Ennius
Quintus, the “father of Roman poetry,” was born at Rudiae in Calabria,
B.C. 239. He served in the Second Punic War and held the post of centurion in Sardinia, whence
he was brought to Rome by Cato , B.C. 204. We have no ground for attributing to Cato any
appreciation of Ennius's poetical gifts; he was no doubt attracted by his vigour and practical
capacity. Established at Rome, Ennius gained a livelihood by giving instruction in the Greek
language and by translating Greek plays for the Roman stage. His talents soon brought him
recognition. Among those who honoured him with their friendship was the great Africanus,
beside whose tomb the poet's bust is said to have been placed. In B.C. 189, he accompanied the
consul M. Fulvius Nobilior into his province of Aetolia, expressly to record his exploits. In
grateful recollection of this service the
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Supposed Bust of Ennius. (Tomb of the Scipios.)
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son of Fulvius in B.C. 184, with the approval of the people, assigned him a lot
among the
triumviri coloniae deducendae, thus constituting him a Roman
citizen. To this he alludes in the last book of his
Annales with justifiable
pride,
Nos sumu' Romani, qui fuimus ante Rudini. His honours did not, however,
bring him wealth. Cicero relates that his old age was passed in poverty, but he did not allow
this to cloud his genial temper. He is said to have keenly enjoyed the pleasures of convivial
intercourse, and died of an attack of the gout at the age of seventy (B.C.
169).
Ennius was a remarkably prolific writer, and left untouched few departments of poetical
composition. He probably did not commence his literary career till middle life, and he
certainly continued it till the time of his death (
Cic.
Brut. 78). In the absence of certain data for determining the
chronological order of his writings, it will be best to enumerate them in the order of their
importance. His chief work was the
Annales, an epic chronicle of Roman history
and legend from the time of Aeneas to his own day, in eighteen books, written in hexameter
verse. The first twelve books formed a connected poem, and may have been published together
B.C. 172 (cf. Aul. Gell. xvii.21.43), though Teuffel thinks the whole work was issued in
successive parts of three books each. Of this renowned work, so justly celebrated in
antiquity, which gained for its author the title of “the Roman Homer,”
sufficient fragments still remain to enable us to appreciate the qualities of his genius, and
to deplore the loss of historical and literary material which it contained. The first book
seems to have been the most poetical, and is naturally the most often quoted. The longest
passages we possess are the Dream of Hia and the Auspices of Romulus and Remus, about ten
lines each. The second and third books continued the regal period to its close, but are almost
entirely lost to us. In all these the poet made a free use of supernatural machinery. The
fourth, fifth, and sixth books began the
Annales proper and carried the history
of the Republic down to the conquest of Italy and the war with Pyrrhus; of these we possess a
few short but striking fragments. In the third triad the Punic Wars were
described—the first briefly, as having been already treated by Naevius (for whose
rude Saturnian verse Ennius shows much contempt); the second, in which he himself had been an
actor, at greater length and not without mythological embellishment. The thirteenth book began
with a fresh exordium, as also did the sixteenth, which headed the closing series and brought
the history down to B.C. 181 at least, if not somewhat later. The poem gained immediate
popularity. It is recorded that large crowds attended its public recitation, and Vergil is
said to have “introduced many lines into the
Aeneid with the view of
pleasing a people devoted to Ennius” (
populus Ennianus). Its high
estimation continued far into the times of the Empire, as we know from abundant evidence. It
is not until Macrobius that we find it falling into neglect.
Next in importance to the
Annales come the tragedies. These were free
imitations of Greek dramas, generally those of Euripides, though a few recall by their titles
the works of Aeschylus and Sophocles. The list is thus given by Ribbeck:
Achilles,
Achilles (from Aristarchus),
Aiax, Alcumena, Alexander, Andromaché
Aechmalotis, Andromeda, Athamas, Cresphontes, Erechtheus, Eumenides, Hectoris Lutra
(or
Lustra),
Hecuba, Iphigenia, Medea Atheniensis, Medea Exul,
Menalippa, Nemea, Phoenix, Telamo, Telephus, Thyestes. Their composition extended
over the whole period of his literary life, B.C. 204-169, in which latter year the
Thyestes was written. It has been doubted whether Ennius used the chorus. If
not, such a play as the
Eumenides, where the chorus is the chief character,
would have had to be entirely recast; and, besides, the criticisms of the
Ars
Poetica presuppose a Roman tragic chorus. The reservation of the orchestra for the
senators' seats would, of course, make choral evolutions impossible; but with this exception
the plays of Ennius were closely modelled on their Greek originals. The magniloquence of their
style and their moral grandeur made them special favourites with the public. Cicero gives them
high praise, and it is to him that we are indebted for the greater part of the scanty
fragments that remain. A
praetexta, entitled
Sabinae (Rape
of the Sabine Women), has been attributed to Ennius by Vahlen from a passage of Iulius Victor,
and there is some ground for conjecturing that the
Ambracia was a drama of the
same class, celebrating the deeds of Fulvius.
There also remain, besides the titles, some insignificant traces of two comedies by
him—
Cupuncula and
Pancratiastes. But his bent of mind
was unsuited for comedy, and he is mentioned by Volcacius Sedigitus only
antiquitatis causa!
