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Editor’s NoteEditor’s NoteECLOGA VIII

Editor’s Note Link 17

d   Nascere praeque diem ueniens age, Lucifer, almum,

Editor’s Note Link 18coniugis indigno Nysae deceptus amore

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 19dum queror et diuos, quamquam nil testibus illis

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 20profeci, extrema moriens tamen adloquor hora.

Editor’s Note Link 21  incipe Maenalios mecum, mea tibia, uersus.

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 22Maenalus argutumque nemus pinusque loquentis

Editor’s Note Link 23semper habet, semper pastorum ille audit amores

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 24Panaque, qui primus calamos non passus inertis.

25  incipe Maenalios mecum, mea tibia, uersus.

Editor’s Note Link 26Mopso Nysa datur: quid non speremus amantes?

Editor’s Note Link 27iungentur iam grypes equis, aeuoque sequenti

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 28cum canibus timidi uenient ad pocula dammae.

Critical Apparatus28a  incipe Maenalios mecum, mea tibia, uersus.a

Editor’s Note Link 29Mopse, nouas incide faces: tibi ducitur uxor.

Editor’s Note Link 30sparge, marite, nuces: tibi deserit Hesperus Oetam.

31  incipe Maenalios mecum, mea tibia, uersus.

Editor’s Note Link 32o digno coniuncta uiro, dum despicis omnis,

33dumque tibi est odio mea fistula dumque capellae

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 34hirsutumque supercilium promissaque barba,

Link 35nec curare deum credis mortalia quemquam.

36  incipe Maenalios mecum, mea tibia, uersus.

Editor’s Note Link 37saepibus in nostris paruam te roscida mala

Editor’s Note Link 38(dux ego uester eram) uidi cum matre legentem.

Editor’s Note Link 39alter ab undecimo tum me iam acceperat annus,

pg 22Critical Apparatus Link 40iam fragilis poteram a terra contingere ramos:

Editor’s Note Link 41ut uidi, ut perii, ut me malus abstulit error!

42  incipe Maenalios mecum, mea tibia, uersus.

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 43nunc scio quid sit Amor: nudis in cautibus illum

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 44aut Tmaros aut Rhodope aut extremi Garamantes

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus45nec generis nostri puerum nec sanguinis edunt.

46  incipe Maenalios mecum, mea tibia, uersus.

Editor’s Note Link 47saeuus Amor docuit natorum sanguine matrem

Editor’s Note Link 48commaculare manus; crudelis tu quoque, mater.

Editor’s Note Link 49crudelis mater magis, an puer improbus ille?

Link 50improbus ille puer; crudelis tu quoque, mater.

51  incipe Maenalios mecum, mea tibia, uersus.

Editor’s Note Link 52nunc et ouis ultro fugiat lupus, aurea durae

Editor’s Note53mala ferant quercus, narcisso floreat alnus,

Editor’s Note Link 54pinguia corticibus sudent electra myricae,

Editor’s Note Link 55certent et cycnis ululae, sit Tityrus Orpheus,

56Orpheus in siluis, inter delphinas Arion.

57  incipe Maenalios mecum, mea tibia, uersus.

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 58omnia uel medium fiat mare. uiuite siluae:

Editor’s Note Link 59praeceps aërii specula de montis in undas

Editor’s Note Link 60deferar; extremum hoc munus morientis habeto.

Editor’s Note Link 61  desine Maenalios, iam desine, tibia, uersus.

Editor’s Note Link 62  Haec Damon; uos, quae responderit Alphesiboeus,

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 63dicite, Pierides: non omnia possumus omnes.

Editor’s Note Link 64

a   Effer aquam et molli cinge haec altaria uitta

Editor’s Note Link 65uerbenasque adole pinguis et mascula tura,

Editor’s Note Link 66coniugis ut magicis sanos auertere sacris

Editor’s Note Link 67experiar sensus; nihil hic nisi carmina desunt.

Editor’s Note Link 68  ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin.

Editor’s Note Link 69carmina uel caelo possunt deducere lunam,

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 70carminibus Circe socios mutauit Vlixi,

Editor’s Note Link 71frigidus in pratis cantando rumpitur anguis.

Link 72  ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin.

Editor’s Note Link 73terna tibi haec primum triplici diuersa colore

pg 23Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 74licia circumdo, terque haec altaria circum

Editor’s Note Link 75effigiem duco; numero deus impare gaudet.

Editor’s Note76  ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin.

Editor’s Note Link 77necte tribus nodis ternos, Amarylli, colores;

Editor’s Note Link 78necte, Amarylli, modo et 'Veneris' die 'uincula necto'.

79  ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin.

Editor’s Note Link 80limus ut hic durescit, et haec ut cera liquescit

Editor’s Note Link 81uno eodemque igni, sic nostro Daphnis amore.

Editor’s Note Link 82sparge molam et fragilis incende bitumine lauros:

Editor’s Note Link 83Daphnis me malus urit, ego hanc in Daphnide laurum.

84  ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin.

Editor’s Note85talis amor Daphnin qualis cum fessa iuuencum

Editor’s Note Link 86per nemora atque altos quaerendo bucula lucos

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 87propter aquae riuum uiridi procumbit in ulua

Editor’s Note Link 88perdita, nec serae meminit decedere nocti,

Editor’s Note Link 89talis amor teneat, nec sit mihi cura mederi.

90  ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin.

Editor’s Note Link 91has olim exuuias mihi perfidus ille reliquit,

Editor’s Note92pignora cara sui, quae nunc ego limine in ipso,

Editor’s Note Link 93Terra, tibi mando; debent haec pignora Daphnin.

94  ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin.

Editor’s Note Link 95has herbas atque haec Ponto mihi lecta uenena

Editor’s Note Link 96ipse dedit Moeris (nascuntur plurima Ponto);

Editor’s Note97his ego saepe lupum fieri et se condere siluis

Editor’s Note Link 98Moerim, saepe animas imis excire sepulcris,

Link 99atque satas alio uidi traducere messis.

100  ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin.

Editor’s Note Link 101fer cineres, Amarylli, foras riuoque fluenti

Editor’s Note Link 102transque caput iace, nec respexeris. his ego Daphnin

103adgrediar; nihil ille deos, nil carmina curat.

104  ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin.

Editor’s Note Link 105'aspice: corripuit tremulis altaria flammis

Editor’s Note Link 106sponte sua, dum ferre moror, cinis ipse, bonum sit!'

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 107nescio quid certe est, et Hylax in limine latrat.

Editor’s Note Link 108credimus? an, qui amant, ipsi sibi somnia fingunt?

Editor’s NoteCritical Apparatus Link 109  parcite, ab urbe uenit, iam parcite carmina, Daphnis.

Notes Settings

Notes
Editor’s Note
Introduction
A reader of the Eighth Eclogue, while admiring individual lines and passages, may become aware of a certain incoherence or forced unity in the poem as a whole.
  The first word of the first line is noticeably insistent, 'Pastorum Musam Damonis et Alphesiboei'—Pastorum, as if to assert the pastoral character of the poem as a whole in anticipation of the reader's response to the unpastoral Muse of Alphesiboeus (64–109). Similarly, certantis, the first word of the third line, invites the reader to regard Damon and Alphesiboeus as engaged in a singing-match, although none of the preliminary formalities has been observed or even suggested.1
  His pastoral décor thus provisionally in place, Virgil announces, with a graceful rephrasing of his first line, his intention—that of telling of the Muse of Damon and Alphesiboeus, 'Damonis Musam dicemus et Alphesiboei' (5). Instead of proceeding to do so, however, he addresses an unnamed patron.
  •       tu mihi, seu magni superas iam saxa Timaui
  •       siue oram Illyrici legis aequoris,—en erit umquam
  •       ille dies, mihi cum liceat tua dicere facta?
  •       en erit ut liceat totum mihi ferre per orbem
  •       sola Sophocleo tua carmina digna coturno?
  •       a te principium, tibi desinam: accipe iussis
  •       carmina coepta tuis, atque hanc sine tempora circum
  •       inter uictricis hederam tibi serpere lauros. (6–13)
These lines present the chief difficulty of the poem, and yet are, in a sense, extraneous to the poem; were they to be removed, their absence would not be felt.2
  Who, then, is the patron so abruptly and cryptically addressed? There are, as there have been since antiquity, only two possible candidates: Octavian and Pollio;3 and modern commentators,
map 1. The Roman Conquest of Dalmatia

map 1. The Roman Conquest of Dalmatia

without serious question, have preferred Pollio, largely because of his reputation as a tragic poet.4 But in 1971 the question was reopened by Bowersock,5 who argued (i) that the traditional dating of the Eclogues (c. 42–39 bc) is a scholiastic fabrication and, as such, worthless; and (ii) that the conqueror of the Parthini, a people in the hinterland of Dyrrhachium, had no reason to be sailing past 'the rocks of the Timavus' some 400 miles to the north along the perilous Dalmatian coast.6 No doubt Pollio returned to Italy the usual way in 39 bc, crossing over from Dyrrhachium to Brundisium, from which he had embarked in the previous year. After celebrating a triumph 'ex Parthineis'7 he ostentatiously retired from public life to devote himself to literature. Since Pollio appears to be excluded on geographical (and other) grounds, Virgil's addressee—unnamed here as he is in the First Eclogue—must be Octavian, who in 35 bc initiated a series of campaigns in northern Dalmatia in the general region of the Timavus.8
  But can this identification be reconciled with Virgil's reference to Sophoclean tragedy? Suetonius reports, though without indicating a date, that Augustus began to compose a tragedy, an Ajax, with great energy, but, his style proving inadequate, deleted it, and when friends inquired after his Ajax, replied—no doubt a much-appreciated witticism—that Ajax had fallen on his sponge.9 Obviously, Virgil's enthusiasm is out of proportion to a single, abortive effort,10 as Octavian's Ajax must appear in retrospect. But suppose that Octavian, with an enthusiasm communicated to his friends, had only begun his Ajax when Virgil wrote these lines.11 And if Octavian was too little known as a tragic poet, Pollio was too well known, it might be argued, to be so praised: high hopes for the future are better suited to a poet as yet little known, of whom great things may be expected.
  Virgil implies a relation between his patron's poetry (10 'tua carmina') and his own, begun at his patron's command (11–12 'iussis / carmina coepta tuis'). Octavian could, as a patron, give such an order and can, as a poet himself, judge the result (11 'accipe'). If Pollio ever was Virgil's patron,12 he has been superseded,13 since the First Eclogue effectively dedicates the Book of Eclogues to Octavian; and here the poet, by an understood fiction, ascribes to his patron's command the poetry he would have written anyhow.14
  This argument is confirmed, finally, by Virgil's declaration that he will begin with his patron and end with his patron, 11 'a te principium, tibi desinam'—a formula applied to Zeus,15 to Agamemnon,16 and, by inference, to Ptolemy Philadelphus, Theocr. 17. 1–4 ʼΕκ Διὸς ἀρχώμεσθα καὶ ἐς Δία λήγετε Μοῖσαι‎, | ἀθανάτων τὸν ἄριστον‎ … | ἀνδρῶν δ‎ʼ αὖ Πτολεμαῖος ἐνὶ πρώτοισι λεγέσθω‎ | καὶ πύματος καὶ μέσσος‎· ὃ γὰρ προφερέστατος ἀνδρῶν‎, 'From Zeus let us begin, and with Zeus in our poems, Muses, let us make end, for of immortals he is best; but of men let Ptolemy be named, first, last, and in the midst, for of men he is most excellent' (Gow). Such intimations of sublimity are unsuited, as Quintilian seems to have recognized, to a mere proconsul, for in congratulating Domitian on his accession to the throne, and extolling his literary genius, he quotes the last line of Virgil's dedication.

Germanicum Augustum ab institutis studiis deflexit cura terrarum, parumque dis uisum est esse eum maximum poetarum. quid tamen his ipsis eius operibus in quae donato imperio iuuenis secesserat sublimius, doctius, omnibus denique numeris praestantius? quis enim caneret bella melius quam qui sic gerit? quem praesidentes studiis deae propius audirent? cui magis suas artis aperiret familiare numen Minerua? dicent haec plenius futura saecula, nunc enim ceterarum fulgore uirtutum laus ista praestringitur. nos tamen sacra litterarum colentis feres, Caesar, si non taciturn hoc praeterimus et Vergiliano certe uersu testamur

          inter uictrices hederam tibi serpere laurus.17

  Apart from the opening lines (1–5), which introduce the singers and set the scene, and the dedication (6–13), the Eighth Eclogue is composed almost entirely of two songs, or two performances: the first by Damon (17–61), of which the idea and several details are borrowed from Theocritus' Third Idyll; and the second by Alphesiboeus (64–109), which is modelled on the incantation of Simaetha in Theocritus' Second Idyll (17–63).
  The second song must be considered first, along with Simaetha's incantation, if the structure of the Eclogue is to be understood. Her incantation consists of nine quatrains—an appropriate number as being a multiple of three, the magic number18—each of which is accompanied by a refrain 'Draw to my house that man of mine'.19 Similarly, the song of Alphesiboeus consists of nine stanzas20—deliberately varied in length, however, but, like Simaetha's incantation, amounting to thirty-six lines—each of which is followed by a refrain 'Bring Daphnis home from town'. Virgil, it seems, conceived of his stanzas in groups of three, for the same numbers of lines recur in a triadic pattern, thus: 4, 3, 5; 4, 5, 3; 5, 3, 4.21 The number four is prominent and may recall Simaetha's quatrains.
  Since Damon and Alphesiboeus are engaged, at least nominally, in a singing-match, the reader will assume that the second song conforms to the first, that Alphesiboeus is following the lead of Damon; and had Virgil chosen to elaborate his fiction, the incongruity of the last three stanzas in the second song with the last three in the first might have seemed a reason for adjudging the prize to Damon. In fact, the second song must be primary and the first song secondary, modelled, that is, on the second song, because the refrain, while necessary to Alphesiboeus' song, is unnecessary, indeed inappropriate, to Damon's;22 hence Virgil's concern to justify it (22–4). Let the reader try the experiment of reading first Theocritus' Third Idyll and then, omitting 11. 22–4, Damon's song without the refrain.
  In a study of the frequency and character of elision in the Eclogues, N.-O. Nilsson23 found, somewhat to his dismay, that the metrical technique of Alphesiboeus differs from Damon's and resembles that of the Second and Third Eclogues, which are generally accepted as being Virgil's earliest. Nilsson rejected the obvious chronological explanation, however, and attributed the difference to a difference of tone in the two songs.24 But a subjective interpretation of metrical evidence will always be dubious, and here a much more plausible explanation presents itself: Pliny, NH 28. 19 'hinc Theocriti apud Graecos, Catulli apud nos proximeque Vergilii incantamentorum amatoria imitatio'. Catullus practiced the art of translation, and it is easy to see why Simaetha's incantation, so beautifully composed and pathetic, would have appealed to him.25 Prompted by the example of Catullus, apparently, and by his own deeper instinct, Virgil imitated Theocritus, or rather, Theocritus and Catullus;26 and some years later (Virgil likes to reuse his own poetry) reused his imitation—modified in certain particulars27 no doubt, but not so modified as to efface the impression of his earlier metrical technique—for the song of Alphesiboeus. If so, then Damon's song may be among the latest of Virgil's pastoral compositions,28 and the Eighth Eclogue, as a whole, contemporary with the First, which, like the Eighth, honours Octavian.

