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Empty Shelves on the Palatine

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 September 2009

Nicholas Horsfall
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The way we study Augustus’ Rome has been changing dramatically: I do not mean so much new discoveries of monuments or inscriptions, exciting though they have been, as the new-found disposition of archaeologists, art-historians, epigraphists, and Latinists to talk to each other and to admit cross-fertilization into their work; this spirit of co-operation has engendered a large bibliography, and one only regrets that the sort of multidisciplinary approach that was self-evident to the best Hellenists in Germany 150 years ago has been so painfully slow in reaching Latin studies!

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Research Article
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Greece & Rome , Volume 40 , Issue 1 , April 1993, pp. 58 - 67
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Copyright © The Classical Association 1993

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References

Notes

1. E. Buchner's interpretation of the Horologium Augusti and the Campus Martius reveals an entire complex of monuments not previously understood: in English, cf. Horsfall, , Omnibus 9 (1985), 5 fGoogle Scholar; Wallace-Hadrill, A., JRS 75 (1985), 246 fGoogle Scholar. For a large new fragment of the Ada Ludorum Saecularium of 17 B.C, see Moretti, L., Rend. Pont. Ace. 55–6 (1982–1984), 361–79Google Scholar = Ann. Epigr. 1988, 10, no. 20–1; Luigi Moretti showed remarkable generosity towards my self-taught fumblings in epigraphy; this paper is offered affectionately to his memory.

2. Zanker, Paul, The Power of Images (Ann Arbor, 1988)Google Scholar; Caesar Augustus, edd. Millar, F. and Segal, E. (Oxford, 1984)Google Scholar; The Age of Augustus, ed. Winkes, R. (Louvain, 1985)Google Scholar; Between Republic and Empire, edd. Raaflaub, K. A. and Toher, M. (Berkeley, 1990)Google Scholar; and cf. the exhibition catalogue Kaiser Augustus, Antikenmuseen, Berlin, 1988Google Scholar.

3. Zanker, , Anal. Rom. Inst. Dan. Suppl. 10 (1983), 27 ffGoogle Scholar; Conte, G. B., The Rhetoric of Imitation (Ithaca, 1986), p. 186Google Scholar n. 1 (fanciful);!. W. Zarker in Winkes (n. 2), pp. 206 f.; B. Kellum, ibid., pp. 174 f; and Spence, S., Vergilius 37 (1991)Google Scholar, forthcoming; I am extremely grateful to Prof. Spence for coaxing me into formulating some ideas about the Palatine complex. This paper would not exist but for her gentle insistence. The two apses discovered on the site of the library belong to the Domitianic reconstruction, long after the destruction of Augustus' original in Nero's fire.

4. Cf. too Platner, S. B. and Ashby, T., A Topographical Dictionary of Ancient Rome (Oxford, 1929), pp. 16–19Google Scholar and Dudley, D. R., Urbs Roma (London, 1967), pp. 154 ffGoogle Scholar.

5. Zanker (a 3), 22; Coarelli, F., Guida Archaeologica di Roma (Milano, 1974), pp. 141 ffGoogle Scholar, Collart, P., Au Palalin (Paris, 1978), pp. 103 ffGoogle Scholar; Carettoni, G., Das Haus des Augustus (Mainz, 1983)Google Scholar, heavily illustrated.

6. fr. 60, Wachsmuth, C., Sillographi Graeci (Leipzig, 1885)Google Scholar.

7. Cf. Fraser, P. M., Ptolemaic Alexandria 1 (Oxford, 1972), pp. 305 ffGoogle Scholar; Pfeiffer, R., History of Classical Scholarship (Oxford, 1968), pp. 98 ffGoogle Scholar. Parsons, E. A., The Alexandrian Library (New York, 1967)Google Scholar is the work of a passionate amateur while Canfora, L., La biblioteca scomparsa (Palermo, 1986)Google Scholar skates delightfully and dangerously between scholarship and ‘The Name of the Rose’.

8. Horsfall, , BICS 19 (1972), 122Google Scholar.

9. Nep. Alt. 20.1–2, with my commentary (Oxford, 1989)Google Scholar.

10. Cf. ch. 2 of my Virgilio: I'epopea in Alambicco (Naples, 1991)Google Scholar. Greek and Latin, Suet. Aug. 29.

11. Horsfall (n. 8), 84–6; Purcell, N., PBSR 51 (1983), 143Google Scholar.

12. Boyance, P. in L'Influence grecque sur la poesie laline, Entr. Hardt 2 (1953), pp. 195 ffGoogle Scholar; Newman, J. K., Augustus and the New Poetry (Coll. Lat. 88, 1967), p. 38Google Scholar.

13. C. O. Brink on Hor. Ep. 2.2.94; Quinn, K., ANRW 2.30.1 (1982), pp. 145 ff., 173 ffGoogle Scholar.

14. Against Horsfall (n. 11); now see Horsfall (n. 10), pp. 36 ff.

15. There is, alas, no full, reliable, and up-to-date study of Roman libraries in English: Boyd, C. E., Public Libraries and Literary Culture (Chicago, 1915) is helpfulGoogle Scholar; cf. too Rawson, E., Intellectual Life in the Late Republic (Oxford, 1985), pp. 39 ff.Google Scholar; Dilke, O. A. W., Roman Books and their Impact (Leeds, 1977)Google Scholar is rare and not altogether satisfactory.

