VESTIGES OF EARLY INDIGENOUS POETRY IN ROME AND ANCIENT ITALY.
The Romans themselves traced the origin of their poetry, as of all
their literary culture, to their contact with the mind of Greece.
Graecia capta ferum victorem cepit, et artes
Intulit agresti Latio.
The first productive literary impulse was communicated to the Roman
mind by the Greek slave, Livius Andronicus, who, in the year B.C.
240--one year after the end of the First Punic War--brought out, before
a Roman audience, a drama translated or imitated from the Greek. From
this time Roman poetry advanced along the various channels which the
creative energy of Greek genius had formed.
But it has been maintained, in recent times, that this was but
the second birth of Roman poetry, and that a golden age of native
minstrelsy had preceded this historical development of literature.
The most distinguished supporters of this theory were Niebuhr and
Macaulay. In the preface to his _Lays of Rome_, Macaulay says that
'this early literature abounded with metrical romances, such as are
found in every country where there is much curiosity and intelligence,
but little reading and writing.' Niebuhr went so far as to assert that
the Romans in early times possessed epic poems, 'which in power and
brilliance of imagination leave everything produced by the Romans in
later times far behind them.' He held that the flourishing period
of this native poetry was the fifth century after the foundation of
the city. He supposed that the early lays were of plebeian origin,
strongly animated by plebeian sentiment, and familiarly known among
the mass of the people; that they disappeared after the ascendency of
the new literature, chiefly through the influence of Ennius; and that
his immediate predecessor, Naevius, was the last of the genuine native
minstrels. He professed to find clear traces of these ballads and
epic poems in the fine legends of early Roman history. His theory was
supported by arguments founded on the testimony of ancient writers, on
indications of the early recognition of poetry by the Roman State (as,
for instance, the worship of the Camenae), on the poetical character of
early Roman story, and on the analogy of other nations.
Although there may be no more ground for believing in a golden age of
early Roman poetry than in a golden age of innocence and happiness,
yet the question raised by Niebuhr deserves attention, not only on
account of the celebrity which it obtained, but also as opening up an
inquiry into the nature and value of the rude germs of literature which
the Latin soil spontaneously produced. Though there is no substantial
evidence of the existence among the Romans of anything corresponding
to the modern ballad or the early epic of Greece, yet certain kinds of
metrical composition did spring up and flourish among the Italians,
previous to and independent of their knowledge of Greek literature.
It is worth while to ascertain what these kinds of composition were,
as they throw light on some natural tendencies of the race, which
ultimately obtained their adequate expression, and helped to impart a
native and original character to Latin literature.
It was observed in the former chapter that while the metres of all
the great Roman poets were founded on the earlier metres of Greece,
there was a native Italian metre, called the Saturnian, which was
employed apparently in various kinds of composition, and was quite
different in character from the heroic and lyric measures adopted by
the cultivated poets of a later age. This metre was used not only in
rude extemporaneous effusions, but also in the long poem of Naevius, on
the First Punic War. Horace indicates his sense of the roughness and
barbarism of the metre, in the lines,
Sic horridus ille
Defluxit numerus Saturnius, et grave virus
Munditiae pepulere[8].
Ennius speaks contemptuously of the verse of Naevius, as that employed
by the old prophetic bards, before any of the gifts of poetry had been
received or cultivated--
Quum neque musarum scopulos quisquam superarat
Nec dicti studiosus erat.
The irregularity of the metre may be inferred from a saying of an
ancient grammarian, that, in the long epic of Naevius he could find
no single line to serve as a normal specimen of its structure. From
the few Saturnian lines remaining, it may be inferred that the verse
had an irregular trochaic movement; and it seems first to have come
into use as an accompaniment to the beating of the foot in a primitive
rustic dance. The name, connected with Saturnus, the old Land-God of
Italy, points to the rustic origin of the metre. It was known also by
the name of Faunian, derived from another of the Divinities worshipped
in the rural districts of Italy. It seems first to have been employed
in ritual prayers and thanksgiving for the fruits of the earth, and in
the grotesque raillery accompanying the merriment and license of the
harvest-home. It is of the Saturnian verse that Virgil speaks in the
lines of the second Georgic--
Nec non Ausonii, Troja gens missa, coloni
Versibus incomptis ludunt risuque soluto[9].
