϰαὶ ἀϰολασίᾳ).61 Indeed, humans are usually the ones compared to wild animals when assuming a “lewd” sexual position, such as the λέαινα (“lioness”).62 Again, part of the humor of the passage derives from the reversal of the usual comparison of humans to animals.63 The Winter Maiden

Now we can finally turn to the image of the “winter maiden” (519–524) embedded among all of these images of men who are, as I have argued, engaged in autoerotic activity. Hesiod’s “winter maiden” has attracted almost as much attention as the “boneless one,” though there is no consensus on Hesiod’s attitude towards her, what she represents, or how she connects to the surrounding images of the “bentover” old man and the “boneless one.” She has been called the most positive depiction of a woman in Hesiod,64 as well as a double of Pandora or a parallel figure to Hesiod’s idle man in winter.65 She has been taken to represent sexual innocence

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  81 (e.g., Marquardt 1982: 288) or the lack of female interest in sex in winter (e.g., Campanile 1986: 359–360; Bagordo 2009: 52–53), as well as the allure of female sexuality on the cusp of marriage (e.g., Marsilio 1997b: 106; Lye 2018: 185–186). While it is true that Hesiod is not explicit about how he judges his winter maiden, I agree with those who read her as a negatively coded image of idleness and sexuality. In particular, I would argue that there are some subtle suggestions that Hesiod’s winter maiden—while explicitly depicted as a virgin and not being used for procreative sexual activity (Op. 519–520)—may be engaged in autoerotic activity. Hesiod’s focus on the maiden’s virgin status and her isolation deep within her house (523), coupled with the sensuous image of her lying down in the daytime after bathing and anointing herself with oil (522–524), has the effect of portraying her as a sexual creature with no productive outlet for her sexual energy but herself.66 Indeed, according to Aristotle, young girls who have reached sexual maturity have the strongest impulse for sexual activity and must be carefully watched (HA 7.1, 581b).67 Some critics have been confused by Hesiod’s suggestion that the maiden is lying down in the daytime (ἤματι χειμεϱίῳ, 524; e.g., Evelyn-White 1916: 211), while others have explained the detail as a general indication of her idleness (West 1978: 288; Marsilio 1997b: 102). Yet lying down in the daytime after bathing and anointing oneself with oil could well connote sexual activity, not just laziness. Lilah Grace Canevaro has suggested that this bathing scene links the winter maiden with Aphrodite, and specifically with the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite: Aphrodite is bathed and anointed as a prelude to her sexual encounter with Anchises (5.61), with whom she pretends to be “a virgin with no experience in sex” (ἀδμήτην…ϰαὶ ἀπειϱήτην ϕιλότητος, 5.133).68 Of course, our winter maiden has no Anchises—only a bath, oil, and a bed. Martin Kilmer has shown that, in visual art, female masturbation scenes are frequently accompanied by bathing accessories and oil (1993: 86–87). While depicting in detail the act of female masturbation may be too taboo for Hesiod, his seamless transition from the winter maiden’s unspecified activity in bed to the “boneless one” eating his foot in winter may be a witty way of filling in details that were too risqué for explication. Finally, then, we might be able to provide an answer to Hesiod’s unspoken riddle about what a stoopedover old man, a young girl, and an octopus in winter have in common, and the answer brings us back to our idle man squeezing his “foot” as a sexualized symbol of the barren season of winter and the dangers of laziness. Hesiod ends his winter scene with some brief didactic advice about making warm clothes and shoes for winter, getting home at night before rain comes, and adjusting rations for men and oxen (536–560). He instructs his readers to remember this advice until the spring, when “Earth, the mother of all, brings forth her commingled fruit” (γῆ πάντων μήτηϱ ϰαϱπὸν σύμμιϰτον ἐνείϰῃ, 563).69 Thus, winter is concluded with a clear reminder that it is the season in which the earth is barren and it is a struggle for farmers to be productive—a theme that the sexual riddles of the passage adumbrate throughout, whether through suggestions of autoerotic activity, impotence, or both. For Hesiod, masturbation, despite the potential association of that activity with self-reliance, does not represent the self-sufficient ideal, because it is an activity that is only focused on bodily pleasure and has no useful purpose.70

82  L. Kronenberg As noted previously, I do not believe Hesiod is making a scientific statement about men’s (or women’s) impotence or lack of interest in (heterosexual) sex in the winter but instead is creating a “poetics of masturbation,” in which autoerotic activity is exploited for its symbolic potential. The Cicada, Impotence, and the Dog Days of Summer

Hesiod does make a statement about men’s impotence (and women’s hypersexuality) in the dog days of summer (586) and, before turning to Vergil, I want to consider briefly this summer scene, both how it complements the sexual symbolism of Hesiod’s winter and its metapoetic aspects, which will be important for consideration of Vergil’s winter. Hesiod’s dog days are introduced by the poetic figure of the cicada (582–584): Ἦμος δὲ σϰόλυμός τ’ ἀνθεῖ ϰαὶ ἠχέτα τέττιξ δενδϱέῳ ἐϕεζόμενος λιγυϱὴν ϰαταχεύετ’ ἀοιδὴν πυϰνὸν ὑπὸ πτεϱύγων, θέϱεος ϰαματώδεος ὥϱῃ… When the golden thistle is in bloom and the clear-sounding cicada, sitting on a tree, pours forth its clear song constantly from beneath its wings, in the season of exhausting summer… Ralph Rosen (1990: 107–108) and Maria Marsilio (2000: 27) have both drawn connections between the cicada and the Hesiodic poet, who, shortly after this summer passage, tells of how the Muses put him on the path of “clear song” (λιγυϱῆς ἐπέβησαν ἀοιδῆς, 659). Yet, the cicada is not only a poet figure; he is also a symbol of the dangers of idleness. In Aesop (Fable 373 Perry), the cicada starves in winter because he spent the summer singing instead of storing food like the ant. In other words, he is precisely the idler in winter against whom Hesiod had inveighed so insistently.71 Thus, while the cicada is certainly a poet-figure with some connections to Hesiod in Works and Days, he is not simply a double of the didactic poet bent on utility and self-sufficiency, but rather seems better to represent a poet interested in aesthetics and ars gratia artis—an association that Callimachus surely drew upon in Aetia fr. 1.29–40 Pf., in which he embraces the cicada as a poetic model.72 Hesiod further associates the dog days with leisure time in his injunction to sit in the shade (ἐν σϰιῇ ἑζόμενον, 593; cf. εἴη πετϱαίη τε σϰιὴ, 589) and drink wine, eat bread and meat, and enjoy the breeze of Zephyr (589–596). Coming so soon after Hesiod’s command to “avoid shady seats and sleeping until dawn in time of the harvest” (ϕεύγειν δὲ σϰιεϱοὺς θώϰους ϰαὶ ἐπ’ ἠόα ϰοῖτον | ὥϱῃ ἐν ἀμήτου, 574–575), as well as his constant concern with avoiding leisure (and useless speech) in winter,73 Hesiod’s sudden celebration of a moment of leisure and “useless” song is striking.74 Perhaps the explanation for Hesiod’s seeming change in attitude toward “useless” leisure can be found in his indication that men are “most weak/impotent” (586) during this time period, with the implication that working beneath the burning dog star is simply counterproductive and even damaging; momentary relaxation is ultimately more useful and productive in the long run. Thus, while the idle

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  83 cicada is not a perfect model for Hesiod and does not represent Hesiodic poetics in toto, Hesiod still allows a (very limited) time and a place for cicada-song and leisure.75 For Hesiod qua poet, the cicada might represent that aspect of his poetry that is self-consciously artistic and seemingly without useful purpose, but that ultimately serves to make his poetry more memorable and meaningful—an aspect well represented by his sexual riddles in winter and his picturesque picnic in summer. Vergil’s Winter Vergil’s winter scene is different in many respects from Hesiod’s. It is shorter and is introduced in conjunction with activities that can be done at night or at dawn (G. 1.287–290). Vergil transitions from these activities to a vignette about the indoor, nighttime labor of a husband and wife during the winter season (291–296), and then to a general statement about the laziness of winter in contrast to the summer, before concluding with a description of the hunting and gathering that can still be done during the snowy days of winter (305–310). Thus, on the surface, there are not many explicit points of contact between the two winters, though the broadly Hesiodic framework of Georgics 1 certainly invites the reader to compare them, as does the exact quotation of Hesiod (Op. 381) in line 299.76 But I will argue that, on the underlying, thematic level, Vergil deeply engages with Hesiod’s winter scene: he incorporates Hesiod’s use of sexual allegories to reflect on the themes of productivity and utility while intensifying the metapoetic aspects of Hesiod’s winter (and summer). Like Hesiod, Vergil evokes autoerotic activity in his winter scene, but instead of coloring it with a negative brush and warning about the dangers of laziness and lack of productivity, Vergil associates masturbation with productive and artistic activity. More specifically, he associates it with Hellenistic poetics, in which art can be an end in itself, even if not “useful.” Vergil distinguishes his didactic poetry from Hesiod’s by infusing it with a Hellenistic aesthetic in a passage that essentially forms a hinge between the Hesiodic and Aratean sections of Georgics Book 1.77 In linking his own didactic poetry with Hellenistic poetics, Vergil fully redeems the poetics of the cicada from Hesiod’s summer festival and expands its purpose beyond the very limited time and place Hesiod grants it. Thus, instead of forcing Hesiod into a Hellenistic mold, Vergil acknowledges the seeds of the Hellenistic aesthetic in Hesiod while also showing the crucial ways in which Hellenistic poetry (and Vergil’s poetry) differ from their Hesiodic inspiration.78 Hellenistic Poetics and the Winter Scene

Before making a case for the presence of sexual allegory in Vergil’s winter scene, I will first review some of the ways in which the passage evokes Hellenistic poetics (G. 1.291–296): et quidam seros hiberni ad luminis ignis peruigilat ferroque faces inspicat acuto. interea longum cantu solata laborem

84  L. Kronenberg arguto coniunx percurrit pectine telas, aut dulcis musti Volcano decoquit umorem et foliis undam trepidi despumat aëni.79 A certain man stays awake by the late fires of winter light and, with sharp iron, shapes torches like an ear of grain. Meanwhile, his wife, having found solace for her long labor in song, runs through the web with singing shuttle or boils down the liquid of sweet must with fire and, with leaves, skims off the foam from the trembling cauldron. The metapoetic aspects of this passage have been well documented by John Henkel, who persuasively argues that “the chores that occupy the farmer and his wife in this passage are literalizations of the metaphorical terms in which Callimachus and Leonidas of Tarentum praise Aratus and his poem.”80 Henkel’s careful analysis of the many connections between this passage and Aratus (as well as the reception of Aratus) ultimately allows the farmer and his wife to represent the Aratean and Callimachean quality of λεπτότης (“refinement”)81—the farmer through his wakefulness, which is associated by Callimachus with Aratus’ refined verses (χαίϱετε λεπταί | ῥήσιες, Ἀϱήτου σύμβολον ἀγϱυπνίης, Ep. 27.3–4 Pf.), and the wife through her toil, which is associated by Leonidas with Aratus’ refined mind (λεπτῇ | ϕϱοντίδι, AP 9.25.1–2; cf. ϰαμὼν ἔϱγον μέγα, 9.25.5), as well as through her singing and weaving activity.82 Callimachus’ epigram about Aratus begins with the name Hesiod and specifically places Aratus in the Hesiodic tradition, while also creating space for a difference between the two poets.83 Similarly, Callimachus’ own intensely metapoetic beginning of the Aetia engages with Hesiod, even as he differentiates his poetics.84 Thus, when Vergil alludes to Aratus and Callimachus’ epigram on Aratus in his winter scene, he is also alluding to the Hellenistic negotiation of its Hesiodic past, while making his own contribution to the reception of Hesiod. The Winter Man

While the metapoetic aspects of Vergil’s winter scene may be most prominent, his picturesque tableau of the farmer and his wife also subtly alludes to the autoerotic activities of Hesiod’s “idle man” and “winter maiden.” For example, the one activity that Vergil gives his “winter man,” making a torch by shaping it like an ear of grain with sharp iron, is laden with phallic imagery,85 and the torch can also connote the flame of passion or the torch of Eros.86 The unusual verb that Vergil uses for cutting the torch with a sharp knife into the shape of grain, the hapax inspico, is reminiscent of two of the literal meanings of the λέπω or glubo/deglubo, namely, “to strip bark (with a sharp object)” and “to husk grain.”87 And, as noted previously, these verbs can be used to evoke the retraction of the foreskin, particularly in ­masturbation. Of course, λέπω also shows up in the “idle man” passage to describe the “thin hand” (λεπτῇ…χειϱί, 497) pressing the “swollen foot” (παχὺν πόδα, 497) and is a perfect verb to link sexual and metapoetic concerns.

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  85 Indeed, Hesiod’s use of λεπτός and παχύς in this passage foreshadows Callimachus’ own stylistic juxtaposition in the Aetia of the “as fat as possible” (πάχιστον, fr. 1.23 Pf.) sacrifice with his “slender Muse” (Μοῦσαν … λεπταλέην, fr. 1.24 Pf.).88 While Hesiod is presumably not making a stylistic point in his depiction of the lazy man’s “thin” hand and “swollen” foot, Vergil may have seen the metapoetic possibilities of the terms and may have been inspired to use his winter passage as an homage both to Hellenistic λεπτότης and Hesiodic double entendres.89 Yet, Vergil transforms the connotations both of Hesiodic λεπτός—which, in Hesiod, connotes poverty and hunger, not a refined poetic style—and of masturbation. Whereas Hesiod created a link between masturbation and being unproductive and hungry, Vergil instead creates an alliance between autoerotic imagery and the productive activity of a skilled craftsman or farmer shaping a torch. The Winter Wife

Vergil’s “winter wife” is also presented in a wholly positive manner, unlike Hesiod’s more ambiguous “winter maiden.” The label “wife” (coniunx) suggests that Vergil’s woman engages in procreative sexual activity with her husband, but in this scene, she is depicted doing solo activities. The most erotically charged word in Vergil’s description is pectine (294): pecten can be used to indicate pubic hair,90 as well as a penis or dildo.91 The nonsexual meaning of the word pecten is ambiguous in this passage: it usually refers to the comb of the weaver, but translators and commentators assume, from the description of it (arguto…pectine, 294), that Vergil means the weaver’s shuttle, since it is usually the shuttle (radius) that is depicted as making a noise. Mynors is troubled by this confusing substitution (1990: 68), but the sexual meaning of pecten—which I would suggest is a dildo here, and not pubic hair, though the latter may be suggested by telas or the threads of the loom in 294—can provide an explanation for its surprising use here.92 In addition to the erotic pecten, the depiction of the wife as “consoling her long labor” (longum…solata laborem) adds further sexual resonance. Lesbia’s erotic activity with her phallic sparrow was labeled a “consolation of her grief” (solaciolum sui doloris, Catull. 2.7),93 while Juvenal’s Roman matron also uses her phallic pecten/plectrum to console herself (hunc tenet, hoc se | solatur gratoque indulget basia plectro, 6.383–384). Finally, the additional activities of the wife in lines 295–296, namely boiling down must and skimming the foam, may also have an erotic sense. The womb and female genitalia are frequently depicted metaphorically by vessels, as well as by the hearth or oven.94 In Greek comedy, wine may have been a metaphor for vaginal secretions, as were other liquids.95 Thus, Vergil’s focus on the moisture of sweet must (dulcis musti…umorem in 295 and undam in 296) in the trembling (trepidi, 296) cauldron seems suggestive.96 Despite these suggestions of autoerotic activity, Vergil’s coniunx, like her husband, is depicted in a positive manner as an artist who sings and weaves. Vergil’s use of arguto (“clear”) to describe either the wife’s singing or shuttle97 might recall the “clear voice” of Callimachus’ cicada-ideal (λιγὺν ἦχον | τέττιγος, fr. 1.29–30 Pf.), as well as the “clear song” of Hesiod’s cicada (λιγυϱὴν…ἀοιδὴν, Op. 583).

86  L. Kronenberg Vergil’s weaving wife, then, is no lazy idler who consumes her husband’s resources, like the bad wife in Hesiod’s Works and Days (703–705), or potentially like all women in the Theogony (590–612). Instead, she combines the sort of practical activity that Hesiod recommends in the final didactic portion of his winter scene (Op. 538—and describes as the activity of a wife in Op. 779) with the song of the cicada, useful only for its beauty and association with solace from labor in summer.98 As a consequence, autoerotic activity is also not painted in a negative light as a symbol of a lack of productivity or procreation, but instead becomes a symbol both of artistic activity that is valued for its own sake and of the refined poetics of Hellenistic poetry. On a metapoetic level, then, Vergil is defining his own brand of didactic poetry as poetry that tilts more in the direction of aesthetic and artistic value than Hesiod’s, though without abandoning the goal of utility.99 Summer Plowing and the Lazy Winter

After the depiction of the solo activities of the husband and wife on a winter night, Vergil next introduces a general contrast between summer and winter (G. 1.297–304): at rubicunda Ceres medio succiditur aestu et medio tostas aestu terit area fruges. nudus ara, sere nudus. hiems ignaua colono: frigoribus parto agricolae plerumque fruuntur mutuaque inter se laeti conuiuia curant. inuitat genialis hiems curasque resoluit, ceu pressae cum iam portum tetigere carinae, puppibus et laeti nautae imposuere coronas. But golden Ceres is cut down in the midday heat, and in the midday heat, the threshing floor threshes the dried grain. Plow naked, sow naked. Winter is lazy/unfruitful for the farmer: in the cold, farmers generally enjoy their produce, and they happily tend to feasts amongst themselves. Festive winter invites them to loosen their cares, just as when laden ships have finally reached port and happy sailors have placed garlands on their ships. This contrast between summer and winter can again be viewed through a sexual lens, as juxtaposing the “procreative summer” with the “masturbatory/ non-­procreative winter,” but even so, the “lazy winter” continues to be presented in a positive light. Vergil ignores Hesiod’s concerns about the debilitating effect of heat on man’s potency and associates summer only with naked plowing and sowing—a literal translation from Hesiod (Op. 391), but also an easy metaphor for procreative sexual activity.100 Vergil imports into the winter season the festive cheer of Hesiod’s summer picnic.101 He embraces the laziness of winter that had so concerned H ­ esiod and replaces the sordid bronzesmith’s hangout of Hesiod’s winter man with a cheerful symposium focused on the enjoyment of what

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  87 has been produced and the releasing of cares. There may be some suggestion of non-procreative, homoerotic activity in the sympotic atmosphere evoked by the phrase mutuaque…conuiuia (301),102 while the language of “releasing cares” has been used in descriptions of masturbation.103 Finally, the concluding image of ships reaching port (303–304) is easily susceptible to a sexual interpretation due to the popularity of “sea of love” imagery.104 Vergil’s depiction of winter as genialis (“festive,” but also “relating to procreation”) in line 302 underscores his transformation of Hesiod’s winter. Unlike Hesiod’s barren landscape full of cold and unproductive creatures, Vergil’s winter is productive—not of the fruits of the earth (or children), but of artistic activity, good cheer, and freedom from care among friends. He thus creates an association not just between winter and Hellenistic aesthetics, but also between winter and a quasi-Epicurean hedonism. The Epicurean undertones of winter are even more pronounced in Vergil’s later depiction of the Scythians, who, happy (laeti, 3.375, 379), live in perpetual winter and spend “carefree leisure” (secura…otia, 3.377) deep in caves, where they hold primitive symposia (377–380). Incidentally, Hippocrates reports in Airs, Waters, Places that the Scythians are the “least prolific” among men (19), have no desire for intercourse due to the cold (21) or even for masturbation (22), and suffer from impotence (21–22). While Vergil does not specifically allude to their impotence, he may expect his readers to create a further association between winter and infertility,105 but once again with a positive overlay of intellectual fulfillment. Like Hesiod, Vergil finishes his winter passage with a few specific tasks that can be done in the cold of winter, though instead of focusing on warm clothing, Vergil details the hunting and gathering that can be accomplished (305–310) when “the snow is deep” (310). Even here, several words and phrases invite sexual interpretations, such as the advice to strip acorns (glandes…stringere, 305) and gather berries, including the myrtle (myrta, 306), and chase long-eared hares (auritos… lepores, 308). The “acorn” (glans, βάλανος) is a medical term for the glans penis in both Greek and Latin and thus easily enters less-technical literature as a slang term for the penis, while myrtle berries are used for the female genitalia in Greek.106 The long-eared hare also has phallic connotations.107 Perhaps Vergil has created further images of autoerotic activity, linked once again with useful tasks and not castigated as a symbol of laziness or lack of productivity. Conclusion Despite adopting the pose of a Hesiodic didactic poet in Georgics, and particularly in Book 1, Vergil takes pains to expand the meaning of didactic poetry and bring into its orbit the Hellenistic aesthetic of finely crafted art, much as Aratus had done. In his winter passage, which comes near the transition from the Hesiodic and to the Aratean section (351–463) of his book, Vergil looks back to Hesiod’s focus on the challenges winter poses to fertility and productivity, which he had symbolized with his poetics of masturbation, while also celebrating the λεπτοσύνη of Aratus (and Callimachus). Vergil’s own poetics of masturbation redeems the pleasures of

88  L. Kronenberg idleness and non-“useful” art without relinquishing his poetry’s claim to a certain kind of utility. Indeed, I would suggest that Vergil simply redefines what it means to be self-sufficient and useful: he divorces this meaning from the primarily materialistic conception of flourishing found in Hesiod’s Works and Days and joins it to a more intellectual and artistic conception, such as is found in the winter scene, and also in Vergil’s final sphragis, in which he is “flourishing in the pursuits of ignoble otium” (studiis florentem ignobilis oti, 4.564). Yet Vergil’s homage to Works and Days also makes clear that the seeds of his complex didactic vision are also present in Hesiod. After all, Vergil acknowledges that even Hesiod found space in his poetry for riddling wordplay, sexual double entendres, and metapoetic reflection, and that even Hesiod felt the allure of the cicada song.108 Notes 1 See Nicolai (1964) 107; West (1978) 283; Heath (1985) 255–256; Hamilton (1989) 70–71; Nelson (1998) 55–56; Marsilio (2000) 31–32; Canevaro (2015) 73–75. On Works and Days as “didactic” in genre, see Koning (2010) 341–349; Canevaro (2015) 123–142, with bibliography for earlier discussions. 2 On Hesiod’s penchant for riddling language and double meanings, both in general and in the winter passage particularly, see Edwards (1971) 111–113; Marsilio (2000) 40; Fraser (2011) 21 and n. 54; Canevaro (2015) 166–180; Vergados (2020) 189–206. 3 Frequently, scholars call the passages “descriptive” or “poetic,” without further discussion of how they connect to the themes of the work as a whole, though Nelson (1996: 50) provides a nice analysis in which she argues that “the length of the section reflects not how long the month of January is, but how long it seems to be. There is no task. Its absence reflects the ἀμηχανίη, the helplessness, of winter” (49). Marsilio (1997a) analyzes Hesiod’s winter scene in conjunction with his sailing section (Nautilia) and argues that “Hesiod demonstrates how both farmer and poet achieve success by working for a healthy supply of livelihood, by avoiding poverty, and by observing timeliness in every pursuit” (412). 4 For example, Watkins (1975) and (1978). I will provide further bibliography in the individual discussions of the sexual double entendres below. 5 On the linking of themes of procreation and productivity in Works and Days, see Canevaro (2015) 123. 6 Text is from Solmsen et al. (1970), except where noted. Translations are my own unless otherwise indicated. 7 For example, West (1978) 283–284; Ercolani (2010) 326. West cites Catalepton 13.40 as one of the passages in support of the hunger hypothesis (scissumque uentrem et hirneosi patrui / pedes inedia turgidos, 13.39–40), but this passage, too, has a strong sexual undercurrent and may reflect understanding of the foot/penis double entendre. 8 See Bader (1984) 15; Campanile (1986) 361–362; Bader (1997) 124–125; Katz (2006) 166 n. 28; Bagordo (2009) 48–50. Ercolani (2010: 326) is skeptical of the obscene interpretation, and West (1978: 283–284) does not mention it. On the use of “foot” for “penis” in Greek, see Henderson (1991) 126, 129, 130, and 138; see also the citations and further bibliography in Bagordo (2009) 46–48. It is not just in comic or “low” genres that “foot” might be used for “penis”: Campanile (1988) adduces, as a comparison for Hesiod’s phallic uses of πούς, the Delphic oracle found in Eur. Med. 679 (and Plut. Thes. 3.5), in which Aegeus is told, “do not loosen the foot jutting out from the wine skin” (ἀσϰοῦ με τὸν πϱούχοντα μὴ λῦσαι πόδα) until he returns home—interpreted by the scholion and Plutarch to mean he should not have sex (and the scholion makes clear that the “foot” means “penis” or μόϱιον). See also Livrea (1979); Bader (1997) 125–130.

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  89 9 See Henderson (1991) 119, 167, 168, 185; and LSJ, s.v. λέπω: “Med., = δέϕομαι: hence, indulge in indecent gestures, Alex. 49, Mnesim. 4.18.” See also Arnott (1996) 170–171 ad Alexis fr. 50/49K. For deglubo/glubo, see Catull. 58.5; Aus. 75.7; Kay and Adams (1982) 74, 168, 208; Weiner (2018); Hawkins (2019) 31–40, who also discusses other similar verbs in Greek. Alcaeus (fr. 347.7 LP), in a passage that seems to draw on ­Hesiod’s description (or on a common source) of male sexual weakness in the dog days of summer (…ἀϕαυϱότατοι δέ τοι ἄνδϱες, Op. 586), describes impotent men with the adjective λεπτός. Cf. Pliny NH 22.22, who cites Hesiod and Alcaeus as describing women as most desirous for sex and men as least capable of it (mulieres libidinis auidissimas uirosque in coitum pigerrimos) when the thistle is in bloom. See also Petropoulos (1994) 85; McMahon (1998) 25–26. In addition, leanness is associated in the Roman tradition with the elegiac lover and sexual exhaustion (e.g., Catull. 89; Prop. 1.5.22; Ov. Am. 1.6.5, Ars 1.733; Priap. 26.8). I will consider the aesthetic connotations of λεπτός when I discuss the reception of Hesiod’s winter passage in Vergil’s Georgics. 10 For recent discussions with further bibliography, see Clay (2003) 124–125; Musäus (2004) 13–41; Ercolani (2010) 156–158; Canevaro (2015) 187–188; Cairns (2016) 28–30; Vergados (2020) 127–36. 11 See Hoffmann (1985) 127; Zeitlin (1996) 64–65. Vergados (2020) disagrees with Zeitlin; however, his reason for resistance to her approach (“Hesiod’s text states that from the pithos come evil things, which is hard to integrate with the uterus-analogy,” 128 n. 170) seems to ignore the ambiguity that he otherwise rightly allows to the pithos and Pandora, including in his own preferred understanding of their meaning: “The pithos is analogous to earth, gaia, the very material of which Pandora is made. Gaia is the source of hope (elpis) for man’s acquisition of βίος in Hesiod’s agricultural world, but as Hesiod will show later in his poem, this hope might be empty in that even if one performs the tasks as needed, he may still face adverse circumstances…In the end, ambiguity is what unites Pandora, elpis, and the pithos” (135–136). 12 Zeitlin (1996) 65. For the use of elpis as child, she cites AP 7.389 and 453, as well as grave inscriptions (Peek 1955: nos. 661, 720). On Pandora’s womb-jar, see also Bonnell Freidin (2021) 94; Lissarague (2001) 40. 13 Cf. Theog. 602–612, in which the price of avoiding marriage in the post-Pandora world is clearly stated and connected to the lack of children, i.e., having no one to take care of you in old age or to whom to pass down inheritance. On the misogynistic worldview of Hesiod, see Loraux (1978); Marquardt (1982); Arthur (1983); Lévêque (1988); duBois (1992); Redfield (1993); Zeitlin (1996) 53–86; Brown (1997); Canevaro (2013); ­Canevaro (2015) 109–123, 172–173. A few scholars have pushed back on the term ­“misogynistic” and pointed to some of the positive ways in which Hesiod speaks of women (e.g., Arrighetti 1981) or the flaws that Hesiod attributes to both men and women (e.g., Rudhardt 1986). Lye (2018: 176) puts Hesiod’s misogyny into a broader context of “hierarchical power dynamics” in which “the poet attempts to assert his status in a system where he himself feels disenfranchised.” 14 There are examples in Latin of the use of spes (“hope”) to indicate offspring, whether of the earth (anni spem, Verg. G. 1.224) or animals (spem gregis, Verg. E. 1.15; spem gentis, Verg. G. 4.162), and the Romans connected spes etymologically to spica (“ear of grain”), spero (“hope”), and sero (“sow”; see Varro, Rust. 1.48.2). Cf. Cairns (1996) 45 on Tibullus’ etymological wordplay on spes and sero in 1.1.7–10 and Cairns (1996) 49 on the play on spes and semen in 2.6.19–22. Vergil also plays a multilayered etymological game in his phrase anni spem in G. 1.224: as Hyman & Thibodeau (1999) show, this phrase picks up on the controversial Hesiodic hapax πλειών in Op. 617, which seems to mean “seed” in this passage, but which was glossed as “year” by Proclus, Tzetzes, and Hesychius, and used by Hellenistic poets to mean year. Vergil’s anni spem shows knowledge of the two meanings of πλειών by referring to seed as the “hope of the year” (and also thereby plays on the ancient etymological connection between spes and semen). Hyman & Thibodeau surmise that Vergil may be making a connection or bilingual pun on

90  L. Kronenberg spero (“hope”) and σπείϱω (“sow”). Cf. O’Hara in this volume (179–197) on Horace’s similar play on a controversial Greek word in Themistius. Perhaps the Romans, in their etymological linking of spes and semen, were also influenced by the association that I am arguing for between elpis and seed/semen in Hesiod (and the other Greek authors I discuss below). Finally, I owe to Alexander Nikolaev the point that uoluptas (“pleasure”) is likely related etymologically to elpis. Voluptas frequently connotes sexual pleasure and is used of semen itself in Hyg. Astr. 13 and Arn. 5.5; OLD, s.v. uoluptas 5. 15 Cairns’ decision to leave thumos untranslated is useful, since it allows for the potential double meaning of thumos as both “mind/heart” and “penis,” though this is not a reading explicitly advocated by Cairns. I will discuss the erotic use of thumos further below. 16 Cf. uolgiuagaque uagus Venere (“wandering with roving Venus”) at DRN 4.1071. 17 For example, Musurillo (1963); Allen (2017). Griffith (1999: 229) explains: “To ‘walk on ashes’ is proverbial for risky conduct.” 18 In addition, the name of Pandora’s daughter is Pyrrha (“flame-colored”), who appears in the first book of Catalogue of Women (frr. 2 and 5 M-W). For examples of sexual “burning” in Greek comedy, see Henderson (1991) 177–78, and in Latin, see Adams (1982) 86–87. Cf. also the erotic use of the “foot in fire” imagery in Posidipp. AP 5.211.1–2: Δάϰϱυα ϰαὶ ϰῶμοι, τί μ’ ἐγείϱετε, πϱὶν πόδας ἄϱω | ἐϰ πυϱός, εἰς ἑτέϱην Κύπϱιδος ἀνθϱαϰιήν; (“tears and revels, why do you rouse me, before I have lifted my feet from the fire, into another bed of coals of Cypris?”). 19 That the chorus has Oedipus on their mind is clear from their general reflection on the troubles of the prior members of the house of Labdacus (594–597) and their reference to Antigone and her sibling(s) as the “last roots of the house of Oedipus” (599–600). 20 Ancient explanations of Oedipus’ name limit themselves (at least explicitly) to “swollen-­ footed” (e.g., Soph. OT 1036, Eur. Phoen. 27), but for further resonances of the name, see Henderson (1991) 248: “The foot as a displacement for the phallus is very common as a structural symbol in myths and folktales, most notoriously in the story of Oidipous (swollen/knowledgeable foot/phallus).” See also Edmunds (1981) 233–236; Bader (1997) 44–46; Katz (2006) 166–167. For other puns on names in the Antigone, see Santirocco (1980), who discusses puns on Haimon (Antig. 1175, p. 184); Antigone (Antig. 377–380, p. 188); Polyneices (Antig. 110–11, p. 191; Antig. 26, p. 193). On Sophocles’ penchant for puns on names and etymological play, see also Knox (1957) 184; Griffith (1999) ad Antig. 111, 300–301, 658–659, 1172–1175. 21 West (1978: 293 ad 533) acknowledges the similarity to the Sphinx’ riddle (“the old man’s stick makes him ‘three-legged’, as in the Sphinx’s riddle”) but concludes, “There is no reason to suppose that the Sphinx’s riddle is pre-Hesiodic” and “it is in riddles that τϱίπους βϱοτός is naturally at home, and it may have been so from time immemorial.” Whether or not West is correct, Sophocles could still have read the passage as alluding to Oedipus and the Sphinx. See also Nagy (1982) 68 on the possible allusions to Oedipus and the Sphinx in Hesiod’s winter passage. 22 Gagarin (1974) 190. Koning (2010: 173 n. 52) adds a bit of caution to Gagarin’s formulation: “[M]ost of its ideas, however, are probably more generally Greek than specifically Hesiodic.” On Solon’s use of Hesiod in fr. 13, see also Hunter (2014) 140; Almeida (2018) 201–202 (with their notes for further bibliography on Solon and Hesiod). 23 Griffith (1999) 229 ad 618–619. On Sophocles’ use of Solon’s “Elegy to the Muses” in the second stasimon of Antigone, see also Gagné (2013) 373–376, with notes for earlier discussions; Cairns (2014); Cairns (2016) 41–42. 24 Cf. also the concern expressed by the Athenian stranger in Plato’s Laws (838e–839a) that spilling the seed through masturbation cannot lead to procreation. Similarly, ­Artemidorus (mid-2nd–early 3rd century ce), in his study of sex-related dreams, speaks of the masturbator’s “useless secretion of seed” (εἰς ἄχϱηστον τοῦ σπέϱματος ἀπόϰϱισιν, Oneir. 1.74), while Martial warns Ponticus of the life that he destroys with his hand by masturbating (istud quod digitis, Pontice, perdis, homo est, 9.41.10) instead of using his seed for procreation. On the connection between fertility and

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  91

25 2 6 27

28 29

30

31

32

33

34

justice in Hesiod and archaic Greek thought, as well as between sterility and injustice/ tyranny, see Unruh (2021). Cf. also Daphnis’ enjoyment of an “empty pleasure” (ϰενὴν τέϱψιν ἐτέϱπετο, Long. 3.9.5) when he sleeps next to Chloe’s father and, dreaming it is Chloe, hugs and kisses him. For example, Ov. 3.7.74; Mart. 6.23.3, 11.46.3, 12.97.9; Juv. 10.205–206. Particularly close is Strato’s use of ἀϱγός (“idle, lazy”) to describe his own impotent penis in AP 12.240.2. Hesiod describes male impotence in the summer with the word ἀϕαυϱός (“feeble, powerless,” Op. 586). As noted previously, Alcaeus (fr. 347.7 LP), in a passage that seems to draw from Hesiod, describes impotent men with the adjective λεπτός. In Latin, words such as iners (Catull. 67.26; Hor. Epod. 12.16; Priap. 83.5, 38; Ov. Am. 3.15), languidus and langueo (Hor. Epod. 12.14; Ov. Am. 3.7.3; Priap. 47.4), or solutus (Hor. Epod. 12.8) are used. In addition, impotent “seed” is described with words akin to ϰενός (“empty, fruitless”), such as sterilis (“barren, empty, fruitless,” e.g., Catull. 67.26). E.g., Automedon AP 5.129.8, 11.29.4; Philodemus AP 11.30.4; Mart. 3.75.6, 11.46.4; Strato AP 12.216. Readers of Works and Days have struggled to make sense of Hesiod’s phrase in 499 (ϰαϰὰ πϱοσελέξατο θυμῷ). While translating the phrase as “meditating evil with/in his thumos” could fit with an image of masturbation, I lean towards the interpretation that Hesiod is depicting his lazy man in an act of self-address. For the latter interpretation, see West (1978) 284; Marsilio (2000) 33; Ercolani (2010) 327. E.g., Phld. AP 11.30 (19 Sider); Ovid 3.7; Priap. 83; Petronius 132.9–10; Rufinus AP 5.47; Strato AP 12.216; Scythinus, AP 12.232. On the impotence poem (and related texts) in antiquity, see McMahon (1998) 19–59; Obermayer (1998) 259–330; Höschele (2006) 129–135; Gärtner (2011); Lavery (2014) 9–62. For a defense of the manuscript reading of θυμῷ and the meaning of “penis” in Hipponax, see Degani (2000). See also Page (1978) 90; Gerber (1999) 361; McMahon (1998) 29; Höschele (2006) 130; Telò (2020) 285. González Rincón (1996: 239) convincingly proposes that Strato uses thumos for penis in a poem with a description of masturbation (AP 12.226.2). See also Floridi (2007) 336. E.g., Hom. Il. 11.403, 17.90, 18.5, 20.343, 21.53; Od. 5.298–299, 20.18–24; Archil. fr. 128 West; Thgn. 695–696, 877–878, 1029–1036. Petronius also calls attention to the merging of these types of “self-address” when Encolpius, after berating his impotent penis, playfully defends his talking to his mentula by the citing the example of Odysseus talking to his heart (Sat. 132). Perhaps the use of thumos for both “mind/heart” and “penis” is also connected to the fact that “reproductive seed and cerebral spinal fluid, called myelos in Greek, are closely aligned in early Greek thought” (Laskaris 2021: 107), or to what Coker (2021: 19) calls a “widespread understanding of a connection between what we might call the upper and lower body and between head or neck and genitals.” Rosenmeyer (1999: 33) quotes Hesiod’s description of Sirius’ drying effect on men’s heads and knees and their resulting impotence (Op. 586–87) as evidence of this notion. Coker adds (2021: 33), “The connections between ‘generative’ and ‘mental’ strength is [sic] also found in Greek μήδεα (mēdea, ‘thoughts’ or genitals’), and in other languages (see Nagy 1974: 265–6).” On Hesiod’s play on the different meanings of μήδεα in the Theogony, see Scully (2015) 43: “There is some evidence of this [i.e., Zeus’ taming or redirecting of ‘the generative but anarchic power of primordial Eros’] in the poem on the lexical level, in the shift in the meaning of a word like μήδεα from genitals (Sky’s, at 180, 188), to counsels (Zeus’s, at 545, 559, 561)….We witness in such shifts an evolution of language that parallels the genealogical evolutions of the poem, as creation moves from the physical and sexual toward the political and orderly.” Campanile (1986) uses this evidence from Aristotle to support his own reading of the double entendres in Hesiod’s winter passage (both “the swollen foot in the thin hand”

92  L. Kronenberg and the “boneless one” kenning that I discuss below) and concludes that Hesiod shows man as having to resort to masturbation in the winter since women are not interested in sex. Bagordo (2009) presents a reading similar to Campanile’s, in that he also argues that “winter man” needs to resort to masturbation to fulfill sexual needs at a time when women are less interested in sex, though he has a different interpretation of the “boneless one,” which I discuss further below. As will become clear, I see no evidence that Hesiod depicts women as uninterested in sex in the winter or that, outside of Aristotle, others in ancient Greece thought this. 35 Pythagoras (D.L. 8.9) says that winter is better than summer for ἀϕϱοδίσια, but then adds that such activity is easier in spring and fall and not good for the health at any season. The Hippocratic corpus advises that sexual intercourse should be more frequent in winter, particularly for older men (Vict. 3.68). 36 On the sexual imagery, see Watkins (1975) 25–26; Watkins (1978) 235; Nagy (1982) 68; Bader (1984) 15; Marsilio (1997b) 106. Hippocrates specifically associates the North Wind with the infertility of the Scythians in Aër. 19. 37 On the similar association in Latin poetry of winter imagery with sterility or infertility, see Dehon (2001, with a list of primary sources in n. 9), who explains Petronius’ use of winter imagery to describe the actions of his impotent penis (Sat. 132.8) by making a connection, similar to the one I am suggesting in Hesiod, between impotence and the infertility of winter. The same sort of adjectives used of the impotent penis are also used of winter, such as iners (cf. Ov. Ex P. 1.2.23) or sterilis (e.g., Mart. 8.68.10; Luc. 4.108). In addition, Maximianus refers to his state of impotence as “coldness amidst the hearth” (in medio frigus…foco, 5.60). 38 I retain the reading of the MSS. (Solmsen accepts Wachler’s emendation of βϱοτοί.) For defense of the MSS reading, see West (1978) 293; Beall (2001) 160-61; and my own explanation below for why it makes sense to compare animals to humans in his passage. 39 Ancient and modern commentators are split between interpreting τϱοχαλός as “bent over/ curved (like a wheel)” or as “fast (like a wheel).” See Ercolani (2010) 333 for a discussion of opinions. Ecrolani prefers “fast”; however, “bent over” fits better with the extended description of the bent-over old man at the end of this section (533–535), as well as with the other images in this passage of “bending over” that I discuss further below. 40 Words for “bending over,” such as ϰύβδα (“with the head forwards, stooping forwards”) or ϰύπτω (“bend forward, stoop”), so frequently indicate a sexual activity that Plato (the comic poet) can make up a sex god named Κύβδασος (Pl. Com. 174.17); see Henderson (1991: 178). See also Hippon. Frr. 17, 77.1, 129; Archil. Fr. 42; Ar. Eq. 365, N. 191, R. 425, T. 488–489; Sophr. Frr. 38, 40; Theocr. 5.117. For discussion of these and other references, see Henderson (1991) 22, 169, 170, 179–181, 183; Hawkins (2014) 575–576; Swift (2019) 265–266. 41 Katz (2006: 166) has deemed it the “single most pored-over bit of Indo-European erotica.” For a useful chart providing an overview of interpretations, see Ronzitti (2021: 42), who attributes sexual interpretations (“metafora sessuale”) to Watkins (1978), Campanile (1986), Bader (1989), Bagordo (2009), and Janda (2014) 290–303, all of which I will discuss further below. 42 See West (1978) 289–290, who lists the ancient sources: Pherecr. 13.4; Alc. Com. 36; Diph. 34; Antig. 21, Carneades ap. Stob. 2.2.20; Lucil. 881 Kr. (861 M.); Opp. H. 2.241–246; [Opp.] C. 3.176–382; Ael. HA 1.27, 14.26; Horap. 2.113; Hesych./ Phot./Suda, s.v. πολύποδος δίϰην. Bonnell Freidin (2021: 96) calls the octopus’ habit of self-consumption “something of a cultural trope, usually signifying poverty and starvation”—a trope that fits well with Hesiod’s concerns in the winter scene. Bonnell Freidin (2021: 96 n. 79) leans towards identifying the “boneless one” with an octopus because of “the sexual connotations of the previous lines (519–523), the ‘soft-skinned maiden…,’ etc.” Bonnell Freidin’s overall concern is to explain the associations of the octopus with the womb, though she also acknowledges the phallic connotations of the octopus, which I discuss further below.