16. Liv. 27.37.13; Horsfall, , BICS Suppl. 52 (1987), p. 10Google Scholar.

17. In Cambr. Hisl. Class. Lit. 2 (1982), pp. 53 ff., 138 ffGoogle Scholar. A. S. Gratwick offers a provocative introduction.

18. For the maths of this, cf. Horsfall (n. 9), p. 118.

19. Cf, e.g., Leg. 1.5 on history, de Oral. 1.13 f., 2.51, Tusc. 1.5 f. Petrochilos, N. K., Roman Altitudes to the Greeks (Athens, 1974), pp. 141 ffGoogle Scholar. is quite literally indispensable on this topic.

20. Cato ap. Plin. N.H. 29.14, Plaut. Asin. 11, Trin. 18 f., Most. 828; on Cic. Rep. 1.58, de Oral. 2.57 see Petrochilos (n. 19), pp. 142 f.

21. Traina, A., Vortit barbare (Rome, 1970), pp. 55 fGoogle Scholar; Beaujeu, J., Ciceron, Aralea, etc. (ed. Budé, ), pp. 54 ff.Google Scholar; Kaimio, J., Romans and the Greek Language (Helsinki, 1979), pp. 276 ffGoogle Scholar.

22. Cic. Fin. 1.6, Acad. 1.10; Traina (n. 21), pp. 59, 64, Kennedy, G., An of Rhetoric in the Roman World (Princeton, 1972), p. 243Google Scholar.

23. Fiske, G. C., Lucilius and Horace (Madison, 1920), pp. 43 ff.Google Scholar; Kroll, W., Studien zum Verstdndnis (Stuttgart, 1964), pp. 139 ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar; Thill (n. 47), p. 459; Focke, F., Herm. 58 (1923), 363 ffGoogle Scholar. has some interesting remarks on the synkrisis of Greek and Latin authors. Whether the Palatine library might shed some light on the great cultural synkrisis of Virg. Aen. 6.847–53 aliispost me memoranda relinquo, after three conflicting discussions of that passage in two years!

24. Horsfall (n. 9), pp. 117 f, 121, 124.

25. Cic. Tusc. 1.1, 1.45, 2.35, Fin. 1.10; Petrochilos (a 19), p. 155, Kaimio (n. 21), pp. 262 ff. For other expressions of Ciceronian confidence, see Tusc. 2.49 (drama), de Oral. 3.95 (oratory); Kaimo, p. 288, Rawson, pp. 323 f.

26. Kenney, E. J., Lucretius, GRNSC 11 (1977), p. 12Google Scholar and id. Mnem. 4.23 (1970), 369Google Scholar f. Also Caesar as cited by Suetonius in his life of Terence.

27. The libraries of the Porticus Octaviae and of the Temple of Augustus; cf. the discussions mentioned in n. 15.

28. Ovid, Trisl. 3.15.5 ff; Speyer, W., Buchervernichtung und Zensur des Geistes (Stuttgart, 1981), p. 61Google Scholar.

29. Suet. Tib. 70; Stewart, A. F., JRS 67 (1977), 85 ffGoogle Scholar.

30. Syme, R., Hiswria Augusta Papers (Oxford, 1983), pp. 164 fGoogle Scholar. and Emperors and Biography (Oxford, 1971), pp. 237 ffGoogle Scholar.

31. Suet. Gramm. 21.3; cf. n. 15.

32. See the commentary of Nisbet and Hubbard, ad loc. and Pfeiffer (n. 7), pp. 203 ff.

33. Pfeiffer (n. 7), p. 207; Zetzel, J. E. G., Critical Inquiry 10 (1983), 97 ffGoogle Scholar; Horsfall, , ‘“Generic composition” and Petronius' Satyricon’ Scr. Class. Isr. 11 (1991/1992), 123 ffGoogle Scholar. Indispensable and inaccessible: Scotti, M., Esperienze letterarie 71 (1982), 74 ff.Google Scholar; cf. PLLS 2. 1974–1975Google Scholar (Jocelyn).

34. Pfeiffer (n. 7), pp. 127 ff; Fraser (n. 7), pp. 452 ff; Scotti (n. 33), 78 f.

35. Cic. Acad. 2.73; Pfeiffer (n. 7), pp. 206 f.

36. Gellius, Noel. Alt. 19.8.15; Pfeiffer, I.e. (n. 33).

37. 10.1.85–90; see, with caution, Cousin, J., Eludes sur Quinlilien 1 (Paris, 1936), pp. 546 ffGoogle Scholar.

38. Cf. Douglas, A. E., Mnem. 4.9 (1956), 30 ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

39. Wendel, C., Kleine Schriflcn (Koln, 1974), pp. 146 ffGoogle Scholar.

40. Note, e.g., that both go in for portraits or statues of authors: Tac. Ann. 2.37,83; Callmer, C., Opusc. Arch. 3 (1944), 189Google Scholar; Wendel (n. 39), p. 146.

