Dulces ante omnia Musae: Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacre (English, French and German Edition) [Multilingual ed.] 9782503590776, 2503590772

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Dulces ante omnia Musae

Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré edited by Jeanine De Landtsheer Fabio Della Schiava Toon Van Houdt

The publication of this volume was generously supported by:

Cover image: Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665), L’inspiration du poète (1629-1630) © RMN – Grand Palais Stéphane Maréchalle Louvre, RF 1774

© 2021, Brepols Publishers n.v., Turnhout, Belgium.

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, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher.

D/2021/0095/132 DOI 10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.121102 ISBN 978-2-503-59077-6 e-ISBN 978-2-503-59078-3 Printed in the EU on acid-free paper.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Dedicatio 11 Jeanine De Landtsheer – Fabio Della Schiava – Toon Van Houdt Introduction 13 PROMULSIS POETICA

Tuomo Pekkanen Sappho Latina 27 Michael von Albrecht Cicero ad colloquium evocatus 37

CHAPTER 1

CLASSICAL MODELS

Shari Boodts Nostram tota urbs est ante fenestram. The Satiric Persona in Julius Caesar Scaliger’s Otium 43 Marc Laureys Bernardino Partenio’s Carmen saeculare and His Imitation of Horace 59 Kristi Viiding Iusta facit versus haec indignatio nostra. Adapting Latin Verse Satire in Early Modern Livonia 81 Jeanine De Landtsheer Catullus’ Phaselus ille and Justus Lipsius’s Dog Melissa 101

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Reinhold F. Glei Arat oder Cicero? Die Ergänzungen zu Ciceros Übersetzung im Syntagma Arateorum des Hugo Grotius (1600) 117 Christian Laes A Poor and Proud Schoolteacher: Alfredo Bartoli’s Primus Horatii Magister (1937) 133 PRANDIUM POETICUM PRIMUM

Remco Regtuit Quinque haiku Theoderici in honorem composita 151 Michiel Verweij Via Appia. Ad Theodoricum Sacré 152

CHAPTER 2

ITALIAN HUMANIST POETRY

Jeroen De Keyser Quid non cogat amor? Carlo Gonzaga and Lyda’s Love Story in Filelfo’s Sphortias 155 Ide François Two Enigmatic Epigrams in Berlin, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, ms. Lat. quarto 469 167 Fabio Della Schiava Poesia goliardica pavese. Maffeo Vegio e la Prosopopea del secchio 183 Béatrice Charlet-Mesdijan Poésie et politique dans deux Carmina d’Ercole Strozzi 197 Heinz Hofmann Basilius Zanchius, Poemata 5.1. Eine poetische Trauerklage auf Giovanni Pontano 211 Giuseppe Marcellino Le eruzioni dell’Etna nella poesia latina dei moderni 229 PRANDIUM POETICUM SECUNDUM

Fidelis Raedle In laudem sancti Ambrosii 245 Fidelis Raedle Grammatica 247

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CHAPTER 3

HUMANIST POETRY FROM THE LOW COUNTRIES

Gilbert Tournoy Neo-Latin Poetry in the Album amicorum of Hubert Audejans 251 Jan Papy – Jeanine De Landtsheer “A Refined and Fragrant Garland”. A Poem by Philip Rubens in Honour of Justus Lipsius’s Seneca 265 Harm-Jan van Dam A Taste of Honey: Daniel Heinsius’s Lusus ad apiculas for Justus Lipsius 285 Jan Bloemendal The First Lyrical Choral Ode of Heinsius’s Herodes infanticida (1632) and the Classics 299 Henk Nellen A Plea for Rehabilitation. Nicolas Heinsius’s Funeral Poem on Hugo Grotius 311 Marcus de Schepper Autumn 1643 – A Smooth Shift of Generations? Poems by Caspar Barlaeus and Caspar Kinschotius on a Portrait of Jacobus Maestertius 327 PRANDIUM POETICUM TERTIUM

Curtius Smolak Carmen de duobus Theodericis 339

CHAPTER 4

HUMANIST POETRY OUTSIDE ITALY AND THE LOW COUNTRIES

Farkas Gábor Kiss Private Poetry: An Unknown certamen of Conrad Celtis and Its Context 343 Walther Ludwig Musen, die Parthenicae des Baptista Mantuanus und Bibelparaphrase in der Musithias des Johannes Tuberinus 359 Jean-Louis Charlet Le Choix des mètres dans les Epigrammata d’Agrippa d’Aubigné (Genève, BPU, ms. Tronchin 158) 377

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Juan Francisco Alcina Rovira La fama como poeta de Antonio Agustín (1517-1586) con un estudio de los dísticos Iurisconsultos non esse alienos a Musis ad Ioannem fratrem 393 Joaquín Pascual Barea Liminary Poems in the First Volume of Jerónimo de Almonacir’s Commentaria in Canticum canticorum Salomonis 407 Brenda M. Hosington Spes mea Christus: Elizabeth Jane Weston’s Religious Poetry 421 Wilfried Stroh Mozarts erstes Opernlibretto. Rufinus Widl OSB: Apollo et Hyacinthus 437 PRANDIUM POETICUM Q UARTUM

David Money Dircaea Carmina 455

CHAPTER 5

JESUIT POETRY

Colette Nativel Sidronius Hosschius, poète de l’hypotypose 459 Ralph Dekoninck – Aline Smeesters L’épode 15 de Jacob Balde, entre vision picturale et peinture visionnaire 475 Stefan Tilg Heroism in the Horatian Lyric Tradition: A  Turning Point in Jakob Balde’s Poetics 495 Toon Van Houdt – Marc Van Vaeck From School Exercise and Affixio to Devotional Emblem Book: The Latin Poems of Typus mundi (1627) 513 Florian Schaffenrath Die Metamorphoses Styriae (Graz, 1722) des Ludwig Debiel SJ 527 Yasmin Haskell Subterranean Subtexts: Allegory and the Jesuit Suppression in Landívar’s Rusticatio Mexicana (Bologna, 1782) 545

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PRANDIUM POETICUM Q UINTUM

Fidelis Raedle In laudem Theoderici Sacré rude gloriose donati 563 Fidelis Raedle Valedictio 565

CHAPTER 6

LATIN POETRY FROM THE LATE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY ONWARDS

Kurt Smolak Augusteische Klassik und katholische Werbung. Zu Gedichten Cölestin Leuthners O.S.B. (Ode 15, Elegia 3) 569 Ingrid A. R. De Smet James Parke’s Ars piscatoria, or The Art of Fishing, according to an Early Nineteenth-Century Cambridge Poet 591 Romain Jalabert Des poèmes manuscrits de collégiens sur le sacre de Charles  X en 1825 615 Nicholas De Sutter Musae Pompeianae. The Reception of Pompeii and Herculaneum in Neo-Latin Literature (19th-20th Centuries) 631 Tom Deneire A Schoolboy’s Exercises. Joseph Alfred Bradney’s Latin Compositions at Harrow (1877) 651 Emilio Bandiera Joseph Tusiani nel Certamen Hoeufftianum 1959 667 PRANDIUM POETICUM SEXTUM

Maurus Pisini Praetereuntis vitae testimonia 685 CRUSTULA

Sigrides C. Albert Verba gratulatoria 689 Victorius Ciarrocchi Laudes et grates 690

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Gerardus Freyburger – Anna Maria Chevallier Ut Selestadienses olim Erasmum celebraverunt, ita nunc Argentoratenses Theodoricum celebrare volunt 692 Milena Minkova In laudem Theoderici Sacré 694 Giancarlo Rossi Colloquium Elysium 695 Robertus Spataro Theodoricus 700 Terentius Tunberg De Theoderico Sacré 702 Index manuscriptorum 705 Index nominum 707 Illustrations 721 Tabula gratulatoria 723

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AD THEODERICUM SACRÉ Nunc permitte senem tibi omne donum De caelestibus invocare tectis Si corpus fieri potest repente Astri mobilitas pudica et ampla. Joseph Tusiani

JEANINE DE LANDTSHEER – FABIO DELLA SCHIAVA – TOON VAN HOUDT

INTRODUCTION *

In or around 1630, the French artist Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665), while sojourning in Rome, created a  painting which would have decisively confirmed his reputation as one of  Europe’s most gifted painters of  classicizing historical and mythological scenes, if  it had circulated longer in the Roman artistic and literary milieus which the learned and inquisitive painter so eagerly frequented at the time. Instead, the work was quickly moved to France, to be stored away safely in a private collection, patiently waiting for more than two centuries to be rescued from nearly complete oblivion. It was not until 1911 that it was rediscovered and proudly displayed in the Musée du Louvre in Paris. The painting was given the appropriate title L’Inspiration du poète (The inspiration of   the poet) and evokes a scene with which early modern artists and men of  letters, deeply steeped in classical Greek and Roman culture and literature, were all too familiar. Apollo, the eternally young and energetic god of, among other things, sun and light, of  medicine and of   the healing arts of  music, song, and poetry, occupies the central part of   the canvas. He has descended from heaven to Mount Parnassus, where, accompanied by Calliope, the most important of  the nine muses and patroness of  epic poetry, he receives a young man, who is holding a writing tablet and a quill pen in his hands. He is about to write down the divine verses which Apollo, his arms resting on a lyre, his right index finger pointing to the poet’s tablet, is about to dictate or rather, perhaps, instill. In eager anticipation the poet has lifted his head to look at *  We are very grateful to Ingrid Sperber for having corrected our English. Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 13-24 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124046

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the skies, as if  he can already discern the harmonious music of   the spheres which he, contrary to ordinary men, can hear thanks to the inspiration which he is receiving from Apollo and Calliope. Skillfully blending two distinct moments – the very beginning of   the creative process of  writing inspired verses and the glorification that, almost inevitably, must result from the production and publication of  such sublime verses – Poussin has added two naked but chaste putti holding laurel wreaths in their hands; one is circling above the young poet and is about to crown him, an act that will turn him into a renowned, though enviable, poeta laureatus. This is, of course, not the proper place to engage in a thoroughgoing art-historical analysis and interpretation of Poussin’s mas­ter­ piece – a  work which has already been admirably executed by Marc Fumaroli in his thought-provoking study “L’Inspiration du poète de Poussin: les deux Parnasses”.1 However, the painting does allow us to highlight some of  the most salient features of  this book – a varied collection of  almost forty scholarly contributions on the poetical output of  early modern and modern Latin authors, ranging from humanists active in Q uattrocento Italy, such as France­sco Filelfo, Maffeo Vegio and Ercole Strozzi, to contemporary NeoLatin poets, such as Joseph Tusiani. Unsurprisingly, all of  them are men of  letters, which has everything to do with the undeniable fact that the Neo-Latin respublica litteraria has always, to a very large extent, been a world dominated by men, a world that has granted only limited space to talented, creative women. It is  equally true, however, that there have always been exceptions to this general rule. One of  them was the Catholic author Elizabeth Jane Weston (1582-1612), born and bred in a progressive English family that saw to it that she received a proper Latin education, on which she capitalized, at least temporarily, for as long as she remained unmarried, by writing and publishing Latin verses that were read and much appreciated by her male colleagues all over Europe.2 It is  no coincidence, then, that on Poussin’s painting L’Inspi­ ration du poète Apollo bestows poetic inspiration upon a lad rather 1  In M. Fumaroli, L’École du silence. Le sentiment des images au XVII e siècle (Paris, 1994), 53-181; originally published in 1989. Poussin’s painting is to be placed in a long tradition of  representations, either in word or image, of  Apollo and the muses being invoked by a poet. For a brief  overview of  this rich tradition, see P. Murray, “Muses”, in A.  Grafton, G.  W. Most, S.  Settis (ed.), The Classical Tradition (Cambridge, Mass. – London, 2010), 603-604. 2  See the contribution of  Brenda M. Hosington in chapter 4.

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INTRODUCTION

than a lady. The presence of Calliope as well as the books containing Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, and Vergil’s Aeneid, which are lying at Apollo’s feet and resting in the left hand of  the putto standing next to him, all seem to suggest that our young man is  about to write an epic poem, admittedly the most elevated and prestigious poetic genre in the literary system of both the ancient Greeks and Romans, and the early modern humanists. However, this impression is not altogether correct, as Fumaroli has convincingly argued in his above-mentioned article. Apart from being, in all likelihood, a pictorial “panegyric” in honour of   the recently deceased Italian poet Marcello Giovanetti (1598-1631), who had sadly failed to obtain the financial support and literary patronage of  Pope Urban  VIII (Maffeo Barberini), L’Inspiration du poète was meant to be a subtle endorsement of   the ambitious poetic program which Urban had already successfully put into practice as a much acclaimed humanist poet before rising to Saint Peter’s throne and which, as the pope, he tried to impose on the men of  letters living and working in the Catholic world. It was a program that strongly favoured a carefully purified, quintessentially “neo-classical” kind of  Latin poetry, in which the loftiest poetic genres of  the ancient Greeks and Romans – not only epic, but also elegies, odes and hymns – were to be combined with a  dignified set of  subject-matters, among which timehonoured ancient wisdom and typically Christian themes were to be given pride of  place.3 It is doubtful, to say the least, whether Pope Urban VIII would have approved of  all the poems discussed in this volume. For the range of  genres treated here is dazzlingly broad and widely exceeds the fairly strict boundaries set by the prelate in his pontifical views and standpoints on poetry. Virtually all the genres and subgenres which were practiced by early modern and modern Neo-Latin poets are represented in this book. The reader will find contributions on major and minor epic poems (epyllia), lyric and elegiac poetry, including erotic or even blatantly obscene poems,4 didactic and satirical verses, and, last but not least, epigrams; many of  the poems discussed can easily be subsumed under the comfortably broad and vague category of  “occasional poetry”. Some poems broach a  rich   Fumaroli 1994 (as in n. 1), 103-116.   See the contribution of  Fabor Gábor Kiss on the titillatingly explicit poem Certamen auri cum cauda virili, that can safely be attributed to Conradus Celtis, in chapter 4. 3 4

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variety of  “secular” themes, while others bear an unequivocally religious character, or deftly manage to fuse “earthly” and “spiritual” matters and preoccupations. It should be noted, however, that several of   the poets highlighted in the following contributions shifted swiftly from one genre or subgenre to another in one and the same poetical collection, as is  for instance the case with the Carmina composed by the sixteenth-century Italian poet Ber­ nar­dino Partenio or the monumental Musithias written by the lesser-­known German humanist Johannes Tuberinus from the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries.5 Moreover, some poems simply defy any clear categorization or infuse a  classical genre with new elements so as to become refreshingly “un-classical”. A good example of  the first tendency is the Prosopopeia mergoris ad dominum Gulielmum Guerram by the Italian fifteenth-century humanist Maffeo Vegio, a  very entertaining specimen of  student poetry which can aptly be labelled a hexametric burlesque.6 A quite remarkable example of   the second case is  to be found in the epicedium which the Dutch humanist Daniel Heinsius, something of  a  poetical prodigy, wrote on the occasion of  Justus Lipsius’s death in 1606. As Harm-Jan van Dam acutely observes, the lyrical poem is playfully polymetric, using a different meter in almost every line, a feature which lends the poem an unmistakably experimental character.7 In the present volume, Calliope, the muse of  epic poetry, is merrily dancing not only with Erato, the muse of  lyric poetry, but also, and perhaps somewhat surprisingly, with Euterpe, who from ancient times onwards was known for inspiring αὐλῳδίαι, choruses accompanied by flute-playing (αὐλός), and Melpomene, who has traditionally been pictured as guiding authors of  tragedies. Melpomene and Euterpe are represented by the biblical tragedy Herodes infanticida, composed by Daniel Heinsius in 1632, the first chorus of  which is  analyzed in depth by Jan Bloemendal.8 Needless to say, the chorus can be considered as a lyrical ode and, 5   See the contribution of  Marc Laureys in chapter 1 and of  Walther Ludwig in chapter 4, respectively. 6  See the contribution of  Fabio Della Schiava in chapter 2. “Student (poetry)” is the rather flat translation of  the French “poésie estudiantine” or the Italian “poesia studentesca”. 7  See his contribution in chapter 3. 8  See his contribution in chapter 3.

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INTRODUCTION

as such, can easily be subsumed under the heading of  lyric poetry. Much more special is  Wilfried Stroh’s detailed analysis of   the libretto Apollo et Hyacinthus which the German friar Rufinus Widl wrote for Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s very first opera from 1767.9 It goes without saying that the opera for which the libretto was destined can by no means be reduced to classical or early modern classicizing tragedies and falls outside the scope of  those genres which are, by common scholarly consent, considered to belong to Neo-Latin poetry in the strict sense of   the word.10 However, in so far as the libretto is largely (though by no means exclusively) based on Ovid’s epic poem Metamorphoses and is  composed in verses rather than in oratio soluta, we are of   the opinion that it truly deserves a place in the present volume. Let us briefly return to Poussin’s painting and pay close attention to its constitutive elements. What immediately strikes the spectator’s eye is  the “other-worldly” character of   the setting and the isolated status of   the young poet. Indeed, confined to the company of  Apollo and Calliope whom he meets on the mythical Mount Parnassus, he shows himself  to be a  solitary genius, writing, or at least about to write, his inspired poetry unhampered by the hustle and bustle of  ordinary life, completely disconnected from other people, be it patrons or listeners, colleagues or friends, spouse or children. From a historical point of  view, this is, of  course, a  very limited, if  not distorted, picture of   the everyday reality in which early modern and modern Neo-Latin poets actually worked. While some may have liked to see and present themselves as lonely figures enraptured by some kind of  divine furore when writing their inspired poems,11 more often than not the writing and publishing of  verses was a highly social event, a communicative act in

  See his contribution in chapter 4.   See, e.g., the classification in Ph. Ford (†), J. Bloemendal, Ch. Fantazzi (ed.), Brill’s Encyclopaedia of   the Neo-Latin World. Macropaedia (Leiden – Boston, 2014). Interestingly, opera based on a  Neo-Latin libretto is  not discussed by Bloemendal in his article “Neo-Latin Drama” (473-484), but briefly, almost obliquely touched upon by Rudolf Rasch in his contribution “Latin Words to Music” (519-536). See also the short mention of opera in Jozef IJsewijn with Dirk Sacré, Companion to Neo-Latin Studies, Part II. Literary, Linguistic, Philological and Editorial Q uestions (Leuven, 1998), 321. 11  This was, e.g., the case with the German Jesuit poet Jacobus Balde, as can be gleaned from the contribution devoted to him by Ralph Dekoncinck and Aline Smeesters in chapter 5. 9

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its own right. Humanists wrote and sent verses in order to establish or confirm friendships. Humanists composed poems as part of  an emulative game that was every inch as social in nature as it was literary in scope. Men of  letters wielded their versatile pens to seek patronage or distance themselves from competitors and foes. The present volume offers numerous examples of  this typical feature of  Neo-Latin verse composition – too many, in fact, to be summarized here. At first sight, Nicolas Poussin’s young poet may seem to be exuding the solitariness of  a  creative genius. However, he does communicate, in a way – if  not with friends or neighbours, patrons or colleagues, then at least with the towering figures of  classical Greek and Roman literature. Indeed, the volumes containing Homer’s and Vergil’s famous epic poems which the painter has inserted into his masterpiece in a  rather unobtrusive way, seem to suggest that the poet’s creativity does not solely rely on the inspiration which he gratefully receives from Apollo and Calliope, but is, at least to a certain extent, also based on thorough reading and conscious imitation of  exemplary classical models. To put it otherwise, Neo-Latin poetry springs from transpiration as much as from inspiration; unsurprisingly, it turns out to be the result of systematic education and persevering study, and entails as much industrious labour as moments of  wondrous inspiration. In this context, it may be useful to remind the reader of   the fact that already in ancient Greek times, the muses were commonly depicted as symbols of  learning and education (παιδεία). And there is, of course, no learning without bitter effort. The untold doggedness, the grim exertions with which Neo-Latin poets chiseled out their verses can sometimes be surmised in the present volume by having a  look at the critical apparatus that many scholars –  all of   them philologists to the bone – have added to their edition of  the poem or poems which they seek to analyze and interpret. To take just one particularly telling example, the Italian teacher of  Latin Alfredo Bartoli continued to modify and improve his Primus Horatii Magister, a poem written in a distinctly Horatian-satirical vein, over a  timespan of  no less than twenty years, from its first published version in 1909 until at least 1928.12 How hard and laborious the training was, which youngsters had to undergo in   See the contribution of  Christian Laes in chapter 1.

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INTRODUCTION

order to become well-versed Neo-Latin poets can be gleaned from Tom Deneire’s fascinating analysis of  the school exercises in Latin (and Greek) prose and verse composition which Joseph Alfred Bradney had to execute as a  schoolboy attending Harrow in the 1870s. As diligently as he could, the docile schoolboy tried to turn the English models that were presented to him and his classmates into grammatically correct and fluent Latin sentences or verses; with unflagging zeal his schoolmaster corrected the various flaws and failings which his trained eagle’s eye mercilessly detected and for which he patiently, if  perhaps somewhat patronizingly, suggested more sound or elegant solutions.13 In our initial “call for papers” we explicitly stated that we wanted to attract specific case studies which would shed light on the rich diversity of  scholarly approaches currently prevailing in the field of  Neo-Latin poetical studies. It is only fair to say that despite the extremely broad chronological, geographical and generic range of   the articles which we have received in response to our call, many, if  not most, of   them share a  remarkably similar methodological approach to Neo-Latin poetry. Nearly all the scholars contributing to this volume successfully combine detailed intra-textual analysis, paying due attention to the interrelationship of  content and form in the poems under discussion, with painstaking reconstruction of   the peculiar historical and biographical circumstances under which those poems came to light, as well as with patient tracing, executed with the tenacity and ingenuity typical of   the true detective, of   the intertextual relationships which tie a  poem together with other literary works – be it ancient models, including the Bible and early Christian authors, or the artistic output of  early modern, sometimes even medieval, authors. These intertextual relationships testify eloquently to the exceptionally learned nature of  much of  Neo-Latin literature and more often than not reveal the game, serious, playful or both, of  imitation and emulation, in which most of   the early modern humanists and their 13  See Deneire’s contribution in chapter 6. The present volume contains some more Neo-Latin poetry deriving from school exercises. See the contributions of  Toon Van Houdt and Marc Van Vaeck in chapter 5 and of  Romain Jalabert in chapter 6. On the unremitting efforts required of, and imposed on, schoolboys in order to bring their poetic labours to fruition, see the interesting essay by Sarah Knight, “How the Young Man Should Study Latin Poetry: Neo-Latin Literature and Early Modern Education”, in V. Moul (ed.), A Guide to Neo-Latin Literature (Cambridge, 2017), 52-65.

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modern successors were engaged. Crucially, they sometimes also point to extra layers of  meaning which would have remained hidden if  the time-consuming task of  finding references and allusions had not been undertaken with sufficient care and diligence. It would be quite pointless to enumerate here all the classical and non-classical authors who appear to have provided the NeoLatin poets treated in this volume with various kinds of  subtexts. Suffice it to say that, among the classical authors, Ovid, Horace, and Vergil appear most frequently, as is of  course to be expected, while widely read and highly appreciated early modern poets such as Baptista Mantuanus, Janus Secundus and Jacobus Balde, to mention just a few, have evidently gained a “classical” status which allowed them to function as subtexts or intertexts for other poets in turn.14 This strong emphasis on intertextuality comes at a certain prize, so it seems. As far as we can judge from the contributions which we have received, Neo-Latin scholars appear to be rather afraid to apply, in a more or less overt and systematic way, other aspects of contemporary literary theory. Apart from the application of  the so-called persona theory in one single contribution,15 literary theory is  conspicuously absent in this volume. In this respect Neo-Latin philologists prove to be more “conservative” or, to put it less unfavourably, more “cautious” than their colleagues who are working on ancient Greek and Latin literature. While Neo-Latin scholars appear to be extremely open-minded when it comes to building bridges with such diverse disciplines as intellectual and political history, art history, and musicology, as is  amply demonstrated in this volume, they are, and remain, fairly reluctant to engage in a fruitful dialogue with their more theoretically inclined colleagues in the literary departments which they, nonetheless, often share with them.16 14 For the pervasive “influence” of  Baptista Mantuanus, Janus Secundus and Jacobus Balde (to use a term that has become hopelessly outmoded in contemporary intertextual studies), see the contributions of Walther Ludwig in chapter 4, Harm-Jan van Dam in chapter 3, and Kurt Smolak in chapter 6, respectively. 15  See Shari Boodts’s article in chapter 1. 16  The abhorrence, or avoidance, of  literary theory may well be connected to the lack of  methodological self-reflection which still prevails in the field. For this regrettable deficit, see especially T. Van Hal, “Towards Meta-Neo-Latin Studies? Impetus to Debate on the Field of  Neo-Latin Studies and Its Methodology”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 56 (2007), 349-365.

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As Yasmin Haskell has put it quite felicitously, Neo-Latin poets practiced an art “that was radically combinatorial, one of breaking, binding, and re-animating a  pre-existing materia poetica.” 17 So it is quite understandable, even laudable, that many of   the authors contributing to this volume engage in a thorough intertextual analysis of   the poem or poems they have chosen to discuss. In some cases the detection of  borrowings from, or subtle allusions to, various classical models occupies such a central place in their articles that we have decided to gather them in a  separate first chapter which we have entitled, aptly but perhaps also somewhat blandly, “Classical Models”. We are acutely aware of  the fact that, by doing so, we have disturbed the otherwise fairly “logical” geographical and chronological order in which the scholarly contributions appear in this volume – starting with articles dealing with Italian humanist poetry (chapter 2), humanist poetry stemming from the Low Countries (chapter 3) and from other countries outside Italy and the Netherlands (chapter 4), to end with “modern” NeoLatin poetry written and published from the late eighteenth until the twentieth century (chapter 6).18 Chapter 5, which deals specifically with Jesuit poetry, once more slightly unsettles this fixed geographical-chronological pattern. In our opinion, Jesuit poetry deserves a separate chapter, if  only because it was so predominant and all-pervasive in the early modern period, not only in the Catholic world but also in several Protestant countries.19

17  Y.  Haskell, “Conjuring with the Classics: Neo-Latin Poets and Their Pagan Familiars”, in V.  Moul (ed.), A  Guide to Neo-Latin Literature (Cambridge, 2017), 17-34, at 18. 18  Our chronological division between Neo-Latin poetry written and published before and after the end of   the eighteenth century differs from the categorization proposed by Demmy Verbeke in his “History of Neo-Latin Studies”, in Ph. Ford (†), J.  Bloemendal, Ch.  Fantazzi (ed.), Brill’s Encyclopaedia of   the Neo-Latin World. Macropaedia (Leiden – Boston, 2014), 907-919, at 908, but fits in nicely with the one that has previously been suggested by Walther Ludwig in his seminal article “Die neuzeitliche lateinische Literatur seit der Renaissance”, in F. Graf (ed.), Einleitung in die lateinische Philologie (Stuttgart – Leipzig, 1997), 323-356 (esp. 334-344); Ludwig, too, draws a clear-cut demarcation line around 1800. 19  As can easily be demonstrated by means of    the international diffusion and reception of   the Jesuit Sidronius Hosschius’s religious poetry. See, e.g., F. M. Dietz, Literaire levensaders. Internationale uitwisseling van woord, beeld en religie in de Republiek (Hilversum, 2012). On Hosschius’s religious poetry, see the contribution of  Colette Nativel in chapter 5.

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JEANINE DE LANDTSHEER – FABIO DELLA SCHIAVA – TOON VAN HOUDT

This volume is  dedicated to Dirk Sacré. While the rich diversity of   the contributions presented here nicely reflects the robust vitality of  Neo-Latin studies at large, it is also meant to give the reader an idea, however partial, of   the astonishingly broad range of  our dedicatee’s scholarly output. Indeed, already at a fairly young age, when working as a doctoral and post-doctoral researcher at the Belgian National Fund for Scientific Research, Dirk Sacré displayed a  truly voracious interest in the Neo-Latin literature of   the early modern and modern period, studying the influential philosophical poem De animorum immortalitate libri tres of  the sixteenth-century Italian humanist Aonio Paleario (Aonius Palearius Verulanus) as passionately as the poetical exercises of   the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century Flemish priest Emiel Gouffaux, and going even so far as to follow the lead of  his mentor Jozef  IJsewijn in drawing attention to the literary output of  contemporary NeoLatin authors active in such different countries as Finland or Japan.20 After his appointment as professor of  Latin at the University of  Antwerp, later at the University of  Leuven, his scholarly aspirations and endeavours in the field of  Neo-Latin poetry continued to grow and expand in various directions, including early modern Jesuit poems, especially those written by Sidronius Hosschius and Jacobus Wallius, and the poetical exercises of  various nineteenth- and twentieth-century authors from Belgium, France, Italy, and many other countries – at the time still a largely uncharted field of scholarly research. Despite his extremely intensive scholarly work, Dirk Sacré has always been ready to share his unsurpassable knowledge of   the Neo-Latin language and literature with his students, colleagues, and friends by giving invaluable advice, actively supporting research projects or simply by correcting, as pre  Under the guidance of  Jozef  IJsewijn, Dirk Sacré prepared a doctoral dissertation on Paleario’s poem, which he successfully defended in 1986 and which eventually led to the publication of  Aonii Palearii Verulani De animorum immortalitate libri III. Introduction and Text in the series “Verhandelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België. Klasse der Letteren”, nr. 144 (Brussel, 1992). Gouffaux’s Neo-Latin poetry was presented in Kleio. Tijdschrift voor oude talen en antieke cultuur, N.S. 21.1 (1991), 36-47, the introduction to contemporary Neo-Latin verse from Finland and Japan in ibid., 17.1 (1987), 6-11 and 18.2 (1989), 88-94, respectively. These Dutch publications go a  long way to prove that Dirk Sacré was eager to “reach out” and make the results of  his scholarly research available to schoolteachers and other lettered persons belonging to his own linguistic community long before “outreach” had become a  fashionable catchword invented and spread by academic policymakers. 20

22

INTRODUCTION

cisely as mildly, certain errors in the first draft of  an article or book. In so doing, he has admirably displayed, and continues to display, the unselfish magnanimity typical of  the truly great scholar. Many of  us, Neo-Latinists, have greatly benefited from his generosity, and this book is but a small token of  our immense gratitude towards him. Dirk Sacré has always passionately loved the Neo-Latin muse, who, in turn, has generously favoured him with an exceptional talent for writing and speaking Latin with great fluency and elegance – a precious gift, the possession of  which he has eloquently demonstrated in the course of  many years on various occasions and in diverse contexts, not least as a  member, later as the president of   the honourable Academia Latinitati Fovendae. For Dirk, the Latin language and literature have never been a  mere object of  scholarly study, but have also, and from a  personal point of  view perhaps more importantly so, always been a  constant source of  intellectual and aesthetic pleasure. This is  precisely the reason why we found it appropriate to honour him by inserting into this volume a  neat sample of  contemporary Latin prose and verse, written especially for this occasion by members of   the Academia Latinitati Fovendae and some other creative souls working outside its ambit. Unsurprisingly, a fair number of   these literary products has taken on the form of  refined, if  sometimes rather florid, pieces of  panegyrical rhetoric. It relieves us, the editors, of  the pleasurable but inevitably somewhat delicate duty of  extolling the numerous merits of  our esteemed colleague and beloved “patron” ourselves; that work has been carried out already, in a manner as brilliant as it is inimitable.21 The publication of  a  book, especially such a  voluminous book as the present one, is  always the result of  a  collaborative enterprise. Many persons and institutions have worked together to bring our project to fruition, and we wish to thank them all. First and foremost, we should like to thank all those scholars, young and promising researchers as well as internationally recognized authorities, who have agreed to contribute to this learned album amicorum by writing, under particularly strange and difficult circumstances due 21  We have decided to intersperse these literary creations between the chapters containing scholarly contributions, presenting them as various courses of  a  hearty “spiritual” meal aimed at relaxing and reinvigorating the reader’s soul.

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JEANINE DE LANDTSHEER – FABIO DELLA SCHIAVA – TOON VAN HOUDT

to the coronavirus, an essay on interesting specimens or aspects of   Neo-Latin poetry. Special thanks are owed to the members of   the Academia Latinitati Fovendae who have been so kind as to wield their versatile Latin pen in honour of  Dirk Sacré. Last but not least, we are extremely grateful to the staff  of  Brepols Publishers, in general, and, more particularly, to Tim Denecker for the highly efficient and pleasant way in which they have guided us through the various stages of   the production process. Without their invaluable help and support this book could not have come to completion. Publishing a scholarly book costs money, much money. Therefore it is a great pleasure for us to mention the many benefactors who generously provided us with the means that were needed to bring our project to a successful end: the Academia Latinitati Foven­dae (Rome), the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Neo-Latin Studies (Innsbruck), the Classici Lovanienses (Leuven), the Faculty of  Arts, the Research Unit Literary Studies, the Research Group Latin Literature, the Section Teacher Training – Latin and Greek and, last but not least, Illuminare – Studiecentrum voor Middeleeuwse Kunst of   the KU Leuven. If  anything, their generosity proves that Dirk Sacré is  held in high esteem, in Leuven and elsewhere, both within and outside the relatively intimate circle of   Neo-Latin scholars. To conclude, we sincerely hope that our book will prove to be as sweet and pleasant to read as it has been stimulating for us to put it together. After all, the Neo-Latin muse is dear to all of   us; or to use a quotation from Vergil, bending its meaning a little by reading a poetical plural in the text: dulces ante omnia Musae.

24

PROMULSIS POETICA

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 25-39 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124047

SAPPHO

TUOMO PEKKANEN

SAPPHO METRIS GRAECIS VERSIBUSQ UE SERVATIS LATINE VERTIT

Praefatio Textus Graecus carminum, quae verti, est curatus ab Eva-Maria Voigt in Sappho et Alcaeus. Fragmenta (Amsterdam, 1971), iterum editus in Biblioteca Universale Rizzoli (= B). Alias editiones ad lectiones ambiguas comparavi.1 Sappho c. 10.000 versus scripsisse aestimatur, ex quibus c. 650 restant. Carmina aut fragmenta in B numerantur 192, quorum maior pars ex singulis vocabulis, strophis aut versibus ambiguis constat. Integer mansit tantum hymnus B  1 Aphroditae dicatus. Magnam partem servata sunt etiam carmina B  2 et 31. Praeter haec ad vertendum elegi tantum strophas, quae sine coniecturis dubiis ad sensus poetriae intelligendos sufficiunt. Etsi versio mea Latina hymni B 1 antea in opere Carmina viatoris (Supplementa. Humanistica Lovaniensia vol. 19, Lovanii 2005, 191) divulgata est, illam ex ceteris versionibus Sapphus metricis excludere nolui, praesertim cum inter editores illius operis esset professor amicus Dirk (Theodoricus) Sacré, artis poeticae peritissimus, quem hoc volumine celebramus cuique multorum annorum felicem cooperationem in Academia Latinitati Fovendae debeo. In eisdem Carminibus viatoris (192) includuntur etiam prima versio fragmentis B 137, cuius versum decasyllabum retractavi, et fragmentum B 168 B.

1 Q uae sunt imprimis F. Sisti (ed.), Lirici greci (Milano, 1990); Fr. Wehrli (ed.), Lyricorum Graecorum florilegium (Basileae, 1961); M.  Treu, Sappho griechisch und deutsch (München, 1958).

27

TUOMO PEKKANEN

Catullus in c.  51 exemplar Sapphicum B  31 imitatur, sed carmen eius partim tantum versio eiusdem Latina haberi potest, ut ex comparatione facile appareat: In primo versu Catullus pluralem θέοισιν singulari deo vertit, quod metrice non fuit necessarium. Scripsit “Ille mi par esse deo videtur”, cum “par esse deis” salvo metro scribere potuisset. Secundus versus “Ille si fas est superare divos” apud Sappho deest, et sententia in secundo versu posita in tertio Catulliano verbis “Q ui sedens adversus identidem te” continuatur, ubi identidem est additamentum Catulli ad versum perficiendum sed πλάσιον “in propinquo” apud eum omissum est. Sappho in versibus 3-5 scribit virum audire puellam dulce loquentem et languide ridentem, ἆδυ φωνείσας ὐπακούει καὶ γελαίσας ἰμέροεν, Catullus autem, dum scribit “spectat et audit dulce ridentem”, pro ὐπακούει duo verba “spectat et audit” ponit, adverbium dulce ad risum puellae iungit, loquelam (φωνείσας) et risus languorem (γελαίσας ἰμέροεν) omittit.2 At ἰμέροεν, languide, quae apud Catullum deest, ostendit puellam amore languere et ita colorem eroticum carmini Sapphus confert,3 qui variationi Catullianae deest. In versibus 5-14 Sappho et Catullus illam secutus signa exteriora mentis vehementer commotae eisdem fere verbis describunt atque Lucretius 3.152-156, ut Kroll in commentario suo monuit: 4 “verum ubi vementi magis est commota metu mens, / consentire animam totam per membra videmus / sudoresque ita palloremque existere toto  / corpore et infringi linguam vocemque aboriri, / caligare oculos, sonere auris, succidere artus.” Lucretius per membra, toto corpore sudores […] exsistere palloremque

Sappho τρόμος δὲ παῖσαν ἄγρει ἴδρως κακχέεται χλωροτέρα δὲ ποίας

2   Horatius quidem carm. 1.22.10-11 scribit “dulce ridentem Lalagen amabo, dulce loquentem.” 3  F. Ferrari (B p. 127) bene vertit γελαίσας ἰμέροεν “un riso che suscita desiderio”. In poesi Latina mediaevali amore langueo “I languish for love” est locutio usitatissima, quae originem habet in Cantico canticorum 2.5 “Fulcite me floribus, stipate me malis, quia amore langueo.” 4  C. Valerius Catullus (Leipzig – Berlin, 1920), 92-93 ad locum.

28

SAPPHO

Lucretius infringi linguam vocemque aboriri caligare oculos sonere auris

Sappho με φώνας οὔδεν ἔτ’ εἴκει κὰμ μὲν γλῶσσα +ἔαγε ὀππάτεσσι δ’ οὐδ’ ἒν ὄρημμ’ ἐπιρρόμβεισι δ’ ἄκουαι

Apud Catullum multa ex his repetuntur, ut torpor linguae (“nihil est super mi vocis,5 lingua sed torpet”), tinnitus aurium (“tintinant aures”), defectio oculorum (“gemina teguntur lumina nocte”). Accuratissime vertit λέπτον δ’ αὔτικα χρῶι πῦρ ὐπαδεδρόμακεν “tenuis sub artus flamma demanat.” At sudor (ἀ δὲ μ’ ἴδρως κακχέε­ ται), tremor (τρόμος) pallorque (χλωροτέρα δὲ ποίας ἔμμι) 6 carminis Sapphici apud Catullum desunt neque ille se mori paratum (τεθνάκην δ’ ὀλίγω ’πιδεύης) confitetur. De ceteris interpretibus nominanda est Anna Elissa Radke, quae ex B 16 novum carmen ita creavit, ut ex poemate Sapphico tres strophas eodem metro Latine redderet quartamque ex suo penu adderet.7 In versu Sapphico Graeco quarta syllaba longa aut brevis esse potest, i.e. secundus pes est spondeus aut trochaeus. Apud Horatium quarta syllaba semper est longa, apud Catullum, qui metro Sapphico bis (c.  11 et 52) utitur, in duobus tantum versibus quarta syllaba est brevis: 11.15 “Pauca nuntiate meae puellae”, et 51.13 “Otium, Catulle, tibi molestum est.” Catullum secutus in versionibus meis Latinis trochaeum in secundo pede versus Sapphici semel (V 9 frangitur) posui.

Versiones I (B 1) O Venus, diva alma, throno in decoro quae dolos nectis, Iove nata, te oro, ne meum curis animum fatiges neve dolore,   Iam Kroll ib. vocis “ziemlich sichere Ergänzung” habet.   Cf.  Catull. 81.4 “Hospes inaurata pallidior statua”, et K.  E. Georges in Ausführliches deutsch-lateinisches Wörterbuch (Leipzig, 1913) s.v. pallidus II “insbes. gelb, olivengrün (χλωρός)”. 7 B.  Dowlasz, Catull-Rezeption in lateinischen Dichtungen von 1897 bis 2010 (Frankfurt am Main, 2017), 229 novum carmen Latinum ita ortum “pseudocatullianum” appellat. Radke illud in Katulla iam a. 1992 divulgavit, quod tantum ex opere Dowlasz novi. Radke in secundo pede versus Sapphici quater ponit trochaeum: “2 classibus pedestri […], 3 agmine – est mihi […], 11 et Cupidinis […].” 5 6

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sed veni huc, si quando alias mihi ante, audiens vocem procul, obsecuta es, aureo tectoque patris relicto ipsa adiisti vecta curru; te nitidi ferebant trans nigram terram celeres olores, firmiter pinnis superis ab auris deveniebant non morantes, tuque, beata, ridens ore divino mihi, qui, rogasti, pectus urgeret dolor, invocarem cur ego rursus, quid furens vellem, mihi ut eveniret, maxime. “Q uocum cupis, ut te amore coniuget Suadela, tibique, Sappho, quis malefecit? Namque si fugit, cito te sequetur, dona si non vult, fit ut ipsa donet, non amat si te, cito te iam amabit, etsi ita nolit.” Advenito et nunc, gravibusque solve pectoris curis, mihi quod futurum mens avet votis, facias et ipsa tu socia esto! II (B 2) Adveni in templum tibi consecratum! Lucus ambit frondeus atque pomi arbores, araeque ibi ture fumant usque deorum; arborum rami resonant aquarum frigido cursu, locus omnis umbris est opacus, de foliis redundat somnus amicus; 30

SAPPHO

sunt equorum pascua ibi parata, arva vernant florida, mitis aura spirat […] Adveni iam ad me, Cypri, cum coronis, aureos infunde suave nectar in scyphos, festo veniente laeto mitis adesto! III (B 5) Cypri cum Nereidibus, precamur, sospes ut frater valeat redire, atque quae vult ex animo evenire, omnia fiant, si quid ante fecerat, sit solutum, ut amicis gaudia ferre possit, hostibus tormenta parare, nobis nulla… Et sororem participare honorem ille concedat, gravibusque curis liberet, quorum olim animum opprimebat […] IV (B 16) Ceteris pulcherrima iudicatur in nigra terra peditum caterva, sive naves sive equites, mihi autem si quis amatur. Id quidem omnes perfacile est docere. Illa enim forma superans Helena feminas omnes proprium maritum vel generosum dereliquit, trans mare nave Troiam immemor nataeque parentiumque venit. Illam pellicuit calentem Cypris amore. […] 31

TUOMO PEKKANEN

quo modo de Anáctoriâ puellâ me monet illa. Eius incessum potius videre fert voluntas et faciem decoram quam citos currus peditesque Lydos congredientes. V (B 31) Ille vir par esse deis videtur, qui sedens adversus et in propinquo languidum risum audit et aspicit te dulce loquentem. Q uo quidem pectus mihi commovetur: namque vixdum te licet intueri temporis paulum, modo in ore vocis nil mihi restat, lingua frangitur tenuisque flamma ilico sub membra mihi cucurrit, visus omnis deficit et susurrant sponte sua aures. Sudor artus occupat et tremisco tota, fio pallida sicut herba, haud procul sum, quin videar iacere morte perempta. Omnia autem sunt mihi perferenda […] VI (B 34) Sidera in caelo faciem decoram contegunt cum luna recrevit omnis atque iam pulcherrima luce plena splendet in orbem. VII (B 47) […] Amor mihi concutit, mentem, sicuti ventus in montibus ilices. 32

SAPPHO

VIII (B 48) Venisti, bene denique agis, quia langueo. Ardentem mihi mentem animumque refrigeras. IX (B 55) Vita functa iacebis neque erit qui memoret tui, versus namque rosae Pieriae deficiunt tuos. Sic invisibilis in tenebris Tartareis eris obscuras animas concomitans corpore mortuo. X (B 94) [...] Sincere placet emori. A me cum lacrimis proficiscitur. Inter multa ita loquitur: “O quantum toleravimus, Sappho. Invita quidem hinc abitura sum.” Illi sic ego dixeram: “Laetabunda abii memor nostri: scis bene, quantum ego amaverim. Si non, tum quidem ego volo recorderis ut omnia de illis temporibus, quibus viximus. Coronas violis, rosis nexisti mihi plurimas, quas iuxta placuit tibi ponere. Serta plurima floribus facta ornant tenerum tuum collum [...]” XI (B 96) Feminas excellit super Lydias; saepe sole cadente sic roseis digitis decora luna omnia astra obscurans sua lumina super salsa maris vada sternit et super arva multiflora. 33

TUOMO PEKKANEN

Sparsus est umor roscidus et rosae florent et tener paederos floribus melilotos et odora. Illa ibi saepe vertitur ambulans, dulcis est memor Atthidis, curis mens animusque praegravatur. XII (B 102) O mater alma iam non valeo movere pecten. Venus domat meum cor iuvenili amore dulci. XIII (B 104) Vesper, cuncta refers, quae lucida dissipat Eos; fers pecus et capras, fers natas a genetrice. XIV (B 105 a) Sicut dulce rubet malum alto in arboris ramo, quod decerptores malorum non meminerunt non sunt obliti, sed tangere non potuerunt. XV (B 105 b) Sic hyacinthum pastores in montibus calcant, et flos purpureus iacet in terra male fractus […] XVI (B 132) Est mihi puella pulchra, floribus chrysanthemi aequipollet illa formâ, Cleis dilectissima. Totam Lydiam non illi praeferam nec (patriam) […] XVII (B 137) “Est, quod velim, sed dicere me impedit Pudor […]” “Desiderares si bona vel pia nec quid pararet lingua loqui mali, in visu haberes non pudorem, sed loquereris, ut esset aequum.” 34

SAPPHO

XVIII (B 168 B) Luna occidit, occiderunt et Pleiades, venitque noctis medium, hora praeterit, dormio at ipsa sola. Editiones carminum graecorum V. Di Benedetto (intr.), F. Ferrari (tr.), Saffo, Poesie (Milano, 2007) (= B) U. Albini (intr.), F. Sisti (ed., trad.), Lirici greci (Milano, 1990) M. Treu (ed., trad.), Sappho (München, 1958) Fr. Wehrli Turicensis (ed.), Lyricorum Graecorum florilegium (Basileae, 1961) Versus et strophae Metrum Sapphicum minus (I-VI) _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗᴗ _ ᴗ Pentameter Aeolicus (VII-VIII) ᴗ ᴗ _ᴗᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ Asclepiadeus maior (IX) ᴗ ᴗ _ᴗᴗ _ _ ᴗ ᴗ _ _ ᴗ ᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ Glyconeus (X 1-2, XI 2) ᴗᴗ_ᴗᴗ_ᴗ_ Tetrameter Aeolicus (X 3) ᴗ ᴗ _ᴗᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ Creticus + Glyconeus (XI 1) _ᴗ_ᴗᴗ_ᴗᴗ_ᴗ_ Phalaecius (XI 3) ᴗ ᴗ _ᴗᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ Dimeter iambicus catalepticus (XII 1,3) ᴗ_ᴗ_ᴗ_ᴗ 35

TUOMO PEKKANEN

Dimeter Ionicus anaclomenus (XII 2,4) ᴗᴗ_ᴗ_ᴗ_ᴗ Hexameter (XIII-XV) _ ᴗ ᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ _ ᴗᴗ_ ᴗ Tetrameter trochaicus catalepticus (XVI) _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ /_ ᴗ _ ᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ Stropha Alcaica (XVII) ᴗ_ ᴗ _ ᴗ / _ ᴗ ᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ ᴗ_ᴗ_ᴗ/_ᴗᴗ_ᴗᴗ ᴗ_ᴗ_ᴗ _ᴗ_ᴗ _ᴗᴗ_ᴗᴗ_ᴗ_ᴗ Enoplii (XVIII) ᴗ _ ᴗ ᴗ _ᴗ _ ᴗ

36

CICERO AD COLLOQ UIUM EVOCATUS

MICHAEL VON ALBRECHT

CICERO AD COLLOQ UIUM EVOCATUS CARMEN THEODERICO SACRÉ DEDICATUM

A : Dicendi unde tibi nata est tam mira facultas? C: Discendi quod omissa mihi est occasio nulla. “Rem teneas,” Maior dixit Cato, “verba sequentur.” Q uem studio veneror, cuius vestigia servo. Privatis opibus minime fuit ille locuples, 5 Nec lucri cupidus. Fuerat res publica cordi Sola viro, patriae sancto flagrabat amore. Pauper et ipse fui. Patriae tamen utilis esse Ardebam. In somnis monuit me Porcius ipse “Res iubeo, non verba sequi. Vigilare memento, 10 Ingenium exacuas, rerumque peritia crescat. Utilior ferro labor hic, pretiosior auro. Mente tibi, non vi, patriam servare licebit.” A: Ille quidem, quamquam visus contemnere Graios, E Danais didicisse senex non pauca probatur. 15 At tibi iam puero Graecos placuisse magistros Suspicor. C: Haud sprevi Romana exempla. Trahebat Me ingenium Antoni, Crassus venerabilis arte. Q ui tamen externos mihi commendare magistros Non dubitat: “Musarum acuat tibi filius aurem 20 Archias; Aesopo gestus polienda venustas!” Imprimis Molon docuit me mitius uti Voce mea. Sine quo patriae servire nequirem. A: Te multum video Graecis debere magistris. C: Unum etiam maius: sapientia summa Platonis, 25 Q ua sine nec patriae neque amicis utilis essem. A: Vix credo: procul a vita sophia ista remota est. C: Nil tamen utilius! Nulla esset copia fandi, 37

MICHAEL VON ALBRECHT

Ni tu, docte Philo, dubitandi fide magister, Socraticus vere, meditari me docuisses 30 Non tantum mea verba, sed et contraria, summa Cum cura, promptum partem pugnare in utramque. Sic ego, molitur quidquid pars altera, mente Anticipans, cunctis sum respondere paratus. His sine exercitiis esset facundia nulla. 35 A: Sic tibi rhetoricae facta est sapientia mater. C: Nec tantum eloquii, vitae dux maxima mansit. Cuncta etenim ad vitam sophiae praecepta referri Certus eram: Ratio et privata et publica frenat. Res etenim cunctas, divina humanaque nosse 40 Et rerum causas, tempus quid postulet ipsum Perspicere illa docet. Consul neque gente neque armis Sed sola vigili confisus mente labantem Servavi patriam, iuris legumque pudorem. A: Victe iaces, Catilina, haud victa audacia! C: Q uare 45 Ulterius quaero, fundamina quomodo firmem Rerum nostrarum. Valuit concordia Romae, Dum terrent hostes. Victa Carthagine rixae Natae inter cives. Tantum sua cuique placebant Commoda, non patriae. Consensus ut ille salutis 50 Communis redeat, praebet sapientia Graeca Arma homini: regnet ratio, non caeca cupido. Se noscat, simul et leges moresque paternos Q uisque suo studeat stabilire in pectore civis! “Vixisti tibi, non patriae satis, inclute Caesar,” 55 Heu frustra suasi. Totum qui vicerat orbem, Se tamen excepto, sapientia defuit illi. Ultima spes in te posita est, Romana iuventus: Q uod superest vitae vobis impendere curo! Utile Graeca tulit quidquid sapientia vitae 60 Librorum in magnum libuit contexere corpus. “Sit notus sibi quisque!” monent Academica scripta. Q uae bona, quae non sint, libri De finibus edunt. Q uas natura ferat leges, Cicero ipse revelo. A: Hunc legum fontem populi communiter unum 65 Inveniant, quem nunc orbi tua scripta recludunt! C: Scipio, quid mundus, pandit, quae publica res sit. Dum tibi amicitiae laudantur vincula, Laeli, 38

CICERO AD COLLOQ UIUM EVOCATUS

Canities viridis fert gaudia sera Catoni. Dum dubitans quaero, quae sit natura deorum: 70 Perspicio numen cunctis a gentibus unum Iure coli. A: Q uod Christicolis hodieque probatur. Q ui tibi amor patriae, nobis fratrisque Deique. Iam fit, quod tua mens providerat; unius orbis Civibus est cunctis custodia tradita mundi. 75 C: Q uinque libris studui medicamina ferre dolori. Post mortem natae, qua nil mihi carius umquam, Ipse mihi non erubui solacia ferre. A: Heu! Impugnatos, non victos multa dolores Littera testatur. Doctorum stulta caterva 80 Pro quo te improbat et clamat minus esse virilem. At mihi carior es tanto: tua littera mecum Sic loquitur, praesens videaris ut edere voces. Morte tamen tua mens animosior exstitit ipsa: Celsa tyrannorum cecidisti victima: sanctae 85 Magnanimum libertatis testatus amorem. C: Filius accepit libros, quem grandior annis, Officium quid sit, doceo. A: Tibi gratulor: ille Factus et est consul. Post quem per saecula multa Milia te iuvenum legerunt non sine fructu. 90 Cum nil suave sonet doctorum cetera turba, Difficilem perhibens sophiam, limaque carentem, Haud iniucunde loquitur sapientia vestra, Et pulchra apparet Virtus, non hispida. Per te Accensa est quam magna cohors illius amore! 95 Mente Augustinus revocata a sensibus auxit Iustorum numerum. Tua quod sapientia fecit: Conversionis erat tuus ille Hortensius auctor. Te probat ex aequo Voltarius atque Lutherus, Te Fridericus rex commendat saepe legendum. 100 Q uorum consilium docta ignorantia sprevit: Lingua quidem multis laudatur, mens tua paucis. C: Nil mea lingua esset, ni mens moderamen haberet. A: Vox tua vas sophiae: doctorum lingua remansit. Q uae fuerat Latii, terrarum possidet orbem. 105 Q uae sine te cum Caesaribus neglecta perisset, Morte caret: per te tenet hanc Sapientia sedem.

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CHAPTER 1

CLASSICAL MODELS

SHARI BOODTS

NOSTRAM TOTA URBS EST ANTE FENESTRAM

THE SATIRIC PERSONA IN JULIUS CAESAR SCALIGER’S OTIUM *

Oscar Wilde famously said: “Man is least himself  when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth”.1 Although he assuredly did not intend it as such, Wilde’s aphorism effectively touched upon the intrinsic complexity of   the satiric voice and the question of  its credibility, a question that has come to replace traditional autobiographical readings in modern studies of  the satiric genre. In its place has come the so-called persona theory, which views the satiric voice as a highly contrived poetic device with a  number of  universal features regarding character, background, style, which are dictated by its function in the satiric work and established by tradition. The persona theory emphasizes the connection between satire and drama, stating that both put human behavior on display before the community in a  context of  selfreferential and self-defensive discourse 2 and that does not revolve around the genuineness of   the performance but instead centers on the plausibility (fides) and appropriateness (decorum) of   the roles assumed.3 The theatrical mask is an obvious symbol to convey the distance between the emotions and opinions of   the author and the satiric persona. While the persona theory has been successfully *  I thank the editors of   the volume as well as the peer reviewers for their diligent reading and useful suggestions. I would also like to take the opportunity to thank Prof. Em. Dirk Sacré. He was the first reviewer of  my work on Julius Caesar Scaliger as he supervised the two MA theses I wrote on Scaliger’s poetry during my studies in Leuven. I greatly appreciated the opportunity to be his student. 1   R.  Ellmann (ed.), The Artist as Critic: Critical Writings of  Oscar Wilde (New York, 1968), 389. 2 C. Kearne, Figuring Genre in Roman Satire (Oxford, 2006), 13. 3  S. M. Braund, The Roman Satirists and their Masks (London, 1996), 1. Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 43-57 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124048

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applied to the study of  Classical Roman satire,4 originally, it was formulated within the framework of  Renaissance English satire.5 My own small contribution will touch upon both periods in its analysis of  the satiric persona in the seventh satire, Otium, in Julius Caesar Scaliger’s collection of  fifteen satires, entitled Teretismata,6 which will pay particular attention to the intertextual references to Juvenal’s third satire. The result will leave us with a small vignette of  Scaliger’s satiric persona and the fictional universe he inhabits.

Scaliger’s persona in Otium The public persona According to Kernan, the satiric persona has both a  public face and a  private one.7 Two universal features of   the public persona are honest, straightforward simplicity and justified indignation – he is a simple man, who prefers a quiet life, but is moved to abandon it in order to express his dissatisfaction with a grave injustice.8 Scaliger’s Otium, which describes the noisiness and incon­ve­niences of  life in the city, takes up an ideal subject to showcase these features of  the satiric persona. The first lines of  the description of  the city are devoted to an overview of  rustic and pastoral activities, severed from life in the city by a  physical barrier, the city gate (vv. 26-29): 9 4  E.g., W. S. Anderson, Essays on Roman Satire (Princeton, 1982); S. M. Braund, Beyond Anger: A Study of Juvenal’s Third Book of Satires (Cambridge, 1988); K. Freudenburg, The Walking Muse. Horace on the Theory of Satire (Princeton, 1993); W. T. Wehrle, The Satiric Voice. Program, Form and Meaning in Persius and Juvenal (Hildesheim – Zürich – New York, 1992); M. M. Winkler, The Persona in Three Satires of  Juvenal (Hildesheim – Zürich – New York, 1983). 5  M. Mack, “The Muse of  Satire”, Yale Review 61 (1951), 80-92 and A. Kernan, The Cankered Muse. Satire of  the English Renaissance (New Haven, 1959). 6  Detailed biographical information on Julius Caesar Scaliger can be found in V. Hall Jr., “Life of  Julius Caesar Scaliger (1484-1558)”, Transactions of   the American Philosophical Society N.S. 40.2 (1950), 85-170. See also M.  Magnien, “Bibliographie Scaligérienne”, in J. Cubelier de Beynac, M. Magnien (ed.), Acta Scaligeriana. Actes du Colloque international organisé pour le 5ème centenaire de la naissance de Jules-César Scaliger (Agen, 1986), 318-320. The Teretismata get a small mention in I. A. R. De Smet, “Satire”, in S. Knight, S. Tilg (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of  NeoLatin (Oxford, 2015), 199-214, at 204. This article is an excellent starting point for further bibliography on Neo-Latin satire. 7   Kernan 1959, 16 (as in n. 5). 8  Kernan 1959, 11 (as in n. 5). 9  See for a  parallel M.  Plaza, The Function of  Humour in Roman Verse Satire (Oxford, 2006), 174, who describes the use of  principium in Hor. Sat. 2.6.22-23 as

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Principio porta est, Bacchi quae ducit in agros, in quos incipiunt a tempestoso Orione ire putatum. Exercetur dein pastinum ad usque quo hospes lucigenae sit portitor Hellesponti. First there is the gate that leads to Bacchus’s fields, where they start to go in order to prune from the tempestuous Orion on. Then the fields must be laboured over until the time when the ferryman of  the Hellespont takes possession of  the sun’s rays.

This rustic scene serves as a way to offset the description of  city life that follows, but there are already hints that the barrier between the two is  penetrable: the workers appear to be people from the city who invade the countryside, bringing with them ceaseless activity, symbolized by the series of  “active” verbs, ire, putare, exercere. The situation quickly worsens, and the description of  life in the city leads the satiric persona to voice a fatalistic point of  view (vv. 71-74): Q uae nunquam cessat primoris lucis ab ortu ad tenebras. Mediis etiam irritata tenebris vix mihi dum coepti disrumpit munera somni. Hoc alibi questi, nec dum profecimus hilum. Never does any of  it cease from the dawning of  first light until sunset. Even in the middle of  the night does it disrupt for me the bitter gift of  hardly begun slumber. I have lamented this elsewhere, and we haven’t made a bit of  progress.

It is this pessimistic view and the belief  that the fate of   the world depends solely on him which compels the persona to depart from his safe harbor and strike at the evil in the world.10 Progress, however, as Scaliger’s persona recognizes, is not to be made.11 The rhetoric of  persuasion The satiric persona’s public personality appears unambiguous, levelheaded, straightforward. However, there is  another side to the a graphical border between two levels in the text, in this case the level of  high poetry and that of  busy reality. 10  Mack 1951, 91 (as in n. 5). 11   Kernan 1959, 31 (as in n. 5): “The normal ‘plot’ of  satire would then appear to be a  stasis in which two opposing forces, the satirist on one hand and the fools on the other, are locked in their respective attitudes without any possibility of  either dialectical movement or the simple triumph of  good over evil.”

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speaker’s personality, which stands in contrast to its claim of  simple, honest and well-meant moral incentive. Through the fact that the speaker fiercely attacks vice and mocks certain aspects of   the world “he consequently acquires several unpleasant characteristics which make suspect his pose of  a  simple lover of  plain truth”.12 The  private personality emerges from certain tensions inherent in the utterances made by the “public persona”, for example the fact that he might present himself  as a plain, blunt, simple artless speaker, while at the same time making skillful use of  rhetoric in his quest to persuade the audience of  his point of  view. In Scaliger’s Otium the artless simplicity as favored by the persona does not appear to be a particular programmatic feature. Instead, it is connected to the subject which the satire addresses. I would argue that the stylistic skillfulness that is one of   the characteristics of   the private persona of  satire is embedded in the way the city is described. It is here that we can recognize the force of  rhetorical persuasion at work in the poem. Braund, for example, links the process of  enargeia or persuasion in satire to cinematic qualities.13 She states that from city-scape panoramas shot from vantage-points and jumbled accumulations of  vivid details emerges an impression of  spontaneity which creates an effect of  realism and naturalism. I will return to this prominent feature of  Otium in the next section; here one example may suffice to illustrate the evocative camera-like perspective applied in Otium (vv. 53-55): […] Rixantur remex, portisculus. Ille vinum adhibet fomenta animo. Hic muriatica spirat, aut Myttota. Furit gladius, scalmusve revulsus. […] Rowers and boatmen are arguing. That one sells wine as a remedy for the spirit. This one spreads the scent of marinated food or seasoned stew, a sword clashes and a gunwale is pulled loose.

A vivid image is  evoked of  someone walking in the marketplace, his attention drawn to different merchants praising their wares and sounds that follow one another. While Scaliger’s public persona is  seemingly denouncing the noise, clutter and chaos of   the city, we catch a glimpse of   the private persona, who presents these   Kernan 1959, 22 (as in n. 5).   Braund 1996, 43 (as in n. 3).

12 13

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abhorrent aspects of  city life in such a way as to expertly draw his audience into the world of  the story. The scene of  satire So far, Scaliger’s persona exhibits many traditional features of   the satiric protagonist. However, theory – in this case, persona theory – can only lead us so far. Scaliger’s satiric persona was not created from a  number of  fixed prescriptions; essentially, he is  brought to life within the scene of  satire. Significant hints to the speaker’s disposition can be deduced from the position he occupies within the satiric scene.14 In Otium, Scaliger creates a typical satiric scene, “disorderly and crowded, packed to the very point of  bursting”,15 an incessant series of  activities that rapidly follow one another, a  busyness which is  expressed on the level of  syntax and style (vv. 30-33): Nunquam cessat opus. Vocat ablaqueatio, posthac deglubit ille pedamenta; hic inspicat; hic oeso vimina lenta legit, queis pendula flabra ligentur. Nec finis. […] Never does the work cease. The uprooting of  the trees calls. Later, one peels off  the plant cuttings, another sharpens them, yet another chooses willow’s wood, supple through use, to tie the hanging fan. No end. […]

Notice the sustained asyndeton. Not one conjunction provides a  smooth transition from one (part of  a) sentence to the next. The syntax is jostled – note the inversions in v. 30. Otium consists of  an amalgam of  disparate scenes with very few conjunctional elements to turn the whole into a harmonious construction. Because of  this disparity it is  particularly interesting to look at how the persona can grasp these different scenes and from what perspective he looks at them. The speaker announces his “point of  view” just before he embarks on his guided tour of   the 14  Kernan 1959, 74 (as in n. 5): “Strictly speaking the scene, vivid as it is, has no separate existence of  its own, for it comes into being entirely through the words of  the satirist. […] As a result every detail is reflexive: the words leave the satirist’s mouth to describe the scene but they also bounce back to define the satirist who chooses these details and uses this language.” 15  Kernan 1959, 7 (as in n. 5).

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city’s activity and noise (vv.  10-11): “For who forbids you to sit at home and watch the crowd from an elevated window?” 16 Three important clues are present here. First, the persona is  at home, a  familiar, comfortable place that forms an excellent base from whence to launch an attack. Secondly, he manifestly occupies an elevated position in the scene, giving him yet another advantage. Finally, the window constitutes a  marked, physical barrier between the speaker and his subject. The distance between the persona and the satiric world is emphasized. This “positioning” of   the persona is  followed by the first scenic fragment which describes the marketplace and ends with the following verses (vv. 14-15): Seu fur se dedit inque pedes, inque avia turbae sublecto, ut Molinus, panno, sectave crumena. or a thief  has sought refuge in his feet and the impermeable crowd, after having shoplifted a piece of cloth, like Molinus, or cut off a purse.

This passage zooms in on the crowd visible from the window. The persona, from his elevated position, sees more than the people scurrying about beneath him and notices what goes unnoticed by them –  he sees the thief  making his way through the crowd. The initial positioning of  the persona at a window in vv. 10-11 was not random; the metaphor of   the window returns in the poem, but now significantly reinforced (vv. 22-25): Ad turbam venio. Q uis me felicior alter? Cui, quae alii discurrentes per strata, per urbem, inveniunt, durum meditanti, aut molle cubanti se ultro dant. Nostram tota urbs est ante fenestram. I arrive at the crowd. Which other could be more blessed than I, to whom, what others discover while running through the streets and the city, they give voluntarily, whether I am contemplating difficult matters or simply resting calmly? The entire city lies before our window.

These lines confirm my earlier assessment of   the persona’s position in his world: privileged and disconnected. To gather material, he does not have to go into the streets. This is  particularly significant since the city is the place to be for a satirist who wants to observe human folly. Welch, for example, has emphasized the   “Domi quis nanque sedere / te vetat, atque alta turbam videre fenestra?”

16

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importance of   the urban center for Horace’s poetic inspiration.17 She states that in the first lines of  Sat. 1.9, which describe Horace taking a  stroll in the forum, the words nugae and meditans refer to the poet at work.18 This solicits a tension as the poet criticizes the faults he finds downtown, but is nevertheless drawn to them because of   their satirical potential.19 Scaliger’s persona, however – remember that he too is meditans – occupies an aloof  position and is offered the material to mock the crowd by the crowd itself. The next line of   the fragment in Otium is even more meaningful. While the market scene could have been viewed from an ordinary window, it is now unambiguously stated that everything, the whole city, lies before the window.20 This image places the persona in a god-like position, granting him total access. The god-like perspective is demonstrated further by the scenic construction in the subsequent parts of  Otium. The speaker can zoom in and out at will. From v.  56 onwards, a  sequence of  scenes starts in a  broadened spectrum. The speaker moves quickly from what appear to be the baths (vv.  56-60) to the mills (vv.  61-63), to the harbor (vv. 66-68). A close-up equally lies within the persona’s purview. Vv. 83-91 constitute a  scene where the chattering of  women in the marketplace is  described. The speaker seems to move rapidly amongst them, listening here and there, reproducing the rapid stream of  trivial topics, which flows so swiftly that he barely has time to record it and does so in one long asyndeton. The distance between the persona and his world also appears from the lack of  interaction with the other people in the satiric scene.

Classical models in Scaliger’s Otium The works of  humanist authors cannot be fully appreciated nor their depth completely penetrated without recourse to the Classical sources on which they built through intertextual references.21 17  T. S. Welch, “Est locus uni cuique suus: City and Status in Horace’s Satires 1.8 and 1.9”, Classical Antiquity 20.1 (2001), 165-192, at 179. 18  Hor. Sat. 1.9.1-2: “Ibam forte via sacra, sicut meus est mos, / nescio quid meditans nugarum, totus in illis”. 19   Welch 2001, 181 (as in n. 17). 20  “Nostram tota urbs est ante fenestram”. 21  Many opinions have been set forth regarding the exact definition, range, and semiotic, psychological and textual impact surrounding the concept of  “intertextuality”. I will not engage with these opinions here, save to say that I benefitted from the

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Otium describes the noisiness and inconveniences of  life in the city. The obvious connection is  with Juvenal’s third satire on life in Rome. However, we are presented with a problem: the person doing the talking in Juvenal’s third satire is  not the author’s persona, but a character named Umbricius, a friend of  “Juvenal”, who is saying his farewell to Rome and in the process spits out a vicious rant on the depravity of  the city. “Juvenal” only appears very briefly in the prologue. So, who does Scaliger’s persona identify with? The prologue Let us first look at the prologue of  Juvenal’s third satire, for it is here that Otium first establishes a connection (Iuv. Sat. 3.10-16): Sed dum tota domus raeda componitur una, substitit ad veteres arcus madidamque Capenam. Hic, ubi nocturnae Numa constituebat amicae, nunc sacri fontis nemus et delubra locantur Iudaeis, quorum cophinus fenumque supellex; omnis enim populo mercedem pendere iussa est arbor et eiectis mendicat silva Camenis. But while his entire house was being loaded onto a single wagon, he halted under the ancient arch of  dripping Capena. Here, where Numa used to date his nighttime girlfriend, the grove and shrine of  the sacred spring are rented out to Jews, with their equipment, a hay-lined chest. Why? Every tree has been told to pay its rent to the people, the Camenae have been thrown out, and the grove has now taken up begging.

This scene contains several elements that “Scaliger” seems to have connected to in the first scenic fragment of  his city description (vv. 26-38). Both fragments share an idyllic undertone with strong references to mythology. “Juvenal” and Umbricius halt at the vallis Egeriae, a sacred place where according to legend king Numa received guidance from the water nymph Egeria. In the satire, the ancient sacral and oracular character of   the spot is evoked in work of  L. Edmunds, Intertextuality and the Reading of  Roman Poetry (Baltimore – London, 2001), T. Greene, The Light in Troy, Imitation and Discovery in Renaissance Poetry (New Haven – London, 1986) and D. M. Hooley, The Knotted Thong. Structures of  Mimesis in Persius (Ann Arbor, 2000 [1997]), particularly 242-267 which contain a very interesting appendix on the tradition of  imitatio.

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the use of nemus, sacri fontis, and delubra.22 In Otium too, the scene shows conspicuous mythological references, especially in the first lines of  the section (vv. 26-29, quoted already on p. 45). The density of  myth in these lines strengthens the contrast with the next line, “Nunquam cessat opus” (v. 30), a prosaic, down-to-earth remark after an almost epic opening. This contrast corresponds nicely to the sharp confrontation in Juvenal’s scene between the legendary past of   the vallis Egeriae and the base reality and state of ruin it has evolved to today. Additionally, both scenes represent a  mingling of  the environment of  the city and what lies beyond its perimeter. In Juvenal’s third satire, the key is the mentioning of  the “dripping archway of  the Porta Capena” (Iuv. Sat. 3.11), which refers to the Aqua Marcia, an important aqueduct for Rome’s water supply and a symbol that Rome is not self-sufficient.23 Scaliger turns the movement around: the people from the city penetrate the countryside outside the gates, taking their urban habits of  busyness and crowdedness with them. The window Already in the previous section, I have noted the importance of  the window as a metaphor in Otium. Twice (v. 11 and v. 25) the window appears, revealing the persona’s position in the satiric scene and his attitude towards it. Juvenal’s third satire adds another angle to the presence of  the window in Scaliger’s text. The locus in question is the following (Iuv. Sat. 3.269-277): Q uod spatium tectis sublimibus unde cerebrum testa ferit, quotiens rimosa et curta fenestris vasa cadant, quanto percussum pondere signent et laedant silicem. Possis ignavus haberi et subiti casus improvidus, ad cenam si intestatus eas: adeo tot fata, quot illa nocte patent vigiles te praetereunte fenestrae. Ergo optes votumque feras miserabile tecum, ut sint contentae patulas defundere pelves. What a long way it is from the high roofs for a tile to hit your skull! How often cracked and leaky pots tumble down from the windows! What a smash when they strike the pavement, 22  A. Hardie, “Juvenal, the Phaedrus, and the Truth about Rome”, Classical Q uarterly N.S. 48.1 (1998), 234-251, at 239. 23  Hardie 1998, 250 (as in n. 22) and Plaza 2006, 244 (as in n. 9).

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marking and damaging it! You could be thought careless and unaware of  what can suddenly befall if  you go out to dinner without having made your will. As you pass by at night, there are precisely as many causes of  death as there are open windows watching you. So make a wish and a pathetic prayer as you go that they’ll be content with emptying their shallow basins on you.

The passage, which is situated near the end of  Umbricius’s speech, discusses one of   the perils of   the city at night. Particularly meaningful is the ominous prediction in vv. 274-275, “there’s death in every open window as you pass along at night”, which has an interesting connection to the prominent fenestra in Scaliger’s satire. When Juvenal’s passage is  combined with the persona’s presence at “an elevated window” (v.  11) in Otium, the result is  that the danger lurking out of  every window is  in fact Scaliger’s persona. The humorous image of  “Scaliger”, looking down on Umbricius and pouring garbage over him furthermore generates an implicit criticism of  Umbricius’s point of  view that cannot quite be called subtle. The allusion nicely illustrates the difference in position and status between “Scaliger” and Umbricius. The latter is down below, ducking the attack from above, being as he himself  says, in a lifethreatening situation. “Scaliger” on the other hand is  on top and in control. The incorporation of   the intertextual reference significantly enriches both the poem and its persona.

Conclusion In this essay I have examined some passages from Scaliger’s satire Otium in order to get to know the satiric persona Scaliger created and that persona’s impact on the world, and ultimately, the message of   the satire. It is certainly an obscure message. As Zetzel put it: “Whatever we feel the final aim of   the poet is, it is surely not simple-minded moral or literary judgments; it is, among other things, the creation of  a complex and demanding poetic world.” 24 Scaliger demonstrates in this satire a thorough understanding of  the conventions of   the genre, of  his literary predecessors, and of   the multi-faceted nature of   the satiric protagonist. His persona exhibits characteristics that are typical both of   the public image of  such 24  E. Zetzel, “Horace’s Liber Sermonum: the Structure of  Ambiguity”, Arethusa 13 (1980), 59-77, at 73.

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a  persona and his private purposes. What has been implicit thus far in my examination, but is an integral part of  the satiric persona, is the sauce of  irony that is poured over all his sayings and doings. This is  a particular type of  irony, which must be distinguished from irony in general or any form of  self-humor on the part of  the persona, because it reveals the presence in the text of   the actual author, the satirist himself. As Plaza puts it: “Humour directed at the persona from beyond his horizon, by the implied author […] will present him as overlooking ridiculous faults in himself, as being vulnerable to derision from outside, and so it will undercut his authority.” 25 In Scaliger’s Otium, irony is definitely at work, most obviously in the final lines of  the poem (vv. 95-101): Unum credo meis accedit pestibus atris solamen. Mihi quod rauco clamore cuculli caupones furtis animarum, ac caede nefanda inter se, foeda tetraque libidine putres, larvatae Spinthurnices, mera cymbala mundi rancida nescio quae media de nocte rudentes displodunt somnum. Hoc uno possim esse beatus. One solace, I believe, accompanies my black torments: that for me the dumb innkeepers with coarse shouting, with the taking of  lives and godless murder amongst each other, languishing over shameful, scandalous lust, that the crazed owls, veritable rowdies, screaming I don’t know what perversities in the middle of  the night, disrupt my dreams. That alone could be a blessing for me.

After spending one hundred lines denouncing the noise and crowdedness of   the city, it is in this final passage that the persona most explicitly and repeatedly links the noise to crime and vice, only to reveal a complete reversal of  his attitude in the final line: the persona in fact welcomes the noise as it disrupts his troubling dreams. The speaker, who was continuously aloof  and detached, now turns out to be bothered and affected by the scene after all. It would not do to interpret this remark literally; it is  the fact of   the reversal, rather than its nature, that offers the more powerful clue for my interpretation of   the satire.26 This reversal would have a  very dif  Plaza 2006, 167 (as in n. 9).   See Braund 1988, 178-198 (as in n. 4) for a nuanced reading of   the indignant persona in Juvenal in light of  the implications of  irony. 25 26

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ferent effect if  we considered the author and the persona to be one and the same and the message of   the satire to be taken as straightforward and autobiographical. It is  precisely because the author and the first-person narrator are not the same person – in essence because the mask of   the persona exists – that the author of  satire is able to add to his complex and chaotic poetic universe, an original comical dimension, an ironic reversal to transform it from sternly moralist to multi-faceted and multi-faced.27 Perhaps the mask does, after all, speak the truth about the world.

Appendix. Edition of  J. C. Scaliger’s Otium Ratio edendi Identification of  the sources My edition of  Scaliger’s Otium is  based on a  collation of  four sixteenthand seventeenth-century editions (Heidelberg [?], 1574; Geneva [?], 1591; Heidelberg, 1600; Heidelberg, 1621), which publish Scaliger’s collected poems under the title Iulii Caesaris Scaligeri viri clarissimi poemata in duas partes divisa, and one manuscript, Oxford, Bodl. Libr., ms.  Rawl. D. 296, ff.  36v-38r. According to Anthony Grafton, the manuscript is  a printer’s copy for the 1574 edition of  Scaliger’s collected Poemata in which corrections and alterations have been made in several hands.28 One of   these – the one responsible for the greater part of   the corrections – has been identified by Grafton as that of  Josephus Justus Scaliger, son of  Julius Caesar Scaliger.29 Note on the text Several alterations have been made in the manuscript containing Scaliger’s Poemata, partly by Scaliger’s son Josephus Justus. We know that he acted as secretary to his father,30 so there is  a chance that the emendations were authorized by Julius Caesar. The annotations themselves provide contradictory indications. On the one hand, folio numbers have been added in the mar R. Paulson, The Fictions of  Satire (Baltimore, 1967), 5.   A. Grafton, “Joseph Scaliger’s Manuscript of  his Father’s Poemata”, Bodleian Library Record 12 (1988), 502-505. It should be noted that the catalogue dates the manuscript to the beginning of   the seventeenth century. Cf.  W. Macray, Catalogi Codicum Manuscriptorum Bibliothecae Bodleianae partis quintae fasciculus tertius, v.m. R. Rawlinson, codicum classis quartae partem priorem […] complectens (Oxford, 1893), 139-140. 29  Grafton 1988 (as in n. 28), 502-505. 30  Hall Jr. 1950 (as in n. 6), 155. 27 28

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gins, which may refer to the pages of  another exemplar that Josephus Justus used to copy out changes made by his father. On the other hand, there is the fact that on vv.  62-63 Josephus Justus has corrected his own emendation, which suggests that the emendations were part of  an organic process during which Josephus Justus revised his father’s poetry. The question of  Josephus Justus’s involvement in his father’s work is  a complex matter that cannot be solved based solely on the study of  a single poem. In the absence of  conclusive evidence, I  have opted to print the original text of   the manuscript – which is much less accessible to scholars – and only to accept J. J. Scaliger’s emendations when they concern scribal errors, not when they constitute, for example, metrical improvements. The emendations are relegated to the apparatus for now. The different correcting hands have been identified in the apparatus by numbers. Corrections made by the copyist himself  are referred to with  O1, the hand of  Josephus Justus Scaliger with O2, and the third, as yet unidentified hand with O3. Conspectus siglorum O b c d e edd.

Oxford, Bodl. Libr., ms. Rawl. D. 296 (s. XVI), ff. 36v-38r. Iulii Caesaris Scaligeri […] poemata omnia, 1574. Iulii Caesaris Scaligeri […] poemata omnia, 1591. Iulii Caesaris Scaligeri […] poemata omnia, 1600. Iulii Caesaris Scaligeri […] poemata omnia, 1621. Consensus editionum 1574-1591-1600-1621.

Text Otium Libertina prius Romana incommoda Laurus vatibus exscripsit. Tali instigatus odore. (Nanque hoc est satyris vitium satis omnibus unum ut praescriptum aliis describant carmine carmen atque novas veteri tumefactent carmine buccas.) 5 Fusius explicuit dilatans acer Aquinas: sarracum, et carrum, atque integra rupe columnas. Hoc tamen est leve, nec praeterquam erronibus, atque dum versus faciunt lymphata vagantibus, acre ac durum tolerare. Domi quis nanque sedere 10 te vetat, atque alta turbam videre fenestra? Sive sues ditaturi sunt pingue macellum, sive boves fugere canes dubiamve securim, seu fur se dedit inque pedes, inque avia turbae sublecto, ut Molinus, panno, sectave crumena. 15 Me sine facta queri Fortunae: quae pia mater sacrilego, productori: insidiosa noverca, siquis in humanis disquirat praemia caeli.

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Huic virgas. Virgae, ludus, si terga fatigant. At si suggeritur virga, ut sint pabula flammis 20 fortunamque, fidem, atque hominum ingenia inde recense. Ad turbam venio. Q uis me felicior alter? Cui, quae alii discurrentes per strata, per urbem, inveniunt, durum meditanti, aut molle cubanti se ultro dant. Nostram tota urbs est ante fenestram. 25 Principio porta est, Bacchi quae ducit in agros, in quos incipiunt a tempestoso Orione ire putatum. Exercetur dein pastinum ad usque quo hospes lucigenae sit portitor Hellesponti. Nunquam cessat opus. Vocat ablaqueatio, posthac 30 deglubit ille pedamenta; hic inspicat; hic oeso vimina lenta legit, queis pendula flabra ligentur. Nec finis. Splendet repetito tempore marra. Luxuries stringenda. Para foenilia. Vix haec comportata, ferum Deois trudit in aestum. 35 Area, plaustra, seges. Defunctus commodum: ad alveos vina cient. Sic idem annus se in seipse revolvit: quos fractos credas, referens opera, atque labores. Adde operas, operas, misero et suspiria Vati: ante oculos cuius, et cuius plurimus aures 40 vinitor armatus lingo, ferroque pedes it tanto cum strepitu, ut sint surda tonitrua. Sed nec hoc contentus, habet vocem, qua lancinet Euros Eurosque, Zephyrosque, et agentes nubila Cauros. Pectora mi findunt tremulo clangore cachinni. 45 Indicium iugulat tum contemplantis inanis cantus, et obscoenis vox prostibulata figuris. Incipit haec scabies iubaris cum fronte: ubi seri appetit hora die: refricat pruritibus aures. Interea sperare licet fortasse quietem. 50 Q uin longe peius. Mala merx vicinia pauper, mangonum, vespillonum: cauponibus adde nautas. Rixantur remex, portisculus. Ille vinum adhibet fomenta animo. Hic muriatica spirat, aut Myttota. Furit gladius, scalmusve revulsus. 55 Adiungas furnosque duos, fontemque Ragaeum. Q uos quot monstra locos huic detestabilia orbi efficiunt passim prava, atque impura frequentes, qui velit enumerare: velit, quot foenora, quotque insidias, imposturas fert Machina Bruci. 60 Adde molas in pistrinis, quas versat aquae vis aut octo, aut plures Asinos, asinisque Agasones: peiores probris, et dedita pectora furtis. Adde fame informes, fecit quos saepe disertos lamentatores querimonia blanda Proseuchas. 65 Aut ex naufragio, aut postliminio redeuntes,

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quos Liguris tenuit, nati Orco, dira triremis. Aut qui se pingunt mentiti fulminis ignes. Adde et Maeonides sibi quam exoptavit ineptus Tartareo Campanarum molimine vocem. 70 Q uae nunquam cessat primoris lucis ab ortu ad tenebras. Mediis etiam irritata tenebris vix mihi dum coepti disrumpit munera somni. Hoc alibi questi, nec dum profecimus hilum. Hic repeto. Q ui se repetit. Q uin nec repetita. 75 Irrequieta imo potius, tum perpetuata. Depromptas prohibet audire, et reddere voces. Adde sacerdotum catulos: queis nequius usquam nil est, nil erit: ut referunt sua semina plantae. Aut flent, aut choreas agitant, aut carmina cantant. 80 Mutuaque indomitis miscent convicia rixis. Et spurias ignobilibus stridoribus iras. Adde obstetrices pistricibus, et lotrices ambubaiarum clamores. Sarda novella, vinum, oleum, far, gossypium, scelerata Sinapis, 85 thus, resina, siser, vitrum, ientacula, sulfur, crustula, Casromaza, tomacla, Epityra, turundae alec, quem putrem captiva Bononia misit: et sale vinivoro mordax Thunnilla Brigantum. Aut fatui, aut medici portenta inventa scelesti 90 pestifera: unde queat nummis se explere vorago. Omnia quae et Phoebo ingenium furarier ausint. Et mirare, bonum nequeo si pangere versum? Aut Stagiraeo succendi afflatus amore? Unum credo meis accedit pestibus atris 95 solamen. Mihi quod rauco clamore cuculli caupones furtis animarum, ac caede nefanda inter se, foeda tetraque libidine putres, larvatae Spinthurnices, mera cymbala mundi rancida nescio quae media de nocte rudentes 100 displodunt somnum. Hoc uno possim esse beatus. 11 atque O bc] ex de | turbam O bc] turbamque de | 21 recense O bcd] recenso e  | 27 tempestoso Orione Oa.c.] lucibus Orionis Op.c. 2 edd. | 30-31 posthac Deglubit Oa.c.] glubit Posthac Op.c.  2 edd. | 38 Q uos fractos credas Oa.c.] Q uae consumpta putes Op.c. 2 edd. | 40 ante Op.c. 1 edd.] adde praem. Oa.c. | 44 nubila edd.] fortasse nubilae O | 53 ille Op.c. 3 edd.] Illi Oa.c. | 54 Vinum edd.] Unum O | 58 prava O de] parva bc | 60 fert Op.c. 2 edd.] fer’ Oa.c. | 62-63 asinisque Agasones peiores probris et dedita Oa.c.] qui ut peior Agaso est asino devota heu Op.prim.corr.2, asinis (asini b) peiores Adde et agasones Op.sec.corr.2 edd. | 68 ignes O] igne edd. | 88 putrem de] patrem O bc | 89 Thunilla O bcd] Tunilla e | 90 portenta edd.] p*rtenta Oa.c., partenta Op.c. 3 ut uid. | scelesti Op.c. 3 edd.] scelestir Oa.c. ut uid. | 93 si Oa.c.] seu Op.c. 2 edd. | 94 Aut Oa.c.] sive Op.c. 2 edd.

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BERNARDINO PARTENIO’S CARMEN SAECULARE AND HIS IMITATION OF  HORACE

In the plentiful scholarship on the reception of Horace, his Carmen saeculare [henceforth CS] has to date received rather short shrift.1 Though related in several ways to the Odes, the CS occupies nonetheless a unique place within Horace’s poetical oeuvre and indeed within ancient literature as a whole. It stands out above all as the single piece in Horace’s poetry that was intended for actual performance in a  very specific setting. The poem was commissioned by the Emperor Augustus for the Ludi saeculares of  17 bc. In celebrating these Secular Games, Augustus revived an age-old republican tradition, prescribed by the Sibylline books.2 The CS was sung, as part of   the festivities, by two joint choirs of  twenty-seven boys and twenty-seven girls. Its performance is famously mentioned in the official records of   the Secular Games of  17  bc, known from a commemorative inscription, substantial fragments of  which were found in 1890 (CIL VI, 32323). 1  This dearth is also to be noticed, I hasten to add, in a recent set of  conference proceedings, in which I myself  was involved: M.  Laureys, N.  Dauvois, D.  Coppini (ed.), Non omnis moriar. Die Horaz-Rezeption in der neulateinischen Literatur vom 15. bis zum 17. Jahrhundert  […] (Deutschland-France-Italia), 2  vols (Hildesheim  – Zürich – New York, 2020). For a  few explorations and case-studies, see R.  Seidel, “Niederländische Bündnispolitik und Horazische Propaganda. Daniel Heinsius’ Ode in expeditionem Indicam”, in E. Lefèvre, E. Schäfer (ed.), Daniel Heinsius. Klassischer Philologe und Poet (Tübingen, 2008), 361-379; V. Brandis, R. Seidel, “On the Reception of  the Carmen Saeculare in the Early Modern Period”, in M. Laureys, K. Enenkel (ed.), Horace across the Media: Textual, Visual and Musical Receptions of  Horace from the 15th to the 18th Century (Leiden – Boston, MA) [in preparation]. 2  The practice of  such choral songs and their designation as a  carmen saeculare prior to Horace remain uncertain. See W. Suerbaum et al. (ed.), Handbuch der lateinischen Literatur der Antike. 1. Band. Die archaische Literatur. Von den Anfängen bis Sullas Tod. Die vorliterarische Periode und die Zeit von 240 bis 78 v.Chr. (München, 2002), 35-36 (§ 105.2).

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 59-80 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124049

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From our modern perspective, the CS strikes as Horace’s most outspoken endorsement of   the Augustan régime, and twentiethand twenty-first-century scholars have occasionally taken Horace to task for it.3 The intricacies of  Horace’s political-ideological stance or the exact role of   the poem in the ritual of   the Secular Games were not the main concern, however, of  early modern interpreters of   the CS, much more attuned than we are to a wide range and long-standing practice of  panegyric literature. They highlighted above all the hymnic nature of   the poem and its parallels with other hymns in Horace’s lyrical poetry. Particularly in a later stage, moreover, the CS became a model for jubilee poems, designed to celebrate the felicitous conclusion of  a saeculum, usually taken literally as a period of  one hundred years or a multiple of  it, and the equally auspicious beginning of  a new one. In a school and academic context, especially, a tradition of  carmina saecularia, inspired more or less closely by Horace, developed and remained popular until well into the nineteenth century at least.4 Finally, the oral, that is to say musical reception of   the CS, in other words its reception as a  poem meant to be performed, should not go unmentioned; musical adaptations of   the CS (as well as of  other odes of  Horace), which are beyond my purview and competence, continue to be produced down to the present age.5 In this essay I intend to analyze one particular carmen saeculare from a Neo-Latin scholar and writer, who both extensively studied the lyrical poetry of  Horace and composed a collection of  poems himself, Bernardino Partenio (c.  1500-1588).6 A brief  general characterization of  his poetry, to date never studied in any detail, 3   The sole book-length study of  the poem, though, is an extensive plea to appraise the poem as a literary work of art: M. C. J. Putnam, Horace’s Carmen Saeculare: Ritual Magic and the Poet’s Art (New Haven, CT – London, 2000). 4  For a  very recent example, see R.  J. Tarrant, “Lyricus vates: Musical Settings of  Horace’s Odes”, in W. Brockliss et al. (ed.), Reception and the Classics (Cambridge, 2012), 72-93, at 89, n. 61. 5  See Tarrant 2012 (as in n. 4), 88-92. 6  For bio-bibliographical information on Bernardino Partenio see the lemmata by Ugo Rozzo in C.  Scalon, C.  Griggio, U.  Rozzo (ed.), Nuovo Liruti. Dizionario biografico dei Friulani. 2. L’età veneta (Udine, 2009), 1931-1940, and by Matteo Venier in Dizionario biografico degli Italiani, vol. 81 (Rome, 2014), 468-470. See also C. Furlan (ed.), Bernardino Partenio e l’Accademia di Spilimbergo 1538-1543. Gli statuti, il palazzo (Venezia, 2001), esp. the essays of  U. Rozzo, “Per una biobibliografia di Bernardino Partenio”, 31-51; A. Cuna, “Le opere di Bernardino Partenio: contributo per una bibliografia”, 159-174.

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may be useful first. Partenio was born in Spilimbergo in Friuli, an area with cultural ties both to Venice and the Veneto towards the south and to the Habsburg empire towards the north. A  schoolman throughout his long career, he taught Greek and Latin in various places, starting out in his home town, and moving on later to Ancona (probably), Vicenza and Venice, where he died. In Spilimbergo and Vicenza he led a local academy, the Accademia Parteniana (1538-1543; named after him) and the Accademia Ocricolana (1555-1560; named after Cricoli, now a suburb of Vicenza), respectively. Especially the former of   these two institutions reveals a clear affinity to the concept of  a collegium trilingue in an Erasmian vein. It is  safe to assume that most, if  not all, of  Partenio’s written work is related in some way to his teaching practice. That connection is most obvious in his commentary on the Odes and Epodes of  Horace, published in 1584 and accompanied by a  preface to the Accademici Olimpici (f.  2r-4r), the members of   the famous Accademia Olimpica of  Vicenza.7 Partenio is the first scholar who wrote a comprehensive commentary on Horace’s lyric poetry from a  very precise perspective, pointed out in the title of  his work: commentarii, quibus poetae artificium et via ad imitationem atque ad poetice scribendum aperitur.8 His commentary is  a “hands-on” explication, oriented towards the active mastery of  poetry and, more specifically, recreating the literary technique of Horace’s odes. 7  Bernardini Parthenii Spilimbergii in Q .  Horatii Flacci Carmina atque Epodos commentarii (Venetiis, apud Dominicum Nicolinum, 1584 [USTC 835940]). Par­ tenio’s attachment to that city is further evidenced by an ode De laudibus Vicentinorum (f. ***4r – ***5v). His commentary has to date received only scant attention. For a  brief  description see A.  Iurilli, Q uinto Orazio Flacco. Annali delle edizioni a stampa. Secoli XV-XVIII, 2 vols (Genève, 2017), 498-499 and 503. A few general observations are made by J.  Starnawski, “Sur l’édition des poésies d’Horace dédiée à Stefan Batory (1584)”, in J. F. Alcina et al. (ed.), Acta conventus Neo-Latini Bariensis. Proceedings of   the Ninth International Congress of  Neo-Latin Studies (Tempe, AZ, 1998), 565-572. 8  In the dedication letter of  his work to the king of  Poland, Stefan Batory, Par­ tenio is  keen to emphasize the novelty of  his approach: “longe aliam rationem, nisi fallor, viamque secutus quam qui hactenus in ea re laborarunt” (f. *2v). In modern secondary literature, it is  often reported that Stefan Batory briefly studied at the University of  Padua around 1549-1550, but there does not seem to be any clear evidence in support of  this claim. Instead, the Polish king may have been confused with his nephew and namesake, Stefan Batory the younger, who studied in Padua in 1571-1573; see G. Gömöri, “Gdzie studiował Stefan Batory albo narodziny legendy” [Where Stephen Batory Studied, or the Birth of  a Legend], Terminus 16 (2014), 169173 (doi: 10.4467/20843844TE.14.020.3564).

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In his exegesis Partenio systematically applied his ideas on imitation, which he had expounded earlier in a treatise, published in 1560 in Italian and translated into Latin, with added material, in 1566. In his Della imitatione poetica or De poetica imitatione libri quinque Partenio was exclusively concerned with the literary imitation of  model authors, the imitatio auctorum.9 He conceived his treatise as a  practical manual destined for the student in the classroom and/or the budding poet. Partenio’s notion of  imitatio was partly indebted to a slightly earlier treatise Della imitatione, composed by his fellow friulano Giulio Camillo and published shortly after Camillo’s death in 1544. Camillo’s influence is already apparent in Partenio’s first published work, an Oratio pro lingua Latina (1545), in which he also addresses the imitatio auctorum.10 In particular, Partenio shares with Camillo a focus on the luoghi (Partenio also speaks of  sentenze), that is  notions, concepts, and thoughts, expressed in ever varying words by different authors. Camillo worked throughout his life on a  teatro della memoria, an edifice containing an encyclopaedic collection of “places”, which ideally should have represented a  system of  universal learning, structured according to mnemonic principles.11 In his small treatise on imitation, too, Camillo argued that a writer should unravel above all the topical structure, the compositional fabric, rather than the mere words of  a model text in order to grasp its artificio. Real imitation, then, is a creative re-casting of  this artificio of   the model text.12 Partenio elaborated on this idea by proposing specific 9  Della imitatione poetica (in Vinegia, appresso Gabriel Giolito de’ Ferrari, 1560 [USTC 846902]), 92-94; De poetica imitatione libri quinque (Venetiis, apud Ludovicum Avancium, 1566 [1565 on the title page] [USTC 846904]), f. 60r-61r. 10   See the introduction of   the critical edition of  this treatise: R.  Bottari (ed.), Bernardino Partenio, Pro lingua Latina oratio (Messina, 2011), esp. 50-55, as well as the explanatory notes to the text. 11  He outlined this concept in his L’Idea del Teatro, which appeared posthumously in 1550 in three slightly diverging versions (two in Venice, one on Florence). See esp. F.  Yates, The Art of  Memory (London, 1966), 129-172, and the numerous studies of  L. Bolzoni, starting with Il teatro della memoria. Studi su Giulio Camillo (Padova, 1984). 12  The notion of  artificium, which seems to be borrowed from Cicero’s rhetorical treatises (artificium dicendi: De or. 1.93, 2.29 and 2.56; Or. 140; compare artificiosa eloquentia: Inv. 1.6), appears quite regularly in the literary criticism of  this time. See e.g., Celio Secondo Curione, De omni artificio disserendi atque tractandi summa (1547), and, for poetry in particular, the small treatises (Explicationes), appended

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techniques of  rewriting and discussing many specific examples in his own treatise. Once a poet had identified the loci or sententiae he wanted to take over from a model text, Partenio said, he could then transform them “rebus varie disponendis, dilatandis, contrahendis, mutandis, praeterea contrariis, similibus atque huiusmodi”.13 The notions of  dispositio, dilatio, contractio, mutatio, contraria, simi­lia of  selected loci or sententiae imply that imitation takes place on the level of  inventio, dispositio, and elocutio, the first three officia oratoris, and involves more than just style.14 Partenio’s rhetorical strategies of  imitation, moreover, reflect the classical quadripartita ratio (Q uint. Inst. 1.5.38) of  rephrasing given texts, as it was practiced in schools: 15 texts could be altered by adding or omitting something, by arranging specific elements in a  different order or by replacing an existing element by a  new one. Par­te­ nio regarded this set of  techniques as the quintessence of  poetic imitation. Rosaria Bottari rightly remarked that “ l’imitatio è il nucleo con­ cettuale dell’orazione [Pro lingua Latina], nonché il cardine at­tor­no a cui si struttura la gran parte della sua produzione letteraria.” 16 And to Partenio’s mind, the undisputed master of  imitatio was none other than Horace: “Ut vero hoc vobis planius ostendam, nullum to Francesco Robortello’s Paraphrasis of  Horace’s Ars poetica (1548): three of   the five essays, those on the epigram, comedy and elegy, carry artificium in their title. Robortello later wrote De artificio dicendi (1567), which includes on f.  35v-40v a Methodus perquirendi artificii in scriptis poetarum antiquorum (with two examples from Horace’s Odes). Worthy of  note is his remark on f. 37r: “Haec est a me excogitata ratio in poetarum scriptis perpendendis et explicandis. Tunc enim demum putandum est aliquem veteres poetas nosse, cum illorum artificium norit.” In the vernacular tradition see Orazio Toscanella, Alcuni artificii delle Ode di Oratio Flacco in his Q uadrivio (1567), f. 63r-83v. 13   Partenio 1566 (as in n.  9), f.  16r; compare Partenio 1560 (as in n.  9), 17. The definition of  imitation, just before, is  limited to a  mere quotation from Rhet. Her. 1.3 (ibid., f.  15v; compare 16-17). Partenio is  more interested in the practical procedures. See also ibid., f.  20r (compare 27): “illamque excellentem esse imitandi rationem, cum alienum argumentum ita tractatur, ut mutandis, addendis, nonnum­ quam praetermittendis rebus, ordinis atque elocutionis praecipua ratione habita, transformari quodammodo videatur”. 14  See J. Jansen, “Imitatio”. Literaire navolging (“imitatio auctorum”) in de Europese letterkunde van de renaissance (1500-1700) (Hilversum, 2008), 68-69 and 107. 15  Compare Q uint. Inst. 1.5.6; see also Cic. De or. 1.163. See W. Ax, “Q uadripartita Ratio. Bemerkungen zur Geschichte eines aktuellen Kategoriensystems (adiectio – detractio – transmutatio – immutatio)”, Historiographia Linguistica 13 (1986), 191214; Jansen 2008 (as in n. 14), 177-179. 16  Bottari 2011 (as in n. 10), 119, n. 2.

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elegantius exemplum excogitare posse existimo quam Horatii.” 17 One would assume, then, that the imitation of Horace governs Par­ te­nio’s lyric poetry as well,18 but in fact this is only partially the case. Partenio’s poems thus seem to confirm Giacomo Comiati’s observation that there is only little interaction between the exegetical and the creative reception of Horace with any single student of Horace in the Italian Cinquecento.19 The collection counts fourty-two pieces in all. The first two books contain together twenty-two odes, whereas the third book comprises mostly poems in hexameters and elegiac distichs. Other meters appear only in Book 3: there is one poem in iambic trimeters (126-129), one polymetric poem with a section in phalaecean hendecasyllabics (129-132), and one further poem in that meter (135).20 These three pieces add a distinctly Catullan flavor to a collection in which elegiac poetry vies with lyrical compositions. In Books 1 and 2 the most recurrent meter, used in eleven of   the twenty-two odes, is  the Alcaic stanza, Horace’s favorite meter (thirty-seven odes in all). Next in line are Asclepiadic stanzas, adopted in seven poems (the second Asclepiadic stanza appears in four poems, the fourth in three poems),21 whereas the Sapphic stanza occurs only once – in marked contrast with Horace’s odes, in which the Sapphic stanza features prominently in second place (twenty-six odes in all). Partenio thus limits himself to a few select meters from Horace’s Odes. He shows no intention of  covering a wide spectrum or experimenting either by imitating rare meters in Horace or innovating beyond classical patterns. In only one poem (13-15) he employs a metrical scheme that is not derived directly from Horace or any

  Partenio 1566 (as in n. 9), f. 16v (compare Partenio 1560 [as in n. 9], 17-18).   Bernardini Parthenii Spilimbergii Carminum libri III (Venetiis, ex typographia Guerraea, 1579 [USTC 846908]). Several of   the poems in this collection had been published earlier in various contexts; conversely, a  few poems, published elsewhere, were not integrated in the Carminum libri III. For detailed information see Cuna 2001 (as in n. 6). The earliest poems in the collection go back to the late 1530s; see Rozzo 2001 (as in n. 6), 39. 19   See G. Comiati, Horace in the Italian Renaissance (1498-1600), Diss. University of  Warwick 2015 (available at http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/79572/), 321-322. 20  Henceforth, bare page numbers always refer to Partenio’s Carminum libri III (as in n. 18). 21 There is  no general consensus on the numbering of  Asclepiadic stanzas. I  follow the order of   the Conspectus metrorum in Klingner’s Teubner edition of  Horace (314-321). 17 18

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other classical poet. Its stanzas consist of  three alcaic hendecasyllabics and one glyconic each, thus combining elements from two different Horatian quatrains. This type of  stanza seems to have been introduced by Pietro Crinito; it appears in five poems of  his Poemata.22 In general, then, Partenio follows the usual trend of  mixing lyrical and elegiac forms and meters, as well as pure hexameter poems, in his Carmina – a trend that can be observed, for instance, in Filelfo’s Odae and Marullus’s Epigrammata. Placing the odes first corresponds to the conventional hierarchy among the short types of  poetry: the ode of  Horatian, and occasionally Pindaric, signature was widely considered the most sollemn and technically demanding variant. Partenio does not seem strictly to associate the various meters with a  specific topic or a  particular ethos. The large majority of  his carmina, in all meters combined, serves an encomiastic purpose, sometimes tied to specific political occasions. The poems are addressed to a  diverse multiplicity of  persons, ranging from the highest sovereign rulers, Emperor Maximilian II, who is celebrated in no fewer than eight pieces, and Pope Pius V, to members of   the Venetian nobility and some of  Partenio’s own siblings. Among the addressees there is  also the poet Marcantonio Flaminio (73-76), whom Partenio admired profoundly,23 and the printerpublisher Aldus Manutius (135), grandson of   the elder Aldus.24 22  See A.  Mastrogianni (ed.), Die Poemata des Petrus Crinitus und ihre Horaz­ imitation (Münster – Hamburg – London, [2002]), 174; J.-L. Charlet, “Le choix des mètres dans les Poemata de Pietro Crinito”, Bibliothèque d’Humanisme et Renais­ sance 67 (2005), 7-26, at 9, and Id., Métrique latine humaniste. Des pré-humanistes padouans et de Pétrarque au XVI e siècle (Genève, 2020), 196. 23 Partenio praised for instance Flaminio’s adaptation of  one of  Petrarch’s canzoni in Partenio 1560 (as in n. 9), 153-154; see G. Comiati, “The Reception of  Petrarch and Petrarch’s Poetry in Marcantonio Flaminio’s Carmina”, in A. Winkler, F.  Schaffenrath (ed.), Neo-Latin and the Vernaculars. Bilingual Interactions in the Early Modern Period (Leiden – Boston, 2019), 188-211, at 188, with n.  3. In his commentary to Horace’s Carm. 1.36 (as in n.  7, f.  63r-64r), Partenio recapitulates his interpretive approach and adduces examples from Flaminio’s odes as consummate models of  imitatio. On f. 96v (ad Carm. 2.19), he praises Flaminio, along with Michele Marullo, for their evocation of  divine furor after models of  Horace and Catullus, and on f. 126v (ad Carm. 3.22) he singles out Flaminio, along with Andrea Navagero, as successful imitators of  ancient pastoral poetry. Marcantonio Flaminio (1498-1550) was born in Serravalle (now a  part of  Vittorio Veneto), in the Veneto, close to the border with Friuli. 24  In 1585, the younger Aldus issued a  reprint of  Partenio’s commentary on Horace’s Odes and Epodes, with a new frontispiece [USTC 835943].

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In Books 1 and 2, only two odes take a  somewhat different line: one (62-65), in the fourth Asclepiadic stanza, is  a sympotic ode, the other (81-85), in alcaic stanzas, consists mainly of  an ekphrasis of   the Villa Trento and the caves in the hill next to Costozza, near Vicenza; several villas, among which the Villa Trento, were provided with cool air from these caves, channelled to the villas through corridors hewn in the rock.25 In Book 3, which includes a separate section of  Epigrammata (123-141), there is a little more thematic variety. The topical influence of  Horace transpires in three fountain poems (109-112, 124, 129-132), albeit in elegiac distichs (the last of   these three is the polymetric poem mentioned above). Furthermore, Book 3 includes a love poem to one Lycoris (126-129) in iambic trimeters (a meter not very common in humanistic poetry, but adopted by Pietro Crinito in four of  his poems), a funeral poem (133) and a poem on the convalescence of  Antonio Milledonne (125), secretary of  the Consiglio dei Dieci, in elegiac distichs. Both from a  metrical and a  thematic point of  view, Horace is  undoubtedly an important source of  inspiration for Partenio’s poetry. On the whole, though, Partenio is  less Horatian in his lyrical poetry than previously assumed. An all too exclusive focus on the imitation of  Horace in assessing Partenio’s poetry, therefore, seems misguided. Still, Partenio’s practice shows that he fully espoused the Horatian notion (Ars 83-85) that the chief  purpose of  lyric poetry, and odes in particular, was the praise of  gods (in hymns), heroes and rulers of  divine descent (in encomia), and men of  notable merit, such as victors in games (in epinicia). Erotic and sympotic poetry complete the spectrum, described by Horace. Partenio’s carmina, and especially his odes, are essentially celebratory poems, in which he eulogizes the merits and virtues of  his addressees. In choosing, furthermore, the alcaic stanza as his preferred meter for his odes, he pays tribute to Horace in two ways: he grants the most popular meter of  Horace’s lyric poetry pride of  place in his own collection and he acknowledges the particular suitability, exemplified by Horace, of  this meter for encomiastic odes in a solemn tone. 25  This ingenious cooling system is described in detail in Andrea Palladio, I quattro libri dell’architettura (in Venetia, appresso Dominico de’ Franceschi, 1570 [USTC 846299]), Book 1, 60 (Cap. 27).

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Only a  comprehensive examination of  Partenio’s carmina, of  course, will eventually reveal the precise nature and extent of  Partenio’s debt to Horace’s lyric poetry. Here I will focus exempli causa on Partenio’s carmen saeculare (86-90), a  poem, whose mere title makes it stand out from all the others. It is con­spic­u­ously placed at the end of  Book 2, and thus concludes Partenio’s poetry in lyric meters. Ad Aloysium Mocenigo, principem Venetorum etc. Carmen saeculare Exsurge, o nimium pondere mens gravi terrae pressa diu noctis et obsita Letheis tenebris, segnitiem excute, pulsis undique nubibus, et mecum Venetum, carmine quam iuvat 5 cantare Aeolio tergeminum decus partum, barbarico sanguine cum vada glauci caerula Nerei spumarunt, agedum Pieri, barbiton argutam undisoni sistere murmura 10 assuetam Pelagi fulminis et minas pelle ac sepositam lyram, quam non aut choreis mollibus aut iocis aut Baccho madidis tempora Gnosio incestisve prius finxit amoribus 15 Maia natus Atlantide, at tantum aetherii ut numinis, ut Patris Summi, cui rutilis sideribus micat caelum, cui variis undique Daedala ridet terra coloribus, 20 laudes concineres. Q uare age non prius exaudita novis carmina nabliis effundens memori pectore gratias curva concipe cum lyra. Urbes, aeriis impositae iugis 25 arces, frondiferis arva sonantia silvis, caelicolum, pontus et aethera, regem tollite laudibus. Afflictam ille hominum commiserans vicem optatum retulit tempore saeculum 30 et mundo tenebras discutiens graves lucem protulit auream. Salve, lux nivea, o lux sacra, lux bona salve, ut te excipimus atque hilari die laeti, te cithara, te fidibus novis 35 et corde atque humili prece

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cantamus, vacui sordibus, obrutos quis pridem Eumenidum sanguineus furor in caedem rapiens traxerat, in sitim effrenata cupiditas. 40 Tu nobis aperis limina candida Olympi atque ambrosia vescier et sacram mirari faciem et lumine luminum pasci in perpetuum iubes. At vos, quis Domini pectora fervidus 45 urit ignis, amor quos rapit arduos sursum ad templa Deum atque igniferas domos dulci vulnere saucios, huc, huc pergite, adeste oraque solvite laudi. Cuncta sonent laudibus et choris 50 certatimque sacrum nomen et inclytam Christi tollite gloriam pacemque ac veniam poscite. Lacrimae in perfusa genis pectora perfluant, nam quos eluerat sanguine, nunc libens 55 lymphis refrigerat piis. At tu, seu Genitor, seu pateris Deus, seu Rex, quem colimus, quem Phlegeton tremit, dic‹i›,26 ne facilis despice, quae tibi festo concinimus die, 60 nosque ad sacrificos dum canimus focos vota ac thuricremis 27 dona rependimus aris, bella procul pelle; alibi insonent arma et clangor aheneus. Fulgens in niveis aurea pax rotis 65 victrix regnet, amor quam sequitur comes et concordia, quam copia, quam ioci dulces laetaque faustitas sectantur. Soboles crescat, amaracus qualis vel riguo mollis in hortulo 70 cana aut lilia vel flos Hyacinthinus udo in margine fontium. Largis fessa gemant frugibus horrea,   The typographical error is pointed out in the Errata (143).  thuricremis correxi] thurieremis ed. 1579. The error in the edition of  1579 is obviously caused by a misreading of   the model text, used by the typesetter. I would surmise that this model was a printed, rather than a handwritten text – a model in which the form of  the letter c could easily be mistaken for an e (or in which this misreading was already present). If  this assumption is correct, it implies that Par­tenio’s Carmen saeculare was first printed separately, as a  plaquette, perhaps for the “festus dies”, referred to in line 60. If  such a  separate issue ever existed, however, no copy of  it is known to have survived. 26 27

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incurvent gravidos pondere palmites uvae, mella fluant ilicibus cavis. 75 Pomis suave rubentibus autumnus calathos impleat et sinus pubis, primitias quas tibi dedicet, balatuque ovium prataque et avia silvarum tenero sonent. 80 Urbes laeta salus ruraque candidis bigis vecta revisat solio insidens, quam circum genius gaudiaque et choris gaudentes Charites volant. At luctus, macies et fugit horrida 85 morborum facies milleque imagines Leti diffugiunt, illacrimabiles quam oderunt Erebi domus. Adsis! Nonne vides ut volitans nigris alis dira lues saeviat impotens, 90 Orco immissa lues, inque dies magis cervicem indomitam efferat. Dat stragem, miseros funeribus lares foedans inficit atque hinc pater, integra hinc taedis cum gemitu rapta iugalibus 95 virgo frigida concidit. Abiectas trepidus corripuit pavor mentes atque animos stravit. Amabiles maerent Pierides. Cuncta iacent. Opem, rerum maxime conditor, 100 – ad te confugimus –, Caelipotens, feras praesentem. Pavidum pelle metum. Tuum perculsa urbs, decus et orbis et urbium, numen sentiat ultimum. Clamanti populo allabere. Supplicis 105 votis principis adsis, precibus patrum maerentum et lacrimis, ne lacrimae pii spem fallant populi irritae. Nos umbra et clipei vis adamantini, quo caelum horrisonum, quo mare, luridos 110 manes, quo Stygia 28 Tartara concutis, servans protegat integros, auctoque imperio ac principe da minas hostis terrifici temnere barbaras. Regnet purpureis condita oloribus 115 terrae urbs et domina aequoris.

28  Partenio permits himself  a prosodical licence: “Stygia” has a short final syllable, whereas a long syllable is required in that position of  the verse.

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Nos vero solito blandius ultimas ad terras, qua aperit quaque diem cadens condit sol tenebris, cantibus et lyra nomen, concita flumina 120 quo sistunt, Rhodope nubiferum caput demittit gelidumque Ismara verticem, tollamus memores, dum vaga Cynthia curru prodeat aureo. 1 Ps. 56.9 (and George Buchanan’s paraphrase)  |  3 cf. Ov. Fast. 1.16  |  12 cf. Tib. Eleg. 2.5.8  |  13 cf. Prop. Eleg. 2.34.42; Mart. Epigr. 1.104.9  |  16. Ov. Met. 2.685686 | 21 Hor.  Carm. 3.1.2-3  |  33 cf.  Cat.  Carm. 64.23  |  62 Verg. Aen. 4.453; Ov. Ars 3.393; Lucr. DRN 2.353  |  68 Hor. Carm. 4.5.18  |  69 cf. Verg. Aen. 1.693  | 71 cf. Prop. Eleg. 1.20.37-38  |  75 Hor. Epod. 47  |  76 Verg. Cop. 19  |  77 Ov. Met. 5.393-394 | 87 cf. Hor. Carm. 2.14.6  |  103 cf. Ov. Fast. 2.684 (and several more instances of  “urbs – orbis”)  |  115 Hor.  Carm. 4.1.10  |  116 Hor.  Carm. 1.35.6; Ov.  Am. 2.14.16 (and several more instances of  “urbs domina”) | 121 cf.  Verg. Buc. 6.30  |  123 Aus. Ep. 14.9; Sid. Carm. 7.32

The specific historical circumstances of  this poem are not explicitly revealed, but a  few details nonetheless shed light on the context in which it needs to be interpreted. The ode is  dedicated to Alvise Mocenigo, doge of  Venice from 1570 to 1577. He was doge, therefore, at the time of   the so-called War of  Cyprus (15701573), a  military clash with the Ottoman Empire, resulting in the loss of   the Venetian strongholds on the island of  Cyprus, the victory of  a  Christian coalition in the naval battle of  Lepanto, and the conclusion of  an uneasy peace treaty, negotiated separately by the Venetians with the Ottomans. Partenio did not compose this poem, however, in the immediate aftermath of   these events, since he also refers to the outbreak of  the plague that hit Venice in 1576-1577. The ode surely dates from the time of  this unsettling catastrophe, as it oscillates between jubilation about a naval defeat of  barbarians (7-9: “barbarico sanguine cum vada / glauci caerula Nerei  / spumarunt”) 29 and gratitude to God for restoring an age of  peace and prosperity (29-32: “Afflictam ille hominum commiserans vicem / optatum retulit tempore saeculum / et […] lucem protulit auream”), on the one hand, and a plea with God for sustained support (99-102: “Opem / […], Caelipotens, feras / praesentem”), while the plague wreaks havoc (89-90: “Nonne vides ut volitans nigris / alis dira lues saeviat impotens”), on the other.   From here on, bare numbers refer to the verses of  Partenio’s Carmen saeculare.

29

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Partenio also refers to a feast day (60: “festo […] die”), at which this poem is sung (60-61: “concinimus” […] “canimus”; see also 37: “cantamus”). That feast is not further specified, but may be related to what was to become the annual Festa del Redentore, to this day celebrated in remembrance of   the liberation from the plague on the third Sunday in July in the Chiesa del Redentore, which the Senate had vowed to have built. Another possible context is  the Feast of  the Holy Rosary. Pope Pius V associated this feast in honor of  the Virgin Mary with the naval victory at Lepanto and therefore set its date at 7 October.30 Along with countless other Christians, he was convinced that the triumph at Lepanto had been achieved through divine intervention. Whether Partenio’s Carmen saeculare was actually performed on such an occasion, must remain an open question. In any case, the performance, evoked in the poem, and of  course the title itself  immediately call to mind Horace’s CS. Partenio’s Carmen saeculare thus fits into his general effort at imitating Horace. The inclusion of  a  carmen saeculare is  even all the more remarkable, since not every “Horatian” Neo-Latin poet took pains to extend his imitation and emulation of  Horace to this particular poem, even though the very first attempt by a humanist author at recreating a Horatian ode was modelled after the CS: Gregorio Correr’s hymn to Martin  V in Sapphic stanzas, composed in Rome for Ascension Day.31 Partenio’s Carmen saeculare, however, is  by no means closely, let alone exclusively, modelled on Horace’s poem. Most strikingly, Partenio chose a different meter for his ode, the second Asclepiadic stanza, instead of  adopting the Sapphic stanza of  Horace’s CS.32 The second Asclepiadic stanza being composed of  three lesser Ascle­pia­dics and a  glyconic, Partenio perhaps intended to evoke in the closing poem of  his odes the dignified tenor of  the Ascle­pia­ dics in the two signature poems, with which Horace opened and closed his first collection of  odes (Carm. 1.1 and 3.30). With its 30   L.  von Pastor, Geschichte der Päpste seit dem Ausgang des Mittelalters, Bd.  8 (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1923), 605. 31  A. Onorato (ed.), Gregorio Correr, Opere, vol. 1 (Messina, 1994), 283-287. Various dates, ranging from 1424 to 1431, have been proposed for the composition of  this poem. 32  Among the Asclepiadic stanzas, the second systema is admittedly the one that resembles most closely the Sapphic stanza in terms of  structure.

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thirty-one stanzas, Partenio’s poem is  also much longer than the nineteen stanzas of  Horace’s model. By Horatian standards, nineteen stanzas is  already quite long for a  Sapphic poem (the length of  his Sapphic odes varies between two and nineteen stanzas), but Partenio shares the wide-spread tendency among “Horatian” Neo-Latin poets to expand their poems beyond the length prevalent in Horace’s poetry itself. In addition, just like most Neo-Latin lyric poets writing in the manner of  Horace, Partenio drew on other authors, too, besides Horace. His Carmen saeculare is  an eloquent case in point. The opening of   the poem (1-24), in particular, displays a  polyphony of  allusions that certainly includes Horatian tones but distinctly Christian accents as well. They are expressed in two sentences, of  which the first is a massive period that runs over 21 verses into the beginning of   the sixth stanza. This grand start immediately suggests a  lofty atmosphere, and the imperatives “Exsurge” (1), “excute” (3) and “pelle” (12) hint at a ceremonial act, about to take place. The exuberant opening and its convoluted syntax remind us of   the long periods, with which Horace begins the closely related epinician odes 4.4 (28 verses) and 4.14 (24 verses), which carry a  strong Pindaric flavor.33 The poem’s association with Horace’s lyric poetry is firmly established through a reference to the “Aeolium carmen” (5-6; see Hor. Carm. 3.30.13), which the lyre is delighted to play.34 In a direct address, Partenio sollemnly requests his own mind (1: “mens”) to rise from lethargy and the Muse (9: “Pieri”) to strike the chords of   the lyre, which Mercury (16: “Maia natus Atlantide”; see Ov.  Met. 2.685-686), its inventor, did not create for sympotic or erotic songs, but for the sole purpose of  praising God. Not only does Partenio thus radicalize the hierarchy, implied in Horace’s list of  topics for lyrical poetry (Ars 83-85), he also transposes it to a Christian context. He further enhances the Christian atmosphere by alluding to George Buchanan’s paraphrase of Psalm 56, which contains a simi33  These openings truly run “monte decurrens velut amnis” (Hor. Carm. 4.2.5). Partenio notes reminiscences to Pindar in his commentary on Carm. 4.4 (Partenio [as in n.  7], f.  143r). Any imitation of  Pindar’s majestic style in Partenio’s Carmen saeculare, however, is  entirely filtered through Horatian modes, mostly from the fourth book of  his Odes. 34  In addition, “excute” may be inspired by Ovid’s invocation of  Germanicus at the beginning of  his Fasti (1.16).

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lar double entreaty to the poet’s mind and, this time, the lyre itself.35 Just like Partenio, Buchanan uses “barbitos” as a  feminine noun, whereas it is  usually masculine, and also employs a  further, quite rare term for the lyre (or harp), “nablium” (commonly used in the plural, almost only in Christian authors, with a  precedent in the Old Testament). Indirectly, Partenio thus also harks back to Psalm 56 itself, which, similarly to his own Carmen saeculare, voices both a sombre supplication for support at a time of  distress and enthusiastic readiness for jubilant praise. In Partenio’s poem the order of   these movements is  reversed, so that the emphatic exhortation “Exsurge”, which appears in the final part of  the psalm (Ps. 56.9, addressed to “gloria mea” and “psalterium et cithara”), becomes the opening of   the Carmen saeculare. It may be added that “Exsurge” appears several times in the Psalms, but nearly always addressed to God, as in Ps. 73.22 (“Exsurge, Domine [‘Deus’ in modern editions of   the Vulgate], iudica causam tuam”), famously taken over as the opening of   the bull, in which Pope Leo X threatened to excommunicate Martin Luther in 1520. The blending of  anguish and hope, of  exasperation and confidence, characteristic of  Psalm 56 (and indeed many other psalms), pervades Partenio’s poem as well. That psalmic flavor, immediately signaled by the opening word, constantly interacts with classicizing formal traits and literary allusions to classical Roman poets. Among these, references to Horace are certainly of  crucial importance for the understanding of   the poem. The key passage for grasping Partenio’s literary intention comes right after the long opening sentence. In a second appeal to the Muse, Partenio urges her to inspire him to express his gratitude by pouring out songs, never heard before, with new lyres. The “carmina non prius exaudita” (21-22) refer to one of  Horace’s most sollemn odes, the first of  the so-called Roman Odes (Carm. 3.1.2-3; compare 3.25.7-8 and Ep. 1.19.32). Along with “novis nabliis” (22) they indicate a song (the plural “carmina” seems to be determined just by the Horatian model passage) that the author has not yet tried out before (see also 35: “cithara, fidibus novis”). That novelty does not only lie in the combined imitation of Horace and Psalm 56 (partly through Buchanan’s paraphrase) in a  carmen saeculare, even though this 35  R.  P.  H. Green (ed.), Poetic Paraphrase of   the Psalms of  David (Psalmorum Davidis paraphrasis poetica) (Genève, 2011), 268, vv. 25-26.

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is unique in his lyrical corpus, but even more, I would submit, in the role Partenio assumes in this poem. He invites us to think of  how Horace characterizes himself  in the stanza he alludes to: Partenio, too, in his Carmen saeculare takes on the guise of a “Musarum sacerdos” (Carm. 3.1.3), who speaks for the community and carries out a  public mission in honor of  God.36 In his commentary Partenio stresses the hymnic quality of  the opening stanza and draws a parallel with Horace’s ode to Apollo and Diana (Carm. 1.21) and his CS. All three poems, Partenio remarks, mention the involvement of  young boys and girls, who symbolize the purity and chastity, appropriate for a praise of  God.37 Even though Horace presents himself  in all these and several more of his odes (most notably and explicitly in Carm. 4.6.44, looking forward to his CS) as a  public vates, the auctorial stance Par­ tenio takes on, however, is wholly and specifically that of  Horace in his CS. The most visible sign of  that particular bond is Partenio’s systematic use of  the first person plural throughout the poem, from “excipimus” (34) to “tollamus” (123), after an initial “mecum” (5), expressing his wish for the Muse to join him in his song. Just like Horace in his CS, Partenio effaces himself  entirely as an individual person and fashions himself  as the bard of   the Venetians, with whom and for whom he addresses his prayer (36: “prece”) to God. The intention of  his poem perfectly corresponds with how he interpreted Horace’s model – in his own words: “Gravissimum et pulcherrimum carmen, sanctam habens pro totius Urbis incolumitate petitionem.” 38 Lacking the necessary sources, Partenio was not able to fully understand the relationship of  Horace’s CS to the Ludi saeculares, nor was he aware of   the triadic structure of   the poem, related to the three-day festival.39 His explanation

36   H.  P. Syndikus, Die Lyrik des Horaz. Eine Interpretation der Oden. Band II. Drittes und viertes Buch (Darmstadt, 1973), 14 aptly reminds us that the notion itself  is widely attested since Pindar. 37  Partenio 1584 (as in n.  7), f.  101r. In his explanatory note he also draws a  general parallel with the Psalms in this respect; he is  probably thinking primarily of  Ps. 112.1. 38  Partenio 1584 (as in n. 7), f. 172r. 39  For an excellent presentation of   the evidence see R. F. Thomas (com.), Horace, Odes. Book IV and Carmen Saeculare (Cambridge, 2011), 53-61. Partenio derived his knowledge about the Ludi saeculares primarily from Onofrio Panvinio’s De ludibus

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essentially follows the humanistic commentary tradition on the CS; the general characterization of   the CS found there ultimately goes back to Ps.-Acro.40 At the basis of   the long-standing tradition of  carmina saecularia, which Ps.-Acro had commented, lay two different concerns, the propitiation of  the gods in the wake of  a threatening plague and the celebration of  the saeculum at the Ludi saeculares. Humanist commentators usually conflated these two facets, whilst the propitiatory nature of   the CS was evoked in the heading “Pro Imperii Romani incolumitate”, which often appears in early modern editions of  Horace down to the nineteenth century. The performance of   the song by a  double choir of  boys and girls and its dedication to Apollo and Diana were also invariably specified as special characteristics. These last two elements led quite a few commentators also to identify Carm. 1.21 and 4.6 – as well as Catullus’s hymn to Diana, Carm. 34 – as (parts of) carmina saecularia.41 For Partenio, too, Horace’s CS was first and foremost a hymn, in which Apollo and Diana, along with other gods, are beseeched to continue to grant their support to Rome and safeguard the security and prosperity of   the Roman Empire after a time of  trouble. It is this message that he transposes to the Christian God and to the republic of  Venice. Just like Horace’s CS, much less tightly structured than most of  his odes, Partenio’s poem does not display any detailed texture, let alone a  symmetrical arrangement of  stanzas, but is  rather characterized by a  chain of  associations and repeated switches in addressing now God, then the Venetian community, thus conveying the interaction between the two. After the grandiose opening, the poem continues to flow in often long sentences that break through the single stanzas nine times (36-37, 48-49, 52-53, 60-61, 68-69, 76-77, 100-101, 112-113, saecularibus liber (Venetiis, in officina Erasmiana, apud Vincentium Valgrisium, 1558), to which he refers on f. 172r of  his commentary. 40  F. Hauthal (ed.), Acronis et Porphyrionis commentarii in Q . Horatium Flaccum (Berlin, 1864), 433. 41 Partenio, too, following earlier commentators, called Carm. 1.21 (with an explanatory comment) and 4.6 (only in the heading of   the poem) a carmen saeculare (f. 41v and 145v). The most radical attempt to determine a group of  carmina saecularia in Horace’s lyrical oeuvre was undertaken by the Danish philologist Hans Peter Anchersen in his Pars sexta operum Horatii, ipsi et Sidonio Apollinari Laudes Phoebi et Dianae dicta (Copenhagen, 1752), along with several other dissertations, published between 1749 and 1760.

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120-121).42 A similar effect is achieved by a flurry of  elisions, fiftyone in all, throughout the poem. There are ten lines that contain even two elisions (17, 34, 42, 47, 49, 63, 79, 92, 94, 113). Very conspicuous is a synapheia through tmesis across two lines (41-42: “O-lympi”, imitating Hor. Carm. 1.2.19-20: “u-xorius”). All these peculiarities are studiously avoided by Horace in his CS, probably in view of  the performance of  the poem. Despite the rather loose structure, two main sections, following the opening stanzas (1-24), can still be distinguished. In the first main part of   the poem (25-84) the focus is first on the praise of  God, to which the entire community is encouraged in the light of   the compassion and protection God has extended to the Venetians, not least in the recent past through the victory at Lepanto (25-56), and secondly on the wish that this peace and tranquillity may last forever (57-84). The second part (85-124) is  dominated by the plea for support in the present misery of   the plague and the wish that God continue to stand by the Venetians, as they pledge to carry God’s name to the confines of  the world, as long as the moon will orbit. In this basic structure, stock elements of   the ancient hymn to the gods are clearly visible, even though the poem is not composed in a canonical hymnic style throughout.43 The first part evokes past and present manifestations of  God’s blessings, the second contains the prayer for continued comfort and succor against new perils and menaces. Just as in a  classical hymn, the motivation for that prayer lies precisely in the favors granted before and described in the poem. A third standard feature, the sollemn invocation, appears 42  Torquato Tasso saw enjambements between stanzas as a  means of  rendering a poem “magnificent and sublime”, as reminds us F. Bausi, “I carmi latini di Giovanni Della Casa e  la poesia umanistica fra Q uattro e  Cinquecento”, in S.  Carrai (ed.), Giovanni Della Casa ecclesiastico e  scrittore (Roma, 2007), 233-258, at 257. Par­te­ nio evokes a grand style also by incorporating several “epic” composita into his poem (10: “undisoni”; 26: “frondiferis”; 27: “caelicolum”; 47: “igniferas”; 62: “thuricremis”; 101: “Caelipotens”; 110: “horrisonum”; 121: “nubiferum”). These are minute instances of  what Stephen Harrison has called “generic enrichment” (Generic Enrichment in Vergil and Horace [Oxford, 2007]), inspired by the concept of  “Kreuzung der Gattungen”, introduced by Wilhelm Kroll (Studien zum Verständnis der römischen Literatur [Stuttgart, 1924], 202-224). Broader examinations of  this phenomenon in Neo-Latin literature have, to my knowledge, not yet been undertaken, so that the extent of  its applicability in that domain remains uncertain. 43  The properties of hymnic style were famously elucidated by E. Norden, Agnostos theos. Untersuchungen zur Formengeschichte religiöser Rede (Leipzig – Berlin, 1913), esp. 143-176.

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at 33-34, turned into a salutation (“Salve […] salve”),44 but lacking the typical relative clauses that indicate the ancestry and the special powers and competences of  the god addressed in the hymn. Finally, Partenio also borrows from the conventions of  hymnic style the enumeration of   the different names of   the god invoked (57-59: “seu genitor, seu pateris Deus, seu rex […] dici”), so as not to miss the most appropriate name for the favor sought in the prayer. Partenio could find this last feature also in Horace’s CS, 15-16. One literary hallmark of   the hymn is not implemented in Par­ tenio’s poem, the frequent anaphoric repetition of   the secondperson pronoun. Such pronouns are strategically placed at the beginning of  several stanzas, but not in the usual hymnic style. They appear rather in couples with a  view to underlining the close bond between God and the Venetians: “Tu  […]. At vos” (41 and 45), “At tu […] nosque” (57 and 61) and “Nos […]. Nos” (109 and 117, first as object, then as subject). The last couple, in particular, mirrors the ancient notion of   the mutual relationship between the god and those worshiping him as a contract between a patronus and his cliens. Further more specific allusions to the CS can be detected in the poem, but they do not necessarily carry more weight than reminiscences of  other passages from Horace or other classical poets. The depiction of   the world through the image of   the rising and setting sun in the penultimate stanza (118-119) is  inspired by CS 9-11. Whereas Horace associates Phoebus Apollo with the sun (CS 9), Partenio connects God with the salvific light that shines upon the earth (33 and 41-44).45 Likewise, his evocation of  Cynthia, that is Diana as goddess of   the moon, at the end of   the poem (123) calls to mind Diana’s presence in the CS. Q uite strikingly, Partenio seems to imitate Horace’s CS in employing the imagery of   the golden age in describing the bliss bestowed by God upon mankind, but avoiding to proclaim explicitly the return of   the Golden Age. Partenio credits God, described 44  There are many instances to be found in Roman literature, but Partenio seems to have thought in particular of  Cat.  Carm. 64.23, given the proximity of  “optato saeclorum tempore” in v. 22 (compare “optatum saeculum” at 30 in his own poem). This apostrophe became a  popular opening in Christian hymns, as in the famous Marian hymn Salve, Regina. 45  “lumine luminum” (43) refers to the Nicene Creed; the phrase is  based on Joh. 8.12.

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as “regem caelicolum” (27-28), with having “brought back at the right time the longed-for age” (30) and “brought forth a  golden light” (32). In the last stanzas of   the first part (65-84) he paints the manifold benefits of   the “golden peace” (65) with the traditional motifs of  harmony and abundance. In his commentary (f.  172v-173r) Par­tenio observed how Horace elaborates on the notions of  “Pax” and “Honos Pudorque”, invoked as deities in CS 57, in another poem, in which the Augustan ideology manifests itself, namely Carm. 4.5.17-23. He evokes that passage by picking up the very rare “faustitas”, attested only in Hor.  Carm. 4.5.18, in this section of  his poem (68). The Horatian carmen 4.5 is  in fact another ode that provided a literary framework for Par­tenio’s carmen saeculare. Horace’s ode to Augustus combines in particularly vivid fashion formal characteristics of   the hymn and topoi of  ruler panegyrics, such as the depiction of   the enjoyments of   the ruler’s reign.46 In the literary guise of  a  ὕμνος κλητικός Horace’s persona calls upon Augustus, on behalf  of   the patria, to return as soon as possible from Spain to Rome, so that the emperor may further consolidate the prosperity he has already brought about. Par­tenio does, admittedly, not write a  ὕμνος κλητικός in the strict sense, because God is  omnipresent and does not need to be begged to return or reappear (contrast “abes” and “redi” in Hor. Carm. 4.5.2 and 4). In this way, he implicitly demonstrates the superiority of  God over a  pagan emperor, who eventually came to be adored as a god: Par­tenio speaks of  continued presence, not desired presence after a  period of  absence. A  similar correction can be traced in Par­tenio’s use of  “light” as a  metaphor for salutary rulership (33 and 41-44). His source of  inspiration is  Horace’s “Lucem redde tuae, dux bone, patriae” (Carm. 4.5.5), which gives Par­tenio the opportunity to emphasize that God has already performed (33: “lucem protulit auream”) what Augustus is requested to do. Par­tenio thus manages to exploit stock elements of  politic panegyrics for his own portrayal of   the bountiful grace of  God. 46   The topics to be discussed in a  typical λόγος βασιλικός were later codified by Menander Rhetor. His instructions correspond quite well with the themes discernible in Carm. 4.5, as has been noted by commentators, e.g., A. Kiessling, R. Heinze (comm.), Q .  Horatius Flaccus, Oden und Epoden (Berlin, 19307), 413, and Syndikus 1973 (as in n. 34), 340, n. 63. In his commentary (f. 145r) Par­tenio noted that Carm. 4.5 contains many useful loci for the praise of  illustrious men and invited comparison with Carm. 3.14.

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Even if  Par­tenio draws in his praise of  God to some extent on the literary conventions of   the eulogy of  a sovereign ruler, his poem remains essentially a religious hymn without any outspoken political connotations. No contemporary person is  mentioned. The doge Alvise Mocenigo is  the mere addressee and does not play any role in the poem itself. The Venetians come into view as a  community, joined in the hope and belief  that God will lead them out of   the present crisis, just as God has championed the Venetians before. Only at the end of   the poem, Par­tenio inserts a veiled political statement into his prayer. The last of   the wishes that Par­tenio hopes will be heeded by God is that Venice may reign supreme. The city is  not mentioned by its name, but only paraphrased. First it is called “the city founded by gleaming swans” (115: “purpureis condita oloribus”) – a learned allusion, via Hor. Carm. 4.1.10,47 to the association of  Venice with Venus, born, just like the city, from the sea. The second qualification, “the city that commands the land and the sea” (116) carries a political connotation. “Domina aequoris” occurs in Horace’s hymn to the Fortuna of  Antium (Carm. 1.35.6), which should safeguard Augustus on his overseas expeditions.48 “Urbs domina”, however, is  usually applied to Rome, as in Ov. Am. 2.14.16.49 Horace’s “domina Roma” (Carm. 4.14.44) is  even more explicit. Par­tenio seems to bestow a  status of  singular excellence upon Venice, which forces Rome and its glorious history into the shadow. The same tendency lies behind the earlier accolade “decus et orbis et urbium” (103), playing on the traditional association “urbs – orbis”, commonplace throughout Roman literature (e.g., Ov. Fast. 2.684) and beyond. In lieu of  a conclusion, I would like to offer three observations for further thought. (1) Ugo Rozzo 2009 ([as in n.  6], 47) loosely qualified Par­tenio’s poems as “di evidente imitazione oraziana”. This assessment is certainly not entirely off  the mark, but I hope to have shown that it is one-sided and fails to do justice to the richness of  Par­ 47  Thomas 2011 (as in n.  37), following earlier commentators, explains how “purple” should be understood. 48   Incidentally, “terrae” at the beginning of  116 seems to mirror “ruris” at the beginning of  Hor. Carm. 1.36.6. Par­tenio, therefore, probably construed “ruris” with “dominam”, rather than with “colonus” in this famously difficult line of  Horace. 49  For more evidence, see W. Gernentz, Laudes Romae (Rostock 1918), 125-126.

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tenio’s practice of  imitatio. It seems more prudent to assume, generally speaking, that even the most “Horatian” of  Neo-Latin lyric poets stood open for a wide range of  literary influences. (2) Partenio read and understood Horace’s CS in close association with the Odes, especially the hymnic odes, whereas most modern scholarship rather affirms the singularity of   the CS.50 Partenio’s approach may be compared with the reception of  the Epodes in the early modern age. Very often these were simply seen as a  further book of  odes. Early modern editions of  Horace can be quite revealing in the way they present the CS. A  particularly idiosyncratic example is  the edition, prepared by Jean du Hamel, Q .  Horatii Flacci Opera expurgata (Paris, Barbou, 1720; 17622). Admittedly guided by a moralistic agenda, the editor united the acceptable Epodes and the CS in a  fifth book of  Odes. The CS thus became Carm. 5.13! (3) The literary reception of  Horace in a religious framework usually takes the form of  either a “Horatian” hymnic ode, a Christian parodia or a psalm paraphrase. Partenio found yet another way of  blending Horatian tunes and Christian feelings. His Carmen saeculare cannot be neatly categorized and shows us instead how Horace’s CS, which mostly falls outside the ambit of  model poems for “Horatian” Neo-Latin lyric poets, could trigger original compositions, such as Partenio’s, intended to praise God in a special situation and appropriating the auctorial stance of  the public “Horatian” vates.

50  See nonetheless recent work, yet to be published, by Brittney Szempruch on the “embedded” hymns in Horace’s Odes.

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IUSTA FACIT VERSUS HAEC INDIGNATIO NOSTRA

ADAPTING LATIN VERSE SATIRE IN EARLY MODERN LIVONIA

Historical and generic background One of   the most challenging genres of  Neo-Latin literature is satire. It presupposed some conflict or crisis in society or in a personal relationship, the literary treatment of  which could help identify and solve it. Yet its author had to be careful not to cause an even more serious conflict or unpleasant consequences. This paradox caused several prohibitions and recommendations for satirists: the Poetae Laureati Caesarei of   the sixteenth – eighteenth centuries, e.g., had to swear to refrain from all satire.1 Given the number of  Poets Laureate in the Holy Roman Empire, one would expect only a small number of  satires to have been written and published.2 Although north-eastern Europe (Courland, Livonia, and Estonia) did not belong to the Empire in mediaeval and early modern times, most intellectuals in this area were immigrants from the Empire, among them ten crowned poets, but no additional coronation happened in the northern Baltics.3 In the seventeenth century, the cautious attitude towards satire prevailing in the region must have 1   J. L. L. Flood, “The Laureation of  Poets in the Holy Roman Empire: An Introduction”, in Id., Poets Laureate in the Holy Roman Empire, vol. 1 (Berlin, 2006), cli, clxxxiii. 2  According to J. L. L. Flood, Poets Laureate in the Holy Roman Empire, vol. 5 (Berlin, 2019), there were around 1500 crowned poets in Europe between 1341 and 1804. On the other hand, W. Ludwig mentions the coronation of  Francesco Filelfo by King Adolfo in 1453 for writing of  100 satires in “Die 100 Satiren des Francesco Filelfo”, in T. Haye, F. Schnoor (ed.), Epochen der Satire. Traditionslinien einer literarischen Gattung (Hildesheim, 2008), 191-258, at 192. 3  From them – A.  Arvidi, C.  Born(e)mann, P.  Fleming, S.  Frenzel, L.  Luden, J.  S. Markard, F.  Menius, E.  Notmann, T.  Polus, V.  Zimmermann – only Fleming

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 81-99 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124050

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been seriously influenced by these poets: hardly any satire, let alone a  collection of   them, seems to have been printed here in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.4 Another condition for composing Latin satires – reading and imitating the classical examples at school – started in north-eastern Europe rather late. There is  no reference to lectures on classical satires in the Lutheran school curricula of  Riga or Tallinn from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.5 This is  not surprising; in one of  his Table Talks (1538) Luther banned the poems of  Juvenal from Protestant schools, together with Martial and Catullus, and the Carmina Priapea, for he considered them to be so rough and impudent that youngsters could not read them without great harm.6 Only in the 1630s the statutes of   the first local university (Academia Dorpatensis) stipulated that the professor had published a  Satyra in grammaticos in verse before his coronation in 1631; see J. M. Lappenberg (ed.), Lateinische Gedichte (Stuttgart, 1863), 6-9. 4 S.  Šiško, Latvias citvalodu seniespiedumu kopkatalogs 1588-1830. Sērija A.  = The Union Catalogue of  foreign language ancient prints in Latvia 1588-1830 (Riga, 2013); E.-L.  Jaanson (ed.), Tartu Ülikooli trükikoda 1632-1710: ajalugu ja trükiste bibliograafia  = Druckerei der Universität Dorpat 1632-1710: Geschichte und Bibliographie der Druckschriften (Tartu, 2000); M.  Klöker, Literarisches Leben in Reval in der ersten Hälfte des 17. Jahrhunderts. Institutionen der Gelehrsamkeit und Dichten bei Gelegenheit, vol.  2. Bibliographie der Revaler Literatur. Drucke von den Anfängen bis 1657 (Tübingen, 2005); Estonian National Bibliography online (https://erb.nlib.ee/); K.  Garber (ed.), Handbuch des personalen Gelegenheitsschrifttums in europäischen Bibliotheken und Archiven. Im Zusammenwirken mit der Forschungsstelle Literatur der Frühen Neuzeit und dem Institut für Kulturgeschichte der Frühen Neuzeit der Universität Osnabrück (Hildesheim, 2001). For a  provisional bibliography of  NeoLatin satires, see J. IJsewijn, “Neo-Latin Satires: Sermo and Satyra Menippea”, in R.  R. Bolgar (ed.), Classical Influences on European Culture a.d.  1500-1700 (Cambridge, 1976), 41-55, at 51-55. 5  No notes are to be found in the poetic school program of  Riga Cathedral School 1589 (Libellus ethicus […] in gratiam puerorum qui in schola Rigensi informantur […], Riga, 1589 [USTC 6910548]) nor in the more official one from 1594 (printed in 1597 Orationes tres […] scholarcharum, Nicolai Ekii, proconsulis et Davidis Hilchen syndici. Tertia Ioannis Rivii, cum solenni et publico ritu produceretur, ad demandatam sibi ab amplissimo senatu inspectionem scholasticam ineundam […]. Adiuncta […] publicae doctrinae series, tabellis expressa inque curias V. distributa. Deinde, docendi in singulis curiis, praescripta ratio  […] in tractando et interpretando omni genere utriusque linguae, autorum, Rigae, 1594 [USTC 6910891]), nor in the first program of  Tallinn Gymnasium (H. Vulpius, Methodica paedias isagoge, pro felici successu gymnasii Revaliensis, […]  anno 1631. Revaliae laudabiliter fundati, […], Revaliae, 1635 [USTC 6911474]). 6 M. Luther, Kritische Gesamtausgabe, Tischreden, vol. 4 (Weimar, 1916), no. 4012, 75. Cf.  Chr.  Schmitz, “Juvenal bei Luther”, in Ead., Juvenal (Hildesheim, 2019), 221-223.

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of  poetry might consider the examples of   the satirists Horace and Juvenal, but with the caveat that their poems be interpreted within reasonable bounds and exemplified only with those satires which did not attack Christian morals: Poeseos professor  […] usum autem praeceptorum monstrabit in Homero, Hesiodo, Theocrito, Pindaro, Euripide, Sophocle, Virgilio, Horatio, Psalterio Buchanani, Ovidio, Propertio, Iuvenale, ita tamen, ut gentiles poetae satyrici inprimis cum sale ab eo interpretationem accipiant et quae non inpugnent christianis moribus.7

These statutes, however, were literally copied from the 1626 statutes of  Uppsala University, including the concession about satire, hence they may not exactly reflect the situation in the Baltic countries.8 Recent archival searches prove, however, that satire was common in early modern north-eastern Europe, too. The first extant piece, entitled satira, published under a pseudonym around 1599, probably in Riga, has been discovered in the court files of  David Hilchen (1561-1610), city secretary and legal councillor of  Riga, in 2016 and has by now been published as well as contextualized with due attention to its historical and mythological peculiarities.9 Its  opening lines show that, by this time, verse satire was distinguished in the region from elegiac, lyrical and heroic poems.10 It also proves that in Livonia Julius Caesar Scaliger’s approach has been spread, according to which satire was not a new genre created by the Roman poets, but had rather developed from ancient Greek satyr plays and therefore also allowed for iambic meters as a generic option.11 Lastly, the current repository of  Hilchen’s satire among

7  M. Lepajõe (ed.), K. Viiding (tr., annot.), Constitutiones Academiae Dorpatensis (Academiae Gustavianae) = Tartu Akadeemia (Academia Gustaviana) põhikiri (Tartu, 2015), 63. 8  C. Annerstedt, Uppsala Universitets historia (Uppsala, 1877), 279. 9  K. Viiding, “Gefährliche Bücher, gefährliche Gattungen, gefährliche Vorlagen: Die Geburt der Satire in Livland”, in O. Merisalo (ed.), Book in Context. Renaissanceforum. Journal of  Renaissance Studies 15 (2019), 73-99. 10 “Q ui leves elegos atque asperitate carentes / vel consuevi odas vel amabile fundere carmen  / flare tuba heroa, didicique heroica gesta:  / nunc tibi, Cerbere atrox, naturam praeter, acerbum  / carminis en scribo genus: en me suscitat ira, /acrior ut surgam, contra teque, omnia tollam / arma.” 11  “Accipito haec rursum, quae Panas inter agrestes / Et satyros lusi hamatis stipatus iambis.” (vv. 17-18). Cf. L. Deitz (ed., tr., annot.), J. C. Scaliger, Poetices libri

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his court files is related to the fact that it was treated as a point in his prosecution, albeit not in the judgment. Although attacking one person was exceptional in Livonian satirical writings and the wider problems and events in society provided more substance to the satirists, the strategies to protect the satirist were similar in both cases: anonymous and handwritten distribution, and the deliberate choice of  a rather incomprehensible language. The Livonian Land Marshal and literate Gustav von Mengden (1625-1688), had combined both strategies in a  satire against the Swedish reduction policy in Livonia written in LowGerman and published only at the end of  the nineteenth century.12 Joachim Rachel (1618-1668), with his satire collection, became a  “German Juvenal” only after his stay in Livonia (1640-1650). To judge from the epigrams of  Rachel’s Livonian period, we can safely assume that he adopted the satirical manner of writing while studying at the Academia Dorpatensis.13 The fact that Mengden and Rachel were contemporaries at the Academy of  Tartu in the 1640s may therefore suggest that the precepts of   the university’s statutes were indeed applied. In the following pages, I  will explore the earliest adaptation of  Latin verse satire in the northern Baltics and the challenges faced by the Livonian literati in complying with the generic framework of  classical models by focusing on the Elegia de nobilium origine vera et vitiosis eorundem moribus (Elegy about the true origin of  nobles and their vicious customs), written in Protestant Riga around 1548, but edited only in 1889.14 Its author, Rutgerus

septem. Sieben Bücher über die Dichtkunst, vol. 1 (Stuttgart – Bad Cannstatt, 1994), 186-189. 12  G. von Mengden, “De fief  Düwelskinder. Plattdeutsche Satyre auf  die Güterreduktions-Commission in Livland”, in J. E. Freiherr von Grotthuss (ed.), Das Baltische Dichterbuch (Reval, 1895), 89-91. King Karl  XI of  Sweden initially instituted legal proceedings against the anonymous author of  the satire, accusing him of  provocation, but withdrew them after Mengden’s authorship became clear. Mengden himself  was during these years in exile. About Mengden, cf.  Chr.  von Zimmermann, “Er stehet unbewegt, und achtet alles nicht. Notizen zu Leben und Werk des livländischen Psalmdichters Gustav von Mengden (1627-1688)”, Daphnis 24 (1995), 401-425. 13  K.  Viiding, “Zum Entstehungskontext und zu den antiken Vorbildern der frühen lateinischen Spottepigramme des deutschen Satirikers Joachim Rachelius”, Neulateinisches Jahrbuch 9 (2007), 309-320. 14  Th. von Rieckhoff, “Rötger Becker – Rutgerus Pistorius, ein livländischer Humanist”, Jahresbericht der Felliner literarischen Gesellschaft für das Jahr 1888 (Fellin, 1889), 62-68. Riekhoff’s edition is  based on a  nineteenth-century transcript by historian

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Pistorius (Rötger Becker alias Wellemer, Wesel ca 1520 – Riga 1577),15 belonged to the second generation of  Livonian humanists. Born in the family of  a  verger, Johann Wellemer alias Herbertz, Pistorius studied in Wittenberg 1539-1544  16 and started probably in 1545 in Riga as teacher and later rector of   the Cathedral School. Ordained in 1553, he was minister of  St  Peter’s in Riga during the last two decades of  his life. His patron was burgomaster of  Riga Jürgen Padel (1505-1571).17 In the second half  of   the 1540s, Pistorius wrote occasional poems in Latin, all in elegiac couplets.18

Satirising through sub-text The title Elegia qualifies Pistorius’s poem according to its verse form, elegiac couplets. It does not signal the common metrical practice of classical and humanist verse satire, the quantitative dactylic hexameter. Of course, in late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, verse satire was written in meters other than the hexameter, even though in contemporary poetic manuals it was understood throughout as a  hexametric poem.19 Sometimes, as in the case of  Sidonius Eduard Pabst (originally in Tallinn City Archives, it was moved to Tartu, Eesti Rahvusarhiiv, ms. EAA.854.7.682, without pagination). The autograph by Pistorius is lost. 15   In the earlier biographies 1510 is given as his birth date. For an updated overview about him, see H. Deeters, “Der livländische Humanist Rötger Becker”, Jahrbuch des baltischen Deutschtums 60 (2013), 42-59. 16  K.  E. Förstemann, G.  Naebus, Album Academiae Vitebergensis 1502-1602 (Lipsiae, 1841), 174; J. Köstlin, Die Baccalaurei und Magistri der Wittenberger philosophischen Fakultät (Halle, 1890), 16. 17  Riekhoff  1889 (as in note 14), 59-60. Padel studied in Wittenberg since 1523. 18  Epicedion pii et eruditi viri dn. Jacobi Batti  […], written around 1547, first published in Lübeck with Jürgen Richolff, in 1548 (Battus died shortly after 10 No­vem­ ber 1545); […]  Justo Claudio syndico  […] (1549), and Epithalamium scriptum ad Thomae Meyr, Rigensi ministro divini verbi Rigae (1549), both published only by Riekhoff  1889 (as in note 14), 68-72. Literary historian Gero von Wilpert, Deutschbaltische Literaturgeschichte (München, 2005), 76 called them “Stilübungen”, whereas he labeled Elegia a  genuine poem with humanist spirit. About his epicedium, see J.  Eickmeyer, “ ‘Sodalitas litteraria Rigensis’? Umrisse eines Netzwerks deutscher und livländischer Humanisten im sechzehnten Jahrhundert”, in R.  Bičevskis, J.  Eickmeyer et al. (ed.), Baltisch-deutsche Kulturbeziehungen vom 16. bis 19. Jahrhundert. MedienInstitutionen-Akteure. Band I. Zwischen Reformation und Aufklärung (Heidelberg, 2017), 237-267, at 242-247. 19 U. Kindermann, Satyra. Die Theorie der Satire im Mittellateinischen. Vorstudie zu einer Gattungsgeschichte (Nürnberg, 1978), 12-30.

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Apollinaris (12.9-11, 20-22), the preference for elegiac distichs or Phalaecean verses instead of  hexameters was a  conscious joke, as if the poet’s muse refused to create hexameters amid barbarians.20 Since the eleventh century, accentual elegiac couplets became common in satires, with the optional title of  satyra or sermo.21 From the beginning of  humanism in the Low Countries, the hesitation of  Erasmus about the proper title of  his three elegiae protrepticae or satirae in elegiac couplets is  well known,22 but his case is  not comparable to the beginning of  satire in Livonia, as there are no explicit explanations of Pistorius’s doubts. Lastly, at the same time as Pistorius, the German humanist Friedrich Dedekind published his satirical poem Grobianus in elegiac couplets in 1549.23 The rest of  the title of Pistorius’s poem, De nobilium origine vera et vitiosis eorundem moribus describes the content of  the poem and comes quite close to the titles added to the eighth satire of  Juvenal in medieval manuscripts and early modern editions.24 For Pistorius’s educated contemporaries it refers implicitly to this sub-text. Without additional evidence, we cannot, however, decide whether the title of   the Livonian poem was consciously aimed at creating

20  K. Smolak, “ ‘Wer sind denn die schon?’ Barbaren in satirischer Kleindichtung der lateinischen Spätantike”, in T.  Haye, F.  Schnoor 2008 (as in note 2), 35-54, at 48-50, 54. K. Schlapbach, “Veriora Nomina Camenarum. Erudition, Uncertainty, and Cognitive Displacement as Poetic Strategies in Sidonius Apollinaris”, Journal of  Late Antiquity 13.1 (2020), 44-61. The analogy between the poets in the Roman (Sidonius Apollinaris) versus European periphery (Pistorius) as dangerous places for composing hexametric satires is inviting. 21  Kindermann 1978 (as in note 19), 16. 22  G. Tournoy, “The Beginnings of  Neo-Latin Satire in the Low Countries”, in R. De Smet (ed.), La Satire humaniste (Leuven, 1994), 95-109, at 95-99. 23   A. Bömer (ed.), Fridericus Dedekindus, Grobianus (Berlin, 1903). Cf. T. Van Houdt, “Vincitis rusticitate viros. Gender, Virtue, and Vice in Friedrich Dedekind’s Ironic-Didactic poem Grobianus”, in G. Partoens, G. Roskam, T. Van Houdt (ed.), Virtutis imago. Studies on the Conceptualisation and Transformation of an Ancient Ideal (Leuven, 2004), 483-505. For some further examples of  meters in satire, see J. IJsewijn, D. Sacré, Companion to Neo-Latin Studies. Part II. Literary, Linguistic, Philological and Editorial Q uestions (Leuven, 1998), 67-73. 24  For the mediaeval examples, cf. B.-J. Schröder, Titel und Text. Zur Entwicklung lateinischer Gedichtüberschriften. Mit Untersuchungen zu lateinischen Buchtiteln, Inhaltsverzeichnissen und anderen Gliederungsmitteln (Berlin – New York, 1999), 268-270; for the early modern ones, see e.g., Q . Horatii Flacci, Auli Persii, Iunii Iuvenalis Opera (Basileae, 1531 [USTC 688901]), 442: Ad Ponticium, de vera nobilitate, quae non maiorum imaginibus censenda est, sed ab animi virtutibus (To Ponticius about true nobility, which should not be judged by the images of   the ancestors, but by the virtues of  the mind).

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a tension between elegiac form and satirical sub-text. The selected topic in itself  allowed the author to adopt a complaining as well as a  moralising-rebuking approach. The purpose of   the following analysis of  Juvenal’s impact on Pistorius’s poem is to examine the main satirical characteristics – topics, structure and auctorial intention – and record the first traces of Juvenal’s reception in the northern Baltics.

Similarities in the structures of  the two poems Even though Juvenal’s eighth satire is one third longer than Pistorius’s poem (275 resp. 192 lines), both contain two approximately equal main parts and a  short coda. Pistorius’s poem begins with a didactic explanation of   the divine origin of  all people and of  virtues, and of  one’s own merits as the only fundament of  true nobility (vv. 1-68) and continues with a catalogue of  vices of  noblemen (vv.  69-180). Juvenal first explains the personal excellence that is necessary for true nobility to benefit society (vv.  1-145), before giving examples of  vicious degeneration. A second similarity is the ring structure: in the exordium appear three (Juvenal: four) questions in crescendo about the origin of nobility, followed by an argumentation to answer these questions in the form of  exempla with clearly formulated summarizing answers at the end of  each part. Pistorius ends the first part with “nobiliores / Virtus praefulgens reddere sola queat” (vv. 65b-66), and the coda with “Virtus poterit nobilitare sua” (v.  192); Juvenal’s exordium ends with “nobilitas sola est atque unica virtus” (8.20). The third similarity is  the consistently repeated comparison between past and present. The most remarkable structural difference between both authors lies in the absence of  an epilogue in Pistorius’s work. Juvenal’s epilogue (placed before the coda) presents a  series of  commendable exempla, admirable men of  lowly birth, who rose significantly in the social hierarchy, in sharp contrast to the nobility of  birth (Iuv. Sat. 8.231-268). In Pistorius’s time, Livonia had only a he­red­ i­tary and no lower civil nobility corresponding to Juvenal’s pattern. Here, the current political situation directly influenced the imitation of  Juvenal. Moreover, although the vices of  both catalogues demonstrate how the addressee should not behave, Pisto­ rius arranged his catalogue symmetrically to avoid monotony 87

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(see below), whereas Juvenal organised it in the form of  gradually revealing narratives going crescendo. Nevertheless, despite small differences, the general structure of  Juvenal’s satire is easily recognisable in Pistorius’s poem.

Authorial persona, addressees and changing intention in Pistorius’s poem Pistorius presents his poem as a first-person monologue. In itself, this form is common in many poetical genres, including elegies and satires. The beginning of  the poem, however, lacks clarity about that “first person”. Instead, the focus is on the omnipresence of  the problem, the true origin of nobility. This omnipresence encompasses the whole society, including the speaker himself: “vulgo  […] ubique” (v. 1), “generis nostri” (v. 4), “omnibus […] sumus” (vv. 6-7), “passim per compita” (v. 21). At this universal level, the speaker belongs to mankind like both of  his addressees (common people, nobility). The omnipresence is  also justified (“se vel summo quaerere iure putat”, v.  22) and has a  long history as the similar choice of  keywords in Juvenal’s eighth satire indicates (cf.  Iuv. Sat. 8.1 “stemmata quid faciunt?” and Pistorius “quonam de stemmate”, v.  3). Therefore, using ancient experience with nobility seems to be justified for the author. At the end of   the introduction (vv.  23-25), the speaker distances himself  from the curious people and assumes the role of  a  teacher (“nos  […] respondere studemus, ut populus […] cognoscat”, vv. 23-24). This kind of nos reflects not only the speaker’s own opinion but his intention to rely on an authoritative body: his precepts are based on the experience of  many authors and thus need to be followed even more (there is only one authoritative “nos” in Juvenal, “utimur”, cf. Iuv. Sat. 8.184). The attitude of  this teacherpersona towards common people is twofold: he accepts their elegiac complaint about the former paradise-like equality of  mankind but nevertheless considers their question extremely simple (“perfacilis”, v. 1) and every doubt about the correct answer illicit to a reasonable person (“vix sanos”, v. 2). He is even ironic about the people’s intellectual capability (“ignavo populo”, v.  20) and their almost aggressive curiosity to learn more about the origin of nobility (three questions: “quonam de stemmate”; v. 3, “unde igitur nati”, v.  17, “haec unde sit”, v. 21). As a teacher, he regards himself  primarily 88

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as intellectually superior, feeling an obligation to docere the common people. The same authoritative persona is also speaking to the second addressee, consisting of  some young noblemen, who need his advice for appropriate behaviour. Yet, in this case, the speaker presents himself  more as a moral counsellor than as a stern teacher, and his attitude towards this noble addressee is no longer superior, but rather neutral and polite. The self-presentation in the form of   the first-person singular appears in Pistorius’s poem only in v. 29 with “fateor” (“I admit”). The development toward a more personal communication is slow: his response to the curious common people, that the origin of  all people is divine (vv. 29-30), together with the following argumentation is still presented by the teacher-persona. Pistorius here activates Seneca’s Ep. 44.1 (“Omnes si ad originem primam revocantur, a  dis sunt”) and Ben. 1 (“Eadem omnibus principia eademque origo; nemo altero nobilior”), and not the mocking explanation in Iuv. Sat. 8.132-133. As for Seneca, the origin of  virtue is divine for the speaker: as soon as mankind grew somewhat, God distributed different virtues to different persons and separated them by means of different ranks (vv. 31-34). Only those who had justifiably (v. 36) been granted such virtue by God could become rulers due to their own virtue (vv. 37-38) – nobility of birth without virtus is incomplete. The speaker highly appreciates the division of  ancient nobility into classes with variant attributes – titles, clothing, arms – (vv. 39-44) due to the harmony which resulted from such an approach of virtue. His opinion is  supported by the elaborated symmetrical versus aureus at the end of  this theoretical part: “talia virtuti tribuuntur praemia clarae” (v. 45), a verse in which the verb symbolically distinguishes achievement and dignified reward.25 This lesson about the development of   the nobility as a  result of  human virtue, supported by divine selection, is illustrated with two trivial examples. The first, about two figures from the Bible and one from ancient history (David, Simson, Scipio), exemplifies the personal nature of  virtue, while stressing physical strength and military courage (vv. 47-50); the second exemplum emphasizes 25 The versus aureus is  prepared by two mentions of  gold: in 18 “aurum exornat” (referring to the arrogant nobles), 42 “aureus torques” (an attribute of  dignified kings). For versus aureus as a favourite tool in Juvenal, cf. Schmitz 2019 (as in note 6), 193-195.

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the universality of   the concept of  virtue even among plants and animals (vv. 51-64). Unlike the previous impersonal attitude, the speaker now increasingly involves the actual addressee in his poem. At the turning point (“Q ua victum vulgus succubuisse vides”, v. 46), the common people, convinced and defeated by the arguments described by the teacher-persona above, recede from the addressee status of  the poem to make room for the new addressee, viz. the nobility, mentioned here for the first time in the second person. In  the second exemplum, the communication with the addressee intensifies even more, imitating the typical intensive interaction displayed in Roman satire (“putes”, “te”, “videris”, “tibi” vv. 54-63). The more personal tone, combined with special examples underlining the addressee’s interest in military achievements, could reveal some details about Pistorius’s noble addressee, especially in comparison with Juvenal’s sub-text, where Ponticus is said to be taking up public office as provincial governor (8.8794a). This passage again shows why Pistorius did not imitate Juvenal’s epilogue with its antithetical list of  men of  low origin who had risen to civil service (the  careers of  Cicero, Marius, Decius, not to mention Servius Tullius, could have been offensive to his noble addressee), and why he replaced the strange vices of   the Roman nobles, decadently working as transport workers, gladiators and actors (Sat. 8.146-230), with more relevant ones for sixteenth-century Livonia. After the rhetorical question on the nonsense of  further examples (“singula quid referam? Satis est”, v.  65),26 the speaker gives several exempla of vices as lessons to the addressee without attacking him personally. The learning process is referred to with verbs in the first and second person singular: verbs expressing noticing and understanding characterize the activity of  the recipient addressee,27 while verbs expressing assessing and prohibiting illustrate the teacher’s own stance.28 The similarity to Juvenal’s strategy supports the assumption that the speaker does not present his observations

  For formulaic wording, cf. Iuv. Sat. 8.71 “haec satis ad […]”; 8.196 “quid satius?”   95 “ut vicium duces”, 98 “vides”, 105 “notares”, 125 “cernas”, 175 “tibi viden­ tur?” (cf.  Iuv. Sat. 8.165 “audes”, 173 “invenies”, 179 “facias”, 180 “mittas”, 189 “ignoscas”, 200 “habes”, 228 “pone”, 230 “suspende”). 28  71 “censemus?”, 79 “nolo”, 91 “nec concedimus”, 97 “grande nefas ducemus”, 113 “non improbo” (cf. Iuv. Sat. 8.184 “utimur”, 188 “iudice me”, 207 “credamus”). 26 27

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on nobility from a distant position, but rather as a passionate critical eyewitness of  the decadence of  nobility.29 Interpreting the vices of  the nobility as study material, Pistorius once more utilizes the Juvenalian motif  of  omnipresence, stressed at the beginning of   the poem; it recurs here as the omnipresence of   the vices of   the nobility (“quis memorare queat?”, v.  140). Yet, unlike Juvenal, Pistorius emphasizes the wide spread of  vices not by an enumeration of  vitiosi, but by anonymous, generalizing phrases (“sunt qui”, “alii”). The aim is, however, the same: to show that the corrupt and irresponsible nobility influences the whole society. The addressee of  Pistorius’s poem must learn through seven negative examples arranged symmetrically (taking into account the number of  verses): 2 verses (79-80) on plundering the property of  others 4 verses (93-96) on copious meals 40 verses (97-136) on luxurious clothing 2 verses (137-138) on playing cards 28 verses (139-166) on drinking with bragging and fighting 6 verses (167-172) on greed 2 verses (173-174) on adultery The alternating length and sequence of  different vices hardly expresses the exact relevance of  some of   these vices in contemporary Livo­nia. A  more plausible reason might be the avoidance of  monotony, and the difference between vices as lack of  inner virtues (here: greed, lechery) and vices as lack of  manners and etiquette (here: gorging, slurping, inappropriate clothing) – a  concept well-known in humanist Europe since the publication of   the influential De  civilitate puerorum (Good Manners for Boys) by Erasmus (1530).30 In society, bad manners were much more visible than inner amorality and therefore had a much stronger potential for critical, mocking, ironical literary reactions, whereas adultery and plundering were serious crimes, which did not provide suitable material for laughing. Such kind of  material needed a  poet who aimed to delectare, to amuse his readership and Pistorius used it with delight.   Cf. Schmitz 2019 (as in n. 6), 167.   Cf. Van Houdt 2004 (as in n. 23).

29 30

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All of   these vices also occur in Juvenal’s satires: in the eighth satire in particular, the plundering and “battles” of  drunkards are described at length.31 Juvenal’s ambiguous art of  joking influenced even those details of  Pistorius’s descriptions of  vicious customs which have no ancient background. Describing, for example, the fly of  trousers (vv. 127-132) Pistorius justifies its size in an unexpected, surprising manner: through it, fleas can move to and from the human body without fear of  pursuit and death,32 and the worms living in the intestines have tidy homes in the trouser-leg. The irony is expressed in several typically satirical elements, accumulated in the same distich. Starting with two quotes from the highest genres, from Gregorian chant (introitus tropus “o quam felices”) and Vergil’s Aeneid 1.94 (“o terque quaterque beati”), the author pushes the object of  admiration from verse 131 to the next line by means of  enjambement, but instead of  “high walls of  Troy”, intestinal parasites are described by means of  the diminutive vermiculos. Thus, the sentence ends completely contrary to expectations: 33 O quam felices, o terque quaterque beatos vermiculos, quibus est tam bene compta domus! 131 O, how happy, three and four times blessed are the little worms which have such tidy dwellings!

At the end of  the treatment of vicious customs, the speaker does not return from the role of  ironic entertainer to that of  an emotionally neutral or serious moral teacher. Instead, he joins the crowd mentioned at the beginning of   the poem to ask his addressees a question (“quaeso”, v.  172; cf.  “quaestio”, v.  1): does this behaviour of  the nobility of  birth seem virtuous and dignified? (vv. 175-176). The answer is negative: the nobility should stand out among others in terms of   their way of  life, but are disgraceful instead (vv.  177  See further Iuv. Sat. 11 about luxurious meals (esp. 77-141) and Iuv. Sat. 6 about adultery and sexual deviations. 32  The fly was common in Livonia in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, I. Põltsam, “Eesti ala kodanike rõivastus 14. sajandi teisest poolest 16. sajandi keskpaigani”, Tuna. Ajalookultuuri ajakiri 2 (2002), 22-43, at 28. 33  Cf. for the diminutive as one-word climax in a new line Iuv. Sat. 10.164b-166a (the poisoned Roman rings sent back to Carthage after Cannae); for παρὰ προσδοκίαν [sic], see Iuv. Sat. 8.158: instead of instaurare Latinas the verse has instaurare popinas; for enjambement, see Iuv. Sat. 6.17-18. 31

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178). Thus, the authorial persona of  Pistorius’s poem expresses the same pessimism as the speaker in Juvenal’s eighth satire.34

Coda: Difficile est satiram non scribere? Unlike Juvenal’s eighth satire Pistorius’s poem does not end with the same kind of  reductio ad absurdum. The imitation of  Juvenal’s ironic statement that all discussions about the true origin of   the Roman nobility are absurd, as all Romans originate from shepherds and criminals (Liv. AUC 1.8, Iuv. Sat. 8.269-275), would have led to severe punishment for giving offence in the particular context of  sixteenth-century Livonia. Instead, Pistorius surprised his readers by means of  a coda containing his poetic program in which he explained his aims (vv. 181-192). In order to convince all learned readers who so far doubted Pistorius’s actual aim of  imitating and emulating Juvenal, the author asserts in v. 191 that he has been motivated to write his poem by indignation, just like Juvenal more than thousand years earlier. Rewording Iuv. Sat. 1.79-80 (“facit indignatio versum  / qualecumque potest, quales ego”), to “Iusta facit versus hos indignatio nostra”, Pistorius places himself  among the satirists, affirming his justified outrage. This verse acts as a confession: the poem Pistorius wrote is neither elegy nor didactic epic, but satire: even though the poem seems to open as an elegy or a didactic epic on the intimate rela­tion­ship between nobility and virtue, only satire can offer a fitting genre because of  the subject. What follows is a summarizing apology reminiscent of   the typical prefaces to satires: unlike Juvenal,35 the Livonian satirist wrote his harsh verses sine ira et malitia, attacking bad manners in general, not specific persons. The aim of  his criticism was not to defame the entire nobility, but to distinguish between the wicked and virtuous, to blame the former and praise the latter. Pistorius, as a moral censor, advises reasonable and curious nobles, but invectively curses the indifferent or incorrigible ones (“If  the insane want to perish, let them perish!”, v. 190). Thus, the coda presents a somewhat more promising vision of  the future than the main part of  the satire. 34  S. Lorenz (ed., tr., annot.), Juvenal, Satiren. Saturae. Lateinisch-Deutsch (Berlin, 2017), 65. 35  E.g., Iuv. Sat. 1.45 “quid referam quanta siccum iecur ardeat ira”.

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Epilogue The Elegia de nobilitatis origine vera by the Livonian poet Rutgerius Pistorius is  written within the classical tradition and is most indebted to the Roman satirist Juvenal. His eighth satire was a  selected compendium of   the points made by Greek and Roman authors and philosophers in previous nobilitas / virtus discourse; his merit lies not so much in the topic, but in the genre he chose.36 The same goes for Pistorius: he chose a  conventional topic to experiment with satire as an unusual genre in the Livonian literature. Despite rather few direct quotes from Juvenal and partially changed exempla, the sub-text is  constantly recognisable on the macro- and microlevel of   the poem: in the main ideas, keywords, structure, the author’s intention to docere and delectare, and stylistic preferences. The satirical element does not leave much room for an elegiac element in the text, which makes it sufficiently clear that the definition of  Elegia in the title refers to the verse form used in the poem. An enrichment on the basis of  contemporary Livonian cir­ cum­stances is  the elevation of   the common people to an explicit addressee, despicable at first, but in the end still intelligent. It seems to reflect the ongoing conflict between Livonian citizens and nobility, in which the nobles used to humiliate ordinary citizens by casting doubt on their mental capability. Was it coincidental that Pistorius wrote his Elegia soon after his patron Padel became burgomaster of  Riga (1547)? And why is the only certain reader of  the poem Tallinn legal counsellor to whom Pistorius sent it? Considering the couplets in Pistorius’s verse epistle to Justus Claudius (1549, as in note 18), he even feared a larger readership: Id tamen obtestor, si vere sim tibi charus, 35 ut soli credas ludicra missa tibi. Nolo meos temere lusus committere vulgo, qui semel est laesus, cautior esse solet. But I implore you, if  I am really dear to you, to consider my poetical experiments to have been sent only to you. I do not want to entrust my playful poetry to the common people – he who has been injured once is usually more cautious. 36  See S.  H. Braund, Beyond Anger: A  Study of  Juvenal’s Third Book of  Satires (Cambridge, 1988), 77-108, 122-129, at 88.

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In retrospect, Pistorius’s poem appears to belong to the same transitional period in mid-sixteenth century Germany as Dedekind –  a  period in which the satirical art of  writing transformed itself  to formal verse-satire. Pistorius no longer used the satirical art of  writing as a general strategy of  literary struggle, but clearly defined himself  as an imitator of  Roman verse satire through his sub-text, Juvenal. It still took another seven years before Thomas Naogeorgus published the first formal Neo-Latin verse satires in Germany (1555).37

Appendix Rutgerus Pistorius Elegia de nobilium origine vera et vitiosis eorundem moribus Q uaestio perfacilis vulgo iactatur ubique, de qua vix sanos fas dubitare puto: quonam sit primus de stemmate nobilis 38 ortus, cum generis nostri sit pater unus Adam nec Deus excipiat 39 personas, una salutis 5 omnibus est apud hunc ingredienda via et sumus in Christi solius nomine iuncti nec cuiquam est alio sanguine parta salus. Non hic magnorum praepollet gloria Regum, divitibus primus non datur esse locus, 10 non valet hic ensis, non vis, non arma potentum et fama et robur nil valet ante Deum. Oenotriis non est quam Graecis gloria maior nec servi dominis inferiora tenent. Denique nulla quidem discrimina sunt apud illum, 15 unum qui ex multis corpus habere cupit. Unde igitur nati sunt nobilitate superbi, quos aurum exornat, purpura multa tegit, aulas qui Regum magno splendore frequentant, ignavo populo qui facienda iubent? 20 Unde haec sit 40 quaerit passim per compita vulgus et se vel summo quaerere iure putat. 37  Cf.  M. Laureys, “Die Kunst der Verunglimpfung in Nikodemus Frischlins Satiren gegen Jakob Rabus”, in M. Laureys, R. Simons (ed.), The Art of  Arguing in the World of  Renaissance Humanism (Leuven, 2013), 187-212, at 194-196. 38  nobilis pro mobilis] Rieckhoff  mutavit 39 excipiat] Pabst: fortasse respiciat? 40  Unde haec sit correxi] Haec unde sit Pistorius : rude sic Pabst et Rieckhoff  mutaverunt

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Nos dubio paucis huic respondere studemus, ut populus falso se dubitare sciat veraque cognoscat quae nobilitatis origo 25 semper in orbe fuit, semper ut esse decet. His quoque conveniet breviter subiungere dictis, nobilibus quae sint efficienda viris. Unus Adam fateor qui 41 nostri est corporis author aequalique beat nos ratione Deus. 30 At genus humanum cum primum crescere coepit, altitonans varios fecerat esse gradus. Namque alios aliis virtutibus ipse colendos reddidit, eximios hinc habet Orbis eos. Inde Duces, magni Reges clarique potentes, 35 quos populo voluit rite praeesse suo. Hisce dedit sceptrum sua Virtus anteferendum, qua constat claros emicuisse viros. Hinc homines inter se distant ordine certo nec sunt hac omnes nobilitate pares, 40 hinc usus varius titulorum et nomina magna, aureus 42 hinc torques Regia colla decet, hinc quoque purpureae magna est discretio vestis, hinc picti clypei, gloria summa ducum. Talia Virtuti tribuuntur praemia clarae, 45 qua victum vulgus succubuisse vides. Sic David vincens Goliad, Sampsonque Philistim – quis neget insignes hosce fuisse viros? Sic facit annales veteres tua gloria plenos, Scipio, nec merita laude carere potes. 50 Spectemus campos, spectemus cultaque rura, nonne placent oculis illa colore suo? Attamen hic aliquos contingit cernere flores, quos lucere putes lumine sydereo, luteus hic color est, illis de sanguine dictus, 55 te tamen hic forsan quam capit ille magis atque unum toti campo praeferre videris florem, qui laudem nobilitatis habet. Q uid referam volucres, quid brutta animalia narrem? Numquid inest Virtus nobiliora parans? 60 Q uis nolit mannis altos praeferre caballos? Q uam vitulos quis non malit habere boves? Cur potius Bubo dira tibi voce placeret, dulcia quae resonet quam Philomela canens? Singula quid referam? Satis est, quod nobiliores 65 Virtus praefulgens reddere sola queat.   qui] quod Pabst et Rieckhoff  mutaverunt  aureus pro aurea] Pabst et Rieckhoff  mutaverunt

41 42

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Haec facit et nostro generi discrimina tanta, imperet hic aliis, serviat ille facit. Nobilibus quondam fuit haec verissima origo, nunc alia causa nobilis ullus erit? 70 Maiorum tamen hos dignos censemus honore, qui per natales nobile nomen habent? Si modo non segnes teneant vestigia patrum, quos notum est dignos laude fuisse data, a quibus antiquae virtutis signa relicta 75 in clypeis licet hos illa referre suis, ut spectent semper maiorum exempla suorum, quae vice pungentis calcaris esse queant. Nolo tamen rapiant alieno parta labore, per quae sic tumeant, ne meliora petant. 80 Maiorum Virtus facienda est amplior illis, aut si non poterit, recte imitanda manet, si cui maiores sint fortes, fortior esto, si iusti fuerint, iustior esse velit. His reliquum vulgus iustum quoque debet honorem, 85 quos patria claros laude vigere decet. Et peccant, illis qui debita ferre recusant quos fatis nasci sic, placuisse vident. His quoque purpureis licitum sit vestibus uti, ut populo distent, qui inferiora tenet. 90 Nec tamen immodicos sumptus concedimus illis, a rebus debet luxus abesse bonis. Nam pater omnipotens, rerum servator et author, victibus 43 voluit semper inesse modum. Ut vicium duces,44 panem potusque salubres 95 abiectos usum non habuisse suum. Sic quoque grande nefas ducemus perdere vestes, quas commendatas utilitate vides. Horrida depellunt a nobis frigora venti, aeris iniustam vim penetrare vetant, 100 urentes aestus arcent de corpore Solis ornatumque solent addere cuique suum. Sed mala mutarunt antiquos tempora mores, nobilibus quondam qui placuere viris. Summa fuit gravitas, mentemque in veste notares, 105 et morum et vitae vestis imago fuit. Non 45 toga civilis collo pendebat ab alto, saepe Chlamys bello commoda, corpus habens.

 victibus Pistorius] Vtilibus Pabst et Rieckhoff  mutaverunt  duces correxi] ducis Pabst et Rieckhoff; cf. “ducemus” v. 97 45  Non […] pendebat correxi] Nunc […] pendebat Pabst et Rieckhoff 43 44

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Tempora sic vestes mutabant, attamen illis nullus erat luxus, nullus abusus erat. 110 At nunc quae furiae dementant nobilitatem, ut vestes scindat dilanietque suas? Tota sit ut splendens, non improbo, serica tota, scindere cur libeat, quid rationis habet? 46 Integra si fuerit, quantumvis trita, maneret 115 utilis, ut pauper nudus haberet eam. Addunt his formas monstrosas et peregrinas, depictas instar multicoloris avis et caput in toto membrorum corpore summum deformant miris dedecorantque modis: 120 ingenii sedem monstroso tegmine velant, scilicet ut doceant, quale sit ingenium. Fortassis rerum successibus ebria turba inguinis 47 et capitis nescit habere decus. Multos sic brevibus tunicis incedere cernas, 125 ut vestis clunes vix tegat ora suae. Sunt alii, multus quis 48 sub coxendice pannus prominet, aut pulici lata fenestra patet, qua digitos fugiat venantis prosiliatque. Nam quo se condat, vix locus esse potest. 130 O quam felices, o terque quaterque beatos vermiculos, quibus est tam bene compta domus! Cornuta pingunt forma ostentantque pudenda, quo fuit in toto turpius orbe nihil. Sic iam posteritas clarorum ignava virorum 135 molliciem gaudet vincere foemineam. Insuper illicitis insumunt ocia pacis lusibus haud dignis nobilitate sua. Corporis atque animi vires extinguere potu quantum contendant,49 quis memorare queat? 140 Arripiunt tremulis minibus Carchesia magna, infundunt ventris vinaque per Barathrum, alter et alterius numerat non segniter haustus naturaeque iubet vim ferat ipse suae. Concitat hic rixas, is iactat nomina partum, 145 hic numerat villas, censet et alter opes, verbaque per plenas tunc efflant maxima buccas atque domus tanta prae gravitate tonat. Hic astant pueri forsan sub fornice nati, lenonum cantus quos resonare iubent. 150  habet Pistorius] habes Pabst et Rieckhoff  mutaverunt  inguinis Pistorius et Rieckhoff] ingenii Pabst 48 quîs i.e. quibus 49 contendant Pabst mutavit] comprendant Pistorius 46 47

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Fit raro aut nunquam virtutis mentio clarae, cuius narratur fabula vana loco. A se commissum non est pudor hic scelus audax prodere, quod laetis plausibus excipiunt.50 Provocat hic alium, de vita dimicat ille, 155 sic credunt enses scilicet esse datos. Mollibus in molli sic Mars est promptus Iaccho, ut clament, pungent diraque verba sonent. Crudelis patriae cum fines irruit hostis, occupat ignavus segnia corda metus. 160 Haud stulte sapiunt, quod non stant ordine primi, milite conducto bella gerenda putant. Hector non fuerat talis nec magnus Achilles, non sic est patribus gloria parta suis. Hostibus hi saevis non tergo, at pectore noti 165 vincere vel vinci nil dubitare solent. Sunt alii, quibus est solum ditescere dulce atque opibus partis addere semper opes. Hi cumulant quocunque modo per fasque nefasque, usuris foedis crescat ut alta domus. 170 Ingenuos aeris quia non decet illa cupido, quid tales, quaeso, nobilitatis habent? At pudet obscaenos Veneris describere lusus, quos impunitos scilicet esse putant. Haeccine digna tibi generosis esse videntur? 175 Nomina qui longae nobilitatis habent? Moribus et vita reliquis excellere debent, sed sunt dedecori patribus atque sibi. Victu, vestitu, luxu corrumpere mores non pudet hos, Virtus rite colenda perit. 180 Iusta facit versus hos indignatio nostra, non ardent odiis pectora nostra malis, nec male vult cuiquam (testem voco, qui regit astra, abdita qui lustrat pectoris alta, Deum) nec moveat quenquam, quod mores in viciosos 185 versibus his duris durius invehimur. Q uae mala sunt taxo, quae sunt contraria laudo, scilicet ut Virtus nomina iusta ferat. Nobilibus sanis satis est nos consuluisse, insani pereant, quando perire volunt. 190 Nobilis ille mihi vero sit dignus honore, quem Virtus poterit nobilitare sua.

 excipiunt Pabst] excipient Rieckhoff

50

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CATULLUS’ PHASELUS ILLE AND JUSTUS LIPSIUS’S DOG MELISSA

In medieval and early modern times cats, black cats in particular, were viewed with suspicion in spite of  the useful services they modestly provided to mankind in exterminating mice, rats, and other vermin. They allegedly brought doom to those who crossed their path, were companions of  witches, even incarnations of  Satan himself, and many of   them were thrown into the fire, when a woman was burned as a witch.1 Hence, it can be no surprise that cats are rarely represented in literature, with the notable exception of  Petrarch (1304-1374), who had his beloved pet mummified and a tomb built for it in Arquà Petrarca, the small village in the Veneto where the poet spent the last years of  his life,2 or Benito Arias Montano (1527-1598), who honoured his feline pet in verse.3 When depicted in the visual arts, they mostly seemed to symbolize envy, falsehood, or aggression. Only from the late seventeenth century on, a more positive approach can be seen.

  Cf. E. Aerts, Zat het snor. Een geschiedenis van kat en mens in de Lage Landen (Gorredijk, 2020). 2  Two centuries later a Latin epigram was added by Antonio Q uerenghi (15461633), a  close friend of  Torquato Tasso. Cf.  U. Motta, “Q uerenghi, Antonio”, in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, vol. 86 (Rome, 2016), 1-3. The inscription reads: “Etruscus gemino vates ardebat amore: / maximus ignis ego; Laura secundus erat. / Q uid rides? Divinae illam si gratia formae, / me dignam eximio fecit amante fides. / Si numeros geniumque sacris dedit illa libellis,  / causa ego ne saevis muribus esca forent. / Arcebam sacro vivens a  limine mures,  / ne domini exitio scripta diserta forent;  / incutio trepidis eadem defuncta pavorem,  / et viget exanimi in corpore prisca fides.” 3  Cf. J. F. Alcina Rovira, “Dos notas sobre Benito Arias Montano (1527-1598)”, Salina: revista de lletres 9 (1995), 37-44. 1

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 101-115 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124051

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Dogs, on the other hand, became increasingly popular either functionally as watchdogs, for pulling carts or assisting hunters, or emotionally as cute lapdogs and companions for noble ladies. They were also very common in art as symbols of  fidelity on the tombs of  noblewomen and often acquired a  prominent place in pictures when members of   the higher social classes had themselves and their family portrayed. Moreover, dogs frequently occurred in literary texts, among them Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472)’s funeral oration on his beloved canine companion, Canis (s.l., 1443).4 They were frequently appreciated and praised in letters or orations as pleasant and faithful companions, and often inspired humanists or their friends to praise or immortalize them in verse after they had died.5 One of   the most famous dog lovers in early modern times was Justus Lipsius (1547-1606), whose friends and students were well aware of  his affection for his canine contubernales.6 This essay will focus on a  poem composed by Lipsius’s friend Victor Giselinus, a  playful but erudite tribute to Lipsius’s much loved dog Melissa that, still young, was killed by a  thief. Yet before embarking on a detailed intertextual analysis of  this poem, fashioned as a parody after Catullus’ popular Phaselus ille (Carm. 4), I have to say a few words about the place of  dogs in Lipsius’s life and situate the poem in the broader context of  the booklet in which it appeared.

Lipsius and his dogs As his reputation grew, Lipsius was increasingly asked by his peers abroad to send them his portrait. In 1585 he had his portrait painted by an anonymous artist. His right hand is  holding a book, his left resting on the head of  a small dog, who is looking 4  Cf.  its modern edition in R.  Cardini (ed.), L.  Battista Alberti, Opere latine (Rome, 2010), 971-986. 5  In Caspar Dornavius, Amphitheatrum sapientiae Socraticae ioco-seriae (Hanau, 1619), an in-folio, eulogies on dogs occupy 506-535, whereas cats must do with only one funeral oration by Guilielmus Canterus (at 535). See also C.  A. Gibson, “In Praise of Dogs. An Encomium Theme from Classical Greece to Renaissance Italy”, in L.  D. Gelfand (ed.), Our Dogs, Our Selves (Maiden – Boston, 2016), 19-41 and A. M. Wilson, An Anthology of  Neo-Latin “Dog” Poems (Cheadle Hulme, 1998). 6   On Lipsius and his dogs, cf. J. Papy, “Justus Lipsius and his Dogs: Humanist Tradition, Iconography and Rubens’s Four Philosophers”, in Journal of   the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 62 (1999), 167-198.

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at the viewer with a  lively, intelligent gaze. It became the source for a whole list of  later representations.7 Two years later, at the age of  forty, Lipsius had a new portrait engraved by Henricus Goltzius (1558-1617), which in turn became very influential for later representations. This time it was the left hand that held the book, while the right was petting the same dog.8 The correspondence indicates that it was sent all over Europe. But dogs also received a  prominent place in his writings: the humanist expressed his love and admiration for the quadrupeds at length in an undated, fictitious essay letter he addressed to his contubernales. Dogs, he pointed out, should not merely be associated with soldiers or hunters; above all, they were also suitable companions for scholars.9 To drive home his point that no other creature stood closer to man, he expounded on four qualities typical of   these quadrupeds – strength, cleverness, vigilance, and fidelity – illustrating each of  these virtues with numerous examples from Antiquity up to his own time. At the end of  his letter he sang the praises of  three dogs which his students had known  – Saphyrus, Mopsulus, and Mopsus. Lipsius even had portraits of  his canine friends made, to which he added a  short description followed by a few distichs.10 Two letters from 1590 which he did not select for 7   The painting was donated by Johannes Woverius, former student of Lipsius and executor of  his will, to Balthasar Moretus in 1620 and is still at the Antwerp Museum Plantin Moretus. 8   Cf. A. M. Berryer, “Essai d’une iconographie de Juste Lipse”, in Annales de la Société archéologique de Bruxelles (1939-1940), 5-71, at 9-10, 17-18. Berryer erroneously identifies the dog as being Saphyrus, since Lipsius only received it in 1590, and it died at the age of  thirteen years old, as we shall see later. 9  Centuria ad Belgas, 1, 44 (Antwerp, J.  Moretus, 1602). See its modern edition ILE 13, [00] 00 00 [ed. J.  Papy (Brussels, 2000)]. It was also incorporated in Dornavius’s Amphitheatrum, 1. 521-532 (as in n.  5). It was translated into French by Antoine Brun as part of  Le choix des Epistres de Lipse (Lyons, B. Ancelin, 1619), 339-382), with several reprints. A German translation, Von wunderbarer Natur und Eygenschafft der Hunde  […], by “Canisius Procyon” appeared separately in 1614 without printer’s address. Recently, a  Dutch translation was published by J.  Papy, Justus Lipsius. Brieven aan studenten (Leuven, 2006), 60-73. The poems are also inserted in Wilson 1998 (as in n. 5), 108-109. 10   Descriptions and epigrams are inserted at the end of  ILE 13 [00] 00 00. They also occur in the biography written by his former student Aubertus Miraeus, Vita Iusti Lipsi sapientiae et litterarum antistitis (Antwerp, J.  Moretus, 1609), 69. Miraeus also adds that Lipsius time and again arrived at his lectures accompanied by one of  his quadrupeds. For further editions, see H.  Nollet, De gedichten van Justus Lipsius, doct. diss., 3  vols (Leuven, 2015), 925, 931, 939 (overlooking Miraeus’s version).

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publication inform us that Saphyrus was a gift from a former law student at Leiden University, Theodorus Leeuwius (1548-1596), who had settled in The Hague. Lipsius eagerly accepted the offer, but begged his friend to keep the young dog until a  trustworthy person could be found to fetch it and bring it to Leiden. Leeuwius was also asked to add a  short note on the animal’s eating and sleeping habits, for he wanted it to be as comfortable as possible.11 Saphyrus remained a  beloved companion until it met an appalling death on 28 August 1601 by jumping into a  cauldron of  boiling water. In a  letter to Philip Rubens (1574-1611) the humanist expressed his grief  at his loss and his anger at the servant who had left the kettle unattended. He also added a poem in hendecasyllables in praise of  Saphyrus together with an epitaph.12 Furthermore, dogs are present in the last treatise Lipsius wrote, Lovanium sive opidi et academiae eius descriptio libri tres (Antwerp, J.  Moretus, 1605). It is  conceived as a  conversation between the humanist and four of  his students, although it turns out to be more of  a  monologue by Lipsius himself, and is  situated during a  walk with two of  Lipsius’s dogs through the hills around Leuven with a view of  the city.13 That the scholar was already fond of  dogs as a  child becomes clear from an anecdote in the aforementioned fictitious essay letter to his students. His father had a hunting dog that followed him everywhere on his heels. One night, wishing to soothe a pub brawl, his father became involved; seeing that its master was threatened, the animal came to his rescue and attacked the fighters with its sharp teeth. However, they repelled the dog with their daggers and seri11  See the modern, annotated edition as ILE 3, 90 03 24 and 90 04 01 [ed. S. Sué, H. Peeters (Brussels, 1987)]. 12  Centuria ad Belgas, 3, 89 (Antwerp, J. Moretus, 1602), published as ILE 14, 01 08 29 R [ed. J. De Landtsheer (Brussels, 2006)]. About the three Saphyrus letters, see Ead., “Iusti Lipsi Epistolica institutio ou l’art d’écrire des lettres”, in L.  Nadjo, E. Gavoille (ed.), Epistulae Antiquae II (Leuven – Paris, 2002), 407-423. For further editions, see Nollet 2005 (as in n. 10), 985. The poem is also inserted in Wilson 1998 (as in n. 5), 110. 13 Cf.  Lipsius, Lovanium, 1.1: “[…] Q uid omitto? Canes meos maiores duos, qui avide sunt assectati aut praecurrerunt, ut fervor et ingenium illorum amat. Mopsulus meus domi servavit, nec ille visus, corpore parvo, aetate grandiuscula, ad longiusculum hoc iter esse.” ([…] Why leave them out? My two largest dogs, who followed us eagerly or ran ahead of  us, as their ardent nature wanted. My dear Mopsulus kept watch at home; small and ageing as it was, it did not seem up to such a rather long walk).

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ously injured it. Lipsius’s father left it for dead in the pub, much to his sadness, but when it regained consciousness, the animal dragged itself  home. A  veterinarian was called and the quadruped was taken good care of. “Shall I tell you about my reaction, still a child then? I visited the healing dog daily, brought it tidbits, stood with it or lay down next to it and – why deny it? – even shed tears, young and sensitive as I was, and feeling already then a wonderful affection for animals of  that kind.” 14 As soon as Lipsius had left Jena and settled in Overijse around New Year 1575, he found himself  a  dog, Melissa: “With regard to sweetness of  character and fidelity, the dogs of  Ulysses,15 Lysimachus,16 or Sabinus 17 are mere trifles.” 18 Unfortunately, he could not enjoy his pet for very long, as it was killed about two years later by thieves, as Lipsius informed Ludovicus Carrio (15471595), and he added: “Please, tell it to Lernutius, tell it to Modius, let them write hendecasyllables. You will laugh and say ‘I had never believed you were a softy.’ Yet I am better than Caelius Cal­ca­gni­ nus who was very fond of  his cat and had his fondness expressed on a  public monument.” 19 Whether the Bruges poet Janus Ler14   ILE 13, [00] 00 00 (as in n. 9), ll. 315-334 (quote ll. 331-334): “De me tunc puero addam? Ego cottidie aegram visere, cibos offerre, adstare vel accumbere et – quid dissimulem? – allacrimare etiam, ut eram aetate atque animo tener et iam tunc (initio dixi) mirifice in hoc genus affectus.” 15   Argus, Ulysses’ old hunting dog, who recognized his master despite his disguise, when he returned to Ithaca twenty years after setting out for Troy. Cf.  Hom.  Od. 17.291-327. 16   Lysimachus (c. 360-281 bc), a Macedonian officer who became king of Thracia in 308  bc. He was killed in the Battle of  Corupedium; his body was found on the battlefield several days later protected against birds of  prey by his dog. Cf.  Plin. M. NH. 8.143, also briefly alluded to in ILE 13, [00] 00 00, l. 241-244 (as in n. 7). 17  A contemporary of  Tiberius who fell into disgrace with the emperor and was led to prison to be executed. His pet dog had followed him and patiently waited outside for his master to reappear. When Sabinus’s body was tossed out, it sat near it and howled miserably. It then accepted some bread from a  passer-by and laid it on his master’s mouth, hoping to revive him. When the body was thrown into the Tiber, the dog jumped after it and tried to keep it from sinking. Cf.  Plin. M. NH. 8.145, also mentioned in ILE 13, [00] 00 00 (as in n. 9), l. 264-270. 18 Cf. Epistolarum quaestionum libri 3.5 (Antwerp, Ch. Plantin, 1577): “Melissa mea, delicium illud caniculae, pessimo furto mihi periit, prae cuius ingenio et fide illius Ulyssi, Lysimacho aut Sabini canis merae nugae.” 19  Cf.  ibid., 3.5: “Amabo te, dic Lernutio, dic Modio, hendecasyllabos parent. Ridebis et ‘numquam te tam Maccum credidi,’ inquies. Sed tamen ego melius quam Caelius ille Calcagninus, cui felles in deliciis fuit. Publicis monumentis testatum reliquit.”

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nutius (1545-1619) or the philologist Franciscus Modius (15461597), two friends of  his student years in Leuven, did, indeed, reach for their quill and write the requested poem is not attested. But another member of   their student group, the philologist and physician Victor Giselinus (1539-1591), paid tribute to Lipsius’s quadruped, whose company he undoubtedly enjoyed when he visited his friend. In its title he explicitly referred to the aforementioned letter to Carrio: In caniculam Iusti Lipsii de qua Epis­ toli­ca­rum quaestionum lib[er] III, epist[ola] V. Lipsius’s request that his friends write some verses fits quite well in with his literary activities in that early stage of  his career. Apart from the strictly philological publications, which Christopher Plantin had printed separately, before collecting them in the Opera omnia quae ad criticam spectant (Leiden, 1585), Lipsius wrote most of  his “spontaneous” and inspired verses 20 in those early days and in the first years of  his stay in Leiden (from the end of  March 1578 on). Apparently, the Leuven friends used to address each other in verses, as can be inferred, e.g., from the poem Lipsius wrote from Vienna to wish Lernutius a  pleasant stay in Rome, but also to warn him against the charm of  Roman young ladies,21 or from book two of  the Antiquae lectiones (Antwerp, Ch. Plantin, 1575), presented as a conversation about diner practices in ancient Rome, held between Lipsius and Carrio in Lipsius’s garden, in which he intertwined prose with verse. And during his first years in Leiden – where he enjoyed occasional visits from Lernutius and Giselinus – Lipsius soon became a  member of  a  “poets’ society”, together with Janus Dousa, city secretary Jan van Hout, and Janus Grotius, the father of  Hugo.22

20   From the mid-eighties on he seldom wrote poetry, and only the obligatory liminary poem to praise a publication from a peer or an epitaph when asked for. Only in the treatises on the Holy Virgin, would he use verse again as a stylistic tool to break the monotony of  the narrations in prose. 21  Cf.  F. Sweertius (ed.), Justus Lipsius, Musae errantes  […] (Antwerp, J.  Keerbergius, 1610), 11-12. See further bibliography, edition, and a  (not always correct) translation and analysis in H. Nollet 2015 (as in n. 10), 182-193. 22  Cf. Janus Grotius’s letter of  farewell when he moved to Delft, in J. De Landtsheer, H.  Nellen, “Leiden Poets’ Society. A  forgotten letter from Janus Grotius (1554-1640) to Justus Lipsius (1547-1606)”, Lias 29 (2002), 157-167. This poetic interaction is also most clear from Janus Dousa’s Elegiarum libri II. Epigrammatum liber cum Iusti Lipsi aliorumque ad eundem carminibus (Leiden, F. Raphelengius, 1586).