As the long roll of the hexameter and the stately march of the alcaic
were expressive of the gravity and majesty of the Roman State, so the
ring and flow of the Saturnian verse may be regarded as indicative
of the freedom and genial enjoyment of life, characterising the old
Italian peasantry.
The most important kinds of compositions produced in this metre, under
purely native influences, may be classed as,
1. Hymns or ritual verses.
2. Prophetic verses.
3. Festive and satiric verses, uttered in dialogue or in rude mimetic
drama.
4. Short gnomic or didactic verses.
5. Commemorative odes sung or recited at banquets and funerals.
1. The earliest extant specimen of the Latin language is a fragment of
the hymn of the Fratres Arvales, a priestly brotherhood, who offered,
on every 15th of May, public sacrifices for the fertility of the
fields. This fragment is variously written and interpreted, but there
can be no doubt that it is the expression of a prayer, for protection
against pestilence, addressed to the Lares and the god Mars, and that
it was uttered with the accompaniment of dancing. The following is the
reading of the fragment, as given by Mommsen:--
Enos, Lases, juvate.
Ne veluerve, Marmar, sins incurrere in pleores.
Satur fu, fere Mars.
Limen sali.
Sta berber.
Semunis alternis advocapit concto.
Enos, Marmar, juvato.
Triumpe, triumpe, triumpe, triumpe, triumpe[10].
The address to Mars 'Satur fu,' or, according to another reading,
'Satur furere,' 'be satisfied or done with raging,' probably refers
to the severity of the winter and early spring[11]. The words have
reference to the attributes of the God in the old Italian religion, in
which the powers of Nature were deified and worshipped long before Mars
was identified with the Greek Ares. The other expressions in the prayer
appear to be, either directions given to the dancers, or the sounds
uttered as the dance proceeded.
Another short fragment has been preserved from the hymn of the Salii,
also an ancient priesthood, supposed to date from the times of the
early kings. The hymn is characterised by Horace, among other specimens
of ancient literature, as equally unintelligible to himself and to its
affected admirers[12].
From the extreme antiquity of these ceremonial chants it may be
inferred that metrical expression among the Romans, as among the Greeks
and other ancient nations, owed its origin to a primitive religious
worship. But while the early Greek hymns or chants in honour of the
Gods soon assumed the forms of pleasant tales of human adventure, or
tragic tales of human suffering, the Roman hymns retained their formal
and ritual character unchanged among all the changes of creed and
language. In the lines just quoted there is no trace of creative fancy,
nor any germ of devotional feeling, which might have matured into
lyrical or contemplative poetry. They sound like the words of a rude
incantation. They are the obscure memorial of a primitive, agricultural
people, living in a blind sense of dependence on their gods, and
restrained by a superstitious formalism from all activity of thought
or fancy. Such compositions cannot be attributed to the inspiration or
skill of any early poet, but seem to have been copied from the uncouth
and spontaneous shouts of a simple, unsophisticated priesthood, engaged
in a rude ceremonial dance. If these hymns stand in any relation to
Latin literature, they may perhaps be regarded as springing from the
same vein of public sentiment, as called forth the hymn composed by
Livius Andronicus during the Second Punic War, and as rude precursors
of those composed by Catullus and Horace, and chanted by a chorus of
youths and maidens in honour of the protecting Deities of Rome.
