In discussing literature by genres Quintilian conformed to a method that was fundamental to Greek and Roman thinking about literature. Hellenistic scholars, some of them accomplished poets, proposed a complex system of classification that formed the basis of later literary theory.5 Associated with criticism by ‘kinds’ was the notion of propriety. To Aristotle’s immediate successor, Theophrastus, decorum was one of the four categories under which style was to be considered; a papyrus fragment which probably belongs to his work on style prescribes that certain words are to be admitted and others rejected.6 In a versified discussion of plays and principles the tragedian Accius considered the nature of the genres and the difference between one and another.7 His critic Lucilius, as is clear from the testimony of Horace, concerned himself with propriety of style. Horace himself regarded acceptance of generic distinctions as a necessary condition of writing poetry, and in the nicest matters of expression his practice accorded with his theory.8 In the first century A.D. Seneca recognized in theory (Epp. 8,8), and for the most part in practice, finely distinguished levels of style.9 Martial, complaining that a fellow poet has copied all his activities, lists the genres in descending order of nobility (and size): epic, tragedy, lyric, satire, elegy and epigram.10 The point of Martial’s poem is a self-depreciating descent to the bathos of his own epi-grammatic miniatures. The joke depends in part on the tacit acceptance of a hierarchy of genres. Modern stylistic analysis has confirmed that in practice also Latin poetry preserved such distinctions.11
Along with the belief in a series of clearly defined genres went two important corollaries: first the recognition of an archetypal master in each genre to whom his successors looked back with a proud loyalty that was tempered sometimes by overt criticism and almost always by some departures in practice in accordance with changes in circumstances or in the taste of the times, and secondly the acceptance of the notion of a lex operis, the rules of stylistic behaviour within the genre that could when necessary be modified by the dictates of inventive genius. For all his criticisms of Lucilius in Book 1, Horace saw him as the inventor of the genre by whose standard his own work was to be assessed, and in Book 2 claimed explicitly that he was writing satire in the manner of Lucilius. Persius and Juvenal both acknowledged the caustic criticisms of Lucilius as the original precedent for attacks on vice and also mentioned Horace as part of their heritage.12 […] That satire had its own law of procedure is implicit in Horace’s discussion of his work in the fourth and tenth satires of Book 1: the word lex is used of satire when in the opening of the first satire of Book 2 Horace reveals that to some critics his satire seemed too harsh and pushed beyond the law; but characteristically he juggles with different uses of lex, the criminal and civil law as well as the law of the genre. In his sixth satire Juvenal, after an impassioned description of murderesses in high places, exclaims in an indignant rhetorical question:
Fingimus haec altum satura sumente coturnum
scilicet, et finem egressi legemque priorum
grande Sophocleo carmen bacchamur hiatu
montibus ignotum Rutulis caeloque Latino?
nos utinam vani.
(6,634–8)
(Do you really think that I am resorting to fiction while my satire usurps the style of tragedy, violating the bounds and law ordained by my predecessors and writing frenzied high poetry in a tragic manner of a kind unknown to the hills of Rome and the sky of Latium? I wish that it was all groundless.)
Having answered his question13 by the wish that he was inventing his own themes Juvenal gives examples of vicious modern practices that rival and outstrip the infamy of heroines of myth and tragic poetry. He was aware that his tradition imposed a certain level of style on him and that his apparent assumption of an alien style required a disclaimer. The tradition of a law of satire is alluded to in late antiquity by John the Lydian, a Byzantine writer of the age of Justinian, who states that while Horace did not go beyond the traditional manner, Turnus, Juvenal and Petronius in their savagery departed from and violated the law of satire.14 Whatever the pedigree of this judgement it demonstrates the abiding belief that satire was an independent literary genre with its own laws of procedure.
