The anonymous panegyrist concludes his prediction of Messalla's future achievements by prophesying that, after his deeds are duly honoured with triumphs, Messalla will be titled the Great (175–6):

Line 175 contains a well-known textual problem: A (cod. Ambrosianus R. 26 sup., the oldest complete manuscript, apparently the archetype of all complete manuscripts) offers a text that is linguistically unobjectionable, but produces a weak sense; F (Fragmentum Cuiacianum, the only other independent witness, no longer extant) seems to express a more appropriate idea, but in a way that is not idiomatic. Hence the conjectures.Footnote ¹

A's poscent faces two objections. First, poscere is too feeble a verb for the context: surely it would have been more appropriate to speak of Messalla's achievements earning or receiving, rather than merely deserving or demanding, due honours.Footnote ² Second, the point clearly must be not just that Messalla's deeds will be worthy of triumphs (which is the implication of poscent), but that triumphs will make Messalla the most famous man in the world. These objections may look pedantic, especially as A's text is altogether comprehensible; but we should ask whether even such an uninspired poet as the author of [Tib.] 3.7 would be likely to use language as inexpressive as that at the high point of his panegyric.

F's ierint, with Scaliger's per claros,Footnote ³ avoids these difficulties and seems to make reasonable sense (‘after your deeds have gone through a number of triumphs’). Tränkle claims that ‘ire per in übertragenem Sinn („etwas der Reihe nach durchlaufen“) in der Literatur der Kaiserzeit recht verbreitet ist, meistens natürlich, wenn auch nicht ausschließlich, mit persönlichem Subjekt’.Footnote ⁴ However, he misses the crucial point that, when per introduces a plural noun referring to objects that are not naturally thought of as constituting a series, the noun requires some sort of universalizing qualifier.Footnote ⁵ Bare triumphos cannot be used in this way, because a triumph is not normally thought of as merely one item in a series of triumphs:Footnote ⁶ to make sense, it would require something like plures.Footnote ⁷

It thus appears that emendation is necessary. The earliest attempt seems to be tulerint, which Dyer claims to have found written in the margins of his copy of Scaliger's 1577 edition, marked with ‘V. C.’ (= ‘uetus codex’?).Footnote ⁸ The required sense is probably OLD s.v. fero 36a ‘To get […], win, acquire’, which can be paralleled, for instance, with Caes. BGall. 21.4 maximam inter suos ferunt laudem, Hor. Sat. 2.1.11–12 multa laborum | praemia laturus, Livy 38.53.11 unus praecipuam gloriam tulit. Sen. Her. Oet. 1552–3 uadis ad manes miserandus, unde | Morte deuicta tuleras triumphum is somewhat different, as it has a more literal sense of ferre (‘from where you had brought victory over death’), but is worth mentioning. I cannot parallel this use of the verb with an inanimate subject, but tua facta for ‘you (will have won) with your deeds’ seems unproblematic.Footnote ⁹ This is a reasonable conjecture; its only weaknesses are the lack of exact parallels (though there are fairly close ones) and the fact that it fails to account for A's poscent.

Lachmann's cierint has little to recommend itself.Footnote ¹⁰

Postgate's noscent and scierint may at first sight seem to produce an acceptable text (‘when people learn about your deeds through your triumphs’), but on consideration one cannot but see that it is unsatisfactory.Footnote ¹¹ To begin with, a plural verb without a subject is weak: in a context speaking of Messalla's worldwide recognition, we might expect it to be accompanied by omnes or something of the kind.Footnote ¹² More to the point, the idea that triumph is merely a vehicle for publicizing the triumphator's achievements is decidedly odd. The feeling that triumphos are allotted a merely technical role is reinforced by the fact that, instead of an ablative, we have per with an accusative, a construction that is more appropriate to express a purely instrumental relationship.Footnote ¹³

My last item on the list, Nencini's peperint yields an excellent sense (‘after your deeds have brought forth triumphs’).Footnote ¹⁴ This metaphorical use of parere can easily be paralleled with contexts such as Cic. Mur. 22 haec huic urbi aeternam gloriam peperit, Planc. 7 honos paritur, Caes. BGall. 6.40.7 ne ante partam rei militaris laudem amitterent, Tib. 1.7.9 non sine me est tibi partus honos, Hor. Carm. 1.2.15–16 cui laurus aeternos honores | Delmatico peperit triumpho, Sil. Pun. 1.610 nomina parta triumphis and especially Verg. Aen. 2.578 partoque ibit regina triumpho, Ov. Am. 2.12.16 o cura parte triumphe mea, Her. 7.154 suo partus Marte triumphus. The only weakness of Nencini's conjecture, unfortunately fatal, is that peperint is a non-existent form.

I propose parient (175–8):

while parient is made plausible enough by the parallels adduced in the preceding paragraph, the strongest argument can be found in the conclusion of Catal. 9, another panegyric of Messalla, on which our passage appears to be modelled (Catal. 9.55–60):Footnote ¹⁵

The verbal parallels speak for themselves, but it may be worth highlighting two crucial points of contact. First, both panegyrists consider themselves unqualified for adequately celebrating Messalla's deeds. Second, both employ the idea that gods, especially Apollo, are the poet's co-authors. Against this background, it seems likely that praeclaros … tua facta triumphos is modelled on egregium facta decus parient. True, the fact that Catal. 9 reads parient does not necessarily mean that the poet of [Tib.] 3.7 would use the same word. But it does show that the verb is entirely appropriate and must indeed have been in the poet's mind as he composed; if he chose to vary his model, he had to have a good reason to do so, and a good substitute for parient, not something as feeble as poscent.

In terms of palaeography, parient can easily account for A's poscent: a → o, r → ſ, ı → c. What is more, F's ierint could also be explained, assuming that in F's ancestor the word's first letters were damaged, as a scribal correction for [pa]rıent, or perhaps [pc]ırıent, the latter of which would only require the transposition of one letter.