2. The verses of the Fauns and Vates spoken of by Ennius, with allusion
to the poem of Naevius, in the lines,
Scripsere alii rem,
Versibu' quos olim Fauni vatesque canebant,
were probably as far removed from poetry as the ritual chants of the
Salii and the Fratres Arvales. The Fauni were the woodland gods of
Italy, and were, besides their other functions, supposed to be endowed
with prophetic power[13]. The word _Vates_, a word of Celtic origin,
originally means not a poet, but a soothsayer. The Camenae or Casmenae
(another form of which word appears in Carmenta, the prophetic mother
of Evander) were worshipped, not as the inspirers of poetry, but as
the foretellers of future events[14]. Both Greeks and Romans sought to
obtain a knowledge of the future, either through the interpretation of
omens, or through the voice of persons supposed to be divinely endowed
with foresight. But the Greeks, even in the regard which they paid to
auguries and oracles, were influenced, for the most part, by their
lively imagination; while the Romans, from the earliest to the latest
eras of their history, in all their relations to the supernatural
world, adhered to a scrupulous and unimaginative ceremonialism. The
notices in Latin literature of the functions of these early Vates--as,
for instance, the counsel of the Etrurian seer to drain the Alban Lake
during the war with Veii, and the prophecy of Marcius uttered during
the Second Punic War,
Amnem Trojugena Cannam Romane fuge, etc.[15],
suggest no more idea of poetical inspiration than the occasional
notices, in Latin authors, of the oracles of the Sibylline books.
The language of prophecy naturally assumes a metrical or rhythmical
form, partly as an aid to the memory, partly, perhaps, as a means of
giving to the words uttered the effect of a more solemn intonation. In
Greece, the oracles of the Delphian priestess, and the predictions of
soothsayers, collected in books or circulating orally among the people,
were expressed in hexameter verse and in the traditional diction of
epic poetry; but they were never ranked under any form of poetic art.
The verses of the Vates, so far as any inference can be formed as to
their nature, appear to have been products and proofs of unimaginative
superstition, rather than of any imaginative inspiration among the
early inhabitants of Latium.
3. Another class of metrical compositions, of native origin, but of a
totally opposite character, was known by the name of the 'Fescennine
verses.' These arose out of a very different class of feelings and
circumstances. Horace attributes their origin to the festive meetings
and exuberant mirth of the harvest-home among a primitive, strong, and
cheerful race of husbandmen. He points out how this rustic raillery
gradually assumed the character of fierce lampoons, and had to be
restrained by law:--
Fescennina per hunc inventa licentia morem
Versibus alternis opprobria rustica fudit;
Libertasque recurrentes accepta per annos
Lusit amabiliter, donec jam saevus apertam
In rabiem coepit verti jocus et per honestas
Ire domos impune minax. Doluere cruento
Dente lacessiti; fuit intactis quoque cura
Conditione super communi; quin etiam lex
Poenaque lata, malo quae nollet carmine quemquam
Describi; vertere modum, formidine fustis
Ad bene dicendum delectandumque redacti[16].
The change in character, here described, from coarse and good-humoured
bantering to libellous scurrility, may be conjectured to have taken
place when the Fescennine freedom passed from villages and country
districts to the active social and political life within the city.
That this change had taken place in Rome at an early period, is proved
by the fact that libellous verses were forbidden by the laws of the
Twelve Tables[17]. The original Fescennine verse appears, from the
testimony of Horace, to have been in metrical dialogue. This rude
amusement, in which a coarse kind of banter was interchanged during
their festive gatherings, was in early times characteristic of the
rural populations of Greece and Sicily, as well as Italy, and was
one of the original elements out of which Greek comedy and Greek
pastoral poetry were developed. These verses had a kindred origin with
that of the Phallic Odes among the Greeks. They both appear to have
sprung out of the rudest rites and the grossest symbolism of rustic
paganism. The Fescennine raillery long retained traces of this original
character. Catullus mentions the 'procax Fescennina locutio' among the
accompaniments of marriage festivals; and the songs of the soldiers,
in the extravagant license of the triumphal procession, betrayed
unmistakably this primitive coarseness.