Bibliography

(11. 6–13)
G. W. Bowersock, 'A Date in the Eighth Eclogue', HSCP 75 (1971), 73–80. W. Clausen, 'On the Date of the First Eclogue', HSCP 76 (1972), 201–5. E. A. Schmidt, Zur Chronologie der Eklogen Vergils (SB Heidelberg, 1974/6). R. J. Tarrant, 'The Addressee of Virgil's Eighth Eclogue', HSCP 82 (1978), 197–9. G. W. Bowersock, 'The Addressee of Virgil's Eighth Eclogue: A Response', HSCP 82 (1978), 201–2. J. Van Sickle, 'Commentaria in Maronem Commenticia: A Case History of Bucolics Misread', Arethusa, 14 (1981), 17–34. A. Köhnken, 'Sola … Tua Carmina', WJA 10 (1984), 77–90. J. E. G. Zetzel, 'Servius and Triumviral History in the Eclogues', CP 79 (1984), 139–42. D. Mankin, 'The Addressee of Virgil's Eighth Eclogue: A Reconsideration', Hermes, 116 (1988), 63–76. M. Pavan, Enc. Virg. s.v. Timavo. J. Farrell, 'Asinius Pollio in Vergil, Eclogue 8', CP 86 (1991), 204–11.

(Damon's song, 11. 17–61)

B. Otis, Virgil: A Study in Civilized Poetry (Oxford, 1963), 105–20.

(the poem as a whole)

Klingner 134–46.