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  93 43 See Troxler (1964) 23; Edwards (1971) 112; Hofinger (1981) 131–140; Bader (1997) 45–46; Arrighetti (1998) 437; Beall (2001) 159; Canevaro (2015) 176–177; Ronzitti (2021). Ercolani (2010) 335–338 also leans towards the snail. This hypothesis usually leads to an understanding of τένδει as “retracts,” though Ronzitti (2021: 51) proposes that it could mean “eat” or “gnaw” and refer to the snail’s withdrawing into its shell and seeming to eat its soft body or, alternatively, that it could mean “relax” and refer to the snail’s hibernating. The scholia interpret τένδει as “eats” and compare τένθης (“glutton”). Philip Ep. 53.1 (AP 9.438) perhaps confirms the meaning of τένδει as “eat,” though the text is uncertain (and could be influenced by the ancient interpretations of Hesiod’s τένδει). Otherwise, τένδει is a hapax. De Angelis (2010) presents a new interpretation and argues that the “boneless one” is the North Wind (Boreas). 44 Watkins (1978) cites several Indo-European parallels in support of interpreting the “boneless one” as “penis” and the image of “gnawing itself” as a symbol of knowledge. Nagy (1982: 68) supports Watkins’ approach. Campanile (1986) agrees with Watkins that the “boneless one” is the “penis,” though he interprets the “foot” as the “glans” and τένδει as “extends”; thus, he reads Hesiod as saying that men need to masturbate in winter (Op. 497) since women are not interested in sex (the implication of the winter maiden scene, according to Campanile, and of the “fireless house,” which Campanile interprets as the vagina). Bagordo (2009) interprets “foot” as “penis,” and agrees with Campanile that Hesiod is presenting women as uninterested in sex in the winter, but argues that τένδει means “make limp” and thinks that “boneless” refers to the state of the “winter man” who is forced to suppress his erection (and thus become boneless) or masturbate (as in Op. 497). For Janda (2014) 290–303, the “boneless one” is the lazy man who stretches out his penis (“foot”) in the futile quest of finding a mate. Bader (1997: 45–46) interprets the “boneless one” both as a penis and a snail and reads line 524 as symbolizing penetration and the consummation of marriage. See also Bader (1989) 97–134. 45 On ancient riddles having both innocent and obscene solutions, see Rokem (1996); Katz (2006); Salvador-Bello (2011); Floridi (2019). On the “boneless one” as an “ambiguous mix of animal and human,” see Marsilio (2000) 35. Bader (1997: 131) also argues that kennings often have a “double meaning.” 46 Cf. Bagordo (2009) 39. For a discussion of Hesiod’s kennings, see Waern (1951) 118–121; Troxler (1964) 21–28; Beta (2016) 25–29; Vergados (2020) 189–205, with notes for further bibliography. 47 Of the snail, in Athen. 10.455e; of the octopus (and other cephalopods), in Opp. Halieut. 1.639; Ael. NA 11.37. 48 The first appears shortly after mention of Hesiod’s own use of ϕεϱέοιϰος for snail (2.63b), which Athenaeus clearly thinks is the only kenning for snail that Hesiod used. 49 Cf. Canevaro (2015) 12-13: “Works and Days’ open formulations, multiple narrative forms, wordplay, and ambiguities constitute that ποιϰιλία which characterizes sympotic poetry…. The use of kennings and of vivid descriptions such as the βασιλῆας δωϱοϕάγους, the gift-guzzling kings, could be residual echoes of a sympotic game of eikasmoi or likenesses.” For “evidence for Hesiod being sung during symposia,” see Koning (2010) 49. For more on the riddle and its connection to the symposium, see Luz (2010) 139–146; Potamiti (2015) 137–151; Beta (2016) 44–63. 50 Cf. Shaw (2014) 567: “The octopus, then, is associated with sex on a number of levels: not only is it an aphrodisiac, but its shape and even its linguistic form are reminiscent of the phallus” (see Shaw’s full discussion of the octopus at pp. 564–567). See also Bonnell Freidin (2021) 93: “Tentacles elicit phallic or masculine associations….Aristotle even suggests that the male octopus may use a tentacle as a penis” (see Hist. an. 524a2–9, 541b8–10, 544a11–13). 51 “Eating” is also utilized in Old Comedy in reference to autofellatio: in Aristophanes’ Wealth, the phrase “you will have a billy-goat’s breakfast” (τράγοι δ’ ἀκρατιεῖσθε, Ar. Pl. 295) is usually interpreted as a reference to autofellatio, especially since the scholiast interprets it as such and notes that goats lick their genitals after sex. Other possible

94  L. Kronenberg references include τὸ πέος οὑτοσὶ δάκοι (Ar. Eq. 1010, “He can go suck himself!” Tr. Henderson) and σὺ δέ γε νὴ Δία | δρᾶ ταῦθ᾿, ἵν᾿ ἀριστᾷς τε καὶ κινῇς ἅμα (“By god, then do this, so that you can eat and screw at the same time,” Ar. Ec. 469–470). On these passages, see Sommerstein (1998) 180–181; Sommerstein (2001) 157; Walin (2012) 96–98. There is also a suggestive fragment of the comic poet Alcaeus in which the speaker says, “I eat myself like the octopus” (ἔδω δ’ ἐμαυτὸν ὡς πουλύπους, fr. 30 K.-A./Athen. 316c), though the context is unknown. Cf. also Lucil. 881 Kr. (861 M./925 W.). 52 For a comparison between the poverty of the “idle man” and “the boneless one,” see Nagy (1982) 68; Marsilio (2000) 35. 53 Ercolani (2010) 336, referring, in particular, to Watkins’ interpretation of the phallus essentially engaging in autofellatio. On the other hand, if Watkins is right, perhaps the image does not need to be strictly logical and could be akin to the many tintinnabula from Pompeii and Herculaneum which depict personified phalluses sporting their own phalluses (e.g. Museo Nazionale, Naples, inv. nos. 27835, 27837, 27844). Another possibility is that Bagordo (2009) is correct that “boneless” refers to a lack of erection; so, perhaps the act of autofellatio is coupled with suggestions of impotence (“boneless”), just as the description of the idle, masturbating man had connotations of impotence. Ancient texts frequently link impotence not just with attempts at manual stimulation, but also with attempts at oral stimulation (e.g., Hor. Epod. 8.20; Mart. 3.75, 11.46). Finally, impotence is associated in ancient texts with old age (e.g., Phld. AP 11.30.5; Ov. Am. 3.7.17; Priap. 83.5), an association which is pertinent to the depictions of the old man, whom I discuss below, along with some further references from Old Comedy linking old age, impotence, and the need for manual/oral stimulation. 54 See Ercolani (2010) 338, who, however, is skeptical that it means “moist.” 55 For Hesiod’s use of other animal kennings or animal behavior to create parallels with human behavior, see Canevaro (2015) 178: “As the spider [Op. 777] looks ahead to the woman weaving [Op. 779], perhaps the ant [Op. 778] stands in for the man making stores.” 56 Katz (2006) 166 n. 28. See also Katz (2006) 181 n. 65, 184. 57 In addition to Katz (2006), see Parsons (1999); Schatzmann (2012) 365–370; Floridi (2019) 355–358. 58 On female riddlers, see McClure (2003) 80–83; Potamiti (2015) 137–138. 59 Henderson (1991) 180; McClure (2003) 81. Henderson (ibidem) also compares “Cratin. 301, where young girls are likened to three-legged tables [τϱάπεζαι τϱισϰελεῖς] loaded with food.” Even without reference to these ancient erotic riffs on the Sphinx’s riddle, Rokem (1996: 265) finds sexual meaning in the riddle: “If we take the transformation of the number of legs very literally, what we see is sexual intercourse between man and woman. During the union itself there are four legs, while afterward there is a division into the two legs of the woman, and the three—the two legs and the sexual organ—of the man. Seen from this perspective, the riddle constitutes a symbolic reenactment of the primal scene.” 60 It is perhaps relevant that two of the probable references to autofellatio in comedy, noted above, involve old men struggling with their virility: the chorus in Ar. Pl. 295 and Blepyrus and Chremes in Ar. Ec. 469–470. Blepyrus voices specific concerns about his virility at his age in Ec. 323–326, 468–469, and 619–622, while Carion seems to be teasing the chorus of Wealth about their virility, since he follows his suggestion of autofellatio in Pl. 295 with a reference to Circe “kneading” for them (Pl. 305), an activity that Sommerstein (2001: 159) interprets as masturbation and compares to what “a prostitute might have to do to an elderly client in order to enable him to penetrate her (Ach. 1149, Wasps 739–40, 1343–4).” 61 On this passage, see Harris-McCoy (2012) 463–464, who interprets “body to body” as the “missionary position.” 62 On this sexual position, see Ar. Lys. 231, Pax 896a, and Henderson (1991) 179–180. Cf. DRN 1264–1265, describing the position with words referencing both wild animals

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  95 and number of feet (more ferarum | quadrupedumque, “in the manner of wild beasts and quadrupeds”). 63 I would even suggest that there might be a veiled comparison between animals and satyrs engaged in autofellatio in Soph. Ichn. 124–130: in these lines, Silenus comes upon his chorus of satyrs doing something novel that he does not understand in their hunt for Apollo’s cattle. He describes them as bent over to the ground (125–126) and compares them to a hedgehog curled up in his lair or a monkey bending over (127–128): [ἐ]χῖνος ὥς τις ἐν λόχμῃ ϰεῖσαι πεσών, | [ἤ] τις πίθηϰοσ ̣ϰύβδ’ ἀποθυμαίνεις τινί. There has been a lot of discussion of the meaning of the hapax ἀποθυμαίνεις (scholars are split between interpreting it as “farting at” or some version of “getting angry at,” if the text is even correct; see discussion in Pearson 1917: 1.244; O’Sullivan and Collard 2013: 353). However, regardless of the reading or meaning of ἀποθυμαίνεις, the focus of both animal comparisons is on their bent-over position (for the implication that the hedgehog is doubled over based on an allusion to a proverb, see Pearson 1917: 1.244; O’Sullivan and Collard 2013: 353), and the hedgehog in his lair is particularly reminiscent of the animals in Hesiod’s winter scene, who are seeking shelter and compared to the bent over old man (532–533).  Pearson (ibidem) emphasizes the sexual associations of the monkey’s pose described by ϰύβδα: “it alludes to σχῆμα ἀϰόλαστον ϰαὶ ἑταιϱιϰόν (schol. Ar. Lys. 231)”; see also Slenders (2006) 138. There could be further sexual connotations to the hedgehog comparison, since both ἐχῖνος and λόχμη can be used of the pubic hair, and ἐχῖνος can also mean a wide-mouth jar or possibly a bodily orifice—here, perhaps mouth (see Henderson 1991: 136, 142, 147; Slenders 2006: 137 interprets the hedgehog in its lair as the satyr’s hairy anus).   I would argue that a sexual interpretation of the satyrs’ behavior makes better sense of the passage than the usual assumption that Silenus is simply reacting to the ­satyrs’ putting their ears to the ground to listen to a noise and acting scared. Silenus seems too perplexed by what he calls their new technē (τίν’ αὖ τέχνην σὺ τήν[δ’ ἄϱ’ ἐξ]ῆυϱες, 124) for their behavior to be so relatively pedestrian. Silenus even exclaims at one point, “where in the world did you learn it?” (ποῦ γ̣ῆς ἐμάθετ’;, 129) and says that he has never heard of such a custom (τοῦ τρόπου, 130). But his reaction does make sense if the satyrs, having bent down to the ground to hunt or investigate the strange noise, have instead discovered a “novel” form of masturbation, namely autofellatio, which momentarily distracts them from their fear. Silenus’ use of τϱόπος here could involve a double ­entendre, since τϱόπος can also connote a sexual position (cf. Ar. Ec. 8 and Ussher 1973: 73 ad loc.; Krenkel 1985: 50; Ar. Pl. 306 and Sommerstein 2001: 159 ad loc.).   Silenus next describes the satyrs’ making suggestive noises (ὕ̣ [ὗ] ὕ̣ ὗ̣, 131) and acting madly (βαϰχεύεις, 133), though he finishes his speech with an emphasis on their uncharacteristic silence (135). The satyrs’ inarticulate noises, paired with a lack of speaking, could constitute a veiled reference to oral sex, which in Latin poetry is frequently alluded to indirectly, by a reference to the silence of the person giving oral sex (see Stevens 2013: 56–81, with notes for earlier bibliography). When Silenus further chastises them for their cowardly behavior, he calls them “mere bodies to look at, tongues and phalluses” (σώματ’ εἰ[ς]ιδ[ε]ῖ ν̣ ̣μόνον | ϰα[ὶ γ]λῶσσα ϰα[ὶ] ϕάλητες, 150–151) and brags of his own conquests with nymphs (153–155) and his heroic feats with his “spear,” which the satyrs now tarnish (158–159). As Okell (2003: 289) suggests, “He is speaking not of military but of sexual conquests and his spear is his phallus” (see also Lloyd-Jones 2005: 126; Slenders 2006: 139; see, contra, Antonopoulos 2018: 452) and is contrasting his masculinity with the satyrs’ lack of it. If we interpret the satyrs as engaging in autofellatio, then Silenus’ reference to them as “tongues and phalluses” makes even more sense, as does his contrast between their disgraceful behavior and his own more “heroic” sexual activity.   Later in the play, the satyrs are, once again, caught masturbating in the midst of the action, and Cyllene uses double entendres to call them out on their masturbatory activity

96  L. Kronenberg while she is speaking to them (368): παύου τὸ̣ λεῖον ϕαλαϰϱὸν ἡδονῇ πιτνάς, which O’Sullivan and Collard (2013: 373) translate as “stop making that smooth knob longer in pleasure,” and explain in their note: “‘making…longer’: by masturbating (cf. Cyc. 327–8), with a play on the two senses of ϕαλαϰϱόν as ‘bald head’ (e.g. Cyc. 227)”; see also Henderson (1991) 244–245; Slenders (2006) 139–140.   It is also worth mentioning that the passage in Euripides’ Cyclops (327–328) that O’Sullivan and Collard cite as another instance of masturbation in a satyr play alludes to Hesiod’s winter scene: in lines 323–328, Cyclops says, that when it rains, he takes shelter in his cave and pounds his robe/masturbates (on this interpretation, see Seaford 1984: 166; O’Sullivan and Collard 2013: 171) and, with even closer reference to Hesiod, “when Thracian Boreas pours out snow” (ὅταν δὲ βοϱέας χιόνα Θϱῄϰιος χέῃ, 329; cf. Op. 506–507), he stays warm inside with a fire and animals skins. Seaford (1984: 166–167) notes the Hesiodic parallel: “Hesiod too (Op. 518–20) realized the importance of staying at home when the north wind blows.” Perhaps the writers of satyr plays recognized the satyr-like (and goat-like) behavior of Hesiod’s winter man (and animals). For further on sexual double entendres in satyr plays, see Slenders (1992), (2005), and (2006). 64 E.g., Lye (2018) 185. See also Hamilton (1989) 72, 82. 65 E.g., Marsilio (1997b). For the emphasis on the winter maiden’s idleness, see also West (1978) 288; Ballabriga (1981) 580–587; Ercolani (2010) 334. Canevaro (2015: 118–119) sees both good and bad in her portrayal but ultimately concludes, “in a poem so focused on the importance of hard work, a scene of such utter idleness as this surely cannot be without pointed negative connotation.” 66 Hawkins (2019: 25 n. 27) notes that μυχίη (Op. 523) is suggestive (cf. μυχός for female genitalia in Ar. Eccl. 12–13), and Op. 522–523 could be translated: “richly anointed inward(ly) with oil, she lies down inside the house.” He further argues (2019: 24–25) that Archil. fr. 188 reverses the sexual imagery of Hesiod’s winter maiden with a depiction of a woman who has a dried-up “furrow” (2) and has been assaulted by “blasts of wintry winds” (4–5)—i.e., she is past her prime and has a history of promiscuity. Cf. also Swift (2019) 352–355. 67 Marsilio (1997b: 107 n. 24) also notes the relevance of this Aristotle passage for the “winter maiden.” 68 Canevaro (2015: 119 n. 117) does not note the relevance of this particular line (Hom. Hymn 5.133) to the winter maiden but does mention several other correspondences with the Hesiodic passage, including Hom. Hymn 5.9, 5.14, and 5.61. 69 While usually translated as “various,” σύμμιϰτον could also point to the sexual meaning of συμμείγνυμι (“to unite sexually,” an aspect which I tried to bring out with my translation “commingled”) and connect to the sexual themes of the winter scene. For an argument in favor of retaining lines 561–563 (athetized by Plutarch), see Ercolani (2010) 348. 70 On Hesiod’s negative attitude towards sexual desire, particularly in the Works and Days, see duBois (1992); Most (2013) 173–174. These studies focus on Hesiod’s negative attitude towards heterosexual desire and the dangers of female sexuality (and, thus, they overlap with the bibliography on Hesiod’s negative attitude towards women provided earlier), but I would argue that Hesiod in his winter scene is similarly distrustful and disapproving of autoerotic impulses. 71 Cf. Tsagalis (2009) 150: “[T]he cicada imagery (582–84) … employs poetical vocabulary to suggest a double-edged analogy, the positive side of which refers to the Hesiodic poet, the negative side to Perses”; Canevaro (2015) 155: “The cicada, then, is an ambivalent figure. He could both represent the poet and be a foil for him.” 72 On the cicada in Greek thought and literature, see Nagy (1979) 302; Petropoulos (1994) 47–64; Tsagalis (2009) 150; Harder (2012) 2.68–87; Canevaro (2015) 154–156; Swift (2019) 397–399. 73 Marsilio (2000: 32–33, 40) comments on the association of the idle man in winter with useless speech, particularly through the term λέσχη: “the most characteristic feature of the λέσχη was leisurely talk” (33).

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  97 74 Cf. Bershadsky (2011) 3, who explains “the swift shift from labor to leisure” through an analysis of possible allusions to the cult of Hesiod in the summer festival. On Hesiod’s construction of the summer feast in conscious opposition to his winter scene, see Bershadsky (2011) 6; Canevaro (2015) 77. 75 Cf. Canevaro (2015) 155: “[The cicada] is a singer (tradition one), but emphatically not a worker (tradition two). He therefore encapsulates the period of midsummer, in which work must halt and rest and feasting take its place—all of which suggests that midsummer is the ‘right time’ for singing.” 76 In addition, Vergil’s winter section appears after an “ostentatiously Hesiodic” adaptation (G. 1.276–286) of Hesiod’s “days” (Op. 765–828), according to Thomas (1988) 1.114, who also notes the allusion in lines 276–277 to the probable title of Hesiod’s work in Vergil’s time, Opera et Dies. On the importance of Hesiod (and Aratus) as a generic model for G. 1, see Farrell (1991), esp. 131–168. 77 As Henkel (2011: 183) notes, Vergil’s winter scene occurs shortly before the beginning of Vergil’s adaptation of Aratus’ Phaenomena in G. 1.351–463. 78 On the Hellenistic reception of Hesiod, see most recently Canevaro (2018), which discusses earlier bibliography. 79 Text is from Mynors (1969). Translations are my own. 80 Henkel (2011) 180. In describing the subtle ways in which Vergil alludes to the figure of Aratus in his depiction of “a certain man” (quidam) in G. 1.291, Henkel (2011: 186 n. 17) suggests, “The form of this cryptic reference might be compared to Menalcas’ riddle at Ecl. 3.40–2, where at least two scholars have seen Aratus.” I agree and would add that Vergil’s riddling manner in this passage could also allude to Hesiod’s riddling language in his winter scene. 81 Henkel (2011: 180 n. 2) notes the uncertainty among scholars over whether the “Hellenistic stylistic program of λεπτότης” originated with Callimachus (cf. Aet. fr. 1.24 Pf.) or Aratus. See Kronenberg (2018) 30 n. 50 for a bibliography on recent discussions of the question. 82 As Henkel (2011: 190) documents, “before λεπτός (‘fine-spun’) was a Hellenistic ­program-word, it was in Homer a common attribute of woven fabrics.” 83 Ep. 27.1–3: Ἡσιόδου τό τ’ ἄεισμα ϰαὶ ὁ τϱόπος· οὐ τὸν ἀοιδῶν | ἔσχατον, ἀλλ’ ὀϰνέω μὴ τὸ μελιχϱότατον | τῶν ἐπέων ὁ Σολεὺς ἀπεμάξατο (“the theme and style are Hesiod’s. Not every detail of the poems, but I do not doubt that the Solean copied the sweetest part of the words”). 84 Callimachus’ engagement with Hesiod is most explicit in his initiatory dream sequence (fr. 2 Pf.), which makes explicit gestures to Hesiod’s own poetic initiation in the Theogony (22–34), but Callimachus’ adoption of the voice of a cicada in fr. 1.29–40 could also be an allusion to Hesiod’s poet-cicada in Op. 582–583. For a recent discussion of Callimachus’ use of Hesiod, see Sistakou (2009), with notes for earlier bibliography. 85 See Adams (1982) 14: “No objects are more readily likened to the penis than sharp instruments, and it is likely that metaphors from this semantic field abound in all languages.” See also Adams (1982) 14–19, 23–24; Henderson (1991) 44. 86 OLD, s.v. fax 7; TLL, s.v. fax II.A ardor, flamma amoris. On the torch of Eros in Greek epigram and Latin elegy, see Gutzwiller (2015) 27–29, 36, 41. See also the play on literal and figurative torches in Valerius Aedituus (fr. 1 Courtney). Finally, it is tempting to read the torches in Pub. Syr. 38 (amans ita ut fax agitando ardescit magis) and Ov. Am. 1.2.11–12 (uidi ego iactatas mota face crescere flammas | et rursus nullo concutiente mori), which cause greater “flames” when they are touched or moved, as phallic double entendres. On phallic torches in Aristophanes, see Walin (2012) 79–81, 108–109 (on Ar. Ec. 692, 978–80, 1150). 87 On the association of glubo with a sharp tool, see Weiner (2018) 97, who also discusses the etymological connection to γλύϕω (“carve, cut out with a knife”). Inspico could also play on the Latin etymological connection discussed earlier between spica/spes/sero/ semen.

98  L. Kronenberg 88 On Callimachus’ uses of these stylistic terms and their literary history, see Asper (1997) 156–189. 89 On the connections between poverty, hunger, and Callimachean λεπτότης in Martial 1.92 and Catullus’ Furius and Aurelius cycle (15, 21, 23, and 24), see Cowan (2014). 90 See Adams (1982) 76–77, who notes that the use of pecten for pubic hair may be a calque on the Greek ϰτείς (“comb, pubic hair”); Pliny NH 29.26; Juv. 6.370. 91 Cf. Juv. 6.382–384, in which both plectrum and pecten refer to a phallic musical pick used by a Roman matron in a sexual manner. Juvenal seems to enjoy playing on the multiple dirty meanings of pecten in Satire 6 (cf. pecten as pubic hair in 6.370). For pecten as “penis,” see also Aus. Cent. Nupt. 127, p. 217 P., and Adams (1982) 25. On the similar use of πλῆϰτϱον (“lyre pick”) for penis or dildo, see Herod. 6.51; Ach. Tat. 8.9.4. In addition, a papyrus fragment, probably of Sappho (fr. 99 L-P), seems to conflate the musical πλῆϰτϱον with the ὄλισβος (“dildo”), though the exact meaning is controversial. On this fragment and the association of the ὄλισβος and πλῆϰτϱον, see Yatromanolakis (2007) 251–254; Power (2017). Cf. also LSJ Supp., s.v. ὀλισβοδόϰος: “receiving the ὄλισβος (perh. in sense “plectrum”), rest. in Sapph. 99 i 5 L.-P.” 92 Perhaps Vergil also plays on the phallic suggestiveness of the Greek word for “shuttle,” ϰεϱϰίς, similar to ϰέϱϰος (“tail,” but often “penis”; see Henderson 1991: 128). For a possible phallic pun on ϰεϱϰίς and ϰέϱϰος in Ar. Ra. 1316, see Walin (2012) 123–124. 93 Gaisser (2007: 20) is probably right to suggest that “many, (perhaps most) scholars accept” the phallic interpretation of Lesbia’s sparrow (at least as one level of meaning). Jocelyn (1980) remains the most extensive rebuttal of the obscene sparrow. For further bibliography, see the recent contribution to the debate of Vergados and O’Bryhim (2012). 94 See Adams (1982) 86–88; duBois (1988) 110–129; Henderson (1991) 142–144; Walin (2012) 193–195. Cf. also the earlier discussions of Pandora’s “jar” and of sexual “burning.” 95 Walin (2012: 85–85) argues for the wine metaphor in Ar. Ec. 1174 and lists the following possible comparanda: Ar. Eq. 351–58; Pax 1322–25 and 1346–54; possibly Ra. 1150; possibly Pl. 1084–1085; Pl. 1121; Pherecrates fr. 113.28–31 K.-A.; possibly Philyllius fr. 5 K.-A. For other liquid substances, such as “soup” or “sauce” (ζωμός, ἔτνος), see Henderson (1991) 145. 96 Cf. the use of conferuesco (“to begin to boil”) of the sexual excitement of the talking penis in Hor. Sat. 1.2.71. The use of the verb despumo in line 296 is also suggestive, given the associations between foam and semen (e.g., Hes. Th. 190–192; see Hansen 2000; see also Arist. Gen. an. 736a15–22). For the belief that women also produce a type of semen during sex, see, e.g., Hippoc. Genit. 3–4; DRN 4.1209–1217; Rosenmeyer (1999) 32–33; Flemming (2021). Hippocrates even uses the image of water boiling to describe female sexual pleasure (Genit. 4). Finally, the boiling down and skimming of must is an activity of the fall, not winter (Mynors 1990: 68); thus, perhaps Vergil imports it into his winter scene for its metaphorical possibilities. 97 On this ambiguity, see Henkel (2011) 191–194. 98 On the importance of the winter wife’s singing, cf. Scarborough (2020) 8 n. 17, who notes that the “only human songs in the poem are those of the farmer’s wife working at night … and of the vine-dresser (G. 2.417).” 99 Cf. O’Hara in this volume on Horace’s advice to mix the utile with the dulce in Ars Poetica (341–346). O’Hara reviews the complex approaches to teaching in ancient didactic and satiric poetry in general and argues that a characteristic feature of both genres is a certain ambiguity about whether the poet is really aiming to teach the topic of the poem, whether he is aiming to teach something else, or whether his goal is serious teaching at all. He also cites Seneca’s oft-quoted belief that the goal of Vergil’s Georgics was not to teach farmers but to delight readers (Ep. 86.15). While I agree with Seneca that Vergil’s main goal was not to teach farmers, I also agree with O’Hara about the ambiguities of the genre and think that Vergil plays with those ambiguities by combining serious

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  99 didactic material (though not “just” about farming per se) with aesthetic and artistic goals. For a recent appraisal of “aesthetics, form, and meaning in the Georgics,” see Thomas (2018). My conclusion is also compatible with Scarborough’s recent study of the “metapoetic pastoral landscape” in Vergil’s Georgics. She argues that “Vergil ­juxtaposes key metapoetic terms from the Eclogues … in order to comment on the value and the limitations of poetry in the world of the Georgics” (2020: 3). Scarborough observes that the Georgics “excludes the human arts of song and poetry that the landscape of the Eclogues both nurtured and was nurtured by” (ibidem), but she also analyzes several passages in which “metapoetic pastoral imagery … complicates the negation of pastoral and poetic values” (15). I consider Vergil’s winter scene a further example of these sorts of passages that “complicate” the seeming negation of poetic value in the Georgics, even if this type of value is in tension with, and at times suppressed by, other, more materialistic types of value in the world of the Georgics. 100 In Ar. Lys. 1173, naked plowing is a euphemism for sex, and verbs related to plowing and sowing are commonly used as metaphors for sex. For other examples, see Adams (1982) 154–155; Henderson (1991) 46–47, 166. As Stephanie Nelson points out to me, Vergil’s transference of Hesiod’s plowing and sowing from fall to summer further underscores the “ulterior purpose” of its inclusion here. 101 Vergil alludes to Hesiod’s metapoetic summer festival later in Book 3, this time in the proper season, when he describes the summer for sheep and goats, which is marked by the “song of the plaintive cicada” (cantu querulae…cicadae, 3.328) and instruction for the flocks to seek shade in the midday heat (331–334) and to eat and drink (from metapoetic “slender waters,” tenuis…aquas, 335, no less). Cf. Scarborough (2020) 28 n. 65. 102 As Pope (2019: 234) notes, “Mutuus and similar terms appear frequently in Lucretius’ discussion of human sexual congress and semen.” For example, communia gaudia (DRN 4.1195), mutua uoluptas (4.1201), mutua gaudia (4.1206), communis uoluptas (4.1208), mutuus ardor (4.1216). 103 For instance, graffiti from Pompeii presents masturbation as a cure for the cares weighing down the speaker’s limbs: [Moles] multa mihi curae cum [pr]esserit artus, | has ego mancinas, stagna refusa, dabo (“When the weight of cares oppresses my limbs, I use my left hand to let the liberating gushes spurt out,” tr. Berg and Varone, CIL 4.2066). On these difficult lines, see Varone (2002) 94. In addition, Catullus expresses a desire to “lighten his cares” (leuare curas) by playing with the “sparrow” in Catull. 2.10—a desire which some have interpreted, on an erotic level, as masturbation (e.g., Hooper 1985: 164–165, with notes for further bibliography). Cf. also Strato AP 12.226.1–2, which, as discussed previously, could indicate that he is soothing his cares through masturbation. 104 In particular, Ovid uses the image of ships reaching their port to describe not just his poetic journey through the art of love but also sexual climax and fulfillment: cf. Ov. Ars 2.9–10, 3.747–748, and Gibson (2003) 326–327. On “sea of love” imagery more generally, see La Penna (1951) 202–205; Murgatroyd (1995). Adams (1982: 144) also notes that “the metaphor of ‘reaching a goal’ was used of achieving orgasm”: e.g., Auson. Cent. Nupt. 128f., p. 217 P.: iamque fere spatio extremo fessique sub ipsam | finem aduentabant. 105 The infertility of the natural world is emphasized in the introduction to the Scythians’ location, where there is no grass on the field and no leaves on the trees (3.353). 106 For the glans or βάλανος as the glans penis or the penis in both scientific and nonscientific texts, see (in Greek) Arist. HA 493a27; Ar. Lys. 413; Gal. 10.381; (in Latin) Cels. 7.25; Mart. 12.75.3. See also Adams (1982) 72; Henderson (1991) 41, 119, 141. The verb stringo would then join verbs such as λέπω and glubo in implying a sexual double meaning to the action of “stripping” or “peeling.” For myrtle berries as female genitalia, see Ar. Lys. 1004; Ruf. Onom. 111; Poll. 2.174; and Henderson (1991) 20, 122, 134–135.

100  L. Kronenberg 107 Cf. the “long-eared hare” (οὐατόεντα λαγών, AP 5.207.2) of Meleager’s poem, which Thomas (1993) has shown to be an important model for Catull. 2 and 3 and to have a similar obscene subtext. Thomas (1993: 134) also cites the use of lepus (“hare”) for penis in Petron. Sat. 131.7. Sullivan (1991: 207 n. 35) explains “Martial’s strange fascination with the hare and lion motif (1.6; 14; 22; 44; 48; 51; 60; 104)” through the connection lion–vagina (e.g., Mart. 10.90.10) and hare–penis. 108 I am grateful for the helpful comments and advice of Jeff Henderson, Stephanie Nelson, Sasha Nikolaev, Tim O’Sullivan, Steve Scully, and the editors, T. H. M. GellarGoad and Christopher B. Polt, as well as the anonymous reviewers.

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Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  101 ———. 2016. “Metaphors for Hope in Archaic and Classical Greek Poetry.” In Hope, joy, and affection in the classical world, eds. Ruth R. Caston and Robert A. Kaster. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 13–44. Campanile, E. 1986. “Ἀνόστεος ὅν πόδα τένδει.” In O-o-pe-ro-si. Festschrift für Ernst Risch zum 75. Geburtstag, ed. A. Etter. Berlin: de Gruyter. 355–362. Campanile, E. 1988. “Ancora su ἀνόστεος ὅν πόδα τένδει (Hes. Erga 524).” Studi Classici e Orientali 38: 155–158. Canevaro, L. G. 2013. “The Clash of the Sexes in Hesiod’s « Works and Days ».” G&R 60: 185–202. ———. 2015. Hesiod’s Works and Days: How to Teach Self-Sufficiency. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Canevaro, L. G. 2018. “Hellenistic Hesiod.” In Loney and Scully (2018) 325–341. Clay, J. S. 2003. Hesiod’s cosmos. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Coker, A. 2021. “Fluid Vocabulary: Flux in the Lexicon of Bodily Emissions.” In Bodily Fluids in Antiquity, eds. M. Bradley, V. Leonard and L. Totelin. London: Routledge. 17–40. Cowan, R. 2014. “Fingering Cestos: Martial’s Catullus’ Callimachus.” In Flavian poetry and its Greek past, ed. A. Augoustakis. Leiden: Brill. 345–371. De Angelis, A. 2010. “Il vento senz’ossa: su alcuni aspetti della rappresentazione teriomorfa dei fenomeni atmosferici e un passo degli Erga esiodei.” In Parole. Il lessico come strumento per organizzare e trasmettere gli etnosaperi, eds. N. Prantera, A. Mendicino, and C. Citraro. Rende: Università della Calabria. 329–350. Degani, E. 2000. “Θῦμος vel θύμος = το μόϱιον?” In Poesia e religione in Grecia: studi in onore di G. Aurelio Privitera, eds. Maria Cannatà Fera and Simonetta Grandolini. Naples: Edizioni Scientifiche Italiane. 273–277. Dehon, P.-J. 2001. “A Skilful Petronian simile: « frigidior rigente bruma » (Sat. 132.8.5).” CQ 51: 315–318. DuBois, P. 1988. Sowing the Body: Psychoanalysis and Ancient Representations of Women. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ———. 1992. “Eros and the Woman.” Ramus 21: 97–116. Edmunds, L. 1981. “The cults and the Legend of Oedipus.” HSCP 85: 221–238. Edwards, G. P. 1971. The language of Hesiod in its traditional context. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ercolani, A. 2010. Hesiodo: Opere e giorni. Roma: Carocci. Evelyn White, H. G. 1916. “Hesiod’s Description of Winter. Works and Days, Ll. 493–560.” CR 30.8: 209–213. Flemming, R. 2021. “One-Seed, Two-Seed, Three-Seed? Reassessing the Fluid Economy of Ancient Generation.” In Bodily Fluids in Antiquity, eds. M. Bradley, V. Leonard, and L. Totelin. London: Routledge. 158–172. Floridi, L., ed. 2007. Stratone di Sardi: Epigrammi. Alessandria: dell’Orso. ———. 2019. “Enigmi sessuali nella tradizione letteraria greca.” Enthymema 23: 348–373. Fraser, L.-G. 2011. “A Woman of Consequence: Pandora in Hesiod’s Works and Days.” CCJ 57: 9–28. Gagarin, M. 1974. “Dike in Archaic Greek Thought.” CP 69: 186–197. Gagné, R. 2013. Ancestral Fault in Ancient Greece. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gaisser, J. H., ed. 2007. Catullus. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Gärtner, T. 2011. “Das Erlebnis Der Impotenz: zur Genese, Struktur und Rezeption von Ov., Am. III, 7.” Latomus 70: 103–123.

102  L. Kronenberg Gerber, D. E., ed. 1999. Greek Elegiac Poetry: From the Seventh to the Fifth Centuries BC. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gibson, R. K., ed. 2003. Ars amatoria. Book 3. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. González Rincón, M., ed. 1996. Estratón de Sardes: Epigramas. Seville: Universidad de Sevilla. Griffith, M., ed. 1999. Antigone. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gutzwiller, K. 2015. “Eros and Amor: Representations of Love in Greek Epigram and Latin Elegy.” BICS suppl 125: 23–44. Hamilton, R. 1989. The Architecture of Hesiodic Poetry. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Hansen, W. 2000. “Foam-Born Aphrodite and the Mythology of Transformation.” AJP 121: 1–19. Harder, A. 2012. Callimachus: Aetia: Introduction, Text, Translation, and Commentary. ­Oxford: Oxford University Press. Harris-McCoy, D. E., ed. 2012. Artemidorus’ Oneirocritica: Text, Translation and Commentary. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hawkins, S. H. 2014. “Catullus 60: Lesbia, Medea, Clodia, Scylla.” AJP 135: 559–597. Hawkins, S. H. 2019. “Archilochus 222W and 39W: Allusion and Reception, Hesiod and Catullus.” Philologus 163: 16–46. Heath, M. 1985. “Hesiod’s Didactic Poetry.” CQ 35: 245–263. Henderson, J. 1991. The Maculate Muse: Obscene Language in Attic Comedy. New York: Oxford University Press. Henkel, J. H. 2011. “Nighttime Labor: a Metapoetic Vignette Alluding to Aratus at Georgics 1.291–296.” HSCP 106: 179–198. Hoffmann, G. 1985. “Pandora, la jarred et l’espoir.” Études rurales 97–98: 119–132. Hofinger, M., ed. 1981. Études sur le vocabulaire du grec archaïque. Leiden: Brill. Hooper, R. W. 1985. “In Defence of Catullus’ Dirty Sparrow.” G&R 32: 162–178. Höschele, R. 2006. Verrückt nach Frauen: der Epigrammatiker Rufin. Tübingen: Narr. Hunter, R. L. 2014. Hesiodic voices: studies in the ancient reception of Hesiod’s Works and Days. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hyman, M. D., and P. Thibodeau 1999. “The hope of the Year: Virgil Georgics 1.224 and Hesiod Opera et dies 617.” CP 94: 214–215. Janda, M. 2014. Purpurnes Meer. Sprache und Kultur der homerischen Welt. Innsbruck: Institut für Sprachen und Literaturen der Universität Innsbruck. Jocelyn, H. D. 1980. “On Some Unnecessarily Indecent Interpretations of Catullus 2 and 3.” AJP 101: 421–441. Katz, J. T. 2006. “The Riddle of the « sph(h)ij- »: the Greek sphinx and her Indic and IndoEuropean background.” In La langue poétique indo-européenne: actes du colloque de travail de la Société des études indo-européennes (Indogermanische Gesellschaft, Society for Indo-European studies), Paris, 22-24 octobre 2003, eds. Georges-Jean Pinault and Daniel Petit. Leuven: Peeters. 157–194. Kilmer, M. F. 1993. Greek erotica on Attic red-figure vases. London: Duckworth. Knox, B. M. W. 1957. Oedipus at Thebes. New Haven: Yale University Press. Koning, H. H. 2010. Hesiod: the other poet: ancient reception of a cultural icon. Leiden: Brill. Krenkel, W. A. 1985. “Figurae Veneris: I.” Wissenschaftliche Zeitschrift der Wilhelm-PieckUniversität Rostock 34.4: 50–57. Kronenberg, L. 2018. “Seeing the Light, Part II: The Reception of Aratus’s LEPTĒ Acrostic in Greek and Latin Literature.” Dictynna 15: http://journals.openedition.org/dictynna/1575

Idle Hands: Poetics of Masturbation  103 La Penna, A. 1951. “Note sul linguaggio erotico dell’ elegia Latina.” Maia 4: 187–209. Laskaris, J. 2021. “The Eyes Have It. From Generative Fluids to Vision Rays.” In Bodily Fluids in Antiquity, eds. M. Bradley, V. Leonard, and L. Totelin. London: Routledge. 107–119. Lavery, H. 2014. The Impotency Poem from Ancient Latin to Restoration English Literature. London: Routledge. Lévêque, P. 1988. “Pandora ou la terrifiante féminité.” Kernos 1: 49–62. Lissarague, F. 2001. “La fabrique de Pandora: naissance d’images.” In Ève et Pandora. La creation de la femme, eds. J.-C. Schmitt and J.-P. Vernant. Paris: Gallimard. 39–67. Livrea, E. 1979. “Il piede di Eupalamo (Antip. A.P. XII 97).” GIF 31: 325–329. Lloyd-Jones, H. 2005. “Notes on Fragments of Sophocles.” In The Further Academic Papers of Sir Hugh Lloyd-Jones. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 115–135 = SIFC 12 (1994) 129–48. Loney, A. C., and S. Scully, eds. 2018. The Oxford Handbook of Hesiod. New York: Oxford University Press. Loraux, N. 1978. “Sur la race des femmes et quelques-unes de ses tribus.” Arethusa 9: 43–87. Luz, C. 2010. Technopaignia, Formspiele in der griechischen Dichtung. Leiden: Brill. Lye, S.. 2018. “Gender in Hesiod: A Poetics of the Powerless.” In Loney and Scully (2018) 175–189. Marquardt, P. A. 1982. “Hesiod’s Ambiguous View of Woman.” CP 77: 283–291. Marsilio, M. S. 1997a. “The Poetics of Hesiod’s Winter.” Annali Della Scuola Normale Superiore Di Pisa. Classe Di Lettere E Filosofia 2: 411–425. ———. 1997b. “Hesiod’s Winter Maiden.” Helios 24: 101–111. ———. 2000. Farming and Poetry in Hesiod’s Works and Days. Lanham: University Press of America. McClure, L. K. 2003. Courtesans at Table: Gender and Greek Literary Culture in Athenaeus. London:Routledge. McMahon, J. M. 1998. Paralysin Cave: Impotence, Perception, and Text in the Satyrica of Petronius. Leiden: Brill. Montanari, F., A. Rengakos, and C. C. Tsagalis, eds. 2009. Brill’s Companion to Hesiod. Leiden: Brill. Most, G. W. 2013. “Eros in Hesiod.” In Erôs in ancient Greece, ed. Ed Sanders. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 163–174. Murgatroyd, P. 1995. “The Sea of Love.” CQ 45: 9–25. Musäus, I. 2004. Der Pandoramythos bei Hesiod und seine Rezeption bis Erasmus von Rotterdam. Göttingen: Ruprecht. Musurillo, H. A. 1963. “Fire-Walking in Sophocles’ Antigone 618–619.” TAPA 94: 167–175. Mynors, R. A. B., ed. 1990. Georgics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Nagy, G. 1974. Comparative Studies in Greek and Indic Meter. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 1979. The best of the Achaeans: concepts of the hero in Archaic Greek poetry. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. ———. 1982. “Hesiod.” In T. J. Luce, ed. Ancient Authors. New York: Scribner’s. 43–73. Nelson, S. 1996. “The Drama of Hesiod’s Farm.” CP 91: 45–53. ———. 1998. God and the Land: The Metaphysics of Farming in Hesiod and Vergil. New York: Oxford University Press. Nicolai, W. 1964. Hesiods Erga: Beobachtungen zum Aufbau. Heidelberg: Winter. Obermayer, H. P. 1998. Martial und der Diskurs über männliche « Homosexualität » in der Literatur der frühen Kaiserzeit. Tübingen: Narr.

104  L. Kronenberg Okell, E. 2003. “The ‘effeminacy’ of the Clever Speaker and the ‘impotency’ Jokes of Ichneutai.” In Shards from Kolonos: Studies in Sophoclean fragments, ed. A. Sommerstein. Bari: Levante. 283–307. O’Sullivan, P., and C. Collard 2013. Euripides: Cyclops and Major Fragments of Greek Satyric Drama. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Page, D. 1978. The Epigrams of Rufinus. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Parsons, P. J. 1999. “4501–2. Epigrams. Nicarchus II?” The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, vol. 66, London: British Academy. 38–57. Pearson, A. C. 1917. The Fragments of Sophocles. 3 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Peek, W. 1955. Griechische Vers-Inschriften. Vol. 1. Grab-Epigramme. Berlin: Akademie-Verlag. Petropoulos, J. C. B. 1994. Heat and lust: Hesiod’s midsummer festival scene revisited. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. Pope, M. 2019. “Embryology, Female Semina and Male Vincibility in Lucretius, De Rerum Natura.” CQ 69: 229–245. Potamiti, A. 2015. “Playing at Riddles in Greek.” GRBS 55: 133–153. Power, T. 2017. “Lyric Indecorum in Archaic Mytilene (and Beyond): Sappho F 99 c. I.1–9 L-P = Alcaeus F 303Aa V.” Turkish Journal of Sociology 37: 259–282. Redfield, J. 1993. “The Sexes in Hesiod.” Annals of Scholarship 10: 31–61. Rokem, F. 1996. “One Voice and Many Legs: Oedipus and the Riddle of the Sphinx.” In Untying the Knot: On Riddles and Other Enigmatic Modes, eds. G. Hasan-Rokem and D. Shulman. New York: Oxford University Press. 255–270. Rosen, R. M. 1990. “Poetry and Sailing in Hesiod’s Works and Days.” ClAnt 9: 99–113. Rosenmeyer, P. A. 1999. “Tracing Medulla as a Locus Eroticus.” Arethusa 32: 19–47. Ronzitti, R. 2021. “Ancora sull’ ἀνόστεος esiodeo: membro maschile, vento di Borea, smidollato o chiocciola?” Lumina 5: 41–62. Rudhardt, J. 1986. “Pandora. Hésiode et les femmes.” MH XLIII: 231–246. Salvador-Bello. 2011. “The Sexual Riddle Type in Aldhelm’s Enigmata, the Exeter Book, and Early Medieval Latin.” Philological Quarterly 90: 357–385. Santirocco, M. S. 1980. “Justice in Sophocles’ Antigone.” Philosophy and Literature 4: 180–198. Scarborough, J. 2020. “Silva Sonans: The Metapoetic Pastoral Landscape in Vergil’s Georgics.” Vergilius 66: 3–34. Schatzmann, A., ed. 2012. Nikarchos II: Epigrammata: Einleitung, Texte, Kommentar. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Scully, S. 2015. Hesiod’s Theogony: From Near Eastern creation myths to Paradise Lost. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Seaford, R. 1984. Cyclops. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Shaw, C. A. 2014. “« Genitalia of the Sea »: Seafood and Sexuality in Greek Comedy.” Mnemosyne 67: 554–576. Sistakou, E. 2009. “Callimachus Hesiodicus revisited.” In Montanari et al. (2009) 219–252. Slenders, W. 1992. “Intentional Ambiguity in Aeschylean Satyr Plays?” Mnemosyne 45: 145–158. Slenders, W. 2005. “Λέξις ἐϱωτιϰή in Euripides’ Cyclops.” In Satyr Drama: Tragedy at Play, eds. G. W. M. Harrison. Swansea: Classical Press of Wales. 39–52. Slenders, W. 2006. “The λέξις ἐϱωτιϰή in Sophocles’ Satyr Plays.” In Land of Dreams: Greek and Latin Studies in Honour of A. H. M. Kessels, eds. André Lardinois, M. H. Pierre, Marc G. M. Van der Poel, and Vincent Jan Christian Hunink. Leiden: Brill. 133–145. Solmsen, F., R. Merkelbach, and M. L. West, eds. 1970. Theogonia: Opera et dies [et] Scutum. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

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5

Animal Love from Vergil Contesting Marital Propriety in the Age of Augustus Steven J. Green

In spite of the differences in their primary area of instruction, Roman didactic poems in the early empire display a fondness for what one might broadly label animal sexual relations. Whether the topic is encountered directly, as in the instructions on animal mating found in the farming and hunting “manuals” of Vergil and Grattius respectively, or indirectly/allegorically, as in Ovid’s Ars Amatoria or Germanicus’ Phaenomena, animal sexual behavior plays a curiously wide-ranging role in the instruction of Romans during this period. In this chapter, I start by looking at instructions given by Vergil in the Georgics on how to bring about and manage the animal mating process. I then trace a journey for this Vergilian instruction through later Roman didactic texts from the Augustan age. I will be arguing for two related points. First, Vergil’s humanized approach to animal interrelations, in particular his fleeting gesture toward animal “marriage,” provides the basis for bolder assimilation by later poets, who regularly implicate animals into acts of both “marriage” and “adultery.” Second, as they are broadly concurrent with Augustus’ raft of sexual legislation, these treatments of animal behavior can be viewed as a means by which our poets engage with the complex sexual politics of Rome’s first emperor.1 Vergil: Setting Conditions for Legitimate amor We start with Vergil, at the very cusp of the Augustan age. In Georgics 3, the book devoted to the care of cattle and horses, Vergil offers instructions on how to establish the optimal conditions for mating (3.49–137). In his contemporaneous farming treatise, Res Rusticae, Varro makes consistent use of what appears to be technical vocabulary to describe the process for animal mating: animals are “admitted” into each other’s presence, whereupon the male “mounts” or “goes into” the submissive female.2 Vergil’s instruction on the same topic strikes a quite different note, as his advice on breeding cattle exemplifies (3.60–65): aetas Lucinam iustosque pati hymenaeos desinit ante decem, post quattuor incipit annos; cetera nec feturae habilis nec fortis aratris. interea, superat gregibus dum laeta iuuentas, DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-8

Animal Love from Vergil 107 solue mares; mitte in Venerem pecuaria primus, atque aliam ex alia generando suffice prolem. The age to endure motherhood and lawful wedlock finishes before the tenth year and begins after the fourth; for the rest of her years, she is neither fit for breeding nor strong for the plow. In those intervening years, while fertile youthfulness abounds in the herds, release the males; be the first to send the cattle into lovemaking and, by generating one from another, supply the stock. If the final verse is worthy of Varro’s dispassionate, business-like approach to animal mating, Vergil elsewhere opts for a more anthropomorphized scene. This is, in one respect, a nod to Lucretius, for whom animal sexual intercourse (4.1197–1207) is motivated by seemingly human desires.3 But the anthropomorphism is taken to the next level by Vergil. For one thing, there is the striking metonym Lucina, the goddess of human childbirth.4 More relevant for our purposes is the equally striking classification of this manner of breeding as “lawful wedlock” (iustosque … hymenaeos).5 This fleeting image of animal “marriage” is not drawn again by Vergil. However, it does give the impression of a sanctioned union of animals, carefully regulated and overseen as it is by the farmer’s cura. This sets it apart from the wild, unsupervised, and ultimately destructive passion between animals to which Vergil will later turn his attention at 3.209–283.6 Particularly important to note is the conception of uenus/Venus in the Georgics. The term is used consistently in the poem to signal raw, physical lust.7 It/she is at least partly responsible (along with amor) for the unleashing of destructive passion into the world, as seen most clearly in the horrific case of the sex-starved mares devouring their master, Glaucus.8 In order to bring about a proper, “legitimate” animal union, then, the farmer must take agency away from this destructive deity, hence the human control implicit over her at 3.64 (mitte in Venerem pecuaria primus) and 3.135–137. While there is no scholarly consensus on how to read anthropomorphism in the Georgics,9 Vergil’s employment of starkly humanized language for animals establishes a gateway that can be entered from either side: it would be just as easy for different forms of sexual liaison in the human world to provide the starting point for discourse on animals. Grattius: Conducting an Augustan Marriage Like agriculture, hunting is an activity that depends on the careful nurturing and mating of animals—this time, dogs—for a successful outcome. Almost two-thirds of Grattius’ extant didactic poem on hunting, Cynegetica, is devoted to the care of dogs.10 But, as in the animal world of the Georgics, canine mating can take very different forms. Grattius first outlines the threat to managed breeding caused by the spirited Hyrcanian hound (161–166): sed non Hyrcano satis est uehementia gentis tanta suae: petiere ultro fera semina siluis; dat Venus accessus et blando foedere iungit.