These rude and inartistic verses, which took their name either from
the town of Fescennia in Etruria or from the word fascinum[18], were
the first expression of that aggressive and censorious spirit which
ultimately animated Roman satire. But the original satura, which
also was familiar to the Romans before they became acquainted with
Greek literature, was somewhat different both from the Fescennine
verses, and from the lampoons which arose out of them. The more
probable etymology[19] of the word _satura_ connects it in origin
with the _satura lanx_, a plate filled with various kinds of fruit
offered to the gods. If this etymology be the true one, the word meant
originally a medley of various contents, like the Italian _farsa_[20],
and it evidently had not lost this meaning when first employed in
regular literature by Ennius and Lucilius. The original satura was a
kind of dramatic entertainment, accompanied with music and dancing,
differing from the Fescennine verses in being regularly composed and
not extemporaneous, and from the drama, in being without a connected
plot. The origin of this composition is traced by Livy[21] to the
representation of Etrurian dancers, who were brought to Rome during a
pestilence. The Roman youth, according to his account, being moved to
imitation of these representations, in which there was neither acting
nor speaking, added to them the accompaniment of verses of a humorous
character; and continued to represent these jocular medleys, combined
with music (_saturas impletas modis_), even after the introduction of
the regular drama.
These scenic saturae, which, from Livy's notice, appear to have been
accompanied with good-humoured hilarity rather than with scurrilous
raillery, prepared the way for the reception of the regular drama among
the Romans, and will, to some extent, account for its early popularity
among them. The later Roman satire long retained traces of a connexion
with this primitive and indigenous satura, evinced both by the
miscellaneous character of its topics, and by its frequent employment
of dramatic dialogue.
4. The didactic tendency which is so conspicuous in the cultivated
literature of Rome manifested itself also in the indigenous
compositions of Italy. The popular maxims and precepts preserved by
the old agricultural writers and afterwards embodied by Virgil in
his Georgics, were handed down from generation to generation in the
Saturnian rhythm. But, apparently, the first metrical composition
committed to writing was a poem of an ethical or didactic character,
written two generations before the first dramatic representation of
Livius Andronicus, by Appius Claudius Caecus, who is also the earliest
known to us in the long line of Roman orators[22].
5. But it was not from any of these sources that Niebuhr supposed the
poetical character of early Roman history to be derived. Nor is there
any analogy between the religious hymns, or the Fescennine verses of
Italy, and the modern ballad. But there is evidence of the existence,
at one time, of other metrical compositions of which scarcely anything
is definitely ascertained, except that they were sung at banquets, to
the accompaniment of the flute, in celebration of the praises of great
men. There is no direct evidence of the time when these compositions,
some of which were believed by Niebuhr to have attained the dimensions
of Epic poems, existed, or when they fell into disuse. Cato, as quoted
by Cicero in the Tusculan Disputations, and in the Brutus[23], is our
earliest authority on the subject. His testimony is to the effect
that many generations before his time, the guests at banquets were in
the habit of singing, in succession, the praises of great men, to the
music of the flute. Cicero, in the Brutus, expresses a wish that these
songs still existed in his own day; 'utinam exstarent illa carmina,
quae multis saeculis ante suam aetatem in epulis esse cantitata a
singulis convivis de clarorum virorum laudibus in Originibus scriptum
reliquit Cato.' Varro again is quoted, to the effect, that boys
used to be present at banquets, for the purpose of singing 'ancient
poems,' celebrating the praises of their ancestors. Valerius Maximus
mentions 'that the older men used at banquets to celebrate in song the
illustrious deeds of their ancestors, in order to stimulate the youth
to imitate them.' Passages are quoted also from Horace, from Dionysius,
and from Tacitus, implying a belief in the ancient existence of these
compositions.
Besides the odes sung or recited at banquets, there were certain
funeral poems, called _Naeniae_, originally chanted by the female
relatives of the deceased, but afterwards by hired women. As the
practice of public speaking advanced, these gradually passed into a
mere form, and were superseded by funeral orations.