A. Richter, Virgile: La huitième bucolique, (Paris, 1970). V. Tandoi, 'Lettura dell'ottava bucolica', in Gigante 265–317.
Editor’s Note
1 See E. 3, Introduction. See also E. Bethe, RhM 47 (1892), 590–6.
Editor’s Note
2 P. Levi, Hermes, 94 (1966), 73–9, in fact argues that all or most of these lines should be removed.
Editor’s Note
3 Serv. on 1. 6: 'ubi ubi es, o Auguste, siue …'; DServ. on 1. 10: 'alii ideo hoc de Pollione dictum uolunt, quod et ipse utriusque linguae tragoediarum scriptor fuit'. The name Augustus, conferred by the Senate in 27 bc, is no indication of date in an ancient author. For convenience, modern scholars refer to Augustus as Octavian (Octavianus) before that date; but from the early 30s he called himself Imp. Caesar Diui f., Caesar being the potent name to which, Antony said, he owed everything. See R. Syme, Historia, 7 (1958), 172–88 = Roman Papers, i (Oxford, 1979), 361–77.
Editor’s Note
4 Nothing survives of Pollio's tragedies; see 3. 86 n.
Editor’s Note
5 Bowersock had been anticipated by H. W. Garrod, CQ 10 (1916), 216–17: 'Nor is it obvious what the conqueror of the Parthini was doing among "the rocks of the Timavus", i.e. in N. Istria … In fact, Virgil's language is less applicable to the circumstances of the year 39 than it would be to those of the years 35–33. In 35 bc Augustus first turned his attention to the subjugation of Dalmatia and Pannonia'.
Editor’s Note
6 And in an extreme angle of the Adriatic; see map, p. 234. The Timavus flows into the Adriatic between Aquileia and Tergeste. Since the identity of V.'s patron depends on his association with the Timavus, the Timavus cannot be dismissed as a geographical imprecision of the sort occasionally found in poetry.
Editor’s Note
7 See T. R. S. Broughton, The Magistrates of the Roman Republic, ii (New York, 1952), 387–8. Horace's 'Delmatico … triumpho' (Carm. 2. 1. 16) is not, nor was it intended to be, geographically exact; J. J. Wilkes, Dalmatia (Cambridge, Mass., 1969), 45: 'Horace was employing a well-known triumphal title, in preference to the technically correct but hardly flattering Parthinicus'.
Editor’s Note
8 Cf. Wilkes, ibid. 50: 'Octavianus probably began his advance in 35 bc against the Iapodes from the Liburnian port Senia …'. It was a difficult campaign, and Octavian himself was wounded in the assault on Metulum, the chief stronghold of the Iapodes. Note that the Timavus is called Iapydian in G. 3. 475 'Iapydis arua Timaui'. For the spelling of their name—Iapodes, Iapudes, Iapydes—see RE ix. 724.
Editor’s Note
9 Suet. Aug. 85. 2 'nam tragoediam magno impetu exorsus, non succedenti stilo, aboleuit quaerentibusque amicis quidnam Aiax ageret respondit Aiacem suum in spongiam incubuisse'; cf. Macrob. Sat. 2. 4. 2 'Aiacem tragoediam scripserat eandemque quod sibi displicuisset deleuerat. postea L. Varius tragoediarum scriptor interrogabat eum quid ageret Aiax suus. et ille, "in spongiam", inquit, "incubuit" '. For Varius see 9. 35 n.
Editor’s Note
10 Hence the desperate expedient of Beroaldus, who interpreted 'tua carmina' as 'songs about you'; see Van Sickle 21. Three parallel phrases: 'tua … facta', 'tua carmina', 'iussis … tuis'—why should the second phrase be different? And, if so, why the reference to Sophocles? Epic deeds demand epic praise. Köhnken n. 43 asserts that 'Sophocleo … coturno' stands by metonymy for the high style in general (genus grande); an arbitrary interpretation unsupported by evidence, for in Prop. 2. 34. 41, which he cites, 'Aeschyleo … coturno' refers to the high style of tragedy.
Editor’s Note
11 In any case, excessive praise of a ruler's poetic achievement (10 'sola … tua carmina') should occasion no surprise. Cf. e.g. Ben Jonson, Epigram 4, To King James 1–2 'How, best of kings, dost thou a sceptre bear! / How, best of poets, dost thou laurel wear!', with Samuel Johnson's opinion of poetic veracity: 'as much veracity as can be properly exacted from a poet professedly encomiastick' (Life of Prior). See below for Quintilian's praise of Domitian as 'the greatest of poets'.
Editor’s Note
12 Not a relationship easy to define. Nisbet and Hubbard, however, on Hor. Carm. 2. 1. 12, define Pollio as Virgil's 'old patron' and find it hard to believe that Virgil would offer him 'so unnecessary an insult'. See also Tarrant 197–8.
Editor’s Note
13 Though not entirely: 3. 84–91, 4. 11–14. Perhaps Pollio may be regarded as a secondary dedicatee, as he is in Horace's Carmina (2.1), which are primarily dedicated to Maecenas (1. 1).
Editor’s Note
14 Cf. G. 3. 41 'tua, Maecenas, haud mollia iussa'.
Editor’s Note
15 Notably by Aratus, Phaen. 1. ʼΕκ Διὸς ἀρχώμεσθα‎. See Gow on Theocr. 17. 1 f.; also M. Fantuzzi, MD 5 (1980), 163–72.
Editor’s Note
16 Il. 9. 97, a passage Virgil had in mind; see ad loc.
Editor’s Note
17 Quintil. 10. 1. 91–2, cited by Bowersock (1971), 79. Domitian assumed the title Germanicus after his campaign against the Chatti in ad 84. For his literary studies cf. Tac. Hist. 4. 86. 2 'Domitianus sperni a senioribus iuuentam suam cernens modica quoque et usurpata antea munia imperii omittebat, simplicitatis ac modestiae imagine in altitudinem conditus studiumque litterarum et amorem carminum simulans', Suet. Dom. 20 'numquam tamen aut historiae carminibusque noscendis operam ullam aut stilo uel necessario dedit. praeter commentarios et acta Tiberi Caesaris nihil lectitabat'.
Editor’s Note
18 See note on 11. 73–4.
Editor’s Note
19 For the arrangement of the refrain see Gow on Theocr. 2. 17–63.
Editor’s Note
20 On the assumption that 11. 26–30 and 73–8 are single stanzas; otherwise Virgil's imitation of Simaetha's incantation would have a stanza too many. See note on 1. 28a.
Editor’s Note
21 In the song of Alphesiboeus; in Damon's song the arrangement of the last three stanzas differs (4, 5, 3)—a further indication that Virgil was not seriously committed to the fiction of a singing-match.
Editor’s Note
22 So Bethe (above, n. 1), 595–6. See note on 11. 18–20.
Editor’s Note
23 'Verschiedenheiten im Gebrauch der Elision in Vergils Eklogen', Eranos, 58 (1960), 80–91.
Editor’s Note
24 P. 90: 'Die Verschiedenheit der Elisionfrequenz innerhalb der achten Ekloge wird vielmehr mit der Verschiedenheit der Stimmung zusammenhängen: tragischer Ernst bei Damon, hoffnungsvoller Eifer nebst abgespanntem, malerischem Realismus bei Alphesiboeus'; an interpretation accepted by Schmidt 32 n. 5.
Editor’s Note
25 See Wilamowitz, Die Textgeschichte der griechischen Bukoliker (Philol. Untersuch. 18, Berlin, 1906), 112, R. Reitzenstein, RE vi (1907), 110, G. Jachmann, Gnomon 1 (1925), 203, S. Timpanaro, Contributi di filologia e di storia della lingua latina (Roma, 1978), 276–7. Catullus' imitation, like several of his poems, has been lost; see the OCT edition of Mynors, p. 106.
Editor’s Note
26 Cf. Clausen 20: 'Almost as a matter of principle, a Hellenistic poet—and by now it should be abundantly clear that Virgil is a Hellenistic poet, writing in that tradition—will choose, where conveniently possible, to imitate two, or even more, poets simultaneously, or to add to his imitation of one poet from another'. It may not be absurd to suggest that Virgil's interest in Theocritus began with Simaetha's incantation.
Editor’s Note
27 Quite possibly the happy ending of Alphesiboeus' song (Simaetha's magic is ineffective), which contrasts with the sad ending of Damon's song.
Editor’s Note
28 And perhaps produced in some haste; so Bethe (above, n. 1), 594. It contains the affecting lines admired by Voltaire, André Chénier, and Thackeray (37–41) as well as the frigid lines which have given so much offence (47–50).
Editor’s Note
1. Musam: 'la dolcissima musa di Damone e di Alfesibeo' (Sannazaro, Arcadia, prosa 10). See 1. 2 n.
Editor’s Note
Damonis: the name of a herdsman in 3. 17, 23; non-Theocritean.
Editor’s Note
Alphesiboei: 5. 73 n.
Editor’s Note
2–4. An amazed heifer, enchanted lynxes, and rivers stayed in their course—no singer in Theocritus possesses such Orphean power over the natural world. Cf. 6. 27–30.
Editor’s Note
2. immemor herbarum: cf. G. 3. 498 (equus) 'immemor herbae', Hor. Carm. 1. 15. 30 (ceruus) 'graminis immemor', where Nisbet–Hubbard remark: 'one suspects a common source, perhaps the passage from the Eclogues, but conceivably the Io of Calvus'; see below, 4 n.
Editor’s Note
2–3. mirata … / … stupefactae: cf. G. 4. 363 (Aristaeus) 'mirans', 365 'stupefactus', A. 10. 445–6 (Pallas) 'iussa superba / miratus stupet in Turno'.
Editor’s Note
3. certantis: the merest indication of a singing-match; see below, 62 n.; also 3. 31 n.
Editor’s Note
stupefactae carmine lynces: exotic beasts, here consorting with the domestic heifer in an imaginary landscape. Lynxes are nowhere to be found in Theocritus, but Callimachus has one, on Mt. Maenalus, Hymn 3. 87–9 (Artemis) ἵκεο δ‎ʼ αὖλιν‎ | ʼΑρκαδικὴν ἔπι Πανός‎. ὁ δὲ κρέα λυγκὸς ἔταμνε‎ | Μαιναλίης‎, 'you came to the Arcadian fold of Pan. And he was cutting up the flesh of a lynx of Maenalus'; see below, 22 n. The only lynx known to V. and his contemporaries was the African caracal (RE xiii. 2476–7); V. therefore describes a huntress in the woods near Carthage as wearing a spotted lynx-hide (A. 1. 323). Lynxes were reputedly fond of music: Eur. Alc. 579 (to Apollo) σὺν δ‎ʼ ἐποιμαίνοντο χαρᾷ μελέων βαλιαί τε λύγκες‎, 'and with the flocks roamed spotted lynxes rejoicing in your songs'.
Critical Apparatus
viii 4 linquerunt γ‎ (liqu-γ‎2)
Editor’s Note
4. et mutata suos requierunt flumina cursus: DServius quotes the Io of Calvus, FPL fr. 13 Büchner 'sol quoque perpetuos meminit requiescere cursus'. For inchoative verbs used transitively see Munro on Lucr. 4. 1282, Löfstedt i. 239–40, and for requiesco transitive, A. Taliercio, RCCM 28 (1986), 117–29. V. seems to have found the construction harsh, however, and modified it with mutata (La Cerda); cf. A. 1. 658 'faciem mutatus et ora Cupido'. Contrast Ciris 233 'quo rapidos etiam requiescunt flumina cursus'. The rivers are 'changed' in their course, that is, they stopped to listen to the Orphean singing of Damon and Alphesiboeus; cf. Ap. Rhod. 1. 26–7 (Orpheus) τόν γ‎ʼ ἐνέπουσιν ἀτειρέας οὔρεσι πέτρας‎ | θέλξαι ἀοιδάων ἐνοπῇ ποταμῶν τε ῥέεθρα‎, 'men say that he charmed hard rocks upon the mountains and the flow of rivers by the music of his songs', Hor. Carm. 1.12. 9–10 (Orphea) 'rapidos morantem / fluminum lapsus' (cf. 3. 11. 14), Prop. 3. 2. 3–4 'Orphea delenisse feras et concita dicunt / flumina Threicia sustinuisse lyra', Ov. Fast. 2. 84 (Arion) 'carmine currentes ille tenebat aquas', Culex 117–18 'Oeagrius Hebrum / restantem tenuit ripis siluasque canendo', Sen. Herc. 573 'ars, quae praebuerat fluminibus moras', Med. 626–7 'cuius ad chordas modulante plectro / restitit torrens', [Sen.] Herc. [Oet.] 1036–9 'Illius stetit ad modos / torrentis rapidi fragor, / oblitusque sequi fugam / amisit liquor impetum', Claudian, De Rapt. Pros. prol. 2. 18 'pigrior astrictis torpuit Hebrus aquis'. See K. Ziegler, RE xviii. 1250, Housman, JPhil 16 (1888), 27–8 = Class. Papers, i. 48–9, Pease on A. 4. 489.
Editor’s Note
5. Damonis Musam … et Alphesiboei: 'bene repetit, ne longum hyperbaton sensum confunderet' (DServ.); but of course that was not the only reason for the repetition. A similar repetition occurs in Alphesiboeus' song, below, 85–9.
Critical Apparatus
6 tu] tum P1
Editor’s Note
6. tu mihi: the reader expects dexter ades, which often occurs in prayers and invocations, e.g. Ov. Fast. 1. 65–7 'lane biceps … dexter ades ducibus', or something of the sort ('subaudiendum faue', La Cerda); but the poet breaks off under the stress of strong excitement as in G. 1. 384, 4. 67, 252. Since the address has some of the attributes of an address to a deity (naming the alternative places where the addressee may be found, e.g. Theocr. 1. 123–6) the reader hears tu with some vocative force. Cf. Stat. Silu. 2. 7. 107–20 'At tu, seu …, seu …, adsis', 5. 3. 19–28 'At tu, seu …, seu …, da'.
Editor’s Note
magni … saxa Timaui: 'the Timavus, so poetically (in every sense of the word) described by Virgil' (Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ch. 7 n. 27). J. Henry, who explored the Timavus in 1865, describes it as follows, Aeneidea, i (London, 1873), 523: 'At the foot of Monte Albio (Schneeberg), the last of the Julian Alps eastward, rises a river, which at San Canziano, sixteen miles from its source, becomes subterranean, and (having flowed from San Canziano eighteen miles underground) emerges from under the mountain at San Giovanni di Tuba, in numerous so-called springs or sorgenti coalescing almost immediately again into a single deep and broad stream, which, after a slow, smooth, and noiseless course of scarcely more than an Italian mile through the flat and marshy litoral, discharges itself into the Adriatic by a single mouth'. The Latin poets permit themselves a good deal of licence in describing rivers (see Tarrant on Sen. Ag. 318 ff.); and V. here accommodates the size of the river to the importance of his patron. The rocks at the river's mouth, to some extent conventional, are also of the poet's making. V. may have been thinking of the notoriously dangerous Illyrian coast; cf., noting the emphasis on tutus, A. 1. 242–6 (Venus to Jupiter) 'Antenor potuit mediis elapsus Achiuis / Illyricos penetrare sinus atque intima tutus / regna Liburnorum et fontem superare Timaui, / unde per ora nouem uasto cum murmure montis / it mare proruptum et pelago premit arua sonanti'. (Venus devotes two lines of her impassioned speech to the mirabilia of the Timavus; see R. Heinze, Virgils epische Technik3 (Stuttgart, 1957), 480 n. 1.) V.'s reference to the Timavus here, while serving to establish his patron's whereabouts, is hardly so simple: the Timavus was strange and portentous, a river of legend, down which Jason and the Argonauts had sailed on their improbable return; see H. Philipp, RE, 2nd ser., vi. 1244.
