The present volume grew out of a conference held at University College London in 2015. At its core are a Latin text of Grattius with facing translation and footnotes, and ten essays written by a combination of well-established and early-career scholars. An introduction and brief account of the text and translation precede, a short appendix (on verses 61–74), bibliography and indexes follow. In his introduction, Green frames the project as a ‘rallying cry’ (p. 2) to the study of the Cynegetica (Cyn.), and the contributors collectively hope that it will become ‘not just a primary access point for gaining a critical awareness of Grattius, but also a launchpad for further work on the poem’ (p. 2). Given the quality of the translation and footnotes and the broad scope and wide-ranging perspectives of the essays, those hopes deserve to be fulfilled. The Anglophone community has never been so well positioned to engage with Grattius, and the volume as a whole demonstrates just how fruitful that undertaking can be.

In the introduction, discussion of dating, the author's identity and the poem's scope and generic affiliation is kept to a bare minimum. Since most readers will have access to critical editions, standard reference works and other scholarly publications, this restricted ambit is understandable. In his preface to the text and translation, Green acknowledges (pp. 13–14) that his text is based on those of earlier editors and does not constitute a new critical edition; the reader will find, for instance, no apparatus. That being said, one might like more information about the manuscripts, beyond the simple identification of the primary witness (p. 5), especially since Green himself refers obliquely to ‘the state of the MSS’ (p. 14) and, in his footnotes to the translation, occasionally mentions ‘the MSS’ (e.g. footnotes 18, 59).

The text is quite readable, although punctuation occasionally causes confusion. At v. 13, for instance, tu trepidam bello, vitam, Diana, ferino reproduces P.J. Enk's text, but surely the comma after bello should be removed; no punctuation appears after bello in the editions of E. Baehrens/F. Vollmer, J.W. Duff/A.M. Duff, R. Verdière or C. Formicola. The translation and footnotes perform a valuable service. The former aims to preserve Grattius’ rich and ambiguous language, rather than to clarify the details of his hunting instruction, and in turn to ‘reveal to readers a more intricate, multilayered text that is worthy of their attention’ (p. 14). The footnotes, which are keyed to the translation and do not form a scholarly commentary, serve a similar purpose. They are primarily interpretative and often draw attention to the ‘poetically rich’ and/or ‘playful’ (p. 14) quality of Grattius’ Latin.

The essays are divided into four parts and collectively explore ‘the potential of Grattius’ text to engage meaningfully with Augustan society and contemporary Augustan authors’ (p. 6). The contributors’ success in treating Grattius seriously, in reading him with the same level of scholarly rigour and sensitivity that other Augustan poets routinely receive, strikes this reader as a breath of fresh air.

Part 1 is titled ‘Roman Didactic and Epic Interactions’. It contains essays by G. Fanti, ‘Grattius’ Cynegetica: A Protean Poem at the Heart of the Roman Didactic Tradition’; M.R. Gale, ‘“te sociam, Ratio…”: Hunting as Paradigm in the Cynegetica’; B. Kayachev, ‘Hunt as War and War as Hunt: Grattius’ Cynegetica and Virgil's Aeneid’; and C. Tsaknaki, ‘Ars Venandi: the Art of Hunting in Grattius’ Cynegetica and Ovid's Ars Amatoria’.

Fanti examines stylistic and thematic features that the Cyn. shares with other (mostly Latin) didactic poems. Perhaps the most stimulating parts of her discussion are comparisons between Grattius and Manilius, which cumulatively suggest that reading these two authors together would enhance our understanding of both their texts and the landscape of Augustan didactic more broadly. Gale reads several programmatic passages from the Cyn. against key passages from Lucretius and the Georgics. Her overarching argument, which convinces, is that Grattius grafts Lucretius’ ‘confident didactic manner’ (p. 94) onto the ambivalent Augustanism of Virgil's poem and that this manoeuvre challenges the world views of Grattius’ predecessors. Gale's position is grasped most readily in a brief discussion of the failure (Lucretius, Virgil) or success (Grattius) of medicina in times of plague. Kayachev considers the intertextual relationship between the Cyn. and Aeneid. While claiming to suspend judgement on the question of chronology, Kayachev treats Virgil as alluding to Grattius. The results are striking. For instance, of the several phrases that connect Virgil's Camilla with the Cyn., one potential point of contact stands out. The Cyn. exhorts readers not to abandon the weapons of Diana (ne tela relinquite divae, Cyn. 125). Camilla, of course, fights to the end, and it is sadly her weapons that abandon her (arma relinquunt, Aen. 11.830; relinquunt is the lectio difficilior, adopted by N. Horsfall and G.B. Conte). In Kayachev's reading, the Virgilian context ‘sounds like a bitterly ironic echo of Grattius’ (p. 100). Tsaknaki uses the Cyn. and Ars am. to shed light on patterns and to expose layers of meaning in Grattius and Ovid, without positing direct influence of one text on the other. The major takeaway is a better understanding of how Grattius invokes Callimachean aesthetics (e.g. nets are to be made with ‘thin thread’, tenui ... filo, at Cyn. 25), which positions the Cyn. ‘at the centre of Augustan poetics’ (p. 131).