The style held to be appropriate for the satirist was informal and close to the language of everyday speech, for the most part that of the educated. The high style was deemed inappropriate for satire except as parody; hence Juvenal’s disclaimer quoted above. In the same way an excess of vulgarity of expression was avoided. Lucilius seems to have admitted words of the utmost obscenity but some of the more extreme verbal obscenities that are common in Martial do not occur in the later satirists. Horace allowed certain obscenities in some of his early satires and in the language of the slave Davus (Sat. 2,7) which do not occur in any of his later works. His abandonment of such words reflects his own maturing judgement and perhaps also contemporaries’ views on verbal decorum. The obscenities of language found in satirists later than Horace were used for special shock effect and are not part of the staple of their language.15 This lexical restriction confirms the hint in Martial that satire was considered to be a somewhat more exalted form of writing than epigram.
Complementary to the overall formal classification of Latin literature by genres is a method of classification by topics which may occur in a number of genres. The poet’s refusal to laud the exploits of an important political contemporary is found in the satires of Lucilius and Horace, who chose instead to write satire, and in works by Virgil and elegiac writers. The invitation to a frugal and morally unexceptionable meal is a topic common to satire (Juvenal, Sat. 11), lyric and epigram.16
It is perhaps all the more necessary nowadays to insist on the importance of the formal classification by genres in ancient literature and the existence of a hierarchy of genres, for in modern times there has been a widespread blurring of distinctions to which writers and critics in former ages would have responded instinctively. Though some great writers and distinguished critics have recognized the importance of differentiated genres and conventional topics, there has been a levelling down of stylistic propriety so that the high style no longer exists in literature except for paratragic buffoonery.17 The ancient writers of the greatest talent were always able to transcend their formal inheritance much though they respected it, so as to blend the traditional with their own originality. One satirist of great genius, Petronius, broke through the inherited patterns so as to create in the Satyricon a unique blend of the quite separate genres of satire and the novel. He had no successor.
It is necessary to eliminate from the study of the Roman genre of satire various writings that have some topics or attitudes in common with it but have their own separate history. Phaedrus, the author of fables in verse who lived in the time of Augustus and Tiberius, has been included among the Roman satirists in some modern discussions on the grounds that fable was a traditional element in satire and that in offering a mixture of amusement and sage counsel his aim was similar to that of the satirists.18 But in antiquity writers of fable were not regarded as part of the traditions of satire, and in spite of certain instructive affinities between the technique of the satirists and the personal and political innuendoes that underlie the words of Phaedrus, a collections of short fables is far removed from satire in matter and manner.
Nor is there any justification for including Martial among the Roman satirists. Epigram belonged to a different literary tradition, and Martial himself distinguished between satire and his own epigrams. It is only to be expected that in ridiculing wickedness and inanity Martial shared some topics and even some phrases with his friend Juvenal. We may also eliminate the tradition of iambi even though Lucilius was given the epithet iambicus in imperial times.19 By writing epodes at the same time as his satires Horace demonstrates his belief that the tradition of Archilochus, which Lucilius seems to have accepted as a source of inspiration for his own work, was something distinct from satire. Quintilian (10,1,96) discusses the iambic tradition separately as a form apart. Als
o to be eliminated is the miscellaneous corpus of abusive verse that ranged from archaic curses on tablets, scurrilous inscriptions and extended poems of malediction such as the Ibis of Ovid, to the verses described as Fescennini that were written by the military dictator Octavianus on a defenceless subject, Asinius Pollio.20 The gambits of rhetoric influenced satire in diverse ways, but the process of invectiva, the discrediting and vilification of an opponent in court, was not in itself to be classed as satire.21 Thus the tradition of Roman satire excludes much that is labelled satirical in a wider context.