Editor’s Note
superas: 'sail past'; 'nauticus sermo est', DServ. on A. 1. 244, quoting Lucil. fr. 125 M. 'promontorium remis superamus Mineruae'; cf. Livy 26. 26. 1 'nauibus superato Leucata promunturio'. Octavian did not, so far as is known, sail past the Timavus; he probably began his campaign in 35 bc from the Liburnian port Senia (now Senj in Croatia), which lies to the south of the Timavus; see Introduction, n. 8, and map, p. 234.
Editor’s Note
7. oram … legis: the first extant occurrence of lego in this sense (TLL s.v. 1127. 54); the phrase is used metaphorically in G. 2. 44.
Editor’s Note
en … umquam: 1. 67 n.
Critical Apparatus
8–18 MPa;
Editor’s Note
8. tua dicere facta: 4. 54.
Editor’s Note
10. Sophocleo … coturno: the cothurnus (κόθορνος‎) was the high boot or buskin worn by actors in Greek tragedy, and hence stands for tragedy, here Sophoclean tragedy; cf. Hor. Carm. 2. 1. 11–12 (Pollio) 'grande munus / Cecropio repetes coturno'.
Editor’s Note
digna: 9. 35–6 n.
Critical Apparatus
11 desinam P: desinet Maω‎, DSeru.: desinit br
Editor’s Note
11. a te principium, tibi desinam: an allusion to the formula (as it had become) ʼΕκ Διὸς ἀρχώμεσθα‎; see Introduction, p. 236. More especially, V. had in mind two passages: Theocr. 17. 1 ʼΕκ Διὸς ἀρχώμεσθα καὶ ἐς Δία λήγετε Μοῖσαι‎, 'From Zeus let us begin, and with Zeus make end, Muses', and Il. 9. 96–8 (Nestor speaking) ʼΑτρεΐδη κύδιστε, ἄναξ ἀνδρῶν‎ ʼΑγάμεμνον‎, | ἐν σοὶ μὲν λήξω, σέο δ‎ʼ ἄρξομαι, οὕνεκα πολλῶν‎ | λαῶν ἐσσι ἄναξ‎, 'Most glorious son of Atreus, king of men Agamemnon, with you will I end, with you begin, for you are king of many peoples'. Note the metrical correspondence of a te to ἐν σοι‎̀‎, tibi to σέο‎1, and ἄρξομαι‎ (with the final syllable shortened in hiatus before the bucolic diaeresis) to desinam.
Editor’s Note
desinam: a prosodic hiatus unparalleled in V.; cf. the hiatus, also unparalleled in V., at A. 1. 405 'et uera incessu patuit dea. ille ubi matrem'. Hiatus occurs at the bucolic diaeresis several times in Theocritus; see Gow on 2. 83 ('usually accompanied, as here, by a sense-pause'). See also 2. 53 n. Desinet (see app. crit.) is evidently an attempt to remove the offence.
Editor’s Note
13. uictricis: cf. A. 3.54 'uictricia … arma' and, for such adjectives, see Wackernagel ii. 54.
Editor’s Note
hederam … lauros: 'nam uictores imperatores lauro, hedera coronantur poetae' (Serv.). See 7. 25 n.
Editor’s Note
serpere: Cicero, who likes to use this verb metaphorically, uses it once of the vine, De sen. 52 'serpentem multiplici lapsu et erratico'. The intertwining word-order is no doubt intentional.
Editor’s Note
14–16. Pastoral order is re-established after the interruption of 6–13. Damon and Alphesiboeus had driven afield several hours before sunrise, 'cum sole nondum orto iam lucet' (Censorinus 24. 2), as V., reusing 1. 15, urges real shepherds to do, G. 3. 324–6 'Luciferi primo cum sidere frigida rura / carpamus, dum mane nouum, dum gramina canent, / et ros in tenera pecori gratissimus herba'. Cf. Varro, RR 2. 2. 10 (flocks) 'aestate, quod cum prima luce exeunt pastum, propterea quod tunc herba roscida meridianam, quae est aridior, iucunditate praestat'.
Editor’s Note
16. incumbens tereti … oliuae: Servius, followed by La Cerda and some older commentators, thought a tree was meant. Other ancient readers disagreed: 'alii tereti oliuae baculum de oliua accipiunt' (DServ.). Shepherds have made their staves of olive-wood ever since Polyphemus: Od. 9. 319–21 μέγα ῥόπαλον‎ … | χλωρὸν ἐλαΐνεον τὸ μὲν ἔκταμεν, ὄφρα φοροίη‎ | αὐανθέν‎, 'a great staff of green olive-wood, which he cut to carry when dried'. Damon's posture is, however, unusual, for pastoral singers are usually seated while performing; see 3. 55 n. Perhaps V. was thinking of the solitary, lovelorn singer in Theocr. 3. 38 ᾀσεῦμαι ποτὶ τὰν πίτυν ὧδ‎ʼ ἀποκλινθείς‎, 'I will step aside under the pine here and sing' (Gow), where ἀποκλινθείς‎ has generally been understood to mean 'leaning against', and may have been so understood by V.
Editor’s Note
17. nascere praeque diem ueniens age, Lucifer, almum: 'ordo est nascere, Lucifer, praeueniensque age diem clarissimum' (DServ., Serv.). Cf. A. 2. 801–2 'iamque iugis summae surgebat Lucifer Idae / ducebatque diem', Ov. Fast. 5. 547–8 'quid solito citius liquido iubar aequore tollit / candida, Lucifero praeueniente, dies?'. For the tmesis see 6. 6 n., L. Mueller, De re metrica2 (Leipzig, 1894), 458–60, Housman on Manil. 1. 355.
Editor’s Note
nascere: used also by V. of the rising sun (G. 1. 441), and by Horace of the new moon (Carm. 3. 23. 2).
Editor’s Note
Lucifer: the Morning Star, that is, the planet Venus, when visible in the east before sunrise; Cic. De nat. deor. 2. 53 'stella Veneris, quae Φωσφόρος‎ Graece, Lucifer Latine dicitur cum antegreditur solem, cum subsequitur autem Ἕσπερος‎ʼ. That the Morning and Evening Star were one and the same was so well known in antiquity as to have become a poetic conceit, e.g. Catull. 62. 34–5 'nocte latent fures, quos idem saepe reuertens, / Hespere, mutato comprendis nomine Eous', where see Fordyce and Ellis. See also Mynors on G. 3. 324–6, Nisbet–Hubbard on Hor. Carm. 2. 9. 10.
Editor’s Note
almum: V. seems to have been the first to apply this adjective to dies and lux (TLL s.v. 1704. 41); cf. A. 5. 64 'diem … almum', 1. 306 'lux alma'. Here as bringing some relief from the ghastly night that Damon has suffered through.
Editor’s Note
17–60. Damon delivers a dramatic monologue (not unlike that of the unnamed goatherd in Theocr. 3 or Corydon in E. 2), impersonating a rejected suitor (32–5) who has lain awake during the night that precedes his girl's wedding to someone else. He prays for the interminable night to end; the Morning Star is either just rising or has not yet risen. He imagines the ceremony that will take place in the evening (29–30), passionately recalls his childhood memories of the girl (37–41), and, finally, after expressing his grief and bewilderment in a series of adynata, decides to commit suicide (52–60).
Editor’s Note
18–20. Nysa had sworn to be true for ever, their understanding ratified, to Damon's satisfaction, by vows of fidelity which she has now broken. Damon's reference to Nysa as his wife (18 'coniugis') embarrasses commentators ('it was as his wife that Damon loved her', Conington; 'an "Arcadian" wife, with whom vows had been exchanged (19–20) but no formal union solemnized', Coleman). But unlike Galatea (1. 30–2), Nysa seems a respectable country girl, if proud and false (but why believe a complaining lover?), who is now about to be married in style (29–30). The word coniunx occurs only in this E. (again in 1. 66 'coniugis') and owes its presence here not to the requirements of the immediate context, which it apparently disrupts, but to V.'s desire to relate Damon's song to the song of Alphesiboeus; see Introduction, p. 238. Under the circumstances, Servius' interpretation is probably as good as can be invented: 'non quae erat sed quae fore sperabatur'.
Editor’s Note
18. indigno … amore: so Damon feels it to be; unrequited love, as in 10. 10.
Editor’s Note
Nysae: a curious name, before V. attested only as the name of the Nymph who nursed Dionysus on Mt. Nysa; see Roscher's Lexikon s.v. 567.
Critical Apparatus
19–39 MPaV
Editor’s Note
19–20. Cf. Catull. 64. 188–91 (the abandoned Ariadne) 'non tamen ante mihi languescent lumina morte, / … / quam iustam a diuis exposcam prodita multam / caelestumque fidem postrema comprecer hora'.
Editor’s Note
19. quamquam nil testibus illis: 'sic hoc dicit tamquam iusiurandum inter eum et Nysam intercesserit' (DServ.). The impunity of perjured lovers is a commonplace of ancient poetry, e.g. Dioscorides 6. 3–4 G.–P. (= AP 5.52) κενὰ δ̓ ὅρκια‎· τῷ δ‎ʼ ἐφυλάχθη‎ | ἵμερος‎· ἡ δὲ θεῶν οὐ φανερὴ δύναμις‎, 'vain were her oaths, yet his love persisted; the power of the gods was not manifest', A. 4. 520–1 (Dido) 'tum, si quod non aequo foedere amantis / curae numen habet iustumque memorque, precatur', Ov. Am. 3. 3. 1 'Esse deos, i, crede: fidem iurata fefellit', Ars 1. 633–4 'Iuppiter ex alto periuria ridet amantum / et iubet Aeolios inrita ferre Notos'. See 3. 72–3 n.
Critical Apparatus
20 adloquar M1P2d
Editor’s Note
20. extrema moriens: extremely pathetic; echoed in his final line (60).
Editor’s Note
21. The refrain is reminiscent of that in Theocr. 1. 64 ἄρχετε βουκολικᾶς, Μοῖσαι φίλαι, ἄρχετ‎ʼ ἀοιδᾶς‎, 'Begin, dear Muses, begin the pastoral song'. See below, 61 n., 68 n., 109 n., and Introduction, pp. 237–8.
Editor’s Note
mea tibia: 1. 2 n.
Critical Apparatus
22 pinosque P2V
Editor’s Note
22. Maenalus: to explain 'Maenalios … uersus' in the refrain. (Carmina occurs at the same place in Alphesiboeus' song (69), although 'mea carmina' (68) requires no explanation.) Maenalus, a mountain sacred to Pan in Arcadia, is mentioned only once by Theocritus, in a prayer to Pan (1. 124). The adjective occurs twice in Callimachus, Hymn 3. 89 (quoted above, 3 n.) and 224. See E. 10, Introduction, p. 289.
Editor’s Note
argutum: cf. 7. 1.
Editor’s Note
pinusque loquentis: cf. Catull. 4. 12 ('comata silua') 'loquente saepe sibilum edidit coma', Manil. 3. 655–6 'totumque canora / uoce nemus loquitur', where Housman cites Petron. 120. 72–3 'non uerno persona cantu / mollia discordi strepitu uirgulta loquuntur', A. 11. 458 'dant sonitum rauci per stagna loquacia cycni'.
Editor’s Note
23. semper … semper: repetition with a shift of the ictus; see 6. 9 n.
Editor’s Note
amores: 'cantica de amoribus' (DServ.).
Critical Apparatus
24 primum Mb (ut uidetur, cf. E. ii 32; def. V)
Editor’s Note
24. Panaque, qui primus: 2. 32–3 n.
Editor’s Note
calamos: 2. 37 n.
Editor’s Note
26–8. Nysa is given in marriage to Mopsus—in such a topsy-turvy world what may we lovers not expect? Unnatural unions are a well-attested form of adynaton; cf. Hor. Epod. 16. 30–2 'nouaque monstra iunxerit libidine / mirus amor, iuuet ut tigris subsidere ceruis, / adulteretur et columba miluo' and see E. 4, Appendix, pp.147–8.
Editor’s Note
26. Mopso: the name of the younger singer in E. 5.
Editor’s Note
datur: old and common in this sense (TLL s.v. 1693. 51).
Editor’s Note
27. iam: 'soon', in contrast with what will happen later, 'aeuoque sequenti'.
Editor’s Note
grypes: griffins, fabulous animals, with the head and wings of an eagle and the body of a lion, who inhabit Scythia and guard its gold; between them and the one-eyed Arimaspian horsemen, who purloin the gold, there is constant warfare; see Aesch. Prom. 803–6, with Griffith's note. Grypomachies with horses are represented in Greek art; see K. Ziegler, RE vii. 1927, J. D. P. Bolton, Aristeas of Proconnesus (Oxford, 1962), 36–7.
Critical Apparatus
28 timidi P2Vω‎, Quint, ix 3. 6, Char. 269. 2, Prisc. v 7, Seru. hic et ad G. i 183: timidae M, Seru. ad A. v 122: timide P1ac
Editor’s Note
28. canibus … dammae: cf. Theocr. 1. 135 τὰς κύνας ὥλαφος ἕλκοι‎, 'let the stag worry the hounds' (Gow), one of a series of adynata imitated below, 52–6.
Editor’s Note
timidi … dammae: 'ne homoeoteleuton faceret dicendo timidae dammae' (DServ.); see TLL s.v. damma 14, Norden 406. Again in G. 3. 539; cf. G. 1. 183 'capti … talpae', with Mynors's note.
Editor’s Note
pocula: drinking-water, with no reference to cups, as in Columella 7. 10. 7 (for pigs) 'puteis extracta et large canalibus immissa praebenda sunt pocula'.
Editor’s Note
28a. This line, which does not appear in any of the capital MSS (see app. crit.), should be deleted along with the corresponding l. 76. See Introduction, p. 238; also O. Skutsch, BICS 18 (1971), 26, RPh 51 (1977), 366.
Critical Apparatus
28a uersum intercalarem hic habet γ‎, ita ut u. 76 respondeat; om. ceteri
Editor’s Note
29–30. The impending ceremony is described, although sarcastically and with much bitterness, in terms appropriate to a legal Roman marriage.
Editor’s Note
29. nouas … faces: torches for the wedding procession in the evening, the deductio, when the bride was conducted to her new home; cf. Catull. 61. 114–15 'tollite, o pueri, faces: / flammeum uideo uenire'. And nouas, 'as the occasion would doubtless seem to require new torches' (Conington).
Editor’s Note
incide faces: cut (wood for) torches; for similarly compressed expressions cf. A. 1. 552 'stringere remos', strip (boughs for) oars, Livy 33. 5. 4 'uallum caedere', cut (stakes for) a palisade, TLL s.v. caedo 57. 3.
Editor’s Note
30. nuces: walnuts were scattered among the crowd during the deductio; see Fordyce on Catull. 61. 121.
Editor’s Note
tibi: 'Haec repetitio, tibi ducitur uxor, tibi deserit Hesperus Oetam, iucunda est' (La Cerda).
Editor’s Note
Hesperus: this seems to be V.'s spelling (MV), though the Palatinus (P) has -os, for in 10. 77 all three capital MSS (MPR) have -us. Cf., however, Censorinus 24. 4 'stellae quam Plautus Vesperuginem, Ennius Vesperum, Vergilius Hesperon appellat', with Skutsch's note on Enn. Op. Inc. 29.
Editor’s Note
Oetam: a mountain in southernmost Thessaly, over the ridge of which the Evening Star rises in Latin poetry; cf. Catull. 62. 7 'nimirum Oetaeos ostendit noctifer ignes', with Fordyce's note. See also Suppl. Hell. 666. The Veronensis (V), a highly respectable witness, and the Verona scholiast have Oetan, which Sabbadini, Geymonat, and Coleman accept. It is possible that V. wrote Hesperus (or Hesperos) Oetan, but not probable, since this Greek ending is not securely attested before Ovid: Andromedan, Ars 1. 53, Met. 4. 671, 757 'Andromedan et tanti'; Electran, Fast. 4. 32, 174, Trist. 2. 395 'Electran et egentem'.
Editor’s Note
32–3. dum … / dumque … dumque: 'The repetition of dum, with or without asyndeton, is a characteristic Virgilian touch'—so Pease on A. 4. 53, where he cites, in addition to these lines, G. 1. 214, 2. 362–3, 3. 165, 325, 428, A. 1. 453–4, 494–5, 4. 336, 8. 580–1, 11. 671–2.
