cover cover next page > title : History in Ovid author : Syme, Ronald. publisher : Oxford University Press isbn10 | asin : 0198148259 print isbn13 : 9780198148258 ebook isbn13 : 9780585220840 language : English subject Ovid,--43 B.C.-17 or 18 A.D, Historical poetry, Latin-- History and criticism, Rome--Social life and customs, Literature and history--Rome. publication date : 1978 lcc : PA6537.S9eb ddc : 937/.07 subject : Ovid,--43 B.C.-17 or 18 A.D, Historical poetry, Latin-- History and criticism, Rome--Social life and customs, Literature and history--Rome. cover next page > file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/Nidia%20San...O-PRENDA%20DE%20NATAL/0198148259/files/cover.html [23-12-2008 0:03:08] page_iii < previous page page_iii next page > Page iii History in Ovid Ronald Syme OXFORD AT THE CLARENDON PRESS < previous page page_iii next page > file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/Nidia%20Sant...PRENDA%20DE%20NATAL/0198148259/files/page_iii.html [23-12-2008 0:03:08] page_iv < previous page page_iv next page > Page iv Oxford University Press, Great Clarendon Street, Oxford OX2 6DP Oxford New York Athens Auckland Bangkok Bogota Bombay Buenos Aires Calcutta Cape Town Dar es Salaam Delhi Florence Hong Kong Istanbul Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madras Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi Paris Singapore Taipei Tokyo Toronto Warsaw and associated companies in Berlin Ibadan Oxford is a trade mark of Oxford University Press Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York © Sir Ronald Syme 1978 Special edition for Sandpiper Books Ltd., 1997 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press. Within the UK, exceptions are allowed in respect of any fair dealing for the purpose of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of the licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside these terms and in other countries should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available ISBN 0-19-814825-9 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by Bookcraft (Bath) Ltd., Midsomer Norton < previous page page_iv next page > file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/Nidia%20Sant...-PRENDA%20DE%20NATAL/0198148259/files/page_iv.html [23-12-2008 0:03:08] page_v < previous page page_v next page > Page v Preface More history than Ovid, some will say. Anxious apologia is not in place. Better, brief statement about the origin of this opuscule. It goes back to an ancient predilection for the Epistulae ex Ponto, reinforced by that faithful companion, portable on long peregrinations. Two chapters began as lectures, while others were at first intended for inclusion in a larger work (The Augustan Aristocracy). The appeal of the poet becoming ever more seductive, scope and direction changed. No commentary happens to exist on Ovid's latest poems, their use and value tend to be ignored. The outcome is therefore a kind of manual, albeit not altogether predictable, designed to cover life and letters in the obscure decade that concludes the long reign of Caesar Augustus. Each of the twelve chapters was composed to be read and understood by itself. Coherence and structure has been accorded proper attention, so I trust. The time and order of composition may (or may not) engage the curious and the erudite. I am happy to acknowledge manifold debts. A grant from the Leverhulme Trust facilitated the preparation of the manuscript. But nothing can equal what could never be repaid, a personal gratitude that belongs to institutions and to many friends across the water, notably in Cambridge and at the Institute for Advanced Study (Princeton). The example of Ovid was inspiriting, who put to good employ the years of exile on less friendly shores as the last chapter will demonstrate, as the poet himself declared: `mors nobis tempus habetur iners'. The book came to completion in the burning summer of 1976, within the walls and battlements of a college newly established on the northern outskirts of Oxford: a community whose indulgence abates the distempers that encroach upon the evening of life. R.S. WOLFSON COLLEGE MARCH 11, 1977 < previous page page_v next page > file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/Nidia%20San...