It is also important that the tradition of Roman satire should be seen as something quite distinct from that of didactic poetry. Horace’s literary epistles of Book 2 and the Ars Poetica are a poetic exposition of a quasi-didactic kind that has nothing in common with the Lucilianus character of his satires, written many years earlier, other than the hexameter. The didactic poems of Hesiod, Lucretius and Virgil were compositions inspired by the Muse and akin to high poetry. The satirical mode that is found in Lucretius’ condemnatory depiction of superstition and sexual passion may owe something of its fervour to Hellenistic popular philosophy, but his impassioned poetry derives from the Greek tradition of Empedocles.22
The line of verse satire ended with Juvenal, and satire in a mixture of prose and verse with Petronius. There was no attempt to revive the genre in the later part of the fourth century A.D. at the time of the final creative outburst of pagan literature. The tradition of Roman satire was lost in the dark ages and remained so throughout mediaeval times. The reading of Juvenal by some scholarly men in twelfth-century France and occasional references to the masters of antiquity by mediaeval Latin satirists are no indication of a line of continuity, nor has Nigel Longchamp’s Speculum Stultorum the authentic qualities of Roman satire, even though it may have an enjoyable variety of contents.23 A garbled reference to Juvenal by Walter of Châtillon does not inspire confidence. The case for the continuity of the classical traditions of satire cannot be made good.24
The beginning of modern scholarship on Roman satire was Isaac Casaubon’s fundamental study De Satyrica Graecorum poesi et Romanorum Satira Libri Duo (Paris, 1605) in which he devoted the first book to examining the evidence for Greek satyr plays, which he was able to separate completely from Roman satire. An inability to separate these two distinct genres had caused confusion in the previous century. Casaubons’s second book is a thoroughly documented study of the different aspects of Roman satura, the primitive stage and the Lucilian and Menippean traditions, to which the efforts of modern scholars have comparatively little to add.25 The next scholarly work of importance on the satire and history of satire was John Dryden’s A Discourse Concerning Satire (1693),26 which owes much to Casaubon but disagrees with his preference for Persius to Juvenal or Horace. Dryden seems to have switched from an earlier higher estimation of Horace to preference later in life for the more highly charged vituperation of Juvenal. Though his Discourse is a classic of English literary criticism, it should be read with some caution.27
It may be of use at this point to refer to two definitions of formal literary satire, one from Roman antiquity and the other modern. The fourth-century grammarian Diomedes, using no doubt the pronouncements of predecessors, defined satire as
carmen apud Romanos, nunc quidem maledicum et ad carpenda hominum vitia archaeae comeodiae charactere compositum, quale scripserunt Lucilius et Horatius et Persius; sed olim carmen quod ex variis poematibus constabat satura voactur, quale scripserunt Pacuvius et Ennius.28
(a Roman verse form that has been in recent times abusive and composed to censure the vices of men in the manner of Old Greek Comedy, as was written by Lucilius, Horace and Persius: but formerly satire was the name given to a verse form made up of a variety of smaller pieces of poetry such as was written by Pacuvius and Ennius.)
The definition is valid in that it describes the essential quality of the Lucilian tradition (the omission of the name of Juvenal does not affect its basic soundness) and also the primitive stage of Roman satire, but defective in its omission of the Menippean tradition. A modern definition is taken from the Encylopaedia Britannica: ‘Satire, in its literary aspect, may be defined as the expression in adequate terms of the sense of amusement or disgust excited by the ridiculous or unseemly, provided that humour is a distinctly recognizable element, and that the utterance is invested with literary form. Without humour, satire is invective; without literary form it is mere clownish jeering’.29 This definition is acceptable for Roman satire, except that ‘wit’ should be added to humour’ and ‘variety of contents’ added to ‘literary form’. There are not good grounds for refusing to accept satire as one of the traditional literary kinds.30 Ancient critics so viewed Roman satire, which throughout its long history retained a recognizable though pliant form. The blend of traditional elements and novelty of subject matter in a supple literary medium gave the satire of the Romans an enduring strength that would lead to satire of high distinction in European literature after the Renaissance.
2 Satura: the name and origin of a literary form
The meaning of the word satura and its use as a literary term were already a matter for speculation in late republican times. There has also been much discussion on the part (if any) that was played by drama and ritual in the development of the literary form, Roman satura.