Critical Apparatus
34 demissaque P
Editor’s Note
34. hirsutumque supercilium promissaque barba: the shaggy brow belongs to Polyphemus in Theocr. 11. 31 λασία‎ … ὀφρύς‎, the jutting beard to the goatherd in Theocr. 3. 9 προγένειος‎, where see Gow. An iambic word is expected after hirsutumque, e.g. A. 1. 487 'tendentemque manus Priamum conspexit inermis'; see J. Hellegouarc'h, Le Monosyllabe dans l'hexamètre latin (Paris, 1964), 287–9. The uncouth rhythm may be taken as suggesting Damon's rough, unkempt appearance; cf. Hor. Epist. 1. 1. 94 'si curatus inaequali tonsore capillos'.
Editor’s Note
37–8. These lines are modelled on Theocr. 11. 25–7 (Polyphemus to Galatea) ἠράσθην μὲν ἔγωγε τεοῦς, κόρα, ἁνίκα πρᾶτον‎ | ἦνθες ἐμᾷ σὺν ματρὶ θέλοισ‎ʼ ὑακίνθινα φύλλα‎ | ἐξ ὄρεος δρέψασθαι, ἐγὼ δ‎ʼ ὁδὸν ἁγεμόνευον‎, 'I fell in love with you, maiden, when first you came with my mother to gather hyacinths on the hill, and I led the way'. See E. 2, Introduction, p. 63.
Editor’s Note
37. saepibus in nostris: Columella 5. 10. 1 'modum pomarii, priusquam semina seras, circummunire maceriis uel saepe uel fossa praecipio'.
Editor’s Note
roscida mala: cf. 4. 30 'roscida mella'. Ursinus compares Theocr. Epigr. 1. 1 Gow Τὰ ῥόδα τὰ δροσόεντα‎, 'The dew-drenched roses'.
Editor’s Note
38. cum matre: 'deest pronomen, et ideo uel huius uel puellae matrem intellegere possumus' (DServ.). La Cerda, Conington, and T. E. Page rather against his better judgment understand 'my mother'. 'The reference of "matre" is fixed by the passage in Theocr. ἐμᾷ σὺν ματρί‎ʼ (Conington)—as if V. could not, as he repeatedly does, modify Theocritus to suit his own purpose. Heyne, Wagner, and Forbiger remain prudently silent; Klingner and Coleman understand 'your mother'. Polyphemus' mother was the sea-nymph Thoösa (see Gow ad loc.), and when the Nereid Galatea first emerged from the sea with her to pick flowers on dry land, Polyphemus was their guide; but Damon's mother would hardly need to be shown around the family enclosure. V. identifies matre by placing the parenthetic dux ego uester eram before it (compare the position of ἐγὼ δ‎ʼ ὁδὸν ἁγεμόνευον‎), for the reference of uester is normally plural; see Housman, 'Vester = Tuus', CQ 3 (1909), 244–8 = Class. Papers, ii. 790–4. Nysa was very young then, too young and small to come without her mother, and Damon was only twelve. An overwhelming first experience of sexual passion, every detail of which remains vivid in memory—like Dante's passion for Beatrice (Vita nuova 2) or Byron's for Mary Duff (Journal, 26 Nov. 1813). But Damon's passion is only a fiction, a 'memory' of Theocritus.
Editor’s Note
39. alter ab undecimo: next after the eleventh, that is, the twelfth. Cf. 5. 49 'tu nunc eris alter ab illo' and see Housman on Manil. 4. 445.
Critical Apparatus
40–4 MPaV;
Editor’s Note
41. ut uidi, ut perii, ut me malus abstulit error: 'I saw, and I was lost, and madness carried me away'. As so often, V. had two passages in mind, one from each of the Idylls he was chiefly imitating in this Eclogue: Theocr. 2. 82 χὠς ἴδον, ὣς ἐμάνην, ὥς μοι πυρὶ θυμὸς ἰάφθη‎, 'I saw, and madness seized me, and my hapless heart was aflame' (Gow), and 3. 41–2 ἁ δ‎ʼ ʼΑταλάντα‎ | ὡς ἴδεν, ὥς ἐμάνη, ὥς ἐς βαθὺν ἅλατ‎ʼ ἔρωτα‎, 'and Atalanta saw, and frenzy seized her and deep in love she plunged' (Gow). The hiatus after ἐμάνη‎ may have prompted that after perii, but the same hiatus occurs several times elsewhere in the E.; see 3. 6 n. S. Timpanaro, Contributi di filologia e di storia della lingua latina (Rome, 1978), 219–87, demonstrates, in impressive detail, that the ancient, and still generally accepted, interpretation of this line is mistaken: 'unum ut (ut DServ.) est temporis, aliud quantitatis; nam hoc dicit: mox uidi, quemadmodum perii' (Serv.); 'uel primum ut postquam, duo sequentia pro admirandi significatione posita sunt' (DServ.). Cf. T. E. Page: 'It is usually rendered "when I saw, how I fell in love!" ' which saves the grammar but destroys the charm of the phrase, for this consists in the parallelism of ut … ut and the exact balance thus established between the ideas of "seeing" and "loving" ' ('il modesto ma stilisticamente fine commento di T. E. Page', Timpanaro 226). The three clauses, Timpanaro argues, must be correlative, as Heyne understood, 'cum vidi, tum statim amore exarsi'. Timpanaro points out, after La Cerda and others, that Ovid imitates V.'s line (and Theocr. 2. 82), Her. 12. 33 'et uidi et perii nec notis ignibus arsi'; 'Nel nostro caso, mentre Virgilio ha voluto mantenersi fedele al modello ellenistico a prezzo di un grecismo alquanto audace, Ovidio ha voluto rendere lo stesso concetto con un'espressione più facile e più latina' (278 n. 87). See Clausen 132 n. 15.
Editor’s Note
malus … error: 'definitio amoris' (Serv.); cf. Prop. 1. 13. 35 'qui tibi sit felix, quoniam nouus incidit, error', Ov. Am. 1. 10. 9–10 'animique resanuit error, / nec facies oculos iam capit ista meos'.
Critical Apparatus
43 qui a
Critical Apparatus
nudis P1a?b?: duris (cf. A. iv 366) MP2Vω‎
Editor’s Note
43. nunc scio quid sit Amor: cf. Theocr. 3. 15–16 νῦν ἔγνων τὸν Ἔρωτα‎· βαρὺς θεός‎· ἦ ῥα λεαίνας‎ | μαζὸν ἐθήλαζεν, δρυμῷ τέ νιν ἔτραφε μάτηρ‎, 'Now I know Love, and a cruel god he is. Surely he sucked the dug of a lioness, and in the wildwood his mother reared him'.
Editor’s Note
scio: iambic shortening, again in A. 3. 602; in A. 10. 904 -o is elided before a short vowel, 'scio acerba'. Cf. below, 107 'nescio quid', 3. 103 'nescio quis', and see Austin on A. 2. 735.
Editor’s Note
43–5. Cf. A. 4. 365–7 (Dido to Aeneas) 'nec tibi diua parens, generis nec Dardanus auctor, / perfide, sed duris genuit te cautibus horrens / Caucasus Hyrcanaeque admorunt ubera tigres', with Pease's note. The pedigree of Love was notoriously uncertain; see Gow on Theocr. 13. 2, D. Page, Sappho and Alcaeus (Oxford, 1955), 271.
Critical Apparatus
44 Maros MP (quid a, latet): Tmarus V: Ismarus Seruii codd.
Editor’s Note
44. aut Tmaros aut Rhodope aut extremi Garamantes: cf. Theocr. 7. 77 ἢ‎ Ἃθω ἢ Ῥοδόπαν ἢ Καύκασον ἐσχατόωντα‎, 'or Athos or Rhodope or remotest Caucasus', G. 1. 332 'aut Atho aut Rhodopen aut alta Ceraunia telo'.
Editor’s Note
Tmaros: or Tomaros (see Schwyzer, Griech. Gramm. i. 278), a mountain range dominating the western side of the valley in which the oracle of Dodona was situated; see E. Polaschek, RE, 2nd ser., vi. 1697–8, D. M. Nicol, G&R, ns 5 (1958), 128–43, N. G. L. Hammond, Epirus (Oxford, 1967), 168–9. The name is first attested in Pindar, Paean 6. 109 Τομάρου‎, but for V. it no doubt had a Callimachean colouring, Aet. 23. 3 Pf. ἐνὶ Τμαρίοις οὔρεσιν‎, Hymn 6. 51 ὤρεσιν ἐν Τμαρίοισιν‎, 'in the mountains of Tmaros'.
Editor’s Note
Rhodope: 6. 30 n.
Editor’s Note
extremi Garamantes: tribesmen of the eastern Sahara, here introduced into poetry; see Pease on A. 4. 198 and cf. Catull. 11. 2 'extremos … Indos', A. 6. 794 'super et Garamantas et Indos'; also Od. 1. 23 (Αἰθίοπας‎) ἔσχατοι ἀνδρῶν‎, '(the Ethiopians) remote from men', A. 8. 727 'extremique hominum Morini'.
Critical Apparatus
45–73 MPa
Editor’s Note
45. nec generis nostri puerum nec sanguinis: 'no boy of our breed or blood' (Lee); inhuman therefore ('nihil habentem in se humanitatis', Serv.) and savage. See McKeown on Ov. Am. 1. 1. 25–6.
Editor’s Note
edunt: the present tense, as often in Greek and Latin poetry (though more often in Greek and not attested before V. in Latin) of birth and upbringing; cf. G. 1. 279 creat, A. 8. 141 generat, 10.518 educat, Prop. 4. 4. 54 nutrit, and see Tränkle 73–4, Schwyzer–Debrunner, Griech. Gramm. ii. 272.
Editor’s Note
47–50. 'Pitiless Love once taught a mother to pollute / Her hands with blood of sons; you too were cruel, mother. / Who was more cruel, the mother or that wicked boy? / That wicked boy was; yet you too were cruel, mother' (Lee). This is the most straightforward way of taking the Latin and agrees with Servius: 'utitur autem optima moderatione; nam nec totum Amori imputat, ne defendat parricidam, nec totum matri, ne Amorem eximat culpa, sed et illam quae paruit et illum qui coegit incusat'. Perhaps no two lines of V., certainly no two in the E., have been so persistently or so violently misconstrued as 49–50; for discussion see Conington, and Coleman, and especially J. Vahlen, Opuscula Academica, ii (Leipzig, 1908), 526–44. Ancient scholars, too, were perplexed, many of whom, says DServius, attempted to extenuate the mother's guilt with this punctuation: 'ille, improbus ille puer crudelis; tu quoque, mater'. But why so much trouble with these apparently simple lines? Two reasons may be offered: (i) such deliberate frivolity seems to strike a wrong note in Damon's song ('Inest enim ieiuni et inepti lusus nescio quid', Heyne); and (ii) the style or manner offends: minimal reference to the story ('et bene fabulam omnibus notam per transitum tetigit', Serv.), sympathetic apostrophe (cf. 6. 47, 52), displaced emphasis (see 6. 79–81 n.), formal repetition (see 4. 58–9 n.)—in a word, Callimachean; and how else was a New Poet to tell an old story?
Editor’s Note
47. saeuus Amor: famously, Medea had been wounded by savage love, Enn. Medea exul 254 V.2 = 216 J. 'Medea animo aegro amore saeuo saucia'. Cf. Prop. 3. 19. 17–18 'nam quid Medeae referam, quo tempore matris / iram natorum caede piauit amor?', Ov. Trist. 2. 387–8 (Medea is not named) 'tingeret ut ferrum natorum sanguine mater, / concitus a laeso fecit amore dolor'. See Clausen 40–1.
Editor’s Note
48. commaculare: in this non-metaphorical sense occurs again in classical Latin only in Tac. Ann. 1. 39. 4 'legatus populi Romani Romanis in castris sanguine suo altaria deum commaculauisset' (TLL s.v. 1818. 75). The simple form, however, is fairly common, e.g. A. 3. 28–9 'huic atro liquuntur sanguine guttae / et terram tabo maculant'.
Editor’s Note
49. improbus: cf. A. 4. 412 'improbe Amor', with Pease's note; also see Mynors on G. 1. 145–6.
Editor’s Note
52–6. Damon has no desire to go on living in such an impossible world (cf. above, 27–8). His adynata are modelled on those of another victim of love, Daphnis in Theocr. 1. 132–6 νῦν ἴα μὲν φορέοιτε βάτοι, φορέοιτε δ‎ʼ ἄκαναθαι‎, | ἁ δὲ καλὰ νάρκισσος ἐπ‎ʼ ἀρκεύθοισι κομάσαι‎, | πάντα δ‎ʼ ἄναλλα γένοιτο, καὶ ἁ πίτυς ὄχνας ἐνείκαι‎, | Δάφνις ἐπεὶ θνάσκει, καὶ τὰς κύνας ὤλαφος‎ ἕλκοι‎, | κἠξ ὀρέων τοὶ σκῶπες ἀηδόσι γαρύσαιντο‎, 'Now violets bear, ye brambles, and, ye thorns, bear violets, and let the fair narcissus bloom on the juniper. Let all be changed, and let the pine bear pears since Daphnis is dying. Let the stag worry the hounds, and from the mountains let the owls cry to nightingales' (Gow). V.'s imitation is accurate but subtle; see L. Braun, Philologus, 113 (1969), 292–3. On the rarity of botanical adynata see D. O. Ross, Jr., Virgil's Elements: Physics and Poetry in the Georgics (Princeton, 1987), 107.
Editor’s Note
52. ultro: emphasizing the reversal of their natural roles; cf. 3. 66.
Editor’s Note
52–3. aurea durae / mala ferant quercus: impossibilities in the real world will be realized in the Golden Age, 4. 30 'durae quercus sudabunt roscida mella'. Cf. 3. 71 'aurea mala'.
Editor’s Note
53. narcisso floreat alnus: V. has transferred Theocritus' narcissus to the alder. Cf. Lucr. 5. 911–12 (the first extant Latin adynaton) 'aurea tum dicat per terras flumina uulgo / fluxisse et gemmis florere arbusta suesse'; gemmis, 'precious stones', the metaphorical (and prevalent) sense is here especially apt; see 7. 48 n. See also TLL s.v. floreo 917. 36–7.
Editor’s Note
54. pinguia corticibus sudent electra myricae: cf. Catull. 64. 106 'conigeram sudanti cortice pinum' and see Clausen, BICS, Suppl. 51 (1988), 17 n. 17. The tree that exudes thick amber is not the tamarisk but the poplar (6. 63 n.).
Editor’s Note
55. certent et cycnis ululae: cf. Theocr. 5. 136–7 οὐ θεμιτόν‎ … ποτ‎ʼ ἀηδόνα κίσσας ἐρίσδειν‎, | οὐδ‎ʼ ἔποπας κύκνοισι‎, 'it is not right for jays to contend with a nightingale, nor hoopoes with swans', Lucr. 3. 6–7 'quid enim contendat hirundo / cycnis?'
Editor’s Note
certent: 5. 8 n.
Editor’s Note
cycnis: 9. 29 n.
Editor’s Note
55–6. sit Tityrus Orpheus, / Orpheus in siluis, inter delphinas Arion: 'uilissimus rusticus Orpheus putetur in siluis, Arion uero inter delphinas' (Serv.). Arion, here a sort of marine Orpheus, was thrown overboard by sailors but carried ashore on the back of a dolphin who had been charmed by his music; for the story see Herod. 1. 23–4, Ov. Fast. 2. 79–118. L. P. Wilkinson, CR 50 (1936), 120–1, conjectures that V.'s dolphins (there are none in Theocritus) come from Archilochus, fr. 122. 6–9 W., the first extant adynaton.
  Nonnus has a line oddly similar to 1. 56 in shape, Dionys. 16. 135 Ἄρτεμις ἐν σκοπέλοισι καὶ ἐν θαλάμοις‎ 'Αφροδίτη‎, (that you may appear) 'Artemis among the rocks and in the bedroom Aphrodite'.
Critical Apparatus
58 fiat MPbf?r, DSeru.: fiant aω‎
Editor’s Note
58. omnia uel medium fiat mare: for the singular verb cf. Dirae 46 'cinis omnia fiat', Ov. Met. 1. 292 'omnia pontus erat', and see Löfstedt ii. 119. It is unnecessary to assume, with Conington and T. E. Page, that V. misread the variant ἔναλλα‎, 'changed', in Theocr. 1. 134 as ἐνάλια‎, 'in the sea'; see Gow ad loc.
Editor’s Note
medium: adds a slight emphasis; cf. Plaut. Truc. 527–8 'si hercle me ex medio mari / sauium petere tuom iubeas', Lucr. 4. 1100 'in medioque sitit torrenti flumine potans', A. 10. 305 (puppis) 'soluitur atque uiros mediis exponit in undis' (TLL s.v. 585. 44).
Editor’s Note
uiuite siluae: 'farewell the woods', 'ualete' (Serv.); perhaps suggested by Theocr. 1. 115–18. Cf. Hor. Serm. 2. 5. 110 'uiue ualeque', Epist. 1. 6. 67 'uiue, uale'.
Editor’s Note