108  S. J. Green tunc et mansuetis tuto ferus errat adulter in stabulis ultroque grauem succedere tigrin 165 ausa canis maiore tulit de sanguine fetum. The great vigor of his own race is, however, not enough for the Hyrcanian [dog]: they seek of their own accord the seed of wild beasts in the woods; Venus grants them approaches and binds them in a seductive covenant. Then indeed does the wild adulterer wander about in safety among the stables of livestock, and the bitch, daring to lie under the fierce tiger of her own accord, bears offspring from mightier blood. I take these verses as presenting the activities of both male and female Hyrcanian dogs. Verses 161–163 form a general statement about Hyrcanian male dogs: they seek a wild non-canine mate, aided by Venus. Verses 164–166 respond by explaining what happens in the absence of the male dog: a tiger (ferus … adulter) roams the “livestock” (tame animals, the dogs), which provides an opportunity for the Hyrcanian female herself to mate with a wild beast. Whatever the difficulties may be in interpreting these lines, verse 163 is striking: a personified Venus is portrayed as instigator of some sort of “contract,” and blando foedere is highly suggestive of marriage. Foedus on its own can be used to signal the pact of marriage, and the combination with blandus, a distinctly erotic adjective, only reinforces this sense.11 But, as we have seen from the Georgics, dangers abound when Venus is allowed full rein in sexual matters, and so it would appear here. This animal union is depicted in a negative fashion, with one party at least labeled as adulter, a term applied to the animal kingdom first by Grattius.12 Its primary sense here is, of course, to describe the “adulteration” that ensues from cross-species sexual intercourse. Borrowed as it is from the human sphere, however, adulter is naturally suggestive of human sexual (im)morality. More specifically, one may detect allusions, albeit subtle, to the sham “marriage” between Vergil’s Aeneas and Dido, a liaison for which Venus is also (partly) responsible (A. 4.90–128, esp. 127–128), and which has long been considered an allusion to the affair between Antony and Cleopatra.13 Grattius’ combining of Hyrcanus and tigris, not found before Vergil, provides a special link with Aeneid 4, in which Dido accuses Aeneas of being parttiger through his presumed nurture by Hyrcanian tigresses (4.367, Hyrcanaeque … tigres). The connection is stronger if Juno’s desire for “pacts to be joined” between Trojans and Tyrians (4.112, foedera iungi) includes the sort of sexual (and, I argue, marital) pact mentioned at Grattius 163.14 With the connection established, one may detect smaller points of contact between the two scenes.15 Having given due warning about, and signaled the immorality of, uncontrolled canine intercourse, Grattius proceeds to provide advice on how to secure an appropriate union of dogs (279–285): sed frustra longus properat labor, abdita si non altas in latebras unique inclusa marito 280

Animal Love from Vergil 109 femina: nec patres Veneris sub tempore magnos illa neque emeritae seruat fastigia laudis. primi complexus, dulcissuma prima uoluptas (hunc ueneri dedit inpatiens natura furorem) si tenuit custos et mater adultera non est. 285 But the long toil speeds along in vain if the female [dog] has not been shut away into deep recesses and kept confined for a single husband: [otherwise,] around the time of Venus, she cannot safeguard the greatness of her ancestors nor their peaks of glory deservedly won. The first embraces and the first pleasure are the sweetest (such frenzy has unrestrained nature given to Venus/lovemaking) if a guardian has kept her in check and the mother is not an adulteress. Advice here on the enclosure of sexually potent animals, and the need for human wardenship, recall Vergil’s instructions to cattle- and horse-trainers from G. 3.209–218. But Grattius’ like-minded advice about dogs is more heavily anthropomorphized: in fact, there is nothing in this passage that connects it unambiguously to the cynegetic world. Some of these humanizing touches are themselves Vergilian: the labelling of the protagonists as femina (281, “woman”) and maritus (280, “husband”), and the emphasis placed on ancestral name (281–282, patres … magnos, emeritae … fastigia laudis).16 But, once again, Grattius stamps his mark by applying adulter (285) to the animal sphere. The overall sentiment feels familiarly Roman,17 and allows for a message that complements the earlier discussion: Grattius’ Venus can preside over adulterous liaisons; but a proper animal “marriage” requires a human custos (285) to regulate Venus and ensure that its sanctity is maintained through an avoidance of “adulterous” behavior. We can go further. Grattius’ sustained anthropomorphism does, I believe, lead the reader more specifically to the contemporary world of Augustan sexual politics, especially in the wake of the Julian legislation against adultery of 18 bce.18 Particular features of Grattius’ sentiment and diction promote an association with the Julian Laws and a specifically Augustan context. First, while Vergil advises enclosure of the male animals, the bulls (G. 3.212–314), Grattius here switches the gender, focusing on the threat posed by the female if not kept under guard—after all, she is the would-be adulterer, she is the one potentially unable to maintain her ancestral name. This gender switch operates in the spirit of the Augustan marital legislation, which is primarily concerned with the regulation of a woman’s sexual behavior. Adultery is defined by the woman’s status alone: the statute assumes the husband to be the wronged party and is configured in terms of the civic duty that a husband or father has to perform in the event of sexual indiscretion on the part of his wife or daughter.19 Consequently, instructions to “lock up your wives” are offered by imperial Roman writers fully aware of the importance of female sexual exclusivity for male honor.20 Second, as noted above, the two “married” protagonists are identified not as dogs but as a “female” and her “husband.” But Grattius goes further than Vergil by

110  S. J. Green insisting on monogamy, stipulating that the female be reserved for a “single husband” (280, uni … marito). This phrase has political resonance, as it reflects epitaphic expressions of the exalted Roman virtue of the uniuira—the “one-husband woman”—which was a celebrated virtue of Augustus’ own wife, Livia.21 In the Grattian world of canine sexual interrelations, then, the statuses to be promoted and avoided look conspicuously human, Roman, and Augustan. In fact, from the potential intertextuality with Aeneid 4 and the allusion to the concept of the uniuira, it may be a short stretch of imagination to see behind this canine advice the specific and (officially) contrasting sexual unions of Marc Antony and Augustus. At any rate, it is tempting to see the figure of Augustus, or at least some law-abiding Augustan citizen, behind this unspecified “custodian” of (canine) sexual propriety.22 Ovid: Learning from an Adulterous Bitch Issues of humanized canine sexuality duly lead us to another Roman didactic treatment of animal mating, which occurs in the middle of the second book of Ovid’s Ars Amatoria. The didactic program rolled out for men across Ars 1 and 2 is how to find, catch, and retain a special woman, and there is a general progression toward success, as the public search in Ars 1 culminates, at the end of Ars 2, with man and woman alone in the private quarters of the latter’s bedroom. Before the student gets to this desired outcome, however, there is an intriguing section on the value of having an affair, and on the ways of either hiding this affair from the beloved or profiting by sharing knowledge of it with her. In a poem where the marital status of both the internal protagonists and those students reading about them is never clear, instructions on how to conduct affairs can easily be read as an implicit incitement to adultery, and a direct affront to Augustus’ moral legislation. This impression is only reinforced by the poet’s nonchalant attitude towards the ethical implications of famous examples of mythological adultery: on the affair between Helen and Paris, Ovid blames Menelaus for creating conducive conditions (Ars 2.365–372), and he reprimands, rather than commends, Vulcan for disclosing Venus’ affair with Mars (Ars 2.575–576).23 Within this part of the poem, Ovid offers a brief history of the evolutionary process (Ars 2.467–488), and it is during his discussion of the naturalness of animal sexual interactions that dogs are specifically implicated in an “adultery” (Ars 2.477–488): blanda truces animos fertur mollisse uoluptas:   constiterant uno femina uirque loco. quid facerent, ipsi nullo didicere magistro;   arte Venus nulla dulce peregit opus. 480 ales habet, quod amet; cum quo sua gaudia iungat,   inuenit in media femina piscis aqua; cerua parem sequitur, serpens serpente tenetur,   haeret adulterio cum cane nexa canis;

Animal Love from Vergil 111 laeta salitur ouis, tauro quoque laeta iuuenca est; 485   sustinet immundum sima capella marem. in furias agitantur equae spatioque remota   per loca diuiduos amne sequuntur equos. Seductive desire is said to have softened fierce spirits: woman and man had tarried together in one place. They themselves, in the absence of a teacher, learned what they were to do; with no skill, Venus carried out her sweet work. The bird has something to love; the female fish finds, in the middle of the water, something with which she might share her own joys; the hind follows her equal, the snake is held fast by a snake, the bitch, entwined with her dog, clings in adultery; joyful is the ewe that is mounted, also joyful is the heifer for the bull; the snub-nosed she-goat endures the unclean male. Mares are driven into frenzy and, across regions removed in distance, they follow the stallions, though separated by a river. Ovid’s use of adulterium at 484 is striking, as it marks the first application of the noun to the animal kingdom.24 Elsewhere in Ars, Ovid uses it only to describe the infamous adultery between Helen and Paris (2.367). Moreover, just as we witnessed in the case of Grattius, it is the female who is singled out as the agent of adultery (the feminine nexa). The use of adulterium—the word found in most formulations of the title of the Augustan legislation—makes Ovid’s statement much more provocative than the description of canine mating found in Lucretius, where dogs merely “cling in the strong bonds of Venus.”25 The self-styled Roman praeceptor amoris strips adultery of its (contemporary) association with moral aberration and implicitly offers it up as a natural mode of sexual behavior. On the basis of the discussion above, my immediate contentions are twofold. First, Vergil’s generally humanized approach to the topic of animal mating, and the specific notion of animal marriage that he raises fleetingly, provide the impetus for the subsequent treatments of animal mating by his two didactic successors. Secondly, Grattius and Ovid are engaging directly with each other.26 By means of their innovative deployment of adulterium and adulter, the two poets engage in a debate around contemporary sexual politics through the medium of the canine world: while Ovid’s female dogs enjoy a “natural” bout of adultery, Grattius’ are subject to the same Augustan moral conditions as their human counterparts, conditions that expressly curtail adultery. More generally, I would venture that this specific instance of intertextuality offers a window onto a host of marital instructor-figures in the Augustan age that is larger than traditionally assumed. A familiar narrative pits Ovid exclusively against Augustus on matters of marriage and adultery. This is, after all, the narrative that Ovid himself promotes when he suggests, time and again, that he has been singled out for an extraordinary punishment (relegation to Tomis) for perceived incitement to adultery in the Ars.27 But our discussion of Grattius suggests that there is at least one poet-teacher figure other than Ovid who, implicitly, takes a stance on the topic

112  S. J. Green of Augustus’ sexual legislation. Does Ovid have any sympathizers? Perhaps he does, and in the unlikely form of an imperial prince. Germanicus: Writing Marital Infidelity into the Cosmos Germanicus Julius Caesar has left us a 725-verse hexameter poem that is a close Latin adaptation of the first 732 verses of Aratus’ Phaenomena.28 “Adaptation” is a better term to use than “translation,” as it is clear that the Latin poem is controlled but not determined by its Greek source text. As Possanza neatly puts it, while there is a “basic core of semantic equivalence” between the two poems, “the translator builds a new structure through a deliberate program of rewriting, a structure which stands on its own, independent of the source text.”29 One conspicuous badge of independence is the adaptor’s predilection for catasterism myths: 14 such myths in Aratus become 30 in the Latin successor. Most interestingly for our purposes, and in a manner more familiar to us from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, these star myths are often predicated on acts of divine adultery, especially those committed by Jupiter.30 A little indulgence from the reader is required here: the poem does not present animal mating per se. It does, however, implicate in human adultery either bestial attendants of the gods or the gods themselves in animal guise, which provides an interesting side angle from which our astronomical poet can engage with the animalized sexual politics of his didactic contemporaries. The constellations of the Eagle and the Arrow find themselves uniquely implicated into one of Jupiter’s infamous love intrigues (Germ. 315–320):31 est etiam, incertum quo cornu missa, Sagitta 315 quam seruat Iouis Ales. habet miracula nulla, si caelum ascendit Iouis armiger. hic tamen altum unguibus innocuis Phrygium rapuit Ganymeden et telo appositus custos quo Iuppiter arsit in puero, luit excidio quem Troia furorem. 320 There is also the Arrow—it is uncertain from which bow it was shot—which Jupiter’s Bird protects. It holds no wonder if the arms-bearer of Jupiter climbs into the sky. Yet this is the one who snatched the Phrygian Ganymede aloft with harmless talons and was stationed as guard over the weapon by which Jupiter burned for the boy—a frenzy for which Troy paid with its destruction. There is nothing comparable to be found in the versions of Aratus or Cicero.32 Germanicus has, moreover, strayed radically from the mythological tradition. Jupiter’s theft of Ganymede by means of an eagle, either the servant of Jupiter or the king of the gods himself in disguise, is well established, as is the association of this eagle with the constellation Aquila.33 But the erotic alliance forged here between the Eagle and the Arrow is without parallel. Amid the traditional uncertainty surrounding the bow from which the arrow was shot, Germanicus offers his own answer by

Animal Love from Vergil 113 implication: the arrow commemorated in the sky is the love arrow shot from the bow of Cupid.34 Jupiter’s adulterous whims are more directly voiced in the treatment of the constellation Cygnus (275–277): contra spectat Auem, uel Phoebi quae fuit olim Cycnus uel Ledae thalamis qui illapsus adulter furta Iouis falsa uolucer sub imagine texit. On the other side, [the Lyre] looks at the Bird, either the bird that was once Phoebus’ (son) Cycnus or the adulterer who slid down into the bedchamber of Leda and, in winged form, covered the intrigues of Jupiter beneath a false image. Again, nothing comparable is found in Aratus or Cicero.35 Though he offers a choice of explanations, Germanicus focuses his attention on the second, more familiar story of Jupiter’s seduction, in the form of a swan, of Leda, who subsequently produces an egg from which children are born, the most notable of whom is Helen.36 Germanicus ignores the fabulous aftermath to focus exclusively and disapprovingly on Jupiter’s sexual conduct. While he shares with his Roman contemporaries the critical focus on Jupiter’s falsehood and deceit,37 our author goes one stage further by calling him out directly as an exponent of adultery: adulter, rather than Iuppiter, is in full view here as the grammatical subject. While authorial choices such as these can be viewed from a literary perspective—especially as an engagement with Ovidian poetics of illicit love and transformation—one should not overlook their potential for political subversion or, at the very least, playful tension. Germanicus’ proem (1–16) equates the emperor (most likely Augustus) with Jupiter as the inspirer of his work and the one who has, in effect, through the reestablishment of peace and human peacetime activities like stargazing, given power to the cosmos.38 It is already awkward, then, that this poem will jettison the Aratean depiction of Jupiter, the kindly deliverer to humankind of reliable celestial signs, for one who forces his sexual will on humans by means of false images (i.e., by sending false signs).39 But the situation is exacerbated by the implicit suggestion that Jupiter is, by means of catasterism, actually rewarding his facilitators/guises of sexual intrigue and acts of adultery.40 This is the cosmos which, we are told, also receives Augustus himself as he is carried to the stars (Germanicus 558–560).41 The implication of all this is subtle but disturbing: Rome’s first august emperor is obliged to share the sky with memorials of acts of illicit and adulterous, “animalized” love committed by his heavenly counterpart.42 The reader may, of course, choose to observe a moral distinction between Augustus and Jupiter in sexual matters, but an awkward tension persists in view of the accusations of adultery that followed the emperor, especially with regard to his early relationship with Livia.43 Germanicus’ contemporary, Ovid, would also enjoy exposing uncomfortable links between the sexual behavior of Augustus and Jupiter.44

114  S. J. Green Conclusion: Didactic Sexual Advisors in the Early Empire We have seen how treatments of animal or “animalized” love in Latin didactic from the age of Augustus gesture regularly toward contemporary, politicized issues of human adultery and marital propriety, through either conspicuous use of anthropomorphic language or stories where a humanized mindset is lurking beneath animal hide. Habinek (1997) has argued that, as part of a wider development of expert discourses at Rome, the early empire witnesses the disentanglement of sex from other Roman social relations, and its corresponding emergence as a discrete topic for discussion and for the development of expertise; this phenomenon, he adds, is given impetus by Augustus’ marriage legislation, which effectively moves regulatory power on sexual matters—marriage, chastity, adultery—away from the traditional family structures and toward the state. While Habinek focuses on Ovid as the voice for this new expertise on Roman sex, one might go further and ask whether didactic poetry in general provides a particularly useful vehicle for this growing professionalization.45 On the basis of the analysis above, Roman sexual advice operates not only directly, as with Ovid in Ars Amatoria, but also indirectly, as instructors of farming, hunting, and astronomy find a suitable means to weigh in on the debate. These varied authority figures stand in the shadows to endorse, challenge, and otherwise interrogate Roman marriage and the sexual legislative voice of Augustus, who can himself be viewed as a teacher-figure.46 No sexual beings can resist being pulled into the orbit around imperial power. Notes 1 I would like to thank Donncha O’Rourke, the editors of this volume, and the readers for Routledge for valuable suggestions on early versions of this chapter. In terms of chronology of texts, I am assuming the following (broadly agreed) dates for publication: Vergil’s Georgics, circa 29 bce; Ovid’s Ars Amatoria, 2 ce; Grattius’ Cynegetica, between 29 bce and 8 ce (see discussion below); Germanicus’ Phaenomena, between 4 and 19 ce. The editions used for these texts are, unless otherwise indicated: Vergil’s Georgics, Mynors (1969); Ovid’s Ars Amatoria, Kenney (1961); Grattius’ Cynegetica, Green (2018a); Germanicus’ Phaenomena, Gain (1976). All translations are my own. 2 Admitto is the standard verb in Varro for the act of bringing animals together for the purpose of mating (Varro R. 2.2.13, 2.2.14, 2.6.4, 2.7.8, 2.7.11, 2.8.2, 2.9.11), with cognate nouns admissio and admissura. For the male’s sexual activity, cf. salio (2.2.14, 2.4.8, 2.7.8, 2.7.9, 3.6.3, 3.10.3), ineo (2.1.18, 2.5.13, 2.7.9, 2.8.4). Varro’s work was published circa 37 bce, in his eightieth year (1.1.1). 3 Cf. uoluptas (Lucretius 4.1201, 1207), mutua gaudia (4.1205), Venus (4.1204), cupide (4.1204), and use of the verb ardere (4.1199); see further Gale (1991) 415–417. 4 Lucina is very rare as a metonym (OLD offers only Ovid Ars 3.785), and its application to the animal kingdom is unparalleled (see Mynors ad loc.). Similarly, iuuentas is first applied to the animal kingdom here and is rare thereafter; cf. Horace Carm. 4.4.5, Nemesianus Cyn. 115 (TLL 7.2.742.68–72). 5 Hymenaeus of animal relationships is only found once elsewhere, in late Latin (Avienus: see TLL 6.3.3142.40–42); though cf. the nuptiae mentioned in reference to a filly at Horace Carm. 3.11.11. As Mynors notes ad loc., iustos … hymenaeos has a legal flavor (iustae nuptiae).

Animal Love from Vergil 115 6 For various studies of this Vergilian section on the destructiveness of amor, see Miles (1975); Putnam (1979) 190–201; Miles (1980) 186–205; Knox (1992); Gale (1991) 418–421; Gale (2000) 96–100, 221–223; Nappa (2009) 132–141. 7 See Miles (1975) 186 = Miles (1980) 198, Mynors on Vergil G. 3.209–211. 8 Cf. Vergil G. 3.267, et mentem Venus ipsa dedit, with Thomas ad loc. 9 See Gale (1991) 415. 10 Out of the poem’s 540 extant verses, 346 relate to dogs (Grattius 150–496). For debate about the scope of the original poem, see Green (2018a) 4–6. 11 For foedus denoting marriage, cf. Catullus 64.373, accipiat coniunx felici foedere ­diuam; Vergil A. 4.339; Horace Carm. 3.24.23, with Nisbet & Rudd (2004) 281, Lyne (1980) 34–38; for blandus, see Pichon (1966) 94–95.  12 See TLL 1.879.71–72, 1.881.14–15. 13 See, e.g., Camps (1969) 29–30, 95–96; Bertman (2000). 14 Cf. also Juno’s words at Vergil A. 4.126, conubio iungam stabili.   15 For example, there is a thematic and syntactic connection between the audacity of the Hyrcanian bitch at Grattius 165–166 and the rumor of Dido’s sexual decision-making at Vergil A. 4.191–192, uenisse Aenean, Troiano sanguine cretum, | cui se pulchra uiro dignetur iungere Dido. 16 For femina and maritus of animals, cf. Vergil G. 3.125, 3.216; for the importance of ancestral name, cf. G. 3.75 (pecoris generosi pullus), 3.158. 17 The inclusa femina (280–281) logically evokes the figure of the male exclusus amator of Latin love elegy. Concern for the sweetest form of sexual pleasure (283–285) betrays a humanized desideratum that recalls the goal of Ovid’s erotic didaxis; cf., e.g., Ars 2.703–732, esp. 727, tum plena uoluptas. 18 For the Lex Iulia de adulteriis coercendis, see below, with Treggiari (1991) 277–298; Cohen (1991); Edwards (1993) 37–42; McGinn (1998) 140–147; Severy (2003) 51–56. 19 For the (disjointed) evidence for the legal wording of Augustus’ laws on adultery, see Riccobono (1945) 1.112–128; Cantarella (1991) 229–234; Lefkowitz & Fant (2005) 129–131. 20 Cf. Juveval 6.346–651, esp. 347 pone seram; cohibe; Tacitus Ann. 3.33–34. 21 For the motif of the uniuira on epitaphs, cf. e.g., Carm. Epigr. 643.5 uno contenta marito, 736.4, 1693.1, 2214; see further Williams (1958) 23–24, Treggiari (1991) 233–236. For the (problematic) celebration of Livia as uniuira, cf. Ovid Fast. 1.650 with Green (2004) 298–299. 22 For Grattius’ more general strategy of exhorting the reader to take on the mantle of Augustus in his own sphere of hunting duty, see Henderson (2001), Green (2018b) 155–168. 23 For the ambivalent status of the internal protagonists in and implied readers of the poem, see Miller (1993) 234–236; Gibson (2003) 25–27, 30–32; Ziogas (2014) 735–739. For the subversion of Augustan sexual legislation in Ars 2, see Sharrock (1994) 109–22; more generally, Davis (2006) 85–95. 24 See TLL 1.883.43–45. 25 Lucretius 4.1203–1205, canes … ualidis Veneris compagibus haerent. For the anatomical and physiological force of haereo in descriptions of canine mating, see Fischer (1981). For Ovid’s adaptation of Lucretius in this section on evolution, see Watson (1984). 26 I advocate a late date for Grattius within the generally agreed parameters of 29 bce–8 ce; see Green (2018a) 6–7, 174–175. One must also remember that, irrespective of actual publication date, the two authors could have been circulating drafts of their works in progress over a longer period of time; for the practice, see Starr (1987). 27 Cf. esp. Tr. 2.207–212 with Ingleheart (2010) 202–207; also Tr. 1.1.105–112, 2.7–8, 2.239–252. 28 I am here following the general scholarly consensus that Germanicus is the author of the poem; for discussion, see esp. Possanza (2004) 219–233. Gain (1976) 17–20 is the most prominent opponent of this viewpoint, as he leans toward an identification with Tiberius.

116  S. J. Green 2 9 Possanza (2004) 29. 30 For the star myths and their affinity with Ovid’s Metamorphoses, see Possanza (2004) 169–217. 31 The text here follows Possanza (2004) 190–191 in its adoption of altum for the corrupt ardum of the manuscripts at 317. 32 Aratus (311–315) has nothing to say on the catasterism; Cicero remarks upon the “burning body” of the Eagle (Arat. fr. 33.87 Soubiran, ardenti … corpore), a detail that might have inspired Germanicus’ metaphorical use of arsit at 319. 33 For the general myth, see Gantz (1993) 560. For association with Aquila, cf. Eratosthenes Cat. 30; Hyginus Astr. 2.16. 34 For the uncertainty surrounding the bow in the Aratean tradition, cf. Aratus 311–312; Cicero Arat. fr. 33.84 Soubiran (missore uacans … Sagitta); the arrow is elsewhere thought to belong to Apollo (Eratosthenes Cat. 29) or Hercules (Hyginus Astr. 2.15). See further Possanza (2004) 191. 35 Cf. Aratus 275; Cicero Arat. fr. 33.47–48 Soubiran. 36 For the complicated sources, see Gantz (1993) 320–321, Hard (2015) 21–23. Association between this swan and the constellation is also well-attested, though older sources cannot decide whether Leda or Nemesis is the woman in question; cf. Eratosthenes Cat. 25 (Nemesis); Hyginus Astr. 2.8 (Nemesis or Leda); Manilius 1.337–340. 37 Cf. Ovid Her. 17.55–56, dat mihi Leda Iouem cygno decepta parentem, | quae falsam gremio credula fouit auem; Manilius 1.340 (fidenti … Ledae); also Ovid Met. 6.109, where Arachne includes Leda within her tapestry of divine deceptions of mortals. 38 For discussion of the proem, and the identification of its addressee as Augustus, see esp. Possanza (2004) 105–116, 227–233. 39 Jupiter is implicated in other stories of illicit love in the poem: as well as those discussed above, cf. also Germanicus 536–539 (Europa and the bull), Possanza (2004) 171, 180–181. 40 The notion of stellification as divine reward for facilitating sexual intrigue is always left implicit in Germanicus, but it is a small step for the reader to take. The text is more explicit in cases where Jupiter rewards those who have performed morally worthy duties with stellar form; cf., e.g., 31–39 (Helice and Cynosura, Jupiter’s childhood nurses), 554–557 (Capricorn, who supported Jupiter in the war against the giants). 41 The general astral and/or divine trajectory for Augustus is clear from these verses, even if the specific elements are subject to dispute; see, e.g., Green (2014) 144–145. 42 The only deity to commemorate marriage in the stars is Bacchus, for his wife Ariadne: Germanicus 70–72, thalami memor (different from Aratus 72, where the Corona constellation commemorates Ariadne’s death or departure). It is unclear whether this creates further awkwardness for Augustus—locating sexual morality in the deity championed by his former enemy, Marcus Antonius (Zanker 1988: 44–47, 57–65)—or provides some small comfort on the basis that the emperor was seeking to rehabilitate Bacchus as a positive symbol for the Augustan age (Castriota 1995: 91–106). 43 For the scandal with Livia, see Barrett (2002) 19–27. For accusations of adultery with a range of women, cf. Suetonius Aug. 69–70, esp. 69.1, adulteria quidem exercuisse ne amici quidem negant, with Wardle (2014) 440–443. It may be particularly noteworthy that Octavian apparently indulged in adulterous behavior while dressed as a god (Suetonius Aug. 70). 44 Cf. Ovid Fast. 1.649–652 and 2.131–146, where the poet’s forging of flattering connections between Augustus and Jupiter sits awkwardly next to reminders of Jupiter’s adultery in the form of the rape of Ganymede; see further Newlands (1995) 44–47, Green (2004) 298–299. On a more general level, critique of the vaunted connection between Roman imperial and cosmic order can be observed in other “technical” texts, such as Manilius’ Astronomica and Hyginus Gromaticus’ Constitutio Limitum; see, respectively, DeNardis (2003), esp. 162–217, and Maticic in this volume. 45 It is certainly worth noting that the development of expert discourses corresponds chronologically with the peak of Roman didactic poetry, in the middle to latter years

Animal Love from Vergil 117 of Augustus: in addition to the poems discussed in this chapter, see especially Ovid’s Remedia Amoris (circa 2 ce) and Manilius’ Astronomica (circa 9–16 ce); while it might not be strictly categorized as didactic, Ovid’s Fasti (2–15 ce) also regularly adopts a didactic pose in terms of both its principal narrator and its internal characters. 46 O’Gorman (1997: 105–115) argues that Augustus, through his political program, assumes the role of praeceptor by means of both direct instruction and allusive exempla. For Augustus’ own conceit that he is an emperor who teaches by example, cf. Res Gestae 8.5, with Cooley (2009) 144.

Works Cited Barrett, A. A. 2002. Livia: First Lady of Imperial Rome. New Haven: Yale University Press. Bertman, S. 2000. “Cleopatra and Antony as Models for Dido and Aeneas,” Echos du monde Classique: Classical Views 44 n. s. 19: 395–398. Camps, W. A. 1969. An Introduction to the Aeneid. London: Oxford University Press. Cantarella, E. 1991. “Homicides of Honor: The Development of Italian Adultery Law Over Two Millennia.” In The Family in Italy from Antiquity to the Present, edd. D. I. Kertzer and R. P. Saller. New Haven: Yale University Press. 229–244. Castriota, D. 1995. The Ara Pacis Augustae and the Imagery of Abundance in Later Greek and Early Roman Imperial Art. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Cohen, D. 1991. “The Augustan Law on Adultery: The Social and Cultural Context.” In The Family in Italy from Antiquity to the Present, edd. D. I. Kertzer and R. P. Saller. New Haven: Yale University Press. 109–26. Cooley, A. E. 2009. Res Gestae Divi Augusti: Text, Translation, and Commentary. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Davis, P. J. 2006. Ovid and Augustus: A Political Reading of Ovid’s Erotic Poems. London: Duckworth. DeNardis, V. S. 2003. “Ratio omnia vincit: Cosmological, Political and Poetic Power in the Astronomica of Manilius.” Ph. D. dissertation, New York University. Edwards, C. 1993. The Politics of Immorality in Ancient Rome. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Fischer, K.-D. 1981. “Lucretius 4,1201ff. and Ovid Ars Amatoria 2,484.” PLLS 3: 417–418. Gain, D. B. 1976. The Aratus Ascribed to Germanicus Caesar. London: Athlone. Gale, M. R. 1991. “Man and Beast in Lucretius and the Georgics.” CQ 41: 414–426. Gale, M. R. 2000. Virgil on the Nature of Things: The Georgics, Lucretius and the Didactic Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gantz, T. 1993. Early Greek Myth: A Guide to Literary and Artistic Sources. 2 vols. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Gibson, R. K. 2003. Ovid, Ars Amatoria Book 3. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Green, S. J. 2004. Ovid Fasti I: A Commentary. Leiden: Brill. Green, S. J. 2014. Disclosure and Discretion in Roman Astrology: Manilius and his Augustan Contemporaries. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Green, S. J., ed. 2018a. Grattius: Hunting an Augustan Poet. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Green, S. J. 2018b. “Grattius and Augustus: Hunting for an Emperor.” Green (2018a) 153–175. Habinek, T. 1997. “The Invention of Sexuality in the World-City of Rome.” In The Roman Cultural Revolution, edd. T. Habinek and A. Schiesaro. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 23–43. Hard, R. 2015. Eratosthenes and Hyginus: Constellation Myths with Aratus’ Phaenomena. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

118  S. J. Green Henderson, J. 2001. “Going to the Dogs: Grattius (and) the Augustan Subject.” PCPS 47: 1–22. Ingleheart, J. 2010. A Commentary on Ovid, Tristia, Book 2. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kenney, E. J. 1961. P. Ovidi Nasonis Amores, Medicamina Faciei Femineae, Ars Amatoria, Remedia Amoris. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Knox, P. E. 1992. “Love and Horses in Virgil’s Georgics.” Eranos 90: 43–53. Lefkowitz, M. R., and M. B. Fant 2005. Women’s Life in Greece and Rome: A Source Book in Translation. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Lyne, R. O. A. M. 1980. The Latin Love Poets: From Catullus to Horace. Oxford: Oxford University Press. McGinn, T. A. 1998. Prostitution, Sexuality, and the Law in Ancient Rome. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Miles, G. B. 1975. “Georgics 3.209–294: Amor and Civilization.” CSCA 8: 177–197. Miles, G. B. 1980. Virgil’s Georgics: A New Interpretation. Berkeley: University of California Press. Miller, J. F. 1993. “Apostrophe, Aside and Didactic Addressee: Poetic Strategies in Ars Amatoria III.” In Mega Nepios: il destinatario nell’ epos didascalisco (MD 31), eds. A. Schiesaro, P. Mitsis and J. Clay. Pisa: Giardini. 231–41. Mynors, R. A. B. 1969. P. Vergili Maronis: Opera. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mynors, R. A. B. 1990. Virgil: Georgics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Nappa, C. 2009. Reading after Actium: Vergil’s Georgics, Octavian, and Rome. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Newlands, C. E. 1995. Playing with Time: Ovid and the Fasti. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Nisbet, R. G. M., and N. Rudd 2004. A Commentary on Horace Odes Book III. Oxford: Oxford University Press. O’Gorman, E. 1997. “Love and the Family: Augustus and Ovidian Elegy.” Arethusa 30: 103–123. Pichon, R. 1966. Index Verborum Amatoriorum. Hildesheim: Olms. Possanza, D. M. 2004. Translating the Heavens: Aratus, Germanicus, and the Poetics of Latin Translation. New York: Lang. Putnam, M. C. 1979. Virgil’s Poem of the Earth: Studies in the Georgics. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Riccobono, S. 1945. Acta Divi Augusti I. Rome: Regia Academia Italica. Severy, B. 2003. Augustus and the Family at the Birth of the Roman Empire. New York: Routledge. Sharrock, A. R. 1994. “Ovid and the Politics of Reading.” MD 33: 97–122. Soubiran, J. 1972. Cicéron: Aratea, Fragments Poétiques. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Starr, R. J. 1987. “The Circulation of Literary Texts in the Roman World.” CQ 37: 213–223. Thomas, R. F. 1988. Virgil, Georgics: Volume 2, Books III–IV. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Treggiari, S. 1991. Roman Marriage: Iusti Coniuges from the Time of Cicero to the Time of Ulpian. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Wardle, D. 2014. Suetonius: Life of Augustus. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Watson, P. 1984. “Love as Civilizer: Ovid, Ars Amatoria, 2, 467–92.” Latomus 43: 389–395. Williams, G. 1958. “Some Aspects of Roman Marriage Ceremonies and Ideals.” JRS 48: 16–29. Zanker, P. 1988. The Power of Images in the Age of Augustus. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Ziogas, I. 2014. “Stripping the Roman Ladies: Ovid’s Rites and Readers.” CQ 64: 735–744.

6

The Language of Teaching and Learning in Propertius Melanie Racette-Campbell

In the opening lines of Propertius’ first book, an allusion to the Georgics sets up the importance of teaching and learning in Propertius’ work—a theme that extends far beyond direct reference to Vergil’s didactic poem. This most prominent intertextual connection between Propertius’ Monobiblos and Vergil’s Georgics holds a programmatic position in the second and third couplets of the first poem (1.1.3–6):1 tum mihi constantis deiecit lumina fastus   et caput impositis pressit Amor pedibus, donec me docuit castas odisse puellas improbus, et nullo uiuere consilio. Then wicked Amor cast down my eyes and my steadfast pride   and pressed my head under his foot, until he taught me to hate well-bred girls and to live according to no plan. These lines, especially the underlined words, respond to what is perhaps the most famous line of Vergil’s didactic poem: labor omnia uicit | improbus et duris urgens in rebus egestas (“wicked labor has conquered all and necessity drives us in harsh circumstances,” G. 1.145–146). The connection between Amor improbus and labor improbus, and the meaning of the latter in the context of the Georgics, have both been covered at length elsewhere; what is relevant here is that just as labor improbus sets the tone for the Georgics, so does Amor improbus for Propertius.2 If, as Thomas says, “the central issue of the Georgics involves the ways in which man copes with the world of labor” (2008: 75), then the central issue of Propertius is the ways that (a) man copes with the world of amor.3 Propertius invites us to read a didactic resonance with the Georgics in his work by setting this tone in his first poem.4 But then he immediately makes clear that his didactic is concerned with amatory teaching and learning: Cynthia is famously the subject of the first verb in Propertius, but Amor is the subject of the next three. In addition to the Vergilian echo with improbus, Amor is portrayed as a teacher: Amor … me docuit (love has taught me).5 This serves to differentiate the Propertian lover-poet, a student of Amor, from Vergil, who does not appear as the object of the DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-9

120  M. Racette-Campbell verb docere in the Georgics, or as the student of labor or of anyone else, for that matter. Vergil is the teacher, but Propertius’ first engagement with the language of teaching and learning positions the speaking voice of the poem as a student.6 The lessons he learns are about submitting to Amor (and Cynthia), about becoming an elegiac lover, rather than about rustic virtue and hard work. Amor makes two appearances in elegy 1.1, both of which portray him as a teacher. When the lover-poet returns to him at line 17, he combines a reiteration of the god’s didactic role with a second Georgics allusion: in me tardus Amor non ­ullas cogitat artes (“In my case, lazy Amor does not think up any skills/stratagems”).7 The repetition of Amor, here tardus instead of improbus, draws our attention back to the previously activated connection with the first book of the Georgics, especially since he appears in the same line as artes (Batstone 1992: 290). Artes is another significant and much-studied term in the labor improbus lines of the Georgics: in 1.145, artes immediately precedes labor (1.143–146): tum ferri rigor atque argutae lammina serrae (nam primi cuneis scindebant fissile lignum), tum uariae uenere artes. labor omnia uicit improbus. Then came the hardness of iron and the blades of the noisy saw (for they were first splitting splittable wood with wedges), then the various skills: wicked labor conquered all. These artes are part of the labor that is necessary when living outside of the Golden Age. Given the intertextual connections, when artes appear with amor, they are a sign of a love that is also excluded from an amatory golden age, when there were no barriers and lovers received the favors of their beloveds freely.8 But there is a complication: Propertius’ Amor has notably not provided artes. Instead, he taught the lover-poet to live nullo consilio (“with no plan,” 1.1.6). Amor is a poor teacher. But, as we will see, someone does teach elegiac artes in the collection, and there are lessons to be learned. Teaching and Learning in Love Elegy and Beyond Despite his lack of artes and seeming unwillingness to instruct the lover-poet, Amor’s role as teacher is almost overmarked by the intertextual engagement with the Georgics. This strong opening statement of love didactic drew me to investigate the language of teaching and learning in Propertius. The concept of erotodidaxis (teaching about love) in Roman poetry is most well-known from Ovid’s work, especially the Ars Amatoria (“the Art of Love”). It has its roots in New Comedy, with its young men learning how to get the most out of their short-term liaisons with unmarriageable women and how to be proper husbands to the young women who turn out to be marriageable.9 In Latin love elegy, the teaching centers on lessons for surviving and thriving as an elegiac lover: how to gain access to the beloved, how to react to and appease her

Language of Teaching and Learning in Propertius  121 anger or tears, how to regain her favor once it is lost. Occasionally, we see a more specific set of lessons, as, for instance, Veremans (1991: 393) has shown in analysis of Tibullus 1.6, which innovates by providing a diverse set of teachers with lessons suited to a variety of characters in the dramatic cast of elegy. Ultimately, this poem shows the Tibullan lover-poet undermined and deceived by the instructions given by the various Tibullan praeceptores amoris, and in some ways sets up the kind of erotodidaxis we see in the Ars Amatoria, which teaches the lovers themselves to deceive (Kennedy 2006: 54–55). Ovid explicitly teaches men to act like lovers, unlike the lessons in his precursor Propertius, which are more about learning how to react once one is already a lover. By the time Ovid wrote his didactic text, he had already brought the actions and attitudes of elegy almost to the point of parody in his Amores, so it was only a small step further to turn them into a playbook teaching a role. If we return to Propertius, though, it seems that the tropes of Latin love elegy had not yet solidified: indeed, he was one of their creators. When we consider his influences, it seems as though the less obviously erotic didactic of Lucretius in the generation before him may be as important, if not more so, than the much earlier comic plays.10 King (1998: 202–203, 215) has noted striking intertextual resonances between Propertius and Lucretius, who both refer to iucunda uoluptas (Lucretius DRN 2.3 and Propertius 1.10.3) in the context of the suffering caused by love, although with a notable difference in how each author proposes these effects should be dealt with. King even argues that Propertius’ reference to Lucretius adds an element of seriousness to the elegist’s praeceptor amoris persona (1998: 214). Her work represents one way of examining didactic material in Propertius’ work, as does the focus of Gibson (1998) on the use of imperatives. Another possible avenue lies in Roman’s consideration of how an anti-Callimachean position influences the doctitude on display in the Ars Amatoria, providing yet another point of divergence between Ovid and the avowed Callimachean Propertius.11 One approach that has not been taken so far, however, is a comparative approach that looks at how the verbs of teaching and learning are deployed in Propertius and in the overtly didactic texts of the Georgics and Ars Amatoria. Docere and discere in Propertius The prominence of the docta puella in elegy is well-known, but there has been less examination of the verb docere in general, especially as a finite verb rather than an adjectival participle.12 It is, however, one of the more common verbs in the collection: docere occurs 27 times in 23 poems, including instances of docta puella or other uses of the participle as an adjective. In addition, the verb for the closely connected act of learning, discere, appears 14 times. As a control, I compared these words to amare, which appears 54 times, like docere often as a (present) participle rather than as a finite or infinitive verb. Teaching and learning may not be as common as loving, but they are still very common actions in these poems. Table 6.1 provides a summary of the appearances of each term per book. I will not address every single example, and I generally exclude participles used as adjectives. I am interested in who is teaching, who is being taught, what they are teaching, who is

122  M. Racette-Campbell Table 6.1  Docere, discere, and amare in Propertius

Book 1 Book 2 Book 3 Book 4 Total

docere

discere

amare

 5 14  5  3 27

 3  4   4 (+ 1 perdiscere)  3 14

17 27  9  1 54

learning, and what they are learning. Sometimes this is implied in the participles, but often they are used more in the adjectival sense as “learned,” and so are less useful for these questions. I begin with docere in Book 1, where it is used five times, twice as a participle, leaving three indicatives, two active and one passive.13 All the indicatives appear in poems about men falling, or potentially falling, in elegiac love: at 1.1 the lover-poet, at 1.10 and 1.13 his friend Gallus. In the larger context of a number of poems in Book 1, the Propertian lover-poet is a teacher, but still, he is never the subject of docere, except for when it is in the passive voice. Instead, he appears as the direct object of docuit twice (1.1 and 1.10) with Amor and Cynthia the teachers.14 I discussed the first instance above. In 1.10, the lover-poet offers to use the knowledge he has gained from Cynthia’s teachings in order to show Gallus how to be a lover (1.10.15–20): possum ego diuersos iterum coniungere amantes,   et dominae tardas possum aperire fores; et possum alterius curas sanare recentes,   nec leuis in uerbis est medicina meis. Cynthia me docuit, semper quae cuique petenda   quaeque cauenda forent: non nihil egit Amor. I can reunite separated lovers, and I can   open the doors of a mistress when they are slow to move; And I can cure the fresh sorrows of another,   and the medicine in my words is not trifling. Cynthia taught me what must be sought out and avoided by every man:   Amor has not done nothing. The Propertian lover-poet is able to take the lessons that he has learned as an elegiac lover and teach them to others. These lessons focus on the kinds of troubles that are specific to the elegiac love relationship: separations, the plight of the exclusus amator (“locked-out lover”), and sorrows (curas), all things that the lover-poet himself deals with in other poems. But it is Cynthia who has taught the lessons, with the help of Amor. Meanwhile, in 1.13, Gallus’ love is also connected to docere, except, again, it is the lover-poet who has learned: haec non sum rumore malo, non augure doctus; | uidi ego: me quaeso teste negare potes? (“I have not been taught these facts

Language of Teaching and Learning in Propertius  123 [i.e., that Gallus is languishing in love] from malicious rumor or divination, I myself saw it: I ask you, can you deny it when I was a witness?,” 1.13.13–14). Gallus, it seems, has effectively learned the lessons he was taught in 1.10 and now is himself an elegiac lover. In Book 1, the lover-poet learns about love, its effects on him and other men, and how to go about conducting a love affair in the idiom of his elegy. Discere is used in a similar way to docere in Book 1, with the learning it refers to consistently of the type taught by a praeceptor amoris (“teacher of love”): in 1.4.14, the lover-poet himself is learning, and in l.5 and 1.10, other men are learning lessons either from Cynthia or from the lover-poet’s experience.15 Of these, 1.5 provides the most succinct example and, once again, shows Gallus in the position of learner: tum graue seruitium nostrae cogere puellae | discere et exclusum quid sit abire domum (“you [Gallus] will be compelled to learn the harsh enslavement to our puella and what it is to go home after being locked out,” 19–20). In this poem, Gallus is contemplating making a play for Cynthia, and the lover-poet warns him what lessons he can expect to learn if he succeeds: enslavement and rejection.16 These lessons are consistent with the teachings of Cynthia and Amor in Book 1 and show the close relation of teaching and learning. Thus, we can see that, in Book 1, learning is elegiac learning: how to be a lover, to submit to love and the mistress, but also how to get around the pitfalls of the lover, such as arguments and locked doors. The lessons the Propertian praeceptor amoris passes on are ones that he himself learned, either from experience or from the overt “teaching” of Amor and Cynthia. And by distancing the lover-poet from the teaching verb but not from the learning verb, Propertius undermines the power of the lover-poet, or at least his responsibility, and gives Cynthia more agency and power as the ultimate teacher of elegiac lessons. In Book 2, docere is used 14 times in 12 poems, a significant increase compared to Book 1, although twelve of those instances are the adjectival doctus, –a, –um (including two indocti).17 As in Book 1, the indicatives feature someone other than the loverpoet teaching: at 2.6.21, Romulus taught the Romans to rape the Sabine women, and in 2.10.10, the lover-poet’s muse is teaching him “other songs.” So, even though there is a marked increase in the appearance of all forms of the verb in Book 2, it appears exactly as many times as an active indicative verb as it did in Book 1—twice. But the teachers have changed, even though they are still interacting with elegiac themes. Romulus appears in a poem on the jealousy of the lover-poet, who compares his puella to the famous hetairai (skilled and high-status sex-laborers) of Greece and Greek comedy, and complains that art and legend all conspire against him to encourage licentiousness. Romulus is part of this conspiracy, since he has “taught” an unelegiac lesson: the poem refers to the rape of the Sabine women, who are certainly not the object of elegiac-style wooing when they are forcibly snatched from their relatives.18 Furthermore, the muse of 2.10 is supposed to be teaching the lover-poet to write loftier poems (magni…oris opus), and therefore to leave elegy behind, although the poem ends with his return to love poetry and the control of Amor (sed modo Permessi flumine lauit Amor). These poems both suggest that the lover-poet is struggling with anti-elegiac forces who are trying to teach lessons he does not want to learn.