1 Satura and the ancient grammarians’ tradition
The spelling satura represents the original form of the word. The spelling satyra seems to have arisen early in the Christian era and is based on a postulated connection between the Roman literary form and Greek satyrs and satyr drama. Satira is in origin simply a variant on satyra. Had satura not been the original form it is difficult to see how it could have arisen from satyra, let alone from satira.1
All three syllables of the feminine noun satura have a short vowel. As there is no evidence for a Latin nominal termination in –ura, satura is a loan word from another language, or else, as is more likely, it is an inflexion of the adjective satur that has come to be used as a noun, a feminine singular with a feminine noun to be supplied. The noun in agreement with the adjective satura through familiar usage came to be omitted, a procedure which can be paralleled, for example, by the optional omission of cena with adventicia or adventoria, a supper to celebrate an arrival.2
The primary meaning of the adjective satur seems to be ‘filled full of food’, ‘replete’. The first attested occurrence is in a hymn of the Arval brothers, the guardians of the fertility of the fields.3 There is a degree of metaphor in some of Plautus’ uses of the word: in one passage there is punning on the senses ‘filled with food’ and ‘satisfied with the play as a substitute for food’ and in another satura is applied ambiguously to Alcmena as having the appearance of one who is both replete with food and also pregnant.4 The adjective also carries overtones of richness when used of a deep colour, a fertile landscape or an opulent style of oratory.5 Further, anything that is filled may well be filled with a variety of contents, and although it is unclear to what extent such associations were uppermost in the adjective satur, the shift in meaning from full to richly variegated was slight. The semantic range of satur was therefore extensive, and when the feminine satura came to be used alone for noun + satura, its meaning will to some extent have depended upon that of the noun omitted.
An approach to the solution of this question is to be found in a passage of the grammarian Diomedes that is the most important discussion in antiquity of the meaning of the word satura:
satura autem dicta sive a Satyris, quod similiter in hoc carmine ridiculae res pudendaeque dicuntur, quae velut a Satyris proferuntur et fiunt: sive satura a lance quae referta variis multisque primitiis in sacro apud priscos dis inferebatur et a copia ac saturitate rei satura vocabatur; cuius generis lancium et Vergilius in georgicis meminit, cum hoc modo dicit,
lancibus et pandis fumantia reddimus exta
et
lancesque et liba feremus:
sive a quodam ge
nere farciminis, quod multis rebus refertum saturam dicit Varro vocitatum. est autem hoc positum in secundo libro Plautinarum quaestionum, ‘satura est uva passa et polenta et nuclei pini ex mulso consparsi. ad haec alii addunt et de malo punico grana’. alii autem dictam putant a lege satura, quae uno rogatu multa simul conprehendat, quod scilicet et satura carmine multa simul poemata conprehenduntur. cuius saturae legis Lucilius meminit in primo,
per saturam aedilem factum qui legibus solvat,
et Sallustius in Iugurtha, ‘deinde quasi per saturam sententiis exquisitis in deditionem accipitur’.6
(Satura takes its name either from satyrs, because in this verse form comical and shameless things are said which are produced and made as if by satyrs; or from a full dish which was packed with a large number of varied first fruits and offered among primitive people to the gods in a religious ritual and called satura from the abundance and fullness of the material. Virgil too makes mention of this kind of dish in the Georgics when he says [2,194] ‘we offer steaming giblets on curved dishes’ and also [2,394] ‘we shall bring dishes of sacrificial cakes’. It may also be derived from a certain kind of sausage which was filled with many ingredients and according to Varro called satura, and indeed there is the following definition in the second book of his ‘Problems in Plautus’: ‘satura is raisins, pearl barley, pine kernels covered with mead, to which some people add pomegranate seeds’. Others say it was called satura from a compendious law which includes many provisions in a single bill, on the argument that in the verse form satura many small poems are combined together. Lucilius mentions this compendious law in his first book [48 M]: ‘who might absolve from the law an aedile elected by a compendious measure’, and Sallust in Jugurtha [29,5]: ‘then his surrender is accepted as if by a compendious law with precise provisions’.)
Latin Verse Satire Page 44