The facts ascertained about these commemorative poems amount to no
more than this,--that they were sung at banquets and the funerals of
great men,--that they were of such length as to admit of several being
sung in succession,--and that they fell into disuse some generations
before the age of Cato. The inferences that may fairly be drawn from
these statements are opposed to some of the conclusions of Niebuhr. The
evidence is all in favour of their having been short lyrical pieces,
and not long narrative poems. As they were sung at great banquets and
funerals, it seems probable that, like the custom of exhibiting the
ancestral images on the same occasions, they owed their origin to the
patrician pride of family, and were not likely to have been animated
by strong plebeian sentiment. If they had been preserved at all, they
were thus more likely to have been preserved by members of the great
houses living within the city walls, than by the peasantry living among
the outlying hills and country districts. If ever there were any golden
age of early Roman poetry, it had passed away long before the time of
Ennius and Cato.
The fact, however, remains, that the Romans did possess, in early
times, some kind of native minstrelsy, in which they honoured the
memory and the exploits of their great men. And this impulse of
hero-worship became in later times an important factor in their epic
poetry. But is there any reason to suppose that these compositions
were of the nature and importance assigned to them by Niebuhr, and
had any value in respect of invention and execution? It is difficult
to believe that such a native force of feeling and imagination,
pouring itself forth in stirring ballads and continuous epic poems,
could have been frozen so near its source; or that a rich, popular
poetry, not scattered through thinly-peopled districts, but the
possession of a great commonwealth--one most tenacious of every
national memorial--could have entirely disappeared, under any foreign
influence, in the course of one or two generations. But even on the
supposition that a great national poetry might have passed from the
memory of men--as, possibly, the poems existing before the time of
Homer may have been lost or merged in the greater glories of the
Iliad and the Odyssey--this early poetry could not have perished
without leaving permanent influence on the Roman language. The growth
of poetical language necessarily accompanies the growth of poetical
feeling and inspiration. The sensuous, passionate, and musical force by
which a language is first moulded into poetry is transmitted from one
generation of poets to another. The language of Homer, by its natural
and musical flow, by its accumulated wealth of meaning, by the use of
traditional epithets and modes of expression, that penetrate far back
into the belief, the feelings, and the life of an earlier time, implies
the existence of a long line of poets who preceded him. On the other
hand, the diction of the fragments of Ennius, in its strength and in
its rudeness, is evidently, in great measure, the creation of his own
time and his own mind. He has no true discernment of the characteristic
difference between the language of prose and of poetry. The materials
of his art had not been smoothed and polished by any long, continuous
stream of national melody, but were rough-hewn and adapted by his own
energy to the rugged structure of his poem.
While, therefore, it appears that the actual notices of the early
commemorative poems do not imply that they were the products of
imagination or poetical feeling, or that they excited much popular
enthusiasm, and were an important element in the early State, their
entire disappearance among a people so tenacious of all their gains,
and, still more, the unformed and prosaic condition of the language and
rhythm used by Naevius, Ennius, and the other early poets, lead to the
presumption, that they were not much valued by the Romans at any time,
and that they were not the creations of poetic genius and art. This
presumption is further strengthened by such indications as there are
of the recognition, or rather the non-recognition, of poets or of the
poetic character at Rome in early times.
The worship of the Camenae was indeed an old and genuine part of the
Roman or Italian religion; but, as was said before, their original
function was to predict future events, and to communicate the knowledge
of divination; not like that of the Greek Muses, to imagine bright
stories of divine and human adventure,--
λησμοσύνην τε κακῶν ἄμπαυμά τε μερμηράων.
Even the names by which two of the Camenae were known--Postvorta and
Antevorta--suggest the prosaic and practical functions which they were
supposed to fulfil. The Romans had no native word equivalent to the
Greek word ἀοιδός, denoting the primary and most essential
of all poetical gifts, the power to awaken the music of language. The
word _vates_, as was seen, denoted a prophet. The title of _scriba_
was applied to Livius Andronicus; and Naevius, who has by some been
regarded as the last of the old race of Roman bards, applies to himself
the Greek name of _poeta_,--
Flerent divae Camenae Naevium poetam.