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Lipsius may have asked for hendecasyllables or Phalaecean verses since Catullus’ famous poem on the death of  Lesbia’s sparrow (Carm. 3) was written in that meter.23 Giselinus, however, preferred the iambic trimeter in imitation of  Catullus’ Carm. 4. The poem appeared in print in a somewhat curious booklet with on its title page Phaselus Catulli, et ad eam, quotquot exstant, parodiae. Cum annotationibus doctissimorum virorum. Accesserunt alia quaedam eiusdem generis, edita a  Sixto Octaviano (Eboraci, apud Ioannem Marcantium, 1579 [USTC 415622]).24

The Phaselus Catulli […] parodiae The Phaselus Catulli […] parodiae is an extremely rare publication – it probably had only a  small print run – alternating prose and poetry. A  synopsis was given by H.  Van Crombruggen in his Lernutiana.25 The booklet opens with an account of   the views of  Julius Caesar Scaliger (1484-1558) 26 and Henricus Stephanus (1528-1598) 27 on this particular type of poem.28 According to these humanists, a  parody is  an aemulatio rather than a  mere imitatio. Both scholars agree on the formal aspect: the author should fol23   On Catullus’ influence during the early modern times, cf.  J.  Haig Gaisser, Catullus and His Renaissance Readers (Oxford, 1993), in particular the last chapter. For an extensive list, see Ead., “Catullus”, in A. Grafton, G. W. Most, S. Settis (ed.), The Classical Tradition (Cambridge, MA – London, 2010), 180-182, at 182. 24  Henceforth Phas. Cat. Later, it was reprinted together with C. Du Verdier (ed.), De artificio epigrammatis disquisitio, et epigrammata quaedam partim ex Graeco translata (Lyons, T.  Soubron, 1593 [USTC 146346]). Giselinus’s poem is  not included in Dornavius nor in Wilson’s anthology (as in n. 4 and 5, respectively). 25  H. Van Crombruggen, Lernutiana (Brussels, 1959). 26  Poetices libri septem (Lyon, A.  Vincentius, 1561) 1.42; Phaselus Catulli, 3-4. See a recent edition: L. Deitz, G. Vogt-Spira (ed., tr., int., com.), Iuli Caesaris Scaligeris poetices libri septem – Sieben Bücher über die Dichtkunst, 5 vols (Stuttgart, 1994-2003). 27  Homeri et Hesiodi certamen (Geneva, H.  Stephanus, 1573), 71-76 (fragm.); Phaselus Catulli, 5-6. Stephanus expounded on the issue in Parodiae morales (Geneva, H. Stephanus, 1573). 28  For contemporary literature on parody, see, e.g., the section “Biblical and po­eti­ cal paraphrases; Parodiae”, in J. IJsewijn, D. Sacré, Companion to Neo-Latin Studies, vol.  2 (Leuven, 1998), 108-110; T.  Schmitz, “Die Parodie antiker Autoren in der neulateinischen Literatur Frankreichs und der Niederländen (XVI. Jahrhundert)”, Antike und Abendland 39 (1993), 73-88; J.  Robert, “Parodie und parodia in der Poetik der frühen Neuzeit”, in R.  F. Glei, R.  Seidel (ed.); “Parodia” und Parodie. Aspekte intertextuellen Schreibens in der lateinischen Literatur der Frühen Neuzeit (Tübingen, 2006), 47-66; R. Simons, M. Laureys (ed.), Catull und Horaz in parodischem Gewand. Die neulateinische “parodia” – Dichtung des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts (Hildesheim, [2021]) [forthcoming].

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low his chosen model – mostly Catullus and Horace – as closely as possible by using the same number of verses and the same meter, by adopting a  similar grammatical construction, and with regard to vocabulary, by repeating the same words or at least striving for similarity of  sound. However, they disagree on the content. Scaliger opts for an exclusively satirical approach: the new subject is to be ridiculed and morally criticized. As possible subjects he suggests fools, drunks, charlatans, bossy or passionately enamoured women, rhymesters, etc. In Stephanus’s opinion, by contrast, the new author should not limit himself to ridiculous or scabby characters; it suffices to change the model’s subject and adapt the whole poem accordingly. The literary theory is  followed by the Catullan source poem itself  and the annotations added to its edition by Marcus Antonius Muretus (1526-1585), Achilles Statius (1524-1581), and Scaliger’s son Josephus Justus (1540-1609).29 Next comes a  first series of  eleven parodies, all based on Phaselus ille, numbered “I.” to “XI.”, the first being the pseudo-Vergilian Sabinus ille (Catalepton 10) about a  mulio, a  mule-skinner quitting his profession to become a magistrate. The last three of  them were composed by the mysterious editor, Sixtus Octavianus, to whom I shall return (Phas. Cat., 15-34). After annotations by earlier humanists to some of   the poems, an Ad lectorem (p. 40) announces a second series of  eleven parodies fashioned after other poems by Catullus (Carm. 54 [twice]; Carm. 3 [five times]), or by Horace (Carm. 3.9 and 1.35) and Proper­tius (Carm. 1.20 [twice]), preceded each time by the original poem and in some cases followed by some comments.30 Van Crombruggen also observed that the name of   the printer and his address, York, were fictitious and that the compilation was probably sent to the press in Antwerp or in Lernutius’s hometown Bruges.31 Lernutius had published a first collection of  poems, Carmina, with Plantin in Antwerp in the first months of  1579; two of  these poems also appeared in Phaselus Catulli.32 About the same  See Phaselus Catulli, 7-8 (poem); 8-15 (commentaries).   Cf. Van Crombruggen 1959 (as in n. 25), 5-8. Since the second series is unnumbered in Phas. Cat., he indicates them by a. unto k. 31  Van Crombruggen, Lernutiana, 9. USTC 415622 gives [Antwerp] without further arguments. 32  Phas. Cat., 27-28, Carm. 6 (= Lern. Carm., 20-21) and Phas. Cat., 50-52, Carm. 1 (= Lern. Carm., 55-56), the latter after Hor. Carm. 1.35. 29 30

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time Lernutius was also cooperating with Victor Giselinus on parodies, as he informed Janus Dousa (1545-1604) in the covering letter of  his Poemata.33 The Phaselus Catulli inserts one parody of  Giselinus, Flete litterulae meae,34 after Catullus’ Carm. 3 (“Lugete, o Veneres Cupidinesque”). The poem is a complaint against Ludovicus Carrio, who had stolen a  box of  letters (thesaurus epistolaris) from Giselinus. Van Crombruggen opened his Lernutiana by claiming Lernutius as editor of  Phaselus Catulli – as biographer of  Lernutius he may have been somewhat biased – but had nevertheless to acknowledge that researchers from the British Library had pointed out that Giselinus was also the author of  Carm. 9 to 11 (Phas. Cat., 30-34). These three poems were published under the name of  Sixtus Octavianus, but had reappeared a few decades later under Giselinus’s own name in Delitiae C. poetarum Bel­ gicorum huius superiorisque aevi illustrium collectore Ranutio Ghero, 4  vol. (Frankfurt, N.  Hoffmann, 1614).35 Hence the mysterious editor of  Phaselus Catulli should rather be identified as Giselinus.36 Whoever the editor was, the booklet definitely was the result of  a close cooperation between Lernutius and Giselinus.

Catullus as a model for Giselinus Let us now examine how Giselinus turned Catullus’ praise of  a sailboat – be it sincere or ironical – into a eulogy on Melissa, the beloved pet of  his friend Lipsius, and to what extent he observed the laws of  the genre,37 besides the obvious fact that he kept himself  to Catullus’ twenty-seven iambic trimeters. In vv.  1-2 both poems introduce their subject (phaselus and Melissa, as opening word) and leave it to them to present their most important quality (the repetition of  ait fuisse, and the superlatives celerrimus versus the couple maxima, optima, albeit with a variation in gender and case). Catullus adds a  specification, navis; a  corresponding canis is omitted by Giselinus, but it can easily be deduced   Letter dated 29 March 1579, edited by Van Crombruggen 1959, 16.   Phas. Cat., p. 34, Carm. e. 35   Ranutius Gherus is an anagram for the Dutch philologist, poet, and librarian of  the Bibliotheca Palatina Janus Gruterus (1560-1627). 36  Van Crombruggen 1959, 9. 37  The analysis is  followed by the text of  both poems; literally repeated words are put in bold; echoing sounds are underlined. 33 34

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from the title. Instead, the humanist chooses the asyndetic oxymoron mel merum dolor. Mel is not only a reference to the sweet character of   the animal, but also a  learned pun on its name, for the Greek μελίσσα means honeybee. In the following three verses of  both Catullus’ and Giselinus’s poem the superlatives are specified with the repetition of  the litotes construction neque ullius […] nequisse praeterire: the ship is fastest in transporting its freight, the dog in following its master. The rival sailboat of   the metonymy natantis trabis has become a docile protégé clientis asseclae, the alternative way of  motion either with oar or with sail, separated by sive […] sive, is turned into an alternative location with the chiastic domi manere and sequi foris, separated by the variant sive (same place) […] seu. In vv. 6-9 Catullus men­ tions six geographical names, seas or regions visited by the pinnace, from the nearby Adriatic Sea to the furthest point, the Black Sea and the region of  Pontus. Giselinus cleverly adapts his predecessor’s Alexandrian erudition by referring to the same number of  (fictitious) dogs. Their names all occur among the companions of   the mythological hunter Actaeon in the third book of  Ovid’s Metamorphoses, a work Giselinus had published when he was still working as a  corrector at Plantin’s.38 The humanist also follows the lively way in which Ovid described the animals, adding references to their origins or to their nature, as we shall see. Apart from the grammatical frame with its polyptoton and strong litotes (et hoc negat […] negare, on the same place in the verse), no literal repetitions of  Catullus’ Phaselus return, but there are numerous other similarities. In both cases the first element continues in the next verse and still sounds familiar: the Adriatic Sea and the Cyclades in Catullus and Giselinus’s remark that the first dog apparently is  an English breed while the next is  Irish, but with the enumeration of  sonorous exotic names in the next verses, corresponding to Catullus’ reminiscences of  somewhat mysterious regions around the Black Sea, the learned character, perfectly in line with the humanist ideal of   the poeta doctus, becomes prominent. Vv. 8-9 both consist of  a pair of  names; v. 8 is chiastic with sounds strongly echoing those of  Catullus. In v.  9 the first name

38  Victor Giselinus (ed.), Publii Ovidii Nasonis Metamorphoseon libri XV (Antwerp, Ch. Plantin, 1578). The dog’s names are also mentioned in Hyginus, Fab. 181.3, but he merely enumerates them.

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has a  Greek accusative ending in both poems, while the second name forms a transition to the next section of  the poem. With vv. 10-15a both poets focus on the origins of  the pinnace/ the dog; both versions are very similar: the gender of iste is adapted to Melissa, both subjects are repeated, and in antea fuit the components have changed places, with fuit moving to the next verse; both predicates consist of  two elements that also have changed position. Catullus uses ubi in a locative sense, since he places the origins of   the ship in a forest on mount Cytorus (northern coast of  Asia Minor), whereas Giselinus opts for a temporal meaning and associates the animal with the so-called Dog Star (Sirius or Canicula), the brightest star in the night sky and part of   the constellation Canis maior. It is called salubre because its appearance may bring some relief  from the summer heat of   the Dog days (dies caniculares), the hottest and driest period of  the year when the sun is situated in the middle of   the constellation Leo (22 July – 22 August). In vv. 13-15a the sailboat/dog is addressing a pair of  geographical elements from their neighbourhood; Catullus prefers a  parallel construction in his reference to a city and a mountain in the region of  Pontus, while Giselinus uses a  chiasm to evoke Overijse, the village where Lipsius had settled for a while after his return from Jena, and another place.39 The verses 14 are identical. The corresponding repetition of  ex principe (v. 15b) introduces a  survey of   the activities of   the phaselus and Melissa throughout their lives with an accumulation of  three subordinated past infinitives (vv. 15b-19a), asserting that they have always done their best to serve their master as well as possible (vv. 19b-24). Both poems begin with a  polyptoton of  tuus in vv.  16-17 and the identical et inde tot per; in v. 16 virgo is used in the meaning of  “young woman” and refers to Lipsius’s wife, Anna van den Calstere, who probably was as fond of   the dog as her husband; vates in v.  17 is used in its figurative sense of  “an expert in some art”. Erum ends the antithesis laeva – dextera in Catullus, which corresponds to herilia and the asyndetic and antithetic pair aequa iniqua. In vv. 19-20 Giselinus repeats sive on the same place as his model, while each time also using an alternative, voce – numine, resumed in 39  Lipsius was very fond of   the village and would have liked to live quietly in that rural setting (cf. ILE 1, 75 09 30 [ed. A. Gerlo, M. A. Nauwelaerts, H. D. L. Vervliet (Brussels, 1978)]), but he was forced to move to the well protected city of Leuven when groups of  mutinous soldiers of   the Spanish army made the area increasingly unsafe.

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utroque, and the antithetic iocosa – seria. Although catam (v.  20) or catta usually means “cat”, it can also refer to a young dog, as is the case here.40 With vv. 22-24 the poets focus on the final moments of   their subject. Interestingly enough, neither the ship nor the dog say a prayer for themselves – not to the gods of   the shore (in the case of   the ship), nor to the gods in the stars (in the case of   the dog). The similarity of  v. 22 with as only exception the first part of   the adjectives litoralibus – sideralibus is  continued in v.  23a, while veniret is echoed in rediret. Sibi as the first word of  v. 23 probably underlines the former claim of both the sailboat and the dog, which have always dutifully served their masters without self-concern. In v. 24 the reader learns more about the fate of   the dog: it met its premature death by the hand of  a thief. The repetition of  ad usque leads to the final destination of  ship and dog, in both cases indi­ cated by the last word of   the verse: a  calm, clear lake (with the alliterative limpidum lacum), in casu Lake Garda, for the pinnace and the firmament from which it originated (with the alliterative patrium polum) for the animal. In the concluding verses, too, Giselinus follows his model closely, appropriating Sed haec prius fuere: nunc to switch from past life to present occupation, the latter in both cases pithily expressed in five syllables. This is followed once more by a repetition of Catullus: seque dedicat tibi. The objects of  this devotion, to which they entrust themselves in the final verse, are aptly chosen: the vessel devotes itself to the constellation Gemini, Castor and the unnamed Pollux as patrons of  the sailors to whom they appeared as what was called St  Elmo’s fire 41 in later times. Melissa, on the other hand, vows itself  to Orion, the mythological hunter and companion of  Artemis, who after having inadvertently killed him, was allowed by Zeus to transform him into a  constellation and place him in the sky. His favourite hunting dog, Sirius, was placed besides its master as the constellation Canis maior. Apart from the conjunction et 40  Attested in Verg. Gramm. Epist. 1, 110, 15 H (cf.  Thesaurus linguae latinae, vol. 3, 621, s.v. “catta”). 41  A blueish white light manifesting itself  at the peaks of   the masts in a strong electric field in the atmosphere, usually the harbinger of  a thunderstorm. In Antiquity sailors interpreted it as a sign that the twins were with them to protect them. In Christian times it became St Elmo’s fire, after Elmo (Erasmo) of  Formia, a martyr who died c. 303 and became the patron of  the sailors.

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no words are repeated, but nevertheless the identical binary structure catches the eye with the repetition of, in Catullus’ poem, the adjective gemelle and the name of  the hero, first in the vocative and then in the genitive, and, in Giselinus’s verse, of  a similar couple, now with the adjective proxime and Orion’s name, Orion’s companion being his second dog, who became Canis minor.

Conclusion Giselinus’s poem was an answer to Lipsius’s “call for poems on my dog”, albeit not in the requested hendecasyllables. Instead, he composed a  playful but also skillful and learned parody in 27 iambic trimeters in imitation of  Catullus’ Phaselus ille. Although its subject may suggest a  satire or ridicule, this was certainly not the case, for with his tribute to Melissa, Giselinus also expressed his affection for its master. Notwithstanding the totally different subject matter, the humanist poet appropriated Catullus’ line of  thought in his own poem, while at the same time adapting the practical implementation to his own needs. Where Catullus evoked his sailboat’s destinations in a  string of  foreign names in accordance with the ideals of  Alexandrian poetry, Giselinus emulated his example by an even more exotic sounding list of  dogs’ names associated with the mythological hunter Actaeon, which he had learned from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. In doing so he prepared the path for connecting Melissa with the constellation Canis maior with bright Sirius and another mythological hunter Orion. Whereas the pinnace would end its days in solitude, moored at the shore of  Lake Garda since its serving days on sea were over, the dog would return to its celestial origins, shining brightly for its former owners and hunting forever at the side of  Orion. Giselinus also closely followed the grammatical structure and tropes of  his model, often repeating the same words, at the beginning of  a verse in particular, as becomes clear from the edited version underneath. The poem must be seen in the context of  a group of  still young humanists, who became acquainted in their student days or at the beginning of   their careers and shared a love for poetry. Moreover, by opting for a parody, Giselinus earned himself a place in a literary tradition that had become quite popular among transalpine humanists. Lipsius will surely have appreciated such a tribute to Melissa, 113

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for a few years later, he would compose a similar parody, successfully combining Catullus’ Carm. 2 and 3 when the tame hedgehog of his friend Janus Dousa had died.42 Cat. Carm. 4: De phaselo 43 Phaselus ille, quem videtis, hospites, ait fuisse navium celerrimus, neque ullius natantis impetum trabis nequisse praeterire, sive palmulis opus foret volare sive linteo. 5 Et hoc negat minacis Hadriatici negare litus insulasve Cycladas Rhodumque nobilem horridamque Thraciam Propontida trucemve Ponticum sinum, ubi iste post phaselus antea fuit 10 comata silva; nam Cytorio in iugo loquente saepe sibilum edidit coma. Amastri Pontica et Cytore buxifer tibi haec fuisse et esse cognitissima, ait phaselus, ultima ex origine 15 tuo stetisse dicit in cacumine, tuo imbuisse palmulas in aequore, et inde tot per impotentia freta erum tulisse, laeva sive dextera vocaret aura, sive utrumque Iuppiter 20 simul secundus incidisset in pedem, neque ulla vota litoralibus deis sibi esse facta, cum veniret a mari novissimo hunc ad usque limpidum lacum. Sed haec prius fuere: nunc recondita 25 senet quiete seque dedicat tibi, gemelle Castor et gemelle Castoris.

Parodia XI eiusdem In caniculam Iusti Lipsii de qua ipse epist[olarum] quaest[ionum] lib[ro] III, epist[ola] V.

42  See J. De Landtsheer, “Justus Lipsius aan zijn vriend Janus Dousa: een parodie op Catullus, Carmen 3”, in D. Sacré, T. Van Houdt (ed.), “Nec scire nefas.” Nieuwe bijdragen over Neolatijn voor het onderwijs (Amersfoort, 2013), 215-233. See also Nollet 2015 (as in n. 10), 614. 43  Text copied from Phaselus Catulli, 7-8 corresponding to the most common editions.

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Phaselus Catulli, 33-34; Delitiae poetarum Belgicorum, 2, 470-471. Melissa, Lipsii illa mel merum et dolor, ait fuisse maxima optima indole neque ullius clientis asseclae fidem nequisse praeterire, sive herum domi opus foret manere, seu sequi foris. 5 Et hoc negat Britanna ab insula advenam negare Lachnam 44 Hyberniumque Laelapa,45 Thoumque 46 mobilem hispidumque Poemenin,47 Melampoda 48 gregisque Grudii 49 Asbolon,50 ubi ista, post Melissa, sidus antea 10 fuit salubre: nam Leonis asperi flagella saepe mitigavit ignea. Perennis Isca, tuque Mera pervigil, tibi haec fuisse et esse cognitissima ait Melissa: principe ex origine 15 tuae inquit emicasse virginis sinu, tuique vatis excubasse in hortulis: et inde tot per aequa iniqua herilia obisse iussa, voce sive numine catam monere, sive utroque ad omnia 20 iocosa, seria incitare coeperat, neque ulla vota sideralibus deis sibi esse facta cum rediret impio abacta furi ad usque patrium polum. Sed haec prius fuere: nunc heri et suae 25 micatque luce, seque dedicat tibi, propinque Orion et propinque Orionis.

44  All the names occur in the catalogue of  Actaeon’s dogs made by Ovid’s friend Hyginus (Fab. 181.3). As to Lachna, cf. Ov. Met. 3.222 (using the Greek form Lachne). 45 Cf. Ov. Met. 3.211. Laelaps – here used with a Greek accusative ending – was named after a mythological dog which never failed to catch what it was hunting. After his death Zeus placed it among the constellations as Canis maior. There it was pursuing Lepus (the Hare) or helping Orion to fight Taurus (the Bull). See Apollod. Bibliotheca 3.192; J. H. Rogers, “Origins of   the Ancient Constellations. II. The Mediterranean Traditions”, Journal of  the British Astronomical Association 108.2 (1998), 79-89. 46 Cf. Ov. Met. 3.220. 47  Greek accusative ending; Poemenis is mentioned in Ov. Met. 3.215. 48  “Blackfeet”. According to Ov. Met. 3.206 he was the first dog to smell his master after Artemis had turned him into a stag. Two verses later the Roman poet adds the detail that he was of  Spartan origin. 49  Grudii is  the name Caesar used to indicate the Gallic tribe that was living in present-day Leuven and the region around it, including Isca, i.e. Overijse, where Lipsius was born and where he had inherited a house from his parents. 50  Cf. Ov. Met. 3.218.

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ARAT ODER CICERO? DIE ERGÄNZUNGEN ZU CICEROS ÜBERSETZUNG IM SYNTAGMA ARATEORUM DES HUGO GROTIUS (1600) *

Im Alter von 17 Jahren veröffentlichte Hugo Grotius (1583-1645) 1 als philologisches Début eine Ausgabe von Arats Lehrgedicht und seinen lateinischen Bearbeitungen. Diese Syntagma Arateorum betitelte Sammlung 2 ist nach Ausweis des Inhaltsverzeichnisses folgendermaßen aufgebaut: Auf  den griechischen Text der arateischen Phainomena (inklusive der Diosemeia) folgt zunächst die (bekanntlich nur fragmentarisch erhaltene) lateinische Version von Cicero mit Grotius’ eigenen Ergänzungen, danach der Text des Germanicus, der mit zahlreichen Kupferstichen von Jacob de Gheyn bebildert ist; 3 anschließend finden sich Anmerkungen von Grotius zu Arat, zu Germanicus, zu den Sternkarten sowie zu Cicero. Am Schluss steht die Version des Avienus mit knappen Randbemerkungen.4 Wir können uns hier nur mit der von Grotius so genannten ‘Übersetzung’ Ciceros befassen,5 die er im Inhaltsverzeichnis (f. *1v) als *  Für Korrekturen und wichtige Hinweise danke ich Niklas Gutt (Bochum). 1   Zu seiner Biographie vgl. J. C. Grayson (tr.), H. Nellen, Hugo Grotius. A Lifelong Struggle for Peace in Church and State, 1583-1645 (Leiden, 2015). Niederländisches Original 2007. 2  Hug. Grotii Batavi Syntagma Arateorum. Opus poeticae et astronomiae studiosis utilissimum. […] (Lugduni Batavorum, ex officina Plantiniana, 1600). 3  Es handelt sich um Jacob de Gheyn II. (ca. 1565-1629), der v.a. als Maler und Kupferstecher bekannt war. 4  Danach folgt noch ein Fragmentum Prognosticorum Germanici Caesaris, obwohl es im Inhaltsverzeichnis nicht aufgeführt ist. 5   Cicero übersetzte bekanntlich “non ut interpres, sed ut orator”, wie Hieronymus (Ep. 57.5) referiert: vgl. dazu u.a. R. F. Glei, B. Reis, “Grammatisches vs. rhetorisches Übersetzen: Zum nicht erhaltenen Original eines Ciceroverses (FPL 55)”, Philologus 157 (2013), 183-193. Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 117-132 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124052

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“Ciceronis interpretatio H. Grotii versibus interpolata” bezeichnet. Diese Formulierung legt nahe, dass Grotius seine Ergänzungen als ‘Interpolationen’, d.h. eigentlich ‘Fälschungen’ der Verse Ciceros verstanden wissen wollte, die der unbefangene Leser für authentisch halten würde, wären sie nicht typographisch unterscheidbar gemacht worden (Ciceros Verse sind recte, Grotius’ Ergänzungen kursiv gedruckt). Damit würde Grotius’ Vervollständigung die klassische Supplement-Definition P.  G. Schmidts erfüllen, wonach das Supplement a)  einen tatsächlichen Verlust ersetzt, b) in Stil und Aufbau das vorliegende Werk nachahmt und c) die Lücke wirklich mit dem füllt, was mutmaßlich verloren gegangen ist, so dass d)  Werk und Supplement eine Einheit bilden, wobei aber e)  im Gegensatz zur Fälschung das Supplement als solches kenntlich gemacht wird.6 Eine ähnliche Formulierung wie im Inhaltsverzeichnis verwendet Grotius in seiner (überaus panegyrisch gehaltenen) Widmung an die Holländischen Stände; 7 bei der dortigen Paraphrase des Buchinhalts heißt es: “De Ciceronianae Metaphraseos […] reliquiis, meis versibus interpolatis, nihil etiam dico” (f. **1r). Im Unterschied zum Inhaltsverzeichnis ist aber hier nicht von Ciceros Übersetzung als ganzer, sondern von ‘Resten’, d.h. Fragmenten der Übersetzung die Rede; mithin wird Grotius’ Ergänzung jetzt ein größeres Gewicht eingeräumt. In der Überschrift des Werkes selbst schließlich ist eine komplette Umwertung vollzogen: “Arati Solensis Phaenomena ex Metaphrasi Hug. Grotii intertextis Ciceronis reliquiis” (f. A1r). Nunmehr soll es sich also nicht um Ciceros Übersetzung mit Grotius’ interpolierten Versen, sondern um Grotius’ Übersetzung mit eingefügten Cicero-Fragmenten handeln; folglich wäre es auch kein Supplement zu Cicero im engeren Sinne, sondern ein weitgehend von Cicero unabhängiges Werk.8 Welche Charakterisierung die zutreffendere ist, werden wir im Folgenden untersuchen; dabei wird sich zeigen, dass in

6  Vgl. P. G. Schmidt, Supplemente lateinischer Prosa in der Neuzeit. Rekonstruktionen zu lateinischen Autoren von der Renaissance bis zur Aufklärung (Göttingen, 1964), 48ff. 7  Die Panegyrik zahlte sich aus: Grotius erhielt eine Zuwendung von 300 Gulden; vgl. Grayson, Nellen 2015 (wie Anm. 1), 57. 8   Im Sinne einer modernen, offeneren Bestimmung des Supplementbegriffs wäre Grotius’ Werk dann zumindest ein “supplementartiger Text”: vgl. M. Korenjak, S. Zue­ nelli (ed.), Supplemente antiker Literatur (Freiburg i.Br., 2016), 11 (Vorwort).

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gewisser Weise beides zutrifft, je nachdem, welche Passagen man in den Blick nimmt. Wie schon erwähnt, ist am Druckbild erkennbar, welche Verse von Cicero und welche von Grotius stammen. Beim Durchgang durch den Text kann man daher auf  den ersten Blick drei Fälle unterscheiden: erstens Passagen, die komplett von Grotius stammen, z.B.  Proömium und Schluss, zweitens Passagen, die aus Ciceros Fragmenten und Grotius’ Ergänzungen zusammengefügt sind, und schließlich drittens Passagen, die komplett von Cicero stammen, nämlich die handschriftlich primär überlieferten Teile; 9 letztere sind für uns hier weniger relevant.10 Wollen wir signifikante Beispiele für die ersten beiden Fälle betrachten, bieten sich einerseits das Proömium, andererseits die unmittelbar folgende Passage über die Bärinnen an. Ab Iove Musarum primordia: semper in ore plurimus ille hominum est, qui compita numine magno conciliumque virum complet pelagusque profundum et pelagi portus. Fruimur Iove et utimur omnes. Nos genus illius, nobis ille omine laeto 5 dextera praesignat populumque laboribus urget, consulat ut vitae: quando sit terra ligoni aptior aut bubus, monet, et quo tempore par sit, aut serere aut saeptas lymphis adspergere plantas. Ipse etiam in magno defixit sidera mundo 10 ordine quaeque suo, atque in totum providus annum astra dedit, quae nos moneant, qua quaelibet hora apta geri, certa nascantur ut omnia lege.

9  Zur handschriftlichen Überlieferung, durch die insgesamt 480 Verse [= Arat 229ff] auf  uns gekommen sind, vgl. A. Traglia (ed.), M. Tulli Ciceronis poetica fragmenta (Mailand, 1971 [erste Auflage 1963]), 11ff; J.  Soubiran (ed.), Cicéron, Aratea. Fragments poétiques. Texte établi et traduit (Paris, 1972), 106ff. Dagegen gehen D.  Pellacani (ed.), Cicerone, Aratea. Parte  I. Proemio e  catalogo delle costellazioni. Intro­duzione, testo e  commento (Bologna, 2015), und N.  Ciano (ed.), Gli Aratea di Cicerone. Saggio di commento ai frammenti di tradizione indiretta con approfondimenti a luoghi scelti (frr. 13 e 18) (Bari, 2019), nicht näher auf die direkte Überlieferung ein. Im Übrigen wird auch an dieser längeren Passage deutlich, dass Cicero Arat relativ frei bearbeitet und manches weggelassen, anderes ausführlicher wiedergegeben hat: 480 Versen Ciceros entsprechen 473 bei Arat. 10  Es gibt eine größere Überlieferungslücke (in der Übersetzung der Passage Arat 634ff), die bereits Dionysius Lambinus (in seiner Ausgabe von 1565, siehe unten Anm. 32) durch vier Verse (670b-674a) aufgefüllt hat, welche von Grotius aber wohl aus Versehen für ciceronisch gehalten und deshalb nicht kursiv gekennzeichnet wurden. Darüber hinaus hat Grotius einige weitere kleinere Ergänzungen angebracht; ein Beispiel ist unten (Anm. 41) genannt.

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Idem ergo primus placatur et ultimus idem. Magne pater, magnum mortalibus incrementum, 15 progenies prior et dulces ante omnia Musae, cuncti una salvete mihi, et dum sidera canto, si ius fasque sinunt, longum deducite carmen.11 Von Jupiter soll das Gedicht seine Anfänge nehmen: Immer ist er der häufigste im Munde der Menschen – er, der die Wege mit seinem göttlichen Walten erfüllt und die Versammlungen der Menschen, das tiefe Meer und die Häfen des Meeres. Wir alle profitieren von Jupiter. Wir sind (ja) sein Geschlecht, er weist uns im Voraus durch günstige Zeichen das Richtige und drängt das Volk zur Arbeit, damit es für den Lebensunterhalt sorgt: Wann die Erde für die Hacke oder das Pflügen mit Ochsen besser geeignet ist, daran erinnert er, und zu welcher Zeit es passend ist, zu säen oder die eingehegten Pflanzungen zu bewässern. Er selbst hat am großen Himmelszelt die Sterne fest angebracht, alle in ihrer Ordnung, und vorausschauend für das ganze Jahr Sternbilder bestimmt, die uns mahnen sollen, was immer zu welcher Stunde passend zu tun ist, damit alles nach festem Gesetz gedeiht. Also wird er zugleich als Erster und als Letzter um Gnade angerufen. Großer Vater, großer Zuwachs für die Menschheit, du früher erzeugtes Geschlecht und ihr über alles süßen Musen, seid mir allesamt gegrüßt, und führt, während ich die Sterne besinge, sofern es erlaubt ist, das Gedicht über die lange Strecke zum Ende.

Die lateinische Übersetzung des Arat-Proömiums stammt, bis auf  den berühmten ersten Halbvers “A(b) Iove Musarum primordia”,12 komplett von Grotius; daher kann man hieran dessen Übersetzungstechnik sehr gut studieren. Wie leicht ersichtlich ist, bemüht sich Grotius um eine möglichst textnahe Wiedergabe des Arat, die auch den Umfang und die Abteilung einzelner Kola soweit wie möglich berücksichtigt – insgesamt eine beeindruckende Leistung, für die Grotius keine direkten Vorbilder zur Verfügung standen: Ciceros Übersetzung ist ja nicht erhalten, und Germanicus hatte seiner Bearbeitung ein gänzlich anderes Proömium vorangestellt, in dem er vor allem dem Kaiser (Augustus oder Tiberius) huldigte.13 Grotius orientierte sich bei seiner Übersetzung sprachlich jedoch 11  Syntagma (wie Anm. 2), 1 (Beginn einer neuen Paginierung). Orthographie und Interpunktion wurden normalisiert. Alle Übersetzungen stammen von mir. 12  Cicero selbst zitiert den Halbvers in Leg. 2.7 als Anfang der Aratea, nachdem er in Rep. 1.56 bereits auf  den Beginn des Gedichts mit Jupiter angespielt hatte. 13   Germanicus verweist explizit auf Arat, schlägt dann aber einen anderen Weg ein: “Ab Iove principium magno deduxit Aratus / carminis, at nobis genitor tu maximus auctor” (V. 1-2). Auch Avienus weicht von den früheren Arat-Bearbeitungen bewusst ab, um seine Vorgänger zu übertreffen.

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nicht an Cicero, dessen Vorbild ja vor allem Ennius war, sondern an klassischen Dichtern. Zwar könnte zu Beginn mit der Wendung “semper in ore […] hominum est” (V. 1f) eine Anspielung auf  das berühmte ennianische per ora virum vorliegen,14 im Folgenden jedoch greift Grotius stets auf  den Sprachgebrauch der Augusteer zurück. Insbesondere Vergils Georgica-Proömium hat für große Passagen (v.a. V. 7-9 und V. 11-13) Pate gestanden, auch wenn die Anklänge eher inhaltlicher als wörtlicher Natur sind.15 Darüber hinaus sind Begriffe wie compita oder ligo aus den Klassikern übernommen,16 auch Manilius hat fast einen ganzen Vers beigesteuert.17 Gegen Ende des Proömiums verstärken sich die intertextuellen Signale: V. 14 erinnert deutlich an Verg. Aen. 10.112 “rex Iuppiter omnibus idem”, und besonders die Jupiter-Epiklese in V. 15 ist vergilisch (Aen. 9.495 “magne pater”; Buc. 4.49 “magnum Iovis incrementum”); auch die Musen stammen aus Vergil (Georg. 2.475 “dulces ante omnia Musae”). Schließlich ruft der letzte Vers Ovids Metamorphosen-Proömium auf  (Met. 1.4 “perpetuum deducite […] carmen”). Dies alles könnte man bereits als anachronistisch bezeichnen, doch muss man bedenken, dass Grotius kaum genügend Versmaterial (etwa aus Ennius) zur Verfügung stand, um ‘ciceronisch’ zu dichten; allenfalls hätte er sich intensiver beim archaistischen Lukrez bedienen können, dessen Lehrgedicht zwar nach Ciceros Aratea entstanden ist, aber doch einen sehr ähnlichen Stil aufwies und diese sogar nachgeahmt hat.18 Tatsächlich anachronistisch und auf  geniale Weise insinuiert ist jedoch der christliche Unterton der Verse 15-17a, denn hier wird kryptisch und zugleich evident die Trinität angerufen: Neben dem Vater (“magne pater”) steht der Sohn, der durch die Übernahme aus der 4. Ekloge als “magnum (Iovis) incrementum” eindeutig als ‘Hypostase’ identifizierbar ist,19 sowie der Heilige Geist, der hier   FPL Ennius fr. 46 (nach Cic. Tusc. 1.34). Eine ähnliche Wendung z.B. auch bei Ov. Trist. 4.1.68. 15   Georg. 1.1-6: “Q uid faciat laetas segetes, quo sidere terram / vertere […] / […], quae cura boum, qui cultus habendo / sit pecori […] / […] Vos, o clarissima mundi / lumina, labentem caelo quae ducitis annum.” 16 Belegstellen: compita z.B. bei Verg. Georg. 2.382; Ov. Fast. 1.142 u.ö.; Prop. Eleg. 2.20.22 u.ö.; ligo häufig bei Ovid, z.B. Met. 11.36 u.ö. 17  Zu V. 13 vgl. Manil. 4.14: “certa stant omnia lege”. 18  Ein Beispiel ist unten (Anm. 38) erwähnt. 19  Auch der Begriff  progenies prior kann auf  den Sohn bezogen werden, der vor aller Zeit vom Vater gezeugt wurde; progenies im Übrigen auch in der 4. Ekloge (Buc. 4.7). 14

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wie so oft in christlicher Dichtung mit den Musen als Inspirationsquelle gleichgesetzt wird. Zur Bekräftigung dieser Deutung heißt es im Anschluss “cuncti una salvete mihi”, was auf  die theologische Bestimmung der Trinität als Einheit in der Dreiheit hinweist. Auf  diese Weise kann Grotius die stoische Theologie Arats ins Christliche wenden,20 ohne explizit zu werden, und der von den Zeitumständen geforderten Pietas 21 Genüge tun. Halten wir zunächst fest, dass Grotius offenbar nicht vorhatte, Ciceros Proömium oder auch nur Ciceros Stil authentisch zu rekonstruieren. Dazu passt, dass er ein Fragment der ciceronischen Aratea, das vermutlich zum Proömium gehört, nicht berücksichtigt hat, nämlich fr. 2 in der üblichen Zählung: 22 “quem neque tempestas perimet neque longa vetustas / interimet stinguens praeclara insignia caeli” (den weder die Zeit vernichten noch das hohe Alter zunichte machen wird, löschend die strahlenden Zeichen des Himmels). Es wird von Priscian (Inst. 10.11  = GLK II 504) für die Aratea bezeugt und passt durch die sprachliche Schwerfälligkeit (inhaltliche Wiederholung bei tempestas und longa vetustas, Doppelung von perimet und interimet, altlateinisches Simplex stinguere – Anlass für das Zitat Priscians) sehr gut zum ennianischen Stil Ciceros. Im Kontext des Proömiums könnte Cicero die Verse an die ewigen Fixsterne (V. 10) bzw. deren ewigen ordo (V. 11) angeknüpft haben, auf  den sich das Relativpronomen quem beziehen dürfte. Bei Arat wird dieser ordo ja nicht weiter ausgeführt, und so konnte Grotius die Verse hier nicht gebrauchen (obwohl er sie definitiv kannte); 23 Cicero hingegen tendierte dazu, die Arat-Bearbeitung durch eigene Verse anzureichern, wie oben bemerkt wurde. Versuchen wir nun,

20  Er konnte sich dabei immerhin auf  die Apostelgeschichte berufen, in der Paulus explizit auf  Arat V. 5 Bezug nimmt (Act. 17.28). 21   Bekanntlich stammte Grotius aus einem calvinistischen Elternhaus und stand zeitlebens in der Auseinandersetzung mit dem orthodoxen Calvinismus; zu Grotius als Theologe vgl.  H.  J.  M. Nellen, E.  Rabbie (ed.), Hugo Grotius Theologian. Essays in Honour of  G. H. M. Posthumus Meyjes (Leiden, 1994). 22  In der Fragmentzählung, die leider spätestens ab fr. 5 uneinheitlich ist, folge ich der Ausgabe von Pellacani 2015 (wie Anm.  9); die neueste Ausgabe von Ciano 2019 (wie Anm. 9) reproduziert nur den Text und den Apparat von Soubiran 1972 (wie Anm. 9). 23  Darauf  weist Grotius selbst in den Anmerkungen (Notae in Ciceronis Fragmenta, 82b) hin: “Q uos versus ego affirmarim ex hoc opere non esse, nisi Cicero admodum limites Arateos excesserit, quod fieri potuit, in Prooemio praesertim, aut Epilogo.”

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an der folgenden Passage unsere Beobachtungen zu vertiefen und weiterzuführen. Cetera labuntur celeri caelestia motu, cum caeloque simul noctesque diesque feruntur; 20 axis at immotus numquam vestigia mutat, sed tenet aequali libratas pondere terras. Q uem circum magno se volvit turbine caelum; extremusque adeo duplici de cardine vertex dicitur esse Polus, quorum hic non cernitur, ille 25 ad Boream, Oceani supera confinia tendit. Q uem cingunt Ursae celebres cognomine Plaustri, quas nostri Septem soliti vocitare Triones. Alterius caput, alterius flammantia terga aspicit, inque vicem pronas rapit orbis in ipsos 30 conversas umeros. Creta (si credere fas est) ad caeli nitidas [sic] axes venere relicta: Iupiter hoc voluit, quem sub beneolentibus herbis ludentem Dicti grato posuere sub antro Idaeum ad montem, totumque aluere per annum, 35 Saturnum fallunt dum Dictaei Corybantes. Ex his altera apud Graios Cynosura vocatur, altera dicitur esse Helice; quae monstrat Achivis in pelago navis quo sit vertenda, sed illa se fidunt duce nocturna Phoenices in alto. 40 Sed prior illa magis stellis distincta refulget et late prima confestim a nocte videtur; haec vero parva est, sed nautis usus in hac est: nam cursu interiore brevi convertitur orbe signaque Sidoniis monstrat certissima nautis.24 45 Die übrigen Himmelskörper gleiten in schneller Bewegung dahin und werden zugleich mit dem (gesamten) Himmel Tag für Tag und Nacht für Nacht herumgeführt; die Achse aber bleibt unbewegt und ändert niemals ihre Position, sondern hält die Massen der Erde im Gleichgewicht. Um diese dreht sich in gewaltigem Wirbel der Himmel; der äußerste Scheitelpunkt der doppelten Drehangel heißt ‘Pol’; von diesen (beiden Polen) ist der eine unsichtbar, der andere zeigt nach Norden, über den Horizont des Ozeans. Diesen umkreisen die berühmten Bärinnen, auch Wagen genannt, die die Unsrigen als die sieben Dreschochsen zu bezeichnen pflegen. Die eine (Bärin) blickt auf  das Haupt, die andere auf  den leuchtenden Rücken der (jeweils) anderen, und wechselseitig reißt die Umdrehung sie rückwärts geneigt in Richtung ihrer Schultern. Wenn man es glauben kann, wurden sie von Kreta aus an die strahlenden Himmelsachsen versetzt: Jupiter

  Syntagma (wie Anm. 2), 1-2.

24

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wollte es so, da sie ihn als Kleinkind unter duftenden Gräsern am Fuße der lieblichen Dikte-Höhle im Ida-Gebirge gebettet und ein ganzes Jahr lang genährt hatten, während die kretischen Priester Kronos durch ihr Trommeln ablenkten. Von diesen (Bärinnen) wird die eine bei den Griechen Cynosura genannt, die andere heißt Helice; diese zeigt den Griechen, wohin das Schiff  auf  dem Meer zu lenken ist, während sich auf  die andere die Phönizier verlassen, wenn sie nachts auf  hoher See navigieren. Jene vorhin Genannte (Helice) leuchtet heller mit ihren klar erkennbaren Sternen und ist schon gleich von Beginn der Nacht an weithin sichtbar; diese (Cynosura) ist zwar klein, aber den Seeleuten trotzdem von Nutzen: Sie dreht sich nämlich weiter innen im Kreis mit kürzerer Wegstrecke und bietet (daher) den phönizischen Seeleuten sehr genaue Orientierung.

Von 27 Versen entfallen 11 auf  Cicero, die restlichen 16 auf  Grotius. Die Cicero-Fragmente stammen überwiegend aus De natura deorum, wo bekanntlich in Buch 2 Balbus zahlreiche Verse aus den Aratea zitiert. Durch den Vergleich der Stellen aus De natura deorum mit dem handschriftlich primär überlieferten Teil der Aratea ist ersichtlich, dass Balbus alle Zitate in derselben Reihenfolge wie im ursprünglichen Text aufeinander folgen lässt; daher kann man davon ausgehen, dass dies auch für diejenigen Zitate der Fall ist, für die es keine Parallelüberlieferung gibt. Über die Anordnung der Verse in einer Rekonstruktion unserer Partie kann es also eigentlich keinen Zweifel geben; lediglich die Verse, die bei anderen Autoren überliefert sind, bedürfen einer näheren Betrachtung, wo sie einzuordnen sind. Dies vorausgeschickt, soll die obige Passage nun im Detail analysiert werden. 19-20 fr. 3 (Cic. Nat. 2.104), entspricht Arat 19-20. Die ungenaue und nicht gleich verständliche Formulierung Arats hat Cicero im astronomischen Sinne präzisiert, indem er auf  die tägliche Umdrehung des gesamten Himmels innerhalb von 24 Stunden (celeri motu) hinweist. 21-23 Grotius, entspricht Arat 21-23. Genaue Übersetzung ohne inhaltliche Abweichung: Die Achse, um die sich der gesamte Himmel dreht, steht unbeweglich fest und hält die Erde im Gleichgewicht (da die Himmelsachse auch die Erdachse enthält bzw. deren beidseitige Verlängerung ist, mithin durch den Mittelpunkt der Erde verläuft). Der Wortlaut ist an Germanicus (V. 19-21a) angelehnt: “Axis at immotus semper vestigia servat, / libratasque tenet terras, et cardine firmo / orbem agit extremum” (Zitat nach Grotius’ Text). 124

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24-25a fr. 4 (Cic. Nat. 2.105), entspricht Arat 24. Cicero erklärt den (griechischen) Begriff  polus durch extremus vertex (Scheitelpunkt) bzw. cardo (Drehangel) und benötigt daher einen halben Vers mehr als Arat. 25b-27 Grotius, entspricht Arat 25-27. Grotius verkürzt etwas, um den halben Vers wieder ‘aufzuholen’, es gibt aber keine inhaltlichen Abweichungen. Der Himmelssüdpol ist unsichtbar, den Nordpol sieht man allezeit über dem Horizont des Okeanos; ihn umkreisen die beiden Bärinnen, auch Wagen genannt. – Zu diesen Versen gehört wahrscheinlich auch fr. 4b (Isid. Nat.  Rer. 12.6) “Hic terra tegitur” (Dieser [d.h. der Südpol] wird von der Erde verdeckt), das Grotius sicherlich nicht kannte.25 Die Formulierung ist diesmal unabhängig von Germanicus. 28 fr. 6 (Cic. Nat. 2.105), Plusvers gegenüber Arat. Cicero nennt hier die lateinische Bezeichnung Septem Triones (Sieben Dreschochsen). Auffällig ist, dass Grotius den Vers vor fr. 5 (siehe unten) platziert, da eine solche Abweichung der Methode Ciceros widerspricht, die Verse in der ursprünglichen Reihenfolge des Textes zu zitieren. Der Grund für diese Verschiebung ist folgender: Der Vers kommt naturgemäß nicht bei Arat vor und hat daher keinen angestammten Platz im Text.26 Grotius erschien er offenbar an dieser Stelle passend, weil Cicero, zusätzlich zu den bei Arat genannten alternativen Bezeichnungen ‘Bärinnen’ (Ἄρκτοι bzw. Ursae) und ‘Wagen’ (Ἅμαξαι bzw. Plaustra), nun explizit auch die römische Bezeichnung ergänzt hatte. Doch Grotius erlag einem Trugschluss: Die Septem Triones stehen nämlich nicht für beide Bärinnen bzw. Wagen, sondern nur für die Große Bärin bzw. den Großen Wagen, also das im Folgenden auch Helice genannte Sternbild.27 Die Ergänzung passt somit nicht an der von Grotius gewählten Stelle, sondern   Es wurde erstmals von Soubiran (wie Anm. 9) in die Edition der Aratea aufgenommen. Pellacani 2015 (wie Anm. 9) folgte ihm (allerdings ohne hic); Ciano 2019 (wie Anm. 9) dann wieder wie Soubiran 1972 (wie Anm. 9). 26 Vgl. Notae, 72a: “versus hic extra Aratum est, a Cicerone adiectus.” Grotius geht aber nicht auf  die veränderte Reihenfolge ein. Im Übrigen begehen noch Traglia und Soubiran denselben Fehler und reihen fr. 6 vor fr. 5 ein. Ciano folgt hier ausnahmsweise (richtig) Pellacani. 27  Vgl. auch Cic. Luc. 66: “non ad illam parvulam Cynosuram […], sed ad Helicen et clarissimos Septentriones.” 25

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erst nach der Erwähnung der Helice, d.h. nach fr. 5, so wie Cicero es ja auch selbst in De natura deorum anordnet: Das Relativpronomen quas, das Grotius in seiner Rekonstruktion auf  Ursae bezieht (also auf  beide Bärinnen), bezieht sich bei Cicero jedoch auf die Sterne der Helice: “altera dicitur esse Helice, cuius quidem clarissimas stellas totis noctibus cernimus, quas nostri Septem soliti vocitare Triones” (Cic. Nat. 2.105). Grotius’ Problem rührte daher, dass er Arat möglichst genau wiedergeben, zugleich aber Ciceros Verse einbauen wollte und dabei von der Prämisse ausging, dass auch Cicero dem ordo Arati gefolgt sei – eine Prämisse, die angesichts des freieren Umgangs Ciceros mit dem Text als unhaltbar gelten muss (s. auch zu V. 40ff). 29-36 Grotius, entspricht Arat 28-35. Sehr präzise, teilweise eigenständige Nachahmung des griechischen Textes, der durch die Namen (Jupiter, Saturn) römisches Kolorit erhält. Nur der Anfang der Passage, nicht jedoch der mythologische Exkurs (bis auf  die Bezeichnung Dictaei Corybantes für Arats Δικταῖοι Κούρητες), ist an Germanicus angelehnt. 37-38a fr. 5 (Cic.  Nat. 2.105), entspricht Arat 36-37a. Cicero fügt apud Graios ein, was bei Arat natürlich fehlt und jetzt mit dem in V. 38b folgenden Achivis eine Doppelung bildet. Cicero dürfte also die Bemerkung, dass sich die Griechen am Sternbild Helice orientieren, in seiner Bearbeitung (als bekannt) ausgelassen und nur die Phönizier erwähnt haben. 38b-39 Grotius, entspricht Arat 37b-38. Grotius’ Versschluss sed illa greift bereits Arats τῇ δ᾽ ἄρα am Beginn von V. 39 auf, was auch die Änderung im folgenden Vers nach sich zieht. 40-44 fr. 7 (Cic.  Nat. 2.106), entspricht Arat 39-43. Das erste Wort Ciceros (hac, scil. Cynosurā) hat Grotius in se geändert, weil er der irrigen Meinung war, hac sei ein Überlieferungsfehler: “Fieri non potest, ut ita scripserit Cicero, nisi ordinem Arati perturbarit. […] At ante hunc versum praecessit sermo de Helice: ergo fieri non potest, ut Cicero de Cynosura dixerit” (Notae, 72a). Wie oben erwähnt, beruhen Grotius’ Schlüsse auf  der (falschen) Prämisse, Cicero habe sich strikt an den ordo Arati gehalten. Tatsächlich aber hat er die Passage über die Bärinnen recht frei bearbeitet und unmittelbar vor V. 40 nicht von Helice, sondern von Cynosura gesprochen, was im Übrigen zweifelsfrei aus der Zwischenbemerkung in Nat. 2.106 hervorgeht, die auf die 126

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Septem Triones folgt: “paribusque stellis [i.e. septem, ut Helice] similiter distinctis eundem caeli verticem lustrat parva Cynosura. Hac fidunt etc.” In seinem Selbstzitat hatte Cicero also einen oder mehrere Verse, deren Inhalt in der Zwischenbemerkung paraphrasiert ist,28 ausgelassen. Grotius’ Anstoß an hac (und seine Schlussfolgerung, es müsse illa heißen, was er in V. 39 bereits umgesetzt hatte) ist also unbegründet, ebenso wie seine anschließende Konjektur se.29 45 Grotius, entspricht Arat 44. Der Vers ist eine inhaltliche Wiederholung von V. 40 (Arat 39) und fehlt daher bei Cicero. Grotius hat ihn pedantisch angefügt, eben weil er bei Arat steht. Germanicus hat den Vers ebenfalls (V. 47), allerdings in anderer Formulierung. Cicero hatte die ganze Passage offenbar anders strukturiert als Arat, vor allem wohl, um die Sieben Dreschochsen erwähnen zu können; der Text der Aratea dürfte demnach folgendermaßen aufgebaut gewesen sein: – – – – –

Die tägliche Himmelsumdrehung aller Gestirne erfolgt um eine feststehende Achse. Der Scheitelpunkt (polus) ist nur im Norden sichtbar; um ihn drehen sich die beiden Bärinnen. [Bei Arat folgen Verse über die genaue Position der Sternbilder sowie eine mythologische Erzählung über den Katasterismos der Bärinnen; von Cicero in De natura deorum nicht erwähnt. Zumindest die astronomische Detailinformation wird Cicero in den Aratea ausgelassen haben, da sie äußerst unklar ist und zum Verständnis des Folgenden nichts beiträgt; den mythologischen Exkurs hat Cicero aus Gründen des ornatus wahrscheinlich beibehalten.] – Bei den Griechen heißt die eine Bärin Cynosura, die andere Helice; – deren (d.h. der letzteren) helle Sterne sind immer sichtbar 28  Über Arat hinaus hat Cicero (wohl für den römischen, in der Regel astronomisch nicht kundigen Leser) Zusatzinformationen über die Sternbilder gegeben, z.B. über die Zahl der Sterne und ihre Anordnung. 29  Sprachlich verteidigt Grotius den reflexiven Gebrauch von fidere als archaistisch: “Nos ἀρχαϊκῶς Se fidunt reposuimus, cui simile est: placere se student bonis in Eunucho [Ter. Eun. 1, dort aber studeat]” (Notae, 72b).

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– – – –

und werden bei den Römern die ‘Sieben Dreschochsen’ genannt. Mit ebenso vielen Sternen leuchtet die kleinere Cynosura, die nicht so hell und daher nicht so gut sichtbar ist, aber dennoch einen besonderen Nutzen für die Seeleute hat, wie die Phönizier wissen.

Cicero hat also den Arat-Text aufbereitet und in eine für den (römischen) Leser verständliche, logische Abfolge gebracht; Grotius’ Text dagegen ist, wie gezeigt wurde, eine nicht schlüssige, hybride Kontamination aus Arat und Cicero. Es bleibt noch, kurz auf  Grotius’ Umgang mit Fragmenten außerhalb von De natura deorum einzugehen. Auf  die Auslassung von fr. 2 wurde bereits hingewiesen; fr. 4b dürfte Grotius, wie gesagt, unbekannt gewesen sein. Die folgende Übersicht zeigt Herkunft und Verwendung aller Fragmente, die vor dem handschriftlich primär überlieferten Teil der Aratea stehen: Fragment Nr.

Q uelle

Grotius

1

Cic. Leg. 2.7

richtig eingeordnet

2

Prisc. Inst. 10.11

fehlt, aber in den Notae diskutiert

3-4

ND

übernommen

4b

Isid. Nat. Rer. 12.6

fehlt (unbekannt)

5-6

ND

Reihenfolge vertauscht

7-16

ND

übernommen

17

Lact. Inst. 5.5.5

richtig eingeordnet

18

ND

übernommen

19

Lact. Inst. 5.5.9

richtig eingeordnet 30

20

Prisc. Inst. 14.52

falsch eingeordnet (hinter fr. 14)

21

Prisc. Inst. 6.19

richtig eingeordnet

22

ND

übernommen

23

Cic. Or. 152

richtig eingeordnet 31

30  Grotius (Notae, 73b) rühmt sich fälschlich, als Erster diesen Vers für die Aratea gesichert zu haben; s. unten zu den früheren Herausgebern. 31  Grotius war sich allerdings nicht ganz sicher: “Vix hunc versum infarsimus”, bemerkt er in den Notae, 73b.

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Fragment Nr.

Q uelle

Grotius

24-25

ND

übernommen

26

Prisc. Inst. 7.74

fehlt, aber am Ende unter den Fragmenta incerta angeführt

27-28(1)

ND

übernommen

28(2)

Ps.-Probus, De ult. syll. (GLK IV 223)

fehlt (unbekannt)

29-33

ND

übernommen

Grotius gibt an, dass er auf eine frühere Sammlung der Cicero-Fragmente zurückgegriffen habe: “In textu nostro eam Fragmentorum editionem secuti sumus quae vulgatis Ciceronis voluminibus solet annecti” (Notae, 72a). Mit dieser ‘Vulgata’ meint er wahrscheinlich Ausgaben, die auf  Lambinus (1565) zurückgehen; welche Ausgabe Grotius konkret benutzt hat, dürfte freilich schwer zu eruieren sein.32 Außer der Lambinus-Rezension scheint Grotius auch andere Ausgaben, z.B. von Patricius (1565 bzw. Nachdrucke), ausgewertet zu haben,33 obwohl er sie z.T. gar nicht erwähnt und sogar explizit Erstheitsansprüche geltend macht, wo frühere Herausgeber bereits Fragmentzuordnungen vorgenommen hatten (z.B. fr. 19 aus Laktanz). Dem Problem kann hier nicht weiter nachgegangen werden.34 32  Editio princeps: Tomus Q uartus operum M. Tullii Ciceronis philosophicos eius libros a  Dionys. Lambino Monstroliensi ex auctoritate codicum manuscr. emendatos, complectens […] (Lutetiae, apud Bernardum Turrisanum, 1565). Vermutlich benutzte Grotius eine der Ausgaben ab 1573, da darin textkritische Marginalien enthalten sind, die in seine Notae eingeflossen sind. 33  M.  Tullii Ciceronis Fragmentorum tomi IIII cum Andreae Patricii Striceconis adnotationibus, Omnia ex eiusdem secunda editione  […] (Venetiis, ex officina Stellae Iordani Zileti, 1565). Die erste Auflage erschien 1561, doch lag dem Herausgeber damals noch kein griechisches Original vor. 34  Eine Studie dazu ist in Vorbereitung. – Sicher unbekannt war Grotius die Arat-Übersetzung des polnischen Dichters Jan Kochanowski (1530-1584), in die ebenfalls die Cicero-Fragmente (ohne kenntlich gemacht zu sein) eingefügt waren: vgl.  B.  Bilinski, “Gli Aratea ciceroniani. Edizione e  traduzione di Jan Kochanowski poe­ta rinascimentale polacco”, in Atti del V Colloquium Tullianum (Roma – Arpino, 2-4 ottobre 1982)  = Ciceroniana. Rivista di Studi Ciceroniani 5  (1984), 213-235. Bilinski erwähnt zwei Ausgaben: “[…] la traduzione latina di Cicerone con numerosi supplementi dello stesso Kochanowski fu pubblicata due volte, per la prima volta già nel 1579 e la seconda nel 1612” (215). Die Erstausgabe ist sehr selten (nachweisbar bisher nur Exemplare in der UB Heidelberg und in der Biblioteka Jagiellońska Kraków) und trägt den Titel: M.T. Ciceronis Aratus ad Graecum exemplar expensus et locis man-

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Über die Fragmente 1-7 und die übrigen, richtig eingeordneten Bruchstücke soll hier nichts weiter gesagt werden. Interessant sind aber die Fragmente 20, 26 und 28(2). In Bezug auf  fr. 20 ist zu sagen, dass es von Grotius, früheren Ausgaben folgend, hinter fr. 14 (entspricht Arat 74f) eingeordnet wurde, in dem vom Haupt des Schlangenträgers die Rede ist: “propter caput Anguitenentis / quem claro perhibent Ὀφιοῦχον nomine Grai”. Bei Arat heißt es weiter, dass man vom Haupt aus auch den Schlangenträger selbst gut erkennen könne, da seine beiden Schultersterne so hell leuchteten, dass sie selbst bei Vollmond sichtbar seien (Arat 75b-79a). Durch die Erwähnung der Schultern verleitet, ordnete Grotius hier fr. 20 ein: Huic supera duplices umeros affixa videtur stella micans tali specie talique nitore, fulgeat ut pleno cum lumine Luna refulsit.35 Diesem oberhalb der beiden Schultern angeheftet, sieht man einen Stern, der mit so eigentümlichem Glanz funkelt, dass er sogar leuchtet, wenn der Vollmond scheint.

Tatsächlich ist aber ja hier von nur einem Stern, und zwar über den Schultern (demnach also vom Haupt) die Rede, während bei Arat genau umgekehrt von zwei Sternen unterhalb des Hauptes, also von den Schultern, gesprochen wird. Die Einordnung der beiden Verse an dieser Stelle beruht somit auf einem Missverständnis. Sie bilden vielmehr eine ziemlich genaue Übersetzung von Arat 137 und 139 (Vers 138 ist interpoliert): Τῆς ὑπὲρ ἀμφοτέρων ὤμων εἱλίσσεται ἀστὴρ / τόσσος μὲν μεγέθει, τοίῃ δ᾽ἐγκείμενος αἴγλῃ, […] (Über deren [d.h. der Jungfrau] beiden Schultern kreist ein Stern von solcher Größe und von solchem Glanz wie der, der […]). Da aus dem lateinischen Pronomen huic in fr. 20 das Genus nicht ersichtlich war, wurden die Verse anstatt der Jungfrau (Arat 137ff) dem Schlangenträger (Arat 74ff) zugeordnet. Grotius hätte das eigentlich auffallen müssen, da die oben erwähnten Abweichungen cis restitutus per Ioannem Cochanovium. Cum adnotationibus eiusdem autoris super Festi Avieni Arataeorum paraphrasim, et Germanici Caesaris fragmenta, animadversiones, sive lectionum coniecturae (Cracoviae, 1579). Der (häufiger nachgewiesene) Nachdruck von 1612 enthält nur den Arat: M.T. Ciceronis Aratus ad Graecum exemplar expensus, et locis mancis restitutus a  Ioan. Cochanovio (Cracoviae, ex officina Andreae Petricovii, 1612). 35  Syntagma (wie Anm. 2), 3.

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in Zahl und Anordnung der Sterne bestehen, aber offenbar hat er hier unkritisch die Einordnung des Fragments durch frühere Ausgaben übernommen.36 Was fr. 26 betrifft, so konnte Grotius es nicht zuordnen 37 und zitiert es am Schluss des Textes als eines von zwei Fragmenta incerta. Es lautet “Navibus amissis fluitantia quaerere aplustra” ([…] dass/ wie sie nach Verlust der Schiffe schwimmende Planken suchen) und wird von Priscian (Inst. 7.74  = GLK II 351, dort absumptis statt amissis) wegen des seltenen Wortes aplustrum/aplustre (vorklassisch nur im Plural aplustra, später auch aplustria) zitiert.38 In früheren Ausgaben ist das Fragment zwischen fr. 22 (= Arat 147f) und 24 (= Arat 160-162), und zwar im Kontext von Arat 152-155 (Schifffahrt ruht während der Etesien) eingeordnet, passt aber dort eigentlich nicht.39 Viel eher gehört es in den nächsten Abschnitt über Fuhrmann, Ziege und Böckchen, wo von Schiffbrüchigen die Rede ist, also erst hinter fr. 23.40 Grotius konnte den Vers nicht gebrauchen, weil er ein Plusvers gegenüber Arat ist; Cicero hatte ihn vielleicht deshalb eingefügt, weil er sich das ennianische aplustra nicht entgehen lassen wollte. Schließlich zu fr. 28, das aus zwei Versen besteht. Der erste, in De natura deorum überlieferte Vers lautet: “Has Graeci stellas ὕαδας vocitare suerunt” (Diese Sterne pflegten die Griechen Hyaden zu nennen). Wegen des Hinweises auf  die Griechen steht er natürlich in dieser Form nicht in der griechischen Vorlage, lehnt sich aber an Arat 172-173a an, wo die Hyaden erwähnt werden.41 36  In den Notae, 73a, verweist er lediglich darauf, dass Formulierungen mit τοῖος, τοῖοι u.ä. häufiger vorkämen; die falsche Einordnung könnte also auch aufgrund des τοῖοι in Arat 77 erfolgt sein. Hinzuzufügen ist, dass Grotius das Fragment auch an der richtigen Stelle noch einmal verwendet, allerdings in leicht abgewandelter und ergänzter Form (weil er Arat 138 für echt hielt). 37  “Illud etiam Fragmentum  […] non invenit versum Arateum cui ad verbum respondeat”: Notae, 82b. 38  Die Form aplustra ist für Ennius (ann. fr. inc. 606 Jackson-Tomasco  = 608 Skutsch) belegt. Ciceros Wendung fluitantia aplustra ist nachgeahmt bei Lucr. DRN 2.555 (dort 4.437 auch im Ablativ aplustris). Germanicus verwendet das Wort ebenfalls (mit dem Plural aplustria), allerdings im Zusammenhang mit der Argo (V. 345). 39   Vielmehr gehört richtigerweise fr. 23 “hoc motu radiantis Etesiae in vada ponti” hierher. Cicero selbst zitiert diesen Vers (ohne Stellenangabe) wegen des Hiats in Or. 152. 40  Dort ordnen es Traglia 1971, Soubiran 1972 und Ciano 2019 ein; Pellacani 2015 (alle wie Anm. 9) dagegen stellt es fälschlicherweise erst hinter fr. 25. 41  Diese Technik Ciceros imitiert Grotius (gewissermaßen ciceronischer als Cicero) in Bezug auf Arat 330b-332a, wo es heißt, dass die Menschen den Hundsstern Σείριος

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REINHOLD F. GLEI

Das Folgende lässt Cicero im Rahmen des Selbstzitats aus, weil es ein neues Thema betrifft, und fügt stattdessen etymologische Betrachtungen über den Namen der Hyaden an. Zufällig ist aber der in den Aratea mutmaßlich folgende Vers bei einem Grammatiker überliefert: “Iam Tauri laevum cornu dexterque simul pes” (Das linke Horn des Stiers und zugleich der rechte Fuß [des Fuhrmanns]). Er trägt das typische ennianische Kolorit und entspricht Arat 174b-175a (die Bemerkung in Vers 173b-174a, wo die Hyaden auf  der Stirn des Stiers lokalisiert werden, dürfte von Cicero bereits vorher verwendet worden sein). Grotius war der Vers unbekannt, und er fährt daher mit seiner eigenen, erheblich klassischeren Übersetzung fort: “Sed pes aurigae dexter cornuque sinistrum / Tauri” (V. 179f). Zusammenfassend kann man Folgendes festhalten. Grotius versuchte, zwei sich weitgehend ausschließende poetische Aufgaben zu lösen: eine sehr textnahe Arat-Übersetzung anzufertigen und gleichzeitig die Reste der sehr viel freieren Arat-Bearbeitung Ciceros in seine eigene Übersetzung einzufügen. Dies konnte nicht vollständig gelingen. Grotius’ hybride Textkonstruktion musste insbesondere dort zu Problemen führen, wo Cicero die Vorlage im Interesse seiner römischen Leser abgeändert hatte; hier konnte oder wollte Grotius Cicero nicht folgen und verstrickte sich so in Widersprüche. Was er ausdrücklich nicht versucht hatte, war eine Rekonstruktion der ciceronischen Aratea im Sinne eines klassischen Supplements: Diese Aufgabe bliebe noch zu lösen.

(von σειριάω, brennen) nennten. Cicero nimmt darauf Bezug mit V. 353 (bei Grotius = V. 112 der handschriftlich überlieferten Partie): “Totus ab ore micans iacitur mortalibus ardor”, es fehlt aber der Name Sirius (nur lateinisch Canis). Grotius ergänzt daher: “Sirion hunc Graeci praeclaro nomine dicunt” (nach dem Vorbild des Germanicus  V. 335: “Sirion hunc Grai prio suu [verderbt für ‘proprio sub’] nomine dicunt”). Die etymologische Komponente geht allerdings im Lateinischen verloren.

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CHRISTIAN LAES

A POOR AND PROUD SCHOOLTEACHER: ALFREDO BARTOLI’S PRIMUS HORATII MAGISTER (1937) *

Introduction Scholarship on Alfredo Bartoli (1872-1954) has largely followed the trail of  studies on Neo-Latin writers from the twentieth century. His biography is  well documented, though many archival sources still await proper study.1 With some effort, it is  possible to bring together and to read through his opera omnia in Latin, but a proper edition of  his collected works still needs to be made.2 Literary analysis is available for some of  his poems, but again more comprehensive studies are lacking.3 *  This article could not have been written without the astonishing archival knowledge of  Nicholas De Sutter (KU Leuven), who was my kind and gentle guide through the archives and history of  the Certamen Hoeufftianum. I owe Nicholas many thanks for his efficiency and kindness. John Taylor (University of  Manchester) improved my English, and I am most grateful for his help. 1  G. Morabito, “Il latinista Alfredo Bartoli”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 28 (1979), 302-325. See also D.  Sacré, Musa Superstes. De poesi saeculi XXI Latina schediasma (Rome, 2001), 15-17 and C. Laes, “Rosa Melitensis (1908-1910): A Latin Journal and the Maltese Episode in the Life of  Alfredo Bartoli (1872-1954)”, in C. Serra­cino (ed.), Festschrift Horatio Vella (La Valletta, 2021), [forthcoming] for further surveys and bibliography. The Istituto di Studi Romani in Rome has no less than twenty “pacchi” on Bartoli. The correspondence between Pascoli and Bartoli is  kept at Casa Pascoli in Castelvecchio and is  fully digitalized. The provincial archives of  Messina, where the correspondence of  Morabito is kept, must surely contain letters by Bartoli. 2  Sacré 2001 (as in note 1), 49-51 (poematia inedita). Collected works from Bartoli’s earlier period in A. Bartoli, Silvae (editio altera) (Pistoia, 1904). 3  Some outstanding examples by D. Sacré, “The Certamen Hoeufftianum During the Ventennio Fascista. An Exploration”, in H.  Lamers, B.  Reitz-Joosse, V.  San­ zotta (ed.), Studies in the Latin Literature and Epigraphy of  Italian Fascism (Leuven, 2020), 201-243; D. Sacré, “From Antiquity to World War I: from Giovanni Pascoli to Alfredo Bartoli”, in C.  Chiummo, W.  Kofler, V.  Sanzotta (ed.), Pascoli Latinus. Neue Beiträge zur Edition und Interpretation der neulateinischen Dichtung von Gio­ Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 133-147 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124053

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CHRISTIAN LAES

Born in a small mountain village of  Le Piastre, in the community of  Pistoia (Tuscany), as the son of  parents of  modest means, Bartoli was never meant to pursue the path of  study and teaching. He managed, however, to study classical languages at both the gymnasium and the lyceum in Siena, where he gained the nickname l’antigrammatico, because of  his aversion to the traditional way of  learning Latin by long lists of  declensions, conjugations and grammatical categories. Though he never graduated from the University of  Siena, where he had enrolled, he went on to become a teacher of  classics (1893-1906), and a prolific Latin writer, with a second edition of  his collected poems appearing as early as 1904. In 1907, Bartoli moved to Malta, where he taught Italian and Latin. During his years in Malta, he also was the editor of   the Latin periodical Rosa Melitensis, which existed from December 1908 up to September 1910, with nineteen issues. In 1914, he was appointed Professor of  Latin and Italian literature at the University of  Malta, a position he held until 1923, when he left the island for reasons that are still unclear. Bartoli then pursued his career as a  teacher in Locri (1924-1928), in Salerno (1928-1929), and finally in Florence, where he settled from 1929 on. For decades, he continued as a prolific (Latin) writer and translator of  Latin authors. For his poems, Bartoli received magna laus at the Certamen Hoeufftianum in Amsterdam no less than fifteen times, though he was never awarded the gold medal. In this article, I  will present Bartoli’s satire Primus Horatii Magister, which was awarded magna laus in the Hoeufftianum contest of  1937. Honouring the triptych of  inventio, dispositio, and elocutio, I want to show how the poet in this piece displays mastery of   diverse aspects: full acquaintance with Horace and the satirical tradition, versatility in using the satirical hexameter, combined with a nice structuring, which makes the poem an entertaining read. Moreover, analysis of  this satire reveals how Bartoli carefully polished and adapted different versions throughout the years. In fact, probably the earliest published version appeared in Rosa Melitensis in 1909, with the admittedly somewhat enigmatic title Ruso tucul­ lio.4 From the archives of   the Certamen Hoeufftianum, we know vanni Pascoli – Nuovi contributi all’edizione e  all’interpretazione della poesia latina di Giovanni Pascoli (Tübingen, 2021), 273-294. 4   Toculio or tocullio is a hapax with Cic. Att. 2.1.12 – the spelling tucullio is no longer accepted in modern editions.

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that Bartoli had submitted this poem under different titles (it was already submitted for 1908): Ruso Tucullio / Flavius ludimagister / Magister Horatii  / Ruso tucullio  / Flavius ludimagister  / Primus Horatii magister.5 The poem was also published in Alma Roma in 1928 and as a separate publication during Bartoli’s time in Malta: A.  Bartoli, Ruso tucullio (Malta, ex tipographia [sic] “Empire” Ioannis Critien, s.d.). By studying the “ontogenesis” of  this poem (i.e. by comparing the version of  the Certamen Hoeufftianum 1937 with earlier versions as in Rosa Melitensis 1909 and in a copy from 1926 kept in the archives of   the Hoeufftianum contest), we can gather as it were a glimpse of   the poet’s workshop, and his choices and options to reach what he considered the perfect version, over a timespan of  twenty years.

Presentation of  the poem Introduction: schoolmaster Flavius departs for Rome (vv. 1-14) Apart from the rather epic opening words (“hei mihi” only occurs in Sil. Pun. 13.655 and 15.732) the poem from the very beginning is  full of  Horatian resonances. Speaking to us is  Flavius, schoolmaster from Venusia, who further on in the poem appears to have taught Horace as a  child.6 He sets off  for the long journey from Venusia to Rome.7 Following the satirical tradition, the reader 5  The following list contains titles and the references to the versions as found in the Haarlem Noord-Hollands archive, abbreviated as HNHA. Ruso tucullio: HNHA, 64.818, n.  24 (1908); Flavius ludimagister: HNHA, 64.818, n.  3  (1909); Magister Horatii: HNHA, 64.827, n. 40 (1924); Ruso tucullio: HNHA, 64.829, n. 43 (1926); Flavius ludimagister: HNHA, 64.830, n.  33 (1927) (abest); Flavius ludimagister: HNHA, 64.848, n. 36 (1935); Primus Horatii magister: HNHA, 64.849, n. 12 (1937) (abest). A missing poem (abest) means that the poet either requested the copy to be sent back, which happened in 1927, or that the manuscript was used for the preparation of  the publication, which was the case for 1937. 6 Q uite ironically, Horace himself  mentions how he did not take Flavius’s classes: Hor. Sat. 71-78, spec. 71-72 (“causa fuit pater his; qui macro pauper agello / noluit in Flavi ludum me mittere”) and 76 (“sed puerum est ausus Romam portare docendum”). Venusia was Horace’s hometown, as testified in e.g., Suet. Vita Hor. fr. 40. Note that Luigi Galante (1877-1926) in 1918 received magna laus in the Hoeufftianum for his poem Flavi ludus. See V. R. Giustiniani, Neulateinische Dichtung in Italien 1850-1950. Ein unerforschtes Kapitel Italienischer Literatur- und Geistesgeschichte (Tübingen, 1979), 45. 7  A journey of  421 kilometers for over eight days, according to the calculation of  the Stanford Orbis Database [https://orbis.stanford.edu/].

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is addressed in verse 3 (“I have sorrows which you do not have”), while the second person of  verse 4 needs to be understood in a  more general way (“many delay you and ask for a  favour”). Somebody asks Flavius to consult the lawyer Aulus Cascellius, in order to know how his case is proceeding (vv. 6-7a).8 Another compatriot wonders whether Spurius Maecius Tarpa will consider putting his play on stage (vv.  7b-8).9 Others want to know whether the Sosii booksellers have some new works on display by Horace, in whom Venusians take pride (vv.  9-10).10 As a  traveller to Rome, Flavius feels like a little donkey for the whole village (v. 11, cf. Hor. Sat. 1.9.20). As if his own burdens were not enough! Indeed, waiting for him are the sad Kalendae (Hor.  Sat. 1.3.87: “cum tristes misero venere Kalendae”) – the day on which the dire creditor Ruso (Hor. Sat. 1.3.86) is waiting for his payment to arrive (vv. 11-13). Hei mihi quam multis extractum rure fatigant, 1 expedienda premunt hinc inde negotia curis, cumque tuis aliena: nimis Venusinus ab Urbe pagus abest. Discedentem te namque morantur sexcenti, officium poscunt, dant munia: “Flavi, 5 de re consultum, oro, mea, quam novit agendam, Aulum adeas”. – “Tibi forte datur si copia Tarpae, fabula, quaeso, roges illi num nostra probetur”. – “Si quid habent Sosii, quod nuper prodiit, adfer, praecipue nostri, quo nos iactamus, Horati.” – 10 Sic omnes; Urbemque petens, pagi fit asellus totius, ut sua ni satis eheu! pondera vexent, me vero… tristes cui iam venere Kalendae, quemque domi Ruso expectat canis ore trifauci! 4-5 Te sexcenti cunctantur euntem,  / officium exposcunt, committunt munia A  | 8 perconteris, in aede sonet num fabula nostra A

8   Aulus Cascellius is mentioned in Hor. Ars 371. Val. Max. Mem. 6.2.12 mentions him as being a senex during the times of  the proscriptions in 42 bc. 9  On Tarpa, see Hor. Sat. 1.10.38. In 55 bc, he chose the plays which were put on stage during the inauguration of  the Theatre of  Pompey (Cic. Fam. 7.1.1). 10  The Sosii are mentioned in Hor.  Ars 345 and Sat. 1.20.2. They also appear in the poem Sosii fratres bibliopolae by Pascoli, awarded the golden medal in the Hoeufftianum of 1900, while bibliopolae are mentioned in the first scene of  the long poem Carmen et error by Nello Martinelli (1889-1976), who received magna laus for it in 1953. On these intertextual allusions, see D. Sacré, “De verbanning van Ovidius uitgeklaard: Nello Martinelli’s (1889-1976) gedicht Carmen et error”, Kleio. Tijdschrift voor oude talen en antieke cultuur 48 (2019), 1-54 [online], spec. 28-29.

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Dialogue with and advice by Caprius (vv. 15-66) In the morning, Flavius reaches the Puteal in the Forum (cf.  Hor.  Sat. 2.6.34-35, also mentioning ante secundam; Epist. 1.19.8): the Puteal Libonis is  known as the place where litigants, moneylenders and business people used to gather. The diminutive popellus has a strong satirical ring (next to Hor. Epist. 1.7.65 it occurs only in Persius Flaccus Sat. 4.15). The following verses masterly evoke the dense atmosphere of   the busy and bustling Forum, with a most popular polyptoton in verse 20.11 aiebat tacitus festinabatque secunda, ad Puteal. Laeto iam fervens omne popello coeperat esse forum; passim tunicisque togisque compleri, variis perstringi vocibus aures, tum pede pes offendi, urgueri poplite poples. 20 17 Totum laeto fervere popello A  |  Laeto fervens iam mane popello B

Flavius now encounters Caprius, who apparently acts as his counsellor and solicitor in financial matters. Together with Sulcius, Caprius appears as a  lawyer skilled in tracing down and accusing criminals in an Horatian satire (Hor.  Sat. 1.4.65-68). Flavius’s dialogue with Caprius, in which the latter explains that Sulcius should not be trusted as a creditor in order to grant new funding, allows Bartoli to fully exploit the possibilities of   the satirical hexameter. The following verses are full of  rather short words (with monosyllabic endings in v. 37 and 39) and caesurae as the bucolic diaeresis in vv.  31, 32 and 36; the diaeresis after the first foot of  v. 38; the unusual stop in v. 33; and even a possible stop after the fifth foot in v. 31. On the other hand, Bartoli managed to avoid the harsh elision of  “spem abicias” in an earlier version of  v.  31. By  this replacement, the verse now becomes heavily loaded with spondees. “Res autem quo nostra loco?” – “Male” Caprius inquit “cessit: quaerenti aes totidem venere repulsae… 30 Ne vero spem deponas, huc, forsitan, unde 11  Pede pes with Enn.  Ann. 584 (Skutsch); Verg. Aen. 10.361; Hom.  Lat. 956; Ov. Met. 9.44; Stat. Theb. 8.399. For twentieth-century Latin poetry, note also the line by Harry  C. Schnur in his Supplementum Petronianum, to be read in G.  Tournoy, D. Sacré (ed.), Pegasus Devocatus. Studia in honorem C. Arri Nuri sive Harry C. Schnur (Leuven, 1992), 128-168, at 143: “sub mensa pede pes premitur, iam poplite poples.”

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aes habeas, aderit, quem nosti, Sulcius… illum opperiamur.” – “At ut veniat vel prosit egenti praemetuo: leviter promittere fertur et idem non praestare fidem, mendax nec in aere repertus 35 est semel iste mihi.” “Nummos cras” inquit “habebis; dispeream…” “Nihil est igitur quin pollicear?” “Nil.” Convenit; obstrictaque fide cras verba daturus, aut mage nullus adest! … Hodie quo more gerat se, ipse vides.” 40 29 “Sed mea quo, rogo, res?” Caprius: “Male cesserit” inquit A | 30 namque exposcenti totiens venere repulsae A | 31 Ne tamen omnem spem abicias A | 34 iam metuo: facile promittens fertur et idem A | 35 haud semel est mihi in aere repertus | 36 mendax. – Cras, adiuro, feram; iam et habere putato A | 37 in manibus A

Others do not turn out to be reliable creditors either. A  medical doctor who passes by fortuitously should be better left taking care of  his patients (vv.  41-47). At this moment, Fufidius enters the scene (Hor. Sat. 1.2.12 mentions a Fufidius who is afraid of  getting the reputation of  being a nebulo, and the same word occurs with Bar­toli in v.  47). For sure, Flavius does not want to get involved with him (vv.  47-55). Did not Horace himself  warn against the dirty tricks of  this individual (vv.  56-57)? 12 And does Caprius really believe that Venusia is so far away from Rome that rumours about Fufidius’s bad reputation would not have reached the little town (vv.  57-58)? Venusians may well be pupils, but then surely under severe fathers (v. 59: “[...] Tirones … igitur? … – ‘Sub duris patribus!’ Eia”, refers to Hor. Sat. 1.2.17: “sub patribus duris tironum”). By now, a quarter of  the day has passed, and Flavius has still three hours left in order to find a solution to get to an agreement with Ruso (vv. 60-66). Reflections of  a poor schoolmaster (vv. 67-77) The moderate means of  men of  letters, in this case teachers, is a theme that has been elaborated in satire (Iuv. Sat. 7.215-243, rather reflecting on grammatici). For all his hard work, Fortune only brought Flavius dire poverty (vv. 69-70: “dura […] pauperie”, note the embracing hyperbaton). After many years of  sedulous 12  Vv. 54-55: “quinas qui capiti mercedes exsecat, atque / quanto perditior quisque est, tanto acrius urget?” are literally taken from Hor. Sat. 1.2.14 (except for the word hic being replaced by qui) and Sat. 1.2.57.

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teaching, no money is  left to settle and pay the bills or to calm down the fierce moneylender (v.  72).13 Who would believe that in Flavius’s school Horace had taken the first steps of  his literary career – Horace who by now had given full honour to the Muses (vv. 73-75), and was celebrated in the capital as a second Lucilius (vv. 76-77; cf. Hor. Sat. 2.1.29 and 2.1.74-75)? The apparatus criticus shows how Bartoli’s struggle with the words has led to more elegant solutions as the years passed by. The poet got rid of   the clumsy double ending on -i of  v.  67; in v.  68 the hyperbaton “nullis […] bonis” fits better than the rather prosaic “nullis gaudere sibi fortuna dedisset”. In v.  74, Bartoli deleted a hypermetrical verse, by changing “Latinisque” to “daturum”, though the succession of  two participles in the accusative (“daturum” and “ingressum”), both referring to “Flaccum”, was not perhaps the most felicitous choice. At Flavi haec inter menti obversatur euntis quae nullis gaudere bonis fortuna dedisset, sed dura extremis urgueret saeva diebus pauperie: tot enim puerorum industrius annos 70 nil praeceptor habet, senior nil invenit aeris, nomina quo expediat, dirum placetque danistan. Num credat quisquam, ludo si noverit ipsum ad maiora meo Flaccum prodisse, daturum, ingressum, me auctore, viam, decus omne Camenis? 75 Q ui Lucilius alter adest iam nomine in Urbe, nec minus interea natalis gloria pagi? 67 Interea Flavi menti observatur euntis A | 68 sibi fortuna dedisset B | 69 et dura A rebus, at B | 72 danystam placet acerbum A | danystan B | 74 prodisse, Latinisque A | 75 decus addere Musis A | 76 qui Lucilio in Urbe alter iam fertur ab illo A

Meeting and praising Maecenas and Horace (vv. 78-102) While meditating about his condition, Flavius suddenly bumps into no less a  person than Maecenas, descending from his palace on the Esquiline in his chariot (encounters with Maecenas in Hor.  Sat. 1.5.31 and Sat. 1.5.48, where Horace and Vergil are 13  Nomina expedire as “to settle, to pay” occurs in Cic. Att. 16.6.3 and 13.29.3. Plācet is  obviously the subjunctive of   the verb plācāre. Danista (“money-lender/ usurer”) occurs only in Plautus, who has the accusative danistam in Plaut. Pseud. 287.

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present; Sat. 2.6.33 mentions the Esquiline; the chariot raeda is mentioned in Sat. 2.6.42, both in connection with Maecenas). When the schoolmaster takes a  closer look, he notices that the great patron of   the arts is  accompanied by Horace. Again, the stops in v. 78 and v. 80 are remarkable and typical of   the satirical hexameter. Talia volventem subito comes occupat: “Ecce Maecenas!” – (curru vectus de more petebat Esquilias) – “Q uis?” ait “secum”? “Videsis”. Ubi primum 80 dispexit, Flaccum cognoscit. 80 “Nosti”. Simul atque A | 81 aspexit A

Flavius is stunned by the fact that his alumnus, born from a freedman father, managed to get accepted in the highest circles (v.  82 “libertino patre natum” echoes Hor. Sat. 1.6.45-46 and Suet. Vita Hor. fr. 40; see also Hor. Sat. 2.6.40-42 on Horace being accepted in Maecenas’s circle).14 The acceptance was all the more astonishing, given the royal Etruscan descent of  Maecenas (v. 83, referring to Hor.  Sat. 1.6.1-2 and Carm. 1.1.1). Flavius’s companion has even better news about Horace: about eight months earlier, he had been introduced into the circle of  Emperor Augustus himself: Septimus octavo propior iam mensis abivit 86 ex quo fas illi magnos contingere divos 15 86 propior mensis fugit, ex quo A | 87 fas est praesentes illi contingere divos A

It was Vergil who had arranged the introduction (v. 88: “munere Vergilii”, cf. Hor. Carm. 1.3.8 and 2.17.5 where Horace calls Vergil “half  of  his soul”). Bartoli now includes a pun, to be appreciated by connoisseurs of  Horace’s life and works (vv. 88-89: “anne / scriba, 14  B. Stenuit, “Horace, son éducation et la politique (jusqu’en 30)”, L’Antiquité Classique 88 (2019), 103-120 explains how Horace, or rather the persona he constructed, in the Satires is depicted as a poet who was active for a rather closed circle of  friends and removed from political ambition. However, politics caught up with him, and he got involved with the highest circles. 15  Compare with Hor. Sat. 1.6.60-62: “[…] respondes, ut tuus est mos, / pauca; abeo, et revocas nono post mense iubesque  / esse in amicorum numero” (on Horace being accepted in Maecenas’ circle by Vergil) and Hor.  Sat. 2.6.40-42: “septimus octavo propior iam fugerit annus,  / ex quo Maecenas me coepit habere suorum” (on Horace being accepted in Maecenas’ circle).

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rogo, satiras faceret quaestorius umquam?”). From the fragmentary Life of Horace we know that Horace had indeed refused Augustus’ offer of  a secretaryship.16 On their walk through Rome, Flavius and Caprius have now reached the statue of  Vertumnus, situated on the South of   the Forum, behind the temple of  Castor and Pollux, close to the Vicus Tuscus (v. 90: “Ventum erat ad Iani et Vertumni”, cf. Hor. Epist. 1.20.1). The bustling covered passage-ways housed a  well-attended book market, where the Sosii sold their books (vv. 92-95, cf. supra vv. 9-10 on the Sosii). Horace’s name is all over the place, and judging his latest satire, the audience now finds him even better than Lucilius (vv.  95-98, cf.  supra vv.  76-77 on Horace and Lucilius). Praise for Horace is unanimous: he brought satire to perfection, a genre that was not even touched by the Greeks (Q uint. Inst. 10.1.93: “Satura quidem tota nostra est” – Q uintilian also values Horace higher than Lucilius). Standing in a  corner, schoolmaster Flavius is proud about all this praise conferred on his disciple. […] Relegunt iterumque poetam, qui genus intactum Grais perfecerit, omnes unanimi clamore extollunt. Q uae simul audit 100 Flavius adridens vacua consistit in umbra, laude et in antiquum conlata gaudet alumnum. 100 uno animo salvere iubent. Q uae intus simul audit A | 102 laude ac in veterem A

Caprius leaves with some good advice (vv. 102-111a) Urgent business is awaiting Caprius, so he now has to leave Flavius and agrees to meet him again for dinner the same evening (vv. 103105). He offers Flavius the following advice. If  he is  finally unable to pay back the full sum to Ruso, he should just offer to pay with his intellectual endeavours, that is  with his poems (vv.  106108). Flavius is  upset with such advice: in no way is  the usurer going to accept this! Nonetheless, Caprius urges Flavius to insist. No matter how forcefully he will resist, in the end Ruso will be 16 Suet. Vita Hor. fr. 40: “Augustus epistolarum quoque ei officium optulit […] ac ne recusanti quidem aut succensuit quicquam aut amicitiam suam ingerere desiit.” See also Hor. Sat. 1.6.130-131: “his me consolor victurum suavius ac si / quaestor avus pater atque meus patruusque fuissent.”

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persuaded (note again the stops, which are thoroughly typical of  the satirical hexameter): […] “Negabit!…” “Si clamet, si oculos distorqueat ille,17 minetur quicquid, ne timeas, obsiste; domabitur: aude!” – 110 Sic ait, et properans discessit.

Horace enters the scene; a discussion on literature (vv. 110b-138) Meanwhile, the discussions on and praise of  Horace have not come to an end in the busy bookmarket. The old schoolmaster Flavius buys a piece of  Horace’s work, sits down in a remote corner, and starts reading (vv.  110b-113). What he bought turns out to be Horace’s third satire (v. 114: “Omnibus hoc vitium est cantoribus” is a quote from Hor. Sat. 1.3.1). When he has reached the passage in which the spendthrift Maenius 18 is  scorned (v.  115: “Iamque notabatur facilis dementia Maeni”, referring to Hor. Sat. 1.3.2124, cf.  also Sat. 1.1.101 and Epist. 1.15.26-40 about the same character), a man of short stature with greying hair enters the bookshop (vv. 116-117).19 Everybody recognises him as Horace, and so he is welcomed by all (vv. 117-119a).20 An enthusiastic attendant of   the bookstore, who later turns out to be the poet Cornelius Gallus, immediately claims that Horace has never produced anything more beautiful than his own poem, entitled Lycoris, which he ambitiously proclaims to be the very best in Latin poetry for ages to come (vv.  119b-121).21 Yet Horace mildly takes this as  Hor. Sat. 1.9.65: “distorquens oculos.”   A remarkable typo in version A, where the character is named Maevi. A character named Maevius, who is said to be thoroughly detested by Vergil too, indeed occurs in Hor. Epod. 10.2 and Verg. Buc. 3.90, but not in Horace’s third satire. 19   Compare v. 117 (“corporis exigui, praecanus inivit”), with Hor. Epist. 1.20.24 (“corporis exigui, praecanum”) describing himself, and Suet. Vita Hor. fr. 40 (“Habitu corporis fuit brevis atque obesus”). 20  In version A, it is Aristius Fuscus who accompanies Horace. Aristius Fuscus was an old friend of  Horace, a poet and grammarian, mentioned in Hor. Carm. 1.22.4; Sat. 1.9.61 and 1.10.83. Epist. 1.10 is dedicated to him. 21  Cornelius Gallus, a poet from the Augustan circle, wrote four books of  elegies, which appeared presumably between 50 and 40  bc. He called his mistress Lycoris (Prop. Eleg. 2.34.91). Only one line of Gallus’s elegies is  preserved (Morel–Büchner, FPL 99). On Gallus, see G. Luck, “Love Elegy”, in E. J. Kenney, W. V. Clausen (ed.), The Cambridge History of Classical Literature. II. Latin Literature (Cambridge, 1982), 17 18

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a  compliment, and at the same time points out that the Muses are favouring a  new star at the firmament of  Latin literature. Taking over from “the old man from Ascra” (v.  127, Hesiod is meant), this poet from Naples (v. 126: Parthenope) is now singing the praise of  Italy. In this reply by Horace, Bartoli displays full knowledge of  poetry by Vergil, who is obviously the new star alluded to. Leniter adrides: – “Nimio tu, Galle, moveris” Flaccus ait “studio nostri, quem praeterit esse, cui magis adspirent sacro de vertice Musae et quo nitatur Romanae gloria linguae. 125 Parthenope 22 nunc dulcis alit praecepta canentem Ascraei senis 23… Italiam iam laudibus ornat, magnam iterum frugum referens pecorumque parentem.” 24 123 studio nostris A

All of a sudden, all customers of  the bookstore want to know about Maro: his work and what of  it is about to be published by the Sosii. For this information, they believe that Horace is  the best source (vv. 129-131). Flavius is  hardly bothered by the literary news, as he is  entirely absorbed in his reading of  Horace’s third satire (v. 132, with totus in illa referring to the famous totus in illis of  Hor.  Sat. 1.9.2). When he arrives at the passage about the usurer Ruso of  verse 86, he immediately stops reading. Apparently, the lines give him inspiration on how to deal with the creditor (vv. 134-135). There is now no time to lose. Without even saluting his alumnus, he leaves the 405-419, at 410-411. Obviously, Bartoli could not know about ten other lines by Gallus, which have been discovered more recently. See R. D. Anderson, P. J. Parsons, R.  G.  M. Nisbet, “Elegiacs by Gallus from Q aşr Ibrîm”, Journal of Roman Studies 69 (1979), 125-155. 22 Verg. Georg. 4.563-564: “illo Vergilium me tempore dulcis alebat / Parthenope studiis florentem ignobilis oti” and the famous lines of Vergil’s epitaph (“Mantua me genuit, Calabri rapuere, tenet nunc / Parthenope. Cecini pascua rura duces”) as quoted by Don. Vit. Virg. 36. 23 Verg. Buc. 6.69-70: “dixerit: ‘hos tibi dant calamos (en accipe) Musae, / Ascraeo quos ante seni, […]’”. 24 Verg. Georg. 2.173-174 “salve, magna parens frugum, Saturnia tellus, / magna virum  […]”, with again a  mention of  an “Ascraeum  […] carmen” on v.  176; Georg. 4.559: “Haec super arvorum cultu pecorumque canebam.”

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place, looking at him with paternal pride, and wishing him eternal fame (cf. Hor. Carm. 3.30.1: aere perennius) Nec mora; discedens oculis bonus usque paternis 136 aspectat Flaccum, et veteri vetus ipse magister optat discipulo vincentem saecula famam. 136 discedens alios Flaccumque tuetur A | 137 deest in versione A | 138 maioremque optat devoto pectore famam A

The final encounter with Ruso (vv. 139-175) After an exiguous lunch and a  lonely walk of  another two hours, Flavius finally sets out for Ruso’s house. He now seems to be well prepared, and even takes into consideration the possibility that the evil creditor may refuse an offer and want the whole sum to be returned (vv. 139-144). In that worst case, praises (laudes) of  Ruso as a  poet will obtain what a  respectful approach (pietas) cannot. This recipe to success was apparently found in Horace’s satire. Q uem pietas nequeat, scribentem carmina laudes 145 quo tu, Flacce, modo tradis, mulcere valebunt. 145 si non danystam, scribentem at carmina laudes A

At first sight, however, the meeting does not seem promising. Ruso sits at his desk with an austere face (vv. 147-149). The following hexameters in true satiric fashion (harsh elision in v. 150, rather large amounts of  small and insignificant words, several unusual breaks, unusual shortening of  the -o of  respuo in v. 154) depict Flavius’s initial failure: Rem exponit, quibus et nequeat tunc solvere nomen 150 percenset causas… Mirari Ruso… negare… et se iussurum, ni praesens debita pendat omnia, quae in pago teneat venire sub hasta…25 – “At…” – “nihil excipio, mercedes respuo, sortem reddere ne cuncteris”. 150 tum solvere A  |  152 iamque sibi certum, ni praesens solveret, esse A | 153 in pago tenet, a  praecone venire A non ita recte, cum “venire” oporteat longam vocalem habere. 25  Same verse ending in Iuv. Sat. 3.33; while the passive vēnire in combination with sub hasta is found e.g., in Liv. AUC 23.37.13.

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Suddenly, things change. Flavius remarks that Ruso’s harsh refusal is  not in line with the character that is  usually ascribed to him. As everyone knows, Ruso is a poet. And would he, as a lover of  the arts, agonize a  fellow poet, beloved by the Muses and Phoebus Apollo (vv. 156-160)? The gentle reminder immediately takes away Ruso’s anger (vv.  161-163).26 He rushes to a  little box, in which he keeps his poems. Of  course, Flavius wants to get to know these works of  art and – quite unsurprisingly – praises them, or at least pretends to like them. Tum: “Mea sed claves servant hic carmina, paucis evolvenda quidem” (parvam digito indicat arcam) 165 – “Non facias quicquam mihi gratius” inquit “aventi” Flavius “ista velis si me cognoscere…” Et ille quaerere, et ex arca promptum recitare volumen: hic patiens audire, ad caelum extollere mendax. 168 expromptum de arca A

When Ruso has finally finished his recitation, roles have definitively been overturned. Instead of  a creditor, he now is Flavius’s debtor (see the pun on words creditor – debitor). He has no objections to an arrangement in which Flavius pays him off  in sixthmonthly instalments. On his way to dinner at Caprius’s place, the old schoolmaster turns back to his reading of  Horace’s third satire, of  which he seems to have reached verse 140 (v.  174 in Bartoli’s text is  a quote from Hor.  Sat. 1.3.140).27 It is  a jocular allusion to his possibly bad literary taste in praising Ruso’s poetry – a mistake his friends will surely indulge. Both the final version of   the poem and the early 1909 version end with an explicit alliteration. Desierat iam Ruso legens: cui creditor esset 170 aeris, nunc laudum fit debitor ipse; roganti annuit, ut detur sexto inde pecunia mense.

26  V. 163: “dentibus atque carens risu diducere rictum” reminds the readers of  Hor. Sat. 1.10.7 and Iuv. Sat. 10.230. The phrase diducere rictum is explained by Porphyry, Comm. in Hor. Serm. 1.10.7-8: “ERGO NON SATIS EST RISV DIDVCERE RICTVM AVDITORIS. Non satis est, inquit, tantum modo loqui, ut qui audiat rideat, quamvis non negaverim esse et in hoc non nullam virtutem.” 27  Note that Hor. Sat. 1.3.141-142 also discusses suffering some hardship in order to live a life with financial comfort.

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Flavius interea quae legit mane volutans: “Ignoscent, si quid peccaro stultus, amici”, ad Capri properat, primo iam vespere, coenam. 175 170 creditor aeris A | 171 esset, A | 175 ad dulcem properat, supremo sole, sodalem A

Bartoli’s readers might be left with a sense of  bewilderment about Ruso’s sudden change in attitude, but the key to understanding this is  a passage in Pomponius Porphyrio’s commentary on Hor.  Sat. 1.3.86-89. In this passage, Horace describes how Ruso’s debtors, in the case of   their not being able to pay off  their debts, have to listen “to sad stories with their neck stretched out” (amaras  / porrecto iugulo historias).28 For these “sad histories” and “stretched out neck”, Porphyrio has his own explanation: Octavius Ruso acerbus faenerator fuisse traditur, idem scriptor historiarum, ad quas audiendas significat solitum fuisse cogere debitores suos, quibus scilicet talia audire poena gravissima erat. Hoc enim significat “porrecto iugulo”.

To Porphyrio, Ruso himself  was a  failed writer, who obliged his debtors to be the audience of  his own poor literary production. No doubt, Bartoli was aware of  this particular explanation by Porphyrio, which became the leitmotiv for the plot of  his Primus Horatii Magister.

Conclusion Bartoli’s satire Primus Horatii Magister is  a display of  virtuosity in Latin literature and meter. It fits in a long tradition of  métier, in which the poet only reaches results after a  long and continuous struggle with the formal aspects of  language and poetry. The outcome of  this process is a truly enjoyable poem, the pleasure of  reading which is  greatly enhanced by understanding the many intertextual allusions to the Roman satirical tradition in general, and to Horace more specifically. Themes such as the underestimated intellectual/educator, the necessity of  flattering the power28  “odisti et fugis ut Rusonem debitor aeris, / qui nisi, cum tristes misero venere kalendae, / mercedem aut nummos unde unde extricat, amaras / porrecto iugulo historias captivus ut audit.”

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ful who have less intellectual skill, the consolation and advice to be found in the study of  literature possibly resonate with Bar­toli’s own experiences, though the satire itself  is bathed in a thoroughly ancient Roman setting, including topography of  the Eternal City. The emphasis on intertextual allusions and the concentration on bringing formal aspects of   the satirical meter to perfection also makes the Primus Horatii Magister a  rather “difficult” work of  art, the appreciation of  which does not only depend on a good knowledge of  Latin, but also on a solid acquaintance with the literary tradition of  satire. For more than one reason, the current academic climate makes a study of  a truly gifted poet as Bartoli a real challenge. One wonders whether an academic would ever spend his time reading through the whole collection of  Bartoli’s Latin poetry, with each single poem being worth a  full commentary. Still another step would be a comprehensive comparison between Bartoli and other Latin epigones of  Pascoli – their works too have hardly been studied.29 Meanwhile, we can take consolation in partial results, highlighting one specific work, with the hope of  spreading curiosity and enthusiasm to explore further with the audience. As I hope to have shown in this chapter, and to return to a financial metaphor of  creditors/debtors, the efforts definitely pay off. Versions: A “Ruso tucullio”, Rosa Melitensis 1.4 (1909), 2-4. B “Ruso tucullio”, Haarlem, Noord-Hollands Archief, 64 (Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen (KNAW) te Amsterdam), 829, n. 43 (1926). C Primus Horatii Magister. Carmen Alafridi Bartoli Pistoriensis in Certamine Hoeufftiano magna laude ornatum (Amsterdam, 1937).

29  V. Ragazzini, “Un erede del Pascoli latino: Alfredo Bartoli”, Convivium 2 (1930), 387-416. See also Giustiniani (as in note 6).

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Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 149-152 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124054

ALFREDO BARTOLI’S PRIMUS HORATII MAGISTER (1937)

REMCO REGTUIT

Q UINQ UE HAIKU THEODERICI IN HONOREM COMPOSITA

SI Q UIS DUBITET DE COPIA VERBORUM FONS UBERRIMUS ADMIRABILIS ACROASES FACIET PAR CICERONI CONTRA BARBAROS LITTERIS IMMINENTES CULTUS DEFENSOR RENASCENTIAE NECNON ANTIQ UITATIS PERITISSIMUS ELOQ UENS DOCTUS VIVAT ATQ UE FLOREAT THEODERICUS! SCRIPSIT REMUS BATAVUS GRONINGANUS

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CHRISTIAN LAES

MICHIEL VERWEIJ

VIA APPIA. AD THEODORICUM SACRÉ

Somniant pini calidis sub horis, Aestus impendet, tremulum cicadae Murmurant cantum, leviter susurrat Ventus in umbra; Allicit vini cyathus neglecti, Allicit carmen, placideque in herba Haurio stratus – modo poscit hora! – Somnia vatum.

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CHAPTER 2

ITALIAN HUMANIST POETRY

JEROEN DE KEYSER

Q UID NON COGAT AMOR?

CARLO GONZAGA AND LYDA’S LOVE STORY IN FILELFO’S SPHORTIAS *

If  Neo-Latin epic poems and modern-day academia have one thing in common, it may be that often little love is  lost between their protagonists. It made Ludwig Braun wonder “Why there is no love in Neo-Latin epic poetry?” Braun states that “obedient Latinists, respecting the sublimity of   the epic genre and the ecclesiastical character of   the Latin language, shied away from the abyss of  desperate love” and therefore refrained from telling stories in which they imitated the famous love affair between Dido and Aeneas in Vergil’s Aeneid 4. However, as Braun points out, such reluctance mainly concerns the (eponymous) protagonists of  Neo-Latin epic, since other characters may indeed occasionally indulge in more frivolous behavior: Liebesverirrungen begegnen allenfalls bei Nebenhelden, wie bei Masinissa mit Sophonisbe in Petrarcas Africa (1338) […], oder z.B. in Fran­ce­sco Filelfos Sphortias (um 1451), wo Francesco Sforza natürlich als Ritter ohne Furcht und Tadel über jede Anfechtung erhaben ist, nur sein Unterfeldherr Carlo Gonzaga versäumt über einem Liebesabenteuer seine militärischen Pflichten und wird streng zurechtgewiesen; ans eigentlich Tragische rührt das aber auch nicht.1

Whether Filelfo’s 2 hero Francesco Sforza is really beyond reproach – as an epic hero, and to the poet’s own eye – has been the object *  It is my pleasure to thank Keith Sidwell for proofreading my English. 1  L. Braun, “Warum gibt es im Neulateinischen Epos keine Liebe?”, Listy filologické / Folia philologica 137 (2014), 339-348, at 343 and 348. 2   For an introduction to Filelfo’s life and oeuvre, see P. Viti, “Filelfo, Francesco”, in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, vol.  47 (Roma, 1997), 613-626. More recent Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 155-166 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124055

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of  some scholarly debate,3 yet in this contribution I would like to focus on the notable exception that is Carlo Gonzaga’s love story.4 Although he is by no means the Sphortias’s protagonist, Gonzaga is  among the poem’s main characters, and the story of  his loveaffair with the unknown (and most likely fictitious) married Lyda runs to almost half  of  book 4 of   the poem (4.61-336).5 It is  also a fact that for some time Filelfo had high hopes about Gonzaga’s chances of  becoming the next leader of  Milan, after the demise of  Filippo Maria Visconti in 1447. He became Capitano del Popolo on 14 November 1448 and this appointment was celebrated by Filelfo in an oration held on 9 July 1449. Gonzaga’s triumph was to be ephemeral, though. Only two months later, he had to undergo Francesco Sforza’s take-over of  Milan and settle for a  subordinate position; Filelfo apparently did not circulate the oration, which survives in a single Ambrosiana manuscript.6 bibliography in J.  De Keyser (ed.), Francesco Filelfo, Collected Letters (Epistolarum libri XLVIII) (Alessandria, 2015), 9 n.  1; and J.  De Keyser (ed.), Francesco Filelfo, Man of  Letters (Leiden – Boston, MA, 2018), 1-3, 271-303. 3 D.  Robin, Filelfo in Milan (Princeton, 1991), 56-81, descried implicit criticism of  Sforza in Filelfo’s description of   the sack of  Piacenza in Sphortias III. Her “second voice” reading of  the Sphortias was drawn upon by C. Kallendorf, The Other Virgil. Pessimistic Readings of   the Aeneid in Early Modern Culture (Oxford, 2007), 50-66, yet dismissed by T.  Burkard, “Kannte der Humanismus ‘den anderen Vergil’? Zur two voices-Theorie in der lateinischen Literatur der frühen Neuzeit”, in T. Burkard, M. Schauer, C. Wiener (ed.), Vestigia Vergiliana. Vergil-Rezeption in der Neuzeit (Berlin, 2010), 31-50, and ultimately in J.  De Keyser, “Picturing the Perfect Patron? Francesco Filelfo’s Image of  Francesco Sforza”, in P. Baker, J. Helmrath, R. Kaiser, M. Priesterjahn (ed.), Portraying the Prince in the Renaissance. The Humanist Depiction of  Rulers in Historiographical and Biographical Texts (Berlin, 2016), 391-414. 4  For Gonzaga’s life and the numerous twists in his political and military obedience see I. Lazzarini, “Gonzaga, Carlo,” in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, vol. 57 (Roma, 2001), 693-696. An overview of Filelfo’s interaction with the Gonzaga family is  offered by A.  Luzio, R.  Renier, “I Filelfo e  l’umanesimo alla corte dei Gonzaga”, Giornale storico della letteratura italiana 16 (1890), 119-217. 5  According to G. Bottari, “La Sphortias”, in R. Avesani, G. Billanovich et al. (ed.), Francesco Filelfo nel Q uinto Centenario della Morte (Padova, 1986), 459-493, at 491492, the entire love story was somehow inspired by Enea Silvio Piccolomini’s Historia de duobus amantibus. 6  For Gonzaga’s short-lived success in Milan and in particular Filelfo’s celebration of  Gonzaga as the perfect princeps, see M.  Celati, “Filelfo e  Carlo Gonzaga. L’Ora­tio de laudibus illustris Karoli Gonzagae, fra storia, oratoria e teoria poli­ tica”, in G.  Alba­nese, P.  Pontari (ed.), Filelfo e  la storia (Firenze, 2017), 127-144. The Ambro­siana manuscript (F 55 sup., f.  13r-17v, digital copy available on the Ambrosiana’s website) was published by R. G. Adam, Filelfo at the Court of  Milan (1439-1480). A Contribution to the Study of  Humanism in Northern Italy (Oxford,

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In the Sphortias’s short story Venus lures Sforza’s ally Carlo Gonzaga to Milan, where he is  welcomed by the citizens. When he and Lyda see each other, it is love at first sight. Lyda is desperately in love but unsure what to do, since she is  newly married and does not want to give in to her infatuation. For ten days she remains paralyzed and avoids the equally infatuated Gonzaga: Q uid faciat nescit; quod non vult sponte, quod odit, vult invita quidem penitusque liquescit amando. Nec tamen audet amans. Solum terrebat inertem nomen adulterii, quod nollet amica vocari. 110 Non et enim poterat per vincla iugalia dulcis ire sub amplexus, quae nuper iuncta marito est. Sic igitur secum lachrymis effatur abortis: “Me miseram! Q uae saeva meum sibi pectus Erinys vendicat et tantos miserae mihi suscitat ignes! 115 Uror amans; nec amare libet. Num carmine forsan Karolus invitam cogat dare colla cathaenis? Non equidem faxo. Potius pia numina nostrum membratim tenerum properent rescindere corpus quam sim moecha viro.” Dixitque et maesta cubili 120 incubuit longis frustra se flaetibus ulta. Nec minus interea stimulis cruciatur amoris Karolus, ingeminans repetito nomine “Lyda! Lyda! Mihi tu sola places, mihi sola videris digna puellarum, mihi quam Cytherea recepit. 125 Q uid fugis? Aut ubi es? An me despicis? Aspice quanta turba puellaris me deperit!” Omnia ventus verba rapit nec Lyda pias accommodat aures. Sic nonus decimusque dies per inania vanis verba terit votis. Amat hic, amat illa; sed alter 130 hanc tenuisse cupit, fugit haec velocior aura.

Disguised as Lyda’s sister-in-law Claudia, Venus encourages Lyda to work less and enjoy life more instead. She suggests accompanying her to church the next day. Lyda dresses up and goes to church. When she sees Gonzaga, they smile at each other. Venus points out to Lyda how handsome Gonzaga is and how pleasant it would be to be in his arms:

1974), 340-345. In the same period, Filelfo addressed his Satyra 10.7 (inc. “Imperitat late Latiumque”) to Carlo Gonzaga, whom he also praises in Satyra 10.8 (inc. “Libertas en tota perit”); both are still to be read in the 1476 incunabulum edition [ISTC ip00615000].

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Q uanta tibi, quam dulcis erit, mea Lyda, voluptas, huius in amplexus si veneris oscula iungens, quantaque sit talis cognoris gratia furti. Non ignota loquor. Nam me quoque Karolus olim ardebat. Nec enim quicquam tibi, Lyda, silebo. 215 Nunc tua pulchra, meus fuerat qui totus, ademit forma sibi. Nec me livor tamen ullus habebit (sic es cara mihi) quin sit communis utrique unus amor. Meliusque duae potiemur amante, dum nemo affuerit qui conscia furta recludat.” 220

Lyda gives in. The next day she sends off  her wine-loving husband to his vineyard. Still, she is in doubt. Venus tricks Lyda again, sending her a letter listing numerous mythological illustrations of   the omnipotence of  Amor. Lyda is  aroused and imagines Gon­zaga making love with her: “Q uid metuis tandem? Nemo sit conscius huius tam dulcis laetique boni. Tu sola cubile, 325 dum vir abest, servas. Promittit et hortulus iste et postica viam nullo custode latentem. Praeterea quis obesse tibi verbove manuve audebit, dum te tuus hic, mea Lyda, tuetur Karolus?” Attentas quod postquam nomen in auris 330 irruit, obstupuit penitus prolapsaque toto corpore diriguit. Q uam tempestiva sagaxque et Venus affatu recreat rursusque Cupido igne domat; fingitque volens ut nocte silenti sentiat haerentem quantus consurgat in hastam 335 Karolus et quantos geminans intorqueat ictus.

Filelfo then leaves the two lovers alone, and “dum voti Gonzaga sui fit victor, amata / dum fruitur Lyda, dum totus amore triumphat,” we return to Sforza himself  and the poem’s main action. In the opening pages of  book five, though, Filelfo returns to the love story, pointing out that Gonzaga is still away without leave: At neque tam crebris monitis placidisque tabellis iussus adhuc Gonzaga duci comes ibat in arma, quem superabat Amor Lydae parere coactum. Q uid non cogat Amor? Puer hic et caecus et amens 30 quod valuit pectus levibus penetrare sagittis atque gravi flexisse iugo, sibi subdit ad omne imperium, ingenui contempta lege pudoris.

Sforza then writes a letter to Gonzaga, urging him to surface, and the latter complies. 158

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While from a narratological viewpoint the epyllion is a digression, only loosely connected to the Sphortias’s plot, its various connections with Filelfo’s oeuvre as a whole contribute in an interesting way to our understanding of  his modus operandi as a writer working in a context driven by competition and patronage. Initially, soon after Francesco Sforza became the ruler of  Milan in 1450, Filelfo planned a  poem of  twenty-four books honoring his new patron’s triumph, but he gradually downsized his Homeric ambitions. The number was down to sixteen books by 1455, as we can see in a letter from that year to Antonio Beccadelli (il Panor­ mita), where he mentions “Libri futuri sunt sexdecim.” When Filelfo revised his epistolarium twenty years later, it had become even more modest: “Libri futuri sunt quattuordecim (ut spero)” (PhE·13.32).7 A first set of  four books was finished by the end of  1455 and another set of four in 1460. While hardly any progress seems to have been made after Sforza’s demise in March 1466, dedication copies of  the Sphortias were sent out to rulers all over Italy, as almost overt applications for a  position at another court. We have two such codices containing the first redaction in four books, and four containing the eight-book version. While Filelfo himself appears to have been proud enough of his accomplishment to distribute it among a  prominent readership, at least some of his readers begged to differ. The work met its fiercest critic in Filelfo’s contemporary Galeotto Marzio, who wrote two polemical letters denouncing the Sphortias’s alleged literary and prosodic flaws.8 For a  long time, scholarship has hardly been kinder, 7  All references to Filelfo’s epistolarium are to the serial numbers and text as published in my 2015 critical edition (as in n. 2). For a more detailed account of   the transmission of   the Sphortias, see J. De Keyser, Francesco Filelfo and Francesco Sforza. Critical Edition of  Filelfo’s Sphortias, De Genuensium deditione, Oratio parentalis, and his Polemical Exchange with Galeotto Marzio (Hildesheim – Zürich – New York, 2015), xi-xix. 8  Filelfo ends his fierce rebuttal of  Marzio’s criticism by priding himself  on being the only writer of  his generation – if  not of  all time – to be so fluent in both Latin and Greek, prose and verse: “Q uod autem ad me attinet: quid de me ipso sentiam, quid praestare audeam, dicere non dissimulabo. Fateor equidem permultos fuisse Latinos viros (et fortassis etiam esse), quibus in omni genere vel disciplinae vel eloquentiae sim ducendus inferior. At illud quoque mihi gloriari licet: me solum esse hac tempestate, qui in omni dicendi genere, et versu pariter et soluta oratione, tum Latine audeam, tum etiam Graece omnia quae velim quamfacillime et scribere et loqui; id quod ex homini-

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considering the poem either exceedingly or inadequately encomiastic. The Lyda episode, in particular, has been heavily criticized as an inappropriate insertion. In his assessment of  the episode, Andrea Novara pulls no punches, dismissing the way Filelfo describes the love story as brutal and entirely vulgar, unworthy of  epic poetry, too easy-going and even against (women’s) nature. According to Novara the episode reveals the gross poet’s true character, as he extols “the triumph of  prostitution”.9 Hardly less condemnatory was Vladimiro Zabughin: he considers Filelfo’s epic machinery a  caricature of   the classical model, and Lyda an unworthy heir to Vergil’s Dido. He is  particularly offended by Venus’ argument that she herself  used to be Carlo Gonzaga’s lover, assuring Lyda that she sees no reason for jealousy. While Zabughin disparages Filelfo as a precursor of   the fifteenthcentury macaronic poet Teofilo Folengo, he somewhat grudgingly concedes that, on the whole, the poem is not badly written, displaying some felicitous Vergilian similes.10 bus nostris video nemini, neque poetae neque oratori, eidem uni adhuc contigisse, non modo praesentibus ac vivis, sed ne ex universa quidem antiquitate. Tu siquem alterum habes, quaeso in medium referas.” (PhE·24.01, 31 October 1464). Filelfo makes the same claim in, e.g., PhE·14.10, 14.28, 34.21, 37.02 and 41.12; see for this theme J.  De Keyser, “The Poet and the Pope. Francesco Filelfo’s Common Cause with Sixtus IV”, Schede Umanistiche 26 (2012 [re vera 2015]), 43-65. 9  A.  Novara, “Un poema latino del Q uattrocento: La Sforziade di Francesco Filelfo”, Carmagnola 1879 [reprinted in Rivista ligura di scienze, lettere ed arti 28 (1906)], 19-22: “Viene qui introdotto un episodio d’amore: è  un amore, in cui Fìlelfo stesso avea fatto da mezzano fra Carlo Gonzaga e  Lida donna Piacenna. Ma al posto del Filelfo viene messa qui più dignitosamente Venere stessa. Già questa Dea avea cercato di allontanare dalla battaglia il giovane, promettendogli l’amore di quella donna. […] Siamo ben lontani da uno svolgimento graduale della passione: abbiamo qui la brutalità dei sensi riscaldati: non quel fenomeno umano così complesso nella sua natura, che è l’amore. […] Ma qui volgare è il modo di innamorarsi, come volgari sono le vicende tutte della passione. […] Q ueste sbirciate che si danno i due amanti nel tempio, non han nulla di epico. La ritrosia della donna sembra omai vinta e senza troppa difficoltà. Il Filelfo ama gli scioglimenti facili. […] Come parlano queste donne del Filelfo! E poi un amore in due! Senza pensare che ciò è innaturale, e sopratutto in donne, bisogna ben credere che esse son giunte all’ultimo grado della più grossa sensualità. […] È questo l’episodio amoroso che Filelfo introdusse in questi primi quattro libri del poema. È una preziosa pagina che ci rivela l’anima del poeta. C’è del grossolano e del meretricio: vi è cantato il trionfo della prostituzione.” 10 V.  Zabughin, Vergilio nel Rinascimento italiano da Dante a  Torquato Tasso (Bologna, 1921), 298-299: “In linea generale, il θεῖον del Filelfo pare una forbita caricatura del soprannaturale classico  […]; la dea Venere conduce in chiesa, alla messa di Natale, una ragazza piacentina, eroina dell’episodio patetico, che dovrebbe corrispondere a  quello di Didone, o, meglio, a  quello di Sofonisba. Q uest’episodio svela tutto Filelfo e tutta la Sforziade. È impostata colla massima solennità: Lida, la prota-

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Rudolf  G. Adam, in 1974, was still mainly echoing Novara’s assessment, stating that Filelfo’s “encomium of  adultery” reflects the poet’s tendency to “fall headlong into the lurid twilight of  vulgar obscenities” and singling out Sphortias 4 as “the extreme point in vulgar perversion of  sexual morality, unredeemed by any spark of  wit or elegance.” 11 Recent readers have shown themselves less judgmental: Diana Robin calls the story “the erotic encounter between a  married woman and one of   the book’s heroes”, pointing out how this “adulterous love affair” creates a  contrast between the poem’s eponymous hero and Gonzaga.12 Marta Celati, finally, is most appreciative of   the way Filelfo relates Gonzaga’s love affair in “un raffinato racconto erotico”.13 In my opinion, book 4 is indeed among the most readable of   the entire Sphortias, and displays a sophisticated and at times amusing emulation of  Aeneid 4, combined with Ovidian wit and a certain Boccaccian flavour. Apart from the carefully produced presentation copies of   the four or eight finished books of   the Sphortias, we have a particular partial witness in a miscellanea manuscript at the Biblioteca Mar­ciana. On its folia 103r-108r, ms. lat. XIV 262 (4719) contains the Lyda and Carlo story in what appears to be an earlier redaction than gonista, è descritta nello splendore della sua purpurea veste di seta, della sua cintura preziosa, alta di statura, bianca e rosea. Da principio essa prende molto sul serio la parte di Didone, invoca Ecate, ricorre ad incantesimi; ma ben presto smarrisce le orme delle antiche eroine. Venere, camuffata da mortale, sotto le spoglie della sorella Claudia, fa da serpente tentatore e  persuade boccaccescamente Lida di non vergognarsi, ché, anch’essa, maritata, fu l’amante del novello Massinissa, Carlo Gonzaga, e per giunta l’assicura di non essere gelosa della seconda passione di lui. […] Certamente il borioso Tolentinate era lontanissimo dall’idea di scrivere un poema eroicomico, eppure la storia letteraria lo deve registrare tra i  lontani precursori del Folengo. Si badi poi, che, nell’insieme, il poema non è scritto male. Se abbondano italianismi […], barbarismi e stridenti prosaismi, essi vengono compensati da squarci di riuscita imitazione virgiliana, specie dalle similitudini.” 11   Adam 1974 (as in n. 6), 81 and 242. He reads the entire episode as a realistic report, assuming that Filelfo acted as go-between in a true story, writing love letters on Gonzaga’s behalf. 12  Robin 1991 (as in n.  3), 59 and 62: “Book 4, like Aeneid Book 4, contains the only love story in the poem. But here Aeneas’s conflicting desires are sorted out and manifested in two separate characters. Sforza is the rational, loyal, pius Aeneas, while Sforza’s chief  lieutenant Carlo Gonzaga is  the irrational, sexualized Aeneas, who falls in love with a married woman.” 13  Celati 2017 (as in n. 6), 143.

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the one in the later presentation copies.14 Its title reads: “Fran­cisci Philelfi ex quarto Sphortiados ad illustrem dominum d.  Karolum de Gonzaga, marchionem Mantuae.” The epyllion is  followed, on f.  108v, by a  short letter to its male protagonist. In it, Filelfo assures Gonzaga of  his unwavering dedication and steadfast sym­pa­ thy, stating that just as in his previous minor literary writings, the Sphortias is  praising Gonzaga both in a  serious way and in jest. Furthermore, Filelfo inquires about Gonzaga’s well-being and confesses that he wishes himself to leave Milan more than anything else, since “begging and writing poetry do not go together”. Potes ex his pauculis versibus intelligere, inclyte Karole, nulla fortunae mutabilitate fieri in hanc diem potuisse ut splendidissimi tui nominis, ut nostrae mutuae benivolentiae obliviscerer. Nam cum alia nostra opuscula, tum et Sphortias ipsa tota, quam scribimus tuis laudibus, seriorum iocorumque inventu referta est. Hoc autem tempore nihil est quod magis cupiam quam de tuo omni statu certior fieri. Nam de meo nihil habeo, nihil est novi quod audias. Ita sum constitutus, ut nihil malim quam mutare caelum; id quod non diu post futurum spero. Sunt enim Musae eo ingenio, ut nulla cura angi velint, ut nolint cogitare de crastino. Mendicare et canere simul esse non possunt. Vale, decus meum. Ex Mediolano, ‹XI› Kalendas Augustas 1454. Siquid es litterarum aut aliud quicquam ad me daturus, id omne clarissimo patricio Veneto Bernardo Iustiniano, summi illius viri Leo­ nardi filio, deferri iube. Illustratissimae dominationis tuae observantissimus Franciscus Philelfus.

It is safe to assume that when, on 22 July 1454,15 Filelfo sent a copy of  his Lyda story to Gonzaga, he had actually just finished it in the earlier version. In fact, all the manuscripts transmitting the complete four (or eight) books contain the Lyda episode in 14  The manuscript’s current f.  103-111 originally formed a  separate libellus. On  f.  114r-127v, written by a  different hand, the codex contains 31 letters by Filelfo; see De Keyser 2015 (as in n. 2), 19. They have no connection with the Gonzaga section. 15  I inserted ‹XI› before the manuscript’s “Kal. Augustas” because of   the “Ex Mediolano XI Kal.  Augustas MCCCCLIIII” at the bottom of  f.  111r, under the second poem (see infra): the use of   the accusative “Augustas”, in both cases, makes it more plausible that ‹XI› was erroneously omitted here than that it would have been interpolated in the second date. This letter was first published in Adam 1974 (as in n.  6), 435. He prints “Kalendis Augustas” and “intentu(?)” instead of  “inventu”.

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a more extended version. Verses 4.142-144, 272-282, and 300-305 are absent from the Marciana manuscript. In the first of   these three instances, precisely these three verses were added afterwards in the margin of  Filelfo’s autograph master copy of   the Sphortias, now ms. 415 at the Biblioteca Casanatense in Rome.16 The letter to Carlo Gonzaga accompanying the Sphortias excerpt is followed by a Heroides-style poem (f. 109r-111r), allegedly written by Lyda to her absent lover, which was included as carmen  5.4 in Filelfo’s collection of  Odes. Lyda’s complaint is written in elegiac distichs (v. 1-68), the follow-up, in the poet’s voice, in hendecasyllables (v. 69-122).17 Here too we find some variants between the final redaction and the original version sent to Carlo Gonzaga from which the Marciana manuscript descends. This earlier version lacks the last elegiac distich, bluntly accusing Gon­zaga of  being a faithless lover (v. 67-68): Karolus innumeras ardens Gonzaga puellas, in nullam stabili perflat amore diu.

In the second part, there are several variants as well; most strikingly, verses 79-83 have been rewritten to claim that Filelfo is entitled to complain about Gonzaga’s response to his dedication: Primitive version (Marciana ms.)

Final redaction (ed. Robin)

Philelfus hic est quem virtus tibi, qua micas in omnis 80 heroas vel ut unus inter astra Phoebus, conciliavit atque vinclis iunxit perpetui piis amoris.

Poeta certe de te iure queratur unus ille, quem virtus tibi, qua micas in omnis illustris proceres, piis amoris vinclis conciliavit atque iunxit.

While each of   these changes might be read as cases of  innocent teasing of  a close friend, as one might deduce from Filelfo’s depiction of  his patron as an adulterer in the first place, taken together they seem to indicate that something more is in play. When Filelfo sent his Sphortias excerpt and carmen 5.4 to Gonzaga in July 1454, these dedications were not without pre­ce­  Description of   the manuscript in G.  Giri, “Il codice autografo della Sforziade di Francesco Filelfo”, Atti e  memorie della R.  Deputazione di storia patria per le Marche 5 (1901), 421-457. 17  Edition and translation in D.  Robin (ed., trans.), Francesco Filelfo, Odes (Cambridge, MA, 2009), 302-311. 16

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dent. He had previously dedicated Odes 1.3, 2.1, 2.5, 3.2, and 3.9 to the same patron, first praising him lavishly for his munificentia and benignitas, and thanking him for what might be regarded as his exaggeratedly numerous munera, whereas 3.9 was a  first letter in Heroides-style by Lyda, complaining about her lover’s departure and silence after he left Milan and defected to Venice, abandoning thereby not only his lover Lyda but also his faithful friend and dependent Francesco Filelfo, as we read at the end of  this ode.18 Another aspect to consider, is  that Filelfo’s sending of   the Sphortias excerpt in combination with Ode 5.4 reflected a  tried and tested method for eliciting patronage. One year before, on 22 June 1453, he had written to Carlo’s estranged brother Ludo­ vico Gonzaga, asking him directly for a contribution to his daughter’s dowry in exchange for a  prominent role in the Sphortias.19 Later, in January 1460, he donated the first part of   the (never completed) book 11 to Pope Pius  II, likewise staging him as an epic character and angling in the cover letter for feedback – and, of  course, fitting remuneration.20 As far as Carlo Gonzaga is  concerned, we know for sure that Filelfo not only sent him the Lyda episode and several odes, but a  dedication copy of   the completed first four books as well. On 19 August 1455, Filelfo wrote to his trusted friend Nico­demo Tranchedini, who acted as Francesco Sforza’s ambassador in Florence and who was, at that moment, sojourning in Siena, inviting him to inquire whether Gonzaga had received the Sphortias copy that Filelfo had sent to Niccolò Guarino, Gonzaga’s secretary in

  Ibid., at 30-33, 84-99, 122-123, 162-171 and 202-209.   PhE·11.31: “Itaque abs te peto ac etiam, si pateris, rogo ut huic meo adolescenti, qui tibi litteras reddidit, aureos quinquaginta dono ad me des ea lege condicioneque, ut, nisi in Sphortiade tibi conflatum aes omne pro dignitate dissolvero, ego tibi fiam pro debitore creditor.” See De Keyser 2016 (as in n.  3), at 411-412, for an analysis of   the interaction with Ludovico Gonzaga, who did indeed get a prominent role in Sphortias 7 and 8. 20  PhE·15.42: “Itaque principium undecimi Sphortiados libri idcirco ad te dedi, ut videres eam orationem, qua te usum facio, cum orator es missus a Frederico caesare ad Mediolanensem populum, quo se is  tempore in libertatem (hoc est, in atrocissimam teterrimamque tyrannida) vendicarat. Nam ea in re orator esse volui, non poeta. Nullis enim figurationibus sum usus. Rem ita exposui, ut gesta est, neque in aliam speciem convertendo traduxi. Siquid autem est a me praetermissum, tuae mansuetudinis benignitatisque fuerit, qui veritate unus omnium delectaris, me facere certiorem.” 18 19

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Venice.21 In another letter to Tranchedini, dated 22 February 1456, Filelfo expresses the hope that Carlo Gonzaga is doing well. Interestingly, the copy of   the letter as it is transmitted by Tranchedini’s letter collection, ms. 834 at the Biblioteca Riccardiana in Florence, adds one more sentence, deleted from Filelfo’s own redaction of  this letter: it repeats his request to ask Gonzaga whether he has received the Sphortias copy that was sent to him a while ago.22 In the following months, on 14 March and on 13 April 1456, Filelfo wrote twice to his Venetian friend Pietro Tommasi urging him to deliver, as soon as possible, an attached letter to Carlo Gonzaga.23 Filelfo did not include these two letters in his epistolarium, nor insert any previous ones sent to Carlo Gonzaga. Moreover, after the forwarding requests to Tommasi, he never again deigned to mention his former protector, who passed away unexpectedly in Ferrara on 20 December 1456. Apparently it had “come to distances” soon after Gonzaga left Milan, his apparent prominence in the Carmina notwithstanding.24 Filelfo pivoted quickly and two 21  PhE·12.73: “Vale, cum Senensibus tuis istis stagnis oraque maritima. Ipsum caelum petimus stulticia: venamini enim ventos. Tu Karolo Gonzagae, heroi meo nobilissimo, me commenda. Velimque ex eo certior fias acceperitne in hanc diem meam Sphortiada. Nam illa iandiu reddita est una cum meis ad se litteris Nicolao Guaryno, scribae suo, Venetiis.” According to Lazzarini’s biography (as in n.  4), “nel 1455 il Gonzaga tentò di porsi al servizio del papa, stipulando una condotta al soldo di Siena contro Jacopo Piccinino il quale, licenziato dalla Serenissima dopo la pace di Lodi, aveva occupato Assisi, nello Stato della Chiesa, ma non si recò mai in Toscana.” Filelfo’s letter to Tranchedini in Siena, appears to suggest that Filelfo at least assumed that Gonzaga did set out for Tuscany and that Tranchedini had direct access to him in the Siena area. On Filelfo’s correspondence with Tranchedini, see P. Sverzellati, “Il carteggio di Nicodemo Tranchedini e le lettere di Francesco Filelfo”, Aevum 71.2 (1997), 441-529; and M.  Menchelli, “Una lettera di Agostino Dati a  Francesco Filelfo e  l’amicitia umanistica con Nicodemo Tranchedini”, Archivio Storico per le Province Parmensi 67 (2015), 77-95. 22  PhE·13.13: “Illustrem meum maecoenatem, Karolum Gonzagam, magno et excelso animo virum, salvere plurimum opto [a quo discas velim habueritne quattuor primos Sphortiados nostrae libros quos iampridem dedi ad se].” 23 PhE·13.17: “Rem mihi facturus es admodum gratam in primisque periucundam, si litteras hisce tuis adnexas reddi curaveris Karolo Gonzagae et quamcelerrime et quamdiligentissime. Q uod ut facias, te maiorem in modum rogo.” PhE·13.21: “Ego Carminum opus hoc tempore sum aediturus; id quod regis Francorum Karoli dicavi nomini. Tu velim litteras meas, tuis hisce inclusas, quamcelerrime et quamaccuratissime reddi cures maecoenati meo, Karolo Gonzagae.” 24  D. Robin (as in n. 17), XVI: “The figure of  Carlo Gonzaga, who is portrayed in Odes 2.1, casts a  long shadow over Books 3 and 5. Elected captain of  the Ambrosian Republic in 1448, Carlo remained one of  the city’s chief  military leaders and political advisors until Sforza’s accession to the throne. Odes 2.1, which celebrates the myth-

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months later, on 16 June 1456, announced to his friend Anto­nio Beccadelli in Naples his intention to travel to France to offer a copy of  his Carmina, which initially without any doubt were to be dedicated to Carlo Gonzaga, to King Charles  VII, the new dedicatee of   the collection as a  whole.25 Gonzaga himself  may have given Filelfo the cold shoulder, upon receiving the Lyda story and subsequently the entire Sphortias, but his snubbed former protégé in response edited his writings to display more overt criticism and less complicité. He even deleted three more poems dedicated to Gonzaga from the final Carmina redaction,26 and decided to exclude his entire correspondence with Gonzaga from his published epistolarium.27 Once a  promising ally, as the presumptive heir to the throne in Filelfo’s hometown Milan, Gonzaga had suddenly left the scene. Filelfo let him vanish into silence, his memory expendable. All that remains of   the physical traces of   their closeness is a carmen et error story in a single Marciana manuscript.

ological origins of   the Gonzaga dynasty in Mantua and portrays Carlo Gonzaga as the model prince, makes it clear that Filelfo had at one time championed Gonzaga’s ascent to the Milanese signory. […]  Filelfo dedicated more odes to the republican captain from Mantua than any other figure in the Carmina.” 25  PhE·13.32: “Scribo etiam Odas (quae nostri nominant Carmina) eruntque decem millia versuum, in omni metrorum genere. Aeduntur a me in praesentia libri quinque eius operis, quos ipse ad Karolum regem Francorum mecum sum advecturus intra quindecim dies. Hi complectuntur quinque millia versuum.” Filelfo had been laying the ground for this dedication in a series of letters to Charles’ courtiers Thomas de Coron (PhE·12.39, 12.64, 12.66, 12.67, 12.79, 12.84, 13.11, 13.15, 13.23, 13.31) and Guillaume Jouvenel des Ursins (PhE·12.16, 12.19, 12.63, 12.65, 12.68, 12.80, 12.83, 13.10, 13.14, 13.30), all of  1454-1456. The invitation to travel to France never materialized. 26  Maintaining them would have made Gonzaga’s predominance in a collection that in the meantime was to celebrate another (potential) patron even more problematic; see Celati 2017 (as in n. 6), 133. 27  Filelfo did include, on the contrary, thirteen letters to Carlo’s brother Ludovico Gonzaga, Marquis of  Mantua, dated between 1452 and 1477 (PhE·10.08, 10.10, 11.05, 11.31, 11.33, 12.76, 12.77, 14.01, 15.47, 25.31, 28.01, 43.22, 47.32). The siblings’ strained relationship (to put it mildly) may have inspired Filelfo opportunistically to suppress evidence of  his close ties with the departed one. Filelfo’s continued begging for support from Ludovico is also illustrated in a series of  letters in Italian, for which see N.  Marcelli (ed.), Francesco Filelfo, Lettere volgari (Firenze, 2019), letters 16, 18-20, 24, 49 and 105-106. A  reply by Ludovico, turning down Filelfo’s request for money because of  his own financial difficulties (“A quello che è  impossibile niuno è obbligato”), was published by Luzio 1890 (as in n. 4), at 169.

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TWO ENIGMATIC EPIGRAMS IN BERLIN, STAATSBIBLIOTHEK ZU BERLIN, MS. LAT. Q UARTO 469

In the miscellaneous manuscript Lat. quarto 469 (olim Morbio 490) of   the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz, the name “Philelphus  / Filelfus” occurs on three folia: f.  99v, 158r, and 159v. On f. 99v, a fragment of  eleven lines is given from Fran­ cesco Filelfo’s Consolatio ad Iacobum Antonium Marcellum de obitu Valerii filii.1 The renowned fifteenth-century humanist composed this Latin prose consolation of  more than 30,000 words for the Venetian nobleman Jacopo Antonio Marcello after the death of  Marcello’s eight-year-old son, Valerio.2 On f.  158r and 159v, two epigrams of two and four verses, respectively, are also attributed to Philelphus / Filelfus. The identity of   their real author, however, 1   I would like to thank Jeroen De Keyser, the editors of  this volume, and the anonymous referee for their valuable comments and suggestions. 2  An excellent overview of  Filelfo’s life and works can be found in P.  Viti, “Filelfo, Francesco”, in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani [henceforth DBI], vol. 47 (Roma, 1997), 613-626; J.  De Keyser lucidly surveys a  century of  Filelfo studies in the introduction to Francesco Filelfo, Man of  Letters (Leiden – Boston, MA, 2018), which should also be consulted for bibliography on Filelfo and editions of his writings. On Filelfo’s life in general, see C. De’ Rosmini, Vita di Francesco Filelfo da Tolentino (Milano, 1808); and R. G. Adam, Francesco Filelfo at the Court of  Milan (1439-1481). A Contribution to the Study of Humanism in Northern Italy (doctoral thesis, Brasenose College Oxford, 1974). On Filelfo’s period at the court of  Milan, see D. Robin, Filelfo in Milan. Writings 1451-1477 (Princeton, NJ, 1991). For the Consolatio ad Iacobum Antonium Marcellum de obitu Valerii filii, see, e.g., M. L. King, The Death of  the Child Valerio Marcello (Chicago, IL – London, 1994), in which the entire collection of  consolatory texts that was dedicated to and compiled by Marcello is explored. In her study, King mentions and cites Filelfo’s Consolatio several times and dedicates three pages (30-33) to the work. See also my forthcoming critical edition and analysis of   the text Francesco Filelfo’s Consolatio ad Iacobum Antonium Marcellum de obitu Valerii filii. Text and Context. The fragment in the Berlin codex corresponds to l. 1258-1265 in my edition.

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 167-181 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124056

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is  less evident, not to say problematic.3 This article discusses the authorship of  these enigmatic epigrams. The first two verses, on f. 158r, run as follows: Papa Pius Q uintus ventres miseratus honustos expensis propriis nobile fecit opus. Pope Pius V felt sorry for the full bellies and at his own expense built a noble building.

Above the verses, the name “Philelphus” is  added in red ink. Allegedly, Filelfo wrote the distich in honour of  Pope Pius V (An­tonio Ghislieri) on the occasion of   the construction of  a  noble building. Francesco Filelfo, however, lived from 1398 to 1481, whereas Pius V lived in the following century, from 1504 to 1572; the identification of   the humanist as the poem’s author is therefore impossible. For the same reason, we can exclude Filelfo’s son, Gian (Giovanni) Mario, who also had a career as a writer and lived from 1426 to 1480.4 The second set of  verses, on f. 159v, runs as follows: Laus tua, non tua fraus, virtus, non copia rerum, scandere te fecit hoc decus eximium. Conditio tua sit stabilis nec tempore parvo vivere te faciat hic Deus omnipotens. Your merit, not your deceit, your virtue, not your wealth, have made you rise to this exceptional honour. May your condition be stable and may God Almighty make you live here for a long time.

The attribution of   these four verses to Francesco Filelfo, in the Berlin codex indicated by “D.  F. Filelfus”, can be found in other manuscripts and in later literature as well. However, the same two elegiac distichs, to which an intermediate distich is  sometimes added, are often also assigned, in later literature, to an anonymous poet who lived a  century earlier than Filelfo, during the papacy of  Pope Clement  VI (Pierre Roger, 1342-1352). The attribution of  this poem to Filelfo is thus not at all clear either.   As far as I can see, the two epigrams are not part of  Filelfo’s Latin epigram collection De iocis et seriis, preserved in Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms. G 93 inf., the only (semi-autograph) manuscript that contains nearly all ten books of  the work. 4  For Gian Mario Filelfo, see F. Pignatti, “Filelfo, Giovanni Mario”, in DBI, vol. 47 (Roma, 1997), 626-631. 3

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Berlin, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz, ms. Lat. quarto 469 The question thus arises, why are these epigrams ascribed to Filelfo in the Berlin codex? We have no information about the owner or the scribes of   the codex, but a codicological description of   the manuscript and a summary of  its content may be helpful in understanding the context in which the poems were copied. The manuscript has been dated to the fifteenth century, but the mention of  Pius  V in the poem on f.  158r shows that someone certainly worked on the manuscript in the second half  of   the sixteenth century. The codex consists of  164 paper folia, of  which f.  43v-44v and 133r-v are blank. The various texts are penned by different – not always tidy, but nonetheless readable – hands in single columns of  25 to 31 lines. Rubrication is  provided, but there are no marginal notes. A  modern foliation has been added in pencil in the upper right corner of   the recto. The codex is slightly damaged by bookworms, but is  otherwise clean and well preserved. It has a leather covering with embossed decoration and shows the remains of  gilt embellishment and traces of  a  clasp attachment. The title on the spine refers to the first text in the manuscript: “Franciscus Aretinus aliique m.s.” 5 The content of   the manuscript is  quite diverse.6 As indicated by the title on the spine, the codex contains a number of  fifteenthcentury humanist texts, such as Francesco Griffolini’s Latin translation of  the epistles of  Phalaris (f. 1r-43r), Poggio Bracciolini’s letter to Leonardo Bruni on the death of  Jerome of  Prague, the Czech scholastic philosopher and theologian (inc.: “Cum pluribus diebus ad balnea fuissem, scripsi ad Nicolaum”; f.  45r-49v), the Italian

  I have consulted the manuscript in situ. See also J. M. McManamon, An Incipitarium of  Funeral Orations and a  Smattering of  Other Panegyrical Literature from the Italian Renaissance (ca. 1350-1550) [s.l.a.], https://www.luc.edu/media/lucedu/ history/pdfs/Incipit_Catalogue.pdf, 130; P. O. Kristeller, Iter Italicum. A Finding List of  Uncatalogued or Incompletely Catalogued Humanistic Manuscripts of  the Renaissance in Italian and Other Libraries, vol. 3 (London – Leiden, 1983), 489; and E. J. Polak, Medieval and Renaissance Letter Treatises and Form Letters. A Census of  Manuscripts Found in Part of  Europe. The Works on Letter Writing from the Eleventh through the Seventeenth Century Found in Albania, Austria, Bulgaria, France, Germany, and Italy (Leiden – Boston, 2015), 359. 6  For a complete description of  the content of  the manuscript, see my forthcoming edition of  Filelfo’s Consolatio ad Marcellum (as in n. 2). 5

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archbishop Timoteo Maffei’s In sanctam rusticitatem litteras impu­ gnantem (f. 50r-95r), epitaphs of Sigismondo Malatesta and Batti­sta Sforza (f. 99r), the aforementioned fragment of  Francesco Filel­fo’s Consolatio ad Iacobum Antonium Marcellum de obitu Valerii filii (warning the reader about the imminence of   death; f.  99v), Gio­ vanni Aurispa’s letter to Thomas Januensis de Valerano (f.  134v and repeated on f.  139v), Gerolamo Squarzafico’s Vita Tibulli (f. 146v), and the Plures subscriptiones litterarum seu epistolarum ad cuiuscumque gradus, attributed to Leonardo Bruni (f. 147v-151v).7 Besides these texts, there are various fragments of  patristic writings, such as Gregory the Great’s Homilia in Evangelia 2.34 (inc.: “Sunt nonnulli qui prava capiunt”; f.  96r-v), and works of   Augustine (f.  96v-97r; f.  105r-130r), Jerome (f.  99v; f.  105r-130r), Lactantius (f. 100r-103v; f. 105r-130r), and Ambrose (f. 156r), as well as some scriptural and related texts, such as Ad inveniendum Pasca resurectionis [sic] (f. 95v), De aetatibus (inc.: “1. Prima aetas incipit ab Adam”; f.  130v-131r), a  list of  biblical books and their content (f.  131r-132v), and Psalm 1.1-7 (f.  158v). In addition, the codex contains passages of  several medieval texts, such as Nicholas of   Lyra’s commentary on the Bible (f.  134r), Hugh of  Fouilloy’s De claustro animae, Hugh of  Saint Victor’s Didascalion (the last attributed to Pietro da Ravenna; f. 156v), and some Latin translations of  fragments of  speeches of  Aeschines, Demades, and Demosthenes, which are excerpts from an eleventh- or early twelfthcentury supplement to Curtius Rufus’ Historia Alexandri Magni. Eye-catching too is the advice for a beautiful voice (Pro raucedine vocis; pillolae sub lingua per voce; f. 145v-146r). Despite the variety in content, the intellectual interests and Christian perspective of   the collection are evident. It is therefore no surprise to find in this group of texts epigrams that were attributed to Filelfo and addressed to popes. The question remains, however, why are the two epigrams of  uncertain authorship attributed to Filelfo in the Berlin manuscript?

7  The authorship of  this work is doubtful: see H. Baron, Leonardo Bruni Aretino. Humanistisch-philosopische Schriften mit einer Chronologie seiner Werke und Briefe (Wiesbaden, 1928), 184.

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Pius V and his public toilets The two verses on f.  158r in which Filelfo seems, at first sight, to praise Pius  V for the construction of  a  noble building, can be connected to a specific event. Shortly after Pius V’s election to the papacy in 1566, Rome suffered an epidemic, possibly typhoid.8 In  an attempt to remedy the situation, Pius drained the marshy areas, improved the drainage of   the city, expedited the restoration of   the Aqua Virgo  / Acqua Vergine, which he finished in 1570, and constructed public toilets.9 These lavatories are what the poet refers to in the expression “nobile opus”, a building meant to serve the “ventres honustos”. Pius was a pioneer of  the Counter-Reformation, advocating the decrees of   the Council of  Trent, severely addressing misconduct, abuse, nepotism, and inappropriate wealth within the papal court, and relentlessly persecuting heretics by means of   the Inquisition. As a  result of  these severe interventions, Pius had many enemies, including educated and cultural men who were accused and brought to justice. Famous in this regard is the process against the apostolic procurator Alessandro Pallantieri (1505-1571).10 Pallantieri, who had been dismissed from his position as procurator, was accused of  embezzlement in the grain supply, illegal enrichment during his various assignments, and immoral behaviour; he was imprisoned in 1557 by Cardinal Carlo Carafa, a  nephew of  Pope Paul  IV, but released from prison by Pope Pius  IV (Giovanni Angelo Medici) in 1559.11 Pius IV also brought an action against his predecessor’s nephews, the Cardinals Carlo, Alfonso, and Giovanni Carafa (1560-1561). This case was led by Federici Girolamo and Pallantieri himself, after the latter was restored to his posi8  For a general overview of  Pius’s papacy, measures, and achievements, see J. N. D. Kelly, The Oxford Dictionary of  Popes (Oxford – New York, NY, 1986), 268-269; K. Rinne, “Urban Ablutions. Cleansing Counter-Reformation Rome”, in M. Bradley, K. Stow (ed.), Rome, Pollution and Propriety. Dirt, Disease and Hygiene in the Eternal City from Antiquity to Modernity (Cambridge, 2012), 182-201, at 195-197. 9   K. Stow, “Was the ghetto cleaner…?”, in M. Bradley, K. Stow, 2012 (as in n. 8), 169-181, at 173; E.  Mori, Lettere tra Paolo Giordano Orsini e  Isabella de’ Medici (1556-1576) (Roma, 2019), 171, n. 471. 10  On the lawsuit, see, e.g., A. Antonucci, “Federici, Girolamo”, in DBI, vol. 45 (Roma, 1995), 639-642; F. Pignatti, “Franco, Nicolò”, in DBI, vol. 50 (Roma, 1995), 202-206; S. Feci, “Pallantieri, Alessandro”, in DBI, vol. 80 (Roma, 2014), 481-485. 11  Feci 2014 (as in n. 10).

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tion as procurator. Alfonso Carafa was sentenced to the payment of  100,000 scudi; Carlo and Giovanni Carafa were sentenced to death.12 However, after the sudden death of  Pius IV and the election to the papal throne of  Pius  V, the new pope, as part of  his harsh politics of  moralization, had the case against the Carafas reopened for investigation in 1566.13 The result was that Cardinal Carlo Carafa was rehabilitated and that Pallantieri was accused of, among other things, being responsible for a  verdict that Pius  V considered deceitful, disputable, and false. Pallantieri was convicted and decapitated on 7 June 1571. Also involved in this game of  political vengeance was the writer Nicolò Franco (1515-1570).14 Franco was particularly drawn to composing invectives, an occupation which often forced him to travel and find new patrons. After working for and later coming into conflict with Pietro Aretino, Franco finally moved to Rome in 1558. There he produced the Commento sopra la vita et costumi di Giovan Pietro Carafa che fu Paolo IV chiamato, et sopra le qualità de tutti i suoi et di coloro che con lui governaro il pontificato, a slan­ derous pamphlet against Pope Paul  IV, which was commissioned by Pallantieri. Pallantieri had provided Franco with the proceedings of  the trial against the Carafas, and the poet used them in composing the pamphlet: the first part of   the pamphlet was written in prose by Franco and was entirely based on the proceedings; the second part consisted of  poetry, more specifically pasquinades against Paul  IV and his family, which were written by various authors, including by Franco himself.15 Franco was arrested together with Pallantieri. In an attempt to save his skin, Pallantieri tried to depict Franco as suspicious and corrupt, denying everything Franco said. The writer admitted the gravity of  his acts and justified them as a result of  the injustice he had suffered at the hands of  the Carafas. Moreover, he stressed that he never attacked the papacy as an institution. This defense was of  no avail: just like Pallantieri, Franco was   Antonucci 1995 (as in n. 10); Pignatti 1995 (as in n. 10).   Feci 2014 (as in n. 10). 14  P. F. Grendler, Critics of  the Italian World (1530-1560). Anton Francesco Doni, Nicolò Franco and Ortensio Lando (Madison, WI – Milwaukee, WI – London, 1969), 38-49, 215-221; Pignatti 1995 (as in n. 10). 15 A fragment of    the pamphlet can be found in Città del Vaticano, Biblio­ teca Apostolica Vaticana, ms. Ott. lat. 2684 (f. 347r-570v). See Pignatti 1995 (as in n. 10). 12 13

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sentenced to death. He was hanged from the Ponte Sant’Angelo on 11 March 1570, a sentence that to his contemporaries seemed disproportionate to the crime.16 The distich regarding Pius’s public toilets, in the Berlin manuscript assigned to “Philelphus”, is  attributed to Nicolò Franco by various seventeenth-, eighteenth-, and nineteenth-century scholars. Their version of   the poem, however, is slightly different and more explicit, as “expensis propriis” is  replaced by “hocce cacatorium”, “this lavatory”, a change which makes the ironic and satirical tone of  the verses clearer: Papa Pius Q uintus ventres miseratus honustos hocce cacatorium nobile fecit opus.

Gilles Ménage (1689) quoted the distich in his Le origini della lingua italiana in order to explain the Latin origin of   the Italian term cacatoio, pointing out a metrical error made by Franco, since in his poem the Italian writer shortened the third syllable of  cacatorium, although it is actually long.17 When writing about investing money in the construction of  important buildings instead of  in statues and paintings, Hendrik Doedijns (1698) presented Pius V as an example, because of  his construction of  a public lavatory, and included the poem in the presentation. Even though Doedijns did not identify Franco as their writer, he did explain that the verses were a pasquinade, a lampoon that in the sixteenth century was attached to the statue of Pasquino on the Piazza Navona in Rome and that was often directed against the church, just like the poems which led to Franco’s death sentence.18 Louis de Mailly (1704) confirmed that the distich had been posted in the public lavatories of   the Lateran Palace.19 In Menagiana (1713), the verses were quoted once more: the metrical error made by Franco was again observed and additional information was given, namely, that Franco was hanged and that this poem was intended to be

  Pignatti 1995 (as in n. 10).  G. Ménage, Le origini della lingua italiana (Genève, 1685), 139. 18 H.  Doedijns, Haegse Mercurius, behelsende, vermakelijke, satyrique, galante, stigtelijke, politique, academische, emblematique, en andere reflexien (’s Gravenhage, 1698), no. 42 (den 28 Dec. 1697), r2. 19  L. de Mailly (Chevalier), Les bains d’Aix ou Les amours secretes des dames, qui vont prendre les eaux à Aix la Chapelle, 3rd ed. (Den Haag, [1704]), 32. 16 17

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attached to the wall in the public lavatories of  the Lateran Palace.20 In his Geschichte der komischen Litteratur (1785), Carl Friedrich Flögel included Franco in his overview of  sixteenth-century Italian satirical authors and presented the pasquinade written on the wall of  a toilet in the Lateran Palace, as the cause of Franco’s hanging.21 In twentieth-century studies on Franco, to the best of  my knowledge, no mention is made of   these specific verses, but only of  Franco’s Commento sopra la vita et costumi di Giovan Pietro Carafa and his pasquinades against the pope in general.22 Whether or not the distich was composed by Franco and whether or not it led to his death sentence, the question remains as to why the copyist of   the Berlin manuscript attributed it anachronistically to “Philelphus”. A possible explanation may be found in the material context: on the same f.  158r, immediately above our epigram, we find another couple of  verses, introduced by the wording “Q uidam ad Pium pontificem”: Si tibi pro numeris nummos fortuna dedisset, non esset capiti digna corona tuo. If  fortune had repaid your verses with money, your head would not be wearing that worthy crown.

These verses were a  reply to a  poem composed by Pius  II (Enea Silvio Piccolomini; 1405-1464; papacy: 1458-1464), in which he warned poets not to expect material rewards for their poetry.23 20  G.  Ménage, Menagiana ou Bons mots, rencontres agréables, pensées judicieuses et observations curieuses, 3rd ed. (Amsterdam, 1713), 177-178. 21   C.  F. Flögel, Geschichte der komischen Litteratur, vol.  2 (Liegnitz – Leipzig, 1785), 181-182. The same information can also be found in s.n., Dictionnaire historique, critique et bibliographique, contenant les vies des hommes illustres, célèbres ou fameux de tous les pays et de tous les siècles, suivi d’un dictionnaire abrégé des mythologies, et d’un tableau chronologique, vol. 11 (Paris, 1822), 144. 22  See A. Mercati, I costituti di Niccolò Franco (1568-1570) dinanzi l’Inquisizione di Roma, esistenti nell’Archivio Segreto Vaticano (Città del Vaticano, 1955); Grendler 1969 (as in n. 14); R. L. Bruni, “Per una bibliografia delle opere di Nicolò Franco”, Studi e problemi di critica testuale 15 (1977), 84-103; Pignatti 1995 (as in n. 10). 23  See Adam 1974 (as in n. 2), 156. Slightly different and sometimes even grammatically doubtful versions of   the distich have been printed by editors. Ludwig Bertalot gives the following verses: “Desine pro numeris nummos sperare, poeta.  / Carmina si dederis, carmina reddidero” in id., “Die älteste gedruckte lateinische Epitaphiensammlung”, in Collectanea variae doctrinae Leoni S. Olschki (München, 1921), 1-28, n. 37. Maria Teresa Graziosi Acquaro produces the following erroneous distich, based on her reading of  Città del Vaticano, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, ms. Borg. lat. 362, f. 46v: “Desine quod numeris numeros sperare, poeta, / musarum et animus

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Interesting is, first, that the reply (with small variations) has been attributed to several humanists, including Pietro Odi  / Odo da Montopoli (probably c.  1420  / 1425-1463),24 Giovanni Antonio Campano (1429-1477), and Gian Mario Filelfo, the son of  Fran­ cesco Filelfo.25 Second, and even more important, is  the fact that Francesco Filelfo was known for his difficult relationship with Pope Pius II and for his critique of  the pope after the latter’s death. As a  matter of  fact, this quarrel is  also the subject of  our second epigram attributed to Filelfo, on f. 159v.

Pius II: praise and vituperation The epigram on f.  159v, in which, at first sight, Francesco Filelfo seems to praise someone for obtaining an honourable position in an honourable way and seems to wish that person a long and happy life, also has a complicated attribution history. Like the two verses

carmina non emere” in Ead., “Petri Odi Montopolitani Carmina nunc primum e libris manu scriptis edita”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 19 (1970), 7-113, at 113. Based on his reading of  Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, ms. lat. 8757, f. 80v, Pascalis Bourgain-Hemeryck repeats the more plausible verses already offered by Bertalot: “Desine pro numeris nummos sperare, poeta. / Carmina si dederis, carmina reddidero” in Id., Les œuvres latines d’Alain Chartier (Paris, 1977), 94 and J. IJsewijn, “Instrumentum criticum. 1. Petri Odi epigramma emendatum”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 27 (1978), 297. Ana Pérez Vega gives her readings of  Milano, Biblioteca Nazionale Braidense, ms. XI 44 y, f. 25r: “Desine pro numeris nummos sperare, poeta: / carmina dedisti, carmina reddo tibi” and of  Perugia, Biblioteca Comunale Augusta, ms. J 25, f. 5v: “Desine pro numeris nummos sperare poeta: / mutare est animus carmina, non emere” in Ead., “Notas sobre el texto de los Carmina de E. S. Piccolomini”, Humanistica Lovaniensia, 39 (1990) 40-47, at 46. It should be noted here that “corona” does not indicate the papal crown, but the laurel wreath of   the poet laureate. In fact, Pius II was crowned poet laureate in 1442. 24  Graziosi Acquaro 1970 (as in n. 23), 118: “Si tibi quod numeris numeros fortuna dedisset, / non esset capiti tanta corona tuo”; Bourgain-Hemeryck 1977 (as in n.  23), 94; IJsewijn 1978 (as in n.  23), 297: “Pro numeris nummos tibi si fortuna dedisset, / non esset capiti tanta corona tuo.” For Pietro Odi / Odo, see M. G. Blasio, “Odo, Pietro”, in DBI, vol. 79 (2013), 158-159. 25   Pérez Vega 1990 (as in n.  23), 46. For Giovanni Antonio Campano, see F. R. Hausmann, “Campano, Giovanni Antonio”, in DBI, vol. 17 (1974), 424-429. Pérez Vega shows that in Perugia, Biblioteca Comunale Augusta, ms.  J 25, f.  5v the verses are attributed to Campano, whereas a second hand in Milano, Biblioteca Braidense, ms. AD XI 44 has added an attribution of   the distich to “Marium”, who could be, Vega adds, Gian Mario Filelfo. In the Milanese codex, the poem is as follows: “Si tibi pro numeris numeros fortuna dedisset  / non esset capiti tanta corona tuo.” In the Perugian manuscript: “Si tibi pro numeris numeros fortuna dedisset / non staret capiti tanta corona tuo.”

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directed to Pius V, this poem is mentioned in numerous studies up to the twentieth century, sometimes in a longer version of six verses. The popularity of  this poem is  due to its display of   the composer’s poetic talent and wit. In fact, it is  a palindrome and consists of  versus cancrini, which, as described by Harry Schnur, “must be read back to front.” The versus cancrini “preserve the metre, but their sense, complimentary when read in the usual way, becomes highly unfriendly in reverse.” 26 The flattering poem then turns into a harsh vituperation: Laus tua, non tua fraus, virtus, non copia rerum, scandere te fecit hoc decus eximium. Conditio tua sit stabilis nec tempore parvo vivere te faciat hic Deus omnipotens. Your merit, not your deceit, your virtue, not your wealth, have made you rise to this exceptional honour. May your condition be stable and may God Almighty make you live here for a long time. Omnipotens Deus hic faciat te vivere parvo tempore nec stabilis sit tua conditio. Eximium decus hoc fecit te scandere rerum copia, non virtus, fraus tua, non tua laus. May God Almighty make you live here for a short time and may your condition not be stable. Your wealth, not your virtue, your deceit, not your merit have made you rise to this exceptional honour.

In 1653, Filippo Picinelli attributed the poem to Francesco Filelfo. According to Picinelli, Filelfo wrote it “nella promotione d’un sog­ getto indegno, ad un magistrato” and, citing only the first distich, Picinelli emphasized how the poem at first sight hides the vices of   the person who was promoted, but reveals them when you read the poem in the opposite direction.27 Iacobus Moons (1682) mentioned the poem for the same reason, but he cited the four verses we find in the Berlin manuscript and ascribed them to a flatterer 26  H. C. Schnur, “The Factotum. Some Varieties of  the Latin Hexameter”, The Classical World, 53.5 (1960) 153-157, at 155. For the poem as an example of  a  palindrome, see A. Liede, Dichtung als Spiel. Studien zur Unsinnspoesie an den Grenzen der Sprache, vol. 2 (Berlin, 1963), 103-105. Liede here refers to W. Meyer, Gesammelte Abhandlungen zur mittellateinischen Rythmik, vol. 1 (Berlin, 1905), 94. 27 F.  Picinelli, Mondo simbolico o sia università d’imprese scelte, spiegate ed illustrate con sentenze ed eruditioni sacre e profane (Milano, 1653), 441.

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(Pluymstrijker) of  Clement  VI, the fourth Avignon pope (13421352), who had a luxurious court and was a patron of  artists and scholars.28 Gilbert-Charles Le Gendre (1733) quoted the poem in the same context (“quidam vates Clementi VI”), but presented the longer version of  the poem, with a second, middle distich: Pauperibus tua das, nunquam stat ianua clausa, fundere res quaeris, nec tua multiplicas. You give your goods to the poor, never is your door closed, you seek to distribute your possessions, you do not increase them.

And in the reverse order: Multiplicas tua, nec quaeris res fundere, clausa ianua stat, nunquam das tua pauperibus.29 You increase your possessions, you do not seek to distribute them, your door is closed, never do you give your goods to the poor.

The same story appeared in The London Magazine and Monthly Chronologer (1751), where the author, in relating some particulars about Pope Clement VI, referred to what he had read in the Lives of  Popes (Vitae et gesta summorum pontificum a  Christo Domino usque ad Clementem VIII, nec non S.R.E. cardinalium cum eorumdem insignibus) by the Spanish historian and Dominican friar Cia­ conius (Ciacconius), or Alonso (Alfonso) Chacón (c. 1530-1599).30

28  I. Moons, Sedelycken vreughdenbergh verthoonende door sinnebeelden den leersaemen handel van de onredelycke dieren aen de verkeerde en beestaerdighe wereldt (Antwerpen, 1682), 424-425. On Pope Clement VI, see Kelly 1986 (as in n. 8), 219221. 29  [G.  C. Le Gendre], Traité de l’opinion ou mémoires pour servir à l’histoire de l’esprit humain, vol. 1 (Paris, 1733), 178-179. 30  [s.n.], “Character of  Pope Clement VI”, The London Magazine and Monthly Chronologer (Dublin, February 1751), 77-78, at 78. He refers to Chacón’s Vitae et gesta summorum pontificum a  Christo Domino usque ad Clementem  VIII, nec non S.R.E. cardinalium cum eorumdem insignibus. On p. 489 of  the second volume of  the 1677 edition (Vitae et res gestae pontificum Romanorum et S.R.E. cardinalium ab initio nascentis Ecclesiae usque ad Clementem IX), in which the section on the popes was extended to the life of  Clement IX and the section on the cardinals was updated with much new material by later authors, we can read the following on Clement VI and the six verses: “Aliquis olim viventi Clementi obtulit libellum supplicem alicuius doni obtinendi gratia et in eum finem versus panxit miro artificio elaboratos, qui in laudem Pontificis legebantur, modo supplicationi fuisset satisfactum, alias eosdem retrogrado ordine vir mercenarius et maledicus in pontificis dedecus composuerat:

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In an anthology from 1839, the last distich was once again assigned to Filelfo and this time presented as a  poem addressed to Pope Pius II.31 In the Histoire littéraire de la France (1862), both attributions were mentioned together: we read that the six verses were written by a  flatterer of  Pope Clement  VI in 1342 at the court of  Avignon, and that, according to some people, Filelfo used the same verses to flatter and – when he did not obtain favour – to criticize Pope Pius  II.32 Finally, Wilhelm Meyer (1905), followed by Alfred Liede (1963), quoted only the first distich and identified its author and addressee once again as Francesco Filelfo and Pius  II, respectively.33 The attribution of   the poem to Francesco Filelfo is unsurprising. Filelfo was well known for his continuous search for patrons – and for the necessary flattery that search entailed – as well as for his contentious character and the often satirical and harsh tone of  his letters and poetry.34 As mentioned above, Filelfo had a complicated relationship with Pope Pius II and criticized him, especially after the pope’s death. This episode in Filelfo’s life has been exhaustively studied.35 According to Filelfo, Enea Silvio Piccolomini had Laus tua […] omnipotens.” On Chacón, see S. Grassi Fiorentino, “Chacón, Alonso”, in DBI, vol. 24 (Roma, 1980), 352-356. 31  S. C. Atkinson, G. R. Graham, C. J. Peterson (ed.), Atkinson’s Casket or Gems of  Literature, Wit, and Sentiment, vol. 15 (Philadelphia, PA, 1839), 28. 32 [s.n.], Histoire littéraire de la France, vol. 24 (Paris, 1862), 433-434. 33   Meyer 1905 (as in n.  26), 94; Liede 1963 (as in n.  26), 103-105. See also E. A. Fonda, “Versos palindrômicos e anacíclicos latinos”, Revista de Letras 22 (1982), 63-69, at 66. The poem in its expanded form was also identified as the work of  “a Jesuit” (“unus e Societate Iesu”) addressed “to a certain pope” (“in quendam papam”) in an anonymous article published in 1791: s.n., “Select Poetry, Ancient and Modern”, The Gentleman’s Magazine and Historical Chronicle 61.1 (1791), 564-568, at 567. In 1992, Lucien Janssens used cryptography to discern Pope Clement  IV (papacy: 1265-1268) as the poem’s dedicatee and noted that Franco [sic] Filelfo later reused it, addressing it to Pius  II: L.  Janssens, “La tradition d’une cryptographie satirique médiévale (D’Ovide à Clément  IV, Napoléon  Ier, Hitler)”, Revue belge de philologie et d’histoire 70.4 (1992), 960-996. The analysis of  Janssens, however, seems rather farfetched. 34   Such strife is reflected, e.g., in the large collection of  Satyrae (100 satires of  100 hexameters each) that Filelfo started writing in 1428. 35  See Adam 1974 (as in n. 2), 149-162; G. Gualdo, “Francesco Filelfo e la curia pontificia. Una carriera mancata”, Achivio della società romana di storia patria 102 (1979), 189-236, at 223, and the bibliography mentioned there (n. 108); A. De Vincentiis, Battaglie di memoria. Gruppi, intellettuali, testi e  la discontinuità del potere papale alla metà del Q uattrocento (Roma, 2002), 28-50; D. Marsh, “Francesco Filelfo as a  Writer of  Invective”, in De Keyser 2018 (as in n.  2),  174-187, at 183-187;

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been his student in Florence from 1429 to 1431,36 so when Pic­co­ lo­mini was elected pope in 1458, Filelfo expected him to shower his former tutor with honour, recognition, and material generosity. In the beginning, Filelfo was treated well by Pius, who promised Filelfo an annual stipend of  200 ducats. When, however, Pius could no longer pay the stipend because money was needed for the crusade against the Ottomans, Filelfo started complaining and harassing various cardinals to plead his case to the pope.37 The relationship between Filelfo and Pius cooled, and after the latter’s decease Filelfo publicly accused him of  ingratitude, simultaneously praising the new Pope Paul II (Pietro Barbo; 1417-1471; papacy: 1464-1471) in an attempt to gain the new pope’s favour.38 Traces of  this posthumous smear campaign against Pius can in the first place be found in Filelfo’s correspondence, most significantly in letters PhE∙23.01 and PhE∙26.01 (dated 15 September 1464 and 1 August 1465) of  Filelfo’s epistolarium. Lodrisio Cri­ velli, a sometime pupil of  Filelfo, as well as a legal scholar, historian, and intimate of  Pius II, reacted to the first of   these letters by composing a  work entitled Apologeticus adversus calumnias Fran­cisci Philelphi pro Pio, maximo pontifice (dated 21 November 1464).39 Filelfo did not hesitate to express his delusion with the former pope

J. De Keyser, N. De Sutter, I. François, Piously Yours. The Dispute between Lodrisio Crivelli and Francesco Filelfo on Pope Pius II [forthcoming]. 36   Adam 1974 (as in n.  2), 152. Lodrisio Crivelli denies this assertion in his Apologeticus adversus calumnias Francisci Philelphi pro Pio, maximo pontifice, l. 108112: “At Pius ipse cum de hac tua nugaci iactantia audisset, semel mentiri te palam dictitavit. Sed neque tu huius ipsius discipulatus testes ullos invenisti unquam, cum nihilo segnius tamen inanibus his figmentis ut gestiens puer exultes. Q uo enim pacto quove tempore discipulus ille tuus vel fuit unquam vel esse potuit?”: De Keyser, De Sutter, François [forthcoming] (as in n. 35). 37   See Adam 1974 (as in n. 2), 156-158. 38   Kelly 1986 (as in n. 8), 249-251. 39  The references to Filelfo’s epistolarium follow Filelfo’s own subdivision of  it, as presented in De Keyser’s edition: J.  De Keyser (ed.), Francesco Filelfo, Collected Letters (Epistolarum libri XLVIII) (Alessandria, 2015). The first number refers to the book and the second to the sequence of   the letters within that book. Other letters in which Filelfo complains about Pius are: PhE·22.26 (23 August 1464), PhE·23.09 (20 September 1464), and PhE·23.25 (4 November 1464). For an overview of  Cri­ velli’s life and work, see L. F. Smith, “Lodrisio Crivelli of  Milan and Aeneas Silvius, 1457-1464”, Studies in the Renaissance 9  (1962), 31-63, at 31; F.  Petrucci, “Cri­ velli, Lodrisio”, in DBI, vol.  31 (Roma, 1985), 146-152. For the Latin text and an English translation of  Crivelli’s Apologeticus, see De Keyser, De Sutter, François [forthcoming] (as in n. 35).

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in verse as well, as is  shown by several preserved satirical poems about Pius II.40 Another indication that Filelfo may in fact have been responsible for the verses – whether or not he was inspired by a  poem directed to Clement VI – is that the epigram is attributed to Filelfo in several fifteenth- and sixteenth-century manuscripts, as has been pointed out by Rudolf  Georg Adam. These are Città del Vaticano, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, ms.  Vat. lat. 3145, f. 88v-89r; Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms. C 12 sup., f. 134r; Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms.  Canon. misc. 308, f.  112r; and Venezia, Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana, ms.  Marc. lat. XII 210 (4689), f.  96r.41 The copyist of   the Berlin manuscript thus followed a widespread attribution.

Conclusion It is difficult to draw firm conclusions concerning the authorship of   the two epigrams in the Berlin manuscript ms. Lat. quarto 469. For the two-verse epigram on f. 158r, we can at least safely exclude Filelfo as its author, since the epigram describes an event from the second half  of   the sixteenth century, that is, a century after Fran­ cesco Filelfo (and his son Gian Mario Filelfo) lived. Possibly Nicolò Franco was its author. The epigram with the four versus cancrini on f. 159v, on the other hand, might have been composed by Fran­ cesco Filelfo, as is suggested by the several manuscripts that attribute it to Filelfo and by Filelfo’s relationship with Pius  II. In that case, Filelfo’s inspiration may have come from a possibly six-verse poem written by a  poet, whose identity remains obscure to us, at the court of  Clement VI. In any case, the double attribution to Filelfo may be explained by a  combination of  two factors. First, both poems are satirical in tone and show traces of  poetical wit. Francesco Filelfo’s contentious nature and razor-sharp pen were not unknown. It is remarkable that both poems do not explicitly reveal their critical sides in the Berlin manuscript, but seem to be simply laudatory:

40  For examples of  such poems, see, e.g., Adam 1974 (as in n. 2), 159 and 307, n. 69; De Vincentiis 2002 (as in n. 35), 27-28, n. 109. 41  Adam 1974 (as in n. 2), 304, n. 52, 471, 505, 523, 542.

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on f.  158r, we find “expensis propriis” instead of   the rather vulgar “hocce cacatorium”; on f. 159v, there is no indication that it is possible to read the words of   the epigram in the opposite order, with an entirely different meaning. Second, Francesco Filelfo’s wellknown, complicated relationship with Pius  II might have played a  role in the attribution of  both epigrams to Filelfo. In the case of   the epigram on f. 158r, the incorrect attribution to Filelfo may be due to the occurrence of   the name “Pius” and to the fact that the verses immediately follow another poem that has been attributed to Gian Mario Filelfo and that was a  reply to a  poem composed by Pius II.

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POESIA GOLIARDICA PAVESE MAFFEO VEGIO E LA PROSOPOPEA DEL SECCHIO *

La ricca e  variegata produzione poetica di Maffeo Vegio sta attraendo negli ultimi anni l’attenzione di sempre più studiosi.1 Sul versante della sua produzione epica, accanto alle ottime edizioni del Supplementum all’Eneide, si sono aggiunte infatti le edizioni dell’Astyanax, del Vellus aureum e  dell’Antonias nonché alcuni studi specifici.2 Se per le sue collezioni di elegie ed epigrammi dobbiamo ancora rifarci in larga misura alle vecchie trascrizioni di Luigi Raffaele, non mancano tuttavia lavori sulla loro composizione e tradizione manoscritta, con qualche affondo monografico.3 Grande interesse sta destando inoltre la sua poesia religiosa, che *  Oltre ai miei commilitoni Jeanine De Landtsheer e Toon Van Houdt, ringrazio per la lettura e per i preziosi suggerimenti Donatella Coppini, Jeroen De Keyser e l’anonimo revisore del contributo. 1  Per una sintesi bio-bibliografica sull’autore: C. Kallendorf, “Maffeo Vegio”, in C. Nativel (ed.), Centuriae Latinae II. Cent une figures humanistes de la Renaissance aux Lumières (Genève, 2006), 817-822. 2  B. Schneider (ed., tr.), Das Aeneissupplement des Maffeo Vegio (Weinheim, 1985); M.  C.  J. Putnam (ed., tr.), Maffeo Vegio, Short Epics (Cambridge, MA – London, 2004); V.  Fontanella, “A Case of  Reconstruction and Supplementation. Maffeo Vegio’s Vellus Aureum and its Relationship with Classical Authors”, in G.  Abbamonte, C. Kallendorf  (ed.), Classics Transformed (Pisa, 2018), 49-62; L. Whittington, “Q ui Succederet Operi: Completing the Unfinished in Maffeo Vegio’s Supplementum Aeneidos”, I Tatti Studies 21 (2018), 217-244. 3 L.  Raffaele, Maffeo Vegio: elenco delle opere; scritti inediti (Bologna, 1909), 130-200; N. Lopomo, Gli Elegiarum libri di Maffeo Vegio. Edizione critica, Tesi di laurea dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze, relatore D.  Coppini, AA. 2008-2009; Ead., Maffeo Vegio, Elegiae, Rusticanalia, Disticha ed Epigrammata. Edizione critica e  commento, Tesi di dottorato, tutor D.  Coppini, AA. 2010-2012 (che, come mi comunica D. Coppini, è in corso di stampa come monografia); Ead., “Maffeo Vegio, Poliziano e la dea Febris”, Medioevo e rinascimento n.s. 25 (2014), 127-148. Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 183-196 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124057

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forma un blocco tematicamente e cronologicamente ben definito.4 Utile è  però anche lo studio della sua produzione “estravagante”, cioè di quei componimenti d’occasione e di quegli esercizi poetici che si possono isolare in alcuni manoscritti. Alcuni anni fa pubblicai io stesso tre favole esopiche in distici elegiaci, primissima prova poetica del lodigiano e raro documento della permanenza del genere medievale nel Q uattrocento; e recente è la pubblicazione della Congratulatio per la vittoria riportata da Niccolò Piccinino alla batta­ glia di Delebio (1432).5 Mi sembra pertanto utile e  opportuno pubblicare una piccola prosopopea in esametri emersa dalle esplorazioni delle sillogi poe­tiche di Maffeo Vegio e  intitolata Prosopopeia mergoris ad dominum Gulielmum Guerram, cioè “Prosopopea del secchio al signor Guglielmo Guerra”. Q uesto componimento forma un dittico con la Prosopopeia catulae ad quandam spectabilem dominam (Prosopopea della cagnetta ad una distinta padrona), con la quale si accompagna negli unici due manoscritti che la trasmettono: L = Lodi, Biblioteca Comunale, ms. XXVIII A 11, f. 68r-69v, pro­ dotto a Lodi nella seconda metà del secolo XV, e V = Viterbo, Biblioteca Comunale degli Ardenti, ms. II D I 8, f. 95v-96r,6 allestito agli inizi del Cinquecento da Bernardino Castagna, un umanista di cui si sa poco o nulla ma che con Vegio era legato a doppio filo, essendo anch’egli lodigiano e  canonico di San Pietro.7 La proso4  Raffaele 1909 (come a n. 3), 203-222; G. Cremascoli, “Maffeo Vegio tra mondo dei classici e  agiografia”, Frate Francesco. Rivista di cultura francescana 82.2 (2016), 438-447. 5  F.  Della Schiava, “Le fabellae esopiche di Maffeo Vegio. Spigolature da un codice lodigiano poco noto”, in P.  Galand, G.  Ruozzi, S.  Verhulst, J.  Vignes (ed.), Tradition et créativité dans les formes gnomiques en Italie et en Europe (Turnhout, 2011), 133-164; G. C. Alessio, “Dittico per la battaglia di Delebio (novembre 1432)”, Bollettino della società storica valtellinese 71 (2018), 13-44. 6  Il codice contiene anche: f.  3r-24v, Bonaccorso da Montemagno, Controversia de nobilitate (in calce al f. 24v: “Bonus Accursius Pisanus legum doctor diligenter absolvit”); f.  24r-42v, Maffeo Vegio, Pompeiana (f.  42v: “Ex vila [sic] Pompeiana 1423”); Libellus de hirundine (f. 44v: “Ex villa Pompeiana 1423”); f. 44v-47r, Laus primae aetatis aurae; f. 47v-57r, Rusticanalia (f. 57r: “Ex villa Pompeiana, Kal. Octobris 1431”); f.  57r-70r, Distichorum liber; f.  70r-93r, Epigrammata; f.  96v-100v, Convivium deorum; f. 100v-105r, Regisol Papiensis contra theologos; f. 105r-v, Laus primae aetatis aureae (di mano e inchiostro diversi da quelli di Bernardino Castagna; trascrizione non completa): P. O. Kristeller, Iter Italicum, vol. 2 (London – Leiden, 1977), 307; Della Schiava 2011 (come a n. 5), 149-150. Lopomo, 2010-2012 (come a n. 3), 416-417 ipotizza che Castagna abbia realizzato il codice di Viterbo con carte provenienti direttamente dal tavolo di lavoro di Vegio. 7  Su Castagna: Della Schiava 2011 (come a n. 5), 150, n. 16.

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popea della cagnetta fu trascritta dal solo codice di Lodi da Luigi Raffaele, che ne offrì anche una brevissima contestualizzazione storico-letteraria.8 La prosopopea del secchio è invece rimasta fino ad ora inedita. Inizio dalla discussione dei rapporti tra i testimoni. L e V condividono almeno un errore. Ai v. 5-7 si legge: “ne me agnoscis, quem turbine tanto / atque labore gravi, tanto sudore petebas, / in puteum cecidisse putans conamine tanto?” cioè “non mi riconosci? Sono quello che credevi caduto nel pozzo e  che ti affannavi a  cercare girando senza posa, stanco morto e  madido di sudore.” Al  posto di “quem”, che è una mia correzione, i codici leggono il pronome femminile “quam”. Ma il secchio è detto successivamente “tacitum” e “maestum”, che sono, a mio avviso, degli accusativi maschili: non solo perché il maschile si adatterebbe meglio del neutro ad una “persona loquens” ma anche perché ai tempi di Vegio il termine “mergus, -oris” veniva percepito, al massimo, come femminile.9 “Q uam” è pertanto probabilmente un errore di scioglimento di una forma abbreviata. L non può dipendere da V perché più antico; l’uni­co errore di L contro V, “prosopeia” in luogo di “prosopopeia” nel titolo, è  inoltre facilmente emendabile inter scribendum. Più frequenti sono invece gli errori di V a fronte di lezioni corrette in L: 3. incolumem] incolumen; 12. sic ferre] om. sic; 20. meritum] medium; 21. intrarat] intrararat. Q uesto quadro indurrebbe a formulare una dipendenza di V da L. Una riserva va tuttavia formulata sulla base di due elementi: 1) V restituisce per il componimento un colophon più dettagliato rispetto a quello tradito da L e l’informazione “in  frequentia” non mi pare a  tal punto utile da ipotizzare

  Raffaele 1909 (come a n. 3), 53-56.   “Mergus, -oris” è termine del latino medievale ed è registrato nei lessici: E. Cecchini et  al. (ed.), Uguccione da Pisa, Derivationes (Firenze, 2004), M 87 3: “Item a mergo -is hic mergus -ris, idest situla cum qua aqua de puteo trahitur” (consultato online su Mirabile Digital Library). È attestata anche una forma “mergora, -ae”, da cui, secondo Matthias Martinius, la forma “mergus” deriverebbe per un’incomprensione dei lessicografi antichi che avrebbero inteso “mergora” come un neutro plurale anziché come un femminile singolare: Matthias Martinius, Lexicon philologicum, praecipue etymologicum et sacrum  […] (Traiecti ad Rhenum [Utrecht], apud Anthonium Schouten, 1697), 315; C. Du Cange, Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis, vol. 5 (Niort, 1885), 354b s.v. “mergorae”. Ai tempi di Vegio, Gasparino Barzizza registrava nel suo Vocabolarium breve (Venetiis, per Georgium de Rusconibus, in contrata Sancti Moysi, 1515 [Edit16 CNCE 4524]), f. Gii la voce “mergus” ma come di genere femminile: “Mergus -ris. f[oeminini] g[eneris], ‘la sechia’, quia in hauriendo aquam puteo immergitur et sic a mergo is dicta est”. 8 9

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un’interpolazione di Castagna: mi pare più economico pensare che sia caduta nella trascrizione di L piuttosto che sia stata aggiunta nella trascrizione di V; 2) entrambi i codici riproducono al v. 30 due lezioni a mio avviso irricevibili: “de frena” (L) e “ad frena” (V), facilmente emendabili in “da frena”. Si potrebbe pensare a un errore di L e a un maldestro tentativo di correzione di Bernardino Casta­gna su V, ma non si può escludere che si tratti della diffrazione di un errore di archetipo in assenza di una lezione ricevibile. La riserva sui rapporti tra i due testimoni verrà sciolta probabilmente dal­l’editore critico delle raccolte poetiche, che potrà contare su collazioni più estese.10 Nell’attesa, nei casi in cui i due codici producano varianti ugualmente accettabili, mi pare prudente seguire L, offrendo nel­ l’apparato critico le varianti scartate di V. Prosopopeia mergoris ad dominum Gulielmum Guerram Q uid quereris, quid te frustra, Gulielme, fatigas? 1 Desine: nunc venio, tua nunc ante ora revertor. Gaudeo quod superi incolumem, quod sidera caeli servarunt, quod te video. Verum, optime rerum, flecte oculos: ne me agnoscis, quem turbine tanto 5 atque labore gravi, tanto sudore petebas, in puteum cecidisse putans conamine tanto? Ut nihil addiderim, vidi doluique videre. Me thalamus tacitum retinebat magnus ubique risus erat. Dum tu sudabas, tollere risum 10 vix poterant: meminisse piget! Suspiria late longa dabam: sic fata volunt, sic ferre necesse est; quae magnis placuere deis, patienter et aequo ferre animo praestat. Sed quo me pectore censes, dum memini quis praedo fuit? Gibbosus et ambos 15 obliquos oculorum orbes hinc inde revolvens, me rapuit, cuius facies sub imagine tauri aut ursi concepta iacet. Proh! Sidera, talem audetis spectare virum! Submergite prorsus atque inter medias meritum damnate tenebras! 20 Me comite, intrarat puteum vix; corda duobus, ut nosti, communis adest; hic impiger ad se attraxit cordam solvitque ligamina. Maestum secreti tenuere lares! O credule, quantum

10  La tesi di dottorato di Lopomo 2010-2012 (come a  n.  3) non raggiunge in questo senso delle conclusioni univoche, in quanto suscettibili di variazioni a seconda della raccolta poetica presa in esame. Si attendono dunque i risultati dell’annunciata monografia in corso di stampa.

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condolui dum te tanto molimine cordam 25 tractantem et lymphas speculantem terque quaterque mirantem inspexi ludos aliisque moventem. Sed tandem redeo. Tantos, Gulielme, labores tolle, animo et placidam requiescens concipe pacem! Nunc adsum. Salve! Misero da frena dolori! 30 Salve iterum! Capiant superi tua vota secundi. Ex studiis Papiensibus t. ad dominum Gulielmum Guerram scripsit in mg. L librarius ipse : Guillelmum V  | 5 ne me L] mene V | quem correxi] quam LV | 13 deis L] diis V | vix L] vir V facilior videtur | 24 secreti L] secretum V  |  Ex studiis Papiensibus L] Ex studiis Papiensibus in frequentia. M. Vegius Laudensis V 5 “turbine tanto” in clausula: Lucr. DRN 6.640, “Nunc ratio quae sit, per fauces montis ut Aetnae / exspirent ignes interdum turbine tanto / expediam […]”; Sil. Pun. 10.271 | 4 “optime rerum” nonnumquam in auctoribus Vegii fere aequalibus invenitur. Cf. exempli gratia Basinii Parmensis Isottaeum 2.10.99-100, “Isottae miseresce tuae, quae te, optime rerum  / sospite  […]”  |  6 “labore gravi”: Ven.  Carm. 9.1.59, “Multimodas perpesse minas tua regna resumis, / namque labore gravi crescere magna solent” | 6 “tanto sudore”: Claud. Pros. 1.240, “Claustra chalybs. Nullum tanto sudore Pyragmon”  |  9 “Me thalamus […] retinebat”: cf. Panormitae Prosop. casei, 30, “laetus et in thalamo collocat ille suo”  |  10 “tollere  risum vix poterant”: Hor.  Sat. 2.8.63-64, “[…] conpescere risum / vix poterat […]”  |  12 “sic fata volunt”: Ov. Met. 15.584, “adpropera! sic fata iubent; namque urbe receptus”. Cf.  etiam Panormitae Prosop. casei 39, “Heu heu, me miserum crudelia fata manebant”  |  20 “meritum damnate tenebras”: Prud. c. Symm. 1.444, “Infernis triste ob meritum damnata tenebris” | 23 “solvitque ligamina. Maestum”: Prud. Perist. 9.86, “Tandem luctantis miseratus ab aethere Christus / iubet resolvi pectoris ligamina”  |  24 “secreti tenuere lares”: Lucan. Phars. 1.507, “Conciperent, tenuere lares; nec limine quisquam”; Sen.  Herc. Fur. 197, “Me mea tellus lare secreto”. Cf. etiam Baptistae Mantuanis Parthenice sexta sive Diva Apollonia 339, “In lare secreto mater […]”  |  25 “tanto molimina”: Ov. Met. 6.694, “(Nam mihi campus is est), tanto molimine luctor”  |  26 “terque quaterque”: cf., inter alios, Ov. Met. 1.179, Ov. Met. 2.49, Luc. Phars. 5.497 nec non Panormitae Prosop. casei 34, “ungebat liquido terque quaterque oleo”.

Un secchio racconta in prima persona le circostanze del suo rapimento e di uno scherzo giocato al suo padrone, un certo Guglielmo Guerra, di cui, suo malgrado, è stato protagonista. Non trovando più il suo secchio, Guglielmo lo crede finito in fondo al pozzo. Nel suo “thalamus magnus” il secchio non è tuttavia solo. Ovunque è riso, dice l’arnese, il riso di chi, presente allo scherzo, ne sta pregustando l’epilogo. Guglielmo inizia a tirare la corda: ma la sua fatica è sproporzionata al peso dell’oggetto. In fondo al pozzo con Secchio, infatti, c’è un uomo deforme, dalla gobba pronunciata, dagli occhi strabuzzati e dal volto sfigurato da tratti ferini. Fu lui a  rapire Secchio e  a  prestarsi alla burla. Con uno sforzo immane (“tanto molimine”) Guglielmo riesce a tirare a sé la corda e pietosa 187

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è la commozione del maestus Secchio, mentre gli astanti si prendono gioco del padrone. Ma lo scherzo è finito e lo spavento è passato. Secchio torna da Guglielmo e gli augura la benevolenza degli Dei. Per contestualizzare il componimento è  necessario partire dai paratesti che lo accompagnano nei manoscritti e dalla biografia di Vegio. La sottoscrizione ex studiis Papiensibus (di identico tenore è  quella posta in calce alla prosopopea della cagnetta; in frequentia aggiunge V) rimanda agli anni in cui Vegio frequentava la facoltà di diritto dell’Università di Pavia, cioè al 1421/3-1435 circa.11 Nel 1423 Vegio trovò rifugio dalla peste nella campagna lodigiana, dove scrisse i  Pompeiana, una raccolta di componimenti in esametri di materia antivillanesca di cui egli svilupperà i  contenuti nei più maturi Rusticanalia del 1431.12 Nel 1428 Vegio pubblica il fortunatissimo Supplementum all’Eneide; nel 1430 tenta (invano) di accreditarsi presso la corte di Filippo Maria Visconti con la composizione del Convivium deorum e dell’encomiastico Carmen heroicum ad Philippum Mariam Anglum, ducem Mediolanensium. Nello stesso anno pubblica l’Astyanax. Accanto ai Rusticanalia, nel 1431 egli diffonde infine i  Velleris aurei libri quattuor, rielaborazione del mito degli Argonauti certamente sollecitata dalla ripresa di interesse per i  testi di Apollonio Rodio e  di Valerio Flacco.13 Lo studium pavese negli anni in cui lo frequentò Vegio fu uno dei centri di maggiore diffusione dell’Umanesimo. A Pavia aveva trovato accoglimento parte della biblioteca di Petrarca e lì si erano dati appuntamento, tra gli anni Venti e Trenta del secolo, i grandi protagonisti di quella vivacissima stagione: accanto a glorie locali come Cambio Zambeccari, Cosma Raimondi, Antonio Cremona e  il prin­cipe dei giuristi culti, Catone Sacco, si stagliano importanti 11  In un atto del notaio Silano Mangano, Vegio è  ricordato nell’autunno del 1426 come “legum scolaris”: R. Maiocchi, Codice diplomatico dell’università di Pavia, vol. 2/1 (Pavia, 1913), 233-234. La data di immatricolazione di Vegio è controversa: A. Franzoni, L’opera pedagogica di Maffeo Vegio (Lodi, 1907), 20; V. Rossi, Il Q uattrocento (Milano, 1964), 272. 12  F. Della Schiava, “Alcune vicende di un sodalizio umanistico pavese: Lorenzo Valla e  Maffeo Vegio”, in L.  C. Rossi (ed.), Le strade di Ercole. Itinerari umanistici e  altri percorsi (Firenze, 2010), 312-313; N.  Lopomo, “Considerazioni sul titolo di una raccolta di Maffeo Vegio: ‘Rusticalia’ o ‘Rusticanalia’?”, Interpres. Rivista di studi quattrocenteschi 34 (2016), 280-285. 13 R.  Sabbadini, Le scoperte dei codici latini e  greci ne’ secoli XIV e  XV (Firenze 1905), 46; Id., Le scoperte dei codici latini e greci ne’ secoli XIV e XV. Nuove ricerche (Firenze, 1914), 257.

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figure dell’umanesimo quattrocentesco come Gasparino Barzizza, Pier Candido Decembrio, Antonio da Rho, Lorenzo Valla e Antonio Beccadelli, detto il Panormita.14 Proprio nel quadro dei rapporti tra Vegio e Panormita va collocata questa prosopopea. Su sollecitazione di Bartolomeo Capra, Panormita giunse a  Pavia nel 1429 per completare gli studi di diritto e per tentare l’ingresso nella corte dei Visconti: la promozione arrivò alla fine di quell’anno.15 Nello studium cittadino tra il 1430 e il 1433 egli ricoprì anche diversi incarichi di insegnamento presso la cattedra di retorica. Il comune interesse per la poesia creò tra i  due umanisti l’occasione di una collaborazione: Panormita cercò infatti l’aiuto del lodigiano per emendare un codice di Virgilio appartenuto a  Cambio Zambeccari, imparando ad apprezzarne la competenza nella poesia latina (“adiutorem Maphaeum Vegium, poetam haud reiecendum”).16 Ma ne accese certamente anche la competizione, che non era orientata solo verso l’esibizione della bravura poetica, ma che, come si è detto, puntava per entrambi all’accreditamento presso la corte viscontea.17 I Rusticanalia, apprezzati con qualche riserva postuma dallo stesso Panormita,18 vanno probabilmente letti proprio come un tentativo da parte di Vegio, che fino ad allora si era cimentato quasi esclusivamente nella poesia epica, di esplorare un terreno diverso, che gli consentisse un confronto di genere con l’Hermaphroditus di Beccadelli, per il quale la giovanile raccolta dei Pompeiana, pur innervata di spunti satirici, epigrammatici e  carnevaleschi, non godeva ancora della necessaria maturità formale. Proprio questo impegno sul versante di una letteratura sì licenziosa ma non scandalosa come quella di Panormita è  alla base dell’avvicendamento dei due poeti come inter-

  A. Sottili, “Università e cultura a Pavia in età visconteo-sforzesca”, in R. Bossaglia et al. (ed.), Storia di Pavia, vol. 3.2 (Milano, 1990), 359-452. 15  G. Resta, Beccadelli Antonio, detto il Panormita, in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, vol. 7 (Roma, 1970), 400-406. 16 G.  Resta, L’epistolario del Panormita. Studi per un’edizione critica (Messina, 1954), 244, no.  588; A.  Sottili, “La natio germanica dell’Università di Pavia”, in Id., Università e cultura. Studi sui rapporti italo-tedeschi nell’età dell’Umanesimo (Goldbach, 1993), 201-364, a  362-364; P.  Rosso, “Catone Sacco e  l’umanesimo lombardo. Notizie e  documenti”, Bollettino della società pavese di storia patria 52 (2000), 47. 17  Della Schiava 2010 (come a n. 12), 312. 18  Sottili 1993 (come a n. 16), 382; Rosso 2000 (come a n. 16), 47, 79. 14

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preti della parte dell’epicureo nelle due successive redazioni del De vero bono di Lorenzo Valla.19 Che le due prosopopee di Vegio vadano ricondotte a  questo clima di competizione con il Panormita sembra essere confer­mato da un componimento estravagante di quest’ultimo, pubblicato da Donatella Coppini sotto il titolo di Prosopopea del for­mag­ gio.20 Si tratta di un’elegia comica, nella quale viene sviluppato il medesimo tema che innerva le due prosopopee di Vegio: il furto. I testi sono cronologicamente contigui, in quanto prodotti a Pavia a  cavallo tra gli anni Venti e  gli anni Trenta del Q uattrocento, e ne sono protagonisti personaggi legati allo studio pavese: il Petrus Azanellus a  cui fu sottratta la forma di formaggio (Panormita) era un doctor della facoltà di Medicina e autore di un commento a Galeno e Avicenna 21 e la vittima della burla del secchio (Vegio) è  forse da riconoscersi in quel Guillelmus de Guerris de Viqueira (cioè da Voghera) menzionato in un atto di Silano Mangano del 19 marzo 1427 come studente di diritto (“legum scolaris”).22 Non è  difficile dunque scorgere sullo sfondo di questi componimenti non solo quella vena goliardica tipica della vita studentesca universitaria, ma soprattutto un’eco, ancorché declinata e  alleggerita in chiave comica, della polemica avviata dagli umanisti nei confronti della cultura scolastica, che nell’Università, e  in particolare nelle facoltà di Giurisprudenza e  di Medicina, trovava, a  loro avviso, una manifestazione ancora molto tangibile: di questa “disputa delle arti” presso l’università pavese l’Epistola contra Bartolum di Lorenzo Valla (1433) costituì senz’altro l’apice e  il De verborum significatione di Vegio un contributo rilevante.23 Alcuni puntuali richiami intertestuali rendono ancora più sicuro il legame tra questi testi, e  in particolare tra la Prosopopea del formaggio (Panormita) e la Prosopopea del secchio (Vegio). For  Della Schiava 2010 (come a n. 12), 301-319.   D.  Coppini, “Prosopopea del formaggio. Un’elegia comica del Panormita e  il latino degli umanisti”, Moderni e antichi 1 (2003), 270-290. 21   “Pietro Arzanello”: Coppini 2003 (come a n. 20), 284. 22  Maiocchi 1913 (come a n. 11), 242, no. 371. Nella prosopopea della cagnetta l’oggetto dello scherno del poeta è un vecchio e insigne legum doctor. 23  G. Rossi, “Valla e il diritto. L’Epistola contra Bartolum e le Elegantiae. Percorsi di ricerca e proposte interpretative”, in M. Regoliosi (ed.), Pubblicare il Valla (Firenze, 2008), 507-599; Della Schiava 2010 (come a  n.  12), 320-341; Id., “Biondo Flavio, il Digesto e  il De verborum significatione di Maffeo Vegio”, Studi e  problemi di critica testuale 89 (2014), 163-184. 19 20

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maggio viene scaricato dal dorso di un cavallo e riposto nella camera da letto (“in thalamo collocat ille suo”), da dove verrà poi sottratto; così anche Secchio attende il compimento della burla dal suo “thalamus […] magnus”, il pozzo della casa di Guglielmo. Le abitazioni dei padroni di Formaggio e Secchio sono da entrambi definite metonimicamente come lares e sulle stesse note si sviluppano anche le loro lamentazioni all’indirizzo dei fata avversi, che in Vegio, tuttavia, si velano di pia rassegnazione: “sic fata volunt, sic ferre necesse est […] patienter et aequo / ferre animo praestat” (Vegio, v.  12-14); “Heu Heu, me miserum crudelia fata manebant” (Panormita, v. 39).24 Non si tratta, dunque, di coincidenze fortuite, ma di un gioco di imitazioni e ribaltamenti, se non addirittura di un certame tra i  due poeti, fondato su regole condivise che ne determinano le comuni scelte linguistiche e  situazionali. Una perfetta variazione oppositiva si trova, d’altronde, nella descrizione del comune gioco di funi e di corde che interessa, mutatis mutandis, tanto Formaggio quanto Secchio. Formaggio viene issato sulla trave della camera da letto (“alligat ad summam, fune tenente, trabem”, v. 32), quindi con un movimento ascensionale; una corda cala Secchio e  il deforme rapitore nel pozzo, con movimento discensionale. Opposto è, infine, l’esito del furto: Formaggio viene fatto a  pezzi e  divorato dalla “turba gulosa” dei suoi rapitori (il suo è dunque un lamento post mortem o, come l’ha definito Coppini, un “carme funebre”); 25 catartica è invece la soluzione della vicenda di Secchio. Perciò anche le apostrofi finali dei personaggi ai rispettivi padroni sono antitetiche: Formaggio invita Azanello a  piangere le sue disavventure e a meglio custodire la sua casa (“Plange meos casus, iam iamque, Azanelle, caveto / incustoditos deseruisse lares”, v. 61-62); Secchio, invece, sollecita Guglielmo a  riprendersi dallo spavento perché la vita – sembra quasi sentirlo dire! – va avanti. Al diverso esito dei due componimenti corrispondono anche diverse scelte di carattere metrico: Panormita opta per il distico elegiaco perché la sua è una parodia dell’epicedio poetico; Vegio sceglie invece l’esa­ metro, per chiarire la prevalenza del carattere eroicomico della sua prosopopea. Credo che si tratti di una studiata scelta di campo da parte di Vegio, operata per posizionare il proprio testo su un   Coppini 2003 (come a n. 20), 279.   Coppini 2003 (come a n. 20), 282.