124  M. Racette-Campbell Unlike docere, discere in Book 2 does focus on elegiac learning. The closely related poems 2.9 and 2.29 provide a juxtaposition of what the lover-poet believes a puella learns, given the chance, and what Amor and the puella want the lover-poet to learn.19 First, at 2.9.32, hoc unum didicit femina semper opus (“woman [in general] has learned deceit and tricks”): this is the learning that the elegiac puella does, from the point of view of the lover-poet. It is certainly not learning he would wish her to do, but it is necessary for the elegiac scenario playing out in this exclusus amator poem. Meanwhile in 2.29, a group of pueri (boys or cupids, sent by Cynthia) say to the lover-poet, i nunc et noctes disce manere domi (“go now and learn to spend your nights at home,” 2.29.22). In this poem, the lover-poet needs to learn his proper elegiac behavior: Cynthia and the pueri believe he has been out with another woman instead of being an exclusus amator at his one true love’s door. In these two poems, the same scenario provides two different learning opportunities. The other two examples of discere in Book 2 represent what the lover-poet wants others to learn. In 2.21.16 (discite desertae non temere esse bonae, “learn, deserted girls, not to be kind rashly”), the imperative is addressed to puellae, who are instructed to learn to be kind only to worthy lovers. This elegy’s scenario has Cynthia in the position of the deserted one, having been tricked by another man for whom she had left the lover-poet. The lesson to be learned, then, is more than just to be careful about whom one trusts; specifically, women should only be bonae to men like the lover-poet. The other instance addresses a rival, rather than a puella (2.24.23–24): contendat mecum ingenio, contendat et arte, | in primis una discat amare domo (“let him vie with me in talent, and let him vie with me in art, let him learn in the first place to love in one home”), and thus bears some connections to the praeceptor amoris poems of Book 1. The lover-poet is attempting to teach this rival to rival him only in artistic, not sexual, skill, with the subtext that, if the rival cannot learn all the skills of elegiac love, he should stay out of the competition entirely. In Book 2, both docere and discere show cracks opening up in elegiac learning and teaching: the teachers are not teaching elegy, and the learners are not learning or remembering the right lessons. It has often been said that Propertius’ work moves away from the strictly elegiac with each book. It is difficult to judge how accurate this statement is since, if Propertius is more or less the earliest extant elegist, it may very well be that this seeming move away from elegy is elegy.20 But he certainly does move away from teaching language, with only five uses of docere in Book 3, of which only one is an indicative verb.21 Yet the way that the verb is used still resonates with those in Books 1 and 2. The one indicative verb is at 3.8.22: me doceat liuor mecum ­habuisse meam (“let my bruises teach them that I have had my girl with me”). This line comes from a poem in which the lover-poet reads violence as a sign of love.22 His bruises—­acting as braggarts to his rivals and the result of an elegiac lover’s quarrel-cum-sexual activity—are the teachers now, rather than Cynthia or Amor. Discere is used in this poem as well: has didici certo saepe in amore notas (“I have learned that these are often the signs of certain love,” 3.8.18). The lover-poet’s lessons are suited to the temperamental Cynthia he has been learning from and teaching about since Book 1, given that the signs of love are that she is in a frenzy and spoiling for a fight.

Language of Teaching and Learning in Propertius  125 The lover-poet is not a praeceptor but a learner of love, in this case violent love, and the poem as a whole is a heavily marked lesson about Propertian elegiac love. Discere, unlike docere, continues to appear in Book 3 at a frequency similar to that in Books 1 and 2. In 3.5, the lover-poet imagines a time when he might abandon elegy to learn philosophy: tum mihi naturae libeat perdiscere mores (“then it may suit me to learn thoroughly the ways of nature,” 25), although this takes place not even in the relative confidence of the future indicative but rather the theoretical musing of the potential subjunctive. Conversely, elsewhere in the book, there is plenty of conventional elegiac learning, although with a Propertian twist. Discere appears twice in elegy 3.11, a poem about women’s power over their lovers (3.11.5–8): uentorum melius praesagit nauita morem,   uulneribus didicit miles habere metum. ista ego praeterita iactaui uerba iuuenta:   tu nunc exemplo disce timere meo. The sailor improves at predicting a delay in the winds,   a soldier has learned from his wounds to have fear, I have thrown about such words in my long-gone youth:   now you learn to be afraid from my example. These couplets are an answer to the opening lines of the poem, where an imagined interlocutor has asked the lover-poet why he allows a woman to control him. The lover-poet marks this as learned behavior, placing the word “learn” twice in his response. And it is very elegiac and Propertian learning: he has learned to fear the wrath of Cynthia and others will learn from him, so that this poem continues the lessons of Book 1. These couplets from elegy 3.11 also tie the amatory lessons to two occupations that are often used as a comparison for the love poet, namely sailor and soldier.23 But rather than placing these roles in opposition to that of lover, here the lover-poet shows their similarity to him, especially to the soldier, who, like the lover, learns from experience to be afraid.24 The final line of Book 3, however, moves away from elegiac lessons in a striking way. Addressing himself to Cynthia, the lover-poet says: euentum formae disce timere tuae (“learn to fear the coming end of your beauty,” 3.25.18). This line is often read in the context of the poem, which seems to be a rejection of elegy. But in terms of my reading of teaching and learning in Propertius’ corpus, it is still an elegiac lesson—and even a reaffirmation of some of the terms of elegy. After all, the puella is always, of necessity, young and beautiful. The end of her beauty would mean the end of elegy, at least for her. This may not be a lesson that Cynthia would wish to teach or learn, but this is not the first time that the lover-poet and puella have been at odds as to what precisely she should learn, creating a continuity even here, at the supposed end of the affair. In Book 4, all the examples of docere are adjectival.25 Discere, however, consistently situates the language of learning in the world of love, women, and interpersonal relationships. It appears in 4.3, when Arethusa learns about where her man

126  M. Racette-Campbell is, and in 4.11, where Cornelia asks her children to learn. But one of the two Cynthia poems in this book, 4.8, has the most prominent use of the word in the entire corpus, since it begins with disce. The poem is also Cynthia’s final act, and so acts as a bookend for Amor docuit in 1.1, in which Cynthia has her first appearance. At the end of Book 3, we see Cynthia dismissed, unneeded, threatened with a lonely old age using the exact same word: euentum formae disce timere tuae. In Book 4, however, she famously reappears in 4.7 as a revenant haunting the lover-poet with his failures as an elegiac lover: his disloyalty, his lack of attendance at her deathbed and funeral, the ease with which he moved on from her (Racette-Campbell 2016). And then, in 4.8, she appears—alive now—for one last elegiac lesson. It may be the lover-poet who commands the audience with disce, but the poem itself centers a triumphant Cynthia, who ends by restoring her own power and the lover-poet’s erotic servitude, overturning her dismissal in 3.25 and her very death in 4.7. Synonyms for docere and discere I also investigated a list of synonyms for docere and discere in Propertius’ work.26 These include terms that have primary meanings of “learn” or “teach” as well as those closer to “know,” “discover,” “warn,” or “show.” Synonyms for docere are not found in Propertius, with the exception of praecipere, which is found three times, once meaning “received” (4.2.11) and twice in the substantive form as praecepta, both of which are contextualized as “knowledge” and do not represent active teaching or learning (2.34b.53; 3.9.21); and monere and monstrare, which always carry their primary meaning of “warn” and “show.” Possible synonyms for discere are far more common, but rarely have a primary sense of learning. Instead, they focus far more on “knowing,” “discovering,” or “hearing” than learning, and they emphasize either knowledge that already exists, or else the experiential acquisition of knowledge through the senses or through investigation rather than through the more traditional didactic process of teacher instructing student. There is, however, one notable exception to this pattern, in two of the twelve appearances of accipere. Twice in Book 4, Propertius uses accipere in a sense that indicates learning. The first time is at 4.2.2, at the beginning of Vertumnus’ speech: quid mirare meas tot in uno corpore formas, | accipe Vertumni signa paterna dei (“why marvel at my shapes, so many in only one body? Learn the paternal signs of the god Vertumnus,” 4.2.1–2). Propertius has used forms of this verb many times before, but always with a sense of “receive,” “accept,” or “hear” more than the idea of intellectual or experiential learning. Placing it so prominently in the first couplet of the first purely etiological poem in Book 4, when he claims to have made a new beginning, could also be a way of marking a new type of teaching and learning. The new leaf is, however, strongly undermined by the only other place in his corpus where he uses it to mean “learn,” at 4.8.74, in the second line of Cynthia’s final speech: atque ait ‘admissae si uis me ignoscere culpae, | accipe, quae nostrae formula legis erit’ (“And she said, ‘if you wish me to overlook your admitted fault, learn what shall be the text of our law,’” 4.8.73–74). Rather than using this word to mark etiological learning, Propertius gives it to Cynthia to teach her final lesson

Language of Teaching and Learning in Propertius  127 to the lover-poet: one of obedience to her and her ideas of elegiac love, in the same poem that begins with disce. Docere and discere in Augustan Didactic Finally, I return to didactic poetry: the Georgics and the Ars Amatoria. Vergil does not use docere or discere much in the Georgics (see Table 6.2), but when he does, the lessons are mostly, and not surprisingly, about farming. There is little overlap between these lessons and those of Propertius.27 All told, Vergil uses docere three times and discere or praediscere nine times over the course of 2,188 lines, making their frequency far lower than in Propertius’ work. They are only used as finite or infinitive verbs, not participles, and do not appear in the subjunctive, so that the teaching and learning that does occur is always presented as actual or ordered, not potential or theoretical. The text rarely specifies who does the teaching and learning implied by these verbs. Vergil usually uses the words in a relatively generic way, suggesting that an unspecified “we” or “you” learns something, often from a teacher who is equally difficult to pin down—for example, a natural force, or even simply experience.28 Thus, out of the twelve possible instances, I have selected four illustrative usages in which an animate being seems to be both teacher and learner. Two of these feature docere (3.116 and 3.440) and two discere (2.35 and 3.414). Both docere examples are indicative verbs, one third-person plural perfect and one first-person singular future. The subject of the first, at 3.116, is the Lapiths, a mythical people known for their horsemanship (Georgics 3.115–117): frena Pelethronii Lapithae gyrosque dedere                impositi dorso, atque equitem docuere sub armis insultare solo et gressus glomerare superbos. The Lapiths provided the reins of Pelethronius and the training circle, having settled themselves on horseback, and they taught the horseman under arms to scoff at the earth and to draw in his proud steps. This is straightforward. A tribe of horsemen is credited with teaching the generic Roman eques the skills that let him ride and fight. Even the connection to battle is natural to the mythology, given that the Lapiths are best known for their battle with the centaurs. The second example is 3.440: morborum quoque te causas et signa docebo. (“I will also teach you the causes and the signs of diseases”). This line does Table 6.2  Docere and discere in Vergil’s Georgics

Book 1 Book 2 Book 3 Book 4 Total

docere

discere

0 1 2 0 3

3 (2 praediscere) 3 (1 praediscere) 3 0 9

128  M. Racette-Campbell exactly what it claims to: it opens a section of the book on treatments of diseases that precedes the well-known passage about the cattle plague, but there is little else to say about it. Even the first-person singular verb with poet-speaker as subject is not particularly rare in the Georgics, as opposed to the Aeneid, which makes sense for a didactic text. For Vergil, in the rare occasions that he uses the word docere, there is no special sense or way that the word is marked out, and it is not used in any consistent or programmatic way. This is also the case with discere. The two examples I have selected for discere are both imperatives, one plural and one singular. In both cases, therefore, the implied “teacher” is once again the poet-speaker, who orders the subject of the imperative verb to “learn.” The first, at 2.35, specifies who that subject is (Georgics 2.35–38): quare agite o proprios generatim discite cultus,                agricolae, fructusque feros mollite colendo, neu segnes iaceant terrae. Therefore go and learn the methods suited to each species, farmers, and tame the fruits and beasts through cultivation, lest your lands lie idle. The farmers are the natural learners of this information and a didactic poet writing about farming is a natural teacher for such lessons. Similarly, at 3.414, the poetspeaker orders an unspecified second-person singular subject to learn how to use odors to keep snakes away: disce et odoratam stabulis accendere cedrum | galbaneoque agitare grauis nidore chelydros (“and learn to light scented cedar in your stables and to drive off the watersnake with smoking aromatic gum,” 3.414–415). The specific choice of odor-producing substances is somewhat odd, given their likely high cost, but the material to learn in itself is still not unusual for the presumed addressee, a shepherd or stock farmer.29 All of the teaching and learning done with these verbs in the Georgics is agricultural, consisting of either farming and herding techniques or relevant meteorological and astronomical knowledge. The words do not occur in the dedications, the mythological excursuses, or any other sections that are not specifically agricultural didactic. They are also not associated with any noteworthy characters, instead often referring to the generic speaker-poet or unspecified agricolae. There is little overlap with the actors or the content of the teaching and learning in Propertius. A more fruitful text for comparison is Ovid’s Ars Amatoria, naturally enough, since the work is explicitly both amatory and didactic.30 Both docere and discere appear numerous times, often as finite verbs.31 Moreover, the first appearance of docere is in the first couplet of Book 1, where Ovid states the purpose of the work (Ars 1.1–2): siquis in hoc artem populo non nouit amandi,   hoc legat et lecto carmine doctus amet. If anyone in this populace does not know the skill of being a lover,   let him read this and having been taught by reading this poem, let him love.

Language of Teaching and Learning in Propertius  129 Table 6.3  Docere and discere in Ovid’s Ars Amatoria

Book 1 Book 2 Book 3 Total

docere

discere

 3  3 10 16

 3  1  8 12

The poem, so the speaker claims, is specifically meant to make a man doctus: reading it will turn anyone from someone who does not know how to be a lover to one who can go forth and love. Placing the word in the opening lines stresses the importance of amatory learning for the “anyone in this population” who is the addressee of the work and provides a slight connection to the programmatic use of the same verb in Propertius 1.1. Despite being marked as important, neither docere nor its companion discere is very common in the Ars (see Table 6.3). This is particularly true in Books 1 and 2, where docere always appears in the passive voice and almost always as an adjectival passive participle, only once as a finite verb (1.472). Book 3, by comparison, uses docere ten times and discere eight times. The third book is the longest, but only slightly so, with 812 lines to the 772 and 746 of Books 1 and 2. Thus the increase in the frequency of these terms in Book 3 is striking: once for every 45.1 lines, as opposed to once for every 154.4 in Book 1 or 186.5 in Book 2. Ovid uses docere and discere three to four times more frequently in the book addressed to women than in those addressed to men. This concentration of teaching and learning in Book 3 could show some debt to Propertius, since he frequently associated such actions with Cynthia, but a closer look suggests that any connection is more of a reaction. Throughout the Ars Amatoria, the teaching is almost exclusively done by the praeceptor amoris (the poem’s speaker) or by a stand-in for him, such as the book itself (1.2) or an authoritative figure in a metaphor (e.g., the horse trainer implied at 1.472). The learning, therefore, is done by the addressee: the would-be male lover of Books 1 and 2 and the would-be female beloved of Book 3. But it seems as though the praeceptor amoris believes that women need a great deal more teaching and learning than men do, at least of the direct sort that comes with this vocabulary. Not only are the words themselves far more common in the third book, but also the active voice of docere appears for the first time, so that the praeceptor’s role as teacher, rather than the addressee’s as having been taught, is centered. This first appearance is at 3.43: nunc quoque nescirent: sed me Cytherea docere | iussit, et ante oculos constitit ipsa meos (“just now they were also ignorant: but Venus ordered me to teach, and she herself stood before my eyes,” 3.43–44). The couplet comes in Ovid’s defense of teaching women the ars amatoria, which his imagined interlocutors, the men addressed in the first two books, protest as detrimental to their interests.32 Ovid backs up the choices of his praeceptor choices with the authority of no less than Venus herself (Cytherea), upon whose express orders he acts. But the lessons that he teaches the women are not the same as those he teaches

130  M. Racette-Campbell the men: he teaches them to play the game of elegiac love and to be desirable as beloved but quite passive puellae. Indeed, the only time the praeceptor is explicitly not the teacher is when women have learned lessons from which he specifically wants to dissociate himself: at 3.251, he says, non mihi uenistis, Semele Ledeue, docendae (“you have come not needing to be taught by me, Semele or Leda”). This is the beginning of a group of mythological women who engaged in extra- or premarital sex, a group that includes married or marriageable women, who are therefore supposed to be excluded from Ovid’s teachings.33 Similarly, at 3.643, a key is given the subject position for the verb: nomine cum doceat, quid agamus, adultera clauis (“when by its name the ‘adulterous’ key teaches what we should do”). This line comes in a section on the ways to elude a guard or watchful lover, near the beginning of which (3.613–614) we find a statement excluding brides (nuptae) from following this advice and overstating the rightness of husbands guarding their wives.34 There is little resemblance between any of these women or the lessons that the praeceptor does or does not give them and the active, disruptive Cynthia. Even where there is overlap, the praeceptor has usurped the teaching role, and the students are the women, not the men. Ovid may have taken the idea of teaching lessons of love from Propertius, but his lessons, and his love, are radically different. Conclusion Propertius interacted innovatively with a number of genres while composing his poetry. The near-contemporary publication of the Georgics and that of Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura in the previous generation, as well as his interest in Alexandrian poetry, spurred his investigation into what didactic could do for him. By examining his use of the language of teaching and learning, I have explicated what sorts of learning and teaching he prioritizes, and concluded that it is consistent with the general themes, developments, and interests of his poetry: in the first book, there is a concentration on setting up the elegiac scenario and “learning” from Cynthia and Amor, which the lover-poet then passes on to others. The next two books refine, redirect, resist, and rework these themes with their use of docere and discere. Finally, in Book 4, the language of teaching and learning participates in the push and pull between Rome and Cynthia, between the elegiac world and the “real” world—but the final lesson is one that undermines the rejection of elegy at the end of Book 3 and returns Cynthia to her role as teacher. Notes 1 See Heslin (2010). 2 On the connection between the two, see Batstone (1992). On labor improbus and the Georgics, see Thomas (1988), Campbell (1996), and Jenkyns (1993). For amor improbus at Aen. 4.412, see Loupiac (2002). 3 The placement of this allusion in this first programmatic poem sets up the Georgics as a point of significant influence, intertextual relations, and dialogue for Propertius. I agree with Gale (2000: 17) that, once an intertextual relationship has been so clearly opened, it can continue to work throughout the poem(s), even if other intertextual resonances are more subtle.

Language of Teaching and Learning in Propertius  131 4 Batstone (1992) summarizes other specific allusions and intertexts between the two authors. 5 Batstone (1992: 291) suggests that Amor improbus sets up Propertius’ work as didactic, but a kind of didactic “whose practical outcome is neither success nor clarity.” 6 King (1975/1976) argues that Book 1 shows Propertius meditating on the theory and practice of love, and ultimately failing to live up to his theory, but eventually learning the importance of fidelity and to accept his girl as she is. 7 See Batstone (1992) for a full discussion of allusions to the Georgics in Propertius Book 1. 8 As in Propertius 3.13.25–38, where the lover-poet contrasts such an amatory golden age with the mercenary times in which he lives. 9 See Rosivach (1998) and Traill (2008). 10 Paschalis, in this volume, also examines Lucretius’ didactism, but with a look back to the Callimachean Hymn to Zeus, where King (1998) looks forward to the “Roman Callimachus” Propertius. 11 Roman (2014) 246–247. See also Paschalis in this volume, who examines Lucretius’ use of Callimachean terms for un-Callimachean endeavors. 12 On which see, e.g., James (2003). 13 The two adjectival participles, while primarily descriptive (“learned”) still appear in amatory contexts: 1.6.13, doctas Athenas, is an adjective describing Athens, where the lover-poet is not going because he does not wish to leave Rome and his puella; 1.7.11, doctae puellae, is an adjective describing girls, but the context is the value of elegiac poetry over Ponticus’ epic. 14 See Stahl (1985: 40) for Cynthia as teacher of affliction. 15 1.4.13–14: quae | gaudia sub tacita discere ueste libet (“what delights one may learn under a silent dress”). This line is disputed: Heyworth prints discere, Fedeli ducere, from the manuscripts’ dicere and ducere. 1.10.13: non solum uestros didici reticere dolores (“not only have I learned to keep silent about your sorrows”). 16 For an overview of seruitium amoris, see Murgatroyd (1981). For a more recent treatment, see McCarthy (1998). 17 In Book 2, most but not all of the participles are in a specifically amatory context: 2.3.19–20, et quantum, Aeolio cum temptat carmina plectro, | par Aganippeae ludere docta lyrae, describing the puella, specifically her musical ability, as part of a list of reasons why the lover-poet loves her; 2.11.6, cinis hic docta puella fuit, describing the puella, a short poem or fragment about how without him, no one will remember her; 2.13.11, doctae puellae, in the context of explaining what kind of girl he likes (learned and with taste); 2.19.12, docta falce, describing a sickle, in a bucolic/georgic episode in a poem about Cynthia going to the country (there is no similar use in the Georgics, where tools are not personified with this adjective); 2.23.1, cui fugienda fuit indocti semita uulgi, the first Propertian usage of indoctus, in a poem about how the loverpoet is going to turn away from elegiac love to a more Horatian style; 2.28.28, docta puella, in reference to Semele, in a poem about Cynthia in danger of death; 2.30.16, tibia docta, describing the pipe that is going to play while Cynthia and the lover-poet live together in elegiac bliss; 2.30.38, docta cuspide, a possession of Bacchus, which Goold translates as “wand of song”; 2.32.20, docto…mihi, indicating that the loverpoet is adept at seeing through Cynthia’s ruses; 2.34.79, docta testudine, Apollo’s lyre, in a description of Vergil’s Georgics; 2.34.84, indocto carmine, in a bird metaphor, where the indoctum carmen belongs to a goose; 2.34.89, docti Calui, describing another love poet. 18 See Dunn (1985) on the relationship of the exemplum to the poem. 19 For these poems’ relationship to each other, see Racette-Campbell (2019). 20 Wyke (2002) 80; Fear (2005) 29–30; Cairns (2006) 68, 356. Lyne (1998) argues for Propertius as earlier than Tibullus, but Knox (2005) argues for Tibullus 1 published earlier than Propertius 1.

132  M. Racette-Campbell 21 The other four are adjectival participles: 3.20.8, docto auo, the grandfather of the girl in the poem; 3.21.1, doctas Athenas, imagined travel to Athens to escape Cynthia (recall that doctas Athenas was rejected in book 1, and note also that Tullus returns in the next poem, none the wiser for having seen Athens); 3.21.26, docte Epicure, study of philosophy or philology instead of love; 3.23.1, doctae tabellae, his writing tablets are lost, thus the source of some of his love-ability has been lost, too. 22 For the violence in this poem, see Zimmermann Damer (2019) ch. 4, esp. 134, 154. 23 Soldiers: 2.7.14; sailors, 3.7.71. Cf. Tibullus 1.1.49–54, 75–78. 24 Using the soldier’s experience as a justification for the lover’s emotions is a twist on militia amoris (love’s military service), a trope that Propertius usually uses to portray the elegiac world as morally superior. For Propertian militia amoris, see Miller (2004) 146; Greene (2005) 66. 25 4.3.38, docti dei, “learned god,” refers to the one who made the countries that Arethusa’s love is in (Heyworth deletes 37–38); 4.5.5, docta, refers to Acanthis and her ability to get anybody, no matter how chaste, to make mercenary or otherwise bad choices in love, i.e., to her skill as a praeceptrix amoris; 4.6.24, docta signa, the standards on Augustus’ side at Actium. Note that although Acanthis is a praeceptrix amoris, elegy 4.5 does not use the language of teaching and learning in a way that fits the focus of this chapter and I have intentionally refrained from further discussion of this poem. 26 Synonyms and potential synonyms for “learn”: accipere (12), cognoscere (9), conperire (0), inuenire (8), (g)noscere (38), percipere (0), reperire (3), scire (7). Synonyms and potential synonyms for “teach”: erudire (0), instruere (0), monere (4), monstrare (5), perdocere (0), praecipere (3). 27 Similarly, in his chapter in this volume, Paschalis notes that, although Lucretius and Callimachus are committed to “the quest for knowledge,” they differ both in what they want to know and in how they want to teach it. Both our chapters showcase the wide range of motivations and approaches that can be found in the single category “didactic.” 28 Rutherford (2008: 81) addresses the problem of pinning down authorial or audience identity, in that it can be difficult to tell when an author is writing as an individual to an individual patron or friend, and when, as a uates, to a broad audience looking for didactic instruction. 29 This material might activate ideas of luxury goods in the minds of the Roman readers, for which see Edwards (1993). 30 For a thorough discussion of connections between the Ars Amatoria and the Georgics, see Leach (1964). 31 Docere: 1.2, 1.472, 1.767, 2.281, 2.282, 2.425, 2.553, 3.43, 3.195, 3.251, 3.255, 3.320, 3.411, 3.551, 3.643, 3.670, 3.769. Discere: 1.50, 1.459, 3.27, 3.281, 3.291, 3.296, 3.298, 3.315, 3.327, 3.455. 32 Kennedy (2006: 56) notes that the lessons that Ovid offers women are not very valuable for keeping a lover, and Sharrock (2006: 37) argues that Ovid’s advice to women is ­“often split into many different possibilities that are not personal alternatives but individual cages.” 33 This claim first appears in the introduction to the poem, at 1.31–34: este procul, uittae tenues, insigne pudoris, quaeque tegis medios, instita longa, pedes. nos uenerem tutam concessaque furta canemus, inque meo nullum carmine crimen erit. Be far from here, slender hair-bands, sign of chastity, and you, long dress covering past the ankles. We will sing of safe affairs and allowable intrigues and there will be no crime in my song. 34 Hoc decet, hoc leges iusque pudorque iubent (“this guarding of wives is fitting, and the laws and right and chastity order this”).

Language of Teaching and Learning in Propertius  133 Works Cited Batstone, W. 1992. “Amor Improbus, Felix, Qui, and Tardus Apollo: The “Monobiblos” and the “Georgics”. CP 87.4: 287–302. Cairns, F. 2006. Sextus Propertius: The Augustan Elegist. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Campbell, J. S. 1996. “Labor improbus and Orpheus’ furor: hubris in the Georgics.” L’Antiquité Classique 65: 231–238. Dunn, F. M. 1985. “The Lover Reflected in the Exemplum. A Study of Propertius 1.3 and 2.6.” ICS 10: 233–259. Edwards, C. 1993. The Politics of Immorality in Ancient Rome. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Fear, T. 2005. “Propertian Closure: The Elegiac Inscription of the Liminal Male and Ideological Contestation in Augustan Rome.” In Gendered Dynamics in Latin Love Poetry, eds. R. Ancona and E. Greene. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. 13–40. Gale, M. 2000. Virgil on the Nature of Things. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gibson, R. K. 1998. “Didactic Poetry as ‘Popular’ Form: A Study of Imperatival Expressions in Latin Didactic Verse and Prose.” In Form and Content in Didactic Poetry, ed. C. Atherton. Bari: Levante. 67–98. Greene, E. 2005. “Gender Identity and the Elegiac Hero in Propertius 2.1.” In Gendered Dynamics in Latin Love Poetry, eds. R. Ancona and E. Greene. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. 61–78. Heslin, P. 2010. “Virgil’s Georgics and the Dating of Propertius’ First Book.” JRS 100: 54–68. James, S. 2003. Learned Girls and Male Persuasion. Berkeley: University of California Press. Jenkyns, R. 1993. “Labor improbus.” CQ 43: 243–248. Kennedy, D. F. 2006. “Vixisset Phyllis, si me foret usa magistro: Erotodidaxis and Intertextuality.” In The art of Love: Bimillennial Essays on Ovid’s Ars Amatoria and Remedia Amoris, eds. R. K. Gibson, S. J. Green and A. R. Sharrock. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 54–74. King, J. K. 1975/1976. “Propertius’ Programmatic Poetry and the Unity of the Monobiblos.” CJ 71: 108–124. King, J. K. 1998. “Erotodidaxis: iucunda uoluptas in Lucretius 2.3 and Propertius 1.10.3.” In Qui miscuit utile dulci: Festschrift essays for Paul Lachlan MacKendrick, eds. G. Schmeling and J. Mikalson. Wauconda, Illinois: Bolchazy-Carducci. 201–222. Knox, P. E. 2005. “Milestones in the Career of Tibullus.” CQ n.s 55: 204–216. Leach, E. W. 1964. “Georgic Imagery in the Ars Amatoria.” TAPA 95: 142–154. Loupiac, A. 2002. “« Improbus amor », « labor improbus », une « retractatio » Virgilienne?” In Hommages à Carl Deroux. 1,: Poésie, ed. P. Defosse. Brussels: Latomus. 327–335. Lyne, R. O. A. M. 1998. “Propertius and Tibullus: Early Exchanges.” CQ n. s. 48.2: 519–544. McCarthy, K. 1998. “Servitium amor: amor servitii.” In Women and Slaves in the GrecoRoman World, eds. S. Murnaghan and S. Joshel. London: Routledge. 174–192. Miller, P. A. 2004. Subjecting Verses: Latin Love Elegy and the Emergence of the Real. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Murgatroyd, P. 1981. “Seruitium Amoris and the Roman Elegists.” Latomus 40: 589–606. Racette-Campbell, M. 2016. “Death Becomes Her: women’s Speech Haunting Propertius IV.” Helios 43.2: 109–131. Racette-Campbell, M. 2019. “Disidentifying with Fides in Propertius 2.9 and 2.29.” Phoenix 73.1/2: 41–61.

134  M. Racette-Campbell Roman, L. 2014. Poetic Autonomy in Ancient Rome. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Rosivach, V. J. 1998. When a Young Man Falls in Love: The Sexual Exploitation of Women in New Comedy. London and New York: Routledge. Rutherford, R. 2008. “Authorial Rhetoric in Virgil’s Georgics.” In K. Volk, ed. Vergil’s Georgics. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 81–93. Sharrock, A. 2006. “Love in Parentheses: Digression and Narrative Hierarchy in Ovid’s Erotodidactic Poems.” In The art of Love: Bimillennial Essays on Ovid’s Ars Amatoria and Remedia Amoris, eds. R. K. Gibson, S. J. Green and A. R. Sharrock. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 23–39. Stahl, H.-P. 1985. Propertius: “Love” and “War,” Individual and State Under Augustus. Berkeley: University of California Press. Thomas, R. 2008. “Prose into Poetry: Tradition and Meaning in Virgil’s Georgics.” In Vergil’s Georgics, ed. K. Volk. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 43–80. Traill, A. 2008. Women and the Comic Plot in Menander. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Veremans, J. 1991. “Tibulle I, 6: sens et structure.” Latomus 50: 376–394. Wyke, M. 2002. The Roman Mistress. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Zimmermann Damer, E. 2019. In the Flesh: Embodied Identities in Roman Elegy. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.

Part III

Metadidaxis

7

Buried in Books Varro’s Papia Papae in the Shade of Scholarship Joseph McAlhany

Literature can be classified as didactic, but it becomes a different matter when an author is, since the classification carries with it assumptions that color the interpretation of everything the author writes, and in particular any attempts at poetry. When a writer of poetry is presumed to be concerned more with the didactic than the poetic elements of his composition, interpretations of his poetry become confined to a narrow band within the spectrum of possibilities. In extreme cases, this reading of didacticism into a text can drain it of all poetic color, and thus the author becomes what he was always assumed to be: an intellectual who dabbles in poetry rather than a “real” poet who treats scholarly material in verse. Perhaps no author in Roman literature has fallen prey to such “didactic reading” to the extent Marcus Terentius Varro has. Varro was long regarded as the most learned man Rome ever produced, with doctissimus as his particular epithet, and his image as a sedulous scholar was ­already fashioned in antiquity. His life, Valerius Maximus quipped, was better measured in books than in years, and Augustine praised his productivity by quoting a paradox from the grammarian Terentianus Maurus: Varro read so much, it is a wonder he had time to write, and he wrote so much, it is hardly credible he had time to read.1 This image found its ultimate expression during Varro’s lifetime, when, in 39 bce, Asinius Pollio placed a bust of him in Rome’s first public library, the only living Roman so honored. Yet that image is belied by his distinguished military and political career, including service under Pompey in the campaigns against the pirates (for which he was awarded the naval crown) and against Mithridates.2 He even commanded legions in Spain against Caesarian forces at the age of 67 rather than retreating into his studies, and during the proscriptions of Antony and Octavian, he was hunted down in part because, as Appian says, he had been a good military commander.3 As for his political career, he was a tribune of the plebs and reached the praetorship, no small accomplishment for a bookworm. Varro could also claim the titles of poet and philosopher, as Jerome, most likely following Suetonius, identifies him in the entry for his birth in 116 bce.4 This brief notice, however, has been buried by Cicero’s invidious encomium at the opening of Academica. This passage, quoted so frequently in scholarly introductions of Varro, front-loads the praise of his antiquarian researches, and after the exhaustive DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-11

138  J. McAlhany catalog of his better-known scholarly productions, his Menippean satires are singled out primarily for their metrical variety and his philosophizing is downgraded to inchoate efforts (1.3.9): ipse uarium et elegans omni fere numero poema fecisti, philosophiamque multis locis inchoasti, ad impellendum satis, ad edocendum parum. Cicero more honestly sums up his view of Varro in a letter to Atticus, calling him a homo πολυγϱαϕώτατος—“he sure did write a lot!” (Att. 13.18). Yet if Cicero was a major contributor to the image of a library-bound pedant that has haunted Varro for centuries, Varro must also bear some responsibility for his afterlife, since there are various Varros inhabiting his different literary endeavors. The Menippean Satires contain several, as attested by titles such as Marcopolis, Bimarcus, and Marcipor, as well as the cantankerous Rip Van Winkle character named Marcus in the Sexagesis, who wakes after a 50-year nap to find the world around him changed utterly from the simple times of his youth. In the opening fragment of the Antiquitates Rerum Divinarum, he compares himself to Aeneas and the lesser-known Lucius Caecilius Metellus, both of whom rescued the Penates from burning buildings, but could not match Varro’s scholarly care in preserving all of Rome’s religious traditions. The summa of his self-portraiture is the Res Rusticae, whose ironies have been well-documented, but one of the more striking is his odd assimilation of its three books to the three surviving Sibylline books, best known for their obscurity and ambiguity, whose truth could only be interpreted by a select group.5 The overly reductive image of him as polymath antiquarian has been shattered in recent scholarship, with more nuanced and thoughtful views illuminating his multifaceted persona.6 Although the satirical and literary possibilities of his scholarly work have been explored, Varro’s poetry has not enjoyed the same ­reevaluation, and his satires still seem to be read as if written by an encyclopedist rather than a poet. Whereas scholarly learning and poetic talent were melded together in the Alexandrian poets of Rome, in Varro’s case they seem to have created an intolerable tension: he was no scholar-poet, but a scholar who wrote poetry. As a result, his poems were drained of their poetic possibilities, affecting not only the way his texts have been read, but even how they have been edited. In fact, the history of one Menippean satire reveals how Varro’s later readers and editors, who fell prey to his scholarly persona, overwrote his poetic text to exorcize any poetic ambiguity and bring it in line with the oversimplified antiquarian “Varro” they knew. Papia Papae (a title which means something like “Holy Moly!”7) consists of 14  fragments, a relatively large number for a Menippean satire, and carries the subtitle πεϱὶ ἐγϰωμίων. Following the lead of this subtitle, various imaginative attempts have been made to reconstruct the satire’s structure and contents, yet while its disiecta membra leave ample opportunity for creative reconstructions, there is little certain beyond the obvious: it is a dialogue about encomia.8 The specific ­“object of attack,” to use Northrop Frye’s terminology, remains unclear. Does it mock the ignorant rabble unable to distinguish true praise from false, fawning hypocrites seeking advancement through flattery? Or is it a take-down of the effete rhetoric favored by Romans turned Greeklings?9 Either of these would conform to the conservative views antiquarian Varro was believed to hold, as if he truly were

Varro’s Papia Papae in the Shade of Scholarship  139 the Marcus of Sexagesis, whose cliché laments of contemporary decline have been naively attributed to Varro himself. One fragment in particular has long exercised the ingenuity of scholars and critics. The text appears below with its original context (Nonius 730 L.), not as it will be found in any edition of Nonius or the Saturae Menippeae, since those all represent some combination of correction and emendation, but rather as it appears in the manuscripts of Nonius, with two minor orthographical corrections (suppaetulis and pupuli). The apparatus criticus provides an expansive list of editorial interventions (375 Astbury): RICTUM ferarum dici uolunt, cum Titinius auctor sit etiam hominis dici debere. … Varro Papia papae πεϱὶ ἐγϰωμίων: ante auris modo ex subolibus paruuli intorti dimittebantur sed cincinni oculis suppaetulis nigellis pupuli quam hilaritatem significantes animi rictus paruissimus ut refrenato risu roseo nodo Gifanius, Scaliger modice Lipsius commode Vahlen | ex s.] crobyli Gifanius ex crobyli Riese (-buli Müller) f. ex silonibus Martinus f. exsoluti Lindsay | parvulis Lipsius subparvuli Riese bis parvuli torti Müller parv. in. del. Oehler | intorti ex subolibus Koch | demittebantur Lipsius demittuntur Scaliger dimittebant Martinus emittebantur Riese demittebant Bücheler | sex Scaliger, Oehler ut Lipsius seu Popma se Martinus, Bücheler, Havet et Guyet del. Semlerus | ex cincinnis Gifanius | cincinnuli Scaliger | oculi ­Gifanius | supetulis codd. suppaetuli Gifanius, Ribbeck | nigelli Riese | populi codd. pupillis Iunius pupulis Scaliger pupuli Ribbeck | quam] aliquam Gifanius nescio quam Lipsius quandam Scaliger del. Guyet Semlerus liquidam Buecheler quantam Riese a! quam Baehrens | significabant Bolisani | ­animitus Scaliger animuli Riese annuunt Baehrens | novum fr. incipere a rictus putavit Scaliger, seq. Vahlen, Riese | purissimus Lipsius | refrenatus Gifanius | ore frenato Lipsius, Popma Despite all the editorial activity, only the phrase nigellis pupuli absolutely requires some correction, though the text as a whole demands some creative punctuation. In fact, much of the textual criticism performed on this fragment emerges from an idea of a Varro who has been circumscribed within the narrow orbit of his identity not as the philosophus et poeta known to Jerome, but the diligentissimus inuestigator antiquitatis of Cicero’s damning praise (Brutus 60). Whatever the details, the fragment is clearly an outpouring of praise for a beauty, beginning with a florid description of hair. As a specimen of encomiastic rhetoric, it would seem to be connected in some way to frr. 370–372: fr. 370 quos calliblepharo naturali palpebrae   tinctae uallatos mobili septo tenent fr. 371 laculla in mento impressa amoris digito   uestigio demonstrat mollitudinem fr. 372 collum procerum fictum leui marmore   regillae tunicae purpura distinguitur

140  J. McAlhany These couplets, in iambic senarii, to all appearances form part of a single ecphrasis, with the requisite catalog of body parts: eyes, face, and neck. Since fr. 375 began with the hair, earlier and more adventurous editors sought to unify the four fragments. Scaliger first performed the drastic surgery needed to form a single body. He inserted fr. 370 between the animi and rictus of fr. 375 (altering animi to animitus), then, with some additional alterations to individual words, appended frr. 371 and 372 to create a single long fragment under the heading pueri formosi:10 ante aures nodo ex subolibus paruoli intorti demittuntur sex cincinnoli. oculi subpaetuli, nigellis pupulis, quandam hilaritatem significantes animitus. quos calliblepharo naturali palpebrae tinctae uallatos mobili septo tenent. at rictus oris candidi paruissimus, ut refrenato risu roseo sigilla in mento impressa amoris digitulo, uestigio demonstrant mollitudinem. collum procerum fictum leui marmore regillae tunicae diffinitur purpura. Six delicate curls, newly grown, hang in a twist before the ears. Lively glimpses of black pupils reveal merriment in eyes half-open, which lids shaded with nature’s hue guard within their fluttering hold. Then, the tiniest grin from a gleaming face, as a rosy smile unleashed… dimples on the chin, the traces left by love’s touch, proofs of delicacy, the long neck formed of white marble set off by the purple of the bride’s dress. Vahlen and Riese maintained Scaliger’s forced unity of fr. 375 with frr. 370–372, though Riese departed from them in identifying the subject of the lines as a young girl rather than a young boy. Moreover, he upped the ironic exuberance by adding animuli (from animi) to the series of diminutives (paruulus, suppaetulus, nigellus, pupula), to which Scaliger had already added cincinnuli (as well as digitulo in fr. 371). The result is a ridiculous homoeoteleuton to open the ecphrasis, two elements of which are the result of emendation:11 ante auris nodo ex crobyli subparuuli intorti emittebantur sex cincinnuli; oculis suppaetulis nigelli pupuli quantam hilaritatem significantes animuli!