41. Horsfall, , BICS 23 (1976), 84Google Scholar.

42. Brink, comm. on Hor. Ep. 2.322.

43. Both meanings are present, but the second (so Brink) is clearly more exciting and inviting.

44. Protracted polemic in JRS 70 (1980)Google Scholar and 72 (1982) did not confirm the conventional Neronian date of Calp. Sic; Armstrong, D., Philol. 130 (1986), 113 ffGoogle Scholar. shows the text cannot in fact be Neronian, and Courtney, E., REL 65 (1987), 148 ffGoogle Scholar. establishes that it is probably post-Flavian. Champlin, E. (Philol. 130 [1986], 104 ff.)CrossRefGoogle Scholar still does not compel belief in a date 170 years after Nero.

45. Fowler, A., Kinds of Literature (Oxford, 1982)Google Scholar is highly illuminating, for classicists too.

46. Syme, , vica voce and Roman Papers 3 (Oxford, 1984), p. 1098Google Scholar.

47. Cf. Catullus, 1.5 on Nep. Chron., with Horsfall (n. 9), p. 117; Lucr. 1.117, 926 f. (with n. 26); Wimmel, W., Kallimachos in Rom, Hermes Einzelschr. 16 (Wiesbaden, 1960), pp. 216 ffGoogle Scholar. el passim; Thill, A., Alter ab Mo (Paris, 1979), pp. 1 ff.Google Scholar; Haussler, R., Das historische Epos 1 (Heidelberg, 1976), p. 303Google Scholar.

48. Thill (n. 47), p. 4 a 13, Brink (a 42), p. 99, Kroll (n. 23), p. 15 n. 42, Griffin, J., Latin Poets and Roman Life (London, 1986), pp. 191 fGoogle Scholar.

49. Thill (a 47), pp. 1 ff, 455 ff.; Kroll (a 23), pp. 13 f; Thill, p. 470: while imilatio/interpretatio are literary in intention, aentulatio has a goal or moral plan.

50. Cf. Quint. 10.1.93 on Roman elegy.

51. Thill (a 47), p. 4 a 15; Domitius Afer ap. Quint. 10.1.86; Catakpton 15; Plin. N.H. praef. 22; LausPisonis 231; etc.

52. Zetzel (n. 33), 95 ff. hints at awareness of some of the issues raised in this paper; Mario Labate in Stork di Roma, ed. Schiavone, A. etc., 2 (Torino, 1990), p. 942Google Scholar (not the place one would think of looking) grasps the nettle firmly but lets go far too soon! Jasper Griffin (n. 48) observes: ‘it is striking how little the poets have to say about the library’ (p. 5 n. 30)!

53. Further enquiry into the physical form of the Augustan library is unhelpful. Richmond, O. L., JRS 4 (1914), 201Google Scholar and Thompson, D. L., AJA 85 (1981), 338Google Scholar suggest a single large room, in place of the two surviving on the marble plan and (just) on the ground. Are they right? The texts are indecisive: references to a singular bibliotheca seem not to bear strongly on the question. Did the Augustan library take up as much space as the Domitianic? Tac. Ann. 2.37 might seem to suggest it was large enough to contain a meeting of the senate. At that date perhaps 400 senators; the Diocletianic curia could hold at most perhaps 465. Possible, therefore, in a single large hall, you might think, since on the marble plan the libraries occupy almost exactly the same (19 m. * 12 m.) space as the curia (25.6 m. * 17.7 m.). Only, though, if no allowance is made for stairs, shelves, books, cupboards. See Taylor, L. R. and Scott, R. T., TAPA 100 (1969), 529 ffGoogle Scholar. and Talbert, R. J. A., The Senate of Imperial Rome (Princeton, 1984), pp. 117 ff, 134 ffGoogle Scholar. Elsewhere Tac. bends topography to rhetoric (and not Tac. alone: cf. Wiseman, T. P., AJAH 3 [1979], 172Google Scholar and Hist. 28 [1979], 49Google Scholar = Rom. Papers [Liverpool, 1987], p. 242)Google Scholar; so too at Ann. 2.37. He could well refer to a meeting in the porticoes before open doors (so too when the senate met in the precinct of Jupiter Capitolinus: see Taylor and Scott, cit.), for his phrasing is genuinely ambiguous (so too Suet. Aug. 29). Tac.'s trope – ‘see my ancestor looking down’ – is an old friend: Taylor and Scott, 561; Liv. 8.5.8 f; Cic. Marc. 10, Phil. 2.112; Ar. Eq. 1323–34; Dem. c. Androt. 76, c. Timocr. 84; Loraux, N., L'Invention d'Athenes (Paris, 1981), p. 285Google Scholar. The glutei palrum seem therefore an inconclusive argument (for their dimensions, see Taylor and Scott, 547). Even a single library, in one large hall, will necessarily have had corresponding Greek and Latin subdivisions.