The Idea of Bucolic in the Imitators of Theocritus, 3Rd–1St Century Bc
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THE IDEA OF BUCOLIC IN THE IMITATORS OF THEOCRITUS, 3RD–1ST CENTURY BC Hans Bernsdorff 1. Corpus The period under review in this paper spans the time between the two greats of ancient bucolic poetry: Theocritus, whose poetic activity extended from the late 80s to the middle of the 3rd century BC, and Virgil, whose Eclogues are to be dated to the late 40s and early 30softhe 1st century BC. The period covered here thus corresponds with that of Hellenism after its early Alexandrian representatives.1 Within this period I will concentrate on those texts that closely fol- low Theocritus’ poems on herdsmen. I thus include only those poems that are at least written in the same metre (dactylic hexameter) and in a dialect of Doric colouring, and are concerned with herdsmen.2 Conse- quently, the reception of Theocritus’ pastoral poetry in other formally distinct genres (e.g. in epigram)3 and also texts following Theocritus in metre and dialect, but not in subject-matter (e.g. [Theocr.] 23 on an unhappy lover or several fragments of Moschus or Bion) can only be addressed in passing here, even though, both in antiquity and in recent times, they have frequently been attributed to the bucolic genre4 1 The lower end is confirmed by the date of the first documented collection of bucolic poetry (probably of Theocritus and his successors) that was compiled by the grammarian Artemidorus of Tharsus in the first half of the 1st century BC (the couplet above the collection is transmitted in AP 9.205 = FGE 113–114). On the possible form of this collection, which had probably been available to Virgil, cf. Gutzwiller (1996a) 123–128. 2 I shall refer to poems whose subject-matter meets these criteria as “pastoral”. 3 Cf. Bernsdorff (2001) and, particularly on epigram, Sens’ paper in this volume. 4 Stobaeus quotes non-pastoral fragments of Moschus and Bion from the υκλι- κ;in[Moschus]3, Bion is seen by his student as a bucolic poet only; together with Theocritus, Moschus and Bion were regarded as the bucolic triad: see Reed’s paper in this volume, §1. The metrical, linguistic and thematic coherence between the ps.- Theocritean Id. 19, 20, 23, 27, which he dates to the 2nd and 1st century BC, is demon- strated by Trovati (2001). 168 hans bernsdorff and of course represent important reactions to Theocritean pastoral poetry.5 The corpus thus delineated overall coincides with the pastoral poems found in some or all of the bucolic manuscripts, with the exception of poems by Theocritus or epigrams. These are either poems transmit- ted under the name of Theocritus which, however, cannot have been written by him (ps.-Theocritea), or those which have been correctly or incorrectly attributed to Moschus of Syracuse (ca. 150 BC)6 or Bion (between the mid-2nd and mid-1st century BC). In the case of both of these authors, we also have to take into account quotes from their υκλικ, most of which have been transmitted via Stobaeus.7 Within these limits we are presented with the following texts:8 [Theocr.] Id. 8 (Boukoliastai):9 the cowherd Daphnis encounters the shep- herd Menalcas. They decide to hold a singing contest, name the prize for the winner and choose a goatherd as judge, who subsequently declares Daphnis the winner of the contest. Daphnis rejoices, while Menalcas 5 E.g. Bion’s Epitaph for Adonis, which represents a clear variation on the sufferings of Daphnis portrayed in Id. 1 (Hubbard (1998) 40–41), or Moschus fr. 3, in which Alpheus and Arethusa are doubtlessly meant to reflect Polyphemus and Galatea from Theocr. Id. 6 and 11,cf.Bernsdorff (2005). 6 Among the genuine poems of Moschus, however, there is none that explicitly focuses on the world of herdsmen as their central theme (perhaps fr. 1, cf. ll. 11–12). 7 Additional pieces of papyrus which may perhaps contain bucolic poetry are too fragmentary to allow a treatment in our present context: SH 902 (PHamb. 2.121,of the 2nd century BC, see Vox (1997) 493), PKöln 8.32 (1st century BC/1st century AD). Due to the lack of Doric dialect features, I consider the Fragmentum bucolicum Vindobonense (PVind. Rainer 29801) as irrelevant, cf. Bernsdorff (1999) 24–25. 8 [Theocr.] Id. 19 (Eros as a honey-thief ), [Theocr.] Id. 21 (Halieis) and Bion fr. 13 (about a birdcatcher) are no pastoral poems, even though all three are set in a rural sphere. The fishermen in Id. 21 represent a profession akin to that of the herdsmen; at the same time we find a form of dialogue modelled on Theocritus. As far as the fragments of Moschus and Bion are concerned, one has to consider the possibility that a pastoral context may sometimes be hidden due to the short length of the fragments and Stobaeus’ predominantly gnomological interests. Nauta (1990) 134 points out that, although eight of Stobaeus’ quotes from Theocritus stem from pastoral poems, we can only see this in two instances. 9 Since Valckenaer (late 18th century) various points have been raised against The- ocritus’ authorship of the whole or parts of this poem, some of them more cogent than others, cf. Gow (1952)vol.2, 170–171 and later particularly Merkelbach (1956) and Rossi (1971a); on research since Gow cf. Köhnken (1995) 297–299. Although the uncertainty concerning many of the indications discussed—particularly in the use of dialect and in stylistic matters: see Gow (1952)vol.2, 171 and most recently Hunter (2002) 96–99,both of whom, however, consider this poem as spurious—and although there have been iso- lated arguments to the contrary, the view of this poem as spurious can today be seen as the communis opinio. Its authenticity has been most recently questioned by Fantuzzi.