Since even normally level-headed scholars tend to go off the rails when they engage with the uncertainties enveloping the bucolic poems of Calpurnius Siculus, V., who published an edition and translation in the BUR series in 1996, is to be warmly commended for the balance and common sense informing her long-awaited full-scale edition, retranslation and commentary.
Her introduction is a model of fair-mindedness, especially in her account of the date of the author. Alternative, but repudiated, views are not short-changed, but are fully set out and critically assessed. V. might have insisted that those who argue for a date other than Neronian must (a) explain why any emperor would build a lavish amphitheatre after the Amphitheatrum Flavium, and (b) produce the comet mentioned in the first eclogue. J.T. Ramsey, A Descriptive Catalogue of Greco-Roman Comets from 500 bc to ad 400 (2006) can be added to V.'s discussions, also on p. 145. Other uncertainties are handled with equal courtesy and fullness. For instance, some fancy Calpurnius is subversive, but V. sensibly repudiates any notion that the fourth eclogue's tone is critical of Nero. Similarly she refuses to countenance criticism of Nero's cultural activities in the seventh eclogue, where the enthusiasm of the stay-at-home Lycotas for the entertainments described by Corydon pulls the carpet out from under such cross-grained interpretations. She prudently admits that there is nothing to be said of Calpurnius Siculus as a person. Her account of the arrangement of the poems in the book is balanced. Particularly valuable is §4 on ‘tradition and renewal’, where Theocritus is restored to prominence. V. is an enthusiastic advocate of the poet's literary adroitness. On p. 228 she recognises his ‘lively experimentation’ in Ecl. 3 (seen also in 6) and on p. 292 she has a good paragraph on the fourth eclogue's originality. In §5 V. draws together from her commentary details which enhance our appreciation of Calpurnius’ verbal skills; non-standard usage is not seen as evidence of composition later than the first century. §§6 and 7 on text, editions and reception conclude the introductory matter.
Turning to the text we find a few changes of mind since 1996, for example at 1.75 -que instead of Baehrens's -ue and at 2.82 decembri replaces novembri. Good sense rarely deserts her, but of course there is occasionally ground for disagreement.
2.11: the tradition reads quaecumque, but V. prints l's quodcumque. That scribe, however, is emending since his text goes on to offer auium instead of altum. It should have been noted that Courtney retained quaecumque, emending altum to ales. 2.31: the optative subjunctive crescat does not suit a prophecy: read crescit. 4.101: the defence of Pharsaliae is not cogent. The context is only political if one accepts a far-fetched interpretation of urgente procella (98), but it is not clear from her note that V. does accept it. Better is Heinsius's Parrhasiae, since reference to Pan/Faunus here is balanced by the mention of Pales in 106. Heinsius corrected another bungled proper noun at 6.5 with Lacaenae for leaenae (vel sim.), referring to a hound. V. none the less prints Leaenae, explaining that ‘Lioness’ is the name of the hound's mother. But would a Roman reader guess that without our capitalisation of proper names? 5.65: tremulo tremebunda cannot be defended as ‘figura etymologica’. Better is Glaeser's queribunda. 5.81: Baehrens's pix tibi followed by et produces hiatus, a licence repudiated in the note to 5.107 and anyway unlikely in this refined versifier. 7.39 cum mihi tum senior: tum is unwelcome and V. does not translate it. 7.43: tremulus et is defended as the lengthening of the final syllable in arsi at the main caesura. If cantus at 2.100 is plural, it may not be lengthened, as V. maintains, so 7.43 would be anomalous.
Finally, the usage of -que … -que in this text needs more careful attention. The notes at 1.72, 2.54–5 and 4.90–1 are faulty (it is easy to get this sort of thing wrong: see E. Fraenkel, Elementi plautini in Plauto, p. 201). V. has in mind the Virgilian doubling of -que where the first -que is redundant, as illustrated by Austin on Aen. 4.83 or Fordyce on Aen. 7.186. But at 1.72 and 2.54–5 the first -que is neither redundant nor anticipatory of the second one, because it connects the second half of the sentence to the first half. The -que added to visura at 4.90, however, does not conform to the Virgilian pattern; V. does not discuss the alterations proposed by some editors. Similarly intolerable is Glaeser's incipietque at 5.61. Lastly, defence of the conjecture sicutque in 6.46 would have been welcome.
The commentary is of course the main dish. It benefits from the publication of large-scale commentaries on individual eclogues. Here too balanced judgement is everywhere in evidence. Only a handful of points provoked disagreement or disappointment. At 1.86 there is a note on translati orbis and one on fragor, but nothing on the whole odd phrase. 2.56–9: the sit–erit conditional sentence is not ‘assai raro nella lingua classica’, unless Ovid is not a classical poet: see K.–S. II.395. 3.8 Lycidan = me, so a note on this ‘pastoral’ style might have been provided, cf. Virg. Ecl. 9.53–4, and in this poem lines 32 and 50. 3.12 iurabat: Phyllis is not promising to do something on oath, she is merely ‘strongly asserting (with an oath)’ (OLD 2) that honey is not sweet when her lover is absent; similar is 62 and 6.5, where V. correctly identifies the sense. 3.73–4 (pp. 263–4): is not the Tityrus mentioned here the same fellow as at line 19? 3.87: by an oversight there is no reference to the first mention of the fatal oak at line 27; V. provided the reference in her earlier edition, p. 99 n. 11. 3.96 ibimus, et veniet: this cannot be the colloquial usage illustrated in the note (for which see OLD eo 10 or TLL V, 2.631.20–32), where the subject of both verbs is the same. 5.89: saeptis, like stabulis in the Virgilian model, is not abl. of circumstance, but local without preposition, ‘nei recinti’ as V. correctly translates, cf. her note on 7.8. 7.67–8: Keene thought the periphrasis indicated that the rustic speaker did not know the name of the Nile. A nice point, similar to the memory lapse of Virgil's Menalcas (Ecl. 3.40), but passed over by V.
This is a long book, which would have benefited from some editorial tightening up. For instance, discussion of numen/numina used of the emperor is spread over far too many occurrences of the word(s), and that has generated error at 7.76–7 (numen is not used of the emperor at 1.89 and 91). We need only a single note, preferably at the first appearance of the usage, and then references back to it. A number of notes could have been combined if this policy had been followed. For instance, that on comitatus (3.27 and 4.87): by Cicero's time it was used adjectivally, there is not a need to define it as the perfect participle, used passively, of the deponent comitor; anyway, it might equally be from the poetic verb comito.
To conclude: this is an indispensable work of sober scholarship.