24 25

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terreno diverso da quello occupato da Panormita, un terreno nel quale egli, autore del Supplemento all’Eneide, aveva acquisito particolare autorevolezza. E in questo senso, un guanto di sfida sem­ brerebbe gettarlo il primo verso della Prosopopea del secchio: esso infatti ricalca quasi alla lettera l’incipit di un’elegia scritta dallo stesso Vegio all’indomani della pubblicazione dell’Angelinetum di Giovanni Marrasio (autunno 1429), a cui per altro anche Panormita aveva risposto in versi.26 Il messaggio è chiaro: anche io so scrivere elegie, pare dire il lodigiano, ma qui faccio a modo mio. L’indagine sugli ipotesti classici e tardoantichi di questo breve componimento si risolve probabilmente nel gioco della memoria poetica: Lucano, Silio Italico, le Metamorfosi di Ovidio e il De raptu Proserpinae di Claudiano erano testi che gli umanisti assimilavano sui banchi di scuola e  la cui imitazione può essere talvolta giustificata da richiami intuitivi più che da sofisticate strategie intertestuali. Lo stesso potrebbe valere per la tessera lucreziana (v.  5): perché se è vero che il De rerum natura in questi anni era tornato a  circolare grazie alla riscoperta di Poggio Bracciolini, la sua fruizione da parte di Vegio, ancorché probabile, va ancora dimostrata, specialmente a fronte della presenza dello stesso elemento testuale in un autore canonico e  certo meglio noto come Silio Italico.27 Meno casuale mi pare invece il riferimento alla satira oraziana di Nasidieno, il generoso anfitrione che invitava gli amici a cene indimenticabili ma a cui mancava quella necessaria sprezzatura che fa la differenza tra il ricco bifolco e  il commensale elegante. Chi ricorda la satira, sa che il suo momento di maggiore tensione narrativa è il crollo sulla tavola dei convitati di un baldacchino appeso al soffitto: una situazione inattesa a cui Nasidieno risponde con una reazione inadeguata, che provoca l’ilarità degli astanti e che offre a Vegio un tassello satirico con il quale arricchire la scena, non dissimile, da lui tratteggiata nella sua prosopopea. In questa breve disamina degli ipotesti, mi pare interessante anche il nesso con Ovidio, Met. 15.584:

26  Raffaele 1909 (come a n. 3), 36. L’elegia in distici elegiaci inizia “Q uid quereris? Q uid te tanto moerore fatigas?” A parlare è Angelina, in una fittizia risposta ai versi dell’innamorato Marrasio: G. Resta (ed.), Johannis Marrasii Angelinetum et carmina varia (Palermo, 1976), 134-135. 27  Si rimanda agli apparati di Schneider 1985 (come a  n.  2) e  Putnam 2004 (come a n. 2).

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Ov. Met. 15.584

Vegio, v. 12

adpropera! sic fata iubent; namque urbe receptus

longa dabam: sic fata volunt, sic ferre necesse est

Tra il verso di Vegio e l’ipotesto ovidiano non c’è perfetta identità, tuttavia va considerato che il sintagma “sic fata volunt” non è mai attestato in poesia e che la formulazione ovidiana costitui­ sce l’unico specimen che si presti a  fungere da modello. La loro identica posizione metrica aggiunge un ulteriore elemento di conferma all’ipotesi del loro rapporto intertestuale, che acquista ancor più fascino se si guarda al contesto in cui la tessera si colloca nel testo di Ovidio. A formulare l’invito ad accettare con rassegnazione il volere del fato e  quindi il proprio destino (variazione, evidentemente, di un tema in primis virgiliano) è l’indovino etrusco consultato dal pretore Cipo allorché, specchiatosi nel fiume (“fluminea  […] in unda”), scopre che gli erano spuntate un paio di corna. Il presagio viene interpretato dall’aruspice come segno dell’imminente presa del potere a  Roma da parte di Cipo, che però inorridisce all’idea di essere il protagonista di un colpo di stato e  si denuncia di fronte al popolo e  al Senato. I quali, non solo lo assolvono ma lo acclamano persino re, avverando così la profezia tanto aborrita. Si può ritrovare più di un parallelismo tra Vegio e  il suo ipotesto: il motivo della pia accettazione del fato; l’assimilazione della figura dell’indovino con quella di Secchio come vaticinatori del futuro dell’erus; il motivo dello specchio come fattore deformante della realtà (Cipo si specchia nel fiume, Guglielmo nel pozzo e  a  entrambi viene restituita un’immagine mostruosa). Tuttavia la vera novità nella proposta intertestuale di Vegio rispetto a  quella di Panormita si gioca in realtà sul terreno di un ricercato dialogo tra fonti classiche e cristiane, lo studio e il recu­ pero delle quali furono centrali nella riflessione poetica del lodi­ giano almeno a  partire dalla seconda metà degli anni Trenta del secolo per diventare poi totalizzanti nella produzione successiva: quella, per intenderci, del Vegio “umanista cristiano”.28 Accanto al suo ricco catalogo di opere di carattere agiografico, di inni e di uffici liturgici, Vegio fu infatti anche cercatore e  scopritore di testi della letteratura cristiana antica. Così emerge da una testi B. Vignati, Maffeo Vegio: umanista cristiano, 1407-1448 (Bergamo, 1958).

28

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monianza di Enea Silvio Piccolomini che fu inserita nel contesto finzionale del suo Dialogus de somnio quodam e che è già stata messa in rilievo per altri aspetti.29 Piccolomini riferisce di una gita a Subiaco avvenuta circa nel 1453 alla quale presero parte Biondo Flavio, Lorenzo Valla e  lo stesso Vegio.30 Q ui il lodigiano scoprì i versi De Pascha di Vittorino poeta, che egli attribuiva, sulla scorta del manoscritto, a  Cipriano.31 Al di là del dato erudito, questo cammeo narrativo è interessante anche per un altro motivo. Mettendo a  frutto una delle qualità distintive dell’Umanesimo, ossia la scoperta dei codici,32 Piccolomini formula infatti un canone di auctoritates moderne a  cui guardare per la restaurazione umanistica di tre luoghi nevralgici dello spazio letterario dell’antichità: Biondo Flavio per la storiografia, Lorenzo Valla per la retorica e Maffeo Vegio per la poesia sacra. Di questo interesse del lodigiano per la poesia religiosa la Prosopopea del secchio non costituisce evidentemente una testimonianza di primo livello, se non altro per la totale estraneità di genere. Ciononostante, lo “smontaggio” del testo nelle sue tessere costitutive consente di documentare un esempio assai precoce, per non dire il primo, di quello sperimentalismo tra fonti classiche e  cristiane che caratterizzerà la produzione futura di Vegio.33 Tra i vari spunti intertestuali proposti in apparato, mi soffermo in particolare sulla probabile imitazione di Prudenzio, autore certo assai ben noto al Vegio più tardo, cioè all’autore di poesia religiosa

29  A. Scafi (tr.), Enea Silvio Piccolomini, Dialogo su un sogno / Dialogus de somnio quodam (Racconigi, 2004); F. Della Schiava, “Nella biblioteca umanistica di Ariosto: un nuovo somnium per Furioso XXXIV-XXXV?”, Aevum 90 (2016), 547-556. 30   Scafi (come a n. 29), 131-146. 31  Un non lontano discendente di questo esemplare scoperto da Vegio è il Città del Vaticano, BAV, ms.  Ott. lat. 1375, che contiene anche la Roma instaurata di Biondo Flavio: F. Della Schiava. “La Roma instaurata di Biondo Flavio nella Biblioteca Vaticana”, in Miscellanea Bibliothecae Apostolicae Vaticanae XXI (Città del Vaticano, 2015), 41-84, a 64-65. 32  Sulle scoperte dei codici basti il recente profilo di C. Gastgeber, “Entdeckung/ Wiedergewinnung”, in M.  Landfester (ed.), Renaissance-Humanismus. Lexikon zur Antikerezeption (Stuttgart – Weimar, 2014), 279-307, a 279-293. Kristeller ne aveva identificato una delle proprietà costitutive dell’Umanesimo: P.  O. Kristeller, “Renaissance Humanism and Classical Antiquity”, in A.  Rabil, jr. (ed.), Humanism in Italy. Vol. 1. Renaissance Humanism. Foundations, Forms, and Legacy (Philadelphia, PA, 1988), 5-16. 33  Per il metodo: R. Cardini, M. Regoliosi (ed.), Intertestualità e smontaggi (Roma, 1998); R. Cardini, Mosaici. Il “nemico” dell’Alberti (Roma, 2004).

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e innografica.34 Le due tessere intertestuali che riguardano il poeta tardo-antico paiono essere certificate dalla concomitanza di rari sintagmi in posizioni metriche specifiche. Curioso è, in particolare, il riuso di un tassello proveniente dal nono componimento del Peristephanon, incentrato sul martirio di s. Cassiano, maestro di scuola che, per non avere abiurato al nuovo credo, fu condannato a  subire il martirio per mano dei suoi studenti.35 Cosa ha a  che vedere questo episodio agiografico con la burla di cui discorre il breve componimento di Vegio? Una risposta a  questa domanda si può cercare nel macrocontesto che inquadra questo componimento, ossia quello della vita studentesca. Si ricordi infatti che Guglielmo era nel 1427 legum sc(h)olaris, studente di diritto civile. I casi di studenti di facoltà superiori che al tempo stesso ricoprivano incarichi di insegnamento nelle facoltà artistiche erano frequenti nell’università medioevale.36 Di questa sovrapposizione di ruoli è indice l’ambiguità che è stata rilevata per lo stesso termine sc(h)olaris, che talvolta indicava lo studente e  talvolta il docente e di cui vi è traccia nei diversi esiti che il termine ha avuto nelle lingue moderne: si confrontino l’italiano scolaro e il tedesco Schüler, che valgono studente, con l’inglese scholar, che significa invece erudito, studioso, accademico. Guglielmo potrebbe essere stato uno di questi studenti anziani, forse già insignito del grado di baccelliere (non sfugga il fatto che nel titolo del componimento il suo nome viene accompagnato dalla reverente apposizione dominus) e già docente in corsi inferiori. Se così fosse, lo scherzo del secchio avrebbe tutto l’aspetto di una burla giocatagli dai suoi studenti e il rimando a  Prudenzio acquisterebbe così senso, contribuendo alla creazione di quell’effetto parodico che è la cifra caratteristica di questo esercizio poetico.

34   F. Della Schiava, “Due uffici liturgici di Maffeo Vegio per s. Agostino”, Augu­stiniana 70.2 (2020), 283-335. Gli inni di Vegio sono stati pubblicati da Raffaele 1909 (come a n. 3), 213-222 e da B. Nogara, “I codici di Maffeo Vegio nella Biblioteca Vaticana e  un inno di lui in onore di S.  Ambrogio”, Archivio storico lombardo 30 (1903), 388-396. Nella tradizione solcata da Prudenzio si inserisce la predilezione del Vegio innografo per la strofe saffica. 35  Sul quale si veda il recente Ch. Laes, “Teachers Afraid of  Their Pupils. Prudentius’ Peristephanon 9 in a Sociocultural Perspective”, Mouseion 16.1 (2019), 91-108. 36 O. Weijers, Terminologie des Universités au XIII siècle (Roma, 1987), 167-173; Ead. (ed.), Vocabulaire des écoles et des méthodes d’enseignement au moyen âge. Actes du colloque, Rome 21-22 octobre 1989, vol. 5 (Turnhout, 1992), ad indicem.

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La prosopopea del Secchio, come si è visto, vanta un’esile tradizione manoscritta.37 Ma il suo valore non si ferma al dato documentario, e  cioè agli elementi che offre per inquadrare meglio i rapporti con il rivale Panormita negli anni più significativi del loro soggiorno pavese. Esso fornisce al contrario uno dei primi specimina di quel dialogo tra fonti classiche e  cristiane che sortirà da lì a  breve il poema Antonias e  che costituirà una delle proprietà distintive della poetica di Vegio. Inoltre, costituisce l’unico precedente a  me noto del tema della secchia rapita, sviluppato e  reso celebre dall’omonimo poema eroicomico di Alessandro Tassoni. E se assai improbabile è  un rapporto diretto tra i  due testi, non è  invece da escludere che entrambi abbiano attinto il soggetto da un comune spunto narrativo. Mi riferisco al leggendario furto di un secchio da parte di un gruppo di modenesi appena al di fuori delle mura di Bologna, che la tradizione pone a pretesto di quella guerra tra le due città emiliane che si concluse con la battaglia di Zappolino (1325) e con la vittoria di Modena.38 Di questo pittoresco racconto pare che non ci siano attestazioni scritte anteriori al sec. XVI, ma la “secchia” oggetto del contendere è  conservata da sempre nella cattedrale di Modena, come monito dell’evento. Non è  pertanto improbabile che la leggenda fosse nota a  Vegio, che potrebbe anzi averne tratto materiale per l’inventio poetica: un’ipotesi verosimile e  suggestiva che, tuttavia, è  destinata a  restare tale.

  La cui Prosopopea del formaggio è invece trasmessa da almeno sei manoscritti, per lo più miscellanee umanistiche. Ma il dato, di per sé, non è  indice di una più ampia ricezione del carme. 38 V.  Lenzi, La battaglia di Zappolino e  la “Secchia Rapita” (Modena, 1994), 11-12. 37

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POÉSIE ET POLITIQ UE DANS DEUX CARMINA D’ERCOLE STROZZI

L’attelage de Poésie et de Politique précipite souvent son conducteur, au lieu de l’élever au faîte de la gloire. La chute de Phaéton, attachée tout naturellement à l’ambiance culturelle ferraraise – l’Éridan n’est-il pas le lieu où finalement s’abîme le fils du Soleil? – fait partie des motifs obsédants de la poésie d’Ercole Strozzi. La problématique de la relation entre poésie et politique, fondamentale pour les poètes italiens de la Renaissance en général, tourne au tragique dans le cas particulier des Strozzi de Ferrare. En effet, à partir du moment où Tito et Ercole Strozzi doivent tenir les rênes du pouvoir, la question de la conciliation de la poésie et de la politique se pose pour eux de manière lancinante. Elle est présente dans la plupart de leurs œuvres datant de cette période. Par exemple, la dernière version de la Venatio d’Ercole 1 mêle deux types de chasseurs: les princes d’une part, les poètes de l’autre, tandis que les Sermones de son vieux père, Tito,2 visent à répondre aux reproches qui lui sont adressés de négliger ses responsabilités administratives pour son otium poétique! Mais, c’est sans doute dans deux poèmes auto-réflexifs composés par Ercole Strozzi (une

1  Il existe deux versions de La Chasse d’Ercole Strozzi. L’édition scientifique, avec traduction française, de B.  Charlet-Mesdijan et D.  Voisin, La chasse d’Ercole Strozzi fils de Tito à la divine Lucrèce Borgia duchesse de Ferrare (Aix-en-Provence, 2015), 21-29, établit que la version manuscrite (Ferrara, Biblioteca Comunale, ms. Antonelli 335) intitulée Herculis Strozae thera est antérieure à celle éditée par Alde Manuce, 1513 [1514 n. st.] et compare les deux versions et leurs contenus respectifs. 2   B. Charlet-Mesdijan (ed., tr.), Tito Vespasiano Strozzi, Œuvres satiriques. Le livre des satires (Sermonum liber, ca. 1503). Contre le Méchant Loup (In Ponerolycon, 1575) (Aix-en-Provence, 2016).

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 197-210 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124058

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ode et une amorce tragique), comme notre lecture le montrera, que l’ambivalence du discours sur l’alliance de ces termes est la plus manifeste.

Le couple poésie et politique dans l’ode à la source du Sandalo La neuvième et dernière pièce du recueil lyrique d’E. Strozzi (Carminum liber 9: Venise, Alde, 1514), intitulée Ad Sandalum, s’inspire de l’Ode à la fontaine de Bandusie (Hor.  Carm. 3.13).3 En effet, à l’imitation de son modèle, elle se démarque métriquement des odes religieuses précédentes, qui avaient toutes adopté des schémas métriques de l’hymnodie latine chrétienne, pour se couler au contraire dans le moule lyrique proprement horatien du Carm. 3.13, soit la strophe asclépiade B, la seule, comme le faisait remarquer Jean-Louis Charlet, à ne pas avoir été utilisée par Prudence.4 Cette émulation avec le chantre de Venouse est d’ailleurs signalée dès l’attaque du vers liminaire “O fons Sandalii”, écho de “O fons Bandusiae”; puis, à nouveau dans le premier vers de la deuxième strophe (v. 13), et de manière plus insistante encore, à la fois par la reprise en même position métrique du nom de la fontaine horatienne, mais sous la forme Blandusiae, et non Bandusiae – ce qui pourrait être l’indice, si ce n’était une variante personnelle, qu’Ercole Strozzi lisait Horace dans un manuscrit issu d’une tradition présentant cette leçon orthographique dont nous connaissons l’existence grâce aux commentaires de certains jésuites érudits des xviie et xviiie siècles –, et par l’emploi de l’adjectif  amabilis, épithète du poète dont il est question toujours dans ce vers, et qui nous renvoie bien entendu à Horace en personne, puisque celui-ci souhaitait l’obtenir pour lui-même (Carm. 4.3.14-15 “inter amabilis  / vatum ponere me choros”). Enfin, de manière plus subtile, on relèvera toute une série de termes, ou d’expressions, de coloration typiquement horatienne: Pindaricae (v.  14); adorea (v.  16); 3  Le texte de l’Ode 9 d’Ercole Strozzi est édité et traduit en annexe 1 par mes soins à partir de l’editio princeps posthume d’Alde Manuce 1513 [1514 n.st.]. Les vers qui font l’objet d’un commentaire sont mentionnés dans le corps de l’article par un simple numéro, invitant le lecteur à se reporter à l’annexe 1 pour les découvrir. 4   J.-L. Charlet, “La métrique des Odes d’Ercole Strozzi”, Euphrosyne 45 (2017), 331-339, à la p. 338.

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Massici (v. 17); in ultimos (v. 2 et Hor. Carm. 1.35.29); agrestium (v. 5 et Hor. Carm. 3.1.21); verba sequi (v. 24 [Ald. V.23] et Hor.  Epist. 2.2.143) qui parsèment le poème en l’inscrivant dans une filiation horatienne, sans toutefois lui ôter sa teneur très personnelle. À  ces emprunts ponctuels lexicaux, déjà relevés par JeanLouis Charlet à l’occasion de son étude sur la métrique du carminum liber,5 correspondent aussi des thèmes communs à l’Ode 9 d’Ercole Strozzi et au Carm. 3.13 d’Horace tels que la personnification de la fontaine, l’évocation d’un arbre comme élément de paysage, la topique de l’offrande à la divine source d’inspiration, ainsi que celle du poète capable de procurer l’éternité à son sujet, à sa patrie et à lui-même. Cette ode “profane” procède donc en vérité d’un autre type de sacré. En effet, elle place la poésie du Vates immédiatement après la foi chrétienne en lui reconnaissant implicitement une vertu proche de celle du Christ même: celle de pouvoir procurer aux sectateurs de la poésie comme religion, et aux sujets qu’ils célèbrent par leurs chants, une forme de survie procédant non d’un acte de résurrection, mais de commémoration: de même que le Christ grâce à son sacrifice a  vaincu la Mort, le Vates, grâce à l’offrande à sa source d’inspiration et à la nymphe qui l’habite de ses chants poétiques, préférés aux habituels sacrifices païens (couronnes de fleurs, libation de vin ou meurtre rituel d’une victime animale), a également la capacité de repousser la Mort en perpétuant le souvenir des mortels que ses carmina auront illustrés. Cette conception très élevée de la poésie comme monumentum aere perennius, héritée des Anciens et commune à la plupart des humanistes depuis Pétrarque,6 nous incline également à rapprocher cette ode de la fameuse Ode 3.30 d’Horace, À Melpomène. En effet, si l’Ode à la fontaine de Bandusie n’évoquait que des sujets poétiques de style humble ou moyen propres à la bucolique, à l’élégie amoureuse ou à la géorgique, Ercole Strozzi, dans ce dernier poème de son recueil lyrique, comme le faisait Horace dans son chant Exegi monumentum, veut célébrer la totalité de l’in­ spiration paternelle, y compris sa poésie encomiastique, composée   Ibid., 331-332, n. 2.   Sur la fortune de ce “thème de l’immortalité de et par l’œuvre poétique” dans “la grande poésie européenne”, cf. R. Brague, “L’immortalité de l’œuvre. D’Horace à Pouchkine”, in F.  Leca Mercier (ed.), La Lettre et l’Esprit. Hommage à Pierre Cahné (Paris, 2011), 241-252. 5 6

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en tant que poète officiel de Borso d’Este, 1er duc de Ferrare; et, donc, après avoir évoqué les cycles amoureux de l’Eroticon qui ont immortalisé les prénoms d’Anthia et de Phylliroé (v.  6), il n’oublie pas non plus la poésie courtisane de Tito, en particulier la Borsiade  (“il commémore le duc”, v.  8), et vante plus généralement son habileté laudative. En effet, Tito est présenté ici comme capable de louer n’importe qui (v. 11), et, de surcroît, sans susciter, en réaction à cet éloge, l’envie malfaisante (v. 12), ce qui n’est pas un mince exploit. Poésie et politique semblent donc dans l’Ode 9 d’E. Strozzi former un mariage uni, comme l’indique la présence du mot fide. En effet, c’est sur celui-ci qu’il faut insister car il traduit la confiance mutuelle du prince et de son chantre: l’expression à l’ablatif grandi fide signifiant tout à la fois, selon moi, “sous un grand patronage” (celui du prince) et “avec une grande loyauté ou fidélité” (celle du poète). Et, de fait, même après la disparition de son sujet, le duc Borso (†  20 août 1471), Tito Strozzi, nous le savons grâce à la reconstitution des différentes phases rédactionnelles de l’épopée par son éditeur, Walter Ludwig,7 n’a pas abandonné sa Borsiade, mais a cherché à plusieurs reprises à la réorienter en limant le texte jusqu’à ses derniers jours, et ce, en dépit de la versatilité de l’actualité politique italienne qui a néanmoins empêché l’achèvement du poème. Dans cette ode, probablement composée entre 14951496,8 mais qui nous ramène à une période antérieure, celle du règne de Borso d’Este (1450-1471), la relation entre poésie et politique apparaît donc comme une évidence: le rôle du poète (ici incarné par Tito Strozzi) est d’honorer sa patrie, que symbolise sa source ou son fleuve nourricier, inspirateur de son génie; et cela consiste avant tout à commémorer son prince (d’abord Borso, puis Ercole d’Este) avec lequel il entretient un lien indé7  Cf. W. Ludwig (ed.), Die Borsias des Tito Strozzi. Ein lateinisches Epos der Renaissance (Munich, 1977). Son introduction propose une reconstitution des phases rédactionnelles de l’épopée les liant aux évolutions successives de la situation politique. Les livres 1 à 4 ont été composés sous le règne de Borso et prennent ce prince pour héros, tandis que les livres 5 à 10, écrits après la disparition du personnage principal éponyme, ont entrepris de chanter plus généralement la Maison d’Este et la foi en sa bonne étoile confortée, dans un premier temps, par l’alliance avec Ludovic Le More (1452-1508). 8  C’est précisément l’allusion des vers 7-8 de l’Ode 9 à la Borsiade qui permet de croire que cette pièce a dû être composée entre 1495-1496, soit au moment de la reprise de la rédaction de son épopée par Tito Strozzi.

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fectible de mutuelle confiance (c’est surtout vrai en ce qui concernait Borso). Cette lune de miel entre le poète et le prince a correspondu à une réalité en ce qui concerne les Strozzi sous Leonello et Borso d’Este, soit du temps de Tito et de ses frères, et non d’Ercole Strozzi. En effet, à partir du règne d’Ercole d’Este, les Strozzi sont souvent en butte aux critiques et à la disgrâce, tout en se voyant contraints d’assumer des charges politiques de plus en plus lourdes, et ce, dans un contexte social, économique et politique dégradé. Le duché d’Este est en proie aux guerres, aux calamités naturelles (famines, épidémies, crues du Pô), ainsi qu’aux dépenses somptuaires du Duc Ercole qui entraînent la levée de taxes et d’impôts insupportables.

Le couple poésie et politique dans le poème hexamétrique aux nymphes d’Andes Le poème aux nymphes d’Andes peut s’interpréter comme une amplificatio de l’Ode 9; ou plutôt son pendant dans le style épique.9 En effet, si l’Ode 9, avec ses vingt-quatre vers, surpassait déjà son modèle horatien en longueur, cette pièce-ci est non seulement plus étendue – elle est longue de cent-cinquante-deux vers –, mais aussi composée en hexamètres dactyliques, et non plus en strophes lyriques. D’autre part, de même que l’Ode 9 occupait la dernière place dans le Carminum liber de l’Aldine, l’invocation aux nymphes d’Andes clôt de son côté la succession des poèmes hexamétriques, puisque la Gigantomachie inachevée, bien qu’également composée en hexamètres, n’est ajoutée dans l’editio princeps posthume qu’après les recueils en distiques élégiaques, à l’extrême fin de la partie du livre rassemblant l’œuvre d’Ercole.10 Autre analogie entre l’ode 9 et ce poème, il prend également la forme d’une invocation aux naïades, divinités personnifiées des eaux inspiratrices. 9  Le plan détaillé du poème est fourni dans l’annexe 2. Sur ce poème, lire aussi B.  Charlet-Mesdijan, “Alleanza dell’Antico e  del moderno nell’epillio eziologico, De loco, ubi Maro lusit – Ad Andiadas nymphas di Ercole Strozzi”, in L.  SecchiTarugi (ed.), Antico et Moderno, sincretismi, incontri e  scontri culturali nel Rinascimento (Firenze, 2020), 75-82. 10  Pour une analyse de la Gigantomachie d’Ercole Strozzi, cf. B. Charlet-Mesdijan, “La Gigantomachie inachevée d’E. S., composition et comparaison avec les versions ovidiennes et claudiennes du mythe”, in C.  Cocco, C.  Fossati et  al. (ed.), Itinerari del testo per Stefano Pittaluga, I. Tome (Gênes, 2018), 207-222.

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Néanmoins, entre les deux pièces, on relèvera aussi trois différences notables: tandis que l’ode était un poème de célébration et d’hommage à l’inspiration paternelle comparée par l’intermédiaire de l’intertexte à celle d’Horace, ce poème-ci est une prière qu’Ercole Strozzi adresse pour lui-même et lui seul, aux Andiades, nymphes inspiratrices du grand Virgile, afin qu’elles lui accordent un souffle épique égalant celui de son illustre modèle antique et le rendant capable de chanter Francesco II de Gonzague (14661519), époux d’Isabelle d’Este (1474-1539), la fille aînée du Duc Ercole, prince régnant sur Mantoue et son territoire et second César par ses victoires à Fornoue (1495) 11 et à Novare (février 1496) sur Charles VIII, le chef  des Franco-galli contemporains.12 En effet, aux yeux d’Ercole Strozzi, “après l’exclusion du jeu politique de Ludovic Le More,13 auquel il avait promis de dédier une épopée dans la première version de sa Venatio 14 et qu’il avait loué dans Elegiae 1.2.79-86 et dans la pièce 46 de ses Epigrammata intitulée Ad Maurum Mediolani ducem, y rapportant ses victoires maritimes dont celle de Rapallo (7 septembre 1494), François   Une autre allusion à cette victoire de Francesco Gonzaga se trouve dans l’épicède du chien Borgeto d’Ercole Strozzi: Borgeti canis per Herculem Strozam Titi filium epicedium, v. 196-199. 12  À propos du jugement d’Ercole Strozzi et des Ferrarais sur la France et les Français, cf.  B.  Charlet-Mesdijan, “Le Roi de France, hospes ou hostis? Le point de vue sur la France et les Français dans la Venatio du poète humaniste ferrarais Ercole Strozzi (ca. 1473-1508)”, Cahiers de recherches médiévales et humanistes / Journal of  Medieval and Humanistic Studies 38.2 (2019), 87-10. 13  Après l’accession au trône de France du duc d’Orléans, Louis XII, mi-1498, l’étoile de Ludovic Le More pâlit: il tombe par trahison entre les mains des Français le 8 avril 1500 et meurt en captivité en 1508. 14  “Pande Erato silvas et mecum retia tende. / Mox, ubi iam virtus numeris adoleverit, arma  / Sforciadenque canam: tecum in pulvere belli  / versabor: nunc pone tubas et carminis orsi.” (Thera, v.  1-4) (Ouvre, Erato, les forêts et tends avec moi les filets. / Bientôt, dès que mes talents poétiques se seront accrus / Je chanterai les combats du Sforciade: je vivrai avec toi dans la poussière de la guerre.  / Mais pour lors dépose les trompettes de l’entreprise épique, tr. personnelle); “Siste age Musa gradum, sat sit venatibus arma,  / arma ciet Mavors. Iam Martia bella canamus.” (Thera, v. 1014-1015) (Arrête donc ta marche, ô Muse, assez des combats pour les chasses.  / C’est Mars qui appelle aux combats. Désormais, chantons les guerres de Mars, tr. personnelle). Dans la version de La chasse de l’Aldine, l’intention d’entreprendre une épopée n’est plus mentionnée dans la conclusion, tandis que, dans le nouveau proème le nom de Juba a  remplacé celui de Sforza (v.  8a, “mox avidum tentare Iubam atque horrentia Martis / agmina”). Certes, par association d’idées entre le Maure et Le More, le nom de Juba I de Maurétanie, allié de Pompée et vaincu par César à Thapsus en 46 avant Jésus Christ, peut renvoyer par allégorie à Ludovic Sforza, mais c’est moins évident! Cf. Charlet-Mesdijan 2019 (cité n. 12), 95, n. 23. 11

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de Gonzague, beau-fils d’Ercole d’Este et très proche de Lucrèce Borgia, représente, plus encore peut-être que César Borgia,15 lié à l’Espagne par ses origines, à la papauté par son père, et à la France par son mariage, la uirtù spécifique à l’Italie du Nord” et l’ultime espoir de ses petites principautés.16 Dans le poème hexamétrique, contrairement aussi à ce qu’on peut lire dans l’ode, les inspirations bucolique et géorgique sont certes évoquées, mais uniquement au début du poème, à propos de la carrière de Virgile, et non quand Ercole expose son propre projet poétique, qui ne semble devoir être qu’encomiastique. Tout se passe en quelque sorte comme si son père Tito, comparé à Horace, avait rivalisé, par le déroulement de sa carrière, avec la trajectoire poétique suivie par Virgile, tandis qu’Ercole, tout en prenant pour modèle Virgile, cherche à brûler d’une certaine façon les étapes en passant directement, et malgré sa jeunesse, à un sujet épique. Et, tandis que le sujet du poème de Tito était Borso, un prince de Ferrare, sa patrie d’adoption, celui que se propose de chanter son fils Ercole, tout en étant le rejeton d’une maison liée à Ferrare, n’est pas le Duc d’Este. En effet, plus encore que les autres princes d’Este, Alfonso (1476-1534) est le grand absent de la poésie d’Ercole Strozzi qui en revanche fait de Lucrèce Borgia, la duchesse d’Este par son mariage avec le même Alfonso, sa dédicataire et l’inspiratrice de son chant.17 Q uant à Francesco  II Gonzaga, le héros loué ici, il est frappant que ses vertus d’homme d’État soient traitées en deux vers seulement (v. 71-72) et de manière parfaitement topique (lui sont reconnues la libéralité, la justice, la piété, la constance), alors que l’éloge insiste sur ses victoires (v.  59-70)  Cf.  B. Charlet-Mesdijan, D.  Voisin, “Non tamen indignum Borgaei dicere laudes / Caesaris […] (T. Strozzi, Serm. 1.120-121). L’éloge épique de César Borgia dans l’œuvre d’Ercole Strozzi (Ferrare, 1474? – 1508): Venatio (1498 TPQ -1505 TAQ ), Borgeti canis epicedium, Caesaris Borgiae ducis epicedium (TPQ  1507)”, Scripta 9 (2017), 251-272. 16  Charlet-Mesdijan 2019, 94, cité n.  12. Selon  I. Cloulas, Les Borgia (Paris, 1973), 373, le poème aux Nymphes Andiades aurait été composé en 1504 pour complaire à Lucrèce Borgia alors proche de François de Gonzague. Tout ce que nous pouvons dire, si l’on s’en tient au contenu du texte, c’est que le terminus post quem pour sa date de composition est 1496. De mon point de vue, Lucrèce Borgia n’est pas la seule motivation de cet éloge de François de Gonzague: la seule raison la plus vraisemblable qui plaiderait pour une laudatio rétrospective, en 1504, du vainqueur de Fornoue et de Novare serait, selon moi, le désenchantement d’Ercole Strozzi vis-à-vis de la politique. 17  Pour une étude de la place réservée à l’éloge des personnalités politiques, cf. Charlet-Mesdijan, Voisin 2017 (cité n. 15), 251-272, à partir de 252. 15

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et sur ses qualités exceptionnelles d’éleveur de chevaux (de guerre) (v.  73-95, voire 101, si l’on inclut la comparaison épique entre les chevaux de Gonzague et ceux du Soleil sur laquelle s’achève la laudatio). Or, même si ce sont les traits que la postérité a  essentiellement retenus de lui et qu’il voulut d’ailleurs lui-même promouvoir auprès de ses contemporains comme dans la mémoire collective en commandant par exemple à Andréa Mantegna (14311506) Les triomphes de César conservés à Hampton Court,18 il faut remarquer qu’Ercole Strozzi choisit comme personnage principal de son épopée un chef  de guerre complet, mais surtout cavalier émérite et grand pourvoyeur de chevaux de guerre, plutôt qu’un homme politique, fondateur ou refondateur d’un État, ce qu’avait fait Virgile ou son père, et s’interroger sur les raisons de ce parti pris qui le démarque de ses modèles. Cela traduit-il sa fascination pour les arts et les combats chevaleresques qui s’exprime aussi dans le Venatio, simulacre de guerre? Une nostalgie pour les formes anciennes d’affrontements menacées par l’invention de l’artillerie, dont Alfonso d’Este, on le sait,19 fait usage avec une parfaite maîtrise (dans ce poème, un seul vers évoque les armes nouvelles)? S’interdit-il, par loyauté envers Ferrare, de louer un autre gouvernement que celui de sa cité? Ou bien marque-t-il ainsi son désintérêt pour la chose publique dont il a dû se charger d’abord avec son père, puis seul et qu’il abandonnera finalement avec soulagement pour se consacrer tout entier à son otium poétique? Et pressent-t-il enfin plus ou moins consciemment que pour les Italiens déchirés par les guerres qu’ils mènent entre eux et qui sont menées sur leur territoire, le temps de la construction politique et de sa célébration poétique est passé ou n’est pas encore advenu? 18  À partir de 1459, Mantegna s’installe à Mantoue et y devient peintre officiel jusqu’à sa mort. Son œuvre la plus célèbre dans ce cadre est sans doute la Chambre des époux du château de Mantoue achevée en 1474, mais les Triomphes de César illustrent la dernière phase de son art. Il s’agit de neuf  grandes toiles de même format frappantes par l’exactitude de la reconstitution historico-mythologique, la sûreté du dessin et la magnificence des couleurs qui tranche avec la manière habituelle de Mantegna, adepte plutôt de tons froids. Dès 1492, alors que la commande n’était pas encore achevée, on répandait déjà les gravures de ces toiles. Elles furent vendues à Charles Ier d’Angleterre au dix-septième siècle, cf. “Mantegna”, Encyclopédie Larousse de la peinture (Larousse.fr), extrait de M. Laclotte, J.-P. Cuzin, P. Arnauld, Dictionnaire de la peinture (Paris, 2003). 19  Alfonso d’Este et son artillerie vont jouer un rôle crucial, plus tard, lors de la bataille de Ravenne (11 avril 1512), voir à ce sujet R. Q uazza, “Alfonso I d’Este, Duca di Ferrara”, DBI, vol. 2 (Rome, 1960), 332-336.

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Enfin, si l’on considère l’agencement du poème, l’on constate que la mythologie finit par l’emporter sur le sujet politique, créant un basculement de la réalité historique vers la fantasmagorie, et de Virgile vers Ovide; car, autant le récit de fondation de Mantoue (v. 45-48), puis l’annonce prophétique du règne glorieux de Francesco Gonzaga, dans le discours de la fondatrice éponyme de cette cité-état (v. 49-57), se justifient du point de vue des canons de l’épopée historique, puisqu’ils servent à  légitimer le prince et confèrent à sa seigneurie un passé ancien et glorieux, à la manière de ce qu’avait fait Virgile lui-même dans les épisodes du bouclier d’Énée (Aen. 6.626-731), de la rencontre aux Enfers avec Anchise (Aen. 6.679-901) ou de sa visite à  Évandre (Aen. 8.102-189), autant la dernière partie du poème où Ercole Strozzi, à  l’imitation des Métamorphoses d’Ovide, invente une fable étiologique sur les nymphes andiadines n’entre plus dans un projet épique qui serait centré sur Francesco Gonzaga. Tout se passe donc comme si Ercole Strozzi, après avoir tout mis en place pour entamer une épopée à la gloire de ce prince, préférait finalement en rester à l’éloge de sa ville de Mantoue et de son poète le plus illustre, Virgile. Ainsi, finalement le poème se suffit à lui-même en revenant en une construction circulaire à  son point de départ: parti de Mantô et des nymphes d’Andes, il y revient. L’éloge de Francesco Gonzaga ne va pas au-delà de sa laudatio enchâssée (v. 59-101) au cœur de cet hommage à  Virgile, génie poétique de Mantoue, dont Ercole se voulait l’émule, et des quelques petits poèmes encomiastiques recueillis par ailleurs dans l’Aldine. Après cette tentative avortée (permettez-moi d’émettre l’hypothèse que ce poème aux nymphes d’Andes aurait pu être le proème d’une Gonzagade), Ercole, assassiné prématurément, ne composera finalement jamais d’épopée à  sujet contemporain; il se tournera, dans un ultime élan épique, vers le sujet mythologique emblématique du discordium: la gigantomachie qu’il laissera inachevée comme les modèles revendiqués par le titre de sa Gigantomachie dans l’Aldine: Ovide et Claudien.20 Invité par son père, Tito, à rechercher l’illustration par la poésie, plutôt que par les armes ou la politique, en raison de ses dons, mais surtout de son infirmité physique – Ercole Strozzi était atteint de boîterie, puis associé très jeune (trop jeune, sans doute!)   Charlet-Mesdijan 2018 (cité n. 10).

20

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à  la plus haute charge de l’État des Este, qui incomba à  son père dans sa vieillesse, et qu’il dut bientôt assumer seul de fait – Ercole Strozzi exprime dans une élégie autobiographique et prosaïque son soulagement de pouvoir finalement dire adieu à  ses munera pour en revenir à  l’otium poétique et à  un second type de gloire acquise non sous les armes ou sous la toge, mais par la poésie de circonstances, et, dans son cas, au service de la duchesse d’Este.21 Néanmoins, il n’écrira pas d’épopée à  sujet contemporain, pas plus qu’il n’achèvera sa gigantomachie. Est-ce la mort qui l’en a  empêché? Ou l’épopée à  l’antique n’est-elle plus de saison? En revanche, sa virtuosité métrique est reconnue et, sur ce plan, il a  surpassé son père en composant, en sus d’hexamètres et de distiques, des vers lyriques. Il a  également à  mon sens contribué par ses epyllia au format, au style et au ton bien particuliers à créer un terreau favorable à la poésie italienne d’un Boiardo et d’un Arioste. Avec ces auteurs, il partage en effet une certaine nostalgie de la chevalerie, une tendance à  fuir la réalité pour se réfugier dans l’imaginaire et la fantasmagorie, ce qui marque peut-être le divortium de la poésie, à  laquelle ces auteurs sont toujours dévoués, et de la politique. Cette interprétation me semble enfin corroborée par l’extrême lucidité dont E. Strozzi fait preuve au sortir de sa charge vis-à-vis de la deuxième voie qui permet d’accéder à  la gloire, la voie politico-militaire, qu’il décrit comme un miroir aux alouettes: un temps, il s’est laissé aveuglé par sa splendeur, puis, confronté aux affres du munus, il a compris que le ministre d’une Seigneurie doit non seulement régler tous les maux en payant de sa personne (Am. 2.3.51-58),22 mais qu’il lui faut également répondre de ses 21  Il s’agit de la pièce liminaire des Elegiae intitulée Ad Divam Lucretiam Borgiam Ferrariae Ducem relictis curis reipublicae (À La divine Lucrèce Borgia, Duchesse de Ferrare, après avoir laissé les soucis de l’administration des affaires publiques, tr. personnelle). Deux pièces des Amores développent la même thématique: Amores 1.5 “Q ueritur, relictis musis, reipublicae incubuisse, ubi praesagit, brevi se moriturum inemendatosque relicturum suos libros” (Il se plaint d’avoir délaissé les muses pour se consacrer aux affaires publiques, quand il présage qu’il mourra sous peu en laissant ses livres en l’état sans avoir pu les corriger, tr. personnelle); Amores 2.3 “Q uod variis negociis impeditus ad amicam Venetiis aegrotantem ire nequeat” (Il dit qu’empêché par diverses affaires qui l’accaparent il ne peut aller voir son amie malade à  Venise, tr. personnelle). 22  “Sarcina magna quidem recte privata tueri, / publica sed non est pondera ferre minor, / immo onerosa magis: premit undique turba precatum. / Nec satis est longo reddere iura die, / non dapibus, sua nec somno conceditur hora. / Usque tribunitiae ianua aperta domus. / Otia saepe foro, nunquam mihi, nostra teruntur / limina, seu fasta est, sive nefasta dies.” (Oui, c’est un lourd fardeau que de protéger correctement

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actes dans la conduite des affaires publiques devant un Prince ingrat et un Peuple capricieux qui, outre ses propres passions, sont les véritables maîtres (Eleg. 1.67-74): Nunc Ducis a vultu, nunc a popularibus auris gaudia non longa stantque caduntque mora. Alterius feror ad nutus, nolimque velimque Q uique rego populum sponteque vique regor. Nescio quo sint iuncta modo, tamen hoc quoque si quis 5 appetat, inveniet iuncta fidemque dabit. Q uis facile in summo frenum sibi ponit honore affectusque etiam temperat igne malos? Suspendues tantôt aux mines du Duc, tantôt à la faveur populaire Mes joies poignent et succombent sans délai. Au moindre signe d’autrui, je suis transporté, que je le veuille ou non, Et moi qui gouverne le peuple, je suis gouverné par la volonté et par la force, Je ne sais comment cela est lié, mais quiconque aura Cette même aspiration découvrira ce lien et le confirmera. Q ui au faîte des honneurs, s’impose facilement un frein Et modère par son ardeur jusqu’à ses mauvaises passions?

Annexe 1 Carm. 9 Ad Sandalum (Au Sandalo) Venise, Alde, 1513 [1514 n. st.], f. 5v (Strophe asclépiade B) O fons Sandalii,23 gurgitis arbiter, Tito vate, dies ibis in ultimos nec te Castalis unda vatum vincet honoribus. Iste, seu numeros ludit agrestium 5 sive est Anthia, seu Phylloroe magis carmen, seu fide grandi, Estensem memorat Ducem; ses intérêts privés,  / mais supporter le poids des affaires publiques n’en est pas un moindre.  / Voire bien plus pesant! Je suis cerné par la foule des solliciteurs qui me pressent / et ce n’est pas assez de rendre la justice à longueur de journée, / on ne me laisse pas le temps de me restaurer ni de dormir. / La porte de la demeure tribunicienne est toujours ouverte.  / Des loisirs, le forum en a  souvent, moi jamais: notre seuil  / est foulé les jours fériés comme les jours ouvrés!, tr. personnelle). 23  Echo d’O fons Bandusiae, attaque d’Hor. Carm. 3.13, moule métrique et plus généralement modèle de ce poème, comme l’explicite aussi le v. 13 avec Blandusiae, orth. de Bandusiae, et amabilis (Hor. Carm. 4.3.14-15 inter amabilis/ vatum ponere me choros). La coloration lexicale en général est aussi celle d’Horace, avec des mots ou expressions (soulignés) typiques de la langue du poète de Venouse.

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Aeternum facit atque Eridano patri praefert et cithara callidus et lyra, 10 cuivis ponere laudes quas livor malus approbet. Cedat blandusiae cantor amabilis quamvis pindaricae suave melos chelys in nostrum citet orbem 15 magna non sine adorea. Non Chij neque libamina Massici aut pressa e patriis pocula vitibus depastamve capellam quartisania gramina 20 offert sed veteri carmina populo fingit sub Rhodope qualia Thracius vates dixit in Hebrum [Ald. 5.24] sylvis verba sequentibus [Ald. 5.23]. O fontaine du Sandalo, arbitre du tourbillon, Grâce au poète Tito, tu couleras jusqu’aux derniers jours Et sur toi l’onde de Castalie, N’emportera pas la palme des poètes. Le tien, qu’il compose en s’amusant des rythmes de paysans, 5 Ou qu’Anthia soit son charme, ou plutôt Phylliroé, Ou bien encore que sous un grand patronage, Il commémore le Duc d’Este; Il te rend éternelle et te place devant ton père, L’Éridan; habile, sur la cithare, comme sur la lyre, 10 À décerner à quiconque des louanges Q ue même approuverait l’envie malfaisante. Q ue s’avoue vaincu le chanteur aimable de Blandusie, Bien que la douce mélopée de sa lyre pindarique Le pousse vers notre monde 15 Non sans grand honneur. Ce ne sont point des libations de Chio ou de Massique, Ni des coupes du jus issu des vignes paternelles, Ou une chevrette nourrie Des herbes de Q uartisana 20 Q u’il offre, mais ses incantations qu’il affiche Sur un vieux peuplier, oui, ses incantations telles que Sous le Rhodope, le poète Thrace en adressa à l’Hèbre, Alors que les forêts suivaient ses paroles.

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Annexe 2 De loco, ubi Maro primum lusit – Ad Andiadas nymphas Venise, Alde, 1513 [1514  n. st.]), f.  48v-51r (152 hexamètres, après 14951496), plan détaillé 1-39  Invocation aux nymphes andiadines 1-10  Salut aux nymphes, inspiratrices du tout jeune Maro, auteur des Bucoliques (2-4) et des Géorgiques (5-6); grâce à lui, Mantoue rivalise avec Ascra, la cité d’Hésiode 11-13  Refus du poète s’exprimant à  la 1ère pers. de recourir aux autres muses 14-22  Description du paysage dont “l’enthousiasme” se communique aux animaux et aux hommes: tout est animé par la musique (Mantoue = seconde Arcadie) 23-29  Invocation aux nymphes auxquelles le poète demande de lui accorder le souffle du Virgile épique 30-39  Exposition de son projet poétique: chanter les nymphes, France­sco Gonzaga et la Cité-État de Mantoue, d’un point de vue à la fois ethnique et géographique 40-101  Éloge de Mantoue 40-57 Mantô 40-44  Le voyage de Mantô: son départ de Cadmos et sa quête d’un lieu sûr et opulent pour fonder une nouvelle colonie 45-48  Récit de fondation de Mantoue 49-57  Le discours prophétique de Mantô prédisant l’avenir de sa Cité et, surtout, la naissance d’un valeureux descendant de la race des Gonzaga: Francesco 58  Vers de transition: question rhétorique adressée à l’enthea Manto 59-101  Éloge de Francesco Gonzaga 59-70  Nouveau César, car par deux fois vainqueur des Franco-galli, il possède toutes les qualités d’homme de guerre, 71-72  mais aussi celles qu’on attend traditionnellement d’un prince: liberalitas, iustitia, pietas, constantia 73-95  Il est renommé pour son haras et s’est acquis une réputation d’éleveur de chevaux de course et de guerre 95-101  L’éloge s’achève sur une comparaison épique de type mythologique: les chevaux de Fr. Gonzaga sont comparés à ceux du Soleil 102-144  Fable étiologique d’Ande et de ses filles nées du viol de la nymphe par Apollon métamorphosé en Mincio 101-106  Description de la beauté d’Ande qui provoque le coup de foudre d’Apollon

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106-113  Discours d’Apollon qui cherche sans succès à séduire la naïade 114-117  Fuite de la nymphe 118-131  Métamorphose du Dieu des arts, de la beauté et de la jeunesse en Mincio, parangon de vieillesse, qui espère ainsi tromper la défiance et la vigilance de la nymphe; Apollon-Mincio exprime son impatience 132-135  Viol de la nymphe 136-144  Naissance des sept filles d’Ande et de Mincio-Apollon. À ses enfants, le Dieu accorde d’être des nymphes de fleuve et de lac et de renouveler ainsi à jamais leur verte jeunesse; leur père les dote également d’une capacité rhétorique égale à celle des Muses, tandis que leur mère, à l’origine nymphe, est devenue ce territoire champêtre célèbre par ses nymphes 145-152  Apostrophe finale à Maro, lui qui s’est baigné dans le fleuve Mincio et a reçu l’enseignement des Andiades, fille d’Apollon

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BASILIUS ZANCHIUS, POEMATA 5.1 EINE POETISCHE TRAUERKLAGE AUF  GIO­VANNI PON­TANO

Basilio Zanchi wurde im Jahre 1500 in eine alte, angesehene und vermögende Familie von Juristen in Bergamo als Pietro 1 Zanchi geboren und starb Ende 1558 in päpstlicher Haft im Castel Sant’Angelo in Rom.2 Die letzte Ausgabe seiner Gedichte datiert von 1747,3 die letzte Biographie von 1911; 4 an Einzeluntersuchun1  Sein Geburtsname war Pietro, bei der Aufnahme in die Accademia Romana 1519/20 nahm er die Vornamen Lucius Petreius an, und als er 1524 in den Orden der Canonici Regolari Lateranensi di Santo Spirito in Bergamo eintrat, wählte er Basilius als seinen Ordensnamen, unter dem er künftig alle seine Werke publizierte; vgl.  H.  Hofmann, “Le Egloghe di Basilio Zanchi di Bergamo (1501-1558)”, Studi Umanistici Piceni 31 (2011), 45-54 (46). Ein Porträt Zanchis von Gio­vanni Battista Moroni (1520/24-1579) befindet sich in der Collection Goodyear (Buffalo, NY); Abbildungen in den Wikipedia-Artikeln über Zanchi. Zum richtigen Geburtsjahr 1500 (statt, wie bisher meistens zu lesen, 1501): E. Cacci, Il De origine Orobiorum sive Cenomanorum di Giangrisostomo Zanchi. Passati immaginari e interessi epigrafici nella Bergamo del primo Cinquecento, Tesi di Dottorato, Università degli Studi di Bergamo, 2015/16 (nur online). 2   Vgl. Cacci 2015/16, 46-47. 3  Basilii Zanchii Bergomatis canonici ordinis Lateranensis Poemata quae extant omnia. Accessit Basilii vita Petro Antonio Serassio auctore. Nunc primum ex Oporiniana editione accuratissime recensita, illustrata et aucta (Bergomi, P.  Lancellottus, 1747), digitalisiert bei Google Books; online auch das Exemplar der ÖNB Wien. Die letzte noch zu Zanchis Lebzeiten veröffentlichte Gesamtausgabe seiner Dichtungen, zusammen mit drei Büchern Poemata von Lorenzo Gambara di Brescia (ca.  14951585: Basel, Oporinus, 1555 [digitalisiert bei Google Books, ebenfalls online die vier Exemplare der Bayer. Staatsbibliothek München]). Zu den verschiedenen Ausgaben: Hofmann 2011 (wie Anm. 1), 46-47; H. Hofmann, “Basilius Zanchius, Poemata 4.7: Eine poetische Trauerklage auf  Jacopo Sannazaro”, in I.  Volt, J.  Päll (ed.), Hortus Floridus (Tartu, 2021), Anm. 2 (im Druck). 4 E. Gritti, Basilio Zanchi: umanista bergamasco (Firenze, 1911); eine (nicht immer zuverlässige) Vita Zanchis von Serassi findet sich in seiner Ausgabe (Bergamo, 1747), i-xx; vgl. jetzt Cacci 2015/6 (wie Anm. 1), 7-55 mit reichlichem Material zur Familie Zanchi und den Söhnen von Paolo Zanchi (39-56).

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 211-228 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124059

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gen zu seinen Gedichten sind zwischen 1980 und 2020 nur vier zu verzeichnen.5 Im folgenden will ich ein Epicedium vorstellen, das Zanchi auf  den Tod von Gio­vanni Pon­tano verfaßt hat. Es folgt unmittelbar auf  die Naenia in Actium Sincerum Sannazarium, die als letztes (7.) Gedicht Buch  IV der Poemata in der Ausgabe Basel 1555 abschließt, und eröffnet als erstes Gedicht Buch  V der Poemata, in dem die fünf  Eklogen Zanchis vereinigt sind.6 Das Epicedium auf  Pon­tano schrieb Zanchi vermutlich in den zwanziger Jahren des sechzehnten Jahrhunderts, nachdem er Mitglied der 1478 von Sixtus IV. neugegründeten “zweiten” Accademia Romana des Pomponius Laetus geworden war und noch bevor er 1524 in den Orden der Regularkanoniker eintrat; erstmals wurde dieses Epicedium in einer Auswahl von elf  Gedichten gedruckt, die der schlesische Adelige Georg von Logau (ca.  1495-1553) ohne Wissen Zanchis und offensichtlich gegen dessen Willen, herausgegeben hat.7 Logau war ein Freund des Dichters aus gemeinsamen Studienzeiten in Bologna (1519-1521); er hielt sich bis 1525 in Italien auf  und lernte in Rom u.  a. Pietro Bembo und Jacopo Sadoleto kennen; ein zweiter Italienaufenthalt führte ihn 1531-1534 u.  a. nach Rom, Venedig und Padua, wo er zum Doktor der Rechte promoviert wurde und erneut mit Zanchi in Verbindung trat,8 ein letzter schließlich 1535/6. Aus dem auf  “Viennae Pannoniae  X. Decembris”, allerdings ohne Angabe des Jahres, datierten Vorwort Logaus zu dieser Ausgabe erfahren wir, daß sein Förderer Georg von Loxan (14911551), Reichshauptmann in Regensburg und Vizekanzler von 5  L.  V. Ryan, “Milton’s Epitaphium Damonis and B.  Zanchi’s Elegy on Baldassare Castiglione”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 30 (1981), 108-123; Hofmann 2011 (wie Anm. 1); Hofmann 2021 (wie Anm. 3). T. Leuker, “Delectare ornate graviterque. Basilio Zanchis theologische Dichtung De horto Sophiae (1540) und ihre Würdigung durch Pietro Bembo”, in T. Leuker, R. von Kulessa (ed.), Nobilitierung versus Divulgierung? Strategien der Aufbereitung von Wissen in romanischen Dialogen, Lehrgedichten und Erzähltexten der frühen Neuzeit (München, 2011), 71-92, gibt nur eine knappe Inhaltsangabe von De horto Sophiae und beschäftigt sich vor allem mit Bembos Würdigung und dessen Kenntnis von Sannazaros De partu virginis und Vidas Christias. 6   Zur Genese von Zanchis Eklogen und ihrer Sammlung in Buch V der Poemata vgl. Hofmann 2011 (wie Anm. 1). 7  G. Logus S[ilesius] (ed.), Lucii Petrei Zanchi Bergomatis Poemata varia [s.l.a.]. 8  G.  Bauch, “Der humanistische Dichter Georg von Logau”, Jahres-Bericht der Schlesischen Gesellschaft für vaterländische Cultur 73 (1895), III. Abt., 5-33; H. Grimm, “Logau, Georg von”, in Neue Deutsche Biographie 15 (1987), 117-118.

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Böhmen, ihm das Studium in Bologna finanziell ermöglicht und auch diese Ausgabe finanziert hatte, weswegen er sie ihm widmete. Darin führt Logau aus, daß Zanchi, “ut est virginali quadam modestia et pudore”, vor etwa drei Jahren ihm in Venedig die Bitte um Veröffentlichung dieser Gedichte abgeschlagen habe (“ante triennium fere Venetiis, ut mihi permitteret roganti et ambienti, saepius negaverit”), daß aber “Zanchus hic Bononiae olim ante annos ferme XII non modo notus, sed familiarissima at[que] assidua consuetudine iunctissimus mihi fuit” und in jener Zeit schon “maximam poematum istorum partem  […] composuerat, cum quidem pene puer, ephebus certe, ad poeticam et ad scribendum carmen se contulisset, quippe XVII aetatis suae anno cum incepisset, ad XXIII usque annum haec omnia absolvit.” Dazu stimmt, was Giovita Rapicio (Ravizza, 1476-1553),9 dessen Schule in Bergamo (1499-1523) die fünf  Söhne Paolo Zanchis besuchten, in seiner Leichenrede auf  ihren Vater († 17.01.1520) berichtet: Petrus (nunc Basilius) vero eo progressus est, ut iam poemata composuerit, quae Venetae et Romanae urbis iudicio comprobata; olim quaecumque se Latina fundit eloquentia cum summa authoris et patriae laude circunferentur. Scripsit et grammaticos commentarios de his quae Epitheta sive Apposita nuncupamus. Ex electis poetis tanta ac tam profunda eruditione ut mihi mirum subeat quomodo vel legere vel scribere tam multa pene adhuc puer potuerit.10

Hieraus ergibt sich, daß Zanchi den Großteil der in Logaus Ausgabe versammelten elf Gedichte zwischen seinem 17. und 23. Lebensjahr, also zwischen 1517 und 1523 geschrieben hat, so daß in diesen Zeitraum auch das Epicedium auf Pon­tano zu datieren ist, und daß Logaus Ausgabe zwischen 1531 und 1533 erschienen sein dürfte.11 9  E. Valseriati, “Ravizza, Giovita”, in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani [künftig DBI], vol. 86 (Roma, 2016). 10  Zitiert bei Cacci 2015/6 (wie Anm. 1), 37. 11   Neben den elf Gedichten Zanchis enthält diese Ausgabe noch ein Widmungsgedicht Logaus in sieben Distichen an Zanchi, in dem Logau sich dafür entschuldigt, daß er die Ausgabe ohne dessen Wissen und Zustimmung gemacht hat, eine Elegie De obitu Narni et Hesteries amantum, die Paolo Zanchi, dem Vater Pietros, zugeschrieben ist (nicht genannt bei Cacci 2015/6 [wie Anm. 1], die stattdessen [33-34] eine andere auf  den Tod des Notars Fioravante Suardi abdruckt), aber in der Edition der Poe­ matum libri VII (1553) und der Oporiniana (1555) unter Basilios Werken erscheint (Poem. 6.9 De Narno et Hesterie) und – “propter similitudinem argumenti”, nämlich des Todes aus Liebeskummer – eine weitere des Juristen Cornelio Castaldi von Feltre (ca.  1453-1537), mit dem Logau während seines zweiten Italienaufenthalts in Padua Freundschaft geschlossen hatte: C.  Mutini, “Castaldi, Cornelio”, in DBI, vol. 21 (Roma, 1978).

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Die Ekloge auf  Pon­tano (132 Hexameter) ist in allen sechs Ausgaben von Zanchis Gedichten gedruckt; ihr Text ist identisch bis auf  einige kleine Abweichungen in den Ausgaben vor 1555, die im folgenden verzeichnet sind. Sarassis Text von 1747 folgt dem der Oporiniana von 1555, den ich hier zugrundelege: Meliseus, sive Ioannes Iovianus Pontanus Vix primum roseo spargebat lumine terras Aurora Oceani exurgens natalibus undis, cum tristis consueta greges in pascua Amilcon propulit e scopulo summique cacumine montis, qua pelagi horrentes late despectat in undas, 5 et Baccho felix, felix viridantibus umbris et cantu et calamis Neptunia Mergilline. Dumque illi exultim persultant pabula laeta et tondent vario gemmantia prata colore, ille animo extinctum repetens Meliseon et alto 10 corde trahens gemitum, scopulo consedit acuto atque haec in vastos protendens lumina fluctus effudit, canos vellit dum vertice crines infelix largoque humectat flumine vultum: “Vos mecum virides saltus, vos flumina et umbrae 15 altorum nemorum, suspiria iungite et acres singultus: mecum valles Meliseon et agri triste fleant Meliseum atque antra impulsa querantur. Intonsi referant montes Meliseon, et ipse myrtusque laurique et moesto murmure voces 20 frondibus ingeminent, iterent Limonia rura extinctum Meliseum, iterent resonantia saxa. Vos aurae, o, nostras, aurae, ingeminate querelas! Nunc gemitus, Hyacinthe, tuos, tua funera, Adoni, inscribas foliis, folia et mirabile carmen 25 ostentent questus succo et testentur amaro. Namque meum nuper fato demersit acerbo impia mors Meliseum et frigida lumina leto clausit et Elysias miserum demisit ad umbras. Cui quondam vallesque cavae saltusque profundi, 30 dum calamo insanos secum meditatur amores, saepe assurgebant, et vasti murmura ponti cui toties posuere, vagique per aequora circum iam norant delphines, et Ionio in magno, dum viridi flavos siccant in litore crines, 35 Nereides stupuere, incensaque turba profundi plauserunt molles per caerula stagna choreas. Vos aurae, o, nostras, aurae, ingeminate querelas! Vos, o quae virides silvas, quae frondea rura incolitis, iuvet et tristes intendere luctus, 40

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Dauliades, vos, o cycni viridantia ripis fluminaque et moestis complentes saxa querelis, nunc mecum socias lacrimoso carmine voces fundite et attonitas letum hoc referatis ad aures Nympharum, quae perspicui stagna ampla Caystri 45 concelebrant, quae formosis in fontibus artus Clitumni et sacro perfundunt flumine crines, quaeque etiam Eridani ad ripas fluvialibus herbis nunc varias ductant choreas, nunc candida colla exornant nexis vario de flore corollis, 50 quaeque Niaseos saltus Garamantide in ora et virides citri silvas Limoniaque arva culta serunt, mecum erepti crudelia fata pastoris scisso plorent per colla capillo, flebiliter miseris variantes pectora palmis. 55 Vos aurae, o, nostras, aurae, ingeminate querelas! Ah dolor, ille etiam, silvae quem et pascua amabant, quem volucres pecudumque genus, non amplius, heu heu!, aeriae quercus viridi proiectus in umbra concinit arguta modulatum carmen avena, 60 sed nigros heroas et irremeabile regnum custodemque Erebi cantu demulcet et angues Eumenidum et vasti nigrantia monstra profundi. Interea inculti montes et pascua muta omnia sunt deserta, omnes lugubre per agros 65 pastores resonant, complent nemora alta querelis fluviorum vitulae immemores: non gramina possunt derivare animum, tremulis non vocibus hoedi, dum placidis matres per florida prata sequuntur. Vos aurae, o, nostras, aurae, ingeminate querelas! 70 Te Satyri Nymphaeque et monticolae Silvani fleverunt, non sancta Pales, non Maenalius Pan infletum voluere; tuum crinitus Apollo interitum et doctae fleverunt saepe sorores. Te fontes luxere, novus dolor attigit amnes. 75 Cernere erat latis amnes dominarier agris et passim largos lacrimarum effundere rivos. Q uin etiam per saxa cavisque in vallibus Echo ingemit et stratis viduatur fructibus arbos tonsa comas: flores foliis languentibus arent, 80 aret et aeterno florens amaranthus amictu, aret et extrema vulgatum Anthedone gramen, quo solis pascuntur equi; non lacteus humor uberibus manat distentis, non apibus mel. Vos aurae, o, nostras, aurae, ingeminate querelas! 85 Q uis calamis, Melisee, tuis trivisse labellum ausit et intacta meditari carmen avena? Q ua quondam nostra cecinisti primus in acta

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aeris immensi motus et nubila et amnes undisonique maris campos, qua limina caeli 90 stellatae et patuere fores ac fata deorum errantesque ignes spirantiaque ignibus astra. Vos aurae, o, nostras, aurae, ingeminate querelas! Te lacrimans ac fusa comas Sebethida ad undam Antiniana gemit, late Meliseon et horti, 95 horti infelices referunt, te moesta Patulcis Pausilypi in saltu queritur, miseranda papillas et molles laniata genas; procul antra resultant Naiadum, miserae deserto Gauridis antro rupis Hamadryades, longum Nesidos alumnae 100 abrumpunt lamenta et femineo ululatu insatiabiliter moestis loca questibus implent. Vos aurae, o, nostras, aurae, ingeminate querelas! Heu heu, sub solem aestivum sitientibus herbis aut imbri gravis aut duro contusus aratro 105 languescit moriens Cilici crocus editus arvo atque apium violaeque et purpurei narcissi. Post tamen, ut tepidi redierunt tempora veris, alma parit tellus, revocatis floribus arva halant et cultis violae nascuntur in hortis. 110 At nos, ut primum tenebris et nocte profunda contexit mersitque nigris in vallibus Orci lurida mors, superas rursum venisse sub auras non datur et caeli spectare orientia signa. Vos aurae, o, nostras, aurae, ingeminate querelas! 115 Atque utinam me me liceat descendere ad umbras, felices umbras, et fortunata piorum concilia Elysiumque nemus et amoena vireta, ut te pallentes animas regemque tremendum mulcentem et veteres heroum carmine poenas 120 alloquar! Optatae quando nunc mortis adempta est conditio, Edonum montes Rhodopeiaque arva et gelidos Hebri fontes Tanaimque nivalem lustrabo infelix mediae sub frigora brumae, cumque fatiscentes findet Canis aestifer aegros, 125 et nigrum Aethiopem desertaque solibus arva extremosque hominum Blemyas, traducere vitam stat mihi et infandum nulli cum fine dolorem detegere: immensi flebunt vaga flumina Nili ingentem luctum et nostras miserata querelas, 130 donec summa dies miseros dissolverit artus et tenuem, Melisee, tibi coniunxerit umbram.” 21 iterum L | 29 undas L | 40 iuvat L 1540 1550 1553 | 46 formosos L: arcus L  | 58 eheu 1550 | 59 alticomae L | 90 caelis 1540 | 99 miserat L | 101 abrumpant L | 104 sici- L | 105 confusus L | 118 Eliseum- L | 121 alloquerer quando optatae L 1540 1550 | 124 frigore L | 126 et] post L 1540 1550 1553

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Die Ekloge gliedert sich in zwei ungleich lange Teile: 12 Auf  eine kurze Einleitung von 14 Versen, in der ein anonym bleibender Erzähler die Situation schildert, in welcher das folgende Epicedium vorgetragen wird, folgt in Vers 15-132 in wörtlicher Rede das Klagelied des Hirten Amilcon auf  den Tod des Hirten “Meliseus”, hinter dem sich die historische Person Gio­vanni Pon­tanos (14291503) verbirgt. Dieses Klagelied besteht aus neun Strophen mit einer Länge zwischen sieben und siebzehn Versen, die durch achtmalige Wiederholung des versus intercalaris “Vos aurae, o, nostras, aurae, ingeminate querelas!” getrennt sind.13 Von der rein formalen Struktur her – einer Erzählereinleitung und anschließenden Monodie ohne Rückführung in die rahmende Erzählung – hat die Ekloge Ähnlichkeit mit Verg. Buc. 2 und Calp. Ecl. 5; allerdings handelt es sich bei Vergil um eine Klage des Hirten Corydon wegen seiner hoffnungslosen Liebe zu dem Knaben Alexis 14 und bei Calpurnius Siculus um einen Lehrvortrag des alten Hirten Micon an den jungen Canthus über die Schafund Ziegenhaltung. Innerhalb der vorausgehenden neulateinischen Bukolik 15 können als formale Entsprechungen die dritte Ekloge (De Ursinis liberatis) von Cantalicius (Giambattista Valentino, detto il Cantalicio, ca.  1445-1515) genannt werden,16 in der auf  eine Erzählereinleitung in der 1. Person (1-8) der Klagemonolog des Hirten Cyrtus (9-73) über den Verlust seiner Tiere durch freigelassene Bären folgt, oder die neunte Ekloge von Publius Faustus Andrelinus (ca. 1462  Dazu Gritti 1911 (wie Anm. 4), 30-32.   Solche Refrainverse erstmals bei Theoc. 1.64; 2.17, dann [Mosch.] Epitaph. Bionis 8; Bion Epitaph. Adonis 1 und 27; später Verg. Buc. 8.21 und 68 (nicht bei Calpurnius Siculus und Nemesian); vgl.  Th. G.  Rosenmeyer, The Green Cabinet. Theocritus and the European Pastoral Lyric (Berkeley – Los Angeles – London, 1969), 94-95, 118-119; R. Schilling, “Le refrain dans la poésie latine”, in M. von Albrecht, W. Schubert (ed.), Musik und Dichtung. Neue Forschungsbeiträge, V. Pöschl zum 80. Geburtstag gewidmet (Frankfurt/M. etc., 1990), 117-131. 14  Ihr entsprechen die Klage des Lycidas in Calp. Ecl. 3.45-91 um den Verlust seiner Geliebten Phyllis und in Nemes. Ecl. 2 die der Knaben Idas und Alcon (20-52; 55-87) um die von beiden geliebte Donace. 15   Eine vollständige Zusammenstellung aller einschlägigen Eklogen würde den Rahmen dieses Aufsatzes sprengen; aus demselben Grund wird auf  Nachweise der wörtlichen Entlehnungen und Imitationen aus der vorangehenden Bukolik seit Vergil und aus Pon­tanos Dichtungen weitgehend verzichtet. 16  L.  Monti Sabia (ed.), Giambattista Cantalicio, Bucolica; G.  Germano (ed.), Giambattista Cantalicio, Spectacula Lucretiana (Messina, 1996), 181-183; zur Chronologie 111-114, zum zeitgenössisch-allegorischen Subtext (Ursini = Orsini etc.) 99-104. 12 13

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1518), in der sich ebenfalls an eine situationsbeschreibende Erzählereinleitung (1-5) die Klagemonodie des mit seinem ländlichen Dasein unzufriedenen Iolas anschließt (6-63).17 Vor allem aber entsprechen in Zanchis eigenem Œuvre seine zweite Ekloge Myrtilus sive Andreas Naugerius (Poem. 5.2) und die dritte Ekloge Damon sive Baltazar Castalio (Poem. 5.3) 18 diesem formalen Typus: In der zweiten folgt auf eine kurze Erzählereinleitung (1-7) die Totenklage des Iolas um Andrea Navagero (8-120), in der dritten auf  ein Einleitungsgespräch zwischen Lycidas und Thyrsis (1-18) die Totenklage des Thyrsis um Baldassare Castiglione (19100); dagegen wird in der Naenia in Iulium Caesarem Gryphonem et Ioannem Cottam (Poem. 4.6) das Klagelied des Hirten Licmon (7-181) von sechs einleitenden Versen und drei Schlußversen (182184) gerahmt, die das Ende der Klage durch die hereinbrechende Nacht andeuten. Die Totenklage (epicedium, naenia), seit hellenistischer Zeit ein fester Bestandteil bukolischer Dichtung,19 fand Eingang in die lateinische Bukolik mit Vergils fünfter Ekloge, in der Mopsus ein Epicedium auf  Daphnis’ Tod (20-44) vorträgt, auf  das Menalcas mit einem Lied über Daphnis’ Apotheose (56-80) antwortet, und wurde seit Petrarcas Buc. 2 mit der Totenklage um König Robert von Neapel und Sizilien († 1343) und den Lobliedern der Hirten auf  ihn von anderen neulateinischen Dichtern übernommen,20 darunter von Pon­tano Ecl. 2.24-144 und 151-180 mit der Klage von Meliseus um seine Gattin Ariadna, von Castiglione Carm. 1.24-154 mit der Klage um Alcon (mit Grabepigramm: 152-154) oder von Sannazaro Ecl. 1.44-105 mit der Klage des Lycidas um Phyllis (mit Grabepigramm: 104-105) bis hin zu John Miltons Epitaphium Damonis von ca.  1640 mit Thyrsis’ Epicedium auf  seinen Freund Damon (18-219) 21 und Nicola Partenio Gian17  W. P. Mustard (ed., intr., annot.), The Eclogues of  Faustus Andrelinus and Ioannes Arnolletus (Baltimore, 1918), 47-48; die ersten elf  seiner zwölf  Eklogen erschienen ca. 1496 in Paris im Druck, spätere Ausgaben 1501 und 1506 (Mustard 1918, 16-17). 18   Zu den Überarbeitungen dieses Gedichts, ursprünglich eines Epicediums auf  den römischen Patrizier Celso Mellini (1500-1519), vgl. Ryan 1981 (wie Anm. 5). 19   Theoc. 1; [Mosch.] Epitaph. Bionis; Bion Epitaph. Adonis; vgl.  Rosenmeyer 1969 (wie Anm. 13), 89-92, 111-123. Im folgenden wird die griechische Bukolik nicht näher einbezogen. 20  Vgl. Hofmann 2011 (wie Anm. 1), 49-50; Übersicht bei W. L. Grant, Neo-Latin Literature and the Pastoral (Chapel Hill, 1965), 306-330 (“Pastoral as Epicedium”). 21  J. K. Hale (ed., transl.), John Milton, Latin Writings: A Selection (Assen-Tempe,

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nettasios (1648-1715) Eclogae Piscatoriae 5 und 9: 22 In der ersten (Thyrsis) beklagen die Fischer Mopsus und Corydon nach dem Vorbild von Verg. Ecl. 5 in zwei Liedern den Tod (25-47, mit Grabepigramm: 46-47) des Olympicus piscator Thyrsis und besingen dessen Apotheose (60-90), in der zweiten (Dorylas) klagt der Fischer Dorylas über den Tod seines Sohnes Iolas (7-79, mit Grabepigramm: 77-78), worauf Anthus, um den Vater zu trösten, die Apotheose des Iolas besingt (82-103). Schließlich hat Zanchi selbst mehrfach seine bukolischen Dichtungen als Epicedium gestaltet: Neben dem hier behandelten Poema 5.1 sind dies die bereits genannten Poemata 4.6 (Naenia in Iulium Caesarem Gryphonem et Ioannem Cottam), 4.7 (Naenia in Actium Sincerum Sannazarium), 5.2 (Myrtilus, sive Andreas Naugerius) und 5.3 (Damon, sive Baltazar Castalio) 23 sowie 6.11 (Naenia in Michaelem Marullum Tarchianotam) und etliche Tumuli in Buch VII. Der Name Meliseus,24 mit dem Pon­ tano in dieser Ekloge bezeichnet wird, verweist auf  Pon­tanos Ecl. 2, die den Titel Meliseus trägt und dessen Klagen um seine verstorbene Gattin Ariadna enthält, die von den Hirten Ciceriscus und Faburnus vorgetragen werden.25 Der Hirt Amilcon, der ab Vers 15 die Totenklage Az., 1998), 119-133; S. P. Revard (ed.), K. L. Revard (trans.), John Milton, Complete Shorter Poems. Latin Poems (Malden – Oxford – Chichester, 2009), 266-283. 22  Letzte Ausgabe in Giannettasios Opera omnia poetica, Tomus II complectens Piscatoria, Nautica et Halieutica (Neapoli, 1715). 23   Siehe oben S. 218. 24   Der Name klingt an den Hirtennamen Meliboeus an, der mehrfach bei Vergil (Buc. 1, 3, 5 und 7), Calpurnius Siculus (Ecl. 1 und 4) und Nemesian (Ecl. 1) vorkommt. 25   Ausführliche Interpretation dieser Ekloge bei C.  V. Tufano, Lingue tecniche e  retorica dei generi letterari nelle Eclogae di G.  Pon­tano (Napoli, 2015), 309-396, bes. 309-322 zum Vorkommen dieses Namens in anderen Dichtungen Pon­tanos und seiner Nachfolger; vgl. auch 446-490 zu Meliseus in Pont. Ecl. 4; H. Casanova-Robin, Pon­tano, Églogues. Étude introductive, traduction et notes (Paris, 2011), CXXVI  f., 201-209, 218; Ead., “Lauri, este mei memores: Mémoire de l’épouse défunte dans la deuxième églogue de Pon­tano. Réflexions sur une poétique mnémonique”, in H. Casanova-Robin, P. Galand (ed.), Écritures latines de la mémoire de l’Antiquité au XVI e siècle (Paris, 2010), 327-359. Die Ekloge Melisaeus von Giano Anisio (1465/75nach 1540) enthält ebenfalls ein Epicedium auf  Pon­tano, das – in der bukolischen Fiktion – ein Dichter Cotta, hinter dem sich Gio­vanni Cotta (1480/2-1510) verbirgt, gesungen hat und das der Hirt Mycon auf  Bitten des Hirten Aegilus nochmals vorträgt. Diese Ekloge erschien erstmals in Anisios Varia Poemata et satyrae ad Pompeum Columnam cardinalem (Neapoli, 1531) im Druck, dürfte Zanchi also noch nicht bekannt gewesen sein; vgl.  C.  Vecce, “L’egloga Melisaeus di Giano Anisio tra Pon­tano e  Sannazaro”, in S.  Carrai (ed.), La poesia pastorale nel rinascimento (Padova, 1998), 213-234.

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anstimmt, trägt denselben Namen wie der Hirt Amilcon der fünften Ekloge Pon­tanos (22), der dort vermutlich für Antonio Beccadelli (“il Panormita”) steht und den Lehrer von Meliseus bezeichnet, der seinerseits ein direkter Schüler von Tityrus (= Vergil) ist,26 hinter dem aber auch eine Projektion des Dichters Zanchi selbst als bukolische persona in die Welt seiner Ekloge vermutet werden darf. In den ersten 14 Versen führt ein anonym bleibender Erzähler die Personen – den Hirten Amilcon, der seine Herden auf die Weide austreibt, und den verstorbenen Meliseus – ein und beschreibt die zeitliche, geographische und emotionale Situation: Es ist früher Morgen bei Sonnenaufgang, Amilcon befindet sich auf einer Anhöhe, von der aus er “pelagi horrentes late despectat in undas” (5), die durch die Nennung von “Neptunia Mergilline” 27 (7) als der Golf  von Neapel kenntlich werden, die Landschaft als die Küstenregion Mergellina und die Anhöhe, auf  der Amilcons Herden weiden, als der Hügelzug des Pausilypus (Posillipo) südwestlich von Mergellina; 28 es handelt sich also um denselben Schauplatz wie in der Naenie auf  Sannazaro (Poem. 4.7) und in den Eklogen Pon­tanos und Sannazaros. Während eingangs die umgebende Natur als froh und glücklich dargestellt ist (1-2: “epischer” Sonnenaufgang, 6-9: Mergelline als “bukolische Ideallandschaft”), wird durch die Q ualifizierung von Amilcon als tristis (3) und infelix (14), von Meliseon als extinctum 29 (10) und der Trauer Amilcons mit den Worten “alto corde trahens gemitum” (10-11), “canos vellit dum vertice crines” 30 (13) und “largoque humectat flumine vultum” (14) der Leser bereits auf  das folgende Epicedium eingestimmt.31 26  L. Monti Sabia (ed., transl.), Ioannis Ioviani Pontani Eclogae (Napoli, 1973), 122-123 schwankt zwischen Panormita und Battista Mantovano; Tufano 2015, 500501, 512-514 unterstützt die Identifikation mit Panormita; Casanova-Robin 2011, 226-227 glaubt nicht, daß Monti Sabias “lecture allégorique”, falls sie zutreffe, “soit primordiale”. 27  Zitat aus Pont. Hort. 2.292. Weitere Übernahmen aus diesem Lehrgedicht finden sich in den Versen 4 (Pont. Hort. 2.306 “e scopulis summique cacumine saxi”) und 6 (Pont. Hort. 2.291 “et Baccho felix”). 28  Pausilipe und Mergellina begegnen in Pont. Ecl. 1.107-133 (= 1.2.1-27) als Nymphen, welche diese Landschaften personifizieren, vgl. Casanova-Robin 2011 (wie Anm. 25), 174-176; Tufano 2015 (wie Anm. 25), 93-101. 29  Pont. Ecl. 2.42-44 “extinctamque Ariadnan agri  […]  / cum gemitu referunt silvae vallesque queruntur, / extinctamque Ariadnan iterant clamantia saxa”. 30 Pont. Ecl. 2.61: crinemque e vertice vellit. 31  Vgl. E. Z. Lambert, Placing Sorrow. A Study of   the Pastoral Elegy Convention from Theocritus to Milton (Chapel Hill, 1976), 84, 215.

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In der ersten Strophe (15-22) fordert Amilcon, entsprechend den Gattungskonven­tionen des Epicedium,32 die umgebende Natur – saltus, flumina, umbrae altorum nemorum, valles, agri, antra, intonsi montes, myrtus, lauri – auf, mit ihm in die Klage über Meliseus’ Tod einzustimmen, und die Limonia rura 33 und die resonantia saxa sollen diese Klagen wiederholen.34 Die zweite Strophe (24-37) beginnt mit einer Aufforderung an Hyacinthus und Adonis, die Jünglinge des antiken Mythos, die durch einen tragischen Unfall eines frühen Todes gestorben sind, ihre Klagen und ihren Tod auf  Blätter zu schreiben, womit auf  das Aition der Blütenblätter der Hyazinthe angespielt wird, das Ovid in den Metamorphosen erzählt; 35 diese Blätter sollen dann das miserabile carmen (25) tragen und mit ihrem bitteren Saft 36 die Klagen bezeugen: denn eine impia mors habe – man beachte das emphatische Possessivpronomen – meum Meliseum dahingerafft und ins Elysium hinabgeschickt: ihn, vor dem, wenn er auf  seiner Flöte insanos amores intonierte, sich einst die Täler, Wälder und Meereswogen ehrfürchtig erhoben, dem die Nereiden staunend 32  Ähnlich Pont. Ecl. 2.6-15. Hierzu G. Norlin, “The Conventions of   the Pastoral Elegy”, The American Journal of  Philology 32 (1911), 294-312; B. F. Dick, “Ancient Pastoral and the Pathetic Fallacy”, Comparative Literature 20 (1968), 27-44; Lambert 1976, 82-88. Zu den antiken motivischen Vorbildern: J. Esteve-Ferriol, Die Trauerund Trostgedichte in der römischen Literatur, untersucht nach ihrer Topik und ihrem Motivschatz, Diss. München 1962. 33  Ähnlich 52 Limoniaque arva, übernommen aus Pont. Hort. 2.37 “en virides citro silvae, en limonia rura”; vgl.  auch Hort. 2.218 “limonis cura colendae”, 245 “limonia dona”, 265 “munere limonum”, 274 “Masitholae limones”, 286 “chariteia limon”, 302 “limonide in umbra”, 318 “accipit et citrium limon limonaque citrus / hospitio”; damit ist die durch ihre Zitrusfrüchte berühmte Gegend am Golf  von Neapel gemeint, deren Weinbau bereits in V. 6 erwähnt wurde, und nicht eine Anspielung auf  die Limon (λειμών) genannte Villa von Pollio Felix am Posillipo, die perspektivisch gegenüber seiner Villa Surrentina lag (Stat. Silv. 2.2.82; 3.1.149 “placidus Limon”). 34   19 “intonsi referant montes”: vgl.  Poema 5.3.45 “intonsi referunt ad sidera montes / egregias laudes”; Verg. Buc. 6.84 “pulsae referunt ad sidera valles.” 35  Ausführlich erzählt im Lied des Orpheus Met. 10.162-219 und 519-739. Zu Hyacinthus und der botanischen Identität der Blume ὑάκινθος: B.  Herzhoff, “Hyakinthos”, in Der Neue Pauly 5  (1998), 767-768 (“als botanisches Monstrum eine dichterische Phantasiepflanze”); F. Bömer, P. Ovidius Naso, Metamorphosen. Kommentar. Buch X-XI (Heidelberg, 1980), 66-72, zum Tod des Adonis: 225-235. Die Inschrift auf  den Blütenblättern der Hyazinthe ist seit Verg. Buc. 3.63, 106-107 auch Thema der Bukolik. Für die aus dem Blut des Adonis erwachsene Anemone gibt es in der Antike keine Tradition einer Inschrift auf  den Blütenblättern; Pon­tano ändert in Hort. 1 die ovidische Metamorphose in die in einen Orangenbaum (citrius). 36  “Succo […] amaro” (26) ~ “succos […] amaros” Pont. Hort. 1.361.

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lauschten und vor dem die Wesen der Wassertiefe sich in sanften Reigentänzen bewegten.37 Die Aufforderung an die belebte und unbelebte Natur, um Meliseus zu trauern, wird in der dritten Strophe (39-55) fortgesetzt und richtet sich namentlich an die Nachtigallen (Dauliades) 38 und Schwäne 39 – beides Vögel, die im antiken Mythos durch ihre Trauergesänge berühmt sind –, welche die Nachricht von Meliseus’ Tod den Nymphen überall auf  der Erde 40 überbringen sollen, auf  daß diese sich, entsprechend dem antiken Ritus, die Haare abschneiden und an die Brust schlagen 41 und sich so der Trauer Amilcons anschließen. In der vierten Strophe (57-69) beklagt Amilcon, daß Meliseus, den die Wälder, Weiden, Vögel und Tiere liebten, nun nicht mehr, unter dem grünen Laub der hochragenden Eiche ausgestreckt, auf  seiner Flöte ein Lied spielen wird, sondern die Bewohner der Unterwelt mit seinem Gesang besänftigt,42 während die Natur der Oberwelt verlassen ist und Hirten und Herden um ihn trauern. 37  “incensaque turba profundi  / plauserunt molles per caerula stagna choreas” (36-37) nach Verg. Aen. 6.644 “pars pedibus plaudunt choreas” (mit abweichender Prosodie chŏrēās). Das Bild zeichnet Meliseus als zweiten Orpheus, vgl. Verg. Buc. 6.2730; Ov. Met. 10.90-106, 143-144, dazu Bömer 1980 (wie Anm. 35), 38-48, 60-61. 38   Daulias ist die in eine Nachtigall verwandelte Prokne (Cat. Carm. 65.14; Verg. Cir. 200; Ov. Her. 15.154; Epicedium Drusi 106; Sen. Herc. Oet. 192). 39 Vgl. Poema 5.3.35 “et, nivei, in ripa cecinistis flebile, cycni”. Die antike Vorstellung vom “Schwanengesang” bei Plato Phaedo 84e-f; Cic. Tusc. 1.73; skeptisch Plin. M. NH 10.63; vgl. D. W. Thompson, A Glossary of Greek Birds (London, 1936), 181-182. 40  Genannt werden der Fluß Caystrus (45) in Kleinasien, der in seinem Mündungsgebiet bei Ephesos durch großen Vogelreichtum, besonders an Schwänen, bekannt war, der Clitumnus (47) in Umbrien, der Po (Eridanus 48), die Niaseos saltus (51), d. h. die Waldschluchten am Fluß Nias (Senegal oder Gambia), den Pon­tano mehrfach erwähnte (Hort. 1.53, 124, 146, 597; 2.52) und den Zanchi im Gebiet der Garamanten (Verg. Buc. 8.44; Aen. 6.794) lokalisiert, die jedoch in der östlichen Sahara wohnten (51 “Garamantide in ora” daher wohl unspezifisch für Afrika allgemein), die grünen Zitruswälder (“citrus medica” oder “malus Assyria”), der Baum, aus dessen Frucht Zitronat [citrium] hergestellt wird: Plin. M. NH 12.5-16, 13.100-103, vgl.  Verg. Georg. 2.127; F. Olck, “Citrone”, in G. Wissowa (ed.), Paulys Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Alterthumswissenschaft. Neue Bearbeitung, 3.2 (Stuttgart, 1899), 2612-2621; S. Tolkowsky, Hesperides: A History of  the Culture and Use of Citrus Fruits (London, 1938) und die Limonia arva am Golf  (dazu oben Anm. 33). 41  54 “scisso plorent per colla capillo” ~ Pont. Ecl. 2.89 “abscissos Veneris de fronte capillos”; 55 “variantes pectora palmis” ~ Pont. Hort. 1.72 “tundebat pectora palmis”; Ecl. 2.145-146 “pectora duris / planxerunt palmis”; Zanchi Poema 5.3.31-34 “et candida circum / pectora foedantes pugnis atque unguibus ora / ceruleae comites, scisso per colla capillo / fleverunt”, 93 “moestis percussa pectora palmis”. 42   Vers 61-63 wurden später in Buch I der Austrias (Basileae, 1540, 10) des Joachim Mynsinger von Frundeck (1514-1588) imitiert, der die Ekloge vermutlich

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In der fünften Strophe (71-84) zählt Amilcon in anaphorischer Te-Apostrophe an Meliseus auf, welche Gottheiten ihn beweinen (Satyrn, Nymphen, Sylvani, Pales, Pan,43 Apollo, Musen), nennt dann Flüsse, Bäche und Q uellen und Echos Klagen,44 Bäume, die aus Trauer ihr Laub abwerfen, vertrocknende Blumen und das trockene Gras im fernen Anthedon,45 das die Pferde des Sonnengottes fressen, schließlich die Weidetiere, die keine Milch mehr geben, und die Bienen, die keinen Honig mehr produzieren.46 Die sechste Strophe (86-92) leitet Amilcon mit der verzweifelten Frage ein, wer es nun noch wagen dürfte, auf  Meliseus’ Flöte ein Lied zu spielen,47 und nennt als Beispiel dafür, was dieser als erster nostra in acta (88) gesungen habe, Themen, die auf die Lehrgedichte Meteora und Urania verweisen. In der siebten Strophe (94-102) zählt Amilcon Landschaften und Personen aus der Golfregion auf, die Meliseus’ Tod betrauern: die Nymphe Antiniana am Fluß Sebethos,48 die unglücklichen aus Logaus Ausgabe kannte: “Sic et Rhodopeius Orpheus / Lethaeos heroas et irremeabile regnum / custodemque Erebi cantu demulsit, et angueis / Eumenidum saevas coeci et nigra monstra barathri”. Die Junktur “irremeabile regnum” ist laut Thesaurus linguae Latinae nicht belegt. 43 Die Junktur “Maenalius Pan” ist nicht antik, Zanchi verwendet sie auch in Poema 5.2.63 und 90; vgl.  Nemes. Ecl. 3.17 “montivagus Pan”; Aus.  Techn. 8.8 “Maenalide Pan” (beide Male Hexameterschluß); Pont. Am. Con. 2.3.4 “Maenala Pana”. 44  78 “cavisque in vallibus Echo” ~ Poema 5.3.48 “et moesta in vallibus Echo”. 45  Il. 2,508 Ἀνθήδονα τ’ἐσχατόωσαν: Hafenstadt im Norden Boiotiens; ihr grasbedeckter Strand mit magischen herbae bewirkte Glaukos’ Verwandlung in einen Meergott: Ov.  Met. 7.232 (“Anthedone gramen”); 13.904-968. Alexandros Aitolos (1.H. 3. Jh. v.Chr.) berichtet im Epyllion Halieus (fr. 1 Magnelli  = fr. 3 Lightfoot, aus Athen. 7.296e), Glaukos sei durch ein Kraut unsterblich geworden, das auf  den Inseln der Seligen sprieße und mit dem Helios seine Pferde füttere. Das übernahm Ov.  Met. 4.214-217 (vgl.  2.120; Stat. Theb. 3.407-414), dem Zanchi offenbar seine Kenntnis verdankt; vgl.  E.  Magnelli (ed., transl.), Alexandri Aetoli Testimonia et Fragmenta (Firenze, 1999), 14-15, 89, 111-124. 46  Ähnlicher Gedanke in Poema 5.2.86-89. 47  86 “trivisse labellum” ~ Verg. Buc. 2.34 (Hexameterende). 48  Zur Nymphe Antiniana in Pon­tanos Eklogen vgl. Casanova-Robin 2011 (wie Anm. 25), 197;  Tufano 2015 (wie Anm.  25), 32-36, 264-304, 497-502, 519-520, 544-545. Der Sebeto, heute beinahe verschwunden, mündete einst in den Golf  von Neapel. In antiker Dichtung wird er bei Stat. Silv. 1.2.263 (“pulchra tumeat Sebethos alumna”), Colum. 10.134 (“doctaque Parthenope Sebethide roscida lympha”) und Verg. Aen. 7.734 im Italikerkatalog genannt (Oebalus als Sohn von Telon und der Tochter des Sebethus), später bei den neapolitanischen Dichtern (Pon­tano, San­ nazaro u. a.); seine Hochzeit mit der Nymphe Parthenope ist Thema von Pon­tanos erster Ekloge Lepidina, seine Verwandlung in einen Fluß erzählt Pont. Parthen. 2.14; vgl. M. Soranzo, Poetry and Identity in Q uattrocento Naples (Farnham – Burlington, VT, 2014), 36-39; Tufano 2015 (wie Anm. 25), 43-56 u.ö.

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Gärten,49 die Nymphe Patulcis 50 auf  dem waldigen Posillipo, erbärmlich ihre Brüste und Wangen zerkratzend,51 deren Klagen die Höhlen der Naiaden widerhallen lassen, die Hamadryaden des Monte Gauro 52 und die Nymphen der Nesis,53 die ihr Wehklagen ausstoßen 54 und mit “femineo ululatu” 55 die Gegend weithin mit ihrem unstillbaren 56 Jammer erfüllen. Die achte Strophe (104-114) stellt den Kreislauf der Jahreszeiten mit ihrem immerwährenden Entstehen und Vergehen dem Schicksal

  96 “horti infelices”, vgl. Poema 5.2.117 “infelicibus hortis”.   Vgl.  Casanova-Robin 2011 (wie Anm. 25), CXXXIX-CXLI, 195, 197, 202, 228 f. u.ö.;  Tufano 2015 (wie Anm.  25), 30 (“La stessa ninfa Patulci è  personificazione della villa che il poeta possedeva nell’attuale zona di Piedigrotta”), 33-36, 249265, 311-334, 374-383, 497-508. Patulcis und Antiniana sind bei Pon­tano häufig zusammen genannt, z. B. Tum. 1.1.7-8, 18.7-8; Hend. 2.24.12, 37.12; Lyra 3 und 4; Erid. 1.40.37-38; 2.31, 37-40; Hort. 1.42-45; 2.12-14. 51  98 “et molles laniata genas”: Verg. Aen. 12.606 “et roseas laniata genas”; Stat. Ach. 1.77 “orabat laniata genas”; Drac. Rom. 9.41 “et planctu laniata genas”; Zanchi Poema 5.3.97 “niveas laniata papillas”. 52 Pont. Uran. 4.22-24 (“deserto Gauridis antro  / rupis, Hamadryades choreas celebrare virenti / Pausilipi in saltu”); Ecl. 1.403; 4.99; Parthen. 2.3.30; Hend. 2.18.12; vgl. Tufano 2015 (wie Anm. 25), 31, 173-176, 468. 53  Die Insel Nesis (Stat. Silv. 2.2.78; 3.1.148; Lucan. Phars. 6.90-91), heute Isola di Niside im Golf  von Pozzuoli, seit 1936 durch einen Damm mit dem Festland verbunden; nach Pont. Ecl. 1.642 (=1.6.19) ist sie die Mutter Macrons, des Ehemanns von Lepidina, der beiden Protagonisten dieser Ekloge, nach Lyra 3.3 ist Antiniana ihre und Jupiters Tochter: Tufano 2015 (wie Anm.  25), 33, 43-44, 50-110, 250252 u.ö.; vgl.  Ov.  Fast. 4.193 Heliconis alumnae: “Der Ausdruck ist singulär (Thes. I 1798, 17) und wohl eine Wiedergabe des griechischen Ἑλικωνίδες νύμφαι. Diese Ovidstelle ist die erste, an denen alumnae von Orten, Landschaften u. dgl. begegnet”: Bömer 1980 (wie Anm. 35) im Komm. zur Stelle. 54  abrumpere muß hier im Sinne von “(von sich) weg-, hinausbrechen lassen, weg-, (hin)ausstoßen” (i.q. erumpere) gebraucht sein, da die Aussage sonst keinen Sinn ergibt, vielmehr ins Gegenteil verkehrt wäre; vgl. Thesaurus linguae Latinae, s. v. 141, 82-83; dagegen Poema 5.3.85 “(mors) invisam et dederit nobis abrumpere vitam” (Verg. Aen. 8.579 und 9.497 “crudelem abrumpere vitam”; 4.631 “invisam  […] abrumpere lucem”; Sil.  Pun. 2.597); Poema 5.3.12: “ipsa nequit superas vox aegra erumpere ad auras”. Die Syntax von 99-102 ist etwas undeutlich, aber ich verstehe Nesidos alumnae nicht als Apposition zu Hamadryades, sondern als davon getrennte Personengruppe, aber beide als Subjekte zu abrumpunt und implent. 55  Auch in Poema 5.3.95, aus Verg. Aen. 4.667 (vgl. A. S. Pease (ed.), Publi Vergili Maronis Aeneidos liber quartus (Cambridge, Mass., 1935), 514-515); 9.477; Vida Scach. 420. 56   102 “insatiabiliter”: Lucr. DRN 3.907 “insatiabiliter deflevimus, aeternumque” (einer der wenigen antiken Drei-Wörter-Hexameter wie Hor. Sat. 1.2.2; Ov. Fast. 2.43); 6.978 (Versanfang); vgl.  M.  Bernhard, “Die penthemimerischen Wortformen im griechischen und römischen Pentameter”, Philologus 84 (1928/9), 10-34; E. Fraenkel, Horace (Oxford, 1957), 76. 49 50

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des Menschen gegenüber und beklagt es,57 wenn durch die Hitze des Sommers,58 von Regen durchweicht oder vom Landmann untergepflügt 59 die Pflanzen erschlaffen und absterben (als Beispiele werden “bukolische” Pflanzen wie Cilici crocus,60 apium, violae und purpurei narcissi 61 genannt); aber während im Frühjahr 62 wieder neue Pflanzen aus der Erde sprießen,63 ist es den Menschen nicht gegeben,64 wenn sie der Tod in die dunklen Täler des Orcus hinabgeschickt hat, wieder an die Oberwelt zu kommen 65 und die aufgehenden Gestirne des Himmels 66 zu sehen. Die neunte und letzte Strophe (116-132) leitet Amilcon mit dem Wunsch ein, es möge ihm vergönnt sein, zu den seligen Schatten und glücklichen Scharen der Unterwelt hinabzusteigen – selig und glücklich, weil Meliseus bei ihnen weilt –, um dort Meliseus zu treffen, der mit seinem Lied die bleichen Schatten, den furchterregenden König und die Heroen, die ihre alte Schuld verbüßen, besänftigt. Aber da ihm jetzt die Möglichkeit eines erwünschten Todes noch verwehrt ist, will er aus Verzweiflung in die Einsamkeit ziehen wie Meliboeus in Vergils erster Ekloge: Doch während Meliboeus Gegenden in allen vier Himmelsrichtungen als mögliche Ziele erwägt (64-66), nennt Amilcon nur zwei: die 57 104 Heu heu am Versanfang und anderen Stellen häufig in Bukolik und Elegie (Cat. Carm. 77.5-6; Verg. Buc. 2.58; 3.100; Tib. Eleg. 1.6.10; 2.3.2. 49; 2.5.108; [Tib.] Eleg. 3.19.7). 58  104 “sitientibus herbis”: Avien. Arat. 499 (Hexameterende). 59  105-106 “duro contusus aratro  / languescit moriens”: Cat. Carm. 62.39-41 “flos […] nullo contusus” (X2: convolsus T: conclusus O) aratro (vgl. 11.21-24); Verg. Aen. 9.435-437 (dazu J. Dingel, Kommentar zum 9. Buch der Aeneis Vergils (Heidelberg, 1997), 175-177); 11.68-71 (dazu N. Horsfall, Virgil, Aeneid 11. A Commentary (Leiden – Boston, 2003), 88-91). 60   Kilikischer Safran, von Plin. M. NH 21.31 als der beste bezeichnet. 61 Verg. Ecl. 5.38 “purpureo narcisso” (Hexameterende). 62  108 “ut tepidi redierunt tempora veris”: Ov. Fast. 5.602 “et tepidi finem tempora veris habent”; “tempora veris” beliebte Junktur, am Hexameterende in Ov. Met. 1.116; Manil. Astron. 2.182; 4.745; Auson. Ecl. 11.3. 63  109 “alma parit tellus”: Ov.  Met. 2.272 “alma tamen tellus”; Colum. 10.157 “alma sinum tellus”; Manil. Astron. 4.667 “parit horrida tellus”. 110 “cultis […] in hortis”: Ov. Met. 5.535 “cultis dum simplex errat in hortis”. 64  114 “non datur”: häufig am Veransfang, z. B. Lucr. DRN 4.1098; Verg. Aen. 1.409; Prop. Eleg. 3.1.14; Ov. Met. 12.596; Fast. 2.214; Stat. Silv. 3.5.6; Val. Fl. Arg. 3.667; Sil. Pun. 7.406; 13.823. 65  113 “superas rursum venisse sub auras”: Verg. Aen. 7.768 “superas caeli venisse sub auras”; Ov. Met. 5.641 “superas eduxit prima sub auras”, ansonsten häufig superas ad/in/per auras. 66  114 “coeli spectare orientia signa”: Lucr. DRN 1.2 “caeli subter labientia signa”; Verg. Aen. 7.138 “Noctisque orientia signa”.

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verschneiten Gebirge und Flüsse Thrakiens und Skythiens (122124) im Norden und die sonnenverbrannten Gebiete der Aithiopier und des südlichsten Randvolkes der Blemyer (125-127), wo er sein Leben verbringen und seinen unsagbaren Schmerz verkünden will, wo die Fluten des unermeßlichen Nils dieses traurige Ereignis beweinen und mit seinen Klagen Erbarmen haben werden, bis der Tod endlich seinem jämmerlichen Leben ein Ende machen 67 und seinen Schatten mit Meliseus – in affektivischer Apostrophe: “Melisee, tibi” – vereinen wird. In ähnlicher Weise nimmt Thyrsis, der Sänger des Epicedium auf  Damon in Zanchis dritter Ekloge, Abschied von der Welt (68-75) und fragt Damon vorwurfsvoll, warum dieser ohne ihn nun in der Unterwelt weile (77-79),68 und sehnt seinen eigenen Tod herbei (82-85). Das Gedicht ist in seinem Aufbau, seinen Ausdrucksmitteln und seinen poetischen Inhalten der Tradition der antiken Bukolik verpflichtet und bemüht im wesentlichen dieselben Bilder und Vorstellungen, dieselben Personen (Nymphen, Dryaden, Hamadryaden) und personifzierten Landschaften des Golfs von Neapel wie auch die anderen Trauergedichte Zanchis.69 Wie diese bewegt es sich in einer rein antiken Vorstellungswelt, in der die paganen Götter und Heroen, die Unterwelt der klassischen Mythologie und die bukolischen Landschaften Theokrits und Vergils heraufbeschworen und als poetische Symbole eingesetzt werden. In Übereinstimmung mit dieser antikisierenden Tendenz, die freilich in der damaligen zeitgenössischen Dichtung gang und gäbe war und als klassizistisches integumentum ohne weiteres akzeptiert und verwendet wurde, entlehnt Zanchi seine Bilder und Formulierungen der antiken und neulateinischen Dichtung vor allem seiner großen Vorbilder Vergil, Ovid und Pon­tano, deren Worte und Junkturen er oft bis ins Detail, wenn auch gerne mit kleinen Veränderungen, übernimmt, und evoziert so nicht nur die berühmten Vorgänger der Gattung, sondern scheint damit auch selbst seinen Anspruch als einer ihrer Nachfolger und Fortsetzer anzumelden. 67   131 “dissolverit artus”: vgl. Poem. 5.3.84 “donec saeva meos tandem mors solverit artus”; die Junktur nur bei Lucr. DRN 3.758 (von den Seelenteilen: “quare dissolvi quoque debent posse per artus”), Theodulf  v. Orléans Carm. 28.549 (“ferreus et gelidos somnus dissolverit artus”) und weiteren mittellateinischen Autoren belegt. 68  In Anlehnung an Castiglione Alcon 95 “Et nunc Elysia laetus spatiaris in umbra”. 69  Vgl. Hofmann 2021 (wie Anm. 3).

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Dagegen ist in seiner Handhabung der Metrik eine gewisse Freiheit, ja geradezu ein gesucht-preziöser Zug festzustellen, der auch in seinen anderen Dichtungen anzutreffen ist: 70 versus spondeaci finden sich in den Versen 7 (“Neptunia Mergilline”), 34 (“Ionio in magno”), 71 (“monticolae Sylvani”, aus Ov. Met. 1.193, wo monticolae Hapaxlegomenon ist) und 107 (“purpurei narcissi”, nach Verg. Ecl. 5.38), Hexameter mit Daktylus nur im fünften Metrum in 8, 20, 26 und 54, Monosyllaba am Versende in 58 (“heu heu”, auch in Poema 5.3.17), 72 (“Pan”) und 84 (“mel”), viersilbige Wörter in 7 (“Mergelline”) und 101 (“ululatu”), eine penthemimerische Wortform in 102 (“insatiabiliter”),71 zwei Hiate in 34 (s.o.) und 101 (“femineo ululatu”),72 Synizese fluviorum (dreisilbig) in 67 (wie Verg. Georg. 1.482) und “irrationale” Längung (Diastole) in 20 (“myrtusquē laurique”, vor einer Form von “laurus” wie in Verg. Aen. 3.91 “liminaque laurusque”) und 118 (“nemūs et amoena vireta”). Im Aufbau des Gedichts läßt sich eine bewußte ringförmige Komposition erkennen: Im Zentrum der Klage steht Strophe 5 mit der Beschreibung der allumfassenden Trauer der niedrigen Gottheiten und der belebten und unbelebten Natur, in der die Klagen der anderen Strophen kulminieren. Strophen 4 und 6 sind der Sangeskunst des Meliseus – jetzt in der Unterwelt, früher auf  der Oberwelt – gewidmet, während 3 und 7 die Orte der Trauer nennen: die Nymphen auf  der ganzen Erde (3) gegenüber den Nymphen und anderen lokalen Gottheiten in der Golfregion. Der Nennung von Hyacinthus und Adonis in Strophe 2, die beide als Menschen tot sind, aber als Blumen am jährlichen Rhythmus von Entstehen und Vergehen teilhaben, korrespondiert Strophe 8, welche beklagt, daß der Mensch von diesem Rhythmus des Entstehens und Vergehens ausgeschlossen ist. Schließlich stellen die rahmenden Strophen 1 und 9 den Kontrast zwischen dem Tod des Meliseus und Amilcons eigenem Todeswunsch dar, der die ursprüngliche Gemeinschaft der beiden auf  der Oberwelt in der Unterwelt wieder herstellen soll: Die Klage über den Tod mündet und kulminiert in dem Wunsch nach dem eigenen Tod.   Vgl. Hofmann 2011 (wie Anm. 1), 52-53.   Siehe oben Anm. 56. 72  Siehe oben Anm. 55. 70 71

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Im Vergleich mit den anderen vier Epicedia fällt die unterschiedliche Gestaltung im Aufbau dieser Gedichte auf: 73 Alle fünf  Gedichte haben eine Einleitung, aber während in Poema 4.4 die Doppelklage des Licmon um Grypho und Cotta durch die Bemerkung des Erzählers über die hereinbrechende Nacht beendet wird und in 5.2 zum Schluß Echo den letzten Vers von Iolas’ Klage wiederholt, enden 4.7 und 5.3, ebenso wie 5.1, ohne abschließende, auf  die Einleitung zurückgreifende Bemerkung des Sprechers. Ähnlich wie 5.1 bestehen auch 4.6, 5.2 und 5.3 aus einer einzigen ununterbrochenen Totenklage eines Hirten (Licmon, Amilcon, Iolas, Thyrsis), während in 4.7 der Ich-Sprecher anonym bleibt und sowohl die einleitende Situation beschreibt als auch Sänger der Totenklage ist, zu der er erst durch die Traumerscheinung des Sebethus aufgefordert wird. 4.7 ist auch das einzige Epicedium Zanchis, das die Errichtung eines Tumulus mit einem Grabepigramm enthält, während sich die übrigen auf die Klagen selbst beschränken. Für alle diese Klagegedichte trifft jedoch zu, daß sie rein antikisierend gestaltet sind wie die hellenistischen und römischen Vorbilder von Theokrit bis Vergil und auch viele der neulateinischen Epicedien, unter Verwendung antiker mythologischer Bilder und Vorstellungen, aber losgelöst von jeglichem christlichen Kontext, während ein Großteil von Zanchis poetischer Produktion, vor allem in den Büchern  II, III und VIII, rein christliche Thematik und Motivik aufweist. Das Epicedium auf Pon­tano erweist sich also als eine wohlausgewogene Komposition und verrät, wie auch die anderen Epicedien Zanchis auf  berühmte Zeitgenossen, eine gründliche Kenntnis von deren Œuvre, aus dem Zanchi in umfangreicher Weise zitiert und darauf  fortwährend offen und verschlüsselt anspielt, und nicht zuletzt einen starken persönlichen Bezug und echte Anteilnahme an dem Tod der von ihm so hoch geschätzten Dichter.

  Siehe oben S. 219.

73

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LE ERUZIONI DELL’ETNA NELLA POESIA LATINA DEI MODERNI

I cupi muggiti dell’Etna hanno più volte risvegliato le muse latine nel corso degli ultimi secoli. Chi voglia intraprendere un viaggio in questa storia di tremori e bagliori deve però essere messo subito in guardia sui rischi connessi, spesso non minori di quelli che comporta una visita in carne ed ossa ai crateri.1 Ardenti similitudini e  metafore incandescenti attendono infatti il lettore a  ogni piede del verso. Cominceremo quindi col ricordare che alla memoria dei poeti latini moderni del Mongibello sono spesso affiorate le calde tonalità delle fiamme e i terrificanti rimbombi cantati nel­l’antichità da Lucrezio, Virgilio, Ovidio, Claudiano, Ausonio e dal­­l’anonimo autore del poemetto pseudovirgiliano Aetna.2 Non bisogna tuttavia aspettarsi soltanto rielaborazioni più o meno riuscite dei miti antichi, perché la storia dell’Etna è  innanzitutto storia della città che con le colate laviche convive da sempre, Catania, fenice che risorge dalle sue ceneri e  patria della martire Agata, sovente celebrata in versi per aver salvato i  cittadini dai fiumi di lava.3

1   Punto di partenza per qualsiasi ricerca relativa alle fonti storiche e  letterarie sull’Etna è E. Guidoboni, C. Ciuccarelli et al. (ed.), L’Etna nella Storia. Catalogo delle eruzioni dall’antichità alla fine del XVII secolo (Bologna, 2014). 2  Per una visione d’insieme sulle fonti antiche si vedano A. Tempio, “Da Aitne ad Aetna. Il Vulcano nell’Antichità classica”, in F. Riccobono, A. Tempio (ed.), Imago Aetnae. Iconografia storica dell’Etna 1544-1892 (Catania, 2004), 15-59; É.  Foulon (ed.), Connaissance et représentations des volcans dans l’Antiquité. (Clermont-Ferrand, 2004); D. Bertrand (ed.), Mythologies de l’Etna (Clermont-Ferrand, 2004). 3  Per il sostrato tardoantico e medievale si vedano G. Rapisarda, L’Etna tra mitologia e simbologia in età tardo-antica e medievale (Catania, 2003); E. Piazza, Tra l’Etna e  Cariddi. La Sicilia nell’immaginario altomedievale (Bari, 2019). Per il legame tra

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 229-242 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124060

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La  produzione latina di tematica etnea rappresenta, come vedremo, il contraltare di una ricca messe di scritti in volgare, in gran parte ancora da studiare, che terremo costantemente in considerazione nel tracciare il nostro percorso di lettura. Che nel Medioevo i crateri etnei siano divenuti luogo di ricovero per personaggi favolosi come re Artù, non è  forse motivo di stupore per il lettore colto.4 A sorprendere maggiormente nel panorama letterario sono invece le pagine in cui l’Etna sbuffa inaspettatamente con una variegata gamma di connotazioni, come nel caso della quarta Ecloga di Dante, dove sono evocati gli “arida Ciclopum  […] saxa sub Ethna” (v.  27) per descrivere la pericolosa situazione politica di Bologna, città in cui il poeta si era recato su invito di Giovanni del Virgilio. Il vulcano è  ben presente anche nelle opere latine delle altre due corone della lingua italiana. Q uantunque Petrarca, non diversamente dall’Alighieri, non abbia mai messo piede in Sicilia, l’Etna, “flammantium princeps montium” campeggia nella seconda parte del suo Itinerarium Syriacum (45) insieme alle descrizioni di Scilla e Cariddi, illustrate secondo il repertorio mitologico classico. Anche per il Boccaccio del De montibus il vulcano rappresenta il luogo del mito, con la storia del gigante Tifeo, che imprigionato sotto le viscere della terra causerebbe continui terremoti tutte le volte che si gira su sé stesso. Per il certaldese, così come per tanti altri scrittori del­ l’epoca, le eruzioni sono un fenomeno letterario con cui si entra in contatto tramite le descrizioni rinvenute nelle fonti antiche, mentre sono assenti i  dati di prima mano sulla situazione coeva.5 Agli inizî del Q uattrocento il vulcano viene celebrato in siciliano in 51 terzine da Andrea di Anfuso,6 ma per una prima seppur parziale descrizione in versi latini bisognerà attendere sino alla seconda metà del secolo, quando Bernardo Bembo, navigando per

Sant’Agata e  l’Etna si veda P.  Sardina, “Il fuoco dell’Etna nel Medioevo, tra realtà e leggenda”, Archivio Storico Siracusano ser. 3, 14 (2000) 85-114, a 94-105. 4   S.  Tramontana, “Le eruzioni vulcaniche nelle fonti, nella cultura, nell’immaginario del tardo Medioevo”, in M. Matheus, G. Piccinni et al. (ed.), Le calamità ambientali nel tardo medioevo europeo: realtà, percezioni, reazioni (Firenze, 2010), 379399, a 380-381; Sardina 2000 (come a n. 3), 89-91. 5   A. Tramontana, “La Sicilia nel De montibus di Boccaccio”, in G. Manitta (ed.), Boccaccio e la Sicilia (Castiglione di Sicilia, 2015), 217-249, a 241-242. 6  Guidoboni, Ciuccarelli 2014 (come a n. 1), Andrea di Anfuso, Canto sull’eruzione dell’Etna del 1408, 203-205.

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raggiungere la Spagna, nel corso di un’ambasceria che ebbe luogo tra il 1468 e  il 1469, poté ammirare dal mare l’imponenza e  la grandiosità dell’Etna. Di tale viaggio ci ha lasciato un resoconto dettagliato Paolo Marsi nelle sue inedite Bembice peregrinae, dove il motivo topico dei terrificanti ciclopi si sposa con l’immagine dei tremendi fenomeni eruttivi.7 La costa orientale della Sicilia appare a  Marsi come una tappa da evitare a  ogni costo, come apprendiamo da questi versi rimasti finora inediti: Interea, celeri ferimur cum nave, cavendum 1 protinus Aetnaeae ne subeamus humo: plura quidem aerei superant discrimina montis, et quae sunt sanis diffugienda viris. Sunt ipsi ingentes horrendaque monstra cyclopes, 5 pascit et ipse suas nunc Polyphemus oves. Adde et crateris quae sunt incendia summi, quae quondam Empedoclem surripuere patrem. Cedamus procul hinc fugientes tecta Catanae, vina Catanei sint mihi nulla soli, 10 laudarunt alii quanquam pleno ore lucum inferiore loco quem solet Aetna dare. At mihi non placeat, vento date vela ferenti, perque datum pelago progrediamur iter. Inque Syracusios tendantur carbasa portus, 15 atque Arethusa suscipiamur aqua: Illius placeant vitrei mihi munera fontis, Aetnaeum poscat dum sibi quisque merum.8

La speranza di trovare ricovero presso i  porti di Siracusa, in realtà, sarà ben presto disattesa, in quanto all’equipaggio non verrà consentito di sbarcare, come narra Marsi nei versi successivi. Il  terrore incusso dal vulcano nell’animo del poeta, pronto a rinunciare ai piaceri dei boschi e del vino catanese pur di fuggire dai “tecta Catanae”, non è  dovuto però alla vista di una qualche colata – non sono infatti attestate attività eruttive negli anni del viaggio di Marsi e Bembo –, ma si fonda ancora, come in Dante, Petrarca e Boccaccio, su di un recupero degli elementi classici del mito: i ciclopi, Polifemo e il filosofo Empedocle che trovò la morte

7  Per quest’opera si veda A. M. V. Fritsen, “Auctoritas: The Travels of  Paolo Marsi, 1468-1469”, International Journal of  the Classical Tradition 6.3 (2000), 356-382. 8  Cito dal codice autografo Città del Vaticano, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, ms. Reg. lat. 1385, ff. 7r-v. Al v. 11 correggo il licum del ms. in lucum.

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in uno dei crateri. Più tardi, invece, un atteggiamento di timore e  sorpresa per la vista delle eruzioni emergerà dalle parole che Pietro Bembo mette in bocca al padre Bernardo nel celebre dialogo De Aetna,9 che costituisce, com’è noto, la prima descrizione moderna del vulcano siciliano, nella quale Pietro riferisce l’escursione realmente fatta insieme all’amico Angelo Gabrieli durante una pausa dai disperatissimi studî di greco alla scuola del celebre maestro bizantino Costantino Lascaris.10 L’Etna, che ricorre anche nei poemetti bembiani Galatea, Amica ad Gallum e  Benacus,11 sarà oggetto di molti altri componimenti latini tra la fine del XV e gli inizî del XVI secolo. Negli anni Novanta del Q uattrocento Battista Spagnoli detto “il Mantovano”, sodale di Bernardo Bembo, dedicò non pochi versi al nostro vulcano nella sua Parthenice quarta.12 Per il Mantovano la costa orientale della Sicilia è  il luogo in cui si svolgono le vicende di sant’Agata, ma prima ancora quelle del gigante Encelado sepolto sotto la Sicilia, i cui respiri sarebbero causa dell’incessante attività eruttiva (vv.  20-24). La parte più drammatica e  commovente di questa Parthenice è la descrizione dell’eruzione che seguì la morte della santa: Attoniti cives quo se molimine servent ignari, curvant genua ante altaria votis supplicibus flentes, urbi magis ac magis instat 295 ignea tempestas, flammisque sonantibus ardor; ut videre Deum frustra implorata suorum auxilia, occurrunt Agathes ad busta, levantque 9  G.  D. Williams, Pietro Bembo on Etna: The Ascent of  a  Venetian Humanist (Oxford, 2017), 332. 10   Sul magistero messinese del Lascaris si veda ora, con ampia bibliografia, G. Salmeri, “La grande scoperta di Costantino Lascaris: il passato greco della Sicilia”, in G.  Salmeri, G.  Marcellino (ed.), Storiografia locale e  storiografia regionale in Sicilia nel tardo Q uattrocento e  nella prima metà del Cinquecento. Alla scoperta del passato (Pisa, 2020), 75-97. 11  Cf.  M.  P. Chatfield (ed., tr.), B.  Radice (tr.), Pietro Bembo, Lyric Poetry  / Etna (Cambridge, MA – London, 2005), 18 (Carm. 7.46), 44 (Carm. 13.92), 76 (Carm. 18.145). 12  Il Mantovano dedicò la Parthenice II a Bernardo Bembo, il quale – come è stato dimostrato – è anche da identificare con il personaggio principale dell’Ecloga X intitolata appunto Bembus. Cf. L. Piepho, “Mantuan and Religious Pastoral: Unprinted Version of  His Ninth and Tenth Eclogues”, Renaissance Q uarterly 39 (1986), 665. Per la Parthenice IV si veda l’analisi di M. Donnini, “Osservazioni sulla Parthenice quarta Agathae agon di Giovanni Battista Spagnoli di Mantova”, Studi medievali s. 3, 57 (2016), 689-710.

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confestim velum a tumulo; quo incendia contra illato, vapor extemplo (mirabile visu) 300 territus aspectu sacri velaminis undam traxit, et ardentem cohibens a moenibus aestum in nebulas abiit tenuesque recessit in auras.13

In questi bei versi la narrazione delle eruzioni si combina con elementi devozionali, fornendo al lettore un’icastica descrizione degli effetti del miracoloso velo sulla colata, tema che ricorrerà poi spesso nella letteratura neolatina siciliana, come ad esempio nel­ l’Opus pulchrum di Matteo Selvaggio.14 Le eruzioni e i personaggi del mito non lasciarono indifferenti i letterati siciliani, i quali celebrarono, in tempi e modalità diverse, la loro montagna. Agli inizî del Cinquecento i  passi dedicati da Ovidio a  Polifemo e  da Ausonio ai Pii fratres vengono richiamati per impreziosire la descrizione dell’Etna che leggiamo negli ancora inediti Bellorum Syracusanorum et antiquitatum libri  tres di Bartolomeo De Grandis,15 il quale dedicò ai ciclopi, a Encelado e ai muggiti dell’Etna anche alcuni carmina recentemente riportati alla luce.16 Nel 1530 ad Augsburg venne pubblicata una raccolta assai eterogenea delle opere del patrizio siracusano Claudio Mario Arezzo, tra le quali figurano ben 370 esametri De  Acidis et Galatheae connubio, dedicati anche alle mitologiche figure che popolano il vulcano, dal ciclope Polifemo al gigante Encelado, tema tra l’altro cantato in quegli anni da Luigi Alamanni nel­l’egloga

13   I. Baptistae Mantuani Carmelitae theologi, philosophi, poetae et oratoris clarissimi opera omnia, vol. 2 (Anversa, 1576 [USTC 407243]), ff. 115v-121r. Per questo brano si veda l’analisi di Donnini 2016 (come a n. 12), 705-708. 14  Matteo Selvaggio, Opus pulchrum et studiosis viris satis iucundum de tribus Peregrinis […] (Venezia, 1542 [USTC 855804]), ff. 153v-159v. Sulla lunga tradizione che attribuiva al velo agatino la proprietà di arrestare le colate cf.  S.  Tramontana, “Sant’Agata e  la religiosità della Catania normanna”, in G.  Zito (ed.), Chiesa e  società in Sicilia. L’età normanna, vol. 1 (Torino, 1995), 196. Su Selvaggio si veda ora A.  Tempio, “La Sicilia di Matteo Selvaggio tra geografia, storia e  archeologia: l’immagine di Catania nell’Opus pulchrum”, in Salmeri, Marcellino 2020 (come a n. 10), 211-231. 15  Palermo, Biblioteca di Storia Patria, ms. I D 3, f. 33r. Per quest’opera mi permetto di rinviare a G. Marcellino, “Bartolomeo De Grandis storiografo”, in Salmeri, Marcellino 2020 (come a n. 10), 153-162. 16 Cf.  i Carmina Latina 9.13-16; 12.3-4; 13.7-8 in G.  Marcellino, “Bartolomeo De Grandis poeta. La silloge dei Carmina Latina”, in Salmeri, Marcellino 2020 (come a n. 10), 163-182.

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di ispirazione teocritea Polifemo.17 Lo stesso Arezzo qualche anno più tardi nel De  situ insulae Siciliae, opera corografica in cui si manifesta un nuovo spirito umanistico, dedicherà celebri pagine al vulcano.18 Per circoscrivere il nostro discorso alle opere latine in versi, ricordiamo che le imponenti eruzioni degli anni 1536-1537 sollecitarono la vena poetica di Pietro Pipi di Noto (1477-1542), autore del primo poema moderno dedicato all’Etna.19 La sua opera, andata purtroppo perduta, avrebbe avuto il titolo di Bellum divinum (1537), ma occorre precisare che essa è menzionata così solo a partire dalla metà del Seicento nella Sicilia sacra di Rocco Pirri,20 alla quale farà poi riferimento Antonino Mongitore e tutta la successiva schiera di studiosi.21 Vincenzo Littara, conterraneo di Pipi, nel De rebus Netinis liber (dato alle stampe a  Palermo nel 1593) ci informa dell’esistenza di questo scritto con le parole: “Tantum edita sunt quae de peste scripsit, qua Netini caeterique Siculi sua tempestate laborarunt, et quae de Aetnae incendio, praesertim an. sal. 1537”.22 Sfortunamente però il Littara, a  differenza di quanto egli fa con l’altra opera sulla peste, non riporta alcun verso di questo poema di tematica etnea. Secondo quanto afferma il cele17  Il poemetto De Acidis et Galatheae connubio si legge in Marius Aretius patritius Syracusanus Caesaris rerum gestarum scriptor. Q uae hoc volumine continentur, dialogus in quo pro Caesare iura Mediolani, Burgundiae, ac Neapolis leguntur  […] (Augsburg, 1530 [USTC 675153]), 109-123. L’egloga Polifemo si legge in P.  Raffaelli (ed.), L. Alamanni, Versi e prose, vol. 1 (Firenze, 1859), vv. 26-32. 18 Sul De situ mi permetto di rimandare a  G.  Marcellino, “Lo studio dell’antichità nel Cinquecento siciliano: il De situ insulae Siciliae di Claudio Mario Arezzo”, in A. Raffarin, G. Marcellino (ed.), La mémoire en pièces (Paris, 2020), 485-504. 19  Un profilo di Pietro Pipi è stato ricostruito da F. Balsamo, “La famiglia Pipi nel quadro storico di Noto antico”, Archivio Storico Siracusano n.s., 1 (1971), 39-55, a 45-49. 20   Sicilia sacra in qua episcopatuum nunc florentium, ac eorum dioceseon notitiae traduntur, liber tertius, auctore abbate Netino d. Roccho Pirro (Palermo, 1641 [USTC 4011671]), 227. Si noti che Pirri non dà alcuna informazione sulla data di pubblicazione. 21 A.  Mongitore, Bibliotheca Sicula, vol.  2 (Palermo, 1714), 154; A.  Narbone, Bibliografia sicola sistematica […], vol. 3 (Palermo, 1854), 139; F. Evola, Storia tipografico-letteraria del secolo XVI in Sicilia (Palermo, 1878), 293, 343, dove la pubblicazione è  ricondotta a  Palermo alla stamperia degli eredi di Giovan Matteo Mayda; G. M. Mira, Bibliografia siciliana […], vol. 2 (Palermo, 1881), 223; C. Pastena, Libri, editori e  tipografi a  Palermo (Palermo, 1995), 112. L’opera è  registrata sempre con il titolo Bellum divinum nel Repertorio EDIT 16, CNCE 57404. 22  Vincentii Littarae doctoris theologi De rebus Netinis liber (Palermo, 1593 [USTC 838268]), 166.

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bre falsario della tradizione catanese Pietro Carrera nell’Aggiunta al primo volume del suo Delle memorie historiche della città di Catania spiegate in tre volumi (1641), il Bellum divinum sarebbe stato dato alle stampe nel 1577. È lecito però dubitare delle informazioni offerte da Carrera, tanto più che egli è  l’unico a  tramandare due versi di Pipi, nei quali si celebrerebbe proprio sant’Agata: “Agatha diva suos cives defendit ab igne / Ostenso Velo, relliquiisque sacris”.23 Per compensare la perdita del poema del netino Pipi possiamo volgere lo sguardo ad altri scritti in prosa che ebbero per oggetto le eruzioni di quegli anni. Allo stesso periodo del Bellum divinum risale, ad esempio, il De Aetnaeo incendio di Federico del Carretto, succulenta descrizione delle eruzioni del 15361537, che merita di essere qui citata per la ripresa significativa dei versi virgiliani sul porto di Catania. Si ricordi anche che l’eruzione del 1536 fu al centro di uno scambio epistolare tra il matematico messinese Francesco Maurolico e Pietro Bembo.24 Se guardiamo alla produzione letteraria del Cinquecento, l’opera più importante e letterariamente meglio riuscita di tematica etnea è senza dubbio la Aetnae topographia incendiorumque Aetnaeorum historia di Antonio Filoteo degli Omodei. La bella prosa latina di questo trattato uscì dalla penna del suo autore intorno al 1560, in un periodo di inattività eruttiva, ma approdò alla stampa postuma solo nel 1591 a Venezia per le cure del padovano don Niccolò degli Oddi, con dedica a Giovanni III Ventimiglia, marchese di Geraci. Alla diffusione di questo scritto non ha di certo giovato il termine Topographia messo a  bella posta nella prima parte del titolo, ma l’opera è  certamente da annoverare tra i  più raffinati prodotti letterari del Rinascimento siciliano. Degli Omodei, elegante poeta di cui recentemente è  stato rinvenuto un canzoniere in volgare,25 non manca di inserire, insieme a citazioni dagli autori classici (Pindaro, Virgilio, Ovidio e  lo pseudovirgiliano Aetna) e  23   Pietro Carrera, Delle memorie historiche della città di Catania (Catania, 1641 [USTC 4014014]), 361. 24  La lettera del Maurolico si legge in G.  Spezi (ed.), Lettere inedite del cardinale Pietro Bembo e di altri scrittori del secolo XVI tratte da’ Codici Vaticani e Barberiniani (Roma, 1862), 79-84. Il Bembo rispose da Padova al Maurolico con una missiva che si legge in E. Travi (ed.), Pietro Bembo, Lettere, vol. 3 (Bologna, 1992), 649-650. 25  A.  Manitta, G.  Manitta, “Il codice autografo delle rime di Antonio Filoteo Omodei (Capponiano 139). Indagini su un inedito petrarchista del Cinquecento”, Cultura e prospettive 27 (aprile-giugno 2015), 54-97.

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rinascimentali (Petrarca e  Ariosto), qualche suo elegante verso latino, che qui riportiamo: Dum mea perpetuis exardent viscera flammis, 1 opprimit exurens extera membra gelu. Hinc igitur, quoniam resplendens semper et ardens his videor, sumpsi nomen et Aetna vocor.26

Non sono invece di Degli Omodei i ventisei versi che precedono la Topographia in carte prive di numerazione. Il loro autore – se bene intendiamo la parte finale del componimento – sembra si possa identificare con Leonardo Clario, che intorno alla metà del Cin­ quecento studiò medicina a Padova: Ne metuas atri hic aliquid, vel cernere fusci; ignem ubi commistum repperies nivibus. Parce ignes, tedasque nitenti inferre libello: 25 nam Clarius clare scribere sic docuit.

Nel corso del Cinquecento l’Etna ricorre spesso nella poesia latina, ma si tratta quasi sempre di una presenza occasionale, dovuta alle similitudini con i  suoi incendî o alle ragioni del mito. Q uesto soggetto è  invece al centro di molti lavori corografici, tra i  quali ricordiamo almeno le monumentali De rebus Siculis decades duae del frate domenicano Tommaso Fazello, che descrisse la gita fatta ai crateri nel 1541.27 Agli inizî del secolo successivo, le eruzioni del 1603-1610, cantate anche in siciliano da Lorenzo Galifi e  adombrate in versi latini nella Sicelis di Francesco Flaccomio,28 incominciarono a sollecitare la vena poetica di Pietro Carrera, il quale inserì questo componimento nella sua raccolta di poesia stampata a Venezia nel 1613 da Giovanni Battista Ciotti: Ignibus Aetna micat, nonus iam volvitur annus, per latera in flammas undique apertus abit. 26  Antonii Philothei de Homodeis Siculi Aetnae topographia incendiorumque Aetnaeorum historia (Venezia, 1591 [USTC 845373]), 3. Sul passo cf.  la nota di commento in C. Curti (tr.), B. Clausi (com.), Antonio Filoteo degli Omodei, Aetnae topographia (Catania, 1992), 159. 27  Tommaso Fazello, De rebus Siculis decades duae (Palermo, 1558 [USTC]), dec. 1, lib. 10, cap. 2. 28 Il Breve e  fidele trattato dell’incendio di Mongibello di Lorenzo Galifi, rimasto a lungo manoscritto, è stato pubblicato per la prima volta in Guidoboni, Ciuccarelli et  al. 2014 (come a  n.  1), 375-384; Francesco Flaccomio, Sicelis (Messina, 1609), 27-28.

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In se casurum vulgus putat, ille cavernis ex imis sulphur saxaque mista iacit. Vertice congeritur collis fitque altera moles, 5 unde assurgit eo, quo minuendus erat.29

Per una più corposa opera in versi dedicata interamente al vulcano bisognerà attendere però sino al 1636, quando Carrera, nella parte conclusiva del suo Il Mongibello in volgare, accluderà un poemetto latino intitolato Aetna, alcuni epigrammi e  due componimenti più lunghi in distici, che portano rispettivamente il titolo di Aetnaea castanea e  Grympa.30 Il Mongibello ebbe anche ampia circolazione in tutta Europa grazie alla traduzione in lingua latina fatta da Sigebert Haverkamp, professore di storia e retorica dell’Università di Leiden, e  pubblicata nel Thesaurus antiquitatum et historiarum Siciliae di Johannes Georgius Graevius e Pieter Burman.31 L’Aetna di Carrera, che nel titolo vuole gareggiare con l’omonimo poemetto d’età neroniana divenuto nel Cinquecento anche oggetto delle cure di celebri letterati,32 è  costituito da 291 esametri in cui si narrano le vicende di Aci e Galatea sullo sfondo di una terribile eruzione. Il lettore così entra nella scena in cui la celebre ninfa, su consiglio del fiume Simeto, chiede aiuto a  Polifemo: recatasi ad Acitrezza, Galatea trova il gigante assiso su uno scoglio in un placido canto d’amore, che a lei appare inspiegabile in una situazione così pericolosa. Carrera fa qui di Polifemo un innamorato servizievole, che nella vana speranza di assicurarsi l’amore dell’amata si ingegna in ogni modo per ostruire le bocche 29   Petri Carrerae Siculi Militellani Variorum epigrammatum libri tres ab authore denuo recogniti et aucti. Accesserunt praeterea eiusdem eclogae cum argumentis Nicolai Antonini Colossi Messanensis, odae et elogia (Venezia, 1613), 14. Su Carrera si veda S. S. Nigro, “Carrera, Pietro”, Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 20 (Roma, 1977), 738-741. 30  Il Mongibello descritto da Don Pietro Carrera in tre libri (Catania, 1636 [USTC 4012162]). Il termine latino grympha corrispondente a  glimpa del siciliano antico, mutuato dal francese antico guimple, viene comunemente adoperato per indicare il velo di sant’Agata. 31  Petri Carrerae sacerdotis Panormitani Descriptio Aetnae, libris tribus, in quibus, praeter varias res memorabiles, incendiorum historia inque eorum causas inquiritur. Accedunt eiusdem supra idem argumentum poemata  […], ex Italo Latine vertit suasque curas adjecit Sigebertus Havercampus, editio nova priori auctior et emendatior, in G. Graevius, P. Burman (ed.), Thesaurus antiquitatum et historiarum Siciliae […], vol. 9, (Leiden, 1723). 32  Per il non ancora identificato commento di Pomponio Leto a  questo poe­ metto si veda N.  Lanzarone, “Il commento di Pomponio Leto all’Appendix Vergiliana: primi sondaggi”, Bollettino di studi latini 47.2 (2017), 696-704, a 697.

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eruttive.33 Il gigante allora, dopo essersi rivolto direttamente al vulcano con tono minaccioso (“Vicisti, gravis Aetna, cibis te denique tantis  / expertem citius reddam, ieiunus abibis”),34 sradica gli alberi che i fiumi di lava avrebbero altrimenti travolto, e cinge con essi un colle, che sarà offerto alla ninfa come un “non aspernabile donum”.35 In questi versi assistiamo a una originale variazione del mito, perché il “rastrum” con cui il gigante ovidiano soleva pettinarsi i capelli diventa uno strumento per scavare un’immensa fossa in cui far riversare il magma (v.  253). Non manca però un colpo di scena: la colata infatti, attraverso la fenditura creata dal ciclope, si immette nelle viscere della terra sino a raggiungere l’antro di Proserpina, obbligata dalle leggi del mito a trascorrervi metà dell’anno. Persefone quindi si rivolge a Plutone e lo esorta ad intervenire per bloccare il gigante Encelado, perché quel celebre luogo non diventi ricettacolo delle lave: dedecus oppleri saxis fierique sepulchrum Aetnaei vomitus, et tot per saecla vigentem deleri famam cunctis memorabile terris. Compedibus vinclisque novis compesce furentem 280 Enceladum, flammis qui decurrentibus Orci audet adire domos; totam sciat improbus Aetnam sub tua claustra regi, noscat tua numina tandem.

E così, accogliendo la richiesta di Persefone, il dio degli inferi ordina che quel gigante, il cui naso emette fiamme di virgiliana memoria, venga imprigionato nel sottosuolo dalle Furie. Una sessantina d’anni dopo la pubblicazione de Il Mongibello, un evento catastrofico segnò la storia della città etnea. La terribile eruzione del 1669, cantata in volgare da non pochi letterati isolani,36   Il Mongibello (come a n. 30), 191-192, vv. 180-209.   Ibid., vv. 226-228. 35  Ibid., v. 240. 36  Cf. le seguenti opere stampate a Catania da Bonaventura La Rocca: Francesco Morabito, Catania liberata (Catania, 1669); Antonio Barbagallo, Cansuna mastra e  ottava siciliana, che incomincia Virgin’Agata Santa di Diu amica. Per la quale si prega S. Agata ad intercedire per la liberatione della sua patria Catania, per la uscita del foco di Mongibello (Catania, 1669); Pietro Recupero, Historia del fuoco di Mongibello, e suoi effetti successo all’11. di marzo dell’anno 1669. Composta in terza rima siciliana (Catania, 1669); Giuseppe Nicosia, Veridica relatione del foco uscito da Mongibello il  dì  11.  di marzo 1669. Composta in terza rima siciliana (Catania, 1669); Giuseppe Sfilio, Vero discorso del foco uscito da Mongibello il dì 11. di marzo 1669. Composta in terza rima siciliana (Catania, 1669); Francesco Gemma, L’incendio di Mongibello. Poema del dottor fisico Francesco Gemma di Biancavilla (Catania, 1674). 33 34

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divenne anche materia per trattati scientifici 37 e poemetti in latino. Il primo di essi è quello che va sotto il titolo di Aetnaeum exarando incendium del sacerdote catanese Francesco Severino Gravagno, stampato a Messina nello stesso anno dell’eruzione.38 In 124 versi si narrano i  danni causati dalle colate e  soprattutto i  miracoli di sant’Agata, implorata dai cittadini catanesi per arrestare gli incandescenti fiumi magmatici. I fenomeni eruttivi e la nascita dei due crateri dei Monti rossi a Nicolosi sono presentati tramite il ricorso a una metafora militare con esiti non disprez­zabili: Q uae binos saxa in montes Mons congerit altos, bella peracturus, firmans sua robora vallis. 40 Se fert in praeceps ignis, furit arma movendo, irruit et raptim, tumidus velut amnis, inundans ingruit; urit agros, plantas, viridaria, villas, oppida, templa, domos, pagos, operitque voratque. Se tollit colles supra, se montibus aequat; 45 fontibus est tegmen, torrensque est vallibus explens. Horrida spectantur, quae spectabantur amoena, splendescunt noctes Aetnae splendoribus ignis, atque fugant tenebras flammarum fulgura tetras.

Il momento culminante della battaglia intrapresa dal vulcano contro il territorio è quello dell’incontro delle sue colate con la fredda acqua del mare: Fertur et indomitus clarissimi ad aequoris oram. O mirum! ille subit: fremit hoc; contrudit uterque. Hoc undis aqueis, undis candentibus ille; 85 se supra torrens effert, se subdit et aequor; hoc succumbit victum; victor et ille triumphat sub pede colla tenens ponti, fluctusque premendo. Comprimit et gressum laetus, gaudetque triumphans.

L’avanzata della lava, nel cui abbraccio finiscono il Castello Ursino e  il Monastero dei Benedettini, non trova ostacolo alcuno nelle acque dello Ionio, ma si arresterà soltanto grazie ai miracoli della 37  Cf. ad esempio Francesco Monaco, Cataclysmus aetnaeus sive inundatio ignea Aetnae montis (Venezia, 1669); Alfonso Borelli, Historia et meteorologia incendii Aetnaei anni 1669 (Reggio Calabria, 1670). 38  Sulla stampa si veda A. Falletta, T. Faraone (ed.), Edizioni messinesi dei secoli XVI-XVIII possedute dalla Biblioteca centrale della Regione siciliana (Palermo, 2013), 87 no. 276. Il testo fu ripubblicato, con qualche svista, da P. Castorina, “Sulla eruzione dell’Etna del 1669 e su d’uno ignoto documento relativo alla stessa”, Archivio Storico Siciliano n.s., 16 (1891), 392-409, a 403-406.

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martire Agata, alla quale la città di Catania deve l’epiteto di “urbs miraculorum” (v. 123). Il secondo poemetto dedicato all’eruzione del 1669, finora del tutto sconosciuto alla bibliografia, venne stampato a  Londra nel 1670 nella tipografia di William Godbid, a  spese di Moses Pitt, con il titolo In nuperam horrendam montis Aetnae eruptionem carmen.39 Le lettere che compaiono sul frontespizio (authore D. B.), sotto le quali si nasconde il nome del poeta, sono allo stato attuale difficilmente scioglibili. Del resto, proprio l’inizio dell’operetta, con un richiamo esplicito al cosiddetto falso proemio dell’Eneide, conferma la volontà dell’autore di celare la sua identità: Ille ego, qui quondam tacui, alta silentia rumpam; 1 quis sileat? Mundi moles operosa laborat, et terrae removentur maxima fundamenta: materiam haec tenui possint praebere poetae.

L’ignoto poeta neolatino è da collocare geograficamente sull’isola britannica, come chiariscono i  versi in cui egli menziona gli incendî delle miniere di carbone di Newcastle: Flammarum saniem clara nostra Britannia sentit, 226 namque Novi Castri foveae carbonibus urunt, infando sonitu ferrum quoque ductile fundunt.

Il fatto che il poemetto appaia a stampa a Londra non sorprende, giacché nella medesima città nel 1669 si pubblicò anche, nelle Philosophical Transactions della Royal Society, il resoconto inviato dalla Sicilia da alcuni mercanti inglesi.40 La stessa Royal Society, sempre nel 1669, per mezzo del suo segretario Henry Oldenburg sollecitò Giovanni Alfonso Borelli a studiare quel fenomeno senza precedenti: nacque così, anche tramite lo stimolo del cardinale Leopoldo de’ Medici, l’Historia et meteorologia incendii Aetnaei anni 1669, il primo trattato moderno di vulcanologia, poi pubblicato a  Reggio Calabria nel 1670. Sempre a  Londra vennero 39  In nuperam horrendam montis Aetnae eruptionem carmen authore D.B. (London, 1670). Il poemetto, di cui esiste un solo esemplare, oggi alla Bodleian Library, si può leggere adesso sulla piattaforma Early English Book Online, ID 2240893153. L’opera è registrata in Annual Report of  the Curators of  the Bodleian Library (Oxford, 1973), 35. 40  “An answer to some inquiries concerning the eruptions of  Mount Aetna, an. 1669. Communicated by some inquisitive English merchants, now residing in Sicily”, Philosophical Transactions 4.51 (1669), 1028-1034.

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pubblicate inoltre, nel 1669, l’anonima ballata dal titolo Mount Aetna’s Flames. Or, the Sicilian Wonder,41 la relazione del conte di Winchelsea, Heneage Finch, fatta per il re d’Inghilterra Carlo II,42 e il trattato The Volcano’s. Or, Burning and Fire-vomiting Mountains Famous in the World, rielaborazione in inglese di una parte del Mundus subterraneus di Athanasius Kircher.43 Il nostro carmen, costituito da 246 versi con numerosissime citazioni da Virgilio, Ovidio e  dal poemetto pseudovirgiliano Aetna, è  presentato come un resoconto attendibile di un avvenimento incredibile: “mira cano sed vera cano” (v. 9). L’intera narrazione, tuttavia, risulta fondata su dati di seconda mano, in quanto sono assenti elementi che possano far pensare a una descrizione autoptica. L’epillio si apre con i topici riferimenti all’altezza e alla fama del vulcano siciliano, sede del Tartaro, secondo i  poeti antichi, e del Purgatorio secondo i cristiani (vv. 9-24).44 Gli autori dell’antichità, chiamati in causa per provare l’ininterrotta attività eruttiva del vulcano (v.  19: “crede poetis”), rappresentano il costante punto di riferimento per giustificare il ricorso continuo al mito, come nel caso della narrazione delle vicende del gigante Encelado (v.  34: “hic iocus est vatum, veniam concede poetis”). Così, sulla scia di Lucrezio e soprattutto dello pseudovirgiliano Aetna, l’autore può additare la causa delle eruzioni nel vento che soffia all’interno delle caverne (vv.  45-65). Un richiamo ad Ovidio (Met. 15.340355), invece, consente di introdurre l’eruzione del 1669 in opposizione a  quanto aveva scritto il poeta di Sulmona profetizzando l’esaurirsi dell’attività eruttiva: Tempore sed nostro ferventes evomit ignes, 81 quales vix unquam viderunt saecla priora, atque ita terribiles vix credent saecla futura: nondum nacta fidem praesagia grata poetae. 41  Mount Aetna’s Flames. Or, the Sicilian Wonder ([London], 1669]. Si tratta di un foglio a stampa che contiene un’illustrazione dell’eruzione del 1669, una ballata, in due parti, e una lista di località distrutte dalla lava. Si conosce un solo esemplare di questa stampa, che adesso è alla Bodleian Library. Cf. ESTC, R41523. 42  H.  Finch, A True and Exact Relation of   the Late Prodigious Earthquake and Eruption of  Mount Aetna […] (London 1669). 43  The Volcano’s. Or, Burning and Fire-vomiting Mountains Famous in the World (London, 1669). Il Mundus subterraneus fu pubblicato per la prima volta ad Amsterdam nel 1664; seguirono una seconda edizione nel 1665 e una terza nel 1678 sempre nella stessa città. 44  Sull’Etna come sede dell’Inferno e del Purgatorio si veda Sardina 2000 (come a n. 3), 88-93.

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Boati, tremori, scintille e  fiamme campeggiano in questo componimento, del quale meritano di essere ricordati almeno i versi dedicati all’incontro della lava con l’acqua del mare, tema già presente, come abbiamo osservato sopra, in Severino Gravagno: Hoc mirum est, undas ignes extinguere nolle, 185 in mare descendunt, ardores gutta refecit: tam bene conveniunt discordes ignis et unda, iussa deo iusto offensas punire virorum.

All’ignoto autore sono ben presenti anche le celebri eruzioni del Vesuvio dell’antichità. Se il vulcano napoletano può vantare un venerando scienziato come Plinio il Vecchio (“sacerdos”), non minore è  la gloria che tocca all’Etna, sui cui crateri perse la vita il filosofo Empedocle, desideroso di rendersi immortale (vv.  204-222). Con una variazione del topos classico della conclusione dell’opera in concomitanza con il tramonto del sole, l’epillio si chiude con quattro versi in cui si annuncia la fine di quella terrificante eruzione (vv. 243-246). Q uantunque nella ricca messe di versi presentati in queste pagine si annoverino non poche esercitazioni retoriche prive di novità espressiva, non mancano esempî di vis poetica realistica con commenti autoptici che esulano dall’imitazione piatta degli antichi, come nel caso dell’incontro della lava con l’acqua del mare icasticamente rappresentato da Severino Gravagno. Non irrilevanti sono inoltre, nel complesso, le poesie di Pietro Carrera, il quale, pur traboccando talvolta di ampollosità retoriche, riuscì a  rinnovare con esiti originali il repertorio dei miti legati alla Sicilia. L’intreccio di temi mitologici e  didascalici, già presente nel poemetto pseudovirgiliano, costituisce il filo rosso di questa variegata produzione poetica, caratterizzata da una continua tensione tra l’adesione ai modelli classici e  la necessità di narrare, con fervide immagini, le nuove tremende eruzioni dell’Etna.

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Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 243-248 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124061

IN LAUDEM SANCTI AMBROSII

FIDELIS RAEDLE

IN LAUDEM SANCTI AMBROSII (Stropha, quae vagantium dicitur) 1

Nóvimùs imáginèm  óperìs musívi, líneás quae cóndidìt  vúltûs túi vívi. 2 Te commendat dignitas  atque stirps Romana, te Patrem Ecclesia  colit Christiana. Salvatoris socius  vix fidelis factus, invitus episcopi  munus iure nactus pacem servas auream  fideique statum, consolaris populum  nimis perturbatum! Gratum evangelium  pulso iam timore tradidisti gregibus  mire dulci ore. (Apes mel, ut fabula  narrat piae gentis, infuserunt pueri  labris dormientis.) Tullii “Officia”  digne complevisti: novis Christi legibus  veteres sanxisti, ut honeste viverent  tandem ergo cuncti. Utinam officiis  suis essent functi! Tunc in testimonium  pium atque verum Creatoris opera  illa sex dierum extulisti laudibus,  orbis ad maiorem gloriam sic tribuens  singulis decorem.

  Elisio vel synaliphe non adhibetur: singulae syllabae pronuntiandae sunt.   Scil. imaginem S. Ambrosii in Basilica di Sant’Ambrogio Mediolani asserva-

1 2

tam.

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Ipse tu dulcisonos  hymnos creavisti, qui ornatum candidum  mundo praestant isti: Salvam fidem seminant  longe atque late, et delectant animas  sua suavitate. Unum te prae ceteris  Christianis ducem atque lumen eligo,  cuius sequar lucem. Mitis et pauperibus  semper eras praesto, Pacis dulcis socius,  mihi Sanctus esto!

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GRAMMATICA

1. In laudem casus vocativi (Stropha, quae vagantium dicitur) Lícet Déclinátiò  quáeque lóco ímo ponere te soleat,  mihi semper primo dignus esse praemio  utique videris – quin praeferri casibus  ceteris mereris! Nam tu solus imperas,  nullius egenus. Vitâ frugi frueris  potestatis plenus, tui vere dominus  ipse te opponis ullius servitio  praepositionis. Immutatus, integer  atque semper idem es poetis usui,  quibus habes fidem. Illos enim liberas,  scio, tibi gratos, quorum versus excites  mire animatos! Exoriris subito  statûs singularis, nec Donati regula  quavis obligaris. Spernas, age, munera!  Sine lege vive! Salva sis, apostrophe! Salve, vocative! 2. Contra elisionem Cur sýllabás auférre gaúdes? Sonum incidere quid audes? Num carmen integrum formidas? Te ipsa, suadeo, elidas! 247

FIDELIS RAEDLE

3. Contra Synaloephen Commísces túrpitèr contráctas litteras! Syllabas quid mactas? Q uae, quamvis ordine conferto, stent castae: intervallo certo!

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CHAPTER 3

HUMANIST POETRY FROM THE LOW COUNTRIES

GILBERT TOURNOY

NEO-LATIN POETRY IN THE ALBUM AMICORUM OF  HUBERT AUDEJANS

By the end of   the sixteenth century the custom of  keeping an album amicorum had spread throughout Europe. At the very beginning, some fifty years earlier, such an album was mostly in the hands of  students and scholars often travelling from one university to another and visiting one country after another. It contained entries by fellow students and acquaintances, as well as by intimate friends and famous professors. These entries normally consist of  two parts. The first one contains a  line or a  short text in prose or in verse, either an original contribution or taken from another source, be it the Bible in the original language or in translation, or a Greek or Latin author from the classical, mediaeval or Renaissance period. In the second part the contributor identifies himself, sometimes adding a more or less carefully executed painting, a  coat of  arms or even a  portrait, and the date and place at which he had made the entry.1 1  The genre of   the album amicorum has been studied for more than a  century now and the bibliography dealing with it is impressive, so that here only a very small selection of  recent material can be offered. See, in general, Stammbücher als kulturhistorische Q uellen. Herausgegeben von J.-U.  Fechner (München, 1981); W.  Klose, Corpus Alborum Amicorum – CAAC – Beschreibendes Verzeichnis der Stammbücher des 16. Jahrhunderts (Stuttgart, 1988); Id., Stammbücher des 16. Jahrhunderts (Wiesbaden, 1989); W.  W. Schnabel, Das Stammbuch. Konstitution und Geschichte einer textbezogenen Sammelform bis ins erste Drittel des 18. Jahrhunderts (Tübingen, 2003); W. Ludwig, “Le genre des Alba amicorum”, in P. Galand-Hallyn et al. (ed.), La société des amis à Rome et dans la littérature médiévale et humaniste (Turnhout, 2008), 260-274; Id., Stammbücher vom 16. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert. Kontinuität und Verbreitung des Humanismus (Hildesheim – Zürich – New York, 2012); H. Cazes, “Démonstrations d’amitié et d’humanisme: alba, adages et emblèmes chez les petits-

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 251-264 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124062

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The album amicorum initiated in 1602 by the Bruges humanist Hubert Audejans, at that time living in Justus Lipsius’s house at Leuven as his secretary, is  rather atypical in several ways.2 He may very well have started it at the instance of   the French nobleman Adrianus de Saisseval, his older colleague in Lipsius’s service, who was on the verge of  leaving Leuven on 26 September 1602. On f.  75v (my numbering in pencil) Saisseval had his coat of  arms painted with, underneath, his device “Sustinendo progredior” (I  advance by standing firm). On the opposite page (f.  76r) he  wrote down his farewell words, in which he admits that his colleague Audejans outdid him in intellectual capacities, but surely neither in years of  service nor in fidelity to Lipsius.3

enfants d’Erasme”, in A.  Steiner-Weber, K.  A.  E. Enenkel (ed.), Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Monasteriensis. Proceedings of   the Fifteenth International Congress of  NeoLatin Studies (Leiden – Boston, 2015), 18-48. For the Netherlands in particular, see C. L. Heesakkers, K. Thomassen, Voorlopige lijst van alba amicorum uit de Nederlanden voor 1800 (’s-Gravenhage, 1986); K.  Thomassen (red.), Alba Amicorum. Vijf  eeuwen vriendschap op papier gezet: het album amicorum en het poëziealbum in de Nederlanden (Maarssen – ’s-Gravenhage, 1990); C.  L. Heesakkers, Een netwerk aan de basis van de Leidse universiteit. Het album amicorum van Janus Dousa. Facsimile-uitgave van hs. Leiden, UB, BPL 1406 met inleiding, transcriptie, vertaling en toelichting, 2 vols (Leiden, 2000); K. Thomassen, Aan vrienden gewijd: alba amicorum in de Koninklijke Bibliotheek (Amersfoort, 2012); G. Tournoy, “Latin Inscriptions by Justus Lipsius in Alba amicorum”, in Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Monasteriensis, 563-571; Id., “On the Tracks of  New and Lost alba amicorum from the Netherlands: the First Album begun in Spain?”, Calamus Renascens 19 (2018 [2021]), with further bibliography (in press). 2  For Audejans, see G.  Tournoy, “Hubert Audejans (1574-1615), a  Bruges Humanist from Lipsius’s Inner Circle”, in C.  Mouchel (ed.), Juste Lipse (15471606) en son temps. Actes du colloque de Strasbourg, 1994 (Paris, 1996), 369-395; Id., “De Brugse rederijker Jan-Baptist Dienberghe en zijn stadsgenoot, de humanist Hubertus Audejans”, Biekorf, 121 (2021), 232-245. For a  first description of   the album, see the entry in G. Tournoy, J. Papy, J. De Landtsheer (ed.), Lipsius en Leuven. Catalogus van de tentoonstelling in de Centrale Bibliotheek te Leuven, 18 september – 17 oktober 1997 (Leuven, 1997), 146-148, no. 40. 3   “Insignia familiae habes, sed non animi mei, pater; nam aliud offerre nequeo. Fave igitur volontati [sic]: quam si sors iuvet, coniunctam com [sic] effectu invenies. Q uid plura? Verba nihil sunt: occasio ergo expectanda et speranda, donec eveniat. Tuus ad omnia paratissimus manebo, modo non presumas te secretarium C[laris­ simi] Lipsi esse antiquiorem me et fideliorem. Q uoad capacitatem vero iure et libenter cedo in illa laude. Vale et nos semper ama. Fac quoque ut amer a C[larissimo] tuo Lipsio, quem venerari numquam desinam. Lovanio discedens. VI cal[endas] octo[bres] MDCII. Adrianus de Saisseval, eternum vester.”

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Audejans was not a  student travelling all over Europe from university to university. He remained in Leuven for several years, probably from 1598 until 1605, the year he finished his studies. During the last months of  his stay he assembled the greater part of   the contributions for his album (13), none of   them accompanied by a  coat of  arms. Then he returned to his home town of  Bruges, where only five more inscriptions were added during the years 1609 (3), 1613 (1) and 1615, the year of  his death (1). This brings the total sum of  inscriptions to only nineteen items written over a  period of  thirteen years in just two localities. Here follows the list of   these nineteen inscriptions, not in chronological order, but in the order they were introduced in the album (my numbering in pencil): 1. (f. 5r) Iustus Lipsius Leuven, 31 August 1605 2. (f. 6r) Leonardus Lessius, Leuven, 16 September 1605 3. (f. 7r) Anonymus canonicus Brugensis, (Leuven), 30 October 1605 4. (f. 8r) Ioannes Clarius, Leuven, 17 December 1605 5. (f. 9r) Maximilianus De Vriendt, Bruges, 30 April 1609 6. (f. 11r) Iustus Rycquius, Bruges, 20 May 1615 7. (f. 12r) Nicolaus Bonardus, Leuven, 19 September 1605 8. (f. 14r) Gerardus Corselius, Leuven, 6 September 1605 9. (f. 15r) Ioannes Malderus, Leuven, 2 December 1605 10. (f. 16r) Iacobus de Baÿ, Leuven, (December 1605?) 11. (f. 17r) Stephanus Weyms, Leuven, 10 December 1605 12. (f. 19r) Dominicus Baudius, Bruges, 25 August (1609?) 13. (f. 34r) Daniel Heinsius, Bruges, 25 August 1613 14. (f. 38r) Frater Emanuel a Jesu, Leuven, 1 September (1605?) 15. (f. 63r) Philippus Rubenius, Leuven, 13 September 1605 16. (f. 64r) Georgius Uwenus, Leuven, 5 November 1605 17. (f. 73r) Ghÿsbertus De Milde, Bruges, 26 June 1609 18. (f. 74r) Bernardus Bauhusius, Leuven, 1605 19. (f.  75v-76r) Adrianus de Saisseval, Leuven, 26 September 1602 253

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The limited space and the specific theme prescribed by the editors prevent me from transcribing and commenting upon all nineteen contributions here. But from the list given here it is  clear that Audejans was able to collect in Leuven contributions not only from members of   the inner circle of  Justus Lipsius, such as Adrianus de Saisseval, Georgius Uwenus or Philippus Rubenius (1574-1611), but also from famous professors such as Lipsius in the first place, the lawyers Stephanus Wamesius (1553-1633) and Gerardus Corselius (1568-1636), the theologians Joannes Malderus (1563-1633), Joannes Clarius (1547-1611) and Jacobus Baius (de Baÿ, c. 1545-1614), not to forget Jesuits such as Leonardus Lessius (1554-1623), Nicolaus Bonardus (1563-1610) or Bernardus Bauhusius (1576-1619). In accordance with the theme proposed to me, I  shall limit myself  to the topic of  sixteenth-century Latin poetry. A first transcription and preliminary examination has revealed that only two of   the nineteen inscriptions contain some Latin verses devised by the contributor himself. The first one is  written by Bernardus Bauhusius or Bernard van Bauhuysen. This Antwerp born Jesuit published his first selection of  Latin epigrams (Epi­grammatum selectorum libri V) at the Plantin Press in Antwerp in 1616 (reprinted in Cologne, 1618; Antwerp 1620; Antwerp 1634,  etc.).4 The copy of   the 1616 edition kept at the University Library of  Ghent is  the one dedicated by the author to the Leuven professor Erycius Puteanus, Lipsius’s successor in Leuven. It has on the title-page the following inscription containing a  pun on the vernacular name of  Puteanus: “Eruditionis Puteo altissimo purissimo Eryc[io] Put[eano]. Auctor.” Puteanus was most favourably impressed by these epigrams and Bauhusius’s predilection for poetry offering the pleasure of  complex artifice. In  the second book, on p.  47-48 he discovered two particular hexameters, one for the Virgin Mary and the other for her son Jesus. They are so-called Protean verses, because they lend themselves to 1022 5 and 3.628.800 permuta4  See for Bauhusius, A.  de Backer, Bibliothèque de la Compagnie de Jésus [...] Nouvelle édition par C. Sommervogel [...] Bibliographie, vol.  1 (Bruxelles – Paris, 1890; repr. Heverlee 1960), 1051-1053; W. Audenaert, Prosopographia Iesuitica. Bel­ gica Antiqua (PIBA). A  Biographical Dictionary of   the Jesuits in the Low Countries 1542-1773, 4 vols (Leuven – Heverlee, 2000), 81. 5  In fact there were quite a lot more possible combinations, but Bauhusius pre-

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tions respectively. Puteanus was so thrilled that he immediately wanted to try out these nearly endless possibilities. Already the following year the Plantin Press printed for him at Antwerp his Pietatis thaumata in Bernardi Bauhusii e  Socie­tate Jesu Proteum Parthenium, with in part  1 the 1022 variations of   the verse for the Virgin Mary, followed in part  2 by a  long encomiastic commentary. The first edition of  Bauhusius’s selected epigrams obviously presents the result of  his poetical endeavour over the previous decade. Most of   them treat specific philosophical or religious topics and hence cannot be attributed to a  precise period. But some of   these, especially those recording the death of  some famous scholar or friend, are likely to have been composed not too long after that event, as is the case, for instance, for the epitaph for Philip Rubens (†  1611), for the Spanish theologian Benito Arias Montano (†  1598), for Justus Lipsius (†  1606) or for the famous German Jesuit and mathematician Christophorus Clavius (†  1612). The epigram Bauhusius introduced in Audejans’s album apparently belongs to this series of  older compositions. It bears no indication of  day or month, only a  year-date: 1605, exactly as the one inscribed by Jacobus de Bay, nephew of   the better known Michel de Bay (†  1589). The revival of   the inscriptions in Audejans’s album started with that of  Lipsius on the last day of  August 1605 (f.  5r); and during the following month at least five more were added, two of   them being by the Jesuits Lessius and Bonardus. Did Audejans perhaps stay with the Jesuits after he left Lipsius’s house? At the very least we can be sure that he paid them a  visit on 16 and 19 September, and it may very well be during these days that he also convinced Bauhusius to add a  small token of  his friendship. So, on the verso of   the second last folio (f. 74v), facing the coat of  arms of  Adrianus de Saisseval, Bauhusius introduced three elegiac dis-

ferred to limit the number to 1022, which is  exactly the number of  stars present in the sky according to Ptolemy’s Catalogue. See F. Hallyn, “Un artifice de peu de poids  […] Poésie expérimentale au XVIIe siècle”, in N.  Blatt (ed.) Epistémocritique et cognition (Paris, 1992), 19-39; English translation by R.  Lapidus, “A LightWeight Artifice: Experimental Poetry in the 17th century”, SubStance 71-72 (1993), 289-305. Id., “Puteanus sur l’anagramme”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 49 (2000), 255-266.

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tichs of  his own, preceded by a verse, in small capitals, taken from Psalm 33 (34), 15: Eruditiss[im]o D[omi]no Licentiato Huberto Audia[n]tio Bernardus Bauhusius symbolon hoc suum posuit Amoris et memoriae ergo. Diverte a malo & fac bonum. Unum si Empyrea crimen ponatur in Aula, Lux fugiet, medio Nox erit atra polo. Unaque si Stygiis virtus ponatur in antris, Nox fugiet, mediaque in Styge Olympus erit. Ergo Virtutem toto plus dilige Caelo, Et vitium toto plus Acheronte time. Ita voveo Bernardus Bauhusius Soc[ietatis] Jesu Religiosus A[nn]o M D C V Lov[an]ii. (My translation:) Bernardus Bauhusius placed this symbol of  his for a  most erudite man, the licentiate Hubert Audejans, as a  token of  his love and remembrance. Turn away from evil and do good. If  one crime were entering the empyrean hall (= the highest heaven), light will flee, black night will be in the middle of   the sky. And if  one virtue would appear in the Stygian caverns, night will flee and heaven will be in the middle of   the Styx. Hence embrace virtue more than the entire heaven and fear vice more than the entire Acheron. This is what I wish, Bernardus Bauhusius, member of  the Society of  Jesus, in the year 1605 at Leuven.

Bauhusius had of  course kept a copy of  this small poem of  three distichs, which appears, with some minor changes, on p. 21 of   the 1616 edition with the title “Virtus et Vitium”. In v.  2 one reads “Styx” instead of  “Nox”, and in v.  3 “Una Acheronteis Virtus” instead of  “Unaque si Stygiis”; these changes of  course are also taken over in all later editions, such as Cologne 1618 (p.  24), Antwerp 1620 (p. 25) or Antwerp 1634 (p. 18). 256

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Fig. 1 The inscription by Bauhusius in Audejans’s album, f. 74v (private collection)

The second text to be examined here comes from the pen of one of the finest poets of his time, particularly in the area of iambic poetry, viz. the Flemish author Dominicus Baudius, who was born in Lille on 8 April 1561 and died at Leiden on 22 August 1613.6 He lived an eventful life, partly due to his Calvinistic convictions, partly to

6  See his Vita, printed along with some of  his works; I have used the one published in Dominici Baudii Poematum nova editio, tertia parte nunc locupletata, et in concinniorem ordinem redacta. Accedit autoris vita, et epitaphia (Leiden, L. Elzevirius, 1616), ff. **2v-**3r; P. L. M. Grootens, Dominicus Baudius. Een levensschets uit het Leidse humanistenmilieu 1561-1613 (Nijmegen – Utrecht, 1942), 224.

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his own cheerful but rather frivolous character. After having studied in Leiden (with Lipsius) and Geneva, he lived in the Netherlands, in England and for ten years in France, before being appointed at the University of  Leiden in 1603, where he died ten years later. His attractive personality as well as his intellectual and poetical capacities earned him the esteem and the friendship of  some of  the most prominent figures of  his time, such as Justus Lipsius, Janus Dousa, Josephus Justus Scaliger, Isaac Casaubon, Hugo Grotius and Daniel Heinsius.7 His inscription in Audejans’s album is one of  the most extensive ones. It starts with a Greek line, as Baudius used to do to display his knowledge of  that language, and which is consistent with that of  many other inscribers: in this very album alone Justus Rycquius, Daniel Heinsius, Philippus Rubens, and Georgius Uwens did the same. He did not choose a  verse from a  Greek poet, but quoted from the last chapter of   the Apostle Paul’s first epistle to his younger colleague Timothy (1 Tim. 6.6).8 Next follow nine iambic senarii of  his own and a  long explanation in prose providing the reason why he is  so happy to make Audejans’s acquaintance and be invited to contribute to his album. Finally the location, the month and the precise day are given, but not the year. This last item will be discussed after the presentation of  the text and translation. ἡ ευσέβεια μετʹαὐταρκείας μέγας ἐστι πορισμός

[f. 19r]

Doctrina gladius est in insani manu, Nisi imperatrix atque dux mortalium Mens recta ducat agmen, et clavum regat. Mens recta nulla est absque Numinis metu, Sanctaeque vinclo Charitatis. Hanc suis 5 Legat Redemtor. Pax et alma Charitas Ex asse toto statuit heredem Dei Mortale semen: quo quid aut dici potest, Aut corde fingi quod sit exoptatius? 7  See Grootens, passim; V. L. Saulnier, “Les dix années françaises de Dom. Baudier. Etude sur la condition humaniste au temps des guerres civiles”, Bibliothèque d’Humanisme et Renaissance 7 (1945), 139-204; Id., “Deux pièces inédites de Dominique Baudier (1603-1605)”, Neophilologus 33 (1949), 172-180. 8  It may be worthwhile to note that the same verse was quoted half  a century later by Johannes Fabricius (c. 1629-1670) in the album of  Jacobus Heyblocq; see C. Wybe de Kruyter, “Jacobus Heyblocq’s album amicorum in the Koninklijke Bibliotheek at The Hague”, Q uaerendo 6  (1976), 111-153 (146, nos  251-252). J.  A. Gruys, K. Thomassen (ed.), The album amicorum of  Jacob Heyblocq, 2 vols (Zwolle, 1998).

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Habet hoc clarorum virorum doctrina, virtus et probitas 9 commendata publicae vocis suffragio, ut etiam eos, quos nunquam viderimus, amore prosequantur mentes ad laudem ac decus natae. Tibi istud, reverende vir Huberte Audeianti, contigisse testor ex animo Dominicus Baudius, qui te pridem a  facie ignotum, a  fama probe cognitum et ab iis dotibus, quibus oportet aestimare insignes viros, iam pridem sum benevolo complexus affectu. Gaudeo mihi evenisse tui videndi compellandique copiam, et gratias habeo humanitati tuae, quod nomen meum adiungi volueris magno Lipsio caeterisque claris nominibus, quae ad exornandum hoc Amicitiae et Fidei album symbolas contribuerunt. Scripsi sine dolo Brugis in urbe foecunda virtutum ac doctrinae, ut si quae usquam est gentium, VIII Kal[endas] VIIbreis. (My translation:) Godliness with contentment is a great gain. Learning is a sword in the hand of  a mad man, unless a well-governed and virtuous mind – that commander and guide of  mankind – leads the troops and firmy holds the helm. No such virtuous mind exists apart from godly fear and the bond of  Holy Charity. Such Charity is  bequeathed by man’s Redeemer to his people. Peace and kindly Charity have turned mortal progeny into God’s sole heir. What can be said or imagined in our heart that is more to be desired? The learning, virtue and probity of  famous men when recommended by the support of  public favour have this quality, that minds born to praise and glory bestow their love even upon men whom we never have seen. I, Dominicus Baudius, sincerely assert that this is  what has befallen to you, reverend Hubert Audejans. Until now I did not know you by face, but you were well-known to me because of  your fame and of  your talents – the elements through which one must value prominent men –, and I already embraced you since quite some time with benevolent affection. I am delighted that the opportunity to see you and address you has befallen to me, and I express my gratitude for your kindness, because you wanted me to add my name to that of  the great Lipsius and to that of  other famous names, who contributed with their inscriptions to adorn this album of  friendship and fidelity. I have written this without deceit in Bruges, a city so rich in virtue and learning as nowhere else in the world, on 25 August.

9 Cf.  Cic.  Planc. 25.62: “virtus, probitas, integritas in candidato, non linguae volubilitas, non ars, non scientia requiri solet.”

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Fig. 2 The inscription by Baudius in Audejans’s album, f. 19r (private collection)

Now is the time to discuss the problem of   the precise date of  this inscription. Since there is no year-date, it theoretically could have been written down on 25 August of  any year between 1602 and 1613. Baudius is  known to have often travelled to the Southern Netherlands when his academic duties did not require his presence in Leiden, hence mostly in August and September. He perhaps already broke his journey at Bruges before or after his visit to England in August/September 1607, where he wished to go to personally offer a copy of  a new edition of  his poems to King James I. It is much more likely, though, that he continued on his way after the Twelve Years’ Truce was signed in Antwerp on 9 April and ratified by the Spanish King Philip III on 7 July 1609. This agreement enormously facilitated the trade between the Spanish Neth260

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erlands and the Dutch Republic and above all the circulation of  persons. So,  for instance, Daniel Heinsius, the Flemish poet, professor and librarian at Leiden University (1580-1655), seized immediately the opportunity to return to Ghent, his home town.10 He made the journey together with one of his most intimate friends, his colleague Baudius, who wrote on 2 August 1609 to their friend in common, the poet Maximilianus Vrientius, secretary of  Ghent, who had lost his only surviving daughter: “scito me et Heinsium heroëm cis paucos dies ad te esse ituros, ut familiari colloquio sublevare possimus curam et solicitudinem”.11 Baudius himself  also visited Brussels and Leuven before returning to Leiden shortly after 8  September.12 The year 1610 presents a  nearly analogous scenario, except that at the very end of  his visit, on 10 September, Baudius asked the curator of  Leiden University, Cornelius vander Myle, to  excuse his somewhat protracted absence, the reason being that his aunt had died at Valenciennes and that his presence was required there.13 During the year 1611 Baudius, who on 1 July wrote to Janus Rutgersius that he was planning to cross the Channel, was at least twice in the Southern Netherlands. He was in Brussels when he was informed of   the unexpected death of  Philip Rubens (†  28 August 1611), and he had consulted with Vrientius about the endless discussion concerning his mother’s house in Ghent; in an attempt to bring this argument to a close he even returned to Ghent for at least a week at the beginning of  December, but without success.14 In a letter to Peter Paul Rubens dated 10  See Heinsius, Eleg. 2.11 “In Gandavum, cum eam denuo post inducias videret”, and Vrientius’s poem In adventum Danielis Heinsii, cum Gandavum veniret, in Danielis Heinsii poemata Latina et Graeca; editio post plurimas postrema, longe auctior (Amsterdam, Joannes Janssonius, 1649), 178-179 and 653. 11  Dominici Baudii Epistolae Semicenturia auctae, lacunis aliquot suppletis. Accedunt eiusdem orationes et libellus de foenore (Amsterdam, 1662), 312: “Significavit nobis Heinsius te gravissimo domesticae calamitatis vulnere afflictum esse ex obitu filiae unicae.” Nearly twenty years earlier, in 1590, Vrientius had had to bury his six-year-old daughter Antoniola. See the chronogrammatic distich in Maxaemiliani Vrienti Gandensis Epigrammatum libri IX (Antwerp, 1603), 227 (also in the edition Ingolstadt, 1607, 219; and Bruges, 1627, 297). 12   Ibid., 313-314. 13  Ibid., 337: “Itaque rogo te, ut pro iure antiquae necessitudinis benignius interpretari velis nostram paulo diuturniorem moram, quam feriarum lex concedit”; Grootens 1942 (as in n. 7), 200. 14  Ibid., 431-432 (letter 83); 428-429 (letter 81 to P.  P. Rubens); 437-438 (letter 87 to Vrientius); 438-439 (letter 88); 439-441 (letter 89 to Grotius); 441442 (letter 90 to Cornelius vander Myle).

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21 February 1613 15 Baudius revealed his intention for yet another visit to the South, but there is hardly any evidence for this trip. Now, the fact that after 1602 Audejans opened his album for contributions only in 1605, 1609 and 1613, considerably narrows down the possibilities. In 1605 Baudius could have visited his old friend Lipsius in Leuven; but at that time Audejans was still in Leuven, while Baudius’s contribution was made at Bruges. A distinct possibility is 1609. Two entries in Audejans’s album date from 1609. The first one is by the Ghent poet Maximilianus Vrientius, written at Bruges on the last day of  April, a few weeks after the Twelve Years’ Truce was signed, as Vrientius explicitly underlined with a  chronogram in the penultimate line of  his contribution: “partIs a Marte InDVCIIs”. The other one is by a Leiden citizen, Gisbertus de Milde. Unfortunately, it is not yet known why that man travelled to Bruges or why he left an entry as token of  his friendship in Audejans’s album on 26 June 1609.16 Finally, there is  the year 1613, with only one inscription, added on 25  August by yet another Fleming, a  professor at the University of  Leiden, and one of  Baudius’s most intimate friends: Daniel Heinsius.17 At first sight, a few elements may suggest that the contribution by Baudius belongs to that same period. First of  all, if  one disregards the blank pages in between, Heinsius’s inscription immediately follows that of  Baudius. Moreover, it is most intriguing that it also is dated 25 August, exactly as is the case with Baudius’s contribution, but Heinsius did not forget to add the year 1613. Hence it is most tempting to surmise that they again travelled together to Flanders in 1613, together visited Ghent and Bruges, and left their names in Audejans’s album before returning to Leiden. There  is, however, a major obstacle: the account of  Baudius’s last weeks and 15   Ibid., 460-461: “Feriis Augustalibus, si potestas data erit, ad vos cum Iunone excurram”. 16  Gysbertus de Milde registered at the University of  Leiden on 3 June 1594 as a medical student. Cf. Guilielmus Du Rieu, Album studiosorum Academiae Lugduno Batavae MDLXXV-MDCCCLXXXV. Accedunt nomina curatorum et professorum per eadem secula (The Hague, 1875), 40. The Antwerp canon Joannes Hemelarius mentions him in a  letter of  21 March 1609 to Franciscus and Justus Raphelengius as the man who will pay for two books to be bought; see P. C. Molhuysen, “Een exemplaar van Orontius Fineus met handschriftelijke aanteekeningen van J.  J. Scaliger”, Tijdschrift voor boek- en bibliotheekwezen 3 (1905), 209-210. 17  Heinsius’s inscription will be published and examined in my contribution “New Inscriptions by Daniel Heinsius in Alba Amicorum”, De Gulden Passer 99 (2021) (in press).

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of  the precise date of  his death, which never have been questioned. Nicholas van Zeyst, the secretary to the curators of  Leiden University, delivered this account on 10 August in a letter addressed to his future son-in-law Petrus Cunaeus (1586-1638): “After D. Baudius had been drinking for several days, he fell into such a  fury, nay rather a raving frenzy, that he had to be strapped down to his bed and even then could scarcely be kept under control without two or three men continuously trying to curb his fury; he vomited strings of  profanities against God, against people, and against the devils.” 18 This is confirmed in his Vita, the last sentence of  which succinctly informs us about Baudius’s last days, his death and funeral: “On  3  August of   the year 1613, towards the evening, he got a  fever. Wretchedly seized by unremitting delirium and sleeplessness, all his strength left him at last and he ended his mortal life on 22 August, around the third hour of   the afternoon. He was buried in St Peter’s in Leiden.” 19 These contemporary testimonies leave no room for any doubt concerning the date of  Baudius’s death. Hence, the year 1613 has definitively to be ruled out as a  possible date for his inscription in Audejans’s album, which brings us back to 1609. And indeed, a closer look at the text itself  reveals a few words or turns of  phrase, which Baudius has used before or was to use in that same year. In several poems collected in the new 1607 edition, for instance, the concept of   the mens recta is  prominently present (117, 440, 461, 520,  etc.), borrowed from Seneca, De vita beata, 8 and also used by Erasmus in his Adagium 3058, “Aurum igni probatum”. Baudius returned to it in the letter he sent to the Board of  Leiden University on 11 October 1611. In that very same letter he also used the image of   the sword given to a madman: “quod professionem honorificam homini profligato, tanquam gladium furioso, dedissetis  […]”.20 These two elements also appear in the Epicedium that Baudius dedicated to the memory of  his colleague,   Petri Cunaei [...] epistolae (Leiden, 1725), 122-123: “D.  Baudius cum per aliquot dies compotasset, incidit in furorem, imo rabiem, ita ut vinculis constrictus teneatur lecto, et vix adhuc teneretur, nisi duo tresve viri continuo ipsius furorem cohiberent: multa evomit in Deum, homines et diabolos horrenda.” 19  Vita, f.  **3r: “Anno MDCXIII, Augusti  III, circa vesperam febre correptus, delirio ac vigiliis continuis misere attritus, omnique tandum robore exutus, mortalitatem explevit XXII Augusti, circa horam pomeridianam tertiam, funeratus Lugduni Batavorum in aede S. Petro sacra.” Grootens 1942 (as in n. 6), 224. 20  Baudii Epistolae (1662), 340. 18

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the theologian Jacobus Arminius, who died on 19 October 1609.21 This Epicedium was printed with Andries Clouck in Leiden in December 1609, and reprinted several times later on.22 What is most striking and quite unexpected in this context is that the nine iambic senarii which Baudius wrote in Audejans’s album appear as a part of  this Epicedium, with only three minor changes: in l. 6 one reads “Redemtor” instead of  “Redemptor” in the editions; in l. 8 “potest” instead of  “queat”, and in l. 9 “exoptatius” instead of  “auspicatius”. This intriguing fact leads us to the following question: did Baudius invent these senarii on the spot for Audejans, or were they part of  a  major poem which Baudius was devising at that time and which he eventually partly reworked and inserted in his Epicedium for Arminius?

21  This date, which can be read on the memorial stone at the St Peter’s Church in Leiden, is confirmed by contemporary and later witnesses, such as the oration given by Petrus Bertius at Arminius’s funeral on 22 October, or the Vita Jacobi Arminii by Caspar Brandt,  in the Historia vitae Jacobi Arminii  […] auctore Casparo Brantio (Amsterdam, 1724), 433. It is hence unclear to me why the date of  his death is said to be 21 October in Grootens 1942 (as in n. 6), 193, or why Moniek van Oosterhout, who studied Grotius’s funeral elegies for Arminius comparing them with Baudius’s Epicedium, stated that Arminius died in August 1609; see M. van Oosterhout, “Hugo Grotius in Praise of  Jacobus Arminius. Arminian Readers of  an Epicedium in the Dutch Republic and England”, in J. Bloemendal, A. van Dixhoorn, E. Strietman (ed.), Literary Cultures and Public Opinion in the Low Countries (Leiden – Boston, 2011), 151-179. 22   Dominici Baudii Epicedium dictum honori et felici memoriae reverendi viri et veteris amici Iacobi Arminii, S. Theologiae Doctoris ac Professoris in Academia Leydensi. Accedunt Hugonis Grotii V.C.  Epicedia in eundem (Leiden, 1609); reprinted without any changes in Baudius’s Poematum nova editio (Leiden, 1616), 282-300, and (Amsterdam, 1640), 232-247, and in Historia vitae Jacobi Arminii […] auctore Caspare Brantio (Amsterdam, 1724), 463-483.

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“A REFINED AND FRAGRANT GARLAND” A POEM BY PHILIP RUBENS IN HONOUR OF  JUSTUS LIPSIUS’S SENECA

One of   the showpieces of  Florence’s Palazzo Pitti is The Four Philosophers painted by Peter Paul Rubens in 1611-1612 as a tribute to his three years older brother Philip, who had died in August 1611. The painting shows the Leuven humanist Justus Lipsius (15471606) seated between his favourite students Philip Rubens (15741611) and Johannes Woverius (1576-1635), with an ancient bust inscribed Seneca in a niche above their heads. Lipsius seems to be teaching from a  book, most likely his edition of   the Roman philosopher. In the background the painter has represented himself  gazing over the group before him. With this composition Rubens wished to affirm his own interest in the Stoics, which may have been aroused by his brother, though he himself  had never been part of  the circle around Lipsius.1 The first part of  this essay will expound on the relationship between Philip Rubens and Justus Lipsius, with their correspondence as a  guide,2 before focusing on the poem which Philip com1  On this painting, see, e.g., W.  Prinz, “The Four Philosophers by Rubens and the Ps.-Seneca in Seventeenth-Century Painting”, The Art Bulletin 55.3 (1973), 410428; H. Vlieghe, Rubens Portraits of  Identified Sitters Painted in Antwerp, in Corpus Rubenianum Ludwig Burchard, vol.  19.2 (London, 1987), 128-132; M.  Morford, Stoics and Neostoics. Rubens and the Circle of  Lipsius (Princeton, 1991), 3-13 and 181183. An anonymous copy can be seen in the Antwerp Museum Plantin-Moretus in the so-called “Lipsius room”. 2   A. Gerlo, H. D. L. Vervliet (ed.), Inventaire de la correspondance de Juste Lipse (Antwerp, 1968), 532 lists nineteen letters under Rubens’s name, but a  superficial glance at the letters themselves shows that many more have been lost, either because they did not reach their destination or because they did not survive. Dirk Sacré has retrieved a twentieth, overlooked letter from Rubens to Lipsius, dated Rome, 18 April 1603, published posthumously in Rubens’s S. Asterii episcopi Amaseae homiliae Graece

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 265-284 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124063

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posed as a  tribute to both Seneca’s philosophical works and the annotated edition by Lipsius, which was published in Antwerp in September 1605.3

Philip Rubens and Lipsius: the first years 4 In the mid-1590s Philip Rubens entered the service of Jean Richardot, one of   the leading politicians of   the Southern Low Countries, as one of  his secretaries and, more particularly, as the mentor of  his youngest sons Antoine and Guillaume. After having gone through the standard school program at the Jesuit College in Antwerp, the adolescents were sent to Leuven to be contubernales of  Lipsius. This stay guaranteed them a more thorough education in the classical languages and the ancient world, but Lipsius also saw it as part of  his educational system of  practical Stoicism.5 They arrived in mid-October 1596; 6 Philip Rubens joined them in May 1597.7 Rubens differed from the other guests at Lipsius’s home: they were still in their late teens; they were supported by their families, who paid for their boarding and other expenses, and aspired to obtain the title of  magister artium and possibly also a Law degree as a first step towards a future career in church or state. Rubens, on the contrary, was an adult in his mid-twenties, with a more advanced state of  learning, which allowed him to supervise the brothers Richardot. That made him less free than the other guests, as he had et Latine nunc primum editae Philippo Rubenio interprete. Eiusdem Rubenii carmina, orationes et epistolae selectiores […] (Antwerp, Wid. and Sons of J. Moretus, 1615), 100. Cf.  D. Sacré, “Filips Rubens aan Justus Lipsius. Een onbekende brief  (1603)”, in D. Sacré, M. de Schepper (ed.), “Et scholae et vitae”. Acta selecta van twee colloquia van Orbis Neolatinus (Leuven, 1998-2002) (Amersfoort, 2004), 135-161, at 135. In the following paragraphs the relevant letters will be referred to with the “code” which they have received or are to receive in the annotated edition of  Iusti Lipsi Epistolae (abbreviated as ILE) that includes references to earlier versions. 3  L. Annaei Senecae philosophi opera quae exstant omnia (Antwerp, J. Moretus, 1605). 4   For this first section we are indebted to D. Sacré’s contribution on Philip Rubens in J. De Landtsheer, D. Sacré, C. Coppens (ed.), Justus Lipsius (1547-1606), een geleerde en zijn Europese netwerk. Catalogus van de tentoonstelling in de Centrale Bibliotheek te Leuven, 18 oktober – 20 december 2006 (Leuven, 2006), 378-389, no. 47. 5   On Lipsius’s ideas about the contubernium and how it corresponded to Stoic pedagogical theories, see Morford 1991 (as in n. 1), 33-51. 6 Cf. ILE 9.96 09 20 H, 2-7 and the confirmation of   their arrival in ILE 9.96 10 17, 3 [ed. H. Peeters (Leuven, 2019)]. 7 Cf. ILE 10.97 05 13 RI, 17-20 [ed. J. De Landtsheer (Leuven, 2021)].

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to fulfill an assignment for a patron who covered the expenses for his boarding as part of  his pay. Moreover, Rubens did not aspire to a  university degree and his social background made it unlikely that he would ever make a career in the government of  the country. Nevertheless, he seized the opportunity to improve his knowledge of  Latin and Greek, the literature and the history of   the ancient world.8 From Lipsius’s viewpoint, it must have been a  welcome change to be able to exchange opinions and have conversations with a more mature man, who shared his interest in philology and (Stoic) philosophy. Not surprisingly, both men gradually developed a bond of  warm friendship and, from Rubens’s side, awe and admiration, as is clear from their extant correspondence. In 1600, Antoine Richardot followed his father to the peace negotiations of  Boulogne-sur-mer and was then sent to Rome in the company of  his elder brother Jean Sr, who had been appointed envoy of   the Archdukes Albert and Isabella at the Holy See.9 Guillaume remained in Leuven for one more year, together with Philip Rubens. In mid-September he too was allowed to set out on a  peregrinatio academica with Rubens as companion. Lipsius, who had been enjoying a few days with friends in Antwerp, hurried home to bid them farewell. A few days later he sent them a letter to wish them a pleasant journey and a safe return, not without warning them against the vices and temptations of  Rome, and added a  testimony for Rubens, who was to take the lead, by way of  recommendation.10 Lipsius praised Rubens, among many other things, for the Carmen apobaterion et eucharisticon which the latter had sent him to comfort him about their departure, and encouraged Rubens to have it printed.11

Rubens’s first journey to Italy (1601-1604) Guillaume Richardot and Philip Rubens followed the so-called “Spanish Road”, the quickest and surest military supply- and trade 8  He explicitly praised Lipsius’s contubernium in a  poem written to congratulate Johannes Baptista Baronius on his promotion to licentiate in both Laws, published among the Carmina in the appendix to S. Asterii […] homiliae 1615 (as in n. 2), 96-97. 9  Cf. ILE 13.00 03 11 R and [00] 09 07 S [ed. J. Papy (Brussels, 2000)]. 10 Cf. ILE 14.01 09 17 [ed. J. De Landtsheer (Brussels, 2006)]. 11  Rubens did so in the second part of  Electorum libri II (Antwerp, J. Moretus, 1608), 97-105.

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route between Northern Italy and the Low Countries, via the Franche Comté and Piedmont.12 They arrived in Milan in time to hear Erycius Puteanus, another of  Lipsius’s former students, albeit not a  commensalis, give his first public lecture on 12 November 1601. He concluded his Oratio with an explicit welcome to his Leuven friends and a  wish for a  safe and pleasant continuation of  their journey.13 About a fortnight later Rubens and Richardot set out towards Padova, where they arrived around 10 December.14 Two months later, Rubens vented his disappointment with the university: only the study of  medicine seemed to count in Padova, attracting a huge number of  students. It also boasted of  its anatomical theatre and botanical garden, yet there were hardly any tulips or other attractive flowers to be found. Lipsius would have had many of  its showpieces uprooted or banned to the furthest corners of his garden! Rubens also warned that a Tacitus edition attacking Lipsius’s work had appeared, presumably printed in Bergamo.15 Nevertheless, the young men must have been enjoying themselves, making frequent excursions, e.g., to Venice at Carnival, returning in June, accompanied by Guillaume’s brother Antoine, who was on his way home from Rome. Much to Rubens’s delight, they were introduced to Antonius Possevinus, who gave them a  warm welcome due to his friendship with Lipsius, for whom he expressed great admiration.16 They also visited Peter Paul, who was at the time employed by Duke Vincenzo Gonzaga of  Mantova, and in July they went together with him to Verona, where they were reunited with the aforementioned Johannes Woverius.17   Asterii […] Epistolae (as in n. 2), 245-246, dated 13 December 1601.  This oratio appeared as an appendix to his Fercula secunda (Hanau, Claude de Marne, 1603), 145-167, with on p. 150 a poem in elegiac distichs which Philip Rubens wrote to congratulate Puteanus. 14   ILE 15.02 02 24 R 02 (edition in progress); ILE 15.02 03 28. 15   ILE 15.02 05 09. The Tacitus edition refers to Pompeii Lampugnani collatio notarum Iusti Lipsii in Cornelium Tacitum cum m[anuscripto] codice Mirandulano. The name of   the editor, the codex, and the printer’s address turned out to be fake. By the time Rubens wrote his letter, Lipsius had already received a  copy (probably through Moretus, from the Easter book fair in Frankfurt), which is  mentioned in his library catalogue, Leiden, Univ. Lib., ms. Lips. 59, f. 15r, book 5. He retorted with the Dispunctio notarum Mirandulani codicis (Antwerp, J. Moretus, July 1602). 16  ILE 15.02 06 27. 17  Woverius had set out on a peregrinatio academica in August 1599, also armed with a testimonium from Lipsius (cf. ILE 12.99 08 10). After a few months in France, 12 13

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Soon afterwards, they travelled to Bologna, although Lipsius had warned Guillaume that they might not find that university to their liking either. In the course of  August, Rubens reported that he had been offered a position. Unfortunately, the letter has been lost and we only have Lipsius’s answer, which was sent to Bologna. It is  rather vague in its details, approving Rubens’s intention to join the household of  a Spanish man of  influence. As the political situation in the Netherlands was deteriorating, there was no reason why he should return. Why not accept that position, as it was an honourable employment, worthy of  Rubens? 18 In Lipsius’s next two letters, both sent to Bologna in October 1602, the travellers were told to expect another former contubernalis, Johannes Baptista Baronius, who wished to accompany them to Rome. Lipsius repeated his request that Rubens keep him informed about his plans for the future and applauded his intention to devote his life to philosophy. A few weeks after Baronius’s departure, his father suddenly died. In a letter of  comfort, which was sent to Bologna, Lipsius assured Baronius that conversations with Philip Rubens would surely help him overcome his grief.19 Since trade contacts across the Alps were reduced in winter, the exchange of  letters was interrupted for a few months. Around 1 March, Lipsius received a  letter from Baronius announcing that the trio had reached Rome. He immediately sent congratulatory letters to Rubens, Baronius, and, in all likelihood, also to Richardot,20 and added a  congratulatory poem, addressed to the three of  them:

he continued to Spain (Seville); in the autumn of  1600 he arrived in Italy. In December 1602 he was back home in Antwerp. 18   ILE 15.02 09 22 RU. In the available secondary literature this offer is  often linked with Rubens entering the service of  Cardinal Ascanio Colonna three years later, but this is not very likely: Colonna was a scion of  an illustrious Italian house (his father, Marcantonio, was the commander of   the flagship of   the papal troops at Lepanto), so he would never have been called Iberus. Moreover, Colonna had been absent from Italy from 1601 on, when King Philip  III had appointed him viceroy of  Aragon, and only returned to Rome in early May 1605. 19  ILE 15.02 12 09 B. 20  ILE 16.03 03 16 R and B. The letter to Richardot has been lost. See F. Vanhaecke, De briefwisseling van Justus Lipsius in het jaar 1603. Tekstkritische editie met commentaar en inleiding, 3 vols (VUB – unpublished PhD, Brussels, 2003). Vanhaecke’s edition in ILE is in progress.

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Ad Guilielmum Richardotum, Io[hannem] Baptistam Baronium, Philippum Rubenium, olim et nunc suos, sed iam Romae sistentes, phaleuci. Ergo vos habet illa magna Roma, florens olim opibus, superba tectis, laeta civibus, urbium Urbs et orbis Princeps! Olim ea, nunc modestiores inscribit titulos: pia atque sancta 5 et sedes adeo ipsa sanctitatis […]

Rubens immediately reached for his quill, thanking Lipsius for his unremitting love and concern which spoke from all his letters and adding his own poem in the same meter, but modestly acknowledging his inferiority: En tibi paucos phaleucos; ad tuos illos ad tres scriptos trium nomine respondi, sed ita nimirum, ut cum ad suavem lusciniae cantum parra rauca crocitat vel ad alacrem equi hinnitum Arcadicum pecus rudit.21

The opening lines were a subtle echo of  Lipsius’s words: Roma nos habet, urbium illa Princeps, lux illa Italiae, orbis ille ocellus, nostri gloria saeculi et vetusti, cuius sola fidelis illa custos; divorum domus ac parens sacrorum necnon relligionis ipsa sedes […]

Yet, however unique and highly recommendable Rome might be, Philip’s conclusion is  clear: “unus Lipsius est enim ante Romam” (Lipsius alone is more valuable than Rome, v. 31). On 13 June 1603 Philip obtained the degree of  doctor utriusque iuris at the Sapienza, applauded by his friends Richardot and Baronius. Rubens’s letter announcing the happy news arrived in Leuven by the end of  the month, when Lipsius was about to seal his next letter, dated 27 June, in which he congratulated his protégé on his new title. He approved of   their plans to stay in Rome until the end of  summer.22 In the following letter he informed Rubens that 21 Cf. ILE 16.03 04 18, published in Sacré 2004 (as in n. 2), 135-136. See also J. Papy, “Lipsius’s Humanist and Neostoic Views on Travelling and Philip Rubens’s Apobateria”, in G. Huber-Rebenich, W. Ludwig (ed.), Frühneuzeitliche Bildungsreisen im Spiegel lateinischer Texte (Weimar – Jena, 2007), 89-112, at 102. 22  ILE 16.03 06 28 / 07 02 RU, published in Vanhaecke 2004 (as in n. 20) as 03 06 27. Rubens’s letter has not been preserved.

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his exhaustive introduction to Seneca’s philosophical works was at the printer’s office 23 and subtly insisted that it was time now for Richardot, and thus also for his companion, to come home.24 All in vain! Hence, on the last day of  January, he vented his longing more urgently: “Venite, affamini, et sistite mihi tres vos illos meos, quos non dimisi, sed commeatum in tempus aliquod dedi.” 25 By the end of  May, Lipsius announced to Puteanus that the trio were returning via Milan and that he could expect them soon.26 On 18 June they arrived in Leuven, much to Lipsius’s relief.

Rubens’s second journey to Italy (1605-1607) 27 This episode in Rubens’s life is well-known: Philip remained in Leuven and once the academic year had started again, he helped Lipsius with his teaching, taking over lectures when the elderly humanist was feeling too ill. Lipsius hoped to obtain a  small remuneration for Rubens and to have him officially acknowledged as his successor by Archduke Albert. In a letter dated 28 January 1605 to the Jesuit Oliverius Manareus, head of   the provincia Flandro-Belgica, he unfolded his plans: he would come to Brussels and offer Albert his Monita et exempla politica, which was dedicated to him, and ask him to grant Lipsius a  part-time retirement, ensuring that this would have no consequences for the university.28 The plea was repeated to Rubens’s former patron, Jean Richardot, and on 17 March Archduke Albert agreed with an annuity of  200 florins to allow Lipsius to pay for an assistant.29 Despite the enticing prospects, Rubens preferred to return to Rome, where his brother had settled. Lipsius understood his wish and penned a letter of  recommendation to the newly elected Cardinal Serafino Olivario-Rasali, who knew Rubens from his first journey and might well need an extra secretary. Having learned 23   Manuductionis ad Stoicam philosophiam libri III and Physiologiae Stoicorum libri III (Antwerp, J. Moretus, 1604). 24  ILE 16.03 11 03 RU. 25  ILE 17.04 01 31 R (edition in progress). 26  ILE 17.04 05 29 P. 27   Apart from Sacré 2006 (as in n.  4), see also F.  Huemer, “Philip Rubens and His Brother the Painter”, in [A. Balis, al. (ed.)], Rubens and His World: bijdragen […] aan R.-A. d’Hulst (Antwerp, 1985), 123-128. 28  ILE 18.05 01 28 (edition in progress). 29  ILE 18.05 02 04 and 05 03 28, appendix, respectively.