Varro’s Papia Papae in the Shade of Scholarship 141 There are sound reasons underlying these editorial rewritings. Descriptions of physical beauty, whether of works of art or living beings, typically began with the hair and worked their way down.12 While fr. 375 starts from the hair and then proceeds as expected to the eyes and the mouth, the syntax is awkward, providing an opening for textual intervention. Fr. 370, however, describes the eyes in more detail, and thus Scaliger’s interpolation not only maintains the expected order of description, but also provides an antecedent (oculi) for the relative quos. The additional alterations, however, not only manufacture a fragment that ­conforms in meter and in content to frr. 370–372, but also create a satire that conforms to a particular understanding of Papia Papae as well as a narrow idea of Varro. Viewed as a conservative-minded antiquarian, he would naturally deploy his scholarly learning against contemporary decadence, be it in personal appearance or rhetorical style. Indeed, some of the early efforts at textual criticism of fr. 375 reveal a tendency to amplify the presumed antiquarianism of its author, parallel to the piling on of diminutives. For example, the emendation of subolibus to crobylus, first proposed by Gifanius (Hubert van Giffen), introduces a rare word for a hair-net (from the Greek ϰϱωβύλη), which is further assisted by the change of modo to nodo.13 Scaliger cleverly emended the transmitted sed into sex because of the six locks of hair worn by brides mentioned by Festus, precisely the kind of antiquarian detail expected of Varro and his encyclopedic successors.14 Gifanius’ crobylus can thus be seen as a Roman bride’s reticulus, and a unified portrait begins to emerge. In fact, these changes bring fr. 375 into close alignment with fr. 372, which contains a regilla tunica, the ritual garment worn by brides the night before the wedding.15 Modern editors have been more conservative with the text, though remaining equally conservative with their Varro. Attempts to versify fr. 375 have been abandoned, eliminating the aggressive editorial intervention required to overcome the stubborn resistance of fr. 375 to metrical conformity. In addition, the awkward relation between the transmitted imperfect dimittebantur and the present tenses of the other fragments was once resolved by Scaliger and others by simply changing it to a present. Now, however, with the formal connection between fr. 375 and the iambic senarii of frr. 370–372 severed, the imperfect can remain, and other textual emendation has been reduced to a minimum.16 Once fr. 375 had been granted its textual independence from 370–372, however, a different question arose: what was being described and was it in any way still related to frr. 370–372?17 The two major modern commentators on the Menippeans, Cèbe and Krenkel, saw enough hints to believe that fr. 375 described not a living being, but a statue. In their interpretation, the oculi suppaetuli allude to Venus, support for which is found in the Venus paeta of the Menippean Octogessis (fr. 344). Though Krenkel ultimately remained agnostic as to whether a work of art or a living being is described, or whether the four fragments were concerned with the same object, he did suggest that Varro has in mind here the famed Venus of Agoracritus, a statue Varro reportedly prized above all others.18 Cèbe (1990: 1587–1591), on the other hand, was adamant that, unlike frr. 370–372, fr. 375 described a statue, and even conjectured that it was the fourth-century Venus of Cnidos by Praxiteles,

142  J. McAlhany an artist Varro admired. At the very least, he claims, it was a statue seen by Varro himself (thus the imperfect demittebantur), likely when he was in Athens or on campaign overseas under Pompey’s command. On the other hand, both commentators believe the object described in frr. 370–372 is a living being, though, again, Krenkel is more reticent. The interpretive difficulties faced by these recent commentators and editors have not diminished the scholarly desire to determine the singular object described in the fragment, even if the field of battle has now become the commentary rather than the text itself. Yet Krenkel’s caution and Cèbe’s strained arguments hint that the ambiguity is not a bug to be eliminated from Varro’s verses, but is in fact a feature. Indeed, it is the main point of the Papia Papae. Because of the tendency to read Varronian satire with the Ciceronian Varro already in mind, scholars have (unconsciously or otherwise) attempted to eliminate any possible ambiguity from fr. 375. However, their critical efforts instead reveal their diminished view of Varro’s poetic abilities. While acknowledging his mastery of poetry’s technical aspects, with an impressive command of various meters and registers, these criticisms bear the implicit judgment that Varro, the presumed polymath, was a writer of poetry, but ultimately not a poet. In fact, Cèbe first argued that the object of frr. 370–372 was a living being, not a statue, because it would be difficult to imagine that Varro “the writer” (“l’écrivain”!) would describe a face made of stone or bronze receiving a dimple from Love’s touch, or a statue with natural makeup on its eyes with moving eyelids.19 Earlier, Ribbeck (1859: 104) acknowledged—as he says anyone with taste (“Geschmack”) must—that many of the phrases in fr. 375 could have been written by a poet, but he has serious doubts that this poet could be Varro. As a result, his fr. 375 becomes a series of quotations from unidentified poets. However, a reading of fr. 375, freed from assumptions about Varro and open to the poetic possibilities of ambiguity, reveals that the text requires no serious emendation. Rather, as constituted, it evokes the image not only of a young woman, but also of a young flower, a common conceit in Greek and Latin poetry. The twisted curls in front of the ears, the dark pupils glimmering with joy, and the hint of a smile from laughter suddenly stifled all anthropomorphize a tender sprout in front of a plow, which, one is to imagine, is at the point of being cut down. As a careful reading will demonstrate, the vocabulary of the fragment plays with ambiguities to create its blurred image, in which both levels of meaning exist simultaneously. The first word of fr. 375, aures, does refer to human ears, but it is also a term for part of a plow, the “pin-ears” that help to make a broader furrow, and would also cut down any small plants they passed by.20 The primary meaning of suboles is young plant growth, and paruulus is more than a diminutive of paruus: the adjective in this form is usually applied to the young and the newborn, including what sprouts from a plant’s roots, as it does in Pliny.21 Whatever their syntactic relation in fr. 375, intortus and cincinnus occur in a similar phrase in Res Rusticae to describe a vine tendril that curls like a lock of hair (1.31.4): is [sc. capreolus] est coliculus uiteus intortus, ut cincinnus. Plants described in terms of hair is nothing unusual, and Columella, in the agricultural poem of book 10,

Varro’s Papia Papae in the Shade of Scholarship 143 describes the new plant growth of Spring in terms of hair, including the “curls” of parsley (164–168):    uiridi redimite parentem progenie, tu cinge comam, tu dissere crines. nunc apio uiridi crispetur florida tellus, nunc capitis porri longo resoluta capillo laetetur, mollemque sinum staphylinus inumbret. Crown the parent with her green progeny— you, wreathe her hair! and you, sow her locks! Let the verdant earth now grow curls of green, let her rejoice in the flowing hair of the leek, and the carrot shade her tender bosom. The ambiguity of fr. 375 continues with oculus, also used for the eye buds of plants and trees, as found in Varro’s Res Rusticae and commonly in Columella. These “eyes” also shed “tears” and are subject to “blinding,” and it would be no stretch to see the tiny black “pupils” (nigelli pupuli) here describing the same natural formation.22 The image at play in fr. 375 comes to life again in Columella’s poem, in which flowers begin to bloom by opening their “eyes” (258–262): iam phrygiae loti gemmantia lumina promunt, et conniuentes oculos uiolaria soluunt, oscitat et leo, et ingenuo confusa rubore uirgineas adaperta genas rosa praebet honores caelitibus templisque Sabaeum miscet odorem. Now the Phrygian lotus shows its jeweled eyes, rows of violets set free their half-closed eyes, the lion’s-foot maw opens wide, and with its natural blush, the rose reveals its virginal eyes, giving honor to the gods and filling shrines with Sheba’s incense. The image of the blushing rose (ingenuo confusa rubore … rosa) in this passage points to the end of fr. 375, where the tiny rictus described as a “rosy laugh” held in check (ut refrenato riso roseo). The adjective roseus has been taken simply to refer to the color of the lips, but we may now see in the phrase a striking example of hypallage, an allusion to the “smile” of a rosebud just beginning to open. With the idea of a young woman’s hair in mind, all modern editors have understandably accepted Lipsius’ demittebantur, the proper word for drooping curls, in place of the transmitted dimittebantur. But the alternative image of a young plant suggests a growing up and out, not a hanging down, which calls into question the necessity of Lipsius’ emendation (called a correction by Lindsay), especially if the shoots grow ex subolibus. The modo, if not emended to nodo, can be

144  J. McAlhany understood to refer to a young woman’s curls hanging “just in front of the ears.”23 However, with the image of a small plant in mind, the modo, when combined with the imperfect taken as inchoative, adds an element of pathos to the image—this plant had just started to sprout when the plow approached. The text of fr. 375, almost exactly as transmitted, thus brings together two images, assimilating a young bride’s curls to a delicate shoot of a new flower, soon to be cut down by the plow. Of course, the image immediately calls to mind both ­Catullus 11 as well as Vergil’s haunting description of Euryalus’ decapitation, which have their own poetic forebears going back to Sappho and Homer.24 More fitting parallels for the double image of fr. 375 may be Catullus 61 and 62. The former, an epithalamium, consistently likens the bride to plants and flowers, highlighting both her beauty and her innocence, soon to be violated by her husband.25 Poem 62, another wedding song, compares a young woman to a flower protected in a walled garden, untouched by hand or plow (40: nullo conuulsus aratro), but again with the undertone of coming loss (39–45). Recognition of the playful ambiguity behind the fragment’s poetic trope renders unnecessary all but a single emendation, the simplest possible one yet proposed by no one: nigelli[s]. ante auris modo ex subolibus paruuli intorti dimittebantur sed cincinni, oculis suppaetulis nigelli pupuli quam hilaritatem significantes animi rictus paruissimus ut refrenato risu roseo Tendrils curly yet arranged start to sprout just before the ears, small black pupils in eyes half-open—what lively merriment they display!— the tiniest smile, as a rosy laugh stifled If there are any remaining doubts about the reading of fr. 375, other fragments from the Papia Papae will remove them. The eye makeup of fr. 370, calliblepharos, is described as naturalis, an otiose adjective if the composition of the cosmetics is meant. However, the adjective has a particular force if the makeup here is not applied by human hand, but instead occurs naturally, no artifice involved.26 A similar conceit is found in Columella’s description of flowers quoted above, where the rose possesses a “natural blush” (260: ingenuo confusa rubore). This fragment, too, might be taken to describe the eye of both a human and a flower, its naturally adorned “eye” surrounded by a mobile septum consisting of petals.27 Frr. 371 and 372, on the other hand, present a different kind of ambiguity, which previous scholars sought to resolve rather than reveal. Does the dimple of fr. 371 (laculla, changed to sigilla by Scaliger), left behind by Love’s gentle touch, serve to praise a statue so skillfully wrought that it seems living flesh, or is it a mark of living flesh, smooth as marble?28 That fr. 372 describes a statue is suggested by fictum leui marmore, the smooth marble neck set off by the purple of the regilla tunica; but a statue wearing such a ritual garment would be odd. Again, is it a living being whose beauty seems formed by the highest art, or a statue praised for creating the illusion of life?29 A scholar with the Ciceronian “Varro” in mind might marshal arguments to determine which is the correct reading, when in fact the ambiguity is essential to the meaning.

Varro’s Papia Papae in the Shade of Scholarship 145 According to its subtitle, the Papia Papae is “on encomia,” but at least in part, it concerns misunderstanding and misrepresentation, especially as a result of deceiving appearances. One fragment notes the failure of the unlearned to distinguish between gems and worthless look-alikes (382 Astbury): inperito nonnumquam concha uidetur margarita, uitrum smaragdos to the ignorant a bit of shell often looks like a pearl, a bit of glass like an emerald The construction reinforces the ambiguity, since it is not clear whether glass is mistaken for emerald or emerald is mistaken for glass. In another fragment, an interlocutor complains that true praise cannot be recognized for what it is, since even the worst sort of citizen might be compared in a funeral oration to Scipio Africanus (376 Astbury): qui potest laus uideri uera, cum mortuus saepe furacissimus ac nequissimus ciuis iuxta ac Publius Africanus how can any praise appear true, when it often happens that the absolute worst citizen, once he’s dead, compares to Scipio Africanus And if the worst scoundrel can end up with an afterlife as Scipio, then what prevents an utterly inventive poet being read as a dry-as-dust antiquarian? But it may not have surprised the author of Papia Papae that the pearls within his poetry were often seen as plain shell, and that a poet might pass unrecognized, mistaken for a scholar. Notes 1 Val. Max. 8.7.3: Terentius autem Varro humanae uitae expleto spatio non annis, quibus saeculi tempus aequauit, quam stilo uiuacior fuit: in eodem enim lectulo et spiritus eius et egregiorum operum cursus extinctus est. Terentianus Maurus, GL 6.409 (quoted by Augustine, CD 6.2): qui tam multa legit, ut aliquid ei scribere uacuisse miremur; tam multa scripsit, quam multa uix quemquam legere potuisse credamus. 2 NH 7.115: M. Varronis in bibliotheca, quae prima in orbe ab Asinio Pollione ex manubiis publicata Romae est, unius uiuentis posita imago est, haud minore, ut equidem reor, gloria principe oratore et ciue ex illa ingeniorum quae tunc fuit multitudine uni hanc coronam dante quam cum eidem Magnus Pompeius piratico ex bello naualem dedit. 3 BC 4.47: Οὐάϱϱων δὲ ἦν ϕιλόσοϕός τε ϰαὶ ἱστοϱίας συγγϱαϕεύς, ἐστϱατευμένος τε ϰαλῶς ϰαὶ ἐστϱατηγηϰώς, ϰαὶ ἴσως διὰ ταῦτα ὡς ἐχθϱὸς μοναϱχίας πϱουγϱάϕη. 4 Chron. 147a (= Ol. 166.1): M. Terentius Varro philosophus et poeta nascitur. 5 See Stroup in this volume. 6 See in particular Volk (2019), Kronenberg (2009) and (2017), and Nelsestuen (2015). 7 See Charisius 3.114 (Barwick); for discussion, Cèbe (1990) 1556–1557. 8 Cèbe (1990) 1563–1564 provides a brief summary. 9 See, e.g. [Bipontina] (1788) 373: “Arguit vulgus, quod insignem formam verae laudis ab inani specie gloriae nesciat discernere: tum in laudando quis sit adhibendus modus, aut quae ratio servanda, praecipit”; Ribbeck (1859) 125: “die Theorie der ἐγϰώμια in ähnlich parodirender Weise wie die der τϱόποι im Bimarcus durch satirische Beispiele aus dem Leben illustriert ist”; Riese (1865) 184: “Actionem saturae divinare non possumus;

146  J. McAlhany

10 11 12 13 14 15

16

17 18

1 9 20 21

22

23 24

25

agnoscimus tamen carmen puellam nimio verborum tumore laudans, quod ἐλληνίζουσι Romanis placet.” Scaliger (1617) 252. Popma (1601) 268 follows Scaliger’s procedure of stitching together the fragments, with slight differences. Riese (1865) 183–185. Cf. Vahlen (1858) 43: “nec illud dubium, quin Scaliger recte in iis pueruli formosi laudationem agnoverit: in qua Varro deminutivorum usu frequentiore istam enervem ϰαλλιλεξίαν egregie expressit.” Krenkel (2002) 672. Courtney (1962) 99 compares fr. 375 to the description of Circe in Petronius (Sat. 126.14): quo enim spectant flexae pectine comae, quo facies medicamine attrita et oculorum quoque mollis petulantia …. Oehler (1844) 183 defends the modo of the mss.: “neque cincinni nodo solent complicari.” Festus 454.23: senis crinibus nubentes ornantur. Cèbe (1990) 1588 rejects the connection. Festus 364.21–24: regillis tunicis, albis, et reticulis luteis utrisque ctis, textis susum uersum a stantibus, pridie nuptiarum diem uirgines indutae cubitum ibant ominis causa. For crobylus (Greek ϰϱωβύλη), see Serv. A. 4.138 (crines nodantur in aurum): ueluti retiolum dicit, quod colligit comas: quae Graece ϰϱωβύλη dicitur. For bridal decorations, see Marquardt (1886) 1.43–46. Astbury (2002) accepts only demittebantur and sex, in which he is followed by Cèbe (1990) and Krenkel (2002); the latter two depart from Astbury’s oculis suppaetulis ­nigelli pupuli and reverse the case endings, oculi suppaetuli nigellis pupulis. On the latter phrase, see the discussion at Cèbe (1990) 1586. Both Bücheler (1859) 439 n. 19 and Norden (1915) 199 had already rejected attempts to force fr. 375 into verse and join it with frr. 370–372, believing there were two separate encomia, one in poetry and one in prose. Krenkel (2002) 681. Note, however, that Agoracritus renamed the statue Nemesis, piqued by the Athenians who voted the Venus of Alcamenes superior (Pliny NH 36.17: quare Agoracritus ea lege signum suum uendidisse tradituri ne Athenis esset, et appellasse Nemesin. id positum est Rhamnunte pago Atticae, quod M. Varro omnibus signis praetulit). Cèbe (1990) 1568: “l’ambiguité serait alors trop forte.” Verg. G. 1.171–172: huic [sc. aratro]…binae aures, duplici aptantur dentalia dorso; cf. Pallad. RR 1.431.1: aratra simplicia uel…aurita. Servius explains the “ears” as quibus latior sulcus efficitur (ad G. 1.172). See White (1967) 139–140. As recognized by Popma (1601) 374: “hos suspicor vocari suboles, a stolonibus sumta metaphora.” On paruulus, see TLL s.v.; OLD s.v. 2; Pliny NH 22.161 (dependentes paruulas ueluti locustas habet [sc. bromos]). Note also Pliny’s description of a plant in much the same style as fr. 375: cotyledon paruula herba est in cauliculo tenero, pusillo folio, pingui, concauo ut coxendices (NH 25.159). TLL s.v., 451.74ff; Varro RR 1.24.4 (a quotation from Cato): oculos harundinis. See, e.g., Columella RR 4.6.5, 4.17.4, 4.29.6, 11.2.6; for the “tears” and “blinding” of plant eyes, 4.9.2: namque defluens umor caecat oculum nec patitur crescere; 4.24.16: ne, ut antea diximus, [sc. palmites] superlacrimet et gemmantem caecet oculum. For pupula as a synonym for oculus, cf. Varro Prometheus Liber, fr. 427 (Astbury): non umbrantur somno populae. Cèbe (1990) 1593: “L’unique petit désordre (charmant) d’une coiffure très sage était constitué par ces bouclettes qui pendaient toutes devant les oreilles.” Cat. 11.21–24: nec meum respectet, ut ante, amorem, | qui illius culpa cecidit uelut prati | ultimi flos, praetereunte postquam | tactus aratro est; V. Aen. 9.435–437: purpureus ueluti cum flos succisus aratro | languescit moriens, lassoue papauera collo | demisere caput pluuia cum forte grauantur; cf. Sappho 105c LP, Homer Il. 8.306–308. 61.21–2: floridis uelut enitens | myrtus Asia ramulis; 57: floridam…puellam; 87–9: talis in uario solet | diuitis domini hortulo | stare flos hyacinthus; 186–188: ore floridulo nitens | alba parthenice uelut luteumue papauer.

Varro’s Papia Papae in the Shade of Scholarship 147 26 According to Pliny (NH 22.61), connoisseurs referred to the purple line around an oyster’s beard, a sign of quality, as calliblephara. 27 Pliny twice uses the image of an eye to describe how leaves surround a root or bud: see NH 25.169 (foliis, latioribus densioribusque circa radicem uelut oculum cingentibus); 25.161 (folia ita ut ambitu effigiem imitentur oculi). 28 For dimples on a young woman, see Ovid. AA 3.283: sint modici rictus, paruaeque utrimque lacunae; on a statue of a young man, Apul. Flor. 15.5: genae teretes, at medio mento lacunatur. 29 For lifelike statues, there is, of course, the myth of Pygmalion (Ov. Met. 10.243–297). Varro himself tells the story of a contemporary who fell in love with one of the Muses of Helicon by Pasiteles (Pliny NH 36.40). For marble-like flesh, see TLL s.v. marmoreus (e.g., Luc. 887–888 Marx, stare papillas pectore marmoreo; Verg. G. 4.523, marmorea caput a ceruice reuulsum). See Krenkel (2002) 673–675.

Works Cited Astbury, R. 2002. M. Terentius Varro: Saturarum Menippearum Fragmenta. Munich and Lepizig: Teubner. [Bipontina]. 1788. M. Ter. Varronis de lingua Latina libri qui supersunt cum fragmentis eiusdem. Volumen secundum: Notae in Varronem. Biponti: Ex Typographia Societatis. Cèbe, J.-P. 1990. Varron: Satires Ménipées. Vol. 9. Rome: École Française de Rome. Courtney, E. 1962. “Parody and Literary Allusion in Menippean Satire.” Philologus 106: 86–100. Krenkel, W. 2002. Marcus Terentius Varro: Saturae Menippeae. Vol. 2. St. Katharinen: Scripta Mercaturae. Kronenberg, L. 2009. Allegories of Farming from Greece and Rome. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 2017. “Varro the Roman Cynic: The Destruction of Religious Authority in Antiquitates Rerum Divinarum.” In Authority and Expertise in Ancient Scientific Culture, eds. J. König and G. Woolf. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 306–328. Marquardt, J. 1886. Das Privatleben der Römer. Leipzig: Hirzel. Nelsestuen, G. 2015. Varro the Agronomist: Political Philosophy, Satire, and Agriculture in the Late Republic. Columbus: Ohio State University Press. Norden, E. 1915. Die Antike Kunstprosa. Leipzig: Teubner. Oehler, F. 1844. M. Terentii Varronis Saturarum Menippearum reliquiae. Quedlinburg and Leipzig: Bassi. Popma, A. 1601. M. Terenti Varronis operum quae extstant. Nova editio. Leiden: Plantiniana. Ribbeck, O. 1859. “Über Varronische Satiren.” RhM 14: 102–130. Riese, A. 1865. M. Terenti Varronis Saturarum Menippearum reliquiae. Leipzig: Teubner. Scaliger, J. J. 1617. Catalecta Virgilii & aliorum poetarum Latinorum veterum poematia. Leiden: Maire. Vahlen, J. 1858. In M. Terentii Varronis Saturarum Menippearum reliquas coniectanea. Leipzig: Teubner. Volk, K. 2019. “Varro and the Disorder of Things.” HCSP 119: 183–212. White, K. D. 1967. Agricultural Implements of the Roman World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

8

Si Est Homo Bulla Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis Sarah Culpepper Stroup

The Problem Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis (henceforth dRR) is a suite of three dialogues published in 37 bce and composed ostensibly to instruct the dedicatees (oddly, there is one for each book) and future readers on the proper management of a Roman estate. There is only one problem: this is not what it is doing at all.1 Varro, a man whom Cicero praised as πολυγϱαϕώτατος2 and whom Quintilian dubbed uir Romanorum eruditissimus,3 is credited with some 74 works in over 600 volumes. As such, he is not only one of the more prolific of Roman authors, but one of the more influential as well. And no wonder, for the man who wrote the 3 books of dRR and the 25 books of de Lingua Latina—the latter 20 books of which were at some point dedicated to Cicero4—also wrote some 159 Saturae Menippeae,5 41 books of Antiquitates Rerum Humanarum et Diuinarum (dedicated to Caesar),6 9 books of the Disciplinae (a kind of encyclopedia of the liberal arts), 3 books de Rebus Urbanis,7 4 books de Vita Populi Romani (dedicated to Atticus), 4 books de Gente Populi Romani,8 de Familiis Troianis, the autobiographical de Vita Sua and Legationes, an Annales,9 Ephemeris Naualis ad Pompeium and Εἰσαγωγιϰός10 (both dedicated to Pompey),11 and de Ora Maritima. To this, we may add his works on rhetoric and law as well as those concerned with philosophy and science (12 books of Orationes, 15 books de Iure Ciuile, Laudationes, de Philosophia, de Forma Philosophiae, 76 books of the mini-dialogic Logistorici);12 his works on drama and the language of the comic stage (Quaestiones Plautinae, de Comoediis Plautinis, de Scaenicis Originibus, and de Actionibus Scaenicis) and, finally, his numerous treatises on linguistic antiquarianism, on Latin wordplay and puns, and on the Roman sermo (De Antiquitate Litterarum ad L. Accium, de Origine Linguae Latinae, de Similitudine Verborum, and de Sermone Latino). The manuscript tradition couples dRR with Cato’s de Agricultura at least by the time of the Codex Marcianus, which predates the twelfth century ce and which was last seen in the library of St. Mark in Florence in the sixteenth century ce, when it was used by Petrus Victorius (1542) for his own commentary—and never seen again. But as much as dRR is coupled with the writings of the historical Cato, both the ordering of its content (Book 1, agriculture; Book 2, animal husbandry; Book 3, DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-12

Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis  149 birds, fish, and bees) and form (the dialogue) find their origins in Cicero’s literary Cato as he is created in Cato de Senectute.13 As such, the decidedly political dRR resounds strongly—if somewhat differently—in Vergil’s Georgics (equally political and tremendously influential) and Columella’s de Re Rustica (with its own tree of influence on later agricultural writers, even into the modern period). But dRR aside, Varro’s deep and wide-ranging intellectual, linguistic, literary, and antiquarian influences are found in Seneca,14 Pliny the Elder, Aulus Gellius, Lucian of Samosata, Augustine of Hippo, Petrarch, and Erasmus. As much as Varro wrote, however, and as influential as he was, the vicissitudes of fate have left us with six books and some change of the de Lingua Latina—a text that continues to receive the lion’s share of Varronian scholarship—as well as fragments of the Menippeans, Logistorici, and others, and the entire text (save a few frustrating lacunae in Book 2) of dRR, which has too frequently and too casually been dismissed as an impossibly straight-faced “Farming Manual.” In the shadow of so staggering a loss, it can be difficult to figure out what to do with the little that has survived.15 And yet the loss of nearly all of Varro’s literary output has not just deprived us of one of the most important and influential prose authors of the first century bce. It has shaped—and, as I argue, greatly misshaped—our understanding of Varro’s prose style and especially his profound ability to mimic that of others, what we might call ventriloquism or “double-voiced writing.”16 The loss of virtually all of Varro’s writing has left dRR as a kind of bizarre dialogic triptych that is sort of like earlier Republican dialogues (those of Cicero, that is), but also very much not like them at all. It appears to claim to be the one thing (“Farming Manual”) that it cannot be, and we are left with a text that is sometimes astonishingly dull, sometimes maddeningly confusing, sometimes ridiculously inept, and often all three at once. Or are we? In what follows, I focus on a fairly small portion of the opening of dRR (1.1.1–1.1.4) to suggest that the work is not a failed Farming Manual, but rather a piece of sophisticated cryptology and masterful code-switching, rife with early Republican “Easter Eggs”17 and dark commentary on the state of things at time of composition. It is a deeply coded and esoteric work, to be sure; but I believe it has been written in such a way as to contain its own decoding tool—if only we read carefully enough, as Varro is instructing us to do.18 DRR, in short, teaches us how to read and write under the most dangerous of political situations. It teaches us how to read and write between the lines.19 It is important to note, of course, that there has been recent and robust recognition that dRR is more than just a “Farming Manual.” Green, Kronenberg, and Nelsestuen have all argued that dRR engages in political and philosophical ­satire or parody,20 configuring this variously as a satire of philosophy writ large, the philosophical dialogue in particular, or—least convincing of all—a parody of the dialogues of the Cicero himself, murdered but five years prior during the proscriptions. Nevertheless, while Kronenberg has indeed left Team Farming Manual, both Green and Nelsestuen—in otherwise highly successful works—have tended to conclude that the text remains, at its foundation, a didactic work dealing largely with the practicalities of farming in the late first century bce.

150  S. Stroup While I do not agree with this conclusion, we are nevertheless left with two problems. The first is that, as long as a reader is convinced that dRR is a Farming Manual, they will be hard-pressed to read it as anything other than a Farming Manual, clinging as they do to a sort of positivism one would never inflict upon poetry. The second is that I recognize that simply writing “this is not a Farming Manual” 100 times on the blackboard is insufficient to convince even the most well-disposed of readers that this is, in fact, not a Farming Manual. I shall instead, then, try to demonstrate briefly the reasons I have come to conclude why this is not a Farming Manual—and I do think this can be done relatively briefly—and hope that the reader defects to my side so that we may proceed to the weird stuff. Why, then, is it reasonable to conclude that dRR is not a Farming Manual? In the first place, because dRR is a dialogue. The dialogue is a highly artificial literary genre established by the fifth century bce as a favored form for philosophical discourse and, by the late Republic, the favored form for discourse ostensibly on matters of political philosophy.21 While dialogues do come to be linked with a degree of satire—this likely began with Menippus,22 but soared to great heights with Lucian—the dialogic satire seems always a politically entrenched one. If a person such as Varro wanted to produce a straight-faced farming handbook, there is neither precedent nor logic for him to have chosen a highly artificial and political literary form. In the second place, dRR is a dedicated dialogue (as were all of Cicero’s—not least the Academica, dedicated to Varro in 44 bce), and we know that dedicated dialogues in the late Republic served also as a powerful means of negotiating and strengthening political and personal alliances (Stroup 2010). While there are significant problems with the dedications of dRR (each book has its own dedicatee, a marked anomaly), the very act of dedication marks dRR as a text engaged with personal and political relationships, and moves us a step farther from a straight-faced technical handbook on how to manage the complexities of an estate. In the third place, if dRR was intended to be a practical “Farming Manual,” we would need to ask whether the wealthy owner of several estates would have considered himself the right person to write such a thing. While the owners of such estates were surely invested in their success (and while someone like Varro may have been more interested than most in the minutiae), they just as surely would not have overseen the day-to-day management of such estates, but would have put the work into the hands of those who possessed the expertise to make such estates profitable. Indeed, Varro himself would appear to draw into question any claim that dRR is a technical handbook early in Book 1, where he explains that, if the dedicatee finds dRR lacking in useful agricultural wisdom, he will indicate from which authors—both Greek and Roman—such wisdom may be found. He then provides an alphabetical list of some 52 authors (many of whom appear suspiciously political and philosophical) whose works might be consulted in need.23 While Varro includes one Carthaginian in the catalogue— Mago—there are notably no Roman authors included therein—not even Cato. “I will tell you something,” Varro has written, and then refuses to do so. We should ask him why.

Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis  151 In the fourth place—simply put, and I am far from the first person to note this— the dRR’s laughably perverse obsession with division and detail would make it the least useful such manual ever.24 If taken at face value, the dRR would be a recipe for general confusion and economic disaster—especially in the hands of someone who knows so little about farming that they need a three-book treatise on the topic. I am, of course, not claiming that the ostensible topics of dRR are not agriculture, animal husbandry, and pastio uillatica—they are. However, dRR is patently no more “about” a farm than is that book by Orwell. And yet, we do not have to worry over the fact that the most learned of the Romans wrote an absurdly useless Farming Manual, because dRR was no more a “Farming Manual” than Varro was a farmer. And Varro was no farmer: he was patently too busy writing. Moreover, Varro was also a man who had run with the most powerful people of the Republic and who lived to see that Republic crumble under the increasingly unbearable weight of its social and political strife. He was a man who fought the pirates with Pompey and, following Pharsalus, waltzed cautiously with Caesar. He was a man who witnessed the murder of several of his close friends during the proscriptions of late 43 and early 42, a period of nearly unimaginable bloodshed, confusion, mistaken identity, and terror that would traumatize Rome for centuries to come.25 Indeed, he was a man who was proscribed himself—almost certainly by Antony, for the crime of knowing Cicero—and escaped death by Triumvir only through the intervention of Calenus (Appian, BC 4.6.47):26 Οὐάϱϱων δὲ ἦν ϕιλόσοϕός τε ϰαὶ ἱστοϱίας συγγϱαϕεύς, ἐστϱατευμένος τε ϰαλῶς ϰαὶ ἐστϱατηγηϰώς, ϰαὶ ἴσως διὰ ταῦτα ὡς ἐχθϱὸς μοναϱχίας πϱουγϱάϕη. Φιλοτιμουμένων δὲ αὐτὸν ὑποδέξασθαι τῶν γνωϱίμων ϰαὶ διεϱιζόντων ἐς ἀλλήλους, Καληνὸς ἐξενίϰησε ϰαὶ εἶχεν ἐν ἐπαύλει, ἔνθα Ἀντώνιος, ὅτε διοδεύοι, ϰατήγετο· ϰαὶ τὸν Οὐάϱϱωνα οὐδεὶς ἔνδον ἐνέϕηνε θεϱάπων, οὔτε αὐτοῦ Οὐάϱϱωνος οὔτε Καληνοῦ. Varro was a philosopher and antiquarian, a distinguished soldier and general, and perhaps that is why he was proscribed as an enemy of the monarchy. His friends were eager to provide him with refuge, and they vied among themselves for the privilege. Calenus won, and brought him to his villa, where Antony was wont to stop when he was traveling. And no slave, either of Varro or of Calenus, revealed that Varro was there. The most literarily prolific of the Romans, Varro had witnessed Rome slowly and irretrievably lose its Republican voice and, by 37 bce, he found himself speaking into an increasingly ominous void. This was a time to write: but it was no time to write about farming. This was a time to write about the state of the State. In what follows, I situate dRR within the political, social, and intellectual context in which it was produced—the start of the Triumvirs’ second term, as Rome was just learning to mourn—and argue that, while this is a heavily didactic text, it offers lessons that have nothing to do with working the land, but a lot to do with the final years of the Republic. Varro instructs his readers not how to care for a recently

152  S. Stroup acquired fundus (the pretense with which Book 1 begins), but how to safely write about and, finally, how to lament the past in a State that had become nearly unrecognizable in his present. Varro instructs his readers in how to write between the lines. However, before we can get to Varro (or, rather, to the opening passages of dRR), we need to engage in a degree of Ciceronian foreplay. This background should help us get to both “why dRR?”—that is, why pretend to write about agriculture in 37 bce—and “how dRR?,” that is, how we might situate dRR in the context of Cicero’s dialogic and political projects some five years after his death. I begin, then, by looking at a first-century semantic drift in ager from a relatively unmarked designation for “land” to a strongly marked codeword for “the State.” Further, we can trace in Cicero the construction of agri cultura as a codeword for statecraft and, in concert with this, his construction of the “dialogic villa” as a distinctly Roman didactic space. Next, I turn to a small selection of Cicero’s letters to Atticus and to Varro, which will provide more context. In the letters to the former, we can trace Cicero’s extreme interest in convincing Varro to join his dialogic project; in those to the latter, we see Cicero explicitly encouraging Varro to write political dialogues, and we see the Academica offered as an enticement to do so. Finally, we come to the opening passages of dRR itself, armed with the questions, “Why write about land now, Varro? Why a dialogue now?,” to see what he may tell us. Villa and domus; ager and Vrbs In the first century bce, as the urbs grew dramatically, semantic drift in the use of uilla produced both strong oppositions and strong pairings. As has been argued convincingly by Ackerman, villa culture is inextricably tied to urban culture: in times of urban growth, so, too, do we see growth in villa culture, and the opposite in times of decline.27 In first-century Rome, the uilla became an increasingly important symbol of elite cultural capital, as the possession of a uilla outside of the urbs (the only place a uilla can be, unless you are Nero) implies the possession of a domus (and considerable influence) within the urbs. This drift creates two oppositions, one of architectural structure, and one of geographic location. In terms of structure, we have the opposition of uilla and domus: a structure outside of the city, and a structure within it. In terms of location (“where is this structure?”), we have the opposition of ager and urbs. Of course, this also produces a pairing of both uilla and ager28 and domus and urbs (“a uilla is in the ager; a domus is in the urbs), but the oppositions—specifically the opposition of ager and urbs—will interest us most. The first evidence for the drifting value of uilla and its eventual opposition to domus appears not in the context of Rome, but rather in Cicero’s 70 bce prosecution of Gaius Verres on charges of extortion. This collocation of domus and uilla occurs in the never-delivered29 second book of the Verrines, in a discussion of the theft of public and private artworks (so Verr. 2.4.6, domum deinde atque ad suas uillas auferebant, and 2.4.126, Verres haec habeat domi; Verres ornamentis fanorum atque oppidorum habeat plenam domum, uillas refertas). In the Actio Secunda, the uilla is configured largely negatively, as the luxurious possessions of

Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis  153 a spoiled elite—the warehouses of hoarded foreign, i.e., Greek art—to which the average Roman could never gain access (Verr. 2.4.126): Nostrum enim unus quisque, qui tam beati quam iste est non sumus—tam delicati esse non possumus—si quando aliquid istius modi uidere uolet, eat ad aedem Felicitatis, ad monumentum Catuli, in porticum Metelli, det operam ut admittatur in alicuius istorum Tusculanum… For if any of us, who are not as rich as that man [Verres]—for we can’t be as foppish—should wish to see anything of that sort [i.e., Verres’ plundered Greek art], let him go to the temple of Felicitas, the monument of Catulus, the portico of Metellus; let him try to gain admission to the Tusculan villa of any of that sort… However, the year after this prosecution, Cicero acquired his own villa at Tusculum,30 and began to outfit it with artworks and, more famously, libraries. In the writing that follows Cicero’s Tusculan acquisition, Cicero uses the collocation of uilla and domus with increasing frequency, usually, though not exclusively, placing domus before uilla.31 By the turn of the century, the idiomatic oppositional pairing of domus and uilla—“city house/country house”—appears to have solidified in response to a rapidly grown urbs and a burgeoning villa culture (and of course continues in the “urban/rural” conceptual, social, and political divides today).32 At the same time, however, we also begin to see the geographic coupling of uilla and ager. Just as the uilla had become naturalized as a certain type of structure indicating a certain type of social status and reserved for a certain type of activity—literary, political, and philosophical discourse—so, too, the notion had become naturalized that there was a place where a uilla belongs (outside of Rome; that is, ager) and a place where it doesn’t (inside of Rome; that is, urbs). It is likely that the impetus for this linguistic divide was multifactorial. As noted above, Rome had experienced increased immigration and rapid urban growth in the decades that preceded these shifts, turning Rome into an urbs unlike any the world had seen before. Rome had become an urbs so urban that, in this period, urbs used without modifier could only mean one place, throwing non-urban spaces—the uilla and ager—into higher social, political, and linguistic relief. Finally, the particular political exigencies of the first century bce propelled rapid semantic drifts, of which this is but one example, and which are literally at the core of Varro’s de Lingua Latina.33 The Republic was changing rapidly, and so was its landscape— both real and linguistic. The collocation of uilla and ager appears once in Plautus34 and once in the fragments of Scipio Africanus.35 However, it is again in Cicero where we see the strongest promotion of this coupling—not as an opposition, but rather as an identification. Whereas uilla and domus belonged apart, uilla and ager belong together.36 Once again, this linguistic maneuver is picked up by those who follow Cicero, especially Varro (who uses this term throughout the dRR and who argues in the dLL that ager comes from verb agere37), but also Livy, Sallust, and Columella. Beyond

154  S. Stroup pairing uilla and ager, Cicero pairs, thus amplifying and forever changing, two other Roman concepts, most specifically the ager and what is done with it (colere). In all extant Latin literature, the collocation of ager and cultura occurs first in 66 bce, in Cicero’s speech defending the Manilian Law (Leg. Man. 6.15): nam in ceteris rebus cum uenit calamitas, tum detrimentum accipitur; at in uectigalibus non solum aduentus mali, sed etiam metus ipse adfert calamitatem. nam cum hostium copiae non longe absunt, etiam si inruptio nulla facta est, tamen pecuaria relinquitur, agri cultura deseritur, mercatorum nauigatio conquiescit. For in other affairs, when disaster comes, damage is sustained; but in the case of revenues, not only the approach of evil, but even the fear of it brings disaster. For when the troops of the enemy are not far off, even if no irruption actually takes place, nevertheless the flocks are abandoned, the cultivation of the fields deserted, and the sailing of merchant ships subsides. Following this, Cicero consistently uses the collocation agri cultura, in which ager comes to represent not just the Good Roman’s Estate, where a Good Roman will have his uilla, but increasingly the State itself. Concomitantly, as ager comes to be used as a metaphor for the State, then agri cultura comes to be used as a metaphor for the cultivation—the governance—of this state as a veritable patrimony.38 Shortly after Cicero has begun to use agri cultura as a way of talking about the state, we see this phrase in Caesar (but only de Bello Gallico, where it stands in for “sophistication,” which the Gauls did not have),39 throughout Varro’s dRR (at about 130 instances, Varro is the greatest user of this term), and then a few times in Pliny the Elder, and, of course, Columella. The term appears in a few other places but, after the first century ce, agri cultura is a phrase that appears only rarely in Latin literature. It is, in short, a linguistic phenomenon of the final decades of the Republic and one that was leveraged largely in discussions of the State. Cicero’s role in this—and I believe he had a large one—can be traced both in his Cato, where he effectively recreates the historical Cato the Elder as a distinctly literary and political figure (this is an identity taken up by all later authors), and in his de Officiis, a treatise whose explicit topic is moral and ethical obligations to the state. The Cato is a dialogue ostensibly on the topic of old age and its merits, and indeed, this is its focus for the first 50 sections. At section 15.51, however, the “Cato” character shifts abruptly to the topic of the pleasures of agricolae (uoluptates agricolarum), proceeding to explain, in highly metaphorical and strangely sexual imagery, that, not only are they not hindered by old age, but alsothey are especially suited to the life of the wise man (et mihi ad sapientis uitam proxime uidentur accedere). At 15.54, “Cato” refers to his own book on agriculture—what we have come to call the de Agricultura, though I do not think that could have been its name—using the term res rusticae (dixi in eo libro, quem de rebus rusticis scripsi). Cicero had been using this term in the plural at least since the Verrines40 (it occurs in the singular once in Cato the Elder himself); in the Republic, only Cicero and

Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis  155 Varro use the plural, and, indeed, I suspect that it is this passage, and this work, that may have suggested to Varro the name and topic of his own. At 16.55, “Cato” first admits that he could talk at greater length about the oblectamenta rerum rusticarum, then admits that he has already said more than he should have (longiora), then immediately reverses: “forgive me if I go on—I am carried away by my studio rusticarum rerum.” He then proceeds not to talk about agriculture at all, but rather introduces Manius Curius Dentatus, a hero of the earlier Republic, thrice consul, who triumphed over the Samnites, Sabines, and Pyrrhus. At 16.56, “Cato” claims to turn again to the topic of agricolae, then introducing the most famous “farmer-statesman” of them all: sed uenio ad agricolas, ne a me ipso recedam. in agris erant tum senatores, id est senes, siquidem aranti L. Quinctio Cincinnato nuntiatum est eum dictatorem esse factum. But let me come to farmers, lest I wander from myself. Back then, ­senators— that is, old men—lived on farms, if indeed it is true that L. Quinctius Cincinnatus was at the plow when he heard that he had been made dictator of Rome. “Cato” first reminds the readers that he, too, is an agricola (ne a me ipso recedam), but then immediately conflates agricolae with senatores. We learn that during the Battle of Mount Algidius, the senatores (i.e., old men—we’re still talking about old age, after all) were summoned from their uillae on the other side of the Tiber to the senate (a uilla in senatum arcessebatur et Curius et ceteri senes), and so from their care of the ager to that of the urbs. We know what happens next, according to Roman legend, at least:41 Cincinnatus goes to Rome and the aid of Tusculum, is victorious against the Aequi, then sets down his dictatorship and returns to his fields within 16 days. “Cato” ends his brief account reflecting that, to him, there is nothing finer (beatior) than the life of a “farmer,” in large part due to their duty performed, because the cultura agrorum is beneficial to the whole of the human race.42 In 17.59, “Cato” turns to Xenophon’s Oeconomicus, a dialogue ostensibly about household management and agriculture that, in fact, engages deeply with both philosophy and statecraft.43 The “agricultural interlude” ends at 17.60, where we meet Valerius Corvinus, who lived to one hundred, cultivated his old age in his fields (in agris eos coleret), and was consul six times. The notion that “Cato” has been talking about agriculture becomes less convincing with every word. Toward the end of the first book of de Officiis, Cicero returns to the Cato by advising his 21-year-old son (de Off. 1.151): nihil est agri cultura melius, nihil uberius, nihil dulcius, nihil homine libero dignius. de qua quoniam in Catone Maiore satis multa diximus. Nothing is better than the cultivation of the ager; nothing is richer, nothing sweeter, nothing more worthy of a free man. As I’ve said more than enough on this matter in my Cato Maior.