Ennius was addicted to philosophical speculations. His convictions oscillated between the
mystic doctrines of Pythagoras and the scepticism of Euhemerus. Both found expression in his
works. In the
Annales he mentioned that the soul of Homer migrated into his
own. In the
Epicharmus, a distant precursor of the
De Rerum
Natura, written in trochaic tetrameters, he explained the tenets of Pythagoreanism. In
the
Euhemerus (erroneously supposed by some to have been a prose work) he
adopted the mythologic theory of that superficial writer. It is probable that both these works
formed part of the four (or six) books of
Saturae—i. e. miscellaneous
poems in various metres. To these, also, belonged the
Sota, mentioned by Varro;
the
Protrepticus, or “Art of Life”; the
Hedyphagetica, a treatise on gastronomics, based on that of Archestratus of
Gela; and a few epigrams, the most celebrated of which were the epitaphs on Africanus and on
himself.
Ennius was filled with a proud and noble self-consciousness. He entered Rome
- 1. as a missionary of culture and free-thought; and
- 2. as a consecrator of ancient tradition.
He gave to Latin literature an impulse it never quite lost. In nearly every field he
led the van. To him, more than to any one, it owes its predominant tone of sober directness
and moral strength. In him Greek culture, grafted on an Oscan or Messapian stock, combined
with Roman patriotism to form for the first time that special intellectual type, enthusiastic
but disciplined, imitative yet independent, Hellenic in source but in development intensely
national, which we can trace all through the subsequent course of Roman letters, and most
conspicuously in their best and most illustrious representatives. In formal polish he was no
doubt deficient; yet he is often imitated by later writers, and by none with happier effect
than Vergil.
Bibliography
The earliest edition of his fragments was in the
Fragm. Poët. Vet. Lat. a
Rob. Stephano Congesta, etc.
(Henr. Stephanus, Paris, 1564). Far more
complete was the edition of Hieronymus Columna
(Naples, 1590), reprinted with
the emendations and commentaries of M. A. Debrius and G. I. Voss by F. Hesselius of Rotterdam
(Amsterdam, 1707).
The best modern edition of the whole of Ennius is that of Vahlen
(Leipzig,
1854). He is also included in Wordsworth's
Fragments and Specimens of
Early Latin (Oxford, 1874), and in L. Müller's
Enn. Carm. Reliquiae, accedunt Cn. Naevi Belli Poenici quae supersunt
(St. Petersburg, 1885).
In the year 1595, Paulus Merula published at Leyden an edition of the
Annales, which, among other alterations, included additional fragments said to
come from a MS. treatise
De Continentia Vett. Poetarum ad Traianum Principem,
by L. Calpurnius Piso. This MS. has never appeared, and its very existence is suspected.
Merula's edition was reprinted with revisions by E. Spangenberg
(Leipzig, 1825).
Cf. Hoch,
De Enn. Ann. Fr. a Paulo Merula Auctis (Bonn, 1839),
and J. Lawicki,
De Fraude P. Merulae (Bonn, 1852). Books VII.-IX.
(Punic Wars) have been treated by T. Hug,
Dissertatio Inaug. (Bonn,
1852); Book I. by H. Ilberg
(Bonn, 1852).
The tragic fragments by M. A. Debrius, in his
Syntagma Tragoediae Latinae
I. (Antwerp, 1593), reprinted at Paris in 1607 and 1619; also in the
Collectanea Vett. Tragg. of P. Scriverius
(Leyden, 1620). The
fragment of the
Medea, including additions to those given by Hessel and
Merula, with a dissertation on Roman tragedy, by H. Planck
(Göttingen,
1807). Also in
Analecta Crit. Poesis Rom. Sen. Relig. Illustrantia, by
F. Osann
(Berlin, 1816). A critical edition of his dramatic fragments, published
by F. H. Bothe, in
Poet. Scen. Lat. (Halberstadt, 1821- 1823; Leipzig,
1840). Also in Ribbeck's
Scaenicae Rom. Poësis Fragmenta, 2
vols.
(Leipzig, 1852-55).
Other Ennian fragments are given in
Enn. Carm. ed. P. Burmann; in the
Anthol. Vett. Lat. Epigr. et Poem. (Amsterdam, 1759). Of this
an enlarged edition was published by H. Meyer
(Leipzig, 1835). The
Hedyphagetica fragments were collected by C. Wernsdorf in the
Poetae
Lat. Minores, vols. i.-v. part i.
(Altenburg, 1780-88); vol. v. 2, 3-5
(Helmstadt, 1791-99). The ancient authorities for the poet's life and writings
are given by Hessel, Spangenberg, and Teuffel (
Rom. Lit. vol. i.; Eng. edit.
London, 1891). Special discussions in Vahlen,
Die Annalen des Ennius
(Berlin, 1886); H. Jordan,
Quaest. Enn. (Königsberg,
1885). For general criticisms of his style and genius, see Patin,
Études sur la Poésie Latine, vol. ii.
(Paris,
1869); Sellar,
R. Poets of Republic, vol. i.
(Oxford,
1881).