59–60. praeceps aërii specula de montis in undas / deferar: cf. Theocr. 3. 25–6 τάν βαίταν ἀποδὺς ἐς κύματα τηνῶ ἁλεῦμαι‎, | ὦπερ τὼς θύννως σκοπιάζεται Ὄλπις ὁ γριπεύς‎, 'I will strip off my cloak and leap into the waves from the cliff whence Olpis, the fisherman, watches for the tunny' (Gow). And in Hermesianax, Leontion fr. 3 Powell, Menalcas, rejected by Euhippe, leaps to his death from a cliff.
Editor’s Note
59. aërii specula de montis: cf. Catull. 68. 57 'in aerii … uertice montis' and see TLL s.v. aerius 1063. 18. For the anastrophe of the preposition cf. Lucr. 3. 1088 'tempore de mortis' and see Mynors on G. 4. 333 'thalamo sub fluminis'; see also Munro on Lucr. 3. 140, Housman on Manil. 1. 245, and, for the anastrophe of prepositions in general, Wackernagel ii. 196–200.
Editor’s Note
60. extremum … morientis: echoing 1. 20, 'extrema moriens'.
Editor’s Note
munus: probably not Damon's song (Heyne, Coleman) but his death, which he imagines will give pleasure to Nysa; see above, 59–60 n., and cf. Theocr. 3. 27 καἴ κα δὴ‎ ʼποθάνω, τό γε μὲν τεὸν ἁδὺ τέτυκται‎, 'And if I die, at least your pleasure will have been done', 54 (the singer, finally, will lie down and die and be eaten by wolves) ὡς μέλι τοι γλυκὺ τοῦτο κατὰ βρόχθοιο γένοιτο‎, 'And sweet as honey in the throat may this be to you'. Cf. also A. 4. 429 'extremum hoc miserae det munus amanti'.
Editor’s Note
61. The refrain is modelled on that in Theocr. 1. 127 λήγετε βουκολικᾶς, Μοῖσαι, ἴτε λήγετ‎ʼ ἀοιδᾶς‎, 'Cease, Muses, come cease the pastoral song', which replaces the earlier refrain ἄρχετε βουκολικᾶς, Μοῖσαι φίλαι, ἄρχετ‎ʼ ἀοιδᾶς‎, 'Begin, dear Muses, begin the pastoral song', as Thyrsis' song draws to a close; see above, 21 n. So here desine replaces incipe.
Editor’s Note
62. responderit: maintains the fiction of a singing-match; see above, 3 n., and cf. 7. 5 'respondere parati'.
Critical Apparatus
63 possimus cr (cf. E. vii 23)
Editor’s Note
63. dicite, Pierides: cf. 6. 13 'Pergite, Pierides'. The poet unexpectedly appeals to the Muses for help, as though recalling the second song were beyond his unaided powers; see 7. 19 n. In much the same way—'si parua licet componere magnis'—G. 3 breaks in the middle and the second half begins with an invocation, or rather, a digression (284–94), in which V. displays great art and artfulness while questioning his ability to render poetic the care of sheep and goats.
Editor’s Note
non omnia possumus omnes: cf. Lucil. 218 M. 'non omnia possumus omnes', a proverb 'in the typical form of the paroemiac' (Fraenkel on Aesch. Ag. 1527). Cf. e.g. Theocr. 15. 62 πείρᾳ θην πάντα τελεῖται‎, 'everything's done by trying' (Gow), and see Gow on Theocr. 5. 38, McLennan on Callim. Hymn 1. 9. For the sentiment, which is as old as Homer, see Otto, no. 1288. Cf. 7. 23.
Editor’s Note
64–109. Alphesiboeus impersonates an unnamed country-woman—and, surprisingly, her assistant (105–6)—as she performs a magic ceremony in the hope of compelling her absent 'husband' to return home from town. Alphesiboeus' song is modelled more or less closely on Theocr. 2. 1–63: the preparations of Simaetha, seduced and abandoned, for a magic ceremony, and her incantation. There is nothing pastoral about Theocritus' Idyll, however; Simaetha lives in a town near the sea, and her faithless lover, Delphis, frequents the local wrestling-school. V. necessarily adapted his imitation to the pastoral mode: hence the rural setting, with a hint of the opposition between town and country; the names Amaryllis and Daphnis; the elaborate, pathetic simile of the weary heifer (V. is more self-consciously 'poetic' than Theocritus); and, finally, though perhaps more rustic than pastoral, mention of a werewolf and crops spirited away. For the structure of Alphesiboeus' song and its relation to Damon's song and Simaetha's incantation see Introduction, pp. 237–8.
Editor’s Note
64–82. Cf. Apul. Apol. 30 'at si Vergilium legisses, profecto scisses alia quaeri ad hanc rem solere; ille enim, quantum scio, enumerat uittas mollis et uerbenas pinguis et tura mascula et licia discolora, praeterea laurum fragilem, limum durabilem, ceram liquabilem'.
Editor’s Note
64. effer aquam: the water, it seems, is to be brought out into the atrium, where the altar stands in the open not far from the outer door of the house (101, 107). The command is addressed to her assistant, whose name, the reader presently learns, is Amaryllis (77); see 2. 10 n. So Simaetha bids Thestylis bring her the bay-leaves and love-charms, Theocr. 2. 1 Πᾷ μοι ταὶ δάφναι‎; φέρε, Θεστυλί‎. πᾷ δὲ τὰ φίλτρα‎; Two is the usual number—a woman and her assistant or accomplice—in such a scene; cf., besides Theocritus 2, the fragment of Sophron's mime (D. L. Page, Select Papyri (Loeb Classical Library, iii. 328–31), Hor. Epod. 5, Serm. 1. 8.
Editor’s Note
molli cinge haec altaria uitta: cf. Theocr. 2. 2 στέψον τὰν κελέβαν φοινικέῳ οἰὸς ἀώτῳ‎, 'Wreathe the bowl with fine crimson wool' (Gow). Both wool and crimson, as Gow observes ad loc., have apotropaic power. Cf. e.g. Prop. 4. 6. 6 'terque focum circa laneus orbis eat', Tac. Hist. 4. 53. 2 'spatium omne, quod templo dicabatur, euinctum uittis coronisque'.
Editor’s Note
molli: 'lanea scilicet' (DServ.).
Editor’s Note
65. uerbenas: boughs or plants used for decorating the altar; see Nisbet–Hubbard on Hor. Carm. 1. 19. 14. Boughs of olive, bay, and myrtle are mentioned in the magical papyri; see A. Abt, Die Apologie des Apuleius von Madaura und die antike Zauberei (Giessen, 1908), 145–6.
Editor’s Note
adole: an old ritual word meaning 'to set on fire'; cf. Lucr. 4. 1236–7 'multo sanguine … / conspergunt aras adolentque altaria donis', A. 3. 546–7 'rite / Iunoni Argiuae iussos adolemus honores'. See A. Ernout, Philologica (Paris, 1946), 53–8, and Mynors on G. 4. 379.
Editor’s Note
pinguis: full of sap, good for burning; cf. 7.49.
Editor’s Note
mascula tura: the choicest frankincense, white globules greasy within when crushed and quick-burning (Dioscorides, De mat. med. 1. 68. 1 λίβανος‎ … πρωτεύει δὲ ὁ ἄρρην‎ …); Pliny, NH 12. 61 'masculum aliqui putant a specie testium dictum', where Ernout remarks: 'L'expression est demeurée en français: oliban ou encens mâle'.
Editor’s Note
66. coniugis: in her view, though hardly in a legal sense; see above, 18–20 n.
Editor’s Note
magicis … sacris: the first extant occurrence of the adjective in Latin; cf. A. 4. 493 'magicas … artis'.
Editor’s Note
66–7. sanos auertere … / … sensus: she wishes Daphnis again to be madly in love with her, not, as he now is, heart-whole and indifferent; cf. Catull. 83. 3–4 'si nostri oblita taceret, / sana esset'. So Simaetha wishes Delphis to return to her 'like a madman' (Theocr. 2. 51 μαινομένῳ ἴκελος‎) from the wrestling-school.
Editor’s Note
67. nihil hic nisi carmina desunt: for the attraction of the verb cf. Ov. Trist. 1. 2. 1 'quid enim nisi uota supersunt?' and see Löfstedt ii. 117.
Editor’s Note
68. ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin: see above, 21 n., and cf. the refrain of Simaetha's incantation, Theocr. 2. 17 ἶυγξ, ἔλκε τὺ τῆνον ἐμὸν ποτὶ δῶμα τὸν ἄνδρα‎, 'My magic wheel, draw to my house that man of mine'.
Editor’s Note
69–71. carmina … / carminibus … / … cantando: elegantly imitated by Tibullus, 1. 8. 19–21 'cantus uicinis fruges traducit ab agris, / cantus et iratae detinet anguis iter, / cantus et e curru lunam deducere temptat'. The omnipotence of charms, carmina, is a commonplace of later Latin poetry; see Pease on A. 4. 487.
Editor’s Note
69. deducere lunam: drawing down the moon, 'the most famous and picturesque charm in all antiquity' (K. F. Smith on Tib. 1. 2. 43). It was always a love charm, as Smith notes, associated with Thessaly, a land of magic, and, in the later tradition, often attributed to Medea. See D. E. Hill, 'The Thessalian Trick', RhM 116 (1973), 221–38, Fedeli on Prop. 1. 1. 19.
Critical Apparatus
70 Vlixis aω‎ (Olyxis titulus Pompeianus, C.I.L. iv 1982)
Editor’s Note
70. Circe: Simaetha prays that her drugs may be no less potent than those of Circe or Medea (Theocr. 2. 15–16).
Editor’s Note
Vlixi: for the form of the genitive see M. Leumann, MH 2 (1945), 245–7, 251–2 = Kleine Schriften (Zurich, 1959), 116–18, 122–4.
Editor’s Note
71. frigidus … anguis: 3. 93 n.
Editor’s Note
cantando rumpitur anguis: by a charm or incantation that causes the snake to swell up until it bursts; cf. Lucil. 575–6 M. 'iam disrumpetur, medius iam, ut Marsus colubras / disrumpit cantu, uenas cum extenderit omnis', Pomponius 118 R.3 'mirum ni haec Marsa est, in colubras callet cantiunculam', Ov. Med.fac. 39 'nec mediae Marsis finduntur cantibus angues', and see K. F. Smith on Tib. 1. 8. 20, Abt (above, 65 n.), 127–8. The Marsi, who still retain their ancient fame as snake-charmers, 'serpari' (see H. V. Morton, A Traveller in Southern Italy (London, 1969), 36–42), were believed to be descended, as V., with his interest in primitive Italy, would have known, from a son of Circe; so Pliny, NH 7. 15 'in Italia Marsorum genus durat, quos a Circae filio ortos ferunt', 25. 11, Gellius 16. 11. 1.
  For the construction cantando rumpitur, with the gerund implying a subject other than that of the verb to which it is attached, cf. G. 2. 239 'mansuescit arando', 250 'lentescit habendo', 3. 215 'uritque uidendo', 454 'uiuitque tegendo', A. 12. 46 'aegrescitque medendo', and see Munro on Lucr. 1. 312 'anulus in digito subter tenuatur habendo'.
Editor’s Note
73–4. terna tibi haec primum triplici diuersa colore / licia circumdo: 'First with these triple threads in separate colours three / I bind you' (Lee)—'id est tria alba, tria rosea, et tria nigra' (DServ.), the colours of Hecate; see Abt (above, 65 n.), 148–50, 156, S. Eitrem, Gnomon, 2 (1926), 97. 'Fairies red, black, white' were believed to exist in Ireland; see Samuel Johnson on Shakespeare, Macbeth, iv. i. 1. The number three and its multiples play a large part in Roman and Greek ritual and magic; see Pease on A. 4. 510, Gow on Theocr. 2. 43.
Editor’s Note
73. tibi: explained by effigiem (75). 'In all enchantments that which is done to the image of a person is supposed to affect the person himself: the threads which bind the image will also bind Daphnis' (T. E. Page). Such images were often made of wax, e.g. Hor. Epod. 17. 76 'cereas imagines'. For the use of images or puppets in witchcraft see Pease on A. 4. 508, Gow on Theor. 2. 28.
Critical Apparatus
74–109 MPa
Editor’s Note
74. licia: an old word used in legal formulae (TLL s.v. 1373. 64); here first in a magic ritual (TLL s.v. 1374. 12), but probably in common use.
Editor’s Note
altaria circum: A. 2. 515, 4. 145, where see Pease, 8. 285. V. likes to place this preposition at the end of the line with a neuter plural preceding—a pattern found twice in Lucretius, 1. 937 ( = 4. 12) 'pocula circum', 4. 220 'litora circum'. And here 'circum / … duco' echoes 'circumdo'.
Editor’s Note
75. deus: 'aut quicumque superorum, aut Hecaten dicit' (Serv.). Cf. Theocr. 2. 28 ὡς τοῦτον τὸν κηρὸν ἐγὼ σὺν δαίμονι τάκω‎, 'As, with the goddess's aid, I melt this wax' (Gow). The goddess is Hecate.
Editor’s Note
impare: 'impare autem propter metrum ait' (Serv.); see TLL s.v. 516. 73.
Editor’s Note
76. See above, 28a n. In Catull. 64 the refrain was interpolated after 1. 377, causing the Oxford MS to omit 11. 379–81.
Editor’s Note
77–8. Cf. Theocr. 2. 18–21 ἄλφιτά τοι πρᾶτον πυρὶ τάκεται‎. ἀλλ‎ʼ ἐπίπασσε‎, | Θεστυλί‎. δειλαία, πᾷ τὰς φρένας ἐκπεπότασαι‎; | ἦ ῥά γέ θην, μυσαρά, καὶ τὶν ἐπίχαρμα τέτυγμαι‎; | πάσσ‎ʼ ἅμα καὶ λέγε ταῦτα‎· "τὰ Δέλφιδος ὀστία πάσσω‎",
'First barley groats smoulder on the fire. Nay, strew them on, Thestylis. Poor fool, whither have thy wits taken wing? Am I become a mock, then, even to thee, wretch? Strew them on, and say the while, "I strew the bones of Delphis" ' (Gow).
Editor’s Note
77. necte tribus nodis ternos, Amarylli, colores: 'It seems clear from the use of the distributive ternos and necte "twine" that each knot is to be twined with three colours … the use of terna, triplici line 73 and ternos necte here certainly suggests that Virgil was not thinking of single threads but of threads each twined with three differently-coloured strands' (T. E. Page). Cf. Petron. 131. 4 'illa de sinu licium protulit uarii coloris filis intortum ceruicemque uinxit meam'.
Editor’s Note
necte … nodis: for the connection of these words, which may in fact be connected (Ernout–Meillet, Dict. étym. s.v.), cf. Cic. Arat. fr. 32. 4 Soubiran 'conectere nodum', A. 12. 603 'nodum … nectit', and see T. E. V. Pearce, CQ, ns 20 (1970), 154–5.
Editor’s Note
78. modo: with 'a colouring of impatience' (Mynors on G. 3. 73).
Editor’s Note
80–1. limus ut hic durescit, et haec ut cera liquescit / uno eodemque igni, sic nostro Daphnis amore: cf. Theocr. 2. 28–9 ὡς τοῦτον τὸν κηρὸν ἐγὼ σὺν δαίμονι τάκω‎, | ὣς τάκοιθ‎ʼ ὑπ‎ʼ ἔρωτος ὁ Μύνδιος αὐτίκα Δέλφις‎, 'As I melt this wax by the goddess's aid, so may Delphis the Myndian at once melt with love', where Gow comments: 'It is however possible that the wax is, in Simaetha's rite, not an image at all but a symbol, like the bay and the barley-groats'. True, κηρός‎ is unqualified, as is cera, but Abt (above, 65 n.), 156–7, remarks, with reference to Theocritus and V., that the wax used in such a ceremony was traditionally in the shape of a human being ('Aber die gesamte sonstige Überlieferung spricht von geformtem Wachs, von einem Wachsbilde'). La Cerda, observing that Canidia uses two images in Hor. Serm. 1. 8. 30–3, one of wool representing herself, and the other of wax representing the faithless lover whom she means to torture to death, supposes that Daphnis' 'wife' also uses two images, but both representing Daphnis, one of wax, which she first binds and carries around the altar (75 effigiem) and then melts, and the other of clay. As fire hardens clay and melts wax, such, she prays, 'let the soul of cruel Daphnis be— / Hard to the rest of women, soft to me' (Dryden). This, the generally accepted interpretation, is as old as the tenth century (and no doubt much older), for it is found in the Vaticanus Reginensis 1495 (R) of Servius; see Thilo's app. crit. ad loc.