The commemorative odes appear to have been recited or sung at banquets,
not by poets or rhapsodists, but by boys or guests. There is one
notice, indeed, of a class of men who practised the profession of
minstrelsy. This passage, which is quoted by Aulus Gellius from the
writings of Cato, implies the very lowest estimation of the position
and character of the poet, and points more naturally to the composers
of the libellous verses forbidden by the laws of the Twelve Tables,
than to the authors of heroic and national lays:--'Poetry was not held
in honour; if anyone devoted himself to it, or went about to banquets,
he was called a vagabond[24].'
It appears that, on this ground also, there is no reason for believing
in the existence of any golden age of Roman poetry before the time of
Ennius, or in the theory that the legendary tales of Roman history were
created and shaped by native minstrels. To what cause, then, can we
attribute their origin? These tales have a strong human interest, and
represent marked and original types of antique heroism. They have the
elements of true tragic pathos and moral grandeur. They could neither
have arisen nor been preserved except among a people endowed with
strong capacities of feeling and action. But the strength of the Roman
mind consisted more in retentive capacity than in creative energy.
Their art and their religion, their family and national customs,
aimed at preserving the actual memory of men and of their actions:
not like the arts, ceremonies, and customs of the Greeks, which aimed
at lifting the mind out of reality into an ideal world. As one of the
chief difficulties of the Homeric controversy arises from our ignorance
of the power of the memory during an age when poetry and song were
in the fullest life, but the use of letters was either unknown, or
extremely limited; so there is a parallel difficulty in all attempts
to explain the origin of early Roman history, from our ignorance of
the power of oral tradition in a time of long established order, but
yet unacquainted with any of the forms of literature. The indifference
of barbarous tribes to their past history can prove little or nothing
as to the tenacity of the national memory among a people far advanced
towards civilisation like the Romans after the establishment of their
Republican form of government. Nor can the analogy of early Greek
traditions be fairly applied to those of Rome, owing to the great
difference in the circumstances and the genius of the two nations.
Many real impressions of the past might fix themselves indelibly in
the grave and solid temperament of the Romans, which would have been
lost amid the inexhaustible wealth of fancy that had been lavished upon
the Greeks. The strict family life and discipline of the Romans, the
continuity of their religious colleges, the unity of a single state as
the common centre of all their interests, the slow and steady growth
of their institutions, their strong regard for precedent, were all
conditions more favourable to the preservation of tradition than the
lively social life, the numerous centres of political organization, and
the rapid growth and vicissitudes of the Greek Republics.
It cannot, indeed, be disputed that although the legendary tales of
Roman history may have drawn more of their colour from life than
from imagination, yet there is no criterion by which the amount of
fact contained in them can be separated from the other elements of
which they were composed. Oral tradition among the Romans, as among
other nations, was founded on impressions originally received without
any careful sifting of evidence; and these first impressions would
naturally be modified in accordance with the feelings and opinions of
each generation, through which they were transmitted. Aetiological
myths, or the attempt to explain some institution or memorial by some
concrete fact, and the systematic reconstruction of forgotten events,
have also entered largely into the composition of Roman history. But
these admissions do not lead to the conclusion that the art or fancy
of any class of early poets was added to the unconscious operation of
popular feeling in moulding the impressive tales of early heroism,
partly out of the memory of real events and personages, partly out
of the ideal of character, latent in the national mind. It has been
remarked by Sir G. C. Lewis that many even of the Greek myths,
abounding 'in striking, pathetic, and interesting events,' existed
as prose legends, and were handed down in the common speech of the
people. In like manner, such tales as those of Lucretia and Virginia,
of Horatius and the Fabii, of Cincinnatus, Coriolanus, and Camillus,
which stand out prominently in the twilight of Roman history, may have
been preserved in the _fama vulgaris_, or among the family traditions
of the great houses, till they were gathered into the poem of Ennius
and the prose narratives of the early annalists[25]. In so far as they
are shaped or coloured by imagination, they do not bear traces of the
conscious art of a poet, but rather of an unconscious conformity to the
national ideal of character. The most impressive of these legendary
stories illustrate the primitive virtues of the Roman character, such
as chastity, frugality, fortitude, and self-devotion; or the national
characteristics of patrician pride and a stern exercise of parental
authority. There is certainly no internal evidence that any of them
originated in a pure poetic impulse, or gave birth to any work of
poetic art deserving a permanent existence in literature.