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that the influential Cardinal Ascanio Colonna was on his way back from Spain to Rome, Lipsius contacted him too, suggesting that he might need a  librarian.30 Both cardinals sent a  benevolent answer, the latter informing Lipsius that Rubens was most welcome in Colonna’s familia.31 A letter from Balthasar Moretus to Lipsius dated 9 September 1605 indicates that Rubens was by then leaving for Rome. As Lipsius’s edition of  Seneca was almost ready, he had agreed with Cardinal Cesare Baronio to include the copy intended for its dedicatee, Pope Paul V, in a shipment of  books which the Officina Plantiniana was due to send to Baronio in Rome.32 By the end of   the month Lipsius wrote to Colonna that he was to expect Rubens, adding more words of  praise, and informed him that the young man was to offer a copy of  his Seneca edition to the Pope. A  covering letter to the Pope was added, in which Lipsius not only implored a  benediction for himself, but also “[ut] libenter videat hunc Philippum Rubenium, latorem mei munusculi, virum pietate praeditum et doctrina.” 33 In January 1606 the Pope sent him a lengthy reaction to both letters, thanking him for the dedication of   the “learned work, surely not opposed to the Catholic dogmas” and promising to help Rubens as well as he could.34 Philip was indeed offered a  chair at Bologna University, but declined. Meanwhile he had sent two poems to Lipsius: a eulogy in hexameters on Lipsius’s edition of  Seneca and an Alterum apobaterion in elegiac distichs, balancing between his wish to be with Lipsius, who would remain with him in heart and mind, and the lure of  Rome.35 There are hardly any letters from the time Rubens spent in Colonna’s service, but he seems to have become unsatisfied with his employment quite soon and apparently discussed an alternative   ILE 18.05 04 01 O and C, respectively.   ILE 18.05 06 25 C and O. 32   ILE 18.05 09 09 M. Copies for Baronio and Colonna would also be included. On Lipsius’s Seneca edition (as in n. 3), cf. D. Imhof, Jan Moretus and the Continuation of  the Plantin Press (Leiden – Boston, 2014), 654-657. 33  ILE 18.05 09 24 C and P respectively. One can readily assume that the letters were sent together with Moretus’s shipment for Baronio. If  Lipsius also added a note for Rubens, it has not been preserved. 34  ILE 19.06 01 07, is written by the Pope’s secretary, Marcello Vestri di Barbiano. 35  Rubens 1608 (as in n. 11), 112-115 and 115-117, respectively. 30 31

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living with Lipsius. In February the latter recommended Rubens to the newly appointed papal datario, asking him to invite his talented protégé to his home from time to time and possibly grant him a prebend.36 The last letter Rubens addressed to Lipsius proves that he must have met the datario. However, since a benefice was linked to a  certain location and implied religious obligations, he did not see how it could be reconciled with his greatest wish: to find a suitable way to return home and spend the rest of  his days with Lipsius and the Muses.37 On 7  April Balthasar Moretus informed him of   Lipsius’s death, although Rubens may have already heard the news from other sources.38 Rubens wrote a  heartfelt Epicedion in funere Iusti Lipsi to be included in the Fama Postuma, a collection of poetry in honour of Lipsius, brought together on the initiative of  Balthasar Moretus and Johannes Woverius.39 Nevertheless, this second journey also had its pleasant sides: Philip and Peter Paul shared a house at the Via della Croce, near Piazza di Spagna, and in their free time they roamed through the city in search of  remains of  antiquity. Peter Paul wanted to study monuments to use them in the scenery of  his historical and mythological paintings. Moreover, he showed a  lively interest in the attire of   the ancients, the details of  which he was to represent with meticulous care. Philip helped him with text sources: in the library of  his patron he transcribed a  Greek manuscript with the sermons of  Bishop Asterius of  Amasea (c. 350 – c. 410 ad) containing numerous references to clothing; 40 Colonna’s recommendation also gained him easy access to the Vatican library, where he collated manuscripts and early printed sources, while gathering annotations on many practical issues of  daily life in Rome. A few months later more sad news arrived: their sister Blandine had died, leaving their ageing mother alone in Antwerp. As Peter   ILE 19.06 02 14.   ILE 19.06 04 01 R. 38   Cf. C. Ruelens, M. Rooses, Correspondance de Rubens et Documents Épistolaires Concernant Sa Vie et Ses Œuvres, vol. 1 (Antwerp, 1887), 330-331. 39  Iusti Lipsi, sapientiae et litterarum antistitis, fama postuma (Antwerp, J. Moretus, 1607), 48-51, also included under a  slightly different title, Lacrymae in funere Iusti Lipsi, in Rubens 1608 (as in n. 11), 117-121. In the second edition of  Fama postuma (1613), 43-46, Rubens added 13 verses at the beginning of  the poem and made several other changes. 40  The transcription, together with its Latin translation, was published posthumously, see n. 2. 36 37

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Paul was held up by a number of  commissioned paintings, Philip decided to return home definitively, albeit not without regret.41

Electorum libri II, a tribute to Lipsius Philip returned to Antwerp in November 1606 and was welcomed by Johannes Woverius, who had begun his career as a  magistrate and who encouraged his friend to follow his lead. Rubens immediately began to turn the notes which he had brought with him into a book that would also be a tribute to Lipsius, as is obvious from its very title, Electorum libri II. In quibus antiqui ritus, emendationes, censurae. Eiusdem ad Iustum Lipsium Poëmatia (Antwerp, J. Moretus, 1608).42 Its main part, Electorum libri II (p. 1-90), is dedicated to Jean Richardot, Rubens’s first patron, and is  a clear reminder of  one of   Lipsius’s earlier publications, also in two books and with the same title.43 Following his mentor’s example, Rubens used his abundant source material in a combination of  philology and antiquarianism. Chapters in which he emendated or explained cruces in a plethora of  authors, many of  them Latin historiographers, but also the Greeks Polybius, Dionysius of  Halicarnassus, and Appian, alternated with essays on Roman customs and daily life, particular attention being paid to clothing. His viewpoints were often endorsed by inscriptions. The approbatio by the book censor in Antwerp Laurentius Beyerlinck is dated 13 November 1607. Four drawings which Peter Paul had made for his brother were inserted as whole-page illustrations, which made the book fairly expensive (22 guilders).44

  Cf. Rubens 1608 (as in n. 11), f. **2v.   On Rubens’s Electorum libri II, cf. Sacré 2006 (as in n. 4), 382-385; Imhof 2014 (as in n. 32), 610-611. 43  Justus Lipsius, Electorum liber I (Antwerp, Ch. Plantin, 1580) and Electorum liber II (Leiden, Ch. Plantin, 1585), the latter as an addition to Opera omnia quae ad criticam spectant, a reprint of  Lipsius’s earlier philological works, including Electorum liber I. 44  M. Van der Meulen, Copies after the Antique, vol. 1 (London, 1994), 97-113 (§  3: Philip and Peter Paul Rubens as Antiquarians: Philip Rubens’s ‘Electorum Libri Duo’). The illustrations are on p.  54, 57, 59, and 61. Since the verso sides were blank, the work was probably also available without them, at a  considerably lower price. 41 42

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The far shorter appendix, Ad Iustum Lipsium Poëmatia (p. 91[126]), dedicated to Guillaume Richardot, was even more closely involved with Lipsius; following his mentor’s suggestion in his farewell letter of  September 1601,45 Rubens had collected six poems dedicated to Lipsius, and added a poem to congratulate his brother Peter Paul on his safe return from Spain to Rome in 1604.46 Yet this publication served a second purpose as well, for when it appeared, Rubens also used it to endorse his application to become one of  the four city clerks of  Antwerp. It was not only proof  of   his literary skills, but also a  captatio benevolentiae to the magistrates of   the city, many of  whom had been friends and correspondents of   Lipsius. Meanwhile Rubens helped another Antwerp humanist, Franciscus Sweertius, to collect the poetry which Lipsius had composed.47 On 14 January 1609 Rubens was appointed city clerk as successor of  Johannes Bochius; on 26 March he married Marie de Moy. A  daughter, Clara, was born in 1610; their son Philip Jr was born two weeks after Philip died of an attack of  fever on 28 August 1611. His brother-in-law, Jan Brant, prepared the posthumous edition with translation of   the Asterius manuscript as well as of   the letters and poems which he had been able to retrieve (1615).

Rubens’s “garland” for Lipsius, the rescuer of  Seneca’s oeuvre 48 The final part of  our essay is focused on the poem which Rubens wrote to extol Lipsius’s annotated edition of  Seneca, which he saw for the first time a few weeks after his arrival in Rome. Before his   The letter itself  is inserted on p. 96.   These poems also occur in Ranutius Gherus [= Janus Gruterus] (ed.), Delitiae C. poetarum Belgicorum huius superiorisque aevi illustrium, vol. 4 (Frankfurt, N. Hoffmann, 1614), 21-44, followed by an epithalamium for Peter Paul at 44-46. The two Apobateria and the Lacrymae in funere Iusti Lipsi are examined in A. Keppens, Filips Rubens’ Electorum libri II: gedichten voor Lipsius. Vertaling en inhoudelijke beschouwingen (unpublished master thesis, KU Leuven, 2013). A seventh poem for Lipsius, a eulogy on his birthplace Overijse, was not included, but was published posthumously in Carmina selectiora in Rubens 1615 (as in n. 2), 102-103. See an introduction and Dutch translation by D. Sacré in De Landtsheer, Sacré, Coppens 2006 (as in n. 4), 6-7, no. 3. 47  Published by Sweertius as Musae errantes (Antwerp, J. Keerbergius, 1610). 48  Cf. Rubens 1608 (as in n. 11), 112-115 and Ranutius Gherus 1614 (as in n. 46), 34-37. 45 46

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edition, Lipsius had added a liminary poem in choliambs, Invitatio ad Senecam, presented as a  caption in two columns of  pseudohandwriting on a  pedestal under Seneca’s portrait, praising the ancient philosopher and encouraging the reader of   the poem to delve into Seneca’s writings themselves.49 This inspired Rubens not only to pay his own tribute to the Roman author, but also to extol the merits of  Lipsius’s edition. While Lipsius emphasizes Seneca’s eloquentia and sapientia, Rubens praises his mentor’s philological skills and his elucidating comments in elegant, smoothly running hexameters, recalling verses of  Lucan with his long-stretched sentences, persistent binary constructions, predilection for (Homeric) similes, and his sense of suggestive word placement. As befits a poeta doctus, the verses are interwoven with references to mythology and echoes of  ancient Roman poets, mostly from the Augustan period.50 In short, the poem eloquently proves that Lipsius was quite right in encouraging Rubens to have his poems published. Rubens’s In Senecam a Iusto Lipsio restitutum opens with a complaint – one long, continuously binary sentence (vv.  1-7) – about the appalling state into which the philosopher’s works, once the pride of  Rome, had collapsed, not only because of  bookworm and other vermin, but also through the faults of  hypercorrective philologists. Antiqui monimenta 51 Sophi, quo sidera tangit et Pandioniis urbs Martia certat Athenis,52 indignis affecta modis 53 multisque – pudendum – manca et hiulca locis, sed et aspera vulnera passa 49  L.  Annaei Senecae opera 1605 (as in n.  3), f.  4v. The portrait was engraved by Theodore Galle. Later occurrences of   the poem either in editions of  Seneca or in collections of  Lipsius’s poems are listed in H. Nollet, De gedichten van Justus Lipsius. Kritische editie met vertaling, annotatie en literaire commentaar (unpubl. PhD, Leuven, 2015), 1251; poem and Dutch translation at 1256-1257. 50  Cf. P. Hofmann Peerlkamp, Liber de vita, doctrina et facultate Neerlandorum qui carmina Latina composuerunt. Editio altera emendata et aucta (Haarlem, 1838), 225: “Q uamquam facile agnoscas Rubenium Lipsii fuisse discipulum, minus tamen, quam alii nonnulli, ingenium remotioris aevi expressit, sed se paulo magis ad Augustam aetatem accomodavit. Nec inertem nec pauperem fuisse Rubenii facultatem.” 51   Whereas Lipsius in his edition of  Seneca always uses the form monumenta, Rubens opted for monimenta, a deliberate choice echoed further in the verse by quo sidera tangit. 52  Pandion, a Greek name, was the son of  Erechthonius and king of  Athens. 53  “indignis  […] modis”: colloquial, occurs often in Roman comedy, e.g., Ter. Eun. 710.

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a criticorum obelis et avari dentibus aevi, 5 in medio leti quasi limine versabantur, iam tineis devotae epulae blattaeque voraci. 1 “quo […] tangit”: Germ. Aratea 425  |  2 “Pandioniis […] Athenis”: Ov. Met. 15.430  | 4 “aspera  […] passa”: Stat. Theb. 2.605-606  |  5 “dentibus aevi”: Ov.  Met. 15.235  | 6 “medio […] limine”: Lucr. DRN 6.1157  |  7 “tineis […] blattaeque”: Mart. Epigr. 14.37.2

Lipsius’s determined action stands in sharp contrast to the indifferent silence of  others (vv. 8-31). His zeal is stressed by the position of  most of   the main verbs at the beginning of   the verse: the asyndetic Non tulit (v.  8), restituit (v.  14), occupant (v.  17), and desiit (v. 19). Ardens […] virtus (v. 8) revokes the Sibyl’s warning to Aeneas (Vergil’s patronymicon Anchisiade is  echoed in Lipsiadae) that returning from Hades to the upper world requires much courage. This anabasis, including the repetition of  monstra, is  resumed in vv.  30-31. So, in a  first long sentence Lipsius is  represented as a  heroic paladin of  Seneca, who bravely fights to overcome the fierce armies of  unbridled, all-dominant barbarism, to bring back to Rome its outstanding citizens as models for the world. Stylistically, dichotomy and hyperbole once again predominate. Non tulit hoc, reliquis tacite mussantibus, ardens Lipsiadae virtus, quae passim sternere monstra, quae coniuratae acies atque agmina contra 10 barbariae ire solet, totamque immane furentem ac tumidam imperio et late dominantibus armis versa fuga dare terga subegit et excellentes restituit Latio cives orbique magistros. 8 “Non tulit hoc”: Verg. Aen. 2.407  |  “reliquis […] mussantibus”: Sall. Hist. 3.48.3  | 8-9 “Ardens […] virtus”: Verg. Aen. 6.130  |  10 “acies […] contra”: Verg. Aen. 12.597  | 12 “tumidam […] armis”: Stat. Theb. 2.162  |  13 “versa […] subegit”: Verg. Georg. 4.85

The following passage reiterates Lipsius’s indignant, determined action to put an end to the shameful neglect. This time he is presented as the healer who stops the festering rot, successfully cures the gaping wounds and makes the scars disappear, resuscitating the text in its radiant and unblemished form. The harsh military language from vv. 10-12, echoed in the plain, almost cruel description of   the wounds (in v.  21 underlined by the repetition of   the hard c), is substituted by idioms suggesting experienced help: occu277

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pat auxilium, notas accingitur artes, the latter elaborated in two mythological similes, namely the healing balm of  Apollo and the incantations and medicinal herbs of  Hecate, guaranteeing success. Ille atrox prodire nefas haud passus et hocce 15 tam detestando temerari crimine saeclum, occupat auxilium et notas accingitur artes, noxia queis gangraena ac tabida serpere pestis desiit ulterius, queis cruda et hiantia late sicut Apollineis coierunt vulnera succis, 20 stigmata queis faciesque cicatricosa recessit inque vicem nitida illa ac germanissima forma carmine ceu magicaeve redit Titanidos 54 herbis. 17 “occupat auxilium”: Stat. Silv. 1.4.112  |  18 “gangraena […] pestis”: Mart. Epigr. 1.78.1-2 | 19-20 “cruda […] vulnera”: Stat. Ach. 2.161  |  20 “coierunt […] succis”: Stat. Silv. 1.4.114  |  23 “carmine […] herbis”: Ov. Met. 10.397

In vv. 24-31 Rubens asserts once more that Lipsius’s efforts have saved Seneca and his works from oblivion, for an author whose works are lost will die a  twofold death. Scriptorum and superstes on v.  27 will be repeated in an address to Seneca in the same order and place: superstes on v. 38, scripta on v. 46 and 48, while the eternal fame of   v. 28 will return in v. 45 (iterumque [...] ora). This rescue is  the worthy result of  his endeavours, namely to have crossed the Styx twice, and to have defied twice the monsters of   the underworld. In praising Lipsius’s merits Rubens elaborates his allusion to a  descent to the underworld in vv.  8-9 (monstra as final word of   v. 9 is repeated at the same position in v.  30) by stressing its favourable outcome (bis as first word and repeated after the caesura), a  feat in which only few heroes succeeded. The address of   labor, in alliteration with Lipsi (v. 24) and its repetition in plural as final word of  v. 29, subtly indicates that Lipsius is seen as a second Hercules, a hero who is also depicted on the frontispiece of   Lipsius’s Seneca edition as an example of  endurance. Needless to say, dichotomy has a  prominent part in this section, too.

54  In Greek mythology, white and black magic, practiced with healing or poisonous herbs, are closely associated with one another. There are several “(grand)-daughters” who could be meant: Hecate (daughter of Asteria), Circe, and Medea (granddaughters of  Hyperion). The latter two, however, are notorious witches.

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O sacer, o magnus LipsI labor, optima leto eripere, integramque colum 55 et nova condere fata! 25 Nam vere mors est geminata atque altera Parca scriptorum interitus, quibus auctor quippe superstes ipse sibi Famaeque aeternum vivit in ore. Scilicet hi fructus, haec praemia digna laborum, bis Stygios innare lacus, bis turpia monstra 30 formidare Erebi, nec fungi simplice fato. 25 “nova […] fata”: Verg. Aen. 10.35  |  30 “bis […] lacus”: Verg. Aen. 6, 134

In vv.  32-36 the poet addresses Lipsius himself  with an iteration of  tibi and tuum: while others feared such a confrontation, Lipsius could approach it without fear (reinforced by the chiasm in v. 32), for his virtue and piety (with the pairing alliterations of  t – v – p respectively) towards the author kept him unscathed and made his limbs invulnerable, a statement endorsed by references to two valiant warriors, allies of  King Priam. Verum haec ut paveant alii, tibi nulla timenda, magne tamen Lipsi: te tutum vivida virtus inque alios praestat pietas; tibi nescia laedi membra, tibi nullo corpus penetrabile telo: 35 quale tuum Perrhaebe,56 tuum Neptunie Cycne.57 32 “nulla timenda”: Ov.  Met. 14.256  |  33 “vivida virtus”: Verg. Aen. 11.386  |  35 “corpus […] telo”: Ov. Met. 12.166

In the following verses (vv.  37-56) Rubens addresses the second protagonist with rhetorical questions: if  the soul indeed escapes death and Seneca is  looking down upon earth, what does he feel when seeing that the unsurpassable testimonies of his mind, nearly reduced to ashes, are nevertheless given a  new life that is  more resplendent than transient lustre? Cum cernis (v.  41) with the   Colus already announces the Parca in v. 26.  With Perrhaebus – toponym of  a border region of  Macedonia and Thracia – Rubens refers to Caeneus, who was born as a  girl, Caenis. After she was raped by Poseidon, the god allowed her a wish. Caenis immediately asked to become a man, so that she would never be abused again. Poseidon granted her this wish and also gave her a skin that was impenetrable by sword or spear. Her name was changed into Caeneus. Cf. Ov. Met. 12.171-209. 57  Allusion to a comical scene told in Ov. Met. 12.41-145. Cycnus’s father Poseidon had made him invulnerable to sword and spear, as Achilles experienced, much to his astonishment. The Greek hero finally killed his foe by strangling him with the strap of his own helmet, whereupon Cycnus was transformed into a swan. Cf. P. Murgatroyd, “Ovid’s Achilles and Cycnus”, Latomus 67 (2008), 931-939. 55

56

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still unspecified ingenii monimenta returns more accurately in v. 44 with the repeated scripta as the first word of  vv. 46 and 48. The richness of  Seneca’s writings is aptly underlined by the simile in v. 47. By stating that they are a strong incentive to Virtus and Honestum the poet evokes once more the frontispiece of  Lipsius’s edition, where Virtus and Honor are represented in the centre of   the plinth. Their powerful impact is  highlighted by the imaginative, hyperbolic language with the sacro thyrso of  Virtus evoking the ecstasy of   the Maenads and the longing for Honestum, which set even the cold and the snow of  the Alps on fire, the whole being phrased in an artful combination of  parallelism and chiasm of   the ablative-genitive followed by the verb. In vv.  51-56 Rubens succinctly reflects the essence of  Seneca’s Stoic dogma that virtue is the only real good, leading to happiness, tranquillity of  mind, and equanimity towards Fate, a  subtle allusion to three of  Seneca’s treatises: De vita beata, De tranquillitate animi, and De constantia, which advise the reader on how to remain untouched by the vagaries of  Fate and how to be indifferent to what common people consider important (the f-alliteration with Fortuna in v. 54 is continued with fucum et faciente in vs. 56). The pairing of  Virtus and Honestum (v. 48-49) and the subsequent explanation of  Virtus in v.  51-54 are unmistakably inspired by Lipsius’s own Invitatio ad Senecam (vv. 7-12).58 Si non ergo nigris miscentur cuncta favillis, si mens, ut certum, cineri bustoque superstes, desuper ex alta mortalia despicit arce, quis tibi nunc, Annaee, videnti talia sensus, 40 quidve modo est animi, cum praestantissima cernis ingenii monimenta tui, iam paene sepulta ac tristi cinefacta rogo, dubitata tueri astra et succiduo melius splendescere cultu? Cum prodire iterumque virum volitare per ora 45 scripta tui sanctos animi testata recessus, unde velut diti fluxerunt aurea vena, scripta quibus sacro Virtutis pectora thyrso percussa exstimulas, pulchroque cupidine Honesti vel supra Alpinas inflammas algida ningueis, 50

58  Cf. Lipsius 1605 (as in n. 3), f. 4v; Nollet 2015 (as in n. 49), 1256, v: “Q uid sensa? Promit dogma Stoicae sectae, / sectae virilis, altae, ad alta ducentis. / Vis vana rerum et falsa regna Fortunae  / despicere, vel ridere? Vis decus summum  / in uno Honesto ponere atque Virtute? / Docebit, asseretque.”

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Virtutem solam dum concinnare beatos 59 posse doces, hanc et tranquilla in luce locare et veris cumulare bonis, quae turbine nullo Fortuna excutiat, quae firma et fixa perennent. Cetera quae vulgum capiunt ceu grandia parvae 55 esse rei, fucum titulo faciente decoro. 39 “ex alta  […] arce”: Claud. Theod. 6  |  45 “virum  […] ora”: Verg. Georg. 3.9, Plin. Min.  Ep. 5.8.3  |  46 “sanctos  […] recessus”: Pers. Sat. 2.73, Stat. Silv. 4.6.4  | 48 “pectora thyrso”: Ov. Trist. 4.1.43  |  52 “tranquilla […] locare”: Lucr. DRN 5.12  | 53-54 “quae […] excutiat”: Luc. Phar. 2.242-243

In vv.  57-71 Rubens answers the questions which were put to Seneca in the previous section: he should praise himself  fortunate, having a paladin who ensures that his name will be revived all over the world without ever disappearing. The rescuer remains an anonymous vindex and ille in v.  68, to be finally revealed in the opening words of  the next passus. In v. 58 Occasu […] Ortum have been aptly switched. This salutary outcome is illustrated by two similes inspired by Ov.  Met. 14.596-608 and Hom.  Il. 19.38-39 respectively. Venus asked the river Numicius to cleanse Aeneas’s corpse of  its human components to grant him immortality. Likewise, Thetis soaked Patroclus’s corpse in nectar and ambrosia to keep it intact until it could finally be buried. In both cases the hero needs to be purified of  his earthly parts to escape total decay, just as Seneca’s writings had to be mended before he could be raised towards a  second life. The three elements are closely connected in a  subtle, inconspicuous way: first the purifier is  mentioned, in Aeneas’s case with the strong hyperbaton corniger […] Numicius, elsewhere with a  simple name or pronoun. Both similes refer to the deceased by using a patronymic as the second word of  the verse (Homer simply uses Patroclus); Rubens omits the nectar and ambrosia in the passus of  Aeneas, but nearly quotes Ovid to “translate” Homer in v.  65; the main verbs, imbuit and eluit, are both used as first words. The reassuring securum (v.  71) refers back to tutum, said of  Lipsius (v. 33). O ter et o quater hoc felicem in vindice, quo se porget 60 ab Occasu redivivum nomen ad Ortum, nullaque venturis dispendia sentiet annis. 59 Cf. Sen. Ep. 27.3: “sola virtus praestat gaudium”. See W. Evenepoel, “The Stoic Seneca on virtus, gaudium and voluptas”, L’Antiquité classique 83 (2014), 45-78. 60  Syncope of  porriget.

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Corniger ut quondam Laurente Numicius 61 ora 60 Aenean Anchisiaden iam caerula caeli 62 sidereasque domos spectantem mortis ab omni labe prius liquidis in fontibus expurgavit; ut Thetis in moesti nimium solatia nati nectaris ambrosiae confuso rore iacentem 65 imbuit Actoriden et cassum lumine corpus integrum ad seros tumuli servavit honores, ille tibi quicquid luteae superabat ab uda faecis humo, quicquid reliquum contagis inesset, eluit, aeternaque dedit vernante iuventa 63 70 securum immanes aevi contemnere vires. 57 “O […] quater”: Verg. Aen. 1.94  |  58 “Occasu […] Ortum”: Plin. M. NH 2.100  | sidereasque domos: Vidae Christ. 4.965  |  65-66 “nectaris  […] imbuit”: Ov.  Met. 14.605 | 66 “cassum lumine”: Verg. Aen. 2.85  |  70 “aeterna […] iuventa”: Alciatis Embl. 100.3  |  71 “immanes […] vires”: Lucr. DRN 5.379

With v. 72 Rubens reconnects to his address of Lipsius in vv. 32-36. Lipsius’s commitment to the commonweal earns him a  reward. Vv. 72-73 with the repetition of  bene, refer to yet another of  Seneca’s treatises, De beneficiis. Lipsius is like the sun that makes the stars fade, his sharp mind shedding light over obscure matters, with solvis in the middle of   the verse rising like the sun amidst the surrounding darkness (golden line with a  wide hyperbaton). The rewards which he deserves are enumerated in a series of  wishes: golden crowns adorned with ribbons and precious stones and laurel wreaths refer to generals entering Rome in a triumph; furthermore, he asks for all kinds of  riches – paintings, ivory, gold and silver, veined marble. The Muses and all gifted people should lavish their awards on him without restriction. At bene te, Lipsi, bene te, cui cura mereri de multis bene et officiis commune iuvare; qui velut astrorum dominus, velut aetherius Sol 64 ingenii radiis ardentibus abdita claras, 75 obnuptasque alta solvis caligine mentes.

61  Numicius is the name of  a river near Laurentum-Lavinium in Latium. As a river god, he is represented with a horn from which water flows, hence the epic epitheton corniger, also used in Ov. Met. 14.602. 62   The repeated a and ae strongly suggest the sound of  mourning. 63  Both are allegedly made from honey that grants immortality and eternal youth to the gods because of  its healing and purifying powers. 64  Lucretius is praising Epicurus.

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Te lemniscatae decora ambitiosa coronae 65 gemmatique premant orbes; tua tempora mille circumeant laurus; tibi cerae et magna elephanti congeries, varii tibi pondera vasta metalli 80 et picturatis animentur marmora venis. Omnis te celebret Phoebi chorus; ingeniorum omne tibi cesset genus, et persolvere tantis mercedem meritis immissis certet habenis. 74 “astrorum dominus”: Sen.  Troad. 388  |  “aetherius sol”: Lucr. DRN 3.1044  | 75 “radiis ardentibus”: Lucr. DRN 6.618 | 76 “obnuptas  […] mentes”: Folengo, Agiomachia 11  |  82 “Omnis […] chorus”: Verg. Ecl. 6.66  |  84 “immissis […] habenis”: Verg. Aen. 5.662

The last part of  the poem (vv. 85-95) is set against the background of  ancient Roman worship. Rubens introduces himself: all the wealth contrasts sharply with his modest gift, four elements underlining his poor means in vv.  85-86: the alliterating parva and pauper, vilibus Samiis (common earthware) and nudi caespitis (on a  simple altar of  turf). Yet he comes with pure hands and heart (metaphorical “translations” of  pietas and honestum of  vv.  48-49 and perhaps implying that they do not always go hand in hand with great wealth). Just as before a shrine of  great height one has to lay down one’s wreath at the base, so Rubens cannot reach as high as Lipsius’s head, but has to leave his little wreath at Lipsius’s feet (once more aptly combining chiasm and parallelism between “ponitur in base corona” and “floridula ante pedes deponimus”). The daring repetition of  serta, with the pronouns in chiasm, emphasizes once more the relation between Lipsius and Rubens. The imaginary crown of  interwoven flowers (serta in its literal sense) has become a real poem of  skilfully composed verses (serta in its figurative sense). The alliterating Phocidos  […] Parnasso is a topical reference to the Muses. Ipse quidem parva facio tibi pauper acerra, 85 vilibus et Samiis ad nudi cespitis aram, sed puris hercle manibus, sed pectore casto. Ac veluti cum magna caput contingere signa alte educta 66 vetat moles, tum ponitur ima

65  A reference to the “Etruscan crown” made of  pure gold-leaves with pendent ribbons (lemnisci), sometimes set with gems. 66  On the image of  a  shrine too elevated to crown the statue, cf.  Ps.-Ov.  Cons. ad Liv. 253-254.

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in base florentis donum sollenne coronae, 90 sic nos tantarum ad fastigia surgere laudum temporaque et sacros inopes incingere crines floridula ante pedes deponimus haec tibi serta, serta mihi nuper quae concinnata reducta Phocidos in convalle sub umbrifero Parnasso. 95 85 “parva […] acerra”: Ov. Pont. 4.8.39  |  87 “puris manibus”: Tib. Eleg. 2.1 | pectore casto: Sen.  Phaedr. 130  |  91 “ad  […] laudum”: Verg. Aen. 1.342  |  93 “floridula”: Cat.  Carm. 61.193  |  94-95 “reducta  […] convalle”: Verg. Aen. 6.703; Hor.  Carm. 1.17.16; Epod. 2.11

Conclusion While Rubens wished to follow Lipsius’s example in the fields of  philology, ancient history, and philosophy, he also charted his own course in his aspirations as a  learned poet. Lipsius’s Seneca was a  model of  scholarship which he deeply admired; with his poem he created a worthy testimony to his beloved mentor by continuously intertwining Lipsius and his edition, on the one hand, and Seneca and his writings, on the other – themes which he plaited into a  “floridula tibi serta” (v.  93), a  refined and fragrant garland of  flowers.

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A TASTE OF  HONEY: DANIEL HEINSIUS’S LUSUS AD APICULAS FOR JUSTUS LIPSIUS

Introduction In the early night of 22-23 March 1606 Justus Lipsius passed away in Leuven after a short illness, peacefully and fortified with the rites of   the Roman Catholic Church. His last moments on earth were described by his colleague Gerardus Corselius, who held the funeral oration on 30 March and by his biographer, the Antwerp canon Aubertus Miraeus. Like all other mourners in the Southern Netherlands, they strongly emphasized Lipsius’s pious devotion to Roman Catholicism.1 Immediately after Lipsius’s death Balthasar Moretus, the son of  his publisher and a  former student, began to organise a commemorative volume, supported by Johannes Woverius, friend and one of   the executors of  Lipsius’s will, and others. This book, the so-called Fama postuma, first appeared in 1607; a second, much enlarged edition was issued in 1613.2 Both, but especially the second 1 G. Corselius, Oratio in Iusti Lipsi funere habita (Lovanii, 1606), later included in Fama Postuma of  1613 (see next note); Aubertus Miraeus, Vita sive Elogium Iusti Lipsii […] (Antverpiae, 1609), also included in Fama postuma, see especially p. 133135 there. See also D. Sacré, “Aubertus Miraeus’ brief  over de dood van Justus Lipsius (1606): twee onbekende edities”, in J.  De Landtsheer, P.  Delsaerdt, Iam illustravit omnia. Justus Lipsius als lievelingsauteur van het Plantijnse Huis (Antwerpen, 2006 [= Gulden Passer 84]). Dirk Sacré published a  report on the scholar’s death as found in the Litterae annuae of   the Leuven Jesuits, “Mortis Lipsianae relatio inedita”, Melissa 77 (1997), 6-8; Id., “Mortis Lipsianae relatio critice edita”, in ibid. 78 (1997), 7-9. 2  Iusti Lipsi sapientiae et litterarum antistitis fama postuma (Antverpiae, 1607), the 1613 edition is varie aucta et correcta, a third edition, 1629, reprints the second: F. van der Haeghen, M.-Th.  Lenger, Bibliotheca Belgica: bibliographie générale des Pays-Bas, vol. 3 (Bruxelles, 1979 [1964]), 1111-1115; cf. D. Sacré, “Iusti Lipsi sapientiae et litterarum antistitis fama postuma”, in G. Tournoy, J. Papy, J. De Landtsheer (ed.),

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 285-298 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124064

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edition, are strongly apologetic in tone: in over a hundred poems and several prose works Lipsius is emphatically presented as a good Catholic and his Protestant detractors are attacked.3 The most important reaction to Lipsius’s death from the North was of  a  different nature. The Fama postuma is  somewhat disappointing as a tribute to Lipsius from the Republic of  Letters since scholars from Leiden university, where Lipsius had worked from 1578 until 1591, are missing. Their absence is  not due to any lack of   trying by Woverius, as we will see, but they had their own agenda and produced a  small but magnificent homage of   their own. It  appeared in March 1607, anonymously, with the university printer Johannes Maire, not long after the Fama postuma, as Epicedia in obitum clarissimi & summi viri Iusti Lipsii. In this essay, I  will gradually zoom in on and discuss one poem in it, Daniel Heinsius’s Lusus ad apiculas; at the end I will zoom out again for a moment in order to consider its meaning in context.

The Leiden volume The first person in Leiden to hear that Lipsius had died was his successor Josephus Justus Scaliger: Shortly before 2 April 1606 he received a  letter from the Antwerp merchant and man of  letters Franciscus Sweertius that Lipsius was dying. On 4 April the Leiden professor of rhetoric, Dominicus Baudius, a former student of Lipsius, informed Petrus Scriverius, who had been away for a few days, that Lipsius had died: as Baudius put it, Scaliger had thought that the letter in question contained fake news, because it was written in an over-familiar way while he did not know Sweertius Lipsius en Leuven. Catalogus (Leuven, 1997), 297-300. There were also separate memorial volumes by Max. De Vignacourt and Ianus Lernutius. 3   Another example of   the persistent emphasis on Lipsius’s Catholicism, which may have been intended for the Fama postuma but was not included is  the draft of   a drawing by Melchior Moretus, see J. De Landtsheer, “Voor vorst en vaderland: Justus Lipsius op zijn sterfbed”, De Gulden Passer 81 (2003), 183-200. On the issue of  Lipsius’s religious position, see J. De Landtsheer, “Pius Lipsius or Lipsius Proteus?”, in J.  De Landtsheer, H.  Nellen (ed.), Between Scylla and Charybdis. Learned Letter Writers Navigating the Reefs of  Religious and Political Controversy in Early Modern Europe (Leiden – Boston, 2011), 303-349. The main representative of  posthumous Protestant attacks on Lipsius is  a pseudonymous pamphlet in two versions, probably from the German lands, printed “in the subterranean forge of   the Cyclopes”, Ex Officina Pyragmonis Subterranea, dated 1606, with four poems altogether. I will discuss this elsewhere.

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from Adam.4 However, it turned out that Lipsius had indeed died, for a  second letter from Antwerp to Scaliger described his constancy on his deathbed. Scaliger remained only half-convinced himself, as appears also from the letter he wrote to Lord Buzanval, the French Ambassador at The Hague.5 On 17 April Johannes Woverius, in his role as executor and as compiler of  the commemorative volume, wrote to Scaliger to tell him of  Lipsius’s death, to forward the last letter Lipsius had written to him, on 12 March, and to ask him for a poem of  comfort. He would make a similar request to Baudius, Heinsius, and Grotius.6 Relevant letters by Woverius to these three are unknown, while Scaliger postponed his reply for almost eight months: on 7 November he wrote to Woverius that they both had been negligent. When Woverius approached him for the second time,7 his epicedion for Lipsius was ready; he includes it now, although it testifies to industry rather than talent, as he stated quasi-modestly. Autographs of  both Scaliger’s letter and the epicedion for Lipsius are preserved at Leiden University Library.8 We may conclude that they were never sent. Scaliger’s poem was not included in the Fama postuma nor is there any proof  of  contributions to it asked from or given by Heinsius, Grotius, and Baudius. 4  Letter dated 4 April 1606: Dominici Baudii Epistolae Semicenturia auctae […] (Amstelodami, 1662), Centuriae, II, 181-183 (here 182): “Ante discessum tuum acceperat epistolam a  cive Antverpiensi, Francisco Swertio, si forte hominem nosti, qua certiorem eum faciebat de afflictissima valetudine summi viri Iusti Lipsii. Sed quia nimis sane familiariter loquebatur homo, quem negat Scaliger se de nomine nosse […], falsi suspectas habuit eas literas […]”. This letter is lacking in early editions of Baudius’s correspondence; in later ones it is printed, but with asterisks replacing proper names. The name of Sweertius is found only in editions from 1639 and later. Hence Scaliger’s correspondent has not been identified before. 5  Baudius to Scriverius (as in n. 4). See also P. Botley, D. van Miert (ed.) The Correspondence of Josephus Justus Scaliger (Genève, 2012), Scaliger to Buzanval, 1606 [03-00]: “On m’a escrit d’Anvers que Lipsius seroit mort un vendredi, enterré aux Cordelliers à Louvain. Mais celui qui m’a escrit ceci m’est suspect pour beaucoup de raisons.” The letter is  undated; the editors of  Scaliger’s Correspondence correctly assume that Scaliger knew of  Lipsius’s death before the end of  March, but are wrong in thinking that it was announced to him by Woverius. Both letters of  Sweertius are lost. 6 Scaliger, Correspondence (as in n.  5), dated 17 April 1606. Woverius wrote: “Si quid etiam tristis tua Musa flebiliter super tanti viri occasum canet, eia, ad me veniat, ut vel ab illo remedio solatium ego, et posteritas, capiat. Idem a  doctissimis Baudio, Heynsio, Grotio petam, quibus solis ingeniis tanti viri funus celebrari poterit.” 7   This must refer to a  lost letter from Woverius sent after 17 April, for it had a postscript which Scaliger mentions here for the first time. 8  Ms. Lips. 3(24).

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Instead the Leiden scholars published their own tribute to Lipsius, which opened on Scaliger’s epicedion: altogether the Epicedia in obitum  […] Lipsii contains seventeen poems by (in this order) Joseph Scaliger with his epicedion, Bonaventura Vulcanius – the only contributor to have been a colleague of  the dead man –, Dominicus Baudius, gifted composer of  iambic poetry (one poem by each of  those three), Daniel Heinsius, just appointed professor of   Greek, then 26 years of  age, and by common consent Leiden’s best poet (nine poems), Hugo Grotius (two) and Petrus Scriverius (three). The editor of  the booklet is not mentioned, but it is Daniel Heinsius, who composed its introduction and probably also the motto on the title page.9 In his nine poems – opening with Felices Grudii, “Blessed people of  Leuven”, and aptly ending on mori  – Heinsius displayed a  superior command of  meter, beginning with a formal epicedium in hexameters, and including, besides epigrammatic poems in elegiacs and in catalectic iambic tetrameters (jambic septenarii), a playful polymetric poem, his Lusus ad apiculas. From 1610 onwards this cycle of  nine poems was included in the six editions of   Heinsius’s collected poetry under the title Manes Lipsiani, together with similar cycles on the deaths of  Janus Dousa senior and Josephus Scaliger.10 9  This is clear from Grotius; see P. C. Molhuysen et al. (ed.), Briefwisseling van Hugo Grotius, vol.  1 (The Hague, 1928-2001), p.  81, no.  95 [dated January 1607]: “editionem a te parari” and Scaliger, Correspondence (as in n. 5), 11 03 1607: “Heinsii, qui et maxima pars est poetarum qui contulerunt operas suas et cuius divina est illa praefatiuncula.” The title page bears four iambic lines in Greek, in capitals: ΘΑΝΕΙΝ ΑΝΑΓΚΗ· ΤΟΝΔΕ ΓΑΡ ΝΟΜΟΝ ΔΙΟΣ / ΚΥΡΒΕΙΣ ΕΧΟΥΣΙΝ· ΗΝ ΔΕ ΤΙΣ ΘΝΗΤΗΝ ΘΥΣΙΝ  / ΒΛΑΣΤΩΝ, ΕΠΕΙΤΑ ΔΕΥΤΕΡΑΣ ΖΩΗΣ ΚΥΡΕΙ,  / ΟΥΤΟΣ ΜΕΓΙΣΤΟΝ ΚΑΤΘΑΝΩΝ ΚΕΡΔΟΣ ΦΕΡΕΙ (Death is  inescapable: that law is written on the tablets of  Zeus. Anyone who is born in mortal nature and afterwards obtains a  second life secures the greatest profit by his death). Heinsius was perhaps inspired by Soph. Aias 760-762 ἔφασχ᾿ ὁ μάντις, ὅστις ἀνθρώπου φύσιν / βλαστὼν ἔπειτα μὴ κατ᾿ ἄνθρωπον φρονῇ / κεῖνος δ᾿ ἀπ᾿ οἴκων εὐθὺς ἐξορμώμενος. 10   The Leiden volume of  1607 was the subject of  a  short lecture given by me at the Budapest IANLS conference of  2006; some results are summarized in my “Taking Occasion by the Forelock: Dutch Poets and Appropriation of  Occasional Poems”, in Y. Maes, J. Papy et al. (ed.), Latinitas perennis, vol. 2 (Leiden, 2009), 115118. The Lipsius cycle is discussed by E. Lefèvre in E. Lefèvre, E. Schäfer (ed.), Daniel Heinsius (Tübingen, 2008), 203-248 with text and German translation (221-224 on the Lusus), on the basis of  the 1649 edition of  Heinsius’s poetry, without reference to the 1607 volume. The Lusus is translated into German by H. C. Schnur, Lateinischer Gedichte deutscher Humanisten (Stuttgart, 1966), 186-189, with a  metrical analysis on 442-443; and into Dutch by J. P. Guépin De vervelende Laura. Bloemlezing behorend bij de colleges van J. P. Guépin over Neolatijnse poëzie (Amsterdam, 1986), 94-96.

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DANIEL HEINSIUS’S LUSUS AD APICULAS FOR JUSTUS LIPSIUS

The Poem The Lusus ad apiculas is the seventh poem by Heinsius. This is a critical edition of  the text of  1607 (spelling and punctuation are mine): 11 12 13 14 15 16 17

Lusus ad apiculas Mellificae volucres, quae per purpureas rosas violasque amaracumque tepidique dona veris legitis suave nectar, teneri 11 cives et aurei 12 coloni et incolae beati hortorum redolentium, gens divino ebria rore, agite, o meae volucres, age, gens vaga nemorum, agite o 13 abite cunctae et tumulum magni cingite Lipsiadae. Illic domum laresque vobis figite, figite; illic vestri copia mellis hereditasque fertur ad vos denuo debita, quam vobis quondam sublegerat ille. At invidos malosque et quem non Venus aurea, quem non amat Cupido, quem non amant lepores, quem non amat venustas, quem non amat Suada, illis acutis protenus figite cuspidibus, ut si quis malus impiusque poscat 14 mel illud roseumque nectar, illas coeli delicias cibosque Divum, impio male vellicare morsu, protenus undique et undique et undique 15 punctus,16 concidat extincto victima Lipsiadae

Playful poem to the bees Honey-making birds, who from purple roses, violets and marjoram and the gifts of  pleasant spring gather sweet nectar, tender citizens and golden settlers 17 and fortunate residents of  odorous gardens, race drunk of  divine dew, now, come on, birds of  mine, come on, race roaming the woods, come on, leave, all of  you and surround the grave of  great Lipsius. Fix a home and abode there for you, fix it: there your honey in abundance and your inheritance is returned to you as your due, which he once gathered for you. But the envious, bad men and whomever golden Venus whomever Cupid dislikes, whomever charm dislikes whomever loveliness dislikes, whomever Persuasion dislikes, them you must instantly, with those sharp stings pierce, so that any bad, impious person who wants to pinch that honey and rosy nectar, those delicacies from heaven and food for the gods, wrongly, with impious teeth, stung here and there and there, instantly falls down as a sacrifice to dead Lipsius.

 teneri Epicedia, 1610 1613 1617 1621 | tenerae 1640 1649.  aurei Epicedia, 1610 1613 | seduli 1617 1621 1640 1649. 13  o Epicedia, 1610 1613 | hinc 1617 1621 1640 1649. 11  14  poscat Epicedia, 1610 1613 1617 | tendat 1621 1640 1649 12  15  undique] ter undique Epicedia 1610 | quater 1613 1617 1621 1640 1649 13  16   / calamisque vocibusque  / et eruditis morsibus /1621 1640 1649 14  17  In the enumeration cives [...] coloni [...] incolae I have chosen not to take colonus 15  as “farmer”, even if  Heinsius in 1617 apparently suggested that explanation – along 16  with17  other less attractive changes. 11 12

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The structure is tripartite: the poem begins with an invocation to the bees in the form of  a  playful hymn (1-11); they are ordered to settle at Lipsius’s grave: there they will get back the honey that Lipsius gathered (12-20); finally (At) they get the command to sting to death any bad and envious honey thief  as a sacrifice to Lipsius (21-34). In the following pages, I  will pay attention to some verbal parallels from other poetry, mainly in the first part of  the poem, next to earlier relevant themes and topoi connected with bees, honey and graves, mainly in the second part, then to the two most important examples for this poem, and finally to the theme of  envy in the last part of  the poem, and its possible relevance for the cycle as a whole. Throughout the poem we shall notice erotic, and to a lesser degree Dionysiac, associations. But first we look at Heinsius’s metrical originality.

Meter The poem is written in a totally free or irregular verse-form, in which almost each line is  in a  different meter, unlike a  Pindaric Ode or Greek choral lyrics, since there is  no metrical responsion. Harry Schnur analysed it as follows: 1. Hemiepes (1/2 hexameter), 2. Glyconeus, 3-5. Anacreontics, 6.  Anapaest  + spondee, 7-8. Catalectic iambic dimeter, 9.  Glyconaeus, 10. Bi-spondaeus, 11. Adoneus, 12. Galliamb, 13. Ionic dimeter with anaclasis (= anacreontic), 14. Pentameter, 15. Catalectic iambic dimeter, or anacreontic with resolution, 16. Glyconaeus, 17. Bi-spondaeus, 18. Adoneus, 19. Iambic senarius, 20. Hexameter, 21. Catalectic iambic dimeter, 22. Glyconaeus, 23-26. Catalectic iambic dimeter, 27.  Acatalectic iambic dimeter, 28. Hemiepes, 29-32.  Hendecasyllables, 33. Hexameter, 34. Catalectic iambic dimeter, or anacreontic with anaclasis, 35. Acatalectic iambic dimeter, 36. Pentameter.

Some elements of this analysis may seem questionable: 6, like 17-18, could also be described as an anapaestic monometer; why introduce an – in Latin – extremely rare variant as the anacreontic with resolution in 15? Is 19 a iambic senarius rather than a iambic trimeter? – Porson’s law is not strictly observed in Horace and other Latin poets; is it useful to speak of an “acatalectic” dimeter in 27 and 35? However, Schnur has made it very clear that this is a free combination of  hexametric, iambic and Aeolic verse. 290

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The oldest poem in free verse appears to be Poliziano’s Threnodia in Laurentium Medicem (Odae 11),18 beginning Q uis dabit capiti meo aquam, quis oculis meis fontem lachrymarum dabit, ut nocte fleam, ut luce fleam.

However, that poem seems to be based on Greek choral lyrics and composed mainly of  dochmii and cretics which are completely absent in Heinsius; moreover, the poem was sung, and it is  uncertain whether melody or words came first.19 In his Poetics (1.44) Julius Caesar Scaliger had mentioned some genres for free verse: “in scoliis, paeanibus, dithyrambicis numerus incertus pro libidine authoris. Q uamobrem eos lege solutos vocat Horatius [Carm.  4.2.11-12].” (In skolia, paeans and dithyrambs the meter is free for the author to choose. That is  why Horace calls them free unregulated).20 Heinsius, favourite pupil of  Scaliger’s son and a  reader and poet who considered Bacchus as the most important inspiration,21 certainly knew this passage. I  have found one possible example for Heinsius’s free verse here: two poems by Eobanus Hessus addressed to Joachim Camerarius, the second one called “ad eundem, item varie mixtum carmen” (my italics). The first one begins: Sive inepta Q uintia mensis apposuit suis nos atque liberaliter instruxit vitulans mirificis epulis, sive nos cupediis […] 22 18   http://www.poetiditalia.it/texts/POLIZIAN | odae | 011 (last consulted 3 September 2020). 19  U. E. Paoli, “La trenodia del Poliziano In Laurentium Medicum”, Giornale Italiano di filologia classica 16 (1939), 165-176. 20  Cf. A. Heider, Spolia vetustatis. Die Verwandlung der heidnisch-antiken Tradition in Jakob Baldes marianischen Wallfahrten (München, 1992), especially 198 ff. In fact, all the pre-1607 examples of  “free verse” quoted there are either tragic or Pindaric choral lyrics, only in Horatian meters. Heider mentions Heinsius, but is  not acquainted with his work (he thinks that the editions were published in Lyons). 21  In Heinsius’s Monobiblos (1603) Bacchus is the key figure, see H.-J. van Dam, “Daniel Heinsius’ Erstlingswerk. Prolegomena zu einer Edition der Monobiblos”, in Lefèvre, Schäfer 2008 (as in n. 10), 185-187; he also edited Nonnus’s Dionysiaca and composed a Dutch Panegyric to Bacchus. 22  Hessus, Sylvae 5 in Eobanus Hessus, Operum farragines duae (Schwäbisch Hall, 1539), of  which a  digital edition is  available at http://mateo.uni-mannheim.de/ camena/hessus1/books/hessuspriorfarrago_10.html, 270-271, last consulted on 3 September 2020.

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being catalectic trochaic dimeter, glyconaeus, iambic dimeter, pentameter, catalectic trochaic dimeter. These two poems show the same kind of  hexametric, iambic and Aeolic scheme as Heinsius’s and he may well have known them: Heinsius possessed a  copy of   the 1539 edition of  Hessus’s poetry, and we shall meet him again below.23 I may well have overlooked other early free verse, but Heinsius himself  is  one of   the most productive poets in it: in 1613 he included in his collected verse (p. 543-546) a Scolion (see Scaliger above) sive Hymnus convivialis ἀρχαίζων in Amorem Graecorum more scriptus, in 1640 an Epimikton (cf. Hessus above) sive vagum on the death of  his wife Ermgard in 1633 (p.  140142), and a  Scolion in Invidiam (p.  142-143). While the former poem seems largely anapaestic and trochaic, the other two share the metrical approach of   the Lusus ad apiculas, and the poem on Ermgard’s death suggests that Heinsius thought the meter suitable for mourning.

Words After this rather technical discussion, we return to the bees. Heinsius’s lexicon may seem imitative, but in its combinations the poem proves to be original: the opening words with the bees as volucres refer to Varro’s De re rustica, where bees are called Musarum volucres, but the word is also used in Ovid’s Fasti.24 The combination mellificae volucres, however, is only found in (again) Hessus, who adds the explanatory word apes: “ceu mellificae volucres per florida prata [...] apes”.25 As to the roses, violets and marjoram giving up their nectar, roses, mentioned by Varro, and violets in Vergil’s Georgics (4.32) are rare, marjoram never plays this role; on the other hand marjoram has a  distinctly erotic connotation in Catullus’ wedding song (61.7) and Vergil (Aen. 1.693). The 23   Catalogus variorum et exquisitissimorum librorum […] Danielis Heinsii (Lugduni Batavorum, 1655): Poetae in octavo no. 240. 24  RR 3.16.7 and Fast. 5.271 volucres […] mella daturas. 25  In Victoria Wirtembergensi ad [...] Philippum Hessorum principem  […] gratulatoria acclamatio, 34b, in Hessus 1539 (as in n. 22), consulted on 3 September 2020 at http://mateo.uni-mannheim.de/camena/hessus1/books/postfar_2.html and at http://mateo.uni-mannheim.de/camena/hessus1/jpg/s772.html. Mellifica turba is found in the Historiae of   the ninth-century bishop Frechulphus, published already in 1539; but this does not seem a probable source for Heinsius, though it indicates that the word mellificus was in use. See also below on Secundus.

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three flowers together point to Neo-Latin poetry again: in Baptista Mantuanus there are meadows full of   them (Parthenice 3.287 ff.). The poet in whose work roses and violets abound is Giovanni Pontano: Tumuli 1.8.13: “unguenta atque rosam at costum properate, puellae, / et violam et cunctas spargite veris opes” (cf. dona veris in Heinsius), 1.10.8, and several times in 2.24, the tumulus of  Pontano’s wife, as well as in his other poetry, such as Baiae or Eridanus, although without any bees. Pontano again is  the only author who has the combination “odorous gardens”: “hortorum redolentium” 9, “redolentibus hortis”: Pontano Urania 1.9.208. The erotic and Catullan overtones of  Heinsius’s poem are brought out in words such as rosas (2), tepidi (4), suave (5), teneri (6), Venus aurea, Cupido, lepores, venustas, the fourfold repetition of  ama(n)t (22-26), roseum (30), delicias (31). Line 12 points directly to Catullus: the rare galliambic meter refers to his carmen 63, in this case line 12 (!) “agite, ite ad alta Gallae, Cybeles nemora simul” (cf. 4 vagus animis, 13 vaga pecora). The erotic angle is emphasized by a poem in which Pontano mentions bees together with marjoram, when Batilla is urged to tend to the marjoram on her windowsill and show herself  to the lecherous old man across the road, who “totus […] haeret in papillis: et mollem cole amaracon, Batilla, / […] Felices sed apes, nemus beatum, / quae circumvolitant leguntque flores, / et rorem simul et tuos labores  / in tectis relinunt, liquantque nectar” (see Lusus 5, 8, 11, 30).26 My provisional conclusion is  that, on this level, many standard poetical words are used in original combinations (tener + civis, aureus + colonus, ebrius + rore, hortus + redolens all seem practically unique); the bold opening metaphor sets the tone. The only ancient poet to whom we are referred is Catullus. Heinsius’s Lusus rather breathes the atmosphere of fifteenth-century and sixteenth-century poetry, with distinct erotic overtones.

Thought I will now turn to some topoi connected with the bees, the protagonists in this poem. The role of  the bee in antiquity, its symbolic meanings, its literary aspects, its relationship to poets and poetry, 26  Hendecasyllabi 1.14,1, 14-18: http://www.poetiditalia.it/texts/PONTANO| hend|001, last consulted on 4 September 2020.

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the different aspects of  honey, have all been discussed very often.27 Leaving aside many aspects, I shall briefly discuss, after mentioning in passing the social character of  bees, first the divinity of  honey and the bee’s relationship with certain gods, secondly the association of  honey with speech and of  bees feeding poets and orators, and finally the presence of  bees on tombs. The triple invocation to the bees as citizens, settlers and residents (6-8) refers to the social character of  bees, living together in a state, as Aristotle argued (HA 448A); it is described by many ancient authors, such as Varro, Vergil, Pliny, Aelian. Varro, for instance, speaks of societas, civitas, rex (RR 3.16), Horace and Seneca of  domus and lares (15 domum laresque).28 That honey – rather than bees – is divine in general, is a basic assumption of   the poem, as it was stated by Vergil at the outset of  his book on bees: aerii mellis caelestia dona (Georg. 4.1): divino rore (10-11), coeli delicias cibosque Divum (31). In this connection we may see Dionysus  / Bacchus in the background of   the poem: he was fed with honey, honey is important in his cult, Ovid tells a funny aition of   the invention of  honey by Bacchus, and the dithyrambic meter of   the poem is associated with him.29 The second god associated with bees, is  Cupido  / Amor (23). Heinsius knew all about it: in his 1603 edition of  Theocritus the spurious eidullion 19 is included, a very popular epigram, Cupid Honey Thief : looking for honey Cupid is  stung by a  bee. When he complains of   the pain to his mother Venus, she replies that now he can perhaps imagine the much worse pain he causes mortals with his arrows.30 The same theme is  the subject of  Anacreontea 33, and of  many emblems since Alciato’s Emblematum liber (1539). In the vernacular volumes of  emblems which Heinsius brought out since 1601 this emblem, taken from Theocritus by Alciato, together with two others forms the “Grund-

27   Apart from commentaries on ancient authors and articles in encyclopaedias, see J. H. Waszink, Biene und Honig als Symbol des Dichters und der Dichtung in der griechisch-römischen Antike (Opladen, 1974); D. Engels, C. Nicolaye (ed.), Ille operum Custos. Kulturgeschichtliche Beiträge zur antiken Bienensymbolik und ihrer Rezeption (Hildesheim, 2008) [without a chapter on Neo-Latin] and the literature mentioned there. 28  Epod. 2.65-66, Phoen. 340-341, cf. Plin. M. NH 11.5-70. 29  Ap. Rhod. 4.1130 f., Ov. Fast. 3.737 ff., Waszink 1974 (as in n. 27), 11-12. 30  See A. S. Gow, Theocritus. Edited with a Translation and Commentary, vol. 2 (Cambridge, 1950), 31-32.

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lage für Heinsius’ Emblematik”.31 In his next, eighth, poem of  the Leiden Epicedia, Heinsius addresses, in high-flown terms, the “genium Ideae” of Lipsius, who is Pater leporis aurei novumque mel Deorum  / pincerna nectaris meri, “Father of  golden charm, fresh honey of  the Gods, cupbearer of  pure nectar”. Whether the mystic dew of  Venus or Dionysus’s thyrsus have smitten him, he is above all men. The combination of   these two divinities is  important to Heinsius, but in the Lusus Bacchus plays a  less important part, and serious aspects should not be pressed, I feel. Lipsius once gathered honey for the bees,32 now that he is dead, they will have it back as their inheritance (19-20). The word Suada, Persuasion (26), must also refer to Lipsius. I take this combination as alluding to the topos that honey flows from the lips of  an excellent speaker, as Homer already said of  Nestor “from whose tongue speech flowed sweeter than honey” (Il. 1.249). This developed into the thought that poets and orators, but also gods and excellent men, are fed by bees or that bees gather on their lips in the cradle: thus Pindar, Plato, Ambrose, Zeus, Hiero II.33 But here too we can quote Pontano: in his Eridanus (34) bees settle on the lips of   the divine Mincius, in Hendecasyllabi 2.10 bees settle on the lips of  Constantia: the Greek Muses have dripped Venerem suam charimque on them. Bees may inhabit tombs of poets: that of Sophocles in Anth. Pal. 7.363-364 (Erycias) αἰεί τοι βούπαισι περιστάζοιτο μελίσσαις / τύμβος (Ever may the tomb be encompassed by bees that bedew  it); 34 and on Erinna’s grave the poetess herself  is  called a  bee.35 Even more significant are the wasps that inhabit the tombs of  Archilochus and Hipponax: passers-by are warned that the aggressive character of   the poets lives on in these wasps that may sting: 7.71.5-6 on Archilochus (Gaetulicus) ἠρέμα δὴ παράμειψον, ὁδοιπόρε, μή ποτε τοῦδε  / κινήσῃς τύμβῳ σφῆκας ἐφεζομένους (Pass quietly by, 31  See A.  de Jonghe in Lefèvre, Schäfer 2008 (as in n.  10), 315  ff., especially 322-323. 32   vobis sublegerat could also mean “stole from the bees”. 33   Paus. 9.23.2; Plin. M. NH 11.15, Cic. Div. 1.78 “Platoni cum in cunis parvulo dormienti apes in labellis consedissent, responsum est singolari illum suavitate orationis fore”; Paul. Med. Vita Ambr. 3; Call. Hymn. 1.49, Verg. Georg. 4.152 ff., Justinus 23.4.7; see Gow 1950 (as in n. 30) on Theocr. 1.146 and 7.78, Engels, Nicolaye 2008 (as in n. 27), 51. 34  All translations from Anth. Pal. 7 are taken from W. R. Paton’s Loeb edition. 35  7.13.1 Leonidas or Meleager.

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O  way-farer, lest haply thou arouse the wasps that are settled on his tomb), 7.405.1-4 on Hipponax (Philippus) Ὦ ξεῖνε, φεῦγε τὸν χαλαζεπῆ τάφον  / τὸν φρικτὸν Ἱππώνακτος, […]  / μή πως ἐγείρῃς σφῆκα τὸν κοιμώμενον (Avoid, O  stranger, this terrible tomb of  Hipponax  […] lest thou wake the sleeping wasp), and similarly 408.1-2 (Leonidas). In conclusion: Heinsius’s favourite gods are present in the background of   the poem, there are bees feeding poets and eloquent orators, bees on tombs sometimes stinging passers-by: topoi from Greek literature, especially the Greek Anthology. We may note that some popular images are not used by Heinsius, such as the humble bee Horace called himself (Carm. 4.2.27), or the busy bee described by Seneca (Ep. 84.3 ff.). Two forerunners Now we zoom out a little to point out two more general examples for this poem. Pivotal here is  Janus Dousa senior.  He is  not only the man who secured Lipsius for Leiden, he also composed one whole book of  poems for him, besides a number of  separate ones.36 In one of  them he combines Lipsius with Suada, Amabilitas, Venus, Cupido (Carmina varia 1.5.2). In his liminary poem for Lipsius’s De constantia (1583-1584) he writes: (falsimonia) Nec hocce Suada Lipsiana nos docet, pares cui haud leporibus / scientiisque (how wonderful to sit in Langius’s garden and) notare florum et omne stirpium genus […] Odor beate, quicquid est aromatum lepore provocans tuo […] (we could weave a garland here) thyma an rosas amaracumve mavelis.

Dousa called Heinsius intimum suum, and elsewhere praises his Suada for introducing Greek poetry into Latin.37 And if  Heinsius did need a model for composing poetic cycles on a dead man   Poemata pleraque selecta (Lugduni Batavorum, 1609), Carminum variorum Bk. 2, also Bk 1.5, Satirae 1.7, Epod. 1.16 et cetera. The poem below is in De Constantia, p. **v – **2r and in Dousa’s Poemata 1609, 250. Dousa also received a bookful of  poems by Lipsius: Poemata 1609, 665 ff. 37  Poemata 1609, 640; 445-446 (cf. Hor. Carm. 3.30.13-14). 36

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– though the genre was already well-known from Italy and France – Dousa offered it with his cycles for the deaths of  Hadrianus Junius, Louis Boisot, and his own son Janus.  Dousa took the lead in the adoration of  Janus Secundus prevalent in Leiden University, and that points to Heinsius’s second general example, Secundus’s Basium 19 Mellilegae volucres, quid adhuc thyma cana, rosasque, Et rorem vernae nectareum violae Lingitis; aut florem late spirantis anethi? Omnes ad Dominae labra venite meae. Illa rosas spirant omnes, thymaque omnia sola, Et succum vernae nectareum violae.

(The poet asks the bees not to keep him away from the mellea labra of  his beloved), non et stimulis compungite molle labellum: […] Leniter innocuae mella legatis apes.

Two completely different poems, one long liminary laudatio of  a philosophical work, and one erotic and Petrarchan poem, in which bees are asked not to sting; and yet the atmosphere of  both pervades a large part of  Heinsius’s poem.

Invidi, mali, impii In trying to identify these persons who want to steal the honey, we zoom out a  little more. In the nine poems for Lipsius which Heinsius composed some themes recur, notably that of   the rivalry between Leiden and Leuven (and Lipsius’s spiritual patria Rome), the pietas of   the Leiden scholars, and Livor, Envy, which is  also the main theme of  Heinsius’s “divine little preface”. Elsewhere I have suggested that this theme refers to the Jesuits’ attacks against Josephus Scaliger.38 Be that as it may, it is  clear that the Leiden volume is  conceived as a  counterpart to the Fama postuma, and everything suggests that Heinsius was its spiritual father and that he talked Scaliger out of  contributing to the volume composed in the South. Perhaps Heinsius’s mali, invidi, impii refer to Jesuits or Catholics –  the purport of   the Leiden volume as a  whole   Van Dam 2009 (as in n. 10).

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would make it less necessary to spell this out – but they may also be explained just as “enemies of  literature”. In any case this proves that texts change as their context changes, as part of  a  memorial volume or within Heinsius’s collected poetry. And that applies also to Heinsius’s general purpose: by outdoing all other contributors with his nine virtuoso poems he could present himself  as the foremost poet of   Leiden, and as far as the Lusus is concerned, the true heir to Secundus and Dousa, a point that was lost when the cycle was included in his collected poetry.

Conclusion The Lusus ad apiculas is  the most playful and original poem of   Heinsius’s cycle. Not all details are clear, but I conclude that the bees of   the opening hymn have fed Lipsius with their divine honey to make him a  brilliant author, whereas in the last part, they are the lovers of  literature, sweet speakers themselves, who defend him against its detractors. The two lines which Heinsius added in 1621 “calamisque vocibusque  / et eruditis morsibus”, “with pens and words and erudite stings” make their humanization explicit – but rather spoil the poetry.39 With this poem Heinsius’s experiments with free verse begin. His originality and poetical power are seen in the combination of  words, and in his introducing and combining of  Greek and Neo-Latin elements. For Heinsius, Greek meant erotic, and he considered Catullus about the only “Greek” Latin poet.40 It is  no coincidence that the “Greek” elements are mixed with erotic Neo-Latin examples. A few years before, Heinsius had composed a poem, also a lusus, for his teacher Bonaventura Vulcanius in which he pictured himself  as a bee dripping honey on the old scholar.41 Sweet-voiced scholars apparently are a Flemish specialty.

39   This is also remarked by Lefèvre 2008 (as in n. 10), 224, without realising that they are a later addition. 40  See Van Dam 2008 (as in n. 21), 189-192. 41  See D.  Sacré, J.  Papy (ed.), Syntagmatia. Essays on Neo-Latin Literature in Honour of  Monique Mund-Dopchie and Gilbert Tournoy (Leuven, 2009), 557-567: “Ludebam Daniel Heinsius”.

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THE FIRST LYRICAL CHORAL ODE OF HEINSIUS’S HERODES INFANTICIDA (1632) AND THE CLASSICS

Lyrical poetry can be found in specific collections of, for instance, Poemata, Lyrica, Odae, Sylvae, Lacrimae, etc., but also in theatre plays, particularly tragedies, such as those of   the Leiden student and professor Daniel Heinsius (1580-1655).1 Heinsius earned some fame for his first tragedy in Senecan vein Auriacus, sive Libertas saucia (Orange, or Liberty Wounded, 1602), written in creative rivalry with his friend Hugo Grotius, who published his Adamus exul (Adam in Exile) in 1601.2 It was well received, and gave a boost to Dutch history drama, as is evidenced by tragedies written by authors as P. C. Hooft and others. Heinsius’s play inspired Theodorus Rhodius to write his Neo-Latin tragedy Colignius (1614) and was imitated by Jacobus Zevecotius in his tragedy Maria Stuarta  / Maria Graeca (1623).3 The author of  Auriacus was famous as a Latin and Dutch poet of, among other genres, elegiac poetry, and a  philologist.4 Heinsius’s second Senecan drama, 1  I would like to thank the editors and my colleague Henk Nellen for their valuable remarks. This article has been written within the scope of  the NWO funded project TransLatin. 2  J.  Bloemendal (ed.), Daniel Heinsius, Auriacus, sive Libertas saucia (Orange, or Liberty Wounded), 1602 (Leiden – Boston, 2020). B. L. Meulenbroek, G. Kuiper, L.Ph. Rank (ed.), Hugo Grotius, Sacra in quibus Adamus exul, 2 vols (Assen, 19701971). 3  On the reception of  Auriacus, see Heinsius, Auriacus (as in n. 1), 39-56; a modern edition of  Rhodius’s Colignius in J.  Bolte, Coligny  / Colignius, Gustav Adolf  / Gustavus saucius, Wallenstein  / Fritlandus: Drei zeitgenössische lateinische Dramen von Rhodius, Narssius, Vernulaeus (Leipzig, 1933); Zevecotius’s play was edited by J. IJsewijn, “Jacobus Zevecotius: Maria Stuarta / Maria Graeca, tragoedia: A Synoptic Edition of  the Five Extant Versions”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 22 (1973), 256-319. 4   E.  Lefèvre, E.  Schäfer (ed.), Daniel Heinsius: Klassischer Philologe und Poet (Tübingen, 2008).

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 299-310 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124065

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Herodes infanticida (Herod, the Murderer of  Children), on the flight of   the holy family to Egypt and the Massacre of   the Innocents (Mat. 2.13-18) was written around 1611, but published only in 1632.5 Both dramas deal with victims of  shameful violence: Prince William of  Orange, who was shot with a  gun in 1584, and the innocent children of  Bethlehem slain by King Herod the Great, although the latter drama might better be labelled a tyrant play on the protagonist Herod. The choruses of  Auriacus were highly lyrical, singing the praise of  Flanders and nostalgic longing for this region, for instance. Also in this second tragedy of  his – and even more deftly than in the first one – Heinsius displays his poetic skills, especially in the chorus songs, which are often lyrical poems in their own right, as was the case in ancient Greek tragedy. His poetic talents were based on his own ingenium, but also on classical sources of  inspiration, which he used very creatively. Poet and philologist in one. The Herodes infanticida, tragoedia was published separately by Elzevier in Leiden, and included in the Poemata editions of  1640 and 1649, edited by Heinsius’s son Nicolaas.6 As is  known, the sacred tragedy roused some controversy with the French humanist Jean-Louis Guez de Balzac,7 since the rage of  Herod is rendered   The tragedy is published online by A. J. E. Harmsen: https://www.let.leidenuniv. nl/Dutch/Ceneton/HeinsiusHerodes1632.html; on the play, see P.  Stachel, Seneca und das deutsche Renaissancedrama: Studien zur Literatur- und Stilgeschichte des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts (Berlin, 1907), 152-157; B. Becker-Cantarino, Daniel Heinsius (Boston, 1978), 128-142; R.  Leo, “Herod and the Furies: Daniel Heinsius and the Representation of  Affect in Tragedy”, Journal of  Medieval and Early Modern Studies 49 (2019), 138-167; J.  Bloemendal, “Daniel Heinsius’ Herodes infanticida as a Senecan drama”, in J. Hilton, A. Gosling (ed.), Alma parens originalis? The Receptions of  Classical Literature and Thought in Africa, Europe, The United States, and Cuba (Oxford, etc., 2007), 217-236; F. Stürner, “Daniel Heinsius’ Tragödie Herodes Infanticida”, in Lefèvre and Schäfer (ed.), Daniel Heinsius: Klassischer Philologe und Poet, 415-439. 6  Danielis Heinsii  / HERODES INFANTICIDA,  / Tragoedia  / [printer’s mark] / Lvgd. Batavorvm, / Ex Officinâ Elzeviriana / M D C XXX II; Danielis Heinsii / POEMATA / avctiora. /. Editore / Nicolao Heinsio, Dan. Fil. / Lvgdvni Batavor.  / Apud Francis. Hegerum. M D C XL, 310-360; Danielis Heinsii POEMATVM  / EDITIO NOVA,  / longe auctior.  / Editore  / Nicolao Hein  =  / sio, Danielis Filio  / Amstelodami,  / Ex officina Ioannis Ianßonij.  / Anno 1649, 210-260. 7  J. Bloemendal, “Mythology on the Early Modern Humanists’ and Rhetoricians’ Stage in the Netherlands: The Case of  Heinsius’ Herodes infanticida”, in Carl van de Velde (ed.), Classical Mythology in the Netherlands in the Age of  Renaissance and Baroque (Leuven, 2009), 333-350, and the references given there. 5

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visible through a passage (IV.1) where the Furies appear together with Herod’s wife Mariamne, a visualisation of   the king’s dream. De Balzac held the opinion that classical mythology was incompatible with Christian drama. For his criticism he could also have pointed to the choruses with their classical form and allusions. For instance, the third choral ode, sung by old Jewish men (Chorus Senum Hebraeorum) and starting with “Felix, quisquis tacitum vitae  / securus iter tenet, ignotus  / rerum dominis  […]” (Happy the man who holds the quiet course of  his life free of  cares, unknown to rulers of   the world  […], Herodes infanticida 714716) is a creative imitation of Hor. Epod. 2: “Beatus ille, qui procul negotiis  / ut prisca gens mortalium  / paterna rura bobus exercet suis […]” (Happy the man who far away from business cares, like the pristine race of  mortals ploughs his paternal fields with his own oxen […]), which was the topos for the opposition of  happy country life in the epicurean sense of  λάθε βιώσας, and the uncertain life at court. Heinsius retains the lyrical, idyllic character of   Horace’s poem, of  which he paraphrases the main images and ideas.8 This chorus song stands in contrast to the action of  the third act, in which Herod swears that he will kill the new-born child. As is often the case in Neo-Latin drama, the choruses offer a commentary in lyrical meters on what is going on in the acts, albeit with an implicit or remote relation to it, avoiding any direct intervention. In general, they raise the action to a more philosophical level. In the case of  Heinsius, they rather increase the rhetoric of  pathos. Here the first choral ode will be discussed, and the question of   how it relates to ancient texts. In the first act (1-155) an angel delivers a  monologue in praise of  Bethlehem. Here will be born the Messiah, who will redeem mankind, forgiving their sins. After having mentioned King David, Moses and the Ten Commandments and the deterioration of  mankind, the angel turns to Herod, who will try to kill the new-born child (“Natum tyrannus credit, et lethum parat”, The tyrant believes that the child is  born and prepares death, 135). The angel tells the readers or audience that 8  Becker-Cantarino 1978 (as in n.  5), 134. On the choruses in Herodes infanticida, see also V. Janning, Der Chor im neulateinischen Drama: Formen und Funktionen (Münster, 2005), 167-168 and 345-346. On the functions of  choruses in Neo-Latin tragedy, see Janning, 45-96 and, for tragedies in Dutch, L.  van Gemert, Tussen de bedrijven door? De functie van de rei in Nederlandstalig toneel 1556-1625 (Deventer, 1990), 59-94.

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the child will be brought to Egypt (“Memphis ereptum feret,  / fidumque matri pandet Aegyptus sinum”, Memphis will take up the saved child, and Egypt will open its bosom safely for the mother, 154-155). The monologue recalls the story, which in itself  is well known: Herod, having heard from the Magi that a  royal child will be born, finds out that the birthplace of  such a boy would be Bethlehem and murders all children of   the town up to two years of   age. The holy family (Mary, Joseph and the child Jesus) escaped the massacre by fleeing to Egypt. After this monologue a chorus consisting of Prophets and Pious Men (Christian believers or Jewish Tzadik, “Chorus Vatum et Piorum”) sings the praise of  Egypt with its River Nile, a safe haven for the child, away from the tyrant Herod, in an ode written in lyric meters, namely Sapphic hendecasyllabic verses and adonians.9 Herodes infanticida, 158-232 Nile, foecundi Meroes beatae terminus regni, genitorque terrae, cuius arentes melius maritas 160 imbribus campos, aliusque et idem semper haud uni veniens colono; 10 sive, cum septemgeminus profundo immines ponto, totiesque lympham dividis, solo dubius colore; 165 sive, qua nulli bene visus unquam, inter extremos Libyae recessus, abditus terris, veniente Phoebo, tutus occurris: nec adhuc repertos ulla gens orbi reseravit ortus. 170 Invident omnes. Tibi sat latere est: ne tuos quisquam, sibi vindicando, polluat fontes. Meliusque mundi diceris flumen. Dominum fatetur Memphis, et totas veneratur undas, 175 prona currenti: recipitque fessum, et tuos ripa reficit labores. Talis abruptis Cataracta vinclis fregit instantem, quoties superbo invidet cursu. Trepidans teneri 180 surgit, et, montes imitata coelum verberat unda. 9  The same meters are used in Sen. Troad. 814-860; 1009-1055 and in Med. 579669, Phaedr. 736-760; Oed. 110-158; Thyest. 546-622; Herc. Oet. 1518-1606. 10  colono 1649] coleno 1632: colore 1640.

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Intonant ripae; pavidus tueri diffugit pastor. Melior sed idem tangis Aegyptum, pluviaeque, genti, 185 et superfusis imitator undis aetheris magni, steriles liquore diluis terras; licet omne nubes nesciat coelum, licet imbre nullo tota damnetur regio, nec udis 190 serviat Austris. Largior campis, neque ditis undae parcus, Aegypto venias precamur. Sentiant glebae, neque sicca tellus imbui pugnet, variisque vincat 195 floribus annum. Rex, pavor Regum, comitique nato sub tuos Virgo comes it lacertos. Cedat infelix, mala qui fatetur Isidis raptae, patriumque turba 200 plangit Osirin. Iam, sui monstrum populi Deusque, deserat sacras crocodilus undas: colla libratae melius securi praebeat Apis. 205 Ille, dum motae furit Ascalonae atra tempestas, et Idumus horror, pinus incertis ut abacta 11 ventis, et procul portu trepidans relicto, fertur huc illuc. Q uibus ah quibusque 210 sedibus, saevum fugies cruorem, et feros ausus? truculentus imber colligit nubes, et adhuc minatur. Nox ruit terris. Abeas licebit, sive te Proteî Pharos, et Canobus 12 215 abdet errantem, meliorve Memphis, sive, quae magni Macetae superba voce, post terras pelago subactas, inclytas turres populo Q uiriti et triumphandam patefecit aulam, 220 sive qua Cancri medio sub aestu gentibus nullae comitantur umbrae, nota montosae regio Syenae, sive desertae Catabathmos orae, sive, qua Phoebo resonant propinquo 225 Memnonis chordae, celebratque portis  abacta 1632] adacta 1640 1649.  Canobus 1632 1640] Canopus 1649.

11 12

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gens Iovis centum spatiosa latae moenia Thebae; I procul, terra patriae relicta; 13 spes et oppresso rediturus orbi 230 dulce lenimen, nec inhospitali praeda tyranno. River Nile, border of   the fertile kingdom of  prosperous Meroe, who brings forth land of  which you drench the dry fields better than rain showers do, and who – always another and the same – comes to the aid of  many farmers, either when you with seven mouths flow into the deep sea and divide your water as many times, various only in colour, or – where no one ever saw you well – you flow among the furthest corners of  Libya, you, hidden from the world at the point where the sun rises, safely run forward, where not any people has yet found and disclosed your origins. All try to cast an eager eye on them. For you it is enough to hide: let no one by claiming them for himself  pollute your sources. You will be better called a  river of   the world. Memphis acknowledges you as its Lord, and worships all your waves, bowing to your current. The banks receive you in your tiredness and refresh you in your toils. Thus the Cataract has broken him although he insisted, with broken chains, every time it looks at his proud stream. Fearful of  being held back, he rises and his waves, like mountains, hit the sky. The banks resound; a shepherd, afraid of   the view, flees. Better, and yet the same, you arrive in Egypt, and imitating the rain and the enormous ether, you make your waves overflow and drench for its inhabitants the barren ground with water, even though the entire sky has no clouds, even though the entire region is punished with lack of  rain, and is not subject to the moisty south wind. We pray you, come over Egypt, covering the fields, do not spare your rich waves. Let the soil feel it, and let the dry ground not resist being drenched and overwhelm the year with various flowers. The King, fear of  kings,14 and the Virgin as a companion to her new-born companion come to your strong arms. Let that wretched one go away, who prophesies the disaster of   the rape of  Isis, and the throng who mourns for the ancestral Osiris. Now let the crocodile, that monster and a  god of  its people, leave the sacred waves, let Apis openly offer his neck to the hovering axe. While the black tempest of  agitated Ascalonite and the horror of   the Idumaean rage, he is driven back and forth as a  pine tree ship driven away by dangerous winds and shivering after it has left the harbour far behind. Ah, to whom and which dwelling place will you go and flee the cruel bloodshed and the savage ventures? The ferocious rain gathers clouds

  I procul, terra patriae relicta 1640 1649: om. 1532.   “Rex, pavor regum”: cf. 1 Tim. 6.15 and Apoc. 19.16.

13 14

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and is  still menacing. Night is  rushing over the earth. You will be allowed to leave, whether the Pharos of Proteus and the Canopus will hide you at your wandering, or better, Memphis, or the place that, with the proud voice of   the great Macedonian 15 after the land subdued by the sea, opens its famous gates for the Roman people and its court to be conquered, or where in the middle of   the heat of  Cancer no shades accompany people, the well-known region of  mountainous Syena, or the lonely shores of  Catabathmos,16 or where the strings of   Memnon resound when Apollo is nearby 17 and the people of   Jupiter celebrate on the hundred gates the spacious walls of   broad Thebes; go far away, after you left your country, you will return as the hope and sweet solace for the oppressed world, no prey for the inhospitable tyrant.

The praise of   the Nile, shaped as a prayer to the river, starts with the fertile Nubian island Meroe (158-159), followed by lines about the river bringing rich ground wherever it flows (159-174), made more explicit in a  distributio mentioning its seven mouths in which it streams into the Mediterranean Sea (163-165), Libya, and the river’s unknown origin – which should remain in the dark to remain pure, including remaining free of  bloodshed (166-174). Memphis, the ancient capital of  Lower Egypt (pars pro toto for Egypt), worships the Nile (174-177), the white-water rapids between Khartoum and Aswan, the Cataracts, make its waters rise high, frightening shepherds (178-184). The river is  invoked as it irrigates the dry land of  Egypt as its only source of  humidity, “we pray thee, come with lavish water”, that the ground become fertile again and bring forth flowers (185-196). Then Jesus as King (“fear of Kings”, also frightening King Herod) and the Virgin Mary with her child are said to seek protection in the arms of  Egypt, and are summoned not to believe prophecies that this arrival will ruin Egypt’s religion, exemplified by Isis and Osiris, the sacred crocodile and the holy bull Apis (197-205). The child is driven back and forth as long as Herod rages (206-210).

15  Maceta may be a reference to a promontory of  Arabia, at the entrance of   the Persian Gulf, but it is more likely a reference to Alexander the Great, cf. Luc. Phars. 10.269 “Macetumque tyrannis”. 16  Catabathmos or Καταβαθμός is a tract of  land or a steep slope that separates Egypt from Nubia and is the origin of  the cataracts. 17  Lewis-Short: “The black marble statue of  Memnon, near Thebes, when struck by the first beams of  the sun, gave forth a sound like that of a lute-string”; the statue is also mentioned in Tac. Ann. 2.61.

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In the next lines the child himself  is  addressed: where will he escape Herod’s fire and fury (210-214)? Wherever in his flight he may come – a  distributio mentions places where he could be received: Alexandria with its Pharos lighthouse; Canopus, a coastal city in the Nile delta; the capital Memphis (215-216); the place where Alexander (the magnus Maceta) opened the gates for the Romans (217-219); the hot country of  Syena (221-223); the coast of  Catabathmos in Libya (224); or the Egyptian city of  Thebes (225-228) – he will return to redeem the world, untouched by the tyrant Herod (230-232). At first sight the praise of   the river Nile is  out of  place, since it symbolises the country where the Israelite people was enslaved.18 It is also the river into which the male babies were thrown (Ex. 1). In the eyes of   the people of  Israel, Egypt was a country where one would avoid being. However, in this context it is apposite as Egypt will be the safe haven for the holy family for some time. In spite of  its Judeo-Christian context, the ode is full of  learned classical and Biblical references: the name of  the Nile island Meroe in Ethiopia is  mentioned (158); Memphis (175, 216); the Cataract (178); Isis, Osiris and Apis (200, 201, 205); Ascalonite and Idumean (for Herod,19 206, 207); Pharos for Alexandria and Canopus (215); Syena (223); the “strings of  Memnon” (226). When looking for classical models for such a description of   the Nile and Egypt, the first text to consider would be the description of   the shield of  Aeneas in Vergil’s Aeneid, where the Nile is  also depicted (Verg. Aen. 8.711-713), but there is  no similarity, or only one, but no less important, which is that the Nile is a shelter: “contra autem magno maerentem corpore Nilum / pandentemque sinus et tota veste vocantem / caeruleum in gremium latebrosaque flumina victos” (while over against her was the mourning Nile, of  massive body, opening wide his folds and with all his raiment welcoming the vanquished to his azure lap and sheltering streams, tr.  H.  Rushton Fairclough, G.  P. Gould, Loeb Classical Library [henceforth LCL]).   Mentioned in the angel’s opening monologue: “At illa, duris mancipata e vinculis / Phari superbae” (But it [Israel], freed from the harsh bonds of  haughty Egypt, 23-24). See Ex. 1. 19  In the Middle Ages Herodes Magnus was called Herodes Ascalonita, to discern him from Herodes Antipas and Herodes Agrippa. 18

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Lucan’s Pharsalia 10.268-331 seems to be a far more convincing model and source of inspiration for Heinsius, since there are several verbal similarities, even though the tone of  Heinsius’s ode is quite different. In Lucan, it is  the aged Egyptian priest Acoreus who, in the conversations after a  banquet with Caesar and Cleopatra, addresses Caesar, and in this monologue inserts an apostrophe to the river Nile: 20 Luc. Phar. 10.268-331 “Q uae tibi noscendi Nilum, Romane, cupido est, et Phariis Persisque fuit Macetumque tyrannis, nullaque non aetas voluit conferre futuris 270 notitiam; sed vincit adhuc natura latendi. Summus Alexander regum, quos Memphis adorat, invidit Nilo, misitque per ultima terrae Aethiopum lectos: illos rubicunda perusti zona poli tenuit; Nilum videre calentem. 275 Venit ad occasus mundique extrema Sesostris, et Pharios currus regum cervicibus egit: ante tamen, vestros amnes, Rhodanumque Padumque, quam Nilum, de fonte bibit. Vesanus in ortus Cambyses longi populos pervenit ad aevi, 280 defectusque epulis et pastus caede suorum, ignoto te, Nile, redit. Non fabula mendax ausa loqui de fonte tuo est. Ubicunque videris, quaereris: et nulli contingit gloria genti, ut Nilo sit laeta suo. Tua flumina prodam, 285 qua deus, undarum colator, Nile, tuarum, te mihi isse dedit. Medio consurgis ab axe, ausus in ardentem ripas adtollere Cancrum: in Borean is rectus aquis, mediumque Booten; cursus in occasum flexu torquetur et ortus, 290 nunc Arabum populis, Libycis nunc aequus arenis: teque vident primi, quaerunt tamen hi quoque, Seres, Aethiopumque feris alieno gurgite campos: et te terrarum nescit cui debeat orbis. Arcanum natura caput non prodidit ulli, 295 nec licuit populis parvum te, Nile, videre, amovitque sinus, et gentes maluit ortus mirari, quam nosse, tuos. Consurgere in ipsis ius tibi solstitiis, aliena crescere bruma,

20  Translation made by J. D. Duff  in LCL. Duff, however, chose not to adopt the apostrophe in the address to the Nile, but to formulate it in the third person.

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atque hiemes adferre tuas: solique vagari 300 concessum per utrosque polos. Hic quaeritur ortus, illic finis aquae. Late tibi gurgite rupto ambitur nigris Meroe fecunda colonis, laeta comis ebeni: quae, quamvis arbore multa frondeat, aestatem nulla sibi mitigat umbra: 305 linea tam rectum mundi ferit illa Leonem. Inde plagas Phoebi, damnum non passus aquarum, praeveheris, sterilesque diu metiris arenas, nunc omnes unum vires collectus in amnem, nunc vagus, et spargens facilem tibi cedere ripam. 310 Rursus multifidas revocat piger alveus undas, qua dirimunt Arabum populis Aegyptia rura regni claustra Philae. Mox te deserta secantem, qua dirimunt nostrum rubro commercia pontum, mollis lapsus agit. Q uis te tam lene fluentem 315 moturum tantas violenti gurgitis iras, Nile, putet? Sed cum lapsus abrupta viarum excepere tuos, et praecipites cataractae, ac nusquam vetitis ullas obsistere cautes indignaris aquis: spuma tunc astra lacessis. 320 Cuncta fremunt undis: ac multo murmure montis spumeus invictis canescit fluctibus amnis. Hinc, Abaton quam nostra vocat veneranda vetustas, terra potens, primos sentit percussa tumultus, et scopuli, placuit fluvii quos dicere venas, 325 quod manifesta novi primum dant signa tumoris. Hinc montes natura vagis circumdedit undis, qui Libyae te, Nile, negant: quos inter in alta it convalle iacens iam molibus unda receptis. Prima tibi campos permittit apertaque Memphis 330 rura, modumque vetat crescendi ponere ripas.”

Because the similarities and allusions are not always obvious, a list of  some of  them will be useful: Heinsius, Herodes infanticida

Luc. Phar.

158  foecundi Meroes 161  haud uni veniens colono 167  extremae Libyae recessus 169-170  nec adhuc […] ortus 171  Invident omnes 171  Tibi sat latere est 175  Memphis […] totas veneratur undas

303  Meroe fecunda 303  nigris fecunda colonis 291  Libycis […] arenis 270-271  Nullaque non aetas voluit conferre futuris / notitiam 273  (Alexander) invidit Nilo 271 latendi 272  quos Memphis adorat

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Heinsius, Herodes infanticida

Luc. Phar.

171 Cataracta 181  montes imitata 181-182  coelum / verberat vnda 187-188  steriles liquore / diluis terras 192  Largior campis 217  magni Macetae 219  populo Q uiriti 221  Cancri medio sub aestu 222  gentibus nullae comitantur umbrae

318  praecipites Cataractae 321 montis 320  spuma tunc astra lacessis 308  sterilesque diu metiris arenas 330-331  campos  […]  / modumque vetat crescendi ponere ripas 269  Macetumque tyrannis 268 Romane 288  ardentem […] Cancrum 305  aestatem nulla sibi mitigat umbra

Although not each allusion or similarity in itself  is  particularly telling, the combination and quantity of   them make it likely that Heinsius had this passage of  the Roman epic in mind. This is made the more probably by the form: the apostrophe of   the Nile in Lucan and the incantation of   the river in Heinsius, in spite of   the different tone. However, Lucan is  not the only author to whom Heinsius alludes. For “Memnonis chordae, celebratque portis  / gens Iovis centum spatiosa latae  / moenia Thebae” (226-228), cf.  Juvenal, Sat. 15.5-6: “magicae ubi Memnone chordae  / atque vetus Thebe centum iacet obruta portis”.21 With “terminus regni” (159) and “cum septemgeminus profundo / immines ponto” (163164) can be compared Silius Italicus’s Punica 1.196: “terminus huic roseos amnis Lageus ad ortus / septeno impellens tumefactum gurgite pontum” (It is  bounded on the rosy east by the river of  Lagus [= the Nile], which strikes the swollen sea with seven streams, tr. J. D. Duff, LCL). For “abditus terris” (168), cf. Horace, Carm. 2.2.2: “abdito terris”; for “pinus incertis ut abacta ventis” (208) cf. Horace, Carm. 2.10.9-10: “saevius ventis agitatur ingens / pinus” and Vergil, Ciris 454: “incertis iactatur ad omnia ventis”. The word septemgeminus (“cum septemgeminus profundo / immi­ nes ponto, totiesque lympham  / dividis” 163-165) is  redolent of   Vergil Aen. 6.800: “et septemgemini turbant trepida ostia Nili”, but also of  Lucan (see above). In this play of  reception and allusion, Heinsius seems to have as his motto: “ars est celare artem”. Heinsius used a  main source 21  For the statue, cf.  Tac.  Ann. 2.61: “Memnonis saxea effigies, ubi radiis solis icta est, vocalem sonum reddens”; for the hundred gates of  Thebes, cf. Hom. Il. 9.383.

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of  inspiration, a passage from Lucan’s Pharsalia on the Nile, and combined it with other quotations or allusions and intertwined them in his own phraseology and style. His imitation went beyond the borders of  genre and turned the epic source into a lyrical poem in a Senecan drama.22 In spite of   the imitative character, the result is  really his own. In his De imitatione (1647) Heinsius’s contemporary Gerardus Johannes Vossius would discern between imitatio puerilis and imitatio virilis.23 It is clear that Heinsius exceeded the “childish imitation” and applied “mature imitation”. He is inspired by the passage from Lucan’s epic, as the several similarities show, but the influence is never overt. The apostrophe to the Nile by the priest Acoreus became a  prayer to the river by vates (prophets) and pii (the faithful, i.e. Christians or, rather, Jewish Tzadik), the pagan text turned into a Christian invocation to the Nile. Heinsius loves to show off  his knowledge and poetic skills. However, since the child saved in Egypt will ultimately become the Saviour of   the world, for the Leiden professor classical knowledge – appealing in its own right – should eventually guide one to Christian piety.

22  On the concept of  imitation, see still H. Gmelin, “Das Prinzip der Imitatio in den romanischen Literaturen der Renaissance”, Romanische Forschungen 46 (1932), 83-360. For a  systematisation of  imitation and allusion, see, for instance, P.  Claes, Echo’s echo’s. De kunst van de allusie (Amsterdam, 1988). For tragedy and the classical tradition, see R. Bushnell, “Tragedy and the Tragic”, in A. Grafton, G. W. Most, S. Settis (ed.), The Classical Tradition (Cambridge MA – London, 2010), 942-947. The most learned study is J. Jansen, Imitatio. Literaire navolging (imitatio auctorum) in de Europese letterkunde van de renaissance (1500-1700) (Hilversum, 2008). 23  J.  Bloemendal (ed.), Gerardus Johannes Vossius, De imitatione cum oratoria tum praecipue poetica deque recitatione veterum liber, ch. 4, Vossius, Poeticae institutiones / Institutes of  Poetics in Three Books, vol. 2 (Leiden – Boston, 2010), 1990-1991: “Priori solum proponimus nobis exemplum in verbis sive simplicibus sive coniunctis. Sed longe ulterius se virilis imitatio extendit” (In the first we set before our eyes the example merely in words, simple or compound. But the manly imitation extends much further).

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A PLEA FOR REHABILITATION NICOLAS HEINSIUS’S FUNERAL POEM ON HUGO GROTIUS *

Nicolas Heinsius, preserver of  the Latin poets Supported by the splendid reputation of  his father Daniel, Nicolas Heinsius (1620-1681) made a smooth entry into the learned world by virtue of  two qualities, his generally lauded Neo-Latin letters and poems, and an insatiable lust for travel. Later on, he confirmed his status by the unparalleled quality of  his editions of  classical authors, Ovid in the first place, which earned him the honourary title “sospitator poetarum Latinorum”. His visits abroad, mainly undertaken to collect and collate manuscripts, enabled him to cultivate many friendships with scholars, most of   them fellow classicists and antiquarians. They helped him carry out the scholarly enterprises he had set himself. His career is described in many biographical studies, for which reason a succinct overview may suffice. Heinsius matriculated at Leiden University on 17 October 1631, at the age of eleven, on the same day as the thirteen year old Pieter de la Court.1 After visits to England (1641), Spa, Leuven and other places in the Southern Netherlands (1644), and to Aachen (June 1645), he embarked on a much longer peregrination, which brought him to France and Italy (1645-1648). Afterwards, he returned for a  short period to Leiden. In 1649 we find him at the court of  the Swedish Q ueen Christina, whom he served on a more or less regular basis. In 1651 he set out again for a second journey *  I feel indebted to Edwin Rabbie, Jeanine De Landtsheer, and Toon Van Houdt for their comments on a previous version of  this article. 1  Album studiosorum Academiae Lugduno Batavae MDLXXV-MDCCCLXXV (The Hague, 1875), col. 239. Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 311-326 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124066

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to Italy to collect manuscripts and coins under the auspices of   the queen. After Christina’s unexpected abdication in 1654 Heinsius became resident of   the Dutch Republic in Sweden, a  diplomatic post that was rewarded with a salary of  4000 guilders (1654-1655). In 1655 Heinsius was nominated secretary of   the city of  Amsterdam, an employment that he fulfilled until 1657. From 1660 until 1671 he again served as resident in Sweden, in which capacity he also undertook a mission to Moscow (1669-1670). He resigned in 1672 and devoted the last years of  his life to the study of  his beloved classical poets.2

Nicolas, intermediary between Daniel Heinsius and Hugo Grotius Nicolas Heinsius never met Hugo Grotius, although he must have known of   the vicissitudes in the career of  his famous compatriot. His father Daniel Heinsius, professor at Leiden University, had been bound in a close friendship with Grotius, until the religious troubles in Holland during the Twelve Years’ Truce (1609-1621) had driven them apart. While Grotius defended the right of  the liberal Arminians or Remonstrants to stay within the public church, Heinsius sided with the other camp, the Counter-Remonstrants. As secretary of  the delegates of  the States General, he even attended the Synod of  Dordrecht (1618-1619), the ecclesiastical gathering that banned Remonstrantism. The rupture proved to be irreparable. According to a  remark by the Grotius adept Jean Leclerc, Heinsius even changed the wording of  one of  his poems, on the grounds that he wanted to remove the traces that his close relationship with Grotius had left in his poetical production.3 Leclerc’s allegation that Daniel Heinsius revised his Greek ode on Pandora 2  F. F. Blok, Nicolaas Heinsius in dienst van Christina van Zweden, diss. Groningen (Delft, 1949); O. Schutte, Repertorium der Nederlandse vertegenwoordigers, residerende in het buitenland 1584-1810 (The Hague, 1976), 269-270. 3   See the annotation on a letter by Gronovius to Heinsius, Paris, 18 November (a.d.  XIV Kal.  Decembris) 1639, in Petrus Burman, Sylloges epistolarum a  viris illustribus scriptarum tomi quinque (Leidae, apud Samuelem Luchtmans, 1727) (hereafter cited as Sylloge), vol.  3, 86-87, referring to “Clericus in Ephemeridibus Trevoltianis, a  se interpolatis, tom. I, pag. 269”, that is  Mémoires pour l’histoire des sciences et des beaux arts, Mois de Janvier et de Fevrier de l’an 1701. Seconde édition augmentée de diverses remarques et de plusieurs articles nouveaux, vol. 1 (Amsterdam, chez Jean Louis de Lorme, 1701), 268-270.

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is correct, in so far as, while the last lines of  Heinsius’s ode in his edition of  Hesiod of  1603 exalt his friendship with Grotius, these lines disappeared in subsequent editions, namely in those of  1613 and 1622.4 In this respect Heinsius much resembled Grotius, who was reluctant to have his juvenile poetry republished, among other reasons because of former friendships that had turned into hostility or, at best, indifference. As he stated in a letter, he did not want to make a  fool of  himself  “by praising the very people who have treated us so badly”.5 In 1619 Grotius was sentenced to lifelong imprisonment, but in March 1621 his wife helped him to escape from the state prison, established in Loevestein Castle, by hiding him in a  book chest. He found refuge in Paris, where he led the life of  a  disgruntled exile until 1635, when his appointment as Swedish ambassador at the French court brought him a  conspicuous improvement of   his social status. During this period he carefully held Heinsius at  bay, although the latter made several attempts to restore the relationship with his old friend.6 These attempts attracted the attention of   many scholars who relished any news on the intricate interplay between such distinguished luminaries of   the Republic of   Letters, the more so because it was generally assumed that Heinsius’s only son Nicolas, whose astonishing precocity matched that of  Grotius himself, was the ideal intermediary. On 26 August 1636 Grotius’s brother Willem de Groot, a former student of  Daniel Heinsius, reported on a meeting he had had with Heinsius senior. The Leiden professor talked at length about Grotius (“multa de te verba fecit”) and proposed to send his son Nicolas to France, with a letter for Grotius that was meant to rekindle their friendship. Bent on breaking the ice, Daniel furthermore referred to the forthcoming publication of  his poems, in which he intended to include a piece on Grotius’s escape from Loevestein Castle. During his conversation with Willem, Heinsius also com  See respectively Hesiodi Ascraei quae extant (Leiden, ex officina Plantiniana Raphelengii, 1603), f. d5r; (Leiden, ex officina I. Patii, iurati et ordinarii Academiae typographi. Prostant in bibliopolio Commeliniano, 1613), f. ):( ):( 7r and (Leiden, ex officina I. Patii, 1622), f. **7r. 5  P. C. Molhuysen et al. (ed.), Briefwisseling van Hugo Grotius, 17 vols (The Hague, 1928-2001) (hereafter BW), vol. 7, no. 2879, quoted in A. Eyffinger, Inventory of   the Poetry of  Hugo Grotius (Assen, 1982), xxxvi. 6 H.  Nellen, Hugo Grotius. A  Lifelong Struggle for Peace in Church and State, 1583-1645 (Leiden, 2014), 412-415 and 506-514. See also BW 3.1156. 4

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plained that, living in these troubled times, he expected a  negative reception of  his voluminous exegetical study Exercitationes ad Novum Testamentum, for example on the part of   the theologians whom the States General had commissioned to prepare an integral translation of   the Bible, later called the “Staten-Bijbel”.7 In his answer to this letter Grotius showed himself  reluctant to bridge the gap and make peace with Heinsius, although he insisted that he was not ill-disposed towards him. If  he could be of  any service to his son Nicolas, he declared himself  ready to act. While he was also steadily working on an extensive commentary on the New Testament, he longed to study Heinsius’s Exercitationes, an impressive folio that eventually saw the light in 1639. As Grotius confided to Willem, he was afraid that Heinsius would encounter in his archenemy Claude de Saumaise an accomplished adversary.8 In his desire to restore his broken relationship with Grotius, Heinsius grasped every opportunity to enforce a  reconciliation. Acting as a go-between, Willem de Groot informed Hugo in several letters of  August and September 1637 that Heinsius had even decided to entrust a Leiden student, Henricus van Bommel, with a  letter of   recommendation, addressed to Grotius.9 Before long, other overtures followed. On 25 April 1638 Willem de Groot sent his brother a letter that accompanied two portraits of  Grotius by Michiel Janszoon van Mierevelt, together with a  parcel of  books. Amongst these were Joost van den Vondel’s Gijsbreght van Aemstel, a  drama dedicated to Grotius, and Franciscus Junius’s De pictura veterum, as well as the first edition of  poems by Nicolas Hein­ sius, Breda expugnata. Accedunt epigrammata aliquot eodem autore (Lugd[uni] Batavorum: Ex officina Elzeviriana, 1637).10 Replying to Willem’s letter Grotius again demonstrated his unwillingness to reconnect with Heinsius. On the other hand, he praised Nicolas Heinsius’s poem on the capture of  Breda, saying that it contained much of   the paternal fire: “Heinsii iuvenis poema multum habet ignis paterni”. He  was glad to see that Daniel was blessed   BW 7.2727.   BW 7.2773. 9  BW 8.3205, 3223, 3256, 3277 and 3310. See Album studiosorum, 279, matriculation on 16 August 1636 of “Henricus van Bommel, Borussus Dantiscanus”, age 27, student of  Law. 10  BW 9.3546. Both Gijsbreght van Aemstel and De pictura veterum were printed by the Blaeu company. 7 8

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with such a  spirited son, but he postponed the task of  replying to Heinsius, although he must have realized that it was a  breach of epistolary etiquette to do so. Willem only received a vague promise that Grotius was ready to write an answer as soon as the carrier of   Heinsius’s mail, Hendrik van Bommel, would return from a  visit to  Geneva.11 Unfortunately Van Bommel died during his journey, an unexpected event that must have given some relief  to Grotius, who now definitively abandoned the thought of  addressing Heinsius in a  personal letter, despite the fact that Willem suggested that his brother might engage another intermediary. Grotius’s argument was a  blatant subterfuge: as Heinsius’s letter was a  recommendation for Van Bommel, he did not feel obliged to react because he was accustomed to answer letters of  this kind only via those who conveyed them.12 Grotius’s correspondence contains many more proofs of  his troubled relationship with Heinsius senior. When he discovered that the introductory matter of  his Annotationes in libros Evangeliorum (Amsterdam, apud Joh. et Cornelium Blaeu, 1641) had been adorned with his portrait, an engraving based on a painting by Michiel Janszoon van Mierevelt, he could not conceal his annoyance because it contained in a caption a  laudatory poem, “Depositum caeli”, by Daniel Heinsius, dating from the period when their friendship was still flourishing.13 In the meantime, Heinsius did not stop making delicate offers of  sympathy, mainly through Willem de Groot. Hoping to mend the broken friendship, Willem told his brother that Heinsius recited the verses he had written on Grotius’s famous escape from Loevestein, for everybody who was willing to listen.14 In 1640, after several previous editions, Nicolas Heinsius saw a new edition of his father’s Neo-Latin poems through the press: Danielis Heinsii Poe­ mata auctiora, editore Nicolao Heinsio, Dan[ielis] fil[io], Lugduni Batavor[um], apud Francis[cum] Hegerum, anno MDCXL, with a dedication by Nicolas, dated on 25 September 1640 and addressed to Cornelis van der Myle, son-in-law of  the former secretary of  the States of  Holland, Johan van Oldenbarnevelt: “Redeunt tandem ad te parentis mei poemata, post aliquot editiones denuo excusa.”     13  14  11 12

BW 9.3586. See also 8.3363. BW 10.3958. Nellen 2014 (as in n. 6), 625. BW 8.3110 and Grotius’s answering letter 3151. See also 8.3393 and 9.3405.

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Nicolas Heinsius had taken care of  this edition, because his father, overwhelmed by studies of  another and more austere kind, was unable to do so. The collection contained two epigrams on Grotius, which Heinsius, at least according to Willem de Groot, had not wanted or had refused to publish until now.15 These poems are De Hugone Grotio, ab uxore carceri, in quo ad vitam damnatus erat, erepto, and In arcam libris onustam, qua servatus est Grotius, printed in the aforementioned Danielis Heinsii Poemata auctiora, 291, and in Danielis Heinsii Poemata Graeca et e Graecis Latine reddita, diverso tempore ac aetate conscripta (Lugd[uni] Bat[avorum], ex officina Francisci Hegeri, 1640), 110. How far Heinsius went in flattering his old friend becomes clear in the first of   these poems: it can be read as an exalted celebration of   Grotius, who thanks to his wife Maria van Reigersberch managed to regain freedom after a  gruesome detention. Heinsius permitted himself  a  distich in which he addressed the authorities in Holland and asked them to relieve Grotius from the burden they had laid on his shoulders by convicting him to a life-long detention: At vos, o proceres, iam poenam mittite et iras, sub vobis pereat ne pietatis amor.

Heinsius praised Maria as the “uxor Turia”, mentioned in Valerius Maximus, Facta et dicta memorabilia 6.7.2, who saved her husband, Q . Lucretius Vespillo, from the hardship of  exile by hiding him in her bedroom above the rafters (“inter cameram et tectum cubiculi”), with the assistance of  a housemaid, a cooperation in antiquity that evoked the help Maria received from her maid Elsje van Houweningen. Despite the efforts of  Heinsius father and son, a reconciliation did not materialize. On 28 August 1645, Grotius died on his return from Stockholm, where he had offered and received his resignation as ambassador of   the Swedish crown. Nicolas Heinsius would never meet Grotius, whom he had come to admire more and more in the course of years. When the rumor of Grotius’s sudden death in Rostock spread over Europe, Nicolas pointed out to his close friend Isaac Vossius how deeply he regretted that he had never met this undisputedly supreme scholar in person. In the years 1643  BW 11.4870.

15

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1644 Isaac Vossius had served as a secretary of  ambassador Grotius in Paris.16 As Vossius had conversed with Grotius on a daily basis, Heinsius expected his words to fall on fertile soil: Sed Deus bone! Q uantum in illustri Grotio amisit respublica literaria! Q uantum privatim tu! Summo enim affectu te complectebatur, quantum hic intelligo. Mihi quidem nihil nunc molestius est quam quod virum sine controversia maximum nunquam allocutus sim, nunquam viderim. Vobis illius amicis ac familiaribus incumbit ne tacito, quod aiunt,17 funere efferatur, memoriam eius posteritati commendare.18

Heinsius’s journey through France and Italy On 19 September 1645 Heinsius boarded a  ship in Rotterdam. Via Dieppe he arrived in Paris on 28 September. He stayed in the French capital until the end of  April 1646, long enough to foster cordial contacts with many Parisian intellectuals, among them Pierre and Jacques Dupuy, Claude Sarrau, Jean Chapelain (with whom he was to conduct an intensive and regular correspondence for many years), and Gilles Ménage. The name “Heinsius” opened many a door to the young traveler, but at the same time he had to carry a  heavy burden on his shoulders: the reverberations of   the controversies in which his father Daniel was constantly engaged. He assiduously tried to prevent his becoming involved in the famous quarrels that opposed Daniel Heinsius to the literary hotshot Jean-Louis Guez de Balzac and to the even more irritable polymath Claude de Saumaise.19 Nicolas Heinsius visited scholars, attended the meetings of   the Cabinet Dupuy and worked on manuscripts of   Ovid and Claudian. Well aware of   the importance of  self-fashioning, he also published in the beginning of  1646 a small booklet, the Elegiarum liber. Accedunt varia diversi argumenti poe-

16  F. F. Blok, Isaac Vossius en zijn kring. Zijn leven tot zijn afscheid van koningin Christina van Zweden, 1618-1655 (Groningen, 1999), 179-199. 17  Cf. Ov. Trist. 1.3.22 and 5.1.14; Sen. Tranq. 1.13. 18   Amsterdam, University Library (UL), ms. III E 8, f. 85, Nicolas Heinsius to Isaac Vossius, 28 October 1645. According to Blok 1949 (as in n. 2), 29, n. 4, a version of  this letter is also preserved in Leiden, UL, ms. Br. F 11, I, f. 37. 19 H. Bots, Correspondance de Jacques Dupuy et Nicolas Heinsius (1646-1656) (hereafter Correspondance) (The Hague, 1971), xxxvi-xl.

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matia, eodem auctore,20 in which he confirmed his relationship with important patrons like Charles de Sainte-Maure, marquis de Montausier, the dedicatee of   the volume, and Guez de Balzac, whom he addressed in a poem of  26 lines.21 At the end of  April Nicolas Heinsius left Paris for Lyon, where he joined up with his compatriot Jan Reynst, a merchant and art collector, since 1625 settled in Venice. But illness kept the traveler from pursuing his plans and it was only on 18 July 1646 that he  arrived in Florence. Nonetheless he assiduously visited the libraries of  San Marco and the Laurenziana. At the end of  October he travelled on to Rome, where he established personal contacts with Christophe Dupuy, prior of   the Carthusian order (“prieur de la chartreuse de Rome”) and Lucas Holstenius, librarian of  cardinal Francesco Barberini and the Vatican.22 With both of   them he exchanged letters in a  more or less regular correspondence later on. Holstenius’s assistance was crucial for getting access to the Vatican and the Barberini libraries in Rome and other libraries elsewhere in Italy, for example in Naples, the next stop on Heinsius’s Italian journey. In mid-April 1647 he departed from Rome to go to  Naples. On  12  June 1647 he wrote a  letter to Jacques Dupuy, in which he described the city as a dull and lifeless place: “Haec [...] urbs, prae caeteris, torporis et oscitantiae mater, quam ipsis olim antiquis otiosam appellatam non nescis.” 23 This quietness of Naples was not to last for long, however, because a popular revolt led by Tommaso Aniello (Masaniello) compelled the Dutch scholar to leave the city head over heels. On 30 July he boarded a  ship that took him to  Livorno. In  a  letter to Jacques Dupuy he described the panic in Naples in a  way that makes it easy to understand why Heinsius’s letters were a  treat for every reader. In a neat handwriting and in carefully polished, but easily understandable Latin he offered a lively report of  an event that will have been circulated and read aloud in the circle of  its recipient, in this 20  Parisiis, apud viduam Ioannis Camusat et Petrum le Petit; copy in The Hague, Royal Library, shelf  number KW 852 D 3 [1]. 21  Bots, Correspondance, xl, referring to Elegiarum liber, 52-53. 22  P. Fuchs, “Holste, Lukas”, in Neue Deutsche Biographie, vol. 9 (Berlin, 1972), 548-550, and P. Rietbergen, Power and Religion in Baroque Rome: Barberini Cultural Policies (Leiden, 2006), 256-295. 23 Cf.  Hor.  Epod. 5.43 and F.  F. Blok, “Nicolaas Heinsius in Napels (april-juli 1647)”, Verhandelingen der Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, Afd. Letterkunde, Nieuwe Reeks, Deel 125 (Amsterdam, 1984), 18, n. 83.

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case the scholars who frequented the Cabinet Dupuy.24 Another example of  his epistolary art is a beautiful letter in which he depicts in a quite unrestrained and disparaging way the behaviour of   the German-Italian scholar Caspar Scioppius. Never did nature engender a  more filthy slanderer and trouble-seeker, unless it were the arch antagonist of  his father, Claude de Saumaise. Heinsius left this tricky matter for Dupuy to decide.25 It comes as no surprise that Christophe Dupuy forwarded Heinsius’s letters to Paris, in order to share the pleasure of  reading these epistolary masterpieces with his brothers Pierre and Jacques and their companions. Jacques Dupuy felt obliged for the elegant description of  Sciop­ pius’s manners 26 and will undoubtedly have cited Heinsius’s attack in a  meeting of   the Cabinet. Heinsius stayed in Italy for more than a year and visited cities like Florence, Venice, Padua, Mantua, Verona, and Brescia. Via Genoa and Paris he returned home, after acquiring a  doctoral degree in law at the University of  Caen on 5 October 1648.27 At the end of  October Heinsius was back in Holland again. This account of Heinsius’s travels only serves to establish a frame for a poem that will be edited and translated in the next part of this contribution. Heinsius added the poem as an appendix to a letter he addressed to Isaac Vossius on 29 April 1648. At that moment he  was staying in Milan.28 In the text of  this interesting letter Heinsius refers to famous scholars like Erasmus, Hadrianus Junius and Janus Secundus (“Erasmus ille, Iunius, Secundus”), who all of  them had to face an adverse fortune. He then continues by asserting that the people of   Holland had recently witnessed another example in Grotius: “Nuperum in magno Grotio exemplum habemus.” As  Heinsius made clear, it was the pervasive disregard for his famous compatriot that caused him to write his poem.29 The context of   the letter needs some explication. In the wake of  many other

 Bots, Correspondance, 20-22, sent from Venice, on 10 October 1647.  Bots, Correspondance, 26-29, sent from Padua, on 31 December 1647. 26  Bots, Correspondance, 31, in a letter dated on 4 February 1648. 27  See W. Frijhoff, “Un chemin de traverse du grand tour: gradués néerlandais en droit à l’Université de Caen au XVIIe siècle”, Lias 34.1 (2007), 59-136, here 91, nr. 69. 28  Amsterdam, UL, ms.  III E 8, f.  174a-b, Nicolas Heinsius to Isaac Vossius, a.d. III Kal. Maias MDCXL(VIII). 29  See also Blok 1999 (as in n. 16), 233, notes 75 and 76. 24 25

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northern representatives of  Late Humanism Heinsius espoused a  negative view of  contemporary scholarly culture that tended to neglect the classics, especially the painstaking collation of  manuscripts in which authors like Ovid had been transmitted. During his travels through Italy he repeatedly signaled the low level of  scholarship and the few protagonists who tried to keep the torch burning. Every now and then the cultural decay reminded Heinsius of   the glorious past when Rome was the center of   the world. In general, the emendation of poorly transmitted authors like Ovid did not bring the editors any gain. This feeling of  being neglected erupts also in an earlier letter addressed by Heinsius to Isaac Vossius on 11 December 1647. He remarks that as yet, during his travels through France and Italy, he had spent most of  his time collating manuscripts of  Ovid and Claudian, but only with meager results. He also refers to the collection of  elegies written during his stay in Italy, which he delivered to the Paduan printer Giulio Crivellari at the end of  1647.30 As the title reads, Italia: Elegiarum liber. Ad illustrissimum virum Cassianum a Puteo. Accedunt alia (Patavii, typis Cribellianis, sup[eriorum] per[missu], 1648), he dedicated the volume to his friend Cassiano dal Pozzo, although he was well aware that this tribute would infuriate his compatriots. To be sure, Dal Pozzo was a Roman Catholic, but the difference in religion did not withhold him from repaying favours with favours. In  Dal Pozzo he had experienced more elegance of  manners (“humanitas”) than in those petty-minded “Catones” who held sway in Holland, for the greatest part rude and ignorant creatures, “animalia magnam partem rustica et ignara rerum omnium”. Heinsius concluded his diatribe with an apology: the recent demise of another good friend, Giovanni Battista Doni, had saddened him to the extent that he allowed himself  to utter his inner thoughts.31 Heinsius did not meet with much acclaim from the authorities and projected his resentment on a much admired, but at the same time incriminated compatriot, Hugo Grotius. For Heinsius, Grotius was an exemplary scholar whose work did not reap the success it deserved. A similar dissatisfaction with the animosity Grotius’s reputation still evoked among his fellow countrymen comes to  Bots, Correspondance, 26.   Amsterdam, UL, ms. III E 8, f. 146.

30 31

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the surface in the dozen-odd lines Heinsius devoted much later to Grotius in another elegy, addressed to the French magistrate and diplomat Jacques-Auguste de Thou, dated 1659 and first published as a  dedicatory poem in Operum  P. Ovidii Nasonis editio nova. Nic.  Heinsius Dan[ielis] fil[ius] recensuit ac notas addidit: “Tu quoque dura minus, mea patria, vatibus esses […].” 32 The praise Heinsius poured on Grotius in this elegy reminds the reader of   the aforementioned poem Depositum caeli that his father once wrote to honour his friend.

Heinsius’s poem Q ui legis aeternos… In his somewhat enigmatic elegy given below Heinsius addresses the visitor to Grotius’s tomb in the Nieuwe Kerk in Delft, expressing his admiration for the famous Dutchman in a  hyperbolical way. Grotius has earned himself  immortality through his writings. Gods cannot die, so the city of  Delft should not claim to have the grave of  an Apollo. Latin version o e1

e2 e3

Amsterdam, UL, ms.  III E 8, f.  174b, autograph, added to a letter of  29 April 1648 Nicolai Heinsii Dan[ielis] fil[ii] Poemata. Accedunt Ioannis Rutgersii quae quidem colligi potuerunt (Lugd[uni] Batav[orum], ex officina Elseviriorum Academ[iae] typograph[orum], 1653), 118-119 Nicolai Heinsii Dan[ielis] fil[ii] Poematum nova editio, prioribus longe auctior. Accedunt Iohannis Rutgersii Postuma [...] (Amstelodami, apud Danielem Elzevirium, 1666), 197-198 Caspar Brandt and Adriaan van Cattenburgh, Historie van het leven des heeren Huig de Groot, vol. 2 (Dordrecht – Amsterdam, 1727), 450-451.

32  Amstelodami, ex officina Elzeviriana, a[nn]o 1661, ff. *2-*5, here *5r, also printed in Nicolai Heinsii Dan[ielis] fil[ii] Poematum nova editio (Amstelodami, apud Danielem Elzevirium, 1666), 95-100 (99): Elegiarum liber IV.2; and elsewhere, for example in Hugo Grotius, Opera omnia theologica, in tres tomos divisa […] (Amstelaedami, apud heredes Ioannis Blaeu, 1679), vol.  1, introductory matter. Heinsius draws a parallel between Ovid and Grotius, who both had to cope with the hardship of  a life in exile.

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Viro Maximo Hugoni Grotio, Delphis Batavis in patria sepulto Q ui legis aeternos hoc condi marmore Manes, et non mortali iusta soluta rogo: ne, quaeso, ne crede. Fidem lapis ipse recusat. Crimina quid, quo iam progrediantur, habent? Aut quid, quo penetrent, mendacia, muta sepultos 5 marmora mentiri cum liquet ausa Deos. Creta dedit tumulum, cunabula Creta Tonanti. Creta docet nasci numina, Creta mori. Scilicet hæc fingant audacter, ut omnia, Graeci: at patriae cuperem non imitanda meae. 10 Gens ob candorem memorata vel hostibus ipsis, fallere vos priscam, turba Batava, fidem? Nec satis est cunas ostendere; pergitis ultra. Iactat Apollineos Delphica terra rogos. t Delphis  […] sepulto] Delphis Batavis in civitate patria sepulto e3 | 1 Q ui  […] Manes] Q ui legis aeternos hac mole quiescere Manes e1; Q ui magnos hac mole legis requiescere Manes e2 e3  |  3 Fidem […] recusat] Fides in marmore nusquam e1; Fides in marmore nulla est e2 e3 | 6 Marmora […] liquet] Saxa cavillari si liquet e1 e2 e3 2 “Iusta soluta”: Ov. Fast. 5.452; Cic. Rosc. Am. 23 | 2 “Mortali […] rogo”: cf. Joseph of  Exeter (Josephus Iscanus), De bello Troiano 6.465 | 5-6 “Muta  […] Marmora”: cf. Prud. Perist. 11.9-10. The current monument erected in Grotius’s honour dates from 1781. Originally his grave was situated elsewhere in the Nieuwe Kerk. The text on the original tombstone (if  there was one) is  not known. Cf.  Nellen 2014 (as in n. 6), 734, n. 58 | 7 “Creta […] Tonanti”: Heinsius’s poem reminds of Lucan., Phars. 8.869-872 on Pompeius’s grave in Egypt: “[…] Veniet felicior aetas, / qua sit nulla fides saxum monstrantibus illud; / atque erit Aegyptus populis fortasse nepotum  / tam mendax Magni tumulo quam Creta Tonantis”. See also Ov.  Ars 1.297, Paul Tit. 1.12 and Erasmus, Adagia, 129: “Cretiza cum Cretensi”: The ancient Cretans were accused of being liars, because they boasted that Jupiter’s tomb was to be found on their island. Note the chiasmus in lines 7-8, taken up again in lines 13-14  | 8 “Creta […] mori”: cf. Lucan. Phars. 8.458-459: “[…] Si numina nasci / credimus aut quemquam fas est coepisse deorum” | 9  “Scilicet  […] Graeci”: cf.  Ov.  Am. 3.10.19: “Cretes erunt testes – nec fingunt omnia Cretes” | 14 “Apollineos […] rogos”: by calling Grotius a (second) Apollo, Heinsius pays tribute to Grotius’s poetical works, but also to his legal writings (Apollo as the god of  harmony)

English translation Dedicated to an exceptional man, Hugo Grotius, buried in his home town, Delft in Holland When you read that this marble stone is harbouring eternal remains and that due tribute has been paid to non-mortal ashes, do not, I beg you, do not believe it. The stone itself  refuses to do so. Why is it that slander is still spreading or lies are still penetrating, while it is clear that mute marbles have dared to lie that gods have been buried?

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Crete has provided a  grave for the god of  thunder and Crete has provided a cradle for him; Crete teaches that gods are born and that they die. Well, let the Greeks boldly make up such fibs, as they do with every­ thing. But I would have wished that such practices were not to be imitated by my homeland. You, a nation praised for its honesty even by its enemies, are you, Batavian crowd, betraying that pristine candour? It is not enough to show a cradle; you go even further: the earth of  Delft boasts that it is holding the ashes of  an Apollo.

10

Appendix Amsterdam, UL, ms.  III E 8, f.  174a, autograph letter, Nicolas Heinsius to Isaac Vossius, Milan, 29 April 1648.33 V[iro] C[larissimo] Isaaco Vossio suo Nic[olaus] Heinsius s[alutem dicit]. Augur optimus fuisti, nec frustra metuebas mihi, Vir Clarissime. Paucis ante Bacchanalia diebus cum Venetias Patavio me contulissem, hospitium selegi quod a Germanorum et nostratium confluxu omnium tutissimum fore arbitrabar, quo meus essem studiisque diligentius incumberem. Sed fefellit me expectatio. Vix enim Bacchanaliorum auspicia, cum undique spectandi studio confluxere transalpini, tanto quidem numero, ut locus in diversoriis publicis non superesset. Tardiuscule aliquot ex popularibus meis advenerant, qui dum urbem totam perambulant quaerendo cubiculo intenti, ex nescio quo intelligunt Venetiis me esse, simulque locum docentur in quo habitarem. Concurrere igitur ad me certatim, ac obsecrare de cubiculis sibi prospicerem, quae duo necdum in ea domo occupata erant. Feci quod volebant, excepti eo hospitio sunt. Sed cum mox quererentur minus sibi commoda cubicula sua videri, meum selegerunt, frustra me renitente, in quo pranderent ac coenarent. Q uid quaeris? Compotationibus comessationibusque dies continui fallebantur. Etsi autem frequenter elaberer, amicos invisendos esse causatus, haerebant tamen illi in eo 34 cubiculo, quod incommodum mihi erat, cum chartae meae omnes paterent pervolverenturque a  nimium curiosis, et quod rei caput est, parum literatis. Erat in eodem hospitio Benedictus Mariottus,35

33   Heinsius wrote this letter in reply to a long letter by Vossius, dated 12 March 1648. See Burman, Sylloge 3, 575-577. 34  eo: meo before Heinsius’s correction? 35  Benedetto Mariotti came from Citerna (Umbria) and lived in Treviso. According to Isaac Vossius, he prepared a refutation of  Paolo Sarpi’s Istoria del concilio tri-

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phoniscus ille suscitabulumque compotantium,36 qui ex insanis insaniores reddebat. Accedebat huic alterum incommodum. Prandia quotidiana ex ostreis ferme solis conficiebantur; quae difficillimae digestionis esse non ignoras. Meo quidem stomacho obesse plurimum expertus sum aliquoties. Sensi statim in peius vergere valetudinem, Pataviumque cum venissem,37 parce in dies multos cibo usus sum, ita praeveniri morbum posse ratus, sed omnia frustra. Pridie illius diei, qua Mediolanum discessurus eram, febricula tentatus sum. Rogavi igitur itineris comites, ut iter in dies paucos differrent, sed cum nil remitteret adversa valetudo, gratiam iis huius morae feci, ultroque ut discederent rogavi. Morbus ipse, etsi cum periculo non coniunctus, nec vehemens admodum, mensem tamen totum mihi perdidit. Vix restitutis viribus iter resumpsi, salvusque ante dies decem Mediolanum adveni. Festinabo quantum potero ut mense proximo in Gallias perveniam. In Ambrosiana codices satis multos Ovidianos inveni. Unum eorum alterumque iam evolvi, et bonos deprehendi. Spero plures eius notae se mihi oblaturos. Cl[arissimus] Ferrarius tui mentionem honorificam admodum ac peramicam aliquoties iniecit.38 Etiam P[ater] Sfondratus,39 qui Romam habitatum concessit ante dies paucos. Sparsus erat a Iansonii typographi filio 40 de morte tua rumor, quem ego dolorem fausto de secunda prosperaque valetudine tua nuncio optimorum virorum animis exemi. Poematia mea placuisse tibi 41 vehementer laetor. Tantum enim curatissimo iudicio tuo a  me defertur, ut alium inter nostrates vix noverim, cui probari malim, quam tibi. Italorum quoque benignissima iudicia expertus sum: ut superbus arrogansque merito videri dentino. See Burman, Sylloge 3, 548; G. L. Bruzzone, “Lettere di Benedetto Mariotti al p. Angelico Agrosio, 1646-1655”, Bollettino della Deputazione di Storia patria per l’Umbria, 103.2 (2006), 69-104 (not consulted). 36  Hadrianus Junius (ed.), Nonius Marcellus, De proprietate sermonum (Antverpiae, ex officina Christophori Plantini, 1565), 204: “Phonascus adsum (instead of: Fonicia sunt) vocis suscitabulum / cantantiumque gallus gallinaceus.” Cf. R. Astbury (ed.), Varro, Saturarum Menippearum fragmenta (Leipzig, 2002), 59, no. 348: “Phonascia sum, vocis suscitabulum/cantantiumque gallus gallinaceus.” 37  See for Heinsius’s stay in Padua Bots, Correspondance, letters 9, 10 and 13, sent from Padua on 10 and 31 December 1647, and 31 March 1648. 38   Francesco Bernardino Ferrari, praefectus of   the Ambrosiana in Milan. Cf. Burman, Sylloge 3, 199, Heinsius to Gronovius, 29 April (a.d. III Kal. Maias) 1648. 39  Father Sfondrati, member of   the Order of   the Theatines (“ordinis Theatini”), in all probability Pietro (“Fra Paolo”) Sfondrati (1602-1654). He was one of   the “viri literati” Heinsius met in Milan (Burman, Sylloge 3, 314 and 564, and 5, 453 and 542). 40  Probably a son of   the Amsterdam publisher and bookseller Johannes Janssonius, Jodocus Janssonius (1613-1655) or Jan Janssen Brouwer de Jonge (1619-1659). 41  Heinsius felt indebted to his pen friend for the praise he had bestowed on the Italia: Elegiarum liber (Padua, 1648), a collection that became available around mid-January 1648. See F. F. Blok, “Nicolaas Heinsius in Napels (april-juli 1647)”, 15.

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possim, si in medium epistolas ac carmina proferam quae in honorem meum scripserunt non e  plebe literati, sed maximi illustrissimique viri. Eant nunc nostrates et appellent Italos malignos transalpinorum ingeniorum aestimatores, cum ipsi revera maligne sese gerant contra 42 popularium suorum 43 ingenia. Nolo nunc recensere quacum calamitate Erasmus ille, Iunius, Secundus, alii sint conflictati, nuperum in magno Grotio exemplum habemus, cuius ego viri manibus hoc epigramma dedi nuperrime, quod hic vides. Ego quoque, mi Vossi, etsi tantis cum viris nullo modo comparandus, ingratissimus tamen 44 sim si diffitear plus humanitatis quolibet huius peregrinationis die in Italia me expertum, quam inter Batavos toto quod vixi tempore. Haec vera praedicantem de candore Italorum invitis auribus, sat scio, audient Zoili isti nostri.45 Audient tamen si reducem me vobis Deus aliquando sistat. Nec de te dubitare debes, quin foris maior tua fama sit, praesertim in his oris quam domi.46 Sed de his iam satis. Campanius iste, cuius meministi, quis sit nescio, nec de eius intestabili captivitate quicquam intellexeram.47 Datium adhortari non desino, ut Donianas inscriptiones quamprimum luci committat.48 Sed languere videtur. Habes hic ab eo literas quas nudius tertius accepi. Ab Holstenio 49 binas nuper habui, in

42  erga before Heinsius’s correction. According to Vossius, Heinsius had proven wrong those Parisian criticasters who assumed that all Dutch Neo-Latin poetry smelled of  beer. 43  ipsorum before Heinsius’s correction. 44   tamen above the line. 45  Zoïlus, Greek grammarian (fourth cent. bc), narrow-minded critic of  Homer; hence nicknamed Homeromastix (Homer whipper). 46  Similar depreciating remarks on his compatriots in the letter to Gronovius cited above: “Italiam nisi amem ac observem, ingratissimus profecto essem, quae eo cum adplausu versus meos exceperit, ut non exspectationem meam sed et vota ipsa superavit. At inter aures Batavas vix unam alteramque futuram video quibus nugas meas probaturus sim. Adeo Midarum illic plena sunt omnia” (Burman, Sylloge 3, 199, Heinsius to Gronovius, 29 April [a.d. III Kal. Maias] 1648). 47  See Vossius’s letter for more detailed information on Campanius, a wigmaker who ended up as a  eunuch in Constantinople: “Verum nonne etiam elegia aliqua celebrasti iacturam nobilis istius capillorum structoris Campanii, nuper admodum in finibus Venetorum a Turcis capti, et inter regia regis Byzantini scorta emancipati, ut et officio esset Gallus, qui Gallus esset natalibus? Tumulum certe et epitaphium merentur partes illae, quibus olim, ut audio, multum valebat. Norunt hoc principes Galliae matronae, norunt Polonicae; et etiam nunc, postquam ipse non unam ob causam factus est intestabilis, si velint, poterunt testari.” 48 See Io.  Baptistae Donii  […] Inscriptiones antiquae nunc primum editae  […] ab Antonio Francesco Gorio (Florentiae, ex regia typographia Magni Ducis Etruriae, 1731), xiv: Heinsius had explained in a letter, dated 13 January 1647 (Id. Ian. anno MDCXLVII) that he was ready to take care of   the edition of   the inscriptions collected by Giovanni Battista Doni (1595-1647). “Datius” is the Florentine scholar Carlo Dati (1619-1676). 49   Lucas Holstenius (Holste), custos of  the Vatican Library.

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prioribus se prolixe excusat, quod ab urbe absens tanto tempore nihil ad me literarum dederit, negatque sua evenisse culpa, quod Alexiade promissa fraudatus sit Gronovius. Misi epistolae eius particulam ad Gronovium petiique a sororio meo 50 ut eam tibi exhiberet.51 Id fecisse eum confido. In posterioribus idem spem facit Holstenius observationum Ciofani quarundam in Ovidium,52 quae necdum editae Sulmone apud Franciscanos serventur. Easque se describendas curaturum pollicetur. Boxhornius 53 quid agat nescio, cum toto peregrinationis tempore nihil ad me scripserit, etsi discedenti iuramento prae­ stito se scripturum affirmaret. Valeat igitur cum caeteris mei oblitis. Habes hic geminas ad Gronovium, quarum alterae illustrissimi Lau­ redani 54 sunt. Habes et ad Smithium,55 quas ut quamprimum cures vehemen(te)r rogo. Non exhiberem tibi hanc molestiam nisi suspicarer sororium (m)eum domo abesse cum et ille iampridem nihil scribat. Vale et me ama. Mediolani, a.d. III Kal. Maias MDCXL(VIII).56

  Willem van der Goes, married to Heinsius’s only sister Elisabeth.   Many letters in Burman, Sylloge, go into the vicissitudes around the edition of  the ancient Greek physician Alexias, a project of  the philologist Johannes Fredericus Gronovius. Here Heinsius refers to the letter he addressed to Gronovius on 15 February (XV Kal. Mart.) 1648 (Burman, Sylloge 3, 195-196). See for Holstenius’s letters, dated 5 and 28 February 1648, Burman, Sylloge 5, 433-434. 52  Hercules Ciofanus (Ercole Ciofani) from Sulmona, sixteenth-century commentator on Ovid. 53   Marcus Zuerius Boxhornius, professor of  eloquence and political science at Leiden University, and in 1648 successor to Daniel Heinsius as professor of  history. 54  Giovanni Francesco Loredan(o), Venetian politician and writer, founder of  the Accademia degli Incogniti. 55  Johannes Smithius or Smetius, Dutch minister, antiquarian and collector of  Roman artifacts. 56  The paper is damaged here, which makes the year illegible. Vossius replied in a letter dated 29 June (III Kal. Q uint.) 1648. See Burman, Sylloge 3, 577-578. 50 51

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AUTUMN 1643 – A SMOOTH SHIFT OF  GENERATIONS? POEMS BY CASPAR BARLAEUS AND CASPAR KINSCHOTIUS ON A PORTRAIT OF  JACOBUS MAESTERTIUS

The manuscript section of   the Bibliotheca Schepperiana Mechliniensis cherishes a leaf  with an autograph poem by Caspar Barlaeus (1584-1648).1 In effigiem clarissimi viri, domini Jacobi Maestertii, iurisconsulti et professoris in illustri Batavorum Academia Abstulerat, Cunaee,2 tuo de vertice crinem 3 Atropos, et fama grande cadaver eras: cum mediis Batavum stupuit Facundia templis,4 et Themis orba suo praeside muta stetit. 1  On the Bibliotheca Schepperiana Mechliniensis (henceforward BSM) see M. de Schepper, “Hugeniana Schepperiana”, in J.  Bos, M.  van Delft et alii (ed.), Een oud Boeck is oud Goud. Studies over bijzondere werken bij het afscheid van Ad Leerintveld als conservator moderne handschriften van de Koninklijke Bibliotheek (Den Haag  – Amsterdam, 2017), 227-237. The leaf  was acquired in November 2014 from Kotte Autographs (Rosshaupten, Germany), Katalog 50 (Autographs and manuscripts), 13, no. 36. It was presented as an “Albumblatt” in “Q u.-gr.-8vo”. The presence of  a title and the absence of   the typical presentation formula of  an album leaf  rather indicate that it is not a leaf  from an album amicorum, but a manuscript leaf  sui generis. In spite of  being cut to oblong size (c. 14.5 × 19 cm), the chain lines and the partial presence of  a watermark indicate that it is the upper half  of  a folio-size leaf. Hardly anything is  known of  its provenance. The recto side has at its bottom the name “Barlaeus C. L[amberti]” in pencil and in the right bottom corner the penned number “15”, probably its place in an album of  autographs. The verso side shows remains of  an album’s stub, as well as an anonymous 19th-century collector’s pink ink note with a date (“19. April 1882 erh[alten]”). 2  Petrus Cunaeus (1586-1638), Maestertius’s predecessor: see n. 10. 3 Verg. Aen. 4.698-699 “Proserpina vertice crinem abstulerat.” 4  Caspar Barlaeus, In obitum clarissimi viri, et mathematici incomparabilis, Willebrordi Snellii (final line), in Casparis Barlaei Poematum editio nova, priore casti­ gatior et altera parte auctior (Lugduni Batavorum [Leiden], ex officina Elzeviriana, Anno 1631 [USTC 1027985]), 229-232, at 232: “In Batavis longo stupuit Facundia luctu.”

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 327-335 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124067

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Omnia, Maesterti, reddis, linguamque decusque 5 et simili Belgis incipis ore loqui.5 Fit levior iactura 6 viri, dum vultibus istis Cunaeum tentat condere Leida novum. Caspar Barlaeus

Fig. 1 Autograph manuscript of  C. Barlaeus’s poem (private collection)

This poem appears to be unpublished, and no engraved portrait has been found with these verses accompanying a portrait of  Maester  Cornelius Schonaeus, In Polycantharum, carmen iocosum. Elegia II (l.  16), in Cornelii Schonaei Goudani gymnasiarchae Harlemensis Sacrae comoediae sex nempe Tobaeus, Nehemias, Saulus, Naaman, Iosephus, Iuditha, exacte diligenterque emendatae atque recognitae. Eiusdem Pseudostratiotae fabula iocosa et ludicra, Elegiarum liber I, Epigrammatum liber I (Harlemi, ex officina Aegidii Romanni, anno 1592 [USTC 423107]) 398-402, at 399: “Incipis Argolico cultius ore loqui”; Constantijn Huygens, “Coram rege Britanniae cithara canturus” (l. 7), in Constantini Hugenii, equitis, Otiorum libri sex. Poemata varii sermonis, stili, argumenti (Hagae-Comitis [Den Haag], Typis Arnoldi Meuris, 1625 [USTC 1031902]), 126, and in T.  L.  ter Meer (ed.), Constantijn Huygens. Latijnse gedichten 1607-1620 (Den Haag, 2004), 192 (text) and 345-346 (notes): “Cui tamen ore loqui Batavo datur, ille Britannos / desperet faciles in sua verba deos?” 6  Fit levior iactura: Petr. Sat. 14 “placuit ut pretium maioris compendii leviorem faceret iacturam”; Erasmus, Lingua (= Opera omnia, vol. 4.1 [Amsterdam, etc., 1980], l.  350-351): “Q uoniam autem famae iactura levior habetur quam pecuniae  […]”; and the proverbial inscription on sundials “Levior est rerum quam temporis iactura.” 5

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tius.7 The only engraved portrait of  Maestertius with a poem is the one engraved by Jonas Suyderhoef(f) (Haarlem c. 1608/1613-1686) after a painting (or drawing) by Nicolaes C. van Negre (Sint-Amands c. 1610 – Leiden c. 1663; active Leiden 1642-1663). Five states are recorded of this engraving: published by (a) Jacob Lauwyck (Leiden), (b) Clement de Jonghe (Brunsbüttel, 1624/1625 – Amsterdam, 1677), (c) Cornelis Danckerts van Sevenhoven (Amsterdam, 16041656; active in Leiden), (d) Dancker Danckerts (Amsterdam, 16341666), (e) Carel Allard (Amsterdam, 1648-1709).8

Fig. 2 Engraved portrait of  J. Maestertius by J. Suyderhoef  (Collectie Universitaire Bibliotheken Leiden)

7  It is not included in the various editions (1645-1646, 1655, 1689) of  Barlaeus’s Poemata, nor in the online Leiden bibliography (with links to electronic editions) of  Barlaeus by A. (Ton) Harmsen at http://www.let.leidenuniv.nl/Dutch/Latijn/ BarlaeusBibliografie.html. 8   Portrait of  Jacobus Maestertius, half-length directed to the right, head slightly turned to face the viewer, wearing an embroidered jacket and a flat lace collar. Lettered

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The engraving has only the initial four lines of   the poem by Caspar Kinschotius (1622-1649). The full text was edited by Jacobus Gronovius (1645-1716) in his 1685 edition of  Kinschotius’s Poemata.9 In effigiem Jacobi Maestertii, iuris in Academia Leydensi professoris Q uem docuit sua iura Themis, quem iura docentem Ipsa suo stupuit stamine Diva minor, vultu etiam voluit te non pereunte tueri, Maesterti, Themidos non pereuntis honos. Ut, cum sera dies nostris venit ultima votis 5 dum tuus aeterno vultus in aere manet, dum pia posteritas, pro te dum scripta loquuntur, totus adhuc superes post tua fata tuis. Hagae Kalendis Septembribus MDCXLIII.

According to the poem’s date the original state of   the engraving might have been published in late 1643.

Cunaeus – Barlaeus – Maestertius On 2 December 1638 Petrus Cunaeus (°1586), professor of  (constitutional) law, died in Leiden.10 He was related to Caspar Barlaeus (1584-1648), who called him “cognatus meus”.11 Cunaeus was in lower margin, with four lines of  Latin verses by Caspar Kinschotius. Portrait illustrated from a copy (state a) in the Collectie Universitaire Bibliotheken Leiden. See Hollstein’s Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts ca. 1450-1700, vol. 28 (Amsterdam, 1984), 243, no. 98 (Suyderhoef); F. Laurentius, Clement de Jonghe (ca. 1624-1677). Kunstverkoper in de Gouden Eeuw (Houten, 2010), and J. van der Veen, “Danckerts en Zonen. Prentuitgevers, plaatsnijders en kunstverkopers te Amsterdam, ca.  1625-1700”, in E.  Kolfin, J. van der Veen (ed.), Gedrukt tot Amsterdam. Amsterdamse prentmakers en -uitgevers in de Gouden Eeuw (Zwolle, 2011), 58-119 (esp. 59-68). 9  Casparis Kinschotii Poemata in libros IV. digesta, quorum primus sacra et pia, secundus elegias et eclogas, tertius res gestas, quartus miscellanea continet. Omnia ex chirographo auctoris diligenter inspecto examinatoque edita [by Jacobus Gronovius] (Hagae-Comitis, apud Arnoldum Leers, 1685), 183-184. 10  W. G. Heesakkers-Kamerbeek, “Petrus Cunaeus”, in J. Bloemendal, Ch. Hees­ akkers (ed.), in Biobibliografie van Nederlandse Humanisten. Digital publication of  DWC/Huygens Instituut KNAW (Den Haag, 2009) at https://www.dwc.knaw.nl/ cunaeus-petrus-1586-1638/. 11   Barlaeus in his 1639 letter to Maestertius (n. 13). Cunaeus likewise addressed Barlaeus as “cognatus suus”, e.g., in his letter of  9 March 1632, edited and translated by F.  Blok in his biographical study of  Barlaeus, Caspar Barlaeus. From the Cor­re­

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succeeded by Jacobus Maestertius (1610-1658), born in Dendermonde from Scottish parents. Maestertius studied law at Leuven University under Valerius Andreas (1588-1655), travelled in France, Italy, and England, and finally settled in Leiden in early 1634.12 He continued his law study there and was created a doctor utriusque iuris on 24 May 1634. He started giving courses in 1635, and in 1639 succeeded Cunaeus as professor of  constitutional law and Roman Law. He married in 1647 and died on 25 April 1658. Little is  known about contacts between Barlaeus (living in Amsterdam) and Maestertius (in Leiden), but these presumably will have been friendly. The only letter known at present, is one of   25  June 1639 from Barlaeus (Amsterdam) to Maestertius (Leiden), dealing with Barlaeus’s son in Leiden, and also referring to Maestertius as a successor of his relative Petrus Cunaeus (“Maximo viro D. Cunaeo, cognato meo, successisti dignus Atlas”).13

Kinschotius Caspar Kinschotius (Den Haag, 29 November 1622 – Middelburg, 31  December 1649) was educated at the Rotterdam Gymnasium Erasmianum,14 studied law in Leiden (1640-1644), published spondence of  a  Melancholic (Assen – Amsterdam, 1976), 37-39. Barlaeus’s reply to Cunaeus starts with “Vir amplissime et cognatorum charissime”, and ends with “Caspar Barlaeus, cognatus tuus dilectiss[imus]” (letter of  12 March 1632, ed. and trsl. by F. Blok, 39-41). 12   M. Bovyn, “Jacobus Maestertius, zoon van Adam Maystertonne”, in Gedenkschriften van de oudheidkundige kring van het land van Dendermonde 3.13 (1964), 325-340. R.  Feenstra, “Jacobus Maestertius (1610-1658). Zijn juridisch onderwijs in Leiden en het Leuvense disputatiesysteem van Gerardus Corselius”, in Tijdschrift voor rechtsgeschiedenis 50 (1982), 297-335. 13  Casparis Barlaei Epistolarum liber. Pars altera (Amstelodami, apud Joannem Blaeu, 1667), 760-762, no. 385, at 761; text available in http://www.let.leidenuniv.nl/ Dutch/Latijn/BarlaeusEpistolae.html, and in the database Early Modern Letters Online (EMLO) at http://emlo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/home. On Caspar Barlaeus jun. (16191673) see Blok 1976 (as in n. 11), 87-92. 14  At the age of  16 he already won the admiration of  his teachers with the declamation of  a self-composed verse eulogy of  Rotterdam, immediately published in two editions: Panegyris in laudem celeberrimae Roterodamensium urbis, ad amplissimos consultissimosque III viros Scholae Erasmianae constituendae (Roterodami, ex officina Petri Waesbergii, X Calend. Maias, anno 1638 [USTC 1029841]); there also exists a variant edition, reading “illustrissimae” instead of  “celeberrimae” in the title, as well as “Rotorodami” instead of  “Roterodami” in the imprint [not in USTC; copy in Gent, Universiteitsbibliotheek, Meul. 2446].

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poems on political and military events,15 and travelled in Germany, Switzerland, and France 1644-1645 (where he took his degree, most probably in Orléans). His wish to continue his Grand Tour to Italy was blocked by his father. He was instead added to the Dutch embassy at the peace negotiations in Münster and Osnabrück, serving as a secretary to raadpensionaris (“prime minister”) Adriaan Pauw (1585-1653).16 In Münster he was appreciated by many, and became a friend of  Cardinal Fabio Chigi (1599-1667), later Pope Alexander  VII. Kinschotius managed to get a  letter of  safe-conduct for his friend Nicolaus Heinsius, who wanted to visit Naples. After Heinsius’s return from Italy in 1648, together with Adriaan van der Wal, the friends published a  small volume of  Saturnalia, which caused a stir in Dutch literary circles.17 Apart from a single-leaf  epithalamium, Fescenninus ad lectissimum sponsum Rulandum Carpenterium, iuris consultum, lectissima sponsa Sara Leisteria potitum, Dordrechti die 8. Kalendas Januarias anno 1649 (Dordraci, Apud Henricum Essaeum, 1649), this was the last of  his writings published in his lifetime.18 He was mourned by the Delft Jesuit poet Isaac van der Mye (1602-1656) in Idyllium de morte et apotheosi elegantissimi poetae Casparis Kinschoti, sub Daphnidis nomine in lusus pastoritios quadrifariam discretum, ad generosum ac pernobilem virum, dominum Sebastianum Iperarum, 15  Brasilia triumphans sive elegia et epigrammata aliquot in classem Hispanicam, cum ingenti damno, a Brasilia litoribus depulsam auspiciis illustrissimi herois Mauritii Nassavii, comitis Nassovii […] (Lugduni Batavorum [Leiden], ex officina Elseviriorum, 1640 [not in USTC; copy in Erlangen – Nürnberg, Universitätsbibliothek, H00/2 PHL-VIIII 14]); Pugna Rocroiana, qua auspiciis christianissimi regis Ludovici XIV et augustissimae reginae matris, ductu fortissimi herois Ludovici Borbonii, ducis Angiani, profligatus est Hispanorum exercitus, lyrico carmine consignata (Lugduni Batavorum [Leiden], excudebat Severinus Matthaei pro Iusto Livio, 1643 [USTC 1016393, 1512247]). 16  Kinschotius is  portrayed standing next to Pauw in the famous painting by Gerard Terborch (1648), The Ratification of   the Treaty of  Münster (Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam). His major poem on the Peace appeared as Casparis Kinschotii Pax Belgica (Hagae-Com[itis] [Den Haag], ex officina Elzeviriana, 1648 [not in USTC, copy in BSM (as in n. 1)]. 17   Saturnalia viris incomparabilibus Cornelio Boyo et Francisco Plantae sacra [et Epistola familiaris ad Franciscum Plantam in qua & de Boyo agitur] [S.l., s. n., 1649; USTC 1024138]. See F. Blok, Nicolaas Heinsius in dienst van Christina van Zweden (Delft, 1949), 50-55; and C.  S.  M. Rademaker, “Oorlog en vrede in de Neolatijnse literatuur in de Noordelijke Nederlanden rond 1648. Dichters, redenaars en geleerden”, De zeventiende eeuw 13 (1997), 245-251. 18   Not in USTC; copy in Erlangen – Nürnberg, Universitätsbibliothek, H00/2 PHL-VIIII 14.

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Iperariae etc. dominum (Leiden, [s. n.], 1650), 16mo (?); also published Delft, Jacobus Jacobi Pool, 1651, 18mo, and Delft (Delphis, excudebat Iacobus Iacobi Pool, 1655), 8vo.19

Vision (instead of  conclusion) Facts are few – a manuscript poem, an engraving with a portrait and a poem, and a probable date stated forty years later. Any conclusion can only be very tentative, as if, to use a truly Dutch image, one is skating on very thin ice. There is  a sitter: a  professor whose portrait is  to be added to the University’s gallery of  fame. There is  a print publisher with a market: the professor’s students, as well as a general public with its perennial interest in people of  name. The engraving needs a short poem in praise of   the sitter (and of  art). The sitter, or a good customer of   the publisher, asks a  friend, known for his well-written occasional verses on friends and public figures. A poem is written, a  fair copy is  made. The old poet has delivered. But did it reach the sitter or the publisher? The print comes on the market with a portrait and a poem. That poem, however, is not the one written by the country’s dean of  Neo-Latin poetry, but one by a promising young writer, already perceived as the “golden boy” of  a  new generation. It rarely occurs that one is able to point to a decisive moment in literary history, but, in my humble view, we are very close here to a shift of  literary generations. In 1643 the age of   the great baroque poets of   the Dutch Republic, such as Daniel Heinsius, Hugo Grotius, and Caspar Barlaeus, is nearing a close.20 A new, 19 P. Begheyn, Jesuit books in the Dutch Republic and its Generality Lands 15671773. A  bibliography (Leiden – Boston, 2014), 113, no.  1650.2 (16mo, “no copy traced”) [not in USTC], 115-116, no.  1651.5 (18mo, “no copy traced”); the 1655 8vo ed. is not listed by Begheyn [copy in BSM (as in n. 1)]. 20  Heinsius dies in 1655, but almost ceased writing verse in 1640. His collected verse appeared in 1640 as Poemata auctiora, editore Nicolao Heinsio, Danielis filio (Lugduni Batavorum [Leiden], apud Franciscum Hegerum, 1640 [USTC 1028664]), and Poemata Graeca et e Graecis Latine reddita diverso tempore ac aetate conscripta, quibus Adoptivorum liber accedit (Lugduni Batavorum [Leiden], apud Franciscum Hegerum, 1640 [USTC 1028665]). This edition was enlarged in 1649 as Poemata Latina et Graeca. Editio post plurimas postrema longe auctior [frontispiece: editore Nicolao Heinsio, Danielis filio] (Amstelodami, apud Joannem Janssonium, 1649 [USTC 1030580]). Between 1640 and 1649 he only published a single verse broadsheet, In obitum Ioannis Polyandri a Kerckhoven [Leiden: s. n., 1646; USTC 1513094], and a number of 

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and younger, neo-classical group of  poets is  rising, headed by Nicolaus Heinsius and Caspar Kinschotius. The old poet continued to add a  series of  occasional writings to his almost completed oeuvre. His collected verse was published in voluminous editions in 1645, 1655, and finally in 1689.21 prose writings. Grotius dies in 1645; after Hugonis Grotii Tragoedia Sophompaneas. Accesserunt Tragoedia eiusdem Christus patiens et sacri argumenti alia, ex editione anni MDCXVII recusa emendatiora (Amsterdami, apud Guilielmum Blaeu, 1635 [USTC 1032354]), only three editions of  his Poemata appeared, in London (1639) and in Leiden (1639, 1645). Barlaeus dies in 1648. 21  In the period 1643-1648 Barlaeus published Casparis Barlaei Epicedium in obitum reverendi clarissimique viri, domini magni Simonis Episcopii, ecclesiastae et sacrosanctae theologiae in illustri Batavorum Academia antehac professoris dignissimi (Amstelodami, ex Typographeio Iohannis Blaeu, 1643 [USTC 1031373]); Faces Augustae sive Poematia quibus illustriores nuptiae, a nobili et illustri viro domino Iacobo Catsio, equite et praepotentum Hollandiae ac Frisiae Occidentalis Ordinum syndico, antehac Belgicis versibus conscriptae, iam a  Caspare Barlaeo et Cornelio Boyo Latino carmine celebrantur. Ad serenissimam principem Elizabetham, Frederici regis Bohemiae et Electoris Palatini filiam (Dordraci, Sumptibus Matthiae Havii et typis Henrici Essaei, 1643, 4to and 8vo editions [USTC 1028295 (4to) et 1028057 (8vo)]); Clarissimo viro, domino Gerardo Vossio, historiarum et politices professori celeberrimo, collegae coniunctissimo, cum funus praestantissimi iuvenis Dionysii Vossii, filii sui charissimi efferret [S. l.: s. n., 1643; not in USTC; copy in Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, Yc. 254]); Casparis Barlaei Laurus Flandrica sive in expugnationem validissimi Flandriae propugnaculi, quod Cataractam (vulgo Sassam) Gandavensem vocant, auspiciis potentissimorum Federati Belgii Ordinum, ductu armisque celsissimi principis Frederici Henrici, Arausionensium principis, comitis Nassaviae,  etc. (Amstelodami, ex Typographeio Iohannis Blaeu, 1644 [USTC 1031373]); Casparis Barlaei Mauritius redux sive Gratulatio ad excellentissimum et illustrissimum comitem Ioannem Mauritium, comitem Nassaviae, Cattimeliboci ac Dietziae, Bilsteinii dominum, Brasiliae terra marique praefectum,  etc., cum ex orbe Americano in Europaeum sospes appulisset (Amstelodami, ex Typographeio Iohannis Blaeu, 1644 [USTC 1031374], folio; also [S. l.: s. n., c.  1644], 8vo [USTC 2070863]); Casparis Barlaei Hulsta sive in expugnatam auspiciis potentiss. Federati Belgii Ordinum a  summo facti duce celsissimo Arausionensium principe Frederico Henrico Nassoviae comite etc. Hulstam poemation ad principem (Amsterdami, ex Typographeio Iohannis Blaeu, 1645 [not in USTC; copy in Rome, Biblioteca Angelica, F.ANT C.6 10:22]); Casparis Barlaei Poemata. Editio IV, altera plus parte auctior. Pars I. Heroicorum (Amstelodami, apud Ioannem Blaeu, 1645 [USTC 1007637, 1512813, 1512812, 112813]); Casparis Barlaei Poematum pars II. Elegiarum et miscellaneorum carminum (Amstelodami, apud Ioannem Blaeu, 1646 [USTC 1007637]; Casparis Barlaei Amores Vandalici sive in nuptias […] principis Frederici Guilielmi D.G. marchionis Brandeburgici […] et […] Loyzae Nassoviae […] Arausionensium principis […] epithalamium (Amstelodami, ex Typographeio Iohannis Blaeu, 1646 [USTC 1022555]); Casparis Barlaei Poemation in nuptias illustrissimi et generosissimi domini Thomae Howard, comitum Suffolciae filii et fratris, ducisque Norfolciae pronepotis, regiae principis Mariae, celsissimi Arausionensium principis Guilielmi coniugis, stabuli comitis, et nobilissimae eximiaeque virginis, dominae Walburgis a Kerckhove, illustris viri, domini Iohannis a Kerckhove, domini in Heenvliet, Aulae regiae principis et Saltuum Hollandiae praefecti, filiae, celebratas Honsolredici XXVII Septembris MDCXLVI. (Lugduni Batavorum [Leiden], ex officina Elseviriana,

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On 14 January 1648 he died, suddenly, by accident or suicide, in a “cisterna” (a rain-pit or a well or a water tank?).22 The young poet, who was actively contributing to a new world order, defined by the Peace of Münster, made international friends, continued to write poetry, but died from tuberculosis at the age of   twenty-seven in 1649. His verses were finally collected in 1685 by a  scholar of   the next generation, Jacobus Gronovius (16451716).

1646 [not in USTC; copy in London, Dr Williams’s Library, PP.8.48.1 (1)]); Somnium nuptiale sacrum illustrissimo ac generosissimo domino Thomae Howard et Walburgae a  Kerckhove ([Leiden], ex typographeio Guilielmi Christiani Boxii, 1646 [USTC 1018618]); Casparis Barlaei Iusta Foederati Belgii sive Exequiae celsissimi et invictissimi principis Frederici Henrici, Arausionensium principis, comitis Nassaviae, etc., Geldriae, Hollandiae, Zelandiae, etc. gubernatoris, etc., militiae Foederatorum terra marique praefecti, etc. (Amstelodami, ex typographeio Ioannis Blaeu, 1647 [USTC 1031379]). The later 1655 Amsterdam edition has a body of  735 + 576 pp., the 1689 Frankfurt-Leipzig edition of  731 + 576 pp. 22 See F.  Blok’s intriguing final chapter Dies ille on the interpretation of  “cisterna” and “puteus”: Blok 1976 (as in n. 11), 154-184, esp. 157-158, n. 14.

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PRANDIUM POETICUM TERTIUM

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 337-339 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124068

UNE POLÉMIQ UE CONTRE PHILON D’ALEXANDRIE ...

CURTIUS SMOLAK

CARMEN DE DUOBUS THEODERICIS

Ennodius taceat! Laudes vomit ille tyranni, Theodrici ingenio barbarieque trucis. Conculcavit enim sacrum caput iste Boethi Doctiloquis scriptis qui sibi ferret opem. En iuvit solata virum scelerisque Minerva Theodricum ultorem iussit adesse novum. Spreto sacrilego cultum fovet ille Latinum Sive renascentem, sive perinde novum. Viscera enim penetrans cuiusvis bibliothecae Carmina docta refert fonte latente prius. Humaneque satis dulcique inventa sermone Pandere promptus adest, adfuit atque aderit. Macte! Deus faveat longoq ue fruare vigore, lovaniense decus praesidiumq ue tuis! Carmen repertum Vindobonae in folio quodam recentiore nec deteriore bibliothecae privatae Curtianae seu Smolachianae.

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CHAPTER 4

HUMANIST POETRY OUTSIDE ITALY AND THE LOW COUNTRIES

FARKAS GÁBOR KISS

PRIVATE POETRY: AN UNKNOWN CERTAMEN OF  CONRAD CELTIS AND ITS CONTEXT

The Ráday Library of  the Hungarian Reformed (Calvinist) Church in Budapest holds a unique copy of  the first edition of  the Q uatuor libri amorum of  Conrad Celtis (1459-1508) under the shelf  mark I 124. It is printed on vellum, and contains a number of  manuscript annotations on its margins, and at the end. The first aim of  this paper is to investigate the provenance of  this printed copy, and to identify its scribes and the context of  its creation. Next, I will pay special attention to the blatantly obscene poem Certamen auri cum cauda virili, which was written down on the last leaf of   the copy in the Ráday Library. As I will try to prove, it is fairly safe to attribute this poem to Celtis himself. The Q uatuor libri amorum is the largest book that was published by Celtis during his lifetime, by the still unidentified printer “A.P.” of  the Sodalitas Celtica in Nürnberg in 1502. Therefore, it does not belong to the rarest of  Celtis’s prints, with almost 40 known copies all around the world. While the woodcuts of  some copies are coloured, no other copy seems to have been printed on vellum.1 1   Holding libraries include Augsburg (SSB), Bamberg (SB), Basel (UB), Berlin (SB), Bern, Budapest (MTA, OSZK), Dresden (SUB), Erfurt (UB), Frankfurt am Main (UB), Freiburg (UB), Heidelberg (UB), Gotha, Göttingen (SUB), Jena (2 copies), Leipzig, Munich (BSB, UB), Nürnberg (StadtB), Schweinfurt (Otto Schäfer), Stuttgart (WLB), Wien (ÖNB, UB), Wolfenbüttel, Zwickau, Copenhagen, Rome (Alessandrina), Wrocław (BU), Bloomington (Indiana), Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard), New Haven (Yale Beinecke), Washington, DC (Library of  Congress, Folger), Melbourne (National Gallery of Victoria), but no catalogue mentions a  parchment copy. Joseph Meder differentiated between copies with the “A.P.” printer’s signet in white (e.g., Stuttgart WLB, and Budapest  / Ráday) and in black (e.g., Munich BSB; Jena UB) on f. r4v, but there is no other obvious difference between these “editions.”

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 343-357 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124069

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Therefore, the copy in the Ráday Library must have been executed for a special occasion, perhaps as a dedicatory copy, as is suggested by the careful rubrication of   the initials throughout the book. Unfortunately, the original binding does not survive, as the volume was rebound in calf  in the eighteenth century, resulting in some textual losses near the upper and lower margins. Annotations from three different hands can be discerned. On the first flyleaf, we find a longer note in Hungarian from a nineteenthcentury librarian, which identifies all the manuscript remarks of  the volume as belonging to Conrad Celtis, including the manuscript poem on the last leaf, which he also attributes to the author of   the Amores. The same hand started to transcribe the poem on the last flyleaf, which he stopped after 12 verses. Second, an early sixteenthcentury hand wrote a Latin poem on the verso side of  the last folio (with a  woodcut of  Apollo and Daphne on the front side by the unknown Master of   the Celtis illustrations) in two columns, the text of  which became mutilated at the margins during the rebinding. Furthermore, we find 21 textual corrections in the margins of  the volume by a similar, but not identical early-sixteenth-century hand. These two early hands can be identified: the scribe of  the poem is Johannes Rosenperger, the amanuensis of  Conrad Celtis, whose neat cursive writing is  present in many manuscripts and prints of  Celtis’s library. For comparison, I  would like to refer here only to Celtis’s Hesiod (now Houghton Library, Harvard, Inc. 5549), the flyleaves of  which are similarly filled with a  number of  poems that were copied in the printed book by Rosenperger. The cursive writing of  Rosenperger can easily be identified in both sources, as illustrated by the writing of   the letters c, r, a  and d in “corda fabellis” (Ráday) and “carmina que dedimus” (Houghton) (Fig.  1), the est and the letter r in “est ignobilior” (Ráday) and “premium est meruisse tuum” (Houghton) (Fig. 2), or the capital C letter in “Cetera”, “Corpore” and “Censor ” (Fig. 3).

(Budapest, Ráday Library)

(Cambridge, Mass., Houghton Library) Fig. 1

Cf. J. Meder, Dürer-Katalog: ein Handbuch über Albrecht Dürers Stiche […] (Vienna, 1932), 202, 280.

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(Budapest, Ráday Library)

(Cambridge, Mass., Houghton Library) Fig. 2

(Budapest, Ráday Library)

(Cambridge, Mass., Houghton Library) Fig. 3

The other hand has added only textual corrections in the margins, which could make the identification of   the hand problematic. Dieter Wuttke has already pointed to the fact that the differentiation between the hands of  Celtis and Rosenperger can be difficult, especially in the manuscripts where both hands are present. Even Celtis’s personal collection of  correspondence, the Codex epistolaris in Vienna, which has long been regarded as an autograph copy, seems to have been created in collaboration with Rosenperger.2 Nevertheless, a  detailed comparison with an autograph letter of   Celtis from 1492, that has recently been edited by Anto­nia Landois, seems to suggest that the marginal corrections are written in Celtis’s hand.3 Although the Nürnberg letter was written at least ten years earlier than Celtis’s notes in the margins of   the parchment copy of  Amores, some of  his letters and words are strikingly similar. The word “fertur” seems to be identical in the Budapest annotations and the Nürnberg letter (Fig.  4), just as the ligature “la” in the words “lacerata” and “exemplar” (Fig. 5).

(Budapest, Ráday Library)

(Nürnberg, Familienarchiv Tucher) Fig. 4

2 D.  Wuttke, “Zur griechischen Grammatik des Konrad Celtis”, in Silvae. Festschrift für Ernst Zinn zum 60. Geburtstag (Tübingen 1970), 299. 3  A.  Landois, “Zwei unbekannte Celtis-Autographen aus dem Tucherischen Familienarchiv”, Mitteilungen des Vereins für Geschichte der Stadt Nürnberg 97 (2010), 111-124.

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(Budapest, Ráday Library)

(Nürnberg, Familienarchiv Tucher) Fig. 5

Even more telling is  the comparison between κατετικον, the only Greek annotation in the Budapest copy which corrects the κατετος of   the typesetting, and the Greek script of  Celtis and Rosenperger (Fig. 6):

(Celtis’s Greek script in the Vocabularium rerum admirandarum Graecum)

(Rosenperger’s Greek script) 4 Fig. 6  4

Obviously, Celtis’s κα-ligature and the lying ε are identical in both scripts. Therefore, these few autograph corrections of  the text of  the Amores have to be taken into consideration in any future critical edition of  his love elegies. The known data about the provenance of   the volume seem to confirm this hypothesis. In the second half  of   the eighteenth century, a period of  economic prosperity, several Hungarian aristocrats decided to collect a  valuable library, and Gedeon Ráday, the founder of   the Budapest collection of   the Reformed Church of  Hungary, was one of   them. Sámuel Nagy, his book agent, often travelled around in Germany and Switzerland, looking for new loots, and had a  continuous contact with Viennese book merchants. According to a letter of  Nagy to Ráday, he bought this volume at the auction of   the Mannagetta library in Vienna in 1768; in his bidding he had to “compete” with the Imperial Library (today’s 4  The samples of  Celtis’s and Rosenperger’s Greek writing are published by Wuttke 1970 (as in n. 2), 289-303.

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Austrian National Library), and afterwards, Johann (Ján/János) Kollár, the imperial librarian, congratulated him on his victory, because the book had to be estimated to be worth at least 100 golden ducats because of  its rarity (“propter raritatem”).5 The founder of   the Mannagetta library was Johann Wilhelm von Mannagetta (1588-1666), the court physician of   the Emperors Ferdinand II, Ferdinand III and Leopold I, but we do not know how Celtis’s parchment volume arrived there, and whether it happened during the founder’s lifetime, or later.6 First, a  few words about Celtis’s corrections. Some of   them appear in the list of  errata at the end of   the volume, as well: obviously, as Celtis read his own text, he could not remember which mistakes had already been corrected during the printing process. E.g., in the elegy to Elsula, where the poet evokes his lover organizing a  birthday celebration for him, the harmony of   the cosmos is  discussed during the feast, and the poet performs a  few songs on his cythara. The correction iubebo in the verse “Hoc cytharam blandis fidibus resonare videbo” is well-founded, since the variant videbo would imply that the cythara performs the song by itself, but this correction already appears at the end of  the volume among the Errata. Celtis has also added new corrections in the margins. These are not momentous textual changes, but still reveal much about Celtis’s care for the text during the publication process. He corrects even twice the word erumna, which he used with a short “e” instead of  “ae”. In the verse “Sed patiens varias tolerabis Celtis erumnas”, he marks the mistake only with a cross (probably because he found no instant solution to the faulty metrics), but in the verse “Andromedeque meas derisit amoris erumnas”, he quickly resolves the problem with a  change in word order: “[a]erumnas risit amoris”. In an elegy about his advanced age, Celtis boldly   The letter was edited by Gabriella Somkuti, “Ráday Gedeon bécsi könyvbeszerzője (Nagy Sámuel 1730-1802)”, Magyar Könyvszemle 84 (1968), 161. 6  The auction catalogue of    the library (Mannagettiana bibliotheca varii argumenti et idiomatis licitabitur D. I. Martii MDCCLXVIII [Vienna, 1768]), surviving in a single known copy in Göttingen, State and University Library (VD18 10867643, digital copy: https://gdz.sub.uni-goettingen.de/id/PPN85349469X), refers to this volume on p.  92. Gerhard Cornelius van den Driesch, the librarian of   the Mannagetta Foundation in 1718, sent a  letter about the manuscripts of   the library to Bernhard Pez, the Benedictine historian, but he only mentioned historical sources, which Mannagetta had copied from the Imperial Library. For more information, see Th. Stockinger, Th. Wallnig et al. (ed.), Die gelehrte Korrespondenz der Brüder Pez, Text, Regesten, Kommentare. Vol. 2.2: 1716-1718 (Vienna, 2015), 743-744. 5

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declares that he has never been a servant of  money, instead, it has always been money that has served him. Here, he realises that the word servus has to be modified to the feminine serva to agree with “pecunia”. In other cases, it is not clear what was Celtis’s motive for changing or transposing some words. In the elegy Ad se ipsum quod amore relegato ad philosophiam se conferre velit, where Celtis proclaims to entirely devote himself  to the study of  philosophy because of  his love pain, it is  Venus who asks him to return to going after girls: “Ergo iterum laetus duce me sectere puellas”. Celtis’s correction, secteris amores fits just as well metrically as sectere puellas, and the difference between the two is  only aesthetic, which clearly demonstrates the poet’s authorship. In another poem, which describes a  nightmare in which his lover Elsula rebukes Celtis for being reckless and unfaithful, she says to herself that Celtis will let her down as soon as he has made her pregnant: “Dumque utero tenerum fecit tibi crescere pondus  / Ille solet tacita cautus abire fuga” (And as soon as he has made a  delicate weight to grow in your womb, he usually runs off  carefully with a silent departure). The word pondus, which expresses the hostile attitude of  the poet towards the unborn child, will be changed to fetum (foetus), which is semantically more unequivocal than pondus, but inconveniently rhymes with the preceding tenerum. In a  similar manner laniata capillos, a  iunctura often attested in Roman poetry, is  corrected to the unusual and more aggressive lacerata capillos.7 On the verso of  the last folio of  the volume (on the verso side of  the woodcut representing Apollo and Daphne), there is  a poem copied by Johann Rosenperger, the title of  which was cut off  by the eighteenth-century bookbinder. Only the first two letters remain visible, “Ce[…]”, which seems to suggest that it might have been the Certamen auri cum cauda virili, as we will see later. The poem starts with a short reflection (vv. 1-10) on the author’s poetic motivation to compose a fictitious story on this occasion, although he has previously written only true history. Nevertheless, the reader should condone the lasciviousness of   the poem, because sad hearts are relieved by funny stories, while young minds love playful sub7  For examples, see C.  Wiener, “Die Aeneas-Rolle des elegischen Helden”, in T. Burkard, M. Schauer, C. Wiener (ed.), Vestigia Vergiliana. Vergil-Rezeption in der Neuzeit (Berlin, 2010), 84-85.

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jects (it is their very nature – naturae tenor), and both the author and his audience seem to belong to this age group (mens iuvenilis – author, iuvenum corda – audience). The story itself  describes the debate of   the gold (aurum) and the male member (cauda virilis), both proclaiming arguments in favour of   their eminence, and comparing their own usefulness and nobility to the faults of   the other (quis utilior nobiliorque foret). First, the gold derides the ugliness of   the male member, and the taboos connected to it, as it throws up disgusting liquids, and even the hands of   the washer woman (lotrix) avoid it (vv.  13-24). Then it prides itself  on its popularity among kings and aristocrats, and on its power in every field of  life: gold can make women the servants of  Venus, it can liberate the guilty, and imprison the innocent. Even God’s will can be deflected by it (money can sell God, vendo deum); it was invented by the father of  all gods, Saturn, and the very first era, the Golden Age, was baptized after it (vv. 24-36). In his reply, the male member first rebuts the arguments about its alleged dirtiness, as it claims to remain in hiding only because the most valuable things in life are hidden and the reason why it is covered by a  cap is  that it wants to protect itself  against being harmed by cold, a custom that, according to the author, was introduced by Semiramis.8 Furthermore, the cauda virilis maintains that it is free from all the charges brought up by the gold: women avoid the male member only because they are afraid of  falling in love, and when they see it, they laugh, which is undeniable proof  of   their love. In a misogynistic tone, the cauda proves its superiority over gold by claiming that women use jewellery (gold) only in order to provoke the love of men, and therefore, gold is inferior to 8  Many legends surrounded the sexual appetite of  Semiramis, about which see Giovanni Boccaccio, De mulieribus claris. Nevertheless, Boccaccio does not refer to Semiramis’s invention of  the praeputium, but only speaks about the chastity belt which she forced on the ladies of  her palace: “Timensque ne a  domesticis feminis concubitu fraudaretur filii, (ut quidam volunt) primum usum femoralium excogitavit.” V. Brown (ed., transl.), G. Boccaccio, On Famous Women (Cambridge, Mass., 2001), 22. On Semiramis’s image in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, see E. Archibald, “Sex  and Power in Thebes and Babylon: Oedipus and Semiramis in Classical and Medieval Texts”, Journal of  Medieval Latin 11 (2001), 27-49, at 39-40; M.  Benz, “Semiramis”, Zeitschrift für deutsche Philologie 134 (2015), 347-368 and A.  L. Beringer, The Sight of  Semiramis: Medieval and Early Modern Narratives of   the Babylonian Q ueen (Tempe, 2016). It is also possible that the author refers to the invention of  the tiara by Semiramis, mentioned by Justinus in his Epitoma of Pompeius Trogus’s Historiae Philippicae (Epitoma 1.2).

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the cauda. This argument ends with a satirical self-praise in which the cauda presents itself  as the father of  all creatures (being a contemporary of  Saturn!), and refers to three ill-fated mythological couples (Phyllis and Demophon, Pyramus and Thisbe, Dido and Aeneas, the latter unnamed), whose love ended badly because their physical love remained unfulfilled or clandestine. At this point the text breaks off. The subject of   the poem seems to be unknown in medieval or Renaissance Latinity, although one could compare it to the fable about the debate between gold and lead in the Dialogus crea­ turarum – which obviously lacks the element of  salacity.9 Closer parallels can be found in vernacular poetry: we find the same basic idea in the late-medieval German rhymed narrative (Mär) Gold und Zers, but there the story takes a  fuller form.10 Gold and the Zers (“resche und gaile zers”, the Middle High German word for mentula) appear in front of  a jury presided by a noblewoman, and she selects gold as the winner of   the debate, which leads to the voluntary exile of   the penis. Nevertheless, women start to regret their decision already after fourteen days, and the Zers is  called back to the court, from where it tries to flee again, but a nun rips out its eyes, out of  which two female breasts are created (zwei schöne prüstl). The story ends with an etiological explanation: this is the reason why the Zers is excited as soon as it catches a glimpse of  breasts, because it wants to be reunited with its own eyes.11 As the German tale was composed before 1393, and the Latin poem in Celtis’s volume survives from (or after) 1502, it can be surmised that the Latin text imitated the German one, and not the other way around. If  this is so, then the author of   the Latin paraphrase of  the debate must have borrowed the idea from the German variant, but instead of  preparing an exact translation, he enriched 9  H.  Walther, Das Streitgedicht in der lateinischen Literatur des Mittelalters (Munich, 1920), 15. 10  H.  Fischer (ed.), Die deutsche Märendichtung des 15. Jahrhunderts (Munich, 1966), 431-438 (variant I) and 439-443 (variant II). 11  Four manuscripts transmit the Gold und Zers story in two variants (Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, cod. 2885 – written by Johannes Götschl in Innsbruck, 1393; Karlsruhe, Landesbibliothek, cod. K408, from 1430-1435; Innsbruck, Ferdinandeum, FB 32001, from 1456; Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, cgm 5919 from Regensburg, 1501-1510), all copied between 1393 and 1510. For a survey of recent scholarship on the story, see M. Schneider, Kampf, Streit und Konkurrenz: Wettkämpfe als Erzählformen der Pluralisierung in Mären (Göttingen, 2019), 103-109.

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and amplified the material with well-chosen mythological arguments both concerning gold (the Golden Age of  Saturn) and the penis (probably presented as a  contemporary of  Saturn because of  the myth of Saturn’s castration).12 In the following, I will argue that the author of  the poem is Celtis himself and that he composed it in his juvenile years. The Latin certamen is  not known from any other source than this fine exemplar of  Celtis’s Amores, printed on parchment, and copied there by the poet’s lifelong companion and secretary, Johannes Rosenperger. The poem is situated at an eminent place in this exquisite volume, on the backside of   the woodcut representing Apollo and Daphne, which was probably selected by Willibald Pirckheimer and Celtis together,13 and which might be interpreted as an allegory of  poetic life.14 Obviously, the poem must have had a certain significance for Celtis and Rosenperger, even if it had not been Celtis’s own. There are several arguments which could be raised against his authorship: first of  all, many of  the verses, especially in the hexameters of  the distichs, are written in Leonine verses (historias – veras, v. 1; iocundis – fabellis, v. 3; materiam – iocosam, v. 5), a practice which was despised by classical purists. Celtis himself warns against the use of  Leonine meter in his Ars versificandi (1486): “Concinna finis et medii modulatio non sit in nostris versibus, atque illa que bestii leonina ventrina caudataque vocant longe a  nobis sint.” 15 This passage is taken over from Jakob Wimpfeling’s De arte metri­ ficandi (1484). However, Celtis also advises against the use of  Leonine verses in the prologue of  his edition of  Hrotsvita’s dramas (1501). Still, exactly the verses in his Ars versificandi et car12  The castration of  Coelius by Saturn was transformed into the castration of  Saturn by Jupiter by Fulgentius, and this became the more widespread form of   the myth in the Late Middle Ages. 13   Most recently, see M. Faini, “Un anonimo canzoniere veneto (Wolfenbüttel, Herzog August Bibliothek, cod. Guelf. 277 4 Extr.) e la sua circolazione in Germania”, Albertiana 18 (2015), 197-217, at 209. 14  Cf.  P. Luh, Kaiser Maximilian gewidmet. Die unvollendete Werkausgabe des Conrad Celtis und ihre Holzschnitte (Frankfurt am Main, 2001), 214. 15 C.  Celtis, Ars versificandi et carminum (Leipzig, Kachelofen, 1486), f. C3r. (GW 6460) About Celtis’s dependence on Wimpfeling, see F.  J. Worstbrock, “Die Ars versificandi et carminum des Konrad Celtis, Ein Lehrbuch eines deutschen Humanisten”, in B. Moeller, H. Patze, K. Stackmann (ed.), Studien zum städtischen Bildungswesen des späten Mittelalters und der frühen Neuzeit (Göttingen, 1983), 462-498.

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minum are often written in Leonine hexameters, which he explains by referring to the mnemonic power of  rhymed meter: “Si quid secus in carminibus artis contigerit, non opinione elegantioris stili, verum tenacioris memorie causa, quia cicius mente reconderentur, factum est.” 16 Thus, Celtis’s aversion to Leonine verses does not seem to have been complete in his youth. Second, the poet treats the distichs with more metric license than usual, and some of   the verses can be rightly qualified as faulty in terms of  metrics: vendŏ deum (v. 34), cură reservatur res (for curā, v. 39), balneŏ dum subeo (v.  45), dēceptī Dĕmiphontis (v.  71) are clearly mistaken and in need of  revision. One could also mention here the strange elisions as aur-ait for aurum ait, or ignobilorque suo instead of  ignobiliorque suo. These errors hint more at a  young, inexperienced poet, which is confirmed by the fourth verse, too: “Mens iuvenilis amat ludicra verba sua” (the young mind likes its playful words). On the other hand, there are important arguments in favour of  Celtis’s authorship, too. Recent scholarship has stressed the importance of   the poetry of  Maximian for Celtis, especially in his love elegies.17 Maximian’s elegies are considered a  main inspiration to the fourth book of   the Amores,18 especially for the descriptions of  old age, and Celtis might have regarded them as the work of   the ancient Roman poet Cornelius Gallus, to whom they were often attributed.19 If  we look at the poetic sources of  this Certamen, a  number of  poetic allusions refer to Maximian’s elegies,20 and verse 69 of   the Certamen (“Me mediante ligat varios concordia sexus”) undeniably imitates Maximian’s “hac sine diversi nulla 16  Celtis 1496 (as in n. 15), C3r. See J. Robert, Konrad Celtis und das Projekt der deutschen Dichtung. Studien zur humanistischen Konstitution von Poetik, Philosophie, Nation und Ich (Tübingen, 2003), 82. 17   J. Robert, “Celtis’ Amores und die Tradition der Liebeselegie”, in C. Wiener (ed.), Amor als Topograph. 500 Jahre Amores des Conrad Celtis. Ein Manifest des deutschen Humanismus (Schweinfurt, 2002), 12-14; Th.  Gärtner, “Die Neudimensionierung der römischen Liebeselegie durch autobiographische Raumstrukturen. Zu den Amores des Konrad Celtis”, in F.  Furlan, G.  Siemoneit, H.  Wulfram (ed.), Exil und Heimatferne in der Literatur des Humanismus von Petrarca bis zum Anfang des 16. Jahrhunderts (Tübingen, 2019), 445-458. 18  Th.  Gärtner, “Der strukturelle Aufbau der Amores des Konrad Celtis vor dem Hintergrund antiker Vorbilder”, in Th. Baier, J. Schultheiss (ed.) Würzburger Humanismus (Tübingen, 2015), 37-45. I  would like to thank Thomas Gärtner for drawing my attention to the importance of  Maximian in the poetry of  Celtis. 19 P.  White, Gallus Reborn: A  Study of    the Diffusion and Reception of  Works Ascribed to G. C. Gallus (London, 2019). 20   See the notes of  the edition below.

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est concordia sexus” (5.119). In fact, Maximian’s fifth elegy can be considered as a direct inspiration behind the entire poem: while its main theme, the old poet-narrator’s personal account of  experiencing impotence in a love affair, is quite distinct from the Certamen, it includes a  lament by the poet’s lover, which describes how the entire nature is kept alive by the penis, how all human happiness depends on the vigour of   the mentula, and once it is  gone, how worthless life becomes (109-152). The ideas presented in a monologue by the lady of   the old man serve as the foundations of   the cauda’s self-praise, as it boasts of being nothing less than the source of  nature, the world and mankind.21 Even more direct proofs of  Celtis’s authorship are found in two letters of  Augustinus Moravus, royal secretary of  King Vladislas  II in Buda and Celtis’s friend, which he sent from Buda to Celtis in 1504. The two humanists had been friends for several years by then (the first letter of  Augustinus to Celtis dates from 1497), which allowed them to build up an intimate relationship, and to exchange works which they intended to keep in private. Augustinus sent a collection of  witty sayings (facetiae) to Celtis at the court of  Emperor Maximilian, which he might have regretted later, as he asked his German fellow humanist to delete two stories from it, one about the cardinal titles, another about the Pope.22 He must have felt that he exposed himself  to danger by sending these stories – which were probably profane and perhaps sacrilegious – to Celtis,23 and it might be connected to this feeling that he asked the German humanist to send him something that contained a similarly delicate subject-matter, the debate of  Gold and Priapus, which Celtis promised him earlier (“Expecto abs te quod pollicitus es, Auri et Priapi de eminentia certamen”).24 As he probably 21   “Sum pater humani generis stirpisque superne / et pecus officio nascitur omne meo. / Auri preter opem posset subsistere mundus / sed sine me nasci non potuisset homo” (63-66). 22  Unfortunately, this work has not come down to us. Christian Gastgeber supposed that these facetiae might have been poems of  Augustinus. See Ch. Gastgeber, “Augustinus Moravus und seine Beziehungen zum Wiener Humanistenkreis”, in P. Ekler, F. G. Kiss (ed.), Augustinus Moravus Olomucensis (Budapest, 2015), 11-31, at 14. 23  Augustinus was an avid reader of  Galeotto Marzio’s De incognitis vulgo, for which its author was convicted on grounds of  heresy by the Venetian Inquisition, and he wanted to publish this work in Vienna. Cf. Ekler, Kiss 2015 (as above), 162. 24  Dated Buda, 23 August 1504. H. Rupprich (ed.), C. Celtis, Der Briefwechsel des Konrad Celtis (Munich, 1934), 566.

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did not receive any response from Celtis in the following days, he grew impatient, and reminded him again twenty days later: “Vale et Priapi cum Auro certamen (quod pollicitus es) mitte.” 25 We do not know if  Celtis ever fulfilled his promise, as the subject never again comes up in the correspondence. Obviously, the certamen mentioned twice by Augustinus is identical to the poem included in the Budapest copy of  the Amores. Still, it does not seem probable that the Budapest volume was the very volume sent by Celtis to Augustinus Moravus, because then it should contain a formal dedication or a letter to the addressee. Furthermore, the question remains open whether the poem which Celtis was supposed to send was his own work, or someone else’s musings. The wording of  Augustinus’s letters does not allow a safe attribution, as he does not make it clear who the author of   the Auri et Priapi certamen was, only that Celtis promised to send it.26 Nevertheless, all the previous letters of  Augustinus to Celtis refer only to poems written by themselves: Augustinus’s (now lost) collection of  erotic poems was in the hands of  Celtis in 1497, while a  year later he asked his friend for any poem, but especially for the finishing of  his epigrams; he sent his own elegies to Vienna in 1500 so that Celtis could print them, and he requested a copy of  his Rhapsodia in 1504.27 Thus, the nature of   their correspondence seems to suggest that Augustinus must have thought that the Certamen was Celtis’s poem. If  this is  so, then the Certamen is a unique piece of  poetry in Celtis’s oeuvre. It follows a vernacular German tradition (which was in no way alien to his taste),28 and its Priapic tone exceeds the limits of   the eroticism found in his love elegies and his epigrams. The poem clearly states in its introductory verses that it might be the remnant of  his poetic production at a younger age, as the “youthful mind” loves its own playful creations (“mens iuvenilis amat ludicra verba sua”, v. 4). Nev­er­the­   Dated Buda, 12 September 1504. Rupprich 1934 (as in n. 24), 572.   Nineteenth-century scholarship had no qualms about attributing this lost title to Celtis’s oeuvre on the basis of Augustinus’s letter. See E. Klüpfel, De vita et scriptis Conradi Celtis Protucii (Freiburg in Breisgau, 1827), vol.  2, 163; J.  von Aschbach, Geschichte der Wiener Universität. Vol. 2. Die Wiener Universität und ihre Humanisten, im Zeitalter Kaiser Maximilians I. (Vienna, 1877), 260. 27  Rupprich (as in n. 24), 311, 318, 386, 581-582. 28  Cf.  his elegy to Ursula Rhenana, who wrote love poems to him in German, which could have equalled his own love poetry, had they been in Latin (Amores 3.9). 25 26

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less, this juvenile piece of  poetry obtained new significance when it was repositioned at the end of   the 1502 edition of  his Amores, and copied to its last folio. In the very first verses, the poet claims that he has related only true stories so far, and the Certamen is the first poem which would be a  fictitious one (“Hactenus historias consuevi dicere veras  / sed modo pauca mihi ficta referre libet”). Seen in this context, the Certamen became a playful poetic ending at the end of   the Amores, which asserted the reality and truth of all that happened in the volume previously, thus creating an amorous autobiography from the adventurous wanderings of  the poet. Ce[rtamen auri cum cauda virili] incipit feliciter 29 [col. a] Hactenus 30 historias consuevi dicere veras sed modo pauca mihi ficta referre libet.31 Tristia iocundis 32 mulcentur corda fabellis,33 mens iuvenilis 34 amat ludicra verba sua. Ergo materiam volvet mea musa iocosam 5 sumere: quo iuvenum pascere corda queat. Da veniam, Lector, lascivis, obsecro, dictis, nam sibi nature postulat ille tenor. Q ualis materia, talis vult esse Camena; esse decet rebus consona verba suis.35 10 Cum rutilo fertur auro certasse virilis 36 cauda, quis utilior nobiliorque foret, aurum ait: “In tenebris latitas et ne videaris, involvunt faciem linea claustra tuam, eternam pateris in opaco carcere noctem. 15

29   I reproduce here the text in a semi-diplomatic edition. The use of  capitals, i/j, and u/v has been standardized according to the style sheet provided by the editors of  this volume. I  have also added punctuation in accordance with modern usage, but I have kept the use of  “e” instead of  “ae”. 30  The title and capital H of  the word Hactenus are rubricated. 31 Cf. Maxim. El. 3.2: “atque senectutis pauca referre meae.” 32  Paleographically, the reading fecundis does not seem possible. 33  Maxim. El. 3.71: “permulcet corda parentum.” 34  Iuvenilis is probably opposed to the senectus described in the elegies of Maximian. 35 To the entire poetical introduction, cf.  Maxim. El. 3.1-4: “Nunc operae pretium est quaedam memorare iuventae /  atque senectutis pauca referre meae,  / quis lector mentem rerum vertigine fractam / erigat et maestum noscere curet opus.” 36 Maxim. El. 5.119: “haec [mentula] si gemma micans rutilum non conferat aurum.”

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Cetera membra vident absque pudore diem; balnea quando subis frondoso tegmine gaudes. Cetera nudato corpore membra patent,37 dextera lotricis totum 38 lavat undique corpus solum preteriens te sociosque tuos. 20 Vile tuum nomen dominarum sordet in aure; nominis ad sonitum quaeque puella pavet; insuper obscenos fundis per guttura rivos. Me mea nobilitas plura referre vetat. Ast ego reginis preciosa monilia presto; 25 associor gemmis in digitisque feror. Regibus et ducibus potum mea vasa propinant, Bacchus in hospicio plus sapit ipse meo. Matronas facio Veneri servire pudicas, predia, rura, domos in mea vota traho. 30 Pontificem placant etiam mea munera summum, imperiumque facit iura silere meum. Iustifico sontes, insontes opprimo, vinctos libero: iudicium destruo, vendo deum. Me genitor superum duxit Saturnus in usum, 35 intitulant nomen secula prima meum.” [col. b] Obviat 39 his dictis sapienter cauda virilis dedecus excusans cum ratione suum: “Cura reservatur res ut raro videatur, res vulgata minus utilitatis habet. 40 Oc[c]ultor quia sum precio preciosior omni,40 frigore ne peream tegmina tuta fero.41 Inclyta Semiramis regina potens Babilonis primitus instituit tegminis huius opem.42 Balneo dum subeo, nimio ne ledar ab estu 43 45 tuta sub umbrosa fronde latere volo. Sed quod lotricis me dextera preterit: hoc est ne nimis ardescat hec in amore meo.  Maxim. El. 5.71: “tunc egomet toto nudatus corpore lecto.”   Interlinear addition by Rosenperger. 39  The capital O of  the word Obviat is rubricated. 40 Maxim. El. 1.19: “fulvo pretiosior auro.” 41   For the personification, cf. Maxim. El. 5.98: “quo [abit, o mentula] tibi cristatum vulnificumque caput?” 42 Cf. Boccaccio, De mulieribus claris, 2 (Semiramis): “Timensque ne a domesticis feminis concubitu fraudaretur filii, (ut quidam volunt) primum usum femoralium excogitavit.” 43 Maxim. El. 3.53: “novo correptus carperis aestu?” 37 38

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Cum reliquis tetigi membris baptismatis undas sacraque me pariter purificavit aqua. 50 Cumque meum nomen resonat mulieris in aure ridet et hic risus testis amoris erit. Nam non rideret, nisi me ferventer amaret; gignere leticiam res inimica nequit.44 Nec pudor est mihi quod turpes effundo liquores: 55 nasus et os etiam feda fluenta vomant. Te vero mulier appendit vestibus ut me fortius ad Venerem provocet iste nitor. Hinc tua fama 45 mihi servire videtur et omnis servus hero minor est ignobiliorque suo.46 60 Processere meo magno de semine reges, me genitore satus Iuppiter ipse fuit. Sum pater humani generis stirpisque superne et pecus officio nascitur omne meo.47 Auri preter opem posset subsistere mundus, 65 sed sine me nasci non potuisset homo. Tempore Saturni nemo cognoverat aurum, nota per omne solum cauda virilis erat. Me mediante ligat varios Concordia sexus 48 nullaque sit sine me femina sola viris! 70 Phillida deceptam 49 Demiphontis amore superbi luget adhuc 50 dominam Tratia tota suam. Piramus et Tispe decepti sic periere: 51 adhuc eadem signa cruoris habet. morus  Vulnera quid referam sese perimentis Elisse 75 Dardanium postquam vidit abesse virum? Me propter mulier patriam dulcesque parentes 52 [cetera desiderantur]

  The entire line is underlined and marked by a cross.   Rosenperger added the variant forma. 46   The entire line is underlined, perhaps because of   the metrical mistake (“ignobiliorque”). 47 Cf.  Maxim. El. 5.111-112: “haec genus humanum, pecudum, volucrumque, ferarum / et quicquid toto spirat in orbe, creat”. 48 Maxim. El. 5.113: “hac [mentula] sine diversi nulla est concordia sexus”. 49  deceptam: corr. Kiss e decepti. 50  Ov. Ars 3.85: “Ut Veneri, quem luget adhuc, donetur Adonis.” 51 Ov. Met. 4.55-166. 52  The bottom of   the folio is  cut off, and the second line of   the distich (if  not more) is missing. The last words are hardly legible. 44 45

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MUSEN, DIE PARTHENICAE DES BAPTISTA MANTUANUS UND BIBELPARAPHRASE IN DER MUSITHIAS DES JOHANNES TUBERINUS

Die Musithias de caelitibus et sacris historiis in Musas novem digesta des Johannes Tuberinus Erythropolitanus (Johannes Beuschel von Rotenburg ob der Tauber, ca. 1480-1521/2) ist das wenig bekannte Hauptwerk dieses Autors – mit ca. 23 000 Versen die umfangreichste bekannte Versdichtung eines deutschen Humanisten.1 Tuberinus hat sich 1496 in Leipzig immatrikuliert, wurde dort 1497 Baccalaureus, 1502 Magister, anschließend Lektor der Poesie und mehrfach Dekan der philosophischen Fakultät 1504-1521. Das Werk enthält neun mit den Namen der Musen bezeichnete Bücher, die eine Enzyklopädie der vorreformatorischen christlichen Glaubenswelt darstellen. Buch 1 (Clio) widmet sich Jesus Christus und der Trinität, 2 (Euterpe) Maria, 3 (Thalia) den Aposteln, 4 (Melpomene) den zwei übrigen Evangelisten und Johannes Baptista, 5 (Terpsichore) neun Märtyrern, 6 (Erato) den vier Kirchenlehrern, 7 (Polymnia) fünf  weiteren Heiligen (Confessores), 8 (Urania) Fran1   Vgl. zu Tuberinus und seinem Werk F. J. Worstbrock, J. Beuschel, “Tuberinus, Johannes”, in Ders. (hrsg.), Deutscher Humanismus 1480-1520: Verfasserlexikon (Berlin, 2005), 183-190. Auf  Sp. 188 schreibt Worstbrock: “Genaueren Aufschluß über B.s versifizierendes Verfahren und seine Güte könnte erst der Vergleich mit den Vorlagen und weiteren Q uellen bringen.” – Für die folgenden Zitate zugrunde gelegt wird ein in Privatbesitz befindliches, VD16 B 2371 entsprechendes Exemplar. Das Exemplar der British Library hat nach der Lima auf f. ccclvij v-ccclx v eine zweite Serie Errata am Schluß unter der Überschrift Lima secunda labecularum auf zwei nach pii = f. ccclx und vor piii = Fo. ccclxi eingebundenen Blättern, die ihrerseits mit piii = ccclxi und ccclxii bezeichnet werden. Es handelt sich hier um einen nachträglich einem Teil der Auflage eingefügten Einschub, wobei damals versäumt wurde, das ursprüngliche Schlußblatt piii  = f.  ccclxi als f.  ccclxiii zu kennzeichnen. Die Bemerkungen im Katalog von Reiss & Sohn, Auktion 195 (29.-30. Oktober 2019) zu Nr. 146 machen auf  diese Divergenz aufmerksam. Die Lima secunda labecularum wird hier nach einer Photokopie herangezogen.

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 359-376 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124070

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ciscus und Dominicus und 9 (Calliope) sieben weiblichen Heiligen. Die kategoriale Anordnung der neun Bücher folgt den Allerheiligenlitaneien der Kirche, in deren Anrufungen nach Christus und Maria auch immer die Apostel, Märtyrer, Bekenner und zuletzt weibliche Heilige einander folgen. Tuberinus verfaßte zu Christus und Maria keine einheitlichen Epen wie später Sannazaro (De partu Virginis, zuerst gedruckt 1526) und Vida (Christias, zuerst gedruckt 1535), sondern einzelne Gedichte zu bestimmten Ereignissen ihres Lebens, die oft auch kirchliche Feiern auf  sich gezogen hatten. Die einzelnen Gedichte in den neun Büchern werden von Tuberinus Symphoniae genannt (in 1.19, 2.24, 3.12, 4.3, 5.9, 6.4, 7.5, 8.2, 9.7). Sie bestehen meist aus Hexametern, dazu kommen in den ersten Büchern elegische Distichen, sapphische Oden und Jamben. Gewidmet hat Tuberinus sein Werk Herzog Georg von Sachsen (1471-1539) in Dresden, der bis zu seinem Tod am katholischen Glauben festhielt (sein fünfteiliger Wappenschild unter drei Helmen mit der Idealgestalt eines Ritters im Hintergrund erscheint als großer Holzschnitt auf  der Titelblatt-Rückseite). Einzelne Symphoniae haben darüber hinaus noch spezielle Widmungsempfänger. Eine Inhaltsübersicht auf  Bl. aiiv-iiiv läßt gleich den Aufbau des großen Werkes überblicken. Der von Tuberinus anscheinend erfundene Titelname läßt sich als eine verkürzende Latinisierung von Μουσῶν θίασος “Musenschwarm” verstehen, worin eine Anspielung auf  Aristophanes, Thesm. 40 θίασος Μουσῶν, zu liegen scheint, für den dort ein Sklave andächtige Stille fordert.2 Die Namen der einzelnen Musen folgen in den Buchtiteln einander in der Reihenfolge, die ihnen Hesiod, Theog. 77 f., gegeben hatte und in der sie auch in dem von Tuberinus mehrfach benützten Syntagma de Musis (Straßburg, 1511 und 1512) des Lilius Gregorius Gyraldus (1478-1552) behandelt worden waren. Die Musen, die laut Lectori Distichon auf  der Titelseite der Musithias (“Excipe caelatum Musis opus ecce novenis.  / Excipe Castalides quod cecinere piae”) die neun Bücher gesungen haben sollen, dienen ausschließlich der Bezeichnung dieser Bücher und haben keine spezifische Beziehung zum Inhalt der einzelnen Bücher.

2 Ludwig Seeger übersetzte die V. 39-42 so in H.-J. Newiger (ed.), Antike Komödien, Bd. 1. Aristophanes (München, 1976), 420: “Andächtige Stille, versammeltes Volk! Schließt alle den Mund: denn der heilige Schwarm der Musen verweilt hier im Herrenpalast und stimmt zum Gesang schon die Saiten.”

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Daß bereits antike Autoren Bücher nach den Musen benannten, konnte Tuberinus der Schrift von Gyraldus entnehmen (Bl. Ciiir): Illud etiamnum addo quod Herodo. […] libros suos a musarum nominibus praenotavit. Notat etiam A. Gellius in ultimo, quosdam libros suos Musas inscripsisse, ut fuit Aurelius Opilius, de quo idem A. Gellius in primo meminit. Bion quoque rhetor novem libros composuit, Musarum nominibus inscriptos.