Part 2, ‘Hunting and the World’, contains two essays: ‘Motion in Grattius’ by G.O. Hutchinson and ‘Grattius and Augustus: Hunting for an Emperor’ by Green. Hutchinson's basic premise is that thinking about how different entities move in the text can reveal broad ethical and even religious concerns. In general, the strategy is appealing. The most interesting part of the analysis is the contrast between the movements of disease, which are purposive and goal-oriented but sinister and destructive, and those of the poem's supernatural forces. Hutchinson concludes that ‘The whole framework of animal and human movement depends on the larger framework of the divine’ (p. 145). But some may disagree that religion constitutes ‘the ultimate source of meaning’ (p. 145–6) in the poem, a reading that pushes hunting into the background. Green frames his discussion as an attempt to discern whether the Cyn. has anything to say, however indirectly, about Augustus or Augustan society. He argues, for instance, that ‘leadership figures in the hunt [e.g. the master of hounds and the dog breeder] are charged with acting in a manner worthy of Augustus’ (p. 163). Green refrains, though, from deciding whether this manoeuvre ennobles Grattius’ subject matter or trivialises the emperor's political agenda. Particularly engaging is the discussion of the poem's ‘critical approach to contemporary human-divine relationships’ (p. 170). Here, Green argues that Grattius comingles the positive outlook of Augustan religious discourse with problematic representations of the gods and not too subtle reminders that those who participate in ritual activities are not always moral. The juxtaposition of perspectives, suggests Green, reminds one of Ovid's approach to religion in the Fasti.

Part 3 focuses on ‘Mythical Hunters’. In ‘The Conditions of Poetic Immortality: Epicurus, Daphnis, and Hagnon’ L. Whitlatch zeroes in on Cyn. 249–52, where Grattiuscelebrates the achievements of Hagnon. Whitlatch reads this passage against its primary intertextual model, Menalcas’ apostrophe to Daphnis at Virg. Ecl. 5.74–80. Grattius’ rejection of the ‘idyllic leisure’ (p. 185) associated with Virgil's Daphnis leads to comparisons with Virgil's own models, the opening of DRN 5 and Theocritus’ first Idyll. The intertextual analysis reveals Hagnon's place within a long literary tradition and allows Whitlatch to argue that Grattius sees hunting as a form of ‘pious engagement with the world’ (p. 190). In ‘Authorial Surrogates in Grattius’ Cynegetica’ D. O'Rourke contends that Dercylos and Hagnon are poet figures and that Grattius’ accounts of both ‘reflect his own agenda as the cynegetic praeceptor of the poem as a whole’ (p. 195). The basic argument is quite convincing. To elucidate the ideological implications, however, O'Rourke turns to a contrast with Aristaeus and Orpheus in the Georgics. The ideological significance and metapoetic valences of Aristaeus and Orpheus are hotly debated, and O'Rourke's limited treatment does not do the situation justice. Be that as it may, I am sympathetic to O'Rourke's conclusion that, by comparison with the Georgics, Grattius offers ‘a far less complicated, far more upbeat perspective’ (p. 208) on the nature of civilisation and empire and on the possibility of authoritative didaxis and poetry. Indeed, Grattius’ cultural optimism is a leitmotif of the volume as a whole.

Part 4 turns to ‘Grattius in the Early Modern Period’. Its two essays are ‘Hunting with Hounds in Neo-Latin: The Reception of Grattius from Fracastoro to Vanière’ by V. Moul and ‘Hunting and the Seventeenth-Century English Gentleman: Christopher Wase's Translation of Grattius’ Cynegeticon (1654)’ by M. Waters. Moul primarily considers Neo-Latin hunting poems written between the sixteenth century, when Grattius was rediscovered, and the eighteenth century. A basic premise, borne out by the discussion, is that within this time frame ancient hunting texts were regularly considered to constitute a generically coherent and intellectually timeless body of work. As a result, it is often difficult to identify imitations of specific classical authors (e.g. Grattius). Moul's final example, however, is rather different: an English poem by Edmund Waller that appears in the frontmatter of Christopher Wase's 1654 edition of Grattius. Waller's poem is ‘unexpectedly sharp’ (p. 233) in its reflections on how the invention of gunpowder and firearms have changed the nature of the hunt. For Waller, at least, ‘the rapid progress of technology … has finally made Grattius look out of date’ (p. 233). Waters explores the circumstances that led Wase to undertake his translation project when he did. In addition, Waters describes and discusses the format of Wase's edition. The translation consists of rhyming iambic pentameters and contains the same number of lines as the Latin. Such fidelity to the original text renders Wase an outlier among seventeenth-century English translators. Wase also composed notes, complete with citations, that explain the meaning of difficult words and obscure passages. Waters analyses some of Wase's translation choices, outlines Wase's procedures as a commentator and traces the fortunes of the translation into the nineteenth century.

A brief appendix argues cogently against the relocation of lines 61–74 after line 23.

This volume has much to recommend it. The text, translation and footnotes make the Cyn. accessible to English readers in a way that it has not been before, and the papers succeed admirably in conveying ‘a greater sense of [the poem's] “Augustan flavour”, in terms of its imperial sensitivity, religious outlook, and engagement with contemporary literary aesthetics’ (p. 7).