The analogy of other nations might suggest the inference that a race
which in its maturity produced a genuine poetic literature must, in
the early stages of its history, have given some proof of poetic
inspiration. It is natural to associate the idea of poetry with youth
both in nations and individuals. Yet the evidence of their language,
of their religion, and of their customs, leads to the conclusion that
the Romans, while prematurely great in action and government, were, in
the earlier stages of their national life, little moved by any kind of
poetical imagination. The state of religious feeling or belief which
gives birth to or co-exists with primitive poetry has left no trace
of itself upon the early Roman annals. It is generally found that a
fanciful mythology, of a bright, gloomy, or grotesque character, in
accordance with the outward circumstances and latent spirit or humour
of the particular race among whom it originates, precedes and for a
time accompanies the poetry of romantic action. The creative faculty
produces strange forms and conditions of supernatural life out of
its own mysterious sympathy with Nature, before it learns to invent
tales of heroic action and of tragic calamity out of its sympathy with
human energy and passion and its interest in marking the course of
destiny, and the vicissitudes of life. The development of the Roman
religion betrays the absence, or at least the weaker influence of that
imaginative power which shaped the great mythologies of different races
out of the primeval worship of nature. The later element introduced
into Roman religion was due not to imagination but to reflection. The
worship of Fides, Concordia, Pudicitia, and the like, marks a great
progress from the early adoration of the sun, the earth, the vault of
heaven, and the productive power of nature; but it is a progress in
understanding and moral consciousness, not in poetical feeling nor
imaginative power. It shows that Roman civilisation advanced without
this vivifying influence, that the mind of the race early reached the
maturity of manhood, without passing through the dreams of childhood or
the buoyant fancies of youth.
The circumstances of the Romans, in early times, were also different
from those by which the growth of a romantic poetry has usually been
accompanied. Though, like all races born to a great destiny, they
had much latent imaginative ardour of feeling, this was employed by
them, unconsciously, in elevating and purifying the ideal of the State
and the family, as actually realised in experience. Their orderly
organisation,--the early establishment of their civic forms,--the
strict discipline of family life among them,--the formal and ceremonial
character of their national religion,--and their strong interest in
practical affairs,--were not calculated either to kindle the glow of
individual genius, or to dispose the mass of the people to listen to
the charm of musical verse. The wars of the young Republic, carried on
by a well-trained militia for the acquisition of new territory, formed
the character to solid strength and steady discipline, but could not
act upon the fancy in the same way as the distant enterprise, the
long struggles for national independence, or the daring forays, which
have thrown the light of romance around the warlike youth of other
races. The tillage of the soil, in which the brief intervals between
their wars were passed, was a tame and monotonous pursuit compared with
the maritime adventure which awoke the energies of Greece, or with
the wild and lonely, half-pastoral, half-marauding life, out of which
a true ballad poetry arose in modern times. Some traces of a wilder
life, or some faint memories of their Sabine forefathers, may be dimly
discerned in the earliest traditions of the Roman people; but their
youth was essentially practical,--great and strong in the virtues of
temperance, gravity, fortitude, reverence for law and the majesty of
the State, combined with a strong love of liberty and sturdy resistance
to wrong. These qualities are the foundations of a powerful and orderly
State, not the root nor the sap by which a great national poetry is
nourished[26].
If the pure Roman intellect and discipline had spontaneously produced
any kind of literature, it would have been more likely to have taken
the form of history or oratory than of national song or ballad. It was
from men of the Italian provinces, and not from her own sons, that
Rome received her poetry. The men of the most genuinely Roman type and
character long resisted all literary progress. The patrons and friends
of the early poets were the more liberal members of the aristocracy,
in whom the austerity of the national character and narrowness of the
national mind had yielded to new ideas and a wider experience. The
art of Greece was communicated to 'rude Latium,' through the medium
of those kindred races who had come into earlier contact with the
Greek language and civilisation. With less native strength, but with
greater flexibility, these races were more readily moulded by foreign
influences; and, leading a life of greater ease and freedom, they were
more susceptible to all the impulses of Nature. While they were thus
more readily prepared to catch the spirit of Greek culture, they
had learned, through long years of war and subsequent dependence,
to understand and respect the imperial State in which their own
nationality had been merged. It is important to remember that the time
in which Roman literature arose was not only that of the first active
intercourse between Greeks and Romans, but also that in which a great
war, against the most powerful State outside of Italy, had awakened
the sense of an Italian nationality, of which Rome was the centre.