Das scheint Tuberinus angeregt zu haben. Sein Verhältnis zu den Musen gibt er in der ersten Symphonia des ersten Buches an (In Musithiada 3 Anteloquium, Fo. iii = Aiii r): Pimpleis 4 nostrum quamquam syntagma 5 relucet,6 non tamen has colimus, colit ut delusa vetustas. Nullum (ut Romulidae) templum siquidem hisce dicamus.7 Nullas his festas (ut prisci) ponimus aras. Non his Harmonias, non his paeana sonamus. At vice librorum nobis commercia sunto his cum.8 doctrinis mortalia pectora honestis instituantque, si rem vocum dispiciamus.9 Obgleich unsere Zusammenstellung die pimpleischen Musen wiederspiegelt, verehren wir sie dennoch nicht, wie sie das im Irrtum befindliche Altertum verehrt. Wir weihen ihnen sicher keinen Tempel wie die Römer. Wir stellen für sie keine Altäre auf  wie die Alten. Wir singen ihnen keine Harmonien, keine Paeane. Doch durch den Austausch über Bücher wollen wir mit ihnen Umgang haben, und sie sollen unsere sterblichen Herzen mit ehrenhaften Lehren unterrichten, wenn wir die aktuelle Sache hinter den Wörtern bedenken.   Musithiada: ed. Musthiada.   Pimpleis: Lima secunda Bl. piii r; ed.: Pimplaeis. 5  Die Bezeichnung seines Werkes als syntagma war durch das Syntagma de Musis des Gyraldus angeregt worden; sonst zuvor nur Griechisch bei Cicero, s. R. Hoven, L. Grailet, Lexique de la prose latine de la Renaissance. Dictionary of  Renaissance Latin from Prose Sources (Leiden – Boston, 2006), 555. 6  Vgl. zu relucet Verg. Aen. 2.312 “Sigea igni freta lata relucent.” 7   Ein Tempel der Musen in Rom ist nicht bekannt; vgl.  H.  Kees, “Musai”, in A. Pauly, G. Wissowa et al. (ed.) Realenzyklopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft, Bd. 16.1 (Stuttgart, 1933), 680-757, 706. Aber Gyraldus, Syntagma, Bl. ciiir, schreibt: “Aedem Herculis musarum in circo flaminio Fulvius ille nobilior ex pecunia censoria foecit.” 8  Vgl.  zu “commercia sunto his cum. doctrinis  […]” Cic.  Tusc. 5.23: “Q uis est omnium, qui modo cum Musis, id est cum humanitate et cum doctrina habeat aliquod commercium, qui se non hunc mathematicum [d. h. Archimedes] malit quam illum tyrannum [d. h. Dionysius]”. 9  Im letzten Hexameter fehlt nach Instituantque eine Silbe. 3 4

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Der Holzschnitt auf  der Titelseite (Abb.  1) zeigt die Musen mit Instrumenten auf  dem Rand des Hippokrene-Brunnens, der von den zwei – vielleicht nach Herodot 8.32 und 39 10 – TITOREA und HIAMPEVM benannten Gipfeln des Parnaß umgeben ist und unter dem sich der Apollo-Tempel in Delphi befindet, dessen Kuppel vielleicht vom römischen Pantheon angeregt wurde. Unter den beiden Gipfeln sieht man, wie Bacchus, vor dem eine Flasche und ein Becher stehen, seinen Rausch ausschläft und wie Apollo auf  seiner Geige spielt. Der Künstler hat hierzu das Bild des Hippokrene-Brunnens aus der Titelseite von Gyraldus übernommen und das Bild durch Parnaß, den ummauerten Tempel und die Götter ergänzt (Abb. 2). Der 1511 zuerst publizierte Hippokrene-Brunnen hat zwei Brunnenschalen. In der unteren schäumt das Wasser, am Rand der oberen sitzen die Musen. Nach den im folgenden Text des Gyraldus gegebenen Abbildungen der Musen sind es vermutlich von links außen an Melpomene mit einer Schellentrommel, Thalia mit einem Hackbrett, Urania mit einem Clavichord, Clio mit einem Orgelportativ, rechts außen Erato mit einer Geige und hinten weiter Polymnia mit einer Gambe, Terpsichore mit einer Harfe, Calliope mit einer Laute und Euterpe mit einer Flöte.11 Die gleichen Musen (allerdings mit deutlicher entblößten Brüsten) erscheinen seitenverkehrt mit identischen Instrumenten bei Tuberinus, wo auch wie bei Gyraldus links und rechts von der Brunnensäule der Versteil von Hesiod, Theog. 76 ᾽Εννέα ϑυγατέρες μεγάλου Διὸς steht (bei Gyraldus: ᾽Εννέα ϑυγατερες με-/γάλου διὸς; bei Tuberinus: ᾽Εννέα ϑυγατερες  / Μεγάλον Διὸς – das zu ν verschriebene υ wird am Ende der Errata-Seite Bl. pii v = Fo. ccclx korrigiert). Die untere Brunnenschale wurde für den MusithiasHolzschnitt weggelassen.12 Es ist wegen des spezifische humanistische 10   Erst 1522 erschienen in Rom von Alexander ab Alexandro (1461-1523) Dies Geniales, später mehrfach veröffentlicht unter dem Titel Genialium Dierum libri VI. Dort steht in lib. 2, cap. 2 (Leiden, 1673), Bd. 2, 398: “Erat autem Parnassus Phocidis mons, in duos divisus colles, Thitorea et Hyampeum, quorum alter Libero, Apollini alter dicati fuere.” 11  Hinweise für die Identifizierung der Musen verdanke ich dem Musikhistoriker Prof. Dr Franz Körndle. 12 Der Musenbrunnen bei Gyraldus wurde auch für einen Plattenstempel in Wittenberg um 1530 von Wolfgang Schreiber für den Einband einer Vergilausgabe verwendet. S.  K.  von Rabenau, Deutsche Bucheinbände der Renaissance um Jakob Krause Hofbuchbinder des Kurfürsten August I. von Sachsen (Brüssel, 1994), Nr. 11,

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Abb. 1 Johannes Tuberinus, Musithias (Leipzig, 1514), Rot und schwarz gedruckte Titelseite, 30 × 20 cm. Private Collection.

wo das Bild des Plattenstempels allerdings hypothetisch auf  die Musithias des Tuberinus zurückgeführt wird. Daß die Vorlage der Holzschnitt bei Gyraldus war, beweisen die im Plattenstempel vorhandene untere Brunnenschale mit dem schäumenden Wasser und die ebenfalls im Plattenstempel vorhandenen und nur bei Gyraldus beigegebenen Sentenzen “AB IOVE PRINCIPIVM” (Verg. Buc. 3.60) und “DULCES ANTE OMNIA MVSAE” (Verg. Georg. 3.475).

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Abb. 2 Lilius Gregorius Gyraldus, Syntagma de Musis (Straßburg, 1512), Titelseite, 20 × 14 cm. Private Collection.

Kenntnisse verratenden Holzschnitts anzunehmen, daß Tuberinus dem Künstler Anweisungen für dessen Konzeption gegeben hat. Daß die Hippokrene in den antiken Q uellen am Helikon lokalisiert war, unterhalb des Parnaß bei Delphi aber die Kastalische Q uelle sprudelte, störte Tuberinus nicht, da er einerseits das schöne Bild der Musen in der Hippokrene zur Verfügung hatte und es verwertet sehen wollte und andererseits der zweigipfelige Parnaß mit Delphi einen ansehnlicheren Anblick bot als der bloße Helikon. Für seine Versdichtungen verwendete Tuberinus viele Vorlagen, von denen beispielhaft hier neben der Legenda aurea die drei Par364

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thenicae des Karmeliters Baptista Mantuanus (1448-1516) nachgewiesen werden sollen, die Tuberinus in seiner Darstellung der Maria, Catharina und Agatha verwendete.13 Die Prima, Secunda und Tertia Parthenice waren seit ihren Erstausgaben von 1488 und 1489 in Bologna sowie 1501 in Zwolle schon mehrfach erschienen. Gregorius Laticephalus Conicianus (Gregor Breitkopf  aus Conitz, imm. Leipzig 1490, Bacc. art. 1494, Mag. 1498, Bacc. theol. 1508, Dr. theol. 1523, Professor artium et theologiae, Dekan der philosophischen Fakultät 1505, Rektor 1508),14 der 1514 das erste Komplimentgedicht für die Musithias beitrug (Bl. aiiii r), veröffentlichte in Leipzig 1510 eine Ausgabe der Parthenice prima und der Parthenice secunda des Mantuanus (VD16 S. 7323 und 7340). Im folgenden werden einander entsprechende Abschnitte aus Mantuanus und Tuberinus (bei Catharina und Agatha zusammen mit Abschnitten der Legenda aurea) zitiert, in denen die übereinstimmenden Wörter oder Wortfolgen unterstrichen sind, um die engen Beziehungen von Tuberinus zu Mantuanus zu verdeutlichen.

I. Maria: Parthenice prima III ~ Musithias II (Euterpe), Symph. 23 Es ist die Szene, in der Maria vor ihrem Tod zu ihrem Sohn Christus betet und ihn bittet, ihm seine Jünger zu schicken und die sie erschreckende Schar der Höllengeister zu vertreiben, worauf  alsbald die Apostel durch die Lüfte fliegend zugegen sind und sie beschützen. Tuberinus hat auf  die von Mantuanus hier gegebene periphrastische Beschreibung der einzelnen Apostel verzichtet, aber – mit Sed tamen ante wie Mantuanus die Szene beginnend 13 Zu Baptista Mantuanus vgl.  H.  Jaumann, Handbuch Gelehrtenkultur der frühen Neuzeit. Bd. 1. Bio-bibliographisches Repertorium (Berlin – New York, 2004), 63 f. Von den zahlreichen poetischen und prosaischen lateinischen Schriften des 1885 selig gesprochenen Karmeliters (seine Verse wurden von Jaumann auf  ca.  50000 geschätzt) wurden seine zehn Adolescentia betitelten Eklogen in der Renaissance am meisten aufgelegt und in der Moderne am meisten erforscht, vgl.  die Editionen mit Übersetzungen von W. P. Mustard (ed.), Baptista Mantuanus, Adulescentia, the Eclogues of  Baptista Mantuanus (Baltimore, 1911); L.  Piepho (ed.), Baptista Mantuanus, Adulescentia, The Eclogues of  Mantuan (New York, 1989); A.  Severi (ed.), Baptista Mantuanus, Adolescentia (Bologna, 2010). Dagegen existiert von seinen Parthenicae weder eine moderne Ausgabe noch ist eine Interpretation der drei Versdichtungen mit ihren insgesamt acht Büchern bekannt. 14  Vgl.  J.  D. Titius, Nachricht von den Gelehrten, die aus der Stadt Conitz des Polnischen Preußens herstammen (Leipzig, 1763), 9-21.

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und mit dem unmittelbar bevorstehenden Tod Marias wie dieser endend – schilderte er die Bitten Marias und die himmlische Erfüllung mit den gleichen oder nur leicht abgewandelten Worten: Mantuanus, Parthenice (1518 I), Lib. III, Bl. liii v-iiii r 15 Sed tamen ante tuos isto quam e corpore migrem da videam fratres, Stygiosque hinc eijce manes, ne mihi Tartarei vultus tristesve figurae horrorem incutiant mortis gelidumque timorem. Nec dum finierat, quom iam duodena per auras laeta cohors aderat. Cilicum revocatus ab oris hic erat a Graecis, alius trans Paelion atque Tethios Euboicae fluctus Minoiaque arva, et mare Carpathium, sitientibus alter ab Indis alter ab Aethiopum siccis translatus harenis transque domos Arabum rubri trans littora ponti. Ille per Europae populos a gente Latina transierat, veniens Siculos Pelopisque penates, Phoebaeamque Rhodum, sparsasque per aequora terras. Mox animos Erebi quot erant per tecta, per auras in caecum deus ire chaos mandavit, et altis immergit tenebris atque intra tartara claudit.16 Tum niveam mentem domibus dissolvit opacis, et superiniecit tulerat quae dona parenti. At gelidum tepido iacuit sine sanguine corpus. Aber dennoch, bevor ich aus diesem Körper wandere, gib, daß ich deine Brüder sehe, und vertreibe die stygischen Geister von hier, daß mir nicht die Unterweltsgesichter oder die traurigen Gestalten einen Schauder einjagen und die kalte Furcht vor dem Tod. Und sie hatte noch nicht zu sprechen aufgehört, als schon die frohe Schar der Zwölf durch die Lüfte herangekommen war. Von den zilizischen Gestaden zurückgerufen war einer von den Griechen [Paulus], ein anderer kam über den Pelion und die Fluten des Euböischen Meeres und die Minoischen Gefilde und das Karpathische Meer [Andreas], ein anderer kam von den Durst leidenden Indern [Thomas], wieder ein anderer war von den trockenen Wüsten der Äthiopier herübergebracht worden und von den Häusern der Araber über die Küsten

15  Zitiert werden die Texte von Baptista Mantuanus aus den Ausgaben der drei Parthenicae aus Straßburg von 1518. Vgl.  E.  M. Coccia, Le edizioni delle opere del Mantovano (Rom, 1960), Nr. 304-306. Der Einband des benützten Exemplars durch den aus den Niederlanden gekommenen Cambridger Buchbinder Nicolaus Spierinck ist ein Beleg für ihre Verbreitung in England. Vgl.  zum Buchbinder G.  J. Gray, The Earlier Cambridge Stationers and Bookbinders and the First Cambridge Printer (Oxford, 1904), 25 und 43. 16  claudit coni. W. L.: ed. claudi.

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des Roten Meeres [Matthaeus]. Jener war durch die Völker Europas vom römischen Volk herübergekommen, er kam nach Sizilien, zum Peloponnes, zum apollinischen Rhodos und zu im Ozean verstreuten Ländern [Petrus]. Alsbald befahl Gott[sohn] den Geistern der Unterwelt, soviel in den Häusern und in der Luft waren, sich in das blinde Chaos zu begeben, und er versenkt sie in den tiefen Finsternissen und schließt sie in der Unterwelt ein. Da löst er den schneeweißen Geist in dem dunklen Haus auf  und wirft darüber, was er seiner Mutter als Geschenke gebracht hatte. Doch ihr eiskalter Körper lag da ohne wärmendes Blut. Tuberinus, Musithias (1514), Bl. lxx r Sed tamen ante obitum, soboles carissima, fratres da videam sanctos, agmina pelle stygis, ne mihi taenariae dira sub imagine larvae horrorem incutiant terrificosque metus. Sic mater domini, patris et nutu omnipotentis ocyus advolitat sacra caterva noto. Sacra caterva virum, bissenique agminis ordo circumstat fulcrum et te, moritura parens. Aber dennoch vor meinem Tod gib, daß ich deine heiligen Brüder, viel geliebter Sohn, sehe, und vertreibe die Scharen aus der Styx, daß mir nicht die unterirdischen Gespenster mit ihrem schrecklichen Aussehen einen Schauder einjagen und panische Furcht! So sprach die Mutter des Herrn, und auf  den Wink des allmächtigen Vaters fliegt die heilige Schar schneller heran als der Südwind. Die heilige Schar der Männer, die Reihe des Zuges der Zwölf, umsteht das Bett und dich, sterbende Mutter.

II. Catharina: Parthenice secunda III ~ Musithias IX (Calliope), Symph. 2 Die aus der Legenda aurea stammenden Szenen von Mantuanus und Tuberinus zeigen Katharina nach ihrer Rede an die von Kaiser Maxentius zusammengebrachten fünfzig heidnischen Gelehrten, die Katharina zum römischen Götterglauben hatten bekehren sollen, aber umgekehrt durch Katharina zum christlichen Glauben bekehrt worden waren, was den Kaiser so ergrimmte, daß er sie alle verbrennen ließ. Catharina bekräftigte sie in ihrem Glauben. Ihr Märtyrertod war für sie Taufe und Krönung zugleich, und das Feuer, das ihre Seelen in den Himmel steigen ließ, war seinerseits aus Ehrfurcht vor den Heiligen so scheu, daß es ihre Körper nicht zu Asche verbrannte, sondern nur “beleckte”. Diese Szenenfolge hat von ihrem Beginn nach der Rede Catharinas (Mantuanus und 367

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Tuberinus: “Finis erat verbis […]”) bis zur Beerdigung der fünfzig Märtyrer (Mantuanus: “sepulchro  / Christigenae intrepidi sublata cadavera ponunt”, Tuberinus: “Christigenae condunt sublata cadavera tumba”) in der Fassung der Legenda aurea ca. 13 Druckzeilen,17 in der des Mantuanus aber 79 18 und in der des Tuberinus 51 Hexameter.19 Mit Sicherheit beachtete Tuberinus auch die Legenda Aurea. Nur in ihr und bei ihm findet sich die Stelle, daß die heidnischen Redner nach Catharinas Rede gar nichts mehr zu sagen wußten, sondern verstummten (Legenda aurea: “obstupefacti illi et, quid dicerent, non invenientes muti penitus sunt effecti.” Tuberinus: “stupidi quum 20 Rhetores omnes / mutescunt, nec habent, quo se tueantur; inertes / redduntur prorsus, non ullas lingua ministrat / eloquii voces, non subsunt Pallados arma.”) Mantuanus hat die knappe Darstellung der Legenda aurea durchgehend anschaulich und psychologisch vertiefend erweitert. Tuberinus geht in der psychologischen Schilderung nicht so weit, folgt ihm aber immer wieder im wörtlichen Ausdruck. Ein durchgehender Vergleich dieser Szenen würde zu viel Raum beanspruchen, an einem Abschnitt – dem Wutausbruch des Kaisers Maxentius, der in der Legenda aurea etwa eine Zeile, bei Mantuanus und Tuberinus aber fast gleichviel Raum einnimmt (17 bzw. 14 Hexameter), – sei dies jedoch verdeutlicht: Da Voragine, Legenda aurea (S. 1208) Tunc imperator nimio contra eos furore repletus increpare eos coepit, cur ab una puella tam turpiter se vinci permitterent. Dann begann der Kaiser, voll von einer übergroßen Wut gegen sie, sie zu beschimpfen, wieso sie sich von einem einzigen Mädchen so schändlich besiegen ließen. Mantuanus, Parthenice (1518 II), Lib. III, Bl. ffii v-iii r. Torva supercilio Maxentius ora minaci tollit et accensus flagranti corda furore elata vocat arma manu, citus arma satelles admovet, accursu proceres tenuere citato 17   G.  P. Maggioni (ed.), Iacopo da Voragine, Legenda aurea (Florenz, 1998), 1208 f. 18 Mantuanus, Parthenice (1518 II), Lib. III, Bl. ffii v – ffiiii r. 19 Tuberinus, Musithias (1514), Bl. ccxcvi (recte: ccciii) v – ccciiii r. 20  quum: ed. qum.

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talibus ardentem furiis, subversa tumultu omnia praecipiti. Postquam sedata parumper ira, leves animos dixit quae movit Erinnis? Q uis malus invasit nutantia pectora daemon? Ergone foemineae potuerunt vertere nugae vos quoque? Vos inquam quos defendenda deorum causa peregrinis ad nos contraxit ab oris? Hoc honor exhibitus vobis, hoc dona merentur? Hoc suspensa tholo? Sic nos, sic omnia Romae numina negligitis? Q uae tanta ignavia? Multos una puella viros superat, proch dedecus, inter milia tot praestantum hominum certaminis huius praemia fert mulier, sic Rex, […] Maxentius erhebt sein finsteres Gesicht mit drohenden Augenbrauen und im Herzen entflammt durch brennende Wut ruft er mit ausgestreckter Hand nach Waffen. Der schnelle Gefolgsmann bringt Waffen. Durch beschleunigtes Hinzueilen hielten die Fürsten den so wutentbrannten fest. Alles geriet durch die überstürzte Aufregung in Unordnung. Nachdem der Zorn sich ein wenig gelegt hatte, sagte er: Welche Erynnie trieb die leichtsinnigen Geister? Welcher böse Dämon drang in die schwankenden Herzen ein? Also konnte dieses läppische Weibergeschwätz auch euch umstimmen? Euch, sage ich, die das Anliegen, die Götter zu verteidigen, von fremden Gestaden zu uns zusammenbrachte. Verdient das die euch erwiesene Ehre, verdienen das die euch gegebenen Geschenke, die in der Tempelkuppel aufgehängten Dinge? Mißachtet ihr uns so, so alle Götter Roms? Was ist das für eine große Feigheit? Ein einziges Mädchen überwindet viele Männer. Oh diese Schande! Bei so vielen Tausenden hervorragender Männer trägt den Preis dieses Wettstreits ein Weib davon. So sprach der Herrscher, […] Tuberinus, Musithias (1514), Bl. ccxcvi (recte: ccciii) v Caesaris attonitos invadit talibus ira, quis stupor iste novus? quae tanta ignavia? multos una viros superat mulier, qui rhetorica 21 arte conspicui esse volunt, aliis praestareque voce. Pro facinus foedum, pro detestabile crimen. Tantum inter cuneum, tanta inter et agmina, ab oris accita extremis rem defensura Deorum lauri fert mulier victrici marte coronam. Dicite Parthenices obiectis, dicite aperto rhetores ore viri. Q uid muta silentia? Radet vos nostra ira, solo. Bardis ea munera sunto.

  In “qui rhe” stehen zwei metrische Längen anstelle von zwei Kürzen.

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Pro animos molles, pro corda levissima, capti mente virili omnes. Puerilis ineptia quanta. Sic Rex involvens convicia, dicta minarum. Des Kaisers Zorn drang so auf  die wie vom Donner Betäubten ein: Was ist das für eine neue Dummheit? Was ist das für eine große Feigheit? Viele Männer überwindet ein einziges Weib, Männer, die durch ihre rhetorische Kunst Ansehen haben und die anderen mit ihrer Stimme übertreffen wollen. Oh diese häßliche Untat, oh dieses abscheuliche Verbrechen! Bei einem so großen Stoßtrupp, bei so großen Marschkolonnen, die von weit entfernten Gestaden herbeigerufen wurden, um die Sache der Götter zu verteidigen, trägt ein einziges Weib nach siegreichem Kampf  den Lorbeerkranz! Antwortet doch den Vorwürfen der Jungfrau, sprecht mit offenem Mund als mannhafte Redner! Was soll das stumme Schweigen? Unser Zorn wird euch vom Erdboden wegfegen. Dummköpfe sollen diese Geschenke bekommen. Oh diese kraftlosen Geister, oh diese leichtsinnigen Herzen und all diese blödsinnigen Männer! Was für eine kindische Dummheit! So setzte der Herrscher seine Beschimpfungen und seine Drohungen fort.

III. Agatha: Parthenice tertia I ~ Musithias IX (Callliope), Symph. 7 Es ist hier die Szene der Legenda aurea, in der die gemartete Agatha im Gefängnis um Mitternacht von einem wunderbar durch die Wolken erschienenen alten Mann geheilt wird, der sich am Ende als der vom Himmel gekommene Petrus zu erkennen gibt und der von einem eine Leuchte tragenden Knaben begleitet wurde. Mantuanus erweiterte diese Szene, indem er zwei heilige Ärzte hinzufügte. In der Gestalt des Knaben verbirgt sich bei ihm der arzneikundige Heilige Cosmas. Und den wegen Col. 4.14 als Arzt geltenden und nach den Kirchenvätern aus Antiochia in Syrien stammenden Evangelisten Lucas läßt Mantuanus die Heilmittel bringen, verbirgt ihn aber, um den Unterschied zur Legenda aurea zu mildern, in einer weißen Wolke, etwa wie die homerischen Götter Helden in Nebel unsichtbar machen konnten. Tuberinus, der wie der Ausdruck grandior aevo für Petrus zeigt, auch die Legenda aurea im Blick hat (vgl. dort grandevus, nicht bei Mantuanus), übernimmt – zum Teil unter Wahrung des Wortlauts – diese Gruppe der Hilfe Bringenden von Mantuanus, läßt aber die Lucas verhüllende Wolke weg. Beide Autoren beginnen die Szene mit einer – von Tuberinus variierten – Schilderung der Mitternacht: 370

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Da Voragine, Legenda aurea (S. 258 f.) Et ecce circa mediam noctem venit ad eam quidam senex, quem antecedebat puer luminis portitor, diversa secum ferens medicamenta, et dixit ei: […] senex et grandevus […] Et subridens senior dixit: “Et ego apostolus eius sum et ipse me misit ad te et in nomine eius scias te esse sanatam.” Et continuo Petrus apostolus disparuit. Und sieh, um Mitternacht kam zu ihr ein Greis, vor dem ein Knabe ging als Träger des Lichts, der verschiedene Heilmittel mit sich führte, und er sagte ihr  […] der Greis von hohem Alter  […] Und lächelnd sagte der Alte: “Und ich bin sein Apostel, und er schickte mich selbst zu dir, und du sollst wissen, daß du in seinem Namen geheilt worden bist.” Und alsbald verschwand der Apostel Petrus. Mantuanus, Parthenice (1518 III), Lib. I, Ddiii r-v Cum faceret medio nox alta silentia cursu et niger hesperias iret casurus in undas Scorpius, illustri geminis surgentibus ore, ecce senex celero lapsus per nubila cursu Petrus adest, et caeca altis abscondita in umbris claustra subit, Petroque comes medicamina portans Assyrius Lucas in nube absconditus alba, it funale gerens pueri sub imagine Cosmas, Paeonas 22 ambo succos, Asclepidas ambo syntheses edocti, fomenta Machaonis ambo. Als die Nacht in ihrem mittleren Lauf  eine tiefe Stille bewirkte und der schwarze Skorpion in die westlichen Wellen zu fallen begann und die Zwillinge sich mit leuchtendem Gesicht erhoben, sieh da ist der greise Petrus da, der in schnellem Lauf  durch die Wolken geglitten war, und er begibt sich heimlich zu dem finsteren, in tiefen Schatten verborgenen, verschlossenen Raum, und mit Petrus kommt als Begleiter, die Heilmittel tragend, der syrische Lucas, der in einer weißen Wolke verborgen war. Der das Licht tragende Cosmas kommt in der Gestalt eines Knaben. Beide hatten die paeonischen Säfte, beide die asklepiadischen Kombinationen, beide die Verbandsmittel des Machaon gründlich gelernt. Tuberinus, Musithias (1514), Bl. cccxlvi v Scanderet ut medii Phoebe fastigia caeli, corpora spirarent et somnum fessa profundum, ecce volans Petrus per nubila grandior aevo claustra subingreditur quis sola in nocte resedit Virgo gravi. Assyrius Lucas medicamine honustus   Paeonas ci. W. L.: ed. Poenas.

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it comes annoso per opaca silentia Petro. Fertque facem ardentem pueri sub imagine Cosmas Phillyridae callens succos et Paeonis artem. Als Phoebe den Gipfel des mittleren Himmels erstieg und die ermüdeten Körper im tiefen Schlaf  atmeten, sieh da fliegt der uralte Petrus durch die Wolken und betritt heimlich den verschlossenen Raum, in dem die Jungfrau in drückender Nacht allein saß. Der Syrer Lucas kommt mit Medikamenten beladen als Begleiter mit dem bejahrten Petrus durch die tiefe Stille. Und es bringt Cosmas in der Gestalt eines Knaben die brennende Fackel. Er kennt die Säfte des Chiron und die Kunst des Paeon.

Wer die zitierten Abschnitte von Mantuanus und Tuberinus und die in ihnen unterstrichenen Wörter miteinander vergleicht, wird unschwer beobachten können, wie Tuberinus hier der Parthenice prima, secunda und tertia des Mantuanus folgte und sie für seinen neuen Text über denselben Gegenstand verwertete und veränderte. Die Art, wie Tuberinus weitgehende wörtliche Übereinstimmungen mit Texten von Mantuanus in seinen eigenen Text einbettete, erinnert geradezu an den Titelholzschnitt, in den der HippokreneBrunnen aus dem Druck des Gyraldus eingefügt wurde. Tuberinus konnte freilich nur in den Fällen so vorgehen, wo er eine poetische Vorlage für seinen Gegenstand hatte, was nicht immer der Fall war. Oft waren prosaische Erzählungen über die Heiligen und ihre Passionen seine Q uellen. Sein Stil steht an veranschaulichender Kraft hinter Mantuanus zurück. Tuberinus fehlen auch die flüssige Eleganz Sannazaros und die erzählerische Gewandtheit Vidas. Bei der Wiedergabe abstrakter Gedankengänge ist Tuberinus manchmal etwas ungelenk und bei hymnischen Äußerungen floskelhaft, aber er konnte sich als Humanist fühlen, der seine Kenntnisse in den Dienst des christlichen Glaubens stellte und mit extremem Fleiß einen Superlativ anstrebte.

Maria: Parthenice prima I ~ Musithias II (Euterpe), Symph. 20 Besondere Ereignisse stellte er mehrfach in formal unterschiedlichen, inhaltlich aber parallelen Gedichten dar, so im Maria-Buch Euterpe die Annuntiatio, auf  die er vier Gedichte, drei elegische und ein sapphisches verwandte (Symph. 15-18), und die Visitatio, der er, basierend auf  Lucas 1, eine ausführliche und freie elegische, das 372

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Magnificat einschließende Paraphrase und eine kurze sapphische Ode widmete (Symph. 19-20). Letztere sei hier als Beispiel für die ansprechende Q ualität seiner Odendichtung zitiert: 23 Aliger postquam volat a puella, illa se accingit, rapidis cacumen gressibus scandit, properat pudico trans iuga calce. It parens gestans gremio Tonantem optimum, magno dominantem Olympo, principem pacis, superumque Regem, Numen et ipsum. Floribus vernat nemus omne, rivi vitrei manant crepitante cursu, campus et fragrat, violae resurgunt purpureaeque. Excipit cognata nurus benigne virginem visam ad puteum capacem, aedibusque infert, gemini lacerti collaque stringunt. Gestiit et foetus recubans in alvo ecce Ioannes, gremio puellae accipit regem, insolitis adorat plausibus atque. Visita virgo famulum benigna mente turbata, properante fato lurido, nullas poterint ut ora fundere voces. Tunc ades nobis genetrix Tonantis, summove vafros barathri tyrannos inferi, scandam regionis altae aurea regna. Nachdem der Geflügelte [Gabriel] von der jungen Frau weggeflogen ist, gürtet sie sich und besteigt mit raschen Schritten die Bergkuppe und eilt mit züchtigem Fuß über die Bergrücken. Die Schwangere geht, in ihrem Schoß den besten Donnerer tragend, der im großen Olymp herrscht, den Friedensfürsten, den König der Himmlischen, und der selbst Gott ist. Von Blumen blüht wie im Frühling der ganze Hain, die glasklaren Bäche fließen in rauschendem Lauf, das Feld duftet und die purpurnen Veilchen erheben sich wieder. Es empfängt die verwandte Frau wohlwollend die bei einem geräumigen Brunnen gesehene junge Frau, bringt sie in ihr Haus, und ihre beiden Arme streicheln ihre Nacken. Es frohlockt auch der im Bauch liegende

 Tuberinus, Musithias (1514), Bl. lxviii v.

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Foetus. Sieh da, Johannes empfängt den König im Schoß der jungen Frau und betet ihn an mit ungewohntem Beifallklatschen. – Besuche, Jungfrau, wohlwollend deinen Diener, wenn sein Geist durch das heraneilende Todesgeschick verwirrt ist, so daß sein Mund keine Worte mehr von sich geben kann! Dann sei, du Mutter des Donnerers, bei uns! Vertreibe die verschlagenen Tyrannen der Unterweltstiefe! Aufsteigen möchte ich in das goldene Reich der Höhe.

Die Kirche feierte am 2. Juli das Fest der Visitatio Mariae (Mariä Heimsuchung). Deshalb endet die Ode nach fünf  narrativen Strophen mit zweien des Gebets. Marias Weg über die Berge zu Elisabeth hatte die elegische Paraphrase im Anschluß an die knappe Äußerung von Lucas 1.39 (“abiit in montana”) nur kurz angesprochen (Bl. lxvii v): “It pede virgo cito, morulas neque quaeritat ullas,  / ventre tuum intacto numen, Olympe, gerit.” Dieses eine Distichon wird in der Ode nun auf drei Strophen erweitert. In deren fünf  ersten Strophen steht in der Mitte die die Leser einnehmende und weder durch Lucas vorbereitete noch in der vorausgegangenen elegischen Paraphrase vorweggenommene Schilderung der gewissermaßen unter Marias Schritten und durch die Gegenwart des noch ungeborenen Gottessohns aufblühenden bewegten Natur. Die Anregung gab wieder Mantuanus, der in seiner Parthenice prima, lib. I, Bl. F iiii r-v, das Aufblühen der Natur (die Marginalnotiz lautet: Veris descriptio) unter den Schritten Marias u.  a. so beschreibt (die wörtlichen Übereinstimmungen werden wieder durch Unterstreichungen hervorgehoben): Dumque viam carpit pedibus calcata pudicis, gestiit immensum tellus, et dulcia longo tempore servavit presso vestigia dorso. […] Arrisit procul omnis ager, nemus omne virentes exorto iam vere comas curvavit, et ibat in flores tunc omne solum, fragrantia rura purpureas passim violas, et candida passim lilia fundebant, nitidis e fontibus 24 undae volvebant dulces cursu crepitante susurros. Und während sie ihren Weg zurücklegt, ihn mit züchtigen Füßen betretend, frohlockte die unermeßliche Erde und bewahrte die süßen Spuren lange Zeit auf  ihrem eingedrückten Rücken. […]  Es lachte weithin jeder Acker, jeder Hain krümmte, da schon der Frühling   fontibus ci. W. L.: ed. frontibus.

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ausgebrochen war, seine grünenden Haare, und jeder Boden brachte Blüten hervor. Überall ließen die duftenden Felder purpurne Veilchen und weiße Lilien sprießen, und aus klaren Q uellen brachten die Wellen in rauschendem Lauf  süß flüsternde Töne hervor.

Dieser dritten Strophe des Tuberinus gehen in den Strophen 1-2 – Lucas 1.38b-39: “Et discessit ab illa angelus. Exsurgens autem Maria in diebus illis abiit in montana in civitatem Iuda” amplifizierend – der Abflug Gabriels und der Aufbruch sowie der bergige Weg Marias, die mit dem in der zweiten Strophe gefeierten Gottessohn schwanger ist, voraus. Und ihr folgen in den Strophen 4-5 – Lucas 1.40-41: “Et intravit in domum Zachariae et salutavit Elisabeth. Et factum est ut audivit salutationem Mariae Elisabeth, exultavit infans in utero eius” unter Aufnahme von 36 Elisabeth cognata tua amplifizierend – Marias Empfang bei Elisabeth und die wundersame Anbetung des ungeborenen Königs durch Johannes in der fünften Strophe.25 Die folgenden beiden Gebetsstrophen 6-7 versetzen darauf  in die Gegenwart des Sprechenden (und Lesenden) und richten den Blick auf  Marias erbetene Hilfe in der Todesstunde. So endet das Gedicht in der siebten Strophe mit dem Blick auf  Maria und Christus, die Teufel der Hölle und die erstrebte goldene Himmelsregion. Nach Fertigstellung seines Werkes erreichte Tuberinus am 12. März 1513 als Dekan einen Beschluß der Philosophischen Fakultät, daß seine Musithias in der Leipziger Universität als poetische Lektüre an die Stelle von Terenz zu setzen ist (er selbst hatte beantragt, sie anstelle von Vergil zu lesen, was noch anspruchsvoller war, aber sachlich sinnvoller gewesen wäre).26 Bald nach ihrer Publikation im Jahr 1514 wurde Tuberinus unter dem Namen Rotburgensis in den im Oktober 1515 erschienenen Epistolae obscurorum virorum von einem Anhänger des Ortwinus Gratius lobend charakterisiert, vom wirklichen Verfasser des Briefes

25  Auch diese Darstellung ist Mantuanus verpflichtet (Bl. Gi r): “iniecti strinxerunt colla lacerti.  / Grandior afflatu vicini numinis infans  / gestiit et subito dominum confessus honore, / maternam insolitis concussit motibus alvum” (die ausgestreckten Arme streichelten die Nacken. Das durch den Anhauch des nahen Gottwesens größere Kind frohlockte, und plötzlich seinen Herrn mit Ehrenbezeugung bekennend erschütterte es den mütterlichen Bauch mit ungewohnten Bewegungen). 26  Vgl. Worstbrock, Beuschel 2005 (wie Anm. 1), 183.

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her gesehen mit satirischer Ironie angegriffen (I.17, M.  Johannes Hipp S. D. M. Ortvino Gratio): 27 Et similiter magister Rotburgensis, qui composuit unum librum bene in triplo ita magnum sicut est Virgilius in omnibus suis operibus. Et posuit multa bona in illo libro: etiam in defensione S. matris Ecclesiae et de laudibus Sanctorum. Et commendavit nostram universitatem principaliter et sacram Theologiam et facultatem artistarum et reprehendit illos poetas saeculares et gentiles. Et domini magistri dicunt, quod sua metra sunt ita bona sicut metra Virgilii et non habent aliqua vitia, quia ipse perfecte scit artem metrificandi et ante XX. annos fuit bonus metrista. Q uapropter domini de consilio permiserunt, quod iste debet istum librum publice legere pro Terentio, quia est magis necessarius quam Terentius et habet bonam Christianitatem in se et non tractat de meretricibus et bufonibus sicut Terentius.

Tuberinus wird hier vorgeführt wegen des exorbitanten Umfangs seines poetischen Werkes, seiner Anmaßung, Terenz ersetzen zu wollen, und seiner kirchlich konservativen Einstellung, die zu der Konzentrierung seiner poetischen Arbeit auf  die christliche Dichtung geführt hatte. Es fehlten bei ihm weltliche Gedichte (einen Tadel derselben habe ich in seinen Texten jedoch nicht bemerkt), und seine metrischen Kenntnisse werden versteckt als antiquiert bezeichnet. Diese Kritik ist für die Dunkelmännerbriefe relativ milde. Tuberinus ist zweifellos ein wichtiger Vertreter des christlichen Humanismus zu Anfang des 16. Jahrhunderts. Die Möglichkeit einer anhaltenden Wirkung seines dichterischen Hauptwerkes wurde durch dessen Umfang erschwert und durch die in Sachsen bald nach 1514 beginnende kirchliche Reformation abgeschnitten.28

27  Zitiert nach Duo volumina epistolarum obscurorum virorum (Romae [fiktiv], 1557), Bl. C 9 v-10 r.  Vgl.  zum christlichen Humanismus von Ortwinus Gratius W. Ludwig, “Der Humanist Ortwin Gratius, Heinrich Bebel und der Stil der Dunkelmännerbriefe”, A.  Steiner-Weber (ed.), W.  Ludwig, Miscellanea Neolatina, Ausgewählte Aufsätze 1989-2003, Bd. 2 (Hildesheim – Zürich – New York, 2004), 572-608. 28  Ich bin Fidel Rädle für hilfreiche Hinweise sehr verbunden.

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LE CHOIX DES MÈTRES DANS LES EPIGRAMMATA D’AGRIPPA D’AUBIGNÉ (GENÈVE, BPU, MS. TRONCHIN 158)

Le recueil d’Agrippa d’Aubigné intitulé Epigrammata dans le manuscrit Tronchin 158 conservé à Genève, qu’avec mon épouse Béatrice je suis en train de publier, après Pierre-Paul Plan,1 dans l’ensemble des poésies latines du grand réformé, compte, hormis une pièce liminaire mise à part de l’Epigrammatum libellus proprement dit, 34 “épigrammes” de sujets variés: 2 – dix-huit pièces spécifiquement religieuses: une prière au seuil de la mort (1, quatorze vers), une pièce sur la vengeance divine (25, six vers), cinq contre les apostats (6, deux vers; 11, dix vers; 12, quatre vers; 13, 145 vers; 16, 43 vers), cinq contre le pape (14, quatre vers; 15, quatre vers; 17, douze vers; 22, dix vers et 31, contre la papesse Jeanne, douze vers), trois contre les moines (4, six vers; 26, six vers; 27, seize vers), une contre l’Inquisition et ses tortures (18, six vers), une contre le cardinal Charles Borromée (19, huit vers) et une contre Simon Bishop (34, six vers); – onze poèmes politico-religieux parfois à connotation militaire: une longue adresse à Henri  IV qui a  trahi ses compagnons d’armes pour se fier à des gens sans foi (2, 58 vers), un long centon qui décrit l’affrontement religieux de son temps avec des

1   Pages inédites de Théodore-Agrippa d’Aubigné (Genève, 1945), 161-217 (à partir du ms. Tronchin 157); le texte de référence est celui de notre édition à partir du ms. Tronchin 158. 2  Au sens où on l’entendait au Q uattrocento: voir J.-L. Charlet, “Q u’est-ce que l’épigramme latine au Q uattrocento?”, Istituto Lombardo. Rendiconti. Classe di lettere e scienze morali e storiche 139 (2005 [2008]), 373-390.

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 377-391 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124071

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vers de Lucain (3, 125 vers) accompagné d’une comparaison entre la situation de Lucain et celle d’Agrippa (5, douze vers), épigrammes sur le roi, son comportement (7, quatorze vers), ses amours (8, quatre vers), sur le duc de Mercœur, dernier chef  de la Ligue (10, 24 vers), Paul Étienne louangeur de Louis XIII (21, dix vers), Arpentina corrompue par l’écuyer du roi puis par un évêque (28, six vers), sur le désaccord entre Dieu et les rois (29, six vers), les conséquences des troubles (32, quatre vers) et le siège de Brouage (33, huit vers); – deux satires personnelles: celle d’un boulanger-pasteur (9, 44 vers, qui pourrait se rattacher aux thèmes religieux) et celle d’un duelliste (20, quatre vers); – trois épigrammes personnelles: sur le château du Crest (23, dix vers, pièce liée à des thèmes religieux) et sur sa retraite (24, huit vers), ainsi qu’une apologie sur le testament de Nicolas Rapin (30, seize vers). Dans ce recueil, on compte 27 poèmes en distiques élégiaques (dont la pièce liminaire), quatre en hexamètres dactyliques, trois en hendécasyllabes phaléciens et une courte pièce qui constitue une variante du premier mètre archiloquien en associant en distiques un hexamètre dactylique et son premier hémistiche, jusqu’à la césure penthémimère, c’est-à-dire ce qu’on appelle un hémiépès (avec, contrairement au premier mètre archiloquien, une substitution d’un spondée à un dactyle au premier pied du v.  10),3 brève improvisation de cinq distiques sur la vengeance divine qui se manifeste par l’apparition d’une maladie d’un genre nouveau (Epigr. 25).4 3  Voir J.-L. Charlet, Métrique latine humaniste (Genève, 2020), 147-148: Hor. Carm. 4.7; Aus. Par. 28 et, à l’époque humaniste, notamment Q uatrario, Cleofilo et Geraldini. Cette épigramme compte bien 10 vers et non 6: Plan (no. XXVIII) a oublié deux distiques ajoutés sur les mss. Tronchin 158 et sa copie, Londres, British Library, Harley 1216. 4  Dans les épigrammes latines contenues dans le manuscrit Tronchin 157, mais non retenue dans le recueil définitif  (Tronchin 158), on relève une pièce de douze sénaires iambiques, mètre probablement choisi parce qu’il évoque une rivalité à propos de fables (éd. Plan, Epigr. 17: “Ad Rapinum, qui victus ludo latrunculorum, cumque de fabulis certasset cum Alb[ineo] vere fabulas elegantes misit”). Il s’agit bien de sénaires, et non de trimètres iambiques, puisqu’on y relève au moins trois spondées quatrièmes (v.  3, 10, 12 et peut-être 9, qui pose des problèmes de scansion). Aubigné semble ignorer la césure de ce mètre: seulement trois césures cinquièmes,

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Dans les quatre pièces en hexamètres, on remarque un long centon de Lucain, le Classicum (Epigr. 3, 125 vers, avec quelques vers ou fragments de vers originaux) et trois petites pièces: Epigr. 4, sur les (mauvaises) raisons qui conduisent à se faire moine (six vers); 18, sur les instruments de torture de la maison de l’Inquisition (six vers aussi) et un poème de seize hexamètres (27), sur l’étymologie du terme coenobium. Le grand centon traite sur le mode épique les guerres de religion, et en particulier la Saint-Barthélémy; les trois autres attaquent le monachisme et l’Inquisition. Le centon de Lucain ne peut révéler la façon dont Aubigné écrivait ses propres hexamètres en stiques. Q uant aux trois autres pièces, elles forment un ensemble trop limité (28 vers!) pour permettre une étude métrique autonome. Mais elles pourront servir de point de comparaison par rapport à l’hexamètre élégiaque des Epigrammata. Nous concentrerons donc notre étude sur le distique élégiaque et l’hendécasyllabe phalécien, beaucoup mieux représentés dans ce recueil. Les 158 distiques élégiaques qui se lisent dans 27 poèmes permettent une étude métrique statistique. Pour l’hexamètre, nous reprenons les quatre points de vue adoptés dans notre Métrique latine humaniste: les schémas métriques des quatre premiers (dactyle = D; spondée = S), la place et la proportion des dactyles; les césures, les élisions et les clausules.5 En ce qui concerne les schémas métriques,6 Aubigné manifeste une certaine originalité en donnant la première place au type SDSS, devant le premier type dans la poésie épique classique DSSS, qui n’atteint la seconde place que dans les hexamètres en stiques de Catulle, Horace (Sat. et Ep.), Silius Italicus et Juvénal, et, dans les hexamètres élégiaques, que chez Properce et Lygdamus. On notera aussi la haute fréquence du type spondaïque SSSS (8,23%, cinquième place ex-aequo, comme dans l’Énéide et les Satires d’Horace, alors qu’il tient la deuxième place dans les dont une après le monosyllabe qui (v.  2, 8 et 12), une septième (v.  3) contre huit sénaires sans césure. Aubigné use avec parsimonie des pieds à longue résolue (un dactyle 3 au v. 12 et peut-être un dactyle premier au v. 9), mais abuse des mots-pieds. 5  Charlet 2020 (cité n.  3), 15-94. Pour les statistiques concernant les auteurs classiques, nous reprenons celle de L. Ceccarelli, Contributi per la storia dell’esametro latino, vol. 2 (Roma, 2008), Tabelle, et Id., Contributions to the History of   the Latin Elegiac Distich (Turnhout, 2018). 6  Mon tableau 1; Ceccarelli 2008 (cité n. 5), vol. 2, 3, tab. 1 et 7, tab. 3, et Cec­ carelli 2018 (cité n. 5), 251-254, tab. 1 et 261-263, tab. 3.

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hexamètres élégiaques de Catulle et la troisième chez Lygdamus (et  Silius dans les hexamètres en stiques), en contraste avec le dernier rang concédé au type holodactylique DDDD (à 1,90%), place qu’il n’occupe dans l’hexamètre classique en stiques que chez Cicéron, Catulle, dans l’Ars d’Horace (15/16 dans les Satires), chez Lucain (son modèle dans le Classicum) et Silius Italicus; il est avant-dernier dans les Géorgiques, l’Énéide et chez Juvénal. Dans l’hexamètre élégiaque, il est à la 14/15e place chez Catulle et Properce. En revanche, les trois schémas les moins prisés dans la poésie classique, SSSD (2,42% en stiques, 2,05 dans les distiques), SSDD (2,05% en stiques, 1,36 dans les distiques) et SDDD (1,91% en stiques, 1,66 dans les distiques) sont nettement moins rares dans les distiques d’Agrippa: 3,16% pour SDDD, 3,80 pour SSDD et autour de 5% pour SSSD.7 C’est qu’Aubigné cherche avant tout la diversité des schémas métriques, d’où il évite à la fois une trop forte répétition des schémas les plus usités (seulement deux schémas à légèrement plus de 10% et ses quatre schémas préférés représentent à peine plus de 41%, ce qui le met dans la catégorie des poètes qui évitent les répétitions rythmiques) et, inversement, il restreint moins la place des schémas habituellement rares, voire très rares. Globalement, Aubigné donne une nette préférence aux spondées puisque, dans ses quatre premiers pieds, les dactyles ne représentent que 42,72%, ce qui le place un peu en dessous du Virgile de l’Énéide (43,52%) ou de Lucain (43,90) ou encore, dans les hexamètres élégiaques de Properce (43,90), alors qu’ils représentaient tout de même 46,87% chez Martial. Du premier au quatrième pied, on remarque une faible amplitude dans la variation du nombre de dactyles (de 51,90 à 34,81% minimum), ce qui prouve qu’Aubigné ne recherche pas les contrastes ou oppositions trop vifs, mais surtout la légère remontée des dactyles au quatrième pied, contrairement à la courbe descendante du premier au qua7  L’hésitation dans la scansion tient à l’incertitude de la valeur prosodique du nom propre Bor(r)omaeo en Epigr. 19.3 (voir commentaire ad loc.). Par ailleurs, on relève dans les mètres dactyliques de ce recueil plusieurs fautes de prosodie: outre les libertés parfois surprenantes dans la longueur des voyelles grecques (confusions ο / ω et ε / η en 0 Ad libellum, 4 et Epigr. 10.10) et dans les finales en -o, même au datif-ablatif de la seconde déclinaison (o bref de Paulo en 21.5), on notera par exemple les abrègements du premier u de “utitur” en 17.10, du i  de “idem” masculin en 9.31 et 32 ou encore du premier e  de livere en 30.16. En revanche, les diérèses qui rendent trisyllabiques “suavis” (1.12) ou “sueta” (30.11) peuvent se comprendre plus aisément et se retrouveront.

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trième pied, adoptée par Virgile et souvent respectée: dans cette remontée du dactyle quatrième (qui correspond à un certain goût pour le type DSSD) et le non-rejet des trois types SDDD, SSDD et SSSD, Aubigné se rapproche d’Ovide et de Martial (64,50; 47,35; 37,02; 38,62). En ce qui concerne les césures,8 ce qui frappe, c’est le désintérêt d’Agrippa pour la césure trochaïque troisième (Tr), habituellement en latin en triple a: 1,90% pour la triple a et 3,16% au total, malgré une concentration dans l’épigramme 31 (trois trochaïques troisièmes – plus de la moitié du total – en six distiques!), alors que même chez Properce elle représente 5,46%, 6,57 dans les hexamètres élégiaques d’Ovide (mais plus de 10% dans les Métamorphoses, comme chez Virgile et autres, et près de 20% chez Lucain) et chez Martial 7,93; seul Lygdamus est plus restrictif  sur ce point (1,38%). De même, la combinaison trithémimère-hephthémimère (TH) n’a laissé que des traces et la diérèse bucolique, au sens moderne du terme, est à peine attestée: 9 chez Aubigné, la penthémimère (P) est hégémonique, soit seule (23,42%), soit en combinaison: au total, elle scande 94,30% des hexamètres élégiaques de notre recueil. Pour les élisions au sens général du terme, en traitant ensemble l’hexamètre et le pentamètre, l’époque humaniste ne faisant pas clairement la différence entre synalèphe et aphérèse,10 on note surtout des élisions de brèves, ou de longues sur longues, et seulement quelques aphérèses, beaucoup moins que chez Martial, et aucune en fin de vers comme chez Ovide. Globalement, Aubigné élide modérément: 21,52% de synalèphes, 24,05 avec les aphérèses pour l’hexamètre, 16,46 et 17,72 avec les aphérèses pour le pentamètre. C’est moins que dans les Bucoliques de Virgile (27,23%) ou que chez Properce (26,58% dans l’hexamètre, 19,34 dans le pentamètre), mais plus que dans les élégies d’Ovide (11,06 dans l’hexamètre, 5,04 dans le pentamètre; mais 19,82% dans les Métamorphoses), chez Tibulle (12,40 et 9,68%), chez Lucain (12,88%) ou surtout chez

8   Mon tableau 2. Ceccarelli 2008 (cité n. 5), vol. 2, 44, tab. 19; Ceccarelli 2018 (cité n. 5), 277, tab. 11. 9  Epigr. 8.3 et 26.5 avec liaison consonne-voyelle; 12.3 avec liaison voyelleconsonne. 10  Charlet 2020 (cité n. 3), 43. Voir mon tableau 3. Ceccarelli 2008 (cité n. 5), vol. 2, 44, tab. 27; Ceccarelli 2018 (cité n. 5), 277, tab. 11.

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Martial (4,36 et 3,94%; mais Martial use abondamment de l’aphérèse). Si Aubigné élide sans restriction dans le premier hémistiche du pentamètre (cf.  Lygdamus, 15,17% globalement), en revanche il évite manifestement de le faire dans le second (deux synalèphes sans aphérèse contre 24 et deux aphérèses). Mais il ne répugne pas à élider des monosyllabes: surtout des pronoms (qui: 9.12 et 15, et 28.3; quae: 28.5; se: 30.10), mais aussi l’adverbe tum en tête de clausule (30, 3). Les clausules d’hexamètres des Epigrammata sont modérément classiques (tableau 3), mais avec une certaine liberté. Les deux types les plus fréquents, condere gentem et conde sepulcro y sont quasiment à égalité (41,77 et 41,14%); mais en y ajoutant le troisième type classique, gente tot annos, on n’atteint pas les 90%. Si les polysyllabes longs en fin d’hexamètre sont très rares (un tétrasyllabe en 12, 3: “nam misereri” et un pentasyllabe en 9.3, le nom propre Massiliensem) et les clausules spondaïques absentes, Aubigné ne néglige pas le type si bona norint (3,80%) et surtout ne répugne pas à placer un monosyllabe en fin de vers, il est vrai toujours précédé d’un autre monosyllabe (5,06%), surtout de type 3-1-1. En ce qui concerne le pentamètre, et tout d’abord le schéma verbal de son second hémistiche, lieu stratégique qui permet de situer les poètes dans l’histoire latine de ce mètre,11 le premier tableau des pentamètres montre au premier coup d’œil qu’Agrippa se situe très loin de la pratique ovidienne, entre la première et la seconde manière de Properce. Chez Properce, on constatait une évolution, depuis la manière de Catulle, très proche des Grecs dans leur liberté à clore le pentamètre, à l’exception du monosyllabe final évité: d’abord, dans le livre I, 62,96% de dissyllabes finaux, caractéristique latine par opposition aux Grecs (dont 60 pour les cinq types a-e qui vont s’imposer en latin), contre 25% de tétrasyllabes (21,8 pour le seul type f  [22,04 chez Catulle], partage syllabique 4-3), 9,12% de trisyllabes et 2,56% de pentasyllabes; puis, dans une évolution du livre II au livre IV, 94,17% de dissyllabes contre 3,94% de tétrasyllabes, 1,09 de trisyllabes et 0,55 de pentasyllabes. Par rapport à la première manière de Properce, Aubi11  Charlet 2020 (cité n. 3), 95-142, en particulier 103-112, qui reprend la typologie de J.  Veremans, “Évolution historique de la structure verbale du deuxième hémistiche du pentamètre latin”, dans J. Bibauw (ed.), Hommages à Marcel Renard, vol. 1 (Bruxelles, 1969), 758-767; Ceccarelli 2018 (cité n. 5), 289, tab. 18.

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gné a augmenté la proportion des dissyllabes finaux (77,85%, avec 73,42% pour les cinq types devenus classiques en latin), mais en conservant une forte proportion de tétrasyllabes (17,72% dont 14,56 de type f), quelques trisyllabes (3,16%) et deux pentasyllabes (Epigr. 23.4 “hospes hirundinibus”; 34.6 “cedet Episcopius”). Il conserve moins de dissyllabes finaux que Martial (88,34% dont 83/84% pour les cinq types canoniques latins), mais surtout fait une place beaucoup plus grande que chez Martial aux tétrasyllabes finaux, surtout du type f. Ici encore, on soulignera la grande liberté d’Agrippa par rapport à la tradition latine. Pour le choix des pieds dans le premier hémistiche,12 Aubigné préfère, mais beaucoup moins nettement que les élégiaques latins antiques (sauf  Catulle), la succession dactyle-spondée (DS) à l’itération des dactyles (DD), ce qui assure une attaque de pentamètre majoritairement dactylique, tout en introduisant un peu plus d’attaques spondaïques que chez les élégiaques antiques (SD à 20,89%, SS à 15,82). Sur ce dernier point, il se montre assez proche de Martial qui offre 18,56% de schémas SD et 16,71 de SS. On relève deux cas d’allongements d’une syllabe brève fermée qui clôt le premier hémistique devant l’initiale vocalique du second (portus au nominatif  en 5.6 et nomen en 34.2) et Aubigné place non moins de quatre monosyllabes en cette fin de premier hémistiche mors en 1.14; me en 5.8; sit en 34.4; mais même et en 34.6. Les Epigrammata contient trois pièces écrites en hendécasyllabes phaléciens, rapprochées dans le recueil et attaquant toutes trois des renégats (concentration métrique à mon sens significative: les renégats méritent un mètre d’attaque!), dont une longue et une très longue, à la manière de Sidoine Apollinaire dans l’Antiquité tardive: – contre un renégat (Miser) qui a  abjuré pour obtenir la charge de lieutenant criminel (Epigr. 11, 10 vers); – contre Ferrier, autre renégat pour la même raison (Epigr. 13, 145 vers); – contre les “sycophanties” d’Olivier Enguerrand (Angerranus), catholique converti au calvinisme, mais ayant quitté sa fonc-

  Charlet 2020 (cité n. 3), 111.

12

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JEAN-LOUIS CHARLET

tion de pasteur en 1606 et ayant publié en 1607 sa Déclaration d’abjuration, avant de revenir finalement au calvinisme en 1610, et de Babylone la prostituée (Epigr. 16, 43 vers). Ces 192 hendécasyllabes peuvent se prêter à une analyse métrique détaillée.13 Avec, comme pour l’hexamètre, d’assez nombreuses fautes de prosodie,14 Agrippa s’aligne globalement sur la pratique des poètes latins impériaux plutôt que sur la métrique plus libre de Catulle. Ainsi, la base de ses phaléciens est spondaïque quasi de règle: les spondées y représentent au moins 97,98% des vers, 98,99% si l’on considère longues les deux voyelles communes en 13.11 (Atrox: iambe?) et 47 (praedo: trochée?). On peut même se demander si Aubigné considère comme bref, selon l’usage classique, le o de professio (13.80) ou de professa (13.83), étant donné que le préverbe pro est souvent long en latin: une confusion est fort possible chez notre poète et donc la base de ses phaléciens serait systématiquement spondaïque, comme chez Piccolomini et Cleofilo, voire Landino et Filelfo, alors que Pontano, Callimaco Esperiente ou encore Marulle conservent à la base la liberté hellénistique de Catulle. De même, Aubigné limite les séparations du bi-bref  sur deux mots différents à peu près dans la même proportion que Catulle (10,61% en face de 9), comme Landino, Marulle ou Filelfo (de 8,33 à 12,14%), alors que d’autres poètes néo-latins sont nettement plus (Callimaco Esperiente, Pontano ou Politien) ou moins (Salmon Macrin, Campano, Dolet ou Jean Second) restrictifs que Catulle sur ce point. Pour le nombre de mots par vers, Aubigné 13  Point de comparaison, Charlet 2020 (cité n.  3), chapitre 6, 247-282 et 525531, Annexe 5 (tableaux). 14  On note aussi des abrègements que des allongements irréguliers: abrègements des premières syllabes de serus (13.41), “Lysander” (13.102), “olim” (13.103), “sycophanta” (13.140), “putidus” et “chyrurgus” (16.40), du i  de “Olivarius” (16.18). Allongements de la première syllabe de “miser” (11.2), “oculis” (13.98), “parietum” (13.124 ou hiatus de la finale avec prononciation parjetum sur le modèle de Virgile, Aen. 2.442 ou 5.589?); de la finale de “cuneus” (13.114), “conductus” devant ha(13.125); du u de “legirupio” (13.123). On notera que la métrique impose l’orthographe “supellex”, contre les deux p des manuscrits (mais T a bien “supellex” en 18.1, contre “suppellex” sur le ms. Tronchin 157) et proscrit la diphtongue oe dans le “poenum” des mss. en 16.25 (“penum” avec e bref  au sens de nourriture, mangeaille) et il faut supposer qu’en 11.2 le s final de “scelus” ne fait pas position devant consonne, comme parfois dans la métrique latine archaïque (Lucrèce et autres). La fin du vers 13.129 est fausse, alors qu’on aurait pu écrire correctement “vigensque”. En revanche la diérèse de “suetus” trisyllabique (13.7; cf.  “sueta” dans un hexamètre en 30.11: voir supra n. 6), comme celle de “cuivis” (16.14), a des précédents.

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(4.78) se situe dans la moyenne des poètes latins, un peu en dessous de cinq mots par vers, alors que Cleofilo se rapprochait de quatre et que d’autres (Filelfo, Marulle ou Dolet) franchissent légèrement la barre des cinq mots. Dans le choix des mots finaux aussi, Aubigné se montre classique: il limite fortement les monosyllabes finaux (quatre seulement, dont trois précédés d’un autre monosyllabe),15 comme l’avaient fait Callimaco et Pontano et comme on le voit dans l’hexamètre classique; il ne s’accorde que deux aphérèses finales,16 en proportion moins que Politien ou Marulle, et donne, comme tous les poètes latins, la préférence aux dissyllabes et trisyllabes finaux, mais en introduisant une certaine variété dans ses fins de vers par un nombre non négligeable de polysyllabes finaux très longs, de quatre, cinq et même exceptionnellement six syllabes,17 comme l’avaient fait Callimaco Esperiente, Campano, Politien, Marulle ou Pontano. Dans les polysyllabes longs intérieurs, Aubigné montre, à l’instar de Filelfo, Callimaco, Pontano ou Salmon Macrin, une prédilection pour les mots choriambiques (dans 17,68% de ses hendécasyllabes), plus fréquents que dans les phaléciens de Campano, Politien, Marulle, Jean Second ou Dolet. Les césures sont assez régulières, avec une préférence pour la césure sixième, en partie induite par le goût pour les mots choriambiques. Si on relève quelques césures cinquièmes estompées par synalèphe (4,55%), le nombre d’hendécasyllabes sans césure cinquième ou sixième est limité, autour de 6%,18 à peu près au niveau de Filelfo, Callimaco, Pontano ou Marulle, mais plus faible que chez Catulle, Campano, Politien, Second, Macrin ou Dolet. En ce qui concerne les élisions, si Aubigné limite les aphérèses (seulement cinq, dont deux finales pour 198 vers), à la différence de Piccolomini, Filelfo, Cleofilo ou Callimaco en ce mètre, il ne répugne pas à la synalèphe, surtout de voyelle longue (19,70%; avec 15   Epigr. 13.88 “mens est”; 16.32 “apud te”; 16.38 “a quo”; 16.42 “cum sis”. Pour les monosyllabes en tête d’hendécasyllabe, Aubigné se situe dans la moyenne (43,43%), au niveau de Politien (42,54%) ou de Macrin (42,61%), au-dessus de Dolet, mais en dessous de bien d’autres. 16  Epigr. 1.89 (“ara est”) et 94 (“poena es”). 17  Epigr. 13.123 “legirupiove” et 16.27 “Archepiscopatus”. 18  L’hésitation sur la proportion (5,56 ou 6,57%) tient au fait qu’à cette époque on ne peut pas exclure une césure (sixième en l’occurrence) par tmèse devant l’enclitique -que. Il en existe ici deux cas, en Epigr. 13.29 et 38.

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les aphérèses, 22,22%), à peu près au niveau de Politien (18,66% pour les synalèphes; 25,37% avec les aphérèses), mais sans atteindre les proportions de Campano, Pontano ou à plus forte raison de Salmon Macrin ou Dolet. On ne relève dans les hendécasyllabes de ce recueil aucun vers à trois élisions, mais quelques élisions, parfois rudes, de monosyllabes: quo (13.117), mais aussi ne (13.106) et surtout si, à l’initiale du vers, en 13.128. Au total, dans une conception renaissante très large d’une épigramme polymétrique et parfois fort longue, en se permettant assez souvent quelques libertés prosodiques, Aubigné introduit dans ses Epigrammata un mètre lyrique, variante du premier mètre archiloquien, quatre pièces hexamétriques, dont une fort longue, quasi centon de Lucain, à côté de 27 pièces en distiques élégiaques et trois dans un mètre mordant qu’il réserve ici aux renégats. Dans ses distiques élégiaques, Aubigné recherche la variété des schémas métriques dans un hexamètre assez fortement spondaïque, mais proche d’Ovide et de Martial sous d’autres aspects et où règne presque sans partage la césure penthémimère, avec des clausules assez classiques, mais non sans quelques libertés, notamment dans l’emploi du monosyllabe final. Ses pentamètres, plus libres que ceux d’Ovide, et plus proches de ceux de Properce dans la métrique verbale de leur second hémistiche, se rapprochent de ceux de Martial dans le choix des pieds du premier hémistiche et, dans l’ensemble de ses distiques élégiaques, comme dans ses hendécasyllabes phaléciens, Aubigné use modérément de l’élision, mais sans interdit sur l’élision des monosyllabes. La facture de ses phaléciens est assez classique, mais se rapproche plus des poètes impériaux que de Catulle, avec une certaine liberté dans la structure verbale de ses fins d’hendécasyllabes, notamment par l’emploi des polysyllabes longs. Aubigné introduit donc, dans une métrique assez classique, une touche de variété et de liberté.

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TABLEAUX MÉTRIQ UES

Hexamètres élégiaques (158 vers) 1. Schémas métriques et proportion des dactyles SDSS

19

12,03%

 

DSSS

17

10,76%

 

DSSD

15

9,49%

 

DSDS

14

8,86%

Q uatre premiers schémas: 41,14%

DDSS

13

8,23%

 

SSSS

13

8,23%

 

DDSD

10

6,33%

 

SDDS

10

6,33%

Huit premiers schémas: 70,25%

SDSD

8

5,06%

 

SSDS

7/8

4,43/5,06%

 

SSSD

7/8

4,43/5,06%

 

DDDS

6

3,80%

 

SSDD

6

3,80%

 

SDDD

5

3,16%

 

DSDD

4

2,53%

 

DDDD

3

1,90%

 

D1

82

51,90%

 

D2

74

46,84%

 

D3

55/56

34,81/35,44%

 

D4

58/59

36,71/37,34%

 

42,72%

 

Proportion des dactyles dans 270 les quatre premiers pieds

(cont.)

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JEAN-LOUIS CHARLET

2. Césures Tr

1

 

 

 

TH

2

 

 

 

TTrH

3

1,90%

 

 

TrH

1

 

 

 

P

37

23,42%

 

 

TP

22

13,92%

 

 

PH

66

41,77%

 

 

TPH

24

15,19%

total P: 149

94,30%

H

2

 

 

 

Bcv

2

 

 

 

Bvc

1

 

 

 

3. Élisions  

hexamètres

 

pentamètres

 

total

 

⌣/⌣

6

 

3/0

 

9

 

⌣/—

7

 

10/0

 

17

 

—/⌣

1

 

3/0

 

4

 

—/—

14

 

4/1

 

19

 

comm./⌣

−

 

1/1

 

2

 

-m/⌣

1

 

−

 

1

 

-m/—

5

 

3/0

 

8

 

total des syn.

34

21,52%

24/2

16,46%

60

18,99%

aph. est (méd.)

4

 

2/0

 

6

1,90%

total général

38

24,05%

26/2

17,72%

66

20,89%

monos. él. qui, qui, quae, tum

4

2,53%

1/1 qui, se

 

6

1,90%

vers à 3 él.

1

(9, 41)

−

 

 

 

4. Clausules 3-2

66

41,77%

 

2-3

65

41,14%

  (cont.)

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2-1-2

10

6,33%

 

clausules canoniques

141

89,24%

 

1()1-3

1

 

 

1-2-2

6

3,80%

 

1-2-1-1

1

 

 

3-1-1

6

3,80%

 

2-2-1

1

monos. final: 8

5,06%

1-4

1

 

 

5

1

 

 

Pentamètres dactyliques (158 vers) 1. Schéma verbal du second hémistiche a 3-2-2

31

19,62%

b 2-3-2

26

16,46%

c 1-2-2-2

25

15,82%

d 5-2

16

10,13%

e 1-4-2

18

11,39%

total des cinq premiers types

116

73,42%

h 2-1-2-2

5

3,16%

1-1()-3-2

1

 

1-1-1-2-2

1

 

dissyllabes finaux

123

77,85%

1-2-1-3

1

 

2-2-3

1

 

3-1-3

2

1,27%

g 4-3

1

 

trisyllabes finaux

5

3,16%

1-2-4

4

2,53%

2-1-4

1

 

f. 3-4

23

14,56%

tétrasyllabes finaux

28

17,72%

2-5

2

1,27% (cont.)

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JEAN-LOUIS CHARLET

2. Schémas métriques et proportion des dactyles dans le premier hémistiche DD

48

30,38%

DS

52

32,91%

SD

33

20,89%

SS

25

15,82%

proportion de D1

100

63,29%

proportion de D2

81

51,27%

proportion de D

181

57,28%

allongements à la coupe

2 (5.6; 34.2)

monosyllabes à la coupe

4 (1.14; 5.8; 34.4 et 6)

Hendécasyllabe phalécien (Epigr. 11, 13, 16 = 10 + 145 + 43 [198] vers) mots / vers

947 mots

4,78 mots/vers

 

vers de trois mots

9

4,55%

 

monosyllabes 1

86

43,43%

 

base

——

194 / 196

97,98 / 98,99

 

—⌣

2 / 3 (?)

 

⌣—

0 / 1

 

 

21

10,61%

césure

5

75

37,88%

  ⌣ ⌣ séparées  

5 sur syn.

9

4,55%

 

6

101 / 103

51,01 / 52,02%

 

sans césure

11 / 13

5,56 / 6,57%

mot final

1

4

2,02%

 

aph.

2

1,01%

 

2

70

35,35%

 

3

95

47,98%

 

4

19

9,60%

 

5

6

3,03%

 

6

2

1,01%

Syn.

—

17

 

 

⌣

11

 

390

(cont.)

LE CHOIX DES MÈTRES DANS LES EPIGRAMMATA D’AGRIPPA D’AUBIGNÉ

 

comm.

2

 

-m

Aph.

 

5 (dt 2 finales)

 

total élisions

44

22,22%

 

monos. élidés

3 (ne, quo, si)

 

 

v. à 3 élisions

0

 

 

 

 

 

 

Polys. init.

———⌣

3

 

1

 

0 / 1

 

11 / 12

 

— ⌣⌣ —

35

(17,68%)

4

 

⌣⌣ — ⌣

7

 

2

 

11

 

  intérieurs            

— — — ⌣⌣

⌣ — ⌣⌣ — — ⌣⌣

— ⌣⌣ — ⌣ ⌣⌣ — ⌣ — —⌣—⌣

391

9 (total: 39

  19,70%)

JUAN FRANCISCO ALCINA ROVIRA

LA FAMA COMO POETA DE ANTONIO AGUSTÍN (1517-1586) CON UN ESTUDIO DE LOS DÍSTICOS IURISCONSULTOS NON ESSE ALIENOS A MUSIS AD IOANNEM FRATREM

La fama de Antonio Agustín como poeta La poesía en español en el siglo XVI no se difunde a  través de la imprenta, al menos en vida del poeta. Como pasa con Garcilaso de la Vega (ca. 1501-1536) o Fray Luis de León (1527-1586), su obra poética nunca se imprime, se transmite y lee en copias manuscritas como señaló hace tiempo A. Rodríguez Moñino.1 Pero la poesía neolatina hispana participa también de esta forma de difusión y el caso de Antonio Agustín es un excelente ejemplo: Agustín, nunca publicó un poema latino suyo,2 pero su poesía circuló y fue apreciada entre diversos lectores. En ese sentido tenemos el testimonio de un colaborador suyo, Baltasar de Céspedes (ca.  1545-1615), catedrático en la Universidad de Salamanca en la última etapa de su vida. De joven, Céspedes trabajó en Tarragona por los años ca. 1577-1579. Lo sabemos porque Céspedes aparece en una estrofa del poema “La fuente de Alcover” empezado por Agustín y completado por F. Mey en torno a esas fechas. Entre los participantes en la reunión de “La fuente” se menciona primero al biblioteca-

1  Construcción crítica y realidad histórica en la poesía española de los siglos XVI y XVII (Madrid, 1965), 18-24. 2   Tampoco publicó su producción en castellano, incluyendo las dos octavas de la “Fuente de Alcover” que entregó a F. Mey y que este imprimió entre las Rimas (30-44) que forman la segunda parte con portada y paginación propia Del Metamorfoseos de Ovidio en otava rima, traduzido por Felipe Mey, siete libros: con otras cosas del mismo (Tarragona, F. Mey, 1586) con licencia de septiembre de ese año, después de la muerte de Agustín.

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 393-405 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124072

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rio Martín López de Bailo y a continuación se dedica una octava a Céspedes (37): A Baltasar de Céspedes te quiero Dar por remate d’esta compañía; No digo qué hay en él, porque no espero Q ue a rematar jamás acertaría; Pues para hazerlo, es menester primero Ir a Helicone, y ha de ser el guía: Síguele si te lleva allá el deseo, Q u’él te será las nueve, y su Timbreo.

Probablemente Céspedes trabajó en tareas de secretario en las múltiples ediciones que tenía en marcha entonces Agustín y quizá fue profesor en la recién creada Universidad local.3 Céspedes es famoso por un tratado sobre los conocimientos que competen a un humanista, titulado Discurso de las letras humanas o El Humanista (ca.  1600), con múltiples influencias de Agustín (por ejemplo el raro capítulo sobre numismática y epigrafía).4 En ese Discurso se dedican unas páginas a  la poesía neolatina que, según Céspedes, exige para ser buen poeta “ser grande humanista” (59) y se mencionan los que considera los mejores. Y después de citar a Poliziano, Sannazaro, Bembo y otros italianos cita al final a Antonio Agustín como gran poeta. La pregunta que me hago es qué pudo leer Céspedes de la dispersa poesía de Agustín para colocarlo a la altura de los grandes italianos. La producción latina en verso que conocemos del aragonés consta de 17 composiciones de variada extensión y metros (aparte de los poemas castellanos de los que no trato aquí).5 Es posible que Céspedes conociera más poemas de los que tenemos. De hecho sabemos que existió una recopilación manuscrita que figura en el listado de los libros de Agustín “Non editi” al principio de sus Bibliothecae (Tarragona, F.  Mey, [1587]) con el título Carmina nonnulla (f. a3v) que de momento nadie ha localizado.6 3   Sobre su biografía es útil todavía G. de Andrés, El Maestro Baltasar de Céspedes y su Discurso de las Letras Humanas (El Escorial, 1965), 7-191, aunque no hace referencia a su relación con Agustín. 4  Cf. M. Comellas (ed.), B. de Cespedes, Discurso de las letras humanas llamado “El Humanista” (Madrid, 2018), sobre epigrafía y numismática en 134* y 43-45. 5  Cf. el censo de su poesía que hizo J. Salvadó en J. F. Domínguez (ed.), Diccionario biográfico y bibliográfico del humanismo español (siglos XV-XVII) (Madrid, 2012), s.v. “Agustín, Antonio”, 32-33. 6  Los libros “Non editi” de Agustín no se llevaron al Escorial en 1591: los de derecho canónico se enviaron a Roma en 1587 y otros sabemos que se vendieron en

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LA FAMA COMO POETA DE ANTONIO AGUSTÍN (1517-1586)

De cualquier manera hay que decir que los poemas que nos han llegado siempre tienen su encanto y algunos como el dedicado a Latino Latinio o el “epyllion” a la victoria de Lepanto son realmente buenos y quizá un solo poema es suficiente para considerarlo un gran poeta.

El poema a su hermano Juan: la lucha por una nueva jurisprudencia Agustín vive en un entorno en el que escribir poesía latina era frecuente entre humanistas; una actividad a  veces similar (o sustitutiva) a  la de escribir cartas. Buena parte de sus amigos escribían versos: como Jerónimo Osório o Pedro Ruiz de Moros en Bolonia, o en Roma Laevinus Torrentius, Gabriel Faerno, Latino Latinio o Juan de Verzosa. Por su parte Agustín escribió poesía en latín y español durante toda su vida, desde la etapa juvenil de Bolonia hasta su vejez, un poco aislado y nostálgico, como prelado en diversas sedes de la Corona de Aragón. Su poesía era una actividad íntima. Era expresión de un momento de emoción y afecto que necesitaba un vehículo más denso que el que podía ofrecer la prosa de una carta por ejemplo. También escribe poesía para recordar: como la delicada poesía de 1577 a Latino Latinio, inc. “Lucebant olim soles mihi candidiores”, sobre su vida pasada en Roma y la añoranza de los amigos; o escribe para celebrar: como el epitalamio a la boda de su hermana Isabel con el anciano duque de Cardona (1540) 7 o el subasta más tarde, por eso creo que Jeroni Besora tenía el Liber epistularum (Barcelona, Biblioteca de la Universidad, ms.  94) o Gregorio Mayans los Fragmenta veterum scriptorum Latinorum (Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional de España, ms.  79017902 [en adelante BNE]). Los Carmina nonnulla debieron tener la misma suerte y no figuran en los catálogos antiguos del Escorial; F. Latassa, “A. Agustín”, en Id., Nueva biblioteca de escritores aragoneses, vol. 1 (Pamplona, 1798), 450, entre las obras manuscritas menciona unas “Poesías varias. D.  Pedro Valero [1630-1700] en las Notas à las Cartas de D. A. Agustín tomo 7, pág. 177 asegura que tubo un Códice de ellas.” Y efectivamente, en A. Augustini Opera omnia, vol. 7 (Lucca, Josephus Rocchius, 1774), 177, nota f  se cita un poema castellano de Agustín en la métrica bárbara de Claudio Tolomei, “Saphicos y Adónicos sobre esta nueva Poesía”, inc. “Iupiter torna: como suele rico;” copiado en un códice suyo “in meo MS. Codice” y otro del que sólo tenía el título “Epigramma de Sannazar traducido” y nada más. No se deduce de ello que Pedro Valero o Gregorio Mayans tuvieran los Carmina nonnulla. 7  Madrid, BNE, ms. 1854, f. 124v (cito por la foliación moderna a lápiz), online en Biblioteca Digital Hispánica de la BNE y cf. descripción en Inventario General de Manuscritos de la Biblioteca Nacional, vol. 5 (Madrid, 1959), 257-261; J. Carbonell, “El Carmen nuptiale d’Antonio Agustín”, Faventia 16 (1995), 87-98, que estudia el trasfondo político de esa boda.

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JUAN FRANCISCO ALCINA ROVIRA

“epyllion” que expresa la emoción por la victoria de Lepanto ante la amenaza de los Turcos (1571).8 No olvidemos que estos últimos poemas podían cumplir también una función social o política: halagar a la familia en el caso de la hermana o enviar reflexiones propias a algunos amigos, de aquí o de Italia, en el caso de la batalla naval. Los poemas de juventud del Colegio de Bolonia (1538-1542) tenían un carácter especial. Eran Lusus, juegos entre amigos, como los de Catulo, pero siempre con una funcionalidad: pueden inmortalizar una relación de amistad que marcó toda su trayectoria, como la invitación a  comer hacia 1540 a  tres compañeros que compartían habitación e intereses (“Ad Ossorium, Calcennam, et Metel­ lum”) para que fueran a su casa que no tiene que ser forzosamente su villa en las afueras de Bolonia (donde empezó a vivir en 1541 y donde transcurre el De gloria de Osório) 9 o los dísticos de la misma época a  su hermano Juan.10 Este último poema es similar a  una carta en dísticos, defendiendo sus ideas sobre el ideal de jurisconsulto humanista según el modelo de Alciato, del que fue alumno en Bolonia entre 1537 y 1541. Esta pieza se conserva formando parte de una serie con otros tres poemas juveniles en Madrid, BNE, ms.  1854, (f.  124v-126v). Este ms.  era un libro blanco de varias manos del s. XVI con Epistulae (incluye un grupo de Roma de 1549 y 1561 y otro de ilerdenses), fragmentos de versiones anteriores del Alveolus, los cuatro poemas latinos juveniles de Agustín y otros materiales suyos, como seis epigramas religiosos (f.  26r27r). Una buena parte son textos de la época italiana de Agustín. Una recopilación de este tipo no era posible hacerla en el quinientos fuera del entorno de Agustín.11 Este zibaldone pasó poco 8   Ed.  J. Salvadó con estudio de fuentes, “Un epyllion desconocido de Antonio Agustín sobre Lepanto”, en L.  Vila (ed.), Estudios sobre la tradición épica occidental (Madrid – Bellaterra, 2011), 83-107. 9  BNE ms. 1854, f. 126r; ed. y datación en 1540 de J. Carbonell, “Entorn a un poemet catul·lià d’Antonio Agustín”, Annals de l’Institut d’Estudis Gironins 31 (19901991), 141-153; y sobre los protagonistas cf.  P.  A. Heuser, Jean Matal. Humanistischer Jurist und europäischer Friedensdenker (um 1517-1597) (Köln, 2003), 64-66 y 63 donde fecha en 1541 tras su doctorado el inicio de la estancia de Agustín en la villa in suburbano. 10  Ed. por C. Flores, “Antonio Agustín estudiante” en E. Verdera (ed.), El Cardenal Albornoz y el Colegio de España, vol.  6 (Zaragoza, 1979), 371-372, la edición es paleográfica y no da el título completo; cf. C. Flores, Epistolario de Antonio Agustín (Salamanca, 1980), 228, no. 157 [en adelante Epistolario]. 11  El primer poema de todos “Ad Metellum” es de una mano que podría parecer la del propio prelado. Pero pienso que es letra de un copista que imita la letra

396

LA FAMA COMO POETA DE ANTONIO AGUSTÍN (1517-1586)

tiempo después por otras manos como Luis Tribaldos de Toledo (1558-1634; del que aparecen en el ms. una Hypotyposis para discursos extemporáneos (f.  194r) y una Oratio (f.  217r, de cuando era profesor de retórica en Alcalá).12 De entre los poemas de este ms. 1854 he escogido el que dedicó a su hermano Juan porque vale la pena volverlo a considerar e intentar entenderlo mejor enmarcándolo con otros textos del joven Agustín y sus amigos de Bolonia.13 Entiendo que se escribe hacia 1540, porque corresponde a  un momento en que Agustín tiene que justificar sus estudios ante sus hermanos (como en la carta a Jerónimo que cito después); 14 por la serie de poemas de 1540 en la que aparece en el ms.; y porque no se menciona o alude a su privilegiado cotejo de la Letra Florentina de 1541, que emocionalmente sería extraño que obviase, tratando el mismo tema. Juan Agustín Albanell fue el segundo hermano mayor de Agustín. Era sin duda jurista y sabemos que fue criado del emperador Carlos en 1552, aunque sus ingresos no le permitían casarse y A. Agustín siempre andaba recomendándolo para posibles empleos; fue amigo y corresponsal de J.  Osório en 1542; 15 se casó (por mantener la herencia en la familia) con su sobrina, Felipa Agustín, hija del hermano mayor Jerónimo; en 1561 gobernaba la villa de Monreal de Ariza después del asesinato por los lugareños del señor Rodrigo de Palafox (esposo de Jerónima Agustín) y fue partícipe de la terridel aragonés. Esa mano aparece también en f. 76r en el encabezado de una carta de 1561 y en f. 120r, en unos proverbios. En cabecera, de otra mano, figura la anotación: “Non sunt A[ntonii] A[ugustini]” y se encuentra también en f. 26r sobre el poema “Titulus Sepulchri Christi” con círculo envolviéndolo. Es interesante que hubiera una voluntad de controlar la autoría agustiniana de lo que se copiaba. 12   Tribaldos fue bibliotecario del Conde-duque de Olivares y Cronista mayor de Indias. Tuvo relación con el bibliófilo portugués, Antonio Noguera (Nogueira), cuyo padre compró manuscritos de Antonio Agustín, que heredó su hijo. Noguera, que ejercía también el mecenazgo de poetas, subvencionó y le fue dedicada la edición de la poesía de Francisco de Figueroa (Lisboa, Pedro Craesbeeck, 1525) que preparó Tribaldos. El Madrid, BNE, ms.  1854 pudo llegar a  manos de Tribaldos a  través de Noguera, aunque solo es una hipótesis. 13  Madrid, BNE, ms. 1854, f. 126r-v; hay ed. de C. Flores 1979 (como en n. 10), 371-372. 14  Epistolario, 94, no. 69 de 1540, cf. n. 33. 15  Epistolario, 120, no. 85; 125, no.  92; cf.  E.  Duran, “Antonio Agustín y su entorno familiar”, en M.  H. Crawford (ed.), Antonio Agustín between Renaissance and Counter-Reform (London, 1993), 9; y M. Avilés, “A. Agustín y la Inquisición”, en Jornades d’Història: Antoni Agustín (1517-1586) i el seu temps, vol. 1 (Barcelona, 1990), 264 y 224-226.

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ble vendetta contra sus habitantes; y cuando Antonio, por utilidades o miedos que desconocemos, gestionó la condición de ser civis Romanus (1573) ante el Papa, a  través de Fulvio Orsini, incluyó a su hermano Juan y a su valiente sobrino Vincencio Agustín en la petición (este canónigo magistral, tocando a  rebato las campanas de la Seo, se enfrentó al ejército de Felipe II que cercó Zaragoza en 1591 por haber acogido al secretario Antonio Pérez, curiosamente de familia de Monreal de Ariza). Iurisconsultos non esse alienos a Musis ad Ioannem fratrem Non parvus timor haec tardat mea carmina, frater, claudaque vix ad te Musa venire potest. Audio nam legum vos irridere peritos quos leges capiunt et capiunt numeri. Nec venit in mentem magnorum turba virorum 5 qui irrisi a vobis, si patiamur, erunt? Dedecus haud tulit hoc, qui Graecis optima iura condidit; et versus condidit ille tamen. Q uid loquar antiquas leges, quae carmine primum sunt scriptae? Q uamvis tunc rude carmen erat. 10 Adde Modestini versus, queis ille coegit consultus paucis grande Maronis opus. Atque alii certant sua cum responsa probare, implerunt libros carmine Maeonio, nullis cum dubitant an possis vendere nummi 15 quod Proculus negat, et Nerva, Sabinus ait. Undique divini carmen iactatur Homeri et vicisse putat plurima qui retulit. Q uae mala, quae bona sint, quae dixerat ille venena quaerunt; curque sues dixerit esse gregem, 20 atque auro argento varii meminere cubilis, Penelope novit quo rediisse virum, illaque poena placet, puero quae indicta Patroclo est. Denique quidquid ait, semper in ore ferunt. Nec minus agnoscunt versus, qui pingue sonantes 16 25 tractarunt leges conditione mala. Illi saepe vomunt centesima quando petatur, et quem iure locum clari homines teneant ordine turbato patrem succedere nato, quid sibi vult pilum, quid sibi vultque chorus, 30

16 Cic.  Arch. 26.4: “Cordubae natis poetae pingue quiddam sonantibus atque peregrinum.”

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LA FAMA COMO POETA DE ANTONIO AGUSTÍN (1517-1586)

et sexcenta quibus iungunt melioribus ausis ex veterum libris carmina culta satis, donec docta meum doctorem saecla tulerunt, primus qui in veram ius retulit patriam, post quem crimen erit non iura ornare decora 35 carmine, vel verbis quae numeris careant. Sed tamen hactenus haec, ne te carissime frater avocet ab rebus garrula Musa tuis. Seu te forte iuvat arctis compescere habenis, mandentis frenos ora ferocis equi,17 40 seu iuvat admotis calcaribus addere vires, ut dum crura movet tarda sit aura levis. No es pequeño el temor que hace ir despacio a estos versos míos y una Musa que anda cojeando casi no puede acercarse a ti, hermano mío. Porque oigo que vosotros hacéis burla de aquellos entendidos en leyes a  quienes cautivan las leyes pero también cautivan los ritmos métricos. [5] Si aceptamos esto, ¿no te viene a  la memoria la cantidad de grandes juristas que serán objeto de vuestra burla? No lo consideró un deshonor el que compuso las mejores leyes para los griegos; y sin embargo compuso versos.18 ¿Q ué decir de las leyes antiguas que primero se escribieron en verso? [10] Aunque entonces era un poema tosco. Añade también los versos de Mode­stino, en los que el jurista concentró en pocos versos la gran obra de Virgilio Marón.19 Y otros, al pugnar por dar argumentos a  sus dictámenes, llenaron sus libros de versos homéricos: [15] cuando dudan de que se pueda vender sin intercambio de dinero, cosa que niegan Próculo y Nerva, y Sabino afirma.20 Por todas partes se exhibe el  Verg. Aen. 4.135: “sonipes ac frena ferox spumantia mandit.”   Alude a la poesía de Solón. Cf. J. Nunes Torrâo (ed.), A. Moniz et al. (trad.), J.  Osório, Tratado De Gloria (Lisboa, 2006), 202, donde hablando de la gloria de los poetas, el personaje Osório acusa a Agustín: “Solonem credo imitatus, cum illis coniunxisti”. Parece que consideraba a  Agustín un poeta jurista y político como Solón. 19  Sobre los argumentos en verso de Modestinus a  poemas de Virgilio, añadidos a  veces como resúmenes preliminares en ms.  medievales de obras virgilianas, cf. M. Schanz, C. Hosius, Geschichte der römischen Literatur, vol. 3 (München, 1959), 212. Recordemos que Agustín tiene un especial aprecio e interés por Modestinus y que le dedica una reconstrucción del texto griego del De excusationibus liber como apéndice de los Emendationum et opinionum libri IV (1543): “Ad Modestinum, sive de excusationibus liber singularis”. Era un tema candente que había interesado a Alciato en 1540, que poseía algunos misteriosos fragmentos, cf. H. E. Troje, “Sobre la crítica y algunas ediciones de textos en la jurisprudencia humanística”, Revista de estudios histórico-jurídicos 31 (2009), 259-275. 20  Sobre los versos 13-16, cf.  P.  Krueger, T.  Mommsen (ed.), Corpus iuris civilis. Institutiones, Digesta (Berlin, 1928), 263 (Iust. Dig. 18.1): “Sabinus Homero teste utitur” con versos griegos de Hom. Il. 7.472-475 y la permutatio de Glauco y Diomedes, Il. 6.234-235, enfrentando la opinión de Nerva y Proculus a la de Sabinus. 17 18

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verso del divino Homero y cree que ha vencido el que hace referencia a más versos. Investigan qué cosas son malas y cuales buenas, a cuáles llamó venenos Homero.21 [20] Por qué dijo que los cerdos eran un rebaño 22 y rememoró el lecho variado de oro y plata de Ulises, con lo que Penélope conoció que había vuelto su marido; 23 y pareció bien el castigo al que fue sentenciado el niño Patroclo.24 En suma, que cualquier cosa que Homero diga, siempre la tienen en sus labios. [25] Y no menos aceptan los versos quienes haciéndolos resonar pesadamente trataron de mala manera a  las leyes. Ellos frecuentemente vomitan, cuando se pregunta por la centésima,25 y  qué orden en derecho ocupan los hombres notables, que, “confundido el orden, el padre sucede al hijo”; 26 [30] ¿qué quiere decir “pilum”? ¿qué quiere decir “chorus”? 27 y seiscientas cosas de ese estilo con las que con esfuerzos que merecerían mejores empresas conjuntan poemas elaborados de sobras, a  partir de los libros de los antiguos. Hasta que los doctos siglos trajeron a mi maestro y doctor, el primero que devolvió al derecho a  su verdadera patria.28 [35] Después de él, será un crimen no ornar las hermosas leyes con poesía o con palabras que carezcan de ritmo. Pero dejemos esto aquí,

21 Cf. Iust., Dig. 50.16.236 que trata de la ambivalencia del término venenum y lo adorna con Hom. Od. 4.226. 22 Iust. Inst. 4.3, “De lege Aquilia” sobre los diferentes tipos de cuadrúpedos, remitiendo a Hom. Od. 13.407. 23 Iust. Dig. 33.10.9: “cum et Ulixem ex auro et argento lectum viventis arboris truncis aedificatum ornasse, quem Penelopa recognoscendi viri signum accepit ut voluit Homerus.” (Od. 23.190-202). 24  Alude a la huida de Patroclo de Opunte a la corte de Peleo tras haber matado al niño Clitónimo en el juego de la taba, Hom. Il. 23.85. 25  Alude a la “Centesima usura” y el valor real de centesima que fue mal interpretado por Accursio, y Agustín critica en Emendationum et opinionum libri IV (Venezia, Giunta, 1543) que cito por la edición Basel, J.  Oporinus, 1544, USTC 611990 44 [en adelante Emendationum libri], 84, en el capítulo 2.10. 26   Parafrasea “Ordine turbato succedis, Bulgare, nato”, hexámetro leonino atribuido al jurista Bulgarus (s. XII), cf.  W.  Müller, Huguccio: The Life, Works and Thought of  a  Twelfth-Century Jurist (Washington, 1994), 133, n.  42, con otros hexámetros de Bulgarus de G. Fransen, S. Kuttner (ed.), Summa “Elegantius in iure divino” seu Coloniensis, vol. 1.2 (Città del Vaticano, 1978), del estilo de los de 161: “Si carta falsa sententia forte feratur,  / ipsa retractatur si cartula falsa probatur.  / Sed si de falso quoque quaestio tunc moveatur, / praetextu falsi sententia non revocatur.” 27   Chorus aparece en Iust. Dig. 21.34; 32.79 (“chorus aut familia legetur”); pero no he encontrado la fuente de esta alusión. 28 Cf. Emendationum libri, en la dedicatoria del libro 2 a M. Mai (44), formula la misma idea: “And. Alciato […] cuius libris quasi postliminio iuris prudentia redisse visa est in civitatem Romanam.” Sobre los Emendationum libri, cf.  F.  de Zulueta, “Don Antonio Agustín”, Boletín Arqueológico / Butlletí Arqueològic. Reial Societat Arqueològica Tarraconense, época IV, 46 (1946), 75-77.

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no sea que la gárrula Musa te aparte de tus asuntos, queridísimo hermano: ya sea que te complazca domeñar con las riendas tensas [40] el morro del feroz caballo que muerde los frenos, ya sea que clavando las espuelas aguijonees sus fuerzas, para que mientras mueve sus tardas patas la brisa sea leve.

El poema o carta métrica a su hermano trata, como reza el título, de la importancia que tiene para un jurista dominar la poesía clásica (griega y latina) para entender los textos jurídicos. La forma poética y el dístico, cojeando, con su ir y volver más corto en el pentámetro, entre burlas y veras, forma parte también del contenido que es el defender la utilidad de la poesía. Pero evidentemente no se trata sólo de eso. Es también, y sobre todo, una defensa y justificación de los estudios y proyectos de Agustín en Bolonia. Es en suma permitir que la filología entre en el mundo del derecho. En el poema Agustín empieza presentando irónicamente el mundo de los juristas hispanos al que pertenecería Juan y al que dice acercarse con temor (v.  1-6). El objeto de la crítica son los rudos leguleyos italianos e hispanos que salvo excepciones interpretan mal las Pandectae y se alimentan del derecho medieval. Es básicamente lo que tratará poco tiempo después en el libro segundo de los Emen­dationum libri dedicado a los errores de los juristas medievales, entre los que especialmente cita “Accursio, Bartolo, Baldo, Alexandro, et ceteris doctis viris” y sobre todo vapulea a los juristas contemporáneos que creen que no se puede ser más sabio que los accursianos.29 Para hilvanar su crítica y su ironía, Agustín desgrana en el poema una densa serie de referencias a pasajes del Corpus iuris civilis en los que las citas de hexámetros griegos de Homero son imprescindibles para la comprensión del Corpus iuris. La importancia del griego en las Pandectae es tratada también extensamente en el libro 2 de los Emendationum libri con capítulos geniales sobre la primacía del griego y su relación con el léxico latino que siempre considera más oscuro que su ver-

29  Emendationum libri, 44, donde Agustín incluye un intento de justificación de los juristas medievales porque realmente tienen menos culpa que sus contemporáneos: “Sed arbitror illum ipsum Accursium et Bartolum si reviviscerent aut ceteros quos nominant egregios viros – qui, quantum illis temporibus elaborari potuit, operam dederunt ut ius civile et discerent et docerent – libenter e  Graeca et Latina lingua multarum legum interpretationem accepturos, seque et barbaris verbis et interpretationibus inanibus exoneraturos.”

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sión helénica. Pero en el poema se limita a ejemplos más sencillos como son las citas de versos homéricos. El objetivo que defiende Agustín en los Emendationum libri es o era hasta hace poco el de cualquier filólogo: “omnes L. Pan­dectarum libros ad illorum scripturam, a quibus orti sunt, reducere” 30 o sea reconstruir todos los cincuenta libros de las Pandectae en la forma y escritura que tuvieron originalmente. Pero para ello ha de demostrar que ni Baldo Perusino ni Bartolo de Saxoferrato ni el resto de los glossatores no habían visto ni de lejos el texto original entonces conservado en Pisa y sólo se habían dedicado a interpretar mal y empeorar el texto y que los juristas coetáneos del quinientos que los reverencian y los siguen viven igualmente en el mismo error. Para ese fin, en el poema Agustín abandona a continuación el tema de los versos griegos de las Pandectae y se pasa a los hexámetros leoninos de Bulgaro, discípulo de Irnerio y padre de la escuela jurídica de Bolonia (v. 25-32). Hasta que al final, en el verso 33, señala el camino de salvación a través de Alciato al que han traído los “docta saecla” y acaba con una pequeña broma del gusto caballeresco por la equitación de su hermano (33-42). Sabemos que Agustín escribió en Nápoles unos Dialogi quinque variis et difficilibus de rebus en favor de los jurisconsultos filólogos de los que dan noticia unas cartas a  Diego Hurtado de Mendoza y Bernardo Bolea de 1540.31 Eran diálogos ciceronianos que escribió Agustín a petición de su hermano Jerónimo, Batlle general de Catalunya,32 “para que los que confieren magistraturas en España tengan más preciso conocimiento de mis estudios”,33 y para ello dice   Emendationum libri, 50.1 (Epístola dedicatoria a M. Mai) f. αα3r.   Epistolario, no.  68, 69 (y 95, n.  5 donde apunta la relación de los prólogos de los Emendationum libri y el poema a su hermano Juan); sobre los Dialogi, cf. también Gregorio Mayans, Vida de D. Antonio Agustín (Madrid, Zúñiga, 1734), 130-131 y 149-150. 32  Era un hombre culto que escribe cartas en latín a su hermano Agustín al que subvencionaba los estudios en Bolonia junto con los otros hermanos. Fue famoso por haber capitaneado el ejército catalán que auxilió Perpignan cercada por Francia en 1542, acompañando a las tropas del duque de Alba que fueron las más eficientes (cf. sobre ese asedio la tragedia neolatina Delphinus (1543) de Franciscus Satorres, ed. O. Rimbault, Perpignan, 2020); perteneció a la orden de Santiago y como Garcilaso sabemos que se relacionó con Juan Boscán y sus reuniones literarias en un momento en que se da forma al endecasílabo italianizante. 33  Epistolario, 94: “petiit is  [Hieronymus] a  me ut conscriberem aliquid quo meorum studiorum fieri certiores possent ii, qui magistratus in Hispania deferunt.” La petición de Jerónimo buscaba lógicamente que su hermano Antonio pudiese optar 30 31

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“dialogis aliquot quaestiones acriter a  nostris doctoribus disputatas conscribo, quibus mei mediocritatem ingenii inveniendis collocandisque et diluendis argumentis, cognitionem Latinae linguae, si quam habeo, exornanda quaestione et ad Tullianam Socraticamque imitationem deducenda ostendo”; y sus interlocutores en los diálogos eran los compañeros de universidad Bernardo Bolea, Juan Sora, Pedro Ruiz de Moros según la misma carta. Y en la carta al Embajador Mendoza dice que acompañándola “dialogorum affert ad te meum primum eorum” o sea que como muestra le envía el primer diálogo acabado.34 Aunque con formas distintas creo que el poema y estos Dialogi tratarían los mismos argumentos. Pero también podemos ver su rastro en otros escritos de esa época como el diálogo De gloria de Jerónimo Osório (aunque publicado en Lisboa, 1549, finge reproducir un encuentro de los tres en Bolonia en 1541 o 1542) o en los Emendationum et opinionum libri, que acaba hacia 1542, al menos el libro cuarto dedicado al entonces obispo de Arras, Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle, si cuento bien los “ante quattuor annos” que dice en la dedicatoria que han pasado desde su encuentro en Padua como alumnos de Mariano Sozzini (noviembre de 1537 – junio de 1538).35 La defensa de una formación filológica, enlazando con la revolución de los studia humanitatis, como disciplina esencial para el jurista 36 es recurrente en los escritos de los años boloñeses de Agustín. En el De gloria de su amigo J. Osório se da al principio una a cargos en el gobierno de la Corona de Aragón; cf. J. Carbonell, “Hipótesis de solución a algunas perplejidades biográficas de Antonio Agustín”, en J. M. Maestre et al. (ed.), Humanismo y Pervivencia del Mundo Clásico. Homenaje al Profesor Luis Gil, vol. 2.3 (Cádiz, 1997), 1324-1327, que cita, entre otras, carta de 1552 a Perrenot (Epistolario, 228-229) en la que Agustín, siguiendo los proyectos de su hermano Jerónimo en 1540, solicita su apoyo para ser nombrado Vicecanciller de la Corona de Aragón y para Juan la de la “Thesorería de Aragón”. 34   Aparecen también en cartas de 1541: En mayo de 1541 en carta a  B.  Bolea que está en Nápoles, junto con unos poemas, se mencionan “Georgius [Turrius] noster dialogos duos tibi perferendos curabit” (Epistolario, 103). Y en julio de 1541 (Episto­ lario, 107) Matal habla de un “De dialogo tuo quod scribis” que espera que pronto acabe y que quizá que formaría parte de los Dialogi. 35  Epistolario, 40, no. 10 y 50, no. 22. 36  Cf.  D.  R. Kelly, Foundations of  Modern Historical Scholarship (New York, 1970), 97-98; A. Grafton, Joseph Scaliger. A Study in the History of Classical Scholarship, vol.  1 (Oxford, 1983), 135-160; R.  J. Schoeck, “Humanism and Jurisprudence”, en A.  Rabil, Jr. (ed.), Renaissance Humanism. Foundations, Forms, and Legacy. Vol.  3. Humanism and the Disciplines (Philadelphia, 1988), 310-326.

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semblanza de Agustín y Jean Matal porque son protagonistas del diálogo que finge ubicar en la villa boloñesa in suburbano durante una comida a la que los invitó Agustín hacia 1541 o 1542. Y justamente lo primero que resalta de ambos es “Neque enim erant [Augustinus et Metellus] ex eorum numero qui sibi diligentissime cavendum esse statuunt ne bonas litteras quasi iuris studio perniciosas attingant, sed potius numquam se posse ad illam amplissimam iuris dicendi et reipublicae constituendae facultatem pervenire credebant, nisi fuissent omni doctrina nobilitate digna in primis eruditi.” 37 En términos similares aparece también esta defensa en la dedicatoria del libro IV de los Emendationum libri a Antonio Perrenot (139-140): “Mitto etiam ad te ex opere multorum dierum, quod nostrae disciplinae studiosis omnibus paro, excerpta quaedam, ad Alciati praeceptoris nostri imitationem. Neque enim existimo te illorum probare sententiam, qui iuris scientiam carere volunt omni non solum ornatu, sed etiam succo et sanguine, qui ex utriusque linguae cognitione, antiquitatis temporumque peritia toto corpore cognoscitur esse diffusus.” Por entonces ya había hecho el cotejo de las Pandectae de Florencia a la que se dedica a finales del 1541 y con la ayuda de Matal y el apoyo de Lelio Torelli en tres meses finaliza el trabajo.38 El tema cultural de la defensa de las letras como complemento de otras disciplinas, en este caso la jurisprudencia, nace de una concepción humanística del conocimiento ligada al erasmismo de la educación en Alcalá de Agustín y sobre todo a Alciato al que escuchaba, en Bolonia por aquellos años, admirándolo y criticándolo. Posteriormente esa furia y vehemencia de acólito de una nueva religión desaparecerá y en Roma ya no volverá a escribir nada similar. Pero buena parte de sus trabajos y proyectos posteriores derivan de 37  De gloria (como en n. 18), 64; en la misma página Osório le pregunta a Agustín sobre las Pandectae que ha visto y respecto de las cuales todavía Osório no había podido preguntarle después que llegaron de Florencia: “Postquam enim Florentia venistis”. Esto nos llevaría a 1542. 38  Cf. N. Barker, “Antonio Agustín’s Letter to Diego Hurtado de Mendoza”, en Crawford 1993 (como en n. 15), 24-25. Osório en el De Gloria (como en n. 18), 64, coloca la acción después del cotejo del códice de Florencia a finales de 1541: “Postquam enim Florentia venistis, nunquam mihi licuit per otium sciscitari quam multa sint in illis Pandectarum voluminibus, quae diligentissime cognovistis, ab iis quae vulgo circumferuntur.”

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ideas de esta época: su interés por el latín arcaico o la recopilación de inscripciones le vienen de Alciato y naturalmente su continua preocupación por las Pandectae y Novellae que seguirá hasta su vejez encabalgándose con el Decretum y antigüedades cristianas obligatorias en su nuevo estado de religioso, lejos ya del espíritu rompedor de joven y haciendo funambulismo sobre textos de cuya autenticidad dudosa era consciente.

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LIMINARY POEMS IN THE FIRST VOLUME OF  JERÓNIMO DE ALMONACIR’S COMMENTARIA IN CANTICUM CANTICORUM SALOMONIS *

Contents of  the book The three poems that are to be discussed 1 in this paper were printed on the preliminary pages of  Jerónimo de Almonacir’s commentaries on Solomon’s Song of  Songs: Commentaria in Canticum canticorum Salomonis. Authore fratre Hieronymo Almonacirio Ordinis Praedicatorum, Sacrorum Bibliorum in Complutensi Academia interprete. Ad D[ominum] Garsiam Loaysam Serenissimi Principis nostri Philippi Magistrum dignissimum. Cum duplici indice et tabula vere aurea concionatoribus utilissima pro concionibus, tam de tempore quam de sanctis, quae per totius anni circulum haberi solent. Compluti Ioannes Iñiguez a Lequerica excudebat. Anno 1588. Almonacir dedicated his work to García Loaysa and received a reply from him in the last two months of  1586. The commentaries were printed in two volumes in quarto in 1587, as stated in the colophon: Compluti Ioannes Iñiguez a Lequerica excudebat. Anno 1587. In 1588, five sheets (twenty pages) were added at the beginning of   the first volume, and four sheets (sixteen pages) at the end of   the second volume.2 *  The English text has been revised by Professor David Langslow (University of  Manchester). 1   The appendix contains the edition of   the poems. In the original edition, all words were capitalized at the beginning of  the verse, and in other cases such as Serenissimi, Principis, Magistro, Aeterijs, Autumni, Rex.  The words et and -que, and occasionally the letters -m and -n were abbreviated. I have corrected the spellings in some cases: Nontamen, vireta, solerti, coelestis, sylva, Mnausicaes, Omnniferi, foetus fructices and autoris. 2  For a bibliographic description and a list of  libraries with copies of   the book, see J. Martín Abad, La imprenta en Alcalá de Henares (1502-1600), vol. 3 (Madrid, 1991), 1147-1149. Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 407-419 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124073

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The first volume includes the title page, the approval of  the book by the Jesuit father Cristóbal Collantes dated Madrid, 20 March 1587, the print privilege granted by King Philip  II in Aranjuez on 4 May 1587, a list of  misprints pointed out by Várez de Castro, and the price of  the book fixed by Lucas de Camargo in Madrid on 16 January 1588. Next follow the Latin letter sent by the author to Loaysa y Girón on 1 November 1586 (f. ¶1r-¶2v) and the latter’s reply a  few weeks later (f. ¶3r-v), the author’s epigram to Loaysa and that of Miguel Venegas in praise of  the author (f. ¶4r-v), which were probably composed at the end of  1586 and in 1587, respectively. The following twenty-two pages begin with a  list of  sermons printed in double columns (§1r-§§3v), and conclude with an epigram to the honest reader whose authorship will be discussed below (f. §§§4r). A  foreword by the author (f.  1r-8v) precedes the first four chapters of   the work (f.  9r-228v). The second volume includes chapters five to eight (f. 1r-192r) and the aforementioned colophon (f. 192v). The remaining thirty-two pages contain an index of  biblical passages (f. Cc1r-Cc3r), another of  subjects and sentences (f. Cc3v-Ff3r), and a  Latin poem to the author by Luis Tribaldos de Toledo (f. Ff4r). Considering its position in the book, the anonymous poem cannot be attributed to Tribaldos, who calls the author Harmonacir, with h and r instead of  l in the first syllable.3 Thus, we read Almonacir in the title of   the book, in the approval by Collantes, in the price, and in the title of   the foreword; Almonazir in the letters between the author and García Loaysa; Almonazid in the title of   the author’s poem, and Almonacid in the anonymous poem. Almonacid and Almonazid derive from Almonacir and Almonazir, influenced by a false etymological association with the Arabism cid (“master”); the name Almonacir actually derives from the toponym al-monastir, compounded of  the Arabic article and the Latin word of  Greek origin monasterium. An additional argument is  perhaps that Tribaldos wrote Astra with an initial capital letter, and we read astra in the last verse of  the anonymous poem.

3  Tribaldos associated Harmonacir with harmonia (quem Musae nitidis aluere papillis / Harmonacir).

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Jerónimo de Almonacir and his epigram to García Loaysa y Girón Jerónimo de Almonacir was born in San Martín del Castañar (Salamanca) around 1524, and died at the age of  eighty in 1604.4 He entered the Order of  Preachers in Ciudad Rodrigo (Salamanca), and in 1561 he received his doctorate of  Theology from the University of  Sigüenza.5 He taught Sacred Scripture in the houses of  his Order, first in Burgos and later in Valladolid around 1559,6 and a  few years later he taught Theology at the College of  Saint Thomas in Alcalá de Henares.7 Here he wrote an elegant letter to the reader of  a book by the Dominican Juan de Segovia: De praedicatione evangelica libri quatuor (Compluti, 1573). He was one of  the theologians who, around 1575, condemned the theory of  Benito Arias Montano that people who acted correctly, according to the dictates of  reason and the fear of  God, would not go to Hell despite lacking faith in Christ,8 and who, in 1580, supported the succession of  Philip II of  Spain to the kingdom of  Portugal.9 From 1580 to 1592, he was the head professor of  biblical studies at the University of  Alcalá. He enjoyed great esteem and fame as a theologian and even more so as a  biblical scholar. Among other tasks,10 on 31 May 1583 he censored many phrases of León de Castro’s Scholia

4  Nicolás Antonio, Bibliotheca Hispana Nova (Madrid, 1783), 567. He was 74 years old when he died in 1604 according to J. López de Toro, “Tres manuscritos de Julio César Stella en la Biblioteca Nacional”, Revista de Archivos, Bibliotecas y Museos 53 (1947), 569-588, at 574-576, who edited the poems of  Almonacir and Venegas (with some minor misprints). 5  Cf.  V. Beltrán de Heredia, “La Facultad de Teología en la Universidad de Sigüenza”, Miscelánea Beltrán de Heredia, vol. 4 (Salamanca, 1973), 7-59, at 12. 6  Cf. J. I. Tellechea Idígoras, “Fray Luis de la Cruz, O.P. y los protestantes de Valla­ dolid (1559): La difusión de una Consideración de Juan de Valdés”, Diálogo Ecuménico 9 (1974), 417-473, at 426, 436 and 445. 7  Cf.  Beltrán de Heredia 1973 (as in n.  5), 135 and 138; E.  Llamas-Martínez, O.C.D., “Jerónimo Gracián Dantisco (de la Madre de Dios) en la Universidad de Alcalá (1560-1572)”, Ephemerides Carmeliticae 26 (1975), 176-212, at 200-204. 8   Cf. B. Macías Rosendo, “De locis apud Habacuc et Malachiam notatis, una obra inédita de Benito Arias Montano”, Revista de Estudios Extremeños 51 (1995), 647-676, at 657. 9  J. A. García Vilar, “El maquiavelismo en las relaciones internacionales (La anexión de Portugal a  España en 1580)”, Revista de Estudios Internacionales 2  (1981), 599-643, at 641, n. 124. 10  Cf. B. de Melgar, Fray Jerónimo Gracián de la Madre de Dios, insigne coautor de la reforma de Santa Teresa de Jesús (Madrid, 1918), 26.

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in Salomonis Canticum Canticorum.11 He began to teach Solomon’s Song a  few months later; but his commentaries on this work are mainly in line with those published in 1580 by the poet and Augustinian friar Luis de León, who suffered persecution from León de Castro.12 In 1593 he proved his nobility in Valladolid, where he signed a Dominican document on 29 September 1595 against the Jesuit theologian Luis de Molina.13 He also intervened as a consultant to the Holy Office of  the Inquisition granting an approbation to a number of  publications: on 15 December 1594, he approved Luis de León’s work on the name of   the Lamb (Nombre de cordero); 14 on 15 January 1596, in the convent of  Our Lady of  Atocha in Madrid, where he was Prior, Historia de la fundación y discurso de la provincia de Santiago de México by the Dominican Agustín Dávila Padilla; on 3 December 1599, in the College of  Saint Thomas in Madrid, a  biblical commentary by the Jesuit Alfonso Salmerón. In 1597, he issued a report on the money the king requested from the city of Burgos,15 and another in Madrid on 10 July 1600 against Nicolaus Vigelius’s Constitutiones Carolinae.16 Around this time he was also one of  the signatories to a document allowing comedies to be performed again.17 The Dominican exegete dedicated his poem, like the book itself, to García Loaysa y Girón (1534-1599), who on 8 October 1585 had been appointed by Philip  II as his almoner and the prince’s tutor. These are the offices to which the epigram alludes (v.  1-4),

11 Cf. Inventario General de Manuscritos de la Biblioteca Nacional, vol. 10 (Madrid, 1984), 247, n. 4025; K. Reinhardt, Bibelkommentare Spanischer Autoren (1500-1700), vol. 1 (Madrid, 1990), 112-113. 12  Cf.  Antonius Possevinus, Apparatus sacer, vol.  2 (Venetiis, 1606 [USTC 5072245]), 362; A.  F.  G. Bell, Luis de León: A  Study of   the Spanish Renaissance (Oxford, 1925), 259, n. 3. 13  J. A. Hevia Echevarría (ed.), D. Báñez, Apología de los hermanos dominicos contra la Concordia de Luis de Molina (Oviedo, 2002), 328. 14   Luis de León, De los nombres de Cristo (Salamanca, 1595), 520. 15  Cf. M. Fernández Valladares, “Difundir la información oficial: Literatura gris y menudencias de la imprenta burgalesa al hilo de sucesos histórico-políticos del siglo XVI”, in A.  Paba (ed.), Encuentro de civilizaciones (1500-1750): Informar, narrar, celebrar (Alcalá de Henares, 2003), 149-170, at 163-164. 16  F. Henares Díaz, “El franciscano Diego de Arce, predicador, calificador del Santo Oficio”, Revista de la Inquisición 8 (1999), 219-273, at 237. 17  C.  A. de la Barrera, “Nueva Biografía de Lope de Vega”, in Obras de Lope de Vega, vol. 1 (Madrid, 1890), 83-84.

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since Philyrides 18 or “son of  Philyra” (a daughter of  Oceanus) is the centaur Chiron, the wise teacher of  Achilles, Ajax, Jason, Aeneas, and many other kings and mythical characters with whom the future king Philip  III is  indirectly compared; he then humbly presents the book to Loaysa asking for his patronage (v. 5-8), praises his lineage,19 piety, wisdom 20 and appearance (v. 9-12), and asks him to punish the anger (ira) of  his adversaries with the same hand he uses to give alms to the poor, symbolised by the beggar Irus at the gate of   the palace of  Ulysses (v. 13-14). Finally, he asks him to protect the book (v.  15-16), so that he will be able to publish other works (v. 17-18); he meant the commentaries on other biblical texts which he had also explained in class, and to which he refers in the aforementioned letter: the fifth chapter of   the Gospel of  St Matthew, the Epistle to the Ephesians of  St Paul, some Psalms, and the Sermon of   the Mount (Jn. 13-17), in addition to some scholastic theological controversies.21 Almonacir uses plenty of rhetorical figures in his poem, such as the alliteration in Phillyrida [...] Philippus and fidei filius (v.  1-2) and in tuae tutum tegmine (v.  6); the repetition of  si vacat (3-4), of  indignum (v.  7-8), and of  hoc with anaphora (v.  9 and 11); the antithesis faciles/difficiles and the word play Irus/ira (v. 13-14), and the polyptota senserat/sentiat (v. 13-14), regis/rege (v. 15-16) and maioribus/maius (v. 17-18). My apparatus of  sources and loci similes shows some coincidences with Ovid, the Corpus Tibullianum, Propertius, Statius, Vergil and other ancient poets. In the second couplet, I  have corrected a  possible misprint, as the verse would be unbalanced if  we accept that teneri agrees with mode­ 18   I keep the spelling Phillyrida used by many poets to lengthen the short initial syllable. 19  He was the son of  Pedro Girón de Loaysa, judge of   the Royal Council and chronicler of  the Emperor Charles V, and nephew of  the Dominican García de Loaysa y Mendoza, Cardinal Archbishop of  Seville and Grand Inquisitor. 20  The learned and pious García de Loaysa studied Greek and Latin at the University of  Salamanca, and Philosophy and Theology at the University of  Alcalá, where he obtained his doctorate in 1567. He is  the author of  several ecclesiastical works in Latin and Spanish. He was a friend of   the historian Juan de Mariana, and of   the humanists Alvar Gómez de Castro and Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda, to whom he dedicated a Latin ode. Julio César Stella dedicated a Latin elegy to him, printed at the head of  his Columbeida (Rome, 1589). 21  V. Beltrán de Heredia, “Catedráticos de Sagrada Escritura en la Universidad de Alcalá durante el siglo XVI”, Ciencia Tomista 19 (1990), 49-55 and 144-156, at 148-155; Reinhardt, 1990 (as in n. 11), 18-19.

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randi principis, whereas tenero aevo is  documented in classical poetry, and even in the same metrical position, which I always point out with the sign #. In the last couplet, Almonacir resorted to the phrase sic erit ut instead of   the more classical sic fiet ut, since the first syllable of  fiet is long and would not fit the metre.

Miguel Venegas and his poem in praise of  Almonacir Born in Ávila around 1530, Miguel Venegas studied from 1543 at the University of  Alcalá de Henares, where he had been awarded the degree of  master of  arts at the Collegium Trilingue when he composed an epigram in praise of Alfonso García Matamoros’s book Pro adserenda Hispanorum eruditione in 1553. In 1554 he joined the Society of  Jesus, and after a stay in Plasencia, he was sent as a teacher to Lisbon (1555-1558) and Coimbra (1558-1562) in Portugal. From 1559, his Neo-Latin tragedies with biblical themes and classical forms, and with music by Francisco de Santa María for the choirs, were performed with great success in several European countries, and gave rise to a new dramatic genre. After a stay in Rome, he was sent to Paris, Antwerp, Augsburg, Dillingen, and Munich. In 1567 he returned to his home town, where he left the Society. He established himself  as a teacher of  Rhetoric in Salamanca, where he continued to compose Neo-Latin tragedies and other poetry. After 1574 he went back to Alcalá, where he died after 1588.22 His poem revolves around the Ciceronian cliché of   the divorce between eloquence (form) and wisdom (content), which is expressly alluded to in verses 1, 10 and 12.23 It may be divided into two parts of  three couplets each: in the first part, Venegas describes wisdom without eloquence and eloquence without doctrine (v.  1-6), and in the second he presents Almonacir as combining biblical wisdom with Ciceronian eloquence (v. 7-12). Other Ciceronian echoes in verses 2 and 6 stress the rhetorical character of  this poem, although there is no lack of  phrases from classical poetry. Venegas makes use   J.  Pascual Barea, “Neo-Latin Drama in  Spain,  Portugal  and  Latin America”, in J. Bloemendal, H. B. Norland (ed.), Neo-Latin Drama and Theatre in Early Modern Europe (Leiden – Boston, 2013), 545-631, at 576-579 and 630-631; M. Miranda, Miguel Venegas and the Earliest Jesuit Theater: Choruses for Tragedies in SixteenthCentury Europe (Leiden – Boston, 2019), 58 and 208, where she mentions the poem of  Venegas in praise of  Almonacir. 23  Cf. Cic. De or. 3.56-61; Arist. Rhet. 1355b1-2 and 1378a; Plato, Apol. 17a-18a, Isoc. Against Eut. 5; Thomas Correa, De eloquentia libri quinque (Bononiae, 1591), 13-20. 22

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of  an etymological figure in verses 2-3 (sapiens/sapientia), of  many figurative meanings and equivalent terms referring to the opposition between wisdom (cor, cordis, sapiens, sapientia, doctrinae) and oratory (linguae, disertus, eloquii, facundia verborum) on the one hand, and between discord (discidium, cassa, nudis) and union (iungunt, pacis, foedere) on the other.

Content of  the poem “To the honest reader” In the first part of  this poem (v. 1-6), its author urges the reader to take the golden fruits from the garden that Almonacir has planted, referring metaphorically to the book as a garden and to the writer as a bee; the non-classical nominative singular apes is found already in ancient texts (Ps.  Q uint. Decl. 13.16 and Ven.  Carm. 3.9.25). The metaphor of   the garden was suggested by Solomon’s Song of  Songs, where the beloved is compared to beautiful gardens and their delicious fruits; indeed, the term hortus occurs in several places in the Vulgate translation of   the Song (Cant. 4.12; 4.16; 5.1; 6.2; 6.11), as do other nouns (or their semantic equivalents) that appear in this epigram, such as myrrh (myrrha or gramina Sabaea) and other scents (aromata) and smells (odor), fruits (poma), flowers (flores), tree (arbore), dew (rore), hand (manus), king (rex), honey (melle) here alluded to through the bee (apes), valleys (convallium) here exemplified in that of  Tempe in Thessaly, hills (colles or iuga), head (caput), a few verbs (lego or colligo, pascor, fluo, vagor), and the poetic adjective aureus. The central part of   the poem (v. 7-20) is an amplification of   the abundant garden of  Almonacir, which contains the holdings of   the most famous gardens and orchards of  Earth and Heaven: those of  the King of  Persia (Cyrus II the Great, c. 600-530 bc); the hanging gardens built by Nebuchadnezzar II (630-562 bc) on the banks of  the Euphrates River in Babylon, a country that was under the rule of  the king of  Assyria (v. 9); the mythical garden of  the Hesperides on the western edge of   the world, whose golden apples granted immortality to whoever ate them (v. 10); the gardens of  a Corycian old man settled in Tarentum (Verg. Georg. 4.116-146); the valley of  Tempe in Thessaly (v. 11) to the south of  Mount Olympus (Georg. 4.317 and 2.469); the aromatic plants from Arabia (Diod. 3.45-46; Hdt. 3.113); those of   the fertile plain of   the River Ganges in India, which Pliny (NH 37.200) includes among the rivers that produce gems (v.  13); the plants of  Sheba to produce 413

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incense from myrrh and olibanum (v. 14), which were grown in the dry lands of  this ancient kingdom; those from the garden of  king Alcinous, to whom his daughter Nausicaa led Ulysses according to Homer (Od. 7.112-132); the gardens of  Adonis (v.  15) are mentioned by Pliny (NH 19.49) along with other famous gardens, such as those of   the Hesperides and the hanging gardens of   the king of  Assyria; the fruits of   the orchards of  Pomona and the flowers of   the gardens of  Flora (v.  16), among other autumn and spring products from trees, shrubs and smaller plants (v. 17-19). The king of  peace who named all those trees and plants (v. 20) does not refer to Adam, who named the animals, nor to Christ, who was also called Princeps Pacis (Is. 9.6) or Pacificus Rex (Heb. 7.1-3), but to Solomon, who “spoke about plant life, from the cedar of Lebanon to the hyssop that grows out of walls” (I Reg. 4.33); unlike his father David, Solomon was a peaceful king, and his name, which is related to the Hebrew word shalom (“peace”), means “peaceful”. The poem concludes that those gardens feed our senses (v. 21): the fruits, taste and touch, the flowers, vision and smell, and the birds, hearing; in contrast, the garden of  Almonacir feeds the mind (v. 22), and it provides in one place all the things that are scattered in the others (v.  23-24); therefore, the reader can make a  crown for his head from this garden (v.  25-26), while God will grant the author the heavenly crown (v. 27-28).

Authorship of  the poem “To the honest reader” The name of   the author does not appear in the title of  this poem, which has been attributed to Jerónimo de Almonacir.24 However, there are many reasons to believe that it was not written by Almonacir, whose poem in praise of  his patron contains the only verses we know of  by this eminent theologian.25 First, the author of   the book is named Almonacid, which, as I explained in the first section, differs from the forms of  this name that appear elsewhere in the book. Then, the anonymous poem is a praise of  Almonacir (v.  4-5 and 27-28), and nothing suggests that it is  a self-praise.

24  Cf. J. F. Alcina, Repertorio de la poesía latina del Renacimiento en España (Salamanca, 1995), 25-26. 25  The printer, Juan Íñiguez de Lequerica, is  not even known to have written any poem.

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Furthermore, Almonacir’s poem does not attain the literary quality of   the anonymous poem: in the first couplet, the word-order in “se cuius […] committit fidei”, for “cuius fidei […] se committit”, is very convoluted, and the rhythm of   the hexameter is destroyed by the long monosyllable se followed by the spondaic word cuius after the penthemimeral caesura. By contrast, by inverting the word order when necessary, this sequence is  avoided in verses 13 (“mittit quot”), 15 (“possunt et”) and 27 (“tanto pro”) of   the anonymous poem, as well as in verses 9 (“iungunt iam”) and 11 (“unus vir”) of  Venegas’s poem.26 Indeed, the fact that the anonymous poem was printed after Venegas’s poem, strongly suggests that he was its author, although the printer placed the aforementioned Tabula concionum between these two poems in order to begin the third sheet with that list of  sermons. Both poems start out with a  Ciceronian phrase, followed by extensive echoes of  the classical poets. Of these, the Ovidian phrase hortus alit is found at the end of one verse of each poem. From all this we can infer that the divine garden of Venegas’s poem could well have given rise to this other poem, in which the fruitful garden is a metaphor for Almonacir’s book. Moreover, in this poem we find many terms that occur in other poems by Venegas: we see the place name Tempe in the aforementioned epigram addressed to Matamoros; the phrase “si […] forte” and the terms Arabes, Persae, tellus, manus, munere, opes, gemmiferi, aurea, legere, dare, alit, fluet, omnes, tanta, unus and tibi appear in the epigram of  six couplets that Venegas had addressed to the reader in Cyprian Soarez’s De arte rhetorica libri tres (Coimbra, 1562), and there are many others in the poems of  Venegas that are preserved in the library of  the Royal Academy of  History in Madrid.27 All this leads to the conclusion that it was Miguel Venegas who wrote the anonymous poem. This was probably the last poem written by this Neo-Latin poet and playwright, as his Latin poems in praise of  Saint Didacus of  Alcalá, although printed in 1589, had already been copied in Salamanca by his disciple Tomas Pinelo around 1574.28 26   Cf. J. Pascual Barea, “Algunas particularidades de prosodia y métrica latinas del Renacimiento,” in J. Luque Moreno, P. Rafael Díaz y Díaz (ed.), Estudios de Métrica Latina, vol. 2 (Granada, 1998), 747-766, at 759-762. 27  Cf. Alcina 1995 (as in n. 24), 206-209. 28  Fray Gabriel de Mata, Vida, muerte y milagros de S. Diego (Alcalá, 1589), f. 158159. Cf. Alcina 1995 (as in n. 24), 111 and 206-209.

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Appendix Garsiae Loaysae serenissimi Hispaniarum principis Philippi magistro dignissimo et sapientissimo F[rater] Hieronymus Almonazid Inclyte Phillyrida, se cuius uterque Philippus committit fidei, filius atque pater, si vacat a tenero moderandi principis aevo, larga tibi a danda si stipe dextra vacat; accipe devoti semper tibi parva clientis dona, tuae tutum tegmine frondis opus, indignum fateor tanti splendore patroni, non tamen indignum quod tueare libens. Hoc genus, hoc pietas, sapientia prodita factis egregiis, vastum qua mare cingit humum; hoc tua promittit species, mihi digna perenni imperio, rosei regius oris honor. Q uas igitur faciles pauper modo senserat Irus, aemula difficiles sentiat ira manus. Et qua Caesareum puerum regis arte magistra, hac rege quassatam per freta longa ratem. Sic erit, ut pelago velis maioribus acta, auspice te, maius trabs mea tentet iter.

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1 Philyrida rectius  |  3 tenero correxi: teneri L 2 #filius atque pater# Ps. Verg. Cat. 9.36  |  3 #si vacat# Ov. Pont. 3.3.1; Iuv. Sat. 1.21  | #tenero  […] aevo# Stat. Silv. 2.1.40, 2.6.49  |  4 dextra … #vacat# Ov.  Fast. 2.10  | 5 tibi  […]  / devotusque cliens Iuv.  Sat. 9.71-72  |  5-6 #accipe  […] / dona# Val.  Fl. Arg. 2.429-421  |  #accipe# dona Ps. Verg. Cir. 46  |  #parva […] / […] dona# Ov. Met. 7.753-754 | 6 frondes  / […] #tuas# Stat. Silv. 5.1.135-136  |  9 genus  […] pietas Hor. Carm. 4.7.23-24  |  prodita sunt #facto# Ov. Her. 10.70  |  9-10 factorum egregiorum Cic.  Rep. 6.8(fr).2  |  10 mare  […] vastum Ov.  Trist. 5.11.27  |  terrae cingit mare Ov. Her. 10.61  |  11 #hoc# tibi  […] promittit Carm. Tib. 3.4.79-80 | #mihi digna# Ov. Fast. 3.541  |  #digna perenni# Prud. c. Symm. 2.113  |  11-12 imperio non #digna# Sil. Pun. 13.606  |  12 #roseo […] ore# Ov. Pont. 1.4.58; cf. Verg. Aen. 2.593 9.5 | 14 #sentiat […] ira# Lygd. 3.7  |  #sentiat […] manus# Tib. Eleg. 2.4.26 | #ira manus# Prop. Eleg. 3.22.22; Ov. Am. 1.7.66; Trist. 4.9.10  |  15 #arte magistra# Verg. Aen. 8.442, 12.427  |  16 #hac rege# Stat. Theb. 5.279 #quassatae […] ratis# Ov. Trist. 1.2.2  |  #per freta longa# Ov. Her. 7.46; Fast. 3.868, 5.660  |  #per freta […] ratem# Tib.  Eleg. 1.4.46  |  17 velis… #pelago# Verg. Aen. 3.477-478  |  #velis maioribus# Ov. Ars 2.725  |  18 #auspice te# Ov. Fast. 1.26

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Fray Jerónimo Almonazid to García Loaysa, very worthy and very wise teacher of  Philip, serene prince of  Spain Illustrious son of  Philyra, to whose loyalty both Philips, the son and the father, are entrusted: if  your generous hand is  not busy in the tender age of   the prince you are to educate, nor busy in giving alms, receive the small gift of  this always your devoted vassal, a  safe work because your shadow covers it. It is  unworthy, I  confess, of   the lustre of  so great a patron, but not unworthy that you should willingly protect it. This promises your lineage, this your piety, your wisdom shown in outstanding deeds where the immense sea surrounds the land; this your appearance, which I judge worthy of  perpetual power, the royal grace of  a rosy face. Therefore, the willing hands that poor Irus had just felt, may the anger of  your rivals feel them untreatable. And with the masterly art with which you guide the imperial child, with it may you guide my ship shaken by distant seas. Thus it will be that, propelled on the ocean by larger sails, with your protection I will take my boat on a longer journey. Magistri Michaelis Venegas Abulensis, in laudem authoris carmen Discidium linguae cordisque vetusta dolebant tempora, cum sapiens nemo disertus erat: Eloquiique diu sapientia lumine cassa, barbariae heu quoties probra pudenda tulit! Doctrinae rursus facundia stabat inanis, verborum nudis ambitiosa sonis. Donec ab aetheriis Hieronymus affuit oris, lex sacra quem Domini laetus et hortus alit. Huius in egregio iungunt iam pectore dextras linguaque corque bonae nescia pacis adhuc. His nunc in thalamis unus vir foedere miro, en linguam Tulli, cor Solomonis habet.

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1 discidium correxi: dissidium L 1 discidium  […] linguae atque cordis Cic.  De or. 3.61 | 2 disertus magis est quam sapiens Cic.  Att. 10.1a.1  |  sapiens nemo Cic.  Tusc. 5.100  |  #disertus erat# Ov. Fast. 3.104 4.112  |  4 #heu quotiens# Hor. Carm. 4.10.6 | pertulit #pudenda# Ov.  Pont. 4.3.48  |  6 verborum sonum Cic.  De or. 3.211  |  7 #aetheriis  […] oris# Sil. Pun. 3.137  |  8 hortus alit Ov. Met. 14.690  |  9 #egregio […] pectore# Sil. Pun. 6.131 | #pectore# iungit Manil. Astron. 4.529 | iungere #dextram# Verg. Aen. 1.408 6.697  |  iungunt dextras Verg. Aen. 8.467  |  #pectore dextram# Pers. Sat. 3.107  |  10 linguaque corque Ov. Fast. 2.732  |  11 #his […] in thalamis# Val. Fl. Arg. 2.233

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Poem by the master Miguel Venegas from Ávila in praise of  the author The divorce of  language and intelligence pained ancient times, when no wise man was eloquent: how often wisdom, long devoid of   the light of  eloquence, endured the shameful insults of  barbarousness! In turn, eloquence was empty of  doctrine, ostentatious with the naked sounds of  words. Until Hieronymus came from the heavenly regions, whom the sacred law and the fertile garden of   the Lord sustain. Speech and intelligence, which did not yet know good peace, joined hands in his outstanding mind. Now one man, with a wonderful alliance, behold in this marriage the speech of  Tullius and the understanding of  Solomon. Candido lectori Si quem forte iuvat per amoena virecta vagantem aurea sollerti carpere poma manu, Almonacidiae dignus cognomine gentis, ecce tibi rerum fertilis hortus adest. Consevit variis pius hunc Hieronymus herbis, non male caelestis prodiga roris apes: Daedala quicquid habent Persae pomaria regis, quicquid habet Tellus, quicquid Olympus habet; Assyriae quicquid Babylonis pensilis hortus, aureus Hesperidum quicquid et hortus alit; Corycii quodque antra senis, quod Thessala Tempe, quodque Arabum profert dives odore solum; gemmifer in ripis mittit quot gramina Ganges, quot creat in laetis silva Sabaea iugis; quod dare Nausicaes possunt et Adonidis horti, quod Pomona tibi, quod dare Flora potest, omnes autumni verisque feracis honores, omniferi innumeras denique ruris opes: arboreos fetus, frutices plantasque minores, nomina pacificus rex quibus apta dedit. At reliqui nostris dant pabula sensibus horti, qui pascat mentes unus hic hortus erit. Q uae reliqui sparsim gignunt, hic educat unus: divitis hinc cornu copia plena fluit; hinc legere ergo potes diverso e flore corollam, quam capiti imponas, lector amice, tuo. Nam caput authoris tanto pro munere libri, summa coronandum ducet in astra Deus.

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1 si quem forte Cic. Verr. 2.5.131; Cael. 42; ad Q . fr. 1.1.15  |  amoena virecta Verg. Aen. 6.638  |  2 #aurea# poma manu Ov. Met. 10.650  |  carpere poma Verg. Georg.

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4.134  |  manu sollerti Tib. Eleg. 1.7.29  |  3 #cognomine gentis# Verg. Aen. 11.246  | #cognomine# dignus Ov. Pont. 2.5.49  |  4 #ecce tibi […] adest# Ov. Fast. 1.63-64  | #fertilis hortus erat# Ov. Fast. 5.316  |  5 variis sed fertilis #herbis# Ps. Verg. Mor. 62  | 6 #caelesti# rore Ov.  Fast. 1.312 | 7 #pomaria regis# Mart. Epigr. 8.68.1 |  8 #tellus# […] Olympus Sil.  Pun. 11.518  |  9 Babylonque  […]  / #Assyriae# Lucan. Phars. 8.426-427 #Assyrius# […] Babylona Mart. Spect. 1.2  |  10 #aureaque# Hesperidum […] mala Lucr. DRN 5.32; cf. Serv. Aen. 3.113  |  hortus alit Ov. Met. 14.690  | 11 #Corycium  […] senem# Verg. Georg. 4.127  |  #Corycium  […] antrum# Lucan. Phars. 3.226  |  #Thessala Tempe# Colum. 10.265; Ov. Met. 7.222  |  12 Arabum […] odores Prop. Eleg. 2.29a.17 | dives #solum# Sen.  Phoen. 608  |  #odore solum# Lotich. Eleg. 4.3.102 | 15 #Nausicaa  […] hortos# Mart. Epigr. 12.31 | 17 #honores  / omnis# Sil.  Pun. 6.137-138; cf.  Mart. Epigr. 8.78.15  |  19 #arborei fetus# Verg. Georg. 1.55  |  21 #nostris# […] sensibus Lucr. DRN 5.565  |  22 #hortus erat# Ov.  Fast. 5.316  |  25 #flore corollae# Ps. Verg. Copa 13  |  26 #lector amice# Ov. Trist. 3.1.2; Mart. Epigr. 5.16.2 | capiti […] #tuo# Ov. Ars 1.582; Mart. Epigr. 3.43.4 14.132.2  |  27 #tanto pro munere# Mart. Epigr. 10.28.7 12.9.3  |  28 summa […] #astra# Mart. Epigr. 9.54.10  |  #in astra deus# Ov. Fast. 2.478

To the honest reader If, when strolling through pleasant gardens, perhaps someone feels like picking golden fruit with a skilful hand, here you have a garden of  abundant fruit, worthy of   the Almonacid family name. It was planted by Hieronymus with a variety of  herbs, like a bee that does not waste the heavenly dew: what the skilful orchards of  the king of  Persia have, what the earth has, what the sky has; what the hanging garden of  Assyrian Babylon, and what the golden garden of   the Hesperides nourish; what the grotto of   the old man from Corycus, what Tempe of  Thessaly, and what the Arabian soil rich in scent produce; as many herbs as the Ganges, rich in precious stones, provides on its banks, as many as the scrubland of  Sheba nurtures on its fertile hills; what the gardens of  Nausicaa and Adonis can give you, what Pomona and Flora can, all the charms of  autumn and fertile spring, in short the innumerable riches of  a field that produces everything: the fruit trees, bushes and smaller plants, which the King of  Peace gave appropriate names to. But the other gardens nourrish our senses, this garden will be the only one that feeds our minds. The things that others raise scatteredly, this one produces alone: from here flows the horn of  plenty full of  riches; from here you can pick a garland of  various flowers, which you can put, my reader friend, on your head. But the head of  the author of  the book, for such a great gift, God will bring it to be crowned unto the highest stars.

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SPES MEA CHRISTUS: ELIZABETH JANE WESTON’S RELIGIOUS POETRY

Elizabeth Jane Weston was known throughout the Neo-Latin republic of  letters as a  precocious English poet of  great talent who corresponded with, wrote poems to, and received tributes from some of   the major poets and humanists of  her day. Her poems were first collected and published in 1602 under the title Poëmata Elisab. Ioan. Westoniae, Anglae, then republished with additional letters and poems written by and to Weston in 1608 and retitled Parthenicôn  […] libri III, which caused Weston some displeasure since she was now married.1 Although her writings are exclusively in Latin, they contain many references to her Englishness, and indeed the title-page of   the Poëmata prominently describes her as an “Englishwoman”. Throughout her work, though, she successfully fashioned herself  as a  virgo Angla exiled in Bohemia, since this term is used over and over again by her admirers, correspondents, and later biographers.2 1  Poëmata, Elisab. Ioan. Westoniae, Anglae, virginis nobilissimae, poëtriae celeberrimae, linguarum plurimarum peritissimae, studio ac opera G. Martinii a Baldhofen, Silesii collecta et amicis communicata (Francofurti ad Oderam, Typis Sciuirinis, 1602); Parthenicôn Elisabethae Ioannae Westoniae virginis nobilissimae, poëtriae florentissimae, linguarum plurimarum peritissimae liber I, [II, III] opera ac studio G. Mart. a Baldhofen, Sil. collectus et nunc denuo amicis desiderantibus communicatus (Pragae, Typis Pauli Sessii, n.d.). All her poems and letters published in both these two volumes and elsewhere, together with others to or about her, are found in D.  Cheney, B.  Hosington (ed.), Elizabeth Jane Weston. Complete Writings (Toronto – London, 2000), from which all quotations are taken. References are provided in parentheses in the text. 2  For a specific discussion of  Weston’s Englishness, see D. Cheney, “Virgo Angla: The Self-Fashioning of  Westonia”, in M.  Bastiaensen (ed.), La femme lettrée à la Renaissance / De geleerde vrouw in de Renaissance / Lettered Women in the Renaissance (Leuven, 1997), 119-128.

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 421-436 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124074

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Weston’s biography is  at once fascinating and frustrating, for although we learn some facts from her correspondence and verse, and especially from her elegy to her mother, In obitum nobilis et generosae faeminae Do[mi]nae Ioannae (336-340), much still remains obscure.3 Born in England in 1581 and christened in an Anglican church, at about age six she joined her mother and new stepfather, Edward Kelley, the infamous alchemist and assistant to  John  Dee, in Bohemia. After his disgrace, impoverishment, and subsequent death, probably in 1597, Elizabeth began writing begging poems and letters to Emperor Rudolf II and other courtconnected men, while corresponding with humanists and poets throughout Bohemia and elsewhere in Europe in the hope of  finding patronage and furthering her goal of  becoming an internationally known poet. The obscurities that mark the accounts of  her life are less true of  her religious sentiments, for there is  no doubt of   the strength of  her Christian faith, articulated in various verse compositions and letters but finding its fullest expression in her poems on religious themes, which will be the focus of  this essay. Nevertheless, information concerning her religious upbringing remains scant and uncertain. What we do know of   the Weston-Kelley family life in Bohemia points to a probable family conversion to Catholicism, although such is never referred to explicitly in her writings. Dee’s diary account of his and Kelley’s sojourn in Poland and Bohemia provides evidence that both men were practising Catholics during this time, although Kelley occasionally exhibited misgivings, while R.  J.  W. Evans claims that Dee was both orthodox Protestant and Catholic.4 Dee also records the 1585 baptism of  one of  his children in the Catholic cathedral church of  Prague Castle and his and Kelley’s partaking of  communion in Cracow churches.5 In Prague, however, they wavered between Catholicism and Protestantism, being banished as Protestants in 1586 but later rehabilitated by the Catholic Count Rožmberk. Lastly, in his incredible

3   S.  Bassnet, “Revising a  Biography: A  New Interpretation of   the Life of  Elizabeth Jane Weston (Westonia) Based on her Autobiographical Poem on the Occasion of  the Death of  Her Mother”, Cahiers Elisabéthains 37 (1990), 1-8. 4  R. J. W. Evans, Rudolf II and his World: A Study in Intellectual History, 15761612 (Oxford – New York, 1984), 224. 5  E. Fenton (ed.), The Diaries of  John Dee (Charlbury, 1998), 173, 178-179.

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account of   their covenant to swap wives, Dee refers to all four of  them as “Catholic Christians”.6 Two other indications strongly suggest the Weston-Kelleys were Catholic. John Francis, Elizabeth’s young brother, attended the Jesuit Clementine college in Prague, then the Catholic University of  Ingolstadt. Bassnet argues the latter does not necessarily prove the family’s Catholicism, since Ingolstadt also admitted Protestants who were in financial difficulties.7 However, by the time John Francis went there in the late 1590s, it was fully under Jesuit control and had become a  bastion of   the Catholic faith. Secondly, Weston was buried in the cloister of  St Thomas monastery in Prague. The Augustinian monks would hardly have allowed this had she been a  Protestant. Her confessional affiliation seems clear, therefore, from external evidence, but, like many another citizen of  Rudolf ’s Prague, she did not move in exclusively Catholic circles. Q uite the contrary. This is  hardly surprising, since Catholics and Protestants in Bohemia maintained relatively flexible and friendly connections and interrelationships. As Evans says, “the culture of  the Rudolfine age was an expression of   the essential unity” that existed between the religious and social factions in Bohemia.8 This intermingling is strongly reflected in Weston’s circle of  friends, patrons and admirers, and in the fact that her husband, Johannes Leo, was a  German Catholic at Rudolf’s court but also an agent for the Calvinist Christian von Anhalt.9 Two of  her most generous and powerful patrons, Petr Vok Rožmberg and Zdenĕk Lobkovic, were fervent Catholics yet not adverse to harbouring Lutheran sentiments. Among her admirers and recipients of  verse were Catholic and Protestant theologians, as well as converts to Catholicism. Whether her poetry reflects this social and cultural ecumenicalism, what Ian McFarlane called in reference to religious poetry in France

  Fenton 1998 (as in n. 5), 196-203.   Bassnet 1990 (as in n. 3), 2. 8  Evans 1984 (as in n. 4), 156. 9  For a discussion of  Weston’s network of  no fewer than forty-four Catholic and Protestant participants, see B. M. Hosington, “Elizabeth Jane Weston and her Place in the Respublica Litterarum”, in A. Steiner-Weber, K. A. E. Enenkel (ed.), Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Monasteriensis. Proceedings of   the Fifteenth International Congress of  Neo-Latin Studies, Münster 2012 (Leiden – Boston, 2015), 293-304. 6

7

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“the lack of  sectarian distinction so often found in the religious literature of  the time”, remains to be seen.10 Of  the 143 poems written by Weston and published either in the Parthenicôn or independently, only fourteen are specifically religious. This might seem surprising given the obvious importance of  religion to their author and the society in which she lived, but in fact it is representative of  Neo-Latin verse in general, in which religious poetry, other than biblical paraphrase or epic, plays a  small part. Paul  Van Tieghem points to the few religious lyrics that express personal sentiments; rather, Neo-Latin hymns and odes, for example, commemorate specific events in the church calendar or well-known figures associated with Christianity such as biblical characters or saints, or portray Christ or his mother.11 Similarly, John Sparrow reflects on the paucity of  Latin religious poetry and its mostly formal nature: hymns, short hagiographies, narrative or epic poems retelling biblical events, or poetic paraphrases of biblical texts. Like  Van Tieghem, he remarks that these afford little room for expressing personal emotions, although he also looks forward to the “ecstatic fervour” of  later Jesuit poetry.12 While these views have been somewhat revised with relation to the devotional poetry of   the period, anthologies, handbooks and literary histories of   Neo-Latin verse similarly speak to the small role played by religious verse. Weston’s fourteen religious poems conform in part to the claims made by Van Tieghem, Sparrow, and others. As I have said, they represent a  small part of  her output. Four are occasional in nature, marking events in the Christian calendar: Christ’s nativity, his circumcision and naming, Lazarus Sunday, and the feast of  St  Andrew. However, the others are epigrams pungently treating of  Christian virtues (faith, hope, humility, acceptance of one’s lot), declaring a  desire to eschew sinfulness and achieve salvation, reworking two famous biblical verses, and offering a  religious commentary on mottoes, a  popular Neo-Latin genre. Weston’s debt to one of   the most salient characteristics of  Neo-Latin religious 10   I. D. McFarlane, A Literary History of  France. Renaissance France 1470-1589 (London – Tonbridge, 1974), 400. 11  P. Van Tieghem, “La littérature latine de la Renaissance. Étude d’histoire littéraire européenne”, Bibliothèque d’Humanisme et Renaissance 4 (1944), 177-418. 12  J. Sparrow, “Latin Verse of   the High Renaissance”, in E. F. Jacob (ed.), Italian Renaissance Studies. A Tribute to the Late Cecilia M. Ady (London, 1960), 383-388.

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verse is seen very clearly in all these poems: a  mix of  classical and Christian elements, or demonstration of  pietas humanistica. Thus, Satan holds sway over Stygian gloom, Phoebus’s rays com­ pete unsuccessfully with Jesus’ light, and the Virgin Mary sits resplendent aloft Mount Olympus. The first occasional poem has as its subject the morning of  Christ’s Nativity (2.1). It is  a work of 102 lines entitled Meditatio cum gratiarum actione in diem natalium Salvatoris, which she first composed in 1601 and sent to her future husband, Johannes Leo, to improve and take to the printer.13 As the title suggests, it is both a poem of  thanks for a specific event and a meditation. It  follows the tripartite model of  devotional or meditative verse composition inspired by Luis de Granada and Ignatius of  Loyola but developed further by devotional poets thanks to the everexpanding practice of  Jesuit poetics. An historical biblical event inspires a given setting, figured forth through the imagination; the issues it raises –  human sinfulness in general and the poet’s own sins in particular  – are identified by the intellect, then analysed and meditated upon; finally, in the form of  a prayer expressing the poet’s “affections” that arise from his or her will, God is thanked for sending his son as Redeemer.14 In writing a Nativity poem, Weston could draw on a long line of  Latin and vernacular compositions, ranging from St  Ambrose’s Veni, redemptor gentium and Prudentius’ Apotheosis, through Mantuan’s Parthenice Mariana, Sannazaro’s De partu Virginis, Fla­minio’s Elegia ad infantem Christum, Julius Caesar Scaliger’s Nata­lia Domini nostri Iesu Christi filii Dei viri, and Joachim Du Bellay’s In natalem Diem. There were also numerous Latin and vernacular works penned by lesser poets throughout Europe in

  It was entitled Meditatio cum gratiarum actione: in diem natalitate [sic] Salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi carmine expressa ab Elisabetha Ioanna Westhonia virgine Angla (Pragae, Typis Georgii Nigrini, 1601). Weston’s request and subsequent gratitude to Leo are found in two epigrams (1.35, 36). The title of   the first, Ioanni Leoni pro carminum Natalitiorum editione, suggests her poem is  intended for his collection of Christmas verse but no such work has been traced. In it, she deftly interweaves references to Christ’s birth and her own poetic compositions through playing on the words cunae, referring literally to his cradle and figuratively to her verse, and pusilla, meaning physically small, like the Christchild, and “trifling”, as she fears her verse will be. 14  See T. Cave, Devotional Poetry in France c. 1570-1613 (Cambridge, 1969), 24-57; A.  Raspa, The Emotive Image: Jesuit Poetics in the English Renaissance (Fort Worth, TX, 1983). 13

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the sixteenth century.15 Moreover, the vogue continued well into the seventeenth, with poets like Sarbiewski in Poland and Crashaw in England. In Bohemia and Moravia alone, over one hundred and fifteen individual Nativity poems saw the light of  day.16 Weston seems to have used no specific composition as a model for her Meditatio. Nor is  her poem, unlike many in the genre, a narrative of   the Nativity as told in the Gospels. Luke’s account of  the babe born in a stable is described in all of  one line, “In stabuloque infans inter præsepia vagis” (55); his rejoicing choirs of  angels take up only two: “Q uo nascente vigil gratantem turba salutat  / aetherea; dant cantus aligerumque chori” (5-6); his statement that the shepherds were the first to hear the news is repeated much further along in the poem, in the distinctly low-key lines, “Nuncia ceu fuerat pecudum vox prima Magistris / Virgine quae natum te tulit esse Deum” (83-84). In this respect, Weston marks a distinctive step away from the traditional models that not only reiterate but also elaborate upon the gospel texts. Over the years, Nativity poems had developed certain topoi that are found in many Renaissance and seventeenth-century compositions. Several are represented in Weston’s Meditatio. For example, the strong link between Christ’s Nativity and Incarnation, with the attendant principle of kenosis that underlies the paradox of  the event, is made clear three times in the first fifteen lines: in the angels’ gratitude to Christ, “Q uod similis nobis carne manere velis” (8); in the fact that “Humani fragiles quia corporis induis artus:  / ut miserae fias” (9-10); and, again, that “Vestiris specie mortali, mille periclis / subiectus” (15-16). Another topos is the link between the Nativity and the Crucifixion. By entering the world as man, Christ makes himself  subject to the laws of  man, therefore in his birth are found the intimations of  his death. In taking human form, he assumes our sins and to atone for them, he suffers crucifixion. Weston reminds us of  this when she refers to the λῦτρον (ransom) that Christ had to pay 15  Two such poets published Latin Nativity verse in Prague: Georgius Handschius, Elegia in natalem Salvatoris Bohemicam vertit (1578) and Salomon Frenzel von Friedenthal, “In nataliciis feriis Domini Iesu, Salvatoris mundi” in a volume dedicated to Rudolf  (1591). Although both poems have lines starting with “Haec est illa dies”, line 3 of  Weston’s Meditatio, no other discernible borrowings can be identified. 16  See J. Hejnic, J. Martínek (ed.), Rukovět’ humanistického básnictví v Čechách a na Moravě/Enchiridion renatae poesis Latinae in Bohemia et Moravia cultae, 6 vols (Prague, 1953-2011).

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to save us as Redemptor; was this, she asks, how he could appease God and “rabidae victor frangere tela necis” (34-38)? Contrast and paradox are quintessential features found in meditative verse. Both are present in the Gospel Nativity accounts, particularly in Jhn. 1 (incidentally, the reading for the Christmas morning liturgy), which strongly juxtaposes light and darkness. Weston fully exploits this. Her opening lines, perhaps echoing Ovid’s “salve, laeta dies” (Fast. 1.87), found in some earlier Nativity poems, simply proclaim the burst of  light accompanying Christ’s birth: “Festa dies hilari (mortales plaudite!) caelo / illuxit” (1-2).17 Later, however, she contrasts light with darkness, first metaphorically, “Ergo quod assequitur minus hac caligine sensus, / addoceat sacro Spiritus igne tuus” (51-52), then by envisioning his birth as an actual shaft of  light in the darkness of  winter. She expands this into a  second contrast, this time between the warmth of  his light and the cold of   the heavy wintry chills: “in lucem brumali tempore prodis, / claudere quo terras frigora densa solent” (53-54). Another strong paradoxical contrast immediately follows, one line realistically portraying the Christchild as an infant wailing in the stable among the mangers, the next raising him to the status of  “aetherii […] Patris ipse Λόγος”.18 In the following section, a prayer for salvation, Christ appears again as light: “Vivida qui lux es, clara nos luce guberna” (75). Finally, light is  linked to another traditional Christmas association, the chance offered by the Nativity to make a  new beginning; we shall offer prayers, “Denique cum veteri pro consuetudine lux haec / anni principium fecerit esse novi” (89-90). Another topos in Nativity poetry contrasts Christ with the sun and is also linked with two other interrelated topoi, the flight of   the pagan gods and the imminence of   the end of   the world. In Weston’s poem, the cessation of   the Oracles, first described by Prudentius in his Apotheosis (438), is  represented by “trembling Themis” (61) and “sighing Phoebus” (62), whom Weston associ17  For the influence of   the Fasti on Christian occasional verse, see J.  F. Miller, “Ovid’s Fasti and the Neo-Latin Christian Calendar Poem”, International Journal of   the Classical Tradition 10.3 (2003), 173-186. Weston might well have been influenced by the work since Ovid is one of  her major classical models. 18  Cave 1969 (as in n. 14), 51 says that a salient characteristic of  the Nativity scene in devotional literature is “the tendency to sentimentalise” and describe the Christchild in “extreme hyperboles”. This cannot, however, be said of  Weston, whose sole description resides in these two lines.

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ates, not with justice and the sun, but with the oracle of  Delphi; the Muses, she adds, “tristia fata dolent” (62). The trembling, sighing and lamenting stand in marked contrast to Apollo’s writhing and Christ’s violent destruction of   the pagan rites in Prudentius (460-494), for example, or the flight and noisy disorder found in later Nativity poems. Weston thus highlights yet another paradox: the most powerful gods in the pagan pantheon stand aside, rendered impotent by the true oracles of  a mere child. She prays: “Illa salutiferi clemens oracular verbi / obsigna in nobis, nec periisse sinas” (71-72). A final topos, found in the liturgy for Christmas Day, addresses yet another mystery: the new order brought by Christ’s birth looks both backward to the creation of   the world and forward to its destruction. Weston, however, addresses only the latter. The child is born when “ad finem dum celer orbis abit. / Tempora labuntur, labuntur sceptra, genusque: / impendet reprobo summa ruina solo” (58-60). The pagan gods sorrow and sigh against the backdrop of  a  world in which “Omnia ad extremum properarunt; omnia finem / expectant; cupiunt esse soluta iugo” (63-64). Devotional poems dealing with Christian mysteries or religious offices like the Nativity often departed from the traditional, often impersonal character of   the hymn to allow the poet to insert himself  or herself  into the text. As Ann Moss has demonstrated, this was already true in the mid-sixteenth century, with a French Neo-Latin poet such as Jean Salmon Macrin, while Anthony Raspa describes how for some English mid-seventeenth-century poets the presence of   the “I” became necessary in imitating a Christian mystery.19 The first-person singular pronoun does not in fact feature strongly in Weston’s Nativity poem, appearing only twice, and fleetingly; rather, she favours the plural form, including herself  in a general plea for religious, political, and social harmony in “Caesar’s empire”, begging for religious, cultural and pedagogical institutions to flourish, and wishing the country to be plague-free.20 She prays to have ministros who teach dogmata pura, presumably 19  A. Moss, “The Counter-Reformation Latin Hymn”, in I. D. McFarlane (ed.), Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Sanctandreani. Proceedings of   the Fifth International Congress of  Neo-Latin Studies, St Andrews 24 August to 1 September 1982 (Binghamton, N.Y., 1986), 371-378; Raspa 1983 (as in n. 14), 87. 20  In a letter to her brother in 1598 she tells him the plague has worsened, causing Rudolf  and other leaders to flee (3.19).

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Catholic, praying that “nec temeret reprobus caelica sacra furor” (97-102). Her own personal petition concerning the fates that robbed her and her mother of   their possessions is merely alluded to: “Sit veniens nobis a  felicissimus annus,  / sint procul a  nostro fata sinistra lare” (93-94), although a  few lines later she not too subtly hints at a possible imperial patronage, since “Musis praemia sistit” (97-98). Her other poems, as we shall see, feature a far more directly personal and more spiritual involvement. Weston’s other long meditative poem is  her De nomine Iesu, celebrating Christ’s circumcision and naming (2.2). The feast day, 1  January, was very popular among Counter Reformationists, although it inspired both Catholic and Protestant sixteenth- and seventeenth-century poets. Circumcision was seen as representing the old Law while the Christchild’s blood was a sign of   the New; it also of  course looked forward to the crucifixion, when Christ would shed blood to save humankind. The Feast of   the Circumcision also focuses on the naming of   the child, one of  its readings being Luke’s account of  Gabriel’s instruction at the Annunciation that the child should be called Jesus (1.26-38). Poetic renderings of   the event were common from the medieval “Iubilus de nomine Iesu” onwards, in both Latin and the vernacular. Although, as for the Nativity poem, no one source can be identified, Weston was obviously drawing on a long tradition. The De nomine Iesu, however, opens with a clear echo of a classical rather than Christian source, the first line of Vergil’s Fourth Eclogue: “Sicelides Musae, paulo maiora canamus!” As Vergil is turning aside from pastoral idyll to speak of  a  supernatural child who will reign over a  new era, so Weston is  “changing her note” to tell us of  a  similar new beginning: “Verte stylum, mea Musa; procul mundana recedant:  / cedant a  calamis nunc leviora tuis” (1-2). However, whereas he is  leaving the pastoral mode for the political, she is turning from her previous “political” poetry – verse greetings to friends, lamentations, pleas to rulers, begging letters, aphorisms, eulogies, and occasional verse – to weightier matters: “Sed veteri graviora modo meditabimur” (13). Turning to her subject, Weston says that Christ’s circumcision is  the day when the first small drop of  blood falls on behalf  of  us and our salvation, thus clearly articulating the full theological significance of   the circumcision at the beginning of   the work and its link with the crucifixion. She appeals to our sense of  pathos by emphasizing Jesus’ young age, repeating the word infans twice 429

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in succeeding lines (17-18), and his suffering at shedding blood “from his tender parts” (17-18). She then passes to the second part of   the ceremony, his naming, and bids her Muse dictate a  song on why the name of  Jesus is special, whence it came, and how it is superior to those that went before, Joshua, Zechariah and Syracides (27-38). The next section of   the poem devotes sixteen lines to the name of  Jesus and the salvation it brings. She reiterates and further develops the earlier statement concerning the ordained name of  Jesus and its announcement by an angel (24); it was preordained “quam vagus orbis erat” and “certa dici de ratione monet” (42, 43). It alone confers true health and a lasting cure, safety from poverty, and the effects of  mors impetuosa (41-56). The final lines emphatically link spiritual salvation and physical wellbeing: “Q ui non salvus erit solius nomine Iesu, / nil hunc fluxa salus divitiaeque beant” (55-56). This might suggest a  recompense of  worldly reward, yet Weston immediately repudiates the thought, in a personal injection reminiscent of  her Nativity poem: “Nulla profanorum moveat me cura bonorum, / caelestis deceat sed diadema domus. / Sic ego salvabor; sic mens et vita valebunt: / sic mors, sic furiae nil nocuisse queunt.” (57-60). The alliteration of  the dental consonant d arrests our attention, slows down the rhythm and brings weight to what Weston is  saying, the repetition of  sic four times confirms the incontro­ vertibility of  her assertion, and the inclusion of  ego emphasizes its relevance to her personally. The personal presence of  the poet is in fact clearer in the De nomine Iesu than in the Nativity poem. Weston appeals to mea Musa in the very first line and promptly lists her various previous poetic compositions. She exclaims, “Cesso heic: tanta meam superant mysteria mentem” when contemplating the circumcision, uses me and mea throughout the poem, and couches a rhetorical question in the first person: Fallor? (72). She also offers up two personal prayers in the first person, pleading “Nulla profanorum moveat me cura bonorum” (57), and, in the tradition of  meditative verse, ends on a note of  gratitude to Jesus and a prayer requesting him to be her Saviour (93-95). In order to “sing” the story of   the Circumcision and naming, she appropriately invokes Calliope; as Muse of  epic poetry, she will help her write of  “more serious things” and as Muse of  eloquence, to spread the news of Jesus’ name. Again, this evokes Vergil’s Fourth Eclogue, but unlike the Roman poet, who prays his verse will out430

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shine that of  Orpheus despite the Muse’s help for her son, Weston appeals for her aid. In a final pastoral flourish, which evokes both the eclogue, styled “Messianic” by Christian interpreters, and the biblical representation of  Christ as shepherd, Weston asks Calliope to confirm that “Non aliena quidem Messias agmina curat” because “Grex alienus is  est, qui nescit cedere fovet” (63-65). She will enable Weston to make it known that no nation who believes in his name will be excluded from eternal life. To this end, Weston paraphrases Act. 4.12, “Non aliud nomen sub caelo restat in orbe”, and Phil. 2.9-10, the text used for the Office of   the Feast of   the Name of  Jesus: “Nominibus reliquis merito praeponitur unum, / quo semel audito flectitur omne genu” (81-82).21 A shorter occasional poem is  rather confusingly entitled Dominica Lazari iacentis ante fores divitis (2.3). Lazarus Day is so-named for the man Jesus restored to life one week before his own death (Jhn.  11.18-45) and was originally celebrated on Palm Sunday; it was then moved back one day but by Weston’s time, the Catholic church had made it a moveable feast celebrated on 17 December. However, her title makes it clear that the Lazarus referred to is  the beggar of  Jesus’ parable, scorned by Dives the rich man, not the resurrected man of  Bethany (Luc. 16.20-31). To complicate matters further, Weston introduces a  second parable, that of   the good Samaritan (Luc. 10.30-37). Both, however, deal with the need for charity and repudiation of  material wealth, a  theme running through her religious verse. The poem can be divided into three sections. It opens with an invocation typical of  pietas humanistica poetry, “O aeterne Deus mirandi rector Olympi” (2.3.1), but then immediately plunges us, first, into the heart of   the Christian mystery, Christ submitting himself  to the crucifixion for us, and then into the world of   the parable as his crowd of  followers, “quae spreta potentum, / Te patiente, ducum nunc iacet ante fores” (3-4). In the second quatrain, Weston switches to the parable of   the Good Samaritan, begging Christ to lend her his aid and anoint her wounds with the healing juice of  herbs (succis), rather than the oil and wine of   the Gospel account. In the last six lines she reverts to the story of  Lazarus, with an allusion to the dogs who ministered to his sores, thus rep21  The Vulgate reads: “nec enim nomen aliud est sub caelo datum hominibus in quo salvos fieri” and “Deus […] donavit illi nomen super omne nomen ut in nomine Iesu omne genu flectat.”

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resenting the charitableness to which we should all aspire. While deftly interweaving the two parables, with their opposing figures of  Dives and the Good Samaritan, and accompanying them with a personal plea to Christ for spiritual aid, Weston is nevertheless also writing as petitioner, begging for “benefactores” that, metaphorically, “saucia vulnera lingant” (9). Given her experiences with certain hard-hearted “Midases” who, Dives-like, have ignored her pleas for financial help and the restitution of  her family’s property, the poem must be seen in the context of  her own material as well as spiritual needs. The former are criticised over and over again throughout her poetry but in one epigram, Mediocritas (2.13), she asks Christ to afford her a medio loco between riches and wealth, saying in alliterative mode, “Nec quaeram, furum more, fugare famem” (4). In the fourth occasional poem, In diem quo fit recordatio S. Andreae Apostoli, fratris Petri (2.4), commemorating St Andrews Day, 30 November, Weston thanks God for the apostles and their successors, although rather strangely not mentioning the saint. Rather, he serves as a point of  departure for focusing on the need for holy ministers and teachers. In two instances, she is clearly referring to the Catholic Church. She alludes to the Catholic, although not exclusive, doctrine of   the Holy Apostolic Succession in “unending line”, then, in an echo of  her Nativity poem, begs that Christ’s dogmata pura be preserved: “Cura, habeat sanctos Ecclesia sancta Magistros” (21). May the “holy teachers” of  his “Holy Church” “[…] tuum per prata gregem viridantia ducant; / limpida ut e gelido fonte fluenta petat” (23-24). It is a paraphase of  Ps. 23.1, “in loco pascuae ibi me conlocavit; super aquam refectionis educavit me”, which she conflates with a line from Vergil’s Tenth Eclogue, “hic geladi fontes, hic mollia prata” (42), while also perhaps glancing at Olympia Morata’s paraphrase of   the same biblical verse: “In loco me ducit molli viridantia prato”.22 We saw earlier how Weston interwove classical and Christian allusions in three of  her occasional poems, although to a  lesser degree than many other Neo-Latin poets. However, in one of  her most powerful expressions of  faith she builds a  whole poem on

22 O.  Morata, “Psalm XXIII” in Olympiae Fulviae Moratae Foeminae doctissimae […] Orationes, Dialogi, Epistolae, Carmina (Basel, 1562), 229. In one poem, Weston denies she seeks to be placed before learned women, amongst whom Morata (1.29).

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a  comparison between a  classical myth and the Christian story of  resurrection (2.5). The title, Mortem non gustabunt, is  taken from Ioh. 8.52: “If  a  man keep my saying, he shall never taste of  death.” 23 Weston sets this against the story of  Castor and Pollux in a  series of  contrasts. Although the two brothers showed each other love (ardor), Christ’s love (amor) for us is greater; Leda was seduced by Jove so that her sons are the fruit of  an impure love – Weston overlooks the fact that only Pollux is Jove’s son – whereas Jesus is  a “pure man in a  pure body”; most important, however, Pollux traded his life with Castor’s but only at a  given time each day, “Dumque hic surgit equis, ille feratur aquis” (8). In contrast, Christ, through dying, obtained eternal life for us and, moreover, lives with us in heaven. The remaining religious epigrams are far more personal. The first, Dissolvi cupio, is  based on Phil. 1.23: “desiderium habens dissolvi et cum Christo esse” (2.6). Dissolvo, which in later Latin meant to annul sins, to forgive, but also to die, had gained proverbial status, in part through its use by churchmen such as Jerome and Aquinas, and was the subject of  many Renaissance and Baroque Latin and vernacular motets and poems. Amongst these was a  close paraphrase by Olympia Morata in her Orationes. Dialogi […], which I suggested provided a source for Weston’s paraphrase of  Ps. 23.2.24 Weston’s poem opens abruptly with a  rhetorical question: Why do I bother about material things? She rejects the temptations of   the flesh and the false value system of   the world, seeking to be “dissolved” in the love of  a  better life. Her ongoing dilemma of  choosing material over spiritual values, which marks so much of  her religious poetry, probably explains her changes to the Pauline verse, “et cum Christo esse”: “Dissolvi cupio vitae melioris amore, / nam bene velle sat est, et potuisse mori” (5-6). Another poem, Q uis dabit capiti meo aquam?, has a rather more impressive liturgical and literary pedigree (2.7). The text originates in Ier. 9.1: “Q uis dabit capiti meo aquam et occulis meis fontem lacrimarum et plorabo die et nocte interfectos filiae populi mei.” An antiphon in the Byzantine church’s Good Friday service and the medieval Catholic Passion narrative recounting the Virgin 23 The exegetical interpretation of  this phrase was not without controversy, according to A. C. Cotter, “Non Gustabunt Mortem”, The Catholic Biblical Q uarterly 6.4 (1944), 444-455. 24  O. Morata, “Olympiae Votum”, in Morata 1562 (as in n. 22), 249.

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Mary’s lamentations, it also became the subject of  Latin and vernacular devotional poems and many emblems. However, no doubt its most famous reincarnation was in Poliziano’s 1492 Neo-Latin funeral ode on the death of  Lorenzo de’ Medici, set to music by Heinrich Isaac. Weston’s text is deeply religious. True to the tradition of  devotional poetry, it uses a  biblical source, Jeremiah’s lament over his people’s sins, as a  means by which to confess personal sinfulness. His occulis become her noxia […] lumina, while she weeps, not for the slain Israelites, but for her vitia, sinfulness in the Christian sense. Her addition of  nunquam deficiente to describe the fountain of  tears evokes the recurring biblical image of  the fountain of  everlasting life, particularly that of  Apoc. 7.17, where God wipes away the tears of   the saved. Like Jeremiah, Weston desires to lament by night and day but, again, in order to deplore her own sins, not collective ones: “filiae populi mei” becomes “Me  vitia ut noctes mea flere diesque viderent  / quo valeam  […] Deum” (my italics). The first-person pronouns are repeated three times in the two final lines which, unlike Jeremiah’s lamentation, end on an optimistic note, “Hoc mihi nulla dabit vis mori subdita; mortem / Pro me qui iugulas, hoc mihi, Christe, dabis” (my italics) (5-6). At  the same time, it encapsulates the Pauline paradox of Christ “killing death” but relates it specifically to herself. The poem is  no small feat for a young poet. It is concise, interweaves several biblical texts within its six lines, and demonstrates an effective use of  repetition and wordplay. A cluster of  four epigrams treats of   the need to hope in Christ alone. The shared title of   the first two, In symbolam Westoniae auctoris, Spes mea Christus (2.92-93), draws on a  set phrase with a  long history, being part of   the Catholic Easter service, which attributes the words “Surrexit Christus spes mea” to Mary Magdalen after seeing the risen Christ. By Weston’s time, they had become a  fairly well-known motto, which she uses to contrast Christ’s hope of  salvation with human accomplishments that offer none. His will endure “per saxa, per ignes”. This leads into the nautical image of   the following two lines, perhaps because hope is traditionally represented by an anchor, but also on account of  Horace’s line that inspired her, “per mare pauperiem fugiens, per saxa, per ignes” (Ep. 1.1.46). Certainly, the Horatian context would have struck home, since the poet is criticising men who are less anxious to escape poverty than evil desires. Punning playfully, 434

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Weston claims “Si vis esse, sequar per freta; si esse iubes / per freta; freta tuo munimine vinco.” (6-7). Her strong faith in Jesus as her only hope is  reiterated in the second epigram, entitled simply In eandem (2.93). It ends on an urgent note that owes something to the devotional and meditative poetry of  her time: “Ergo ad te, Iesu dulcissime, fortis anhelem.  / Spes mea sis, Iesu, sis via, vita, salus.” (7-8). The superlative dulcissime and forceful verb anhelem heighten the passion with which she speaks, while the reworked “sum via et veritas et vita” of  Ioh. 14.6, heightens the sense of  urgency with its alliterating “s”, staccato rhythm, and transformation of  the first-person active verb into two imperatives. The remaining two poems have as their subject her comments on a  similar motto, Spero meliora, used by her friend Balthasar Exner, Silesian Poet Laureate (2.97-98), who would reprint them in 1619 in his own collection of  verse.25 Again, this time in terms familiar from the contemptus mundi and vanitas mundi traditions, which found a  new voice in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century devotional writing, she expresses her hope in Christ, while in eschatological mode rejects the false hopes held out by a world spinning to its decline and destruction. Although while a declared preference for heavenly over worldly hopes and recompense is typical of  devotional verse, Weston’s own continuing financial predicament, as I have said, gives her poems a  personal resonance, expressed nowhere more feelingly than in the line, “sequuntur / spem praeter quovis deteriora die” (5-6). In moving from pagan to Christian registers, combining as Terence Cave says “Arcadia with Eden”,26 in placing God, Christ and Biblical figures side by side with those taken from classical mythology, and in expressing Christian sentiments through the words of  Vergil, Horace, and Ovid, amongst others, Weston was of  course writing in the best of  Neo-Latin traditions and indeed of  Renaissance devotional poetry. Ann Moss has said that MarcAntoine Muret used domestic happiness as a  middle ground by which he could reconcile the Christian and pagan worlds. Perhaps we might say that Weston used domestic unhappiness, at least in the years preceding her marriage to Leo, to reconcile the two. 25 B.  Exner, Anchora utriusque vitae, hoc est Symbolicum “Spero Meliora” a  trecentis qua genus, qua doctrinam illustribus et clariss. in Europa viris carmine celebra­ tum […] (Hanover, 1619), 41-42. 26  Cave 1969 (as in n. 14), 299.

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It also served to ease the tension between her material and spiritual needs, and between her self-presentation as an exiled, orphaned, and destitute young woman yet an aspiring and well-connected poet. This tension certainly colours much of  her religious verse, which was particularly influenced by the meditative poetry made popular by the Jesuits and other Counter-Reformation and late sixteenth-century Neo-Latin writers. Like them, she sought after union with God, expressed a deep sense of  sin, articulated a need for grace and redemption, and despite her youth expressed dissatisfaction with life on this earth. Like them, too, she injected personal details into occasional verse celebrating the events of   the Christian calendar. The figure of   the poet, the essential “I” of  meditative verse in the period, intervenes throughout her religious poems, although without dominating it. She liked paradox and contrast and used both, inspired by devotional poets: light in darkness, warmth in winter, hope in despair, life obtained through dying. In order to express fervour and persuade the reader to believe in Christ and redemption, she effectively used other figures of  speech like alliteration, antithesis, and wordplay. It is  possible to see in her writings the expression of  a  strong Catholic faith. Twice she speaks of   the dogmata pura that must assert themselves and asks for freedom from the “reprobate fury defiling heavenly rites,” which quite possibly refers to Protestantism (2.1.96). She once refers to the Ecclesia sancta, which probably refers to the Catholic Church. She pens a  congratulatory poem to Matthew II, crowned Holy Roman Emperor the year she died, in which she prays that the vera fides will be diffused throughout the world so that the church will take on greater power (399-361). However, in her religious poetry, the faith she expresses is  above all Christian and does indeed conform to what McFarlane called the “lack of  sectarian distinction” typical of  French Renaissance religious poetry. She states it is  enough to believe in Christ in order to be saved, and his salvation extends to all nations. Perhaps in saying this she was thinking nostalgically of  England, with which she consistently identified by means of  the title Virgo Angla. But in a  larger perspective, she was perhaps expressing the kind of  tolerance that must have marked her childhood and adolescence in Rudolf’s Bohemia.

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MOZARTS ERSTES OPERNLIBRETTO RUFINUS WIDL OSB: APOLLO ET HYACINTHUS

Die Sage von Apollo und Hyacinthus, berühmt vor allem in der Fassung, die Ovid (Met. 10.162-219) ihr gegeben hat,1 gehört nicht zu den gängigen Stoffen des europäischen Theaters. Erst (und offenbar nur) der Salzburger Benediktinerpater und Gymnasialprofessor Rufinus Widl (1731-1798) hat daraus 1767 das Libretto einer dreiaktigen, fast anderthalbstündigen “Oper” gemacht, heute genannt Apollo et Hyacinthus,2 und sich so dank der genialen Musik des elfjährigen Mozart, der hier als Opernkomponist debütierte, eine kleine Unsterblichkeit verschafft. Wie man längst weiß,3 hat Widl dabei, aus Palaiphatos (De incredibilibus 46) oder Lukian (Deor. dial.  14) schöpfend, die Gestalt des Zephyrus eingeführt, der mit Apollo um die Gunst des schönen Hyacinthus buhlt, und er hat so aus dem Tod des Hyacinthus, der bei Euripides (Helena 1469  f.) und Ovid ein von Apollo unwillentlich verursachter Sportunfall war, eine kriminelle Eifersuchtstat eben des Zephyrus gemacht. Und er hat weiterhin aus freier Erfindung die Gestalt der Prinzessin Melia als des hauptsächlichen Liebesobjekts von Apollo geschaffen und so dem Mythos ein konventionelleres Happy End mit Hochzeit gegeben. Mit diesen bekannten Feststellungen ist

1  Die antike Tradition ist aufgearbeitet schon bei S.  Eitrem, “Hyakinthos”, in G. Wissowa, W. Kroll (ed.), Paulys Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft. Neue Bearbeitung, vol. 9.1 (Stuttgart, 1914), 7-16. 2  Dieser heute gängige Titel stammt nicht von Widl, in dessen Libretto das Werk nur als Opus musicum des W. Mozart erscheint. 3  Die grundlegende Untersuchung dazu stammt von A.  Orel (ed.), Apollo und Hyacinth, in Neue Mozart-Ausgabe Ser. II/5, Bd. 1 (Kassel u. a., 1959). Dort sind in Übersetzung die wichtigsten Q uellentexte abgedruckt.

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 437-452 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124075

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aber die dichterische Leistung Widls, die den jungen Mozart zu inspirieren vermochte, noch keineswegs ausreichend gewürdigt. Wir vergegenwärtigen uns zunächst den Inhalt des Librettos, das am 13. Mai 1767 den Zuschauern in der Aula Maior der Benediktineruniversität Salzburg 4 schön gedruckt vorlag.5 Prologus = “1. Akt”. Bei den Vorbereitungen zu einem Apollo gewidmeten Opfer macht Zephyrus despektierliche Äußerungen über den Gott. Bald darauf  wird während des Opfers der Altar durch einen Blitz zerstört, und man befürchtet das Schlimmste. Hyacinthus aber beruhigt seinen Vater, den Spartanerkönig Oebalus: Oft, sagt er, scherzen die Götter nur mit solchen Zeichen. Da erscheint Apollo selbst in Hirtengestalt und gibt sich zu erkennen. Er bittet als ein von Jupiter Verfolgter um gastfreundliche Aufnahme, die ihm gerne verheißen wird, und stellt dafür seinen göttlichen Schutz in Aussicht. Melia nimmt als einzige mit Entzücken die volle Schönheit des Gottes wahr. Dieser bietet Hyacinthus seine Freundschaft an und erregt damit die Eifersucht des in Hyacinthus leidenschaftlich verliebten Zephyrus. Chorus I = “2. Akt”.6 Melia hört von ihrem Vater, dass Apollo um ihre Hand angehalten habe, und sie wähnt sich schon zu göttergleichem Glück erhoben. Da bringt Zephyrus, der sich mit Hyacinthus und Apollo im Diskuswerfen geübt hatte, die Nachricht, dass Hyacinthus tödlich verwundet sei: Apollo sei der Mörder. In Wirklichkeit war es aber Zephyrus selbst, der aus Eifersucht mit einem Diskuswurf  seinen Freund umgebracht hat. Oebalus ist empört über die Nachricht, der er Glauben schenkt, und eilt zu seinem sterbenden Sohn. Zephyrus, der, wie man jetzt erfährt, auch in Melia verliebt ist und erneut in Apollo seinen Rivalen erkennt, versucht, diese durch weitere Verleumdungen von ihrem Bräutigam abzubringen. Da erscheint Apollo selbst, und in gerechtem Zorn bestraft er Zephyrus dadurch, dass er ihn in einen Wind, den “Zephyr”, verwandelt. Wegen dieses zweiten vermeintlichen Mords stößt Melia nun Apollos Liebeswerbung zurück und verweist ihn des Landes. Er beschließt zu bleiben, im Verborgenen. 4  Auch über die Umstände der Aufführung informiert ausführlich Orel (oben Anm. 3), VIII ff. 5   Das Libretto (gedruckt in: Clementia Croesi tragoedia in scenam data a Syntaxi in Universitate Salisburgensi III Idus Maii 1767, wie üblich, ohne Angabe des Autors, der sich als Leiter der Syntaxis-Klasse von selbst verstand), wurde (zusammen mit dem der Clementia Croesi) neu ediert von Th. Lederer, “The Clemency of  Rufinus Widl. Text and Context of  W.  A. Mozart’s First Opera”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 58 (2009), 217-373 (nach der Versnummerierung dieser Ausgabe wird zitiert). 6   Die Bezeichnung Chorus für das, was wir “Akt” nennen, ergibt sich aus der antiken Tragödie. In dieser wurden ja die einzelnen “Akte” (gr. epeisódia) durch gesungene Chorlieder getrennt. So vertreten hier eben die “Akte” des Musikdramas solche chori zwischen den Akten des Sprechdramas Clementia Croesi (s. unten). Zur Formgeschichte vgl.  W.  Stroh, “Die Comedia Frisingana und das bayerische Schulmusiktheater”, Musik in Bayern 82-83 (2017-2018), 44-91, dort 62 ff.

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Chorus II  = “3. Akt”. Von Hyacinthus, der in seinen Armen stirbt, hört Oebalus was wirklich geschehen ist: Zephyrus, nicht Apollo, war der Mörder. Oebalus verzweifelt und dies noch mehr, als er von Melia erfährt, dass sie voreilig den Gott aus dem Land ausgewiesen hat. Nun erst lernt auch sie die Wahrheit. Der Tod des Hyacinthus und die Angst vor der Rache des Gottes versetzen Vater und Tochter in traurige Niedergeschlagenheit. Da erscheint wieder Apollo, um aus Liebe zu Hyacinthus dessen Leichnam in Blumen, “Hyazinthen”, zu verwandeln. Nun bitten Oebalus und Melia Apollo voll Reue um Verzeihung, die dieser gerne gewährt. Auch das frühere Heiratsversprechen wird erneuert, und gemeinsam freut man sich auf  die Hochzeit.

Clementia Croesi et Oebali? Wie geriet Widl auf  diesen mythologischen Stoff? 7 Wir haben zu beachten, dass seine “Oper” kein selbständiges Werk war, sondern nur ein Zwischenspiel (Intermedium) 8 zu einem größeren, 5-aktigen Sprechdrama Widls, der Clementia Croesi.9 In diesem stofflich aus Herodot geschöpften Drama, tötet Adrastus, ein Gastfreund des Königs Croesus von Lydien, bei einer Eberjagd aus Versehen den Sohn seines Wohltäters, Atys. Croesus, der diesen zunächst bestrafen will, wird allmählich dazu gebracht, die Unschuld des Täters zu erkennen und ihm zu vergeben. So wird am Ende des Stücks die clementia des Herrschers gefeiert: “Sic te, verende rex, tuam et clementiam / stupebit orbis semper […]” (V. 1336 f.). Bei oberflächlicher Betrachtung verbindet nun in der Tat das Motiv der clementia Sprechstück und Oper. Denn in deren letztem Rezitativvers wird in der Tat König Oebalus für seine clementia gerühmt. Apollo selber sagt (V. 383): “Sic saecla te futura clementem 7  Von den 334 Aufführungen die Boberski (wie Anm. 8), 259-310 für die Jahre 1701 bis 1778 zählt, hatten nur zwei Dramen ein mythologisches Thema: dazu kommen acht entsprechende musikalische “Intermedien”. 8   Zur Tradition dieser heute sogenannten “Intermedien” in Salzburg vgl. H. Boberski, Das Theater der Benediktiner an der alten Universität Salzburg (1617-1778) (Wien, 1978), 133-145, bes. 144 f. 9   Nach dem “Prologus” des Apollo folgten “Akt I” und “II” der Clementia, dann “Chorus I” des Apollo, “Akt III” und “IV” der Clementia, “Chorus II” des Apollo und schließlich “Akt V” der Clementia. Der Text der Clementia Croesi wurde erstmals herausgegeben von Lederer 2009 (wie Anm. 5); vgl. dazu die guten Bemerkungen von G. Petersmann, “Sic saecla te futura clementem sonent: Pater Rufin Widls Clementia Croesi und Wolfgang Amadeus Mozarts Apollo und Hyacinthus – Text und Kontext”, in G. Petersmann, V. Oberparleiter (ed.), The Role of  Latin in Early Modern Europe (Graz – Salzburg 2005), 121-131.

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sonent”, wobei er zweifellos daran denkt, dass Oebalus ihn in Sparta gastfreundlich aufgenommen hat. Natürlich ist diese Verklammerung der beiden Stücke von Widl beabsichtigt. Aber sie ist eine ganz äußerliche. Von Anfang der Oper an ist nämlich klar, dass Apollos Kommen nach Sparta einen großen Segen für dieses Land darstellt. Apollo verheißt Oebalus, er werde dank seiner Wohltaten omni rege beatior (V. 122) sein, und dieser jubelt (V. 107): Dies beata! Die clementia liegt hier eher auf  der Seite des Gottes. Und am Schluss des Stücks bewährt sich auch im strengsten Sinn des Wortes (Milde, Verzeihen) seine, Apollos, nicht etwa des Oebalus, clementia: Dieser und seine Tochter müssen ja den Gott reuig um Gnade bitten, und dieser übt in der Tat clementia, freilich ohne dass dies der Vokabel nach ausdrücklich gesagt wäre, denn Widl, frommer Untertan eines Fürsterzbischofs, will nun einmal das Stück gerade nicht in einen Lobpreis göttlicher, sondern (wie in so vielen Opern) fürstlicher clementia ausgehen lassen. So ist deutlich zu sehen, dass der Lobpreis der clementia des Oebalus am Schluss der Oper in keiner Weise aus der Handlung selbst hervorgeht: Dass Oebalus etwa seinen Gastfreund Apollo vor dem Zorn Jupiters in Schutz genommen hätte, wird nirgendwo gesagt; und noch viel weniger kann davon die Rede sein, dass er Apollo, wie Croesus den Adrastus, begnadigen müsste. Dieses Motiv der clementia dient also zu einer nur scheinbaren Verknüpfung; und so ist es fast unbegreiflich, dass man seit Alfred Orels sonst wertvollen Untersuchungen 10 behauptet, die beiden Stücke seien in feinster Weise aufeinander bezogen, und man könne sie überhaupt nur zusammen verstehen. So hat sich zuletzt Thomas Lederer geäußert: 11 “Der Text der Clementia Croesi ist integrierender Teil der Handlung, der Botschaft, ja der Musik [!] von Mozarts kleiner Oper. Er […] enthält den Schlüssel zu ihrer Interpretation” usw. Stellt also die clementia keine wirkliche Klammer der beiden Dramen dar, so fragt sich umso mehr, wieso Widl gerade den Hyacinthusstoff  mit seinem Croesusdrama verbunden hat. Dies ergibt sich, wenn wir die ursprüngliche Fassung der HyacinthusSage betrachten. Bei Ovid und schon bei Euripides war der Tod des Hyacinthus ein von Apollo schuldlos verursachter Unfall: Der fatale Diskus wird zwar vom Gott geschleudert, aber die tödliche   (Wie Anm. 3), X-XIII.   Lederer 2009 (wie Anm. 5) 220 (freie deutsche Übers. von mir).

10 11

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Verwundung geht auf das leichtsinnige Verhalten des Hyacinthus zurück. Man kann also nicht einmal von fahrlässiger Tötung sprechen, wohl aber von “tragischer Schuld”. Hier besteht nun in der Tat eine frappante Ähnlichkeit zu der Adrastusgeschichte, die von Herodot erzählt und von Widl in Clementia Croesi dramatisiert wurde. Auch Adrastus hat ja Atys, den Sohn seines Gastgebers Croesus, aus schierem Versehen auf  der Jagd getötet; er fühlt sich darum selbst schuldig und muss am Ende (1497  ff.) durch die clementia des Croesus begnadigt werden. Es kann kaum zweifelhaft sein, dass es diese Parallelität der versehentlichen Tötungen durch Adrastus und Apollo war, die Widl ursprünglich auf  den Hyacinthusstoff  brachte (obwohl das in der jetzigen Oper kaum mehr deutlich ist).

Widls Zephyrus als Mörder und Verleumder Aber, wenn dies richtig ist, warum ist dann Widl nicht beim Mythos in seiner ovidischen Fassung geblieben? Aus demselben Grund, aus welchem kein Mensch außer Widl auf den Einfall kam, ein Hyacinthusdrama zu schaffen. Ovids Erzählung war mit ihren nur zwei Personen und ihrer einsträngigen Handlung für die Bühne schlechtweg unbrauchbar. Allein schon aus diesem Grund musste Widl die Handlung in der von Palaiphatos und Lukian vorgegebenen Weise erweitern: Zephyrus und Apollo sind nun wie dort Nebenbuhler um die Gunst des Hyacinthus, wobei Zephyros vorerst kein Windgott, sondern ein Mensch ist. Dadurch wird das Verbrechen noch bösartiger: Während der Windgott Zephyros bei Palaiphatos-Lukian den von Apollon geworfenen Diskus nur, schlimm genug, auf den Kopf des Jungen umlenkt, schleudert Widls sterblicher Zephyrus, der ja keinen Wind zur Verfügung hat, den mörderischen Diskus ganz aus eigener Initiative. So ergibt sich auch ein effektvoller Abschluss der Zephyrushandlung. Wie am Ende des dritten Akts die Hyacinthushandlung durch eine Metamorphose, das aus Ovid bekannte Blumenwunder, gekrönt wird, so beschließt gegen Ende des zweiten Akts die Metamorphose des Zephyrus in den homonymen Wind 12 – kein Problem für die Salzburger Flugmaschine – dessen Laufbahn als krimineller Liebhaber. 12  Daran, dass die Winde ja auch Götter (wenn auch geringeren Standes) sind, Zephyrus somit eigentlich sozial gehoben wird, darf  man hier natürlich nicht denken.

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Aber Zephyrus ist nicht nur Mörder aus Leidenschaft, wie bei Palaiphatos und Lukian, er ist dank Widls Neugestaltung vor allem auch ein Lügner und Verleumder und erst dadurch bekommt das Libretto das Format einer vollgültigen Oper. Motiv der Verleumdung ist neben der Rache an Apollo, der ihm den Geliebten streitig gemacht hat, die Notwendigkeit, seine eigene schuldbeladene Haut vor Oebalus zu retten. Später kommt dann auch noch die Absicht hinzu, mit seinen Lügen Melia zu erobern.

Knaben- und Frauenliebe auf  der Benediktinerbühne Noch ein zweites Problem hatte Widl beim Hyacinthusstoff  des Ovid: die Behandlung der griechischen Knabenliebe, die (seit Paulus, ad Rom. 1.26 f., sie als “widernatürlich” verworfen hatte) katholischen Christen anstößig sein musste. Längst hat man gesehen, dass Widl dieses Motiv zurückgedrängt hat, indem er Apollo als den Gegenstand seiner Liebe die spartanische Prinzessin Melia gegeben hat. Mit der Vereinigung dieser Liebenden endet ja (wie eine römische Komödie oder eine heutige Operette) das Stück. Aber auch diese Melialiebe beseitigt nicht ganz das Homoerotische: Widl braucht es ja als Motiv für den Eifersuchtsmord des gekränkten Hyacinthusliebhabers. Die modernen Interpreten versuchen diesen Punkt meist zu eliminieren,13 ja man hat sogar schon fälschlich gemeint, eine Hochzeit von Zephyrus und Melia werde schon im ersten Akt vorbereitet – oder man hat sich ähnliche frei über dem Text schwebende Erfindungen ausgedacht. Nicht nur durch Melia relativiert Widl das Homoerotische. In Apollo und Zephyrus stellt er, gerade bezüglich des Hyacinthus, zwei Arten der Liebe dar. Zephyrus ist ein leidenschaftlicher Liebhaber, ganz im Sinne griechischer Päderastie. So sagt er am Anfang, er wolle (V. 15) “Herz und Eingeweide” dem Geliebten “darbringen” – “wärest du nur mein Apollon!” In dieser Art haben griechische Dichter ihren Geliebten als Gott angerufen, und der enthusiastische Isokrates (Or. 10 = Encom. Hel. 56) sagte sogar generell: “Schönen Knaben wie den Göttern zu dienen, hören wir nicht auf” (vgl. Pla­to Symp. 183A-B). Apollos Liebe dagegen ist frei von solcher

13  Eine Ausnahme macht die auch sonst sehr wertvolle Arbeit von G. Petersmann 2005 (wie Anm. 9), bes. 127 ff. Gängig ist die Behauptung, Widl habe alles Homoerotische beseitigt.

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Überspanntheit, die auch von Hyacinthus als nimius amor (V. 19) halb getadelt wird. Nur als “Freund” und guten Sportskameraden offeriert sich Apollo seinem Hyacinthus (V. 103 f.): “amicum semper addictum tibi / habebis in me, amare si deum potes.” Und auch Hyacinthus hält das eigentliche amare vom Gott selbst fern (V. 105): “O quanta res, diligere [sic] si Hyacinthum potes!” Anders Zephyrus (V. 106): “Heu! nunc amatum Apollo mihi puerum rapit!” Erst als Hyacinthus gestorben ist, spricht der Gott von seinem unschuldigen amor (V. 345). Wo es dagegen um die Liebe zur Frau geht, bedient er sich der klassischen Liebessprache (V. 264-267): “Est mitis Apollo, qui deperit te  / quid? innocentem  / Sic abicis dura!  / sic perdis amicum, si reicis me.” 14 So bleibt die griechische Knabenliebe zwar erhalten – und das war kühn genug – aber sie wird, als verderbliche Passion abgewertet. Zurück zu Zephyrus. Es bleibt ein psychologisches Paradox, dass aus dem Knabenliebhaber Zephyrus im ersten Akt plötzlich ein Frauenliebhaber im zweiten wird. Dabei besteht kein Zweifel, dass er schon immer auch in Melia verliebt war. Als nämlich diese die Vorstellung, Apollo als den Mörder ihres Bruders ehelichen zu sollen, entrüstet zurückweist, ist Zephyrus seinerseits über diese Heiratsabsichten entsetzt (V. 176-179): Klar, dass er sie immer geliebt hat. So triumphiert er nach scheinbarem Erfolg (V. 203 f.): “succedit dolus  / Meliaque me dilecta nunc coniux manet.” Für Griechen dürfte das damit gesetzte Problem nicht so groß gewesen sein wie für uns, die wir meist säuberlich nach heterosexuell und homosexuell einteilen – und gerade als Sonderform auch noch eine sogenannte “Bisexualität” gelten lassen. Für klassische Athener, die keine “Homo-Ehen” kannten, war diese Sonderform ja geradezu das Normale: Wurde ein Junge als Ephebe von älteren Liebhabern umworben, so wandelte er sich, seinerseits mannbar geworden, meistens zum Knabenliebhaber, dann auch zum Ehemann. Trotzdem bleibt es eine gewisse Ungeschicklichkeit Widls, dass er, als sich schon im ersten Akt Apollo und Melia annähern, Zephyrus keine Andeutung von Liebe oder Eifersucht macht, sondern dass dieser damit erst im zweiten Akt herausrückt. Natürlich hatte das auch seinen dramatischen Vorteil: So lief die Handlung zunächst gradlinig auf  den Mord als ihr eigentliches Zentrum zu. 14  Üblich: (de)perire aliquam; dura für die abweisende Geliebte; zu perdere vgl. Thesaurus linguae Latinae X/1.1262.66-73.

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Die Abwertung des Zephyrus betrifft nicht nur seine päderastische Passion. Für die ursprünglich bei Platon, vor allem von Teilnehmern des Symposion vorgetragene Doktrin, dass die Liebe den Liebenden edel und tapfer mache – man findet sie wieder im amour courtois des Mittelalters wie in der umfangreichen Liebesemblematik des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts – ist Zephyrus ein regelrechtes Gegenbeispiel: Nicht nur, dass er wegen Hyacinthus zum Mörder und Verleumder wird: Auch sein stürmisches Liebeswerben um Melia ist plump, ja taktlos. Wie kann er dies wagen gegenüber der Frau, die noch unter dem Schock des Mordes steht – und ihn mit Grund zurechtweist (V. 221): “Nunc fata fratris cogito, haud Zephyri faces” (vielleicht die feinste Sentenz der Oper)? Wie anders ist das zarte Werben Apollos im folgenden Duett? Aber noch schlimmer: Zephyrus ist feige. Als ihm der selbst nicht gerade mutige Oebalus den Auftrag gibt, Apollo des Landes zu verweisen, da kneift er, obschon gerade diese Ausweisung in seinem Interesse läge, und gibt seine Furcht offen zu (V. 193-195). Noch lächerlicher ist seine Angst, als sich bald darauf  der rächende Apollo naht. Er der sich seiner Melia eben noch als treuer Beschützer angedienert hat, will jetzt ausreißen. Was sie schnippisch quittiert (V. 234 f.): Ob das seine Treue sei? Dennoch glaubt sie diesem Hasenfuß immer noch, dass Apollo der Mörder ihres Bruders sei, ja sie wähnt sich in diesem Irrglauben durch die Metamorphose des Zephyrus bestätigt.

Die Erfindung der Melia Dieses Fehlurteil darf aber nicht übersehen lassen, dass die kindliche Melia eigentlich überhaupt die Klügste in unserem Stück ist. Als Gott Apollo im ersten Akt sich trotz Hirtenmaske zu erkennen gibt, notiert König Oebalus nur mit Verwunderung die Diskrepanz zwischen Schein und Gottheit (V. 85  f.); Hyacinthus dagegen spürt immerhin die tremenda dignitas (V. 102), das Numinose, das auch Zephyrus in Angst versetzt: Nur Melia aber nimmt die überirdische Schönheit des scheinbaren Hirten wahr (V. 90-100). Später aber überzieht sie allerdings, als sie auf  die Nachricht von Apollos Heiratsantrag in einen Glücksrausch gerät (Arie: Laetari iocari, V. 145  ff.) und sich bereits im sozialen Feld des Olympus positioniert. Diesem kindischen Hochmut folgt die Ernüchterung, und am Ende der Oper muss Melia fast wie eine christliche Büßerin das pater, peccavi sprechen (V. 352): “Pudore me subfusa profiteor 444

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ream.” Richtig erkennt sie hier in Unwissenheit und Affekt die Ursachen ihres allzu menschlichen Fehlverhaltens. Und so zweifelt sie, als Apollo nun seinen Ehewunsch erneuert, nicht ohne Grund, ob der Gott sie überhaupt lieben könne. Worauf  Apollo, der sonst so taktvoll zärtliche Bräutigam es nicht lassen kann, sie für einen Moment seine Überlegenheit spüren zu lassen und durch Erwähnung des nicht gerade monogamen Jupiter seine Braut fast zum Playgirl für Götter zu degradieren (V. 369-372):       O crede! ipsemet Iuppiter amare saepe mortales solet; amare namque convenit tantum Diis vobis amari.15

Diese bemerkenswerte Sentenz hat Widls Apollo vielleicht dem Poseidon des Aischylos abgelauscht. Als dieser (in einem Satyrspiel) sich lüstern an die schöne Amymone machte, erstickte er alles Sträuben mit dem Vers: “Dir ist bestimmt, gefreit (gameisthai) zu werden, mir zu frein (gamein)” (Aesch. Fr. 13 Radt). Welches Los Melia demütig akzeptieren muss (V. 372 f.):        Numen! en famulam, suo quae pro parente pectus hoc offert tibi.

“Ich bin des Herrn Magd  […]”: so spricht ein fehlbarer Mensch. Dabei war gerade bezüglich der Intrige des Zephyrus Melia noch am hellsichtigsten. Während Oebalus der Nachricht, Apollo sei der Mörder, sofort Glauben schenkt, sieht sie den Widerspruch zwischen dem Heiratsantrag des Gottes und der ihm zugeschriebenen Tat (V. 165): “Ista quis credat tibi?” Und selbst als sie es nicht mehr wagt, Zephyrus zu widersprechen, bleiben ihr Zweifel an dessen Behauptung, Apollo sei ein charakterloser Rabauke (V. 214-216). Erst Apollos Rache, also Zephyrs Verwandlung, die sie missverstehen muss, treibt sie in ihren begreiflichen Irrglauben. Dafür hat sie, die junge Frau, dann als einzige die Courage, das zu tun, was Oebalus nicht gewagt hat – von Zephyrus zu schweigen –, den leibhaftigen Gott Apollo des Landes zu verweisen. Und so sehr ist sie nunmehr überzeugt, das Richtige getan zu haben, 15  Das bedeutet: “Mach dir keine Sorgen, ob du meiner würdig bist. Wir Götter lieben, wen und wie wir wollen. Nur das Lieben liegt bei uns; ihr Frauen braucht euch nur lieben zu lassen.”