156  S. Stroup In promoting a strong political tension between the uilla and the urbs, then, and in choosing villas as the dramatic location for his political and philosophical dialogues, Cicero had created hand-held villas—“textual Tuscula”44—as a distinctly Roman didactic space into which one might retreat in times of danger, and in which one might teach others how to navigate, and perhaps influence, an increasingly dangerous urbs. This brings us back to Varro and, ultimately, back to the dRR. Let Us Read and Write Republics Cicero’s “dialogic project” is well documented (Stroup 2010). He was far from the only one of this generation writing and dedicating texts as a means to control and increase political and social capital, and he was far from the only one using such texts to instruct others on the practice. However, Cicero’s preference for the dialogue as the form for such didacticism appears remarkable for this period, and just as remarkable is our record of his repeated requests that Varro—the most literarily prodigious man in Rome, a man whose writings must have held considerable sway across political boundaries—join him in his didactic efforts. And he did, as evidence shows, at least partially through the use of letters.45 Cicero’s literary relationship with Varro is a complicated one,46 and it appears to have involved, and, in large part, evolved through, the person of Titus Pomponius Atticus, mutual friend, influential literary connoisseur, and notorious fence-sitter. Atticus is an interlocutor in three of Cicero’s dialogues: Brutus (46 bce; dedicated to Brutus; he and Cicero are co-interlocutors), de Legibus (52–?47 bce; though it is unclear to whom it was dedicated, Atticus or Quintus would be likely; Cicero and his brother are co-interlocutors), and Academica (44 bce; dedicated, again, to Varro; he and Cicero are co-interlocutors). Atticus is also an interlocutor in the second book of dRR, which is set in Epirus, notably also the location of Atticus’ country estate, named the Amaltheum. Varro appears to be a planned part of Cicero’s dialogic project from the beginning, and, indeed, Linderski has argued that Varro had begun writing dialogues prior to Cicero’s death and eagerly sought to be included in Cicero’s (1995: 51–52). I do not think we can prove either of those propositions, but they provide needed pushback against entirely unfounded claims that the two men didn’t like each other much,48 or that dRR is in some way a spoof of Cicero’s own dialogues—an argument that would require a violent upending of elite Republican social code, and one that would seem to suggest that Varro seeks to ingratiate himself with Antony. At any rate, by 58 bce, Varro begins to appear in Cicero’s letters to Atticus as a mutual friend and an important player in the political scene.49 In 57, Varro is referred to as a “mutual friend,”50 and in 54, in a letter discussing the composition of de Re Publica and the tricky choice of participants, Cicero writes that he’d like to include Varro as a speaker, but “you know the way of my dialogues” (that is, he is not yet using living interlocutors).51 By 46, and after about half a decade of silence,52 Cicero’s dialogic project has picked up again with Brutus, the only of the dialogues set in Rome.53 In April of that year, he writes to Varro, exhorting him to join in the task of “reading and writing Republics,” with a heavy Platonic wink to the Greek Πολιτεῖαι underlining the

Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis  157 fact that the writings are meant to be political and specifically political dialogues (Ep. Fam 9.2, 46 bce): sed hoc tu melius; modo nobis stet illud: una uiuere in studiis nostris, a quibus antea delectationem modo petebamus, nunc uero etiam salutem; non deesse, si quis adhibere uolet, non modo aut architectos, uerum etiam ut fabros, ad aedificandam rem publicam, et potius libenter accurrere; si nemo utetur opera, tamen et scribere et legere Πολιτεῖας et, si minus in curia atque in foro, at in litteris et libris, ut doctissimi ueteres fecerunt, gubernare rem publicam et de moribus ac legibus quaerere. But you know this better than I. Only let us stand by our agreements: (1) to live as one in our studies, from which we used to seek only pleasure, but we now seek our very safety; (2) not to be remiss should anyone seek our services, not only as architects but even as workmen, for the rebuilding of the Republic, but rather hasten eagerly to the task; (3) should no one seek us out, nevertheless to write and read Republics and (4) if not in the Curia and Forum, then in our writings and books—just as the sages of old had done— to guide the Republic and interrogate its laws and customs. In the following year, we learn that Cicero has, at last, decided to transfer his hastily (or so he claims; I find the protestation of hastily composed dialogues always suspect) rewritten Academica to Varro as a dedicatee (and interlocutor), and, rather more importantly, that Varro had himself promised a substantial dedication some two years prior (Ep. Att. 13.12, 45 bce):54 quod ad me de Varrone scribis, scis me antea orationes aut aliquid id genus solitum scribere ut Varronem nusquam possem intexere. postea autem quam haec coepi ϕιλολογώτεϱα, iam Varro mihi denuntiauerat magnam sane et grauem πϱοσϕώνησιν. biennium praeteriit. Now, as to what you write to me about Varro, you know that I heretofore composed my speeches and other writings55 of that sort in such a way that it was impossible to weave Varro in anywhere. But when I began these more literary works, Varro had already announced to me that he was planning a dedication of some importance. But two years have passed. In the letters that follow, Cicero becomes increasingly anxious about producing an appropriate dedication to Varro—undoubtedly to spur a return dedication—and there is a sense that some of the urgency is coming from Atticus as an enabler of the exchange. Finally, by late July 45, Academica, along with a dedicatory epistle (Ep. Fam. 9.8), had been delivered to Varro through the person of Atticus. The anxiety of the letters leading up to this ceases immediately: we hear almost nothing more of Varro and nothing at all of a return dedication. Indeed, while we don’t know if Cicero received anything from Varro before his death, we can say with confidence

158  S. Stroup that he had not received what he had explicitly requested, which was a dialogue (or dialogues) on the state of the Republic. And this brings us back to dRR. Having hopefully convinced the reader what dRR is not, I now want to return to what I believe it is. I believe that, at places, it functions as a eulogy for Cicero, killed in the proscriptions; at places, an attack on Antony, the man who had proscribed him; at places, a set of dialogues lamenting the loss of the Republic; and, taken as a whole, a posthumous dedication to Cicero of precisely the sort of text he had requested before his death. The clues for this reading run throughout dRR: prefaces that ventriloquize Cicero, bizarrely cryptonymic (and, in one case, impossible) dedicatees,56 inconsistent chronology and geography (each book is set in a different time and location, lending a sense of instability to the whole),57 problematic hosts, sudden ruptures at the end of each book that bring a swift end to the discussion and a swift scattering of interlocutors, and, finally, focusing on the cultura of the ager at a time when agri cultura had become Republican code for “statecraft.” This is a work that subverts every established rule of the dialogue, one that challenges the mere possibility of “Dialogue on the Republic” in the time of the Triumvirs, and one that presents a new way of speaking about—and coping with—the burdens of the past in a posttraumatic-stress present. Writing Between the Lines In what remains, I want to turn to the opening section of dRR, which is worth looking at in its entirety:58 otium si essem consecutus, Fundania, commodius tibi haec scriberem, quae nunc, ut potero, exponam cogitans esse properandum, quod, ut dicitur, si est homo bulla, eo magis senex. annus enim octogesimus admonet me ut sarcinas conligam, antequam proficiscar e uita. quare, quoniam emisti fundum, quem bene colendo fructuosum cum facere uelis, meque ut id mihi habeam curare roges, experiar; et non solum, ut ipse quoad uiuam, quid fieri oporteat ut te moneam, sed etiam post mortem. neque patiar Sibyllam non solum cecinisse quae, dum uiueret, prodessent hominibus, sed etiam quae cum perisset ipsa, et id etiam ignotissimis quoque hominibus; ad cuius libros tot annis post publice solemus redire, cum desideramus, quid faciendum sit nobis ex aliquo portento: me, ne dum uiuo quidem, necessariis meis quod prosit facere. quocirca scribam tibi tres libros indices, ad quos reuertare, siqua in re quaeres, quem ad modum quidque te in colendo oporteat facere. Had I possessed the otium, Fundania, I’d write more aptly to you what I now set forth as I am able, figuring that I must hurry up; for if a man is a bubble, as the saying goes, all the more an old man. For my eightieth year warns me to pack up my things before I set out from this life. Wherefore, since you have purchased a fundus, and as you wish to make it profitable by means of careful cultivation, and ask that I make this a matter of my concern, I shall try: and not only that I might warn you what ought to be done

Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis  159 as long as I should live, but even after I die. Nor shall I suffer the Sibyl to have sung prophecies that aided men not only while she was alive, but even when she had passed, and men she had never known—whose books we are accustomed to consult officially, when we wish to know what we ought to do about some portent—and not do something myself, while still alive, which will benefit my friends and family. Therefore, I shall write for you three informers, to which you might turn, whenever you wish to know, in a given case, how you ought to proceed in your cultivation. It is my contention that the entirety of this passage (and indeed, much of the ­introductory sections of all three books of dRR) ventriloquizes—or, to use a musical term, “samples”—Cicero in terms of style and lexical choice. What I mean by this is that we might all imagine a dear colleague who has favorite words, turns of phrase, and patterns of speech or writing: a verbal habitus that is so recognizably theirs and theirs alone that mimicking or invoking the habitus is enough to signal the referent to others similarly familiar with it. Now, we might imagine that this dear colleague has passed away, and that another colleague, one just as familiar with the deceased’s habitus as you are, writes an article in which the verbal habitus of the deceased is imported as a signal to others who can recognize it, but which will remain invisible to those who are not. In this, it differs from parody, which must be broadly recognizable for it to work. To those in the know, the author is writing with two voices. The author is writing between the lines. And Varro, in the opening sections of dRR, is writing in Cicero’s voice. We can start with the first word: otium. By the mid-50s bce, otium had come to signal, in late Republican textual code, a distinctly textual time, a “time to write,” and, through such writing, a time to create and strengthen social, intellectual, and political bonds.59 It is hard to imagine a more Ciceronian flourish than beginning a dialogue with otium, as Cicero wrote of the role of otium in his political writings with some frequency, and he is indeed one of the most prominent users of this noun and its adjectival otiosus in the entire corpus of Latin literature.60 Si essem consecutus is a similarly Ciceronian turn of phrase, with si essem followed by a perfect passive participle occurring only six times in the corpus, five times in Cicero and here.61 Commodius is also a Ciceronian favorite: of the approximately 71 times this word appears in the Republic, Cicero accounts for 60 of these, Varro for five, four of which in dRR. In the late Republic, commod– words functioned as strongly weighted terms denoting writing or speaking “aptly” or “appropriately.” We might think here of Catullus 84 and his jibe at the linguistically pretentious Arrius, who says chommoda when he should be saying commoda: this upstart tries his best, but the man’s inability to speak like a Roman makes him an outsider. And so, in the very opening lines of dRR, we might read not, “If I had more time to write, I’d have written more fittingly,” but rather, “If I had more time to write, I’d have written more Republicanly” (or perhaps even “more Ciceronianly”). I’ve skipped over the most alarming word in the first clause, and that is the name of the dedicatee: Fundania. Passing over the obvious pun with the name—Fundania

160  S. Stroup has bought a fundus, a rather clumsy joke, even for Varro—as well as some questions I have about a possible agricultural pun on Varro’s own nomen gentilicium, the main problem with Fundania is that she is a she. Setting aside the fact that naming one’s wife in so public a way would be highly irregular for a Roman man of any stature—indeed, it would have been so irregular that I am convinced that whoever Fundania was, or wasn’t, this cannot have been the name of Varro’s wife62—the appearance of a woman in a dialogue, and especially as the dedicatee of one, is problematic. We do not have to look beyond the opening lines of any of Cicero’s dialogues, all of which Varro likely knew well, having been the recipient of Academica some eight years prior, to know that you only dedicate a dialogue to a man. Be it Quintus or Brutus or Lucullus or Atticus or Varro, you only dedicate a dialogue to an individual who is in a position to make a return dedication. And thus, even as Varro has initiated what looks like a classic Republican dialogue, he lets the initiated know immediately that it is nothing of the sort. But Fundania is not the only oddly placed woman in this dedication. In what comes next, Varro drops what I am calling a “predictive” paronomasia with si est homo bulla: “if man is a bubble.”63 While, at first, this otherwise unattested apothegm might appear unremarkable, it contains, in Varro’s arrangement, the hidden word Sibulla, the Sibyl, as well as a dactylic line-end, which suggests that this is either a quote (ut dicitur), perhaps from one of the Saturae Menippeae, or a general nod to the poetic nature of the Sybilline prophecies. The cryptologic appearance of the Sibyl here seems puzzling. However, I suggest that it is a form of predictive wordplay, as the Sibyl herself appears immediately thereafter. In the lines that follow, Varro likens himself to the Sibyl (neque patiar Sibyllam non solum cecinisse) and provides a weighted and forced explanation that he will not let her be the only one to have left behind three books of prophecy. She will not be the only one useful after death. She will not be the only one with things to teach the Romans. We know from Lactantius (Inst. Div. 1.6) that Varro had written extensively on the Cumaean Sibyl and her books in his Antiquitates; and, as Varro had a villa in “Cumae,”64 it is not surprising that he felt a personal connection to this local h­ istory. So what he would have known first and foremost—what any Roman worth their salt would have known first and foremost—is that the Sibylline Books and their prophecies were not light-hearted how-to guides, but were state oracles meant to be consulted only by the Quindecimuiri sacris faciundis and only in the case of the direst national crises. Furthermore, Sibylline utterances, typically described as fata, are never characterized as easy-to-interpret directives. They are notoriously difficult to interpret. They are, by definition, a type of cryptological writing. This is a type of writing Varro knew well. With dRR, Varro has kicked the dust of the Republic from his sandals, readied his old muscles for one last fight, and begun to stretch his wings in producing both an overdue return dedication to the murdered voice of the State and a careful lesson in how to talk about it in the days, decades, and centuries to come.65 “Farming Manual?” Before he has written a word about “farming,” Varro has told his readers in no uncertain terms: “Listen closely. This is not about farming.

Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis  161 This is, at long last—and it’s probably too late—about the Republic. But if you want to know how, now, we are to write about the Republic, my Sibylline answer, if you read carefully enough, is: ‘We are to write carefully; we are to write in between the lines; we are to write about the Republic on behalf of the voice it has lost.’”66 Notes 1 This chapter represents a small portion of a larger project, a book-length manuscript tentatively titled Varro’s Dystopian Rome: Political Cryptology and the Shadow of the Triumvirate in de Rebus Rusticis. 2 Cicero, Ep. Att. 13.18, cum ipse homo πολυγϱαϕώτατος numquam me lacessisset, in a cautious discussion of the appropriate way to dedicate a text to Varro. 3 Quintilian, Inst. Orat. 10.95; cf. Senenca Helv. 12.8 (doctissimus Romanorum), Apuleius Apol. 42.18 (Varronem philosophum, uirum accuratissime doctum atque eruditum), Augustine of Hippo, Civ. Dei 3.4, 4.1, and 4.31, and, later, Petrarch Ep. Fam. 24.6. 4 While it has been generally assumed that Cicero received the partially dedicated dLL prior to his death in 43, there is no record in Cicero’s letters that this was the case. Cicero writes of his hoped-for dedication most extensively in the letters to Atticus in Att. 13 (from 45 and 44) and those to Varro in Fam. 9 (from 45); his last letter to Atticus (Att. 16.15) dates from between Nov. 1 and Dec. 9 of 44, approximately a year before he was murdered. In October 44, we hear that Cicero still awaits a dedication in return for the Academica (Att. 15.13), and can therefore say with certainty only that such a return had not yet been received. Therefore, while we cannot conclude that Cicero had not received the dLL prior to his death, and the oddness of the split dedication of dLL aside, it is clear that the dLL was not the dedication Cicero had hoped for, as I discuss below. 5 The Saturae Menippeae, influenced by Menippus of Gadara, included the timely—and likely self-referential—Sexagesis (Astbury frr. 484–505), a satire involving a grouchy old “Marcus” who slept for fifty years and returned to a Rome that had become unrecognizable in its deterioration; cf. Rose (1996) 228 and Conte (1999) 215. Other selfreferential Menippeans include the Bimarcus, Marcopolis, and Marcipor. 6 While the late Republic’s elevation of tradition and social etiquette made it resistant to philosophical Cynicism in the strictest sense, the Cynics’ free mixing of literary genres and skillful employment of the spoudaiogeloion to political ends gained adherents— among them Varro—in literary circles. For Varro’s “cynical” approach in ARD, see Kronenberg (2017). 7 Surviving only in a one-line fragment mentioning Spartacus (Spartaco innocente coniecto ad glum), preserved in Charisius, Ars 1.17; 272. 8 Written around 43–42, January of the latter year being the dramatic date of the first book of dRR. 9 This was possibly the source of his dating of Rome’s foundation year, to which he alludes at the beginning of the third book of dRR. 10 The Εἰσαγωγιϰός, or “Introduction,” was apparently an introduction to senatorial procedure, cf. Gellius NA 1.47: eum magistratum Pompeius cum initurus foret, quoniam per militia tempora senatus habendi consulendique, rerum expers urbanarum fuit, M. Varronem, familiarem suum, rogauit uti commentarium faceret Εἰσαγωγιϰόν—sic enim Varro ipse appellat—, ex quo disceret quid facere dicereque deberet, cum senatum consuleret. 11 Likely dated to 77 bce, though a second installment of the EN followed Pompey’s piratic war of 67, which is, interestingly, the date of Book 2 of dRR. 12 At least the Logistorici and Disciplinae—as well, of course, as the dRR—are to be identified as late works, certainly postdating Cicero’s death and likely dated to the 30s.

162  S. Stroup 13 This ordering, which does not exist in Cato, appears to be an entirely Ciceronian invention, cf. Cato 15.54: Quid de utilitate loquar stercorandi? dixi in eo libro, quem de rebus rusticis scripsi; de qua doctus Hesiodus ne uerbum quidem fecit, cum de cultura agri scriberet. at Homerus, qui multis, ut mihi uidetur, ante saeculis fuit, Laerten lenientem desiderium, quod capiebat e filio, colentem agrum et eum stercorantem facit. nec uero segetibus solum et pratis et uineis et arbustis res rusticae laetae sunt, sed hortis etiam et pomariis, tum pecudum pastu, apium examinibus, florum omnium uarietate. On Cicero’s creation of Cato, see further Stroup (2013). 14 In addition to Seneca’s choice of Menippean satire for the Apocolocyntosis, which was almost surely influenced by Varro, cf. Apocol. 8.1.4 (rotundus esse, ut ait Varro, sine capite sine praeputio), Helv. 12.8.1 (doctissimus Romanorum, noted above) and NQ 5.16 (where Varro is described as uir diligens). 15 As Petrarch lamented to Varro at Ep. Fam. 24.6, “Our age has lost your books.” 16 I use this term in a loose adaption of Bakhtin’s concept of “double-voiced-discourse,” on which see Baxter (2014) 23–41 and Morson (1989). 17 I use this term in a loose adaption of the function of Easter Eggs in media, in which the term indicates a hidden feature in a video game, software, a film, or a television series. In video games, an Easter Egg may be triggered by a set of commands that are undocumented (and so may be stumbled upon or shared with an inside group). In film and TV, Easter Eggs function as a form of visual intertextuality at varying strata of erudition or geekery. 18 On the decoding of esoteric philosophical works, a category to which I believe dRR belongs, I highly recommend Melzer (2014). 19 I take the phrase “writing between the lines” from Strauss’ excellent essay “Persecution and the Art of Writing” (1952): “Persecution cannot prevent even public expression of the heterodox truth, for a man of independent thought can utter his views in public and remain unharmed, provided he moves with circumspection. He can even utter them in print without incurring any danger, provided he is capable of writing between the lines.” 20 Green (1997); Kronenberg (2009); Nelsestuen (2015); the political and philosophical satire of the Menippeans, while similarly underserved, is addressed by Mosca (1937). 21 I write “ostensibly” here because, beginning with de Oratore in 54 and continuing through the end of his dialogic project, Cicero’s dialogues engage in careful layering of larger philosophical and political issues with encoded references to Rome’s current political crises. 22 The nature of what Menippus actually wrote remains somewhat unclear, as his satires survive only by their titles. While Diogenes Laertius relates that there is “nothing serious” in Menippus (ϕέϱει μὲν οὖν σπουδαῖον οὐδέν, Lives 6.8.99), Strabo refers to him as σπουδογέλοιος (16.2.29), suggesting a mixture of the serious and the lighthearted, likely using humor to convey a more serious philosophical or perhaps political subtext. 23 Nelsestuen (2015: 36–39) provides a useful breakdown of this list. 24 While Volk (2019) does not focus on dRR, she briefly touches upon these divisions, or, rather, Varro’s general proclivity to categorize and divide. Skydsgaard (1968: 36), also quoted in Volk, notes that the divisions of Book 1 of dRR frequently do anything but clarify matters. It is my argument, of course, that this is precisely the point. 25 On the proscriptions, see Livy Perioch. 119–120, Suetonius Aug. 27, Appian BC 4, Dio 47, Orosius 6.189. Appian 4.17 specifies that not only was Cicero proscribed, but so, too, his son, his brother, his brother’s son, all of his household, his factions, and his friends. 26 On Antony’s attempted confiscation of Varro’s villa at Casinum (and his successful plundering of Varro’s library) in 47 bce, as well as his unwelcome visit to the villa at some point in 44, see Cicero Phil. 2.104–105. 27 Ackerman (1986) 11: “the fate of the villa has been intimately tied to that of the city; villa culture has thrived in periods of metropolitan growth (as was true in ancient Rome,

Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis  163 eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Britain, and the twentieth century throughout the West).” 28 Cato uses the terms uilla rustica and uilla urbana (de Agr. 3.2, 4.1), links the uilla with the fundus or ager, and places it outside the urbs, but his use of the term (which appears 18 times in that work) does not appear to carry political heft. In Plautus (Rudens 34) we hear only that the villa should be in agro atque…proxima propter mare. 29 Following the Oratio Prima—a brief and forceful speech with the most brilliant ending ever (simply: dixi), Hortensius advised Verres to split town—and he did. The far longer Oratio Secunda is a purely “literary” oration and, as I have argued elsewhere (Stroup 2013: 126–129), an important turning point in Cicero’s awareness of the power of political writing. 30 At the time of acquiring his Tusculan estate, Cicero had his family estate in Arpinum, his house on the Palatine, and at least one villa at Formiae (at Ep. Att. 1.4, on the outfitting of Tusculum, Cicero tells Atticus he will transfer property from Formiae to Tusculum). He eventually held two villas at Formiae, as well as villas at Caeta, Baia, Pompeii, and elsewhere; he possessed some 18 residences in total. 31 In addition to those cited above, see especially Domo Sua 62.3 (domus in Palatio, uilla in Tusculano), de Orat. 1.162 (si in…domum plenam ornamentorum uillamue uenisses?), Par. Stoic. 5.38 (quorum in uilla ac domo nihil splendidum), Ep. Fam. 6.18 (domus est quae nulli mearum uillarum cedat). 32 So Varro (dRR 3.1: general opposition of city life with country life, traced to Rome’s political foundations; see also 3.17), Sallust (domos atque uillas, Bel. Cat. 12.3; quisque domum aut uillam, Bel. Cat. 51.33; so too the spurious Ad Caes. 1.8.1 and In M. Tullium 3.13), Horace (et domo | uillaque, Carm. 2.3.17–18; de uillis domibusue, Serm. 2.6.71), Pliny Maior (et uillas et domos, NH 14.11.2; in domo aut uilla, NH 24.116.5), Pliny Minor (ut illi uilla, ut domus pateat, Ep. 5.18.8l; huic laxior domus, illi amoenior uilla, Pan. 50.5), Seneca Minor (e uilla mea surripuit in domo mea ponat, Dial. 2.7.3.4), Tacitus (his domos uillasque patefecimus, De Orig. Germ. 41.2). I can find no evidence of such a linguistic coupling in pre-Republican Greek sources. 33 By way of interesting comparison, we may trace similar shifts in the nineteenth-century United States, in terms of immigration trends, the rapid growth of large cities, and the concurrent rise of both country pleasure mansions and grand inner-city parks. On comparisons between the ideological functions of Roman villas and those of the modern period, see Ackerman (1986). 34 Rudens 33–35: illic habitat Daemones | in agro atque uilla proxima propter mare | senex. 35 Orationes 20.1: ubi agros optime cultos atque uillas expolitissimas uidisset. 36 This collocation appears at least 27 times in the Ciceronian corpus; representative are Verr. 2.2.92 (circum agros eius uillasque dimittere), Phil. 3.31 (uastantur agri, diripiuntur uillae), and Ep. Att. 8.13 (49 bce: nihil prorsus aliud curant nisi agros, nisi uillulas, nisi nummulos suos); see also Ep. Fam. 10.33 (44 bce, from Pollio: aut in agris aut in uillis sunt). 37 Varro, dLL v.6.34: ager dictus in quam terram quid agebant, et unde quid agebant fructus causa; alii, quod id Graeci dicunt agron. ut ager quo agi poterat, sic qua agi actus. 38 de Orat. 1.249; dRP 5.5; de Fin. 3.4.9; Cato 54, 55, 59; de Off. 1.151, 2.12. 39 BG 3.17, 4.1, 6.22, 6.29. 40 Cf. Verr. 2.3.26, 2.3.200, 2.3.237; de Orat. 1.69, 1.249; Ep. Frat. 3.1.16 and 3.3.1 (in the singular). 41 Livy 3.26–29 presents a more extended account of this legend; see too Pliny HN 18.4. 42 Cato 16.56, mea quidem sententia haud scio an nulla beatior possit esse, neque solum officio, quod hominum generi uniuerso cultura agrorum est salutaris… 43 For the use of farming allegory in this text, see Kronenberg (2009) 39–72. 44 This is a term I coined first for a paper delivered at the annual meeting of the (then) American Philological Association in Montréal in 2006 (“Textual Tuscula: The Sociopolitics of Villa and Book in Cicero’s Technical Treatises”).

164  S. Stroup 45 See Leach (1999) for an excellent discussion of the correspondence between Cicero, Varro, and Papirius Paetus in 46. 46 See Wiseman (2009: 107–130) for a useful discussion of the relationship between the two men, with which I do not entirely agree. 47 It is unclear when the final book of de Leg. was published. 48 While the depth and authenticity of Cicero and Varro’s affection for each other is both irrecoverable and entirely extraneous to this argument—close collaboration and mutual respect need hardly indicate “friendship”—the notion that Cicero and Varro did not like each other much, and most specifically that the latter disliked the former, seems an entirely modern prejudice and one that, I suspect, is linked to a curiously petty dismissal of Cicero’s character (the man is guilty of having written enough to reveal the fact he was human). Both Augustine (Civ. Dei. 6.2) and Petrarch (Ep. Fam. 18.4 and 24.6), at any rate, considered the two close collaborators and genuine friends. 49 Ep. Att. 3.15, 58 bce: Varronis sermo facit expectationem Caesaris atque utinam ipse Varronis incumbat in causam! 50 Ep. Att. 4.2, 57 bce: quod uereor ne tardius interuentu Varronis tui nostrique facias. 51 See Ep. Att. 4.16, 54 bce: Varro, de quo ad me scribis, includetur in aliquem locum, si modo erit locus. sed nosti genus dialogorum meorum, and Ep. Att. 13.19, 45 bce: sic enim constitueram, neminem includere in dialogos eorum qui uiuerent. 52 At Brut. 19, the character of Atticus is made to remark: iam pridem enim conticuerunt tuae litterae. nam ut illos de re publica edidisti, nihil a te sane postea accepimus. 53 The Brutus is set in Cicero’s house on the Palatine. It is unclear why Cicero chose to break his own convention with this dialogue—perhaps it is because Brutus is aggressively Rome-centered; perhaps he was merely experimenting with form—but it is not a choice he repeats. On the role of Brutus in Cicero’s dialogic project, see Stroup (2010: 237–273; 2003). 54 See also Baraz (2012: 207–209) for a discussion of this dedication. 55 To be honest, I wonder whether orationes aut aliquid id genus is better understood to refer to Cicero’s earlier dialogues rather than to his orations. 56 The woman dedicatee of Book 1, “Fundania,” is impossible, according to established dedicatory practices. The dedicatee of Book 2, “Turranius Niger,” is quite likely Antony, and that of Book 3, “Pinnius,” is, almost beyond a doubt, Cicero himself. I discuss this in a forthcoming monograph. 57 Book 1 is set in late January 42, Book 2 on 21 April 67, and Book 3 in late July 50. 58 This passage is also examined productively by McAlhany in the previous chapter of this volume; while we reach different conclusions as to various of its aspects, our arguments dovetail nicely. 59 See Stroup (2010: 48–63) on “textualizing” otium. 60 Oti– words appear in Republican authors approximately 457 times, of which Cicero accounts for 346, or just over 75%. 61 Needless to say, the state of the corpus and the overrepresentation of Cicero does not admit the use of hard statistics. Nevertheless, I consider instances in which Ciceronian use accounts for over 50% of occurrences in Republican usage to be statistically notable. 62 For example, Cicero names Terentia—likely a relative of Varro’s—85 times in the Ciceronian corpus, all in the letters. For a summary of this, see Claasen (1996) 214–215. 63 This apothegm makes its way to Erasmus, Adagia 1248 “Homo est bulla.” If this was indeed a Roman apothegm (and I suspect it was not), the phrase would have been “homo bull’ est” or “hom’ est bulla,” not Varro’s est homo bulla. More on this bizarre phrase below, but Erasmus’ quotation of Varro is the origin of the “Homo Bulla” topos, a popular motif in early Renaissance art and especially Vanitas paintings (cf., e.g., Karel DuJardin, Boy Blowing Soap Bubbles; David Bailly, Still Life; Circle of Hans von Aachen, Homo Bulla Est; Sir John Everett Millais, Bubbles; Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin, The Soap Bubble).

Writing between the Lines in Varro’s de Rebus Rusticis  165 64 For “Cumae,” we should understand not so much the ancient town surrounding the acropolis of Cumae and hard by the “Cave of the Sibyl,” but rather the area extending to the southeast, toward the Lucrine Lake and the coastline, which is where Cicero himself also held a villa. 65 Joseph McAlhany has noted that the Sibyl is said to have written her prophecies on leaves (cf. Servius Ad Aen. 3.444, in foliis autem plamarum sibyllam scribere solere testatur Varro) and to live on within them, and he suggests that this is a meaning that underlies Varro’s use of the Sibyl in this passage. I find this an attractive and convincing interpretation, and one that dovetails nicely with my own. 66 So Martial—if hardly careful or between the lines—5.69: Antoni Phario nihil obiecture Pothino et leuius tabula quam Cicerone nocens, quid gladium demens Romana stringis in ora? hoc admisisset nec Catilina nefas. impius infando miles corrumpitur auro, et tantis opibus uox tacet una tibi. quid prosunt sacrae pretiosa silentia linguae? incipient omnes pro Cicerone loqui. See also cf. Velleius Paterculus 2.66 (abscisaque scelere Antonii uox publica est).

Works Cited Ackerman, J. 1986. “The Villa as Paradigm.” Perspecta 22: 10–31. Baraz, Y. 2012. A Written Republic: Cicero’s Philosophical Politics. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Baxter, J. 2014. Double-Voicing at Work: Power, Gender, and Linguistic Expertise. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Claasen, J.-M. 1996. “Documents of a Crumbling Marriage: The Case of Cicero and Terentia.” Phoenix 50: 208–232. Conte, G. B. 1999. Latin Literature. A History. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Green, C. M. 1997. “Free as a Bird: Varro de re Rustica 3.” AJP 118: 427–428. Kronenberg, L. 2009. Allegories of Farming from Greece and Rome: Philosophical Satire in Xenophon, Varro and Virgil. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 2017. “Varro the Roman Cynic: The Destruction of Religious Authority in Antiquitates Rerum Divinarum.” In Authority and Expertise in Ancient Scientific Culture, eds. J. König and G. Woolf. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 306–328. Leach, E. W. 1999. “Ciceronian ‘Bi-Marcus’: Correspondence with M. Terentius Varro and L. Papirius Paetus in 46 B.C.E.” TAPA 129: 139–179. Linderski, J. 1995. Roman Questions. Stuttgart: Steiner. Melzer, A. M. 2014. Philosophy Between the Lines. The Lost History of Esoteric Writing. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Morson, G. 1989. “Parody, History, and Metaparody.” In Rethinking Bakhtin: Extensions and Challenges, eds. C. Emerson and G. S. Morson. Evanston: Northwestern University Press. 63–86. Mosca, B. 1937. “Satira Filosofica e Politica nelle ‘Menipee’ di Varrone.” Annali della R. Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa. Lettere, Storia e Filosofia, 2nd series, 6: 41–77. ———. Nelsestuen, G. 2015. Varro the Agronomist. Columbus: Ohio State University Press. Rose, H. J. 1996. A Handbook of Latin Literature: From the Earliest Times to the Death of Augustine. Wauconda: Bolchazy-Carducci.

166  S. Stroup Skydsgaard, J. E. 1968. Varro the Scholar: Studies in the First Book of Varro’s De Re Rustica. Copenhagen: Munksgaard. Strauss, L. 1952. Persecution and the Art of Writing. Chicago: Free Press. ———. Stroup, S. C 2010. Catullus, Cicero, and a Society of Patrons: The Generation of the Text. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 2013. “‘When I Read My Cato, It Is as If Cato speaks’: The Birth and Evolution of Cicero’s Dialogic Voice.” In The Author’s Voice in Classical and Late Antiquity, eds. A. Marmodoro and J. Hill. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 123–151. Victorius, P. 1542. Explicationes suarum in Catonem, Varronem, Columellam Castigationum. Lyon: Gryphium. Volk, K. 2019. “Varro and the Disorder of Things.” HSCP 110: 183–212. Wiseman, T. P. 2009. Remembering the Roman People: Essays on Late-Republican Politics and Literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

9

The Shadows of Archimedes Intertextual Anxieties in Hyginus Gromaticus’ Constitutio Limitum Del A. Maticic

The Constitutio Limitum of Hyginus Gromaticus, a Flavian-era treatise preserved in the Corpus Agrimensorum Romanarum, teaches the reader methods of laying and recording limites, the grid of roads that divide the properties in a Roman colony.1 On the way, the sweeping, if at times meandering, didactic plot of this treatise leads the student through the history of limites and various problems arising in the process of centuriation.2 One of these requires that the surveyor-in-training ­understand the basics of gnomonicē, or the science of sundials, and is illustrated with a triad of literary references, to Archimedes’ Sand Reckoner, Vergil’s Georgics, and Lucan’s Pharsalia. Such literary references are highly unusual in the works of the agrimensores, and the goal of this chapter is to analyze their intertextual dynamics. In particular, I argue that, if we read them as literary allusions that import meaning of the source text into the new context of the treatise, they seem to allude to the violence of Roman wars that were the backdrop of the images of cosmic order extracted by the surveyor. These allusions, therefore, seem to introduce a subversive element into the technical discourse of land-survey instruction. In approaching Hyginus’ treatise in this way, I aim to contribute to the large body of scholarship on Roman land-surveying an analysis of the understudied art of writing treatises about it.3 Few scholars have made much of the literary dynamics of the Constitutio, or scrutinized Hyginus’ dialogues with nontechnical literature through a literary-critical lens. Rather, the consensus finds that the references demonstrate, in Dilke’s words, the “predilection of the ancients for using poetry as an educational medium” (1971: 61). They are read as honey on the cup of ­especially tricky technical instruction, or merely as passages from canonical texts that happened to suit Hyginus’ need for examples.4 Only recently, Courtney Roby has systematically explored how two land surveyors, Balbus and our Hyginus, approach, in different ways, the transformation of the land-surveying treatise into a form fit for an elite Roman literary milieu.5 As we shall see, however, still more may be made of the literary references as such, for they deepen the text and behave poetically in unexpected ways (Nicolet 1990: 151). Indeed, Hyginus’ allusivity is not only a rhetorical device of the text, but also a way of complicating the poetic and ideological dynamics in the text. In phrasing my argument in this way, I aim to build on recent approaches to the literary dynamics of Greek and Roman technical literature. In recent years, scholars DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-13

168  D. A. Maticic have come increasingly to realize that Roman technical literature, as the loose genre has been called, constitutes more than just practical treatises on “real-world” problems at the margins of ancient literature.6 On the contrary, they share with more canonical literary texts dynamics that make them “literary” in the first place. The recent volume of Formisano and van der Eijk (2017) demonstrates that, throughout Greek and Latin medical, architectural, agricultural, and geographic writings, authors wrestle with the question of what it means to textualize and transform into literature the expertise they purport to impart. In many ways, these texts appear to be more interested in discursive and epistemic problems than in generating pragmatic value. Hyginus, not only as a writer but also as a reader, engages precisely in these problems. I will first introduce the references and, in the next section, will explore their subversive penumbra. They come in Hyginus’ guide to using the heavenly bodies to orient orthogonal settlements properly. The author invokes the cosmic significance of orthogonal planning in the oft-cited opening passage. He writes, “limites are not established without taking the system of the world into account, since the decumani are aligned according to the course of the sun, and the kardines from the axis of the earth” (enim limites non sine mundi ratione, quoniam decumani secundum solis decursum diriguntur, kardines a poli axe, CL 1.3). But just as past surveyors sometimes failed to follow the neat grid pattern, they also often miscalculated the cardinal directions since, either out of laziness or ignorance, they determined these directions by sighting according to the sunrise instead of adequately finding the directions. To empower his students to access the requisite information to centuriate properly, Hyginus introduces the science of the sundial, which is, Hyginus explains in a gnomic remark seeming more Pindaric than agrimensorial, a necessary tool because “our desire to find the truth cannot be realized except through a shadow’s movements” (explicari enim desiderium nostrum ad uerum nisi per umbrae momenta non potest, CL 8.1). As he has earlier indicated, in order to understand the proper method of determining the cardinal directions, it is necessary to discover the origins of the system of centuriation (quaerenda est ergo huius rationis origo, CL 7.1). It is in this excursus on fundamentals of the practice of limitatio that our three literary references come. The first step in the instruction is to determine how to measure the size of the Earth, which we can do by using the science of sundials. First, as an example of the power of doing things with shadows, Hyginus offers Archimedes (CL 8.3): Nam et Archimeden, uirum praeclari ingenii et magnarum rerum inuentorem, ferunt scripsisse, quantum arenarum capere posset mundus, si repleretur. credamus ergo illum diuinarum rerum magnitudinem ante oculos habuisse. They say that Archimedes, a man of celebrated genius and inventor of many great things, wrote how many grains of sand the universe could hold if it were filled up. We should believe, therefore, he had the magnitude of the divine order of things before his eyes. This he wrote in Sand Reckoner, but, as I shall argue, Hyginus is pointing to specific passages in a literary tradition about Archimedes.

The Shadows of Archimedes in Hyginus Gromaticus  169 Having established the importance of measuring how much land is in the Earth, it is then necessary to understand the position of the Earth in the mundus. Thus, Hyginus proceeds to explain the Pythagorean model of celestial intervals between Saturn, the Sun, and the Earth at the center, and to explain the familiar model of the five heavenly zones, which he quotes seven lines from Georgics 1 to illustrate. ­Finally, he synthesizes the phenomena of the celestial spheres and heavenly zones by explaining that one’s location in the terrestrial zones influences how one perceives the heavenly bodies. In particular, he points to the fact that, depending on where on Earth someone stands, their shadow can fall in different directions at even the same time of day. By way of illustration, he quotes a couplet from Pharsalia 3. Each of these references, superficially, depicts the lights and shadows of the cosmos performing their orderly function. This knowledge promises to allow the surveyor to impose this order on human space. However, in contrast with their explicit orderly content and their didactic employment in the treatise, each reference alludes to literary contexts in which the violence of war is about to erupt and the human world fails to accord with the ratio mundi. First, let us consider the Archimedes allusion. Earlier readers of the Constitutio Limitum have puzzled over the inclusion of Sand Reckoner over a more “serious” or practical treatise by the philosopher. Roby argues that the allusion serves to elevate the status of the surveying treatise as a literary and not just pedestrian discipline, with the result that, “while the problem is ostensibly practical, it is put on a higher plane by invoking this more advanced mathematics” (2014: 21–22). I argue, however, that Hyginus alludes not only to Archimedes’ writing, but also to the story of the death of Archimedes, oft-repeated in Roman literature, in which all report that Archimedes was killed when Marcus Claudius Marcellus sacked Syracuse during the Second Punic War.7 As the story goes, Archimedes built war machines that made Syracuse nearly impregnable, and when the Romans finally broke through, they occupied the streets. Expressly against Marcellus’ orders, an unnamed Roman soldier slew the mathematician, whom he found drawing geometrical diagrams in the sand. It is, first of all, noteworthy that he signals with ferunt scripsisse that he is not engaging with Archimedes’ text directly. By contrast, when introducing the “evidence” of Georgics and Pharsalia, Hyginus uses the same formula: he makes a claim, introduces confirming passages with the same formula (sic ait Vergilius, 8.5; sic ait Lucanus, 8.9), and quotes the passage. In so doing, Hyginus effectively creates what scholars of Roman and Hellenistic poetry call an Alexandrian footnote, embedding an allusion within what is presented as a quotation.8 In our text, Archimedes is called both an inuentor and mortalis. The work of Sand Reckoner is articulated using metaphors of capture and detainment in arenarum capere and deprehendit. Most importantly, there is evidence to suggest that Hyginus had a particular account of the death in mind. In his Life of Marcellus, Plutarch records three different versions of the death of Archimedes. According to the first two, the unnamed soldier kills Archimedes, who refused to stop working on his problem. In the third version, the story differs: “as Archimedes was carrying to Marcellus some of his mathematical instruments (i.e., sundial rods and spheres and squares) with which he made the magnitude of the Sun visible, soldiers happened upon him

170  D. A. Maticic and, thinking that he was carrying gold in the box, killed him” (ὡς ϰομίζοντι πϱὸς Μάϱϰελλον αὐτῷ τῶν μαθηματιϰῶν ὀϱγάνων σϰιόθηϱα ϰαὶ σϕαίϱας ϰαὶ γωνίας, αἷς ἐναϱμόττει τὸ τοῦ ἡλίου μέγεθος πϱὸς τὴν ὄψιν, στϱατιῶται πεϱιτυχόντες, ϰαὶ χϱυσίον ἐν τῷ τεύχει δόξαντες ϕέϱειν, ἀπέϰτειναν, Marc. 19.11 Ziegler). The parallel construction of diuinarum rerum magnitudinem ante oculos habuisse and αἷς ἐναϱμόττει τὸ τοῦ ἡλίου μέγεθος πϱὸς τὴν ὄψιν is immediately striking, and the reference to the Sun in Plutarch fits with the broader point Hyginus is making. An allusion to the death of Archimedes in a land-surveying treatise would sound quite an ideological chord. The presence of a land surveyor, as we have seen, implies colonization and the presence of war or, at best, recently obtained peace.9 Hyginus implies this, and other agrimensores say so explicitly. The later author Siculus Flaccus, for example, states this most matter-of-factly: “when the Romans held sway over all peoples, they divided the fields taken in victory from the enemy among the people.”10 Surveyors themselves were often either in the military or accompanying it, with the result that soldiers, therefore, were intimately involved in taking, dividing, and settling centuriated space. The amateur surveyor Balbus illustrates this when he calls his knowledge the “rudiments of his military apprenticeship” (tirocinii rudimenta, 204.8 Campbell), suggesting that the context in which young men first encountered surveying was during their military service.11 In light of this, Hyginus’ invocation of the abstract and lofty mathematics of Archimedes’ Sand Reckoner to empower young surveyors to partition land more effectively and non sine mundi ratione reads like a re-appropriation of Archimedes’ labors to expand Roman empire. The sources of Archimedes’ death are all careful to record Marcellus’ sadness over and lack of complicity in the death of the absentminded genius. Because of a general hesitance to describe Archimedes’ death in detail and a tendency to blame his stubborn industria for his death, scholars have argued convincingly that this death was a source of shame for the Romans. This poignant, complicated moment of contact between Greece and Rome over a technical expert expressly admired seems to say that Rome the invader, supposedly the bearer of geometric hegemony, can perpetrate acts of violence even against mathematics itself. If the presence of emotional ambiguity in response to the ambivalent relationship between Roman violence and knowledge about land management is implicit in the first example, it becomes explicit in the quotations from poets that follow. Both appear somewhat abruptly in the midst of an otherwise technical explanation of surveying methods. The first one is a quotation from Georgics, which describes the five zones of the sky (Geo. 1.233–239 = CL 8.5): quinque tenent caelum zonae: quarum una corusco semper sole rubens et torrida semper ab igni; quam circum extremae dextra laeuaque trahuntur caeruleae, glacie concretae atque imbribus atris; has inter mediamque duae mortalibus aegris munere concessae diuum, et uia secta per ambas, obliquus qua se signorum uerteret ordo.

The Shadows of Archimedes in Hyginus Gromaticus  171 Five zones comprise the sky. One of them is always red with the glowing sun and always parched by fire. Around this zone, the dark, outermost zones stretch to the left and right, clotted with ice and black storms. Between these and the middle zone, two have been conceded to feeble mortals by the generosity of the gods. A path transects these zones through which the slanted series of the constellations may turn itself. Though what Hyginus takes from Vergil is an Eratosthenean scheme for dividing the world up into five parts, our interest is less in the technical details preserved in the quotation than the fact that its provenance is Georgics 1.12 As Monica Gale and others have shown, Georgics is caught in a Lucretian paradox, balanced ­between promises of tranquil peace and the antithetical relationship between warfare and agriculture, on the one hand, and, on the other, the perpetual war waged in the world down to the atoms.13 Along these lines, the poem casts the farmer as a warring general leading a charge against res incultae, and proper knowledge of the working of the world can elevate the farmer to a stronger, if contingent and temporary, position of power. This is present at the very beginning of Vergil’s anthropogony in Georgics 1, in the language of land surveying: “Before Jove, no settlers subjugated the plowland. To designate or divide the field with limites was sacrilege. Men sought middle ground, and the Earth herself gave everything more freely, even if no one asked.”14 Servius notes explicitly that Vergil’s use of the word signare here is seemingly drawn from the writing of the agrimensores.15 Even though, as Richard Thomas (1988b: ad loc.) has noted, war has not yet been introduced in Vergil’s Ages of Man, the language of veteran settlement forms a synecdoche for farming in general. But then labor was introduced into the post-Saturnian world as a necessary part of surviving on the land,16 and would-be farmers had to use whatever resources were at their disposal to subjugate effectively. Thus come the many lessons on farming, on husbandry, on kosmos for reading knowledge. The ability to interpret the signa in the natural world (like those of the heavenly bodies) can help you navigate contingencies in the ongoing agricultural struggles. Or (and this is more important for our purposes) the signa can tell you the sky is falling, as Vergil poignantly explains concerning the fidelity of the Sun: “Who would dare to call the sun a liar [solem quis dicere falsum | audeat]? Often will he even warn us that black tumult looms and that treachery and covert wars swell” (1.463–464). It is here that the famous depiction of Roman social strife ends Georgics 1, as the orderly arts of labor seem to get swept away. Within this cosmic setting, Hyginus, to use the phrase first applied to Roman literature by Philip Hardie (1986: 64), teaches us to read the heavens. Both the absence of the surveyor in the Golden Age and the colonizer’s promotion to the rank of a quasi-general in a cosmic war complicate the relationship between knowledge, land, and power. Though, in many ways, modern scholars are the ones who have established the notion of a “pessimistic” Vergil, the ambivalent status of the role of surveying and its cultural and ideological limitations did not elude Hyginus. He seems, indeed, to hint at a conversation with Vergil and his portrayal of the natural world.