  There is another interpretation, however, that of DServ.: 'se de limo facit, Daphnidem de cera', which was adopted by H. J. Rose, The Eclogues of Vergil (Berkeley, 1942), 157, and has recently been defended by C. A. Faraone, CP 84 (1989), 294–300. Faraone 'can find no parallels … for a spell that attempts simultaneously to change a victim into diametrically opposed states, such as hard and soft' (295); even so, it is easier to imagine V. manipulating the practice of magic for his own purpose—hence perhaps the emphasis 'uno eodemque igni'—than it is to intrude Daphnis' abandoned 'wife' into a passage that has no room for her.
Editor’s Note
80. limus ut hic durescit, et haec ut cera liquescit: this artful line, with its parallel clauses and rhyming words, in which ictus and accent coincide (see 1. 70 n.), has been designed to suggest the assonantal, accentual character of primitive spells or charms (carmina), e.g. 'terra pestem teneto, salus hic maneto' (Varro, RR 1. 2. 27), 'nouum uetus uinum bibo, nouo ueteri morbo medeor' (Varro, LL 6. 21). For a collection of examples from Latin, Greek, and German see Norden, Die antike Kunstprosa (Leipzig, 1898), ii. 819–24. V. may also be indebted here to Lucr. 1. 305–6 'suspensae in litore uestes / uuescunt, eaedem dispansae in sole serescunt'.
Editor’s Note
81. uno eodemque igni: cf. A. 10.487 'una eademque uia', 12. 847 'uno eodemque … partu'.
Editor’s Note
82. molam: salt mixed with spelt, mola salsa; see Pease on A. 4. 517.
Editor’s Note
fragilis … lauros: 'brittle', as in Lucr. 6. 112 'fragilis <sonitus> chartarum', Prop. 4. 7. 12 (Cynthia's ghost) 'pollicibus fragiles increpuere manus'. Cf. Theocr. 2. 24 χὠς αὕτα λακεῖ μέγα καππυρίσασα‎, 'And as this (the bay leaf) crackles catching fire'. 'The extent to which laurel crackles when it burns is proverbial', K. F. Smith on Tib. 2. 5. 81 'et succensa sacris crepitet bene laurea flammis', quoting Lucr. 6. 154–5 'nec res ulla magis quam Phoebi Delphica laurus / terribili sonitu flamma crepitante crematur'. Cf. also Ov. Fast. 1. 344 'et non exiguo laurus adusta sono' (La Cerda).
Editor’s Note
bitumine: cf. Hor. Epod. 5. 81–2 'quam non amore sic meo flagres uti / bitumen atris ignibus' and see G. Tabarroni, Enc. Virg. s.v. bitumen.
Editor’s Note
83. Daphnis me malus urit, ego hanc in Daphnide laurum: a line modelled on Theocr. 2. 23 Δέλφις ἔμ‎ʼ ἀνίασεν‎· ἐγὼ δ‎ʼ ἐπὶ Δέλφιδι δάφναν‎ | αἴθω‎, 'Delphis brought trouble on me, and I for Delphis burn this bay' (Gow). Gow on Theocr. 2. 1: 'Bay however is not otherwise associated with love charms except at Virg. E. 8. 82, Prop. 2. 28. 36, and both passages seem dependent on T.'; cf. Serv.: 'aut intellegamus supra Daphnidis effigiem eam laurum incendere propter nominis similitudinem'.
Editor’s Note
85–8. No doubt, as La Cerda notices, V. was thinking of Lucretius' pathetic description of a cow looking for her lost calf (2. 352–66), and incorporates, as if to alert his reader, a Lucretian phrase, 87 'propter aquae riuum' (2. 30, 5. 1393).
Editor’s Note
85. qualis cum fessa …: the construction is qualis amor buculam tenet cum ….
Editor’s Note
86. bucula: first attested here and again in G. 1. 375, where Mynors remarks that words for domesticated animals tend to be diminutive in form. See also Axelson 40.
Critical Apparatus
87 procumbit MP2ω‎, Macrob. vi 2. 20: concumbit P1a
Editor’s Note
87–8. uiridi procumbit in ulua / perdita, nec serae meminit decedere nocti: cf. G. 3. 466–7 (a sheep) 'medio procumbere campo / pascentem et serae solam decedere nocti'.
Editor’s Note
88. perdita, nec serae meminit decedere nocti: a line borrowed, but not the pathos, which is V.'s own, from Varius' De morte (written in 44 or the first part of 43 bc; see A. S. Hollis, CQ, ns 27 (1977), 187–8) describing the pursuit of an aged doe by a Cretan hound, FPL fr. 4. 5–6 Büchner 'non amnes illam medii, non ardua tardant, / perdita nec serae meminit decedere nocti'. Varius' hound has become a heifer enamoured of a young bull whom she pursues through the groves and clearings until finally, late at night, she sinks down exhausted, 'amore consumpta' (Serv.). For Varius see 9. 35 n.; for lovesick animals, 3. 100 n.
Editor’s Note
nec meminit: for 'not remembering' to perform a habitual action where no question of memory is involved see Mynors on G. 1. 399–400 'non ore solutos / immundi meminere sues iactare maniplos'.
Editor’s Note
89. talis amor: see above, 5 n.
Editor’s Note
mederi: cf. 10. 60.
Editor’s Note
91. exuuias: pieces of clothing left behind by Daphnis; cf. A. 4. 496, with Pease's note. In Theocr. 2. 53–4, Simaetha shreds the fringe of Delphis' cloak and throws it into the fire.
Editor’s Note
perfidus: cf. A. 4. 305, with Pease's note, and see Clausen 47.
Editor’s Note
92. pignora cara sui: 'dear pledges of himself' (she loves him still, despite his treachery) which she buries under the threshold. In Theocr. 2. 59–60, Simaetha orders Thestylis to knead magic herbs over the threshold of Delphis. The door or any part of it was efficacious in ancient magic; see M. B. Ogle, 'The House-Door in Greek and Roman Religion and Folk-Lore', AJP 32 (1911), 251–71.
Editor’s Note
93. debent: cf. A. 12. 317 'Turnum debent haec iam mihi sacra'.
Editor’s Note
95. has herbas atque haec … uenena: 'these poisonous plants'; described by Mynors on G. 2. 192 as 'a hendiadyoin of closer definition (epexegesis)'. So 2. 8, G. 1. 106, 4. 56, 388–9, A. 1. 61. Cf. Hor. Epod. 5. 21–2 'herbasque, quas Iolcos atque Hiberia / mittit uenenorum ferax', A. 4. 514 'pubentes herbae nigri cum lacte ueneni', Tib. 2. 4. 55–6 'quidquid habet Circe, quidquid Medea ueneni, / quidquid et herbarum Thessala terra gerit', where K. F. Smith remarks: 'The distinction between a drug, a poison, and a magic philtre tends to disappear as we approach the primitive stage of popular belief'.
Editor’s Note
96. ipse … Moeris: 'a noted country wizard' (Conington); non-Theocritean, the name of the dispossessed farmer in E. 9.
Editor’s Note
Ponto: Pontus was known for its poisons because of Mithridates, and aconite, the deadliest of poisons, grew there (Pliny, NH 27. 4), but V. probably means Colchis, the country of Medea; cf. Cic. De imp. Pomp. 22 'ex suo regno sic Mithridates profugit ut ex eodem Ponto Medea illa quondam fugisse dicitur', Juv. 14. 114 'Hesperidum serpens aut Ponticus' (Forbiger).
Editor’s Note
97. his: Moeris changed himself into a wolf with drugs (95 'uenena'), but the ghosts of the dead were raised and crops conveyed elsewhere by incantation; cf. Tib. 1. 2. 45–6 'haec cantu finditque solum manesque sepulcris / elicit' and 8. 19 'cantus uicinis fruges traducit ab agris', with K. F. Smith's notes. Cf. also the Twelve Tables 8. 8a 'Qui fruges excantassit' (C. G. Bruns, Fontes Iuris Romani Antiqui (Leipzig, 1893), 30).
  Belief in werewolves is ancient and universal; see J. A. MacCulloch, Hastings' Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, s.v. lycanthropy. For classical antiquity see W. Kroll, RE Suppl. vii. 423–6, TLL s.v. lupus 1853. 25.
Editor’s Note
97–9. ego saepe … / … saepe … / … uidi: very emphatic, as if anticipating disbelief. Cf. 9. 51 'saepe ego', G. 1. 316–18 'saepe ego … uidi'.
Editor’s Note
98. excire: first attested here in this sense (TLL s.v. 1246. 83); the usual verb is elicio (TLL s.v. 366. 56). See Pease on Cic. De diu 1. 132 (psychomantia).
Editor’s Note
101–2. In Theocr. 24. 93–6, one of the serving-women is to gather up the ashes of the fire at dawn, carry them across the river to the rocks and throw them beyond the boundary, then return without looking back. Sinister things, the remains of witchcraft, and to be disposed of as expeditiously as possible; here Amaryllis is ordered to throw the ashes into the river, which will bear them away to the sea; cf. Ov. Fast. 6. 227–8 'donec ab Iliaca placidus purgamina Vesta / detulerit flauis in mare Thybris aquis' (La Cerda).
Editor’s Note
101. cineres: the poetic plural is first attested here; see Maas 519 = 560. Cf. 106 cinis.
Editor’s Note
101–2. riuoque fluenti / transque caput iace, nec respexeris: her instructions are exact and particular (and supported by the rhythm? Note the diaereses in the second and fourth feet of l. 102). For the dative cf. A. 12. 256 'proiecit fluuio' and see 6. 85 n.
Editor’s Note
102. nec respexeris: looking back could be dangerous and was commonly forbidden in Greek and Roman ritual; cf. Plaut. Most. 523 'caue respexis', Ov. Fast. 6. 163–4 'sic ubi libauit, prosecta sub aethere ponit, / quique adsint sacris, respicere illa uetat', and see Gow on Theocr. 24. 96, Bömer on Ov. Fast. 5. 439.
Editor’s Note
his ego: repeating 'his ego' (97) with a certain emphasis and the same reference (so Klingner and Coleman); not the ashes (so T. E. Page), which would have no magical potency. Cf. Vahlen (above, 47–50 n.), i. 397 (with regard to 101–2 'fer—respexeris'): 'quod medium interiectum est inter duas partes unius sententiae … nec obfuit perspicuitati et hanc moratam orationem decuit'. She now intends to employ more drastic means—the drugs given her by Moeris, the potency of which she has often observed (97–8)—and is only prevented by the sudden and unexpected arrival of Daphnis.
Editor’s Note
105 aspice: 'hoc ab alia dici debet' (DServ.). The vocative Amarylli (101) prepares for her speech. Direct speech, surprising in a song, would be appropriate in a mime, and Alphesiboeus' song may originally have been conceived as a mime; see Introduction, p. 239, E. Bethe, RhM 47 (1892), 591, and Gow's Preface to the Second Idyll, pp. 33–5.
Editor’s Note
tremulis … flammis: cf. Cic. Arat. fr. 22. 3 Soubiran 'tremulam … flammam', Lucr. 4. 404 'tremulis … ignibus'.
Editor’s Note
106. bonum sit!: she hopes that the sudden blaze may be a good omen.
Critical Apparatus
107 Hylax ed. Ascensiana an. 1500/1: Hylas codd.
Editor’s Note
107. nescio quid certe est: colloquial; cf. Catull. 80. 5, Pers. 5. 51.
Editor’s Note
Hylax: the correction appears to have been made by A. Mancinellus (1490); see J. Van Sickle, RIFC 102 (1974), 311–13. A very suitable name; cf. Ov. Met. 3. 224 'acutae uocis Hylactor' and see 3. 18 n.
Editor’s Note
108. credimus? an, qui amant, ipsi sibi somnia fingunt?: modelled on Lucr. 1. 104–5 'quippe etenim quam multa tibi iam fingere possunt / somnia'; but Lucretius is speaking of seers who invent terrifying fantasies for others, V. of lovers who invent their own fantasies of happiness. La Cerda compares Publ. Syr. A 16 Meyer 'amans, quod suspicatur, uigilans somniat'.
Editor’s Note
qui amant: prosodic hiatus, that is, the shortening of a long syllable in hiatus; cf. e.g. Plaut. Merc. 744 'nam qui amat', Amph. 597 'ita me di ament', Catull. 97. 1 'ita me di ament', Hor. Serm. 1. 9. 38 'si me amas', and see Munro on Lucr. 2. 404, Leumann, Lat. Laut- und Formenlehre2, 105.
Critical Apparatus
109 carmina (-ne c) parcite Mcer
Editor’s Note
109. parcite, ab urbe uenit, iam parcite carmina, Daphnis: an ingenious reworking of the refrain 'ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin'; see above, 61 n. Like the concluding line of E. 10, 'ite domum saturae, uenit Hesperus, ite capellae', the concluding line of E. 8 contains an 'explanation' of its imperatives, 'parcite, ab urbe uenit, iam parcite carmina, Daphnis'.
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Extras
Secondary scholarship
On 8 see Lyne and Harrison, R. O. A. M. Lyne (2007), 106
Secondary scholarship
On 8 see Sewell-Rutter, Guilt by Descent (2007), 55 n. 25
Secondary scholarship
On 8 see Plaza, The Function of Humour in Roman Verse Satire (2006), 69
Secondary scholarship
On 8 see Wallace, Reconstructing Damon (2015), 176–8
Secondary scholarship
On 8 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 73
Secondary scholarship
On 8 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 76
Reference
1. Version of 8 by John Oldham: Virg[il], Ecologue VIII: The Enchantment.
Reference
1. Version of 8 by John Dryden: The Eighth Pastoral or, Pharmaceutria
Dictionary definition
3. See OLD sv stupefaciō
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4. See OLD sv mūtō sense 14b
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6. See OLD sv superō sense 1c
Dictionary definition
6. See OLD sv Timāuus
Secondary scholarship
6. On 8.6–13 see Farrell and Nelis, Augustan Poetry and the Roman Republic (2013), 264–5
Secondary scholarship
6. On 8.6–13 see Syme and Santangelo, Approaching the Roman Revolution: Papers on Republican History (2016), 220
Secondary scholarship
6. On 8.6–13 see Syme and Santangelo, Approaching the Roman Revolution: Papers on Republican History (2016), 224
Secondary scholarship
6. On 8.6–13 see Syme and Santangelo, Approaching the Roman Revolution: Papers on Republican History (2016), 226
Dictionary definition
7. See OLD sv ēn sense 1
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7. See OLD sv legō sense 7b
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7. See OLD sv ōra sense 2b
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7. See OLD sv sum sense A5
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7. See OLD sv umquam sense 1c
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9. See OLD sv ferō sense 26
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9. See OLD sv orbis sense 12b
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10. See OLD sv Sophoclēus
Secondary scholarship
10. On 8.10 see Farrell and Nelis, Augustan Poetry and the Roman Republic (2013), 181 n. 3
Secondary scholarship
10. On 8.10 see Elsner and Hernández Lobato, The Poetics of Late Latin Literature (2016), 333 n. 35