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dass, sogar als Oebalus sie mit der endgültigen Wahrheit konfrontiert, dass eben Zephyrus der Mörder ist, sie dies nicht augenblicklich akzeptiert, sondern höchst vernünftig nachfragt (V. 312 f.): “Unde autem, Pater!  / Haec nosse poteras?” Dann wird aber auch ihr, während der ebenso fromme wie begriffsstutzige Oebalus noch über die gerechte Rache des Gottes jubelt, als erster die völlige Trostlosigkeit der Situation bewusst (V. 319): “O Genitor! omnes perditi iamiam sumus.” Kein Zweifel: Sie ist immer die Schlaueste. Widl kann kein Weiberfeind gewesen sein.

Die Erfindung des Oebalus Aber nicht nur Melia ist, wie seit je bekannt, eine Neuschöpfung des Benediktinerpaters, sondern auch die Person des Oebalus. Bei Ovid erscheint er nur als Name, bei Palaiphatos-Lukian überhaupt nicht. Zunächst ist auch er wahrscheinlich eingefügt, um das Homoerotische des Stoffs abzumildern. Bei Ovid war es ja Apollo, in dessen Armen – wie oft und gerne hat man das gemalt! – der schöne Hyacinthus sein Leben aushaucht; bei Widl dagegen stirbt er, zu Mozarts herzergreifender Musik, in der Umarmung des Vaters, eines wahren pater dolorosus. Und es ist wiederum der Vater, nicht Apollo, wie bei Ovid, der dann über ihn die verzweifelte Klage erhebt (V. 292  f.): “Furore sublevor,  / dolore deprimor.” Doch nicht erst im Tod zeigt sich die Verbundenheit von Vater und Sohn. Als zu Beginn der Oper der respektlose Zephyrus die Verehrung des Apollo in Sparta kritisiert, verzichtet sein Freund Hyacinthus auf  jede religiöse Begründung des Herkommens. Ihm genügt die väterliche Autorität (V. 13 f.): “Genitor hunc magnum Deum / veneratur, et ego veneror exemplo Patris.” Dafür erweist er sich aber als gewitzter Theologe, als sein Vater nach dem missglückten Opfer in Gefahr ist, den Kopf  zu verlieren: Unter Hinweis auf  die Launen der Götter spielt er das Omen herunter (Arie: Saepe terrent Numina, V. 65  ff.), obwohl er selbst insgeheim durchaus an eine Verstimmung Apollos glaubt: Sein Vater, König von Sparta, sollte eben, meint er, auch bei eventuellem Götterunwillen staatsmännische Haltung zeigen. Wie also Hyacinthus seinem Vater gehorcht, so weiß er ihn auch moralisch zu stützen. Spiegelt sich in dieser schönen Harmonie von Vater und Sohn nicht auch etwas vom Verhältnis Leopolds Mozarts, der ein Vertrauter Widls war, 446

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zu seinem Sohn Wolfgang, der von seinem Papa gesagt hat, er komme ihm gleich nach dem lieben Gott? Jedenfalls ist aber, wie schon diese feine Episode zu Beginn der Oper zeigt, die Auffassungsgabe von König Oebalus nicht immer die schnellste. Als sich Apollo ihm offenbart, braucht er ganze 21 Verse, bis er die aus der göttlichen Präsenz für Sparta resultierenden Vorteile erkennt und Dies beata! ruft (V. 107). Dafür zeigt er sich im 2. Akt umso beflissener, Melia zu der ja nicht ganz unproblematischen Hochzeit mit Apollo zu überreden, erkennt er darin doch nur die Rangerhöhung für die ganze Familie (V. 136-138). Auf  die Lügenmeldung des Zephyrus fällt er dann (wie erwähnt), im Gegensatz zu seiner Tochter, prompt herein. Geradezu sträflich verwirrt zeigt er sich in der Szene nach dem Tod seines Sohns. Als seine Tochter auftritt, fragt er sie: “An latro iamiam fugit?” (V. 301) und meint damit naiv Zephyrus, ohne zu bedenken, dass die ja immer noch uninformierte Melia darunter nur Apollo verstehen kann. Als sie dann antwortet, sie habe den latro des Landes verwiesen, nachdem er einen zweiten Mord begangen habe, blickt er überhaupt nicht mehr durch (V. 304: “caedem Nata! quam narras novam?”) Erst als Melia genauer von den Vorgängen berichtet, wird ihm die Identität der Personen klar. Nach einem bigotten Entzückensausruf  über die Gerechtigkeit Apollos informiert er nun erst endlich Melia, die darauf  sogleich, noch vor ihm, die Gefahren sieht, die sich aus der Ausweisung Apollos für Sparta ergeben. So hat der selber seinem Fürsterzbischof  sicherlich ergebene Widl in seinem Oebalus trotz Lobpreis mit ironischer Feder einen zwar beflissenen, aber doch recht schusseligen Herrscher gezeichnet.

Der heidnische Apollo auf  christlicher Bühne Apollo, Liebhaber und Bräutigam, ist großenteils der griechische Apollo, wie man ihn kennt. Widl denkt nicht daran, ihn, den doch unter Menschen weilenden Gott, als Typus Christi vorzustellen; er ist, gut antik, ein Gott mit relativer Allmacht, aber auch mit Schwächen. Seine Macht zeigt sich in den beiden mirakulösen Verwandlungen von Zephyrus und Hyacinthus, doch auch eine gelegentliche Ohnmacht wird deutlich: Die Bluttat des Zephyrus kann er nicht ungeschehen machen, ja er sieht sie auch nicht voraus. Bezeichnenderweise hat Widl aus der Aretalogie des Gottes, die 447

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dieser (“Iam pastor Apollo”, V. 111  ff.) selbst vorträgt, die Gabe der Prophezeiung weggelassen. Wie sehr Widl um Plausibilität der Handlung, was Apollo angeht, bemüht ist, zeigt sich auch daran, dass er dessen relative Schwäche eigens motiviert. Von seinem ersten Satz an erscheint er als ein Exulant, nämlich Verfolgter des erzürnten Göttervaters Jupiter, so dass sein Aufenthalt in Sparta auch eine Art Asyl ist. Nach der Auseinandersetzung mit der ihn verstoßenden Melia kommt er in einer monologischen Arieneinlage noch einmal darauf  zurück (V. 268): “Q uem coeli premunt inopem, / an terris agat exulem?”, ein fast schon tragischer Gott, der vom Himmel verstoßen, nun nicht einmal auf Erden eine Heimat findet.16 Offenbar betrachtet er das Unglück, das ihm in Sparta widerfährt, Tod seines Sportfreunds, erlittene Verleumdung, Zwist mit der Verlobten – als Ausfluss von Jupiters Zorn. Aber worüber zürnt dieser eigentlich? Der verleumderische Zephyrus erklärt Apollos Exil damit, dass dieser ein Schuft sei, der auch im Himmel nur Unruhe gestiftet habe und der darum verbannt worden sei (V. 211-213). Aber das passt wahrlich nicht zu dem sanftmütigen Gott (V. 264 “mitis Apollo”), den uns das Stück sonst zeigt. Das Richtige erfahren wir beim Mythologen Apollodor (3.122): Apollon hatte einst die Zyklopen des Zeus (bzw. Jupiter) getötet. Zur Strafe dafür musste er ein Jahr lang dem sterblichen König Admetos als Hirtensklave dienen. Widl hat dieses Motiv, das mit Hyacinthus von Hause aus nichts zu tun hatte, punktuell in sein Libretto hereingezogen, um Apollos Spartaaufentalt und seine relative Ohnmacht zu erklären, und er hat dabei aus dem Sklaven Apollo einen Exulanten gemacht. An diesem Punkt ist sicherlich auch die Lösung des Rätsels zu suchen, das Widl schon seinen dramatis personae aufgegeben hat: Ich meine den Blitzschlag, der im ersten Akt das geplante Opfer zunichtemacht. Sofort vermutet der konsternierte Oebalus, Apollo habe das Opfer verschmäht und müsse folglich von jemandem beleidigt worden sein. (So sonderbarerweise auch die übliche

16  Mit diesem ergreifenden Monolog Apollos, der sich entschließt, sozusagen ohne Aufenthaltsgenehmigung in Sparta zu bleiben, wollte Widl nach Ausweis des Librettos den Akt schließen (wie schon Orel 1959 [wie Anm. 3] gesehen hat). Aber Mozart hielt es für musikalisch befriedigender, das schwungvolle Duett da capo zu wiederholen.

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Auffassung der Interpreten.) Hyacinthus und Zephyrus beziehen dies auf  die vorausgegangenen etwas blasphemischen Worte des letzteren – obwohl dann Hyacinthus, geradezu gegen besseres Wissen, das böse Omen herunterspielt. In der Tat verliert Apollo, als er zu den Spartanern durchaus wohlgesonnen kommt, kein Wort über eine ihm widerfahrene Beleidigung. Bedenkt man weiterhin, dass Apollo nach antiker Vorstellung überhaupt keine Blitze schleudert, dass er aber sofort vom “Zorn des blitzenden Jupiters” (V. 84) spricht, dann wird klar, was Widl offenbar wollte (und was ein einziger Interpret, Engelbert Hellen, gesehen hat 17): Jupiter selbst ist verstimmt darüber, dass sein aufsässiger Sohn nach Sparta kommt, und er bekundet more suo seinen Unwillen. So kann man in diesem Blitz auch ein Vorzeichen für die ganze kommende tragische Handlung sehen, in der Apollo eben auch ein Verfolgter ist.

Widls Dramaturgie Das führt nun zu Widls dramaturgischer Leistung. Er hat, durchaus kunstvoll, zwei Handlungen parallel geführt, die jeweils um eines der beiden Oebaluskinder zentriert sind: Die Hyacinthushandlung beginnt mit den ersten Versen, in denen er sich als frommer Apolloverehrer vorstellt, und sie geht bis zu seiner Verklärung durch das Blumenwunder gegen Ende des dritten Akts. Die Meliahandlung beginnt in dem Augenblick, wo Melia als einzige die Schönheit des Gottes wahrnimmt; sie reicht bis zum glücklichen Hochzeitsfinale. Das Drama ist aber auch in einem anderen Sinn zweigeteilt. Vom Auftritt Apollos bis zu Melias großer Arie steigert sich das Glück des vom Gott begnadeten Sparta. Dann fast genau in der Mitte des zweiten Akts kommt mit der Nachricht vom Tod des Hyacinthus der völlige Stimmungsumschwung. Nun beginnt eine Verleumdungshandlung, die bis zur Aufklärung gegen Ende des dritten Aktes geht und, im geraden Gegensatz zum ersten Handlungsteil, in tiefer Depression endet: Kein Gegensatz könnte größer sein als der von Melias überdrehter Jubelarie und dem tief  traurigen Zwiegesang von Vater und Tochter. Dabei hat es Widl geschickt verstanden, die Verleumdungshandlung und damit Schürzung und Lösung des Knotens in die Länge 17 In Klassika. Die deutschsprachigen Klassikseiten: https://www.klassika.info/ Komponisten/Mozart/Oper/KV_038/index.html.

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zu ziehen. Nach der Intrige des Zephyrus hofft der mitfühlende Zuschauer, dass Apollo endlich kommt, die Sache aufklärt und den Übeltäter bestraft. Nun kommt er auch, aber nicht um, wie ein Hercule Poirot als Kriminaldetektiv, den Schuldigen zu überführen und seiner Strafe zuzuführen (womit die Handlung vorschnell am Ende wäre); vielmehr bestraft er Zephyrus im Zorn geradezu überhastet, so dass eben das, was Melia die Augen öffnen müsste, sie im Gegenteil – und das ist eine im modernen Sinn geradezu tragische Zuspitzung – in ihrem Wahn noch bestärkt: Apollo, glaubt sie ja nun, habe auch ihren Freund getötet. Wie Widl es so versteht, das Ganze seines Dramas zu strukturieren, so gibt er aber auch den einzelnen Chori bzw. Akten, die ja nach den Gesetzen des Benediktinertheaters getrennt voneinander gespielt werden, ihre je eigene Einheit. Jeder Akt hat drei vollgültige Musiknummern; in jedem erscheint vor der jeweils letzten Nummer Apollo, der eine verfahrene Situation mit mehr oder weniger Erfolg bereinigt, zweimal durch das Wunder einer Metamorphose. Das aus der antiken Tragödie bekannte Kunstmittel des deus ex machina ist also in dieser dreiaktigen “Oper” verdreifacht, aber ohne Gleichförmigkeit. Dem segnenden Gott in den Schlüssen der Akte I und III korrespondiert der am Ende von Akt II fast schon verzweifelnde Gott: “Q uem coeli premunt inopem, / an terris agat exulem?” Widls Leistung als Dramatiker soll damit nicht überbewertet werden. Auch wenn wir absehen von dem unbefriedigenden Schlusspreis einer zuvor nie dargestellten clementia Oebali und wenn wir uns abfinden mit der nicht ganz geglückten Kreuzung zwei verschiedenartiger Liebeshandlungen: Auch dann noch mutet Widl seinem Zuschauer einiges zu, was die psychologische Wahrscheinlichkeit angeht: Die zentrale Mordtat des Zephyrus wird kaum genügend motiviert. Dessen Hoffnung, bei einem Gott als Rivalen straffrei durchzukommen, wirkt unglaubwürdig naiv. Und dass es schließlich Apollo nicht fertigbringt, selber seine Unschuld zu beweisen, scheint doch auch wenig plausibel. Aber die Q ualität eines Librettos liegt nicht vor allem in seiner psychologischen Schlüssigkeit – Mozartfreunde denken etwa an Così fan tutte – sondern in der Fülle der Stimmungen, die es dem Komponisten bietet. Hier hat Widl Beachtliches geleistet. Von dem etwas pomadigen Eingangsgebet kommt man nach dem vorläufigen Schock des Blitzschlags zur künstlichen Lustigkeit der virtuosen 450

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Hyacinthusarie, der dann die Ruhe von Apollos lieblicher Pastorale schön kontrastiert. Dann geht es im zweiten Akt weiter mit drei Nummern hocherotischer Musik: Melia, im Taumel ihres Liebesglücks, überschlägt sich in Koloraturen. Völlig anders ist die rhetorisch werbende Kanzone des hinterhältigen Zephyrus, der Melia mit seinem schmierigen “Q uem prudens eligis?” (V.  231) betören möchte. Ihm wiederum kontrastiert die liebevoll noble Werbung des Apollo, der Melia zu beschwichtigen sucht. Dann bringt der Anfang des dritten Akts einen musikalischen Glanzpunkt mit der ergreifenden Sterbeszene des Hyacinthus: Erst hier hat Mozart das sonst nur vom Continuum begleitete Rezitativ mit den Streichern unterlegt, so dass wir bis zur anschließenden großen Arie des Oebalus eine quasi durchgängige Musiknummer hören, die vom Todesschmerz bis zum verzweifelten Zornesausbruch führt. Im größten Gegensatz zu den wilden Wutkaskaden des Königs steht dann der eigentliche musikalische Höhepunkt der Oper: das Trauerduett von Vater und Tochter – ein melodisch-harmonisches Wunderwerk des Elfjährigen, das auch vom folgenden Blumenmirakel nicht mehr überboten wird. Hier begleiten die Streicher noch einmal das Rezitativ. Dann erst löst sich alle Trauer im heiteren Schlussterzett (V. 385-389): “Tandem post turbida  / fulmina,  / nubila,  / Tonantis murmura / pax alma virescit et explicat se”, es ist die einzige wirklich fröhliche Partie in dieser aller Affekte durchlaufenden Oper. So hat Widl in neun verschiedenen Nummern von je ganz eigenem Ethos dem blutjungen Komponisten Gelegenheit gegeben, sein unglaubliches Einfühlungsvermögen in die verschiedensten seelischen Zustände zu zeigen. Und noch einen Pluspunkt bot dieses Libretto. Der Mythos von Apollo und Hyacinthus hatte sich nicht nur wegen des Sportunfalls als Parallele zur Clementia Croesi angeboten: er war auch einer der wenigen Mythen, die unter Jugendlichen spielen – Apollo, der bartlose, langmähnige bleibt ja immer jung – und er handelte von dem, was die Jugend beschäftigt: Kameradschaft und Sport, Liebe und Eifersucht, und (wenn wir Melia miteinbeziehen), der Traum vom Märchenprinzen. Auch daran muss Rufinus Widl, der ja im Hauptberuf  Pädagoge war, gedacht haben, als er dieses Textbuch schrieb, gewiss auch daran, dass Ovids fabulöse Metamorphosen immer – von Montaigne bis Goethe – zur Lieblingslektüre der Jungen gehört haben. Hier konnte Widl seinem Ovid sogar noch eins draufsetzen: Bei ihm wird ja nicht nur das Opfer, sondern auch sein Mörder verwandelt. 451

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So wird man sagen dürfen, dass Widl mit seinem Apollo et Hyacinthus ein Textbuch geschaffen hat, das nach der Kunst der Charakterzeichnung und der dramatischen Handlungsführung keine unwürdige Grundlage für Mozarts erste Oper war. Und wenn man dieses kleine Werk mit Widls langer, zähflüssiger Clementia Croesi vergleicht, dann möchte man fast glauben, als habe hier einmal nicht der Librettist den Musiker, sondern Mozarts kindlicher Genius den Benediktinerpater Rufinus Widl beflügelt.

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Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 453-456 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124076

DIRCAEA CARMINA

DAVID MONEY

DIRCAEA CARMINA

I. Carmen Sapphicum Blanda Dircaeum levet aura fumum: Solvitur cogens operis catena. Laudibus posthac meritis fruatur Arbiter artis. Taedium curae leviter relictae Vitet, ad campum sine bile vertat Adque maturos studiosa fructus Vespa recurrat. Praemium indagat penitus Camenis Dedicatum aevi pariter recentis; Inter hos coetus teneat benignos Praemia famae. Translation: May a  kindly breeze lift up Dircaean smoke; the chain of  compulsory labour is loosened. Henceforth may he enjoy deserved praises, as a  judge of  artistry. May he avoid the dullness of  chores which are gratefully left behind, and turn to a field without acrimony; and may an industrious Vespa keep buzzing back to ripe fruit. He makes deep investigations into a prize offered on equal terms to Muses of a recent age; among such groups of friends may he himself  gain the rewards of  fame. Cf. Hor. Carm. 4.2. II. Haicua (a) Q ui diligenter Miscuit eloquium Coquit perite. 455

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(b) Olympicus si Tempore pestis abest Pulvis, resurget. (c) Foris videtur Nec strepitum sequitur Constans figura. Translation: (a) He who has carefully mixed his eloquence cooks skilfully. (b) If  Olympic dust is absent in the time of  disease, it will rise again. (c) He can be seen outside, he does not follow the confusion: a steadfast figure. Note: In addition to D.  Sacré, M.  Smets (ed.), Tonight they all dance: 92 Latin and English Haiku (Wauconda, 1999), I  am indebted to S.  Coombs, In Perendinum Aevum (Portlaoise, 2015). Coombs introduces a metrical element to the Latin haiku, which I adopt here, treating the first and last lines as iambic, and the second line as dactylic.

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SIDRONIUS HOSSCHIUS, POÈTE DE L’HYPOTYPOSE

Parmi les nombreux poètes néo-latins que Dirk Sacré a  remis à l’honneur, Sidronius Hosschius (de Hossche, 1596-1653) mérite une particulière attention. Sacré souligne, en ces termes, son importance, en même temps que les raisons de son relatif  oubli 1 qu’il a tenté de réparer dans de nombreuses publications: 2 Hosschius, dont l’influence sur la formation littéraire des intellectuels catholiques de Belgique fut considérable, mais reste en partie à découvrir, et qui a été lu et imité dans la plus grande partie de 1  La bibliographie ancienne sur Hosschius est assez réduite: Al. et Aug. De Backer, C. Sommervogel, S. J., Bibliothèque de la Compagnie de Jésus (Bruxelles – Paris, 18901960), vol. 4, 473-479; F. van Hulst, Notice sur le P. de Hossche (Sidronius Hosschius) à l’occasion du monument que l’on se dispose à lui élever à Merckem Flandre Occidentale (Liège, 1844); J.  Levaux, “Notice historique sur le Révérend Père Sidronius de Hoosche de la Compagnie de Jésus”, Annales de la Société d’Émulation pour l’Étude de l’Histoire et des Antiquités de la Flandre 36 (1886 [1888]), 1-93; H. Hosdey, “Trois lettres autographes inédites de Sidronius Hosschius”, Annales de la Société d’Émulation pour l’Étude de l’Histoire et des Antiquités de la Flandre 53 (1903), 49-88. 2  D. Sacré (ed.), Sidronius Hosschius (Merkem 1596 – Tongeren, 1653) jezuïet en Latijns dichter. Publicatie n.a.v. zijn vierhonderdste verjaardag (Kortrijk, 1996); “A Forgotten Autograph Poem by Sidronius Hosschius, S.J. (1596-1653)”, Ziva Antika 45 (1995 [1997]), 271-285; “Ab oblivione vindicetur Sidronius Hosschius poeta Latinus (1596-1653)”, Melissa 72 (1996) 9-11 et 73 (1996), 8-9; 74 (1996) 7-8; “Some Unexplored Editions of  Sidronius Hosschius’s (and of  Becanus’s) Poetry (with a Forgotten Poem)”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 47 (1998), 350-357; “Een Latijns jezuïetendichter uit de zeventiende eeuw: Balduinus Cabillavius”, De Zeventiende Eeuw 14 (1998), 107117; “Verkenningen in een zeventiende-eeuws handschrift van de Gentse universiteitsbibliotheek: poëzie van Aloysius Lauwenbach S.J.?”, Handelingen van de Koninklijke Zuid-Nederlandse Maatschappij voor Taal-en Letterkunde en Geschiedenis 50 (1996 [1998]), 115-139; “Verdere bibliografische sprokkelingen met betrekking tot de dichter Sidronius Hosschius S.J. (1596-1653)”, De Gulden Passer 76-77 (1998-1999), 175-181; “Hosschius (Sidronius) (1596-1653)”, dans C. Nativel, C. Magnien et al. (ed.) Centuriae latinae II. Cent une figures humanistes de la Renaissance aux Lumières offertes à Marie Madeleine de la Garanderie (Genève, 2006), 403-408.

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 459-474 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124077

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l’Europe et même en Amérique, est une des gloires de la poésie latine des Pays-Bas; sa renommée est comparable à celle d’un Jean Second au xvie siècle, mais pour le lecteur d’aujourd’hui, qui s’intéresse moins à la perfection formelle et à la brillante imitation des poètes anciens, sa thématique presque exclusivement religieuse est sans doute moins attrayante; il n’en est pas moins vrai qu’il mérite d’être étudié par ceux qui s’occupent de l’histoire des lettres latines belges et européennes.3

De fait, Hosschius fut, en son temps, célébré comme l’un des plus grands poètes néo-latins. Suprême hommage, en 1656, trois ans après sa mort, le pape Alexandre VII, qui l’avait connu alors qu’il était légat pontifical, fit publier ses œuvres par son ami Jacobus Wallius (Van de Walle) dans un beau volume imprimé par Balthasar Moretus.4 Ses œuvres connurent de nombreuses rééditions et traductions au xviie et au xviiie siècle, étudiées par Sacré.5 Outre les éloges qui ouvrent le volume de 1656, on trouve des notices admiratives chez des auteurs contemporains comme René Rapin (16201687).6 Adrien Baillet (1649-1706) – et on ne peut soupçonner de complaisance envers les jésuites cet adversaire des bollandistes –, fait de lui cet élégant éloge dans les Jugemens des sçavans: C’est par nécessité plûtôt que par bien-seance que j’ay crû devoir marquer le temps de la naissance & de la mort, aussi bien que la qualité & le païs de Sidronius Hosschius, de peur qu’on ne s’y trompât, en le croyant né aux siecles les plus heureux de Rome florissante, sous pre3  Sacré, “Hosschius (Sidronius)” 2005 (cité n. 2), 407. J. IJsewijn a une appréciation plus nuancée in “Sidronius Hosschius (1596-1653), Latijns dichter”, De Zeventiende Eeuw 13 (1997), 410: “Sidronius Hosschius est incontestablement un homme doué pour la poésie et un personnage non négligeable d’un point de vue historique. Mais comme beaucoup d’autres auteurs du passé, qui ne sont pas parmi les plus grands de la littérature, son destin sera de rester connu dans un cercle restreint de ‘spécialistes’ qui se consacrent à la préservation et à la conservation de notre patrimoine spirituel et artistique dans son ensemble et pas seulement dans ses moments les plus forts” (ma traduction). 4 Hosschius, Elegiarum libri sex. Praemittuntur illustrissimorum virorum poëmata in obitum Sidronii Hosschii scripta […] (Antverpiae, B. Moretus, 1656). Aux Elegiae de Christo patiente publiées auparavant (Bruxellae, Typis I. Mommartii, 1649), le volume de 1656 ajoute une élégie, la première, et plusieurs pièces qui ne sont d’ailleurs pas des élégies, malgré le titre de l’ouvrage. Nous renvoyons à cette édition. 5  Voir supra, n. 2. 6 R. Rapin, Les réflexions sur l’éloquence, la poétique, l’histoire et la philosophie […] (Amsterdam, A.  Woefgang, 1686), 206: “Il s’est trouvé dans ces derniers siècles un Allemand nommé Lotichius [Petrus Lotichius Secundus, Peter Lotz, 1528-1560], un Italien nommé Molsa [Francesco Maria Molza, Franciscus Maria Molcia, Marius Molsa, 1489-1544], un Flamand nommé Sidronius, qui ont écrit des Elegies d’une grande beauté.”

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texte qu’il égale les premiers d’entre les Anciens Poëtes Latins qu’elle a  produits, & que ses écrits semblent nous porter à le confondre avec eux”.7

C’est sur la beauté de sa langue, que Baillet souligne, et plus particulièrement sur son imitation des élégiaques antiques – Properce, Tibulle, Virgile et surtout Ovide – que les études récentes se sont attardées.8 De fait, ses élégies sont exemplaires de l’émulation avec les anciens qui anime Hosschius. Il est un aspect de son œuvre sur lequel on s’est moins attardé, comme le remarque Dirk Sacré, c’est sa thématique religieuse. Nous voudrions ici nous arrêter un peu sur l’ouvrage d’Hosschius le plus prisé en son temps, le Christus patiens. Notre sensibilité moderne est souvent heurtée par les images de violence. On se souvient des réactions des spectateurs au film que réalisa Mel Gibson en 2004, The Passion of   the Christ. Parmi les nombreuses critiques qu’on lui adressa, celle de la violence dans la représentation de la Passion n’était pas la moindre. De la même façon, Jozef  IJsewijn blâmait en ces termes Hosschius: 7 A.  Baillet, Jugemens des sçavans sur les principaux ouvrages des auteurs. Tome quatrième contenant les poètes (Paris, A.  Dezallier, 1686), 242-246, à 242; il ajoute, à 243-244: “II n’y a rien de plus net, rien de plus exact, ny rien de plus elegant que toutes ses Poësies au jugement de M. Borrichius, Professeur en l’Université de Copenhague (‘sed nihil tersius, exactiusque est Sidronii Hoschii poematibus […]’), écrit Ole Borch ou Oluf  Bork, 1626-1690, dans les Dissertationes academicae de poetis, publicis disputationibus in regio Hafniensi Lyceo assertae, ab anno 1676 ad annum 1681, nunc iterum evulgatae, [Havniae], Paulli – Francofurti, Drullmann, 1683, 143.” Baillet continue en citant Rapin, à 244: “Le P. Rapin dit qu’il a joint la pureté à l’élevation. Ce sont deux qualitez rares & excellentes qu’il est fort difficile d’allier ensemble, et c’est ce qui ne se trouve point dans Casimir [Sarbiewski, 1595-1640], ni dans Cerisante [Marc Duncan, dit Cérisantes, c. 1612-1648], ni dans Madelenet [Gabriel Magdelénat ou Magdelenet ou Madelénat, 1587-1661], ni dans plusieurs autres Poëtes Latins qui passent pour les premiers du sìecle.” Baillet se trompe cependant – et son erreur a été souvent répétée – c’est à Cerisantes que Rapin 1686 (cité n. 6), attribue ces qualités, à 208: “Sarbieuski a de l’élevation, mais sans pureté. Magdelenet est pur, mais sans élevation: Cerisantes a joint dans ses odes l’un et l’autre, car il écrit noblement, et d’un style assez pur.” 8  L. T. Gourde, Select Elegies of  Sidronius Hosschius, S.J. (thèse, Loyola University, Chicago, 1950); Jesuit Latin Poets of   the 17 th and 18th Centuries. An Anthology of  Neo-Latin Poetry, Selected, Paraphrased by J. J. Mertz, S.J., Edited, Annotated by J.  P. Murphy, S.J. in collaboration with J. IJsewijn (Wauconda, Ill., 1989) 85-92; La lyre jésuite, Anthologie de poèmes latins (1620-1730). Présentés, traduits et annotés par † A. Thill, Notices biographiques et bibliographiques par G. Banderier, préf. M.  Fumaroli (Genève, 1999), 91-99; A.  Glover, “Sidron De Hossche (1596-1653) and the Poetics of   the Passion”, International Journal of   the Classical Tradition (Sept. 2020). Voir aussi les articles de D. Sacré, supra, n. 2.

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La deuxième élégie du livre Christus Patiens, par exemple, décrit de façon horriblement réaliste les tortures et les blessures du Christ et l’empathie poétique lui donne un caractère pour ainsi dire masochiste. L’élégie II du troisième livre du premier cycle, “Supplicium Cupidinis”, est en quelque sorte un manuel détaillé de torture. Hosschius semble parfois trouver un plaisir pervers à évoquer de manière réaliste des scènes de torture, ce qui peut probablement s’expliquer par une atmosphère générale de l’époque où les exécutions publiques étaient des plaisirs presque populaires et où les auteurs trouvaient un plaisir pervers à décrire et à représenter la torture […].9

Certes, les descriptions qu’Hosschius fait de la passion du Christ sont terribles. Cependant, je ne crois pas qu’elles procèdent d’un masochisme ou d’un “plaisir pervers”, pas plus d’ailleurs que “l’atmosphère générale de l’époque” suffise à expliquer leur violence. Plusieurs éléments justifient leur présence. Je voudrais ici en souligner trois. Il y a d’abord le souci des contemporains d’Hosschius de comprendre le processus de la crucifixion. Ensuite, d’un point de vue stylistique, ces descriptions procèdent d’une rhétorique moderne que les jésuites ont mise en place et qui se fonde sur l’hypotypose. Enfin, elles ont une fonction théologique, leur propos étant de susciter le repentir du pécheur. Le décret du Concile de Trente De invocatione, veneratione, et reliquiis sanctorum, et sacris imaginibus (3 décembre 1563) avait exigé “ut nullae falsi dogmatis imagines et rudibus periculosi erroris occasionem praebentes statuantur” (qu’on n’expose aucune image porteuse d’une fausse doctrine et pouvant être l’occasion d’une erreur dangereuse pour les gens simples). Les dévotions à la Croix et aux plaies du Christ, si elles n’étaient pas nouvelles, connurent, à la fin du xvie siècle, un développement considérable. Les méditations se fondant sur des images, représenter le Christ souffrant comportait, pour les artistes, peintres ou sculpteurs, toute sorte de difficultés. La première raison en est que les textes ne donnent aucune indication sur la croix et la façon exacte dont Jésus fut crucifié. C’est ce que constate le premier des commentateurs du décrêt, le théologien de Louvain, Joannes Molanus, dans son De picturis et imaginibus sacris (1570) réédité,10 en particulier à propos du nombre   IJsewijn 1997 (cité n. 3), à 409 (ma traduction).   Joannes Molanus (1533-1585), De picturis et imaginibus sacris liber unus: tractans de vitandis circa eas abusibus, et de earundem significationibus […] (Lovanii, apud H. Wellaeum, 1570). Le traité connaîtra cinq éditions augmentées entre 1570 et 1771. 9

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de clous utilisés.11 Avec le De cruce (1593-1594), Juste Lipse tenta de répondre, en s’appuyant sur les textes, aux questions posées par la crucifixion, en général, et par celle du Christ en particulier.12 L’ouvrage fut à l’origine de nombreux débats, théologiques, archéologiques et philologiques. Ainsi, Rubens fut blâmé pour avoir, dans ses crucifixions, suivi Lipse qui plaçait les clous dans le poignet du Crucifié et non dans sa paume.13 Nous possédons un témoignage précieux de ces critiques. Bartoldus Nihusius mentionne une lettre du jésuite Joannes Bollandus (1596-1665) qu’Hosschius connaissait puisqu’il collabora avec lui à la rédaction de l’Imago primi saeculi: 14 Sed, ut dixi, redditum clavo pervium fuisse carpum Salvatori, non profatus ego sum, aut opinatus; quicquid Rubenius tandem fecerit, quem nec mansisse irreprehensum, scimus. Ita quippe ad me scribebat Joannes Bollandus, vir summus, Antverpia, VIII Januarii 1643: “Memini, ante annos XXIV acriter in Rubenium pictorem invectos in hac urbe concionatores nonnullos, quod Crucifixi illustri in loco ponendam imaginem pinxisset, clavis non medio manuum infixis, sed inter brachium et manum. Videri enim aiebant id prophetico illi adversari: ‘Q uae sunt plagae in medio manuum tuarum’ [Zach. 13.6]? Q uis enim manus brachiique iuncturam medium manus dicet?” Mais, comme je l’ai dit, que le carpe du Sauveur ait offert un passage au clou, pour ma part, je ne l’affirme ni ne le crois. Ce que Rubens fit, enfin, nous le savons et il en fut blâmé. Ainsi Joannes Bollandus, ce très grand homme, m’écrivait à Anvers, le 8 janvier 1643: “Je me souviens qu’il y a  24 ans, plusieurs prédicateurs dans cette ville ont violemment attaqué le peintre Rubens parce qu’il avait peint l’image d’un crucifix que l’on devait placer dans un lieu illustre, avec des clous qui n’étaient pas fixés au milieu de la main, mais entre le bras et la main. Ils disaient en effet que cela semblait aller contre ces 11  Fr.  Bœspflug, O.  Christin, B.  Tassel (tr., com.), Molanus, Traité des saintes images (Paris, 1996), vol. 1, 494-496: dans le doute, Molanus refuse de décider s’il y en avait trois ou quatre. 12   Publié à Anvers en 1594, par Plantin, le De cruce libri tres ad sacram profanamque historiam utiles a trop souvent été considéré comme un ouvrage de dévotion à la Croix, alors qu’il s’inscrit parmi ce qu’on peut appeler les “traités archéologiques” de Lipse. Voir J.  De Landtsheer, “De Cruce and the Reception of   the Fathers”, Neulateinisches Jahrbuch. Journal of  Neo-Latin Language and Literature 2  (2000), 97-122. Voir aussi F.  Rosso (tr., com.), Juste Lipse, Crucifixion: en trois livres pour servir l’histoire sainte et profane (Paris, 2018). 13  Lipse 1594 (cité n. 12), 49. 14  Imago primi saeculi Societatis Iesu a provincia Flandro-Belgica eiusdem Societatis repraesentata (Antverpiae, B. Moretus, 1640). Voir J. W. O’Malley (ed.), Art, Con­ troversy and the Jesuits. The “Imago primi saeculi” (1640) (Philadelphia, 2015).

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mots du prophète: ‘Q uelles sont les plaies au milieu de tes mains’ [Zach. 13.6]? Q ui peut dire, en effet, que la jointure de la main et du bras est le milieu de la main?” 15

Fig. 1 Boëtius Adamsz. Bolswert, Le coup de lance (Iesus crucifixus), d’après Peter Paul Rubens, estampe, 606 × 432 mm, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, RP-P-OB-67.485

Il faut ajouter à cela les ouvrages médicaux sur les causes de la mort du Christ. On peut évoquer, en se limitant à l’Europe du Nord, le débat suscité par Thomas Bartholin (1616-1680), célèbre médecin 15   B. Nihusius [1590-1657], De cruce epistola ad Thomam Bartholinum. Est anticritici, anno 1644 vulgati, prosequutio (Coloniae Ubiorum, apud J. Kalcovium, 1647), 6. À ma connaissance, ce témoignage n’a pas été remarqué par les spécialistes de Rubens qui se contentent d’écrire que les prédicateurs condamnaient ce choix de Rubens; voir B.  Knipping, The Iconography of   the Counter Reformation in the Netherlands (Leiden, 1974), vol. 2, 451; J. R. Judson, Corpus Rubenianum. Part VI. The Passion of  Christ (London, 2000), 32 et 124. Bollandus reste vague quant à l’indication de l’œuvre destinée à “un lieu illustre”. Il indique une date approximative: “il y a 24 ans”. Or, il semble que Rubens n’ait peint que deux crucifixions entre 1618 et 1620. Le Christ en croix entre les deux larrons (Antwerpen, Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten) daté de 1619-1620 et destiné à l’église des Récollets à Anvers et une Élévation de la Croix pour l’église des jésuites à Anvers, Saint-Charles-Borromée, dont il ne reste que l’esquisse (Paris, Musée du Louvre). Dans Le coup de lance (fig. 1) les clous sont visiblement placés dans le carpe, mais rien ne permet d’affirmer qu’il n’en allait pas de même pour le tableau de Saint-Charles-Borromée. Ce n’était pas une invention nouvelle de Rubens. Les clous sont ainsi placés dans le Christ en croix de 16101611 (Antwerpen, Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten), dans la Crucifixion de München, Alte Pinakothek, datée vers 1615, pour me limiter à deux exemples.

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de la cour du Danemark. À son De latere Christi (1646), l’évêque de Myre, Bartoldus Nihusius, répondit avec la De cruce epistola, déjà citée, à laquelle lui-même répondit dans les De cruce Christi hypomnemata IV (1651).16 Tous ces ouvrages étudient avec un regard médical les conséquences physiologiques des tortures subies par le Christ. Enfin, les témoignages de cette volonté de vraisemblance dans les représentations religieuses sont aussi nombreux chez les amateurs d’art. J’en retiendrai deux qui encadrent la période de notre auteur et expliquent la brutalité de ses descriptions. En 1582, déjà, dans son Discorso intorno alle imagini sacre et profane, le cardinal Gabriele Paleotti (1522-1597), critiquait en ces termes les peintres qui ne respectaient pas la vraisemblance: […] quando si figura il corpo di N[ostro] Sig[nore] in croce morbido e bianco, sì come communemente sogliono fare i pittori, senza alcun segno di livore o de flagelli: chi non s’accorgerà subito ciò essere non verisimile, essendo stato poco prima fierissimamente battuto e consumato? 17 […] lorsqu’on représente le corps de Notre Seigneur en croix délicat et blanc, comme le font couramment les peintres, sans aucune trace de meurtrissure ou de flagellation, qui ne remarquera pas aussitôt que cela n’est pas vraisemblable, puisqu’il a été peu avant très cruellement meurtri et désarticulé?

On trouve des propos très proches dans la bouche d’Adrien Valois, dans les Valesiana (1694): De tous les excellens Peintres anciens et modernes, il n’y en a  pas un jusqu’à présent qui ait réussi à représenter comme il faut Nôtre Seigneur en Croix. Ils ont crû faire merveille de donner un coloris de chair mourante sans aucune playe que celles du côté, des pieds et des mains, en quoy ils se sont grandement trompez. Car quand Nôtre Seigneur fut attaché en Croix, il venoit d’être flagellé cruellement par tout le corps, et l’avoit par consequent tout déchiré de coups et tout en sang. Car le tems qu’il fut à porter sa Croix du lieu où il avoit été 16 Th.  Bartholin, De latere Christi aperto dissertatio. Accedunt Cl.  Salmasii et aliorum de cruce epistolae (Lugduni Batavorum, J. Maire, 1646); Nihusius 1647 (cité n.  15); Th.  Bartholin, De cruce Christi hypomnemata IV  […] (Hafniae, ex officina M. Martzan, 1651) (1660); B. Nihusius, De cruce epistola ad Thomam Bartholinum; Nicolai Fontani responsum ad propositam sibi quaestionem an manus, clavis transfixae, pares ferendo corpori inde pendulo (Amstelodami, sumptibus A. Frisii, 1670). 17  G. Paleotti, Discorso intorno alle imagini sacre et profane […] (Bologna, A. Benacci, 1582), vol. 2, 179.

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flagellé jusqu’au Calvaire, n’étant pas suffisant pour fermer des playes si récentes, il est incontestable que quand les Juifs l’attachèrent en croix son corps étoit encore tout couvert de playes et de sang depuis les pieds jusqu’à la tête. Il est donc ridicule de représenter Jésus-Christ mourant en Croix avec une chair pâle et jaunâtre, comme pourroit être celle d’une personne qui meurt dans son lit. Puisque son corps étoit déchiré et que son sang couloit de tous les côtez, pourquoy le représenter sans blessures? 18

Valois conclut par ces mots, soulignant la grande difficulté pour les peintres de montrer une pareille image: “Il est vray que cela paroîtroit nouveau à bien des gens, et feroit même horreur, mais cependant voilà la seule maniere dont il faudroit le peindre.” Hosschius aborde aussi cette question de la représentation du Christ souffrant par les artistes. Dans l’Élégie XVI du Christus patiens, Etiam nos Christi doloribus causam dedisse (“Nous aussi avons causé les douleurs du Christ”), il médite sur les souffrances du Christ à partir d’une image peinte: Est mihi sanguineae crucis, et pendentis in illa Numinis artifici picta tabella manu. Haec mihi saepe animi sopitos suscitat ignes, nonnunquam lachrymas provocat illa meas. Nuper in hac oculis et toto pectore fixus spectabam populi triste furentis opus.19 J’ai un petit tableau peint d’une main artiste de la Croix couverte de sang et de la divinité qui y est suspendue. Ce tableau ranime souvent les feux assoupis de mon âme: parfois la croix provoque mes larmes. Récemment, les yeux et tout mon cœur fixés sur lui, je regardais le triste ouvrage du peuple en fureur.

Cependant, l’Élégie XV du Christus patiens, Memoriam vulnerum Christi retinendam (“Il faut garder la mémoire des plaies du Christ”), où le jésuite invite à méditer sur la passion à partir d’une image de l’Homme de douleur, tout en soulignant la fonction dévotionnelle de l’image, montre l’impossibilité de peindre le corps souffrant du Christ:

18  A. Valois (Hadrianus Valesius) (1607-1692), Valesiana, ou les pensées critiques, historiques et morales et les poésies latines de monsieur de Valois, […]  recueillies par monsieur de Valois son fils (Paris, F. et P. Delaulne, 1694), 131-132. 19  Hosschius 1656 (cité n. 4), Christus patiens. Elegia 16.36.

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Si quis es, in tristi qui fixus imagine spectas, quae tulerit pro te vulnera, quotque Deus, in lacero nunquam tot vulnera corpore cernes, quot tulit, ars numerum pingere nulla potest. At sunt, quae rapiant animos, penitusque morentur lumina, quaeque suo sunt speciosa loco. Aspice quam lato patefactum pectus hiatu, quantaque sint manuum vulnera, quanta pedum. Illa cicatricem non sunt ductura; patebunt donec qui moriens illa recepit, erit.20 Toi qui, les yeux fixés sur cette triste image, contemples et dénombres les blessures que Dieu a souffertes pour toi, jamais tu n’en pourras compter autant qu’Il en reçut sur son corps lacéré, car aucun art ne saurait en peindre le nombre. Mais il en est qui saisissent l’âme, et intensément retiennent le regard et se font remarquer chacune en son lieu. Vois la plaie béante qui déchire sa poitrine, vois les larges blessures de ses mains, de ses pieds. Celles-là ne cicatriseront pas, elles resteront ouvertes tant que durera Celui qui en mourant les reçut.

Ce que le peintre ne peut réussir, le poète va pourtant tenter de le faire par les mots. Dans la préface aux Elegiae, Wallius, pour évoquer l’œuvre inachevée qu’il a  fait imprimer, se fonde sur un passage bien connu de l’Histoire naturelle de Pline l’Ancien à propos de la signature à l’imparfait que pratiquait Apelle et du plaisir qu’éprouvaient les anciens à contempler des œuvres inachevées 21 et sur l’éloge que Cicéron faisait d’Apelle dans le De officiis: Ut enim nemo inventus fuit, qui eam tabulae partem, quam Apelles inchoatam reliquit, absolveret (oris enim pulchritudo reliqui corporis imitandi spem auferebat), sic ea quae Sidronius (nam quae Cicero de Panaetio, ego de illo vere dicam) non perfecisset, propter eorum quae fecit praestantiam, nemo persecuturus fuisset.22   Hosschius 1656 (cité n. 4), Christus patiens. Elegia 15.35. Je remercie vivement Pierre Laurens, de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, d’avoir traduit ces vers. 21  Hosschius 1656 (cité n. 4), “Dedicatio”, n.p.; Plin. M. NH, Praef. 26. De fait, si certains des textes avaient déjà connu une publication, Wallius leur a  ajouté des pièces inédites qu’Hosschius n’avait pas révisées. 22  L’allusion aux propos de Cicéron sur Panaetios est un bel exemple de la pratique de l’imitation dans la rhétorique jésuite. Wallius renvoie implicitement, sans préciser davantage sa source – il s’adresse à un pape cultivé – au De officiis 3.10 qu’il cite: “Accedit eodem testis locuples Posidonius, qui etiam scribit in quadam epistola, 20

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De même qu’il ne se trouva jamais personne pour achever la partie d’un tableau qu’Apelle avait laissée inachevée (la beauté du visage enlevait, en effet, l’espoir d’imiter le reste du corps), de même ce que Sidronius n’a pas fini (car je pourrais assurément dire de lui ce que Cicéron disait de Panaetius), nul n’aurait pu le poursuivre à cause de l’excellence de ce qu’il a fait.

Si ces textes relèvent, au xviie siècle, du topos, cette comparaison avec un peintre semble avoir été choisie à dessein par Wallius pour mettre en valeur le lien entre la poésie d’Hosschius et la peinture. Une des qualités de la poésie d’Hosschius est, en effet, son caractère pictural. L’évocation abstraite des souffrances du Christ, la métonymie qui consiste, par exemple, à montrer les instruments de la passion pour signifier les souffrances subies par le Christ ne suffisent plus. Il faut montrer les plaies du Christ dans toute leur réalité, dans toute leur horreur, les mettre devant les yeux des spectateurs. Comme Marc Fumaroli l’a montré dans L’Âge de l’éloquence, La figure par excellence de la rhétorique des Jésuites de Cour, […], c’est la description, ou ekphrasis, riche en puissance, comme le miroir, de toutes les possibilités de l’imitatio Naturae: hypotypose, éthopée, topographie, narration, “charactere”  […], interrogation, dialogisme, prosopopée.23

Fumaroli parle ici du discours. Mais cette remarque s’applique aussi bien à la poésie ou encore à la peinture. Hosschius lui-même écrit, dans l’Élégie XI des Vota ser. archiduci Leopoldo intitulée Vota ex statuis et picturis: Seu pingant hominum formas, qui viderit illas, natas, non pictas, arte latente putet. Ora loqui credat, vestigia velle moveri, officiis fungi cetera membra suis. Seu simulent flores, et mixtas floribus herbas, ipsa suos hortos Flora videre putet.24

P. Rutilium Rufum dicere solere, qui Panaetium audierat, ut nemo pictor esset inventus, qui Coae Veneris eam partem, quam Apelles inchoatam reliquisset, absolveret (oris enim pulchritudo reliqui corporis imitandi spem auferebat), sic ea, quae Panaetius praetermisisset propter eorum, quae perfecisset, praestantiam neminem persecutum.” 23 M. Fumaroli, L’Âge de l’éloquence: “Rhétorique et res literaria” de la Renaissance au seuil de l’époque classique (Paris, 1994) (première éd. Genève, 1980), 678. 24  Hosschius 1656 (cité n. 4), Vota ser. archiduci Leopoldo, Elegia 11.109.

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S’ils peignent des figures humaines, que celui qui les a vues pense, l’art se cachant, qu’elles ne sont pas peintes, mais naturelles. Q u’il croie que leurs bouches parlent, que leurs pieds veulent se mouvoir, que tous leurs membres remplissent leur fonction. S’ils imitent des fleurs et des herbes mêlées de fleurs, que Flore même pense voir ses jardins.

Cet art de peindre que propose ici Hosschius se fonde sur les préceptes que Q uintilien donnait dans l’Institution oratoire à propos de la narration. Une peinture, comme un beau discours doit faire voir les choses. Itaque ἐνάργειαν, cuius in praeceptis narrationis feci mentionem, quia plus est evidentia vel, ut alii dicunt, repraesentatio quam perspicuitas, et illud patet, hoc se quodam modo ostendit, inter ornamenta ponamus. Magna virtus res de quibus loquimur clare atque ut cerni videantur enuntiare.25 C’est pourquoi l’ἐνάργεια, que j’ai mentionnée parmi les préceptes de la narration, parce que l’évidence ou, comme d’autres disent, la “représentation”, est plus que la clarté, doit être comptée comme un ornement; celle-ci se laisse voir, celle-là se montre elle-même d’une certaine manière. C’est une grande qualité d’énoncer les choses dont nous parlons clairement et de façon qu’on semble les voir.

Et, au livre suivant: Illa vero, ut ait Cicero, sub oculos subiectio tum fieri solet cum res non gesta indicatur sed ut sit gesta ostenditur, nec universa sed per partis: quem locum proximo libro subiecimus evidentiae. Et Celsus hoc nomen isti figurae dedit: ab aliis “hypotyposis” dicitur, proposita quaedam forma rerum ita expressa verbis ut cerni potius videantur quam audiri.26 Q uant à cette figure qui, comme dit Cicéron, “place les choses sous les yeux”, on s’en sert, lorsqu’on n’indique pas seulement un fait, mais qu’on montre comment il s’est passé, non dans son ensemble, mais en détail; dans le livre précédent, je l’ai placée dans la catégorie de l’évidence. Celsus donna ce nom à cette figure, d’autres l’appellent “hypotypose”, une image des choses exprimée par les mots de manière à que l’on croie les voir plutôt que les entendre.

Ainsi, Hosschius, dans sa volonté de montrer les souffrances du Christ, nous donne à voir des descriptions d’une précision et d’une  Q uint. Inst. 8.3.61-62.  Q uint. Inst. 9.2.40.

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violence rares. Je ne prendrai pour exemple que l’Elégie 7, Dolores Christi in crucem acti (“Douleurs du Christ mis en croix”). Corripiunt pronum, vertuntque in terga supinum, pressaque nodoso brachia fune ligant. Atque ita diversi geminos utrimque lacertos distendunt: validas adiuvat ira manus. Iuncturis emota suis dant ossa fragorem: abrumpenda humeris brachia paene putes. Nec convulsa minus crurum internodia solvunt, dum tendunt, odio vim geminante, pedes. Hei mihi! Q uis teneat lacrymas? Maiora minantur artifices scelerum: non habet ira modum. Pars tenet iniecto distentos fune lacertos, pars fera sanguinea concutit arma manu. Malleus in dextra est, rigidum tenet altera clavum, (asper, et obtusa cuspide clavus erat). Dira viris facies, torvis in vultibus iras, inque oculis facinus, quod meditantur, habent. Me miserum! Stringunt clavos, magnoque furentes perque manus adigunt impete, perque pedes. Rumpuntur venae, nervi rumpuntur, et ossa: sanguinis en rivi fluminis instar eunt. Dum geminant ictus, dum mons et saxa resultant ictibus, heu quantus transit ad ossa dolor! Esse, homines credamne, quibus tam tristis imago nil animum, qua sunt saxa movenda, movet? Si quibus est tantum circum praecordia ferri, aspiciant siccis haec in amante genis. Haec ego dum specto, cor quod mihi durius aere est, rumpitur et sensum commiserantis habet. Proh! Supreme Pater, patientem talia natum aspicis et cessas iraque lenta tua est.27 Ils le saisissent penché en avant et le font tourner sur le dos penché en arrière, ils lient ses bras en les serrant avec une corde noueuse. Et ainsi, chacun de son côté, ils disloquent de part et d’autre les deux muscles des bras: la colère aide leurs mains puissantes. Les os sortis de leurs articulations craquettent: tu croirais presque que les bras vont se détacher des épaules. Ils brisent les jambes tout autant brisées que les bras, quand ils tirent les pieds, la haine redoublant leur force. Hélas! Q ui peut retenir ses larmes? Ils menacent de plus grands maux, les artisans des crimes: la colère n’a pas de mesure.   Hosschius 1656 (cité n. 4), Christus patiens, Elegia 7.20.

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Une partie tient les muscles distendus avec la corde qu’on a attachée, une partie agite des armes sanglantes d’une main cruelle. Un marteau est dans la droite, l’autre tient un clou dur (un clou rugueux à la pointe émoussée), Leur aspect est sinistre, sur leurs faces farouches ils ont la colère, dans les yeux le crime qu’ils méditent. Malheureux que je suis! ils appliquent les clous et, en furie, à travers les mains, à travers les pieds, à grands coups, ils les enfoncent. Les veines se rompent, les nerfs se rompent, et les os: voici que des ruisseaux de sang coulent comme des fleuves. Q uand les coups redoublent, quand le mont et les rochers résonnent des coups, hélas, quelle douleur passe dans mes os! Puis-je croire qu’il y a des hommes dont une si triste image, capable d’émouvoir des rochers, n’émeut pas l’âme. Si certains ont le cœur tellement de fer, qu’ils regardent cela dans l’amant avec des paupières sèches; Pour moi, quand je vois cela, mon cœur, qui est plus dur que l’airain, se rompt avec un sentiment de commisération. Hélas! Père suprême, tu vois ton Fils subir de telles choses et tu tardes et ta colère est lente.

Hosschius applique les procédés que Q uintilien suggère dans son analyse de l’evidentia. Le résultat est saisissant. Ce tableau verbal se dessine et s’anime peu à peu. Les procédés de l’hypotypose donnent à sa description vivacité et pathétique: emploi du présent; accumulation de verbes d’action – tout est dans le mouvement; énumérations qui renforcent l’impression d’horreur voulue par l’auteur avec parfois des répétitions expressives (Rumpuntur venae, nervi rumpuntur; movenda/movet), interventions du narrateur (Hei mihi! quis teneat lacrymas? / Me miserum!). Un autre procédé de l’evidentia est remarquable, l’utilisation du champ lexical des sons combiné au jeu des sonorités. Le vacarme est évoqué par des noms qui précisent les divers bruits audibles (fragorem, resultant), mais aussi par le jeu des sonorités (accumulation de syllabes longues, allitérations en liquides…). Il faudrait analyser tout le passage dans ce sens. Cette page est une ἔκφρασις qui émeut le spectateur et sollicite son imagination grâce aux images et aux sons. Ces descriptions ne sont pas gratuites. Elles visent à montrer l’étendue de la faute du pécheur et la grandeur du sacrifice du Christ. Les méditations sur la Passion reprennent invariablement cette thématique en citant Isaïe 53.5: “Ipse autem vulneratus est propter iniquitates nostras; attritus est propter scelera nostra: disciplina 471

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pacis nostrae super eum, et livore eius sanati sumus” ou Hébreux 9.14: “Q uanto magis sanguis Christi, qui per Spiritum Sanctum semetipsum obtulit immaculatum Deo, emundabit conscientiam nostram ab operibus mortuis, ad serviendum Deo viventi?” Ainsi Charles Scribani, dans le Christus patiens piis exercitationibus illustratus, cite Isaïe et reprend à trois reprises l’Épître aux Hébreux.28 Ce long manuel de méditation – il compte 814 pages in-4°  – évoque inlassablement les souffrances du Crucifié et les fautes du pécheur. Deux rapides exemples suffiront à montrer la violence avec laquelle Scribani peint, comme Hosschius, la terrible douleur du Christ et la culpabilité de l’homme. Et d’abord, le commentaire qu’il donne des versets d’Isaïe sur les fautes des pécheurs: Ipse autem vulneratus est propter iniquitates nostras. Illae nimirum Christum vulnerarunt, illae tot spinis confixerunt, illae tot plagarum millibus onerarunt et nos interim ad expiandas iniquitates nostras, non dico vulnera aut verbera, sed nec monita admittimus […]. Attritus est propter scelera nostra. Vere attritus, tot verberum millibus, tot centenis spinarum. Non caesus leviter reorum communium more, sed tamquam molaribus attritus et commolitus fuit. Scelera attriverant nostra et tamquam in torculari, caelestis huius uvae expresserant sanguinem […] 29 Lui-même a été blessé pour nos iniquités. Ce sont elles qui ont blessé sans conteste le Christ, elles qui l’ont percé avec tant d’épines, elles qui l’ont accablé de tant de milliers de plaies. Et nous, pendant ce temps, pour expier nos iniquités, nous n’admettons pas, je ne dis pas les blessures ou les coups, mais les conseils […]. Il a été brisé pour nos péchés. Vraiment brisé par tant de milliers de coups, par tant de centaines d’épines. Il ne fut pas battu légèrement comme les coupables communs, mais brisé et broyé comme par des meules; nos crimes l’avaient écrasé. Et, comme dans un pressoir, ils avaient exprimé le sang de ce raisin céleste […]

Ou encore: Clamat deinde, monetque nos impietatis, crudelitatis, ingratitudinis summae Christi nostri sanguis tam prodige fusus. Monent immane hiantia vulnera sceleribus nostris inflicta. Monent livores, sputa, vincula et ad se alliciunt, invitant peccatores ad morum emendationem, veniam spondent, medelam ultro malis nostris ingerunt: vulneribus enim nostris per vulnera sua medetur Christus, lacrymas nostras 28 C. Scribani, Christus patiens piis exercitationibus illustratus (Antverpiae, apud M.  Nutium, 1629), Isaïe, 304 et Heb. 9.14, 221, 279, 360. Scribani (1561-1629) appartenait au cercle d’Hosschius puisqu’il fut le premier recteur du collège d’Anvers (1598-1612), avant de devenir Provincial de Flandres (1613-1619), puis recteur à Bruxelles (1619-1625). 29   Scribani 1629 (cité n. 28), 303.

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lacrymis suis siccat, sudorem nostrum sudore suo detergit, sanguinem sanguine sistit suo […]. Fluit hic sanguis melior mille modis Iordanis aquis ad detergendam animorum nostrorum lepram. Ingredere quisquis morbo teneris hanc piscinam, non aqua sed purpureis sanguinum fontibus natantem, nec ab angelo, sed per tot verberum millia a Deo motam: et morborum genera omnia depulsa senties.30 Le sang du Christ répandu avec tant de prodigalité crie ensuite et nous rappelle notre impiété, notre cruauté, notre immense ingratitude envers le Christ. Nous le rappellent les blessures béantes infligées par nos crimes. Nous le rappellent les tuméfactions, les crachats, les liens et ils attirent à eux les pécheurs et les invitent à corriger leurs mœurs, ils promettent le pardon, ils apportent en outre un remède à nos maux: car le Christ soigne nos blessures par ses blessures, il sèche nos larmes avec ses larmes, il lave notre sueur avec sa sueur, il arrête notre sang avec son sang […]. Ce sang coule, plus efficace de mille façons que les eaux du Jourdain pour laver la lèpre de nos âmes. Entre, toi qui est possédé par la maladie, dans cette piscine débordant non pas d’eau,  mais de flots pourpres de sang, agitée non par un ange,31 mais par Dieu de tant de milliers de coups, et tu sentiras toutes les sortes de maladies chassées.

Scribani revient sur cette thématique dans une sorte d’acte de contrition qui clôt ces exercices de dévotion: […] Nihil habeo praeter lacrymas contriti et amantis cordis: misce has sanguini tuo, bone Iesu. Si peccata intuear mea, nihil habeo quod sperem; si vulnera tua, nihil est quod non audeam sperare. […]. Non mereor iungi tibi. Sed vincula, columna, spinae, crux, clavi iunxerunt me tibi, amor meus. Peccavi: sed sanguis tuus peccatorum meorum spongia est. Sit aeternum: ut mundo corde serviam tibi.32 […] Je n’ai rien que les larmes d’un cœur contrit et aimant: mêle-les à ton sang, bon Jésus. Si je regarde mes péchés, je n’ai rien à espérer, si je regarde tes plaies, il n’est rien que je n’ose espérer […]. Je ne mérite pas d’être uni à toi. Mais les liens, la colonne, les épines, la croix, les clous m’ont uni à toi, mon amour. J’ai péché, mais ton sang est l’éponge de mes péchés. Q u’il soit éternel afin que je te serve d’un cœur pur.

  Scribani 1629 (cité n. 28), 316.   Allusion à Ioh. 5.4. 32   Scribani 1629 (cité n. 28), 807. 30 31

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Ce sont aussi des larmes de contrition que veut provoquer Hosschius en décrivant avec violence la Passion. L’Elégie XX, Christum a peccantibus iterum cruci figi (“Le Christ une seconde fois crucifié par les pécheurs”) est aussi un acte de contrition, à la première personne: Sum reus: haec brevis est actorum summa. Sum reus: est crimen crux tua morsque meum. Ergo ego sustinui tua scindere membra flagellis, teque cruentantum pars ego magna fui? Tene ego percussi, rapuique a vertice crines, et sputis facies est tua sparsa meis? Tene ego calcavi trunci sub mole iacentem, tamquam oneri truncus non satis ipse foret? Haec crux, hi vepres, hi sunt mea crimina clavi? Haec sunt flagitiis vulnera facta meis? 33 Je suis coupable: ce mot résume tous mes actes. Je suis coupable: ta croix et ta mort, c’est mon crime. C’est donc moi qui ai permis qu’on déchire tes membres avec des fouets et moi qui ai eu trop de part parmi ceux qui te mettaient en sang. Ne t’ai-je pas frappé, moi, n’ai-je pas tiré tes cheveux, et ta face n’est-elle pas couverte de mes crachats, Ne t’ai-je pas piétiné, moi, quand tu gisais sous la masse du tronc, comme si le tronc n’était pas lui-même un fardeau suffisant? Cette croix, ces épines, ces clous sont mes crimes? Ces blessures ont été faites par mes péchés?

L’horreur du spectacle est à la mesure des fautes du pécheur et doit l’inciter à la repentance.34 Grand connaisseur d’Horace, Hosschius suit la voie suggérée par Paleotti et préfère susciter chez son lecteur l’horreur qui convient au sujet qu’il traite. Il malmène son lecteur en lui montrant la plaie dans des descriptions sans complaisance. L’hypotypose, en même temps qu’elle donne à sa poésie son caractère pictural, devient dans ses élégies une arme de persuasion.

  Hosschius 1656 (cité n. 4), Christus patiens, Elegia 20.39.   On retrouve les mêmes éléments dans Hosschius 1656 (cité n.  4), Christus patiens, Lacrymae S. Petri. 33 34

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L’ÉPODE 15 DE JACOB BALDE, ENTRE VISION PICTURALE ET PEINTURE VISIONNAIRE

Le jésuite Jacob Balde (Ensisheim 1604 – Neubourg 1668),1 couramment surnommé l’Horace allemand, est l’un des poètes néo-­ latins les plus influents au niveau européen dans la première moitié du xviie siècle. D’origine alsacienne, il est principalement actif  en Bavière et voit sa vie marquée par les ravages de la guerre de Trente Ans (1618-1648). Son œuvre poétique, majoritairement néo-latine, est parcourue de thèmes récurrents: la dévotion à Marie, la déploration des malheurs du temps, la mélancolie et l’enthousiasme du poète, la satire des vanités et contradictions de ce monde… Partagée entre imitation des Anciens et spiritualité chrétienne, mais aussi entre ascèse et fascination pour l’expérience des sens, sa poésie est particulièrement riche en descriptions d’œuvres d’art,2 et notamment de tableaux religieux.3 1  Jacob Balde étant un auteur très étudié, il est impossible de proposer ici une bibliographie complète. Nous nous contenterons de signaler le site internet consacré à Jacob Balde par Wilfried Stroh, qui propose un résumé chronologique de la vie de Balde, un répertoire de ses œuvres et une liste très complète et tenue à jour de littérature secondaire: http://stroh.userweb.mwn.de/main7.html.

Pour une synthèse en français sur la biographie de Balde, voir par exemple A.  Thill, La lyre jésuite. Anthologie de poèmes latins (1620-1730) (Genève, 1999), 101-102. Pour un regard critique sur les données biographiques disponibles, fondamental est l’article de P. Lebrecht Schmidt, “Bemerkungen zu Biographie und Text im Werk des Jesuiten Jakob Balde”, dans Rh. Schnur (ed.), Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Hafniensis (Tempe, Ar., 1997), 97-119; certaines conclusions de cet article sont remises en discussion par W. Stroh dans le “Nachwort” (3*-14*) de la réédition (Amsterdam – Maarssen, 1998) de la vieille biographie de G.  Westermayer, Jacobus Balde (16041668), sein Leben und seine Werke (Munich, 1868). 2  Cf.  G. Kranz, “Zu Jacob Baldes Bildgedichten”, Archiv für Kulturgeschichte 60 (1978), 305-325. 3  Plusieurs de ces textes (ode 3.7; ode 4.13; épode 15; silve 8.10; De eclipsi solari) sont mis en lien dans l’article de J.  Robert, “Texttabernakel. Jacob Baldes sakrale Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 475-494 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124078

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Dans le cadre de cet article, nous nous concentrerons sur un poème précis: l’épode 15,4 décrivant un tableau de Rubens: la Vierge comme femme de l’Apocalypse 5 (Fig. 1). L’épode de Balde, qui alterne les hexamètres et les dimètres iambiques, raconte un événement censé s’être déroulé en 1639 6 et fut publiée pour la première fois en 1643; 7 elle émane de la “décennie lyrique” 8 que constituent pour Balde les années 16371647. De 1637 à 1650, il vit à Munich où il remplit notamment les fonctions de professeur de rhétorique, précepteur princier, prédicateur et historiographe à la cour de Bavière, sous Maximilien Ier. L’épode 15 est d’abord parue dans les Lyrica de 1643 sous le titre: Descriptio Virginis, qualem in mentis excessu viderat (“Description de la Vierge, telle que le poète l’avait vue lors d’une extase”). Elle se présente donc comme le récit d’une vision, le lecteur n’apprenant qu’à la fin du texte (aux vers 77-86) que le poème décrivait aussi un tableau de Rubens. En 1648, l’épode reparaît dans le volume De laudibus Beatae Mariae Virginis odae partheniae (volume dédié aux membres de la sodalité mariale de Munich et qui rassemble les poèmes lyriques de Balde consacrés à la Vierge), sous un titre plus complet qui dévoile d’emblée sa nature ekphrastique: Virgo in mentis excessu visa. Describitur summum altare visendum Frisingae in ecclesia cathedrali. Opus Petri Pauli Rubens (“La Vierge vue lors d’une extase. Description du maître-autel qui peut être admiré à Freising dans la cathédrale, œuvre de Pierre-Paul Rubens”). Dans Ekphrasen und die Krise des religiösen Bildes”, dans T. Burkard et al. (ed.), Jacob Balde im kulturellen Kontext seiner Epoche (Regensburg, 2006), 287-312. 4   Une édition critique en est récemment parue dans la Bibliotheca Teubneriana: U. Winter (ed.), J. Balde, Liber Epodon (Munich – Leipzig, 2002), 46-50. Voir aussi l’article (avec également une édition du texte latin, accompagnée d’une traduction allemande) de G. Hess, “Ut pictura poesis. Jacob Baldes Beschreibung des Freisinger Hochaltarbildes von Peter Paul Rubens”, in Id., Der Tod des Seneca. Studien zur Kunst der Imagination in Texten und Bildern des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts (Regensburg, 2009), 166-180 (= réédition d’un article déjà paru dans Handbuch der Literatur in Bayern [Regensburg, 1987], 207-220). 5   Ce tableau datant des environs de 1625 orna longtemps le maître-autel de la cathédrale de Freising en Bavière et est aujourd’hui conservé à l’Alte Pinakothek de Munich (inv. no. 891). Signalons l’existence d’une esquisse de la même œuvre, aujourd’hui conservée au Getty Museum à Los Angeles (inv. no. 85.PB.146). 6  Date qui peut être déduite des dix premiers vers du poème, comme nous le verrons plus bas. 7  Voir le détail des éditions ci-après, avant l’édition du texte latin. 8  W. Kühlmann, “Balde, Jacob”, in W. Killy et al. (ed.), Literaturlexikon. Autoren und Werke deutscher Sprache, vol. 1 (Gütersloh – Munich, 1988), 296-298, à 297.

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Fig. 1 Pierre-Paul Rubens, La femme apocalyptique, c. 1623-1625, peinture à l’huile, 554,5 × 370,5 cm. Alte Pinakothek, Munich

les éditions suivantes toutefois (et notamment les grandes éditions des Poemata de 1660 et des Opera poetica omnia de 1729), c’est à nouveau le premier titre qui est utilisé. Dans cet article, nous explorerons successivement les deux lectures possibles de ce poème – comme récit de vision et comme ekphrasis de tableau religieux – en nous interrogeant sur le sens de ce dispositif  poétique. En guise 477

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de préambule, nous commencerons par présenter en quelques mots le discours tenu par Balde, dans l’ensemble de son œuvre, au sujet de Pierre-Paul Rubens, en partie son contemporain (le peintre a  vécu de 1577 à 1640), et dont il admirait non seulement l’art, mais aussi la vie.

Balde et Rubens L’œuvre de Balde compte deux ekphraseis de tableaux de Rubens: l’épode 15 qui fait l’objet du présent article, ainsi qu’une description en prose du Grand Jugement dernier (c. 1617, Munich, Alte Pinakothek, inv. no. 890) qui ornait le maître-autel de la Hofkirche de Neubourg, description insérée dans le De eclipsi solari de 1662 (I.47-49).9 Dans ce dernier texte, Balde admire en particulier, chez Rubens, l’usage des couleurs, la vivacité des figures et le maintien du decorum; son admiration est aussi soutenue par ce qu’il sait de la vie, de la moralité et de la foi du peintre. Il attribue en particulier à Rubens une dévotion ardente envers la Vierge – dévotion que Balde cultivait lui aussi, en harmonie avec la politique religieuse et culturelle de Maximilien Ier de Bavière.10 À plusieurs endroits de son œuvre, Balde cite le nom de Rubens parmi ceux des grands peintres modernes qui ont pu égaler voire surpasser les Anciens, dont Zeuxis et Apelle sont les deux noms emblématiques. Dans le Poema de Vanitate Mundi de 1638 (série 36), le maître anversois est nommé à ce titre aux côtés de Dürer, Raphaël, Pisanello, Callot, Schwartz, Candid et Bolswert. Il apparaît plus précisément au sein d’un trio qui l’associe à Peter Candid et Christoph Schwartz (deux artistes géographiquement proches de Balde, tous deux peintres à la cour de Bavière à Munich),11 dont le poète se plaît à souligner les évocations colorées des noms: le rouge, le 9   Ce texte date de la dernière période de la vie de Balde (1654-1668), au cours de laquelle il est prédicateur et confesseur à la cour du comte palatin Philippe-Guillaume à Neubourg. Sur cette ekphrasis, voir l’article (avec texte latin et traduction allemande) de G. Kaps, “Jacobus Balde: De eclipsi solari. Die Beschreibung des Hochaltarbildes ‘Das Jüngste Gericht’ von Peter Paul Rubens in der Neuburger Hofkirche”, Neuburger Kollektaneenblatt 161 (2013), 42-57. 10  Sur le culte marial en Bavière et chez Balde: J.-M. Valentin, “Balde et la Bavière de Maximilien”, in J.-M. Valentin (ed.), Jacob Balde und seine Zeit. Akten des Ensisheimer Kolloquiums 15.-16. Oktober 1982 (Berne – Frankfurt a.M. – New York, 1986), 48-63: 56-57. 11  Candid de 1586 à 1628, Schwartz de 1574 à 1592.

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blanc et le noir.12 Dans le poème Urania victrix, publié à Munich en 1663, nous trouvons un autre palmarès des plus grands représentants modernes de l’art de la peinture, où Rubens figure cette fois à la suite des grands Italiens, à commencer par Michel-Ange et Raphaël, et des deux Allemands Dürer et Schwartz (élégie 1.3, sections 5 sur les pictores Itali, 6 sur Dürer, 7 sur Schwartz et 9 sur Rubens). Balde y loue la formidable puissance d’invention de Rubens ainsi que l’impression de vie qui se dégage de ses tableaux, tout en évoquant l’immense richesse qu’il s’est acquise de son vivant; dans l’élégie suivante (1.4), il présente Rubens comme un oiseau rare pour avoir su rester industrieux et sobre tout en étant riche. Notons que les deux panthéons de Balde ne correspondent qu’en partie avec celui que l’histoire de l’art a consacré. On y perçoit en tout cas une volonté d’atteindre un certain équilibre entre artistes italiens et artistes du Nord de l’Europe, selon une tendance bien présente dans l’historiographie nordique, qui attribue clairement la première place à Rubens.

L’épode 15 comme récit de vision L’épode 15 commence par l’évocation d’une série de faits historiques qui rappellent le contexte de la Guerre de Trente Ans et qui permettent de dater le récit en l’année 1639. Le poète raconte ensuite une promenade dans un locus amoenus silvestre, le long des rives de l’Isar, qu’il aurait effectuée à l’aube du 1er juillet de cette année-là 13 (vers 9-16). Cette promenade aurait été marquée par une vision, dont le statut demeure flou: “rem miram aut vidi, aut vidisse putavi” (“je vis, ou je crus voir quelque chose d’admirable”, vers 15). Rappelons que, selon la tripartition augustinienne encore bien en vigueur à l’époque de Balde,14 les visions étaient divisées 12   De Vanitate, série 36, poème 5, v. 7-8: “Q uis placeat magis? anne Rubens, anne Albus, an Ater? / Hic pictor triplex, est simul ipse color.” 13  La précision de la datation peut évoquer, selon Hess, cité n. 4, 172, les tracts et feuilles volantes imprimées à l’époque pour annoncer l’apparition de signes et prodiges. Par ailleurs, la date du 1er juillet n’est pas indifférente au niveau astrologique: elle suit de peu le solstice d’été (qui symbolise la victoire du soleil sur les ténèbres) et est marquée par le passage de la constellation du Dragon sur l’horizon septentrional; voir Hess, cité n. 4, 175. 14 Aug.  Doct. 2.1.2; Gen. 12.6.15. Voir R.  Dekoninck, “Visio intellectualis vel sensualis. La vision napolitaine/parisienne de saint Thomas d’Aquin d’après Santi di Tito”, in Ph. Morel, A. Beyer, A. Nova (ed.), Voir l’au-delà. L’expérience visionnaire et

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en trois catégories: apparition corporelle (visible par les yeux du corps), imaginaire (qui se produit dans l’imagination) ou intellectuelle (qui se produit dans l’intellect). Balde semble vouloir suggérer ici une vision mystique de type imaginatif, telle que la définit par exemple un autre jésuite actif  dans le monde allemand et contemporain de Balde, Maximilianus Sandaeus (1578-1656): selon ce dernier, les apparitions ou visions imaginariae des mystiques sont produites par des images divinement proposées à l’imagination, de manière soudaine, sans aucun effort de la part du contemplant, et avec autant d’évidence que si elles étaient perçues par les yeux, au point que la confusion avec l’apparition corporelle est fréquente; 15 en outre, quand il définit le mot excessus (qui est le terme utilisé dans le titre de l’épode baldienne), Sandaeus précise que certaines extases peuvent ravir l’âme ad aliquam imaginariam visionem seu phantasticam apparitionem.16 Mais on se rappellera par ailleurs aussi que Balde cultivait une image de lui-même, non pas tant comme visionnaire mystique, que comme poète sujet à des “enthousiasmes” poétiques capables de le ravir et de le transporter en imagination dans l’espace et dans le temps.17 Les vers 17 à 66 décrivent longuement la vision du poète: une jeune femme rayonnante, portant un enfant, déploie ses ailes et s’élance dans les airs pour éviter l’attaque d’un monstrueux serpent, lequel est foudroyé par un ange guerrier. Dès les vers 17-18, des allusions lexicales très claires (les mots solis, amictu et lunam) font comprendre au lecteur que cette vision n’est autre qu’une réactualisation de celle racontée par saint Jean au chapitre 12 de l’Apocalypse, un livre biblique scandé par la répétition de l’expression et vidi. Pourtant, au fur et à mesure que la vision se déploie, le lecteur familier de l’Apocalypse s’aperçoit aussi que la paraphrase n’est pas entièrement fidèle: certains éléments de la vision biblique sont passés sous silence (notamment l’épisode de l’enfantement et les personnages des bons et des mauvais anges qui combattent avec sa représentation dans l’art italien de la Renaissance (1430-1600) (Turnhout, 2017), 131-148. 15  Maximilianus Sandaeus, Pro theologia mystica clavis (Coloniae, 1640), 104, s.v. “apparitio” et 364, s.v. “visio”. 16  Sandaeus, cité n. 15, 202. 17  A. Smeesters, “Enthousiasme, fureur poétique et puissance imaginative chez le jésuite Jacob Balde (1604-1668)”, Atlante. Revue d’études romanes 9 (2018) (Enthousiasmes, passions et émotions dans l’Europe moderne), 69-88.

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Michel et le dragon) et l’enchaînement logique même du récit est contrarié (par exemple, l’envol de la femme n’est plus une fuite après la victoire de l’ange, mais une première victoire sur le dragon, à laquelle participe l’enfant).18 Par ailleurs, l’intertexte du vers 27 rappelle au lecteur cultivé une vision d’une tout autre nature: l’apparition de la déesse Vénus à son fils Énée, sous la forme d’une chasseresse, dans les bois des environs de Carthage, au premier livre de l’Énéide de Virgile. Certes, un locus similis seul n’est pas forcément significatif, mais cette suggestion est renforcée à la fois par le parallélisme des situations (une virgo de nature divine apparaît, dans les bois, à un homme en promenade) et par un second locus dont nous parlerons bientôt. Ceci doit nous rappeler que Balde n’est pas seulement un religieux porté par une foi fervente, mais aussi et en même temps un érudit rompu à la poésie classique profane, sur laquelle il effectue des variations virtuoses. Sa description du “dragon” de l’Apocalypse est d’ailleurs inspirée de celles des grands serpents de la poésie classique, tels qu’évoqués par Virgile, Ovide et Stace.19 Le vers 67 marque la fin de la vision: le poète, stupéfait, se trouve dans un état qui mêle plaisir, effroi et horreur sacrée. Il interpelle alors la femme de sa vision, dans des termes inspirés de ceux par lesquels Énée s’adresse à la chasseresse carthaginoise (c’est le second locus annoncé, au vers 70): il est persuadé que la femme est de nature divine (o Dea certe).20 Pourtant Balde n’est certain ni de l’identité de cette dea (o quaecumque, enchaîne-t-il au vers 71), ni de la fiabilité de ses impressions (si non deludor au vers 73).21 Le poète demande alors à la femme de bien vouloir apparaître

18  Dans l’édition du texte ci-dessous, les correspondances les plus claires avec le texte de l’Apocalypse ont été rassemblées dans un second apparat à la suite du texte latin: on constatera que l’ordre des versets n’est pas respecté. 19   Voir les loci similes aux vers 40, 57, 61, 63 dans l’édition du texte ci-après. 20  La comparaison entre le poème de Balde et ce passage de l’Énéide peut être poursuivie plus avant: au moment où Vénus s’éloigne, son identité réelle est révélée à son fils; Énée l’implore alors de cesser de lui apparaître sous de fausses images (“falsis imaginibus”, dans Aen. 1.407-408) et de lui accorder une rencontre palpable et sans faux-semblants (joindre leurs mains, échanger de vraies paroles). 21  Peut-être faut-il reconnaître ici un écho aux préoccupations récurrentes à cette époque par rapport à la confusion entre les apparitions mystiques d’origine divine et les illusions causées par de mauvais démons. Cf. par exemple Sandaeus, cité n. 15, 364 qui évoque le risque encouru par le videns d’être exposé à des illusionibus Caecodaemonis.

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directement à ses yeux corporels, et non plus seulement à son esprit (vers 75-76) – confirmant du même coup au lecteur le statut mental de la vision précédente. Le souhait de pouvoir contempler “corporellement” une expérience vécue intérieurement est souvent exprimé par des mystiques; mais l’originalité du poème de Balde est que ce souhait se résout, non pas par l’apparition des personnages saints sous les yeux du visionnaire, mais bien par l’exhibition d’un tableau vers lequel les cieux ont indiqué le chemin. En effet, suite à la prière du poète, un coup de tonnerre retentit sur l’Olympe rougeoyant (Olympus rubens, l’adjectif  renvoyant déjà de manière voilée au nom du peintre)22 et un arc-en-ciel indique au poète la direction de Freising, ville dans laquelle, un peu plus tard, Balde retrouve sa vision sur le tableau du maître-autel de la cathédrale peint par Rubens (vers 77-86). Le poète identifie alors la jeune femme ailée de l’apparition comme étant la Vierge Marie,23 et l’ode se clôt par une prière qui lui est adressée (vers 87-94). Par cet épisode final surprenant, le poème de Balde suppose une autre vision encore que celles de saint Jean, d’Énée et du poète-­ narrateur: une vision de Rubens lui-même. Bien sûr, le poème étudié est fondamentalement une savante construction littéraire qui, si nous tentons d’en reconstituer la genèse véritable, a  bien plus probablement été inspirée à Balde par une contemplation du tableau de Rubens que par une soi-disant expérience visionnaire vécue dans les bois de Bavière. Mais si nous acceptons d’entrer dans la logique de l’histoire que Balde nous raconte, il nous faut alors supposer que pour avoir pu peindre la vision décrite avec une telle vérité, le peintre a dû lui-même vivre une expérience semblable à celle du poète-narrateur (ou de saint Jean). Le poète et le peintre auraient alors eu tous deux accès aux mêmes prototypes divins – que le poète peut raconter, mais que le peintre a su fixer sur la toile pour l’offrir aux yeux de chair de ses contemporains. Le tableau de Rubens gagne ainsi une dimension proprement épiphanique, selon un scénario inverse à celui habituellement présent dans la   Le jeu de mots est signalé par Hess 2009 (cité n. 4), 175.   L’exégèse traditionnelle rapprochait la femme de l’Apocalypse tantôt de la Vierge Marie, tantôt de l’Église, tantôt de l’épouse du Cantique des Cantiques, tandis que le monstre était rapproché du Serpent du livre de la Genèse; voir Hess 2009 (cité n. 4), 173. 22 23

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littérature miraculaire où la vision advient à la suite de la contemplation d’une image,24 mais en phase avec la littérature artistique où il n’est pas rare de mettre en scène des tableaux nés d’une vision, l’exemple prototypique étant celui de La Madone Sixtine de Raphaël.25 Le poème de Balde met donc en intrigue l’avènement d’une peinture visionnaire et fait de Rubens un interprète inspiré des révélations célestes.

Le poème comme ekphrasis de tableau Si nous relisons à présent les vers 17-66 en les confrontant au tableau de Rubens, l’ekphrasis poétique qui y est proposée apparaît subtile et soigneusement pensée; elle est représentative d’un certain “art ekphrastique” baldien dont les traits marquants se retrouvent aussi dans les autres ekphraseis de tableaux religieux produites par le poète.26 Notons tout d’abord que Balde ne décrit rien qui ne soit visible chez Rubens (ce qui explique par exemple l’absence signalée plus haut de certains épisodes du texte biblique, comme celui de l’enfantement); mais qu’en même temps, il ne décrit pas tout ce qui se trouve chez Rubens, se focalisant plutôt sur les personnages principaux. La Vierge, l’Enfant et le dragon occupent en effet quasiment seuls le récit poétique de la vision, tandis que saint Michel et l’allégorie de la Victoire ne reçoivent qu’un distique chacun (vers 59-60 et 65-66) et que les autres personnages qui peuplent la composition rubénienne (les bons anges, les démons, et Dieu le Père qui

24   Sur des visions de ce type, voir V. Stoichita L’Œil mystique. Peindre l’extase dans l’Espagne du Siècle d’Or (Paris, 2016), 65-103; G.  Cassegrain, Représenter la vision. Figuration des apparitions miraculeuses dans la peinture italienne de la Renaissance (Arles, 2017). 25  Voir D. Arasse, Les visions de Raphaël (Paris, 2003); Chr. K. Kleinbub, Vision and the Visionary in Raphaël (University Park, Pen., 2011); Cl.  Brink, A.  Henning (ed.), Raffael. Die Sixtinische Madonna. Geschichte und Mythos seines Meisterwerks (München – Berlin, 2005). Sur Rubens, voir I. von zur Mühlen, Bild und Vision. Peter Paul Rubens und der “Pinsel Gottes” (Frankfurt a. M., 1998). 26  Cf., outre les deux ekphraseis rubéniennes, celles de trois tableaux conservés de Schwartz dans lesquelles les mêmes procédés peuvent être observés: une Sainte Catherine dans le Panegyricus de laudibus sanctae Catharinae, v. 299-354 (Opera poe­ tica omnia, vol.  3, 1729, 303), une Vierge à l’enfant dans l’ode 4.13 (Opera poe­tica omnia, vol. 1, 1729, 212) et une Chute de Lucifer dans la silve 8.10, v. 67-110 (Opera poetica omnia, vol. 2, 1729, 250).

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domine la scène) sont totalement passés sous silence par le poète. Une telle économie permet d’accentuer l’effet dramatique sans se perdre dans les détails descriptifs. On constate aussi que Balde, alors qu’il décrit une scène figée, introduit habilement plusieurs moments dans la vision. Il crée ainsi l’impression d’une action qui se déroule sous ses yeux, en se servant d’adverbes et de conjonctions comme iamque (vers 47) et at (vers 49), suggérant une soudaine agressivité du dragon et un déploiement consécutif  des ailes de la femme. Mais moins que la trame narrative, ce qui compte aux yeux de Balde est l’émotion que dégage le drame, et cela principalement sur le visage du ou des personnages principaux dont l’interaction constitue le nœud de l’intrigue. Sur le visage de la Vierge, longuement décrit, Balde souligne, outre la beauté, l’alliance paradoxale entre majesté et humilité, un trait que l’on retrouve aussi dans d’autres de ses ekphraseis de représentations peintes de la Vierge.27 Attentif  au moindre détail expressif, Balde s’attarde également sur la dynamique de cette interaction, ou plus exactement sur les forces qui s’y jouent, signes des puissances qui s’épousent ou s’affrontent, conférant à sa description une forme d’enargeia ou d’évidence et plus encore d’energeia c’est-à-dire de mouvement. Le monstre à sept têtes tombe ainsi “foudroyé” par “l’ange guerrier”, alors que la Vierge, déployant ses ailes, “suspend son corps étincelant” et que l’enfant “tend au loin avec elle, hardi, dans un geste triomphal”. Cette écriture du drame qui se joue entre les forces ascendantes et les forces précipitées témoigne ainsi d’une parfaite compréhension de la dynamique propre au tableau de Rubens. À côté de cette vision hautement dramatisée de l’art pictural, la sensibilité baroque du poète se remarque également à des notations de couleur: par exemple le bandeau blanc, alba, de la Vierge au vers 28 – bandeau qui n’apparaît cependant pas sur le tableau – et les crêtes rouge sang, sanguineae, du dragon au vers 57 – celles-ci ressortent en effet vivement sur fond noir chez Rubens. Plus encore

27  Cf. l’ode 4.13 sur la Vierge à l’Enfant de Schwartz (vers 2: species viva Modestiae; v. 26: frons augusta); la silve 7.2 sur une Vierge (perdue) de Sandrart; ou encore la description en prose du Jugement dernier de Rubens (De Eclipsi solari, 1662, 108: “quam decore coram filio mater cernua se gerat! Demissam, stantem tamen pinxit, non supplicem”).

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que sur la couleur, l’intérêt du poète se porte sur la lumière qui participe du mystère et de la sacralité de la scène, jusqu’à devenir l’attribut principal des personnages sacrés, Vierge et Enfant, qui “rayonnent” littéralement (renidens au vers 22, instar sideris au vers 32, fulgidus au vers 50). Du strict point de vue de l’art mimétique, c’est bien de la combinaison de la couleur et de la lumière que peut naître l’illusion de présence réelle; d’où l’attention portée aux qualités pour ainsi dire vivantes de la couleur. On peut dès lors parler d’une émulation de la poésie vis-à-vis de la peinture. Alors que le tour de force du peintre avait été de provoquer l’illusion de la vie à partir d’un instantané, celle du poète est de porter cette vision animée au regard mental du lecteur, tous deux visant ultimement à rendre compte de la dimension surnaturelle de la scène et à célébrer et glorifier la Vierge de l’Apocalypse. Notons que dans ses divers écrits, Balde n’a pas manqué d’entrer dans le débat du paragone des arts: sans surprise, il s’est prononcé pour la supériorité de la poésie sur la peinture, la première étant capable, contrairement à la seconde, d’aller au-delà des apparences pour rejoindre une dimension explicitement spirituelle et morale.28 Il n’en reste pas moins que la fascination du poète pour les arts plastiques est patente. Si l’exercice de confrontation systématique que nous venons de réaliser est riche et instructif, il faut toutefois souligner qu’il n’était pas accessible à la grande majorité des lecteurs contemporains de Balde, à qui il ne suffisait pas d’introduire quelques mots sur un moteur de recherche pour avoir accès à une reproduction en couleur du tableau de Rubens! Le sens de la démarche de Balde n’était certainement pas de placer son lecteur en position de juge, ni de la qualité de son ekphrasis en regard du tableau, ni des avantages comparés de la poésie et de la peinture dans le rendu d’une scène. Pour mieux comprendre l’effet que pouvait rechercher le poète chez son lecteur, il n’est pas inutile de faire un détour par une autre ekphrasis de Balde: celle de la Chute de Lucifer de Schwartz qui est décrite aux vers 67 à 110 de la silve 8.10, un long poème 28  Par exemple dans la triade formée par les silves 5.1-3: Apollon accorde au poète que ses créations mentales deviennent visuelles, que ses poèmes deviennent images; le poète s’aperçoit ainsi que la peinture ne peut dépasser les apparances, tandis que la poésie peut reproduire les réalités spirituelles.

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consacré à l’évocation de la première semaine des Exercices d’Ignace de Loyola.29 Contrairement au cas de l’épode 15, rien dans le texte même de la silve 8.10 ne signale la nature ekphrastique du passage, qui est seulement révélée par l’ajout d’un sous-titre dans la seule édition de 1648.30 La source picturale restait donc latente pour les lecteurs de toutes les autres éditions des poésies de Balde.31 Q uel était alors l’intérêt pour le poète de pratiquer une telle ekphrasis? L’édition de 1648 nous donne un élément de réponse, dans le titre considérablement élargi dont elle fait précéder la silve: Balde y affirme “dépeindre comme sur une tapisserie la matière des saintes méditations par lesquelles l’âme se perfectionne, afin que les images et simulacres mentaux, étant déjà formés, se présentent d’autant plus facilement au méditant.”32 Il est donc question ici de favoriser la composition de lieu ignatienne, ce processus dans lequel le méditant est amené à se construire des visions intérieures immersives de scènes sacrées dont il devient lui-même un protagoniste. Soulignons que ces visions mentales ne doivent pas être confondues avec les apparitions imaginatives dont il a été question plus tôt, et qui consistaient en des visions fulgurantes s’imposant à l’homme indépendamment de sa volonté: bien au contraire, les compositions de lieu sont des images mentales que le méditant se construit consciemment et à force de concentration et d’introspection. C’est donc pour faciliter ce processus méditatif  que Balde, dans le passage en question de la silve 8.10, propose à ses lecteurs une “image toute faite” et particulièrement efficace qui tire tacitement exemple d’une grande représentation picturale de son temps. Mais cela veut

29  La silve est parue pour la première fois dans l’édition en neuf  livres des Sylvae de 1646. Sur ce poème: E. Schäfer, “Baldes Exerzitien-Tapisserien (Silv. 8, 10)”, dans E. Lefèvre (ed.), Balde und Horaz (Tübingen, 2002), 319-358 (spécialement 335-339 pour l’extrait qui nous occupe). 30   De laudibus Mariae, 1648, 101 (l’ode y est numérotée 63). Dans cette édition, les vers 67 à 110 sont identifiés comme: Consideratio prima. De ruina Luciferi. Descriptio summi altaris in templo S.I. Monachii. Pingebat Christoph. Schwartz, renvoyant donc au tableau de Schwartz “St. Michael im Kampf  mit dem Teufel”, qui orne encore aujourd’hui le maître-autel de l’église Saint-Michel munichoise. 31 Notamment: Sylvae, 2e éd., 1646, 263; Poemata, vol. 1, 1666, 545 (où le poème apparaît comme la silve 8.9) et Opera poetica omnia, vol. 2, 1729, 250. 32  “Auctor sanctarum commentationum materiam, quibus animus excolitur, depingit velut in tapete, ut eo facilius imagines et simulacra mentis jam efformata meditabundo subjiciantur.”

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dire aussi que ce dernier type de représentation pouvait servir de support à la méditation, dans un aller-retour constant entre image intérieure et image extérieure, toute construction imaginaire ne pouvant être nourrie que d’images déjà vues. Ce sont ces échanges entre mémoire visuelle et imagination que les jésuites n’ont cessé de vouloir exploiter et cadrer pour incarner la méditation, en rendre l’enseignement et la fruition spirituelle les plus profonds et durables possible. Même si l’épode 15 ne thématise pas, pour sa part, les exercices de composition de lieu, il est tentant de penser que l’ambition de Balde ait pu y être similaire: se servir des grands tableaux religieux contemporains pour nourrir et stimuler la méditation spirituelle. Tous les détails visuels qui sont donnés – les expressions des visages, les gestes  (genou levé, bras dressé), les vêtements, les couleurs… – peuvent dès lors aussi être considérés comme autant de points d’accroche pour le lecteur qui voudra recréer la peinture dans sa tête, et s’en servir de tremplin pour la méditation et la prière. Conjointement, Balde contribue à promouvoir l’idéal d’un art nourri à son tour par cette introspection méditative, laquelle peut, dans certaines circonstances et pour certains artistes particulièrement inspirés comme Rubens, prendre la forme d’une vision mentale d’une grande vivacité (comparable, si tant est qu’elle n’en soit pas une, à une authentique apparition). Ainsi, non seulement l’épode 15 propose-t-elle l’ekphrasis d’un tableau de Rubens, mais cette ekphrasis construit ce tableau comme la matérialisation d’une vision, vision qui fonde la peinture tout autant que la peinture fonde la vision dans l’expérience que Balde met en scène.

En conclusion Nous espérons, par cette trop rapide analyse, avoir pu mettre en évidence un peu de la richesse et de la complexité du poème de Balde. Récit de vision mystique ou d’enthousiasme poétique, paraphrase d’un passage biblique, ekphrasis inventive d’un tableau religieux, poème néo-latin érudit au riche intertexte classique, texte conçu comme point d’appui pour la composition de lieu ignatienne, hommage admiratif  au peintre anversois ou encore expression de la dévotion personnelle du poète envers la Vierge Marie: l’épode 15 de Balde est un peu tout cela à la fois… 487

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Texte latin Les éditions prises en compte (auxquelles l’apparat renvoie par leur date) sont les suivantes: 1643 J. Balde, Lyricorum lib. IV. Epodon lib. unus (Monachii, 1643), 299. 1648 J. Balde, De laudibus Beatae Mariae Virginis, Odae Partheniae (Monachii, 1648), 17 (ode 14). 1660 J. Balde, Poemata, vol. 1 (Coloniae, 1660), 288. 1729 J.  Balde, Opera poetica omnia magnam partem nunquam edita, e mm.ss. auctoris nunc primum collecta et in tomos VIII distributa, vol. 1 (Monachii, 1729), 289. L’apparat critique ne reprend que les variantes qui font sens, sans signaler les différences de graphies (majuscules, accents) et les coquilles formant des mots inexistants. Une édition avec un apparat plus complet (mais présentant certains manques, notamment pour les variantes des vers 25, 27 et 38 qui ne sont pas signalées) est disponible dans l’édition d’U. Winter parue dans la Bibliotheca Teubneriana, Jacobus Balde. Liber epodon (Munich – Leipzig, 2002), 46-50. Un second apparat rassemble les rapprochements qui peuvent être opérés avec le texte de l’Apocalypse (tandis que les passages parallèles dans le corpus des auteurs classiques sont signalés en notes de bas de page). Ode XV Descriptio Virginis, qualem in mentis excessu viderat Septima post caedem Gustavi fluxerat aestas 1 Boiorum in urbe principe, cum regeret Romam sacris octavus habenis, sacris Viennam tertius, tempore quo secum certans Germania belli 5 civilis augebat nefas, cum privatus adhuc,33 modo Dorstensonius hostis, captivus esset Hornius. Nondum bis quattuor lustris succinctus adibam silvas, calendis Iuliis. 10

 Iuv. Sat. 13.41: “Et privatus adhuc Idaeis Iuppiter antris”.

33

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A tergo cantabat avis, lucumque sonantem mulcebat aura lenior. Ante, toro ripae,34 Nymphis innixa, loquaceis trudebat undas Isara. Heic ego rem miram vidi, aut vidisse putavi,35 15 Eoa post crepuscula. Virgo serenati circumdata solis amictu 36 lunam premebat calcibus, os umerosque Deae similis,37 quantamque referre augusta maiestas potest. 20 Regia frons, acres oculi, lux vivida, vultus castis renidens gaudiis. Hinc atque hinc vigiles exsultavere pyropi formosa circum tempora.38 Ipsa caput nitido risu, turgentibus astris 25 cinctum modeste sustulit. Cingebant bis sena,39 comam diffundere vento 40 vetabat alba taenia. Pars tamen in laevam, quod erat neglecta decore, undare visa gratius. 30 In manibus portante Dea formosior infans florebat instar sideris. Ecce autem insidias huic formidabile monstrum tendebat, immanis draco, prodigiis septem capitum, suspensus in auras 35 et dena tollens cornua, agmine membrorum longe post terga relicto, et implicatis nexibus. Si molem expendam, quantus, qui corpore vasto Arctoa plaustra separat.41 40 Tertia stellarum pars cauda tracta deorsum serpebat in vestigia.

 Verg. Aen. 6.674: “riparumque toros et prata recentia rivis”.  Verg. Aen. 6.454: “aut videt aut vidisse putat per nubila lunam”; Ov. Ep. 10.31: “Aut vidi aut tamquam quae me vidisse putarem”. 36 Ov. Met. 4.313: “nunc perlucenti circumdata corpus amictu”; Sil. Pun. 15.284: “donec Nox atro circumdata corpus amictu”. 37 Verg. Aen. 1.589: “Os umerosque Deo similis, namque ipsa decoram”. 38   Voir note au vers 27. 39  Verg. Aen. 12.162-163 (à propos du roi Latinus): “cui tempora circum / aurati bis sex radii fulgentia cingunt”. 40 Verg. Aen. 1.319 (Vénus apparaissant à Énée dans la forêt sous la forme d’une chasseresse): “venatrix dederatque comam diffundere ventis”. 41 Ov. Met. 3.44-45 (serpent affronté par Cadmus): “tantoque est corpore quanto / si totum spectes, geminas qui separat Arctos”; Stat. Ach. 5.529-530 (aussi un serpent): “quantus ab Arctois discriminat aethera plaustris / anguis”. 34 35

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Vipereus thorax; facies tot mortibus horrens carbone gliscit igneo. Cocytum fauces spirant, nebulamque rogumque, 45 et spissa fumi flumina. Iamque minax tenerum propere sorbere puellum cristatus assurrexerat. At mulier passis super aethera grandibus alis librare corpus fulgidum,42 50 attractoque genu procul evitare sinistro os multiformis Cerberi. Ipse etiam, ceu se sciat evasisse periclum, laetatur ingens parvulus, et micat et matrem iuvat et connititur ultra, 55 gestu triumphali ferox, sanguineasque iubas 43 et aenae verbera squamae et vana spernit sibila. Desuper armipotens Genius quoque fulminat Hydram ferro nocentem flammeo. 60 Detruncata vomit saniem 44 atque irascitur hosti ipsaque in ira supplicat. Sed varios maculis 45 frustra torquetur in orbeis,46 virusque spumat lividum. Personat interea toto Victoria caelo 65 sternitque palmis semitas. Ut vidi, ut stupui,47 ut me metuenda voluptas 48 horrore sacro perculit. “O, Dea,” dicebam, “(neque enim mortalia cerno mortalis), o certe Dea! 49 70 O quaecumque fugam per candida nubila carpis, sontemque calcas beluam, si non deludor, minimis si vatibus esse dignaris aspectabilis: 42 Ov.  Met. 8.202-203 (à propos de Dédale): “geminas opifex libravit in alas  / ipse suum corpus motaque pependit in aura”. Voir aussi, toujours à propos de Dédale, Sil. Pun. 12.94. 43 Dans l’Énéide, le serpent de Laocoon a  également des “iubae sanguineae” (2.206-207). 44 Ov.  Met. 4.494 (les vipères de Tisiphone): “sibila dant saniemque vomunt linguisque coruscant”. 45 Verg. Cul. 164: “immanis vario maculatus corpore serpens”. 46  Voir notamment Verg. Cul. 167 et Ov. Met. 3.41-42 pour l’expression “torquere orbes” appliquée à un serpent. 47  Cf. Verg. Buc. 8.41 = Cir. 430: “ut vidi, ut perii, ut me malus abstulit error”; Ov. Her. 16.135 et Met. 7.727: “ut vidi, obstipui”. 48 Claud. Ruf. 2.363 pour “metuenda voluptas” en fin de vers. 49 Verg. Aen. 1.327-328: “Namque haud tibi voltus / mortalis, nec vox hominem sonat – o, dea certe”.

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da quoque, clara, meis oculis te, Diva, videndam,50 75 ut mente nunc permetior.” Audiit et laeva de parte rubentis Olympi amoena nubes intonat. Frisingam versus fax una clara cucurrit, vibrans colores Iridis. 80 Post ea, forte illuc summam delatus in aedem, arae fruor spectaculo. Obiectos animo vultus habitumque coloremque en penicillus exhibet. Q ualiter artifici radio miracula ducit 85 Rubens Apelles Teutonum! Protinus exclamo: “Talem suspeximus olim divina passi 51 Virginem! Tune ergo, praedulce decus, Nazareia virgo, alata bellatrix eras? 90 Vive, vale.52 Sed cum serpens antiquus ab Orco redibit illaetabili, eripe nos etiam, mansurisque instrue pennis tecum volaturum gregem.” Titre  Ode XV. Descriptio Virginis, qualem in mentis excessu viderat 1643, 1660, 1729: XIV. Virgo in mentis excessu visa. Describitur summum altare visendum Frisingae in ecclesia cathedrali. Opus Petri Pauli Rubens. Ode 1648 | 25 turgentibus 1643, 1648, 1660: surgentibus 1729 | 27 vento 1643, 1660, 1729: ventis 1648 | 36 et dena 1643, 1660, 1729: bis quina 1648 | 38 et 1643, 1660, 1729: sub 1648 | 43 tot 1643, 1660, 1729: male 1648 | 82 fruor 1643, 1648, 1729: furor 1660 | 88 Tune 1643, 1648, 1729: Tunc 1660. 17-18 Apoc. 12.1: “mulier amicta sole et luna sub pedibus eius” | 25-27 Apoc. 12.1: “et in capite eius corona stellarum duodecim” | 33-34 Apoc. 12.3: “et ecce draco magnus rufus” | 35-36 Apoc. 12.3: “habens capita septem et cornua decem” | 41 Apoc. 12.4: “et cauda eius trahebat tertiam partem stellarum caeli, et misit eas in terram” | 47-48 Apoc. 12.4: “et draco stetit ante mulierem, […]  ut  […] filium ejus devoraret” | 49 Apoc. 12.14: “et datae sunt mulieri alae duae aquilae magnae ut volaret” | 59 Apoc. 12.7: “Michael et angeli eius praeliabantur cum dracone, et draco pugnabat et angeli eius” | 61-62 Apoc. 12.12: “descendit diabolus […] habens iram magnam”; Apoc. 12.17: “et iratus est draco in mulierem” | 64 Apoc. 12.15: “misit serpens ex ore suo  […] aquam tanquam flumen” | 65 Apoc. 12.10: “audivi vocem magnam in caelo”.

50  Verg. Aen. 2.590-591: “cum mihi se non ante oculis tam clara videndam  / obtulit”. 51  Ces deux mots sont imprimés en italiques dans les quatre éditions consultées. 52 Hor. Ep. 1.6.67 et Sat. 2.5.110 pour l’expression “vive, vale”.

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Traduction 53 Ode XV Description de la Vierge telle que le poète l’avait vue lors d’une extase C’était le septième été après le meurtre de Gustave,54 1 Dans la capitale de la Bavière.55 Le Huitième 56 tenait les rênes sacrées de Rome, Et le Troisième 57 celles, sacrées, de Vienne. C’était au temps où l’Allemagne, luttant contre elle-même, 5 Accroissait le sacrilège de la guerre civile; Où Torstenson,58 bientôt notre ennemi, était encore un simple particulier, Et où Horn 59 était prisonnier. Pas encore quarantenaire,60 je m’en allais, relevant mon habit, Dans les bois, aux calendes de juillet. 10 Derrière moi un oiseau chantait, et une brise légère Caressait la forêt murmurante. Devant moi, entre le renflement de ses berges, l’Isar 61 Aidée de ses nymphes poussait ses eaux bavardes. Là, je vis, ou je crus voir, quelque chose d’admirable, 15 Après le crépuscule de l’aube. Une jeune femme, nimbée du voile d’un soleil serein, Pressait la lune de ses talons. Elle avait le visage, les épaules d’une Déesse, et une stature Q ui pouvait évoquer une Majesté impériale. 20 Royal, son front; ses yeux, perçants; vif, son regard; son visage, Rayonnant de chastes joies. De toutes parts jaillissaient des pyropes toujours ardents Autour de ses belles tempes.62 53  Une traduction allemande a été publiée par Hess, cité n. 4, 168-170; on trouvera aussi une traduction allemande partielle chez Robert, cité n. 3, 289. 54  Sans doute Gustave II Adolphe de Suède, mort à Lützen en 1632. Ce qui situerait donc le poème en 1639. 55  Munich, lieu où se déroule la scène relatée dans le poème (et non le meurtre de Gustave). 56  Urbain VIII. 57  Ferdinand III. 58  Lennart Torstenson, soldat dans l’armée suédoise, participa à divers combats en Allemagne en 1636-1639. Après un retour en Suède, il revint en Allemagne en 1641 et fut nommé maréchal, généralissime des armées et gouverneur général de la Poméranie suédoise. 59  Gustav Horn, chef  militaire suédois de la guerre de Trente Ans, fut prisonnier de 1634 à 1642. 60  Balde aura 40 ans en 1643. 61   L’Isar, rivière de Bavière, traverse Munich, Freising et Landshut. 62  Le vers est d’interprétation difficile. Le pyrope (terme composé sur le grec πῦρ, le feu), alliage de métaux ou pierre précieuse selon les sources, est en tout cas caracté-

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Elle-même, avec un doux sourire, levait modestement sa tête 25 Ceinte d’étoiles saillantes. Elles étaient douze à la ceindre; 63 un bandeau blanc Empêchait sa chevelure de flotter au vent.64 Sur la gauche pourtant, une partie de celle-ci, élégamment négligée, Semblait ondoyer avec grâce. 30 Dans ses mains, un enfant, plus beau encore que la Déesse qui le portait, Fleurissait comme une étoile. Or voilà qu’un monstre effroyable lui tendait un piège: Un serpent gigantesque, Prodigieusement pourvu de sept têtes, suspendu dans les airs, 35 Dressant ses dix cornes Et laissant traîner, loin derrière lui, un bataillon de membres Dans un enroulement d’anneaux. Si je devais évaluer sa masse: il était de la taille de celui qui sépare, De son vaste corps, les Chariots arctiques.65 40 Le tiers des étoiles, entraînées vers le bas par sa queue, Rampaient dans ses traces.66 Sa poitrine est vipérine; sa gueule, hérissée de tant de morts, S’enfle de charbons ardents. Sa gorge respire le Cocyte,67 le brouillard, le bûcher, 45 Et de denses fleuves de fumée. Et déjà, menaçant d’engloutir d’un trait le tendre Enfant, Le serpent à crête s’était dressé. Mais la femme, déployant de grandes ailes par-dessus les cieux, Suspend son corps étincelant, 50 Et ramenant vers elle son genou gauche, évite largement La gueule du Cerbère multiforme. L’enfant lui-même, comme s’il savait avoir échappé au danger, Se réjouit – lui tout petit et immense! Et il tressaille, et il seconde sa mère, et il tend au loin avec elle, 55 Hardi, dans un geste triomphal; risé par son aspect flamboyant (cf. Ov. Met. 2.2: “flammasque imitante pyropo”, où le pyrope est, avec l’or, un des matériaux principaux du palais du Soleil), souvent aussi par sa couleur rouge (le Dictionarium Latinogallicum d’Estienne de 1552 traduit par “rubis, escarboucle”). L’association avec le feu est renforcée dans le texte par l’adjectif  vigil (qui peut qualifier un feu toujours entretenu). L’intertexte virgilien rappelle la couronne de rayons du roi Latinus, descendant du Soleil. Les pyropes représentent donc sans doute ici le rayonnement qui entoure la tête de la Vierge (G. Hess évoque dans sa traduction des “feuerfarbene, leuchtende Strahlen”), ou bien peut-être sa couronne ornée de gemmes. 63  Seules six de ces étoiles sont visibles sur le tableau; Balde suit ici le texte biblique. 64  Ce bandeau blanc n’est pas visible sur le tableau. 65  Allusion à la constellation du Dragon (Draco) qui se trouve entre les deux Ourses. 66  Ce détail, tiré du texte biblique, n’apparaît pas sur le tableau. 67   Fleuve des Enfers.

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Et il méprise les crêtes rouge sang, les coups des écailles de bronze, Et les vains sifflements. D’en haut, un Ange guerrier foudroie aussi l’Hydre Funeste, d’un glaive de feu. 60 Mutilée, elle vomit son venin, se met en rage contre son adversaire, Et, dans sa rage même, le supplie. Mais c’est en vain qu’elle s’enroule en anneaux tachetés Et qu’elle crache son poison livide. Pendant ce temps, la Victoire fait retentir tout l’espace du ciel 65 Et jonche ses sentiers de palmes. A la vue de ce spectacle, je restai ébahi, et un plaisir mêlé d’effroi Me frappa d’une horreur sacrée. “O Déesse,” dis-je, “(car ce ne sont pas choses mortelles que je vois De mes yeux de mortel), ô Déesse, à coup sûr! 70 Toi, qui que tu sois, qui prends la fuite à travers les blancs nuages Et qui piétines la bête coupable; Si je ne suis pas le jouet d’une erreur, si tu daignes te laisser contempler Par les plus petits des poètes, Donne-toi aussi à voir, brillante Déesse, directement à mes yeux, 75 Tout comme à présent je te parcours en esprit.” Je fus entendu et, du côté gauche de l’Olympe rougeoyant, Un charmant nuage tonna. Un rayon de lumière courut en même temps en direction de Freising, Vibrant des couleurs de l’arc-en-ciel. 80 Un peu plus tard, m’étant rendu par hasard dans la cathédrale de cette ville, Je jouis du spectacle de son autel. Les visages, les attitudes, les couleurs qui s’étaient présentés à mon esprit, Voilà que le pinceau me les fait voir. Comme, avec son rai 68 artiste, il conduit des miracles, 85 Rubens, l’Apelle allemand! Aussitôt je m’exclame: “Voilà la jeune femme que j’ai vue jadis Q uand j’ai subi l’extase! Ainsi donc, douce gloire, Vierge de Nazareth, C’était toi la guerrière ailée? 90 Vis et porte-toi bien. Mais, quand l’antique Serpent reviendra De l’Orcus sans joie, Sauve-nous aussi, et munis de plumes pérennes Le troupeau qui s’envolera avec toi.”

68  Radius désigne soit un rayon aux divers sens du terme, soit une baguette (mais jamais à notre connaissance un pinceau). Hess traduit “Strich”, “trait”. Nous préférons garder le sens littéral, qui rappelle le rayon du vers 79, lui aussi chargé de couleurs.

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HEROISM IN THE HORATIAN LYRIC TRADITION: A TURNING POINT IN JAKOB BALDE’S POETICS

Over the course of   the last years, heroes have been my constant companions in the Freiburg Collaborative Research Centre Heroes, Heroizations, Heroisms.1 Since several of  the Centre’s projects have investigated the heroic in drama and epic, the time seemed ripe to me for lyric poetry. Being a classicist and a Neo-Latinist, I set myself  the task of  approaching lyrics from the angle of   the Pindaric and Horatian traditions. This article is my first attempt to explore the field. I focus on heroism in the Horatian tradition and in particular on the odes of  Jakob Balde, the “German Horace” and one of   the most successful Horatian poets ever. To the best of  my knowledge, the subject of  heroism in Balde (and, in fact, in the whole Horatian tradition) has never been studied in its own right before.2 This general interest leads me also to a more particular point: I shall argue that paying attention to the motif  of  heroism can reveal and throw into relief  a significant turning point in Balde’s lyric poetics. What do I mean by heroism? I here list some basic tenets of  the Freiburg Research Centre without accounting for them in detail: heroes are out-of-the-ordinary human individuals that overcome great difficulties and perform particular actions for which they are remembered – the heroic deed, such as slaying a dragon. War and other forms of  agonistic settings are the most familiar habitat

 https://www.sfb948.uni-freiburg.de.   Sarbiewski and Balde have been variously discussed as “patriotic” poets. See e.g. E. Schäfer, Deutscher Horaz. Conrad Celtis, Georg Fabricius, Paul Melissus, Jacob Balde. Die Nachwirkung des Horaz in der neulateinischen Dichtung Deutschlands (Wiesbaden, 1976), 232-249 on Balde’s political odes. However, heroism and patriotism do not always cover the same ground – see below on Horace. 1 2

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 495-511 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124079

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of  heroes. They do not fear death and may sacrifice themselves for their community. Their strong “agency” and their example often help in breaking with old conventions and in establishing new ones (think of  Hegel’s famous dictum of  heroes as the “managers of  world spirit”).3 Although human beings, heroes tend to have a special connection with the divine and other forms of  transcendence. A  strong manifestation of  this would be, for instance, that they are demi-gods like Achilles and other heroes of  Greek myth; a  weaker manifestation that their physical appearance is  illuminated by light and brightness (e.g., a shining armour as sign of  some higher endorsement). Last but not least, heroes are narratively constructed by “hero-makers” (e.g., poets), and they inspire an audience of  “hero-worshippers” whose group identity is (also) established by the fact that they have a common hero. For these definitions of  the heroic it is not absolutely necessary that heroes are called “heroes”, but one would expect the word to pop up here and there if  the discourse in question can properly be called “heroic” and not simply a discourse of  “greatness”, “strongness”, “excellence” etc. There is a linguistic dimension to the construction of  heroes, too, and I shall exploit this fact by taking particularly into account passages in which the very word “hero” occurs.

Heroism in the Horatian tradition up to Balde What do I mean by Horatian lyric tradition? In principle, all poetry clearly inspired by Horace’s odes in form (especially meter) or content. It is easy to see, however, that the corpus resulting from such a broad definition would be immense and unwieldy. My narrower focus, then, is  on collections of  Latin odes modelled on the formal structure of  Horace’s collection, that is ideally in four books.4 Balde belongs here as an outstanding example. I would also argue that, together with his Jesuit predecessor Sarbiewski, Balde is  the first lyricist to make heroism a truly significant and engaging subject of  Horatian poetry. For the Horatian Carmina are not an obvious choice for displays of  heroism. There is certainly patriotism in Horace in that he is concerned about Rome and its fate. Nor is he 3  G. W. F. Hegel, Vorlesungen über die Philosophie der Geschichte (Frankfurt a.M., 1986), 46. 4  I have not considered for this study any books of  epodes, sometimes attached to the collections of  odes as known from the editions of  Horace.

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a  stranger to panegyrics on the princeps. But patriotism, focussed on a nation, state, or empire, is not the same thing as the individual agency of  a hero; and while panegyrics do focus on a (typically ruling) individual, they usually consist of  static and general attributions of  greatness, and not of   the action and narrative of  which heroes are made. To put it another way, one could also argue that panegyrics tend to divinization, not heroization. In the single ode in which Horace uses the word “hero”, Augustus is  a human likened to a god: 1.12.1-3: “Q uem virum aut heroa lyra vel acri / tibia sumis celebrare, Clio? / quem deum?” (What man or hero do you choose to celebrate with lyre or shrill pipe, Clio? What god?).5 Correspondingly, Horace lists gods (13-24), Greek mythological heroes (25-32), and Roman men (32-48). Augustus caps the list of  great Roman men but is also compared to Jupiter. In my view, the closest thing to a  hero in Horace is  Marcus Atilius Regulus, an oft-quoted third-century bc example of  old Roman virtue, in the “Roman ode” 3.5. A  Carthaginian captive, Regulus was sent to Rome to negotiate an exchange of  prisoners. But he went along with this only to set an example of  fighting spirit. He advised his countrymen to reject what he perceived as disgraceful acquiescence and chose to return empty-handed to be tortured to death. Horace zooms in on Regulus’s unexpected counsel against the deal, on his calm readiness to face death himself, and on his inspiration for future generations. Overall, however, Horace’s odes strike a lighter tone altogether. Their single most dominant topic is love, which forms part of  a broader current of  “Epicurean” motifs (enjoy life as long as you can, wine, friendship, love) running throughout the collection. The Neo-Latin authors of  Horatian lyric collections (note that this may be different with individual Horatian odes outside such 5  Modelled on the beginning of  Pindar’s second Olympian ode (“ Ἀναξιφόρμιγγες ὕμνοι,  / τίνα θεόν, τίν’ ἥρωα, τίνα δ’ ἄνδρα κελαδήσομεν” (Hymns that rule the lyre, what god, what hero, and what man shall we celebrate?). The rigid distinction between heroes and men collapses in Petrarch’s poetic reading of  Horace (Ad Horatium Flaccum lyricum poetam; Fam. 24.10); cf. W. Ludwig, “Horazrezeption in der Renaissance oder die Renaissance des Horaz”, in O.  Reverdin, B.  Grange (ed.), Horace. L’œuvre et les imitations. Un siècle d’interpretation (Vandoeuvres – Genève, 1993), 305-379, at 312-325. Petrarch praises Horace (or rather his Muses) for immortalizing old and new heroes alike, the latter clearly referring to great men (28-30: “aut [sc. canis] choreas Pieridum sacras, / sculpunt quae rigido marmore durius / heroas veteres, si quae forent, novos”). He thus prepares for a more general use of   the word “hero” in NeoLatin Horatian poetry, as often seen in my examples below.

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collections) develop different aspects of  the Horatian model to different extents, but until Sarbiewski and Balde they share Horace’s relative neglect of   the heroic. For reasons of  space, I cannot survey this tradition here in any detail but have to restrict myself  to summary notes on major examples. Francesco Filelfo (1398-1481), often credited with the early modern revival of  Horatian lyric poetry and the author of  five books of  Odae (1497), is exceptional in that – not least by combining the Horatian with the Pindaric model – he takes a radical panegyrical approach. Most of  his odes are praises of  contemporaneous leaders, and quite a  few times these leaders are called “heroes”. But with Filelfo, this term is little more than an epitheton ornans, almost a linguistic side effect of  his general panegyrical approach.6 The German “arch-humanist” Konrad Celtis (1459-1508) and his Libri Odarum quattuor of  1513 are a striking contrast. Celtis stays away from both panegyrics and heroism, nor does warfare play any significant role in his odes. He conceives of  Horatian lyric as a  more private and “humanist” genre, celebrating a learned community of  letters. The word “hero” never occurs. Jean Salmon Macrin’s (1490-1557) Carminum libri quatuor of  1530, the most successful collection of  Latin Horatian poetry in France, combines panegyrical, “Epicurean”, and humanist strands. His praise of  his dedicatee and patron, the diplomat and historian Guillaume Du Bellay (1491-1543), may have heroic facets, particularly given that Du Bellay had made himself  also a  reputation as a brave soldier. Odes 2.9 and 3.1, for instance, extol Du Bellay for his talents, for his exploits, for his fight against injustice, and they promise remembrance. Macrin’s praise seems somewhat more personal and more adroit than Filelfo’s, but it is still rather perfunctory and adheres to well-known panegyrical patterns. And Du Bellay is not a “hero” in Macrin’s own terminology. In two of  three occurrences of   the word, Macrin’s “heroes” refer to men of  letters: the Greek emigrant Janus Lascaris, imagined in a poetic vision as wandering about in Greece and embodying ancient greatness (1.19); and Horace himself, imagined to be in the Isles of   the Blessed, the Elysian Fields, or – most probably – on the moon (2.3).7 Both of    Cf., e.g., Carlo Gonzaga (died 1456), the Captain of  the People in the Ambrosian Republic of  Milan, as “celebrandus heros” (2.1.10 and 147); “fortis heros” (2.1.213); “tantus […] heros” (2.5.8); “heros Carolus” (3.2.21). 7  For the idea that the souls of   the deceased are transported to the moon see e.g. Plutarch’s De facie in orbe lunae (Moralia 920-945); cf. Macrobius, Commentary on the 6

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Macrin’s literary heroes have a  distinct air of  other-worldliness, perhaps reminiscent of  ancient Greek hero cult, which was a prerogative of  the dead (although the real Lascaris was still alive at the time). This applies also to Macrin’s third “hero”, the mythological character of Protesilaus, who is invoked as heros Philacides (after his grandfather Phylacus) in 3.15.21, serving as an example of  deathdefying love – Greek myth would have it that after Protesilaus’s death at Troy, his wife Laodamia was granted to see him return to the upper world for some hours (and note that Protesilaus also had a well-known cult in the Thracian city of  Elaeus). It is  only with the Polish Jesuit Maciej (Matthias) Sarbiewski (1595-1640) that heroism becomes a  concept of  broader signifi­ cance. The final authorized edition of  his Lyricorum libri IV (Antwerp, 1634) reflects on moral life, on immanence and transcendence, and on the poet’s standing and work; it deals with sacred matters and characters, e.g., the Bible in lyrical paraphrases of   the Song of  Songs, and the Virgin Mary, here made a prominent subject of  Horatian poetry for the first time and many times invoked as a patroness of  Poland; and it praises the politically powerful such as Pope Urban VIII, under whom Sarbiewski served in Rome from 1622 to 1625 and to whom the collection is dedicated, or the Polish prince and (from 1632) king Władysław IV Vasa. The single most prominent topic in Sarbiewski’s collection, however, and at times connected with the panegyrics, is war, namely the Ottoman threat and the poet’s relentless call for defence, crusade, and the liberation of  Greece as the origin of  classical culture.8 If  a  single word may evoke this dominant theme, it is  surgamus! (let us rise, get up), hammered home three times in 1.8.41, 45, 56 (compare surgemus? in 4.6.33, surgite! in 1.12.2, and surge! in 1.16.25 and 37). It is precisely this pervasive martial theme and the poet’s continuous call to action that frames a  concept of  heroism even where the word “hero” is absent.9 What Sarbiewski expects from his contemporarSomnium Scipionis 1.11.6 “dixerunt […] ipsam lunam vitae esse mortisque confinium.” See also Ludwig 1993 (as in n. 5), 344-357 for a close reading of  Macrin’s ode and esp. 348-351 for Horace on the moon. 8  For this theme, see 1.1, 1.6, 1.8, 1.11-12, 1.15-16, 1.20, 2.2, 2.9, 2.10, 2.22-23, 3.10, 3.13, 3.19, 3.20, 3.24, 3.28-29, 4.1, 4.4-6, 4.8-9, 4.16, 4.29, 4.38. 9  Terms of  “heroism” are attributed to Władysław (4.29.31), to an imagined group around the Netherlandish humanist Erycius Puteanus restoring the old cultural and intellectual glory of  Greece (3.29.114); and to Urban  VIII’s cardinal-nephew Fran­ cesco Barberini (3.11.46, with a general reflection on the perennial fame of  heroes).

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ies, and in particular from outstanding individuals, is  otherwise also strongly associated with heroes. A compressed formula could run: “Overcome your inertia, man up and act, according to your true divine nature and in order to redeem your people! You will inspire your community, and you will be remembered forever, not least through my poetry.” Ode 3.30 encapsulates the longing for an exceptional and inspiring individual when it complains that “Bellamus omni consilio senes  / nullius exempli, et perennem  / desidiae trahimus catenam” (10-12; we fight like old men with every deliberation, but with no-one’s example, and we drag the perennial chain of  inactivity); when it asks “Q uis iuvenum prior?” (2; Which young man will take the initiative?); and when it urges “Succute,  / ignava bello succute saecula,  / quicumque plus a  Dis honesti / nominis ingeniique ducis.” (13-16; whoever has received great distinction and talent from the gods should step forward and shake up the idle times). This idea is  borne out by individuals such as a certain Visnovius, who is reported in ode 3.20 to have “Alti navita sanguinis / portum non soliti nominis attigit” (15-16; steered on a sea of Turkish blood before he reached the harbour of  unusual fame). Killed in action, the barbarian Turks ripped out his heart and his liver and ate them. But his great soul (“egregiam […] animam”) they could not reach, and he will inspire later generations to bloody revenge (23-24).

Heroism in Balde’s poetics Just nine years after Sarbiewski’s final edition and clearly under his influence, his German fellow Jesuit, Jakob Balde (1604-1668), brought out his own Lyricorum libri IV (Munich, 1643).10 Balde adopts some major Sarbievian topics such as the contemplation of   the frailty of  worldly life. But he also departs from Sarbiewski in crucial ways. The single dominant subject in Balde’s poetry is the Virgin Mary, whose praise he sings in countless variations (an important biographical background to this is certainly the poet’s election as president of  Munich’s academic Sodality of  Our Lady in 1637). He differs from Sarbiewski not only in the sheer number 10  On Sarbiewski’s influence on Balde see, e.g. Schäfer 1976 (as in n. 2), 113-126. I follow the edition of  Balde’s odes by B. Müller (ed.), Jacobi Balde Soc. Jes. Carmina Lyrica (München, 1844).

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of  poems on the Virgin, but also in their content: the motif  of   the “patriotic” Mary (as patroness of  a country, here Bavaria) is greatly outweighed by the motif  of  Mary as the object of  personal and affectionate veneration and love.11 It has often been observed that Balde’s Mary (also) works as a kind of Catholic replacement for the worldly love interests of  traditional Horatian poetry.12 As we shall see, this has implications also for Balde’s treatment of  war, which –  in  another marked difference from Sarbiewski –,13 is  just one topic among many. When Balde talks about war – which concerns in his case the Thirty Years’ War but also the Ottoman threat – this often does not take the form of  a battle cry but serves as a backdrop to focus on varieties of  psychological or bodily suffering: examples include the guilt and distress of  Germany in the Thirty Years’ War (1.8, 3.21, 4.45), the poet’s own melancholy at the capture of  Breisach (1.36) and his disgust at “barbarian” Turkish culture now omnipresent in Constantinople (4.37-39), the pain and selfrecognition of  a wounded soldier (4.8), and an ironic lesson in the moral laws of  war, given to an Alsatian officer and knowing full well that it will be ignored (4.11). As far as panegyrics are concerned, only odes 4.1 on the Bavarian elector, Maximilian I, and 4.25 on the Tyrolian Archduke, Ferdinand Karl, are homages to rulers. Strikingly for the literature of  this period, Balde’s Lyricorum libri IV does not even have a  dedicatee.14 All this does not seem a fertile breeding ground for heroes, and yet a  number of  heroic individuals occur in Balde’s collection, most of  them in book 1. I only touch on 1.3, which pays tribute to the steadfastness of  Thomas More and combines many heroic ingredients. Modelled on Horace’s Regulus ode 3.5, the poet emphasizes More’s superhuman calm in the face of  death and details e.g. his manliness (9-16: he remains unmoved by the begging and tears of  his wife and daughter) and his contempt for the imminent execution and the temporal world at large (25-32; he even steadies the shaking hand of   the executioner with a  gift, 30-31: “Postquam paventem

11  “Personal” Mary: 1.42-43, 2.1, 2.4, 2.7, 2.11, 2.14, 2.18, 2.24, 2.29, 2.32, 2.38, 2.41, 2.44, 3.2, 3.5, 3.7, 3.11, 3.18, 3.22, 3.38, 3.40, 4.4, 4.12-13, 4.15, 4.27, 4.32, 4.34, 4.40, 4.46; 4.49; “Patriotic” Mary: 2.26, 3.15, 3.28, 4.43. 12  E.g., Schäfer 1976 (as in n. 2), 218-232. 13  1.19, 1.25, 1.37-41, 2.3, 3.21, 3.42, 4.10-11, 4.24, 4.37-39, 4.44. 14  See Schäfer 1976 (as in n. 2), 233 on Balde’s disregard for political praise.

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carnificis manum / mercede firmasset”).15 The implied heroism of  this Stoic take on Thomas More emerges even more clearly when compared to Macrin’s ode 3.25 on More, which admires More as a great humanist disengaged from the turmoil of  politics and war (of  course, Macrin wrote his poem before More’s fall from grace and his execution). Balde’s first explicit reference to heroism comes at 1.19 with an ode on the death of  Gottfried Heinrich Graf  zu Pappenheim (1594-1632), one of   the most memorable generals of   the Holy Roman Empire in the Thirty Years’ War.  After many exploits in the war and feared particularly for his loyal and powerful cavalry (the proverbial “Pappenheimer” in German and some other languages), he was killed in the battle of  Lüzen (1632), one of   the decisive battles of   the time in which the Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus also met his death. The title phrase calls Pappenheim outright a “German hero” (Heros Germanus). The ode itself, however, is  more of  a  general reflection on heroism and death than a  report of  Pappenheim’s actions and eventual fate.16 Well aware that heroism is  constructed by narrative, the poet starts with a rebuke of  vulgar Fama (1 Fama, quid narras?) who tends to frame the death of  great men as a  story of  loss and mourning. But this is not the right way to go about it. In fact, true greatness often manifests itself precisely in falling down and death. A  body may fall, but it rests on its noble deeds (18-19). The most sublime things have fallen and have commanded respect: an alpine oak, Alexander the Great, and Tydeus, one of   the Seven against Thebes (21-28). The wounds and the disfigured body of  a soldier are beautiful signs of  greatness (37-40). Think how ruins of   the past are sometimes more admired than new buildings, think of  Rome! (41-45). Even a fragmented finger of   the Colossus of  Rhodes inspires onlookers with awe (49-56). Rather than heroizing an individual in any direct manner, Balde here discusses how we should tell heroic stories and what heroism might be in the first place. For heroism to work, 15  For the model of  Horace see esp. Schäfer 1976 (as in n. 2), 205-210; R. Glei, “Der Narr und seine Frau. Zu Baldes Ode 1, 3”, in E. Lefèvre (ed.), Balde und Horaz (Tübingen, 2002), 11-23 argues for a “second voice” criticizing More for exaggerated Stoicism. 16  W.  Stroh, “Der Koloss von Pappenheim: Jacobus Balde S.J. würdigt einen deutschen Helden”, Literatur in Bayern 37 (1994), 50-53 at 52 sees the particular appeal of this poem “in der eigenartigen Mischung von überpersönlicher Norm [i.e. the general thoughts on heroism] mit der so unnormierten Persönlichkeit Pappenheims.”

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Balde seems to demand also some great-mindedness of  interpreters (here the storytellers) which matches the great-mindedness of   the heroes themselves.17 The most striking instance of  heroism in Balde’s collection, however, comes near the end of  book 1 with a  whole cluster of  combative and heroic odes. In the sequence of   the published collection, this cluster appears to be ultimately triggered by the poet’s pain over the capture of  Breisach, the subject of  ode 1.36.18 The Alsatian Breisach was a key fortress of  the Holy Roman Empire and dear to Balde, an Alsatian native himself. Its surrender to the troops of  Bernard of  Saxe-Weimar in 1638 did not bode well for the Empire and the Catholic parties. 1.36 describes how the poet’s emotion over the news from Breisach silences his lyre and lets him take refuge in drinking. Picking up on the motif  of  drinking, the following ode 1.37 Ad Germanos calls the Germans away from their drinking habits and to the battle against Swedes and Turks. Some examples of  past bravery in war – the Trojan Polydamas, Seyfried Schweppermann (c. 1257-1337), a byword for courage, and Adolf  von Schwarzenberg (1551-1600), a recent general fighting the Ottomans – should give them heart. In the final call to action Sarbiewski’s surge recurs twice (21 “Heu surge tandem”; 25 “Insurge in hastas”), and indeed the whole cluster of  odes 1.37-41 seems more or less directly inspired by Sarbiewski’s rhetoric of  war. The next ode, 1.38, begins with surge and is addressed to the Eagle of  the Empire: it should fly out and expel invading birds which of  course stand for the enemies of  the Empire. Uniquely in Balde’s collection, the following three odes 1.39-41 are subsumed under a section of  its own, entitled “Three Heroes” (Tres Heroes). The accompanying explanatory text says that these heroes are “ab auctore in exemplum bellicae laudis propositi et Germanis contra suos hostes decertaturis imitandi” (put forward by the author as an example of  military glory and as models for the Germans in fighting their enemies). 17 The phenomenon of  “heroic interpretation” occurs more often in literary and cultural history. A.-C. Bolay, Dichter und Helden. Heroisierungsstrategien in der Biographik des George-Kreises (Würzburg, 2017) observes it, e.g., in the “heroic” admi­ ration for great poets in the circle around the German poet Stefan George (18681933). 18  For a  close reading of this ode, focussing on the imitation and variation of  Horace, see G. Manuwald, “Das ‘Paradoxum’ in der Praxis. Zu Jakob Balde, Lyr. 1, 36”, in E. Lefèvre (ed.), Balde und Horaz (Tübingen, 2002), 105-125.

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The significance of  heroic showing through individual examples as opposed to abstract telling is underlined by the beginning of  1.39, which serves as an introduction to the whole section: Exempla verbis praefero (I prefer examples to words); brave men of  old should leave their graves, show themselves (see, for instance, the deictic “hic ille […] est” in line 17) and energize the living. First up is the Albanian national hero Skanderbeg (1405-1468) who led a  successful Christian rebellion against the Ottomans around the middle of  the fifteenth century. The ode vividly describes Skanderbeg’s feats in battle and in particular his courage at the Siege of  Krujë (1450), when all seemed lost and only Skanderbeg with his spirited endurance and encouragement turned things around. A  twist comes at the end of  the poem, however, when the focus is placed on Skanderbeg’s adversary, the Ottoman sultan Murad  II, who despite great losses and personal pain – “with his lips bitten to pieces and his nails chewed to the bone” 19 (74-75: “Fissisque labris et digitis […] praemorsis”) – kept rejecting a  bitter truce almost to the end. This gives rise to a concluding general reflection on the workings of  virtue (77-80): Tantum supremis icta periculis virtus, honestum dum petit exitum, pulcerque desperantis ardor cordis habet stimulique acuti. So desperate a valour, so sharp a goad have courage and noble zeal when face to face with the greatest danger they seek an honourable issue.

Given that this passage immediately follows upon the narrative about Murad’s stubbornness, the “courage” (virtus) and “noble zeal” (pulcer ardor) seeking an “honourable issue” (honestum exitum) must be his – one may compare the recognition accorded to the defeated Cleopatra at the end of  Horace’s famous ode 1.37 (“Nunc est bibendum […]”). Surprisingly, then, it turns out that Murad II was not so different from Skanderbeg at all but that he simply fell on the wrong side of  history. The same virtue that made Skanderbeg a hero made Murad  II a  tragic figure. This is  an astonishingly complex 19  All English translations from book 1 are from D. Dooley (ed., tr.), The Carmina Lyrica of  Jakob Balde, S.J. Book 1 (Diss. St Louis University, 1966).

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reflection of  heroism in a  poem that otherwise works as a  call to arms. Balde’s second hero in this series (1.40) is John of Austria (15471578), the admiral in the naval Battle of Lepanto (7 October 1571) fought between the Holy League and the Ottoman Empire. The poem presents some battle scenes, escorts the Turks to Orcus, and finally reports the joy of   the gods of  sea and wind over John’s triumph. Unusually for a  heroic ode, it never focuses on an individual, not even John himself, but talks only collectively about the two warring parties. The hero of  1.41 is  John Hunyadi (1387 or 1407-1456), called the Terror Turcarum and Regent-Governor of   the Kingdom of  Hungary 1446-1453. His praise is rather conventional: he is associated with the divine and with light by comparing him to Jupiter, Jupiter’s lightning, and a comet that terrifies the Ottoman armies. The Ottomans are like a  dragon slain by Hunyadi. Hunyadi’s example should revive the aemula virtus of  today’s Germans, addressed as Q uirites (41-42), and help sharpen their blunted swords (42-44 “gladios […] retusos / exacuat”). 1.41 is the antepenultimate ode of book 1, and with the sequence of   the combative pieces 1.37-41 Balde seems on track to become, like Sarbiewski, a  warrior-poet. But then something unexpected happens in the penultimate ode, 1.42: the Virgin Mary appears to Balde, bidding him to quit war and to become her bard singing of  holy love (or as the title phrase says: Se deinceps D. Virginis vatem et encomiasten fore). This vision of   the Virgin and her message is detailed with great metaliterary awareness in eight Sapphic stanzas – the meter, often associated with the female and with love, can hardly be a coincidence. The poet is told to praise Mary first; epic poetry with its concern for fame and its arma virumque (nicely placed/recoded in the adonean of   the Sapphic stanza) may follow later in his Tillias (18-20: “Nos canes primum: celebris sequetur / Tillias magnam meditata famam et / arma virumque”).20 The final stanza summarizes Mary’s intervention in an effective scene:

20  Johann Tserclaes, Count of  Tilly, the commander of   the Catholic League in the Thirty Years’ War, died from a battle wound in 1632, and Balde’s plan to an epic praise of  him probably dates back to this time. The resulting prosimetric poem, however, was published only posthumously under the title of  Magnus Tillius Redivivus (München, 1678).

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Utque ferratam manibus tenentem repperit pennam gladiique acumen, et tubae cornu galeamque et hastam ex cussit in auras. And when she observed me with an iron-tipped arrow in my hand and a sharp sword, into the air she tossed my ivory trumpet, helmet, and spear.

I do not think that Dooley and other translators 21 get the point of  this passage. What would Balde do with an “arrow” in his hand, given that we do not hear anything of  a bow? This is a poem about Balde’s writing, and surely what he holds in his hands should be a  pen? I  suggest that Balde here wittily refers to a  quill (penna), dipped in iron gall ink (ferrata; the standard ink well into the nineteenth century), and to the pen-knife (gladiique acumen) used to sharpen the quill (which had to be done often, so specialized penknives were part of  a  normal writing set). The other equipment (trumpet – cf. the litui in line 5 –, helmet, and spear) could easily belong to a more general fancy dress of  the writing poet. Be that as it may, the final poem of  book 1, 1.43, addressed to the Virgin, translates Balde’s new literary programme into reality and enumerates the joys of  singing her praises. The last two lines tie his fortune as a lyric poet firmly to Mary (35 “quas [sc. laudes] si dura mihi neges, / non opto lyricis vatibus inseri”).22 Poetologically, this address to Mary at the end of  book 1 corresponds with the address to her in the last poem of   the whole collection (4.49), in which Balde wishes to die at her altar. This programmatic focus on Mary is somewhat misleading in that the many poems between 1.42/43 and 4.49 of  course deal with a variety of  subjects and not just with the Virgin. It is true, however, that from 1.42/43 onwards she emerges as the single most frequent topic, that this topic first had to be found over the course of  book 1 (there are no Marian poems before 1.42/43), and – most importantly here – that it also

21 E.g., J.  B. Neubig (tr.), Bavaria’s Musen in Joh.  Jak. Balde’s Oden, vol.  1 (München, 1828) and A.  Thill (ed., tr.), Jacob Balde: Odes (Lyrica), Livres I-II (Mulhouse, 1987) translate literally like Dooley, without further explanation. 22  A close reading of  this poem, with a focus on Horatian intertextuality (cf. e.g. Balde’s final verse, “Non opto lyricis vatibus inseri”, with Hor.  Carm. 1.35 “quodsi me lyricis vatibus inseres”), is provided by Schäfer 1976 (as in n. 2), 219-222.

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affects the way war and heroism are treated in the remainder of  the collection. As regards war, the battle cries disappear almost completely,23 and when military conflicts and threats are nonetheless discussed, the focus tends to be on their painful consequences (see above). Regarding heroism, we find no more extended celebrations of brave individuals comparable to Thomas More in 1.3. Ode 2.3, a Paean Boicus written for the anniversary of  the Battle of White Mountain (1620) describes the fray of  fierce fighting from a  bird’s eye perspective and at one point zooms in on two valiant generals of   the imperial army, Bucquoy and Tilly (34-40). But their exploits in the battle field are noted only in passing and comprise no more than two out of  twenty Alcaic stanzas. There is certainly implied heroization in ode 2.17, Paean Parthenius, on brave Bavarian virgins who chose to fight the invading Swedes and die at their hands rather than lose their virginity. They are likened to the Amazons and to other strong mythological women: they resist fiercely, die a noble death, and their song should be sung. But nowhere is an individual named. This is  a different, anonymous and collective form of  heroization,24 which is further complicated by gender. Perhaps the heroism of   these virgins is acceptable in Balde’s “Marian” poetics of  books 2-4 because they represent to him a more “female”, private and defensive form of  bravery. Perhaps they also remind him in some associative ways of  the Virgin Mary herself  – the following ode 2.18 is one of many addressed Ad Virginem Mariam. More­over, leaving aside for a moment the special case of 4.24, discussed below, books 2-4 no longer present us with “programmatic” heroes such as Pappenheim, Skanderbeg, John of  Austria, and John Hunyadi in book 1, who are all explicitly called “heroes” in the title phrases. The word family “hero” occurs only in two passages of  books 2-4, and in both of   them the poet adds a  new, broader and spiritual dimension to the concept of  heroism. In the long narrative of  2.13 on the assassination of Wallenstein, presented as the just and divine 23  An exception is  4.44, where the poet once more calls the Germans to unity against the Ottomans. This poem explicitly picks up on 4.36-39 reporting a  vision of  the disgusting decadence of  present-day Constantinople. 24  For theoretical aspects of  collective heroes see O. Gölz, “Kollektive”, in R. G. Asch et al. (ed.), Compendium heroicum (doi: 10.6094/heroicum/kolld1.0). For the issue of  anonymity, see also Balde’s ode 3.26 praising the cleverness of  an anonymous young woman who eluded the Swedes by feigning her own death.

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punishment of  a fallen character, Wallenstein’s prospective assassins (Butler, Gordon, and Leslie) are called “heroes” (49-52): Q uando (sic Divi voluere) pulcrae lucis heroes animaeque magnae dulce coniurant tacitoque claudunt pectore foedus. Then [sc. after nightfall] (the Gods so bidding) the heroes of  beautiful light and the great souls take a sweet oath and lock it up in their silent heart.

Whereas the term “hero” in book 1 always referred to battle, war here only provides a  diffuse backdrop to a  more general concept of  heroism. Butler, Gordon, and Leslie are “heroes” because they execute divine will in an extremely tense and difficult situation. Their association with “beautiful light” creates an atmospheric contrast with the surrounding nightfall, but also suggests their transcendent mission and righteous cause. Finally, a  similar but even bolder extension of   the concept of  heroism can be found in 4.24, addressed to one Philippus Mandora, a soldier in the imperial army.25 This is the single instance in books 2-4 in which we might expect to find a  “programmatic hero” in the manner of  book 1, since the title refers to Mandora as an “outstanding hero” (Ad fortissimum heroem Philippum Mandoram). In fact, however, the poem is not about Philip but about an allegorical horse he is supposed to mount. This is, as the title phrase says, the horse described in Job 39 and compared by the author with the grace of  God, based on the oracular saying of  Thomas a  Kempis: “He rides with ease whom the grace of  God carries along” (“Equus   I could not find any information about this Philippus Mandora, ex antiquissima familia Wackermannorum, in Caesareo exercitu militans. “Philippus” (the “horselover”) and “Wackermann” (“good/valiant man”) are excellent speaking names for this poem, but that does of  course not mean that a  historical person did not exist. “Mandora” would still not be accounted for. Or should it be read as “chew-mouth”, from mandere and os, referring to the horse again? For what it is worth, Philip’s wild horse does “chew its golden bridle” (l. 5: Ut ore fulvum mandit aurum!). There is a letter to one Philippus Mandora in the Epistolae familiares (1725; 2.19) of  Franz Lang (who was, like Balde, a Munich-based Jesuit presiding the Sodality of  Our Lady), but the historicity of  Lang’s addressees is a problem of  its own. More than once names of  addressees seem to be taken from Balde (cf. e.g. Benno Cossa in letters 2.64, 2.91 and 2.98 with Balde’s ode 1.4; Paulus Riverna in letters 1.8, 2.80 and 2.92 with odes 1.35 and 2.10; Iulius Tamerinus in letter 1.4 with ode 3.44). 25

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a s. Iobo descriptus с. XXXIX. et ab auctore cum gratia Dei com­ paratus ex illo Thomae Kempensis oraculo: Suaviter equitat, quem gratia Dei portat”).26 The first 16 out of  18 Alcaic stanzas portray this wild and sublime creature. The last two stanzas, 17-18, ask Mandora to mount the horse – he will be fine as long as he does not attempt to steer it himself. He will be steered safely. If  there is  anything heroic in Mandora, it is  either irrelevant to this poem, or, and more likely, his heroism consists precisely in his anticipated willingness to mount such a powerful horse. Considering that the horse represents God’s unlimited power and grace, however, this would logically suggest that true heroism is resigning oneself  to God’s will – a  broad definition of  heroism reminiscent of  Wallenstein’s assassins in ode 2.13. Pushing this one step further, this definition once again recalls the idea of  more or less ordinary people becoming themselves heroic by rising to an understanding of  a heroic higher being – compare the “heroic” interpreters in Pappenheim’s story (1.19). The real hero, one could conclude in our case, is  the horse or God himself. Note that the horse has always been regarded a  heroic animal 27 and that its description in Job 39 in particular ticks many heroic boxes, as will be seen below. In the larger context of   the book of  Job, Job asks God tough questions about theodicy which God answers by putting Job in his human place: what does Job know about the complexity of   the universe? How can he doubt God’s larger plan from his narrow human perspective? However, God does not make this point in an abstract but rather in a highly poetical way, by challenging Job about his understanding of  animal life, with the horse being his chief  example (Job 39.19-25; English Standard Version): Do you give the horse his might? 28 Do you clothe his neck with a mane? Do you make him leap like the locust? His majestic snorting is terrifying. He paws in the valley and exults in his strength; he goes out to meet the weapons. He laughs at fear and is not dismayed; he does not turn back from the sword. Upon him rattle the quiver, the   Thomas a Kempis, De imitatione Christi 2.9.   A.  Aurnhammer, M.  Beichle, K.  Minelli, “Pferd”, in R.  G. Asch et  al. (ed.), Compendium heroicum (doi: 10.6094/heroicum/pd1.1.20200608). 28  The Hebrew word for “might” in 39.19, ‫ּבּורה‬ ֑ ָ ְ‫“( ג‬might”, “strength”, “power”), can also convey notions of  heroism; cf. the German standard translation (Einheitsübersetzung 2016): “Gabst du dem Ross die Heldenstärke?” 26 27

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flashing spear, and the javelin. With fierceness and rage he swallows the ground; he cannot stand still at the sound of   the trumpet. When the trumpet sounds, he says “Aha!” He smells the battle from afar, the thunder of  the captains, and the shouting.

Like a  hero, the horse is  mighty, terrifying, fearless and com­bat­ ive. Balde adapts this model to form his own poetic horse charging between earth and sky, thus adding further signs of  divinity; e.g. vv. 45-48 and 60-62: Subit procellam fortior alipes fervens fremensque et sorbet anhelitu terram volaturusque nescit stare loco remorasque damnat. […] insidentem ad astra tollens nubibus invehit scribitque gyros. The swift horse vigorously enters the fray with roars and rage, and it swallows the ground, and set to fly it does not know how to stay still and it condemns hesitation […] lifting its rider to the stars, it flies to the clouds and goes round in circles.

Of  course, Balde’s horse is not just God’s horse (as in Job) but represents also God’s grace (as in Thomas a  Kempis). By combining these two images, the poet creates a highly complex heroic symbol mirroring the ultimate hero, God. This is a far cry from the rather traditional heroes with whom book 1 (almost) ended. Let me briefly sum up. The Horatian model, apart from its obvious “Epicurean” aspects, invited patriotic and panegyrical, but not necessarily heroic appropriations. Neo-Latin poets in the Horatian tradition until Sarbiewski were only superficially and marginally concerned with heroism. It is only with Sarbiewski that a concept of  heroism, closely tied to war and a call to arms, gains larger prominence. Balde picks up on that concept in his first book of  odes, only to stage it as a poetological cul-de-sac.29 His sequence of  “heroes” at 29  In my view, Odes 1.39-41 are also of  gradually deteriorating poetic quality (an observation which, I appreciate, would require further detail to be convincing). This would not be a fault but a virtue if  Balde’s point was precisely to show that this form of  heroism was a dead end.

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the end of  book 1 carefully builds up a metaliterary turning point at which the Virgin intervenes and bids the poet to adopt her new, “Marian” poetics. True to this programme, the more traditional heroes disappear almost completely in books 2-4 and give way to more complex and more spiritual reflections on heroism.30 I hope my analysis has demonstrated how the concept of  heroism matters in Balde’s odes. On a more general note, it suggests that the literary study of  heroism is  rewarding not only in its own right, but also helps to shed light on larger issues of  poetic composition.

30  It speaks to Balde’s poetic genius that he cannot resist including some highly original reflections on heroism also in book 1, particularly in 1.19 on Pappenheim (how should we tell a hero’s story?) and at the end of  1.39 (with the implied question “what distinguishes a villain from a hero?”).

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FROM SCHOOL EXERCISE AND AFFIXIO TO DEVOTIONAL EMBLEM BOOK THE LATIN POEMS OF  TYPUS MUNDI (1627) *

“Iuvenes sumus, Rhetores sumus”: with these words, exuding both modesty and self-confidence, nine senior students of   the Antwerp Jesuit college address the readers, contemporary and future, of  the emblematic volume Typus mundi (Image of   the World), issued in 1627 by the Antwerp printer Jan Cnobbaert, on the basis of   their own emblematic endeavours. The rhetoricians hasten to add that their aim has been to illustrate emblems with verses, a  playful poetic work which they purport to have executed in just a  few days. For it is indeed a play in which they have been involved, they assert: “If  you expect something grand, know that we are playing.” 1 However, it is a serious, pious game which they have been playing (“ludimus, sed pie”), as they also duly stress in the dedication of  their “little, mediocre work” (“opusculum hoc […] exiguum, […] mediocre”) to St Ignatius of  Loyola. As the full title of   the emblem book (Typus mundi in quo eius calamitates et pericula nec non divini humanique Amoris antipathia emblematice proponuntur) clearly indicates, it describes the moral disasters and dangers of   the subcelestial world, as well as the battle between divine and earthly Love by means of  32 + 1 emblems, nearly all of  which contain one or more balls or, to be more precise, orbs with a  mounted cross, as a  recurrent pictorial motif. Most, if  not all, of  the engravings were made by Philippe van Mallery and

*  We would like to thank Dr Ingrid Sperber for having corrected our English. 1  Ad lectorem: “Si grande quid expectas, ludimus.” We have used a copy of   the 1627 edition preserved in the Maurits Sabbebibliotheek, Leuven, shelf number P 264.5 Typus 1627. Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 513-525 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124080

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his father Charles.2 In order to enhance the attractiveness of   the volume for readers who did not sufficiently command the Latin language, the printer made sure brief  French and Dutch poems were added as well. Typus mundi turned out to be a success: it was reprinted three times in the course of   the seventeenth century, and it served as a model or a source of  inspiration for various other emblem books both in the Netherlands and elsewhere in Europe, including Adriaen Poirters’ widely read Ydelheyt des werelts (Vanity of  the world), first issued in 1645.3 Although Typus mundi has been subjected to a  succinct analysis by Michael Schilling in his afterword to the facsimile reprint of   the first edition of  1627,4 the work has not yet been submitted to an overall analysis and interpretation from an emblematic and poetical-rhetorical point of  view. In the present article, we would like to fill this gap at least partly by focusing on the Latin poems. In the first part of  our contribution, we shall try to demonstrate that the Latin verses play a crucial role in guiding the readers/viewers through the meditational trajectory which the students mapped out for them. Next, we shall pay attention to the changes that were made to the Latin poems in the second edition of  1630. Interestingly enough, many of   these changes were cancelled in the third edition issued in 1652.

Meditational trajectory and rhetorical strategies Playing a  serious, pious game: the words seem to refer, however obliquely, to the joyful, festive occasion for which the emblematic exercises of  the Antwerp rhetoricians were destined – the magnificent, multi-media spectacle scheduled for the happy celebration of  the lustrum of Ignatius’s canonization on 31 July of  the year 1627. Indeed, their exercises can rightly be considered as prolusiones, literary preparations for the emblematic exhibition that was to be 2  See M. Schilling, “Nachwort”, in Typus mundi (1627) (Hildesheim – Zürich – New York, 2010), 3*. 3 In The Jesuit Emblem in the European Context (Philadelphia, 2016), 90, P. M. Daly and G. R. Dimler S.J. go so far as to call Typus mundi rather boldly “perhaps the most famous and influential devotional work” in the history of  Jesuit emblematics. For a brief  overview of   the history of  reception of  Typus mundi, see Schilling 2010 (as in n. 2), 21*-26*. 4  Schilling 2010 (as in n. 2).

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mounted during the festivity. It should be emphasized, however, that composing emblems in a Jesuit school context was often more than just a  playful exercise aimed at a  public, ostentatious display of  rhetorical skills. At least in the case of  Typus mundi, the visual and verbal rhetoric deployed by the Antwerp pupils clearly served a moral and even a distinctly meditational purpose as well. The  emblematic rhetoric at work in the volume appears, indeed, to be aimed at activating the viewers’ or readers’ external senses which, according to the psychological views embraced by the early modern Jesuits, formed the main, or rather the sole, gate by which the soul could be reached – a process in which the so-called internal senses of   the imagination played a  crucial intermediary role.5 Through a carefully devised “psychagogic” trajectory, the viewer or reader is induced to look at the images that unfold themselves in his physical or mental sight, to memorize them thoroughly, to ponder them carefully, to detect the deeper moral lesson that lies hidden behind their surface and, last but not least, to attune their behavior to the new insights they have gained through the meditative process which they have undergone. In this clarifying and purifying process, sensory delight (delectare) is  as crucial as intellectual instruction (docere). For it is precisely the inextricable combination of  profit (utile) and pleasure (dulce), seriousness and playfulness (serio ludere) that enables the emblem authors to move the minds and hearts of   their readers and, as a result, to bend their will and change their conduct.6

5  On the psychological views underpinning the Jesuits’ educational program, see now P. R. Blum, “Psychology and the Culture of  the Intellect: Ignatius of  Loyola and Antonio Possevino”, in D. Heider (ed.), Cognitive Psychology in Early Jesuit Scholasticism (Neukirchen – Seelscheid, 2016), 12-37 and S. De Boer, “The (Human) Soul”, in H.  Lagerlund, B.  Hill (ed.), The Routledge Companion to Sixteenth-Century Philosophy (New York – London, 2017), 411-435 (esp. 421-423), with further literature. 6  Thanks to their education and their participation in the activities of  the Sodality of  Our Lady of   the Annunciation attached to the Antwerp college, the rhetoricians who composed Typus mundi were undoubtedly well acquainted with Jesuit spirituality, in general, and Jesuit meditational practices, more particularly. On the intimate connection of  intellectual, artistic and devotional education in both Jesuit colleges and sodalities, see also J. Loach, “Revolutionary Pedagogues? How Jesuits Used Education to Change Society”, in J. W. O’Malley et alii (ed.), The Jesuits. 2. Cultures, Sciences, and the Arts, 1540-1773 (Toronto – Buffalo – London, 2006), 66-85. On the various “psychagogical” tools and techniques developed by the early modern Jesuits in order to provoke mental (self-)transformation, see now M. Sluhovsky, Becoming a New Self. Practices of  Belief  in Early Modern Catholicism (Chicago – London, 2017).

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Let us first briefly delineate the meditational trajectory which the Antwerp pupils mapped out for their readers/viewers and then analyze in some more detail how the rhetoric deployed in the Latin verses helped them to undertake this imaginative journey from start to finish. A  close look at the emblems reveals, indeed, that some sort of  dramatic progression can be discerned in the volume, a consciously created sequence of  emblems which guides the reader/ viewer from contemplation of  original sin and the many calamities that have resulted from it, all of  which are attributed to the sordid world or to fraudulent, wicked Cupid (emblems 1 to 18), to mentally witnessing the confrontation between divine and earthly Love, which eventually culminates in the victory of  the former – a victory which is  not coincidentally described in terms very reminiscent of   Judgement Day (emblems 19-32).7 Q uite often, perhaps more often than Schilling has acknowledged in his preliminary study of  Typus mundi,8 an element present in one emblem reappears in the following one, so that the reader/viewer has the distinct feeling of   proceeding along a well-established, if  perhaps somewhat tortuous, trajectory. Let us illustrate this procedure by means of  a  few telling examples derived from the end of  Typus mundi. As stated above, the second part of Typus mundi features a fierce battle between earthly and divine Love which culminates in the glorious victory of   the latter in the last emblem. This victory is carefully prepared in the preceding emblems which are clustered. Thus, emblem 27 and 28 are thematically related to one another. In  emblem 27, beautiful, charming Cupid has been transformed into an ugly owl with a swine snout (referring to the sin of  gluttony) and donkey’s ears (referring to Midas-like greed) (Fig. 1). Although Cupid tries to hide, he will be exposed by the light of   the day, a  day of  revelation and truth, according to the poetic narrator who uses terms and images reminiscent of Judgement Day (vv. 23-32). Emblem 28, too, centers around the motifs of  light and darkness, albeit in a slightly different way. Eternal night covers the 7  It should be stressed that there is no clear-cut difference between the two parts but rather a subtle change in focus. The order in which the emblems appear does not correspond to the clusters of  poems composed by each and single pupil. However, it is too speculative to infer from this observation that the emblem volume as it has come down to us was carefully monitored or even edited by Johannes Matthiae, at the time professor of  rhetoric at the Antwerp Jesuit college. 8  Schilling 2010 (as in n. 2), 4*-20*.

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Fig. 1 Typus mundi (Antwerp, Ioannes Cnobbaert, 1627), 216, emblem 27. Cupid transformed into an owl with a swine snout and donkey’s ears. Leuven, Maurits Sabbebibliotheek, shelf  number P264.5 Typus 1627

world, as earthly Love delights in darkness and his crimes change the day into night (vv.  1-10). Even the poetic narrator, an adept of  divine Love, is  believed to be lacking in light, as earthly Love utterly despises a pious life (vv. 11-18). However, a time will come when light in the form of  lightning will be sent to the world and a clear distinction will be made between good and bad people (again an unambiguous reference to Judgement Day). The bad will come to realize the fundamental error in life they have made, while the good will at last enjoy eternal happiness (vv. 21-34). 517

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The following two emblems elaborate on the theme of  vanity and emptiness. In emblem 29, the poetic narrator states that, in his opinion, the World’s riches are empty since the well from which they pour forth is dry and needy (vv. 1-6). Earthly Love laughs at this message: credulous as he is, he lets himself  be deceived by the World which, like a tinkling little bell (represented in the pictura), cries out great but empty gifts (vv.  7-16). In emblem 30, worldly vanity and emptiness are contrasted with God’s plenteousness. Nothing is enough for the soul, it is stated (vv. 1-4). No matter how thoroughly the senses are satiated, the soul will remain unsatisfied, as it will only find full satisfaction in bountiful heaven (vv. 15-24). The poem concludes with a  sharp contrast between God’s plenteousness (He is  everything – wealth, wisdom, fame, pleasure  – to everyone) and nothing’s emptiness (vv. 35-42). The four preceding emblems pave the way for the penultimate emblem in the volume, which elaborates on the suffering of  Jesus Christ. Jesus’ cross, nails, blood, etc. are the last means which divine Love has at its disposal to submit the World (vv. 1-6), and it will succeed in its final attempt (vv.  7-12), as is  proven by means of  a long series of  rhetorical questions in which Jesus’ suffering is contrasted with the World’s seeming happiness (vv. 13-36). The promise of  success inherent in emblem 31 is redeemed in the last emblem. Divine Love’s triumph has finally come true. God occupies the heart which has closed itself  to the World and its deceitful gifts and passions. Reiterating the previously used motif  of  honey which turns out to be gall (mel – fel),9 the poetic narrator affirms that “a heart in harmony with heaven is  an unconquerable stronghold, when it has learnt  […] that the Paphian honeycomb is  dripping gall”.10 The concluding poem quite naturally changes into a vow made by the young poets to Ignatius of  Loyola. Indeed, they promise him to close the doors of   their hearts to the World and to accept only the riches of  the World above – just as Ignatius was shown to have done in the opening emblem of   the volume. Guided by the young   See emblem 3, vv. 4-9.   “Cor Superis concors arx insuperabilis, […]  cum didicit Paios felle madere favos” (vv. 7 and 10). In the accompanying pictura, divine Love holds in his left hand a heart (the soul) which is nurtured by the rays of  light coming from blissful heaven. The heart is  neatly separated from the terrestrial globe (the sordid World), which Cupid holds in his right hand, by means of  a cross. It is of  course Jesus’ cross described in the previous emblem. Both the beams of  light and the cross reinforce the connection of  the last emblem with the previous ones. 9

10

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poets of  Typus mundi, we have come full circle on our meditational journey. The spiritual journey which the reader/viewer has to make is greatly facilitated by the rhetorical strategies which the young emblem composers lavishly deployed in their poems. The abundant use of  particularly arresting descriptions (energeia, evidentia) and of  addresses or apostrophes to the reader, as well as the mesmerizing repetition of  important catchwords or phrases, ceaselessly ham­mered into the reader or viewer’s head like a mantra or an incantation, are among the most important means by which he is induced to let himself  be completely absorbed by the scenes which unfold before his physical or mental eyes, and to ponder the moral message which they convey.11 More often than not, the reader is made to feel that he experiences from nearby the “mini-drama” that is  vividly staged in each poem – as an eye-witness or even as a  full participant. Indeed, the subtle use of  personal pronouns (“I”, “you”, “we”) help him to identify with one of  the main characters that feature in the picturae and the accompanying subscriptiones. Thus he is made to associate himself  with the sinful people who are under the spell of  wicked Cupid.12 Alternatively, he sees himself  as the real target audience of  moral admonishments which, at first sight, are directed only towards Cupid.13 In other cases, especially in the latter part of   the volume, so it seems, the reader is subtly invited to identify with the persons depicted who have denounced the World and its many allurements, and have instead chosen a life of  virtue and hardship under the guidance of  divine Love, such as Christian 11   Evidentia is successfully exploited in, among many other passages, the pitiful description of  Troy’s fall in emblem 7 and the shocking account of   the paradoxical effects of  a tarantula’s poisonous bite (laughter and tears, corybantic frenzy and total collapse) in emblem 8. The addresses and apostrophes are often deictic in nature in so far as they draw the reader’s attention to the scene depicted in the pictura or described in the subscriptio. See for example emblem 6 (vv. 3-5: “Huc ades; et tacita quae venit ab icone, vocem / accipe […]. Aspicis ut […]”), emblem 10 (v. 1: “Hoc quod suspicis, hoc quod obstupescis”), and emblem 14 (v. 1: “cernis ut […]?”), and emblem 15 (v. 1: “Ecce tibi”), and so on. Repetition of  catch-phrases containing important moral messages is felicitously exploited in emblem 6 (“in cruce sola quies”) and emblem 12 (“hamat Amor”). Incessant repetition of   the word levis (levius, levior) plays a crucial role in the Latin subscriptio of  emblem 4 which hinges entirely on the idea that the world is lighter than all other light things. 12  See for example emblem 9, where the reader/viewer consciously or subconsciously puts himself  on a par with the boaster, the gold-hunter and the lover whom the poetic narrator addresses (huc ades, huc cades, huc ades, disce, vv. 1, 3, 5 and 7). 13  This is for instance the case in emblem 7, vv. 39-40.

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martyrs,14 the twelve apostles,15 missionaries like Franciscus Xaverius 16 and, ultimately, the suffering Christ himself.17 The more or less gradual shift in self-identification reflects the mental transformation which the reader/viewer is meant to undergo in the course of  his meditational journey: from having been a sinner he becomes a truly virtuous and pious man who utterly rejects the World and henceforth focuses his attention entirely on blissful heaven.

The printing history of  Typus mundi: modifying and restoring the original text Only three years after its initial release in 1627, Jan Cnobbaert issued a  second edition, which was followed by a  third edition in 1652, published by his widow, Maria de Man, who had taken over her deceased husband’s professional activities in 1639.18 For our present purposes we can content ourselves with a  brief  analysis of   the second edition of  1630. Were there changes made to the Latin verse subscriptiones and, if  so, did they affect the nature and purport of  the first edition? 19 Careful analysis reveals that in nearly half  of  the poems the text underwent some minor or major modifications, be it in the form of   deletions, additions, or substitution of  words, or even entire verses, by new ones.20 In a few cases, some metrical flaws or in­fe­lici­ ties were mended.21 This seems to suggest that the text was submitted   Emblem 22, vv. 23-30.   Emblem 24, vv. 29-38. 16  Emblem 25, vv. 26-42. 17  Emblem 23, vv. 33-42 and especially emblem 31. 18  K. de Vlieger-de Wilde (ed.), Directory of  Seventeenth-Century Printers, Publishers and Booksellers in Flanders (Antwerpen, 2004), 31, no. 25. As late as 1697 Johann Kaspar Bencard published a  reprint of  Typus in Dillingen, largely based on the first Antwerp edition of  1627. See further P. M. Daly, R. Dimler, The Jesuit Series, Part One (A-D) (Toronto, 1997), 17-21, no. J.16-J.19. 19   Lack of  space prevents us from discussing the changes made to the picturae and the inscriptiones. 20  Changes occur in 16 of   the 33 Latin poems: dedicatory emblem, and emblem no. 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, 20, 21, 30, and 32. Minor changes such as the substitution of  a  single word by another one have not been taken into account. For our comparison we have made use of  a  copy of   the 1630 edition preserved at Museum Plantin-Moretus, Antwerp, shelf  number R 51.3. 21  Metrical errors or infelicities occur in emblem 1, v. 24 (the first half  of  the pentameter is metrically incorrect), 2, v. 6 (elision and rather heavy sequence of  spondees 14 15

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to a fairly thorough “quality control” in view of  the new publication in 1630. We do not know, and will probably never know for sure, who was responsible for the revision. Did the printer, Cnobbaert’s widow, contact Joannes Ciermans, at that time professor of  rhetoric at the Antwerp college, and ask him to make the changes which he deemed necessary? 22 Or did she rather address Jacobus Wallius who was working as praefectus studiorum at the Jesuit college during the school year 1629-1630 and was known as a  young and promising Neo-Latin poet? 23 We can only speculate.24 What can be asserted with a sufficient degree of  certainty, on the contrary, is that whoever revised the poetic exercises of   the rhetoricians of  1627 found much to praise and remarkably little to criticize or mend in their collective work. Indeed, the reviser only made significant changes to four percent of  all the verses which they had composed. In carrying out his task, however, he appears to have gone much further than removing small metrical mistakes or altering less fortuitous word combinations. Q uite a few modifications appear to have been inspired by the desire to eliminate or replace verses that were considered too flat or slightly redundant. A  small but telling example is  offered by the very first line of   the very first numbered emblematic poem on Adam and the apple-tree. In the 1627 version, the first line basically in the first half  of   the pentameter), 3, v. 4 (elision), 4, v. 8 (elision) and v. 9 (stopgap dum), 14, v. 29-30 (huic with short and long syllable in the first verse, with one long syllable in the latter; elision in v.  30), 21, v.  16 (rather harsh enjambement of  ante which moreover seems to be a stopgap). 22   See M. Moehlig, Het Jezuïetencollege te Antwerpen in de 17de en 18de eeuw (Leuven, unpublished licentiate thesis, 1988), Appendix VII, xxvii. It is important to note in this respect that Cnobbaert’s widow was living and working near the residence of  the Antwerp Jesuits (the so-called domus professionis or professed monks’ house), located at the old Huis van Aken between Korte Nieuwstraat and the Jesuit Church (nowadays Carolus Borromeus Church); establishing and maintaining contacts must have been fairly easy. See De Vlieger-de Wilde 2004 (as in n. 18), 31, no. 25. 23  In 1640 he would contribute several poems to the important but controversial commemorative emblem book of   the Jesuit order, the Imago primi saeculi. In 1656, the Antwerp printer Balthasar Moretus published the first edition of  his collected poems, which would make Wallius famous all over Europe. 24  See Moehlig 1988 (as in n. 22), Appendix V, xiii. The hypothesis is all the more attractive as the educational instructions for the Flemish Jesuit province of  1625 explicitly ordered the college’s prefect to subject the affixiones made by the pupils of   the higher classes (Rhetorica and Poesis) to a  close inspection before their being exhibited. See C. van der Vorst, “Instructions pédagogiques de 1625 et 1647 pour les collèges de la province flandro-belge”, Archivum Historicum Societatis Iesu 19 (1950), 181-236 (206).

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repeats, with little variation, the message expressed in the motto, which contains an important but unsurprising pun: Mundus in ma-li ligno positus est (The World is situated in an apple-tree/in the tree of  evil). Compare with the first two verses which read as follows: Omina sunt hominum mali pendentia ligno: arbore in hac mundi statque, caditque salus.

In all likelihood, the opening line was completely rewritten because it was deemed too repetitive. A  more vivid opening was created, consisting of  two rhetorical questions which are clearly meant to elicit surprise and awe from the reader/viewer who is  thus, from the very start of   the poem, much more forcefully drawn into the compelling description of   the apple-tree/tree of  evil and its dire con­se­quences: Q uis credat? Q uis non totis tremat artubus? omnis arbore in hac mundi statque, caditque salus.

Perhaps not coincidentally, the subscriptio of  emblem 1 was thoroughly revised in 1630 – much more thoroughly than any of   the other emblematic poems of  Typus mundi. In vv. 11-20, the poetic narrator warns Adam against the fragile apple-tree in front of  him, as it is  a tree of  evil, bearing lethal fruit. In lines 17-18, Adam is explicitly urged to flee from it and not to put trust in the alluring color of   the apples it carries: “Ille color vermem, quem tegit, intus habet.” In the 1630 version these two lines were entirely deleted. The reviser may have found the image of  worms hiding inside fruit a little too graphic, or its association with lethal poison (a theme developed in vv.  19-20) simply too far-fetched: in the reworked version it is unambiguously the apple itself  rather than the vermin inside that appears to be poisonous. Furthermore, the exhortation to flee (v.  17: “hinc fuge”) is  not really in line with the sequence of  suggested actions that follow in an ingenious decrescendo: Adam eats an apple – he seizes an apple – he touches an apple – he wishes to touch one – he looks at the apple-tree and, by doing so, is seen by the serpent hiding in the tree. As the changes to the first verse of   the first numbered emblematic poem already indicates, adaptations in the edition of  1630 appear to have been made not only for strictly esthetic reasons; not infrequently they have a palpable impact on the way the reader or 522

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viewer is addressed: the Seelenleitung is reinforced, the admonition imparted made more explicit or compelling. The concluding verses of   the first emblematic poem is  an excellent case in point. In the 1627 version they read as follows (vv. 31-32): Notitiamque boni spondet, pariterque malorum. Heu mala quam cupias noscere, plura scies!

In the 1630 version, these lines were amplified, so as to broaden their focal point and strengthen their emotional charge (vv. 31-34): Notitiamque boni spondet, pariterque malorum. Optima sed nocua parte futura fides. Hinc voti reus ipse tui damnabis orexin. Hei mihi, quanta scies mox mala, quanta feres?

The suggestion implicit in the 1627 version (“You will prefer to know evil to good”) is now made explicit (v. 32), while more emphasis is laid on the consequences of that choice or inclination: having obtained what he desires (v. 33: voti reus), the addressee will regret his longing (orexin): his knowing will involve suffering (scies, feres), as the narrator of  the poem, who is more of  an exhorter, ominously foretells in the last line of  the poem. It should be added that the changes to the original verses composed by the Antwerp rhetoricians sometimes resulted in a loss of  freshness and playfulness. This is for instance the case with verses 8-9 of  emblem 4, consisting of  “light-footed”, swiftly flowing hendecasyllabi Phalaecei. The poem is  built entirely on the paradoxical realization of   the world’s extreme lightness. As the narrator explains, the world is  lighter than all other light things, and will remain so as long as Cupid rules over it; a long series of  similes is inserted in order to make this point (vv. 7-21). The world’s lightness is first compared with that of  a breeze (vv. 7-9): Levis sibilus est sonantis aurae, seu Neptune tua ambulat per arva, seu dum Flora tuum natat per aequor.

The last two verses were changed into […] seu tuos Tethis ambulet per agros, seu tuum Ceres ambulet per aequor.

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The modification was undoubtedly made in order to improve the technical quality of   the verses.25 But there is more to it than that. The new lines show a more conspicuous parallelism and ring composition, with a nicely anaphoric opening (“seu tuos Tethis – seu tuum Ceres”), a repetition of  the verb ambulet, and an anaphoric ending (per agros  – per aequor); each time pronoun and noun (tuos – per agros, tuum – per aequor) encircle the proper name and verb (Tethis ambulat, Ceres ambulat), thus visually reinforcing the image of  Tethis and Ceres wandering in the midst of  fields. At the same time, however, the changes have a serious impact on the image that is  evoked. In the original version, the proper names appear in the vocative; the subject of  ambulat and natat is  the sounding breeze mentioned in the previous line (“sonantis aurae”): that breeze is said to walk through Neptune’s plains (arva) and to swim through Flora’s surface (aequor). Noteworthy is  the strong inversion (walking through the sea, swimming through a  field full of  flowers). This suggestive and daring image has been considerably toned down in the later version. The walking and swimming breeze has been replaced with a water nymph and a goddess, who are simply said to walk through the fields; aequor in line 9 now unambiguously refers to the smooth surface of  land and is no longer explicitly connected with swimming. Moreover, the possessive pronouns have gained new status and meaning. In the original version, they refer to Neptune and Flora respectively; in the new version they refer, more vaguely, to the world mentioned in line  6. In short, in the original version it is a whistling breeze that flies over land and sea; in the new version Tethis and Ceres are wandering over the world, producing, as it were, an audible displacement of  air. In the original version it is precisely the whistling breeze that makes the listener assume their presence (hence the subjunctives introduced in the later version which lend the image a more hypothetical character). It is safe to conclude that, despite the obvious technical improvement of   the verses, the poetic image of  1627 lost quite a bit of  its potential and appeal. While the not entirely satisfactory changes made to the fourth emblematic poem were maintained in the edition of   1652, most, if   not all, of   the major modifications of   the 25  The elisis in line 8 (“tua ambulat”) has been eliminated so that a clear caesura appears after the third arsis, while the stopgap dum in line 9 has been eliminated. The more common spondaeic basis of  the original hendecasyllables has been replaced with a less common trochaeic one.

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1630 edition in emblem 10 and the following were undone in the third edition, in which the original verses, as they had been composed by the pupils of  the Antwerp Jesuit college, simply reappear.26 At least to a certain extent, then, the link with the original affixio, somewhat loosened by the interventions of   the anonymous reviser of  1630, was strengthened again.

Conclusion Typus mundi was deeply steeped in the educational practice and festive culture of   the Jesuit order in the early seventeenth century. Based on the emblematic affixio created by the most gifted rhetoricians of   the Jesuit college at Antwerp to adorn the celebration of   the lustrum of  Ignatius’s canonization in 1627, the emblem book printed and published by Jan Cnobbaert in the same year was more, or perhaps rather something else, than an aide-mémoire, a fête book meant to commemorate the jubilant festivity and preserve the splendid but ephemeral emblematic products which the pupils had created for that special occasion. Thanks to the joint efforts of   the pupils, the printer, and the engravers Philippe and Charles van Mallery, the temporal exhibition of  word and image was turned into a  slim but elegant volume which bore the typical features of  a  Jesuit devotional emblem book. Erudite and full of  wit, the emblems composed by the pupils of  the Antwerp Jesuit college appear to have been devised in such a way as to allow the reader/viewer to embark on a  meditational journey that would bring him from contemplation of  original sin and the many vices stemming from it to the heightened awareness of   the joy and bliss of  a  life entirely devoted to God.  Whereas quite a  few changes were made to the Latin text in the 1630 edition of  Typus mundi – some of   them more felicitous than others – these modifications were largely undone in the third edition, which was issued in 1652. As a result, the close connection between school exercise, affixio and printed emblem book was largely restored.

26  For our comparison we have made use of  a copy of  the 1652 edition preserved in the Maurits Sabbebibliotheek, Leuven, shelf  number P 246.5 Typus 1652.

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DIE METAMORPHOSES STYRIAE (GRAZ, 1722) DES LUDWIG DEBIEL SJ

Ovids Metamorphosen, um deren Rezeption in der neulateinischen Literatur es in diesem Beitrag gehen soll, sind ein Text, der den Autoren und Künstlern der verschiedensten Epochen als reiche Inspirationsquelle gedient hat. Schier unüberschaubar sind die künstlerischen Erzeugnisse, denen eine Verwandlungssage aus Ovids carmen perpetuum zugrunde liegt. Musiker, Maler, Bildhauer, Tapisseure, Skulpteure, Regisseure zeigten sich fasziniert von den Metamorphosen, man denken nur an die erste Oper Orfeo ed Euridice, Titians Diana und Callisto, Berninis Apollo und Daphne, die Bildteppiche der Diane de Poitiers, Auguste Rodins Monumentalskulptur La porte de l’enfer, oder auch Christophe Honorés Film Métamorphoses (Frankreich, 2014).1 Aus dieser reichhaltigen Rezeptionsgeschichte der Metamorphosen soll hier eine Spezialfrage herausgegriffen werden: Es soll unter einem philologisch-literaturgeschichtlichen Gesichtspunkt gefragt werden, wie es um die strukturelle Rezeption der Metamorphosen als lateinisches Großepos, als carmen perpetuum, in der neulateinischen Literatur bestellt ist.

1  Die Zahl der Arbeiten, die sich mit der Rezeptionsgeschichte von Ovids Metamorphosen beschäftigen, ist enorm. Einen Überblick bieten u. a. H. Walter, H.-J. Horn (ed.), Die Rezeption der “Metamorphosen” des Ovid in der Neuzeit. Der antike Mythos in Text und Bild (Berlin, 1995); Ph.  Hardie (ed.), Ovidian Transformations. Essays on the Metamorphoses and its Reception (Cambridge, 1999); M. Schmitz-Emans (ed.), Fortgesetzte Metamorphosen. Ovid und die ästhetische Moderne. Continuing Metamorphoses. Ovid and Aesthetic Modernity (Würzburg, 2010). Speziell zur Einbettung von Metamorphosen in literarische Werke vgl. C. Heselhaus, “Metamorphose-Dichtungen und Metamorphose-Anschauungen”, Euphorion 47 (1953), 121-146.

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 527-543 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124081

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Struktur der Metamorphosen Ovids Die Frage nach der genauen Struktur, nach dem Werkaufbau der Metamorphosen Ovids wurde zwar schon häufig gestellt und traktiert, aber zu einer befriedigenden Lösung ist die Forschung bisher noch nicht gekommen.2 Ovid behandelt in seinem hexametrischen Epos – allein in der Wahl des Metrums besteht ein klares Signal für die gattungsmäßige Einordnung des Textes – ca. 250 Verwandlungssagen. Legt man den Gesamtumfang von ca.  12.000 Versen zugrunde, so entfallen auf  jede Metamorphose im Durchschnitt etwas weniger als 50 Verse. Als grundlegendes Gliederungsprinzip wirkt die Chronologie: Ovid beginnt sein Werk mit der Schöpfung der Welt und beschließt es mit der Apotheose Caesars im Jahre 44 v.  Chr. bzw. mit der Parallelisierung Jupiters mit Kaiser Augustus. Ovid endet also in seiner eigenen Zeit. Formal gliedert sich das Werk in 15 Bücher. Zweimal kommt Ovid in seiner späteren Dichtung, in den Tristien, auf  die Metamorphosen explizit zu sprechen und spricht dabei expressis verbis aus, dass sie sich aus dreimal fünf  Büchern, also aus drei Pentaden, zusammensetzen (Trist. 1.1.117-118: “Sunt quoque mutatae, ter quinque volumina, formae, / nuper ab exequiis carmina rapta meis”; Trist. 3.14.19-20: “Sunt quoque mutatae, ter quinque volumina, formae,  / carmina de domini funere rapta sui”). Auf  der Grundlage dieses Selbstzeugnisses lag es nahe, im Gedicht selbst nach Gliederungselementen zu suchen, die diese Einteilung rechtfertigen, und man wurde fündig: Thematisch unterscheiden sich die Pentaden insofern, als es in den Büchern 1-5 in erster Linie um Götter, in den Büchern 6-10 um Heroen und in den Büchern 11-15 um Menschen, also um die historische Zeit im engeren Sinn, geht. Am Ende jeder Pentade findet sich eine Passage, die das in den letzten fünf Büchern Erzählte rekapituliert: die Erzählung der Muse 2  Aus der reichen Forschungsliteratur, die sich mit dem Aufbau und der Struktur der ovidischen Metamorphosen beschäftigen, seien exemplarisch folgende Publikationen genannt: F.  Lenz, “Betrachtungen zu einer neuen Untersuchung über die Struktur und Einheit der Metamorphosen Ovids”, Helikon 7  (1967), 493-506; R.  Coleman, “Structure and Intention in the Metamorphoses”, Classical Q uarterly 21 (1971), 461477; R.  Rieks, “Zum Aufbau von Ovids Metamorphosen”, Würzburger Jahrbücher für die Altertumswissenschaft 6b (1980), 85-103; A. Crabbe, “Structure and Content in Ovid’s Metamorphoses”, Aufstieg und Niedergang der Römischen Welt 2.31.4 (1981), 2274-2327; St. M.  Wheeler, Narrative Dynamics in Ovid’s Metamorphoses (Tübingen, 2000).

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(Met. 5.250-678), der Gesang des Orpheus (Met. 10.143-739) und die Rede des Pythagoras (Met. 15.75-478).3 Während bei diesen Beobachtungen eine gewisse Übereinstimmung in der Forschung erzielt werden konnte, muss man doch eingestehen, dass diese Gliederung noch sehr grob ist und den Detailaufbau der Metamorphosen nicht zu erklären vermag. Bereits bei der Bucheinteilung muss man ein caveat anmelden: Sind die Einschnitte nach den Büchern 5 und 10 recht klar, legt es Ovid zwischen den meisten anderen Büchern eher darauf  an, die Buchgrenze zu verwischen oder zumindest undeutlich zu machen. Ein Gliederungsprinzip, das in der Mikrostruktur der Metamorphosen eine große Rolle spielt, ist das der variatio, und zwar auf  unterscheidlichsten Ebenen: Erstens bemüht sich Ovid um Abwechslung in der Art der Verwandlungen selbst: Menschen werden in Vögel verwandelt, in andere Tiere, sie werden Pflanzen, sie werden Steine oder Seeungeheuer oder einfach nur Q uellen. Wer Glück hat, wie Aeneas oder Romulus, wird unter die Götter versetzt, andere, wie Caesar, werden Kometen. Es gibt eine breite Palette möglicher Verwandlungen, die Ovid zu variieren versteht. Ovid variiert auch die Art der literarischen Genera, auf  denen er seine Verwandlungen jeweils fußen lässt: Viele Verwandlungssagen spielen in der Welt der Elegie, Liebeshändel welcher Art auch immer liegen ihnen zugrunde und führen letztlich zur Verwandlung. Eine solche kann auch aus einem rein kriegerischen Geschehen hervorgehen und ein episches Vorbild haben. Einem nicht unbedeutenden Teil der Metamorphosen liegen komödienhafte Elemente zugrunde – kurz: Ovid variiert den literarischen Subtext seiner Metamorphosen. Schließlich bietet Ovid eine breite Vielfalt verschiedener Erzählinstanzen: Der Erzähler der Metamorphosen bleibt nicht über das ganze Gedicht hinweg derselbe allwissende Erzähler. Vielmehr bedient sich Ovid zahlreicher Techniken, um die Erzählsituation zu variieren: Er führt intradiegetische Erzähler ein, verengt die Perspektive durch interne focalizers, besonders gerne durch große Frauengestalten, oder verlagert die Erzählung in die Beschreibung von Kunstwerken.

3 Ausführlich zu den Enden der Metamorphosen-Bücher 5 und 10 und der Bedeutung dieser klaren Einschnitte für die Gesamtstruktur des Epos vgl. N. Holzberg, “Ter quinque volumina as carmen perpetuum. The Division into Books in Ovid’s Metamorphoses”, Materiali e discussioni 40 (1998), 77-98.

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In Summe kann zur Struktur und zum Aufbau der Metamorphosen festgehalten werden, dass es nach wie vor keine universale Erklärung für die Werkstruktur gibt, dass aber zahlreiche Merkmale bestimmt werden konnten, die wesentlich und charakteristisch für die Metamorphosen sind.

Neulateinische Metamorphosen Dieser kurze Blick auf  die Struktur der Metamorphosen Ovids war nötig, weil diese Punkte wesentlich für die Widerlegung einer These sind, die zur Erklärung einer auffälligen Lücke in der Rezeption der Metamorphosen vorgeschlagen wurde, nämlich dem auffälligen Fehlen neulateinischer Metamorphosen. Damit soll nicht gesagt werden, dass die Metamorphosen überhaupt nicht rezipiert wurden – der eingangs gebotene Katalog war plakativ – sondern es geht darum, dass Ovid in der neulateinischen Literatur mit seiner Metamorphosendichtung keine strukturellen Nachahmer gefunden hat. Heinz Hofmann, einer der besten Kenner der neulateinischen Literatur, hat dieses Phänomen in einem grundlegenden Artikel zum neulateinischen Epos folgendermaßen zusammengefasst: Ovids Metamorphosen haben als mythologisches Epos […] zu keiner direkten Nachfolge in der neulateinischen Epik des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts geführt. Dies mag erstaunlich sein angesichts der extrem intensiven Ovid-Rezeption der Humanisten und ihrer Nachfolger im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert, doch gibt es kaum ein Epos, das – ähnlich wie so viele neulateinische Epen die Aeneis – seinerseits nun die Metamorphosen insgesamt nachgestaltet oder ihre Strukturen als Bezugs- und Referenztext in neue Zusammenhänge eingeformt hätte.4

Wenn man dieses Urteil zwei Jahrzehnte nach seiner Veröffentlichung einer neuerlichen Überprüfung unterzieht, kann man es fast bestätigen: Inzwischen sind in der Forschung mehrere hundert neulateinische Epen bekannt,5 und in der Tat ist es so, dass (spätestens 4  H.  Hofmann, “Von Africa über Bethlehem nach America: Das Epos in der neulateinischen Literatur”, in J.  Rüpke (ed.), Von Göttern und Menschen erzählen. Formkonstanzen und Funktionswandel vormoderner Epik (Stuttgart, 2001), 130-182, hier 135. 5  Einen Überblick über die neulateinische Epik bieten J. IJsewijn, D. Sacré (ed.), Companion to Neo-Latin Studies. Part II. Literary, Linguistic, Philological and Editorial Q uestions (Leuven, 1998), 24-45; C.  Kallendorf, “The Neo-Latin Epic”, in Ph.  Ford, J.  Bloemendal, Ch.  Fantazzi (ed.), Brill’s Encyclopaedia of   the Neo-Latin World (Leiden  – Boston, 2014), 449-460; F.  Schaffenrath, “Narrative Poetry”, in

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ab dem 16. Jahrhundert) Vergils Aeneis das alles überragende Strukturvorbild für die meisten dieser Texte ist. Aber das Urteil ist nur mehr fast richtig, denn es sind inzwischen einige Gedichte aufgetaucht und untersucht worden, die sich explizit in die Nachfolge Ovids stellen wollen und die die Metamorphosen nicht nur thematisch, sondern eben auch strukturell in ihrer Gesamtkonzeption imitieren.6 Eine kleine Zahl von neulateinischen Epen zeigt allein schon durch die Titelgestaltung, dass hier eigene Wege beschritten werden: Die meisten Titel neulateinischer Epen enden in der Nachfolge Homers und Vergils auf  -as oder -is (z.  B. Filelfos Sphortias oder Frischlins Hebraeis), doch die Epen dieser Gruppe nennen sich dezidiert Metamorphoses und machen damit von Beginn an den Bezug zu Ovids Text explizit. Bereits Gerard Genette hat den Titel eines Werkes als ersten Schlüssel zu seinem Verständnis bezeichnet; durch die Titelwahl Metamorphoses wird der Leser somit in eine ganz bestimmte Erwartungs- und Perzeptionshaltung versetzt. Es handelt sich bei diesen Werken um längere, d.  h. mehrere hundert bzw. tausend Verse umfassende Gedichte in daktylischen Hexametern, in denen eine Reihe von Verwandlungen thematisiert wird, die erzähltechnisch mehr oder weniger raffiniert miteinander verbunden werden. Von anderen langen Hexameterdichtungen, die ebenfalls Verwandlungsgeschichten enthalten, unterscheiden sich diese Texte darin, dass hier die Metamorphosen im Zentrum der Erzählung stehen und dass ihre Verbindung letztlich das ganze Gedicht ausmacht. Thematisch lassen sich zwei Untergruppen dieser Metamorphosen-Dichtungen voneinander trennen: Bei der ersten Gruppe handelt es sich um Gedichte sakralen Inhalts: Hier haben sich Autoren der Mühe unterzogen, die Bibel in episches Gewand zu kleiden und dabei in erster Linie solche Erzählelemente auszuS. Knight, St. Tilg (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of  Neo-Latin (Oxford, 2015), 57-72; P. Gwynne, “Epic”, in V. Moul (ed.), A Guide to Neo-Latin Literature (Cambridge, 2017), 200-220; F. Schaffenrath, “Neo-Latin Epic”, in M. Sgarbi (ed.), Encyclopedia of  Renaissance Philosophy (Cham, 2018), 1-6. 6  Unter den frühen Publikationen, die sich mit dem Problem der Metamorphosen-­ Rezeption beschäftigt haben, sind zu nennen L.  Szörényi, “De carminibus heroicis Ovidium Vergiliumque imitantibus a  Patribus Societatis Jesu provinciae Austriacae saeculis XVII-XVIII scriptis”, in P. Tuynman (ed.), Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Amste­ lodamensis (München, 1979), 965-975 und A.  Thill, “Métamorphoses néo-latines”, in W. Schubert (ed.), Ovid. Werk und Wirkung (Frankfurt a.M., 1999), 967-975.

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wählen und zu verbinden, in denen eine Verwandlung vorkommt. Im Gegensatz zu anderen Bibelepen bietet sich gerade vor diesem Auswahlkriterium Ovid als Vorbild an. Aus dieser Gruppe sind heute Texte aus dem 16. und 17. Jahrhundert aus Deutschland und aus England bekannt.7 Die zweite Gruppe wird von Gedichten mit geographisch-aitiologischen Metamorphosen gebildet, die die Genese von bestimmten Ländern, Flüssen, Bergen und Städten thematisieren. Alle bisher bekannten Texte dieser Gruppe stammen aus der ersten Hälfte des 18. Jahrhunderts und sind im Umfeld des Jesuitenordens entstanden.8

Geographisch-aitiologische Metamorphosen Auf die Existenz der geographisch-aitiologischen Metamorphosen haben in jüngerer Zeit besonders die Forschungen der Wiener Neulateiner, die sich mehrere Jahre lang mit den Erzeugnissen der poetischen Habsburg-Panegyrik beschäftigt haben,9 hingewiesen. Sie sind auf  die Metamorphoses Hungariae (Trnava, 1716) des Peter Schez (1651-1756), die Metamorphoses Styriae (Graz, 1722) des Ludwig Debiel (1697-1771) und die Metamorphoses Austriae 7  Zu dieser Gruppe gehören folgende Werke: F. Dedekind, Metamorphoses sacrae (Schmalkalden, 1565), vgl. G. Ellinger, B. Ristow, “Neulateinische Dichtung Deutschlands im 16. Jahrhundert”, Reallexikon der deutschen Literaturgeschichte 2  (1965), 620-645, hier 636; Hofmann 2001 (wie Anm.  4), 168; P.  Panter, Metamorphoseon quae in S. Scriptura extant libri sex (London, 1651), vgl. L. Bradner, Musae Anglicanae. A History of  Anglo-Latin Poetry (New York  – London, 1940), 196; B.  Pannagl, Metamorphosis metamorphoseos sive transmutatio profanarum fictionum Ovidii in sacras Veritates Evangelii, ad christianae poëseos emolumentum compendio exhibita (Prag, 1712), vgl. L. Szörényi, “L’epopea Columbus di Ubertino Carrara e il modello d’epopea neolatina”, in K. Kürtösi (ed.), Celebrating Comparativism. Papers Offered for György M. Vajda and István Fried (Szeged, 1994), 415-426, hier 424. 8   Zu dieser Gruppe gehören folgende Werke: P.  Schez, Metamorphosis Hungariae (Trnava, 1716), vgl. Szörenyi 1979 (wie Anm. 6), 967-969; Hofmann 2001 (wie Anm. 4), 155; E. Klecker, “Ovidrezeption in der neulateinischen Habsburg-Panegyrik”, in B. Waźbińska, J. Domański (ed.), Owidiusz. Twórczość-recepcja-legenda (Warschau, 2006), 197-216, hier 198-199; E.  Klecker, “Spiegelungen. Wien und Bratislava in der neulateinischen Dichtung”, Graecolatina et Orientalia 29-30 (2007), 149-169; L. Debiel, Metamorphoses Styriae (Graz, 1722), siehe unten; F. Dolfin, Metamorphoses Austriae sive Relatio fabulosa de ortu et progressu Austriae (Wien, 1732), vgl. Szörenyi 1979 (wie Anm.  6), 969-970; Hofmann 2001 (wie Anm.  4), 154; Klecker 2006 (wie Anm. 8), 199-200. 9 Vgl.  F. Römer, “Klassische Bildung im Dienst habsburgischer Propaganda. Lateinische Panegyrik in der Donaumonarchie”, International Journal for the Classical Tradition 5 (1998), 195-203.

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(Wien 1733) des Franz Dolfin (1697-1775) gestoßen. Alle genannten Autoren waren Jesuiten und dürften einander gekannt haben. Um einen Einblick in den Charakter dieser Werke zu gewinnen, wird im Folgenden ein exemplarischer Blick auf die Verwandlungen der Steiermark geworfen. Dieses 1722 in Graz entstandene Werk verfolgte das Ziel, die Steiermark zu feiern,10 und scheint sich großer Beliebtheit erfreut zu haben, wurde es doch noch einige Jahrzehnte später von Karl Klein in den ersten Band seiner Analecta poetica provinciae Austriacae Societatis Iesu aufgenommen.11 Der Autor, Ludwig Debiel (auch de Biel), wurde 1697 in Wien geboren, trat in den Jesuitenorden ein und wirkte als Lehrer in Graz, später wieder in Wien.12 Er wurde mit einigen Leitungsfunktionen betraut; so leitete er etwa das von Maria Theresia gegründete Theresianum in Wien und war ab 1760 Kanzler der Universität Graz. Als Wissenschaftler beschäftigte er sich im Bereich der Theologie mit Dogmatik und Kontroverstheologie,13 und er erwarb sich auch 10   So wird in der Vorrede an die “Illustrissimi, perillustres, reverendi, religiosi, praenobiles, nobiles ac eruditi domini, domini Neo-Baccalaurei” als Ziel der Schrift angegeben “Styriam celebrare” (Debiel 1722, wie Anm. 8, A2r). 11  K. Klein (ed.), Analecta poetica provinciae Austriacae Societatis Iesu. Analectorum epicorum pars I (Wien, 1755), 31-183. Klein stellt seiner Edition einige Zeilen voran, in denen er erklärt, warum er das Gedicht gerade an dieser Stelle in seine Sammlung einfügt. Er widmet das Gedicht besonders der steirischen Jugend: “Felicem Nasonis metamorphoseon imitatorem, in primis florentissimae offerimus Graecensis Academiae iuventuti, in cuius utilitatem mirifica naturae artisque opera ceteraque ornamenta patriae et veteres maxime memorias paullo copiosius peregimus.” (31-32). 12   Debiels Leben ist wiederholt dargestellt worden: J. N. Stöger, “Debiel, Louis”, in A. de Backer, Bibliothèque des écrivains de la Compagnie de Jésus ou notices bibliographiques, Bd. 5 (Liège, 1839), 159-161; Id., “Debiel, Ludovicus”, in Scriptores Provinciae Austriacae Societatis Jesu (Wien, 1855), 54; A.  Weiß, “Debiel, Ludwig”, in Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie 4 (1876), 791; M. Glück, Die “Metamorphoses Sty­ riae” des P. Ludwig Debiel S.J. (Diss. Wien, 1999), 8-12; H. Platzkummer, “Debiel (De Biel) Ludwig”, in Ch. O’Neill, J. M. Domínguez (ed.), Diccionario histórico de la Compañía de Jesús. Biográfico-temático, Bd. 2 (Madrid, 2001), 1065-1066. Zu seiner Rolle als erster Rektor des von Maria Theresia in Wien gestifteten Theresianums vgl.  A.  Geusa, Geschichte der Stiftungen, Erziehungs- und Unterrichtsanstalten in Wien (Wien, 1803), 341. 1752 arbeitete er eine neue Studienordnung für die theologische Fakultät der Wiener Universität aus, vgl.  W.  Telesko, “Das Programm der Deckenmalereien im Johannessaal der alten Wiener Universität”, in M. Csáky et al. (ed.), Barock – ein Ort des Gedächtnisses (Wien, 2007), 17-37, hier 21. Er errichtete 1754 ein Buß- und Bekehrungshaus für reumütige Sünder in der Grünangergasse in Wien, vgl.  J.  B. Weis, Der österreichische Volksfreund, Bd.  2 (Wien, 1830), 362. Zu seiner Tätigkeit als Kanzler der Grazer Universität vgl.  Kaiserlich-Königlicher innerösterreichischer Schematismus auf  das Jahr 1771 (Graz, 1771), 28. 13   Hier sind seine in mehreren Bänden erschienenen Assertiones theologicae zu nennen.

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als Numismatiker 14 einiges Ansehen. Besonders in seinen frühen Lebensjahren trat er auch als Dichter hervor. Seine 1722 veröffentlichten Metamorphoses Styriae sind ein Musterbeispiel für die geographisch-aitiologische Untergruppe der Metamorphosendichtungen. Debiel hat das Epos im Alter von 25 Jahren verfasst. Ein weiteres Gedicht aus Debiels Feder schaffte es in den Druck: 1733 erschien in Wien seine Ars scutaria, ein Lehrgedicht bzw. Prosimetron über Heraldik, dessen Proömium in bemerkenswerter Weise auf  die frühere Metamorphosen-Dichtung Bezug nimmt (Ars scutaria, pars 1.1-5): Astra deosque canant cognataque numina coelo fulmineumque Iovem aut subter mole superbae Mempheos et regum cineres et nomina grandi sollicitent cythara, mutent hi corpora rebus aut celebrent stantes iam Caesaris aere colossos […] Andere mögen Sterne und Götter besingen, wie Gottheiten zusammen mit dem Himmel entstanden sind, wie Juppiter Blitze schleudert, oder sie sollen zur hohen Lyra die Asche und die bloßen Namen von Königen unter der Last des stolzen Memphis besingen; andere sollen sich Körper in Dinge verwandeln lassen oder kolossale Kaiserstandbilder aus Bronze feiern, […]

Wenn Debiel es hier in V. 4 anderen überlässt, Verwandlungssagen zu beschreiben (“mutent hi corpora rebus”), spielt er damit auf  Ovid und seine Metamorphosen an (Met. 1.1-2: “In nova fert animus mutatas dicere formas  / corpora”). Er grenzt sich aber gleichzeitig auch von seiner eigenen früheren Dichtung ab, denn in seinen Metamorphoses Styriae geht es gerade darum, wie sich Körper in Dinge verwandelt haben. Die Metamorphoses Styriae bestehen nach einer 20 elegische Distichen umfassenden praefatio aus 2596 Hexametern, eingeteilt in 35 Paragraphen, in denen die Entstehung des Landes Steiermark, seiner Städte, Flüsse, Berge und Höhlen, beschrieben wird. In der metrisch gestalteten praefatio redet der Dichter die Personifikation der Steiermark an und beschreibt ihr sein Vorhaben (Metamorphoses Styriae, praefatio 31-32):

14  Als Numismatiker bekannt wurde er vor allem mit seinem Werk Utilitas rei numariae veteris compendio proposita (Nürnberg, 1733).