-PRENDA%20DE%20NATAL/0198148259/files/page_v.html [23-12-2008 0:03:09] page_vii < previous page page_vii next page > Page vii Contents I 1 The Chronology II 21 Evidence in the Fasti III 37 The Latest Poems IV 48 Forgotten Campaigns V 72 The Friends of Ovid VI 94 Patronage and Letters VII 114 The Sons of Messalla VIII 135 Paullus Fabius Maximus IX 156 Sextus Pompeius X 169 Poetry and Government XI 199 Legislation and Morals XII 215 The Error of Caesar Augustus Bibliography 230 Index of Proper Names 235 < previous page page_vii next page > file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/Nidia%20Sant...PRENDA%20DE%20NATAL/0198148259/files/page_vii.html [23-12-2008 0:03:09] page_1 < previous page page_1 next page > Page 1 I The Chronology The poems of Ovid offer the historian much more than he might expect. First of all, it is necessary to discover the chronology. The general position can be defined without undue hesitations. In the poet's productivity, prolonged over a good forty years, a turning-point is discerned about the year A.D.I. An item in Book I of the Ars Amatoria (it comes as a surprise) permits a close dating, by a precise event in I B.C.1 There was a period of intense activity, terminated before the early months of A.D. 2. Ovid now revised and supplemented a whole corpus of elegiac verse, to be put on show as his mature achievement. Then follow Fasti and Metamorphoses. The poems from exile present no problems. Indeed, the latest instalment, his Epistulae ex Ponto, offers unexpected precisions. By contrast, the earlier products: Amores, Heroides (and the lost Medea). At first sight, and on second thoughts, the problems appear insuperable.2 The field is open to conjectures of wide range, in competition often uninhibited.3 Brief prolegomena are expedient to a summary statement. <><><><><><><><><><><><> I. First, references in poets to contemporary transactions. In general, scholars have a propensity to assume that these echoes are heard and reported as soon as possible after the event in question.4 For love poetry, the question hardly ever arises. Which is natural. 1 A war against the Parthians, to be conducted by the prince Gaius Caesar (AA I. 177 ff.). 2 Thus the judicious and sceptical L.P. Wilkinson, Ovid Recalled (1955), 83. 3 For earlier work, E. Martini, Einleitung zu Ovid (Prague, 1933); Schanz-Hosius, Gesch. der r. Literatur II4 (1935); W. Kraus, RE XVIII (1943), 1910 ff. Among recent studies may be noted S. d'Elia in Ovidiana (ed. N.I. Herescu, 1958), 210 ff.; G. Luck, Die r. Liebeselegie (1961), 161 f.; A.D.E. Cameron, CQ XVIII (1968), 320 ff.; E. J. K(enney) in OCD2 (1970), 763 ff.; and, especially, H. Jacobson, Ovid's Heroides (1974), 300 ff. 4 Below, p. 37. < previous page page_1 next page > file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/Nidia%20San...-PRENDA%20DE%20NATAL/0198148259/files/page_1.html [23-12-2008 0:03:09] page_2 < previous page page_2 next page > Page 2 The Amores carry only two items for dating, not of special importance. But the projected Parthian War to be waged by the prince Gaius Caesar (in AA I) is in another case, permitting narrow limits of time. Elsewhere negative instances can sometimes be of value: no reference, so it appears, to Tiberius in the first edition of the Fasti.1 Second, the rhythm of writing. Ovid, born in 43 B.C., was a fluent composer in youth, with a distinctive manner early shaped. At one late stage in his writing rapid composition can be proved, with no loss of force and elegance.2 Given the long period antecedent to 1 B.C. (he was forty-two in the spring of that year), an abatement or some intervals may have to be postulated. When, and for how long, not so easy. The case of the historian Livy is instructive. This steady citizen operated without respite or fatigue (so some have fancied), turning out on an average three volumes each year (the total production was 142) until death took the pen from his hand.3 On the contrary, at least one interval can be surmised. For Livy the culmination of Roman history was the end of the Civil Wars and the triple triumph celebrated in 29 B.C. (in Book CXXXIII). What follows is an epilogue, and perhaps an afterthought: namely the Republic of Caesar Augustus in nine books from 28 to 9 B.C., terminating with the death of Drusus in warfare beyond the Rhine.4 Livy did not set about writing his epilogue (it may be conjectured) until the change of dynastic politics in A.D. 4 (Claudius Nero becoming Tiberius Caesar) showed the safe path and proper emphasis. Third, simultaneous composition. Ovid was mobile and versatile. His temperament might encourage him to compose in different genres at the same time. That cannot be denied or confirmed. Yet, for a parallel in artistic prose, observe Cornelius Tacitus writing the tranquil Dialogus when he was already immersed in the murderous history of the year 69. Fourth, revisions or additions. An insertion may often be betrayed by inconsistency with the context.