Secondary scholarship
10. On 8.10 see Oxford Medieval Texts: Walter Map: De Nugis Curialium: Courtiers&apos; Trifles Eds M. R. James, C. N. L. Brooke, and R. A. B. Mynors (1983), 404–5
Dictionary definition
12. See OLD sv co͡epī sense 3b
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13. See OLD sv laurus sense 2c
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13. See OLD sv serpō sense 2b
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13. See OLD sv uictrix sense 3
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14. See OLD sv dēcēdō sense 1e
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14. See OLD sv umbra sense 6
Secondary scholarship
14. On 8.14 see Oxford Medieval Texts: Alcuin: The Bishops, Kings, and Saints of York Ed. Peter Godman (1983), 1159
Dictionary definition
15. See OLD sv rōs sense 1
Secondary scholarship
15. On 8. 15 see Lucretius on Atomic Motion: A Commentary on Lucretius: De Rerum Natura Book Two, Lines 1–332 Ed. Don Fowler (2007), commentary on 2.313
Dictionary definition
16. See OLD sv incumbō sense 3
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16. See OLD sv olīua sense 2c
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16. See OLD sv sīc sense 4
Secondary scholarship
16. On 8. 16 see Lyne and Harrison, R. O. A. M. Lyne (2007), 103
Dictionary definition
17. See OLD sv almus sense a
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17. See OLD sv nascor sense 3a
Dictionary definition
17. See OLD sv praeueniō sense 1
Secondary scholarship
17. On 8.17 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 73
Secondary scholarship
18. On 8.18 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 75 n. 68
Dictionary definition
19. See OLD sv queror sense 1
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20. See OLD sv alloquor sense 2
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20. See OLD sv hōra sense 3
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21. See OLD sv Maenalius
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21. See OLD sv meus sense 2e
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21. See OLD sv tībia sense 1
Secondary scholarship
21. On 8.21 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 74
Dictionary definition
22. See OLD sv loquor sense 1d
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22. See OLD sv Maenalus
Secondary scholarship
22. On 8.22–4 see Armstrong, Vergil&apos;s Green Thoughts (2019), 60–61
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23. See OLD sv amor sense 5
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24. See OLD sv iners sense 2c
Secondary scholarship
26. On 8.26 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 37 n. 26
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27. See OLD sv gryps
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27. See OLD sv sequens sense 1
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28. See OLD sv damma
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28. See OLD sv pōculum sense 3
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29. See OLD sv fax sense 2a
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29. See OLD sv incīdō sense 2
Secondary scholarship
29. On 8.29–30 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 73
Secondary scholarship
29. On 8.29–30 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 74
Dictionary definition
30. See OLD sv marītus sense 1
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30. See OLD sv nux sense 1c
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30. See OLD sv spargō sense 1
Secondary scholarship
30. On 8.30 see Statius: Silvae 5 Ed. Bruce Gibson (2006), 5.4.8–9n.
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32. See OLD sv dignus sense 2
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34. See OLD sv hirsūtus sense 1b
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35. See OLD sv quisquam sense 1b
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37. See OLD sv mālum sense 1
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37. See OLD sv roscidus sense 1
Secondary scholarship
37. On 8.37–42 see Lyne and Harrison, R. O. A. M. Lyne (2007), 102
Secondary scholarship
37. On 8.37–42 see Spentzou, Readers and Writers in Ovid&apos;s Heroides (2003), 88 n. 11
Secondary scholarship
37. On 8.37 see Cynthia: A Companion to the Text of Propertius Ed. Stephen J. Heyworth (2007), 416
Secondary scholarship
37. On 8.37–8 see Armstrong, Vergil&apos;s Green Thoughts (2019), 93
Dictionary definition
38. See OLD sv dux sense 1
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39. See OLD sv accipiō sense 4
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39. See OLD sv alter sense 3
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40. See OLD sv ab sense B16
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40. See OLD sv contingō sense 3b
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40. See OLD sv fragilis sense 1
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41. See OLD sv auferō sense 13
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41. See OLD sv error sense 4
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41. See OLD sv pereō sense 4
Secondary scholarship
41. On 8.41 see A Commentary on Ovid, Tristia, Book 2 Ed. Jennifer Ingleheart (2010), commentary to 2.109
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43. See OLD sv cautēs sense 1b
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43. See OLD sv sciō sense 4
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43. See OLD sv sum sense B18
Reference
43. Version of 8.43 by Samuel Johnson: Numb. 82. Saturday, August 18, 1753
Secondary scholarship
43. On 8.43–5 see Kanellou, Petrovic, and Carey, Greek Epigram from the Hellenistic to the Early Byzantine Era (2019), 236 n.8
Dictionary definition
44. See OLD sv Garamas
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44. See OLD sv Tmaros
Dictionary definition
47. See OLD sv sanguis sense 2
Secondary scholarship
47. On 8.47 see Kanellou, Petrovic, and Carey, Greek Epigram from the Hellenistic to the Early Byzantine Era (2019), 235
Secondary scholarship
47. On 8.47 see Kanellou, Petrovic, and Carey, Greek Epigram from the Hellenistic to the Early Byzantine Era (2019), 245
Dictionary definition
48. See OLD sv commaculō sense 1
Secondary scholarship
49. On 8. 49 see Lyne and Harrison, R. O. A. M. Lyne (2007), 189
Secondary scholarship
49. On 8.49–50 see Kanellou, Petrovic, and Carey, Greek Epigram from the Hellenistic to the Early Byzantine Era (2019), 236
Secondary scholarship
50. On 8.50 see McAuley, Reproducing Rome (2015), 61
Secondary scholarship
50. On 8.50 see McAuley, Reproducing Rome (2015), 106
Dictionary definition
52. See OLD sv aureus sense 4b
Dictionary definition
52. See OLD sv ultrō sense 4
Secondary scholarship
52. On 8.52 see Oxford Classical Monographs: Jerome, Vita Malchi: Introduction, Text, Translation, and Commentary Ed. Christa Gray (2015), 164
Secondary scholarship
52. On 8.52–6 see Armstrong, Vergil&apos;s Green Thoughts (2019), 48–49
Secondary scholarship
52. On 8.52–4 see Armstrong, Vergil&apos;s Green Thoughts (2019), 228–229
Dictionary definition
54. See OLD sv ēlectrum sense 1
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55. See OLD sv cycnus sense b
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55. See OLD sv ulula
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58. See OLD sv medius sense 4b
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58. See OLD sv uīuō sense 5b
Secondary scholarship
58. On 8. 58–60 see Lyne and Harrison, R. O. A. M. Lyne (2007), 102–3
Dictionary definition
59. See OLD sv specula sense 1
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60. See OLD sv dēferō sense 3b
Dictionary definition
60. See OLD sv habeō sense 1b
Secondary scholarship
60. On 8.60 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 51 n. 80
Secondary scholarship
60. On 8.60 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 75
Secondary scholarship
60. On 8.60 see Oxford Medieval Texts: William of Malmesbury: Saints&apos; Lives: Lives of SS. Wulfstan, Dunstan, Patrick, Benignus and Indract Eds M. Winterbottom and R. M. Thomson (2002), 290
Dictionary definition
61. See OLD sv dēsinō sense 3
Secondary scholarship
61. On 8.61 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 74 n. 64
Dictionary definition
62. See OLD sv hic sense B10
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62. See OLD sv respondeō sense 2
Secondary scholarship
63. On 8.63 see Oxford Medieval Texts: Byrhtferth of Ramsey: The Lives of St Oswald and St Ecgwine Ed. Michael Lapidge (2008), 184
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64. See OLD sv aqua sense 5e
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64. See OLD sv efferō sense 1d
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64. See OLD sv uitta sense 2d
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65. See OLD sv masculus sense 3
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65. See OLD sv tūs sense 1d
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65. See OLD sv uerbēna sense 1a
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66. See OLD sv āuertō sense 7
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66. See OLD sv magicus
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66. See OLD sv sānus sense 3b
Secondary scholarship
66. On 8.66 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 75
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67. See OLD sv dēsum sense 1
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67. See OLD sv experior sense 3
Dictionary definition
67. See OLD sv sensus sense 4
Dictionary definition
68. See OLD sv carmen sense 1b
Dictionary definition
68. See OLD sv domus sense 1b
Dictionary definition
68. See OLD sv dūcō sense 20
Dictionary definition
69. See OLD sv dēdūcō sense 6
Dictionary definition
70. See OLD sv Circē
Dictionary definition
70. See OLD sv mūtō sense 12
Dictionary definition
70. See OLD sv Vlixēs
Dictionary definition
71. See OLD sv cantō sense 6
Dictionary definition
72. See OLD sv rumpō sense 1
Secondary scholarship
72. On 8.72 see Lyne and Harrison, R. O. A. M. Lyne (2007), 352
Secondary scholarship
72. On 8.72 see Wasdin, Eros at Dusk (2018), 75
Dictionary definition
73. See OLD sv triplex sense 4
Dictionary definition
74. See OLD sv līcium sense 1b
Dictionary definition
75. See OLD sv effigiēs sense 1
Dictionary definition
75. See OLD sv impār sense 7
Dictionary definition
75. See OLD sv numerus sense 2
Dictionary definition
77. See OLD sv nectō sense 2
Dictionary definition
78. See OLD sv uinculum sense 1
Dictionary definition
78. See OLD sv Venus sense 1
Dictionary definition
80. See OLD sv cēra sense 1
Dictionary definition
80. See OLD sv dūrescō
Dictionary definition
80. See OLD sv liquescō sense 1
Secondary scholarship
80. On 8.80–1 see Lateiner and Spatharas, The Ancient Emotion of Disgust (2016), 194 n. 22
Dictionary definition
81. See OLD sv noster sense 2
Dictionary definition
82. See OLD sv fragilis sense 2
Dictionary definition
82. See OLD sv incendō sense 1
Dictionary definition
82. See OLD sv mola sense 2
Secondary scholarship
82. On 8.82–3 see Armstrong, Vergil&apos;s Green Thoughts (2019), 160–161
Dictionary definition
83. See OLD sv laurus sense 2a
Dictionary definition
83. See OLD sv malus sense 5a
Dictionary definition
86. See OLD sv būcula
Dictionary definition
86. See OLD sv lūcus sense 2
Dictionary definition
87. See OLD sv perditus sense 2b
Dictionary definition
87. See OLD sv rīuus sense 1
Dictionary definition
87. See OLD sv uiridis sense 1
Dictionary definition
87. See OLD sv ulua
Dictionary definition
88. See OLD sv meminī sense 4a
Dictionary definition
88. See OLD sv sērus sense 6
Secondary scholarship
89. On 8.89 see Armstrong, Vergil&apos;s Green Thoughts (2019), 162
Dictionary definition
91. See OLD sv exuuiae sense 1b
Dictionary definition
91. See OLD sv ōlim sense 1b
Dictionary definition
93. See OLD sv dēbeō sense 2
Dictionary definition
93. See OLD sv mandō sense 1c
Secondary scholarship
95. On 8.95–6 see Armstrong, Vergil&apos;s Green Thoughts (2019), 160–161
Dictionary definition
96. See OLD sv nascor sense 7
Dictionary definition
98. See OLD sv anima sense 6
Dictionary definition
98. See OLD sv exciō sense 2b
Dictionary definition
99. See OLD sv aliō sense 1
Dictionary definition
99. See OLD sv serō sense 1
Dictionary definition
99. See OLD sv trādūcō sense 1b
Dictionary definition
101. See OLD sv cinis sense 1
Dictionary definition
101. See OLD sv forās sense 1
Secondary scholarship
101. On 8.101–2 see Pinkster, The Oxford Latin Syntax, Vol. 1: The Simple Clause (2015), 717
Dictionary definition
102. See OLD sv iaciō sense 1
Dictionary definition
102. See OLD sv neque sense 3b
Dictionary definition
102. See OLD sv respiciō sense 1
Dictionary definition
102. See OLD sv trans sense 1
Dictionary definition
105. See OLD sv tremulus sense 3b
Dictionary definition
106. See OLD sv bonus sense 17b
Dictionary definition
106. See OLD sv cinis sense 2
Dictionary definition
106. See OLD sv spons sense 5b
Dictionary definition
107. See OLD sv lātrō sense 1
Dictionary definition
107. See OLD sv nesciō sense 5b
Secondary scholarship
107. On 8.107 see Pezzini, Terence and the Verb ‘To Be’ in Latin (2015), 38
Dictionary definition
108. See OLD sv amō sense 2
Dictionary definition
108. See OLD sv an sense 3
Dictionary definition
108. See OLD sv somnium sense 2
Secondary scholarship
108. On 8.108 see Armstrong, Vergil&apos;s Green Thoughts (2019), 162
Dictionary definition
109. See OLD sv parcō sense 2b
Secondary scholarship
109. On 8. 109 see Lyne and Harrison, R. O. A. M. Lyne (2007), 352
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