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Scilicet est animus rerum meminisse tuarum in nova versarum corpora, diva fave! Es ist nämlich meine Absicht, daran zu erinnern, wie sich all deine Teile in neue Körper verwandelt haben. Göttin, steh mir bei!

In einem ersten Werkteil 15 tritt König Vindus in seiner Residenzstadt Celeia auf, der damit zu kämpfen hat, dass ein Teil seines Königreiches – eben die spätere Steiermark – so sumpfig und wild ist, dass er unbewohnbar ist. Zudem treibt dort ein wildes Ungeheuer sein Unwesen. Der Kriegerin Tauriscia gelingt es mit Hilfe des Gottes Mars, das Ungeheuer zu töten, sie selbst aber muss daraufhin auch sterben; sie wird in ein Land, Stiria, die Steiermark, verwandelt, aus den Tränen, die Mars über ihren Tod vergießt, entsteht der Fluss Mürz. Jupiter verkündet, dass von den beiden Söhnen des Königs Vindus, Mura und Petovius, derjenige die Herrschaft über das neu entstandene Land erlangen soll, der als erster von den Tränen des Mars trinkt. Auf  jeden Fall soll aber Mura Tauriscias Tochter Graecia heiraten. Aufgrund von Hofintrigen fliehen Mura und Graecia und werden von Petovius, der es selbst auf  Graecia abgesehen hat, verfolgt. Zufällig trinkt Mura als erster aus der Mürz, was den Kampf  zwischen den beiden Halbbrüdern aber nicht beendet. In einer an Pyramus und Thisbe erinnernden Geschichte werden Mura und Graecia zu Fluss und Stadt, die von Petovius weiter belagert wird. Nach zahlreichen Kriegsepisoden wird Petovius von Mars im Kampf  besiegt und in eine Stadt (Pettau bzw. Ptuj) verwandelt. Die Einwohner des neuen Landes Stiria beschließen, die Königsherrschaft abzuschütteln, und wählen Retla zu ihrem ersten freien Konsul. König Vindus marschiert ein, wird aber schon in der ersten Schlacht geschlagen, sodass nun sein Reich Stiria zugeschlagen wird. Der aus Ungarn stammende Prinz Sava wirbt um Retlas Tochter Duromontia und entführt sie; die Verfolgung trägt brutale Züge und führt schließlich zur Vernichtung der gesamten Familie Retlas, der selbst in den Restelberg verwandelt wird. Am Ende des Gedichtes, das hier nur in seinen Grundzügen vorgestellt wurde, wendet sich Mars an seinen Vater Jupiter und fragt ihn, was dereinst aus seinem schönen Land werden soll. In einer prophetischen Schau zeigt ihm 15  Einen detaillierteren Überblick über den Inhalt der Metamorphoses Styriae bietet Glück 1999 (wie Anm. 12), 25-33.

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Jupiter die Seelen der künftigen Habsburger, die in Zukunft über die Steiermark herrschen würden. In Summe verbindet das Gedicht 43 Metamorphosen, wobei meistens (23 Metamorphosen) Personen der Handlung in Flüsse oder Städte verwandelt werden. Seltener sind Verwandlungen von Menschen in ortsübliche Tiere (z. B. wird der Knabe Dama in eine Gämse verwandelt, § 9) oder Pflanzen (z. B. wird Rosilla in einen Rosengarten am Rosenberg bei Graz verwandelt, § 14). Vergleicht man die Proportionen von Debiels und Ovids Dichtung, kommt man in beiden Werken in etwa auf  dieselbe Zahl von Versen, die pro Metamorphose durchschnittlich verwendet werden: In Debiels Gedicht umfasst eine Verwandlungssage durchschnittlich 54 Verse. Die Metamorphoses Styriae sind nicht wie Ovids Metamorphosen in 15 Bücher, sondern in 35 Paragraphen, umrahmt von einer praefatio und einer peroratio,16 eingeteilt. Am Beginn jedes Paragraphen verrät eine knappe Überschrift, worum es in den folgenden Versen gehen wird. Dieses Untergliederungssystem könnte zu dem Schluss verleiten, dass es sich bei den Metamorphoses Styriae um ein Sammelsurium verschiedenster Texte handelt, nicht aber um ein zusammenhängendes Ganzes. Dem ist jedoch nicht so: Der Text hängt zusammen und bildet ein stimmiges Ganzes; an einigen Stellen wirken die Einschnitte durch die Paragraphennummerierung sogar störend und unterbrechen den Erzählfluss, was sich an zwei konkreten Phänomenen zeigen lässt: (1.) Nicht selten finden diese Einschnitte mitten im Vers statt (mitten im Vers findet der Paragraphenwechsel statt zwischen den Paragraphen 12 und 13, 17 und 18, 18 und 19, 21 und 22). (2.) Eine enge Verbindung über die Paragraphenfuge hinweg stellen anaphorische Demonstrativpronomina dar; wenn es zu Beginn von § 14 beispielsweise heißt “Fratris enim vix ille fugam bene senserat” (Met. 14.1) verweist ille auf  den am Ende des letzten Paragraphen genannten Petovius, der am Beginn von § 14 bemerkt, dass sein Halbbruder Mura die Flucht ergriffen hat, aber nicht erneut namentlich erwähnt wird. Ovids Metamorphosen sind dafür bekannt, dass sie (anders als etwa Vergils Aeneis) versuchen, die Übergänge zwischen den einzelnen Büchern möglichst zu verwischen. Wenn nun Debiel seine Metamorphosen auch nicht

16  Auch Ovid beginnt mit einem stark poetiologisch aufgeladenen prooemium und endet mit einer Sphragis.

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in einzelne Bücher gliedert, so imitiert er doch diese Technik der verwischten Übergänge zwischen einzelnen Baugliedern.

Charakteristika der Metamorphoses Styriae In seiner Einleitung zur Edition des Gedichtes in den oben genannten Analecta poetica nennt Karl Klein Debiel einen “felicem Nasonis metamorphoseon imitatorem”.17 Diese glückliche Ovidnachfolge soll an drei für Ovid typischen Phänomenen überprüft werden: (1.) an der sprachlichen Imitation, (2.) an der Verschachtelung der Erzählung und (3.) am verstärkten Interesse an der weiblichen Psychologie. Sprachliche Imitation Der Jesuit Debiel war selbst ein Schüler des Jesuitengymnasiums, in dem er bereits zu einem sehr frühen Zeitpunkt mit der Sprache und der Poesie Ovids vertraut wurde, und zwar nicht nur passiv, sondern auch aktiv beim Verfassen eigener Gedichte. In seinem Epos nun ahmt er auf  sprachlicher Ebene die gewitzt verspielte Leichtigkeit – oder in den Worten Italo Calvinos seine legge­ rezza 18 – nach, mit der Ovid erzählt. Sprachspiele, eingeschobene Autorenkommentare (wie mirabile dictu), pointierte Wendungen und Vieles mehr charakterisieren diesen Stil, den Debiel perfekt zu imitieren versteht. Ein frappierendes Beispiel findet sich in § 26: In einer Nacht- und Nebelaktion hat sich ein Mädchen namens Vindica, das der jungen Graecia sehr ähnlich sieht, ins Lager des Petovius begeben, der Graecia gerade im vindischen Gebiet belagert. Sie bietet sich ihm dar und bittet ihn, sie zur Frau zu nehmen. Daraufhin heißt es (Metamorphoses Styriae 26.45-48): Exsilit ille suo, quem fesso corpore lectum pressit, et “Optatam teneo te, Graecia, praedam” ingemit. “O Vindis non assimilanda puellis!” Audit ea et sibi se praeferri ridet […] Petovius sprang vom Bett auf, auf  dem er mit müdem Leib gelegen hatte, und seufzte: “Habe ich dich nun endlich, meine Graecia, die

  Klein 1755 (wie Anm. 11), 31.  I. Calvino, Lezioni americane (Mailand, 1993), 7-35.

17 18

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Beute, nach der es mich so lange verlangt hat! Oh wie lässt du dich doch mit keinem der vindischen Mädchen vergleichen!” Vindica hörte es und musste darüber lachen, dass sie sich selbst vorgezogen wurde.

Der Witz der Stelle liegt darin, dass der Leser die tragische Ironie im Seufzer des Petovius erkennt, gleich wie Vindica, die sich als vindisches Mädchen eben sehrwohl mit Graecia vergleichen lässt. Die aus Ovids Somnus-Episode entlehnte Formulierung in Vers 48 (vgl. Met. 11.621 “excussit tandem sibi se”) gibt der Szene durch ein Aprosdoketon eine zusätzliche Pointe mit ovidischem Flair. Ein zweites Beispiel bezieht sich auf typisch ovidische Wortwiederholungen unter wechselnden Gesichtspunkten. Diese werden bei Debiel nicht nur eingesetzt, um der Erzählung Tiefe und Plastizität zu verleihen – so Michael von Albrechts Erklärung des Phänomens bei Ovid 19 – sondern fungieren insbesondere auch als intertextuelle Marker zum ovidischen Vorbild. In § 12 möchte Rosilla von Merkur wissen, wie ihr Bruder die Herrschaft über das Land erlangen kann (Metamorphoses Styriae 12.58-60): Illa rogavit his tenebras demat verbis arcanaque pandat. His tenebras dempsit verbis arcanaque pandit. […] Sie bat ihn darum, die Dunkelheit von diesen Worten zu entfernen und ihr das Geheimnis zu offenbaren. Er entfernte die Dunkelheit von diesen Worten und offenbarte ihr das Geheimnis.

Der Witz in der Formulierung liegt darin, dass die Aussage fast identisch wiederholt wird; 20 nur die Verbalform wird verändert, um zu zeigen, dass ihre Bitte erhört wurde. Vergleichbar aus dem 13. Buch der Metamorphosen Ovids ist die Bitte der Töchter des Anius an Bacchus, ihnen zu Hilfe zu kommen (Met. 13.669-670): […] “Bacche pater, fer opem!” dixere, tulitque muneris auctor opem “Vater Bacchus, komm uns zu Hilfe!” So sprachen sie, und der Urheber dieser Wohltat kam ihnen zu Hilfe. 19  M. von Albrecht, Geschichte der römischen Literatur von Andronicus bis Boethius, zweite, verbesserte Auflage (München – New Providence – London – Paris, 1994), 638. 20  Von der sprachlichen Struktur her vergleichbar ist die Stelle Metamorphoses Styriae 4.45-47 “[…] toto ‘Tauriscia’ clamat ab ore / nec, quam suspiret, quam toto clamet ab ore / noscit adhuc.”

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Die Wiederholung der Aussage bei gleichzeitiger Abwandlung (an der zuletzt zitierten Stelle etwa in Tempus bzw. Modus) schafft bei Debiel ovidisches Flair und wirkt witzig verspielt. Erzählstruktur Debiel wollte sich aber nicht nur auf sprachlich-stilistischer Ebene an Ovid anschließen, sondern auch in der Erzählstruktur: Bekanntlich erzählt Ovid keine ausschließlich linear fortschreitende Geschichte, sondern setzt eine beeindruckende Fülle von Strategien ein, wie er die einzelnen Verwandlungen erzählerisch miteinander verbinden kann; es wurde einleitend auf  ein paar mögliche Techniken hingewiesen (z. B. durch intradiegetische Erzähler, ekphraseis oder genealogische Verflechtungen). Debiel kopiert diese Techniken bereits in den ersten fünf  Paragraphen seines Gedichts: Dort wird zunächst beschrieben, wie König Vindus versucht, ein in seinem Land wütendes Ungeheuer zu besiegen. Da treten die Kriegerin Tauriscia und ihre Tochter Graecia auf  (§§ 1-3). In § 4 wird in einer Rückblende nachgetragen, wie Tauriscia aus dem Haupt ihres Vaters Taurus entsprungen ist, in § 5, wie sie Penthesilea in den Trojanischen Krieg folgte. Dort traf sie auf Mars, dessen burleske Auseinandersetzung mit Amor, der kräftig versohlt wird, geschildert wird. Es handelt sich also um eine Erzählung, die drei Ebenen aufweist: Auf der ersten Ebene wird das Eingreifen Tauriscias in die Geschehnisse rund um König Vindus geschildert. Auf  der zweiten Ebene wird die Geburt und Vergangenheit Tauriscias nachgeliefert, und eingefügt in diese biographische Rückblende findet sich auf der dritten Ebene die Auseinandersetzung zwischen Mars und Amor. Die drei Ebenen sind ineinander verschachtelt, aber der Erzähler bleibt in allen drei Fällen der allwissende Erzähler des Epos. Es findet sich bei Debiel auch die bei Ovid beliebte Technik, dass eine Figur der Geschichte die Rolle des Erzählers übernimmt: In §  9 erzählt Orythia dem Zyklopen, der sich in sie verliebt hat und der ihr nun ernstlich zusetzen will, mehrere Geschichten, um ihn einzuschläfern. Ihre Erzählsituation ähnelt der des Merkur vor Ios Wächter Argus, wobei sie schließlich nach all ihren Erzählungen zusammen mit dem Zyklopen in ein Bergwerk verwandelt wird (§ 10).

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Weibliche Figuren Ein weiterer Aspekt an Debiels Ovidnachfolge ist auffällig: An Ovid wurde häufig bemerkt, dass er besonderes Interesse an der weiblichen Psychologie erkennen lässt. Das bemerkenswerteste Werk in dieser Hinsicht sind seine Heroides, aber auch in den Metamorphosen finden sich entsprechende Passagen, die ein Geschehen aus der Fokalisierung einer Frau nachvollziehbar machen. Hier eröffnet Ovid seinen Lesern eine Innenschau und lässt die Zerwürfnisse, Unsicherheiten, das Hinundhergerissensein seiner Protagonistinnen sichtbar werden. Ähnliches bietet auch Debiel seinen Lesern: Während seine männlichen Figuren eher oberflächlich und blass bleiben, verwendet er viel Energie darauf, seine Protagonistinnen nicht nur plastisch werden zu lassen, sondern auch ihr Innenleben auszuleuchten, ihr inneres Ringen und Hadern, etwa wenn Rosilla damit kämpft, ob sie ihrem Bruder gestehen soll, dass ihr von Merkur die Unschuld geraubt wurde (Metamorphoses Styriae 13.12-36). Die am ausführlichsten beschriebene Figur ist hier Duromontia, eine Tochter des Konsuls Retla, aus der später die Stadt Hartberg werden soll (§§ 29-33): Sie wird ganz nach dem Vorbild der Medea gestaltet, was umso bemerkenswerter ist, als Medea im Œuvre Ovids immer besondere Aufmerksamkeit geschenkt wurde, war doch der Verlust seiner Tragödie Medea zu betrauern. Duromontias Vater Retla hat einen auswärtigen Prinz namens Sava aus guten Gründen ins Gefängnis werfen lassen. Duromontia hat Mitleid mit ihm, ist aber zwischen der Loyalität zu ihrem Vater Retla und der Liebe zu Sava hin- und hergerissen. Sie verflucht ihre Schönheit, die Savas Liebe für sie erst entflammt hat. Als sie dann aber hört, dass Sava einem Drachen zum Fraß vorgeworfen werden soll, beschließt sie, ihn zu retten, koste es, was es wolle (Metamorphoses Styriae 30.30-31): Per fas perque nefas, per et intentata tueri crimina constituit Savam. Sie beschloss, Sava durch Recht, durch Unrecht, durch noch nie versuchte Verbrechen zu retten.

Duromontia weiß, dass ihr Vater den Drachen mit einem magischen Zweig bezähmen kann. Diesen will sie Sava bringen, um dann mit ihm zusammen auf  einem Wagen die Flucht zu ergreifen. Sie sorgt sich, was passieren würde, wenn ihr Vater versuchen sollte, sie 540

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aufzuhalten. Schließlich setzt sie ihren Plan in die Tat um. Sava erhält den Zweig und kann damit den Drachen bezwingen. Duromontia lockt ihren kleinen Bruder Sulmo zu sich und reißt ihn auf  den Fluchtwagen. Retla wird alarmiert, doch als er den Flüchtenden nachsetzt und sie fast eingeholt hat, zerstückelt Duromontia ihren Bruder und wirft ihn vom Wagen. Die Sonne verfinstert sich, die Erde bebt, Retla gibt die Verfolgung auf. Sulmos Leiche verwandelt sich in einen See. Dass diese Handlung nach der Geschichte von Medea und Jason in Kolchis gestaltet ist, liegt auf der Hand. Falls ein Leser dies nicht von selbst erkennen sollte, baut Debiel einen Hinweis ein, der diese Verbindung explizit macht: Als Duromontia sich sorgt, von ihrem Vater verfolgt zu werden, beschließt sie Folgendes (Metamorphoses Styriae 30.46-48):       […] Ne fiat, cogimur illo, quo Medea modo patrem remorata, morari nos quoque patris iter. Damit es nicht dazu kommt, müssen wir den Vater auf  dieselbe Art und Weise aufhalten, wie schon Medea ihren Vater aufgehalten hat.

Somit wird der Leser direkt dazu aufgefordert, die Parallelen zur Medea-Geschichte zu suchen, wie Ovid sie im 7. Buch der Metamorphosen oder auch im 12. Brief  seiner Heroides erzählt. In der Tat gibt es viele Parallelen, etwa dass die Heldin zwischen der Loyalität zu ihrem Vater und der Zuneigung zu ihrem Geliebten hin- und hergerissen ist (vgl.  Met. 7.14-24 und Metamorphoses Styriae 32.7-19). Am auffälligsten ist es aber, dass sowohl bei Ovid als auch bei Debiel Vieles aus der inneren Perspektive der Medea bzw. Duromontia geschildert wird; ihre Beweggründe werden klar, während bei Debiel die anderen Beteiligen, etwa der Entführer Sava oder der Vater Retla blass bleiben.

Carmen perpetuum In Summe also versucht Debiel durch eine Reihe von imitatorischen Techniken ein Gedicht zu schaffen, das Ovids Metamorphosen auch auf struktureller, erzähltechnischer Ebene gleichkommt. Wenn Ovid sein Lied als carmen perpetuum von Anbeginn der Welt bis in seine eigene Zeit fortführte, ahmt dies Debiel insofern nach, als er in seinem letzten Paragraphen schildert, wie Mars sich bei Jupiter 541

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nach dem künftigen Schicksal des Landes erkundigt. In einer großen Schau führt der Göttervater daraufhin die verschiedenen Habsburger (Metamorphoses Styriae 35.23: “innumerus populus”) vor, die künftig über das Land herrschen werden. Solange die Erde stehe, könne dieses Herrscherhaus nicht untergehen (Metamorphoses Styriae 35.47-49): Dum cardine mundus firmus utroque suo steterit, non ista perire gens augusta potest. Solange die Welt fest in beiden ihren Angeln hängt, kann dieses kaiserliche Geschlecht nicht untergehen.

Hier ist Debiel eine geschickte Kombination der Epen Vergils und Ovids gelungen: Die Grundidee dieser Szene geht auf  das sechste Buch der Aeneis zurück; dort sieht Aeneas in der Unterwelt die Seelen der künftigen Römer und bekommt durch seinen Vater Anchises zumindest einen rudimentären Einblick in ihr zu erwartendes Wirken. Die Rollen von Aeneas und Anchises übernehmen bei Debiel Mars und Jupiter. Das Ovidische an der Szene besteht jedoch in ihrer Position im Gesamtzusammenhang: Bei Vergil findet sich die Heldenschau bekanntlich im Zentrum seines Epos; Debiel versetzt diesen Ausblick, der den Bogen der geschichtlichen Entwicklung bis in seine eigene Zeit spannt, an das Ende des Werkes, und somit genau an die Stelle, an der auch bei Ovid der Bogen in seine eigene Zeit geschlagen wird. Durch diesen Einfall ist Debiel innovativer als etwa vierzig Jahre nach ihm Ludwig Bertrand Neumann (1726-1777), der ein Supplement zum sechsten Buch der Aeneis verfasst und die vergilische Heldenschau bis zu Maria Theresia fortsetzt.

Folgerungen Diese kurzen Ausführungen zu einem konkreten Gedicht aus einer der beiden Untergruppen neulateinischer Metamorphosendichtungen erlauben ein paar Folgerungen für unser bisheriges Verständnis der Gattung: Ein Erklärungsversuch, der bisher gemacht wurde, um zu verstehen, warum es keine neulateinischen Metamorphosen gibt, kann so nicht mehr gelten: Ein wichtiger Grund dafür lag sicher darin, daß die Metamorphosen in ihrer epischen Gesamtstruktur den Humanisten und ihren Nachfolgern noch gar nicht bewußt geworden sind, daß ihr planmäßiger

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Aufbau und ihre spezifische epische Gattungsstruktur von ihnen noch gar nicht erkannt und durchschaut worden ist, so daß sie auch nicht zur Imitation und Transformation hätten einladen können.21

Es wurde deutlich, dass den neulateinischen Dichtern der geographisch-aitiologischen Metamorphosen viele literarische features bekannt waren, die auch modernen Lesern (bei aller Aporie über die genaue Struktur der Metamorphosen) als einschlägig erscheinen, etwa eine komplexe Erzählstruktur, deren Abfolge von variatio geprägt ist, eine absichtliche Verwischung von Übergängen oder ein Erzählbogen, der von einem mythischen Anfang bis zur eigenen Zeit reicht. All dies war neulateinischen Dichtern bekannt und wurde imitiert. Es gibt zwar kein 15 Bücher umfassendes Werk, das die ovidischen Metamorphosen in vollem Umfang imitiert. Doch der Umfang allein verstärkt nicht die Ähnlichkeit mit dem angestrebten Vorbild, was die sakralen Metamorphosen belegen. Die viel wichtigeren Struktur- und Aufbauelemente waren bekannt und wurden imitiert. Prinzipielle Unkenntnis kann also als Grund für die fehlende Rezeption ausgeschlossen werden. Eine andere Erklärung bietet sich an: Neulateinische Epen entstanden zum Großteil im Umfeld weltlicher oder kirchlicher Macht und sollten einem klaren Zweck dienen: Es ging ihnen um die poetisch überhöhte Legitimierung bestimmter Taten bzw. um das Festlegen bestimmter Narrative im Sinne der Person, deren Verherrlichung das Gedicht diente. Um diese Absicht zu erreichen eignete sich Vergils Aeneis als Vorbild in vielen Aspekten besser als die in ihrer Tendenz schwierig zu durchschauenden Meta­ mor­phosen Ovids, eines suspekten Dichters, der aufgrund seiner Probleme mit dem Herrscherhaus ins Exil gehen musste. Neulateinische Epiker wollten also nicht nur keine zweiten Metamorphosen schreiben, sie wollten auch nicht das Schicksal Ovids teilen und ihren jeweiligen Mäzenas, wie immer er auch heißen mochte, vor den Kopf  stoßen. War es ein Zufall, dass sich die strukturelle Nachahmung der ovidischen Metamorphosen durch die Jesuiten gerade zu der Zeit entwickelte, als sich die Probleme des Ordens mit der jeweiligen staatlichen Gewalt abzuzeichnen begannen, die dann schließlich 1773 zu seiner Aufhebung führten?

  Hofmann 2001 (wie Anm. 4), 135.

21

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SUBTERRANEAN SUBTEXTS: ALLEGORY AND THE JESUIT SUPPRESSION IN LANDÍVAR’S RUSTICATIO MEXICANA (BOLOGNA, 1782)

The Guatemalan Jesuit Rafael Landívar (1731-1793) spent the final years of  his life in exile in Bologna, where he produced the poem for which he was hailed as the Vergil of   the Americas, the Rusticatio Mexicana.1 But if  he was the Vergil, he was also the Vanière. Jacques Vanière’s sixteen-book georgic poem on the management of  a French country estate, Praedium rusticum (Toulouse, 1730), is answered by Landívar’s fifteen-book RM (Bologna, 1782; ex­pan­ ded from ten books, Modena, 1781), with an “appendix” on the miraculous grass cross of  Tepic taking it up to sixteen. From its Latin title (i.e. Rusticatio) the poem already invites comparison with Vanière’s, and the frontispiece bears an inscription from the French Jesuit’s first book (“Secreti tacita capior dulcedine ruris: / quod spectare juvat, placuit deducere versu”).2 The title given by its modern English translator, Regenos, gestures to the poem’s   See A. Laird, The Epic of  America: An Introduction to Rafael Landívar and the Rusticatio Mexicana (London, 2006), citing, e.g., Menéndez y Pelayo and the dissenting opinion of  José Mata Gavidia: “Vergil writes his work in the midst of  comfort and his patrons’ generosity, Landívar creates a work born of  the bitterness of  an exile” (at 46). Unless otherwise indicated (by *) I reproduce the text of   the 1782 edition (RM) and the English translation by G. W. Regenos (New Orleans, 1948; facsimile reprint in Laird, 2006). 2  Praedium rusticum 1.21-22. There is another nod to Vanière at the beginning of  the book on birds. Mexico has sent its poultry to Spain and “clucking hens are heard everywhere in the cities, on the ranches, in the hamlets and about the huts of  the poor. But who is  to tell of   these, since eloquent Vanière has filled the poultry-yards with his precious gift of  song, and borne away an Aonian crown with the applause of  Phoebus?” (“Gallinis resonant passim glocientibus urbes,  / praediaque, et pagi, et miserae magalia plebis.  / Q uis tamen has memoret, postquam Vanierius omnes  / providus implevit pretioso munere chortes,  / Aoniamque tulit, Phaebo plaudente, coronam?” (RM 13.21-25). 1

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 545-559 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124082

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serial structure and ekphrastic texture: “Mexican Country Scenes”. At first sight, the RM better fits L. P. Wilkinson’s somewhat problematic designation of  Vergil’s Georgics as a  “descriptive” poem.3 But is there a deeper purpose to the descriptions in Landívar? Are they merely the delectare to his didactic docere? Does the poem, in fact, “teach”, and if  so, what and how? Several scholars have noted the RM’s implicit contribution to the so-called controversy of   the Indies, its copious vindication of  the lands and culture of New Spain against allegations of Ameri­ can inferiority put about in Europe by such “enlightened” experts as Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (1707-1788) and Cor­nelius de Pauw (1739-199).4 A sustained counterblast to this Eurocentrism issued from the pens of exiled Ibero-American Jesuits in Italy, writing in Latin, Italian and Spanish.5 As Laird observes, “it is not impossible that an attack on American nature prompted Landívar’s Rusticatio Mexicana, much as the Bibliotheca Mexicana of  Eguiara [y Eguren] had been incited some years before by Manuel Marti’s defamation of  American culture.” 6 The poem is certainly full of  contrasts and contests of  Old and New World – and emphatically awards the palm to the latter. Mexico functions simultaneously as space of  exotic wonders and of   the golden mean, trumping Vergil’s praises of  Italy in the second georgic (2.136-175). But the RM transcends its strictly georgic roots in its inclusion of  3  “Viewed as a whole, the pleasure and significance of   the Georgics is most akin to that which may be described from descriptive poetry, the literary counterpart of  landscape-painting” (L.  P. Wilkinson, The Georgics of  Virgil: A  Critical Survey [Cambridge, 1969], 14). This is a now superseded view of  the Georgics. 4   E.g. A. Higgins, Constructing the Criollo Archive: Subjects of  Knowledge in the Bibliotheca Mexicana and the Rusticatio Mexicana (West Lafayette, 2000); Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 21-30; Id., “Controversy of   the Indies”, in P. Ford, J. Bloemendal, C. Fantazzi (ed.), Brill’s Encyclopaedia of   the Neo-Latin World: Micropaedia (Leiden, 2014), 954. 5  The key writers are Juan Andrés, José Rafael Campoy, Francisco Javier Clavigero, Juan Ignacio Molina, Juan de Velasco, Francisco Iturri, Josef  Jolís, Gian Dome­ nico Coleti, and Diego Abad. See N.  Guasti, L’esilio italiano dei gesuiti spagnoli. Identità, controllo sociale e pratiche culturali (1767-1798) (Rome, 2006); id., “I gesuiti spagnoli espulsi e l’apologia della conquista del Nuovo Mondo: le Riflessioni Imparziali di Juan Nuix”, in M. G. Profeti (ed.), Giudizi e pregiudizi. Percezione dell’altro e  stereotipi tra Europa e Mediterraneo (Florence, 2010), vol. 1, 339-393. 6  Laird 2006 (as in n.  1), 25. Specifically in response to accusations of  inferior New World Latinity, see the Dissertatio Ludicro-Seria of  Landívar’s roommate in Bologna, Diego Abad, edited by A.  Kerson, “Diego José Abad, Dissertatio LudicroSeria: Edition, Translation and Notes”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 40 (1991), 357-422.

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detailed descriptions of  mining, hunting, natural history, and even indigenous sports. Moreover, if  Vanière had adorned his Praedium rusticum with lively vignettes celebrating life in the French countryside, he had retained throughout the classical didactic fiction of  a  second-person addressee instigating and overseeing – if  not always personally carrying out – the labour therein described. In the RM, on the other hand, the third person is generally preferred to the second,7 to show, as if for the record, the true nature of Mexico, providing a  window on a  world that the poet has personally witnessed, and armchair travellers like De Pauw and Buffon had not.8 On one level, then, Landívar’s poem furnishes documentary evidence, for the benefit of  sceptical Europeans, of  the natural beauty and bounty of  New Spain. Landívar’s rejection of  fiction in his prose preface (Monitum), and his apology for occasional mentions of  “the false deities of   the ancients”, signals a  further alignment with a  group of  contemporary Jesuit scientific poets in Rome who celebrated Newtonian science and modern technology in more or less Lucretian Latin poems.9 Indeed, in the closing lines of   the preface he quotes a certain “Golmarius Marsiglianus” confessing the difficulty of  finding Latin poetic terms for novel matters.10 Laird had wondered about the identity of  this individual but he is none other than Girolamo Lagomarsini (1698-1773), professor of  Greek at the Roman College, editor of  a  six-book poem on electricity by his colleague,

  The main exceptions to the rule are the books on hunting and birds, 13 and 14.   It is  difficult not to read these words in the Monitum as a  veiled criticism of  “authorities” who have never visited the New World: “I relate those things which I have seen and those that have been told to me by eyewitnesses, entirely trustworthy, however. Besides, I have been careful to confirm the more unusual things written by the authority of  eyewitnesses” (“Q uae vidi refero, quaeque mihi testes oculati, caeteroquin veracissimi, retulere. Praeterea curae mihi fuit oculatorum testium auctoritate subscripta, quae rariora sunt, confirmare”, v). Cf. Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 122. 9  E.g., Carlo Noceti, Bernardo Zamagna, Roger Boscovich, Giuseppe Maria Maz­ zo­lari, Gregorio Landi Vittori, and Camillo Garulli. See Y.  Haskell, Loyola’s Bees: Ideology and Industry in Jesuit Latin Didactic Poetry (Oxford, 2003), ch. 4, passim. 10  “Alas! How difficult it is  to find words, and to fit those words to the meter when the subject is wholly new. Often words will fail me (even now I foresee it), often the meter itself  will rebel against the words” (“Heu! quam difficile est voces reperire, modosque / addere, cum novitas integra rebus inest. / Saepe mihi deerunt (iam nunc praesentio) voces:  / saepe repugnabit vocibus ipse modus”, vi). The verses are from Aleae Genuensis Romam Traductae Ratio, Elegiacon, in H. Lagomarsini, Opera edita et inedita (Genoa, 1842), 325. 7 8

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Giuseppe Maria Mazzolari (1712-1786), and himself  the author of  an unfinished didactic poem on the origin of  springs.11 With these Rome-based writers Landívar professes – from prose preface to the final lines of  his appendix – a commitment to a Lucretian poetics of  truth, clarity and scientific progress, all the while sustaining a serenely Vergilian Latin style.12 Even those moments of  awestruck contemplation of American Nature which Laird has dubbed proto-Romantic might, after all, be recalled to a Lucretian aesthetic of  “horror ac divina voluptas”.13 And yet the scientific poets of   the Collegio Romano, following in the footsteps of   the Croatian cleric and emulator of  Lucretius, Benedict Stay (1714-1801), tended to fetishize the difficulty of   their technical subjects and the labour of  transforming them into verse. As we shall see, Landívar seeds a different variety of  sublime in his RM. He has no problem growing poetry out of  his fertile American subject matter and he breathes an atmosphere of wonder and ease into his poem – ease, at least, for the observers of  dangerous and laborious New World industries such as mining and sugar production! The Edenic scenes of   the first book combine elements of  Lucretius’s hymn to Venus and the bees of  Vergil’s fourth georgic: leisure alternates with indigenous industry in a vernal paradise of  seemingly impossible abundance. If  Europe has its formal gardens, fountains and follies – already celebrated by Vanière’s Jesuit georgic forerunner, René Rapin, in his Horti libri IV (Paris, 1665) – Mexico has something even more marvellous, the chinampas: floating gardens.14 11  Landívar pays tribute to Lagomarsini’s didactic poem on springs in his first book: “But it is uncertain where the perennial spring has its source or by what force its surging waters arise […]” (“Unde tamen iugis fontis ducatur origo, / quove reluctantes consurgant impete lymphae,  / incertum  […]”, 88-114). Lagomarsini’s poem (first recited in 1726) was printed with the second edition of  (Jesuit) Francesco Eula­lio Savastano’s Botanicorum libri IV, translated by Giampietro Bergantini (Venice, 1749). 12   There is no room here to track the significant influence of  Lucretius in Landívar’s poem. For the reception of  Lucretius in Landívar’s Mexican Jesuit circle, see A.  Laird “Lucretius in the Spanish American Enlightenment: Atomism, Sublimity and the Dispute of   the New World”, in P. R. Hardie, V. Prosperi and D. Zucca (ed.), Lucretius, Poet and Philosopher (Berlin, 2020), 289-308. 13  Landívar may have imbibed a poetics of   the sublime from his confrère Francisco Javier Alegre, whose Arte poetica de Mr Boileau seems to have been influenced by Longinus. See Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 27-28; cf. Laird 2020 (as in n. 12). 14  For a  “Rapinian” passage of  nature imitating art see RM 254-276; cf.  Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 223-224.

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The city’s “noble youth”, having competed in a colourful boat race, navigate these flowery canals “in slender boats” (“nobilis exiguis pubes devecta phasellis”): Ceu quondam Theseus Creta generosus in alta elusit coecos labyrinthi pervigil orbes ancipiti lustrans fallacia limina flexu: haud secus incertos vestigat remige calles nutantes peragrans hortos urbana iuventus. (RM 1.246-250) So once upon a time in proud Crete noble Theseus skilfully escaped from the secret windings of   the labyrinth, groping his way along the bewildering turns of  the treacherous maze, so these young men of  the city trace with the oar uncertain pathways across the swaying gardens.

The festive mood gives way momentarily to a  reflective, almost melancholy, one. After the noisy, cheerful crowds repair to the city, the shores of   the lake are frequented by those “who are wearied with care and who desire undisturbed rest, and those who are devotees of  eloquent Minerva. Then the bards, captivated by the restful loveliness of   the country along the lake, sometimes fill the shores with melody” (“Q ueis cordi tranquilla quies, quos cura fatigat, / et quos facundae iuvat indulgere Minervae. / tunc capti tacita rigui dulcedine ruris / littora concentu replent quandoque poetae”, RM 274-277). Landívar proceeds to call the roll of  illustrious Mexican poets, past and present, who are here imagined as inhabiting the same time and space.15 As Laird says, the “scenario is  somewhat reminiscent of   the bella scuola of  ancient classical poets in the fourth Canto of  Dante’s Inferno.” 16 But if  the abovementioned Jesuit Lucretians had routinely digressed to pay homage to their literary (and scientific) confrères, Landívar’s bards are not exclusively Jesuit, nor Latin-writing, nor even all male. True, his catalogue begins with fellow Jesuit exiles, Abad and Alegre, but it culminates in the Mexican “tenth Muse”, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz (1648-1695), a curious if  not ironic inclusion when we recall 15  In the preface he tells us that this is the only fiction he has allowed himself  in the poem (v). 16  Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 64. I would add that the earlier reference to the Cretan labyrinth primes us for a sort of  metaphorical katabasis. Laird notes that the central book on mining parallels the katabases of  the Odyssey and Aeneid (55). There are in fact several virtual katabases in the poem.

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that the Hieronymite nun ended her days in self-censorship and seclusion after she clashed with the Bishop of  Puebla. Laird detects a rich allusive web linking Landívar’s Sor Juana and Vergil’s Cornelius Gallus.17 In the light of   the labyrinthine metaphor of   the boat race, however, I would press the association with the Orpheus who visits the Underworld in Georg. 4: Ut tamen occinuit modulis Ioanna canoris, constitit unda fluens, ruptoque repente volatu aere suspensae longum siluere volucres, visaque dulcisono concentu saxa moveri. (RM 1.289-292) Moreover, when Joanna sang her melodious songs, the water stopped flowing, and birds suddenly interrupted their flight and for a  long time held themselves suspended silently in the air, and rocks were seen to move as a result of  the sweet-sounding melody.18

Landívar’s patriotic catalogue cannot be taken as straightforwardly programmatic for the poetics of   the RM.19 Nevertheless, the climactic position of  Sor Juana has led Laird to suspect a more ambiguous attitude to the “baroque” than has sometimes been inferred from the RM’s proem: Obtegat arcanis alius sua sensa figuris, abstrusas quarum nemo penetrare latebras ausit, et ingrato mentem torquere labore; tum sensum brutis aptet, gratasque loquelas; impleat et campos armis, et funere terras, omniaque armato debellet milite regna. (RM 1.1-6) 17   As may have been the case with the learned Cornelius Gallus, it was an excess of  confidence in the face of  despotic authority which brought the erudite Mexican poetess to a kind of  martyrdom [viz. forced retraction of  her “Reply to Sor Filotea” and renunciation of  her secular writing, musical instruments, and extensive library]. See Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 65-66. 18 Cf.  Georg. 4.481-484, on Orpheus’s power to disrupt the “nature” of    the Underworld. For the threads connecting Cretan labyrinth, Underworld, and Orpheus and Eurydice in Vergil and Catullus, see A. Crabbe, “Ignoscenda Q uidem […] Catullus 64 and the Fourth Georgic”, The Classical Q uarterly 27.2 (1977), 342-351. It is also worth noting that Sor Juana wrote a comedy, “El amor es más laberinto” (1689) which influenced the baroque comic dramatist, Juan Ruíz de Alarcón, who immediately precedes her in Landívar’s catalogue. 19  The inclusion of   the famous Golden Age comic poet Alarcón may be for the benefit of  a contemporary Spanish audience, reminding them that true literary talent could also be found in the “colonies”.

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Let another conceal his thoughts in obscure figures whose hidden meaning no one would venture to interpret or worry his mind with the thankless task. Let another bestow reason and pleasant discourse upon dumb animals, let him cover the field with armies, the earth with death, and let him vanquish entire nations by armed force.

Let us pause for a moment on these opening lines. Is Landívar really turning his back on the obscurantist Spanish seicentismo decried by Tiraboschi and other eighteenth-century Italians, in favour of  an enlightened Neoclassicism? 20 Or might he be alluding, albeit obliquely, to the contemporary literary activity of  his fellow exiled or ex-Jesuits, who wrote (or translated) poetic fables (e.g. FrançoisJoseph Terrasse Desbillons, Bernardo Zamagna) and epics (e.g. José Manuel Peramás, Andrés Diego de la Fuente, Francisco Javier Alegre, Emmanuel de Azevedo), expressly or implicitly to assuage or sublimate their “suppressed” – that is, “Suppression” – emotions? 21 Landívar’s own motive for writing is  divulged only after this rather cryptic recusatio: Debueram, fateor, maesto praecordia peplo induere, et lacrymis oculos semper suffundere amaris: nam flores dum prata dabunt, dum sydera lucem, usque animum, pectusque meum dolor altus habebit. Sed tantum cogor celare in corde dolorem, corde licet cauto rapiat suspiria luctus. Q uid duros ergo gemitus de pectore ducam? Ardua praecipitis conscendam culmina pindi, Musarumque Ducem lacrymis in vota vocabo; ambit enim quandoque dolens solatia pectus. (RM 1.18-27) I should, I confess, have put on the garb of  mourning and shed bitter tears, for as long as the fields put out flowers and the stars give forth light, deep sorrow will ever occupy my heart and mind. But I am obliged to conceal this great pain in my breast, though grief  forces sighs from my guarded heart. But why should I utter mournful groans? I shall climb the steep heights of  Pindus and call suppliantly upon the Leader of  the Muses, for the suffering heart sometimes looks to him for comfort.*

  Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 32.   By this admittedly subtle reading lines 1-3 might even be taken to refer to the scientific poems of  the “Roman” school mentioned above, especially those on technical topics. 20 21

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But what exactly is the nature of  the poet’s grief? While it is natural to assume that he is  sighing for his native Guatemala we should not forget that Landívar is, in fact, suffering a double exile – from his beloved patria and his former religious life. That spiritual loss must have weighed at least as heavily on him as homesickness.22 His contemporary biographer F. Sebastián makes much of  Landívar’s personal piety and downplays his poetry, suggesting that the RM was written merely to pass the time.23 It seems pertinent to inquire whether any traces of  that cherished Jesuit identity may, in fact, be detected in the poem. Niccolò Guasti has shown that the exiled Iberian (and American) Jesuits were obliged to play a careful game in their post-expulsion literary activity; they were monitored by agents of   the Spanish crown who worked zealously to stamp out any embers of  religious renewal.24 Of  course, the exiles also needed income, and Landívar will have been counting on a larger market for his poem than one comprising solely his indigent confrères and their sympathizers. And yet, it would be extraordinary in a  work of  this scale and imaginative scope, written under the difficult and humiliating conditions of  exile and the Suppression, if  the priest-poet did not at some level reflect on the cataclysmic circumstances that had deprived him of  both his native land and habit. The Lucretian “truth-telling” proem, apparently abjuring fables and obscurity, might even have been intended as a wry wink at his Jesuit companions, alerting them to the presence of  just such a spiritual subtext. To be sure, the RM is not obviously directed to Landívar’s confrères – unlike, for example, the exile poetry of  a  contemporary Portuguese Jesuit, Emmanuel de Azevedo.25 Moreover, the subject 22  This is  not to underplay the significance of  that homesickness which is  evident on every page of  the Rusticatio Mexicana. In this frame, the poem can be read as extended meditation and self-consolation, as the exiled poet recreates a memory palace of  a lost Eden. Yet as Laird points out, this is not exile poetry in the autobiographical and self-pitying mode of  Ovid’s Tristia. Cf. Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 59. 23   See M. I. Pérez Alonso, “El Padre Rafael Landívar, SJ”, Estudios Centro Americanos (Mayo) 5.40 (1950), 24-32; cf. Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 30. 24  Guasti 2006 (as in n.  6); Id., “Il tema americano nelle strategie culturali dei gesuiti spagnoli espulsi”, in U. Baldini, G. P. Brizzi (ed.), Presenza in Italia dei Gesuiti iberici espulsi. Aspetti religiosi, politici e culturali (Bologna, 2006), 411-449. 25  Y.  Haskell, “Suppressed Emotions: The Heroic Tristia of  Portuguese (ex-) Jesuit, Emmanuel de Azevedo”, Journal of  Jesuit Studies 3.1 (2016), 42-60; Ead., “The Tears in Things: How the Jesuits Ripped up Virgil”, Proceedings of   the Virgil

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matter of   the RM is only intermittently religious: there is no open mention of   the missions, let alone the expulsion of   the Jesuits from the Americas or the papal brief  of  Suppression.26 Indeed, if  the RM is more than just a versified reverie on the natural beauties of  the poet’s homeland, how might the allegorical mode operate in a  descriptive-didactic epic, one that – on the surface, at least – proposes to tell us exactly how things are? A similar issue, of  course, confronts the reader of  Vergil’s Georgics, especially of   the fourth book on the bees.27 In fact, any allegorical meaning in a “scientific” didactic poem is  bound to rub up against natural-historical (and historical) realia. Yet, with an uncannily Vergilian knack of  implying more than he states, Landívar populates the RM with animals and humans (indigenous Americans, African slaves, miners, farmers, hunters, noblemen, kings and commoners) whom he variously stands back from, empathises with, marvels at, and passes fleeting moral judgment on.28 A paradise of  flowery fields, exotic birds, spectacular waterfalls, and indigenous sports is here and there streaked with violence and cruelty, slavery and oppression. Through incidental anthropomorphism,29 affective shading, authorial interjections and telegraphic moral commentary on animal ethology and human cultural practices, Landívar invites the reader to discover hidden meanings in his poem.30 That said, while any number of  disSociety 30 (2020), 61-75; Ead., “Latin Scientific Poetry Under the Shadow of  the Jesuit Suppression”, in R. Markevičiūtė, B. Roling (ed.), Poesie der Dinge: Ziele und Strategien der Wissensvermittlung im lateinischen Lehrgedicht der Frühen Neuzeit (Berlin, 2021), 239-255. 26  It is  noteworthy, however, that the poem is  staked out by two miraculous crosses: that of  Chalco in the first book and of  Tepic in the appendix. The Virgin of  Guadalupe gives rise to a miraculous spring in the twelfth book, Fontes. Constraints of  space dictate that discussion of  these passages be deferred to another occasion. 27   See e.g. J. Griffin, “The Fourth ‘Georgic’, Virgil, and Rome”, Greece & Rome 26.1 (1979), 61-80. 28  However, there is  a significant departure from the moralizing practice of  Vanière, who is  in this respect a  much more “didactic” didactic poet. See Haskell 2003 (as in n. 10), 46-47. 29  Even of  metals, which undergo “medical” treatment in the eighth book, on silver- and gold-working (vv. 59-90). 30  The cochineal beetle industry frustrates the aspirations of  Europeans because they cannot match the dedication of   the indigenous farmers, who are undeterred by heat, rain, night or day, in caring for their tiny charges – an “improba cura” but a profitable one (4.205). Yet the “barbara […] Inda” is no kindly beekeeper when he “sacrifices” (“mactavit”) the cochineal race (“gentem Coccineam”). Thus, too, the Vergilian pastoral atmosphere of   the opening of   the eleventh book, Greges, contrasts

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crete episodes or vignettes might be read as historical or political allegories, their significance to Landívar’s overall ideological project is elusive.31 It is, of  course, the extended narrative mode in didactic poetry which allows us to pursue allegorical veins to deeper levels, as in the closing Aristaeus epyllion of Vergil’s Georgics. A cluster of shorter Jesuit georgic poems produced in France at the turn of   the eighteenth century featured ornamental myths of  metamorphosis, as had Rapin’s Horti. These poems wear their epyllia and allegories lightly – as it were, on their Ovidian sleeve.32 Vanière himself  had initially indulged in such myths but later renounced them.33 Nevertheless, in the fourteenth book of  his Praedium rusticum, Vanière turns Vergil’s ethnography of   the bees inside out in a “truthful” digression on the utopian society of  the Guaranís in Paraguay.34 This same Vanierian passage was picked up and “fact-checked” in a digression in the (unpublished) Latin exile diary by Landívar’s Spanish-American confrère, José Manuel Peramás.35 It is thus almost impossible not to read Landívar’s sixth book, Fibri (“Beavers”) – his own homage to Vergil’s bees – as some sort of  allegory of  human society; and in the light of  his emulation of  Vanière, perhaps of   the Jesuit reductions. Frustratingly, though, it is  also impossible to read sharply with the matter-of-fact description of   the cruelty of  sow stalls (388-409). Throughout the poem, in fact, Landívar casts mottled Vergilian shadows over the unwarranted suffering of  both men and beasts. 31 Laird, for example, points to the “regal” eagle which kills a  Mexican parrot, “pride of   the forest”, and plausibly wonders whether Landívar is alluding to the violence of   the Spanish crown. Jupiter’s eagle is a more obvious allegory for imperial power in a didactic poem on the production of chocolate by Neapolitan Jesuit Tommaso Strozzi (in Poemata varia, Naples, 1689, 30). Cf. Haskell 2003 (as in n. 9), 89. 32   See Haskell (as in n. 9), 60-69. 33  See Haskell 2003 (as in n. 9), 42. 34  See Haskell 2003 (as in n. 9), 48-49. 35  I am grateful to Fabrizio Melai for sharing a copy of  this manuscript with me. See M. Suárez, “At iam satis est de rebus guaranicis: la digressio etnográfica en el Annus Patiens de José Peramás”, Folia historica del Nordeste 28 (2017): https://revistas.unne. edu.ar/index.php/fhn/article/view/1774 (accessed 11 October 2020). On Peramás’s published work (Faenza, 1793) on the polity of   the Guaranís compared with Plato’s Republic, see F. Melai, “The Impossible Dialogue Between Plato and Epicurus: José Manuel Peramás’ Commentarius on the Paraguayan Missions”, in J.  Mander, D. Midgley and C. D. Beaule (ed.), Transnational Perspectives on the Conquest and Colonization of  Latin America (Abingdon, 2020), 35-46, and D. Arbo, “Plato and the Guaraní Indians”, in A. Laird, N. Miller (ed.), Antiquities and Classical Traditions in Latin America (Hoboken, 2018), 119-131.

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this book as a  straightforward epyllion-à-clef, and we will surely “torquere mentem ingrato labore”, to recall the poem’s opening lines, if  we attempt to equate the beavers with either Indians or Jesuits. In spite of  Landívar’s assertion that his only fictional excursus is that of   the conference of  Mexican poets in the first book, there are, in fact, several episodes in the RM which, while purporting to be historical, are presented so as to have the appearance of  legend or fabulous invention. Such is the aetiological account of  the chinampas in the first book, on the lakes of  Mexico: the indigenous people originally created their water gardens to convey tribute to a tyrannical king who was envious of   their success (Landívar’s footnotes briskly identify him as the king of  Atzapotzalco).36 In the second book, a mysterious, bearded prophet, “wearing a muddied garment, covered by a  coarse cloak” (“lutea quem vestis, crudusque tegebat amictus”),37 suddenly appears at the estate of  an industrious settlerfarmer (colonus, 2.59), who has hitherto been blessed with peace and prosperity, and predicts the eruption of  Jorullo (Xorulus). This dire prophecy is bruited abroad by Fama, who spreads alarm throughout the countryside, causing the indigenous people to flee to the forest. The colonus upbraids the simple folk for their unmanly belief  in the idle words of  this stranger.38 He even begins to persuade them to return to the fields […] but then all hell breaks loose; 36  Cf. José de Acosta (1540-1600), Historia natural y moral de las Indias (Seville, 1590), book 7, ch. 9. Landívar cites him in the following note (though not for the story of  the cruel king). As Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 262-263 notes, it is also mentioned in the Ancient History of  Mexico by Landívar’s contemporary, Clavigero. 37   An indigenous sage? Or perhaps a Franciscan? 38   Laird 2006 (as in n. 1), 58 compares Ascanius’s speech to the Trojan women in Aen. 5.670-673, but the colonus is  also a  “rational” Lucretian voice sneering at superstition: “ ‘What madness, ye wretched people, oh! What madness has taken possession of  you to be putting so much trust in the idle words of  a stranger, to forsake everything in cowardly flight – your treasures, the estates of  your fathers, your ancestral homes, everything provided you through the diligence of  your forefathers? Is this courage; is this strength of  character and fortitude? Ah, shame on you, men, frightened and quaking with womanly fear, for having fled from the golden harvests!’ With these words the master calmed their faltering hearts and urged them to disregard the stranger’s prophecies” (“Q uae vos, o miseri, quae vos dementia cepit, / ignoti vanis tantum concedere dictis, / ut gazas, et rura patrum, patriosque penates, / et quidquid vobis maiorum cura paravit, / omnia praecipites cursu mittatis inerti? / Hic vigor, haec virtus animi, pectusque virile?  / Ah, pudeat trepidare viros, pudeatque trementes  / femineo fugisse metu flaventia culta. / His mulcebat herus nutantia pectora verbis, / ignotique viri spernenda oracla monebat”, RM 2.104-111).

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the earth shakes violently and the sun is obscured by a black cloud. The people are eventually persuaded by a priest (sacerdos) to flee to safety. In a long coda to this book (300-355), Landívar reveals that, at the very time he was consoling himself  for his troubles by composing these verses, Bologna itself  was shaken by a terrifying earthquake. In the same way, he suggests, the eruption of  Jorullo was caused – “si fas est credere dictis” – by the sly rumblings of  another volcano, Colima, some seventy miles away, which was “hostile to the people” (“infensus populis”). Landívar shares the terror of   the Bolognese when he feels the convulsions of  the earth – who would not fear the fate of  Jorullo? – but he reassures his city of  asylum that her piety will save her. This second book is, it seems to me, the most likely candidate for an allegorical commentary on the expulsion of   the Jesuits from America, if  not the Suppression of   the Society of  Jesus. The great earthquake of  Lisbon in 1755, and the fulminations of  its ill-fated post-facto prophet, Gabriel Malagrida, were seen as setting in train a series of  unfortunate events that culminated in the order’s undoing. Expelled and exiled Jesuits from all quarters blamed irreligion as well as the petty resentments and political intrigues of   the Society’s enemies, notably the Marquis of  Pombal and the Count of  Campomanes, for their unfolding misfortunes.39 Landívar’s sacerdos, who exhorts his people to be sensible, to cut their losses and flee, is, on this reading, the voice of  the Society, rallying her priests on the eve of   their expulsion from New Spain (or, by extension, the Suppression). They flee, leaving “behind their wealth, homes and fields, as once upon a time the Dardanians swiftly fled before the black wreaths of fire started by the Greeks and over the byways left behind their beloved homes and land and the kingdom of Troy, grief-stricken over the fall of   their country” (“Sic gazas, sic illa domos, sic arva relinquit. / Ceu quondam Graecae tenebrosa volumina flammae  / Dardanidae fugere citi, perque avia caros  / deseruere lares, patriamque, et Troia regna, / labentis patriae transfixi corda dolore”, 162-166). The fall of  Troy is the framing metaphor for the long Suppression in the Heroum libri IV (“Louvain”, 1798)

39  See e.g. J. P. Murphy, SJ (tr.), Giulio Cesare Cordara, On the Suppression of  the Society of  Jesus: A Contemporary Account (Chicago, 1999), a translation of  De Suppressione Societatis Jesu Commentarii: opera inedita (Padua, 1925).

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by Emmanuel de Azevedo.40 In RM 2, the underground sneakiness of   the resentful volcano Colima might be viewed as the machinations of  the Jesuits’ enemies. And finally, when Landívar takes aim at those, “O Virgin Mother of  Jesus, who defile your name with wicked tongues, and to whom your gifts, once pleasing, perhaps seem base” (“Jesseia Virgo, / qui tua perversis maculant praeconia linguis,  / et queis, grata olim, forsan tua munera sordent”, 343345), it is not difficult to hear in the epithet, Jesseia, an allusion to the Society of  Jesus itself.41 Taken together, however, the mythical histories of  the RM convey a  more general, “Catholic Enlightenment” moral: that indigenous industry and piety will ultimately prevail over imperial cruelty, pride and religious scepticism. The figure of   the colonus in the second book is ambiguous, however: on the one hand, he is a voice for fortitude and “reason” against the dire fulminations of  a mysterious prophet – a prophet whose warning about the pending cataclysm is  spread by Fama (hardly a  reliable messenger in the Aeneid!). In an “enlightened” didactic poem which advertises its truthfulness, if  not “scientific” credibility, how can this apparent religio-cognitive dissonance be resolved? I suggest that we need to go beyond the usual ancient suspects, Vergil and Lucretius, and even beyond the Society of  Jesus – Rapin, Vanière and Landívar’s “Lucretian” contemporaries from the Collegio Romano – for an answer.

40  See Haskell 2020 (as in n.  25). Other passages in the RM might have been heard as allegories of   the Suppression or the expulsion of   the Iberian Jesuits by those who had ears to hear: gold undergoing extraction is compared to a nobleman (Jesuits?) surrounded by a gang of  robbers (enemies of   the Jesuits?), who, realising that resistance is  futile, prudently saves his life by submitting to their demands (transport to Italy?) (RM 8.256-264); at the end of   the 14th book monkeys (the common people?) are enticed out of   the forest by a  warming fire, in which a  gourd has been placed; when it explodes they abandon their beloved infants (Jesuits?) in the clearing; hunters (agents of  the Spanish crown?) round up the terror-stricken young and consign them to a dingy prison (“moesto […] carcere”, RM 14.425-443). 41  The seismic activity persists into the third book, where we learn how the Spanish relocated and magnificently rebuilt the original Indian city of  Guatemala, which had been destroyed by flood, only to see it levelled by an earthquake in 1773. It is  this earthquake which is commemorated in the poem “To the City of  Guatemala” which precedes the RM. It seems natural to interpret the destruction and Phoenix-like rebirth of  Landívar’s native city as a metaphor for the rebirth of  his beloved Society of  Jesus, which was of  course suppressed in the year 1773.

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Laird names the sixteenth-century poet and physician Girolamo Fracastoro (1476/8-1553) among the “astonishingly wide range of  Greek and Roman authors”, “prominent Renaissance humanists”, “later Latin writers”, “Spanish vernacular poets […] natural historians of  Europe and the New World, and […] Jesuit scholars” on whom Landívar draws. I suspect that the significance for Landívar’s poem of  Fracastoro’s Syphilis sive morbus gallicus (Verona, 1530) has been underestimated.42 The influence of  especially the third book of   the Syphilis may be traced through several Jesuit Latin Columbus epics, from the (Jesuit-educated) Giulio Cesare Stella’s Columbeis (1589) through Ubertino Carrara’s Columbus: Carmen epicum (1715) to the De invento novo orbe inductoque illuc Christi sacrificio (1777) by Landívar’s brother-in-exile, Peramás.43 While direct borrowings from the Syphilis are few, the Renaissance medical poem seems to be a  subliminal but pervasive presence in the RM. Like Fracastoro’s, Landívar’s poem is motivated by a combination of  curiosity and consolation.44 Both poets reject themes of  conquest and empire to sing of   the nature of   the New World (Syphilis 3.21-22). Landívar’s “true myths” have a decidedly Fracastorian flavour. The Aztec king of RM 1 recalls Fracastoro’s haughty king Alcithous, who decrees that, on pain of  death, no other power than he should be worshipped on earth (3.318-320). The feisty and doubting colonus of  Landívar’s second book has something of  Fracastoro’s skeptical shepherd, Syphilus (3.288-309), who scorns the Sun god to his cost. The earthquake which swallows up the island of  Atlantia in Syphilis 3.275 was punishment for pride, luxury and 42   It has also been noted by Laird 2006 (as in n.  1), 29, that Landívar’s roommate, Francisco Javier Alegre, disclosed a debt to Fracastoro’s poem in his Alexandriad (1773), an epic on the capture of  Tyre by Alexander the Great. 43  See e.g. H.  Hofmann, “Adveniat tandem Typhis qui detegat orbes. Columbus in Neo-Latin Epic Poetry (16th-18th Centuries)”, in W.  Haase, R.  Meyer (ed.), European Images of   the Americas and the Classical Tradition (Berlin, 1994), 420-657; F. Schaffenrath (ed., tr.), U. Carrara, SJ, Columbus. Carmen epicum (Berlin, 2006). On  the rediscovery of  Peramás’s poem, see M.  Feile Tomes, “News of  a  Hitherto Unknown Neo-Latin Columbus Epic, Part I. José Manuel Peramás’s De Invento Novo Orbe Inductoque Illuc Christi Sacrificio (1777)”, International Journal of   the Classical Tradition 22.1 (2015), 1-28; Part II, 22.2 (2015), 223-257. Peramás cites Fra­ca­storo as a model in the preface to his poem. 44  Y.  Haskell, “Between Fact and Fiction: The Renaissance Didactic Poetry of  Fra­castoro, Palingenio and Valvasone”, in Y.  Haskell, P.  R. Hardie (ed.), Poets and Teachers: Latin Didactic Poetry and the Didactic Authority of   the Latin Poet from the Renaissance to the Present (Bari, 1999), 77-103.

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a failure of  piety – causes implied, if  not spelled out, by Landívar in his narratives of  natural disaster. Above all, Landívar inherits from Fracastoro a  poetics of  wonder and discovery, by means of  which he achieves a  truly remarkable reconciliation of  spirit and science, allegory and didaxis.45

45  I hope to elaborate further on the Fracastorian theme of  discovery in the RM in my presentation to the 2022 meeting of  the IANLS.

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Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 561-566 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124083

IN LAUDEM THEODERICI SACRÉ RUDE GLORIOSE DONATI

FIDELIS RAEDLE

IN LAUDEM THEODERICI SACRÉ RUDE GLORIOSE DONATI

Hoc carmen secundum illum hymnum nunc “Europaeum” dictum c. t. “Freude, schöner Götterfunken” (i. e. “Gaudium scintilla diva”) scriptum est, quem Ludovicus de Beethoven suis modis musicis olim instruxit. Ergo semper mente teneat, immo producat ipse illos modos, quicumque haec verba leget. Observetur autem haec ratio poetica mediaevalis: nec synaloephae nec elisiones adhiberi solent; hac de causa singulae syllabae pronuntiandae sunt legentibus. Ceterum primae strophae notas apposui, ut carminis numeri facilius cognoscantur. In laudem Theoderici Sacré rude gloriose donati Cúrsum quó quis príus coépit, éo príus áttigìt métam, quám desíderávit, – ét corónam áccipìt! Éxoptáta quíes gráta húnc deléctat méritò, nám in ánnos hínc licébit dígno frúi ótiò. Cursum finit praematurus subito emeritus, ecce, iam Theodericus, tot elatus laudibus, qui praecavit senectutis tetricam miseriam et incolumis evasit vitam academicam. Iam donatus rude prodit iuvenili facie, vultu laeto, dulci voce (et Latinâ maxime). Docet, studet, quippe Musis omnibus se tradidit, facileque Vespâ velox iuniores praeterit. Q uem Josephus, frater noster, dignum amicitiâ duxit et implevit novâ suâ tum scientiâ, quem Italia et Roma, Roma cara!, docuit, hic profecto Belgis suis tandem decus exstitit. 563

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Cui adauxit bene vires, sortem atque gloriam uxor cara docta, prolem quae nutrivit nitidam: ut Elisabeth, Christinam necnon et Aegidium, quorum proles “Grappae” tandem cumulavit gaudium. Ergo grati tribuamus merita praeconia tam collegae quam amico (succinat Leonia! 1): Vita haec Musis sacrata et firmata Stoicâ Lipsii doctrinâ, crescat clara et heroica!

  Leonia: felis domestica Sacrata.

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VALEDICTIO (Stropha, quae vagantium dicitur)

Dúlce sólum pátriùm  cáris cúm cognátis numquam cedet animo,  donec cedam fatis. Rident anni pristini  senescenti suaves, dum vitae delibero  condiciones graves: Q uodam die iuvenis  cum paterna rura sueto more operâ  exercerem durâ, trepida me tetigit  anxitudo mentis: vis languoris animos  dire deprimentis. Horrui, fiducia  quaque destitutus, cuiusnam auxilio  saltem essem tutus, dubius, quem vindicem  demum invocarem, nescii, vel quomodo  vitam appararem. Silva prope iacuit,  forte quam intravi. Haec refecit languidum  frigore suavi: quae protexit foliis  solis ab ardente aestu meque condidit  cingulo virente. Respiravi – stupui:  consolationis quantum hausi! devius  omnis rationis, sponte dum amplecterer  lêvem stirpem fagi, saltem ut quiesceret  cordis motus vagi. Tantum beneficium  arboris fidelis semper mente recolo:  ecce vita telis fati, quae tunc timui,  restat satis tuta, et de tantis gratiis  maneat non muta. 565

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Postea, cum viserem  patriam optatam fratris e pomario  plantam recens natam tum tuli castaneae,  veris quam exorto tempore inserui  ipse nostro horto. Primo quasi timida   crevit in aliena terra – iam convaluit,  en, vigoris plena! Q uam accendit cereos  candidorum florum, et producit fructuum  globulos fuscorum! Sicut cedrus Libani  vel ut palma flores (quasi iustus! 1), tenuem  hortum ut honores! Illum, licet torridum  ac fontis egenum, promovisti placide  locum in amoenum. Spero atque scio: me  superabis vitâ. Ergo perge, viridi  robore munita, dulci caros hospites  umbrâ delectare. Dulcem quoque coniugem,  precor, consolare! Iam vale, castanea!  vivus tibi fundam, ne te sol hic perimat,  aquam periucundam, neve demum opus sit  fonte lacrimarum, quae iam mihi irrigant  nimis hoc amarum.

  Ps. 91.13.

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LATIN POETRY FROM THE LATE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY ONWARDS

AUGUSTEISCHE KLASSIK UND KATHOLISCHE WERBUNG

KURT SMOLAK

AUGUSTEISCHE KLASSIK UND KATHOLISCHE WERBUNG ZU GEDICHTEN CÖLESTIN LEUTHNERS O.S.B. (ODE 15, ELEGIA 3)

Vorbemerkung Unter der reichen Produktion lateinischer Literatur in Dichtung und Prosa in Bildungsinstitutionen katholischer, vornehmlich, aber nicht ausschließlich jesuitischer Prägung gerade im bayerischsüddeutschen Raum zwischen dem Konzil von Trient (1545-1563) und dem Ende des Heiligen Römischen Reiches (1806) nehmen die Werke Cölestin Leuthners im achtzehnten Jahrhundert, der gymnasialen Spätphase jener Kulturwelt, einen nicht unbedeutenden Platz ein.1 Am 23.11.1695 im oberbayerischen Traunstein geboren, studierte Leuthner (Leutner, Leittner) bei den Jesuiten in München und bei den Benediktinern im fürsterzbischöflichen Salzburg. 1717 legte er in der bayerischen Benediktinerabtei Wessobrunn, deren Chronik er später schreiben sollte, die Profess ab und wurde 1721 zum Priester geweiht.2 In der Folge war er als Lateinlehrer der Grammatik und Rhetorik sowie als Dichter für offizielle Anlässe in Freising und, von 1733 bis 1738, wieder als Rhetoriklehrer am benediktinischen Gymnasium in Salzburg tätig. In seinen zahlreichen dichterischen Werken stellt die für das Selbstverständnis des Katholizismus zentrale Verehrung der Gottesmutter Maria

1  Zur Biographie Leuthners, cf.  A.  Kraus, “Leut(h)ner (Leittner), Cölestin”, Neue Deutsche Biographie, vol. 14 (Berlin, 1985), 387. 2  Historia Monasterii Wessofontani illustrans Historiam Bavaricam universalem et particularem deprompta ex approbatissimis scriptoribus rerum Germanicarum, et maxime Bavaricarum (Wessobrunn, 1753); A. Mayer, Erika Schelb (tr.), Geschichte des Klosters Wessobrunn. Mit Hinweisen auf  die allgemeine und besondere Geschichte Baierns (Wessofontanum – Wessobrunn, 20112).

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 569-589 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124084

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ein Leitthema dar.3 Leuthner starb am 9.1.1759 in seinem Kloster Wessobrunn. Die zu verschiedenen Zeiten entstandenen kleineren Gedichte Leuthners werden nach der einzigen Gesamtausgabe seiner nichtdramatischen poetischen Werke zitiert.4 Die Orthographie musste klassizistisch normalisiert werden.

Lyrik (Ode 15): Venus – Maria Einleitung Thema des Gedichtes ist ein wahrscheinlich etwas mehr als drei Jahrzehnte zurückliegendes “Wunder” der Gottesmutter in der oberbayerischen Ortschaft Iffeldorf, die seit 1653 Eigentum des Klosters Leuthners, Wessobrunn, war: Ein Großbrand gegen Ende des Jahres 1698 oder Anfang 1699, dem mehrere Gehöfte und die Pfarrkirche des Ortes zum Opfer fielen, erlosch, als eine Taubenschar von einer auf  einem Hügel am Ostrand des Ortes gelegenen, Maria geweihten, um 1690 errichteten Kapelle in Richtung des Brandes flog. Zuvor wurde die “Gnadenmutter”, eine spätgotische Statue der Madonna mit Kind, in einem hohlen Baumstamm verehrt. Schon am 13. November 1698 war mit dem Bau eines repräsentativen Gebäudes begonnen worden, das im Laufe des 18. Jahrhundert erweitert wurde – eine Demonstration des Katholizismus. Die Einweihung erfolgte 1701. Das Heiligtum wird gemeinhin als Heuwinkelkapelle bezeichnet.5

  Ein Verzeichnis der Werke Leuthners findet sich bei Kraus (wie Anm.  1); zu seinen marianischen Dichtungen, cf. K. Smolak, “ ‘Ardebo igneo amore Tui’. De Coelestino Leuthnero matris Dei amatore”, in P. P. Aspaas, S. Albert, F. Nilsen (ed.), Rara avis in Ultima Thule. Libellus festivus Sunnivae des Bouvrie dedicatus (Tromsø, 2014), 345-361. 4  Epigrammatum libri quatuor [sic] cum lyrico uno, elegiarum altero, ad honestam animi remissionem, et iuventutis studiosae commodum scripti a P. Coelestino Leuthner […] (Salisburgi, typis et impensis Iohannis Iosephi Mayr, Aulico-Academici Typographi p. m. Haeredum, [s.a.]). Obwohl der Druck kein Erscheinungsjahr angibt – die spätesten in den Anmerkungen zu dem Gratulationspoem auf  Leuthner von Meinrad Dorner angegebenen Jahre sind 1733 und 1736 – weisen alle drei dem Werk vorangestellten Gedichte auf  den Abschied des Gefeierten von seiner Lehrtätigkeit in Salzburg im Jahr 1738 hin. 5  Nähere Information bei B. Roßbeck, A. Heider, Pfarrgemeinde S. Vitus Iffeldorf  (ed.), Wallfahrtskirche zu Unserer Lieben Frau in Iffeldorf  a. d. Osterseen, Die Heuwinkelkapelle (Iffeldorf, 2001). 3

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Die Ode besteht aus sechs Alkäischen Strophen, der von Horaz bevorzugten lyrischen Form. Auf  ihn als seinen Bezugsautor hinsichtlich der Gattung und des Metrums weist Leuthner selbst in subtiler Weise in den Versen 11-12 hin, indem er Vergil, der ihm, wie gezeigt werden soll, die Grundlage der Makrostruktur seines Concetto bot, als “Schwan aus Mantua”, Mantuano cygno, bezeichnet. Hier liegt eine unerwartete metaphorische Paraphrase Vergils als Epiker vor, die auf  jene des Lyrikers Pindar, als “Schwan aus Theben”, Dircaeum (das heißt: Thebanum) cygnum, durch Hor. Carm. 4.2.25, Bezug nimmt, obwohl die Metapher des (singenden) Schwans der Lyrik eher zukommt als der Epik. Ziel dieses poetologischen Vorgehens Leuthners ist die Kombination der zwei antiken Bezugsautoren auf  dem Umweg der Verschmelzung von deren Gattungen durch die Transposition des Gegenstandes der horazischen Ode, des Herrscherlobes, in ein historisches, christlich-katholisches Narrativ, wohl nicht nur aus literaturästhetischen, sondern auch aus politischen Gründen. Ein “lyrischer Vergil” trat in der lateinischen Literatur erstmals in dem bukolischen Gedicht des Severus Sanctus Endelechius um 400 über eine Rinderpest, De mortibus boum, in Erscheinung: Ein Thema aus Vergils Georgica, die Viehseuche in Noricum, Georg. 3.478-566, gestaltet als bukolischer Dialog, wurde in horazischen Versen (2. Asklepiadeische Strophe) präsentiert. Wie Leuthner stellte Endelechius das Geschehen in eine aktuelle christliche, in diesem Fall missionarische und angesichts der Entstehungszeit noch kulturapologetische Sphäre.6 Zentraler Referenztext Leuthners ist die Szene des Brandes der Schiffe der Trojaner bei Verg. Aen. 5.604-699: Um Aeneas am Erreichen seines vom Fatum bestimmten Zieles, Italiens, zu hindern, schickt Juno Iris zu den der Irrfahrten bereits überdrüssigen Frauen nach Sizilien. Die Götterbotin überredet sie, die im Hafen liegende Flotte in Brand zu stecken und wirft die erste Fackel auf  eines der Schiffe, die Frauen tun es ihr gleich. Erst durch das Eingreifen Jupiters in seiner Funktion als Regenspender, der ein Gebet 6  D. Korzeniewski (ed., tr., comm.), Hirtengedichte aus spätrömischer und karolingischer Zeit (Darmstadt, 1976), 57-71; zur Interpretation, cf. R. Herzog (†) “Severus Sanctus idem Endelechius, De mortibus boum”, in R. Herzog, P. L. Schmidt (ed.), Handbuch der lateinischen Literatur der Antike, vol.  6,1: D.  Berger, J.  Fontaine, P.  L. Schmidt (ed.), Die Literatur im Zeitalter des Theodosius (474-430  n. Chr.) (München, 2020), 345-347.

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des Aeneas erhört, wird der Brand gelöscht, so dass die Trojaner ihrer Schicksalsbestimmung folgen können. Diese Szene wird direkt evoziert und in der Ausgabe durch eine Fußnote zu Vers 12, die einzige zu dem Gedicht, hervorgehoben. Als weiterer, mit dem erstgenannten Erzählkomplex verschränkter Referenztext kommt Verg. Aen. 8.370-406 hinzu, die Genreszene der Verführung des Vulcanus durch seine Gattin Venus und des nach der “glühenden” Liebesvereinigung ermüdet schlafenden Feuergottes. Text und Übersetzung Ad Divam Virginem In colle prope Yffeldorfium propitiam, ob extinctum, advolantibus ab eiusdem Sacello columbis, pagi incendium. Sedere flammae. Concidit ignium immanis aestus. Robore perdito Vulcane dormis, et minaces in cinerem redeunt favillae. Q uis Divum acerbas Mulciberi faces 5 sopivit, et iam culminibus pares lapsu repentino subactas iussit humi trepidare taedas? Classem Sicano littore Dardanam cremasse missa dicitur Iride 10 infesta Iuno, Mantuano siqua fides tribuenda cygno. Tu, Virgo (nam te non dubia fide) nostrae salutis credimus auspicem) flammae vaganti non fluento, 15 non pluvio dominaris arcu. Illapsa siccis taeda mapalibus de colle missa pellitur alite. Aufers timorem, cum paventes obiiceres facibus columbas. 20 Non iam corusci fulminis armiger nobis molestos incutiet metus. Q uidquid minentur facta, tuti virgineas colimus volucres.7 7  Zum Text von Vers 23: Der häufigen Wortverbindung von fata (fatum) und minari liegt das klassische Konzept der schicksalshaften Bestimmung eines drohen-

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Ode 15 An die heilige Jungfrau, huldvoll auf  dem Hügel nahe Isseldorf, aus Anlass der Löschung eines Dorfbrandes beim Anflug von Tauben von ihrer Kapelle her. Gelegt haben sich die Flammen, zusammengebrochen ist die Gluthitze. Deiner Kraft verlustig, schläfst du, Vulcanus, und die bedrohlichen Brandnester werden zu Asche. Wer von den Heiligen hat die Fackeln des Feuerschmiedes eingeschläfert und die beiden brennenden Holzlatten von den Giebeln in jähem Fall herabstürzen und auf  dem Boden bebend liegen lassen? Die Flotte der Trojaner, so sagt man, habe an der Küste Siziliens die feindselige Juno durch ihre Botin Iris in Brand gesteckt, falls man dem Schwan aus Mantua Glauben schenken darf. Du, Jungfrau – denn frei von Zweifel glauben wir, dass Du Hüterin unseres Heils bist – übst Herrschaft aus über den Flächenbrand, nicht durch einen Regenguss, noch durch einen Regenbogen: Die brennende Latte, die auf  die trockenen Hütten gefallen war, wird abgewehrt durch Vogelkraft, gesandt vom Hügel herab. Du nimmst hinweg den Schrecken, als du furchtsame Tauben gegen die Brandfackeln in die Schlacht warfst. Nicht mehr wird uns der Waffenträger des leuchtenden Blitzes bedrückende Furcht einjagen. Wie bedrohlich die Ereignisse auch immer sein mögen: Unter sicherem Schutz hegen wir die Jungfrauenvögel.

Analyse und Interpretation Das Gedicht setzt mit einer minimalistisch knappen, auf  die unmittelbare werkimmanente Gegenwart bezogenen Faktenfeststellung ein: “Brand aus!” So nimmt der Leser direkt an dem Geschehen teil. Diese Feststellung wird in einem parallelen Satz um eine die menschlichen Sinne und damit das literarische Erleben aktivierende Präzisierung – Hitze – entfaltet, an Umfang ausgedehnt, aber nicht um eine die Handlung fortführende Information erweitert, sehr ähnlich der Einleitung des in seiner melancholischen Grundstimmung aber konträren späten Frühlingsgedichts Hor.  Carm. 4.7.1-31. Dazu kommen, in demselben Gedicht 32-36, zwei weitere den Gedankenlauf  nicht entwickelnde Schritte. Auch bei Leuthner den Unglücks zugrunde, cf.  in Nachklassik und Spätantike: Lucan. Phars. 10.101; Ps. Sen. Oct. 616; Claud. Stil. 1.284; im Mittelalter: Gualterus de Castilione, Alexandreis 2.1; 3.158; 9.98; 9.133-134. Angesichts dieser lexikalisch konstanten Stellen ist anzunehmen, dass Leuthner mit der leichten Modifikation von fata zu facta (ein Druckfehler ist wohl auszuschließen) mittels des unspezifischen Alltagswortes den nicht christlichen, dem göttlichen Willen übergeordneten römischen Fatum-Begriff, wie er Vergils Aeneis zugrunde liegt (vgl. Aen. 1.18; 257-258), und den Gedanken an das Feuer als Strafe Gottes vermeiden wollte.

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tritt erst spät, konkret in der letzten, ihrerseits gegenüber dem zweiten Satz längeren syntaktischen Einheit – die Strophe ist also nach dem Gesetz der wachsenden Glieder eines Trikolons aufgebaut – das lyrische Subjekt selbst in den Gesichtskreis seiner Leserschaft, entsprechend Hor. Carm. 4.7.7, worin dieser vor der Hoffnung auf  Unsterblichkeit als Reaktion auf  die Wiederbelegung der Natur warnt, also eine mögliche Hochstimmung dämpft. In Gegensatz dazu vollzieht sich das Auftreten des Dichters bei Leuthner in Form einer triumphierenden Apostrophe an den – von wem? – (die Antwort erfolgt im zweiten Teil des Gedichtes) durch “Einschläfern” seiner Kräfte beraubten Vulcanus, von dessen “maßlosem Wüten” in Form von Feuer im Kontext metonymisch Verg. Aen. 5.662 berichtet: “furit immissis Vulcanus habenis”. Von Leuthner dagegen wird er eben durch die Apostrophe und die Schlafmetapher eher als durch jene der entfesselten Rösser bei Vergil, vollständig als Person und nicht als bloße Metonymie für Feuer erkennbar.8 Diese Personalisierung wird überdies durch zwei weitere Elemente intensiviert: Erstens durch die Vorschaltung einer eindeutig nicht metaphorischen, an Vergils Ausdrucksweise orientierten Bezeichnung des Großbrandes: ignium (entspricht Vergils Volcanus) immanis (klangähnlich mit Vergils immissis) aestus (1-2); zweitens durch die auf  die Personalisierung Vulcane dormis folgende Schilderung der Folgen dieses seltsam kampflosen Sieges (wessen? Auch hierauf  gibt der zweite Teil Antwort) über den Feuergott.9 Der Sieg manifestiert sich in der Verwandlung von heißer Asche in kalte – hier verrät sich der Grammatiker, dem die differentia zwischen favilla und cinis wohl vertraut ist.10   Zur Metapher des Einschlafens des Feuers, isoliert von der Person des Vulcanus, aber in ähnlichem lexikalischen Kontext cf. Verg. Aen. 5.743; Stat. Theb. 6.512-514. Bei Leuthner liegt eine sprachliche “Repersonalisierung” der Metapher zur Metonymie vor, die ein personales Narrativ ermöglicht (darüber im Folgenden). 9  Eine Umbeziehung von einer Sache auf  eine Person auf  dem Weg einer Metapher könnte auch in der metaphorischen Anwendung des Begriffs robur in Leuthners robore perdito (2) auf  den geschwächten Vulcanus vorliegen: In der Schilderung Vergils erscheint das Wort in seiner eigentlichen Bedeutung zweimal im Zusammenhang mit dem regennassen hölzernen Material der Schiffe, bei dem das Feuer seine Kraft erst teilweise und schließlich zur Gänze eingebüßt hat: Aen. 5.681: udo sub robore; 697-698: madescunt / robora. 10  Die gesamten Verse 1-2 erinnern überdies lexikalisch an Vergil, der im Kontext der Bestattung des Steuermannes Misenus Aen. 6.226-627 cineres (für den eingeäscherten Leichnam), flamma (für den brennenden Scheiterhaufen – entspräche einem metonymischen Vulcanus – mit dem nur noch metaphorischen Prädikat quievit statt dormivit) und favillam (für das noch leicht glühende Brennholz des Scheiterhaufens) 8

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In der zweiten Strophe wird das “Einschläfern” der “heftigen Fackeln” des Vulcanus (“Mulciber” – der poetische Kultname erlaubt eine Assoziation zu dem Verb mulcere, “besänftigen”, “beruhigen”, “ruhig stellen”), auf  das Eingreifen einer jenseitigen Macht, etwa eines in gängiger Weise antikisierend mit divus umschriebenen christlichen Heiligen – zur Ehre Marias und der Heiligen wurde die erweiterte Kapelle 1701 gemäß einer deutschsprachigen Votivtafel geweiht – jedenfalls jenseitiger Wesen, zurückgeführt. Die Kausalkette des Ereignisses mit ihrem guten Ende wird also traditionell in der (epischen) Göttersphäre festgemacht. Innerlich folgerichtig, doch äußerlich zunächst überraschend, bietet die dritte Strophe ein der Epik entnommenes Beispiel für Aktivität aus dem Jenseits bei einer Brandkatastrophe: den Brand der trojanischen Flotte vor Sizilien, veranlasst von Juno und exekutiert von Iris im Erscheinungsbild der greisen Trojanerin Beroe bei Verg. Aen. 5.620-658, wie in der Einleitung dargelegt. Die Szene stellt in mehrfacher Hinsicht einen Gegensatz zu Leuthners Brand dar: Erstens, weil “von oben” nicht Rettung vor dem Feuer kommt, sondern eben der Brand, und zwar durch eine feindselige Göttin mit gleichfalls weiblicher Assistenz, ein Detail, das aber an dieser Stelle bei erstem Lesen seinen vollen Sinn noch nicht entfalten kann; zweitens, weil sich das Geschehen in heidnischem Umfeld und großer chronologischer und vor allem historischer Distanz ereignet; drittens, weil gerade die Historizität des im Bereich des nach antiker Theorie mit der Wahrheit nicht unbedingt deckungsgleichen Mythos,11 dicitur (10), liegenden Brandes in Zweifel gezogen wird, eine Historizität, welche demnach geringere Glaubwürdigkeit, fides, besitzt als die zeitlich nähere, nachprüfbare Feuersbrunst. Somit endet der erste Halbteil der Ode mit der nach wie vor offenen Frage: quis divum?, die den gelehrten Professor scheinbar assoziativ verwendet. – Die Versklausel des Enneasyllabus (3), et minaces, ist Hor. Carm. 2.7.11 entnommen, wobei der vorangehende Teil des Horazverses, die “gebrochene Kraft”, fracta virtus (nämlich in der Schlacht bei Philippi), der “verlorenen Kraft”, robore perdito, im vorangehenden Hendekasyllabus Leuthners inhaltlich entspricht: Es liegt also ein inhaltlicher, nicht bloß mechanischer Bezug zu Horaz vor. 11  Zur negativen Konnotationen von fabula cf.  Thesaurus linguae Latinae 6.1. 26.5-27. 3 (praevalet levitas et mendacii notio, “es überwiegt Unernst und die Bedeutung ‘Lüge’”); 6.1. 27.43-78 (indignum, “Unwürdiges”). – Vom späteren Mittelalter bis tief  in die Neuzeit war die Definition von fabula als “Erzählung”, “Mythos”, wie er in (epischen) apologi vorliegt, in der Rhet. Her. 1.6.10 maßgeblich: fabula veri simili, “Geschichte ähnlich der Wahrheit” (vgl. schon Hes. Theog. 26-27).

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zu dem Fall aus der Aeneis geführt hatte – ein durchaus raffiniertes kompositorisches Vorgehen. Umso entschiedener erfolgt zu Beginn der zweiten Gedichthälfte in der vierten Strophe die Antwort: “Du, Jungfrau”, Tu, Virgo (13)! Diese Apostrophierung erweckt zunächst den Eindruck, dass Maria – es ist jedem Leser klar, dass bei Auslassung eines individualisierenden Eigennamens nur sie als die Jungfrau schlechthin gemeint sein kann – die Gegenfunktion zu der kurz zuvor genannten, als Brandstifterin von Juno entsendeten Iris (10) einnimmt, die Verg. Aen. 5.610 ausdrücklich als virgo bezeichnet wird. Im selben Vers verleiht Leuthner seiner Antwort auf  die Frage nach der vor dem Feuer rettenden Potenz in antithetischer Aufnahme von siqua fides (12) aus dem unmittelbar vorangehenden Vers mittels der Feststellung non dubia fide, die er aus Ov. Her. 19.200 ohne inhaltliche Kontingenz übernommen hat, unbezweifelbare Glaubwürdigkeit. Wie bei dem Verursacher des “Bösen”, Vulcanus, wird Maria, die “Geberin des Guten”, um eine homerischer Wendung für gute jenseitige Kräfte anzuwenden, direkt angesprochen. Die Form der Apostrophe wird, anders als jene an Vulcanus, bis zum Ende der Ode durchgehalten. Sie ist nicht als subjektive Devotion des Dichters ausgeführt, sondern, wie in späten, chorlyrischen Oden des Horaz,12 als Ausdruck einer Glaubensgemeinschaft – nostrae, credimus (14) und in den folgenden Strophen nobis (22), colimus (24) –, als deren Sprecher der Dichter auftritt. Dieses Vorgehen eines Lyrikers hat darüber hinaus etliche Parallelen in den lyrischen Dichtungen des Prudentius, die ja teilweise im Breviarium Romanum Aufnahme gefunden hatten, also jedem Geistlichen vertraut waren: Beispiele finden sich in den Zyklen Cathemerinon und Peristephanon.13 Angesichts der historischen Umstände der Entstehungszeit und des salzburgisch-fürsterzbischöflichen beziehungsweise bayerischbenediktinischen Ambientes von Leuthners Lyrik und angesichts der Formulierung in der ersten Person des Plurals erhalten die Begriffe fides, salutis und das Prädikat des Satzes, credere, neben ihrer konkreten, praktischen Bedeutung innerhalb des narrativen Kontexts eine konfessionelle, den Katholizismus betreffende semantische Komponente. Dies mag auch auf  einen metaphori Hor. Carm. 4.2.50-51; 4.5.38; 4.15.32; Saec. 3.  Prud. Cathemerinon 1.81; 91; 2.53-57; 4.100-102; 5.135-140,  etc.; Periste­ phanon 1.120; 4.197-200; 5.561-564; 6.153, etc. 12 13

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schen Nebensinn des Flächenbrandes in dem Ausdruck flammae vaganti als einer sich wie ein Lauffeuer im Land verbreitenden Häresie zutreffen. Gleiches kann der Grund für die lexikalische Rationalisierung der mythologischen, “geflügelten” Iris Vergils und ihres “gewaltigen Bogens in den Wolken”, Aen. 5.657-658, als eines “natürlichen” Regenbogens, pluvio arcu,14 gewesen sein – konnte man doch die Lutheraner seitens der Katholiken bis in die jüngste Vergangenheit als “(Neu-)heiden”, da “religiös Irrende”, desavouieren. Allerdings: Iris erscheint nur als Mittlerin von Junos destruktivem Plan, sie handelt heteronom. Eine solche Rolle trifft auf  Maria aber keineswegs zu – in Leuthners Darstellung handelt sie gänzlich autonom, nicht als Fürbitterin im Sinne einer Deesis, weder Christus oder gar Gottvater werden erwähnt. Diese Position Marias kommt in dem Prädikat dominaris, “du bist Herrin (hast Herrschaft)” deutlich zum Ausdruck – sie ist also nicht die wirkliche christliche Antithese zu der Jungfrau Iris. Die Rettung aus der Bedrohung durch das Feuer erfolgte, wie am Ende der 4. Strophe ausgesprochen, auch nicht durch “Wasser vom Himmel”, was eine physikalische, “natürliche” Interpretation, wie im gegenteiligen Fall des Regenbogens, zuließe: Bei Vergil ist es Jupiter als Iupiter pluvius, der ein Gebet des Aeneas erhört und wolkenbruchartige Regenfälle niedergehen lässt (Verg. Aen. 5.685-699) und somit als bloße Metonymie für Regen aufgefasst werden kann. Marias “Herrschaft” manifestiert sich nicht, wie bei den antiken Göttern, in natürlichen Vorgängen wie einem Regenguss, fluento (15), oder in dessen Ende, angezeigt durch einen Regenbogen, pluvio arcu (16), sondern, gemäß der fünften Strophe, in einem Paradoxon, zwar ebenfalls mittels geflügelter Wesen wie Iris‚ ebenfalls aus der Höhe, aber des Hügels mit dem Marienheiligtum: An die Stelle der Götterbotin treten sanfte, von Natur aus schreckhafte Tauben. Die wahre Gegenpositition der Vollstreckerin göttlichen Willens geht von der geflügelten Iris auf  andere geflügelte Wesen, Tauben, über. Somit tritt Maria letztlich als positive christliche Gegengestalt (“Gegenspielerin”) der heidnischen Juno auf. In christlichem Kontext fungiert die – in der Tradition weiße – Taube seit dem Ende der zu einer Feuersbrunst elementar konträren Sintflut Gen. 8.12 als Zeichen für den Frieden zwischen Gott und   Zu dem nicht-personalen Begriff  für “Regenbogen”, cf. Hor. Ars 18.

14

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den Menschen und somit wie Iris als “Himmelsbotin”. Auf  welche Weise die Beruhigung des Feuers durch die wie eine Truppeneinheit dem Feind in einer Schlacht “entgegengeworfenen” Vögel (20) erfolgte, ist eine Frage, die zu stellen sich angesichts des Wundercharakters des Ereignisses verbietet. Freilich vermittelt in der Genesis und in den Evangelienberichten über die Taufe Jesu je eine Taube als Einzelwesen zwischen dem göttlichen Bereich und dem Diesseits, und in der Tat verwendet Leuthner zunächst den Singular “missa (pellitur) alite” (18) – eine in Rhythmus und Klang ähnliche, aber antithetische Entsprechung zu der Formulierung “missa (dicitur) Iride” (10). Grundlage für die Formulierung ist Verg. Aen. 5.606: “Irim de caelo misit (sc. Iuno)”, so dass dem mythologischen “Himmel” in Leuthners realer Welt der “Hügel”, de colle (18), mit der Kapelle entspricht. Der an Iride anklingende Singular alite erweist sich aber im Nachhinein als kollektiver Numerus, denn in der Folge ist von Tauben im Plural die Rede, welche als “Feuerwehr” die gegenteilige Aufgabe der “brandstiftenden” Götterbotin übernommen haben: columbas (20), und schließlich virgineas volucres (24). Die Formulierung verwendet Ov.  Met. 7.4 für die in der Mythologie generell negativ bewerteten Harpyien, Wesen mit Vogelleibern und Mädchengesichtern. Da aber kein inhaltlicher Bezug auf  diese Stelle erkennbar ist, darf  keine kontrastierende Absicht vermutet werden. Bei Leuthner könnte allerdings eine zweifache Beziehung des Attributs vorliegen, einerseits auf  die Person Maria, die Herrin über die Tauben, andererseits auf  die in diesem Kontext, wie alle Darstellungen in der bildenden Kunst beweisen, stets weiß gedachten Vögel selbst als Symbol jungfräulicher Reinheit. So nennt Prud. Dittochaeon 1 Eva vor dem Sündenfall eine “weiße Taube”. Ein von der Wallfahrtskapelle auf  dem Hügel abfliegender Taubenschwarm wird wohl einer realen Beobachtung entsprochen und als Grundlage für die Deutung als Wunder durch Leuthner oder, schon vor ihm, durch einen Geistlichen oder spontan durch das Volk gedient haben. In Rücksicht auf  die in regelmäßigen Abständen evozierte, im Hintergrund durchgehende episch-mythologische Folie liegt aber eine sich auf eben diesen Komplex beziehende metatextuelle Ebene nahe, die sich Leuthner als intellektuellen “Privatgenuss” gegönnt haben mag, ganz im Sinn der auf  Liv. AUC Praef. 3.1 basierenden Aussage der Hrotsvit von Gandersheim im Vorwort zu ihren hagiographi578

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schen Dramen (Praef. 9). Hier also das mutmaßliche Konzept der aus dem ersten Teil weitergeführten Kontrastierung des Mythos, konkret der Aeneis: Im Sinne der unterschwelligen konfessionsrelevanten Aussagen der vierten Strophe ist die “heilbringende” Maria der Christen (Katholiken), wie bereits erwähnt, die dem Feuer wehrende Gegenspielerin der “feindlichen”, brandstiftenden Juno der “Heiden” (Lutheraner, für die der Marienkult ja problematisch war?), so dass der “Waffenträger des leuchtenden Blitzes”, “corusci fulminis armiger” (21), der aggressive Adler – Jupiters Name wurde entgegen antiken Belegstellen für diese Funktion des Greifvogels auffälligerweise ausgespart – gemäß der sechsten Strophe nicht mehr zu fürchten sei.15 Der Ausdruck corusci fulminis (21) findet sich übrigens bei Val. Fl. Arg. 6.55-56, dort ebenfalls im Zusammenhang mit Adlern, und auf Schilden zur Abschreckung der Gegner dargestellten Blitzbündeln. Ob mit diesen Wörtern der antike Text anzitiert wird – der wie der Adler als “Waffenträger” auch einem flavischen Epos entlehnt wäre (cf. n. 15) –, um eine Assoziation zu einer staatlich-offiziellen Institution auf  der mit Marias Dominanz als (genereller) Heilsbringerin angelegten Metaebene zu stiften, soll vorerst offen bleiben. Diese abschließende Aussage über den “Waffenträger” enthält den Schlüssel zu dem Gesamtkonzept der Ode: Maria, unterstützt von ihren nicht nur furchtsamen, sondern mutmaßlich auch sanften, zu dem Adler daher wesenhaft konträren Tauben, kann Vulcanus “in Schlaf versetzen”, und “schlafend” erscheint dieser ja in den zwei ersten Strophen. Überdies kannte jeder, der in der ersten Hälfte des 18. Jahrhunderts in Westeuropa höhere Bildung genossen hatte, aus Vergils Aeneis Venus als “Gegenspielerin” Junos. Ferner: im 8. Buch des Epos erfährt man, wie schon zuvor angedeutet, dass es Venus auf  ihre Weise, nämlich durch einen erschöpfenden, Kräfte raubenden (cf. robore perdito [2]) Beischlaf  gelang, die mittels des Attributs solitam mit der eigentlichen Flamme der Esse auf  ein und dieselbe Stufe gestellte metaphorische Liebesflamme, flammam (Verg. Aen. 8.389; cf.  Leuthners flammae [1] und [acerbas 15  Das (substantivierte) Adjektiv armiger(a) für den Adler als Blitzträger findet sich für gewöhnlich in Verbindung mit Iovis, vgl. Sil. Pun. 10.108-109 (nahe zu fulmina); Mythographus Vaticanus 1, cap. 181. Eine Assoziation dieses poetischen Bildes mit der jeweils höchsten Herrschaft war demgemäß für das Lesepublikum geradezu unvermeidlich.

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Mulciberi] faces [5]) ihres Ehemanns Vulcanus “einzuschläfern” – placidum soporem (Aen. 8.406), cf. Leuthner sopivit (6) –, bevor er das für den Ausgang des Epos entscheidende, die Niederlage Junos herbeiführende große Werk, die Herstellung der neuen Waffen für Aeneas, in Angriff  nahm, also im Sinn des Narrativs positiv wirkte, wie der “Schlaf  der Flammen” bei Leuthner. Dass andererseits Maria, mag das auch paradox klingen, zunächst als Kontrastfigur in vieler Hinsicht auch die Nachfolge der Venus, von der Spätantike an bis in die astrale Sphäre der stella maris und bis zur züchtigen marianischen Venus in Botticellis Primavera, angetreten hatte, war längst evident.16 Ebenso bekannt war die Tatsache, dass die Tauben der Venus heilig waren, wie es der Hauptreferenzautor Leuthners, Verg. Aen. 6.190-194, selbst und ein weiterer Augusteer, Prop. Eleg. 3.3.31, bezeugen.17 Tauben fungierten bereits im hocharchaischen Orakel von Dodona laut Philostr. Imagines 2.33 als Orakelmedien und, hellenistisch verspielt, als Zugtiere des Himmelswagens der Göttin, in dem sie in spätantiken Panegyriken zur Erde fuhr, um an Hochzeiten des Adels teilzunehmen, wie etwa im Preisgedicht auf  den Konsulat Stilichos bei Claud. Stil. 2.354: Tauben haben hier Anteil an der Epiphanie weiblicher göttlicher Macht – auf  Bildern aus Spätrenaissance und Barock finden sich Darstellungen der Venus mit Tauben nicht selten.18 In der Ode übernimmt Maria als jungfräuliche Herrin der auch in volkstümlichem Kontext als Liebessymbol geltenden Tauben in einer aufgrund des “Taubenwunders” ad  hoc als Antithese zum paganen Mythos gebildeten katholischen “Mythologie” die Rolle der erotisches Feuer löschenden Ehefrau Venus: Beide “himmlische Frauen” löschen einen Brand, indem sie Vulcanus, einmal proprie, einmal translate, in Schlaf  versetzen. Erst in der paradoxen Rolle als jungfräuliche Venus, sinnlich wahrnehmbar ausgedrückt durch die Affinität zu Tauben, wird 16   Cf.  K. Smolak, “Virgo Caelestis. Ein Himmelsphänomen bei Prudentius und ‘Ovid’  ”, in M. Onorato, S. Condorelli (ed.), Verborum violis multicoloribus. Studi in onore di Giovanni Cupaiuolo (Napoli, 2019), 589-616, dort 599-601. 17  Zu dem Aition, cf. Mythographus Vaticanus 2. cap. 44. 18  Als Beispiele seien genannt: Annibale Carracci, Venere e  Cupido (1592, Modena, Galleria Estense) und Pietro da Cortona, Il carro di Venere (um 1622, Roma, Pinacoteca Capitolina). Im zwanzigsten Jahrhundert wurde auch Maria mit Tauben dargestellt, so auf  dem Bild Jungfrau mit Christuskind und Tauben, AK 1935 Kunstwerkstätten Abtei Maria Laach. Anknüpfungspunkt für die Übertragung des Tauben-Motivs auf  Maria mögen Verkündigungsdarstellungen mit der Taube des Heiligen Geistes gewesen sein.

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Maria vollends zur christlichen Gegenspielerin Junos und der Brand von Iffeldorf  zum Miniaturbild nicht nur des Schiffsbrandes vor Sizilien – dieser stellt bloß den Ansatzpunkt dar –, sondern des Grundthemas der Aeneis auf  der Götterebene unter Einbeziehung der alten apologetischen Opposition von dem die Wahrheit entstellenden Mythos und dem die reine Wahrheit bietenden Christentum, ein Gegensatz, der beispielsweise Thema der durch Jahrhunderte in den Schulen gelesenen Ecloga Theoduli ist.19 Diesem poetischen Wandlungsprozess entspricht die Metamorphose der epischen Großform Vergils in die Kleinform horazischer Lyrik. Für gebildete und sensible katholische Leser mochte Marias Leistung, bei nicht allegorischer Interpretation Vergils, ganz im Sinne Leuthners, ein noch erinnerliches Exempel aus der jüngeren Vergangenheit für ihre Mithilfe an der universalen Rettung umso größer erscheinen, als die Assoziation des antiken Feuergottes mit dem Höllenfeuer des Teufels schon in der volkstümlichen Missionsschrift des Martinus von Bracara/Braga, De correctione rusticorum 16, p. 168 im sechsten Jahrhundert im Zusammenhang mit einer Polemik gegen das heidnische Fest der Vulcanalia nahegelegt worden war. So mochte über die Schiene der Beurteilung der Reformation als einer dem (Neu-)heidentum nahestehenden Bewegung, wie sie etwa Laurentius von Brindisi, Lutheranorum hypothesis, pars I: hypothesi Martini Lutheri additamentum 25, p. 488 andeutet, die erfolgreiche Brandbekämpfung Marias mithilfe ihrer von Venus “entlehnten” Tauben für den Dichter und seine vermutlich jugendliche Leserschaft Symbol der Niederwerfung der lutheranischen Bewegung durch Aussiedlung der Protestanten aus der Erzdiözese Salzburg unter Fürsterzbischof  Leopold Anton von Firmian (1727-1744) sein. Wenn ferner der “Waffenträger des leuchtenden Blitzes”, der mythologische Knappe Jupiters, der Adler, ein natürlicher Widersacher der Tauben – der reale Brand mag durch Blitzschlag (!) entstanden sein (allerdings im Spätherbst, Früh- oder Hochwinter?) – genannt wird, so konnte im ganzen oberbayerischen Raum und nicht nur in Salzburg jedermann dar19  Zu dem Thema, cf.  K.  Goehl, J.  Wintjes (ed., tr.), Die Ecloga des Theodulus (Baden-Baden, 2012); K. Smolak, “Venus imperat, Bacchus dominatur – Venus befiehlt, Bacchus herrscht. Götter in lateinischer Lyrik des Mittelalters (Carmina Burana)”, in E. Vavra (ed.), Die Welt und Gott – Gott und die Welt? Zum Verhältnis von Religiosität und Profanität im “christlichen Mittelalter” (Heidelberg, 2019), 225-255, dort 227-228.

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unter ein restriktives Eingreifen in die radikalen erzbischöflichen Maßnahmen beziehungsweise in den Machtbereich der “Herrin” (16: dominaris) Maria durch einen kaiserlichen Emissär (“Waffenträger”) verstehen. Einem solchen würden die Jungfrau und ihre in diesem Fall wider ihre Natur nicht furchtsamen Tauben Widerstand leisten: Ein epischer Vergleich, einmal mehr aus der Epoche der Silbernen Latinität, und zwar aus Val.  Fl. Arg. 8.32-34, mag Leuthner als Kontrast- und Bezugstext im Gedächtnis gewesen sein: Eine, zum Unterschied von der “Herrin” Maria furchtsame Jungfrau wird mit einer furchtsamen Taube, “pavidae […] columbae” (cf. “paventes […] columbas” [19-20]), verglichen, die vor dem Schatten eines Greifvogels zu den Menschen flieht. Wie dem auch sei: Der Adler verkörpert jedenfalls seit der römischen Antike und besonders im Heiligen Römischen Reich die imperiale Macht.20 Eine Intervention zugunsten der Protestanten seitens des Wiener Hofes durch Johann Franz von Gentilotti lässt sich beispielsweise im Fall der Vertreibung der Protestanten aus dem salzburgischen Gasteinertal im Jahr 1731 belegen, als der Habsburger Karl VI, der damalige Imperator Romanorum, die Sympathien der evangelischen Kräfte im Sacrum Romanum Imperium für seinen Plan der Pragmatischen Sanktion zugunsten seiner Tochter, der späteren Kaiserin Maria Theresia, zu gewinnen trachtete.21 Diese Hypothese gilt freilich nur, wenn die Ode in den (frühen) Dreißigerjahren des achtzehnten Jahrhunderts, entstanden ist. Aber selbst dann behielte der Adler angesichts der Grundeinstellung des Dichters und der politischen Situation seine metatextuelle Funktion. Hinsichtlich der Biographie des Dichters muss die Ode jedenfalls von der Brandkatastrophe chronologisch getrennt werden.

20  Cf. N. Weyss, Der Doppeladler in aller Welt: Geschichte eines Symbols, Gesellschafts- und Wirtschaftsmuseum, Ausstellung (Wien, 1993). – Als Beispiel für die Antike diene der Adler-Kameo des Augustus von 27. v. Chr. (Wien, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Antikensammlung, Inv. Nr. IX a 26), für das Mittelalter die “Adlerdalmatika” von 1130-1140 (Wien, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Weltliche Schatzkammer, Inv. Nr. XIII 15). 21  Dazu cf. G. Schwarz-Oberhummer, “Die Auswanderung der Gasteiner Protestanten unter Erzbischof  Leopold Anton v. Firmian”, Mitteilungen der Gesellschaft für Salzburger Landeskunde 94 (1954), 1-85, dort 9.

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Heroides (Elegiae 3-5) Einleitung Der folgende Abschnitt versteht sich zum Unterschied von der vorangehenden Detailanalyse eines lyrischen Gedichtes als exemplarischer Hinweis auf  eine von Leuthner wieder aufgenommene Traditionslinie der religionspolitischen Rezeption der Heroides als Frauenbriefe in elegischem Versmaß – daher die Klassifizierung durch den Autor entsprechend der üblichen Terminologie als Elegiae, nicht als Epistolae – anhand dreier nur mittels weniger Anmerkungen summarisch vorgestellter längerer Dichtungen. Leuthner bediente sich außer der Lyrik auch des “ovidischen” Heroinenbriefes, einer in der Epoche der augusteischen Klassik geschaffenen Untergattung der poetischen Epistolographie,22 um mittels großförmiger Rezeption augusteischer Dichtung, die im Zentrum seiner Unterrichtstätigkeit stand, durch Angriffe auf  den Protestantismus den Katholizismus zu propagieren. Wie für die lyrische Rezeption einer vergilischen epischen Dichtung, wie eingangs dargelegt, gab es auch für den Einsatz des literarischen Liebesbriefes einer Frau an den fernen Geliebten einen Vorläufer in der Spätantike beziehungsweise, je nach Epochendefinition, im frühesten Mittelalter: Venantius Fortunatus baut in Carm. 8.3 in Adaptation der Tradition des Himmelsbriefes, der epistolographischen Kommunikation zwischen Diesseits und Jenseits, das Liebesbekenntnis einer Nonne zu ihrem himmlischen Bräutigam Christus ein.23 Auf  das reiche literarische Spektrum der lateinischen Heroides sacrae der Frühen Neuzeit, wie sie hauptsächlich in der jesuitischen Literatur, im (süd)-deutschen Sprachraum etwa von Jakob Bidermann und 22  Zu Ovid als dem Archegeten der Werkreihe der Heroidenbriefe, die schon zeitgleich zum Weiterdichten anregte, cf. H. Wulfram, Das römische Versepistelbuch. Eine Gattungsanalyse (Berlin, 2008), 173-181. Den umfassendsten Überblick über die bis ins neunzehnte Jahrhundert reichende, sich verselbstständigende und die Grenzen der lateinischen Produktion überschreitende Gattung des heroischen Briefes bietet nach wie vor H. Dörrie, Der heroische Brief. Bestandaufnahme, Geschichte, Kritik einer humanistisch-barocken Literaturgattung (Berlin, 1968). Leuthner ist dort nicht berücksichtigt. 23  Darüber W. Schmid, “Ein christlicher Heroidenbrief  des sechsten Jahrhunderts. Zur spätantiken Traditionsgeschichte elegischer Motive und Junkturen (Venantius Fortunatus, Carm. 8, 3, 219 ff.)”, in H. Dahlmann, R. Merkelbach (ed.), Studien zur Textgeschichte und Textkritik. Festschrift Günther Jachmann (Köln – Opladen, 1959), 253-263; Nachdruck in H.  Erbse, J.  Küppers (ed.), Wolfgang Schmid, Ausgewählte Schriften (Berlin – New York, 1984), 544-554.

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Jakob Balde, gepflegt wurde, kann hier nur hingewiesen werden, wenngleich der zuletzt Genannte auf  die Dichtung Leuthners Einfluss ausgeübt zu haben scheint – dazu Näheres im Folgenden.24 Somit reiht sich dieser, wie das im Bereich der benediktinischen Bildungseinrichtungen in Salzburg und Kremsmünster auch in der Produktion lateinischer Dramen der Fall war,25 in die Tradition der Jesuiten ein und macht wie in Ode 15 konkrete Ereignisse zu Ausgangspunkten seiner katholischen Heroides. Elegia 3: Dido / Elissa – Maria Stuart, Elizabeth I Epistola Mariae Stuartae ad Elisabetham Angliae reginam. Brief  der Maria Stuart an Elisabeth, Königin von England.

Wie etliche Werke Friedrich Schillers, beispielsweise die Balladen Die Bürgschaft und Die Kraniche des Ibykus, steht auch sein Drama Maria Stuart in einer längeren, in diesem Fall sehr dichten literarischen Tradition, die ihre Grundlage letztlich in den Aufgabenstellungen an Lateinschüler der Rhetorikklasse hatte.26 Schiller konnte sich freilich, was das literarische Genus betraf, auf  das Thema der schottischen Königin als einer katholischen “Märtyrerin” der anglikanisch-reformierten englischen Königin bereits auf  eine schon früh in lateinischer Sprache einsetzende, in der Folge von den Nationalsprachen übernommene Behandlung in Dramenform beziehen.27 Nebenher oder vorher existierte aber die “Passion der Maria Stuart” offenbar auch als Aufgabenstellung im gymnasialen 24  Zu diesem umfangreichen Komplex, cf.  J.  Eickmeyer, Der jesuitische Heroidenbrief. Zur Christianisierung und Kontextualisierung einer antiken Gattung in der frühen Neuzeit (Berlin – Boston, 2012). 25   Ein Beispiel: V. Oberparleiter (ed., tr., comm.), Simon Rettenpachers Komödie “Iudicium Phoebi, De nostri saeculi Vatibus” (Salzburg – Horn, 2004). 26  Eine Zusammenstellung von Titeln der literarischen Primärliteratur zu Maria Stuart, nach Jahrhunderten geordnet, bietet I. Krem, Maria Stuart – ein literaturwissenschaftlicher Vergleich unter Berücksichtigung der Werke von Mignet, Zweig und Fraser (Diplomarbeit Universität Wien, 2009), 19-62: Lateinische Werke werden für die frühen Epochen zwar angeführt (mit horriblen orthographischen Fehlern), doch die hier zu behandelnden Stücke fehlen. – Beispiele für jesuitische Maria-Stuart-Heroides bietet Dörrie 1968 (s. Anm.  22), 424: (anonym, aber) Nikolaus Muszka, Epistolae miscellae etc. (Kaschau, 1739), Nr. 1: Maria Stuarta Elisabethae Angliae reginae et sorori; (anonym, aber) Adamus Nyro, Epistulae Heroum et Heroidum (Klausenburg, 1747), Nr. 5: Maria Stuarta Pio V P.M. 27 K. Kipka, Maria Stuart im Drama der Weltliteratur vornehmlich des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts. Ein Beitrag zur Literaturgeschichte (Leipzig, 1907), Nachdruck Ulan

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katholischen Schulbetrieb der Jesuiten. Dies bezeugen etliche Dramen und, kulturell und im weiteren Sinn auch zeitlich und räumlich Leuthner nahe stehend, eine Gruppe von Elegien Jakob Baldes.28 Zwar nennt dieser in seinem Verzeichnis von Übungsvorschlägen für poetische Ausarbeitung durch Schüler an dreiundsiebzigster Stelle als elegisches Thema nur: Nemesis Stuartina sive sanguis Mariae Stuartae, reginae Scotiae, in caelum ex tumulo clamans contra Elisabetham reginam Angliae (Stuartische Rachegöttin oder das Blut Maria Stuarts, der Königin von Schottland, das aus dem Grab zum Himmel schreit gegen Elisabeth, die Königin von England).29 Es handelt sich um ein Stück eines Zyklus von fünf Gedichten in elegischen Distichen zum Thema Maria Stuart und Elizabeth Tudor. Dieser findet sich in dem nachgelassenen, erst 1729 im Anhang zu Urania Victrix gedruckten dreiunddreißig Elegiae unter den Nummern 23 bis 27.30 Die zentrale dritte Position, Eleg. 25, ist besetzt von: Clamor sanguinis ex tumba Stuartiana, Schrei des Blutes aus dem Grab (Maria) Stuarts. Vorangehen die Elegien De utraque Fortuna Maria Stuartae Scotiae Regina [sic!], worin Maria in der Tradition antik-mittelalterlicher Fortuna-Dichtung als Beispiel für den jähen Umschlag des Schicksals erscheint, und Triumphalis Agon eiusdem Reginae, eine mit typischen Elementen literarischer Passionsliteratur zur papsttreuen katholischen, im Himmel willkommen geheißenen Märtyrerin stilisiert wird. Auf  den “Schrei des Blutes”, in dem Maria bereits aus dem Paradies Abschied von Elisabeth nimmt, folgen noch zwei Stücke, Apotheosis Mariae Stuartae, reg(inae) Scot(iae), eine Weiterführung der Worte Marias aus der vorigen Elegie an Elisabeth durch den Dichter als literarischer Person, und als Abschluss des Zyklus die Apostrophe expostulans cum Elisabetha Angl(iae) regina Stuarticida, eine Prosopopoiie der Rachegöttin Nemesis (Rhamnusia) an die “Stuartmörderin” Elisabeth mit sexuellen Verunglimpfungen von deren königlichen Eltern – schließlich hatte Heinrich VIII. mit Rom gebrochen! Press Verlag (2012). – Als Beispiel diene R. Wörner (ed.), Adrianus Roulerius (Adrian De Roulers), “Stuarta Tragoedia” (Berlin, 1906). 28   Zu Baldes Elegienzyklus Urania Victrix, cf. schon Dörrie 1968 (s. Anm. 22), 404-405, ohne Berücksichtigung von dessen Maria-Stuart-Gedichten. 29  Hinweis bei E. Lefèvre (ed., tr., comm.), Jakob Baldes “Expeditio polemico-poe­ tica” (1664) (Berlin – Boston, 2017), 250. 30  R. P. Iacobi Balde e Societate Iesu Opera poëtica omnia, vol. 5, 309-317 (Monachii [München], 1729); Nachdruck von W. Kühlmann, H. Wiegand (Frankfurt a.M., 1990).

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Nach diesem für die literarhistorische Bewertung von Leuthners Präsentation des Stoffes erforderlichen Ausblick zurück zu dessen Maria-Stuart-Gedicht. Wenngleich damit zu rechnen ist, dass der Benediktiner die neueste Ausgabe der Werke seines berühmten jesuitischen Vorgängers und damit die posthumen Stuart-Gedichte zur Hand hatte, so ist deren Rezeption im Sinne antiker, mittels linearer oder kontrastierender Zitate durchgeführter imitatio nicht nachweisbar. Viel wahrscheinlicher wäre die Hypothese einer aemulatio innerhalb der im barocken Sinn auf die daktylischen Distichen längerer Dichtungen generell anwendbaren Definition der Elegia: Demzufolge würde Leuthner, ausgehend von vereinzelten Elementen in Baldes Stuart-Zyklus,31 dessen diversen Textsorten zuordenbare Elegien in eine Untergattung aus der Epoche der Augusteischen Klassik zum Zweck der “Propaganda” für seine katholische Heroine zurückführen: in die der ovidischen Heroides, im Sinne der zuvor erwähnten “religiösen” Heroinenbriefe der jesuitischen Tradition. Dieses Vorgehen wurde schon dadurch nahegelegt, dass ein fiktionaler, unmittelbar vor ihrem Selbstmord angesetzter Abschiedsbrief  der Dido mit dem alternativen Namen Elis(s)a – nur so nennen Balde und Leuthner Elisabeth – in dem ovidischen Zyklus vorlag, Her. 7, worauf  Balde nicht Bezug nimmt – das einzige Zitat daraus, Eleg. 27.12 nach Her. 7.191 – steht in völlig anderem Kontext. Leuthner dagegen evoziert gleich im ersten Distichon mittels Anspielungen Briefköpfe poetischer Briefe Ovids: 31 Balde, Eleg. 23.19-20 stellt der Dichter fest, dass Maria keine Möglichkeit zu schreiben hatte: “Non licuit scriptis ulli sua sensa tabellis / edere”; Leuthners Heroide würde in sophistischer Praxis einer Antithese diese Klage durch ihren Brief  kontras­ tieren; 27-28: der Satz “Buchostus quaestor (potiori iure vocandus / lictor) supremum tempus adesse monens” könnte Leithners Schlussvers 240 angeregt haben: “Migrandum est, instat lictor, Elisa vale” (zur Klausel cf. Eleg. 25.13: “Denique Elisa vale” [Anfang einer sieben Distichen umfassenden Apostrophierung Elisabeths von Marias Blut, aber nicht in Briefform]); bei beiden Autoren bekennt Maria sich durch Berufung auf Rom zum Katholizismus, Eleg. 24.33-34: “Si tamen in Scota Romana inquiritur, adsum”; 36: “Prona tuum vereor, maxima Roma, Caput” (Periphrase des Katholizismus beziehungsweise dessen “Hauptes”, des Papstes, durch Adaptation des kaiserlichen [!] Siegeltextes des Mittelalters: Roma caput mundi), cf. bei Leithner 161: “Q uod mea Romuleam ratis est sectata phaselum” (Bild des ökumenisch ausgerichteten Papsttums als Schiff  der katholischen Christenheit); Eleg. 27: Direkte Apostrophierung Elisabeths erst durch den Dichter, von Vers 5 an in Form einer Ethopoiie: Schelte der Rachegöttin; kein Brief; auf  Eleg. 25 (Clamor sanguinis) könnte sich Leuthner, Eleg. 3.226: “innocuus clamat ad astra cruor” beziehen, wenngleich der Ausdruck auf das Blut Abels nach Vulgata, Gen. 4.10 zurückzuführen ist (“Schwestermord” statt “Brudermord”?).

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Mittit, Elisa, tibi, quam perdidit ipsa, salutem, tu nisi iussisses, non moritura soror.32 Heil, das sie selbst verloren, entbietet Dir, Elisabeth, Deine Schwester – dem Tode nicht nah, hättest Du es nicht befohlen.

Dazu cf. Ov. Her. 7.1: “Accipe, Dardanide, moriturae carmen Elissae”, und Pont. 1.10.1-2 (cf.  Trist. 5.13.1-2): “Naso suo profugus mittit tibi, Flacce, salutem / mittere rem si quis, qua caret ipse, potest”, wobei die Wortgruppe qua caret durch die Synonyma quam perdidit, lexikalisch angeregt von Her. 7.6: perdiderim, perdere, ersetzt ist. Durch den Verweis auf  die Verbannungsdichtung Ovids wird die unterschiedliche Situation der königlichen Briefschreiberin, ihre “Verbannung” in den Kerker, gegenüber jener der Königin Dido / Elissa in den Heroides hervorgehoben. Somit ist das Lesepublikum anders als bei Balde auf  einen Ovidbezug des gesamten Stückes eingestimmt. Dieser wird denn auch über den ganzen Brief  hinweg mehr oder weniger deutlich in thematischer und struktureller Hinsicht, nicht durch weitere sprachliche Signale, durchgehalten. Hier die acht markantesten Elemente: [1] Identische Ausgangssituation: ultima verba in Briefform an einst geliebte(n) Betrüger(in): Ov.  Her. 7.1-2 – Leuthner, Eleg. 3.1-4; [2] Gebrochenes Bündnis, foedus, gebrochene Treue, fides: Her. 7.9 – Eleg. 3.19-20 (im Kontext von zerbrochenem Kristallring, dem Symbol ursprünglicher Verbundenheit); Her. 7.8 – Eleg. 3.22; [3] Bezugnahme auf  (konstruierte beziehungsweise echte) “Verwandtschaft” mit Adressat(in): Her. 7.31-36 – Eleg. 3.51-52, cf.  die häufige Anrede als Schwester im ganzen Brief; [4] Rückblick auf  eigene Geschichte und Exil: Her. 7.115-118 – Eleg. 3.33-39; 55-96; 131; [5] Vorwurf  religiöser impietas: Her. 7.129-132 (Aeneas gegenüber den Penaten) – Eleg. 3.155-162 (Elisabeth wegen Abkehr vom Katholizismus); [6] Ausblick auf  eigenen Tod und Begräbnis: Her. 7.181-195 – Eleg. 3.173-240 (gemäß der Tradition der katholischen Maria-Stuart-Literatur als Martyrium stilisiert); [7] Trotz der gegebenen Umstände zeigen beide Briefschreiberinnen gelegentlich ein positives Gefühl (“irdische” Liebe) beziehungsweise eine positive Grundhaltung (christliche Feindesliebe) gegenüber den Adressaten: Her. 7.23-30; 167 f.; 177-180 (noch andauernde 32  Ringkompositorische Aufnahme des Halbverses mit Klangähnlichkeit gegen Ende des Gedichtes (239): “quae moritura loquor”.

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Liebe) – Eleg. 3.3-10; 216-220; [8] göttlicher Fluch: Her. 7.8788 – Eleg. 3.223-238. Erst durch die Wahl der Gattung der Heroides mit Bezugnahme auf  Ovids Brief  der Dido  / Elissa an Aeneas – den spätantiken anonymen Heroidenbrief  Didos an Aeneas, Anthologia Latina 83, hat Leuthner nicht berücksichtigt – wird, anders als bei Balde, die “gute”, da bedingungslos liebende Königin von Karthago in die Rolle des “bösen”, da des Liebesverrats schuldigen Aeneas überführt, also Ovids Wertung umgedreht. Maria Stuart übernimmt die Rolle der durch Betrug dem gewaltsamen Tod ausgelieferten “guten” Dido / Elissa. Somit erfüllt Maria, die katholische Königin von Schottland, als “christliche Dido” eine Funktion, die jener der Jungfrau Maria als “christlicher Venus” in Ode 15 vergleichbar ist. Für eine moralische Abwertung Didos boten sich der christlichen Tradition schon im Mittelalter mehrere Anknüpfungspunkte: Ihre mutmaßliche erotische Sinnlichkeit – so bei Dante, Commedia, Inf. 5.61-62; Convivio 4.26.8; Rime 103.36 –,33 die sie selbst belastende “Untreue” gegenüber ihrem ermordeten Gatten Sychaeus und ihr Konkubinat mit Aeneas – Verg. Aen. 4.172 nennt es culpa, “Schuld”! –, und schließlich ihr Freitod. Wenn ferner Geoffrey Chaucer in The Legend of  Good Women 923-1367 die Didotragödie, die er unter Berufung auf  Vergil und Ovid berichtet, als Legenda Didonis Martyris, Carthaginis Reginae betitelt, so muss es sich um eine bewusst frivole Anwendung des christlichen Martyriumbegriffs auf  eine “Märtyrerin der Liebe” handeln. Ihr steht die “echte” königliche Märtyrerin Maria gegenüber – wiewohl Leuthner mit dem Werk des englischen Dichters sicherlich nicht vertraut war. Ausblick: Elegiae 4, 5 (Geographisch-politische Allegorien als Heroinen): Colonia, Gallia Auf  die zwei folgenden Heroides, in denen weibliche Allegorien, die Stadt Köln und Frankreich, ferne Männer, nämlich Ernst, Bayernherzog und Bischof  von Freising, beziehungsweise den 33  Auch in dem anonymen, höchstwahrscheinlich Bernardus Silvestris zuzuschreibenden Kommentar zu Verg. Aen.1-6 wird Aen. 4 als Allegorie für das Lebensalter der adulescentia und Ausdruck verwerflicher Laszivität interpretiert, cf.  K.  Smolak, “Two 12th-Century Commentaries on Martianus Capella and Virgil”, Wiener Studien 126 (2013), 249-260, dort 259.

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frühmittelalterlichen Freisinger Bischof  Corbinian, brieflich um Hilfe gegen die Reformation bitten beziehungsweise als Helfer begrüßen, kann hier nicht näher eingegangen werden. Bei den Allegorien handelt es sich nämlich um Abstraktionen ohne durchgehend konturierte mythologische Gegenfiguren aus der Dichtung der augusteischen Klassik, auch wenn einerseits Colonia ihren Brief  mit fast den gleichen Worten beendet (Eleg. 4.82: “Non mihi responde, sed, precor, ipse veni”), mit denen Ovids Penelope den ihren an Odysseus beginnt, Her.1.2 (“nil mihi rescribas attinet: ipse veni!”), sich somit erst am Ende wie die wartende Ehefrau geriert, und wenngleich andererseits der römische Papst als katholischer Oberhirte unter Andeutung eines antikisierenden bukolischen Szenariums als der divinisierte Hirte Daphnis aus Vergils fünfter Ekloge erscheint (7-8). Der vom Katholizismus abgefallene Kölner Erzbischof  nimmt gewissermaßen die “Störfunktion” von Penelopes Freiern während der Abwesenheit des Helden ein. Eleg. 5 schließlich überschreitet, bei Wahrung des atmosphärischen Ambientes der Heroides, die Grundidee dieser elegischen Untergattung. Denn Gallia vergleicht sich zwar mit verlassenen Geliebten und Ehefrauen des Mythos, darunter einmal mehr mit Penelope (9-12), doch kann sie den ersehnten Mann wenigstens in Form übersandter Reliquien begrüßen: aber nicht als Gatten, sondern als Sohn (14-15): Corbinian stammte ja aus dem Frankenreich!

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JAMES PARKE’S ARS PISCATORIA, OR THE ART OF  FISHING

INGRID A. R. DE SMET

JAMES PARKE’S ARS PISCATORIA, OR THE ART OF  FISHING, ACCORDING TO AN EARLY NINETEENTHCENTURY CAMBRIDGE POET * Noster in arte labor positus, spes omnis in illa. Ov. Hal. 82

“Gone Fishing”. The phrase is reportedly of  early twentieth-century American origin, referring to the shop signs posted by local tradesmen to indicate that they were not around to do business. Fishing, in effect, has long evoked visions of  leisure and escape, and of  retirement, just as those educated in the Classical and humanist tradition, from the Renaissance to the nineteenth century, often considered poetry as an ideal pursuit to prevent one’s otium from slipping into sheer idleness. In Britain, poetry and fishing became inextricably linked when the popularity of  angling (the most common form of  recreational fishing) accelerated from the mid-seventeenth century onwards. The long-lasting success of  Izaak Walton’s (c. 1593-1683) and Charles Cotton’s (1630-1687) dialogue, The Compleat Angler (mixing prose and verse), is  considered a  prime exponent of  this trend, which continued well beyond the end of  the Georgian era.1 However, compared to the number of pre-Modern English poems on fishing-related topics, similar Latin compositions are scarce.2 *  I owe thanks to The Master and Fellows of  Trinity College Cambridge, for supplying me with a photograph of  the college’s copy of  the poem (as in n. 16) during the Covid-19 pandemic. 1   See, among others, F. De Bruyn, “What Is Sport? Arts of  Rural Sport and the Art of  Poetry, 1650-1800”, in D. O’Q uinn, A. Tadié (ed.), Sporting Cultures 16501850 (Toronto, 2017), 21-45; M. E. Wright, The Poetics of  Angling in Early Modern England (New York, 2018); J.  Strachan, “Wordsworth, Walton and Romantic-Era Angling Literature”, The Charles Lamb Bulletin n.s. 142 (2008), 34-47; M. Swann (ed.), Izaak Walton, Charles Cotton, The Compleat Angler (Oxford, 2014), Introduction. (All further references for Walton are to Swann’s edition, unless otherwise stated). 2  Latin examples include Henry Vaughan’s (1621-1695) epigram De salmone, on a gift of  a freshly caught salmon, and Arthur Johnston’s (1579-1641) Apologia piscatoris, a defence of  fishing on Sundays. Phineas Fletcher (1582-1650), best known for his vernacular Piscatorie eglogues, also composed a Latin equivalent (Lusus. Ecloga: Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 591-613 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124085

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A hitherto unstudied, early nineteenth-century Neo-Latin poem on the art of  angling adds a  valuable dimension to this tradition of  piscatory verse. Concomitantly, it allows for a  more nuanced perspective on Latin composition at Cambridge, at a  time when British Latin poetry was in decline.3 Let us first investigate the poem’s author and the circumstances of  its composition, publication, and early reception, before moving to an evaluation of  its poetic and piscatory qualities.

Latin poetry on the banks of  the Cam In 1814, the Museum Criticum, a short-lived periodical (1813-1826) of  “Cambridge Classical Researches”, featured a  Latin hexameter poem entitled Ars piscatoria.4 The poem’s subscription indicates that it had been composed twelve years earlier, in 1802, by a certain “J.  P. Coll.  SS.  Trin.  et  Univ.  Schol.” 5 The initials belong to Sir James Parke (1782-1868), who pursued a  successful career in law: admitted to Lincoln’s Inn in 1803, Parke was called to the Bar in 1813 and served, from 1828, as a judge on the King’s Bench. He was raised to the peerage in 1856 as Baron Wensleydale.6 Thyrsis, Myrtillus), published in his Sylva poetica. On the continued circulation of, and debate sparked by, Sannazaro’s piscatory verse, see N. Smith, “The Genre and Critical Reception of Jacopo Sannazaro’s Eclogae piscatoriae (Naples, 1526)”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 50 (2001), 199-219 and E. Fredericksen, “Jacopo Sannazaro’s Piscatory Eclogues and the Q uestion of  Genre”, New Voices in Classical Reception Studies 9 (2014) [open access, last consulted 28 July 2020]. 3  D. Money, “Neo-Latin Literature in Cambridge”, in R. C. Alston (ed.), Order and Connexion. Studies in Bibliography and Book History. Selected Papers from the Munby Seminar, Cambridge July 1994 (Cambridge, 1997), 77-95 at 93-94; L. B. T. Houghton, G.  Manuwald, “Introduction: Musa Britanna”, in Iid. (ed.), Neo-Latin Poetry in the British Isles (London, 2012), 1-14, at 6-7. 4  “Ars piscatoria: carmen hexametrum”, Museum Criticum 4  (1814), 465-468. On the journal, see C. Stray, “From One Museum to Another: The Museum Criticum (1813-1826) and the Philological Museum (1831-1833)”, Victorian Periodicals Review 37.3 (2004), 289-314. 5   See the Appendix for an annotated transcript and my translation of   the poem. All references are to this text. 6  On Parke’s life and career, see G. H. Jones, “Parke, James, Baron Wensleydale (1782-1868), judge” (2004), in Oxford Dictionary of  National Biography (ODNB) (doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/21283) and particularly “James Parke” (identifier PRK799J), in ACAD. A  Cambridge Alumni Database (revised and enlarged entries based on J. Venn, J. A. Venn, Alumni Cantabrigienses: A Biographical List of  All Known Students, Graduates and Holders of  Office at the University of  Cambridge, from the Earliest Times to 1900 [Cambridge, 1922]), http://venn.lib.cam.ac.uk [henceforth ACAD]. I have verified and supplemented these biographies as indicated in the notes below.

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In 1925, the law lord’s grandson, the politician James William Lowther (1855-1949), still recalled how Parke took a lifelong pleasure in “the recitation of  scraps of  poetry, whether English or Latin, which his wonderful memory retained up to the age of  eighty-four or eighty-five” and how he (young Lowther) “became a  frequent victim of  his [grandfather’s] passion for poetry”.7 The judge, more­ over, reportedly taught his daughters Cecilia (1819-1845) and Charlotte Alice (1828-1908) Latin himself.8 Parke was indeed well-trained in the Latin tongue. The son of  a  Lancashire merchant and banker, he had been educated at Macclesfield Grammar School. He subsequently enrolled at Trinity College, Cambridge, winning a Craven scholarship in Classics (1799).9 In 1802 Parke received the Sir William Browne’s Medal for a Latin Alcaic ode on Pompeii columna, that is, Pompey’s Pillar in Alexandria: the – incorrectly named – Ancient monument had become an object of  competing French and English scientific interest but also served as a vehicle of  criticism of  Napoleon Bona­ parte’s Egyptian campaign in a  satirical cartoon by James Gillray (1799).10 In 1803, Parke graduated as “fifth wrangler” (a First-Class Honours student with the fifth best result in his year group) and as senior Chancellor’s medallist in Classics.11 In 1804, he was not only elected to an open Fellowship at Trinity, but as a  Middle Bachelor, he also received a  (University) Members’ Prize for the best dissertation in Latin prose, read publicly around the time of  Commencement (the graduation ceremony). Its topic was “Q uibus modis, et gradibus, civitates iam florentes paulatim labare, inclin7  J.  W. Lowther, viscount Ullswater, A  Speaker’s Commentaries, vol.  1 (n.p., 1925), 117. 8   U. Ridley (ed.), Cecilia. The Life and Letters of  Cecilia Ridley, 1819-1845 (Stocksfield, 19902), 14; Lowther 1925 (as in n. 7), 49. 9   The Cambridge University Calendar for the Year 1869 (Cambridge – London, 1869), 243 [henceforth Calendar 1869]. 10 H.  Gunning (ed.), A.  Wall, The Ceremonies Observed in the Senate-House of  the University of  Cambridge […] (Cambridge, 1828), 384; Calendar 1869, 223. For “Jacobus” Parke’s ode, see the ephemeral print Poema numismate annuo dignatum et in curia Cantabrigiensi recitatum […] 1802 (Oxford, Bodleian Library, G.Pamph. 2138 (1) and Arch.Num. inf. IIIa 34; Cambridge, University Library, Cam.c. 1.39.51) and C. J. Blomfield, Th. Rennell (ed.), Musae Cantabrigienses; seu carmina numismate aureo Cantabrigiae ornata, et Procancellarii permissu edita (London, 1810), 9-14. For the satirical print Siège de la Colonne de Pompée / Science in the Pillory, see London, British Museum, inv. 1851, 0901.959. 11  Calendar 1869, 217.

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are, et occidere soleant?” (In what way, and by what degrees, do states that once flourished gradually totter, tip and fall?).12 Parke graduated as a Master of  Arts in 1806. He vacated his fellowship in 1817 to pursue his legal career and marry, but he maintained his ties with his college: in 1825 Parke was elected to the office of auditor, which he held for three years.13 At his appointment as a barrister or serjeant-at-law, he tellingly turned to a  Classical source (Iuv.  Sat. 8.25) for his motto, iustitiae tenax (a firm upholder of  justice).14 Last but not least, in 1835, the University awarded Parke a Doctorate of  Letters (LL.D.). Parke’s poem on fishing formed part of  his prize-winning student oeuvre. Composed as “Tripos verses”, to accompany the Uni­ ver­sity’s degree ceremony, the text was originally printed on a broadsheet, to be distributed on the second Tripos day of  1802.15 The anonymous pamphlet does not feature the title of   the 1814 edition, only the Greek epigraph evoking the guile of   the fisherman, borrowed from Homer’s Odyssey (12.252). The verso of   the broadside, however, includes a further Latin poem, under the heading Roma quodam tempore florentissima nunc prostrata et diruta, ante oculos iacet. Sulp. ad Cic. (Rome, once so flourishing, now lies before us in helpless ruin, after Cic. Fam. 4.5.4.[248]). The reverse also displays the list of  “Baccalaurei quibus sua reservatur senioritas comitiis posterioribus”, that is, the students who gained their B.A. degree as Junior Optimes (with Third Class Honours). Parke has been identified as the author of  the first poem thanks to handwritten notes on the Cambridge University Library and Trinity College Library copies. The second poem is attributed to Raleigh   Wall 1828 (as in n. 10), 373; Calendar 1869, 220.   [A. A. Watts?], “Wensleydale, James Parke, Baron”, in [Id.], Men of  the Time: Biographical Sketches of  Eminent Living Characters […] (London, 1859), 743-744 at 743; W. W. Rouse Ball, “The College Auditors”, in Id., Cambridge Papers (London, 1918), 127-143, at 138-140. 14   Cf. Lowther 1925 (as in n. 7), 115 and the online catalogue notes to the 1828 serjeant’s ring, inscribed with this motto and associated with Parke, London, British Museum (1905,0612.1). 15  Tripos verses, named after the three-legged stool on which the poets sat, must not be confused with the composition and translation tasks set for the Tripos exam in Classics, which was only established in 1824 and until the 1850s remained open just to those who had already achieved mathematical honours. On Tripos verses, see J. J. Hall, Cambridge Act and Tripos Verses, 1565-1894 (Cambridge, 2009). On the Classics Tripos and the teaching of  Classics at Cambridge in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, see M.  L. Clarke, Classical Education in Britain, 1500-1900 (Cambridge, 1959 [repr. 2014]), 104-105. 12

13

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Trevelyan (1781-1865), a  Johnian, who earned some distinction later in life as a miscellaneous writer.16 Parke’s authorship, however, remained a matter of  some speculation in 1856, when Durham Dunlop (1812-1882), the editor of  Dublin University Magazine, lamented in an article on “Modern English Latin Verse” that “the palmy days of  Latin verse writing [were] over”.17 Toward the end of  his survey of  British Neo-Latin poets, from George Buchanan to Lord Grenville, Dunlop cited the Ars piscatoria – which he knew from the Museum Criticum – as a “superior” example among the Latin poems of  recent times: The author of  Ars piscatoria is, we believe, the present Lord Wensleydale, who carried off  all the classical prizes within his reach. Whether he was ever accustomed to put his precepts upon angling to a practical proof  we have never heard, but it is at all events one of  the best imitations of  the Georgics extant.18

Dunlop’s praise, sadly, did not prevent Parke’s poem from sinking into oblivion. Only a  few angling enthusiasts appear to have had wind of   the Ars piscatoria: George Washington Bethune (18051862), who wrote a  seminal preface on the halieutic and piscatory tradition for the first American edition of  Walton’s Compleat Angler (1847), quotes the poem’s homage to Walton (ll. 116-128) in an appendix, alongside an English version of   the extract by “Archdeacon [Francis] Wrangham” (1769-1842), a  friend of   the Romantics Samuel Coleridge and William Wordsworth, and a tireless poet, translator, and book collector.19 It remains unclear how Bethune obtained these texts or if  Wrangham ever translated the 16  See the catalogue notes to “Ichthysi tois iligoisi [sic] dolon kata eidata ballō: Odyss.”, Cambridge University Library, MS.UA.Exam.L.3, MS.UA.CUR.73*, and  Cam.bb.1.1.2. UkCU. Another copy of   the poem is  included in Cambridge, Trinity College Library, X.12.48 (“Verses from the Cambridge University Tripos 17921811”, [Cambridge], [1792-1811]), 79 (verso not legible because of   the pasting). Hall 2009 (as in n. 15), no. 1802.2. On Trevelyan, see E. I. Carlyle, M. C. LoughlinChow, “Trevelyan, Raleigh (1781-1865), writer” (2004), ODNB (doi.org/10.1093/ ref:odnb/27717). 17  D. Dunlop, “Modern English Latin Verse”, Dublin University Magazine 48.24 (1856), 189-203, at 189. 18  Dunlop 1856 (as in n. 17), 200. 19   [G.  W. Bethune (ed.)], Isaac Walton, The Complete Angler, or the Contemplative Man’s Recreation […] (New York – London, 1847), cix-cx. The Latin text is attributed to “James Park [sic], Esq., Late Professor of  Law, Kings College, London”. On Wrangham, see “Francis Wrangham” (WRNN785F), in ACAD [last consulted 3 July 2020] and D. Kaloustian, “Wrangham, Francis (1769-1842), writer and Church of  England clergyman” (2004), ODNB (doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/30009).

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entire Latin poem. Two further extracts from the Ars piscatoria are quoted as epigraphs –  with a  firm attribution to Lord Wensleydale – in Autumns on the Spey (1872), an affably written book on salmon fishing and deer stalking near the river Spey (Scotland), by the sportsman and amateur naturalist Arthur Edward Knox (1808-1886), whilst John Jackson Manley cites an excerpt on the virtue of  angling (attributed to “a well-known scholar”) in his Notes on Fish and Fishing (1877).20 Parke’s piscatory effort, however, escaped the attention of  Thomas Westwood (1814-1888) and Thomas Satchell (d.  1888), whose Bibliotheca piscatoria (1883) is still a prized reference work on fishing and fisheries.

Poetic lessons in fishing The Ars piscatoria is conceived as a short didactic poem on angling and exploits the tropes and topoi of   the genre. A conscious poetic voice addresses the reader in the second person, like a master would his pupil, in an expository and at times deictic or imperative mode. The poem surveys the fisherman’s tackle (a rod and hook), various types of  bait, the most propitious conditions for fishing, and the most commonly fished freshwater species – the barbel, chub, perch, pike and tench – alongside the more challenging catches of  salmon and trout. Over the course of   the poem, several British rivers and lakes pass the review: the poet patriotically prefers these waters to the most illustrious continental lakes. The poem ends on an increasingly moral, and indeed metaphysical, note. Angling is thus not only construed as a more virtuous activity than marine fishing, but river-fishing in pleasant, natural surroundings – as propounded by an idolized Izaak Walton – leads to serenity and godliness.21 The poem’s length (137 hexameters), although quite typical for Tripos poems, is comparable to the surviving fragments of  pseudo20  A.  E. Knox, Autumns on the Spey (London, 1872), 13 and 61; J.  J. Manley, Notes on Fish and Fishing (London, 1877), 91. Manley, however, omits Parke from his subsequent Literature of  Sea and River Fishing (London, 1883). 21  Compare, for example, Walton’s The Anglers Song: “[…] Of  Recreation there is none / So free as Fishing is alone; / all other pastimes do no lesse / than mind and body both possesse: / my hand alone my work can do, / so I can fish and study too. / I care not, I, to fish in seas, / fresh rivers best my mind do please, / whose sweet calm course I contemplate, / and seek in life to imitate […]. For so our Lord was pleased when / He fishers made fishers of  men: / where (which is in no other game) / a man may fish and praise his name.” Walton (as in n. 1), Pt. 1, Ch. V, 66-68.

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Ovid’s Halieutica (On Sea-Fishing, 134 lines), to which Parke makes one, evident allusion (l.  101). His main model, however, as Dunlop rightly posited, was Vergil’s Georgics. In addition, the Ars piscatoria contains several nods towards the Eclogues and Aeneid as well as reminiscences of  Lucretius, Ovid, and Lucan. Parke’s Latin, however, is  not strictly Classical and some iuncturae, such as mane novo (l. 35) or scelerata libido (l. 115), or epithets, such as odora for nemora (ll.  110-111), may have been suggested by dictionaries, phrase books and manuals for verse composition. Possible echoes of  two other Tripos poems, the Platonis principia (1791) by Robert Percy Smith and Marasmos (1797) by William Frere, hint that Parke also studied previous ceremonial compositions.22 The Trinity College student further appears to have been familiar with Girolamo Fracastoro’s well-known didactic poem Syphilis, sive morbus gallicus, reprinted several times in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: it was notably included in Francis Atterbury’s 1684 Anthologia, seu selecta quaedam poemata Italorum qui Latine scripserunt, which Alexander Pope revised and extended in 1740.23 Parke also alludes to English poems by Pope himself  (and/or their Latin renditions by Samuel Johnson and Arthur Murphy) as well as to John Milton’s Lycidas.24 For any subject-specific knowledge or vocabulary on fishing, however, Parke rarely, if  ever, seems to have turned to Neo-Latin poems on the topic, such as Lorenzo Lippi’s (c. 1440-1485) Latin verse translation (1478) of  Oppian’s Halieutica, the books on fishing and pisciculture in Jacques Vanière’s (1664-1739) Praedium rusticum, or Nicola Partenio Giannettasio’s (1648-1715) Piscatoria et nautica. Closer in scope is Simon Ford’s (c. 1619-1699) Piscatio, first published in 1692; 25 yet here too any firm intertextual links elude us. In contrast, I have already mentioned Parke’s eulogistic evocation of  Walton’s best-selling treatise on angling. An allusion to

  Hall 2009 (as in n. 15), no. 1791.2 and 1797.1; appendix (Latin text), notes to l. 41 and l. 109. 23  Appendix (Latin text), note to l. 30. 24  Appendix (translation), notes to ll. 68, 89 and 113. Money 1997 (as in n. 3), 91-92 signals an eighteenth-century translation of Milton’s Lycidas among the papers of  John Strype (1643-1737) (Cambridge University Library, Add. 42, ff. 151-159). 25  Simon Ford, “Piscatio”, in Musarum Anglicanarum analecta (Oxford, Sheldonian Theatre, for John Crosley and Samuel Smith, 1692), 129-143. 22

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the salmon leap on the Welsh river Teifi (Tivy) may have been inspired by Walton, if  not directly by one of  Walton’s own sources, William Camden’s Britannia and Michael Drayton’s Poly-Olbion.26 Moreover, whilst the title of  Parke’s poem, Ars piscatoria, must be ascribed to the editors of   the Museum Criticum, Charles James Blomfield (1786-1857) and James Henry Monk (1784-1856),27 it strengthens – albeit retrospectively – the link with The Compleat Angler, since Henry Bailey (or Bagley) and James Duport (16061679) praise Walton’s treatise under that name in their Latin liminary poems.28 The single footnote that Parke permits himself  (l. 79), to justify salaris as his term of  choice for trout (rather than truta or trutta), refers to “Pennant”: it concerns Thomas Pennant’s (1726-1798) British Zoology, whose third volume discusses reptiles and fish.29 My comparison of  Parke’s brief, poetic remarks on the morphology or habitats of  fish species with Pennant’s Zoology suggests that the poet consulted this work more widely, but that he did not follow it rigorously.30 One example is Parke’s designation of  the charr, which he calls scarus (following Ovid), a  term that is  not listed in Pennant’s taxonomy but was likely dictated by a  dictionary.31 I have found no persuasive evidence that Parke relied directly on other, important ichthyological works such as John Jonston’s Historiae naturalis de piscibus et cetis libri V (1649) or Francis Willughby and John Ray’s Historia Piscium (1686). Through Walton and Pennant, however, he was likely aware, if  only indirectly, of  the treatises of  Guillaume Rondelet (1554), Conrad Gesner (1556) and Ulisse Aldrovandi (1613). Finally, the Ars piscatoria’s technical advice seems to derive from a similarly tangled transmission of  angling books in prose or verse. Walton, for instance, borrows freely from The Arte of Angling   Appendix (translation), note to l. 67.   Monk was a contemporary of  Parke’s at Trinity College Cambridge, admitted as a pensioner in 1799 and matriculating in 1800. Blomfield joined Trinity in 1803. See “James Henry Monk” (MNK799JH) and “Charles James Blomfield” (BLMT803CJ) in ACAD [last consulted 27 July 2020]. 28   Walton (as in n. 1), 9-16 (“Commendatory Verses”) at 14-16, and the notes at 234-235. 29  Thomas Pennant, British Zoology, 3 vols (Warrington, William Eyres – London, Benjamin White, 1776). 30  Appendix (translation), notes to ll. 45 and 53. 31  Appendix (translation), note to l. 101. 26 27

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(1577) by Samuel William and quotes The Secrets of Angling (1613), a  substantive English didactic poem now attributed to John Dennys. In turn, Walton and Robert Venables’s The Experienced Angler (1662) informed John Gay’s georgic poem, Rural Sports (1713, subsequently revised), whose English lines on trout-fishing and types of  bait loosely prefigure Parke’s treatment of   the same.32 The Trini­tarian’s indebtedness to such instruction manuals, however, remains opaque and involves a fair degree of  poetic licence.33

Conclusion What, then, must we make of  Parke’s Ars piscatoria? Its publication in 1814 arguably occurred at a  time when both the editors of   the Museum Criticum and the circle of  its rival periodical, The Classical Journal, led by Abraham Valpy (1787-1854) and Edmund Barker (1788-1839), questioned the artistic accomplishments of  Latin prize-poems and Tripos verses. Whilst Blomfield scorned the patchwork tendencies of schoolboy poetry,34 an anonymous “Essay on Triposes” that appeared in The Classical Journal in 1816 lamented the “arrest of  dullness” into which these once ludic “sallies of   the Muses” had degenerated. The critic dismissed, among others, “the pompous description of   the Newtonian system”, that is, Robert Percy Smith’s Newtoni systema mundanum of  1792. His scoffing description of  “a cold and cautious display of  poetical talent in a  hundred unmeaning Virgilian lines” may well have been a snide at Parke’s Ars piscatoria.35 My commentary on the poem, however, indicates it was anything but a  Vergilian cento: it stands up as an original, independent composition, fully 32  V. A. Dearing (ed.), John Gay, Poetry and Prose, vol. 1 (Oxford, 1975 [online edition 2014]), 41-58, at 47 (ll. 155-158). 33   E.g., Appendix (translation), notes to ll. 30 and 55. 34  Blomfield to Monk, 25th November [1812], partially quoted in A. Blomfield (ed.), A Memoir of  Charles James Blomfield, D. D. Bishop of  London, with Selections from his Correspondence (London, 18642), 19-20: “[…] I continue most decidedly adverse to the notion of  printing any juvenile poetry. The prize compositions in Greek and Latin are frequently creditable to young men; but as they are generally centos from ancient authors, and are at best but the exercises of  seventh-form boys, I cannot think that the admission of  them into our journal will be judicious. By all means leave them to [Abraham] Valpy [editor of  The Classical Journal] and Mr Deighton, who prints correct editions of  them ‘ad calcem Kalendarii’ [The Cambridge University Calendar].” 35  [Anon.], “Essay on Triposes”, The Classical Journal 25 (1816), 83-90, at 84. For Smith’s poem, cf. Hall 2009 (as in n. 15), no. 1792.1.

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deserving of  the attention it received from the likes of  Wrangham, Dunlop, Bethune, Knox and Manley.36 Parke’s artistry, however, does not lie so much in the disclosure of  practical piscatory knowledge: the poem’s restricted length does not allow for the development of  technical details that we might find in earlier, much bulkier examples of  Latin and vernacular didactic poetry on hunting and fishing.37 Instead, the poet easily takes recourse to enumeration and preterition (e.g. ll.  22-24; ll.  92-105). There is  admittedly some repetitiveness in the phrasing, not to mention an abundance of  epithets, while apostrophes (ll.  106-107, 116-125) and the vignettes of   the leaping salmon (ll. 72-77) and the dying trout (ll. 84-91) duly infuse pathos. Nonetheless, Parke partakes in the creative tension that characterises Neo-Latin didactic poetry by evoking a  topography and modern practices and inventions for which Classical Latin did not offer a ready vocabulary or reference frame: one thinks of  British hydronyms such as Lake Windermere (l. 100), or the mention of  the artificial fly (ll. 65-76), the “scouring” of  live bait (ll. 17-19), and the critique of  arctic whaling (ll. 112-115). Some will argue that, overall, the Cambridge poet conjures up an idyllic world that is more pastoral than georgic. Certainly, the Waltonian call for contemplation anticipates the appeal of   the natural landscape for the Romantic poets of  the 1820s, 30s and 40s.38 The result is a pleasing, late Neo-Latin poem on the art of  angling. After reading Parke’s endeavour, one may well be tempted to retire to the brook and “go fishing”.

36  For Parke’s ability to take Vergilianism with a pinch of  salt, see Appendix (text), note to l. 89 (“variabilis umbra”). 37  On the changing characteristics of   the didactic genre, see D. Money, “A Symphony in Gray and Browne: Was Eighteenth-Century Didactic Poetry off  Colour?”, in Y.  Haskell, Ph.  Hardie (ed.), Poets and Teachers: Latin Didactic Poetry and the Didactic Authority of   the Latin Poet from the Renaissance to the Presence (Bari, 1999), 141-153; Y.  Haskell, “The Classification of  Neo-Latin Didactic Poetry from the Fifteenth to the Nineteenth Centuries”, in Ph. Ford, J. Bloemendal, Ch. Fantazzi (ed.), Brill’s Encyclopaedia of  the Neo-Latin World, vol. 1 (Leiden, 2014), 437-448. 38  Cf. Strachan 2008 (as in n. 1).

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APPENDIX

Text and Translation This transcription collates the text of  the 1802 pamphlet, as held by Trinity College Cambridge (T), with the 1814 version, published in the Museum criticum (M). I have opted for a “poeticised” prose translation to reflect the original’s volume and flavour. The apparatus to the Latin text signals variants between M and T (a, b, …) and identifiable intertexts, adding the occasional linguistic comment (i, ii, …) . The notes to the translation contain realia (1, 2, …).

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Text Ars piscatoria (a) Ἴχθυσι τοῖς ὀλίγοισι (b) δόλον κατὰ εἴδατα βάλλων (c). Hom. Odyss. M. 252. (d) Ver ubi iam coelum ridenti luce reclusit,i quisquis amat faciles curas, cuique arte quieta piscibus innocuas studio est intexere fraudes, continuo ad fluvium properet, qua lenior inter errat agros, proprioque recumbit lubricus alveo.ii 5 Tempore quippe illo, mira dulcedine tacti, undique pacatos latices, et pabula laeti nota petunt, coelique exultant lumine pisces purpureo: hinc vitreos interlucentia passim caerula terga lacus, hinc crebro levia tolli 10 corpora ad occiduum iactu mirabere solem. Plura adeo haec dudum speranti gaudia veris, cum iam saevit hyems cumque intractabile caelum,iii maturanda tibi, et (e) multo properanda labore indico: graciles hamos, et lucida fila 15 cura sit, et teretem finxisse ex arbore virgam.iv Immundos multo ante idem servasse memento vermiculos, postquam viridi squalentia terga v eluerint musco vi gelidaeque adspargine lymphae; neu pigeat: nullas tantum sibi flumina poscunt 20 illecebras, dapibusve adeo laetantur opimis. Q uid memorem galbas, et pictis tenuia plumis corpora muscarum? quid glauca volumina mollis erucae? hanc hortos circum densaque virescens fronde nemus, liquidos trahere aegris flexibus orbes 25 cernere erit; quanquam haud alia exultantior exit vere novo,vii et rutilis ultro sese induit alis. Profuit atque hamo varium inspersisse saporem, pallentisque hederae lacrymamviii et fragrantia mella,ix  Ars piscatoria M  (b) ὀλίγοισι M] ἰλίγοισι T  (c) βάλλων M] βάλλω T  (d) Hom. (e) et T] ut M Odyss. M. 252. M] Odyss. T  

(a)

i “ubi iam coelum ridenti luce reclusit”: Verg. Georg. 4.51-52, “ubi […] / […] caelumque aestiva luce reclusit”   ii “alveo”: a Vergilian synaeresis, as in Aen. 6.412; 7.33; 7.303; iii “intractabile caelum”: Verg. Aen. 4.53, “non tractabile caelum”; Georg. 1.211 9.32   “umbrae intractabilis”   iv “teretem […] virgam”: Ov. Met. 2.735-736, “teres […] virga” v “squalentia terga”: Verg. Georg. 4.13 (speaking of lizards)   vi “viridi […] musco”: Lucr. DRN 5.949, “viridi […] musco”   vii “vere novo”: Verg. Georg. 1.43   viii “pallentisque hederae lacrymam”: Plin. M. NH 24.79, “lacrima hederae”; Verg. Buc. 3.39, “hedera […] pallente”; Verg. Georg. 4.124, “pallentisque hederas”   ix “fragrantia mella”: Verg. Aen. 1.436; Georg. 4.169

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Translation The Art of  Fishing Casting bait into the water to deceive the poor little fishes […] Homer, Odyssey, 12.252 As soon as spring opens up the sky with cheerful light, anyone who loves to ease his cares, and strives with tranquil art to weave his harmless deceptions around the fish, should rush forthwith to where the river gently wanders through the fields and smoothly rests in its own bed. 5 For at that time, stirred by a wondrous charm, the fish gladly seek out the steady waters and familiar haunts from all around, to revel in the sky’s reddish haze. Here the shimmering of  blue-tinged backs among the glassy waters, there their lithe bodies’ frequent launches 10 towards the setting sun you will admire. While you wait in hope for these springtide delights – and more –, while winter rages on and the sky is grim, you must set to work without delay, as I advise: thin hooks and diaphanous lines 1 15 you must produce. Fashion, too, a smoothly rounded rod from a tree. Likewise, remember well ahead to keep a stash of  vile grubworms, once they’ve cleansed their scaly backs thanks to green moss and a squirt of  cool water.2 Don’t hold back: it is not as if  the rivers demand bait 20 for themselves, or relish in plentiful food. Why mention maggots, and the colourful down on the small bodies of  flies? Or the greenish tube that is the soft, malleable caterpillar? Around the garden and in a verdant wood with dense fronds, you’ll notice it laboriously pulling on its supple rings; 25 yet it could not be more jubilant than when it emerges in the new spring and dons its gold-red wings. It will have been expedient too to dip the hook in various essences: resin of  pale ivy and fragrant honey, 1  “Clear”, “glass-colour” (i.e. light green) lines were produced from several lengths of  carefully selected horsehair. Walton (as in n. 1), Pt. 1, Ch. 11, 155-156. 2   Parke refers to the process of  “scouring” the worms intended for use as bait. This consists of  washing the worms and letting them crawl over moss (so they are clean on the outside) and cleanse their digestive system. This makes the worms livelier and more colourful, and tougher to put on the hook. See (among others) Walton (as in n. 1), Pt. 1, Ch. 5, 69.

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galbanaque, et graveolens laser,x electrique liquores: 30 scilicet haec credunt praedulces piscibus auras sufficere, occultoque animos impellere sensu. Praeterea coelique vicesxi et flamina venti,xii et servare diem meminit, cui talia curae;xiii mane novo,xiv aut primo sub vespere, pallida nubes 35 aethera caeruleumxv subtili vestiat umbra, et Zephyrus spiret: Zephyro spirante, per undas it (f) calor, et gelidi mulcet penetralia rivi. Q uod si vel densus supra caput astitit imber, solave per noctem ingreditur placidissima Luna, 40 heu male tum vigiles prodest excudere curas.xvi Q uod superest, species studio est ediscere cunctas, et quos quaeque ferant undae, quae pabula cuique conveniant. fluctus rapidos, amnemque profundum Barbus amat, sparso flavescens Barbus ab auro: 45 at fluvio ingenti crassaque uligine laetus,xvii infert se Capito; et ripas incana sonantes, tenuis ubi argilla et strepitantis glarea rivi, ludit Perca inter; stagnoque inamabilis atro Lucius, et pigra solus spatiatur in unda. 50 At Tincam latices tardi atque uberrimus amnis invitant melius, cui fulvum ridet opima luxurie latus, et miro medicamine pollet; et facilis manet iste labor; tu vermibus illum,xviii halantique croco,xix et commista falle farina 55 nec vero mihi displiceat, vaccinia siquis nigra xx legens primasque rosas pictosque hyacinthos,

 it T] ita M

(f)

x “galbanaque, et graveolens laser”: Fracastoro, Syphilis 2.434 (ed. Eatough), “galbanaque, et lasser grave olens, oleumque”   xi “coelique vices”: late antique and post-Classical (cf. Auson. Griph. 25; Alanus de Insulis, Anticlaudianus 210, 0503C) xii “flamina venti”: Lucr. DRN 1.290, “venti  […] flamina”; Verg. Cir. 404, “flamina xiii  “cui talia curae”: Verg. Georg. 4.113   xiv  “mane novo”: not found in Clasventi”   sical Latin, but relatively frequent in late antique texts   xv “aethera caeruleum”: Val. Fl. xvi “vigiles prodest excudere curas”: the phrase emulates the Arg. 1.82 (var. lect.)   expression “vigiles pernox excudere curas”, in Marasmos (l. 20), a 1797 Tripos poem on consumption and its cure, by another Trinitarian, “W[illiam] F[rere]” (1775-1836) (Hall 2009 [as in n. 15], no. 1797.1). Marasmos immediately precedes Ars piscatoria in the 1814 issue of Museum Criticum (461-464, at 462). For “vigil” as an epithet of “cura”, singular or plural, cf. Ov. Ars Am. 3.412; Met. 3.396 and 15.65; Luc. Phars. xvii “crassaque uligine laetus”: Verg. Georg. 2.184, “uligine laeta”   xviii “illum”: 8.161.   sc. piscem. Parke reverts to the female pronoun “illa” in l.  60, to refer to the tench xix “halantique croco”: cf.  Verg. Georg. 4.109, “invitent croceis halantes (tinca).   floribus horti”; Iuv. Sat. 7.208, “spirantesque crocos”   xx “vaccinia […] nigra”: Verg. Buc., 2.18, “vaccinia nigra”  

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galbanum, strong-smelling laser juice, and amber oil; 3 30 Indeed, it’s thought that these delightful scents entice the fish and urge them with mysterious wafts. The changes of  the sky, moreover, and any gusts of  wind, the right kind of  day also the aficionado must observe; at a new dawn or at sunset, let a pale cloud 35 cloak the cerulean sky in subtle shade: let Zephyr breathe, for Zephyr’s breath warms the water and mellows the deep holes of  a cool river. If, however, a thick rain cloud hangs overhead or a solitary, gentle moon appears in the dark, 40 then, alas, it’s not a good idea to shake off  your troubles. There remains for you to study all the species diligently, what type of  water each is carried by, and what kind of  bait may suit each one. Rapid flows and deep water the Barbel loves, the Barbel with its golden-yellow sheen.4 45 But it is in a big river and dense wetland that the Chub happily resides. Between the resounding banks of  a burbling stream that washes over fine clay and gravel, frolics the hoary Perch. A dark pond hides the disagreeable Pike – a solitary ambler amid the sluggish water. 50 Better yet, still waters and lush rivers invite the Tench, whose gold-red flank, glimmering with opulent luxury, is valued for its wondrous medicine.5 Now there remains an easy task: to lure this fish with worms, or a paste of  bread mixed with fragrant saffron.6 55 Nor do I mind if  someone picks dark blueberries, rose buds, and colourful hyacinths,

3   As the phrase is inspired by Fracastoro, the aromatic substances listed here must not be taken literally. 4  According to Walton, the barbel is found in rapid waters in the summer but retires to quiet and deep parts of  the river in winter: Walton (as in n. 1), Pt. 1, Ch. 14, 127. Pennant 1796 (as in n. 29) simply notes that the barbel “frequents the still and deep parts of  rivers” (3.313). 5  Pennant 1796 (as in n. 29) notes that “the [Tench’s] head, sides, and belly, [are] of  a greenish cast, most beautifully mixed with gold, which is in it its greatest splendor when the fish is in the highest season”. As for its medicinal qualities, “[the Tench] has been by some called the Physician of  the fish, and that the slime is so healing, that the wounded apply it as a styptic” (3.314-315). Allusions to the tench as a “doctor fish” are commonplace in English piscatorial writing from the seventeenth century onwards. Walton remarks: “The Tench, the Physician of  Fishes, is observed to love Ponds better than Rivers, and to love pits better than either; yet Cambden observes there is a River in Dorset-shire that abounds with Tenches, but doubtless they retire to the most deep and quiet places in it”: Walton (as in n. 1), Pt. 1, Ch. 11, 116. 6  Walton (as in n. 1), Pt. 1, Ch. 12, 118 mentions “a Paste made of  brown bread and honey” as possible bait for the tench. The saffron (crocus) is likely a poetic liberty.

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albaque luteola distinguens lilia xxi caltha,xxii instruxitque dolos et circum retia tendit. Scilicet illa amens miroque incensa furore 60 continuo implicuit sese, mollemque resolvit inter claustra animum: tantum se laeta colorum piscibus insinuat facies, perque anxia corda xxiii labitur, inque imos persedit lubrica sensus. Ast alios melius fallet tibi daedala musca,xxiv 65 artifici distincta manu, plumaque tenella consita. Nonne vides Tiviae resonantis ad oras, et Vedram, ac magicae secreta ad flumina Devae, regius ut placida tibi maiestate per undas radit iter, vitreoque superbit gurgite Salmo? 70 Idem, ubi Solis aquas mulsit penetrabilis ardor, continuo vivos latices atque alta requirit otia, progeniemque fovet; neque tactus amore ille alio incassum qua spumeus ingruit amnis, tollit ovans sese, et multo luctamine victor 75 exilit: interea it liquidum per lubrica lumen corpora, et adverso ardescunt latera humida Phoebo. Q uod si non tantae capiat te gloria praedae, et pulcram Salaris (*) magis admirabere curam, contemplator: xxv aquas celeres et turbida rivi 80 stagna colit; tu frondiferas vestigia ad oras crebra leges: tu subtili vibrantia lina ipse manu, et facilem torquebis arundinis arcum. Post ubi iam devictum astu doctoque labore,

*  “Salaris, the Trout, vid. Pennant.” [Parke’s own note]

( )

 “albaque […] lilia”: Verg. Georg. 4.130-131, “albaque cum / lilia”   xxii “luteola […] caltha”: Verg. Buc. 2.50, “luteola calta”   xxiii “perque anxia corda”: Lucr. DRN 6.15, “anxia corda”   xxiv “daedala musca”: for the adjectival use of “daedalus”, cf.  Verg. Georg. 4.179, “daedala fingere tecta”; Aen. 7.264, “daedala Circe”   xxv “contemplator”: a future imperative. Lucr. DRN 2.114; Verg. Georg. 1.187  

xxi

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or arranges white lilies and yellow marigolds, heaping them over fish-weirs and spreading them around nets.7 For the silly Tench, driven by some wondrous folly 60 immediately enters them and loses its courage, already weak, in captivity: that is  the extent to which the colours’ cheerful appearance appeals to the fishes, slides into their nervous heart and smoothly settles in their innermost feelings. But you had better bait other fish with an artificial fly,8 65 adorned by a crafty hand and tied with delicate feathers. Don’t you see how near the banks of  the resounding Tivy 9 and in the Wear,10 and the secluded streams of  the wizard Dee 11 the regal Salmon carves its way with gentle majesty through the river and basks in its glassy currents? 70 But when the Sun’s piercing heat has soothed the water, it instantly requires livelier streams and higher leisure grounds, to foster its spawn. Stirred by love, the joyous Salmon vainly vaults against the foaming river’s threat; countless battles later, the conqueror 75 leaps, whilst light flows over its smooth frame and its wet flanks catch the fire of  the Sun. But if  the glory of  such great prey does not appeal to you, and you charmingly care or wonder more about the Trout, consider this: it lives in swift water and swirling river 80 pools. Toward the verdant banks you must often direct your step: with a subtle hand the quivering line and pliant bow of  your cane 12 you’ll twitch. When at last you’ve outwitted the fish with learned skill

  Parke’s inspiration for this method of fishing for tench with a trap net is unclear.   Literally, “Daedalian fly”: like Daedalus, the mythical architect of   the Cretan Labyrinth who flew towards the sun with his ill-fated son Icarus, the fishing fly has man-made wings. 9  The Teifi (formerly anglicised as Tivy) is in Wales. Walton refers to the river’s spectacular annual salmon run, as described in Camden’s Britannia and Drayton’s Poly-Olbion: Walton (as in n. 1), Pt. 1, Ch. 7, 94. Its pools and cascades at Cenarth Falls (Pembrokeshire) remain a well-known salmon-leap, mentioned also by Pennant 1796 (as in n. 29), 3.286 (“Kennerth”, based on Drayton). 10   The Wear flows in North East England, from the Pennines, past Durham, to the North Sea. 11  The Scottish Dee is famous as a salmon-fishing river. However, here it must concern the homonymous Dee in Wales (also home to salmon and trout), as Parke alludes to a well-known line from John Milton’s Lycidas (1637): “Nor yet where Deva spreads her wisard stream” (l. 55). 12  Parke follows Ancient poets such as Ov. Met. 8.217 in their use of  (h)arundo for a fishing-rod. 7 8

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et laceratum hamo, et longo conamine fessum 85 traxeris ad litus; raptim illi lumine glauco ardentes pallere oculi, perque illita guttis corpora purpureis, nec adhuc flaventia terga, ire anceps iubar, et leti variabilis umbra: xxvi Heu! tibi de medio manat dolor iste triumpho 90 unus, et haec lacrymam poscunt spectata volentem. Ast ego quid memorare, et longo condere versu aggredior varias artes, et nomina cunctis quos velox tenet Usa, aut fulvo Tamara fluctu; quos et Idumanium pelagus, placidumque sonantes 95 Sabrinae fluvii, et Musis gratissimus Avon; quos Thamesis pater ante omnes, et Dova silentes inter quae scopulos, atque impendentia saxa murmurat, et glauca vestit caligine fluctus? vellem et Winandrae dulces memorare recessus, 100 (qua Scarus epastam solus sibi ruminat herbam,) xxvii et nemora, et prima sub luce rubentia saxa,xxviii quae subter tardos devolvit pura vapores planities undarum, et longo caerula tractu componit spatia, et diffuso lumine ridet. 105 Hos adeo fluvios et laetas piscibus undas, tu, patria, ante alias felix miraris: at Arni non ego terribiles sonitus,xxix placidive Lemani

xxvi  “variabilis umbra”: a tongue-in-cheek echo of “iuncique tremit variabilis umbra” in Samuel Johnson’s Latin translation (1783) of Pope’s Messiah. Johnson’s use of variabilis was criticised for being un-Vergilian in a famous literary anecdote: “The Scholar (Pedant if you will) said, there is no such word as variabilis in any classical writer. Surely, said the other, in Virgil: variabile semper fœmina. – You forget, said the opponent, it is varium & mutabile.” Joseph Warton (ed.), The Works of Alexander Pope, Esq., vol. 1 (London, B.  Law and others, 1797), 105-106, at 105. Johnson’s translation also circulated with the more purely Vergilian variant “mutabilis umbra”. xxvii  “Scarus epastam solus sibi ruminat herbam”: Ov. Hal. 118-119, “At contra herbosa pisces laetantur harena / ut scarus, epastas solus qui ruminat escas”   xxviii “rubentia saxa”: cf. Lucan. Phars. 2.103-104, “multaque rubentia caede / lubrica saxa”   xxix “ter­ ribiles sonitus”: Verg. Aen. 9.503, “terribilem sonitum”  

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and it is hooked and tired out by the lengthy struggle 85 you’ll draw it to shore; soon a blue-grey tinge will make its burning eyes go pale: over its body, daubed in purple drops, and over its back (no longer golden), creeps a treacherous glow and the variable shade of  death: Alas, in the midst of  your triumph this will be a single 90 cause of  grief, as what you see readily brings a tear to your eye. But why should I start to name and pour into a longer poem the various techniques and the names of  the fish that roam the rushing Ouse,13 the Tamar’s tawny flow,14 Blackwater Bay,15 or the gently whispering 95 Severn,16 the Avon (beloved haunt of  the Muses),17 and Father Thames, above all others, or the Dove that babbles among quiet rocks and hanging cliffs, and cloaks its waters with blue-grey darkness? 18 I’d also like to recall the sweet recesses of  Windermere 19 100 (where the solitary charr 20 ruminates on the weeds it has grazed), its woods, and the rocks that blush at first light, as underneath the lingering mists the pure plain of  water rolls them down, creating – with one long trait – cerulean bays and delighting in the dispersing light. 105 Those are the streams and waters teeming with fish which you, my country, blissfully admire above all others; not the Arno’s dreadful din, not the glassy waters of  gentle

  The Ouse flows in North Yorkshire, through the city of  York.   The Tamar, in South West England, forms the border between Devon and Cornwall. 15  The estuary of  the Blackwater river is in Essex. 16  The Severn is  Britain’s longest river, flowing from mid-Wales to the Bristol Channel. 17  There are several British rivers of  this name. Here, it concerns the Warwickshire Avon, associated with Stratford and the playwright William Shakespeare. 18   The Dove flows in the Peak District, in the British Midlands. Walton’s friend, Charles Cotton, owned a fishing house near the Dove. 19  Winandrae [sc. aquae?]: Lake Windermere was known as Winandermere Water until well into the nineteenth century. 20  Pennant 1796 (as in n. 29) notes of  the charr “that there are but few lakes in our island that produce this fish, and even those not in any abundance. […] The largest and most beautiful we received were taken in Winander Mere […]” (3.268). Pennant does not list scarus in the species’ nomenclature. Ainsworth’s Thesaurus linguae Latinae compendiarius, however, translates scarus as “a scar, or char as called in Cumberland”, noting (after Ovid and others) that it is “a fish that feedeth on herbs, and cheweth the cud, like a beast”. 13 14

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lubrica vitra xxx lacus, aut sanguineum Trasymenum praetulerim; nec qui late, Benace, ad odora 110 porrigeris nemora, et densam interlabere laurum. Nec magis Oceanum pelagique immania monstra,xxxi foedaque crudeles Zemblae prope saxa xxxii triumphos demiror: tales ineat, cui crimina durum infecere sinum, aut nummi scelerata libido. 115 At nobis rigui fontes et flumina cordi; xxxiii nos potius tua, sancte senex, veneranda per aevum auguria, et grato exsequimur praecepta labore; omnia quae quondam Leae labentis ad undam cantasti; neque enim mihi fas, Waltone, tacere 120 mentem in te facilem et nullis pallentia culpis pectora, et antiqua sanctam pietate senectam. Felix, cui placidae fraudes atque otia curae,xxxiv Piscator! tibi enim tranquillo in corde severum. Subsidit desiderium, tibi sedulus angor: 125 dum tremula undarum facies, et mobilis umbra, dum purae grave murmur aquae, virtute quietaxxxv composuere animum, et blandis affectibus implent. Praeterea id verum est, vitae inter tutaxxxvi vacanti his studiis, rerumque videnti daedala dona, 130 ingenium in melius crebro mitescere visu, et maiora sequi.xxxvii Usque adeo placidissima circum naturae species, campique, et caerula mundi

xxx “lubrica vitra”: perhaps an echo of “lubrica vitra Selemni”, from the philosophical Tripos poem Platonis principia (1791) by Robert Percy Smith (1770-1845), a King’s College student (=  Hall 2009 [as in n.  15], no.  1791.2). Reprinted in R. V. S[mith] (ed.), Early Writings of Robert Percy Smith with a Few Verses in Later Years (Chiswick, 1850), 24-33 (at 27).   xxxi “immania monstra”: Verg. Aen. 3.583; Ov.  Fast. 5.35; Val.  Fl. Arg. 2, 17   xxxii “Zemblae prope saxa”: a possible emulation of the well-known lines from Alexander Pope’s The Temple of Fame (ll. 53-54): “So Zembla’s rocks (the beauteous work of frost) / Rise white in air and glitter o’er the coast” (Warton, ed., 1797, as n.  xxvi above, II.58-103, at 63. Arthur Murphy’s (1727-1805) Latin translation of the poem, Templum Famae, reads: “Sic ubi Zembla iacet, liquidi miracula saxi, / Daedala quae finxit vis frigoris, ardua surgunt [...] /” (The Works of Arthur Murphy, 7  vols [London: for T.  Cadell, 1786], VII, 158). xxxiii “At nobis rigui fontes et flumina cordi”: cf. Verg. Georg. 2.481-482, “rura mihi et rigui placeant in vallibus amnes, / flumina amem silvasque inglorius”   xxxiv “felix, cui placidae […] curae”: cf. Verg. Georg. 2.490, “felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas”; Tib. Eleg. 2.1.80, “felix, cui placidus leniter adflat Amor”   xxxv “quieta virtute”: cf. Cic. Sest. 60, “virtus, quae in tempestate quieta est”; Stat. Silv. 2.2.70-71, “expers curarum atque animum virtute quieta / compositus”   xxxvi “vitae inter tuta”: Verg. Aen. 11.882, “inter tuta domorum”   xxxvii “et maiora sequi”: cf. Verg. Georg. 2.434, “quid maiora sequar?”  

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Lake Geneva 21 nor the bloodied waves of  Trasimene 22 I would choose, nor you, Lake Garda, who far and wide lap 110 at fragrant woods and slide among dense laurel groves. Nor the Ocean and enormous monsters of  the sea or cruel triumphs near Zembla’s loathsome rocks do I admire more: they are for those whose hearts have been hardened by crime or filthy lucre.23 115 We care instead for gushing springs and streams: we prefer, venerable old man,24 your lasting insights and follow your precepts in thankful toil – all that once you sang on the banks of  the gliding Lea.25 Nor should I, dear Walton, pass in silence 120 over your gentle mind, your guiltless heart and old age marked by old-fashioned piety. How fortunate you are to pursue this peaceful trickery 26 and recreation, Angler! 27 For within your rested heart, fierce desire and relentless anxiety melt away, 125 as the river’s rippling face, as ever-shifting shade and the water’s solemn murmurs settle your mind with quiet virtue and soothe it with contentedness. Yes, it’s true that when, in the very bustle of  life, you leave your cares behind and observe the world’s precious gifts, 130 frequent contemplation will improve and mellow your mind, making it strive for greater things. In these serene surroundings, Nature’s creatures, the fields and the azure expanse of  the sky

21  Walton remarks with reference to Gesner and the geographer Gerardus Mercator that Lake Geneva was well-known for its trout fishing: Walton (as in n.  1), Pt. 1, Ch. 4, 53-54. 22  An allusion to the Battle of  Lake Trasimene in 217 bc. The lake is located in the modern Italian province of  Perugia. Walton notes with Gesner that the largest pike can be found there (Walton, as in n. 1, Pt. 1, Ch. 18, 105). 23  “Zembla”, i.e. Nova Zembla, is a metaphor for the Arctic region. See also the note to the Latin text, l. 113. The four-line passage alludes to whaling, but possibly also to fur seal and/or walrus hunting, then considered a  type of  “fishery”. Whales were hunted for oil as well as for baleen (whale bone), which, like sealskin, was in high demand in the luxury fashion industry. On the hey-day of  British whaling from the 1730s to the 1820s, see G. Jackson, The British Whaling Trade (St. John’s, Newfoundland, 2005). 24   An allusion to Izaak Walton, named in l. 120, who lived to be a nonagenarian. 25  The Lea (or Lee) is a river of  South East England: it flows through East London and is a tributary of  the Thames. The Lea is associated with Walton’s Angler. 26  The deceit (fraudes) lies in the angler’s cunning methods for catching fish (as in l. 3). 27  The apostrophe is purposely ambivalent: it is both an appeal to the general amateur angler and an allusion to Piscator, the prime interlocutor of  Walton’s Compleat Angler.

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ante oculos spatia,xxxviii ingenua dulcedine sensus perfundunt: hinc vera fides, venerandaque cordis 135 simplicitas; animoque Deum propiore tueri, illapsumque datur sentire in pectora numen. J. P. Coll. SS. Trin. et Univ. Schol. In Comitiis Posterioribus, 1802.(g)

 J. P. Coll. SS. Trin. et Univ. Schol. In Comitiis Posterioribus, 1802. M

(g)

 “caerula mundi […] spatia”: cf. Lucr. DRN 5.771, “magni per caerula mundi”

xxxviii

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before your eyes fill your senses with real harmony: Here lies the source of  true faith and a sacred 135 simplicity of  heart; here one can heed God more closely, and feel His power slip into one’s heart. J[ames] P[arke], Schol[ar] of  Trin[ity College] and the Univ[ersity], On the graduation of  the lower cohort, 1802.

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DES POÈMES MANUSCRITS DE COLLÉGIENS SUR LE SACRE DE CHARLES X EN 1825

ROMAIN JALABERT

DES POÈMES MANUSCRITS DE COLLÉGIENS SUR LE SACRE DE CHARLES X EN 1825

De l’Empire à Jules Ferry,1 les collégiens français suivaient deux classes de vers latins par semaine. Ils mettaient en vers un texte en prose ou traduisaient en latin un poème de langue française, et composaient des odes à l’occasion des fêtes de collège et des fêtes nationales. Ces derniers poèmes prolongeaient une tradition scolaire de l’éloge du pouvoir en vers et faisaient écho à la vogue de l’ode civique, dont Corinne Legoy a étudié la vitalité sous la Restauration.2 Ils reflétaient, en outre, les enjeux politiques et disciplinaires dans les collèges publics, où la jeunesse affirmait volontiers son “anticléricalisme”, son “libéralisme” et son “bonapartisme”.3 Les occasions de représenter le roi et la famille royale, dans le cadre des événements solennels qui ponctuaient l’actualité du régime, étaient nombreuses. Les collégiens de la Restauration purent ainsi composer des poèmes sur le retour des Bourbons (1814), sur le rétablissement de la statue d’Henri IV sur le Pont-Neuf  (1818), sur la mort du duc de Berry (1820), sur la naissance et le baptême du duc de Bordeaux (1820-1821), sur l’expédition d’Espagne (1823), sur la mort de Louis XVIII (1824) et sur le sacre de Charles X (1825). D’autres sujets sur Clovis, Charlemagne, saint Louis et Richelieu, notamment, les invitaient à établir un lien avec Louis  XVIII ou Charles  X, et à réinscrire le régime dans une histoire longue, en 1   Cet article reprend, en l’approfondissant, un court développement de ma thèse de doctorat consacrée à la pratique des vers latins en France au xixe siècle, publiée sous le titre La Poésie et le latin en France au xix e siècle (Paris, 2017). 2  Voir C. Legoy, L’Enthousiasme désenchanté. Éloge du pouvoir sous la Restauration (Paris, 2010). 3  J.-C. Caron, “Révoltes collégiennes, élites juvéniles et société post-révolutionnaire (1815­-1848)”, Histoire de l’éducation 118 (2008), 90.

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 615-629 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124086

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représentant les monarques face à leurs ancêtres. À l’épreuve de vers latins du concours général en 1814, le sujet de la classe de rhétorique portait sur Louis XVI (“Ludovici Decimi Sexti testamentum in arce templo dicta scriptum”), celui de la classe de seconde sur Louis XV (“Vitellius et Ludovicus Decimus-Q uintus”), et celui de troisième célébrait le retour de Louis XVIII (“Nympha Sequanae rediturum Galliæ regem, Lodoicum, votis et precibus urget”). Le sujet de la classe de troisième suivait de quelques semaines l’établissement de la Première Restauration. Il invitait les collégiens à célébrer le 24 avril, jour du débarquement de Louis  XVIII à Calais, après vingt ans d’exil. Celui de rhétorique précédait de quelques mois les cérémonies expiatoires de janvier 1815. Il représentait Louis XVI dans son cachot,  “supportant des moqueries indignes” (“indigna ferens […] ludibria”) 4 et demandant pardon à Dieu pour son peuple: “Gallis, summe Deus, veniam concede;  meisque  / parce, precor, populis” (Accorde, Dieu très haut, ta grâce aux Français; pardonne, je t’en prie, à mon peuple).5 Les éloges du pouvoir en vers représentaient, pour les meilleurs élèves, une occasion de s’illustrer aux yeux de leurs professeurs. Leurs poèmes étaient lus à l’occasion de séances publiques organisées par les établissements, qui pouvaient être mondaines.6 Ils  étaient parfois publiés en plaquette ou en brochure, ou dans des revues latines comme l’Hermes romanus (1816-1819), l’Almanach des muses latines (1817-1819) ou l’Apis romana (1821-1823). Ils étaient également envoyés, imprimés ou sous une forme manuscrite, au ministère des Affaires ecclésiastiques et de l’Instruction publique ou à la Maison du roi. Les Archives nationales conservent un lot de dix-neuf  poèmes manuscrits sur le sacre de Charles X, composés par des collégiens de Louis-le-Grand. Nous nous intéresserons au rattachement de ces poèmes à la pratique scolaire de l’ode civique et à leur inscription dans l’actualité du régime.

4   A. Bignan, “Le testament de Louis XVI” [2e prix], Hermes romanus ou le Mercure latin 8 (janvier 1817), 350-351; rééd. dans les Annales des concours généraux ou recueil des discours latins, discours français et vers latins couronnés, en rhétorique, aux concours généraux de l’ancienne et de la nouvelle Université (Paris, 1825), 356. 5  Ibid. 6  Dans son Histoire de Sainte-Barbe, J.  Q uicherat évoque des auditoires com­ posés de “ducs et pairs”, d’“hommes de goût” et de “grands citoyens” (vol. 3, 202203 [Paris, 1864]).

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Dix-neuf  poèmes de collégiens Le 6 juin 1825, jour de l’entrée de Charles X à Paris, le proviseur du collège Louis-le-Grand, Pierre-Laurent Laborie, adressait dixneuf poèmes au recteur de l’Université, parmi lesquels deux poèmes d’élèves de classe de rhétorique, trois poèmes d’élèves de classe de seconde, huit de classe de troisième et six de classe de quatrième; 7 un élève de troisième avait composé en français. Dans une lettre datée du 18  juin, le recteur Denis-Luc Frayssinous exprimait sa satisfaction et rendait hommage aux “efforts” 8 du proviseur, la valorisation des travaux des collégiens par l’encadrement du collège servant la réputation de l’établissement tout entier. Les poèmes furent composés le jour de l’arrivée du roi à Paris. Les collégiens, semble-t-il, avaient pu assister, plus tôt dans la journée, au passage du cortège royal, comme le signale dans sa composi­ tion un élève de quatrième: “Praesul dedit otia nobis, / nam iuvat et pueros principis ore frui” (Le proviseur nous a donné un congé car il est également utile que les enfants jouissent de la vue du prince).9 L’impression que les collégiens purent retirer des festivités parisiennes avait très probablement nourri les descriptions du sacre de Reims. Les poèmes portaient sur le 29 mai, la journée du sacre, et faisait généralement allusion à l’entrée à Paris. Dans leurs vers, les collégiens se donnaient pour la plupart un rôle de “vates […] inexpertus” (poète débutant).10 Un élève de quatrième se conseillait à lui-même de renoncer à composer, “Musa imprudens, fuge munera tanta” (Imprudente Muse, fuis une aussi grande tâche).11 Cependant, il cédait à la ferveur de son patriotisme: “Sed tamen immensus patriae regisque verendi / vicit amor” 7  Dans l’enseignement secondaire français du xixe siècle, un élève entrait au collège, vers onze ans, en classe de sixième, et suivait une scolarité qui le conduisait jusqu’à la classe dite de “rhétorique”, puis à celle de “philosophie”. L’enseignement des vers latins débutait en classe de quatrième. La classe de seconde était tout particulièrement consacrée à la poésie, conformément à la tradition de la pédagogie humaniste, tandis que la classe de rhétorique était associée au discours latin. Le discours français était réservé à la classe de philosophie. La composition de vers latins n’était pas au programme du baccalauréat, mais elle figurait parmi les épreuves les plus prestigieuses du concours général, qui mettait, chaque année, en compétition les meilleurs élèves des établissements parisiens, jusqu’en 1879 (des concours généraux furent organisés dans les académies de province à partir de 1865). 8   Lettre du comte Denis-Luc Frayssinous à Pierre-Laurent Laborie, 18 juin 1825. 9  Suatrin, À Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 17-18. 10 Biseau, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 13. 11  Hippolyte Mosselman, Vers hexamètres sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 7.

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(Et cependant l’immense amour de la patrie et de son vénérable roi l’emporte).12 Un autre élève de quatrième sollicitait la bienveillance du roi: “Ne spernas, Rex, nascentis munuscula Musae” (Ne méprise pas, ô Roi, ce petit présent d’une Muse naissante).13 Il regrettait qu’un collégien de son niveau ne puisse pas rivaliser dans l’éloge avec les poètes confirmés: “O utinam possim laudes aequare canendo! / At non Q uartano gloria tanta datur” (Ô si seulement je pouvais égaler les louanges par mon chant! Mais à un élève de quatrième, une telle gloire n’est pas accordée).14 Si la profession d’humilité était un lieu commun bienvenu, dans une composition de collégien, certains poèmes, qui avaient peutêtre été composés en peu de temps, se caractérisaient, de fait, par un souffle hésitant. Ainsi les premiers vers d’Évariste Galois, élève de seconde, réduisaient l’amplification poétique à deux épithètes (novum et Gratus). Ils manquaient d’ampleur, malgré l’allitération en [t] et le rejet: Musa, novum celebra regem; tibi talia mandat gratus amor. Muse, célèbre le nouveau roi; un amour reconnaissant te commande de si grandes choses.15

Q uelques collégiens à l’aise dans l’exercice des vers latins, en revanche, s’adressaient directement à Apollon, à la manière de poètes confirmés: “Da facilem versum Caroli mihi, Phoebe, petenti  / laudes, et numeris annue Musa meis” (Accorde-moi de composer facilement des vers, Phébus, moi qui cherche à louer Charles, et, Muse, approuve mes rythmes).16 Ils rattachaient leur poème à l’ensemble de la production thuriféraire, en s’attribuant un rôle dans le concert d’éloges qui accompagnait le sacre: “Carmen grande sonent cytharae: nil Musa loquatur  / demissum”  (Q ue les lyres fassent résonner un grand chant: que la Muse n’exprime rien de bas).17

  Ibid., v. 8-9.  Suatrin, À Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 1. 14  Ibid., v. 2. 15  Évariste Galois, In sacram optimi regis Caroli decimi inunctionem, v. 1-2. 16 Floret, À Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 1-2. 17  Charles Chardin, Ad augustissimum principem Carolum in Urbem redeuntem, v. 3-4. 12 13

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Les poèmes partageaient d’autres motifs traditionnels de la parole de gloire comme les apostrophes: “Gallia tolle caput” (France, relève la tête) 18 et “Gallia plaude tibi” (France, applaudis-toi).19 L’enthousiasme des collégiens se manifestait également à travers la reprise du lieu commun de la distribution de fleurs, d’après notamment l’expression de Virgile “manibus date lilia plenis” (donnez des lys à pleine main, Aen. 6.883): “date flores, nectite palmas, […] appendite lauros” (donnez des fleurs, tressez des palmes, […] suspendez des lauriers).20 Les fleurs, qui étaient un symbole traditionnel de fête et un symbole important de l’imagerie du sacre, en raison de l’adoption du lys par Clovis, se retrouvaient dans le poème en vers français du lot envoyé au ministère: “Couronnez vos lyres de fleurs”.21 Enfin, dans plusieurs poèmes, l’impulsion lyrique naissait de l’émotion suscitée par le spectacle de la rumeur des rues parisiennes et de la liesse populaire. Elle se traduisait par des questions rhétoriques: “Unde repentino resonant concussa tumultu / culmina? Q uid laeta tantus concursus in urbe?” (D’où ce soudain tumulte dont les collines se font l’écho? Pourquoi une telle ruée dans la ville joyeuse?) 22 Les poèmes contribuaient, au même titre que les publications officielles, à donner à la journée du sacre sa “forme idéale”.23 Les collégiens, qui n’avaient qu’une connaissance imparfaite de la cérémonie, ne mentionnaient ni la galerie couverte qui reliait l’archevêché au porche de la cathédrale, ni le jubé qui avait été installé devant le chœur, ni les tribunes hautes.24 Ils compensaient en décrivant, avec des mots vagues, la pompe extraordinaire du décor de la cathédrale de Reims (pompa miracula).25 Ils imaginaient, à juste titre, des contrastes entre les murs de l’édifice et des draperies de cou18 Dhuique, Ad clarissimum dilectissimumque Carolum decimum Francorum regem, v. 1. 19  Floret, À Sa Majesté Charles X [quatrième], v. 4. 20  Ibid., v. 1-2. 21 Daubrée, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles dix, v. 6. 22 Besnard, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 1-2. 23   C.  Saminadayar-Perrin, “Introduction”, in C.  Saminadayar-Perrin, É.  Perrin (ed.), Imaginaire et représentations des entrées royales au xix e  siècle (Saint-Etienne, 2006), 8. 24  Les “dispositions et décoration de la cathédrale pour la cérémonie du sacre” sont détaillées, notamment, dans Promenade à Reims, ou journal des fêtes et cérémonies du sacre (Paris, 1825), 99-101. 25 Besnard, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 11.

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leur pourpre: “Augustos iuxta muros diffusa refulget  / purpura” (la pourpre resplendit à côté des augustes murs),26 et l’édifice baigné dans les vapeurs d’encens: “rutilis solemnia fumant  / thura focis, passim sacri funduntur odoris  / nubila”  (L’encens solennel fume dans des feux rutilants, il diffuse de toute part un nuage d’odeur sacrée).27 Ils mobilisaient très probablement leurs souvenirs d’anciens devoirs. Un poème comparait Charles  X à un imperator. Décrivant l’arrivée à Reims, il proposait un parallèle un peu fantaisiste avec une parade impériale sur un quadrige: “victor quum Caesar […] quadriiugos altus gauderet ducere currus” (tandis qu’un empereur victorieux, dominant son quadrige, se réjouissait de le conduire).28 La plupart des poèmes mentionnaient le rite de l’onction: “Ungendam praebet caelesti chrysmate frontem” (Il présente son front à oindre du saint chrême),29 en soulignant la valeur symbolique: De l’huile sainte il est marqué! Oui ton bonheur est assuré Réjouis-toi, chère patrie! 30

Cependant, le geste n’avait pas le même sens, d’un poème à l’autre. Un collégien prétendait que le saint chrême avait été versé sur les cheveux du roi: “In Caroli crines oleum […] perfundit” (Il répand l’huile sur les cheveux de Charles).31 Un autre, qui savait peut-être que le monarque avait reçu en tout sept onctions à la tête, sur la poitrine, aux épaules et aux bras, affirmait qu’il s’agissait du corps tout entier: “Perfuditque sacer regia membra liquor” (Le fluide sacré a arrosé les membres du roi).32 Un troisième établissait un parallèle audacieux avec les athlètes antiques, en exploitant probablement, lui aussi, une réminiscence d’un devoir précédent: 26 S. Cornu, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 7-8. À l’intérieur de la cathédrale, des “draperies de velours cramoisi” tombaient des tribunes hautes qui bordaient le jubé (Promenade à Reims, ou journal des fêtes et cérémonies du sacre [voir n.  24], 100-101). 27  Ibid., v. 9-11. 28 Biseau, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 18-20. 29  E.-A. Ségris, Ad Carolum Gallorum regem, v. 21. 30 Daubrée, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles dix, v. 35-37. 31 Besnard, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 29-31. 32  À propos des onctions, voir Promenade à Reims, ou journal des fêtes et cérémonies du sacre (voir n. 24), 123.

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Atque, mihi si sacra licet conferre profanis ceu qui olimpiacis quondam palmaria campis praemia laturus, molli perfusus oliva, unctaque membra nitens, ad pugna aptior ibat; haud aliter sacra magnus rex noster oliva unctus in athletae morem. S’il m’est permis de mélanger le sacré et le profane, ainsi celui qui autrefois devait porter les palmes de la victoire dans les plaines olympiques, les cheveux arrosés d’huile grasse et les membres oints et brillants, allait au combat en étant mieux préparé; notre grand roi n’allait pas autrement, oint de l’olive sacrée à la manière d’un athlète.33

Dans deux poèmes, l’onction était suivie d’une intervention divine, prenant la forme d’éclairs de foudre et de coups de tonnerre: “Numinis adventum monstrant horrenda fragore / fulmina” (Des éclairs de foudre signalent la manifestation de la puissance divine, dans un terrible fracas) 34 ou d’un ange descendu du ciel: “Et subito, dictu mirabile, coeli / aeternae patuere fores et sacra relucent / atria […] praepetibus labens venit angelus alis” (Et soudain, chose admirable à dire, les portes éternelles du ciel s’ouvrent et les voûtes sacrées resplendissent […] un ange descendu s’approche de ses ailes rapides).35 Le récit du prodige montrait bien que l’exercice ne consistait pas tant, pour les collégiens, à écrire un récit idéalisé et enthousiaste de la cérémonie du sacre, qu’à en donner la signification politique.