The great Republic derived her education and literature from the
accumulated stores of Greek thought and feeling; but these were made
available to her through the willing service of poets who, though born
in other parts of Italy, looked to Rome as the head and representative
of their common country.
[Footnote 8: Epist. ii. 1. 157.]
[Footnote 9: Georg. ii. 385.]
[Footnote 10: It is thus interpreted by the same author:--Nos, lares,
juvate. Ne malam luem, Mamers, sinas incurrere in plures. Satur esto,
fere Mars. In limen insili. Pesiste verberare (limen)! Semones alterni
advocate cunctos. Nos, Mamers, juvato. Tripudia.
'Help us, Lares. Suffer not, Mamers, pestilence to fall on the people.
Be satisfied, fierce Mars. Leap on the threshold. Cease beating it.
Call, in turn, on all the demigods. Help us, Mamers.'--Mommsen, Röm.
Geschichte, vol. i. ch. xv.]
[Footnote 11: Such is the interpretation of Corssen, Origines Poesis
Romanae.]
[Footnote 12: Epist. ii. 1. 86.]
[Footnote 13: Cf. Virg. Aen. vii. 81, 82:--
At rex sollicitus monstris, oracula Fauni,
Fatidici genitoris adit.
]
[Footnote 14: Cf. Schwegler, Röm. Gesch. i. 24, note 1.]
[Footnote 15: Livy xxv. 12.]
[Footnote 16: 'The Fescennine raillery in this way, arose and poured
forth its rustic banter in responsive strains; the spirit of freedom,
made welcome, as the season came round, first played a kindly part; but
soon the jests grew cruel, then changed into sheer fury, and began,
with impunity, to threaten and assail honourable households. Men
smarted under the sharp edge of its cruel tooth: even those who were
unassailed felt concern for the common weal. A law was passed, and a
penalty enforced, forbidding any one to be branded in libellous verses.
Thus they changed their style, and were brought back to a kindly and
pleasant tone, under fear of a beating.'--Epist. ii. 1. 144-55.]
[Footnote 17: Sei quis ocentasit, casmenue condisit, quod infamiam
faxsit flacitiomque alterei, fuste feritor.]
[Footnote 18: Teuffel quotes from Festus: Fescennini versus qui
canebantur in nuptiis, ex urbe Fescennina dicuntur allati, sive ideo
dicti quia fascinum putabantur arcere. It seems more natural to connect
the name of these verses, which were especially characteristic of the
Latian peasantry, with fascinum (the phallic symbol) than with any
particular town of Etruria, though the name of that town may probably
have the same origin.]
[Footnote 19: Mommsen's explanation, 'the masque of the full men'
('saturi'), does not seem to meet with general acceptance.]
[Footnote 20: Cf. Teuffel, vi. 2.]
[Footnote 21: vii. 2.]
[Footnote 22: Cf. Teuffel, Wagner's Translation, p. 102.]
[Footnote 23: Tusc. Disp. iv. 2; Brutus, 19.]
[Footnote 24: Noct. Att. xi. 2. A similar character at one time
attached to minstrels in Scotland.]
[Footnote 25: Some of these tales may have been originally
aetiological, but the human interest even in these was probably drawn
originally from actual incidents and personages of the Early Republic.
Some of the aetiological myths, such as that of Attus Navius the augur,
have no human interest, though they have an historical interest in
connexion with early Roman religion or institutions.]
[Footnote 26: Cf. Schwegler, Röm. Gesch. i. 1. 24.]