172  D. A. Maticic The Lucan quotation, introduced similarly in the midst of technical discussion, offers further evidence for this relationship between the Sun and civil war (3.247−248 = CL 8.9): inuisum uobis, Arabes, uenistis in orbem, umbras mirati nemorum non ire sinistras.17 Into a world begrudged by you, O Arabs, have you come, shocked that the shadows of trees do not fall on your left. This quotation from Pharsalia 3 is, of the three references made in the guide to sundials, the one most obviously recalled from a theater of war. The Arab who sees his shadow is one of the many peoples from around the world who rise behind Pompeius Magnus in the Roman civil war. Announcing the catalog that includes the couplet in question, Lucan reports that “across the world, the fortune of Magnus stirred cities about to die with him in battle” (interea totum Magni fortuna per orbem | secum casuras in proelia mouerat urbes, 3.169–170). While scholars are inclined to treat the quotation as the poetic description of a curious optical phenomenon, however, I suggest that Hyginus has picked up on a subtler feature of the couplet’s poetic power that functions similarly to the allusions to Sand Reckoner and Georgics. On one reading of the ideological underpinnings of Pharsalia 3, the world rallies around Pompey and Caesar because Rome, to use (like Lucan) Ovid’s famous phrase, has successfully brought the entire world into the city (orbis in urbe) and made Roman imperium co-terminus with the cosmos.18 However, the image of shadows falling in unexpected ways seems to function as a kind of hiatus in the expected elision between human and natural discordia. Here, though, humans can wage their cosmic wars, while the greater mundi ratio goes on turning unaffected. Lucan, as it were, cleaves cosmos and imperium, causing them to misalign. Instead of being a symptom of a mysterious cosmic accident, it is rather the natural outcome of the Sun behaving as it always does. Just as, in Vergil and Lucretius, strife is encoded into the atoms, here too it is adumbrated by the solar system itself.19 Hyginus, I conclude, imports the same tension into his treatise, and the experience of reading the text is one of poignant friction between didactic instruction and the contexts of his source material. Each explicit reference to another author in the passage offers, on the one hand, a brief snapshot of the cosmos nested in a textual or narrative context of war. On the other hand, this narrative context of violence is, in turn, encompassed by the cosmos it seems to contain. The presence of these other texts in Constitutio hints at a certain crisis of context. The image of the marshaled Arabs standing, perhaps, in Italy, ready for war and shocked at the business of heavenly bodies going on as usual, shows how tenuous the connection between human and natural realms can be for a viewer in both places at once. Thanks to Georgics, we are put on guard against the heavenly signs themselves, have been reminded that even the ratio mundi can promise tumult, treachery, and war. Meanwhile, the author compels us to ask whether the surveyor is Archimedes of Sand Reckoner, triumphantly picturing the whole universe filled

The Shadows of Archimedes in Hyginus Gromaticus  173 with Earth before his eyes, or Archimedes of Syracuse, staring to death at geometry furrowed underneath him in the dust. Not only can the human and natural worlds be misaligned, even as human affairs rise to cosmic proportions, but the misalignment seems almost to be encoded into the limites of a Roman colony. Hyginus’ ideal for the surveyor is one who seeks out shadows on the land and records them. He shows us those shadows in ambiguous memories of Rome’s worldwide violence, despite still being sine mundi ratione. The presence of this ambiguity seems to run counter to the predominant interpretation of how the agrimensores conceived of empire. Multiple studies have found justifications of Roman imperium in their writings.20 This is connected to a broader tendency to find in the practice of centuriation an imposition of mathematical ideological infrastructure onto the Roman landscape.21 Of course, thanks to archaeological investigations into the history of Roman urban form, it has become increasingly clear that the ideal of an even grid of centuriation was absent from the vast majority of colonial contexts. Scholars have been especially ready to read Hyginus’ treatise in these optimistic terms. Though some dispute the dating, we may assign it to the second half of the 70s ce.22 The mid- to late 70s in Rome was a time, as Carlos Noreña has expounded in detail (2003: 29–31), when Pax was a cornerstone of imperial ideology. In 75 ce (the terminus post quem for Constitutio) alone, Vespasian inaugurated the Templum Pacis in the very heart of Roman political space, as part of a building program commemorating his conquest of Judea, and Pax appears on 80% of minted denarii. It thus befits his time that in Constitutio, Hyginus sandwiches a digression on the history of Roman limites between two peace-filled ablatives absolute. Hyginus writes that “when then the toil of many wars was over, distinguished Romans founded cities for the sake of expanding the Republic” (finitis ergo ampliorum bellorum operibus, augendae rei publicae causa inlustres Romanorum uiri urbes constituerunt, CL 5.1). Hyginus also contrasts the uir acerrimus Julius Caesar, waging war all over the world and bringing a moment of peace only at the tired end, with Augustus, who imparted peace to all the world (Augustus adsignata orbi terrarum pace, CL 5.6). Nor is this the only part of the treatise to establish a positive view of Augustus. Ratti has shown that, more than any other extant writing of an agrimensor, Hyginus is preoccupied with Augustus, mentioning him seven different times as a clement reformer (cf. Ratti 1996: 221–222). The sort of pax the Templum celebrated was, as Noreña (2003: 34–35) and Pollard (2009: 314–319) are careful to remind us, not civil peace achieved at the end of civil war, but military pax that Rome imposed on those it defeated. It was parta uictoriis pax, in the words of Res Gestae. It was the kind of peace that kept a gromaticus employed. Fittingly, one express aim of Hyginus’ historical digression is to provide examples of different forms of colonial foundation. This is important because in many, if not most cases, the surveyor is not working on a blank canvas of landscape, but rather imposing Roman order onto an urban plan already present (Rati 1996: 225–228). Despite—and, in part, because of—this variation, Hyginus stresses that we should aim to establish limites not according to contingencies of history or topography, but rather according to the ratio mundi.

174  D. A. Maticic Hyginus’ intertextuality introduces a wrinkle into this optimism, however, reminding the attentive reader that, before one can have this pax, there must first be war, and that for every Marcellus there is an Archimedes. It is as if Hyginus momentarily relates with the dead geometer, a colleague on the losing side of the mathematics of conquest. One may here compare a Vergilian allusion to the philosopher’s death in the Elysium episode of Aeneid 6. As Kirk Freudenburg has recently argued (2017: 129–136), in the famous “Parade of Heroes,” when Anchises briefly mentions the elder Marcellus triumphantly bearing the spolia opima, Aeneas’ father celebrates Rome’s imperial power while also triggering memories of its violent ends (6.855–859). Though Archimedes’ death is present in the text only in absentia, its memory casts a shadow on Anchises’ cosmic-imperial vision of Rome’s imperium sine fine—and on the very possibility of such an empire’s existing as a geodesic reality. It is, of course, only a subtle hint and not an outright warning about the accidents and dangers of empire. The presence of this tension is unspoken beneath the surface of the text, and imperium is ultimately undeterred. The penumbral pessimism that Hyginus’ intertexts cast on the technical discourse of his treatise are similarly ambiguous and ultimately ineffectual. Without explicitly questioning the ideological engine of which he was a part, he introduces anxieties about the status of the technical experts who work at the intersection of geometry, literature, and empire, and contextualizes his activity in a wider context of not only Roman order but also the accidental violence it spawns. It is therefore fitting that a central concern of Constitutio is to explain how best to impose one spatial system on another one. The new order should be superior, more sublime, truer to the world. This is, of course, not that far afield from the promise of the imposed peace of Pax Romana, a parta uictoriis pax, but a partita uictoriis pax, as well. Fittingly, as Ratti notes, when Hyginus says that Augustus reigned adsignata terrarum orbi pace, he puns on the use of adsignare “to assign land” (1996: 25). Such a transformation entails changes to regimes and spaces, and even if the defeated are drawn in, it is on the terms of the winners. Vespasian’s Templum Pacis, after all, publicly displayed masterpieces of Greek art and the spoils of his Judean conquests all around the Forma Urbis Romanae (Noreña 2003: 27). Hyginus’ literary allusions function to encode anxieties about such conquests into the discourse of the land surveying treatise and, it would seem, into the very limites inscribed on the Earth. Ultimately, those anxieties fail to be subversive or change anything. The very existence of the land surveyor means that humankind has fallen from the Golden Age into strife, and Marcellus took Archimedes’ measuring tools, even if he regretted the inventor’s accidental death. But, by reminding us that land surveying is a discipline immersed in shadows of its own, the author embeds his technical instruction into a long history of violence and intertextuality. Notes 1 This chapter emerges out of a seminar on ancient technical manuscripts with Alexander Jones in 2016. I must thank Alessandro Barchiesi, Marco Formisano, Michael Peachin, Courtney Roby, and Andrew Riggsby for their feedback along the way. I finished parts of this project in residency at the Fondation Hardt in September of 2019, and I am

The Shadows of Archimedes in Hyginus Gromaticus  175 grateful for the use of their resources. There are two authors called Hyginus in the Corpus Agrimensorum Romanorum (CAR). The one discussed in this chapter is usually known as Hyginus Gromaticus or Hyginus 2 in Campbell (2000). I shall always refer to the author discussed here as Hyginus for brevity. I do not discuss the other Hyginus. 2 On the notion of the didactic plot, see Fowler (2000). 3 The voluminous scholarship on the treatises tends to be more interested in historical and technical questions. For a thorough bibliography on the day-to-day practices of the surveyors, their social status, and the legal and religious context in which they worked, see Roby (2014: 14 n. 13). The critical monographs on the texts and historical practice of land surveying include Chouquer & Favory (2001), an essential study of the texts and professional practices of land surveyors and the laws pertaining to them that builds on the earlier work of Hindrichs (1974); and Dilke (1971), which provides a similar introduction for anglophone audiences. The past twenty years have seen the publication of two commentaries and translations of the CAR that have vastly increased access to the difficult texts: Guillaumin’s three-part Budé commentary (2005, 2010, 2014); and Campbell (2000). All Latin passages reference Guillaumin’s Budé editions (so, for the Consitutio Limitum, see Guillaumin 2010: 78–123). While Campbell is helpful for its unique English translation of the treatises (2000: 134–163), Guillaumin’s edition is superior for its extensive critical apparatus. On the extremely complicated MSS tradition of the CAR, cf. Guillaumin (2005: 45–50) and Campbell (2000: xxi–xxii). 4 Neither Campbell (2000) nor Guillaumin (2005) includes any discussion of the literary references as such in their commentaries. That said, cf. Guillaumin (2010: xlv) on how “le souvenir” of Vergil and Seneca “soit present à l’esprit de Siculus [Flaccus],” a later author in the CAR. 5 Roby (2014) explores how the surveyors transform the knowledge of geometry to suit it to a Roman audience. In the case of Hyginus, she shows how he “constructs surveying as a mosaic of interdisciplinary influences” and builds a bridge between the practical work of surveying and the theoretical concerns of Greek geometry (19). 6 See Formisano (2017) for a recent survey of scholarship on Greek and Roman scholarship. By “practical,” I mean, as Formisano (2017: 14) articulates it, that the texts seem, on the surface, to “claim to be instruments applicable in extra-textual reality.” 7 For the various accounts of Archimedes’ death, see Cicero Verr. 2.4.131, De Fin. 5.50; Livy 25.31.9; Valerius Maximus 8.ext.7; Plutarch Marc. 19.4–6. Cf. also Pliny NH 7.125; Silius Italicus 14.665–678. See Jaeger (2008: 77–100) for a discussion of these accounts. 8 Ross (1975: 78) and Hinds (1998: 1–5). Such Alexandrian footnotes are often signaled, or indexed, with words like dicunt or fama est. 9 For Hyginus, this is the historical reality of Roman land surveying, which burgeoned during Caesar’s wars and continued during Augustus’ peace (CL 5.1–6). 10 Siculus Flaccus 1.7 Guillaumin: ut uero Romani omnium gentium potiti sunt, agros ex hoste captos in uictorem populum partiti sunt. On the dating of this treatise, which is most likely written after 96 ce and possibly as late as the early fourth century ce, see Guillaumin (2010: xxxv–xxxvi) and Chouquer & Favory (2001: 27–29). On the treatise as possessing “la dimension de texte paradigmatique” of the land surveying treatise, see Guillaumin (2010: xxxvi). 11 Cf. tirocinium ponere (Livy 45.37.3; Seneca Contr. 9.5.15); rudimentum ponere (Livy 31.11.15; Suetonius Nero 22.2). 12 On the schema of the world, see also Eratosthenes, Herm. fr. 16 Powell, clearly Vergil’s source, and Thomas (1986: 195–197) on the relation between the two and other Vergilian sources. 13 See esp. Gale (2000: 232–269) on nature as a cosmic battlefield. Cf. Thomas (1988a) for more on the relationship between violence and nature in Vergil. For a collocation of “pessimisms” in scholarship on Georgics, see Zanker (2011). 14 Geo. 1.125–128: ante Iouem nulli subigebant arua coloni; | ne signare quidem aut partiri limite campum | fas erat; in medium quaerebant, ipsaque tellus | omnia liberius

176  D. A. Maticic nullo poscente ferebat. Cf. also Geo. 2.109 with Thomas (1988: ad loc.); Ecl. 4.393. The idea that land surveying is a symptom of man’s devolution appears also in Tibullus 1.3.43–44, Horace Carm. 3.24.9–15, and Ovid Met. 1.135–136. One may trace the idea of the generous giving unasked back to Hesiod Op. 117–118. 15 Serv. Gramm. ad loc. Geo. 1.126 (Thilo and Hagen 1961: 162): signare notare, propterea quod, cum agri colonis diuiderentur, fossa ducebatur ab oriente ad occidentem, quae cardo nuncupabatur, et alia de septentrione ad meridiem, qui decimanus limes uocabatur, et alii minores erant in obliquum discreti, qui lineares appellabantur et agros per centurias siue iugera diuisos coercebant. Cf. Hyginus Gr. 1.3–4: constituti enim limites non sine mundi ratione, quoniam decimani secundum solis decursum diriguntur, kardines a poli axe. unde primum haec ratio mensurae constituta ab Etruscorum haruspicum [uel auctorum habet, quorum artificium] disciplina, quod illi orbem terrarum in duas partes secundum solis cursum diuiserunt: dextram appellauerunt quae septentrioni subiacebat, sinistram quae ad meridianum terrae esset, occasum, quod eo sol et luna spectaret; alteram lineam duxerunt a meridiano in septentrionem et a media ultra anticam, citra posticam nominauerunt. Cf. also Frontinus 3.1 Guillaumin, which is very similar to Hyginus’ text. For an explanation of the kardo and decumanus, see Dilke (1971: 231–233). 16 In the words of Geue (2018: 119), “Labor is a touchstone (or grindstone) of the Georgics’ universe; an existential state forced on men by the negative boons of the age of Jupiter.” On the etiology of labor, see Geo. 1.145–146; Geue (2018: 119 = 122); Gale (2000: 143–195); Jenkyns (1993). 17 Note that Hyginus has replaced ignotum with inuisum. Neither Housman (1927) nor Shackleton -Bailey (1988) record any alternatives to ignotum in the manuscripts. 18 See Ars Amatoria 1.174 with Hollis (1977: ad loc.). For more on this phrase, see Otto (1962: 358–359), s.v. urbs; Hardie (1986: 364–366, 376); Nicolet (1990: 113–114). 19 As Christopher B. Polt insightfully points out to me, one might ask whether the anxieties surrounding Hyginus’ intertextual limites might be compared to those related to maritime boundaries, the transgression of which marked the decline from the Golden Age and inevitably caused wars among men. See, e.g., Seneca Med. 319–320; see Feeney (1991: 330–331) for other examples of this motif in Latin literature. It is perhaps noteworthy that, like Hyginus, Catullus uses the language of the Alexandrian footnote at the beginning of poem 64 in one of the most densely intertextual passages in Latin literature, suggesting perhaps a conceptual link between the acts of literary allusion and maritime travel. On the allusivity of that passage, see Thomas (1982). Unlike Catullus, however, in Hyginus, war is ushered in not by an act of boundary-crossing but rather boundary-marking. Of course, the dynamics of intertextuality facilitate doing both. 20 Ratti (1996) and Guillaumin (1994) in particular. Guillaumin (2010: xliv) refers to an “idéologie de la victoire qui sous-tend les textes” of the agrimensores. 21 See Guillaumin (2005: 1) on the “mathematical fields” of the Romans. Many note the ideological ramifications of linking Roman conquest to the geometric ideal of centuriated space. Nicolet (1990: 149–170) reads the limites as primarily part of Rome’s “administrative geography,” and sees the function of ordered space as an expression of control (and especially fiscal control) over conquered lands. Guillaumin (1994) finds in the mundi ratio a Platonizing ambition. Moatti (1997: 247) sees in the surveyors a culmination of “les progrès de l’abstraction” that, according to her, characterizes intellectual history between the late Republic and the Empire. La Gall (1975) argued that the land surveyors of the early Empire were the first to place this ideological emphasis on limites, and that the attribution of the importance of orthogonal planning based on the stars to Etruscan haruspices was an exercise in backdating. For a recent rebuttal of La

The Shadows of Archimedes in Hyginus Gromaticus  177 Gall on the history of orthogonal planning in Rome, see Magli (2008). For other studies of the ideological ramifications of centuriation, see Palet & Orengo (2011), Chouquer (2003; 2000). On centuriation as a signum imperii imposed by the Romans on conquered space, see Clavel-Lévêque (1993). 22 Roby (2014: 18–19) thoroughly summarizes the debate over the date, concluding that the text most likely appeared in the 70s or 80s. Ratti (1996: 228–234) concludes very precisely that the treatise can be dated between 75 and 77 ce, though the terminus ante quem is not entirely certain. See Guillaumin (2005: 67) for a cautious endorsement of the principles of Ratti’s argument.

Works Cited Campbell, B. 2000. The Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors: Introduction, Text, Translation and Commentary. London: Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies. Chouquer, G. 2000. L’étude des paysages: Essais sur leurs forms et leur histoire. Paris: Errance. ———. 2003. “L’espace des sociétés antiques, entre projet et experience.” Études Rurales 167–168: 69–91. Chouquer, G., and F. Favory 2001. L’Arpentage romain: histoire des textes, droit, techniques. Paris: Errance. ———. 1993. “La cadastració en l’espai imperial: Memòria I raó.” L’Avenç 167: 18–23. Dilke, O. A. W. 1971. The Roman Land Surveyors: An Introduction to the Agrimensores. Newton abbot: David & Charles. Feeney, D. 1991. The Gods in Epic: Poets and Critics of the Classical Tradition. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Formisano, M. 2017. “Introduction: The Poetics of Knowledge.” In Formisano & van der Eijk (2017) 12–26. Formisano, M., and P. van der Eijk 2017. Knowledge, Text and Practice in Ancient Technical Writing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Fowler, D. 2000. “The Didactic Plot.” In Matrices of Genre, eds. M. Depew and D. Obbink. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. 205–219. Freudenburg, K. 2017. “Seeing Marcellus in Aeneid 6.” JRS 107: 116–139. Gale, M. 2000. Virgil on the Nature of Things: The Georgics, Lucretius, and the Didactic Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Geue, T. 2018. “Soft Hands, Hard Power: Sponging off the Empire Off Leisure (Virgil, Georgics 4).” JRS 108: 115–140. Guillaumin, J. 1994. “Géométrie grecque et agrimensorique romaine. La science comme justification d’une idéologie.” Dialogues d’Histoire Ancienne 20: 279–295. Guillaumin, J. 2005. Les Arpenteurs Romains Tome I: Hygin le Gromatique; Frontin. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Guillaumin, J. 2010. Les Arpenteurs Romains Tome II: Hygin; Siculus Flaccus. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Guillaumin, J. 2010. Les Arpenteurs Romains Tome III: Commentaire anonyme sur Frontin. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Hardie, P. 1986. Virgil’s Aeneid: Cosmos and Imperium. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hindrichs, F. T. 1974. Die Geschichte der gromatischen Institutionen. Untersuchungen zu Landverteilung, Landvermessung, Bodenverwaltung und Bodenrecht im römischen Reich. Wiesbaden: Steiner. Hinds, S. 1998. Allusion and Intertext: Dynamics of Appropriation in Roman poetry. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

178  D. A. Maticic Housman, A. E. 1927. M. Annaei Lucani, Belli Civilis libri decem. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Jaeger, M. 2008. Archimedes and the Roman Imagination. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Jenkyns, R. 1993. “Labor improbus.” CQ 43: 243–248. La Gall, J. 1975. “Les Romains et l’orientation solaire.” Mélanges de l’École française de Rome 87: 287–320. Magli, G. 2008. “On the Orientation of Roman Towns in Italy.” Oxford Journal of Archaeology 27: 63–71. Moatti, C. 1997. La raison de Rome. Naissance de l’esprit critique à la fin de la République. Paris: du Seuil. Nicolet, C. 1990. Space, Geography, and Politics in the Early Roman Empire. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Noreña, C. F. 2003. “Medium and Message in Vespasian’s Templum Pacis.” Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome 48: 25–43. Palet, J. M., and H. A. Orengo 2011. “The Roman Centuriated Landscape: Conception, Genesis, and Development as Inferred from the Ager Tarraconensis Case.” AJA 115: 383–402. Pollard, E. A. 2009. “Pliny’s Natural History and the Flavian Templum Pacis: Botanical Imperialism in First-Century C.E. Rome.” Journal of World History 20: 309–338. Ratti, S. 1996. “Le substrat augustéen dans la Constitutio limitum d’Hygin le Gromatique et la datation du traité.” Dialogues d’Histoire Ancienne 22: 220–238. Roby, C. 2014. “Experiencing Geometry in Roman Surveyors’ Texts.” Nuncius 29: 9–52. Ross, D. O. 1975. Backgrounds to Augustan Poetry: Gallus, Elegy, and Rome. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Shackleton Bailey, D. R. 1988. M. Annaei Lucani de bello civili libri X. Stuttgart: Teubner. Thilo, G., and H. Hagen. 1961. Servii Grammatici qui feruntur in Vergilii Bucolica et Georgica Commentarii. Hildesheim: Olms. Thomas, R. 1982. “Catullus and the Polemics of Literary Reference (Poem 64.1–18).” AJP 103: 144–164. Thomas, R. 1986. “Virgil’s Georgics and the Art of Reference.” HSCP 90: 171–198. Thomas, R. 1988b. Virgil: Georgics I-II. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Thomas, R. 1988a. “Tree Violence and Ambivalence in Virgil.” TAPA 118: 261–273. Zanker, A. T. 2011. “Some Thoughts on the Term ‘pessimism’ and Scholarship in the Georgics.” Vergilius 57: 83–100.

10 Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts for Problems in Horace’s Ars Poetica James J. O’Hara

Before the rediscovery of Aristotle’s Poetics, Horace’s Ars Poetica was perhaps the central Western text offering advice about the composition of literature. Its famous precepts about how “poetry is like painting,” that a storyteller should begin in medias res, and that the writer must carefully revise and polish, continue to resonate with readers. We are all attracted by the idea of studying with a master. The speakers of Horace’s other poems have often talked directly and indirectly about writing poetry, but not with this focus or at this length: at 476 lines, this is Horace’s longest poem. But the Ars Poetica also presents a number of curious problems. It begins by arguing that, just as no painter could avoid laughter if he were to paint a creature part-human, part-horse, and part-fish, so the poet should produce work that is tightly unified. Scholars of art history have shown that hybrid creatures rather like what Horace describes were popular in contemporary wall-painting, so that “As an ancient Roman, if you laughed every time you saw a composite creature painted on the wall, your life would certainly be mirthful.”1 And literary scholars know well that genre-mixing is characteristic of all of Latin poetry, and that both genre-mixing and poems that yoke together two surprising halves make up a good deal of Horace’s output. Most of the Ars Poetica is devoted to teaching its addressees how to write drama, a genre never attempted by Horace and not tremendously popular during his day. A section is even devoted to writing satyr plays, whose importance slowly faded after the Hellenistic period in Greece, and for which there is little unambiguous evidence of existence or production at Rome. There are also several curious statements about the history of poetry and drama, about which dramatists invented what features of tragedy, and how the various poetic meters were invented. Famous for what it says about poetic unity, the poem itself is also either disunified or at least oddly structured. My argument in this chapter is that Horace’s Ars Poetica, like many other works of both Greek and Latin satire and didactic as re-interpreted in recent scholarship,2 offers a speaker whose teaching is often undercut, but never consistently or decisively, so that readers are left unsure of the poem’s genre, goals, and ultimate didactic meaning. This is not a radically new idea, but my somewhat novel claim is that in creating a teaching situation like this, Horace, a former writer of satires, is taking his place in a long tradition of writers of both didactic and satire, who create DOI: 10.4324/9781003378051-14

180  J. J. O’Hara speakers whose authority the poet undercuts either a little or a lot, in ways that can leave the reader uncertain about how seriously to take the teaching. My stress on this ambiguity separates me from some scholars who make confident claims about exactly how we must read these texts. Here I also offer a new context in which to view recent work on the Ars Poetica, as well as differently focused analysis of several passages. And I cite some new or neglected pieces of evidence, one from Philodemus, one from an obscure author discussing Aristotle about whom I learned from an edition of Philodemus. The chapter is related to a book project called Teaching, Pretending to Teach, and the Authority of the Speaker in Greek and Roman Didactic and Satire, that will go from Hesiod to Juvenal, and discuss either briefly or in depth Hesiod; Aristophanes; Callimachus, both his scholarly Aetia and his work in iambic; the ­didactic poems by Aratus on constellations and Nicander on drugs and wild beasts; lesser-known, fragmentary Hellenistic didactic poems; the Epicurean epic of ­Lucretius; Cicero’s translations of Aratus and his comments in prose on Aratus and Nicander; Philodemus’ discussions of poetry; Vergil’s Georgics, plus a bit of the Aeneid that looks like didactic; Horace’s Satires, as well as Ars Poetica; Ovid’s Ars Amatoria, plus portions of the Metamorphoses that look like didactic; and, finally, the Satires of Juvenal.3 This new book will be similar in some ways to my 2007 book on inconsistency in Roman epic. One resemblance is that I am again using a comparative method, beginning with Greek texts and then looking at related problems in a series of Roman poets. Another is that I am again bringing together a lot of scholarship by scholars that have been working independently on similar questions in all these authors. A third is that, in the new book, I will at times be dealing again with inconsistencies, since how we as twenty-first-century scholars respond to inconsistencies in a poem is one of the things that has given us incentive to interpret—rather than emend or fault or lament—problematic features of classical texts, such as the sections that seem to undercut speakers of didactic and satire. This chapter will look at a few problematic passages in the Ars Poetica, which I argue fit well into this broader context. In the larger project, I am looking at both ancient didactic and ancient satire together, in a way that I think has not been done before to this extent. In a sense, I am asking, for all ancient didactic and satire, whether the teaching depicted is real, fictional, or some teasing combination of the two. Each of my authors has been subjected to questions about whether his teaching—be it the often-somber teaching of most didactic or the playful mockery of satire—was both meant and, more importantly, thought or expected to offer useful instruction, or was merely a pose for poetry whose readers looked to it for things other than information and instruction. For Horace’s Ars Poetica, I follow much recent or semi-recent scholarship. Scholars have long struggled with numerous problems in the poem. In 1991, Bernard Frischer tried to provide a complete solution, arguing that the poem is a clear parody of literary criticism, that the speaker is meant to be seen as completely incompetent. This confident and extreme view has not won many adherents, yet many do now question the poem’s status as a teaching document.4 More recent studies argue that advances in the sophistication of our reading of other Horatian

Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts in Ars Poetica  181 poems have made us better able to handle the Ars Poetica; most recently, in the time since I delivered this paper in Cuma, Jennifer Ferriss-Hill has published an excellent book on the Ars Poetica that argues that it should be interpreted much like a Horatian Satire, Epistle, or Ode. In this chapter, I deal first with the opening lines of the poem, and then with what the poem says about drama in its large central section; then I step back to discuss a number of larger concerns, and contexts that might help us address these concerns, before concluding with a few words on the ending of the poem. At the start of the poem, Horace asks whether his friends would be able to hold back laughter (line 5) if they were to view a curious painting of a curious creature, which has a human head, a horse’s neck, feathers described as uarias, and limbs gathered together undique (1–13):5 Humano capiti ceruicem pictor equinam iungere si uelit et uarias inducere plumas undique collatis membris, ut turpiter atrum desinat in piscem mulier formosa superne, spectatum admissi, risum teneatis, amici? 5 Credite, Pisones, isti tabulae fore librum persimilem, cuius, uelut aegri somnia, uanae fingentur species, ut nec pes nec caput uni reddatur formae. “Pictoribus atque poetis quidlibet audendi semper fuit aequa potestas.” 10 Scimus, et hanc ueniam petimusque damusque uicissim, sed non ut placidis coeant immitia, non ut serpentes auibus geminentur, tigribus agni. If a painter should wish to join a horse’s neck to a human head, and add varied feathers to limbs brought together from everywhere, so that a woman beautiful above should disgracefully end in a fish, would you, if brought in for a viewing, hold back your laughter, friends? 5 Trust me, Pisos, a book would be similar to that painting if its depictions are empty and imaginary, like a sick person’s dreams, so that neither head nor foot would match up to one form. “But painters and poets always have had equal power to dare whatsoever they wish.” Yes, and this privilege we both seek and give in turn, but not so that the harsh come together with the tame, that serpents should mate with birds, and lambs with tigers. In line 4, we learn that the creature’s upper half is that of a beautiful woman (“lovely as a wish,” as one translator supplemented it), but that its lower half ends up—in a way described as turpiter, “disgracefully”—as that of a fish. In line 5, Horace asks us to agree with him that we would all laugh at such a painting. In lines 6–9, we learn, for the first time, that the poem will be about or at least partly about written

182  J. J. O’Hara texts and not painting, as Horace decries the “book” in which things appear that are silly fictions, so that the foot and head do not seem to belong to the same shape. An interlocutor objects, at lines 9–10, that poets and painters are always allowed to do whatever daring thing they want, and Horace replies that that’s fine, but only as long as they don’t put together things that don’t belong together. After a few more lines on plastic arts, Horace sums up with a pronouncement: let your work of art be whatever you wish, as long as it is can be described as “simplex” and “unum”: denique sit quod uis, simplex dumtaxat et unum (“in sum, let your work be whatever you wish, as long as it is simple and just one thing,” 23). These first 23 lines have been much discussed, but I think more can be said about them, in part by focusing on the experience of the reader or addressee. I’d like to ask what we, as the addressees of these lines, are being taught. First, we haven’t yet been taught what to do, only what not to do. But what exactly are we being taught not to do? Suppose Horace, or the speaker of this poem, were your dissertation director, or your department head, and your career depended on not doing the thing he hates people doing. What is it? Is it acceptable to have a hybrid, as long as it doesn’t end up in a fish tail? What about that word turpiter, “disgracefully”? Is that a throwaway word that simply intensifies what is being said: “don’t have your hybrid end in a fish tail, that’s awful”? Or is it, “don’t be like the painter who does a bad job of giving his hybrid a fish tail”? Is this something that can be done either well, or badly? What kind of a teacher leaves all this unclear? Critics also rightly ask whether these recommendations of the speaker fit with what was popular in Roman literature, culture, and especially art. Hybrid creatures were popular in Roman wall-painting at this time, and fairly common in poetry.6 So is the speaker out of touch with, or simply disapproving of, current trends? Some scholars say yes, but others say that nothing in wall-painting is quite as whacky as what is described in lines 1–5, and that is true enough. But this would mean that the speaker is telling you not to do something that no one ever does—what is the worth of this kind of teaching? In line 23, denique sit quod uis, simplex dumtaxat et unum, the word simplex (“simple, uncomplicated, made up of only one ingredient”) is a strong one and would seem to prohibit any kind of hybrid creature in painting. When scholars say there is nothing in Roman art as whacky as the creature of lines 1–5, they are downplaying or ignoring this summation in line 23. Horace would seem to be prohibiting anything in painting and poetry that is not simplex. But, of course, nothing in Horace’s own body of published verse, including the Ars Poetica, is really simplex, is it?7 I think it’s clear that the first 23 lines are not very simple. The large central section of this poem, at least lines 153–294 and maybe more, offers advice on how to write plays. Beginning at line 220, Horace enters a lengthy discussion of satyr plays, first as a historical phenomenon, but then clearly as something he imagines his addressees, and even himself (ego…scriptor in 234–235), writing for the present-day stage: Carmine qui tragico uilem certauit ob hircum, mox etiam agrestis Satyros nudauit et asper incolumi grauitate iocum temptauit eo quod

Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts in Ars Poetica  183 inlecebris erat et grata nouitate morandus spectator functusque sacris et potus et exlex. Verum ita risores, ita commendare dicacis 225 conueniet Satyros, ita uertere seria ludo, ne quicumque deus, quicumque adhibebitur heros, regali conspectus in auro nuper et ostro, migret in obscuras humili sermone tabernas, aut, dum uitat humum, nubes et inania captet. 230 Effutire leuis indigna tragoedia uersus, ut festis matrona moueri iussa diebus, intererit Satyris paulum pudibunda proteruis. Non ego inornata et dominantia nomina solum uerbaque, Pisones, Satyrorum scriptor amabo… 235 The poet who first competed in tragic song for a cheap goat prize, soon even bared rustic satyrs and, though still harsh and with his dignity unhampered, tried out joking around, because enticements and pleasant novelty were needed to keep the attention of an audience whose celebration of the festivals left them drunk and unruly. And so it will be suitable to bring on and win favor for joking and talkative satyrs, and to turn what is serious towards the playful, as long as no god will be brought on the stage, and no hero, none recently seen in royal gold and purple, lowering themselves towards dingy huts in humble diction, or, while trying to avoid the lowly, talk in silly, overly lofty ways. Tragedy should not deign to babble light verses, and like a matron ordered to dance on festival days, will be a bit embarrassed among a group of shameless satyrs. If I am writing (plays) for satyrs, Pisos, I will not love only plain and proper words for things… One of the claims of this chapter is that if the Ars Poetica is your only evidence for something, you have no evidence. Satyr plays started fading in prominence after the third century BCE, and although there is scattered evidence for their continuation in the Greek world, there is little unambiguous evidence for much more than very amateurish writing of satyr plays at Rome.8 This makes Horace’s attention to the topic strange, and certainly not very useful to young writers. It’s like recommending in the 2020s that your student, or your child, specialize in typewriter repair. A few lines later, in 251–262, Horace discusses the meters of drama, first the iamb, and then the spondee: Syllaba longa breui subiecta uocatur iambus, pes citus; unde etiam trimetris adcrescere iussit nomen iambeis, cum senos redderet ictus, primus ad extremum similis sibi; non ita pridem,

184  J. J. O’Hara tardior ut paulo grauiorque ueniret ad auris, 255 spondeos stabilis in iura paterna recepit commodus et patiens, non ut de sede secunda cederet aut quarta socialiter. Hic et in Acci nobilibus trimetris adparet rarus, et Enni in scaenam missos cum magno pondere uersus 260 aut operae celeris nimium curaque carentis aut ignoratae premit artis crimine turpi. A long syllable following a short is called an iamb, a quick foot; from this came the command that the name be attached to iambic trimeters, though the trimeter has six beats, from first to last the same measure; not so long ago, so that it might come to the ear more slowly and with more weight, it admitted steady spondees into paternal rights, happy to permit this, except that this cooperative spirit did not extend to allowing spondees in the second or fourth position. But this kind of foot occurs rarely in the noble trimeters of Accius, and as for the verses of Ennius sent on stage with great weightiness, it lays on them the disgraceful charge of hasty work lacking in care or of ignorance of the art. Horace says that the iambic trimeter originally consisted of all iambs, but eventually allowed for substitution of spondees in some positions. This is an odd claim, but odder still because Horace says this happened non ita pridem, “not so long ago,” a strange thing for a Roman of the Augustan Age to say about the addition of spondees to the tragic trimeter of Greek tragedy. Most editors, including Rudd, Shackleton Bailey (1985), and Brink (who, of course, has a full discussion) say that there is a problem with the text here, but no one has come up with a satisfying emendation. But to fault the text here is to assume that the speaker of the Ars Poetica cannot say things that are wrong.9 Is that assumption valid? In lines 275–284, we get more on the history of drama: Ignotum tragicae genus inuenisse Camenae 275 dicitur et plaustris uexisse poemata Thespis quae canerent agerentque peruncti faecibus ora. Post hunc personae pallaeque repertor honestae Aeschylus et modicis instrauit pulpita tignis et docuit magnumque loqui nitique coturno. 280 Successit uetus his comoedia, non sine multa laude; sed in uitium libertas excidit et uim dignam lege regi; lex est accepta chorusque turpiter obticuit sublato iure nocendi. Thespis is said to have discovered the unknown genre of the tragic Muse and to have carried on wagons the poems

Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts in Ars Poetica  185 for men with faces smeared with wine-lees to sing and act out. After him, Aeschylus came up with the mask and noble robe and laid a stage over some simple boards and taught both grand language and mounting high on the tragic boot. Old comedy came next, not without a good share of praise, But its freedom descended into offense and violence that needed to be controlled by law; the law was passed and the chorus, its right to harm removed, grew silent, disgracefully. This is mostly nonsense. The supposed lex restraining comedy at the end of the passage (282–284) is a mystery; Rudd says, “scholars are inclined to discount these statements.” To go through the other claims in order from the beginning: this is the only source that associates Thespis and tragedy with wandering in wagons, as the most natural meaning of lines 275–276 does—comedy was the genre said to be performed by a wandering troupe (see Rudd’s n.).10 Again, one of the claims of this chapter is that if Horace’s Ars Poetica is your only evidence for something, you have no evidence. In lines 278–280, Horace says that Aeschylus invented the mask, the respectable cloak or costume, the use of a moderate wooden stage, speaking grandly, and the tragic boot called the cothurnus. Aeschylus did not invent the mask. He may have made both costume and tragic language grander, so parts of this are not far from the truth. We have no secure information about Aeschylus’ inventing a new kind of stage. And, of course, the cothurnus, the tragic boot or buskin, belongs not to the fifth century but to the Hellenistic period, perhaps the second century BCE. Saying Aeschylus invented the cothurnus is like saying Mozart invented the electric guitar—although, for some reason, there are many ancient sources that do say this about Aeschylus.11 For two details in lines 278–280, we can see exactly what Horace is doing. This has not made it into most discussions of the poem yet, but I think it is important. We need one interesting piece of information that I learned about from Janko’s edition (within his edition of Philodemus’ On Poems) of the fragments of Aristotle’s On Poets, from the fourth-century-CE Themistius’ work On Speaking, or, How the Philosopher Should Speak; I offer Janko’s text and an adapted version of his translation:12 ϰαὶ οὐ πϱοσέχομεν Ἀϱιστοτέλει ὅτι τὸ μὲν πϱῶτον ὁ χοϱὸς εἰσιὼν ᾖδεν εἰς τοὺς θεούς, Θέσπις δὲ πϱόλογόν τε ϰαὶ ῥῆσιν ἐξεῦϱεν, Αἰσχύλος δὲ ὑποϰϱιτὰς ϰαὶ ὀϰϱίβαντας, τὰ δὲ πλείω τούτων Σοϕοϰλέους ἀπηλαύσαμεν ϰαὶ Εὐϱιπίδου; Do we not pay attention to Aristotle, [when he says] that at first the chorus entered and sang to the god, Thespis invented a prologue and the speech, Aeschylus (invented) actors13 and stages (?), and we enjoy the rest of these things courtesy of Sophocles and Euripides? Themistius says that Aristotle said that Aeschylus invented both actors (or the third actor) and something called ὀϰϱίβαντας. This word ὀϰϱίβας can mean buskin or

186  J. J. O’Hara boot, and if that is what Themistius is saying Aristotle said, then he’s obviously wrong and untrustworthy. But Janko notes that this word can also mean “platform,” i.e., the stage, or “supports” for a wooden auditorium, so that’s how he translates it here. This is a more plausible claim for Aeschylus. But it also makes Horace more interesting, for Horace attributes to Aeschylus the invention of both meanings of ὀϰϱίβας, perhaps both “platform” and “platform shoes.” Janko says that Horace is “making sure he was at least half-right.” But he also makes sure he is half-wrong. Horace, even in the first-person persona of the Ars Poetica, is playing around with a scholarly question, a zetema, the way he and especially Vergil and Ovid do when playing around with questions of mythology and etymology.14 So what is Horace doing in the Ars Poetica? He gives some useful advice about writing, although I have not given many examples of that in this chapter—those passages are well known. He also gives some misinformation. And he gives some advice that would be useful only to the student writing in classical Greece. It seems to me that Horace is pretending, pretending to teach; and, in doing so, I think he is following both the practice of some satirical writers and an underappreciated aspect of the didactic tradition. Most ancient and modern authors, beginning with Aristotle and continuing with recent studies, say that didactic differs from other poetry in having no mimetic element, no mimesis or pretense.15 And it’s true that no one’s pretending to be the king of Thebes, or a shepherd, or a lover on someone’s doorstep. But my contention is that, in many instances, the whole thing is mimesis, and the didactic poet is pretending to be a teacher, or at least making it hard for a reader to decide whether he is teaching or merely pretending to be a teacher. One short paper cannot be fully convincing on this point, but I do want to present two pieces of first-century-BCE evidence, one quite well known, one less broadly familiar, though it has been cited. The first is Cicero De Or. 1.69:16 Etenim si constat inter doctos, hominem ignarum astrologiae ornatissimis atque optimis uersibus Aratum de caelo stellisque dixisse; si de rebus rusticis hominem ab agro remotissimum Nicandrum Colophonium poetica quadam facultate, non rustica, scripsisse praeclare, quid est cur non orator de rebus eis eloquentissime dicat, quas ad certam causam tempusque cognorit? If learned men agree that Aratus, who knew nothing about astrology, spoke about the stars and heavens in excellent, nicely ornamented verses, and that Nicander, who was as far removed from the farm as anyone, wrote outstandingly about agricultural matters by means of his poetic, not agricultural skill, then why shouldn’t the orator be able to speak eloquently on those matters on which he has just studied up for a particular time and situation/case?” Cicero says that Aratus, who knew nothing about astrology, spoke elegantly about the subject, and that Nicander, who knew nothing about the farm, wrote in an excellent way about agriculture. The references in this passage to the ignorance of Aratus and Nicander concerning their subject matter, even if unfair to them, show what some contemporaries of Lucretius or perhaps even Horace may have expected

Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts in Ars Poetica  187 from a didactic poet. As scholars have noted, Cicero’s claim probably comes from the biographical tradition, from his reading of the first Vita of Aratus.17 That Life of Aratus goes so far as to claim that King Antigonus ordered Aratus the physician and Nicander the astronomer to write poems on the other man’s area of specialty. Neither story need be literally true; for Cicero it serves his own need to demonstrate that the orator must be ready to discuss any topic. But both the story and Cicero’s adaptation of it tell us a good deal about ancient and late Republican Roman expectations of didactic, about their Jaussian “horizon of expectations” regarding the genre. My next text from the first century BCE is a newish piece of evidence from Philodemus On Poems Book 5. It has been discussed in other contexts in recent years but has not, I think, played much role in the debate about the function of didactic, although, almost thirty years ago, David Armstrong argued for its relevance for the Ars Poetica (1993: 224). Almost every word here is contested, and I am grateful to Professor Michael McOsker of Ohio Wesleyan University for answering some questions and showing me early a chapter from his 2021 book Philodemus on the Good Poem, from which I mostly reproduce his text and English translation (a new edition of Book 5 will be produced at some future date). Like most Philodemus, it’s challenging, and, as often, Philodemus can leave the non-specialist feeling like Winnie the Pooh, like a “bear of very little brain” (On Poems 5.25.30–26.11):18 εἰ γάρ καθὸ πόηµα, φυϲικὸν οὐδὲν οὔτε λέξεωϲ οὔτε δι̣[α]ν̣ο̣ήµατοϲ ὠφέληµα π[αρ]αϲκευάζει. διὰ τοῦτ[ο] δὴ τῆϲ ἀρετῆϲ ἑϲτηκότεϲ ὑπόκεινται ϲκ[οπ] οί, τῆι µὲν λέξει τὸ µ[εµι]µῆϲθαι τὴν ὠφέλι[µα] προϲδιδάϲκουϲαν, τῆϲ δὲ διανοίαϲ τὸ µεταξὺ µετ[εϲχη]κέναι τῆϲ τῶν ϲοφῶν καὶ τῆϲ τῶν χυδαίων. καὶ ταῦτ’ ἔϲτιν, ἄν τε νοµίϲῃ τιϲ ἄν τε µή, καὶ κριτέον ἐπὶ τ[α]ῦτ’ ἐπανάγονταϲ. …if a poem, qua poem (καθὸ πόηµα), provides no natural benefit (ὠφέληµα) either in language or in content. On that account, then, solid goals for goodness do exist—for language, the portrayal (µ[εµι]µῆϲθαι) of language which teaches useful things in addition, and for thought, being intermediate between the thought of the wise and that of the uneducated. And these [sc. solid goals] do exist, whether one thinks so or not, and one must judge with reference to them. Philodemus is probably not talking specifically about what we call didactic poetry, but more broadly all poetry that may seem to teach something. But I find this ­extremely interesting as near-contemporary evidence associating poetry not with instruction as a goal but with mimesis (µ[εµι]µῆϲθαι), “representation,” “portrayal”, or even “imitation” of instructional writing—pretending to teach.19 Horace deals with the function of poetry at Ars Poetica 333–334: Aut prodesse uolunt aut delectare poetae aut simul et iucunda et idonea dicere uitae. Poets wish either to be useful or to delight, or at the same time to say what both pleases and is helpful in life.