La figure du roi Une série de motifs traditionnellement associés à la célébration de la paix, dans le genre de l’ode civique, étaient repris par les collégiens, dans leurs poèmes. Avec l’avènement de Charles X, le soleil se levait plus brillant et plus pur: “campos puro sol lumine vestit / largior” (Un soleil plus grand recouvre les plaines d’une pure lumière).36 Le beau temps chassait les nuages:  “Les nuages sont dispersés  /   Constant, [Gallia, plaude tibi…], v. 60-65.  Besnard, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 35-36. 35  Francey, Renoy, Roux, À Sa Majesté Charles dix, v. 25-27. 36  Charles Chardin, Ad augustissimum principem Carolum in urbem redeuntem, v. 21-22. 33 34

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Un ciel pur succède à l’orage”.37 L’océan s’apaisait,  comme sous l’effet d’un ordre de Neptune: Haud aliter quam, cum tumidas audita per undas Neptuni vox exoritur, […] Iam nubila cedunt, iam venti posuere, omnes iam subiicit undas Oceanus. Pas autrement que lorsque la voix de Neptune se fait entendre à travers les eaux gonflées, […] aussitôt les nuages se retirent, aussitôt les vents se sont apaisés, aussitôt l’océan soumet toutes ses eaux.38

Le commerce maritime reprenait: “nunc tuti volitant parata per aequora nautae” (à présent les marins courent en toute sécurité à travers les eaux qui sont prêtes à les accueillir).39 Il annonçait le retour de l’âge d’or: “redeunt Saturnia regna” (il revient, le règne de Saturne).40 Filant la métaphore maritime, un collégien comparait la France à un bateau longtemps échoué: “O patria, o navis longa quassata procella, […] vix atri erepta ruinis / naufragii” (Ô patrie, ô bateau rompu par une longue tempête, à peine arrachée aux ruines d’un affreux naufrage).41 L’allusion au naufrage renvoyait, bien entendu, à l’épisode révolutionnaire, auquel le sacre de Charles  X venait mettre un “point final”.42 Dans un esprit comparable, plusieurs collégiens, tirant probablement une nouvelle fois profit de leurs précédents devoirs (sur le retour des Bourbons en 1814, par exemple), intégraient à leurs poèmes des développements sur la Terreur et sur l’exil: “Insanos furiis agitans discordia cives / miscuerat late miserando cuncta tumultu” (La discorde excitant des citoyens devenus fous de rage avait largement mêlé toute chose en un désordre déplorable).43 Les digressions sur la période révolutionnaire pouvaient occuper jusqu’aux deux tiers d’un poème, comme dans le cas de Guenée, élève de troisième (22 vers sur 36). Les collégiens mention Daubrée, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles dix, v. 21-24.   Francey, Renoy, Roux, À  Sa Majesté Charles dix, v.  9-12. Francey, Renoy et Roux s’inspirent de Verg. Aen. 1.142-143. 39  Constant, [Gallia, plaude tibi…], v. 30. 40 Guenée, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 33. Guénée cite Verg. Buc. 4.6. 41   Constant, [Gallia, plaude tibi…], v. 74. 42  L.  Raillat, “Les manifestations publiques à l’occasion du sacre de Charles  X ou les ambiguïtés de la fête politique […]”, in A. Corbin, N. Gérome, D. Tartakowsky (ed.), Les Usages politiques des fêtes aux xixe-xxe siècles (Paris, 1994), 55. 43 Guenée, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 1-2. 37 38

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naient également l’épisode de l’Empire, qu’ils présentaient comme le retour du règne des tyrans et des Nérons: “saeva ditione tyrannus / oppressit populum, et  […] regna Neronum  / reddidit”  (un tyran oppressa le peuple de sa domination cruelle et restaura le règne des Nérons).44 Dans les poèmes, le sacre et le beau temps marquaient également la fin du deuil de Louis XVIII, décédé le 16 septembre 1824: “Et posita tandem funebri veste triumphans / tecum omnis grato laetetur Gallia cantu” (Et ayant enfin posé son habit funèbre, que la France tout entière triomphant avec toi se réjouisse par un chant reconnaissant).45 La plupart des collégiens insistaient sur la continuité du règne de Charles  X avec le précédent et faisaient du roi un nouveau Louis: “Lodoicus at eminet alter” (Mais un autre Louis s’élève).46 Charles X achevait un travail de pacification du pays commencé par son frère: “Sic Caroli ad vocem civilia bella quierunt: / quod frater suscepit opus, firmabit” (Ainsi la guerre civile s’apaise devant la voix de Charles: ce que son frère a  pris en charge, il le consolidera).47 Dans certains poèmes, Louis  XVIII (ou peut-être Louis XVI) était représenté comme une sorte de figure tutélaire. Le monarque défunt assistait au sacre de son frère, depuis le ciel: Tunc Lodoix frater germanum spectat ab altis sideribus, gaudensque affert pia vota precantum Gallorum ad solium summi sublime parentis. À ce moment-là, Louis observe du haut du ciel son frère germain, et apporte, en se réjouissant, les pieuses oraisons des Français en prières jusqu’au trône sublime de son illustre parent.48

Deux poèmes associaient, dans ce panthéon (“alta caeli […] aula”),49  la figure de Louis XVIII (ou Louis XVI) à celle d’Henri IV: “Henricus adest, Lodoix et raptus amori / Gallorum”, (Henri est présent, tout comme Louis, emporté par l’amour des Français).50 Cependant, les collégiens étaient plus nombreux à faire le lien entre Charles X et l’ancêtre des Bourbons, “figure tutélaire de la royauté”, qui nour  Constant, [Gallia, plaude tibi…], v. 11-14.  S. Cornu, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 2-3. 46 Lalanne, Ad Carolum Gallorum regem, v. 4. 47   Francey, Renoy, Roux, À Sa Majesté Charles dix, v. 13-14. 48  Audouin, In Caroli regis faustissimam consecrationem, v. 25-26. 49 Besnard, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 43. 50  Ibid., v. 44-45. 44 45

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rissait sous la Restauration, observe Yann Lignereux, “toute une rhétorique légitimante et normative”.51 Les collégiens rappelaient que Charles X était l’héritier naturel d’Henri IV: “digna Henrici proles, Henricus et alter” (digne descendant d’Henri, et autre Henri).52 La figure d’Henri IV, qui alimentait, dans le premier tiers du xixe siècle, la nostalgie d’une France “prospère, forte et réconciliée”, et représentée par la “famille royale”,53 les invitait également à compléter le parallèle, et plusieurs poèmes évoquaient la présence, pendant la cérémonie du sacre, des autres membres de la famille royale, comme le duc d’Angoulême, le héros de l’expédition d’Espagne en 1823: “Hos inter primus regali e  sanguine princeps  / eminet, Hispana redimitus tempora lauro” (parmi eux, se distingue le premier prince de sang, les tempes couronnées du laurier espagnol),54 Marie-Thérèse de France, sa femme (“conjux generosa”),55 ou la duchesse de Berry, veuve du duc de Berry assassiné le 14 février 1820 (“juveni viduata marito”) 56 et mère du petit Henri d’Artois, qui occupait le deuxième rang dans la hiérarchie des héritiers et qui représentait l’ “autre espoir du peuple” (“spes altera gentis”).57 Enfin, les collégiens, remontant aux origines de la monarchie, étaient nombreux à rappeler que le sacre de Charles X reproduisait symboliquement le baptême de Clovis à Reims: “Hic ubi Francigenum primus de gente Clodoveus / abluerat regale caput baptismatis unda” (Ici, Clovis, le premier parmi les Francs, avait purifié sa tête royale dans l’eau du baptême).58 Les poèmes réaffirmaient le lien entre la monarchie et l’Église (“Q ue toujours le Dieu de Clovis / Prête son bras à Charles dix”),59 en insistant sur l’acte de soumission à l’autorité de Dieu que la conversion du chef  païen avait

51  Y.  Lignereux, “Dans les pas d’Henri  IV. La Restauration à Paris, Lyon et Amiens, 1814-1827” in Saminadayar-Perrin, É. Perrin 2006 (voir n. 23), 20. 52   Ernest de Franqueville, In faustissimam Caroli decimi Galliae et Navarrae regis consecrationem, v. 50. 53   Lignereux (voir n. 51), 20. 54 A. Doucet, Le Sacre de Charles X, v. 9-10. 55  Charles Chardin, Ad augustissimum principem Carolum in urbem redeuntem, v. 43. 56  Ibid., v. 48. 57   Ernest de Franqueville, In faustissimam Caroli decimi Galliae et Navarrae regis consecrationem, v. 51. 58 Besnard, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 14-15. 59 Daubrée, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles dix, v. 18-19.

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représenté (“submisit colla Sicamber” – le Sicambre baissa la tête) 60 et sur le caractère sacré de la ville: “multos urbs sacra per annos” (ville sacrée depuis de nombreuses années).61 Un collégien évoquait, en outre, les figures de Charles VII et de Jeanne d’Arc, qui étaient associées à Reims mais aussi à l’idée de Restauration: 62 Haec, ubi sede sua sede longum regnisque paternis Carolus exul, iter tandem faciente puella, […] praebuit ungendam divino chrismate frontem. Cette ville où Charles, longtemps exilé de son trône et du royaume de ses pères, une jeune fille ayant enfin fait le voyage, […]  présenta son front à l’onction du divin chrême.63

Charles  X, reprenant les vertus de Louis  XVIII et d’Henri  IV, apparaissait comme un roi législateur, rassembleur et débonnaire. Dans le même temps, il se distinguait de son aîné en s’inscrivant dans l’héritage de Clovis et de la chrétienté.64 Son règne marquait le rétablissement de la loi et de la religion: “Iam leges et iura vigent, iam sancta resurgit / relligio” (Déjà les lois et la justice sont pleins de vigueur, déjà la sainte religion se relève).65 Les collégiens articulaient les deux idées dans leurs poèmes. Charles X, d’une part, veillait sur les lois (“tutari leges”), défendait les faibles (“defendere inermes”), relevait ceux qui étaient accablés (“erigere oppressos”) et punissait les rebelles (“castigare rebelles”).66 Il voulait être aimé de son peuple: “Hic carum esse cupit, non esse timendum”  (Il veut être aimé et non pas craint) 67 et les poèmes le caractérisaient par sa bienveillance: “iucunda verenda / fronte sedet gravitas; clementia regnat in ore” (Une agréable gravité 60  Ernest de Franqueville, In faustissimam Caroli decimi Galliae et Navarrae regis consecrationem, v. 7. 61   Ibid., v. 8. 62  Sur la fortune de Jeanne d’Arc sous la Restauration, lire l’article de NadineJosette Chaline, “Images de Jeanne d’Arc aux xixe et xxe siècles”, in F. Neveux (ed.), De l’hérétique à la sainte, les procès de Jeanne d’Arc revisités. Actes du colloque international de Cerisy, 1er-4 octobre 2009 (Caen, 2012), 273-284. 63  Ibid., v. 12-13 et v. 15. 64  Legoy 2010 (voir n.  2), 151-160 s’est intéressée aux portraits en vers de Louis XVIII, roi philosophe, et de Charles X, roi chevalier. 65  Guenée, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 21-22. 66 Biseau, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 64-65. 67  Ibid., v. 64-65.

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marque son front vénérable; la clémence règne dans son discours).68 Les collégiens soulignaient également sa sagesse et son sens de la justice  (“Consilio ut populos justitiaque regat”  –  il règne sur les peuples par sa sagesse et par la justice), sa tempérance (“Gallorum temperat iras” – il modère la colère des Français) et son intégrité (“pellat regno flagitium atque dolos” –  il chasse le scandale et la tromperie de son royaume).69 Enfin, Charles X incarnait un idéal de noblesse, qui se retrouvait dans les traits de son visage: “Q uantus honos fronti! Q uantum decus enitet ore! / Blandaque maiestas, lenique micantia flamma  / lumina” (Q uel honneur illumine son front! Q uel distinction illumine sa bouche! Tout comme sa séduisante majesté et ses yeux brillants d’une douce flamme).70 Ernest de Franqueville, un collégien de rhétorique, le plaçait au centre d’une allégorie du bon gouvernement, à la manière des fresques médiévales: Proh! qualis, rex alme, tibi chorus assidet! Adsunt incorrupta Fides, vitiisque Astraea fugatis, ante omnes Pietas candenti insignis amictu, pulchraque Libertas aureis circumvolat alis. Sed maior supera caetus te respicit arce, Borbodinumque pater Lodoix, Henricus et ille. Oh! quel chœur, roi bienfaisant, est assis auprès de toi! la Foi intègre, Astrée, qui a chassé les vices, et, au premier rang, la Piété remarquable par son manteau brillant, sont présentes, et la belle Liberté vole tout autour, avec ses ailes d’or. Mais une assemblée plus prestigieuse –  Louis, père des Bourbons et le grand Henri  – te regarde depuis le ciel.71

D’autre part, les collégiens célébraient la piété de Charles X: “supplex Carolus procedit ad aras” (Charles, en suppliant, s’avance vers 68 S. Cornu, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 18-20. Les collégiens du xixe siècle étaient familiers des vertus royales et impériales de l’Antiquité, qu’ils étudiaient dans leurs manuels, notamment le Selectae e profanis scriptoribus historiae (1727) de Jean Heuzet. où figure la réflexion de Sénèque: “Neminem ex omnibus hominibus magis quam regem aut principem decet Clementia” (Paris, 1810), I, 406. Le texte exact de Sénèque est: “Nullum tamen clementia ex omnibus magis quam regem aut principem decet” (Clem. 1.3.3.). 69 Floret, À Sa Majesté Charles X, v. 6-8. 70 Biseau, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 31-33. 71  Ernest de Franqueville, In faustissimam Caroli decimi Galliae et Navarrae regis consecrationem, v. 38-43.

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l’autel).72 La soumission du roi à l’autorité de Dieu était évoquée dans des termes comparables à celle de Clovis: Voyez vous-mêmes votre roi Q ui fait tout plier sous sa loi: Il courbe devant Dieu la tête.73

La cérémonie de l’onction offrait une occasion d’insister sur cette soumission, en la dramatisant: “Carolus conspergitur, atque / supplice voce Deum exorat” (Charles reçoit l’onction et implore Dieu d’une voix suppliante).74 Enfin, un collégien évoquant la liesse autour du roi, décrivait l’empressement de la foule dans des termes empruntés au Panégyrique de Trajan de Pline le Jeune. L’allusion aux pouvoirs thaumaturgiques du monarque signalait qu’il avait connaissance de la visite de Charles X à l’hospice Saint-Marcoul de Reims, le 31 mai, et de la tentative controversée de ressusciter le “miracle royal”: 75 pueri te noscere regem conspicuum, iuvenes simul ostentare superbi, mirarique senes, quin et neglecta medentum iussa aspernantes aegri, cupidique videndi sponte tui ad visum tentant prorepere, corpus tanquam accepturi sanum optatamque salutem. Les enfants font ta connaissance, roi remarquable, les jeunes gens, en même temps, te montrent fièrement, et les vieillards t’admirent, et même les malades, négligeant les injonctions des médecins, qu’ils méprisent, désireux de te voir, tentent de se traîner jusqu’à toi, par leurs propres moyens, comme s’ils allaient recevoir un corps bien portant et la santé espérée.76

  Francey, Renoy et Roux, À Sa Majesté Charles dix, v. 20.  Daubrée, Sur le sacre de Sa Majesté Charles dix, v. 28-30. 74   Charles Chardin, Ad augustissimum principem Carolum in Urbem redeuntem, v. 7-8. 75 M. Bloch, Les Rois thaumaturges. Étude sur le caractère surnaturel attribué à la puissance royale particulièrement en France et en Angleterre (Paris, 1924), 402. Selon Marc Bloch, “cette résurrection d’un rite archaïque, que la philosophie du siècle précédent avait ridiculisé, paraît avoir été jugée assez déplacée par presque tous les partis, à l’exception de quelques ultras exaltés.” (404). 76 Duicque, Ad clarissimum dilectissimumque Carolum decimum Francorum regem, v. 23 et v. 25-32. Voici le passage du Panégyrique de Trajan de Pline le jeune, qui a servi de source: “Te parvuli noscere, ostentare iuvenes, mirari senes; aegri quoque, neglecto medentium imperio, ad conspectum tui, quasi ad salutem sanitatemque prorepere”  (Les enfants s’empressaient de vous connaître, les jeunes gens de vous montrer, les 72 73

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Les poèmes des collégiens de Louis-le-Grand reprenaient assez fidèlement la teneur des éloges en vers composés à l’occasion du sacre et recueillis, pour certains, dans la Couronne poétique de Charles dix.77 Ils décrivaient une figure paternelle, prolongeant le règne précédent, garante des lois et de l’unité nationale. Cette unité était réaffirmée, à travers la cérémonie du sacre, dans le lien entre la monarchie et l’Église. L’adhésion des collégiens à l’imagerie du sacre contrastait avec le regard désabusé que certains poètes de l’époque portaient sur ces symboles, comme Amable Tastu: Q uand les temps sont changés, qu’importe à ma patrie De ces mœurs d’autrefois la vaine allégorie? 78

La pratique scolaire de l’éloge commandait de restituer un discours politique, qui avait probablement été étudié préalablement en classe. Cependant, la mobilisation, dans certains poèmes, d’un savoir scolaire hérité de la lecture des auteurs classiques et renvoyant à des devoirs antérieurs, rappelait que la composition des vers latins laissait aux collégiens une assez grande liberté d’invention, et que cette liberté était évaluée par les professeurs avec une relative bienveillance, lorsque les poèmes étaient composés pour une fête. Dans sa réponse au proviseur de Louis-le-Grand, le recteur de l’Université évoquait plusieurs poèmes “dignes d’éloges sous le rapport littéraire”. Il faisait peut-être allusion aux deux rhétoriciens: Ernest de Franqueville, futur polytechnicien, auteur d’un poème très structuré et érudit, qui mobilisait les lieux communs attendu du genre (la liesse populaire, le retour du beau temps, etc.) et qui insistait sur le rattachement du règne de Charles X à l’histoire longue, par l’évocation des figures de Clovis, Charles  VII, Henri  IV et Louis  XVIII; Charles Chardin, futur professeur de troisième au collège Louis-le-Grand, moins érudit que son camarade mais plus talentueux et plus expressif, osait une rime, dans son poème:

vieillards de vous admirer; les malades même, oubliant les ordres de leurs médecins, se traînaient sur votre passage, comme s’ils eussent dû y trouver la guérison et la vie) (Pan. 22.1.1; traduction de Jean-Louis Burnouf). 77  A.  de Lamartine et alii (ed.), Couronne poétique de Charles dix. Recueil des poésies composées à l’occasion de l’avènement au trône et du sacre de S. M. Charles X, Roi de France et de Navarre (Paris, 1825). 78  A. Tastu, “Les oiseaux du sacre”, in de Lamartine 1825 (voir n. 77), 381.

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maius quiddam nunc spirat in ore: scilicet aeterno frontem signavit honore relligio. quelque chose de plus inspire sa bouche: c’est bien sûr la religion qui a marqué son front d’un honneur éternel.79

Mais le recteur pensait peut-être également à l’allitération qui décrivait, dans le poème d’Audoin, élève de quatrième, Louis XVIII déposant au pied du trône de son frère les prières des Français: “ad solium summi sublime parentis” (au sublime trône de son illustre parent); 80 ou encore aux quatre-vingt-treize vers du poème de Biseau, élève de troisième, dans lesquels on remarquait des allitérations (“Nunc Carolus ecce canendus” – Voici qu’il faut maintenant chanter Charles!),81 que le collégien combinait parfois intelligemment avec un polyptote emprunté à Virgile: “rex longos regnet in annos, / et nati natorum et qui nascentur ab illis” (que le roi règne pendant de longues années, et les enfants de ses enfants et ceux qui naîtront d’eux).82 Enfin, il avait sans doute apprécié le dialogue en vers composé par Hippolyte Mosselman, élève de quatrième, qui reprenait la forme de poèmes que la tradition scolaire destinait aux fêtes scolaires.

79  Charles Chardin, Ad augustissimum principem Carolum in Urbem redeuntem, v. 15-17. En versification latine, les rimes étaient tolérées lorsqu’elles étaient suivies d’un rejet: “Si le sens n’est pas complet à la fin des deux vers, la consonance est peu sensible, et l’emploi n’en est pas interdit” (L. Q uicherat, Traité de versification latine à l’usage des classes supérieures [1826], 15e éd. [Paris, 1858], 165). 80  Audouin, In Caroli regis faustissimam consecrationem, v. 26. 81 Biseau, Le Sacre de S. M. Charles X, v. 11. 82  Ibid., v.  90. L’hexamètre “Et nati natorum et qui nascentur ab illis” est tiré de Verg. Aen. 3.98.

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NICHOLAS DE SUTTER

MUSAE POMPEIANAE. THE RECEPTION OF  POMPEII AND HERCULANEUM IN NEO-LATIN LITERATURE (19TH-20TH CENTURIES)

Introduction The literary reception of  Pompeii and Herculaneum has been so profound that “Pompeii literature” can rightly be considered a genre of  its own. Yet despite the wealth of  scholarship on the place of   the Vesuvian cities in our literary imagination, little attention has been paid to the many Neo-Latin experiments with this genre.1 It should come as no surprise, after all, that writers have been tempted to approach these ancient cities frozen in time through the prism of  an equally fossilized language, spoken in ancient Pompeii itself. Several modern Pompeii novels in the vernacular, for example, have experimented with inserting Latin into their narratives or dialogues, with varying degrees of  success.2 Our focus here, however, is the corpus of  literary works written entirely in Latin, particularly during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This is one of  those rare cases in Neo-Latin literature in which the reception regarding one of   the most extraordinary episodes in the history of  ancient Rome blossomed only after the humanist period, as the cities were only rediscovered in the mid-eighteenth century. Of  course, the catastrophe itself  was well-known from Pliny the Younger’s letters to Tacitus, so Pompeii did make its way into humanist Latin writ1  E.g. V.  C. Gardner Coates, J.  L. Seydl (ed.), Antiquity Recovered. The Legacy of  Pompeii and Herculaneum (Los Angeles, 2007); S.  Hales, J.  Paul (ed.), Pompeii in the Public Imagination, from Rediscovery to Today (Oxford, 2011); E. M. Moormann, Pompeii’s Ashes. The Reception of   the Cities Buried by Vesuvius in Literature, Music, and Drama (Boston, 2015). 2   E.g. G. Pagliara, Giallo Pompeiano (Castel Maggiore, 2003).

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 631-649 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124087

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ings – we find mention of  it in Petrarch’s letters and Sannazaro’s eclogues, for example 3  – but it only emerged as a  recurring topic in the nineteenth century, when increasing public awareness fired the imagination of  countless authors, including those still writing in Latin. With the help of  García y García’s vast bibliography, Eric  M. Moormann made a  first foray into uncovering the presence of  Pompeii in Neo-Latin poetry.4 Yet in literary archaeology, just as in its “material” cousin, excavation is a gradual process that often overlooks treasures, which are left behind for future expeditions. Moormann’s scope was limited to poetry from nineteenth-century Italy, resulting in a select corpus of  some of   the most famous NeoLatin Pompeiana such as the excellent elegy cycles by Diego Vitrioli and Settimio Augusto Trillini.5 This essay argues that there is much more Neo-Latin material to be found, and moves beyond the works discussed by Moormann – without detracting from their importance, of  course – by including neglected texts from both the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, published and unpublished alike, of  Italian and non-Italian origins. Though the focus here will be on poetry, some literary prose will also be discussed.

Roaming the ruins Neo-Latin Pompeiana generally fall into one of  two categories: firstly, literary evocations of   the city’s demise, and secondly, antiquarian accounts of  either everyday life in pre-disaster times or trips to the present-day archaeological sites. Antiquarianism seems to   Moormann 2015 (as in n. 1), 169-171.   L. García y García, Nova bibliotheca pompeiana. 250 anni di bibliografia archeologica (Roma, 1998) [hereafter: NBP]; E.  M. Moormann, “Pompeii in Neo-Latin Poetry From Nineteenth-Century Italy”, in C.  Chiaramonte Treré, G.  Bagnasco Gianni, F.  Chiesa (ed.), Interpretando l’antico. Scritti di archeologia offerti a  Maria Bonghi Jovino (Milano, 2013), vol. 2, 821-847; Moormann 2015 (as in n. 1), passim. 5  The poems discussed in Moormann 2013 (as in n. 4) are the following: S. A. Trillini, Elegie pompeiane (Benevento, 1882); a number of  Vitrioli’s Elegiae, for which see A. Zumbo (ed.), Diego Vitrioli, Xyphias. Epigrammata. Elegiae (Reggio di Calabria, 1998), including the separately published Su’ due scheletri che abbracciati si rinvennero in Pompei, non lungi dalle pubbliche terme (Rovigo, 1871); Versi in occasione del XVIII Centenario dalla distruzione di Pompei recitati da’ due accademici Mirabelli e Guanciali nella tornata de’ IX di settembre MDCCCLXXIX (Napoli, 1879); R. Car­ roz­zari, Leo gladiator seu Pompeii Vesuvii montis conflagratione obruti (Amsterdam, 1899). Moormann 2015 (as in n. 1) also includes Latin poetry from Britain, which will be touched upon infra. 3 4

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have been the more popular option, as it allowed writers to share in the ongoing Entdeckerfreude and to display their skills in ecphrasis while responding to the continual stream of  new discoveries. Those focusing on the eruption, on the other hand, ran the risk of  becoming somewhat bland and generic. This was the fate of  some of  the overlooked Pompeiana I will mention but briefly here: Vittorio Pandolfo’s 1905 submission Pompeiana to the renowned Certamen Hoeufftianum, for instance, was quickly brushed aside by the jury as the umpteenth evocation of  Pliny the Elder’s last moments, just as Henry Earle Tweed’s (1827-1910) brief  Pompeii from 1845 offers a  rather trite sketch of  Pompeians running for their lives.6 One atypical poem I would like to discuss in more detail from this category, before moving to antiquarianism, is  Leonard Cyril St.  Alban Lewis’s Pompeii, which won the Chancellor’s prize for Latin verse at Oxford in 1915.7 In a dazzling display of  Lucretian didacticism, Lewis applies both the physics and ethics of  Epicureanism to the Pompeii catastrophe. After expounding his views on the absurdity of  religio – the gods are living in splendid isolation and do not care about human suffering – he points out how volcanic eruptions can be rationally explained by atomic theory. In  doing so, the poet skillfully imitates Lucretian style, including archaic morphology and versification, as well as an impressive number of  apocopes, as can be seen in the following fragment about the various ways in which the Pompeians met their end: Nequiquam: miserisque modis multi moribundi corpori’ per caulas fundunt naturam animai, vel saxi gravibus sub molibu’ dilaniati, vel complexu avido rapti gliscentibu’ flammis, quominus effugerent cinerum lapsu indupediti, cum clamoribus atque ululatibu’ talipedantes ibant […] 8 6 Haarlem, Noord-Hollands Archief  [hereafter: HNHA], 64.816, XVI; published as V. Pandolfo, Pompeiana (Salerno, 1906) (not in NBP); H. E. Tweed, Pompeii, in G. H. Brown (ed.), Sertum Carthusianum floribus trium seculorum contextum (Cambridge – London, 1870), 375 (not in NBP); see also Raffaele d’Apuzzo’s musings on the final moments of the Vesuvian towns in his brief Alcaic ode De Herculano et Pompeis a montis Vesuvii flammis exustis (in Id., Carmina [Benevento, 1913], 13-14) (not in NBP). 7 L.  Lewis, Pompeii. Carmen Latinum praemio Cancellarii donatum (Oxford, 1915) (not in NBP). 8  Ibid., 8.

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As the poet imagines the victims of  the eruption praying to the gods and seeking refuge in their temples, he reverts to his tirade against superstition, before concluding with the comforting thought that, according to the atomic world view, nothing ever really perishes; it simply changes form: Omnia communi sub pernicie labefacta, mixtaque imaginibus semiusta cadavera sanctis – quorum suppliciter divos in vota vocantum sensiferos motus hebetavit torridus ignis. Q uare etsi interdum res interiisse videntur, nil perit omnino: aut alias in disposituras semina transmutat natura, aut integra servat, rerum provida, nec consumit materiem ullam, ne res ad nilum redeant radicitus omnes.9

From an antiquarian point of  view, most literary evocations of  Pompeii take the form of  an account of  a personal visit to the site. In 1856, this was even the mandatory topic of  a contest in Latin verse composition organized by a  number of  French schools. The assignment – viator Pompeiorum urbem luci redditam invisit – went as follows: Percurrenti tot per annos sepultas urbis antiquae ruinas quot rerum miracula apparent: hic faber obscuras artes exercuit inglorius; hic furnus coquendis panibus adhuc repletus; hic solo adhuc impressae rhedarum orbitae,  etc. Ubique morum, artium, totius vitae imago oculis nostris renovatur.

Only the poem that won second prize, by one Jean-Michel-AlbertAlfred Dutens (1841-1917), has been preserved.10 British school children once even performed a brief  Latin play featuring a Pompeian archaeologist. In 1879, exactly 1800 years after Pompeii’s destruction, the students of  Westminster School, one of  England’s most renowned public schools, staged a performance of  Plautus’ Trinummus.11 As tradition dictated, the annual play   Ibid., 12.   Concours généraux de l’université. Devoirs donnés au concours général entre les élèves des collèges de Paris et de Versailles suivis de copies d’élèves couronnés (Paris, 1857), 68-70 (not in NBP). Cf. R. Jalabert, La Poésie et le latin en France au xix e siècle (Paris, 2017), 472. 11  Two of   the poems discussed in Moormann 2013 (as in n. 4) – by Q uintino Guanciali (1811-1883) and Antonio Mirabelli (1812-1883) – were also composed to commemorate the eighteenth centenary of  Pompeii’s destruction. Another overlooked Latin poem written on the same occasion is  Antonio De Antiquis’ (18279

10

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was to be followed by a witty epilogue, often touching on contemporary issues. Composed by erstwhile Under Master Henry Bull (1798-1884), the epilogue picked up on the surge in spectacular archaeological finds in the 1860s and 70s, i.e. Heinrich Schliemann’s (1822-1890) discovery of  Troy and the new era of  Pompeian excavations ushered in by Giuseppe Fiorelli (1823-1896). The character Lysiteles is one such Pompeian excavator, who has returned to Britain with his Gladstone bag full of  antiquities. He proudly shows them to Trojan explorer Callicles, who dismisses the common household objects, which pale in comparison to the artefacts he has found in Turkey. The play comes to a close when the two are suddenly visited by spirits from ancient Troy, who, rather surprisingly, applaud the modern excavations: Lys. […] Pater alter, et optime Custos, [enter Lysiteles in tourist’s dress.] salvete ambo! Cal. Adsis salvus! At unde venis? Lys. Nuper, ut audistis, gens Pompeiana notavit funestum ludis, laetitiaque diem, quo quondam flammis, cinerumque Urbs imbribus atris, heu miserum! ex oculis obruta disperiit. Scilicet hoc munus monti, cultumque propinquo Deberi. Cha. Fumo ah! festa Vesevus agit! Lys. Centum oratores verbis commenta disertis certatim texunt ingeniosa satis. Agmine dein facto immenso, iuvenesque senesque congestum invadunt, effodiuntque solum; Q uisque sibi cupidus Thesauri. Cal. Offenderis illic tute aliquid? Lys. Dis sit gratia! Multa tuli [opening his Gladstone bag.] En! Culter – lampas figlina! Et fictilis olla! Q uique cibos avibus semina saccus habet! Femineus pecten, speculumque, et fibula vestis – et, coma qua nimium fusa prematur, acus! Cal. Gestabantur heri haec! Pretii, me iudice, constant exigui! Lys. Exigui? Cal. Res tibi habeto tuas! [scornfully] Bis mille annorum! Tantillum ah! temporis ex quo tristi ista urbs fato semi-sepulta fuit! Troiae ter tumulus superadditus; auspice sed me, nunc exstat prisca grandior Umbra loci. Lys. Nomen et umbra mera est […] 12

1912) Pompeianus Genius, a prosopopoeia of  Pompeii’s guardian spirit celebrating the revival of  its city: Id., Q uaedam Latina carmina (Neapoli, 1887), 17-18 (not in NBP). 12  H. Bull, “Epilogus in Trinummum”, in R. J. Mure, J. Sargeaunt, J. Gow (ed.), Lusus alteri Westmonasterienses […]. Pars tertia. 1866-1905 (Westminster, 1906), 81-85

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Francesco Tranquillino Moltedo (1839-1919), a Latin poet of  some standing, continuously revised his poetic account of  a visit to Pompeii throughout his career. Though he initially published it as part of a digression in his didactic epic on cotton, Gossipion (1873), Moltedo eventually elaborated the episode into an individual poem, Pompeiorum reliquiae, which he submitted to the Hoeufftianum in 1907.13 The poet focuses particularly on the numerous mosaics and wall paintings he comes across while walking through the city. In fact, he does not even usually make it past the doorway, as he is often stopped in his tracks by the wonderful patterns on the floor: Ergo prima domus transgressus limina, siste: contemplator enim, qua tu grediare, quot ipsa daedalicis antiqua nitent assarota figuris. Te modo Martis humi certamina picta morantur, seu leo, seu ictus aper mediis in saltibus hasta, agmina te modo nympharum per gramina campi ad numerum pedibus choream ducentia motis.14

In a sequence of apostrophes addressed to some of Pompeii’s most famous homeowners (Diomedes, Pansa, Sallustius…), Moltedo then continues this glorification of  Pompeian decoration before concluding with the obligatory musings on the locals’ final moments. These visits are occasionally focalised through scholars who actually worked on the excavations themselves. During the First World War, for instance, Italian poet Luigi Illuminati (1881-1962) dedicated a Latin elegy, Rusticatio Pompeiana, to Felice Barnabei (18421922), an archaeologist best-known for his work on the Pompeian villa of  Publius Fannius Synistor in Boscoreale with its exquisite frescoes.15 Now that the archaeologist is  enjoying his well-earned retirement, Illuminati writes, he can roam the ruins in peace and (83-84) (not in NBP). The Vesuvian cities were also the topic of   the annual “Dean Ireland’s Prize” for Latin verse composition at Westminster School in 1864 (Urbes Campaniae Vesevi eruptione obrutae): F.  H. Forshall, Westminster School. Past and Present (London, 1884), 437 (not in NBP). 13   F.  T. Moltedo, Gossipion (Firenze, 1873); HNHA, 64.818, XVIIIa (not in NBP). A similar tour in which Pompeii and Herculaneum are described as ghost towns where everyday life seems to have been frozen in time can also be found in Pompeii et Herculaneum, a brief elegy by the German classical philologist Theodor Kock (1820-1901) in his Flores poetici (Lipsiae, 1887), 52-53 (not in NBP). 14  HNHA, 64.818, XVIIIa, v. 15-21. 15 L. Illuminati, Rusticatio Pompeiana (Atri, 1918) (not in NBP). Cf. F. Barnabei, La villa pompeiana di P. Fannio Sinistore scoperta presso Boscoreale (Roma, 1901).

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share his knowledge and enthusiasm with his wife and daughter. The poet then continues to paint a picture of  Barnabei as a doting husband and father, eagerly guiding his family around the sites: Sed iuvat interdum monumenta revisere tecum, funere quae tristi mersit ab igne cinis: quaeque diu tenebris tenuere silentia mortis, vitae conlustrat gloria luce nova. Dum tarde incedens spatiaris laetus in urbe, sermones confers cordaque laeta facis. Et modo ludos et mores et festa referre, nunc sacros ritus commemorare libet. “Siste gradum, pater”, en inquit tibi culta puella; “siste gradum, liceat visere, care, domum, marmore quam nitido excoluit gens Vettia scite et varia pinxit vividus arte color.” 16

At other times, even Pompeii scholars themselves turn to literary Latin. An all-round Altertumswissenschaftler, Italian Pio Ciprotti (1914-1993) published not only archaeological studies on Pompeii, he also wrote Neo-Latin prose fiction fuelled by his profound knowledge of   the Pompeian world. In 1951, for example, he won the Certamen Capitolinum with a  short-story, Pompeianum somnium, in which the narrator falls asleep during a visit to the Vesuvian city and is  transported to pre-eruption Pompeii in a  dream.17 Within this oneiric framework, Ciprotti is  able to roam a bustling Pompeii in all its glory. In his best Latin, he solicits a local guide to show him around. Not only do they pass famous monuments in their pristine state, they also encounter countless Pompeians known to us from the city’s many inscriptions. In the following fragment, for instance, his guide points out the gloriously named Fabius Ululitremulus, whose shop is now famous for its Vergil-inspired inscription Fullones ululamque cano, non arma virumque: Paulo post digito mihi demonstravit Fabium Ululitremulum, pleno gradu domum properantem: cui id esse dixit cognomentum eo quod, summo cum teneretur Romanarum antiquitatum, quemadmodum ipse appellaret, studio, ut amici eius, morbo et insania, ideo et fullones (qui ululam sacram Minervae avem colebant) despiceret, immo

 Q uoted from L. Illuminati, Inter viburna (Genova, 1933), 39-42 (40).  P. Ciprotti, Pompeianum somnium (Roma, 1951) (NBP 2998).

16 17

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vero paene metueret, et eorum carmen, quo ulula celebrabatur, e suis aedibus prorsus exterminasset, ita ut hospitibus quoque id stomachum faceret.18

The story suddenly stops when Ciprotti is woken up by an Italian guard, angrily prodding him and urging him to leave the park at once, before it closes for the night. Inscriptions also provided the basis for Ciprotti’s Epistulae Pompeianae, an impressive collection of  fictitious letters sent by Pompeian politician Marcus Holconius Priscus to his friend, the Roman senator Gaius Caecina Paetus.19 In response to Emperor Titus’ request to collect as much surviving material as possible from the destroyed cities, Ciprotti has Paetus submit his recent correspondence with Priscus.20 The letters offer a  glimpse into the life of  Priscus during his run for the office of  duumvir in 79 ad. Since this was the last political campaign before the volcano erupted, the city’s walls are to this day rife with advertisements and notices from Priscus and his opponents, offering a treasure trove of  inspiration to Ciprotti. Though the letters are full of  diverse kinds of  Pompeiana, politics takes centre stage. In the following example, Priscus has just won the election, and writes to his friend in the hope that he will come down from the capital to join him in his celebrations: Veni proinde, Marce mi carissime, veni autem “pro mansu”,21 ut mei cives aiunt; noli tamen, nisi per iocum, stolidos illos cives tuos imitari, qui huc cum venerint cupidi multo magis ire cupiunt.22 Q uodsi in civitate nostra paulisper commoratus eris, iam desines a  me quaerere, ut solebas in epistulis, quis hic sit quis ille Pompeianus: nemo enim fere est, cuius non modo nomen, sed omnis status, genus vitae, natura, mores, animi sensus, casus, non sint in aliquo pariete vel saxo inscripta.23

The final “literary trip to Pompeii” I would like to introduce briefly here was submitted for the Hoeufft competition of 1934 by the Lithuanian Jesuit priest Rudolf  Nowowiejski (1879-1963).24   Ibid., 43. Cf. CIL 4.9131.  P.  Ciprotti, “Epistulae Pompeianae”, Latinitas 7  (1959), 83-94; 184-200 (NBP 3009). 20 Cf. Suet. Tit. 8. 21 Cf. CIL 4.1314. 22  Cf. CIL 4.1227. 23  Ciprotti 1959 (as in n. 19), 186. 24  HNHA, 64.846, XXXIVa (not in NBP). 18 19

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Consisting of  678 hexameters, Pompeii is an exceptionally lengthy though enjoyable account of a personal visit to Pompeii, which had been a life-long dream of  the poet’s: “Visere Pompeios, cum crastina fulserit Eos” – tanto haec dicta ducis me confudere, ut in imo motus sensierim gravius vibramina corde; ecce implebuntur iuvenilis somnia vitae; ecce brevi veterum peregrinans urbe sepulta mente viis gradiar defixa, quae Latiorum semper adhuc hodie populi vestigia magni asservant eadem, postquam iam praeteriere viginti aeva […].25

After a  short introduction to Pompeii’s history, Nowowiejski embarks on the epic account of  his guided tour – bono duce Rai­ mundo – consisting of  an impressive catalogue of  virtually all of  the city’s best-known attractions. While the poet is able to give lavish descriptions of  the local architecture, artwork, decorations, inscriptions and objects discovered across town, there is one instance where he balks at the idea of  going into any detail: the famous brothel (Lupanar). Here, the priest in Nowowiejski gains the upper hand as he interprets the building’s preservation as a  divine reminder of   the ancient city’s moral decay. Blushing with shame, the priest quickly leaves the brothel to continue his tour: Haud procul a thermis stat (proh!) infame lupanar, servatum mira ratione, fere ut videantur vulcani cineres non destruxisse cadentes (vertissent utinam!) sed protexisse probrosum prostibulum, ut maneat possintque putare futurae progenies, Pompeiorum corruptio morum quam scelerata olim fuerit – certe urbe Gomorrae pravius ac Sodomis homines vixere repente. Poenas sumentes – poenam ignis crimina poscunt. Aedes intramus – rubor igneus inficit ora – pariete picta dei squalore figura Priapi cornua copiae uti cultus emblemata spurci (quaque domo ista vides) ingentia portat sub alis. Ast fugiamus abhinc; nam lumina talibus horrent: sunt stupra imaginibus variis ratione nefanda cunctaque picta domo lascivi crimina cultus.26

  Ibid., 1.   Ibid., 21.

25 26

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The Christian myth Conclusive evidence as to the presence of  a Christian community in Pompeii in 79 ad is meagre to say the least. In the nineteenth century, however, the strained interpretation of  a number of  graffiti as well as the discovery of  various cross-like symbols across the city led some archaeologists to believe that there must have been Christians in ancient Pompeii. Numerous authors took advantage of   these views in their fiction and further anchored this “Christian myth”; Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s (1803-1874) novel The Last Days of  Pompeii (1834) was particularly influential in this respect.27 In the Latin poetry about Pompeii, however, Moormann noted the conspicuous absence of  the Christian myth, which he attempted to explain in relation to the secular context of   the Italian Risor­gi­ mento.28 Still, this alleged absence is mostly the result of  the limited scope of  Moormann’s corpus, as there actually are various NeoLatin Pompeiana that touch on the Christian question. In 1866, for instance, a prizewinning Alcaic ode on Pompeii’s destruction from Harrow School, one of  Britain’s prestigious public schools, explicitly referred to Bulwer-Lytton as a  source of  inspiration.29 While introducing the latter’s take on the aedile Pansa and mainly singing the praises of   the doomed city through the oft-glorified sentinel of   the Herculanean Gate, the poem also dedicated a few stanzas to the underground community of  fearless Christians: At Christiani vota cient domo clam sub remota, queis placidi nitent vultus, nec horrores beata corda movent necis imminentes. Constat sacerdos canitie gravis caeloque tollit cum precibus manus, gestitque iam certa per aevum pace frui, superumque tectis.30

27  On the Christian myth (and relevant bibliography), see Moormann 2015 (as in n. 1), 215-256. 28   Moormann 2013 (as in n. 4), 845-846. 29 H.  N. Abbot, “Pompeii”, in Prolusiones praemiis anniversariis dignatae et in auditorio recitatae Scholae Harroviensis IV Kal.  Jul. MDCCCLXVI (Harroviae [Harrow], 1866), 18-21 (not in NBP). 30  Ibid., 19.

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In 1905 Italian priest and prolific Latin poet Cesare De Titta (1862-1933) dedicated a brief  poem to the discovery of  a lamp in Pompeii, markings on which purportedly attested to a  Christian presence in the city.31 Common symbols on objects such as amphorae and lamps were often misconstrued as christograms at the time.32 The elegy simply sings the praises of   the tell-tale oil-lamp, opposing the dying of   the light in 79 ad to the divine and everburning flame of  Christianity: Nox rapuit lumen, quo ardebat, dira Vesevi cum vis Campanis urbibus incubuit, at divina piam quae accendit flamma lucernam, nulla vi exstingui non potuitque rapi.33

Belgian clergyman Peter Claessens (1817-1886) was also inspired to compose a Latin poem in honour of   the city – Pompeii seculo primo extincti et nostra aetate redivivi – by his personal visits to the site in 1870 and 1880. It can be divided into three parts, moving from a typical description of   the city’s destruction and its rediscovery and archaeological renaissance to an eye-witness account of  some of   the best-known monuments. In both opening and concluding his poem with references to Christianity, Claessens is very clear in his views: not only were there Christians in Pompeii, it was the Christian God himself  who destroyed the heathen city as divine punishment for its sinful ways: Iam Christi audierat nomen, sed nomine Christi contempto, et, Divos venerans mendacis Olympi, turpi luxuriae vivebat dedita Divum. Numinis, heu, dextram supremi experta repente concidit, et triplicem stupuit Campania cladem.34

Several Hoeufftianum submissions also responded to the Christian myth. In 1928, for example, regular contestant Vincenzo Pel­ lec­chia sent in two separate Pompeii poems, Cestilia and Gladiator 31  C. De Titta, “Ad Alphonsum Capecelatro”, Carmina (Lanciano, 1922), 31-32 (not in NBP). 32   Cf. P. Ciprotti, “Num Christi signum amphorae Pompeianae ferant”, Latinitas 1 (1953), 279-283. 33  De Titta 1922 (as in n. 31), 31. 34 [P. Claessens], Carmina iunioris et senioris aetatis selecta (Lovanii, 1886), 62-66, at 62 (not in NBP).

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Pom­peianus.35 While the latter is  a simple, pre-disaster tale about a gladiator dying in the arena in an attempt to obtain his Christian father’s freedom, the former takes its inspiration from a  romantic inscription –  “Cestilia, Regina Pompeianarum,  / anima dulcis, vale!” – which has been the starting point of  many a Pompeii story.36 In  his lengthy epyllion, Pellecchia refashions this mysterious “queen of  Pompeii” into a  veritable Christian matrona. Loosely based on the Bulwer-Lyttonesque Italian epic poem Pompei (1888) by Luigi Conforti (1854-1907) – in which the Greek slave Cestilia and Roman soldier Marcellus fall in love and survive the catastrophe – Pellecchia’s poem opens with Marcellus returning home from the war in Judea after an absence of  many years. Greeted at the door by his slave Sosia, Marcellus learns of  the death of  his wife Cestilia, which is  recounted by Sosia in the first part of   the poem. It turns out that his wife had turned to Christianity, and had prayed to God to take her life in exchange for Marcellus’s safe return. In the second part of   the poem, Vesuvius erupts and Marcellus flees with the remainder of  his household to the safety of  a secret Christian catacomb outside the city where Cestilia has been buried. Convinced by a priest that he could be together with Cestilia for eternity, Marcellus then also decides to convert at the close of  the poem: Vir, cui barba cadit mento atque in vertice cano infula sacra nitet, niveo et velatus amictu, Marcellum totum defixum in coniuge cara excutit exstincta et blandis verbis ita fatur: “audi, magne heros, vocem, quam mittit ab isto cara tibi tumulo coniux: ‘Marcelle, veni ad me! In Christo Domino aeterno cum foedere iuncti ambo erimus caelo, immortali sede beati!’ ” 37

While both of  Pellecchia’s submissions proved unsuccessful, Gio­vanni Battista Pigato (1910-1976) managed to win the gold medal in Amsterdam with a  Pompeii poem in 1952: Nox Pom­

  HNHA, 64.850, XXI and XV (not in NBP).   CIL 4.2413h. On Conforti’s Pompei, see R. Cremante, “Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei in un dimenticato poema di Luigi Conforti”, in Id., I misteri di Pompei. Antichità pompeiane nell’immaginario della modernità. Atti della giornata di studio. Pavia, Collegio Ghislieri, 1 marzo 2007 (Pompei, 2008), 113-134. 37  HNHA, 64.850, XXI, 11. 35 36

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peiana.38 In this long polymetric poem, Pigato describes how he walked among the moonlit ruins of  Pompeii one night and experienced a series of  visions – a recurring theme in his oeuvre. These dream-like encounters include the passing of  a  Bacchic train and a  vision of  Venus herself  singing an ode to love. Following the sound of  yet another song, the poet finally arrives at a small Pompeian house which had been inhabited by… Christians. From this humble abode then bursts forth an ode to Christ himself, giving thanks for saving the family’s little son during the catastrophe: Per glauca caeli, Christe, mihi obviam tuo adferebas pectore sospitem matrique reddebas puellum et pariter bona cuncta nuptae. Nam quae instituto sacra facis tuo nectisque suavi corda hominum iugo, in te vigent semper, nec inde mors animos dirimet beatos. Contrita duri sub pede barbari peiore flamma pulvere in arido iaceret ipsa Urbs, ni dedisses vivere tempus in omne tecum.39

The latest example of   the Christian myth in our Latin Pompeiana is  another rare case of  literary prose: Nilo Casini’s (19231993) De Herculanensibus rebus diebusque novissimis, a short-story that won the Certamen Capitolinum in 1962. Set in Herculaneum in 79 ad, this lengthy tale tells the story of  one Rufus, who moved to the town a few years before and mainly keeps to himself, working in his bakery. During a long introduction to the figure of  Rufus and his odd ways – roaming the countryside while mumbling to himself, making secretive visits to a  retired centurion named Julius  – the narrator gradually reveals that Rufus is in fact an underground Christian who has fled Rome in the wake of  Nero’s Great Fire. As is the case with Pompeii, speculation on a  Christian presence in Herculaneum has run amok, and has been particularly fuelled by the discovery of  what looks like the imprint of  a cross – though most likely simply the traces of  a shelf  – on a wall in the “Casa del Bicentenario”. In Casini’s imagination, the town did in 38  For Pigato’s poetry, see P. Camporini (ed., tr.), Giovanni Battista Pigato, Opere poetiche latine (Como, 2006). 39  G. B. Pigato, Nox Pompeiana (Amsterdam, 1952), 5-20, at 15 (not in NBP).

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fact have a  small Christian community, which would convene in Rufus’s house. Much of  the story is actually concerned with Rufus’s attempts to convert his friend Julius, who turns out to have been the Roman soldier who brought Paul to Rome (cf. Act. 27). When disaster strikes and the volcano erupts near the end of   the story, Rufus and Julius perish together as they try to save a  bedridden Christian woman: Ubi pinea nubes, quae ex telluris visceribus maximo nisu ad excelsa proiecta erat, impulsu destituta suo, ipso pondere consedit, litus omne illud Herculanense saxis antea liquefactis, tum vero durescentibus, quasi immani tegmine sepultum est. Rufus et certe Iulius et suavissima Baebia et sexcenti alii quos necopinantes igneus vortex deprehendit quibusque aufugiendi adempta est facultas, dum obruuntur, fractum orbem illabi certe putaverunt. Baebia vero, cuius vocem Rufus extremum spiritum, interclusa anima, edens, audire flebilem extremamque sibi visus est, infirma ut fuit cruribus, non tantum valuit ut e grabato, quo fessa procubuerat, adsurgeret.40

Herculaneum, Pompeii’s little sister Casini’s short-story brings us to our final topic: Herculaneum, Pompeii’s oft-forgotten sister town. Though it boasts some unique treasures –  e.g. the Villa of   the Papyri and its surviving scrolls  – the town was quickly overshadowed by her bigger sister, both in real life and in literature. While Moormann recognised this “Pom­ peii-centric” trend in the literary tradition, he did point to the existence of  three Latin Herculaneum poems, all of which were the product of  Oxbridge poetry competitions.41 Still, there remained more to be discovered. In 1821, for instance, French secondary school students participating in the annual contest in Latin verse composition were to  N. Casini, De Herculanensibus rebus diebusque novissimis (Romae, 1962), 1-22, at 22 (NBP 2695). 41  E. Moormann, “Literary Evocations of  Herculaneum in the Nineteenth Century”, Studies in the History of  Art 79 (2013), 189-204; Moormann 2015 (as in n. 1), passim. Moormann discussed three poems: J. Hughes, Herculaneum. Carmen latinum (Oxford, 1811) (NBP 6926); J. Hayter, Herculaneum. A Latin Poem, in Id., A Report upon the Herculaneum Manuscripts (London, 1811), 104-111 (NBP 6611); T.  Gisborne, Herculaneum, in Translations of   the Oxford and Cambridge Latin Prize Poems (London, 1833), 61-71 (not in NBP). Unsure whether the Latin original had survived, Moormann discussed Gisborne’s 1777 poem in its 1833 English translation. The Latin original has survived, in fact, and can be found under its complete title, Herculanei prostrati relliquiae, in Musae Cantabrigienses (London, 1810), 30-35 (not in NBP). 40

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write a  poem on “les fouilles d’Herculanum”. The following text was to act as a source of  inspiration: Q ua florentem quondam urbem flammarum globi ex igneo monte statim erumpentes, tot abhinc saeculis obruerunt, nunc effossa humo, cineribusque discussis, recentiorum industria priscae artis monumenta eruit atque investigat. Urbs sepulta caelo ostenditur. Aspicias quaecumque vel antiquis iam aetatibus perierant. Apparent viae, circus, theatra, praetorium, carcer. Apparent interiores domus fumo spurcatae, sed integrae, quales sepelivit servator ignis. Multa remanent veterum supellectilia. Vitam ac mores Romanos pene deprehenderis. O, si liceat inter tot antiquioris vitae reliquias, et in aliquot clarorum ingeniorum monumenta incidisse, et e medio pulvere Tacitum, Crispum, aut quemvis alium excitasse! 42

The final element in the model text – the hope of  rediscovering ancient texts amid the rubble – became a leitmotif  in Herculanensia.43 Faithfull to the assignment, gold medallist Charles-Amance Prieur de la Comble (1806-1875) concluded his composition with the same yearning for such a literary discovery: O mihi fatales liceat lustrare recessus, vitae reliquias investigare vetustae! Me videat Phoebus, videat Diana vagantem illustres inter tumulos, si fausta celebris incidat ingenii manus in monumenta, novasque induxisse faces, medio de pulvere, Crispum, aut Tacitum, Variumve queat depromere, et omnes ingeniosa quibus diffundere carmina vena divite Musa dedit, praeclaraque facta virorum Castalia celebrare lyra: potiora metallis Illa quidem; quid enim? Mollit funestius aurum pectora, in adversis robur doctrina ministrat, grataque suppeditat lapsis solatia rebus.44 42   Annales des concours généraux, seconde partie, ou recueil de toutes les compositions couronnées en seconde aux concours généraux de l’Université, vol. 3 (Paris, 1825), 93-94 (not in NBP). Cf. Jalabert 2017 (as in n. 10), 446. 43  Cf. Moormann 2015 (as in n. 1), 333-357. For a comic example of  this trope, see [J. Ml.], CCLXXII. Male creditur. Specimen codicis vetustissimi Bucolicon A. Asinii Aselli, in domo Pompeiana, nondum retecta, asservati, brevi fortuito quodam casu (modo sumptus ad effodiendum suppetat) feliciter eruendi, in J. Mure, H. Bull, C. Scott (ed.), Lusus alteri Westmonasterienses […]. Pars secunda. 1820-1865 (Oxford – London – Cambridge, 1867), 287 (not in NBP). 44  Apis Romana. Journal de littérature latine 1 (1822), 101-103; Annales des concours généraux, seconde partie, ou recueil de toutes les compositions couronnées en seconde aux concours généraux de l’Université, vol.  3 (Paris, 1826), 93-95 (not in NBP); see

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In the early-twentieth century, the Hoeufftianum also received three Herculaneum-related poems. It should come as no surprise that two of  these were sent in by Italians who overtly supported the Fascist regime in their poetry: Giovanni Mazza (1877-1943) and Luigi Taberini (?-1933). In fact, both poems date from the late 1920s, coinciding with a new phase of  government-sponsored excavations in Herculaneum headed by the recently-appointed chief  archaeologist Amedeo Maiuri. Mazza competed with his Retina seu Herculanei excidium twice before publishing it in 1928.45 The tripartite elegy opens after the downfall of  Herculaneum. Hercules, the town’s mythical founder, has descended from the heavens to witness the destruction in person. Walking among the ruins, he launches into a catalogue of  all the beauty that has been lost in the fires of  Vesuvius before angrily flying back to Olympus. The subsequent central part of Retina deals with the visit of  Emperor Titus to the site, where he hears the plea of  a  desperate father, begging for help to recover the body of  his daughter Retina, who has been buried beneath the rubble. When they eventually uncover her body, the heart-broken father dies of  exhaustion. The final scene shifts back to Hercules as he confronts Jupiter. The father comforts his son with the promise that a new town will arise from the ashes, viz. modern-day Resina (which was only redubbed “Ercolano” in 1969). In fact, not only will Herculaneum come back to life, an entirely new age of  Italian greatness will dawn under the auspices of  none other than Mussolini: Nam video – aetatis, quam multa volaverit ala, exciderint nostra sceptra diuque manu – nam video gentes romana ex arce regendo laturum Italiae nomen ad astra virum. Dixit: di plausere deaeque; ast urbe futura Alcides gaudet doctaque nata Iovis.46

ibid., vol. 3, 96-97 for silver medallist Napoléon Bauwens’ poem (1805-1870) (not in NBP). 45  HNHA, 64.830, XVIII; 64.831, VIII; G. Mazza, Retina seu Herculanei exci­ dium (Torre del Greco, 1928); also included in A. Maglione, B. Scognamiglio (ed.), G.  Mazza, Poesie latine e  italiane (Napoli, 1988), 13-43. See also D.  Sacré, “Two Unknown Poems by Giovanni Mazza (1877-1943)”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 65 (2016), 427-437 (428); NBP 9074 (though erroneously referring to Mazza’s Q uattuor anni tempora). 46  Mazza 1928 (as in n. 45), 15; cf. Sacré 2016 (as in n. 45), 433.

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Taberini’s Alcaic ode Herculanum resurgens is very much in the same vein as Mazza’s elegy.47 Submitted to the Hoeufftianum in 1928 after having already obtained an honourable mention in the Locri contest the year before, Herculanum resurgens similarly brings the story of  Herculaneum into the realm of  ancient mythology, only to end with a climactic celebration of   the Fascist regime. The ode opens by singing the praises of  Hercules as the town’s founder, who, were he to come back to earth today, would be faced with the new Herculean task of  liberating an entire town buried under layers of  volcanic debris. However, there will be no need for such supernatural assistance, Taberini concludes, as Mussolini himself  will make short work of  restoring the town to its original splendour: At non labore est Herculeo tamen nobis opus, namque Italiae novae dux magnus audet, semper ardens, consilio superare fata. Q uod cogitavit perficit et cito. Sic Herculanum tegmine saxeo prodibit excusso, resurget prodigium, vetus urbs, datura inter recentes integra. […] 48

In 1933, the Hoeufft competition received its last Herculaneum poem, entitled Herculaneum et Vesuvius mons.49 In fact, we have already met its author, Rudolf  Nowowiejski, the Jesuit who submitted his lengthy Pompeii that very same year. Though it begins in the same way – with an announcement of  a visit to the site in the morning, followed by a  brief  history of   the town’s rediscovery – the poem is much shorter than its Pompeian counterpart, as the party was only allowed to visit one particular site: the famous underground theatre. After a brief  description of   the monument and a  reference to the ongoing excavations under Mussolini, the poem shifts to the party’s trip to the summit of  Mount Vesuvius, concluding with a Latin rendition of  a Neapolitan ditty:

47  L.  Taberini, Herculanum resurgens (Ancona, 1930); HNHA, 64.832, XLI (not in NBP). 48  Taberini 1930 (as in the previous note), 8. 49  HNHA, 64.846, XXXIVc (not in NBP).

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Crastina mane statuta dies Herclaneum adire est: Oppidulum Resina iacet super urbe vetusta, olim quae Graecis erat Heracleia vocata; […] Antiquum effossit Carolus rex parte theatrum Burbonidaeque iterum villas, delubra forumque porticibus cinctum; nos vidimus unice in imis degressique gradus scalarum (lumine claro) centum obscurarum vetus et fatale theatrum. Sic intus gradimur per multa cunicula terrae ad scalas veteres; hic quinquaginta per annos effodiebantur caveae atque sedilia et imum pulpitum, ubi actores ludebant, et basis, in qua olim erat Holcuni Balbi statua; at locus amplus quo exuerant vestes, picturis est decoratus. Nunc fodiunt operae propius mare; iamque reperta tecta bis octo, Ducis Mussolini ultima iussu.50

The last Latin Herculaneum poem I would like to discuss here has only been preserved in a single copy. Signed “W.H. Jun[ior]”, undated (though estimated between 1850 and 1920) and without any known place of  publication, Herculaneum consists of  202 hexameters and has been preserved in a compilation volume kept at Boston Library.51 The poem takes the typical form of  a diptych, dealing with the town’s destruction in the first half and its archaeological revival in the second part.52 Concluding with an apostrophe to the town itself, it calls paradoxically for readers to be grateful for the way things have turned out: by meeting its end prematurely, Herculaneum has been able to come back to life. For had Vesuvius never erupted, the town would have fallen victim to barbarian invasions like the rest of  Italy: Sed si dura tibi invidissent fata ruinas, dum Scythia invasit flammis victricibus agros Italiae, et Martis quatiens clamore flagellum Attila personnuit terras, caedesque cruore

  Ibid., 1-2.   [W. J. Jun.], Herculaneum [s.l.a.] (Boston College, Thomas P. O’Neill Library, OCLC number 309232836) (not in NBP). 52  For another example of  this diptych structure in a Latin Pompeii poem, which could not be discussed here for reasons of  space, see F. W. Shannon, Pompeii. Carmen heroicum, in Prolusiones praemiis quotannis propositis dignatae et in ludo Marlburiensi recitatae VI Kal.  Jul.  a.d.  MDCCCXLIX (Marlburiae [Marlborough], 1849), 1-8 (not in NBP). 50 51

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infecit cursus, tremuitque exterritus orbis; non tum relliquias ornasset fama perennis laudibus insignes, vivax tibi nulla maneret gloria, sanguineoque Alaricus milite victor igne incendisset turres, bellique vibrasset fulmina; iam plorant cunctae infortunia gentes, impendentque tibi luctu; iam sacra Poesis te beat, augustumque aeternant saecula nomen.53

Concluding remark This brief  contribution opened with a comparison between literary studies and archaeology: much like archaeologists, philologists and historians of  literature dig their way into the past, uncovering new layers one at a time, piecing together fragments and making assumptions based on erratic surviving material. This survey, though necessarily condensed, has similarly tried to break new ground in the ongoing excavations of  literary Pompeii by bringing to light a  series of  previously overlooked Neo-Latin Pompeiana and Herculanensia, prompting us to reconsider certain set assumptions (e.g. the alleged absence of  Christian elements). Nevertheless, just as it is said that as much as a third of  Pompeii still awaits to be discovered, chances are that there remains much more literary material to be unearthed on future expeditions.

  [W. J. Jun.], Herculaneum (as in n. 51), 11.

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TOM DENEIRE

A SCHOOLBOY’S EXERCISES JOSEPH ALFRED BRADNEY’S LATIN COMPOSITIONS AT HARROW (1877)

Introduction “He’s as close to a native speaker of  Latin as one can get…”

I have always found this characterization of  Dirk Sacré very apt. Not only did I hear it often from his peers, but I was also fortunate enough to experience his remarkable Latinitas first hand. One such occasion was when I took two years of  Advanced Latin Grammar with him at Leuven University. A  firm believer in the linguistic merits of  actively writing (indeed even speaking!) Latin, Dirk regularly had his students write Latin compositions. To be sure, those who know him, are aware that writing Latin prose and poetry is one of  his great pleasures. His Latin articles in Vox Latina or Melissa, his occasional Latin haiku, his Latin honorary doctorates… all of  these testify to his great versatility in Rome’s language and above all, the great pleasure he takes in the Latin muse.1 Even as I am writing this, I am reminded of  a spring noon some fifteen years ago, when he popped into my office room and dropped off  a card with this frivolous hexameter: Maioniden pomis frictis da Tartara iam iam! Give me mayonnaise and tartar sauce for my chips, yummy!

1   See e.g. D. Sacré, “De carmine quodam Hermanni Röhl (1851-1923) inedito”, Vox Latina 53 (2017), 172-183; Id., “Recens diploma honoris causa Lovaniense”, Melissa 165 (2011) and Id., “Gerrae mensis Mai 2002 haicuanae – Nugamenta Id. Mart. 2003”, in A. E. Radke (ed.), Alaudae ephemeridis nova series. Fasciculus primus (Hildesheim, 2005), 145-146.

Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 651-665 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124088

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The nimble versification together with the quick wit of   the macaronic line is vintage Dirk Sacré. Therefore, in honour of  this love of  Latin composition, I have chosen to present here the Latin school compositions of  Joseph Alfred Bradney (1859-1933), whom I have studied extensively as a Neo-Latin poet of   the Great War.2 Surely, a fitting choice, considering that it was none other than Dirk who introduced me to Bradney…

Joseph Alfred Bradney Sir Joseph Alfred Bradney (11 January 1859-21 July 1933) was born in Greet, a township and parish in Salop, Shropshire, bordering Wales, the only son and heir of  Joseph Christopher Bradney of  Sutton Court, near Hereford. Young Bradney was educated at Harrow and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he matriculated in 1877 and received a B.A. in 1881 and an M.A. in 1912. On his father’s death in 1868 he inherited estates in Somerset, Wiltshire and Shropshire, but he decided, while still a  student, to settle in Gwent. His patrimony already included a  farm in the parish of  Llanfihangel-Ystern-Llywern, to which he added an estate he bought himself  in 1880. The year after, he built a house on the site he called “Tal-y-coed”. He spoke Welsh well (although only learning it after his first marriage through his servants), he wrote and corresponded in Latin, and was a member of  Boodle’s Club (London). At Tal-y-coed, Bradney established himself  as the complete country gentleman, occupying himself  with hunting, improving his estates, planting trees, and reading and writing about local history. Apart from this, Bradney was also quite active in local administration. He was High Sheriff  of  Monmouthshire in 1889, a long-time member of  Monmouthshire County Council (1898-1924; chairman 1921-1922), and an Alderman in 1924-1928. He was Justice of  the Peace and Deputy Lieutenant for the counties of  Monmouth and Radnor (Vice-Lieutenant for the County of  Radnor in 1932). Bradney joined the army and served as a Captain in the Royal Monmouth Engineer Militia from 1882 to 1892, and as LieutenantColonel commanding the 2nd Battalion, Monmouthshire Regiment from 1892 to 1912. In 1899 he became an Honorary Colonel. 2  T.  Deneire, B.  Deneire, Nights in Flanders. Joseph Alfred Bradney. Neo-Latin Poet of  the Great War (s.l., 2019).

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In 1912 he received the Territorial Decoration, an accolade awarded to officers who had more than 12 years of  commissioned service in the Territorial Army, and retired, entering the Territorial Force Reserve (1912-1919). This gave him the opportunity to get his M.A. from Cambridge, which was probably completed largely extra muros. Bradney returned to active service in 1914. During the Great War, he trained and commanded, as Lieutenant-Colonel, the 9th (Reserve) Battalion of  The London Regiment (Q ueen Victoria’s Rifles) in 1915-1916. In 1917-1918 he was on the Western Front with the rank of  Colonel, first as Area Commandant with the 10th Corps and briefly as Agricultural Officer, something most biographical sources fail to mention, and only later as Commander of   the 28th Group Labour Corps in France and Belgium. After the war, Bradney was Chairman of  the Monmouthshire Territorial Army Association (1919-1931). In his spare time, Bradney was a keen historian, his magnum opus being the monumental History of  Monmouthshire. From the Coming of  the Normans into Wales, published in four volumes comprising 12 parts, from 1904 until 1933. A final fifth volume, drawing on his notes, was published posthumously. He also published a great number of  other historical and chiefly genealogical works, and three books of  Latin poetry,3 including Noctes Flandricae (1919), written partly during the Great War. As a prominent figure of  society Bradney also received a number of  honours in recognition of  his service to his country and of  his scholarship, most importantly being appointed Companion of   the Bath in 1911 and receiving a knighthood in 1924. He was a Fellow of   the Society of  Antiquaries of  London, Commander of   the Order of  St John of  Jerusalem and Commissioner of  the Order for the County of  Monmouth, and a Member of   the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of  Wales. He was Governor of  the Council of  the National Library of  Wales and the 3  Carmina Jocosa: temporibus diversis et de diversis rebus lucubrata (notis quibusdam additis), a Josepho Alfredo Bradney, Armigero, Honoratisimi Ordinis de Balneo Socio, Artium Magistro, et Societatis Antiquariorum Socio. Accesserunt tria ab aliis conscripta (Londoni, ex officina Mitchell Hughes & Clarke, in vico dicto Wardour Street, 1916); Noctes Flandricae a Josepho Alfredo Bradney, Armigero (Londoni, ex officina Mitchell Hughes & Clarke, in vico dicto Bream’s Building, 1919) and Carmen in curiam Universitatis Cambrensis 20mo die Julii, A.S. 1923 Swanseae habitam compositum ab Achydd Glan Troddi qui ad gradum doctoratus in literis, honoris causa, evectus est (Gobbani, ex officina Owen fratrum, 1923).

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National Museum of  Wales. Finally, in 1923, he was made an Honorary Doctor of  Letters at the University of  Wales in recognition of  his works on the history of  Monmouthshire and on reasons for the decline of  the Welsh language. Bradney was married twice: in 1883 to Rosa Jenkins († 1927), and still in 1927 to Florence Prothero (†  28 November 1946) – and had five children, all from his first marriage: Margaretta aka Madge (17 April 1885-1965), John aka Jack (16 August 18861962), Edward (20 June 1889 - 29 October 1948), Nest (apparently a Welsh diminutive of  Agnes, born 19 May 1890), and Walter (4 September 1892 - 24 March 1918).

A “schoolboy’s exercise book” The Gwent Archives,4 based in Ebbw Vale, South Wales, which is the local record office for the historic county of  Monmouthshire, hold the Bradney family documents, among which is a booklet catalogued as “schoolboy’s exercise book” (GB0218.D554/122). It has no proper title, but a label on the cover reads: “Bradney a.d. ix Cal: Maias. Hergae-super-Collem. Com: Middlesex”. The booklet contains the fair copies of   the model versions for the Latin and Greek composition exercises Bradney was assigned in 1877 at Harrow, and for some exercises it also includes – on loose sheets – Bradney’s own attempts at the versio. The exercises consist of  both prose and poetry, the former featuring, for instance, an excerpt from Green’s History of   the English People 5 or Mrs  Hutchinson 6 with Latin and Greek versions by, for instance, Arthur Sidgwick.7 The poems are by British classic authors such as Shakespeare, Coleridge, Keats or Shelley, translated by former Harrovian Charles Merivale – among others.8 4  http://www.gwentarchives.gov.uk/media/17515/d554-bradney-of-talycoedmonmouthshire.html 5  John Richard Green (12 December 1837 - 7 March 1883) was an English historian, who published a famous book A Short History of  the English People (London, 1874). 6  This is from (an edition of) Memoirs of  the Life of  Colonel Hutchinson […], written by his widow Lucy […] from the original manuscript by the rev. Julius Hutchinson, to which is prefixed The life of  Mrs Hutchinson, written by herself, fifth edition (London, H. G. Bohn, 1846). 7  Arthur Sidgwick (1840-1920) was an English scholar, naturalist, and politician who wrote several books on Greek prose composition. 8   Charles Merivale (8th March 1808 - 27 December 1893) was an English historian and churchman.

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Bradney’s own versions – dated April-July 1877, and thus written by an eighteen-year old adolescent – bear no small number of  corrections and suggestions for rephrasing. His teacher’s general appraisals range from “not bad”, over “not much to remark”, to “f.g.” [fairly good(?)] or “v.f. good” [?]. In light of  other sources,9 it seems very possible that these notes were made by the famous Henry Montagu Butler (1833-1918), who was Headmaster of Harrow from 1859 to 1885. A  talented and versatile Latinist, Butler achieved fame as one of  the most adept British composers of  Latin (and Greek) verse in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Specimens A full critical edition of   the booklet and Bradney’s versions is beyond the limits of  this album amicorum. Therefore, I have chosen to present only four specimens of  his Latin composition. The dates in the exercise book suggest that the students, as a rule, were assigned one prose and one verse composition per week (on Tuesdays and Saturdays). Here I will discuss the pensa of  8 and 12 May and 3 and 7 July 1877.10 I have retained original spelling and punctuation, and for Bradney’s texts I have kept word and line breaks, which makes it easier to discuss the teacher’s remarks. Rather than transcribing these remarks, I will discuss their main points in a  separate paragraph. Confining them to an apparatus would do them less justice, as they are sometimes quite cluttered, difficult to read, trivial (corrections to punctuation) or difficult to interpret (some are mere marks, dots or crosses – not always with a clear intention). 1. He endeavoured to prove the motion The first text is  a prose translation of David Hume’s The History of  England. From the Invasion of  Julius Caesar to the Revolution in 1688, first published in 1754-1761. The model versio is by Arthur   Deneire, Deneire 2019 (as in n. 2), 34-35.   The full schedule, as apparent from the dates on Bradney’s exercises, is  the following (G/L  = Greek/Latin, PO/PR  = poetry/prose): 21/04 GPO, 24/04 LPR, 28/04 LPO, 01/05 GPR, 05/05 GPO, 08/05 LPR, 12/05 LPO, 15/05 GPR, 19/05 GPO, 22/05 LPR, 02/06 GPO, 05/06 LPR, 09/06 LPO, 12/06 GPR, 16/06 LPR, 19/06 LPR, 23/06 GPO, 25/06 (perhaps a  mistake as this was a  Monday) GPR, 30/06 LPO, 03/07 LPR, 07/07 LPO, 10/07 GPR, [undated] GPR. 9

10

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Sidgwick. The number “30” after Bradney’s name is  probably his class number. In any case, it recurs on all preserved sheets. Bradney. 30. 8 May 1877. “He endeavoured to prove the motion”. etc: – Conatus est ille demonstrare rogationem illam à Tito 11 latam esse rem inanem nec sine metu suscipiendam, quum enim illâ majestas deminueretur, quod quidem si aliquis faceret, nedum cogitaret, non posse quin hostis publicus censeretur. Q uid enim interesse an 5 diceres non oportere reginam Imperio frui, an illam non esse reginam. Q uamvis autem experientia docuisset tam clementiam reginae esse quam faceret ut cives officio obliviscerentur, non tamen esse bonum principibus nimium ludere aut omnia in aleam dare. Recorda- 10 rentur fabulam illam dicentem leporem quemdam, omnibus animalibus, quibus cornua pertinerent, e regiâ excedere jussis, protinus fugere, ne aures ejus esse cornua putarent. Q uâ quidem fabulâ expositâ, videtur in animo fuisse audientibus illis talia aut etiam sinentibus 15 audiri non omnino abfuturum esse periculum. Oravit quoque cavere ne, si talibus rebus se immiscerentur regina ad Imperium suum spectaret, quae, quum sentiret posse libertatem eorum diruere, qua jam petita esset, imperioque uti, Ludovicum Galliae regem 20 imitaretur, qui regnum et tutelâ eripuit.

This first text bears numerous remarks and suggestions from Bradney’s teacher. At the top of   the sheet he suggests “quid aliud quam pro hoste esse habendum”. In the first sentence he offers “arguere” instead of  “demonstrare”, finds fault with the overly strong pronoun “illam”, rewrites “quum […] deminueretur” into “quippe suâ imperii majestas deminueretur”, strikes ali- from “si aliquis faceret”, suggests “quod vel animo conciperet, nedum id efficeret” and adds “fieri” to “non posse quin”. In the second sentence, he points out the construction “utrum […] an […]” instead of  Bradney’s “an […] an […]”. In the next, he suggests “Q uam etsi tam eâ esse clementiâ experti didicissent ut” and firmly changes Bradney’s “officio” into “officii”, as “oblivisci” governs the genitive case. He also finds “esse bonum” less elegant than “esse sapientis”. In the story about the 11  It is unclear why Bradney translates “Bell” as “Titus”. Hume’s book does feature people with these names (one Colonel Titus and one Titus Oates), but in different contexts. Sidgwick’s version (“Bulius”, cf. bulla – bubble, bell) makes a lot more sense.

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hare he would change “fugere” into “fugisse” and opts to remove “illis” from “audientibus illis” and to add “etiam” before “sinentibus”. In the final sentence, he suggests to remove “Oravit quoque” and to continue as indirect speech with “Caverent”, he marks Bradney’s double use of “quae” with an x, he adds “ut ipse dicebat”, and finds fault with the mode of  “eripuit”. Original 12 He [sc. Humphrey Gilbert] endeavoured to prove the motion made by Bell to be a vain device and perilous to be treated of; since it tended to the derogation of   the prerogative imperial, which whoever should attempt so much as in fancy could not, he said, be otherwise accounted than as an open enemy. For what difference is there between saying that the Q ueen is not to use the priveledge [sic] of  the Crown and saying that she is not Q ueen? And though experience has shewn [sic] so much clemency in her majesty as might, perhaps, make subjects forget their duty; it is not good to sport or venture too much with princes. He reminded them of   the fable of   the hare who upon the proclamation that all horned beasts should depart the court, immediately fled, lest his ears should be construed into horns; and by this apologue he seems to insinuate that even those who heard or permitted such dangerous speeces [sic pro speeches] would not themselves be entirely free from danger. He desired them to beware lest if  they meddled farther into these matters, the queen might look to her own power; and finding herself  able to suppress their challenged liberty, and to exert an arbitrary authority might imitate the example of  Lewis [sic] XI of  France, who, as he termed it, delivered the crown from wardship. Idem Latine Redditum Arguebat a Bulio inceptam relationem futilem esse rem, nec sine periculo posse tractari. Q uippe violari ipsam majestatem regiam, quod si quis animo concepisset, nedum moliretur, quid aliud quam pro aperto hoste habendum esse? Q uid enim interesse, utrum negarent jure regio reginam uti oportere, an ne esse quidem reginam diceret. Sane eâ clementiâ esse reginam ut officii terminos aliquando exuere cives auderent expertos didicisse. At periculosam aleam cum principibus nimium aliquid tentare et tanquam ex aequo agere. Cogitarent leporem in fabulâ, qui edicto posito ut cornuta animalia curiâ egredirentur statim se in pedes dedisset, veritus scilicet ne quis aures pro cornubus interpretaretur. Q uâ fabulâ submonere visus est, qui sententias tam periculosas sive arriperent sive taciti audirent ne ipsos quidem 12  The original English is copied out in the exercise book. It is difficult to determine which Hume edition was used specifically. The passage is  found verbatim, for instance, in the London 1824 edition (vol. 2, 47), which seems a plausible candidate considering the year.

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fore vacuos periculo. Porro caverent ne, si ultra progredirentur, suam ipsa potestatem regina respiceret, compertoque posse se libertatem flagitatam opprimere et plenum imperium inhibere, Gallorum regem imitaretur, qui, ut ipse dicebat, regnum a tutelâ vindicasset. Arturus Sidgwick.

2. Oceanus’s speech to the Titans The poetry pensum for that the same week was a passage from Keats’ Hyperion,13 for which a model translation was given by the aforementioned Merivale.14 Bradney. 30. 12th May 1877 “Oceanus’s Speech to the Titans”. (John Keats). Q uos stimulat fervens rabies, quibus ira retenta est Odiaque infensae cladis semperque dolores. Sistite vos mentes, aures occludite vestras, Talis enim mea vox non est ut pellat ad iram. Pulchrior ut terra est, ut Olympus pulchrior altus 5 Q uam Chaos et Tenebrae fuerant, quamquam optima quondam, Ut quoque trans coelum terramque decore repletam, Et specie formâque omnino pulchra videmus. Sic venit in plantas nostras insueta venustas, Q uae vis, nescio quo, magis est perfusa decore, 10 Ex nobis quamquam nata et praecellere fatum est. Praeterit ut tenebras antiquas gloria nostri, Nec valet haec talis speciem vis vincere nostram, Plus Chaos horrendâ quam formâ vincimus atrum. Vult ager excelsis tandem contendere silvis 15 Q uas pavit, pascitque ipsâ majore decore? Num virides saltus valet abnuere optima rerum.

Bradney’s poetry assignment has far fewer remarks than his prose. Indeed, at the top of   the sheet his teacher writes not bad, accompanied by the suggestions “vincique deletis” and “partâque dolo­ribus ira”. Instead of  “quibus ira retenta est” he suggests “quos efferat ira”. In verse 2 he would change “Odiaque” into “Invidia”, and in the next “Sistite vos mentes” into “Claudite vos sensus”. In verse 8 he suggests “Utque super” instead of  “Ut quoque trans”. 13  Verses 173-220 (vv. 177-205 and 210-111 have been left out) from John Keats’ Hyperion (book 2). 14  I found it published (with minor differences) in Keatsii Hyperionis, libri I, II. Latine reddidit Carolus Merivale (Cantabrigiae et Londini, 1862), 42-47.

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In the next, he would rather read “Nos specie […] videmur” than Bradney’s “Et specie  […] videmus”. In verse 9 he suggests “subit” instead of  “venit”, but in the margin seems to change his mind with the note “impulit” (= “tread on the heels”). In verse 11 he changes “nobis” into “ipsis” and in the next “nostri” into the more idiomatic “nostra”. In verse 15 he suggests “Ne velit tellus” for “Vult ager”. Finally, he draws attention to Bradney’s “ipsâ” with the neuter “decore” and at the bottom of  the page he jots down: “ablative used for quam + noun or quam + acc”. All in all, a good version it seems, as two lines next to verses 4-7 (accompanied with v.f.g., cf. supra) and 8-11 (f.g.), which presumably pleased him well, seem to suggest. “Oceanus’s Speech to the Titans” O ye, whom wrath consumes! who passion-stung Writhe at defeat, and nurse your agonies! Shut up your senses, stifle up your ears, My voice is not a bellows unto ire. As heaven and earth are fairer, fairer far 5 Than Chaos and blank darkness, though once chiefs; And as we shew beyond that heaven and earth In form & shape compact and beautiful, So on our heels a fresh perfection treads, A power more strong in beauty, born of  us 10 And fated to excel us, as we pass In glory that old darkness: nor are we Thereby more conquered, than by us the rule Of  shapeless Chaos. Say, doth the dull soil Q uarrel with the proud forests it hath fed, 15 And feedeth still, more comely than itself? Can it deny the chiefdom of  green groves? John Keats Idem Latine Redditum a.d. XII Cal. Jun. Vos oh quos angit rabies et vulnere diro Contorquit clades, et pasta doloribus ira, Claudite jam sensus, auresque obtundite vestras, Spiritus hic istos non follibus efferet ignes. Cœlus ut et Tellus formâ Chaos atque Tenebras 5 Exsuperant, quondam reges; utque agmina nostra Tellurem Cœlumque novâ compagine vincunt, Mente manuque citâ, consortis et ordine vitae, Et mille indiciis melior natura probatur; Sic et nostra recens Species vestigia pressat. 10 Moribus et formâ praestantior, hos ea fatis Vincere certa Deos, ut nos quoque vicimus illos.

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Nec magis obruimur, quam per nos obruta cessat Informis mixtura Chaos. Num languida gleba Dissidet arboribus quas extulit ipsa superbis, 15 Principiumque negat viridis laudabile silvae? Carolus Merivale S[acrae] T[heologiae] P[rofessor]

3. The power of  the Romans The next text is a prose version of an unidentified text about Roman political power. It seems the original was French (cf. infra). Bradney. 30. July 3rd 1877. “The power of  the Romans” etc: – 1

5

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15

Ut opera Romanorum permanserunt, sic imperium non evanescuit, quod ut eversum sit necesse fuit multa saecula praeterire ac impetus identidem fieri. Si quis enim inspectet nunc Imperatorem imbecillem, nunc tam multas gentes quae tempore praeterito enisae sunt ut Imperium everterint, videtur regiam esse antiquam, quae contineatur mole ipsâ ac viribus fundamentorum, nunc autem neglecta per hospes: pereat tandemque omnino spolietur causâ sese ruinis augendi. Verum est tempora prima Romae vitas splendidiores actas ac clariores monstrare, res enim videre possumus nobilius gestas et scelera terribiliora, virtutibus ac vitiis fortius et vehementius actis. Imperio autem decidente, aliquid imbecillitatis haec etiam praeferunt. Respublica minus strenue administrabatur; consilium magistratuum excipit res fortius gestas; Virtutem in proelio non jam consequitur disciplina. Romani temporis posterioris solum res suas defendunt, majores autem eodem statu impetum fecerunt; scelus fit minus audax sed crudelius; ira autem ac gloriae amor saepius veneno utuntur quam ense.

This prose version bears fewer remarks than the previous one. Perhaps a sign of  the advancing term? At the top of   the sheet the teacher writes Q ua de eadem re stabilitas. In the first sentence, he changes the non-existent form evanescuit into evanuit by crossing out sc, replaces eversum sit by everteretur and ac by aut. In the next sentence, he finds fault with the ending of  imbecillem (probably suggesting Imperatorum imbecillitatem). In l.  7 he suggests peregrinorum per manus instead of  per hospes, and ex ruinis instead of  ruinis. He would prefer the next sentence to feature Scilicet [...] monstrant instead of  Verum est [...] monstrare. Interestingly, he scans the end of   the sentence (– ︶ ︶ – ︶ ︶ – –), pointing out that Bradney should take care 660

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to avoid poetical rhythms in prose composition.15 In the next sentence, he advises dilabi rather than decidente and prefers prae se f. to praeferunt. For Virtutem in proelio he offers the alternative fortitudo or virtus militaris, and changes consequitur disciplina into disciplinâ nititur. He suggests the inclusion of  tantummodo with res suas defendunt. At the bottom of   the sheet he also adds bellum quod te, ultro inferebant and defendunt. [original] 16 [Bradney’s hand] July 3rd 1877. L.P. The power of   the Romans had the same endurance as their works. It required many centuries and repeated strokes to shatter and overthrow it. When one regards on the one hand the weakness of   their emperors, on the other the efforts of  so many nations in succession to undermine the empire, one fancies that he is looking at an ancient palace supporting itself  still by its very massiveness and the solidity of  its construction, but which has fallen into neglect, and is  gradually destroyed by the hands of  strangers and at length utterly demolished, for the sake of  enriching themselves with its ruins. It is true that the first ages of  Rome present a drama more full of  life and brilliant. One sees there actions more heroic and crimes more startling. Virtues and vices were then alike at a higher pitch of  strength and vigour. But as the empire declines, these begin to carry on them a stamp of  feebleness. Political life becomes more hesitating; court intrigue takes the place of  bolder measures; courage in the camp is no longer backed by discipline. The Romans of   the later ages only dream of  defence, where their ancestors ventured on aggression; crime becomes less daring, but more deadly; while hatred and ambition use the poison-cup more freely than the sword. [In Bradney’s hand] From the French. Idem Latine Redditum Q uae Romanorum operibus eadem Romano imperio stabilitas erat. Q uod ut quassarent et everterent permulta saecula iterataque vulnera vix effecerunt. Hinc autem si quis imperatorum ignaviam, illinc si tot gentium impetus consideret quae singulae deinceps imperium comminuebant, veterem aedem videtur sibi videre, quam adhuc mole et

  Whereas a dactylus + spondaeus sometimes occurs in prose, although frowned upon (Q uint. Inst. 9.4.102), the worst clausula of all – dixit Q uintilian (Inst. 9.4.75) – is the second half  verse of  a hexameter, which we find here. 16  A pasted piece of  printed paper to which Bradney added “July 3rd 1877” (on the top) and “From the French” (on the bottom). I have not been able to identify this text. 15

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stabili structurâ nixam, sed situ jam neglectam alienae paulatim evertunt manus et funditus diruunt, ejus rudera lucro sibi appositurae. Prioribus quidem saeculis fatendum est Romae peractam esse actuosam magis ac decoram fabulam; nobiliora enim facinora et insigniora scelera occurrunt, virtutibus scilicet ac vitiis ex vi et robore luxurianti orientibus. Dilabente contra imperio, nescio quid debilitatis prae se ferre jam videntur. Minor in republicâ gerendâ vigor; audaciam excipiunt aulicae artes; Disciplinâ militari non jam nititur fortitudo. Posteriorum aetatum Romani bellum tantummodo defendunt, quod majores ultro inferebant, audax minus scelus est, sed atrocius, et veneno saepius quam ferro odium ambitioque utuntur.

4. Old stories tell that men are fickle As a final example we have an extract from Charles Mackay’s (18141889), The Salamandrine. Bradney 30. July 7 1877 “Old stories tell that men are fickle,” etc. 5

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A. En omnes memorat mendaces fabula multa, Carpere vitam ullum vix sine fraude suam, Non manet heu constans, (sic dicunt) fraude solutus In terras, radios sol ubi fundit, amor. Temporibus verus miseris, fortisque periclo, Debet si possit vivere purus amor. Sic faciat, qui vult aeternum vincere amorem Virginis innuptae, matris amicitiam. G. Oh Amethysta mihi, qua non est carior ulla Q uam tua splendescunt lumina clara mihi. Jam veniunt animae lapsatae gaudia nulla, Sed te solus amo, – me meus urit amor. At tenet alterius non umquam pectora verus Ardor, quae possit nemo negare mihi. Te prope, si quidquid damni mihi concidat ipsi, Sic frustra gentes impia bella gerant. Sed te semper amo adversis rebusque secundis, Tu mihi vita nidor, tu quoque sidus eris.

Few remarks again for the verse assignment. At the top of   the sheet, the teacher writes See fair copy. In the first verse, he suggests Omnes commemorat instead of  En omnes memorat and finds fault with ullum. In verse 8 he would prefer In terra instead of  In terras; in the next fidus instead of  verus. In verse 12 there are some dots under matris amicitiam, probably indicating that it is a less fortuitous junctura. There is a firm ‡ mark next to tua, indicating Brad662

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ney’s metrical error in scanning the “a” short before splendescunt. In  the next verse lapsatae has been underlined, probably because it is unusual in connection with mens. In verse 19, the teacher prefers si quid instead of  si quidquid. In the penultimate verse, he underlines amo adversis, indicating Bradney’s hiatus. In the final verse, he circles nidor, to signal Bradney’s confusion with nitor, and underlines tu quoque, possibly because quoque feels like patchwork here. [original] 17 L.E. A. OLD stories tell that men are fickle False and fickle every one, And that love by guile untainted Never dwelt beneath the sun. Great in sorrow, strong in danger Must his pure affection prove Who would hope to win for ever Maiden’s passion, woman’s love. G. O Amethysta, best beloved! Since first thine eyes upon me shone, My soul has had no other joy Than love of  thee, and thee alone; No other passion shall it own; And be the doubt for ever far! Thee at my side whate’er betide, In vain the envious world shall war; I’ll love thee still, Through good, through ill, My light, my life, my guiding star! Idem Latine Redditum A. Flaribus esse marem levius, mutabile semper, Prisca fides, fidos nec docet esse viros. Q uique merum fucis numquam temeravit amorem Hunc negat humanis eminuisse plagis. Q uod sit in adversis constans, quod forte periclis, Ingenium juveni constet inesse velim. Cui stetit in votis, uni sibi duret in aevum Virginio [sic] sponsae continuatus amor. G. Oh praeter dilecta alias Amethysta puellas 17  Parts V-VI of  The Salamandrine (Canto Third: Love Betrayed), as preserved (as a printed and glued sheet) in Bradney’s exercise book (Gwent Archives, GB0218. D554/122).

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Arbitrio mentem quae regis una meam, Tu postquam illuxere meae tua lumina vitae, Sola voluptatis fons et amoris eras. Non alii posthac poterit succumbere pectus – Ista sit invidiae jam procul aura – faci Q uos dederit fors cunque dies, nil rixa quod angat Livida turbarum, te comitante feret. Te noceat faveatque idem securus amabo Lux modo sis vitae sis cynosura meae.

Conclusion In nineteenth-century upper-class education, Latin and Greek composition, both poetry and prose, was still an important part of  the school curriculum. In order to master the language, students were expected not only to translate texts and poems into Latin and Greek, but also to produce original writings in the classical languages, such as orations, disputations or poetry. Surprisingly, it appears that this was not Bradney’s forte. Madeleine Grey, who studied Bradney’s works and life extensively and who inspected his school reports, states: “The young Bradney was surprisingly unsuccessful at school: in spite of   the fact that he wrote and even published Latin verse later in life, he was regarded as particularly weak in the classics.” 18 It is true that the compositions I have discussed above are not top notch. For sure, Bradney’s Latin still leaves a lot to be desired (e.g. the non-existent form evanescuit, confusing nidor for nitor, oblivisci governing the ablative case, etcetera). However, to be honest, I am not sure how his attempts would measure up to those of  his peers. This level does not seem disastrous for an eighteen-year old, but then again Harrovian standards would obviously have been very high for classics, as we see, for instance, in the keen observation about Bradney’s prosarhythmus in 4.3. – an instance that reminded me, in turn, very much of  my own composition teacher’s feel for Latin prosody! Notwithstanding the quality of  Bradney’s Latin, it is clear that the man enjoyed the classics very much. We know from the cata18  “Introduction”, in A History of  Monmouthshire from the Coming of   the Normans into Wales Down to the Present Time by Sir Joseph Alfred Bradney. Vol. 5. The Hundred of  Newport, edited from Bradney’s MSS by Madeleine Gray (Cardiff, 1993), vii.

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logue of   the sale at Tal-y-Coed Court after his daughter Margarette’s death that Bradney owned a rich library collection of  Latin and Greek grammar, poetry and ancient history books.19 From the prefaces of  his anthologies Carmina Jocosa (1915) and Noctes Flandricae it is abundantly clear how he thoroughly enjoyed reading and writing Latin as a  pastime. And this brings us full circle; back to Dirk Sacré and the joy of  Latin. May he continue to find such joy for many years to come!

19  H. Lewis, “Sir Joseph Bradney. Some miscellaneous notes”, Gwent Local History. The Journal of  Gwent Local History Council 85 (1998), 54-56, at 54.

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JOSEPH TUSIANI NEL CERTAMEN HOEUFFTIANUM 1959

Josephus Tusiani, Morientis Ovidii visio Terra patrum, video rursus miracula solis audioque harmoniae sermones et tremit in me gratia magna deorum et lux surgente triumpho acrem longamque ex animo fugat asperitatem. Nonne domi semper mansi? Valles tenebrosas 5 fortesque ventos dubiasque vias mea tantum mens pinxit formidine vecta, sed hic stetit ardens corpus in effuso festo splendoris amati. O rus, quid narras? Super alba cacumina montis aspicio lustralem herbam videoque capellas 10 solis edentes purpureos radios. Mare nostrum, quid narras? Exultantes in aequore verno nant pueri nostri, pulcherrima aquatica serta, et nitor undarum caelosque oculosque coronat. Aspice, nunc piscatores sua retia lenta 15 in spuma rutilante lavant labiisque triumphum semiapertis concelebrant Veneris orientis ex undis ridentibus: omnia litora laeta chrysolithis plaudunt vivis tremulisque smaragdis. Concine, sol Romae, tua fulgida carmina canta 20 et septem resonent colles murmuribus amplis. Sit mihi candida lux, noctis umbras metuenti, sit mihi vasta quies, hiemis ne turbine tangar. Vae mihi! Supplicio subito solem necat atra insidiosaque nubes: nox ubicumque potens est. 25 Nonne ego sum Romae? Has tenebras agnoscere possum. Sulmonensis terra ferax, tua nox coronata stellis carmen amoris erat cum, tempore fasto, omnia parvus ego tua sidera significabam attonitis digitis et tu puerum rapiebas 30 in altum in altum. Historias pietate canebat cana avia et avide mea mens illas renovabat. Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 667-681 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124089

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Pars ego sum nivei Fiscelli, pars ego fusci Aterni: sed quomodo mons meus occupat Urbem? Nonne ego sum Romae? Nocturna quies trahit omnes. 35 Nascitur ex umbris madidis luscinia dulcis et me cantus eius memorem facit artis et arcis quae mundum ornabant. Q uid dixi? Praeteritorum fama dierum me a gestis praesentibus arcet. Nox quoque tristitia insolita subitaque tenetur 40 et procul astra favillae sunt ac signa doloris. Nox Paeligna, meum hospitium insula fusca videtur at ego Romae vivo aut in regione paterna. De caelo imperiosa sonat vox: “accipe, fili” 1 inquit, “et hunc memorare hominis morientis amorem. 45 Italiam pete, quaere tuam post aequora terram et agnosce tuas radices. Non bene vivit qui praecepta patris in se servare recuset. Testamentum est hoc: Roma exstincta, tua virtus virtutem Romae narret impavida mundo.” 50 Q uis loquitur tristissima funera? Roma perenni imperat auspicio. Non est mihi terra petenda quam pede securo teneo lacrimisque saluto. Augustus facit hoc donum mihi dulce poetae. Caesaris ampla domus victoria confugiumque est, 55 carmina nostra canent ergo genitoris amorem. Salve, pater. Tecum sto: nox lacrimaeque fuere. Joseph Tusiani, Sogno di Ovidio moriente Terra dei padri, vedo di nuovo i miracoli del sole e ascolto i discorsi armoniosi e vibra in me la grande grazia degli dei; e la luce in sorgente trionfo allontana dall’animo l’aspra e lunga sofferenza. Non sono rimasto sempre a casa? Solo la mia mente 5 portata dalla paura ha immaginato valli tenebrose, forti venti e vie ignote, ma qui era fermo l’ardente corpo nell’effusa festa dell’amata luce. O campagna, che cosa racconti? Sulle bianche cime del monte guardo l’erba lustrale e vedo le caprette 10 che brucano i raggi purpurei del sole. Mare nostro, che cosa racconti? Esultanti i nostri bambini nuotano nel mare primaverile bellissime capriole di acqua, e lo splendore delle onde corona i cieli e gli occhi. Guarda, ora i pescatori lavano le loro lente reti 15 nella schiuma risplendente e con le labbra semiaperte celebrano tutti insieme il trionfo di Venere che sorge dalle onde ridenti: tutti i litorali lieti   Nell’originale si legge De caelo vox imperiosa sonat et “accipe, fili”.

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plaudono con vivi crisoliti e tremuli smeraldi. Intona i cori, o sole di Roma, i tuoi fulgidi carmi canta 20 e i sette colli risuonino con musiche più ampie. Ci sia candida luce, per me che ho paura delle ombre, ci sia per me vasta quiete, perché non sia colpito da bufera invernale. Ahimé! Con inatteso supplizio una nera e insidiosa nube uccide il sole: dappertutto regna la notte. 25 Non sono io a Roma? Posso riconoscere queste tenebre. Terra ferace di Sulmona, la tua notte coronata di stelle era carme d’amore, quando, in un tempo fausto, io bambino indicavo tutte le tue stelle con dita ispirate e tu rapivi quel bambino sempre più in alto. Devotamente cantava storie 30 la nonna canuta e la mia mente avidamente le ripeteva. Io sono parte del nevoso Fiscello, io parte del fosco Aterno: ma in che modo il mio monte occupa l’Urbe? Non sono io a Roma? La quiete notturna attrae tutti. Viene dalle umide ombre il dolce usignolo 35 E il suo canto mi fa ricordare l’arte e l’arce che ornavano il mondo. Che cosa ho detto? La fama dei giorni passati mi allontana dai fatti di oggi. Anche la notte è vinta da tristezza insolita e improvvisa e lontano gli astri sono scintille e segni di dolore. 40 Notte Peligna, il mio ospizio sembra fosca isola, ma io a Roma vivo, o nella terra dei padri. Dal cielo risuona una voce potente: “Ascolta, o figlio”, dice, “e considera ora l’affetto di un uomo che muore. Vai in Italia, cerca la tua terra oltre il mare 45 e riconosci le tue radici. Non vive bene chi non vuole conservare in sé gli insegnamenti paterni. Q uesto è il testamento: quando Roma non ci sarà più, le tue imprese narrino impavide al mondo il valore di Roma”. Chi parla di tristissimi lutti? Roma domina 50 per perenne auspicio. Non devo tornare a una terra sulla quale cammino con piede sicuro e saluto piangendo. Augusto fa questo dolce dono a me poeta. L’ampia casa di Cesare è vittoria e rifugio, i nostri carmi canteranno dunque l’amore del genitore. 55 Salve, padre. Sto con te: non ci sono più notte e lagrime.

Con il poemetto Morientis Ovidii visio [success. MOv], Joseph Tusiani, partecipò al Certamen Hoeufftianum del 1959 [success. CH1959], tre anni dopo la pubblicazione di Melos cordis,2 piccolo  J. Tusiani, Melos cordis (New York, 1955).

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libro che ebbe una certa sua fortuna, ma fu anche criticato per qualche problema di prosodia. Anche leggendo il testo di MOv si riscontra qualche problema di prosodia e di metrica. 1) Al v.  6, si nota l’allungamento della -e finale di fortesquē. Può essere considerato un allungamento in arsi e  davanti a cesura tritemimera, voluto anche come variatio prosodica con la -e finale di dubiasquĕ che resta breve. 2) Al verso 29 si incontra ĕgō, ossia con la -o finale lunga. Anche qui c’è allungamento in arsi, davanti a cesura pentemimera. 3) Al v. 50 si presentano 2 casi di allungamento in arsi: a) nārrēt (invece di nārrĕt) con -ĕt allungata in arsi e davanti a eftemimera; b) impāvĭdă al posto di impăvĭdă, ossia con l’allungamento in arsi della sillaba -pa- originariamente breve. 4) Al v.  27 cŏrŏnātă, si presenta con l’abbreviazione della -o della sillaba -rŏ-. Si potrebbe pensare qui a un caso di brevis brevians, ossia che la vocale -o breve della sillaba cŏ- abbia abbreviato la vocale della sillaba seguente -ro- originariamente lunga (iato prosodico?). 5) Al v. 37 è presente ĕiūs con la ĕ- abbreviata e con la -ūs allungata per posizione. Anche in questo caso si potrebbe pensare a un caso di brevis brevians. Il fenomeno delle breves breviantes si può usare anche negli esametri dattilici? Forse il giovane Tusiani, ancora poco esperto di metrica, usò le breves breviantes senza sapere che nel mondo latino si usavano soprattutto nella metrica arcaica. Seri problemi di metrica pone il v. 44: “Dē cæ¯lō vōx īmpĕrĭōsă sŏnāt ēt ‘āccĭpĕ, fīli’.” Nessun problema nelle prime 4 parole. Sŏnāt ha l’allungamento della vocale finale; ugualmente ēt. Ammesso che per sŏnāt si possa invocare l’allungamento in arsi, non trovo alcuna motivazione dell’allungamento di ēt. Si aggiunga la presenza di altri due piedi, ossia una finale di esametro nella forma di adonio. Un esametro con 7 piedi, cioè un eventuale ettametro? 3 Sarebbe l’unico ettametro nell’ampia produzione latina in esametri di Tusiani. O  forse 3  Sono presenti 2 nella Thallusa di Giovanni Pascoli, ai vv. 28 e 63. Per Thallusa, Pascoli, molto malato, affidò la revisione alla sorella Maria. Gli editori hanno lasciato i due versi. M. Valmigli (ed.), G. Pascoli, Poesie latine (Milano, 1970), 637, 711.

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può essere errore per distrazione. In fondo, bastava spostare di poco le parole per avere un esametro corretto: “Dē cæ¯lo͜ īmpĕrĭōsă sŏnāt vōx: ‘āccĭpĕ, fīli’.” L’originale dattiloscritto inviato dall’autore al CH1959 ha la data del 24 dicembre 1958; Tusiani evidentemente intendeva partecipare al Certamen del 1959. Era un buon periodo per l’autore. Abitava ormai da undici anni a New York, aveva un buon numero di libretti di poesia in lingua italiana, aveva pubblicato nel 1955 il volumetto di liriche latine Melos cordis, insegnava al College of  Mount Saint Vincent a New York. Ma, fatto più importante, il 24 marzo 1957 4 il New York Times pubblicava la notizia che la Poetry Society of  England aveva assegnato il prestigioso “Greenwood Prize” del 1956 5 al prof. Joseph Tusiani; il primo (e resterà l’unico) cittadino statunitense a vincere quel premio. Tusiani, avendo deciso di partecipare al CH1959,6 inviò in Olanda entro dicembre 1958, secondo regolamento, il poe­ metto MOv, di soli 57 esametri dattilici. L’originale è in 2 cartelle dattiloscritte, con la numerazione dei versi sulla destra della pagina: versi 1-28 nella prima cartella e il resto nella seconda. Il poemetto, senza nessun commento e nessun premio, fu chiuso in una busta con vari altri testi poetici. Fu però riscoperto da Dirk Sacré ad Haarlem nel 2018; lo stesso Sacré mi comunicò la notizia via email, mi inviò una fotocopia delle due cartelle dattiloscritte e mi suggerì qualche altra notizia. Nella composizione latina, Tusiani si identifica col poeta Ovidio esiliato nel Ponto.7 A una prima lettura, il poemetto tusianeo può risultare un po’ disordinato o addirittura confuso. Viene nominata   L. Petracco Sovran, Joseph Tusiani poeta e traduttore (Perugia, 1984), 41, n. 21.   La data del premio è indicata nelle notizie preliminari (prima dell’indice), nel volume di J. Tusiani, The Fifth Season. Poems (New York, 1964), dove è stato poi pubblicato il testo del poema premiato, The return. 6  Ringrazio Dirk Sacré per le notizie sul poemetto di Tusiani, fornitemi tramite email nel 2018. Al Certamen 1959 parteciparono 23 poesie. Il poemetto di Tusiani era al numero 17. La relazione sulle composizioni partecipanti al Certamen 1959 fu scritta dai giudici dello stesso: H. Wagenvoort, J. Waszink e W. J. W. Koster. Il motto per il riconoscimento della poesia tusianea era “Felix cui placidus leniter adflat amor”. 7  Lo aveva già notato D.  Sacré, “Obitus Nasonis. De dood van Ovidius in een Latijns gedicht (1958) van Nello Martinelli”, Kleio, 48.1-2 (2019), 34-50, 48, n. 3: “Morientis Ovidii visio, een vroege (en nog steeds onuitgegeven) compositie van de ItaloAmerikaanse dichter Joseph Tusiani (°1924), waarin de naar Amerika geëmigreerde Italiaan zich duidelijk identificeert met de uit Italië gezette dichter Ovidius.” 4 5

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più volte Roma e altre volte Sulmona. Non ci sono, almeno apparentemente, altri riferimenti a  luoghi precisi. Ma un certo ordine nel poemetto potrebbe stare in qualcosa che avviene, come comunemente si pensa, nel momento della morte di un uomo. La mente del morente ricorderebbe vari momenti della vita, ma in maniera disordinata, senza una logica sequenza temporale. Il morente è ormai chiuso in se stesso e non comunica più con gli altri. Nel poemetto tusianeo, proprio all’inizio viene invocata la terra patrum (v. 1). All’ultimo verso, Augusto, che, secondo il poemetto, avrebbe concesso a Ovidio – come dono – la possibilità di tornare a Roma, viene salutato (v. 57) con l’espressione Salve, pater. Che la terra patrum (v. 1) sia Roma? Si fa notare la ripetizione del termine pater in tutto il poemetto. La composizione tusianea prosegue con una serie di ricordi della propria infanzia,8 collegati al sole, alla luce, ai suoni di quel periodo e di quel luogo. Ma la mente, in un momento di apparente lucidità, si chiede: (v. 5) “Nonne domi semper mansi?” Negli sprazzi di memoria del drammatico momento della morte, nel poemetto tusianeo predomina solo la prima parte della vita, come se i ricordi di quegli anni fossero rimasti più incisi e vivi. Il poeta sembra sostenere di non essersi mai allontanato dalla terra patrum (v. 1). Solo la sua mente avrebbe immaginato viaggi e spostamenti, difficoltà, dolori e  paure. Viene ricordata la campagna, la vita sugli alba cacumina montis (v. 9), dove le caprette, brucando l’erba assolata, sembrano brucare il sole stesso. Poi viene ricordato il mare, dove i  bambini si  divertono tra le onde e  i pescatori riparano le reti parlando tra di loro, mentre spiaggia e coste sembrano pieni di colori e di suoni, di colorati gioielli. Ed ecco di nuovo il ricordo di Roma e dei suoi sette colli. Che Roma canti i  suoi fulgidi inni e  con la luce liberi la mente del poeta da ogni timore. Ma ecco che un’improvvisa nube riempie di paura la mente del moribondo,9 che con insistenza si chiede ancora: (v. 26) “Nonne ego sum Romae?” La mente ricorda notti lontane trascorse nella ferace terra della patria Sulmona. Q uei ricordi riempiono di dolcezza e di gioia; il cielo di Sulmona  Q uei ricordi non mi sembrano riferibili a Ovidio, nato in una cittadina vicina ai monti, ma lontana dal mare. Il Gargano, dove nacque Tusiani, è  invece in zona montuosa e vicina al mare. 9  La poesia latina di Tusiani è piena di queste paure delle nuvole, dell’oscurità in generale. 8

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era pieno di stelle splendenti, che il bambino guardava e imparava a  riconoscere. Ecco il ricordo della nonna che raccontava storie e il bambino le apprendeva e le ripeteva subito. Q uello che fu un bambino ed ora è  un morente, ricorda il monte Fiscello coperto di neve e  le acque del fiume Aterno, presso Sulmona. Come mai all’improvviso il buio della notte occupa il cielo di Roma? Il moribondo nei suoi ricordi è  tornato da Sulmona a  Roma. La quiete notturna fa rivivere il canto dell’usignolo e il canto e la grandezza di  Roma. Ma  allo stesso tempo i  ricordi della Roma del passato lo allontanano dal presente. La stessa notte, tanto bella quando il morente era bambino, ora diventa dolore. Le stelle diventano scintille di fuoco e  segni di sofferenza. La notte Peligna, prima descritta come dolce e  benigna, diventa fosca isola. Il poeta però continua a  sostenere che vive a  Roma, nella regione dei padri. È per il moribondo un momento di dubbio e di disorientamento. Allora una voce dal cielo parlando con autorità impartisce consigli al poeta: (v. 45) “memorare hominis morientis amorem”. L’uomo che muore non deve dimenticare quel che ha amato in vita. “Torna alla tua terra al di là dal mare. Ricorda i precetti di tuo padre. Fai in modo che, quando Roma non ci sarà più, i tuoi versi la ricordino.” Chi parla di dolore e di morte? “Roma imperat perenni auspicio” (vv.  51-52). Il poeta morente ripete che sta a  Roma, ne calca il suolo. Augusto ha concesso al poeta il perdono e gli ha donato la possibilità di tornare a vivere a Roma. Ovidio ora vive nella grande casa di Augusto e i suoi carmi cantano l’amore per Augusto padre: “Salve, pater. Tecum sto: nox lacrimaeque fuere” (v.  157). Così Ovidio muore, con l’illusione che Augusto lo abbia perdonato e gli abbia permesso il ritorno a Roma. Tusiani non nomina mai Tiberio, ma solo Augusto. Chi conosce anche un poco Joseph Tusiani e  le sue opere, leggendo i  primi versi di questa composizione latina MOv, corre subito all’inizio di un’altra opera dello stesso autore, ma scritta in inglese, ossia The return, con la quale partecipò e  vinse il “Greenwood Prize”. Non trascrivo tutto il poema, ma solo i passi che si collegano al testo di MOv (1-10): My cradle-land, who suffered? I did not, nor did I ever miss your wonderbreeze, if  my sad eyes can see you, lucent still, and still maternal. Over savage seas my fear alone has grouped, through winds, and weird

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valleys, and moonless paths, only my thought has ventured; but the soul, blood through the veins, has passed through your roots wild eternally, and the man has not outgrown the child. […] The sun, the sun is here, part of  you, part of  me, so low that we can almost touch its fulgence, tender and melodious. Look, on that rock the goat is crunching purple grass – it seems to us it’s chewing sun-rays; and on this steep hill listening to the fresh words of  the sea, a silent little shepherd near his flock is glad to balance on his open hand a sky of  gold. And all about are bells, and soon is evening – ah, this tranquil thing that films our eyes with tears and makes us gaze at you, my mountain land. […] When night is gray, and the cricket and I are the only living spirits beneath a sky now ebbing then reflooding to the sleepy and melancholy eye, an old man sings a tale of  life; nearby, the little shepherd listens. The sea glistens, as if  attentive, too, till the song trembles, and till on the same rock a white head and a million curls are still in the long night that is restless with stars. […] Has tenebras agnoscere possum. Sulmonensis terra ferax, tua nox coronata stellis carmen amoris erat cum, tempore fasto, omnia parvus ego tua sidera significabam attonitis digitis et tu puerum rapiebas in altum in altum. Historias pietate canebat cana avia et avide mea mens illas renovabat. pars ego sum nivei Fiscelli, pars ego fusci Aterni.

Nel precedente libretto tusianeo di liriche latine Melos cordis (del 1955) è  possibile rinvenire espressioni o situazioni che possono essere collegate ad alcune frasi di MOv. Solo che i  collegamenti tra queste due opere sono meno precisi. Si tengano presenti i vv. 26-34. La lirica di Melos cordis, che in qualche modo ricorda il poe­ metto Hoeufftiano, è la quinta (p. 9), dal titolo Michaeli fratri: 674

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Te, puer, his quae sint cordi suavissima verbis adloquor et nosco, trimule frater, ego. Adloquor astrorum eloquio lyrico redeuntum ne mea verba tuos aperiant oculos. Dormi. Audiri a te nocturnas nolo querellas quod gemitum celant carmina quae didici. Cum tangam frontem immotam, de temporis oris ille puer surgit quem unus ego aspicio. A, puer ipse fui quamquam non amplius horas defunctae pacis mens meminisse potest. Tristis erat genetrix pueroque canebat amaras undarum et nulli tristitias reditus. Et nunc mater adest infirma oppressaque crudis annis nec cantum laetitiae didicit. En cunae lente cum luna eunt sine manu et solum puero solacium tibi ego nenia quaenam sit dicenda ignoro: quietem a me quam expectas caelicolae prohibent.

È una lirica piena di nostalgia, di tristezza, di amari ricordi. Il poeta guarda il fratellino di tre anni che dorme; vorrebbe parlargli, ma non vuole svegliarlo. Il fratellino si metterebbe a  piangere e  lamentarsi e l’autore non vuole ricordare proprio quei lamenti del­ l’in­fanzia. Anche egli, Tusiani, è  stato puer e  “dalle spiagge del tempo” 10 ritorna il bambino che fu.11 Non può ricordare tutto il passato, ma gli ritornano alla mente le tristezze della mamma, le amare tristezze delle onde del mare che impedivano al marito e  padre emigrato di ritornare a  casa. Anche oggi c’è la mamma ormai anziana, ma non ha appreso canti di gioia. Resta il poeta a consolare il fratellino, ma non ricorda più la nenia che dovrebbe cantargli; gli dei gli impediscono di donare la quiete che il piccolo Michael si aspetta dal fratello maggiore. I ricordi del passato in MOv in genere sono lieti e propri di un fanciullo attento e che apprende subito gli insegnamenti di genitori e nonni. In Michaeli fratri invece c’è solo mestizia, anche se le situazioni nelle due poe­ sie sono sempre le stesse. Si potrebbero riportare, qui e altrove, loci similes anche di altre liriche latine di Joseph Tusiani, presenti in opere successive.12   Espressione spesso usata da Tusiani latino.   Il motivo del puer ricorrerà spesso nella futura poesia latina di Tusiani. 12  Già nelle prime opere scritte da Tusiani giovane sono presenti temi ed espressioni che ritorneranno in seguito, magari variate. 10 11

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Ma  un tale lavoro richiederebbe lunghi elenchi, impossibili in questo saggio. Credo però necessario, oltre che utile, un altro riferimento, presente nelle opere latine e inglesi di Tusiani. Mi riferisco ai continui richiami al “suono” e alla “luce”: studiati e approfonditi in altri lavori riguardanti la poesia latina 13 di Tusiani, saranno presenti e addirittura più numerosi nella sua poesia inglese. Suono e luce, con tutte le loro concatenazioni e le loro varianti semantiche, sono per Tusiani i  motori della vita e  della poesia. Riporto qui, come esempio, quella parte di MOv, dove si riscontra maggiormente questo procedimento caratteristico. Il poemetto tusianeo inizia mettendo espressamente in evidenza questi due elementi, luce e suono (vv. 1-4): 14 Terra patrum, video rursus miracula solis audioque harmoniae sermones et tremit in me gratia magna deorum et lux surgente triumpho acrem longamque ex animo fugat asperitatem.

Nei vv.  9-20, le espressioni simili O rus, quid narras? (v.  9) e  poi mare nostrum, / quid narras? (vv. 11-12) introducono la montagna e il mare. I cacumina montis (anticipati da rus nello stesso verso 9) sono seguiti e  caratterizzati dal verbo aspicio (v.  10) collegato al campo semantico della luce. A  rafforzare il riferimento alla luce, segue un quadretto delle capre che brucano il sole: […] Super alba cacumina montis aspicio lustralem herbam videoque capellas solis edentes purpureos radios.

I versi seguenti si riferiscono al mare, che nello stesso tempo si può collegare al suono e  alla luce. E in questi versi le immagini sono effettivamente di luce e  di suono: una delle sinestesie tanto care a Joseph Tusiani (vv. 11-19):

13  E. Bandiera, “Musica vita est. La musica nella poesia latina di Joseph Tusiani”, D.  Sacré, I.  Tusiani, T.  Deneire (ed.), Musae saeculi XX Latinae. Acta selecta. Conventus patrocinantibus Academia Latinitati Fovendae atque Instituto Historico Belgico in Urbe in Academia Belgica anno MMI habiti (Brussel, 2006), 81-106; Id., “Lucis ad fontem vehe me futurae”, Humanistica Lovaniensia 55 (2006), 195-212. 14  Evidenzio in corsivo i collegamenti con la luce e sottolineo i collegamenti col suono.

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[…] Mare nostrum, quid narras? Exultantes in aequore verno nant pueri nostri pulcherrima aquatica serta, et nitor undarum caelosque oculosque coronat. Aspice, nunc piscatores sua retia lenta in spuma rutilante lavant labiisque triumphum semiapertis concelebrant Veneris orientis ex undis ridentibus: omnia litora laeta chrysolithis plaudunt vivis tremulisque smaragdis.

Lo stesso procedimento si verifica nei versi seguenti (vv. 20-23): Concine, sol Romae, tua fulgida carmina canta et septem resonent colles murmuribus amplis. Sit mihi candida lux, noctis umbras metuenti, sit mihi vasta quies, hiemis ne turbine tangar.

Il primo verso pone ai margini sinistro e destro il richiamo al suono (concine, carmina canta), mentre nella parte centrale sono inseriti i riferimenti alla luce (sol Romae, fulgida); addirittura fulgida carmina ripete i riferimenti alla luce e al suono, con un’altra sine­stesia. Perché Joseph Tusiani si identifica con Ovidio e non con un altro poeta? Nel 1957 si celebrò il bimillenario della nascita di Publio Ovidio Nasone, nato nel 43 a.C. a Sulmona. Ci furono manifestazioni culturali di vario tipo, che certamente furono notate anche da Tusiani, che pure viveva a New York da 10 anni. Però c’è un altro importante motivo, che avrà impressionato e  ispirato Tusiani. È risaputo che Ovidio fu relegato in esilio da Augusto ai confini dell’Impero, a  Tomi. Ovidio, non contento dell’esilio e  del luogo lontano da Roma, tentò in vari modi di ritornare. Chiese perdono, chiese l’aiuto di amici; ma non ottenne niente né da Augusto, né da suo successore. Tusiani, nelle sue opere latine, si è  spesso identificato in vari personaggi, come Enea che cerca una nuova patria, Ulisse accolto nella reggia di Alcinoo, Giovanni Pascoli che perdette il padre, ecc. Vissuto con la madre, non aveva mai conosciuto il padre, emigrato in America per lavoro, appena aveva saputo che la moglie era incinta.15 Per vari motivi, il padre non era tornato più in Italia, 15  Nel primo volume della sua trilogia autobiografica, J. Tusiani, La parola difficile. Autobiografia di un italo-americano (Fasano, BA, 1988), 287, Tusiani indica

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e il figlio Peppino (poi Joseph) lo conosceva solo da una foto appesa al muro in casa. Nel 1947, dopo la laurea presso l’Università di Napoli, Tusiani e  la madre intrapresero il viaggio alla volta di New York, la madre per rivedere il marito dopo 23 anni, il figlio per conoscere il padre mai visto prima. Si prevedeva un ritorno in Italia, ma per vari motivi (non ultimo la nascita di un fratello) il viaggio fu senza ritorno. Il giovane Tusiani si inserì nell’insegnamento universitario newyorkese e  la madre continuò a  rimanere con la famiglia nel Bronx, conservando sempre la speranza di un ritorno in Italia. Nonostante le normali difficoltà dell’inserimento nel nuovo mondo, Tusiani conservò sempre un profondo attaccamento al­ l’Italia e al suo Gargano, al paese natio San Marco in Lamis e agli amici rimasti lì. Il profondo legame con la patria è diventato uno dei motivi della produzione letteraria di Tusiani, forse il più sentito e sofferto, almeno a giudicare da quanto risulta dalla lettura delle sue opere. Egli si è  considerato, fino al suo ultimo giorno di vita, un emigrato (sia pure speciale) e  un esiliato.16 Mi sembra quindi chiara e spiegabile l’identificazione di Tusiani col grande e famoso “esiliato” dell’antichità, il poeta latino Publio Ovidio Nasone. Il dolore del distacco e i problemi dell’integrazione furono certamente più sentiti – e più dolorosi – nei primi anni vissuti a New York, nel Bronx. Nella cosiddetta Little Italy di Belmont (dove viveva in quei primi anni la riunita famiglia Tusiani), c’erano molte famiglie di emigrati da San Marco in Lamis (paese natio di Tusiani), addirittura parenti e  amici dei Tusiani. E forse anche per la presenza di tali emigrati sammarchesi si percepiva maggiormente la lontananza forzata dall’Italia. I due saggi citati alla nota 16 mostrano i vari aspetti dell’emigrazione nella poesia latina di Tusiani e  poi l’emigrazione considerata “esilio”. La sofferenza dell’autore risulta profonda e sentita, a  tal punto da comporre una lirica dove vengono confrontate con precisione mese e  anno del viaggio di emigrazione del padre: “senza potermi godere […] il panorama della piccola città portuale dove era sbarcato mio padre nel lontano agosto 1923.” 16  Su questi temi la bibliografia è ampia. Per la produzione latina, rinvio a E. Bandiera, Il tema dell’emigrazione nella poesia latina di Joseph Tusiani, in C. Siani (ed.), “Two Languages, Two Lands”. L’opera letteraria di Joseph Tusiani (San Marco in Lamis, 2000), 29-46; Id., “L’emigrazione come esilio nella poesia latina di Joseph Tusiani”, in P. Giordano, A. J. Tamburri (ed.), Esilio, migrazione e sogno americano (Boca Raton, FL, 2001), 17-43.

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le realtà delle due terre dell’America e  del Bronx, con l’Italia e  il Gargano. Si legga la lirica Redire necesse, già pubblicata in Melos cordis (p. 14): I corollas ad quaerendas qui dumeta nosti vilia: post deserta serta sera postque nigrum litus lilia. I maternas petens oras qui perpessus es exsilia: hic est imber atri mensis. illic rura stant aprilia. I iuventam clamans claram qui defessa cies cilia: solis munus potens erit super limina hostilia. I ad carmina audienda quae dant ora puerilia: cantum quondam carmen unum taciturna implebit milia.

È una lirica ritmica e rimata, dalla struttura ben precisa, che sembra composta secondo uno schema musicale. Ognuna delle quattro strofe presenta una proposta nei primi due versi (che terminano con i  due punti): ad essi segue una specie di risposta che in qualche modo chiarisce la proposta dei primi due versi. La rima sdrucciola in -ilia, presente alla fine dei versi pari, sembra un martello che ripete, ribatte le raccomandazioni, espresse anche dal ripetuto verbo “i” all’inizio di ogni strofa. Mi sembra la vox imperiosa del v. 44 di MOv, che ricorda al poeta morente la necessità di tornare al suo paese di origine, alla terra patrum (vv. 45-48): […] et hunc memorare hominis morientis amorem. Italiam pete, quaere tuam post aequora terram et agnosce tuas radices. Non bene vivit qui praecepta patris in se servare recuset.

Sono le stesse opposizioni che ritorneranno nelle future poesie latine (e non solo) di Tusiani e  in tutta la sua futura produzione letteraria. Tusiani (con la madre) affrontò il viaggio post aequora proprio in cerca del padre mai conosciuto prima. Nell’estate del 1954, Tusiani ritornò in Italia dopo 7 anni passati a  New York. Venne 679

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in Italia con l’amica scrittrice Frances Winwar. Dopo lo sbarco a  Napoli, Frances Winwar si diresse a  Gardone Riviera, al Vitto­ riale degli Italiani, per le ricerche necessarie per scrivere la sua biografia di Gabriele D’Annunzio; Tusiani si diresse a San Marco in Lamis, il suo paese natio sul Gargano. Il capitolo XIV (p.  268-291) de La parola difficile è  dedicato a quel viaggio in Italia. Ma è anche importantissimo per il nostro discorso sul poemetto tusianeo Hoeufftiano. Vi si rinvengono espressioni molto significative, che in qualche modo si ricollegano al testo del poemetto Hoeufftiano. Q uel viaggio per Tusiani ebbe il significato di un ritorno alle origini, alla sua terra, alla terra dei padri. A  p.  269 17 si legge “Rivolsi, così, un pensiero al mio Gargano in termini nuovi, in termini di ritorno.” 18 A p. 270, “Ma quel viaggio io dovevo farlo, un po’ per vedere quali fossero i miei veri sentimenti nei riguardi dell’Italia e  un po’ per sapere, rimettendo piede sul suolo natio, quale sarebbe stato il mio futuro.” A p. 281 si legge “In quei pochi minuti di riconciliazione fraterna (troppo pochi nella storia di sette anni) mi vidi ripagato d’ogni sofferenza e  mi sembrò di non essermi mai allontanato da quella mia terra sublime.” Particolarmente significativa la prossima lunga citazione (p. 283): La montagna lontana mi perseguitava. Che cosa voleva da me? E quella stessa sera (ricordo), sentivo proprio il bisogno di liberarmi d’un peso a cui non ero abituato. Volevo scrivere ma non riuscivo ad esprimermi in italiano: o la mia lingua materna si vendicava dei miei sette anni di diserzione o un’altra lingua mi ricordava una missione non ancora ufficialmente incominciata. Disperatamente amavo quel mio piccolo promontorio solatio; mi sembrava, anzi, di non averlo mai amato come ora.

E quella notte Tusiani scrisse The return. Termino con un’altra citazione presa dallo stesso volume (p.  289): “Q uando fummo a casa a me sembrò di essere arrivato a destinazione: mi sentii, final­ mente, nella terra a  cui appartenevo e  da cui nessuno mi avrebbe potuto allontanare: l’America di mio nonno e di mio padre, l’America, soprattutto, di mio fratello.” C’è qui una specie di capovolgimento di prospettiva. La terra patrum è  diventata l’America, poiché l’autore vede nel nonno e nel padre i suoi antenati, i suoi   Per le citazioni, uso l’edizione originale de La parola difficile (Fasano, 1988).   Segno in corsivo le parole che richiamano il poemetto Hoeufftiano e The return.

17 18

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patres; e poi vede il futuro, ossia il fratello che continuerà la stirpe. Ma  per Tusiani la terra patrum è  sempre il Gargano in Italia. Q uesto si deduce da molte citazioni possibili, dalle opere scritte nelle quattro lingue che Tusiani ha usato. In una lirica inglese 19 (tradotta poi in latino 20), Tusiani realizza una paretimologia del termine “Tusiani”, che fa derivare da Tus Iani, ossia “incenso di Giano”, e immagina che un suo antenato sia stato sacerdote e che abbia venerato la divinità pagana Giano con l’incenso. Ma è anche vero che Tusiani doveva anche riconoscere che in America aveva avuto successo e fortuna, che vi aveva trovato una vera nuova patria e che per questa “nuova patria” sentiva di dover usare lo stesso linguaggio e le stesse espressioni usati per il Gargano. Tusiani si è  identificato con Ovidio, che vuole tornare nella sua terra patrum. Ma di fatto Ovidio non vuole tornare a Sulmona, ma a  Roma. In questa città ha trovato notorietà e  fortuna; essa è diventata la sua nuova patria. Q ui Augusto, dopo averlo perdonato, lo richiama e lo invita a vivere nella propria casa. Tusiani è  Ovidio. Come Ovidio, ha attraversato il mare emigrando e andando in esilio in cerca del padre. Solo che Tusiani è in continuo viaggio tra vecchia e nuova terra patrum. E ha scritto il poemetto Hoeufftiano ispirandosi ad altri testi già scritti (e che avrebbe scritto in seguito). Ma ha scritto il suo eterno e continuo return, anche se non gli sembra di essersi mai allontanato da un paese all’altro.

  Tus Jani: J. Tusiani, Rind and All (New York, 1962), 44-45.   What’s in a Name: E. Bandiera (ed.), Iosephus Tusiani Neoeboracensis, In nobis caelum. Carmina Latina (Leuven, 2007), 47. 19 20

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Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 683-685 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124090

TITOLO

MAURUS PISINI

PRAETEREUNTIS VITAE TESTIMONIA

Iam vetus annus abit, tacet omnis vita, tacet mors, nix quoque humi liquefit, cor micat usque, at abest … Q uid tibi sum, vel ero? Longe sunt ardor et aestas et mare habent imbres: nil sine fine manet. Fallor ego, an caelo stat sol immotus in alto nec radiis audet condere murmur avis? Q uisquis amans poscit requiem, at tantum irrita temptat compita quae nequeunt sensibus esse quies. Immissas cernebam undis colludere frondes, inde, in aquis celeres ire, redire simul … Non peto mi veniam: cor pugnas incitat imas, longior, aut brevior, vita coronat iter. Corde serenato, mihi res splendescere circum cerno et eis capior, vero in amore tremens. Ora tibi quotiens temptabit vesperis aura, adspicias quod fert, dum sinat esse quod es. Sunt culpae, sunt et morsus: quid tu, bone, mavis? tempus fert propius quod cor adire timet. Hic crepitant furtim veteri robigine quercus quae venti impulsu spectra sonora dabunt. Vita mihi cur ferrea adest, cur nullo ob amorem impete commoveor? Vita, resiste mihi! Si, forte, hunc digitum transfixit spina dolosa, vis animi puncto temporis omnis abit. Mox, tiliae frondes tenerum mutantur in aurum atque meis oculis, nunc, ea lux graditur. Hoc aevum ignorat rerum confinia: nam, quod casus habet miri non semel esse putat. Nos mala vexat hiems? Rebus sine luce fruamur, donec, ut umbrae animi, nox crepet ante focum. 685

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Dulces ante omnia Musae. Essays on Neo-Latin Poetry in Honour of Dirk Sacré, ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer, Fabio Della Schiava,   ©  and Toon Van Houdt, Turnhout, 2021, pp. 687-703 DOI  10.1484/M.STLLL-EB.5.124091

TITOLO

SIGRIDES C. ALBERT

VERBA GRATULATORIA

Haec contributio mea ad hunc librum festivum honorificumque Theoderico Sacré dedicatum est minima neque est inquisitio scientifica. Tamen gaudeo haec verba gratulatoria amicaliaque proferre mihi licere, id quod toto ex animo atque libentissime facio. Theodericus Sacré, quem iam ante multos annos ut hominem valde affabilem et hilaritate praeditum cognoscere potui, est – ut omnes sciunt – vir vere scientificus, uti ex eius operibus multis multiplicibusque manifestatur. In themata varii generis incubuit atque incumbit, quae semper sunt scitu dignissima. Inquisitionibus suis divulgatis nos lectores lectricesque multa docere valuit, imprimis de Latinitate humanistica atque posthumanistica eiusque auctoribus. Semper gavisa sum et adhuc gaudeo, cum idem symbolam ab ipso scriptam in periodico, quod est Vox Latina, divulgandam mihi praebet. Nam praeter ipsum thema optime exaratum eius Latinitatem excellentem, qua textus scribit et qua viva voce loquitur, et eius eloquentiam iterum iterumque admiror. Sicuti esse solet in homine, qui pro disciplina sua ardet atque de laboribus suis gaudet, Theodericus quoque mansit vir iuvenilis, qui magno cum impetu interno operari solet. Ut hanc condicionem plurimos annos servet, toto ex animo ei (et nobis) exopto. Ab ipso multa scripta maioris momenti adhuc exspectamus. Itaque in plurimos annos!

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VICTORIUS CIARROCCHI

LAUDES ET GRATES

Q uoniam inter omnes constat quam gravioribus in difficultatibus versetur studium linguae Latinae, idcirco laudandi sunt homines, qui hanc linguam officioso colant amore. Q uibus hominibus adnumerandus est Theodericus Sacré, strenuissimus linguae Latinae vindex, qui magnam apud omnes Latinitatis cultores existimationem iam pridem adeptus est maioremque adepturus ex quo munus “Academiae Latinitatis Fovendae” perite sagaciterque tueri coepit. Cum praeterea is totius Latinitatis patrimonium penitus investigare soleat, vetera recentioraque opera Latine composita scite interpretatur. Huic viro doctissimo igitur gratulandum est non modo pro eius scriptis, in quibus apparet ingenii acies, iudicii praestantia, facile scribendi genus, verum etiam pro sollicito studio, quod in  quibusdam scriptoribus ab oblivione vindicandis adhibet, quorum opera Latina etiam viris Latinitatis peritioribus diutius ignota manserant. Cuius quidem laudabilissimi incepti duo exempla referenda sunt: 1) symbola, quae “De Roma Tullia” inscribitur quamque Theodericus composuit ut Michael Olmo, Hispanus, commemoraretur, utpote qui anno 1817 librum de civitate Latina fundanda singularem scripserit (quae symbola edita est in commentariis q. i. “Vox Latina”, a. 1990, fasc. n. 99, pp. 38-46). 2) Altera symbola, c. t. “Ephemerides statistico-politicae (1804)”, quam locupletissimus adnotationum adparatus pretiosiorem reddit, edita est in commentariis q. i. “Melissa” (a. 2021, fasc. n. 221, pp. 4-11). Q ui harum aliarumque symbolarum scriptor, cui generosa est animi constantia, miram atque indefessam navat operam ut lingua Latina etiamnunc vivat et colatur.

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Haec leviora paucaque verba in huius viri laudem scribere opportunum duxit Victorius Ciarrocchi, Italus Pisaurensis, valde confisus, quin immo pro certo habens, fore ut provido Theoderici Sacré consilio et singulari, qua is pollet, doctrina non modo “Academia Latinitatis fovendae” in dies floreat, sed maxime ut usus totius linguae Latinae vivus magis magisque foveatur ac provehatur.

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GERARDUS FREYBURGER – ANNA MARIA CHEVALLIER

UT SELESTADIENSES OLIM ERASMUM CELEBRAVERUNT, ITA NUNC ARGENTORATENSES THEODORICUM CELEBRARE VOLUNT

Notum est philologos totius Europae iam ab initio Renascentiae temporum arctis vinculis religatos esse ut paulatim floreret quam ipsi a  quinto decimo saeculo “rem publicam literariam” nuncuparent. In qua fuit saeculo sexto decimo ineunte sodalitas philologorum in Alsatia viventium, id est Selestadii, in urbe haud longe ab Argentorato sita. Ad Scholam Latinam Selestadiensem versabantur, quae tum illustris erat studii literarum locus. Haec scriptiuncula ad tres ex illis homines pertinet: Beatum Rhenanum, Iohannem Sapidum, Paulum Volsium. Beatus Rhenanus, inter eos clarissimus, editionem principem Tertulliani operum praebuit et unicum Vellei Paterculi reliquum codicem repperit; bibliotheca eius privata, cum servata esset, anno bismillesimo undecimo in Patrimonium Mundanum ab Unitarum Nationum educationis scientiae culturae ordine (UNESCO) adscripta est. Iohannes vero Sapidus rector fuit Scholae, Paulus autem Volsius ex socio ordinis Benedictini in anabaptistam se convertit. Iis maxima erat admiratio et amicitia erga Erasmum quocum commercium epistulare habebant quique, cum Basileam ibat, eos Selestadii visitabat. Etenim Erasmum Roterodamum Basilius Amerbach, Iohannis filius (inclyti illius typographi Basiliensis), in quadam ex epistulis suis “totius Reipublicae literariae monarcham” nominabat. Q uingentis post annis Respublica quaedam litteraria etiam constat, in quam philologi non solum tota ex Europa, sed etiam ex omnibus orbis terrarum regionibus coguntur: Academiam Latinitati Fovendae dicimus cui sedes est Romae. Illuc sodales quotannis conveniunt, praeside nunc temporis Theodorico Sacré, cuius in honorem hoc opus compositum est. Philologi vero Alsatiani qui inter illos homines numerantur hodierno tempore sunt Argentoratenses. Ii  sunt qui his lineis subscripserunt et sibi in incepto 692

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Robertum Schilling adiungere volunt, Argentoratensem etiam ipsum, anno bismillesimo quarto vita functum, qui inter sodales conditores Academiae fuit et vero Theodoricum Sacré bene novit magnique fecit. Theodoricus autem ille ab iis tribus personis habetur aut habitus est pro illustri amicoque philologo ex Europa septentrionali qui Erasmum secutus facem litterarum praefert. Ceterum si epistulam legimus a Paulo Volsio ad Beatum Rhenanum anno millesimo quingentesimo tricesimo sexto missam 1 accipimus Erasmum Volsio cui, postquam ab Ecclesia catholica discesserat, opes defuerunt, auratum poculum ex argento obtulisse. Tum Sapidus venustum carmen distichis elegiacis composuit inter alia de claro largitore memorans: Ad cuius minimam rerum quibus erudit orbem Particulam nil sunt totius orbis opes, Cuius item famam extinguet non ulla vetustas Ut quam posteritas cuncta futura colet (v. 7-10).

Haec eruditio Theodorico Sacré prorsus communis est cum Erasmo, cuius egregiam scientiam magnamque auctoritatem saepissime demonstrabat. 2 Prorsus etiam alteri cum altero communis est doctrina atque usus latinitatis et purae et disertae. Ita quotannis Academiae sodales Romae congregati facundissimis orationibus delectantur quas more Ciceroniano Theodoricus habere solet. Ille tamen non tantum doctus est sed etiam, sicut Erasmus fuit, amicis suis benevolentissimus ac benignissimus. Studio praeterea cum aliis convivendi et assuetudine iocandi se dignum aemulum Erasmi praebet. Cum nequaquam sodalibus Academiae pocula aurata obtulerit, semper tamen curat ut conciliis peractis omnes nectarei vini poculis fruantur! Haec pocula iis utilia sunt – ad sitim suaviter explendam – sicut utile fuit poculum Paulo Volsio ab Erasmo oblatum – ad opes comparandas. At utraque multo magis, ut Sapidus scripsit, ad amicitiam datoris ostendendam usui sunt. Itaque cum poeta Selestadiensi dicemus: Attamen, ut reor, haec [sc. dos] arctum designat amorem (v. 13).

Q uibus verbis libentissime ad hanc scriptiunculam concludendam addemus: “Vivat Theodoricus noster, vir doctissimus et amicissimus!” 1  A. Horawitz, K. Hartfelder (ed.), Briefwechsel des Beatus Rhenanus (Hildeshemi, 1966), ep. 283. 2   Exempli gratia in S. Knight, S. Tilg (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of  Neo-Latin (Oxoniae, 2015), 477-492.

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MILENA MINKOVA

IN LAUDEM THEODERICI SACRÉ

Theoderici Sacré hominis doctissimi, disertissimi, maxima modestia humanitateque praediti exemplum praestantiae quae hoc volumine celebratur adferre cupit etiam Milena Minkova. Anno 2011 anniversarium decimum ab Instituto studiis Latinis provehendis apud Universitatem studiorum Kentukianam condito celebrantibus petentibusque ut festivitates praesentia sua honestaret adnuit Theodericus. Q uamquam multae aliae occasiones exstabant Theoderici conveniendi (nec semel Lexintoniam in Kentukia sitam petivit), in illa tamen aliquot dierum commoratione sollemni Theoderici virtutes omnibus patuerunt omnibusque erant in promptu. Praeclara doctrina atq ue eruditione ornatus saeculi duodevigesimi latebras Latinas auditoribus luculenter aperuit ea ratione ut in patrimonio totius Latinitatis continuo ea aetas collocanda ab illis intellegeretur. Discipulos, professores, litterarum cultores eximia sermonis elegantia atq ue dulcedine sive inter orationem modo memoratam sive in schola quam de Bartholomaeo Boscovicio poeta patriam Ragusam desideranti docuit capere necnon devincire valuit. Tam doctus et tam eloquens modestia et humanitate eminebat sententias discipulorum audiendi studiosissimus, tempus cum omnibus comiter et cum gaudio degens, alios potius laudans quam in se laudes accipere paratus. His diebus sollemnibus quos albo signavit Theodericus lapillo adhuc, licet post decem annos elapsos, fruimur, erigimur, sustentamur. Talis est apud Theodericum Sacré concinnatio virtutum!

694

TITOLO

GIANCARLO ROSSI

COLLOQ UIUM ELYSIUM

Personae: Morus Desiderius D. Q uo noster Morus? M.  Ad te ibam. D.  Istud quidem facis crebro. M.  Anne molestus tibi umquam fui, quia assiduus? D.  Minime vero, immo quo crebrius veneris, eo mihi venies gratior! Nam tecum conversari numquam non iucundum; quae autem est causa cur properantius quam soles accurras? M.  Nuntius mihi nuperrime est allatus, quem tecum communicare confestim cupiam. D.  Effer igitur quod fers teque exonera! M.  Mox ad nos venturus est vir Latinissimus, qui se nobis adiungat comitem, ne dicam congerronem; hanc ob causam praesertim gaudeo quod pauciores in dies ad domos Elysias migrant, qui docte sermocinari, paucissimi, qui etiam convivari laete valeant. D. Q uid ego audio? Novusne ad sedes nostras succedet hospes idemque Latinissimus? M.  Sic res habet. Sed nomen tibi non aperiam: divina ipse, magnae sagaciae ut es. D. Tu me ad pugnam lacessis, sed pauca indicia praebe mihi, quaeso, qui mentis sim acris, ut aiunt, sed non praesagacis. Primum ergo dic unde tibi nuntius ille allatus vel a  quo? Fons est enim curiose rimandus, antequam aquam hauriamus e flumine. M.  Mercurium forte offendi, qui modo animularum gregem huc comitatus erat; ipsissimus me certiorem de re fecit. 695

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D.  Mercurium ain tu? O  mi More, cui nomen est omen, siquidem ob nimium animi candorem interdum quasi desipere videris. Agnosco enim tuam simplicitatem, qua vivens adeo ab omni mendacio alienus exstitisti, ut ansam dederis tyranno ut te damnaret capitis. M.  Bona verba! Maesti pectoris infandum cogis rescindere vulnus…, si fas est iisdem verbis uti, quibus Carolus Aquinas, 1 contubernalis ille noster, Dantis Aligeri versus de comite Hugolino reddidit. 2 Insons enim morte sum mulctatus, uti compertum habes, qui numquam candorem animi mei, quem mihi obiecisti, infuscari mendaciis sum passus. D. Noli mihi irascier, quem liberioris sermonis esse hominem probe nosti, sed simplicitas animi, quae virtus fuit in vi veritatis defendenda, in vitium vertitur, si aures praebes mendacibus. Q ui enim potes, mercle, Mercurii dei fallacissimi dictis fidem adhibere? Q uem mercatorum furumque patronum haud immerito praedicant! Mercatores vero, nisi essent toti ex mendacio ac fraude facti, nullum lucrum vendendo sibi compararent. Ceterum tenes in Adagiis me meis Mercurium saepius induxisse ut deceptorem, quam ut decursorem. Pauca tibi repeto exempla, ut memoriam refricem tuam: scripsi in Mercurio communi  3 Cillenium furtorum esse auctorem et repertorem, et in Fico Mercurii  4 eundem deum favere furibus; praeterea in Mercurio infante 5 adagium eis referri contendi qui rudes esse se fingunt eius artis, cuius sunt callentissimi; monui denique tricipitem Mercurium 6 obici in ambiguos ancipitesque aut in vehementer astutos. M. O mi Erasmiole, spatio quingentorum fere annorum chiliadas tuas memoriae mandavi, sed a  vate Venusino monemur naturam furca expulsam tamen usque recurrere. 7 Q uomodo indoli meae

1 Carolus Aquinas S.J. (1654-1737) Neapolitanus, linguae Latinae professor, tribus libris carmina sua, duobus orationes complexus est, lexica specialia composuit, Comoediam Dantis versibus latinis expressit. Cum Moro et Desiderio in campis Elysiis de ratione vocabula novandi disputat. 2  Della Commedia di Dante Alighieri, trasportata in verso latino eroico da Carlo d’Aquino […] (Neapoli, 1728). 3 1085. 4  1764. 5 1910. 6 2695. 7 Hor. Epist. 1.10.24.

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relucter, qui, ut de se Cicero, 8 verba mihi dari facile patior meque libenter praebeo credulum? Neque sum ingenii acerrimi, ne dicam suspicacis, quemadmodum tu… D.  Esse te credulum credam, o bone, qui excipiebare in infida regis aula, ubi fraus regnat, neque candidis locus ullus? M.  Non tam excipiebar, quam excipiebam ipse omnem regis vim omnemque aulicorum invidiam. Sed redeamus ad Adagia tua. Non modo Mercurium haud semel fraudis insimulasti, sed etiam in mercatorum mendacitatem saepe es invectus, utpote qui non vera aliis sed sibi utilia dicerent, atque in exemplum Ultraiectinos 9 attulisti, quos videlicet a te amari non puto. D.  Parce Ultraiectinis… sed profecto mihi mendaces et negotiatores, qui in foro merces praedicant suas, perquam molesti semper fuerunt. M.  Noli, amabo te, modum excedere in iudicandis negotiatoribus; profecto tales sunt nonnulli, sed bona eorum pars quaestum honeste faciunt. D. Ista tua bona pars memoriam mihi Napoleonis, Gallorum quondam imperatoris, revocat, qui ad has sedes non est admissus, uti scis. M. Q uamquam non fuit omnino ineruditus, qui animum historicis et Graecis et Latinis adiunxit. D.  At plures militum chiliades demisit Orco, quam ut pacifero gregi nostro ascisceretur. Sed quoniam in Napoleonis mentionem incidi, tibi de eodem facetiam narrabo, quae pertinet ad furta, Mercurii tui curam. Constat Romae asservari statuas quae ideo loquentes appellitantur, quod versus mordaces in principes iis appingi solent; quas inter praecipuum locum obtinet Pasquillus, secundarium Marfurius. Q ua igitur aetate Napoleon Bonaparte antiquissima Italorum monumenta spoliabat, ut Parisiorum ditaretur Museum Lupariense, par ille dicacissimus sic sunt collocuti: Nonne Galli omnes fures? Non omnes, Bona pars…

Sed revertamur ad aenigma tuum, o Sphinx Londiniensis, moremque gere Roterodamensi Oedipodi. Cedo alia indicia! M.  Concivis tuus ille est, quem exspectamus.  Cic. Att. 15.16.  2026.

8 9

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D.  Ergo non delectatur esu piscium… 10 Ecquid porro? M.  Adhibuit magistrum, et ipsum civem vestratem, infinitarum virum litterarum, quicum saepenumero nobis discumbere placet, adeo est enim affabilis sermone, moribus suavis, doctrina ornatissimus; huc accedit quod hic diu miles exstitit acerrimus in pugna pro Latinitate suscepta, sed demum, ingruente undeunde barbarie, aetate iam provectior et ab omni spe destitutus, actum esse de Romanorum sermone clamavit atque in solitudinem secessit. 11 D.  Duo indicia dedisti, unde iam mihi videor coniecisse de quo viro agatur, sed aliud desideratur, ut rite numerus ternarius impleatur. M. Q uin etiam plura numerabo, ut promulside salivam tibi moveam, antequam opimis fruaris epulis. D.  Esto sane, placet. M. Praetereo libros quos innumeros eosque perdoctos Noster conscripsit; praetereo carmina recentiorum, quae immodico paene studio identidem volvere solet; ipsius quoque carmina praetereo, in quibus nescias utrum magis nativam venam, an paene prodigiosam veterum imitationem mireris; ac venio ad Athenaeum, cuius ille alumnos strenue erudiebat atque ad humanitatem formabat, quoad rude donaretur. D.  Iam mihi videor Athenaeum divinare quale sit: nonne collegium illud meum trilingue? M.  Rem fere acu tetigisti, si locum significare volueras. D.  Ne quid adieceris! Teneo nomen viri a  te exspectatissimi, sed de eius adventu – scito enim – Mercurius te decepit. Q uantum enim a  Parcis accepi, diutissime erit nobis praestolandum, antequam ad nos advolet ille, quem mox affore sperabas. Pensum enim tantum sibi a  Fato traditum esse ait mihi Lachesis, quod Clotho net impigre, ut diu sit otiatura Atropos, antequam stamen rumpat. M. Q uae cum ita sint, aegre fero quod eum mox convenire non licebit, cuius fama usque ad hos sacratissimos secessus manavit, sed gaudeo quod Latinitatem colere inter mortales perget, apud quos languentia studia Latina illo auctore reviviscere videntur. Hoc unum restat tamen: te ex indiciis collegisse affirmas quis sit vir de quo loquimur, sed nomen reticuisti. Q ua es dissimulandi arte,

  Ut patet ex colloquio de Ichthiophagia, Erasmo vesci piscibus non placebat.   De Josepho IJsewijn (1932-1998) doctissimo viro agitur, cui ob merita erga studia Latina, datum divinitus est ut cotidie cum Erasmo in sedibus beatis sermocinaretur. 10 11

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nolim mi des verba, ut saepenumero mecum Aiace consuesti, o versute Ulixes! D.  Nomen teneo, sed eum per ambages etymi declarabo. Scis enim veriloquia mihi esse in deliciis haud secus atque colloquia. M. Aliud esse ambages, aliud veriloquium submisse obiecerim, tamen etiam per ambages quis vetat dicere verum? D.  Arrige ergo auriculas. Praenomen, quod pluribus ductoribus Germanorum inditum fuit, 12 e duobus coalescit partibus, quarum altera gens, altera rex significatur: est ergo Noster gentium dominator, ac quidem in Latinitatis regno regia pollet dignitate; nomen autem gentilicium e  fonte Latino derivatur, quod Graece Hosius a quibusdam est redditum. M.  Video tibi non aurem Batavam, 13 sed oculorum aciem sagittario Britanno dignam esse, tam cito omnia perspexisti. Q uicquid id est, eritne nobis diu praestolandum? D.  Immo diutius quam initio Fatum decreverat. Scisne causam? Tua res agitur! M. Meane? D. Lex est fatalis ut quotienscumque mors cuiuspiam viventis falso nuntietur, eiusdem dies supremus ad multos procrastinetur annos. Merito ergo tuo, qui temere Mercurio credulus, falsum nuntium pro vero habuisti, Noster Nestoris superabit aetatem, nisi forte vel Patriarcharum numeraturus sit annos. M.  Itaque nedum ego, qui nondum sexagenarius ad  hoc beatum litus eiectus sum, at tu, qui septuagenarius anno post appulisti, coram viro innumerabili annorum serie gravato puelli videbimur lac nutricis sugentes…

  Cf. Caroli Egger Lexicon nominum virorum et mulierum (Romae, 1963).  3535.

12 13

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ROBERTUS SPATARO

THEODORICUS

Pluries me cogitantem de Latinis scriptoribus antiquis, qui sapientiae monumenta tradiderunt insignia, desiderium idque aestuans tenuit serendi docta colloquia cum hominibus tantis eosque interrogandi de rebus humanis, de rebus divinis. Nonne vel Tullius disseruit quomodo res publica esset gerenda principe honesto ne cives discordia dirimerentur, vel umbratilis Carus Lucretius rerum naturam indagavit ne divina numina perperam metuerentur, vel Titus Livius probandissimos mores maiorum eorumque exempla imitanda ad virtutes amplectendas ostendit, vel Cornelius animi sensus finxit quibus – eheu – turpia quoque patrarentur vel Fabius Q uintilianus docuit artem instituendi optimos viros dicendi peritos? Illa autem sapientia, quam praeclari cumulaverunt Latini auctores in scriptis ab eis exaratis, profecto ornatissimus mihi videtur quidam vir, cui nomen est Theodoricus, qui seu doctrina amplissima seu Latino eloquio perpolito, humanissimus est habendus. Hanc ob rem, illud desiderium colloquendi cum antiquis viris doctissimis prorsus satiatur, quotiescumque mihi datur ansa vel audiendi Theodoricum nostrum docentem vel eum interrogandi vel etiam disceptandi. Q uam multa discere queo eaque spectantia ad provincias plurimas studiorum doctrinae! Praesertim, Theodorico magistro, didici quam multum Litterae excultae essent Latinae aetatibus quibus artes renatae sunt saeculisque insequentibus usque ad tempora nostra adeo ut hoc mihi persuasum fuerit, numquam vero Latinum Sermonem cessisse studiis et ludis, foris et ecclesiis eumque indesinenter viros quidem doctos fovisse. Insuper gratissimum est unicuique institui et imbui ab humanissimo Theodorico quippe qui hilari vultu, risu iucundo, verbis temperantibus tantam cognitionis copiam magnitudinemque cum admiranda humilitate 700

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necnon animi benevolentia, tecum colloquatur, te doceat, te ad bonas disciplinas instruat ita ut ab eo tandem discedas semper eruditior immo honestior quam ad eum, Deo duce, antea appropinquaveris. Robertus Spataro Italus Ex aedibus Pontificii Instituti Altioris Latinitatis in Urbe

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TERENTIUS TUNBERG

DE THEODERICO SACRÉ

Hanc dicendi occasionem arripere volui ut studiosis litterarum praecipueque linguae Latinae praeceptoribus indicarem, cur Theodericus Sacré civis rei publicae litterariae, quae ita vocatur, eximius esset existimandus, in quo specimen humanitatis et eruditionis conspiceretur singulare et praeclarum. Hominem enim suscepi laudandum doctissimum, qui studia humanitatis monumentaque litterarum Latinarum recentiore aevo condita et carmina praesertim suis scriptis sic patefecit et illustravit, ut alii paucissimi. Tot ego Theoderici scripta, unde nitet eius eruditio, memorare ne incipiam quidem: ad quae recensenda non haec oratiuncula, sed aliquot orationes amplissimae vix sufficere poterant. Maluerim igitur hoc unum de operibus a Theoderico elucubratis et in publicum emissis generatim et universe asseverare: eum nobis quanta copia litterarum Latinarum saeculis etiam novissimis esset nata et quanti ad cultum civilem Europaeorum aliarumque gentium intellegendum essent momenti scripta Latina hoc aevo recentissimo edita quasi digito monstrasse. Minime autem mirum, si Theodericus hanc sibi provinciam depoposcit. Etenim a Iosepho illo IJsewijn, ab illo, inquam, antesignano, qui fere primus ostendit quantus thesaurus in litteris Latinis recentioribus reperiri posset, Theodericus noster est litteris Latinis institutus. At non solum suis scriptis scriptores alios ab oblivione vindicavit Theodericus, verum etiam multos per annos fasciculis Humanisticorum Lovaniensium edendis laudabiliter praefuit. Et in hoc negotio praecipue eminebat opera, quam ille una cum aliis navabat ut Instrumentum bibliographicum Neolatinum quotannis ederetur, quo subsidio nihil utilius exstabat usui eorum destinatum, qui in litteras Latinas recentiores excutiendas incumbere vellent: quod utinam etiam nunc et aevo nostro 702

TITOLO CRUSTULA

exstaret, quo quidem tempore nullum in promptu est instrumentum, quo omnia opera in Rete omnium gentium exposita efficaciter inveniantur, quae quidem ad litteras Latinas recentiores pertineant. Itaque Theodericus iis laudibus cumulari potest, quas aliis quibusdam philologis, etsi non ita multis, impertiri possumus, quippe qui scientiam litterarum nostram maxime ditarint. At Theodericus non solum multa opuscula aliud alia lingua de litteris Latinis composuit; ipse etiam auctor Latinitatis exstitit praeclarus, qui permulta Latine et perpulchre scripsit. Omni in opere ab eo Latine condito cum delectum verborum summo ingenii acumine perpolitum, tum etiam vocum structuram et collocationem aptissimam mirari soleo. Et – quod est etiam magis mirandum – qui in opusculis Latinis a Theoderico accurate cogitateque scriptis apparet, idem orationis nitor in eius verbis Latine et pro re nata sermocinantis elucet. Ut vocibus idoneis quasi depingam quantopere Theodericus in sermone fortuito polleat, quidni ad Erasmi verba de Thomae Mori eloquentia extemporali disserentis confugiam? Erasmus enim, “vix alium,” inquit, “reperias qui felicius dicat ex tempore: adeo felici ingenio felix lingua subservit. Ingenium praesens et ubique praevolans, memoria parata; quae cum omnia habeat velut in numerato, prompte et incunctanter suggerit quicquid tempus aut res postulat.” 1 Haec omnia eodem iure de Theoderico dici possunt. Attamen, etsi tot ingenii dotibus praeditus est Theodericus, nemo se verecundius pudentius modestius gerit, nemo longius a iactantia fastu superbia distat. Ne plura – Theodericus noster omnia humanitatis, eruditionis, eloquentiae puncta tulisse videtur!

1  P. S. Allen, H. M. Allen (ed.), Opus epistolarum Des. Erasmi Roterodami, vol. 4 (Oxonii, 1922), 21.

703

INDEX MANUSCRIPTORUM

INDEX MANUSCRIPTORUM

Amsterdam, University Library III E 8 317-323

Firenze, Biblioteca Riccardiana 834 165

Barcelona, Biblioteca de la Universidad 94 395

Genève, Bibliothèque publique et universitaire Tronchin 138 378 Tronchin 157 377-378, 384 Tronchin 158 377-378

Berlin, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin Lat. quarto 469 (olim Morbio 490) 167-181

Leiden, Universiteitsbibliotheek Br. F 11, I 317 Lips. 3(24) 287 Lips. 59 268

Budapest, Ráday Könitvár I 124 343-347

Leuven, Private collection Gilbert Tournoy Album amicorum Huberti Audeiantii 251-264

Cambridge, Trinity College Library X.12.48 595 Cambridge, University Library Cam. bb.1.1.2. UkCU 595 UA.Exam.L.3 595 UA.CUR.73* 595

Lodi, Biblioteca Comunale XXVIII A 11 184 184

Ebbw Vale (S. Wales), Gwent Archives GB0218.D554/122 654, 663

Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional de España 1854 395 7901-7902 395

Ferrara, Biblioteca Comunale Ario­ stea Antonelli 335 197

Mechelen, Bibliotheca Schepperiana Mechliniensis loose leaflet 327

705

INDEX MANUSCRIPTORUM

Roma, Biblioteca Casanatense 415 163

Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana C 12 sup. 180 F 55 sup. 156 G 93 inf. 168 Milano, Biblioteca Nazionale Brai­ dense AD XI 44 175 Oxford, Bodleian Library Canon. misc. 308 180 Rawl. D. 296 54-55 Palermo, Biblioteca di Storia Patria I D 3 233 Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France lat. 8757 175 Perugia, Biblioteca Comunale Augusta J 25 175

Tartu, Eesti Rahvusarhiiv EAA.854.7.682 85 Vaticano (Città del), Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana Borg. lat. 362 174 Ott. lat. 1375 194 Ott. lat. 2684 172 Reg. lat. 1385 231 Vat. lat. 3145 180 Venezia, Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana lat. XII 210 (4689) 180 lat. XIV 262 (4719) 161 Viterbo, Biblioteca Comunale degli Ardenti II D I 8 184

706

INDEX MANUSCRIPTORUM

INDEX NOMINUM

Names of mythological figures and fictitious persons appearing in the Latin texts have not been inserted into this index.

Abad Diego José, SJ  546, 549 Accolti Francesco  169 Accursius Franciscus  400-401 Acosta José de  555 Ps.-Acro  75 Adolfo, king  81 Aeschines  170 Aeschylus  445 Agatha of Catania, s.  229, 232, 235, 239-240, 370 Agustín Antonio  393-405 Agustín Felipa  397 Agustín Jerónima  397 Agustín Jerónimo  397 Agustín Juan Albanell  393, 397398 Agustín Vincencio  398 Alamanni Luigi  233 Albert, archduke of Austria  267, 271 Alberti Leon Battista  102 Alciato Andrea  294, 396, 399-400, 402, 404-405 Aldrovandi Ulisse  598 Alegre Francisco Javier SJ  548-549, 551, 558 Alexander the Great  305-306 Alexander VII, pope  332 Alexander Tartagnus  401 Alexandro Alexander ab  362

Alexias  326 Alighieri Dante  230-231, 549, 588, 695 Allard Carel  329 Almonacir Jerónimo de  407-419 Ambrosius Aurelius, s.  170, 245, 295 Anchersen Hans Peter  75 Andreas Valerius  331 Andrelini Publio Fausto  207, 218 Andrés Juan  546 Andrew, apost., s.  366 Anfuso Andrea di  230 Anhalt Christian von  423 Anjou Robert of, king  218 Aniello Tommaso (Masaniello) 318 Anisio Giano  219 Anonymus Canonicus Brugensis 253 Antoniola, Vrientius’s daughter 261 Apelles  467-468, 491 Apollinaris Sidonius  85-86 Apollodorus  115, 448 Apollonius Rhodius  188 Appianus  274 Aquinas Thomas, s.  433, 479 Aratus  120, 130 Arc Jeanne d’  625 Archilochus  295 Archimedes  361 Aretino Francesco  169

707

INDEX NOMINUM

Aretino Pietro  172 Arezzo Claudio Mario  234 Arias Montano Benito  101, 255, 409 Ariosto Ludovico  236 Aristius Fuscus  142 Aristophanes  360 Aristoteles  294 Arminius Iacobus  264 Arpentin  378 Artois Henri d’  624 Arvidi A.  81 Arzanello Pietro  190 Asterius, bish. of Amasea, s.  273 Atterbury Francis  597 Aubigné Agrippa d’  377-386 Audeiantius Hubertus  259 Audouin  623, 629 Augustinus Aurelius, s.  39, 170 Augustus Octavianus, imp.  59, 78-­ 79, 120, 140-141, 497, 528, 582, 668 Aurispa Giovanni  170 Ausonius Decimus Magnus  229 Austria John of, admiral  505, 507 Avicenna  190 Avienus  117, 120 Azevedo Emmanuel de, SJ  551-552, 557 Bailey (Bagley) Henry  598 Baillet Adrien  460-461 Baius Iacobus  254 Balde Jacob, SJ  17, 20, 475-511, 584-588 Baldus de Ubaldis  401-402 Balzac Jean-Louis Guez de  300-301, 317-318 Barbagallo Antonio  238 Barberini Francesco, card.  318, 499 Barberini Maffeo  vd. Urban VIII Barbo Pietro  vd. Paulus II Barlaeus Caspar  327-335 Barlaeus Caspar iunior  331 Barnabei Felice  636 Baronio Cesare, card.  272 Baronius Iohannes Baptista  267, 269-270

Bartholin Thomas  464-465 Bartoli Alfredo  18 Bartolus de Saxoferrato  401-402 Barzizza Gasparino  185, 189 Basinio da Parma  187 Batory Stefan  61 Baudius Dominicus  253, 258-264 Bauhusius Bernardus SJ  253-257 Bauwens Napoléon  646 Bay Iacobus de  253 Bay Michel de  255 Beccadelli Antonio  159, 166, 187, 189-193, 196, 220 Becker Rötger  vd. Pistorius Rutgerius Bembo Bernardo  230-232 Bembo Pietro  212, 232, 235, 394 Bencard Johann Kaspar  520 Bergantini Giampietro  549 Bernard of Saxe-Weimar  503 Bernini Gian Lorenzo  527 Bertius Petrus  264 Besnard  619-621, 623 Besora Joan Jeroni  395 Bethune George Washington  595 Beyerlinck Laurentius  274 Bion Rhetor  361 Biondo Flavio  194 Biseau  617, 620, 625-626, 629 Bishop Simon  377 Blomfield Charles James  593, 598599 Boccaccio Giovanni  230-231, 349, 356 Bochius Iohannes  275 Boiardo Matteo Maria  206 Boisot Louis  297 Bolea Bernardo  402-403 Bollandus Iohannes SJ  463-464 Bolswert Schelte  464-478 Bommel Henricus van  314-315 Bonaparte Napoleon  539, 696 Bonardus Nicolaus SJ  253-255 Borelli Giovanni Alfonso  239 Borghese Camillo  vd. Paulus V Borgia Cesare  203 Borgia Lucrezia  203, 206 Born(e)mann C.  81

708

INDEX NOMINUM

Borromeo Carlo, card., s.  377 Boscovich Roger SJ  547 Botticelli Sandro  580 Boxhornius Marcus Zuerius  326 Bracciolini Poggio  169, 192 Bradney Joseph Alfred  19, 651-665 Bradney Joseph Christopher  652 Braga Martinus von  581 Brandt Caspar  264, 321 Brant Jan  275 Breitkopf Gregor  365 Brindisi (von) Laurentius  581 Bruni Leonardo  169-170 Buchanan Georgius  72 Bucquoy  vd. Longueval (de) Charles-Bonaventure Bulgarus  402 Bull Henry  635 Bulwer-Lytton Edward  640 Buonaccorsi Filippo  vd. Callimaco Esperiente Buonarroti Michelangelo  479 Burmannus Petrus  237, 312, 323326 Butler Henry Montagu  655 Buzanval Paul Choart  287 Caesar Gaius Iulius  202, 307 Callimaco Esperiente  384-385 Callot Jacques  478 Calpurnius Siculus  217, 219 Calstere Anna van den, Lipsius’s wife 111 Camargo Lucas de  408 Camden William  598, 607 Camerarius Ioachim  291 Camillo Giulio  62 Campano Giovanni Antonio  175, 384-386 Campoy José Rafael  175, 384-386 Cantalicio  vd. Valentino Giambattista Canterus Guilielmus  102 Capra Bartolomeo, archbish. of Milan  189 Carafa Alfonso, card.  172 Carafa Carlo, card.  171-172 Carafa Giovanni, card.  172

Carafa Giovanni Pietro  vd. Paulus IV Carmina Priapea  82 Carracci Annibale  580 Carrara Ubertino SJ  532, 558 Carrera Pietro  235-237 Carretto (del) Federico  235 Carrio Ludovicus  105-106, 109 Carrozzari Raffaele  632 Casaubon Isaac  258 Casini Nilo  643 Cassianus, s.  195 Castagna Bernardino  184-186 Castaldi da Feltre Cornelio  213 Castiglione Baldassare  212, 218, 226, 230 Castilione (de) Gualterus  573 Castro León de  409-410 Castro Várez de  408, 411 Catherine of Alexandria, s.  367369 Catullus Gaius Valerius  28-29, 65, 75, 82, 101-102, 107-115, 292293, 298, 379-380, 382-386, 396, 550 Celtis Conrad  15, 343-357 Cérisantes  461 Céspedes Baltasar de  393-394 Chacón Alonso  177, 179 Chapelain Jean  317 Chardin Charles  618, 621, 624, 627-628 Charles I, king of England  204 Charles V, emp.  411 Charles VI, emp.  615-629 Charles VII, king of France  166 Charles VIII, king of France  202 Charles X, king of France  615-629 Chaucer Geoffrey  588 Chigi Fabio  vd. Alexander VII Christina, queen of Sweden  311312, 317, 332, 564 Cicero Marcus Tullius  37-39, 90, 117-132, 151, 361, 467, 469, 696 Ciermans Iohannes  521 Ciofanus Hercules  326 Ciotti Giovanni Battista  236 Ciprotti Pio  637-638, 641

709

INDEX NOMINUM

Claessens Peter  641 Clarius Ioannes  253-254 Clarius Leonardus  236 Claudianus Claudius  187, 192, 229, 317, 320, 604 Claudius Iustus  94 Clavigero Francisco Javier  555 Clavius Christophorus SJ  255 Clemens VI, pope  168-178, 180 Cleofilo Francesco Ottavio  378, 384-385 Cleopatra  307 Clodoveus, king  615, 624 Clouck Andries  264 Cnobbaert Jan  513, 517, 520-521, 525 Cochanovius Iohannes  130 Coleridge Samuel Taylor  595, 654 Coleti Gian Domenico  546 Collantes Cristóbal, SJ  408 Colonna Ascanio, card.  269, 272273 Colonna Marcantonio  269 Columella Lucius Iunius Moderatus 223, 225, 419 Conforti Luigi  642 Constant  621-623 Corbinianus, bish. of Freising  589 Cornu S.  620, 623, 626 Coron Thomas de  166 Correia Tomé  412 Correr Gregorio  71 Corselius Gerardus  253-254, 285, 331 Cortona Pietro da  580 Cosmas, s.  370-372 Cossa Benno  508 Cotta Giovanni  219 Cotton Charles  591 Court Pieter de la  311 Craesbeeck Pedro  397 Crashaw Richard  426 Cremona Antonio  188 Crinitus Petrus  65 Crivellari Giulio  320 Crivelli Lodrisio  179 Cruz Juana Inés de la  549 Cunaeus Petrus  263, 327, 330-331

Curius Caelius Secundus  62 Curtius Rufus  180 Cyprianus Thascius Caecilius, s. 194 D’Alessandro Alessandro  362 D’Annunzio Gabriele  680 D’Apuzzo Raffaele  633 Danckerts Dancker  329 Danckerts van Sevenhoven Cornelis 329 Dati Carlo  325 Daubrée  619-620, 622, 624, 627 David, king  301 Dávila Padilla Agustín, OP  410 De Antiquis Antonio  634 De Cesare Titta  641 De Grandis Bartolomeo  233 Debiel Ludwig, SJ  527-543 Decembrio Pier Candido  189, 212, 312 Dedekind Friedrich  86, 95, 532 Dee John  422-423 Demades  170 Demosthenes  170 Dennys John  599 Dhuique  619 Dionysius I, tyrant of Syracuse  361 Dionysius of Halicarnassus  274 Doedijns Hendrik  173 Dolet Étienne  384-386 Dolfin Franz, SJ  532-533 Donatus Tiberius Claudius  143 Doni Giovanni Battista  320 Dornavius Caspar  102-103, 107 Dorner Meinrad  570 Doucet A.  624 Dousa Ianus iunior  106, 109, 114, 258, 297-298 Dousa Ianus senior  288, 296 Drayton Michael  598, 607 Driesch Gerhard Cornelius van den 347 Du Bellay Guillaume  498 Du Bellay Joachim  425 Duncan Marc  vd. Cérisantes Dunlop Durham  595, 597, 600 Dupuy Christophe  318-319 Dupuy Jacques  317-319

710

INDEX NOMINUM

Dupuy Pierre  317, 319 Dürer Albert  478-479 Dutens Jean-Michel-Albert-Alfred 634 Eguiera y Egunen Juan José  546 Ekius Nicolaus  82 Elmo (Erasmo) of Formia  112 Emanuel a Jesu  253 Empedocles  231, 242 Endelechius Severus Sanctus  571 Enguerrand Olivier  383 Ennius Q uintus  121, 131 Epicurus  282 Erasmus Desiderius  86, 91, 263, 319, 322, 325, 328, 692, 702 Erinna  295 Ernst, duke of Bayern, bish. of Freising  588 Este Alfonso d’, duke of Ferrara 203-204 Este Borso d’, duke of Ferrara  200201, 203 Este Isabelle d’, duchess of Ferrara 202 Este Leonello d’, marquis of Ferrara 201 Étienne Paul  378 Euripides  437, 440 Exner Balthasar  435 Fabricius Iohannes  258 Fazello Tommaso, OP  236 Ferdinand I, emp.  347 Ferdinand III, emp.  492 Ferdinand Karl, archduke of Tyrol 501 Ferno Gabriele  395 Ferrari Francesco Bernardino  324 Ferry Jules  615 Figueroa Francisco de  397 Filelfo Francesco  14, 65, 81, 155181, 384-385, 498, 531 Filelfo Giovanni Mario  168 Finch Heneage  241 Fiorelli Giuseppe  635 Firmian Leopold Anton von, archbish. of Salzburg  581

Flaccomio Francesco  236 Flaminio Marcantonio  65, 425 Fleming F.  81 Fletcher Phineas  591 Flögel Carl Friedrich  174 Floret  618-619, 626 Folengo Teofilo  160-161, 283 Ford Simon  597 Fouilloy Hugh of  170 Fracastoro Girolamo  558-559, 597, 604-605 Francey  621 Franco Nicolò  172-174, 180 Franqueville Ernest de  624-626, 628 Frayssinous Denis-Luc  617 Frechulphus, bish.  292 Frenzel S.  81 Frere William  597 Friedenthal Salomon Frenzel von 426 Frischlin Philipp Nicodemus  95, 531 Fuente Andrés Diego de la, SJ  551 Fulgentius Fabius Planciades  349 Gabrieli Angelo  232 Galenus  190 Galifi Lorenzo  236 Galle Theodore  276 Gallus Cornelius  142-143, 352, 550 Galois Évariste  618 Gambara Lorenzo  211 Gandersheim Hrotsvitha  578 García Matamoros Alfonso  412 Garulli Camillo, SJ  547 Gay John  599 Gellius Aulus  361 Gemma Francesco  238 Gendre Gilbert-Charles Le  177 Gentilotti Johann Franz von  582 George Stefan  503 Geraldini Antonio  378 Germanicus  72, 117, 120, 124-127, 131-132 Gesner Conrad  598, 611 Gheyn Jacob II de  117 Ghislieri Antonio  vd. Pius v

711

INDEX NOMINUM

Giannettasio Nicola Partenio  219, 597 Gilbert Humphrey  657 Gillray James  593 Ginés de Sepúlveda Juan  411 Giovanetti Marcello  15 Girolamo Federici  171 Girón de Loaysa Pedro  411 Gisborne T.  644 Giselinus Victor  102, 106-107, 109113 Giustinian Bernardo  162 Godbid William  240 Goes Willem van der  326 Goltzius Henricus  103 Gómez de Castro Alvar  411 Gonzaga Carlo I, duke of Mantova 155-166 Gonzaga Francesco II, duke of Mantova  202-203, 205, 209 Gonzaga Ludovico III, duke of Mantova  164, 166 Gonzaga Vincenzo, duke of Mantova  268 Gordon John  508 Götschl Iohannes  350 Gouffaux Emiel  22 Graevius Iohannes Georgius  237 Gratius Ortwinus  375-376 Gravagno Francisco Severino  239 Green John Richard  654 Gregorius I Magnus, pope, s.  170 Griffolini Francesco  169 Gronovius Iacobus  321, 324-326, 330, 335 Gronovius Iohannes Fredericus  326 Groot Willem de  313-316 Grotius Hugo  117-131, 261 Grotius Ianus  106 Gruterus Ianus  109, 275 Guanciali Q uintino  634 Guarino Niccolò  164 Guenée  622, 625 Guerris de Viqueira Guillelmus de 190 Gustavus Adolphus, king of Sweden 502

Gyraldus Lilius Gregorius  360-364, 372 Hamel Jean du  80 Handschius Georgius  426 Haverkamp Sigebert  237 Hayter J.  644 Heinsius Daniel  16, 59, 253, 258, 261-262, 285-298 Heinsius Ermgard, Daniel’s wife 292 Heinsius Nicolas  311-323 Hemelarius Iohannes  262 Henry IV, king of France  377, 615, 623-625, 628 Herodes Magnus, king  306 Herodotus  362, 439, 441 Hesiodus  83, 107, 143, 313, 344, 360, 362 Hessus Eobanus  291-292 Heuzet Jean  626 Heyblocq Iacobus  252 Hiero II, king  295 Hieronymus Eusebius Sophronius, s. 117, 170, 433 Hilchen David  82-83 Hipponax  295-296 Holstenius Lucas  318, 325-326 Homerus  15, 18, 83, 281, 295, 398-401, 414, 531, 576, 594, 603 Honoré Christophe  527 Hooft Pieter Cz.  299 Horatius Flaccus Q uintus  20, 49, 59-80, 78, 83, 108, 135-146, 184, 198, 202-203, 224, 290291, 294, 296, 301, 309, 379380, 434-435, 455, 474-475, 495-504 Hosschius Sidronius, SJ  459-574 Hout Jan van  106 Houweningen Elsje van  316 Hrotsvita  351 Hugh of Saint Victor  170 Hughes J.  644 Hume David  655, 657 Hunyadi Iohannes  506-507

712

INDEX NOMINUM

Kock Theodor  636 Kollár Johann  347 Koster W.  671

Hurtado de Mendoza Diego  402 Hutchinson Iulius  654 Huygens Constantijn  328 Hyginus  110-115 Ianus Secundus  297 Ignatius of Loyola, SJ, s.  425, 515, 518 Illuminati Luigi  636 Iñiguez de Lequerica Juan  414 Iohanna, pope  377 Irnerius  402 Isaac Heinrich  434 Isabella, archduchess of Austria 267 Iscanus Iosephus of Exeter  322 Isidorus Hispalensis, archbish. of Seville, s.  125, 128 Isocrates  412 Iturri Francisco  456 Iunius Hadrianus  319, 325 Iustinus  295, 349 Iuvenalis Decimus Iunius  50-51, 87-­ 90, 93, 144-145, 416, 488, 594, 604 James I, king of England  260 Janssen Brouwer de Jonge Jan  324 Janssonius Jodocus  324 Janssonius Johannes  324 Januensis de Valerano Thomas  170 Jenkins Rosa  654 Jerome of Prague  169 Johnson Samuel  597, 608 Johnston Arthur  591 Jolís Josef  543 Jonghe Clement de  329 Jonston John  598 Jouvenel des Ursins Guillaume  166 Juba I, king  202 Karl XI, king of Sweden  84 Kastrioti Gjergj  vd. Skanderbeg Keats John  658-659 Kelley Edward  422 Kinschotius Caspar  327-355 Knox Arthur Edward  596-600 Kochanowski Jan  vd. Cochanovius Iohannes

Laborie Pierre-Laurent  617 Lactantius Lucius Caelius Firmianus 170 Lagomarsini Girolamo, SJ  547-548 Lalanne  623 Lambinus Dionysius  119 Landi Vittori Gregorio, SJ  547 Landino Cristoforo  384 Landívar Rafael, SJ  545-559 Lang Franz  508 Lascaris Costantino  232 Lascaris Giano  498-499 Laticephalus Gregorius  vd. Breitkopf Gregor Latinio Latino  395 Latinus, king  489 Lauwyck Jacob  329 Leclerc Georges-Louis  546 Leclerc Jean  312 Leeuwius Theodorus  104 Legenda aurea  364-365, 367-368, 370-371 Leo Iohannes  423 León Luis de, OESA  393, 410 Leopold I, emp.  347 Lernutius Ianus  286 Leslie Walter  508 Lessius Leonardus, SJ  253 Leto Giulio Pomponio  212, 237 Leuthner Cölestinn, OSB  569-588 Lewis Leonard Cyril St. Alban  633 Lippi Lorenzo  597 Lipsius Iustus  16, 101-115, 252255, 258-259, 262, 265-290, 295298, 463 Littara Vincenzo  234 Livius Titus  699 Loaysa y Girón García de  407-417 Loaysa y Mendoza García de, OP 411 Lobkovic Zdenĕk  423 Logau Georg von  212 Longueval Charles-Bonaventure de, count of Bucquoy  507

713

INDEX NOMINUM

López de Bailo Martín  394 Loredan(o) Giovanni Francesco 326 Lorraine Philippe Emmanuel de, duke of Mercœur  378 Lotichius Petrus  460 Louis IX, king of France, s.  615 Louis XII, duke of Orléans  202 Louis XIII, king of France  378 Louis XV, king of France  616 Louis XVI, king of France  616 Louis XVIII, king of France  615616, 623, 625, 628-629 Lowther James William  593-594 Loxan Georg von  212 Lucanus Marcus Annaeus  187, 192, 276, 307, 309-310, 322, 419, 573, 608 Lucianus  437, 441-442, 446 Lucilius  139, 141 Lucretius Titus Lucius Carus  2829, 70, 131, 187, 224-226, 229, 241, 277, 281-283, 384, 419, 548, 557, 597, 602, 604, 606, 612, 699 Luden L.  81 Luke, evang., s.  370, 372, 374-375 Luther Martin  39, 73, 82, 581 Lygdamus  379 Lysander  364 Mackay Charles  662 Macrin Jean Salmon  384-386, 428, 498-499, 502 Macrobius Ambrosius Theodosius 498 Madelenet Gabriel  461 Maecenas  139-140 Maestertius Iacobus  327-331 Maffei Timoteo  170 Magdelénat Gabriel  vd. Madelenet Mailly Louis de  173 Maire Iohannes  286 Maiuri Amedeo  646 Malagrida Gabriel  556 Malatesta Sigismondo  170 Malderus Ioannes  253 Mallery Charles van  525

Mallery Philippe van  513, 525 Manareus Oliverius, SJ  271 Mandora Philippus  508-509 Mangano Silano  188 Manilius  121 Manley John Jackson  596 Mannagetta Johann Wilhelm von 347 Mantegna Andrea  204 Mantovano  vd. Spagnoli Giovanni Battista Manutius Aldus iunior  65 Manutius Aldus senior  65 Marcello Jacopo Antonio  167 Marcello Valerio, Jacopo Antonio’s son  169-170 Maria Theresia, emp.  533, 542, 582 Mariamne, Herod’s wife  301 Marie-Thérèse, queen of France 624 Mariotti Benedetto  323 Markard J. S.  81 Marrasio Giovanni  192 Marsi Paolo  231 Marsiglianus Golmarius  vd. Lagomarsini Girolamo Marti Manuel  546 Martialis Marcus Valerius  70, 82, 277-278, 326, 380-383, 386, 419 Martinelli Nello  136 Martinius Matthias  185 Marullo Michele  65 Marzio Galeotto  159, 353 Masaniello  vd. Aniello Tommaso Matal Jean  404 Matthew, apost., s.  367 Matthew II, emp.  436 Matthiae Iohannes  516 Maurolico Francesco  235 Maxentius, emperor  367-369 Maximianus Marcus Aurelius Valerius  352-353 Maximilian I, duke of Bayern  476, 478, 501 Maximilian I, emp.  353 Maximilian II, emp.  65 Mayans Gregorio  395, 402 Mazza Giovanni  646 Mazzolari Giuseppe Maria  548

714

INDEX NOMINUM

Medici Giovanni Angelo de’  vd. Pius IV Medici Leopoldo de’  240 Medici Lorenzo de’  434 Mellini Celso  218 Ménage Gilles  173, 317 Menander Rhetor  78 Mengden Gustav von  84 Menius F.  81 Mercator Gerardus  611 Merivale Charles  654 Mierevelt Michiel Jansz. van  314315 Milde Ghisbertus de  253 Milledonne Antonio  66 Milton John  218-219, 597, 607 Mirabelli Antonio  634 Miraeus Aubertus  103 Mocenigo Alvise  67, 70, 79 Modestinus  399 Modius Franciscus  105-106 Molanus Iohannes  462 Molina Juan Ignacio  546 Molina Luis de, SJ  410 Moltedo Francesco Tranquillino 636 Monaco Francesco  239 Mongitore Antonino  234 Monk James Henry  598 Montemagno Bonaccorso da  184 Moons Iacobus  176-177 Morabito Francesco  238 Moravus Augustinus  353-354 More Thomas  501-502, 507 Moretus Balthasar  103, 272-273, 285, 460, 521 Moretus Melchior  286 Moses  301 Mosselman Hippolyte  617, 629 Moy Marie de, Philip Rubens’s wife 475 Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus  17, 437-­ 452 Murad II, sultan  504 Muretus Marcus Antonius  108 Murphy Arthur  597, 610 Mussolini Benito  646-648

Muszka Nikolaus  584 Mye Isaac van der, SJ  332 Myle Cornelius van der  261 Mynsinger von Frundeck Joachim 222 Nagy Sámuel  346-347 Naogeorgus Thomas  95 Navagero Andrea  65, 218 Negre Nicolaes C. van  329 Nemesianus  217, 219 Neumann Ludwig Bertrand  542 Nicholas of Lyra  170 Nicosia Giuseppe  238 Nihusius Bartoldus  463-465 Noceti Carlo, SJ  547 Noguera Antonio  397 Notmann E.  81 Nowowiejski Rudolf, SJ  638-639, 647 Nyro Adamus  584 Oddi Niccolò degli  235 Odi da Montopoli Pietro  175 Oldenbarnevelt Johan van  315 Oldenburg Henry  240 Olivario-Rasali Serafino, card.  271 Omodei Antonio Filoteo degli  235236 Opilius Aurelius  361 Oppianus Apamaeensis  597 Orange William of  300 Orsini Fulvio  398 Osório Jerónimo 395-397, 399, 403404 Ovidius Naso Publius  17, 20, 70, 72, 79, 83, 110, 113, 115, 121, 136-137, 178, 187, 192-193, 205, 221-227, 229, 233, 235, 241, 277-279, 281-284, 292, 294, 311, 317, 320-322, 326, 357, 381, 386, 411, 416-419, 427, 435, 437, 440-442, 446, 451, 461, 481, 489-490, 493, 527-532, 534, 536-543, 545552, 576, 578, 580, 583, 586589, 591, 598, 604-610, 667669, 671-673, 677-678, 681

715

INDEX NOMINUM

Ps.-Ovidius  597 Padel Jürgen  85 Palaephatus  437, 441-442, 446 Paleotti Gabriele  465, 474 Palladio Andrea  66 Pallantieri Alessandro  171 Panaetius  468 Pandolfo Vittorio  633 Panormita  vd. Antonio Beccadelli Panvinio Onofrio  74 Pappenheim Gottfried Heinrich 502, 507, 509, 511 Parke James  591-613 Partenio Bernardino  16, 59-80 Pascoli Giovanni  133-134, 670, 677 Patricius Andreas  129 Paul, apost., s.  122, 258, 366 Paulus II, pope  179 Paulus IV, pope  171-172 Paulus V, pope  272 Pauw Adriaan  332 Pauw Cornelius de  546 Pellecchia Vincenzo  641-642 Pennant Thomas  598 Peramás José Manuel, SJ  551, 554, 558 Perrenot de Granvelle Antoine  403 Persius Aulus Flaccus  137, 281, 417 Petrarca Francesco  65, 101, 155, 188, 218, 230-231, 236, 497, 632 Peter, apost., s.  367, 370-372 Pez Bernard, OSB  347 Phalaris  169 Philip II, king of Spain  398, 408410 Philip III, king of Spain  260, 269, 411 Philostratus  580 Piccinino Niccolò  184 Piccolomini Enea Silvio  vd. Pius II Picinelli Filippo  176 Pigato Giovanni Battista  642-643 Pindarus  72, 74, 83, 194, 235, 295, 384-385, 497, 571 Pinelo Tomas  415 Pipi di Noto Pietro  234-235

Pirckheimer Willibald  351 Pirri Rocco  234 Pisanello  478 Pistorius Rutgerus  84-95, 97-98 Pitt Moses  240 Pius II, pope  156, 164, 174-175, 178-181 Pius IV, pope  171-172 Pius V, pope  65, 71, 168-169, 172173, 176 Plantin Christopher  106, 108, 110 Plato  37, 222, 295, 412, 444, 554, 597, 610 Plautus Titus Maccius  139, 634 Plessis Armand Jean du  vd. Richelieu Plinius Maior  105, 222, 225, 242, 282, 294-295, 413-414, 467, 602, 633 Plinius Minor  281, 627, 631 Plutarchus  498 Poirters Adriaan  514 Poitiers Diana of  527 Poliziano Angelo  291, 394, 434 Polus T.  81 Polybius  274 Pompeius Magnus Gnaeus  202 Pontano Giovanni  211-228, 293, 295, 384-386 Pope Alexander  597, 608, 610 Porphyrio Pomponius  146 Possevinus Antonius, SJ  268, 410 Poussin Nicolas  13-14, 17-18 Pozzo Cassiano dal  320 Prieur de la Comble Charles-Amance 645 Priscianus  122, 131 Propertius Sextus Aurelius  70, 83, 121, 142, 225, 411, 416, 419, 580 Prothero Florence  654 Prudentius Clemens Aurelius  187, 194-195, 322, 416, 425, 427428, 527, 578, 580 Ptolemaeus  255 Puteanus Erycius  254-255, 268, 271, 499

716

INDEX NOMINUM

Q uatrario Giovanni  378 Q uerenghi Antonio  101 Q uintilianus Marcus Fabius  63, 141, 469, 661, 699 Ps.-Q uintilianus  413 Rachel Joachim  84 Ráday Gedeon  346 Raillat  622 Raimondi Cosma  188 Raphelengius Franciscus iunior  262 Raphelengius Iustus  262 Rapicio Giovita  213 Rapin Nicolas  378 Rapin René, SJ  460-461, 557 Ray John  598 Recupero Pietro  238 Regenos Graydon W.  545 Regulus Marcus Atilius  497, 501 Reigersberch Maria van  316 Renoy  621-623, 627 Reymst Jan  318 Rhenana Ursula  354 Rho Antonio da  189 Rhodius Theodorus  299 Richardot Antoine  267 Richardot Guillaume  267-268, 270271 Richardot Jean  266, 271, 274 Richelieu, card.  615 Riverna Paulus  508 Rivius Ioannes  82 Robortello Francesco  63 Roger Pierre  vd. Clemens VI Rondelet Guillaume  598 Rosa Jenkins  654 Rosenperger Iohannes  344-346, 351, 356-357 Roux  621-623, 627 Rovere Francesco della  vd. Sixtus IV Rožmberg Petr Vok  423 Rubens Peter Paul  261, 265, 268, 273-275, 463-464, 476-478, 483 Rubens Philip  104, 255, 258, 261, 265-284 Rudolf II, emp.  422-423, 426, 428, 436 Ruiz de Alarcón Juan  550

Ruiz de Moros Pedro  395, 403 Rutgersius Ianus  261, 321 Rycquius Iustus  253, 258 Sacco Catone  188-189 Sachsen Georg von, duke  360 Sainte-Maure Charles de  318 Saisseval Adrianus de  252-255 Salmerón Alfonso, SJ  410 Sandaeus Maximilianus  480-481 Sandrart Joachim von  484 Sannazaro Jacopo  211-213, 218220, 360, 372, 394-395, 425, 592, 632 Santa María Francisco de  412 Sanzio Raffaello  478-479, 483 Sappho  27-35 Sarbiewski Maciej Kazimierz, SJ 426, 461, 495-496, 499 Sarpi Paolo  323 Sarrau Claude  317 Satchell Thomas  596 Satorres Franciscus  402 Saumaise Claude de  314, 317, 319 Savastano Francesco Eulalio  548 Scaliger Iosephus Iustus  108, 262, 268, 286-288 Scaliger Iulius Caesar  43-57, 83, 107-108, 291-292, 297, 425 Schez Peter, SJ  532 Schiller Friedrich  584 Schliemann Heinrich  635 Schonaeus Cornelius  328 Schreiber Wolfgang  362 Schwartz Christoph  478-479 Schwarzenberg Adolf von  503 Schweppermann Seyfried  503 Scoppius Caspar  319, 484-486 Scribani Charles, SJ  472-473 Scriverius Petrus  286-288 Sebastián F.  552 Segovia Juan de, OP  409 Ségris E.-A.  620 Selvaggio Matteo  233 Semiramis, queen  349 Seneca Lucius Annaeus  89, 187, 222, 263, 265-284, 294, 296, 299, 302, 317, 419

717

INDEX NOMINUM

Ps.-Seneca  573 Servius Maurus Honoratus  419 Servius Tullius  90 Sfilio Giuseppe  238 Sfondrati Pietro, OT  324 Sforza Battista  170 Sforza Francesco  156-159, 164165 Sforza Ludovico (il Moro)  202 Shakespeare William  609, 654 Shelley Percy B.  654 Sidgwick Arthur  654, 656, 658 Silius Italicus  135, 187, 224-225, 309, 379, 417, 419, 489-490, 579 Silvestris Bernardus  588 Sixtus IV, pope  212 Skanderbeg  504, 507 Smetius (Smithius) Iohannes  326 Smith Robert Percy  597, 599, 610 Soarez Cyprian  415 Solon  399 Sophocles  83, 295 Sozzini Mariano  403 Spagnoli Giovanni Battista, OCarm 187, 232, 366 Spierinck Nicolaus  366 Squarzafico Gerolamo  170 Statius Achilles  108 Statius Publius Papinius  411, 481 Stay Benedict  548 Stella Giulio Cesare  558 Stephanus Henricus  107-108 Strozzi Ercole  14, 197-209 Strozzi Tito  197-201, 205, 207 Strozzi Tommaso, SJ  554 Strype John  597 Stuart Maria, queen of Scotland 299, 584-588 Suardi Fioravante  213 Suatrin  617-618 Suetonius Tranquillus Gaius  135, 140-142, 638 Suyderhoef(f) Jonas  329-330 Sweertius Franciscus  106, 275, 286287 Synistor Publius Fannius  636

Taberini Luigi  646-647 Tacitus Publius Cornelius  268, 305, 631 Tamerinus Iulius  508 Tasso Torquato  76, 101 Tassoni Alessandro  196 Tastu Amable  628 Terborch Gerard  332 Terentius  375-376 Terrasse Desbillons François-Joseph, SJ 551 Theocritus  83, 294-295 Theodulf of Orléans  226 Thomas, apost.  366 Thomas a Kempis  509-510 Thou Jacques-Auguste  321 Tiberius, emp.  105, 120, 673 Tibullus Albius  70, 225, 419, 610 Tilly  vd. Tserclaes Iohannes Timothy, s.  258 Tiraboschi Girolamo, SJ  551 Titus, emp.  638, 646 Tiziano  527 Tolomei Claudio  395 Tommasi Pietro  165 Torelli Lelio  404 Torrentius Laevinus, bish. of Antwerp 595 Toscanella Orazio  63 Tranchedini Nicodemo  164-165 Trevelyan Raleigh  595 Tribaldos de Toledo Luis  397, 408 Trillini Settimio Augusto  632 Trogus Pompeius  349 Tserclaes Johann, count of Tilly  505 Tuberinus Iohannes  16, 359-376 Tudor Elizabeth, queen of England 584-587 Turrius Georgius  403 Tusiani Joseph  14, 667-681 Tweed Henry Earle  633 Urbanus VIII, pope  15, 499 Uwenus Georgius  253-254 Valentino Giambattista  217 Valerius Flaccus Gaius  188

718

INDEX NOMINUM

Valerius Maximus  136 Valesius  vd. Valois Adrien de Valla Lorenzo  189-190, 194, 409410 Valois Adrien de  466 Valpy Abraham  599 Vanière Jacques, SJ  545, 547-548, 553-554, 557, 597 Varro Marcus Terentius  292, 324 Vasa Władysław IV, king of Poland 499 Vaughan Henry  591 Vega Garcilaso de la  393 Vegio Maffeo  14, 16, 183-196 Velasco Juan de  546 Venables Robert  599 Venegas Miguel  408-409, 412, 415, 418 Ventimiglia Giovanni III  235 Vergilius Maro Publius  15, 18, 20, 24, 70, 92, 121, 137, 139-140, 142-143, 155, 160, 217-228, 277, 279, 282-284, 292, 294-295, 306, 309, 327, 361, 375, 393, 399, 411, 413, 416-419, 429-430, 432, 435, 489-491, 531, 536, 542-543, 545-546, 550, 553-554, 557, 571581, 588-589, 597, 599, 602, 604, 606, 608, 610, 622, 629 Ps.-Vergilius  108, 229, 235, 241242, 416, 419 Verzosa Juan de  395 Vestri di Barbiano Marcello  272 Victorinus poeta  194 Vida Marco Girolamo  112, 224, 282, 360, 372 Vigelius Nicolaus  410 Vignacourt Maximilien de  286 Villedieu (de) Alexandre  401 Virgilio Giovanni del  230 Visconti Filippo Maria, duke of Milan  156-188 Vitrioli Diego  632 Vladislas II, king of Hungary  353

Vondel Joost van den  314 Voragine Iacobus de, OP  367-369 Vossius Gerardus Iohannes  310 Vossius Isaac  316-317, 319-320, 325-326 Vrientius Maximilianus, secretary of Ghent  261-262 Vulcanius Bonaventura  288, 298 Wagenvoort H.  671 Wal Adriaan van der  332 Wallenstein Albrecht von  507-509 Wallius Iacobus, SJ  22, 460, 467468, 521 Walton Izaak  591, 595-599, 603, 605, 607, 609-611 Wamesius Stephanus  254 Waszink J.  671 Wellemer Iohann  85 Weston Jane Elizabeth  14, 421-435 Weston John Francis  423 Westwood Thomas  596 Weyms Stephanus  253 Widl Rufinus, OSB  17, 437-452 William Samuel  599 Willughby Francis  598 Wimpfeling Jakob  351 Winwar Frances  680 Wordsworth William  595 Woverius Iohannes  103, 265, 268, 273-274, 285-287 Wrangham Francis  595, 600 Xaverius Franciscus, SJ s.  520 Zamagna Bernardo, SJ  547-551 Zambeccari Cambio  188-189 Zanchius Basilius  211-227 Zeuxis  478 Zevecotius Iacobus  299 Zeyst Nicholas van  263 Zimmermann V.  81 Zoïlus, greek grammarian  525

719

ILLUSTRATIONS

ILLUSTRATIONS

p. 257, fig. 1: The inscription by Bauhusius in Audejans’s album, f. 74v Private Collection p. 260, fig. 2: The inscription by Baudius in Audejans’s album, f. 19r Private Collection p. 328, fig. 1: Autograph manuscript of C. Barlaeus’s poem Private Collection p. 329, fig. 2: Engraved portrait of J. Maestertius by J. Suyderhoef Leiden, Collectie Universitaire Bibliotheken, BN 900 p. 363, fig. 1: Johannes Tuberinus, Musithias (Leipzig, 1514) Rot und schwarz gedruckte Titelseite, 30 × 20 cm Private Collection p. 364, fig. 2: Lilius Gregorius Gyraldus, Syntagma de Musis (Straßburg, 1512) Titelseite, 20 × 14 cm Private Collection p. 464, fig. 1: Boëtius Adamsz. Bolswert, Le coup de lance (Iesus crucifixus), d’après Peter Paul Rubens, estampe, 606 × 432 mm Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, RP-P-OB-67.485

721

ILLUSTRATIONS

p. 477, fig. 1: Peter Paul Rubens, La femme apocalyptique, c. 1623-1625 peinture à l’huile, 554,5 × 370,5 cm München, Alte Pinakothek p. 517, fig. 1: Typus mundi (Antwerp, Ioannes Cnobbaert, 1627), emblem 27, p. 216 Leuven, Maurits Sabbebibliotheek, shelf number P264.5 Typus 1627

722

TABULA GRATULATORIA

TABULA GRATULATORIA

Albert, Sigrid C. (Saarbrücken) Alcina Rovira, Juan Francisco (Tarragona) Bandiera, Emilio (Carpignano Salentino) Békés, Enikő (Budapest) Beyers, Rita (Antwerpen) Bianca, Concetta (Firenze) Blanchard, Daniel (Paris) Bloemendal, Jan (Amsterdam) Boodts, Shari (Nijmegen) Ceulemans, Reinhart (Leuven) Charlet, Jean-Louis (Aix-en-Provence) Charlet-Mesdijan, Béatrice (Aix-en-Provence) Chevallier, Anne-Marie (Strasbourg) Ciarrocchi, Vittorio (Pesaro) Cockx-Indestege, Elly (Dilbeek) Coroleu, Alejandro (Barcelona) Crab, Marijke (Leuven) Cristini, Marco (Brescia) Czerenkiewicz, Michal (Cracow) De Beer, Susanna (Leiden) De Bom, Erik (Onze-Lieve-VrouwWaver) De Keyser, Jeroen (Serskamp)

Dekoninck, Ralph (Louvain-la-Neuve) De Landtsheer, Jeanine (Leuven) Della Schiava, Fabio (Leuven) Denecker, Tim (Turnhout) Deneire, Tom (Antwerpen) Dennistoun Bryant, Peter (Perth, Australia) de Schepper, Marcus (Mechelen) De Smet, Ingrid A. R. (Warwick) De Sutter, Nicholas (Leuven) Evenepoel, Willy (Leuven) Fera, Vincenzo (Messina) Feys, Xander (Leuven) François, Ide (Leuven) Freyburger, Gérard (Strasbourg) Gärtner, Thomas (Köln) Gilmore, John T. (Coventry) Glei, Reinhold F. (Bochum) Glomski, Jacqueline (London) Gualdo Rosa, Lucia (Roma) Guldentops, Guy (Köln) Gysens, Steven (Lokeren) Hankins, James (Cambridge, MA) Haskell, Yasmin (Perth, Australia) Hofmann, Heinz (München) Hosington, Brenda M. (London)

723

TABULA GRATULATORIA

Ingelbrecht, Tom (Sint-Michiels) Isebaert, Lambert (Louvain-la-Neuve) Jalabert, Romain (Paris) Janssen, Augustinus M. P. P. (Sittard) Janssens, Bart (Turnhout) Jenniges, Wolfgang (Brussel) Kiss, Farkas Gábor (Budapest) Kofler, Wolfgang (Innsbruck) Laes, Christian (Antwerpen – Manchester) Laureys, Marc (Bonn) Leonhardt, Jürgen (Tübingen) Licoppe, Guy & Françoise (Marneffe) Ludwig, Walther (Hamburg) Maleusius Thenensis, Maximus (Lovanii) Marcellino, Giuseppe (Padova) Marsico, Clementina (Firenze) Meeus, Hubert (Antwerpen) Merisalo, Outi (Jyväskylä) Miglio, Massimo (Roma) Minkova, Milena (Lexington) Money, David (Cambridge) Nassichuk, John (London, ON, Canada) Nativel, Colette (Paris) Nellen, Henk (Amsterdam) Ouwerkerk, Aron (Utrecht) Papy, Jan (Leuven) Partoens, Gert (Leuven) Pascual Barea, Joaquín (Cádiz) Pekkanen, Tuomo (Helsinki) Petrides, Andreas (Lovanii) Pisini, Mauro (Roma) Raedle, Fidel (Göttingen) Regtuit, Remco (Groningen) Robiglio, Andrea Aldo (Leuven)

Roggen, Vibeke (Oslo) Römer, Franz (Wien) Rossi, Giancarlo (Milano) Sanzotta, Valerio (Innsbruck) Sarasti-Wilenius, Raija (Helsinki) Schaffenrath, Florian (Innsbruck) Schnur, Rhoda (Sankt Gallen) Silvano, Luigi (Torino) Smeesters, Aline (Louvain-la-Neuve) Smolak, Kurt (Wien) Spataro, Roberto (Roma) Stroh, Wilfried (Freising) Tilg, Stefan (Freiburg) Torfs, Mon (Gelrode) Tournoy, Gilbert (Leuven) Tunberg, Terence (Lexington) Tusiani, Joseph (New York) Universiteit Antwerpen, Departement Letterkunde (Antwerpen) Urlings, Sam (Leuven) Van Dam, Harm-Jan (Amsterdam) Van de Venne, Hans (Venray) Van Hal, Toon (Leuven) Van Houdt, Toon (Leuven) Van Nuffelen-Van Hoof, Peter & Lieve (Gent) Van Rooy, Raf (Leuven) Van Vaeck, Marc (Leuven) Velter, Johan (Gent) Verbaal, Wim (Gent) Verbeke, Demmy (Leuven) Vercruysse-Coppens, Marc & Chris (Heverlee) Verweij, Michiel (Brussel) Verwerft, Sander (Geel) Viiding, Kristi (Tallinn) von Albrecht, Michael (Heidelberg) Wuttke, Dieter (Bamberg)

724