188  J. J. O’Hara A few lines later, he says that the writer who mixes the useful with the sweet has the most success (341–346): Centuriae seniorum agitant expertia frugis, celsi praetereunt austera poemata Ramnes. Omne tulit punctum qui miscuit utile dulci, lectorem delectando pariterque monendo; hic meret aera liber Sosiis, hic et mare transit et longum noto scriptori prorogat aeuum. The tribes of older men criticize anything lacking in usefulness, the lofty knights have no interest in poems short on charm. He has won every vote who has mixed the useful with the sweet, by both delighting the reader and in equal measure giving advice; this book makes bank for the Sosii’s shop, and also crosses the sea to make known and long-lived its author. Horace is literally talking here about what kinds of dramas or poems his addressees may write, and how they should mix the utile with the dulce to be successful. And it is natural to think that he may be reflecting metapoetically on the poem we are reading as well, and that it’s right for readers to do so. But when discussing hybrids earlier, I suggested that Horace’s recommendations don’t really fit his own poetry in general, or the Ars Poetica in particular. We should be alert to see whether this problem occurs here as well. Because this is Horace, it’s always easier to see what issues he is bringing up than to pin down what position he’s r­ eally taking. I noted earlier that advances in our appreciation of the sophistication, the complexity, the slipperiness of other Horatian poems, especially the Odes and Satires and the other Epistles, have made us better able to handle or begin to handle the Ars Poetica. This is the message of a David Armstrong article from 1993, the chapter on the Ars Poetica by Tobias Reinhardt in the Brill Companion to Horace in 2013, the special volume of MD in 2014, and now the 2019 full-length study of the poem by Ferriss-Hill.20 But I want to add to the list of what makes us better readers of the Ars Poetica not only Horace’s own work, but also the whole tradition of didactic and satire that Horace is evoking by writing this poem the way that he does. Some theorists of didactic, like Bernd Effe in his 1977 book, distinguish between poetry that teaches its professed topic, poetry that teaches something else, and poetry that merely pretends to teach or “mock didactic.”21 I would argue, and I am not alone in arguing, that these three elements can be at play at the same time in a didactic or satiric poem, without the author’s making it clear which one is correct or dominant, and readers’ uncertainty about this is one of the characteristic features of both genres. A brief review of the authors treated in my book will be useful here, though it must be stressed that we should not expect to find or impose the same pattern for each poet.22 Hesiod seems to many to be genuine didactic, but some have claimed it makes more sense to see him as playful, or even as composing mock didactic or poetry

Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts in Ars Poetica  189 more interested in being good poetry than being useful. Is Aristophanes really trying to help the city, as he has characters claim, or is he trying to amuse and to win prizes? One poem that does not teach its professed topic especially well, but does seem to be teaching something else, might be Aratus’ Phaenomena, which arguably does a better job teaching you that Zeus is in charge of the world than it does teaching you the stars (according to both ancient and modern critics). Cicero’s translation has similar priorities, if slightly differing goals. Nicander’s Alexipharmaca, Barchiesi (2002) suggests, “could be a source of delight for many readers, if they accept that the joke is on the didactic addressee not on the virtuoso poet.” A poem that seems to teach its professed topic would be Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura, which seems genuinely eager to convince you to adopt Epicureanism, but even this poem has some curious features that make it resemble those like Aratus and Nicander who are versifying prose treatises,23 and recently Gellar-Goad has shown how the poem plays with the satiric tradition of leaving the reader uncertain about satire’s seriousness.24 Vergil’s Georgics is not terribly good at actually teaching you how to farm, but arguably has a strong didactic message about broader concerns—although Seneca claims that he wrote the poem not to offer instruction, but to provide pleasure: Vergilius noster, qui non quid uerissime, sed quid decentissime diceretur aspexit, nec agricolas docere uoluit, sed legentes delectare (“Roman Vergil, who sought to say not what was closest to the truth, but what was most elegant; he did not want to teach farmers, but to delight readers,” Epistles 86.15). Seneca would put the Georgics in the third category: the poem that is not really teaching anything, but is written and read for aesthetic reasons, for pleasure. In this volume, Leah Kronenberg reads aspects of Geo. 1.291–310 as dealing metapoetically with the contrast between useful and pleasurable didactic, as both defending the poem’s focus on pleasure, and as arguing for the utility of pleasure-centered didactic (Chapter 4).25 Many but not all readers would say that Ovid’s Ars Amatoria does a poor job of teaching its professed topic, seduction, but has much to say (or teach) about the Augustan Age.26 To turn to satire: in Book 1 of Horace’s Satires, and especially in the first few poems of the book, Freudenberg and Turpin have argued that Horace’s main speaker is a persona presenting hackneyed truisms and inconsistent advice, ­basically an ineptus doctor, an incompetent teacher, that no one should take s­ eriously. Susanna Braund earlier made similar arguments about Juvenal, showing both that there is little new in Juvenal’s moralizing and advice,27 and that the ­speaker’s stance and argument do not really hold up to rigorous analysis as argument. What of the Ars Poetica? As I mentioned earlier, Frischer’s idea that the whole poem is a clear parody is interesting, but not fully convincing; it seems too simple, too confident. There is some strange teaching in this poem, but also some useful and accurate teaching, things that we can use in our own writing or as we teach students how to write. Is there teaching about something else besides writing? ­Oliensis (1998: 198–223) argues that the poem is teaching the addressees how to be proper Roman young men, while Lowrie (2014) argues for a political reading of the poem, and Armstrong (1993) that the poem is teaching the Piso boys that

190  J. J. O’Hara poetry is too hard, so that they should not try to do it. Hajdu argues that parts of the Ars Poetica work best as just fun: to him, lines 333–346, some of which I’ve quoted above, in which Horace is talking about whether poetry should be useful or pleasurable, don’t really make sense, but are a great pleasure to read: “I find this show of talent for the richest poetic expression delightful. And I cannot say that this passage is similarly insightful as a discursive text” (2014: 19). Most recently, Ferriss-Hill (2019) argues at length that the poem teaches how to live (as an Ars Vivendi), and works as an Ars Poetica not through its precepts but through its example, its implicit rather than explicit teaching. The Ars Poetica also fits the long tradition of satiric and didactic poetry. To provide a little more support for this claim, I cite four books written in the past several years. The first has been important for my whole study: Ralph Rosen’s 2007 Making Mockery: The Poetics of Ancient Satire. Rosen argues that satire and aggressively satirical comedy (most of the book is about Greek texts) are basically fictionalized, mimetic representations of aggressive human behavior, and not real instances of that behavior. Satiric poetry, he argues, mainly aims for an aesthetic and intellectual effect on the audience. He also argues that there is often an ambiguity about this fictionality (2007: 23): [P]oets of mockery…are constantly engaged in a kind of game in which the audience never quite knows when to give themselves over to the fictions of the poet’s constructed enmities or when to take them at their word; and the poet can never be quite sure, in turn, whether he has succeeded in getting the audience to experience the comic pleasures of a fictional attack, or whether he has left them with the impression that the poet’s performance is merely playing out aspects of his autobiography. Similar claims have been made for didactic, for example by Peter Toohey, who says that “Didactic poetry, to be really successful, ought to exhibit…several features, including…a tension between play and instruction.” Of our poem, he says: The Ars Poetica projects itself not so much as a piece of discontinuous advice for two members of the jeunesse dorée and their father, as a piece of sophisticated leisure entertainment. Much of its instruction, I feel sure, Horace felt quite seriously about (especially the professionalism he demands of aspiring poets). But, I suspect, what really interested him and what he suspected his audience would enjoy most was the clever way in which he has packaged things and how, within the doctrines of Nicander, Aratus, Lucretius and Virgil he had renewed [the didactic] tradition.28 This tendency arguably stretches across the whole history of didactic. In a review of a book of essays edited by Haskell and Hardie on Didactic Poetry…from the Renaissance to the Present, I. De Smet (2000) notes that “play on the tension between edification and delectation, between veracity and fictionality, seems to unite nearly all who aim to teach through poetry.”

Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts in Ars Poetica  191 Most recently, in a study of the didactic (and, he argues, satiric) De Rerum Natura of Lucretius, Gellar-Goad has surveyed the ways in which satirists play with readers’ uncertainty about their seriousness: In my view, what makes satire truly subversive—and what amounts to one of the greatest risks of the satiric act—is its challenge to epistemic certainty. Satire calls into question what is serious, what is trustworthy, and what we think we know about texts and speakers. By shining a spotlight on the blameworthy elements of society, satirists appear to offer a definite critique of prevailing social norms, yet frequent occurrences of self-contradiction or abject selfrepresentation undercut audience confidence in the bona fides of the critic.29 I see this tension, this game, this fondness for play, throughout the Ars Poetica, including in the way that both the whole poem, and the ending of the poem, play with the image of the hybrid creature from the start of the poem, and I’ll end this chapter by returning to this image. I claimed earlier that the Ars Poetica is certainly not simplex, not a simple, onepiece work of art. There are more aspects of this than I have mentioned. I have pointed out how the speaker sometime says useful, sensible things, and sometimes things that are either useless or wrong: this phenomenon could be associated with the shifting identity of an inconsistent speaker, something Horace also uses in his earlier Satires. It is also well known that the poem brings together aspects of different genres, including satire, didactic, and, of course, the verse epistle. In sum, this poem that starts off by banning either crazy hybrids, or any hybrids, in poetry, is itself a unique hybrid made from parts “brought together from varied sources” (undique collatis, 3). And it even ends with a virtual hybrid, at 468–476: Nec semel hoc fecit nec, si retractus erit, iam fiet homo et ponet famosae mortis amorem. Nec satis apparet cur uersus factitet, utrum minxerit in patrios cineres, an triste bidental mouerit incestus; certe furit, ac uelut ursus, obiectos caueae ualuit si frangere clatros, indoctum doctumque fugat recitator acerbus; quem uero arripuit, tenet occiditque legendo, non missura cutem nisi plena cruoris hirudo. This was not his first suicide attempt, nor, if pulled back, would [the poet] now become a man and give up his desire for a famous death. Nor is the reason clear why he keeps writing verses, whether he pissed on his father’s ashes, or sacrilegiously moved the barriers around a hallowed spot hit by lightning; clearly he is mad, and like a bear who has been able to break the bars locking up his pen, by cruelly reciting his poem makes the learned and unlearned run away; but the man he catches, he holds and kills by reading, a leech that will not let go of the skin unless full of blood.

192  J. J. O’Hara Horace concludes the poem by likening the poet at a recital to two very different animals: a bear who has escaped from his cage, and a leech that will not let go of a reader or audience member until it is full of blood. This is not literally a hybrid—not literally a man-bear-leech, if you are a fan of American television’s South Park30—but, as scholars have noted, these bizarre images at the end of the poem basically violate the interdiction of hybrids at the start of the poem: the poem ends with a thorough renunciation of its beginning. But, of course, the end of the poem also contains some good advice: the end of Horace’s longest poem also warns against a speaker or writer going on too long. So I will end as Horace ends Sat. 1.1, uerbum non amplius addam, “I will not add one word more.” Notes 1 Nichols (2017) 145–46. 2 For some examples, see n. 3. 3 A sampling of bibliography: on Hesiod, Heath (1985), Nelson (1996), Nisbet (2004); but see now also Canevaro (2015), who argues in novel ways for useful instruction. Aristophanes, Heath (1987/2007), Rosen (2007) and (2012). Callimachus, Harder (2007), Rosen (2007). Aratus, Bing (1993), Toohey (1996), Hunter (1995), arguing, however, that even incomplete instruction can teach. Nicander, Toohey (1996), ­Barchiesi (2001), Payne (2014). Lucretius, Martindale (2005) 182–200, great on the history of views of Lucretius’ didacticism, though he has no doubts about Lucretius’ aims; O’Hara (2006), Gellar-Goad (2020). Cicero, Bishop (2019). Vergil’s Georgics, Kronenberg (2009) and Chapter Four in this volume, Thibodeau (2011); Aeneid, O’Hara (2007). Horace’s Satires, Freudenberg (1993), Turpin (1988), and Gowers (2012), but with the recent energetic dissent of Yona (2018); Epistles, Maric (2012). Ovid’s Ars, James (2008), Watson (2007); Metamorphoses, Myers (1994) on the “pseudo-scholar.” Juvenal, Braund (1988), Rosen (2007). Others for whom there has been a debate about whether they are teaching or doing something else, whom I will mention but not discuss at length: Vitruvius, Howe (2005), Nichols (2017), Oksanish (2019); Apuleius, Winkler (1985), Harrison (1999); Petronius, Sullivan (1967), Walsh (1974), Conte (1997), Harrison (1999); Martial, Watson (2005), with further bibliography. A little more bibliography on these poets comes below, in notes 21–27. 4 Among those who question whether the poem teaches its professed topic or teaches at all: Williams (1964, 1968: 329–57; see below, n. 28); Frischer (1991) with the reviews of Sacks (1992), Mayer (1992), and O’Hara (1992); Armstrong (1993); Toohey (1996: 156); Oliensis (1998: 198–233); Lowrie (1998: 198–223; 2014); Laird (2007); Reinhardt (2013); Ferenczi (2014); Hajdu (2014); Ferriss-Hill (2019). More references in Gellar-Goad (2020: 30 and 171). 5 Among the huge bibliography on the opening lines see Frischer (1991: 57–58), Laird (1996), Oliensis (1998: 198–223), Citroni (2009), Johnson (2011: 231–273), ­Nichols (2017: 145–46) and now Ferriss-Hill (2019), excellent and stimulating. On wall-­ painting, I have profited also from an unpublished seminar paper by Emily Lime (2019). 6 See references in n. 5. Citroni (2009) would eliminate the problem by dating the Ars Poetica to a time when Roman interest in hybrid creatures in art had been sated and was fading, but that is neither plausible nor a very attractive solution. 7 See Lowrie (1997: 164–175) on the complexities of simplice myrto at Carm. 1.38.5, with discussion at the end of simplex et unum here and simplex munditiis at Carm. 1.5.5. 8 Wiseman (1988) takes Horace at face value as evidence for satyr plays, in a way I think is misguided: he shows that there were satyrs at Rome, but not necessarily satyr plays.

Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts in Ars Poetica  193 Cf. Brink (1995: 275): Wiseman “overstates the weight of the direct evidence, and, fascinating though the indirect evidence is, it tells us…more about satyrs at Rome than Roman satyr-drama.” The latest full study of satyr plays, Shaw (2014), when discussing Rome, can only pull together exiguous and ambiguous evidence for amateur playwrights noodling around with satyr plays. 9 On attempts to emend the text in Roman epic rather than deal with some inconsistences, see O’Hara (2007: 5, 36–37, 58, 75–76, 83, 92, 116). 10 Nünlist (1996–1997) makes a detailed argument that this line, which made numerous people in the last 2000 years think that Thespis traveled around with a theatrical troupe, should be read as a poetological metaphor like the common poet’s “journey” or “chariot.” But is not Horace’s word choice responsible for the misunderstanding, if it is a misunderstanding? “Carried poems on wagons” (plaustris uexisse poemata) seems to me different from the metaphor of the poet on a chariot. For more comparison of what Horace says in 275–276 with other sources, see Ferriss-Hill (2019: 55); she rightly notes that, with dicitur (“some say,” 276), Horace may be distancing himself from what he is reporting. 11 Brink (1971) ad loc. 12 Janko (2011) 371, 434–435; fr. 38. For reasons that are soon made clear, I translate the plural ὀϰϱίβαντας not as “a stage,” as Janko does, but as “stages (?).” 13 Some manuscripts say “the third actor.” 14 Cf. my work on Ovidian reception of Vergilian etymologizing in O’Hara (1996) and (2017: 95–102), and on inconsistency in O’Hara (2007). 15 No mimesis in didactic: Aristotle, Poetics 1447b, 17ff.; Dalzell (1996: 13–14); Volk (2002: 31–34), who cites the Tractatus Coislinianus, of uncertain date but possibly preserving ideas of Aristotle or a Hellenistic writer, which lists didactic among the kinds of writing that are non-mimetic (amimetos); see Sider (2014: 15–16). 16 Bishop (2019) 45–46; Gee (2013) 6. 17 For the Vita, see Martin (1974). 18 McOsker (2021) 165–170, except that, in his text, the quotation begins ε⟦υ⟧ \ἰ/ γάϱ {ο̣ι̣} ϰαθὸ πόηµα, which means that an upsilon has been corrected to an iota by a scribe, producing the word translated as “if,” and that editors have deleted the οι. 19 On the Philodemus passage, see Asmis (1991: 8–11), Armstrong (1993: 224), Janko (2000: 131), Blank (2019), Gellar-Goad (2020: 5), and McOsker (2021: 165–170). Blank summarizes: “For poetry the aims should be to imitate the diction which also teaches useful things and to have a content which is between what wise and vulgar people would say (Poem. 5, xxv.30–xxvi.20…). After all, the sage will rather express what is crucially useful for life in philosophical prose, while poetry will be a pleasant adjunct or pastime.” Yona (2018) is an extended argument for the influence of Philodemus on Horace’s Satires—but also for a view of the Satires very different from mine, one that takes them unambiguously seriously, as philosophical satire and as moral criticism. 20 Armstrong (1993), Reinhardt (2013), Ferenczi & Hardie (2014), Ferriss-Hill (2019).   Armstrong’s long article on the poem’s addressees twenty years ago, in a sense, argued for treating the Ars Poetica like a really big Ode, in terms of its subtle and shifting message for its addressees. 21 Effe (1977) 26–39; cf. Dalzell (1996) 32, Volk (2002) 4, Harder (2007) 25–26. 22 For bibliography, see above, n. 3, with some additional notes below. 23 I have a separate forthcoming paper entitled “What Are the Goals of Lucretius’ De ­Rerum Natura? How Do We Know?” 24 O’Hara (2006), Gellar-Goad (2020); but see also below, n. 29, on Gellar-Goad. 25 As my review, O’Hara (2021), indicates, several of the essays in Xinyue & Freer (2019) address the question of whether the Georgics offers actual teaching, aesthetic pleasure, or some combination of the two, as well as whether any teaching is effective. 26 I would differ from many who confidently assert that Ovid is or is not serious about his role as praeceptor amoris in the Ars in that he seems to me to play with the role, to provide some details that undercut the speaker’s authority but also some good practical

194  J. J. O’Hara

27 28

29

30

advice, so that the reader has some choice (or decisions to make) about how much to distrust the speaker, as often in didactic. For both Horace and Juvenal as full of familiar conventional wisdom, cf. Juvenal 9.124, where one character tells another than he has “given advice that is good, but commonly known” (utile consilium modo, sed commune, dedisti). Toohey (1996) 156: Cf., much earlier, Williams (1964), in a review of Brink (1963): “Horace in AP took a Greek literary world and practised a Greek technique of analysis, adding Roman touches and opinions of his own, so that the result was something completely new, which had, however, nothing like a direct relationship to contemporary reality.” Gellar-Goad (2020) 37. Ultimately, Gellar-Goad argues that Lucretius’ use of the expectations raised by satire and didactic makes his argument more and not less compelling: “Lucretius’ poem integrates satire with didactic by harmonizing its moralizing blame and comic mockery of its targets with its more straightforward scientific discourse. ­Didactic and satiric impulses coexist and mutually support the Lucretian speaker’s aims, and the poem’s interweaving of the two is intentional” (178). “ManBearPig,” the sixth episode in the tenth season of South Park, aired in the United States on April 26, 2006, and the ManBearPig has made some appearances in recent episodes.

Works Cited Armstrong, D. 1993. “The Addressees of the Ars poetica: Herculaneum, the Pisones and Epicurean Protreptic.” MD 31: 185–230. Asmis, E. 1991. “Philodemus’s Poetic Theory and ‘On the Good King According to Homer.” Classical Antiquity 10: 1–45. Barchiesi, A. 2001. Review of O. Taplin, ed., Literature in the Greek & Roman Worlds. BMCR 2001.12.01. http://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2001/2001-12-01.html Bishop, C. 2019. Cicero, Greek learning, and the Making of a Roman Classic. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Blank, D. 2019. “Philodemus.” In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, eds. E. N. Zalta. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2019/entries/philodemus/ Braund, S. H. 1988. Beyond Anger: A Study of Juvenal’s Third Book of Satires. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Brink, C. O. 1963. Horace on Poetry: Prolegomena to the Literary Epistles. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 1971. Horace on Poetry II: The ‘Ars Poetica.’. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 1995. “Second Thoughts on Three Horatian Puzzles.” In Homage to Horace…, ed. S. J. Harrison. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 267–78. Canevaro, L. G. 2015. Hesiod’s Works and Days: How to Teach Self-Sufficiency. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press. Citroni, M. 2009. “Horace’s Ars Poetica and the Marvellous.” In Paradox and the Marvellous in Augustan Literature and Culture, ed. P. Hardie. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 19–40. Conte, G. B. 1997. The Hidden Author: An Interpretation of Petronius’s Satyricon. Berkeley: University of California Press. Dalzell, A. 1996. The Criticism of Didactic Poetry. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. De Smet, I. 2000. Review of Y. Haskell & P. Hardie, eds., Poets and Teachers: Latin Didactic Poetry and the Didactic Authority of the Latin Poet from the Renaissance to the Present. Bibliothèque d’Humanisme et Renaissance 62: 708–710.

Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts in Ars Poetica  195 Effe, B. 1977. Dichtung und Lehre: Untersuchungen zur Typologie des antiken Lehrgedichts. Munich: Beck. Ferenczi, A. 2014. “Introduction. The new Horace and the Ars poetica.” Ferenczi & Hardie (2014) 11–17. Ferenczi, A., and P. Hardie, eds. 2014. New Approaches to Horace’s Ars poetica. MD 72. Ferriss-Hill, J. 2019. Horace’s Ars Poetica: Family, Friendship, and the Art of Living. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Freudenberg, K. 1993. The walking muse: Horace on the Theory of Satire. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Frischer, B. 1991. Shifting Paradigms: New Approaches to Horace’s Ars Poetica. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Gee, E. 2013. Aratus and the Astronomical Tradition. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Gellar-Goad, T. H. 2020. Laughing Atoms, Laughing Matter: Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura and Satire. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Gowers, E. 2012. Horace: Satires Book I. Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press. Hajdu, P. 2014. “Horace’s Ars poetica as Pure Poetry.” Ferenczi & Hardie (2014) 85–96. Harder, A. 2007. “To Teach or Not to Teach…? Some Aspects of the Genre of Didactic Poetry in Antiquity.” In Calliope’s Classroom: Studies in Didactic Poetry from Antiquity to the Renaissance, eds. A. Harder, A. A. MacDonald and G. J. Reinink. Leuven: Peeters. 23–48. Harrison, S. J. 1999. “Introduction.” In Oxford Readings in the Roman Novel, ed. S. J. Harrison. Oxford: Oxford University Press. xi–xxxix. Heath, M. 1985. “Hesiod’s Didactic Poetry.” CQ 35: 245–263. Heath, M. 1987/2007. Political Comedy in Aristophanes. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/3588/ Howe, T. N. 2005. “Vitruvian Critical Eclecticism and Roman Innovation.” Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome 50: 41–65. Hunter, R. 1995. “Written in the Stars: Poetry and Philosophy in the Phaenomena of Aratus.” Arachnion 2: 1–34 = On Coming After: Studies in Post-Classical Greek Literature and its Reception (Berlin, 2008) 153–188. James, S. L. 2008. “Women Reading Men: The Female Audience of the Ars amatoria.” CCJ 54: 136–159. Janko, R. 2011. Philodemus On Poems Books 3–4: With the Fragments of Aristotle On Poets. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Johnson, T. S. 2011. Horace’s Iambic Criticism: Casting Blame (iambikê poiêsis). Leiden; Boston: Brill. Kronenberg, L. 2009. Allegories of Farming from Greece and Rome: Philosophical Satire in Xenophon, Varro, and Virgil. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Laird, A. 2007. “The Ars Poetica.” In Cambridge Companion to Horace, ed. S. J. Harrison. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 132–143. Lime, E. K. 2019. “Painted Peculiarities and Poetic Persona in Horace’s Ars Poetica.” ­Unpublished paper. Lowrie, M. 1997. Horace’s Narrative Odes. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ———. 2014. “Politics by Other Means in Horace’s Ars poetica.” Ferenczi & Hardie (2014) 121–42. Maric, L. 2012. “Horace, The Liar Persona and The Poetry of Dissimulatio: The Case of Epistles 1.” Akroterion 57: 53–77. Martin, J. 1974. Scholia in Aratum vetera. Stuttgart: Teubner.

196  J. J. O’Hara Martindale, C. 2005. Latin Poetry and the Judgement of Taste: An Essay in Aesthetics. ­Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mayer, R. 1992. Review of Frischer (1991). CR 42(2): 442. McOsker, M. 2021. On the Good Poem According to Philodemus. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Myers, K. S. 1994. Ovid’s Causes: Cosmogony and Aetiology in the ‘Metamorphoses.’. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Nelson, S. 1996. “The Drama of Hesiod’s Farm.” CP 9: 45–53. Nichols, M. 2017. Author and Audience in Vitruvius’ De architectura. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nisbet, G. 2004. “Hesiod, Works and Days: A Didaxis of Deconstruction.” G&R 51: 147–163. Nünlist, R. 1996–1997. “Der Theaterkarren des Thespis: eine poetologische Metapher,” WJA 21: 259–271. O’Hara, J. J. 1992. “Review of Frischer (1991).” CW 8: 57–58. ———. 2006. “The End(s) of Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura.” Conference paper, Classical Association of the Middle West and South, Gainesville. ———. 2007. Inconsistency in Roman Epic: Studies in Catullus, Lucretius, Vergil, Ovid and Lucan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ———. 2017. True Names: Vergil and the Alexandrian Tradition of Etymological Wordplay. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Expanded edition of 1996 version. ———. 2021. Review of Xinyue & Freer (2019). BMCR 2021.01.19. https://bmcr.bryn mawr.edu/2021/2021.01.19 Oksanish, J. 2019. Vitruvian Man: Rome under Construction. New York: Oxford University Press. Oliensis, E. 1998. Horace and the Rhetoric of Authority. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Payne, M. 2014. “The One Absolute Didactic Poem, and Its Opposite: Schelling on Ancient Didactic Poetry and the Scienticity of Contemporary Lyric.” CRJ 6: 245–269. Reinhardt, T. 2013. “The Ars Poetica.” In Brill’s Companion to Horace, ed. H.-C. Günther. Leiden; Boston: Brill. 499–526. Rosen, R. 2007. Making Mockery: The Poetics of Ancient Satire. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press. Rosen, R. 2012. “Efficacy and Meaning in Ancient and Modern Political Satire: Aristophanes, Lenny Bruce and Jon Stewart.” Social Research 79: 1–32. Rudd, N. 1989. Horace: Epistles. Book II and Epistle to the Pisones (‘Ars poetica’). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sacks, E. 1992. Review of Frischer (1991). BMCR 1992.02.09. https://bmcr.brynmawr. edu/1992/1992.02.09/ Shackleton Bailey, D. R. 1985. Q. Horati Flacci Opera. Stuttgart: Teubner. Shaw, C. 2014. Satyric Play: The Evolution of Greek Comedy and Satyr Drama. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Sider, D. 2014. “Didactic Poetry: the Hellenistic Invention of a Pre-Existing Genre.” In Hellenistic Studies at a Crossroads: Exploring Texts, Contexts and Metatexts, eds. R. Hunter, A. Rengakos and E. Sistakou. Berlin: de Gruyter. 13–30. Sullivan, J. P. 1967. “Petronius: Artist or Moralist?” Arion 6: 71–88. Thibodeau, P. 2011. Playing the Farmer: Representations of Rural Life in Vergil’s Georgics. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Satire, Didactic, and New Contexts in Ars Poetica  197 Toohey, P. 1996. Epic Lessons: An Introduction to Ancient Didactic Poetry. London: Routledge. Turpin, W. 1988. “The Epicurean Parasite: Horace, Satires 1.1–3.” Ramus 27: 127–140. Volk, K. 2002. The Poetics of Latin Didactic: Lucretius, Vergil, Ovid, Manilius. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Walsh, P. G. 1974. “Was Petronius a Moralist?” Greece & Rome 21: 181–190. Watson, L. C. 2005. “Epigram.” In A Companion to Latin Literature, ed. S.J. Harrison. ­Oxford: Oxford University Press. 201–212. Watson, L. C. 2007. “The Bogus Teacher and His Relevance for Ovid’s Ars Amatoria.” RhM 150: 337–374. Williams, G. W. 1964. “Review of Brink (1963).” JRS 54: 186–196. Williams, G. W. 1968. Tradition and Originality in Roman Poetry. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Wiseman, T. P. 1988. “Satyrs in Rome? The Background to Horace’s Ars Poetica.” JRS 78: 1–13. Xinyue, B., and N. Freer, eds. 2019. Reflections and New Perspectives on Virgil’s Georgics. London; New York: Bloomsbury. Yona, S. 2018. Epicurean Ethics in Horace: The Psychology of Satire. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Index

Note: Numbers in bold refer to tables and numbers with “n” refer to notes in the text. Academica (Cicero) 137, 150, 152, 156, 157, 160, 161n4 acorn 87 Adelphoe (Terence) 1–2 administrative geography 176n21 adultery 106, 109, 111; adulter 108–109, 111, 113; adulteration 108; adulterium 111; adulterous bitch 110–112; divine 112; female dogs 111; implicit incitement to 110; marital propriety and 114; marriage and 111; mythological 110; sexual intrigue and 113 Aeneas 47, 108, 138, 174 Aeneid (Vergil) 41n4, 42n33, 47–48, 64, 108, 110, 128, 174, 180 Aeschylus 184–186 aesthetic inconsistency 14 Aetia (Callimachus) 13, 16, 82, 84–85, 180 aetiology 19, 35 Africanus, Scipio 145 ager 152–156 Airs, Waters, Places (Hippocrates) 87 Alexandrian 13–16, 19, 130, 138, 169 Alexipharmaca (Nicander) 189 ambiguous status 3 Anaxilas 79 Anchises 81, 174 Andronicus, Livius 1 animal love 106–114; adulterous bitch 110–112; mating 106–107 animal mating see mating Annales (Varro) 148 anthropomorphism 107, 109 anti-Callimachean 121 Antigone (Sophocles) 74–75 Antiquitates Rerum Divinarum (Varro) 138, 160

Antiquitates Rerum Humanarum et Diuinarum (Varro) 148 Antony, Marc 108, 110, 137, 151, 156, 158 anxiety (ataraxia) 5, 7, 53, 157, 174; see also Constitutio Limitum Aphrodite 73, 77, 81 Aratus 53, 84, 87, 112–113, 186, 187, 189, 190; didactic poems on constellations 180; Phaenomena 112, 189 Archimedes 167–174; Sand Reckoner 167–170, 172 Aristotle 76, 81, 91–92n34, 180, 186; Poetics 179; On Poets 185 Ars Amatoria (Ovid) 106, 110–112, 114, 120–121, 127–129, 180, 189 Ars Poetica (Horace) 8, 98n99, 179–192; on Aeschylus 185; iambic trimeter 184; meters of drama 183–184; plastic arts 182 Athenaeus 78–79, 93n48 Augustine of Hippo 6, 26, 106–114, 149, 173–174 Bacchylides 73; elpis 74 bent over 77–80, 82, 92n39, 95n63 Bimarcus 138 boundaries 3, 7, 8, 156, 176n19 Brutus (Cicero) 139, 156, 160, 164n53 Bucolics (Vergil) 27, 40, 41n17 Caesar, Germanicus Julius 24, 27, 41n10, 42n22, 112–113, 151, 154, 172, 173 Callimachus: aesthetic principles of 15; Aetia 13, 16, 82, 84–85, 180; with Aratus 84; cicada-ideal 85; engagement with Hesiod 97n84; Hymn to Apollo 13, 16; Hymn to Artemis 15; Hymn to

Index  199 Zeus 13–20; Lucretius inspired by 20n3; metaphors used by 14, 15; stylistic juxtaposition in the Aetia 85; on Zeus 17, 19 catasterism 113 Cato de Senectute (Cicero) 149 Cato the Elder 154–155; De Agri Cultura 1, 148 Catullus 7, 99n103, 144, 159, 176n19 cicada 82–86, 88, 97n75, 97n84, 99n101 Cicero 1, 7, 26, 27, 49, 112–113; Academica 137, 150, 152, 156, 157, 160, 161n4; Brutus 139, 156, 160, 164n53; Cato de Senectute 149; de Legibus 156; de Officiis 155; de Re Publica 156; Pro Caelio 2 Cistellaria (Plautus) 1 Columella 142, 143, 144, 153, 154 Constitutio Limitum (Hyginus Gromaticus) 167–174 Corvinus, Valerius 155 cosmic savior 24–27 Croesus 29 culture 2; urban 152; villa 152–153, 162n27 cura 19, 107 Cyclopes 15 Cynegetica (Grattius) 107–110 de Actionibus Scaenicis (Varro) 148 de Agricultura (Cato) 148 de Antiquitate Litterarum ad L. Accium (Varro) 148 de Familiis Troianis (Varro) 148 de Forma Philosophiae (Varro) 148 de Gente Populi Romani (Varro) 148 de Iure Ciuile (Varro) 148 de Legibus (Cicero) 156 de Lingua Latina (Varro) 26, 148, 149, 153 de Morte (Rufus) 32, 33 de Officiis (Cicero) 155 de Ora Maritima (Varro) 148 de Origine Linguae Latinae (Varro) 148 de Philosophia (Varro) 148 de Rebus Rusticis (dRR) (Varro) 148–161; ager 152–156; domus 152–156; problem in 148–152; uilla 152–156; urbs 152–156; writing between the lines 158–161 de Rebus Urbanis (Varro) 148 de Re Publica (Cicero) 156 De Rerum Natura (DRN) (Lucretius) 1, 4, 5, 13–20, 23, 29, 30, 32, 34, 35, 36, 130, 191; metaphors in 13 de Re Rustica (Varro) 149 de Scaenicis Originibus (Varro) 148

de Sermone Latino (Varro) 148 de Similitudine Verborum (Varro) 148 de Vita Populi Romani (Varro) 148 de Vita Sua (Varro) 148 Diogenes Laertius 27, 29, 162n22 Disciplinae (Varro) 148 docere and discere in Augustan didactic 127, 127–130 docere and discere in Propertius 121–126, 122 dog days of summer 82–83 dolor 19 domus 152–156 Easter Egg 3, 149, 162n17 Eclogues (Vergil) 5, 53, 55, 99n99 education 1–4, 8 elpis 73–75, 89n11, 90n14 Ennius, Quintus: Epicharmus 1; Euhemerus 1; Hedyphagetica 1; paradox of 15 Ephemeris Naualis ad Pompeium (Varro) 148 Epicharmus (Ennius) 1 Epicurean/Epicurus 5, 18, 19, 23–40, 41n11, 58; annual labor 34; communities on the Bay of Naples 26; cosmic savior 24–27; cosmology 48; divinity 26; estate management 34; ethical ideal 31; farmer and 54–55; good life 27–34; hedonistic calculus 34; philosophical engagement among Roman politicians 27; plague and death 34–40; precepts 23; precepts of living “unknown” 24; principles 24, 30, 34, 40; Vergil’s ironic 47–64; view of natural wealth 33 epidemiology 35 Epigrams (Philodemus) 13–14 Epistles (Horace) 50 Erasmus 149 ethos 2 etymology 26–27 Euhemerus (Ennius) 1 Euphrates 24 Euripides, Cyclops 96n63 farmer 128, 171; abundance 34; challenges 58; contemporary 57; early Rome and 56; Epicurean and 54–55; fortunate 33, 38, 39; georgic felicity 38; happy 51–52, 56, 58, 59, 60, 61; knowledge of rustic gods 29, 32; life, praise of 48, 52–53; masturbatory 7; philosopher and 27, 29, 34; year and early Rome 56 Farming manual 150–151

200 Index Fasti (Ovid) 116n44, 117n45 felix qui 54, 57 female sexuality 74, 76, 81, 96n70 fertility 71, 75–76, 87; in winter 71; see also infertility fortunatus ille 54, 57 Gaia 17, 19, 89n11 genre 3, 7, 47, 50, 54, 88n8, 98n99, 150, 168, 179, 185, 187–188, 191 georgic didacticism 4 georgic poet 27–31, 34, 36–38, 40, 44n57 Georgics (Vergil) 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 21n8, 21n10, 23–40, 41n3, 48, 52–53, 55, 58, 63, 83, 87, 98–99n99, 119, 120, 127–128, 131n17, 170–172, 189; see also Epicurean/Epicurus Germanicus 1, 106, 112–113, 115n28 Golden Age 52, 57 good life 27–34 Grattius 1, 6, 106; Cynegetica 107–110; didactic poem on hunting 107–110 Greece 2, 92n34, 123, 170, 179, 186 Greek New Comedy 2 Hedyphagetica (Ennius) 1 Hellenistic 2, 19; aesthetic 83, 87; art 3; didactic poems 180; poetics 16, 83–84; ruler cult 41n11 helper 27 Hercules 19 Herodotus 29 Hesiod 71; impotence 92n37; infertility of winter 92n37; on male impotence in summer 91n27; negative attitude towards sexual desire 96n70; presentation of the natural world 77; Theogony 20, 74; winter 71, 72–83; Works and Days 6, 71, 73, 75, 82, 86, 88, 91n29 hierarchy 2, 29, 31–32 Hippocrates 92n36, 98n96; Airs, Waters, Places 87 Hipponax 75 Homer 15, 21n8, 49, 144 hope 37, 72–76, 89–90n14, 89n11, 150 Horace 1, 24, 64n9, 90n14; Ars Poetica 8, 179–192; Epistles 50; Odes 50; poetic irony in 49–51; Sermones 23 hunting 39, 83, 87, 107, 114 Hyginus Gromaticus: Constitutio Limitum 167–174 Hymenaeus 114n5 hymn 16–18 Hymn to Apollo (Callimachus) 13, 16

Hymn to Artemis (Callimachus) 15 Hymn to Zeus (Callimachus) 13–20 Hyrcanian 107–108 Ichneutai (Sophocles) 95n63 idle behavior 72 Iliad (Vergil) 18, 21n8 impotence 82–83; masturbation and 76 incompleteness theorem 56–61 infertility 6, 87, 92n37, 99n105; see also fertility intellectual capital 2 Isidore (Bishop of Seville) 26 iuuentas 114n4 Jerome 137, 139 latifundia 32 Latin poetry 142 Laudationes (Varro) 148 laudes Italiae 58 Laws (Plato) 90n24 lazy winter 86–87 Legationes (Varro) 148 Leonidas of Tarentum 84 Life of Marcellus (Plutarch) 169 Lipsius, Justus 143 love elegy 120–130 lover-poet 119–127, 130, 131n13, 131n17 Lucan: Pharsalia 167–168, 172 Lucian of Samosata 149 Lucilius 1 Lucina 114n4 Lucretius 25, 28, 34, 37, 50, 55, 57, 65n18, 65n35; conception of a deity 26; De Rerum Natura (DRN) 1, 4, 5, 13–20, 23, 29, 30, 32, 34, 35, 36, 130, 191; emotional description of sacrificed calf’s mother 38; emotional intensity 37; expressions of hostility to religio 36; inspired by Callimachus 20n3; knowledge of agricultural gods 32; phraseology 37; plague narrative 35; priorities 51 Macrobius 38, 43n56 Manilius 1 Marcellus, Marcus Claudius 169 Marcipor 138 Marcopolis 138 marriage 81, 106, 107–110; adultery and 111; animal 107; avoiding 89n13; legislation 114

Index  201 masturbation: impotence and 76; see also poetics of masturbation mathematical fields 176n21 mating 106–107 Meleager 75, 100n107 Meliboeus 25–26, 27 Menippean Satires (Varro) 7, 138 Menippus of Gadara 150, 161n5, 162n22 Metamorphoses (Ovid) 112 Metellus, Lucius Caecilius 138 Metrodorus 34 metus 19 Mithridates 137 Monobiblos (Propertius) 119 mores maiorum 1–2 Mostellaria (Plautus) 1 Mount Algidius, Battle of 155 myelos 91n33 neoteric influence 13 Nicander 186–187; Alexipharmaca 189 Nicarchus 79 non-procreative sex 78–79 nuptiae 114n5 Octavian 24–27, 116n43, 137 Odes (Horace) 50 Oeconomicus (Xenophon) 155 Oedipus 74, 80, 90n19–21 On Poets (Aristotle) 185 On Property Management (Πεϱὶ οἰϰονομίας) (Philodemus) 5, 31–33 On Speaking, or, How the Philosopher Should Speak (Themistius) 185 On Vices (Philodemus) 23 Oratio Prima 163n29 Oratio Secunda 163n29 ostentatiously Hesiodic 97n76 overschematization 3 Ovid 1, 6, 99n104; Ars Amatoria 106, 110–112, 114, 120–121, 127–129, 180, 189; Fasti 116n44, 117n45; Metamorphoses 112 Papia Papae (Varro) 7, 137–145 persecution 162n19 Petrarch 149 Phaenomena (Aratus) 112, 189 Pharsalia (Lucan) 167–168, 172 Philodemus 37, 42n36, 43n37, 43n38, 64n9, 65n18; Epigr 13–14; exaltation of philosophy-teaching 32; poetic irony in 49–51; On Property Management (Πεϱὶ οἰϰονομίας) 5, 31–32; On Vices 23

philosophy 4, 63–64; didactic poetry 4; discourses 54; Epicurean 26, 34, 41n17, 53, 59, 61–62; humanity and 5; natural 28–31, 54; political 150; teaching 32; Vergil’s interest in 23 physical beauty 141 Piso 49 pithos 89n11 plague and death 34–40 plastic arts 182 Plato 57; Laws 90n24 Plautus 1 Pliny the Elder 149 Plutarch: Life of Marcellus 169 poetics 3; commonplaces 7; irony in Philodemus and Horace 49–51; vocations 31 Poetics (Aristotle) 179 poetics of masturbation 71–88; bent 79–80; boneless one 78–79; cicada 82–83; dog days of summer 82–83; Hellenistic poetics 83–84; Hesiod’s winter 72–83; hope 72–76; impotence 82–83; lazy winter 86–87; natural world 76–78; summer plowing 86–87; three-legged man 79–80; Vergil’s winter 83–87; winter maiden 80–82; winter man 84–85; winter scene 83–84; winter wife 85–86 poetry 54; art of fiction 20; as autonomous discourse 61; civic 14; didactic 83, 87, 116n45, 127, 186; Hellenistic 83; idle 6; interpretation 48, 49; Latin 95n63; of love 5; Roman 120; satiric 98n99 poet-speaker 128 polymath antiquarian 138 Pompeius Magnus 172 post-modern ironist 61–64 praise of the farmer’s life 52–53 Praxiteles 141 Principate 2, 6 Probus 23 Pro Caelio (Cicero) 2 procreation 71–73, 75, 76, 86, 90n24; in winter 72 Propertius 119–142; docere and discere in 121–126, 122; Monobiblos 119; teaching and learning in love elegy 120–130 prose 3, 7, 49, 62, 149, 180, 189, 193n19 prosimetric/prosimetrum 3 Pythagoras 92n35 Quaestiones Plautinae (Varro) 148 quies 65n18 Quintilius 23

202 Index recusatio 18, 42n33, 54 religio 18, 19, 28, 36, 39 Res Rusticae (Varro) 106–107, 138 Roman-ness 2 Roman Republic 1–2 Rome 151, 152; Alexandrian poets of 138; discourses 114; expansion into Greece 2; farmer and 56; farmer’s year and 56; Mediterranean hegemony 31; prodigious man in 156; satyrs 192n8 Rufinus 75 Rufus, L. Varius 23, 48; De Morte 32, 33 Sand Reckoner (Archimedes) 167–170, 172 satire 179–192 Saturae Menippeae (Varro) 139 Scythinus 75 Seneca 57 Sermones (Horace) 23 sexual advisors 114 sexually impotent man 75 Silenus 95n63 Sophocles: Antigone 74–75; elpis 74; Ichneutai 95n63 sphragis 13, 23–24, 30, 40 stellification 116n40 Suetonius 137 summer plowing 86–87 teaching and learning in love elegy 120–130 Terence: Adelphoe 1–2 Themistius 90n14, 186; On Speaking, or, How the Philosopher Should Speak 185 Theogony (Hesiod) 20, 74, 86 thumos 91n33 Tityrus 25–27, 41n11 triumvir 7, 24, 26, 151, 158 Truculentus (Plautus) 1 Tucca, Plotius 23, 48 uilla 152–156 uniuira 110 urbs 152–156 Valerius Maximus 137 values 2, 15, 34, 64 Varro 1, 26; Annales 148; Antiquitates Rerum Divinarum 138, 160; Antiquitates Rerum Humanarum et Diuinarum

148; de Actionibus Scaenicis 148; De Antiquitate Litterarum ad L. Accium 148; de Familiis Troianis 148; de Forma Philosophiae 148; de Gente Populi Romani 148; de Iure Ciuile 148; de Lingua Latina 26, 148, 149, 153; de Ora Maritima 148; de Origine Linguae Latinae 148; de Philosophia 148; de Rebus Rusticis (dRR) 148–161; de Rebus Urbanis 148; de Scaenicis Originibus 148; de Sermone Latino 148; de Similitudine Verborum 148; de Vita Populi Romani 148; de Vita Sua 148; Disciplinae 148; Ephemeris Naualis ad Pompeium 148; Laudationes 148; Legationes 148; Menippean Satires 7; Papia Papae 7, 137–145; Quaestiones Plautinae 148; Res Rusticae 106–107, 138; Saturae Menippeae 139 Vergil: Aeneid 41n4, 42n33, 47–48, 64, 108, 110, 128, 174, 180; autoerotic activity in his winter scene 83; Eclogues 5, 53, 55, 99n99; emphasis on animal husbandry 35; Georgics 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 21n8, 21n10, 23–40, 41n3, 48, 52–53, 55, 58, 63, 83, 87, 98–99n99, 119, 120, 127–128, 131n17, 170–172, 189; happy farmer 51–52; Iliad 18, 21n8; interest in philosophy 23; intertextual relationship with Lucretius 40n1; lexicon 44n58; philosophical engagement 27; posture of “inglorious leisure” 24; “the race of swimmers” 44n57; representation of “Caesar” 42n22; see also animal love Vergil’s ironic Epicureanism 47–64; choice of subject matter 53–54; Epicurean and the farmer 54–55; farmer’s year and early Rome 56; happy farmer 51–52; incompleteness theorem 56–61; poetic irony in Philodemus and Horace 49–51; post-modern ironist 61–64; praise of the farmer’s life 52–53 Vergil’s winter 83–87 winter 80–86 Works and Days (Hesiod) 6, 71, 73, 75, 82, 86, 88, 91n29 Xenophon: Oeconomicus 155