VERGIL AND DIONYSIUS

Author(s): Jerzy Linderski

Source: Vergilius (1959-), Vol. 38 (1992), pp. 3-11
Published by: The Vergilian Society
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VERGIL AND DIONYSIUS*
Archaic Rome: is it
history
or literature? If
history,
is it
possible
to
recover facts from fiction? Are modern theories
superior
to ancient
legends?
But fictions themselves and
legends
are
history
too. "La
grande
Roma dei Tar-
quini"
mirrors,
evokes and
justifies
la
grande
Roma of
Mussolini,2
and Roman
stories of
early
Rome reflect the successive
layers
of Roman
history,
from the
Punic Wars
through
the Gracchi to
Augustus.
It was at the time of the first Prin-
ceps
that the new and
lasting
edition of Rome's
past
was
compiled.
Two names
stand out:
Livy
and
Vergil;
in their shadow
languishes Dionysius
of
Halicarnassus. The vates and his
prose counterpart
boast innumerable modern
treatments;
Gabba's
bibliography
covers
twenty
three
pages
and
yet
one sear-
ches in vain for an earlier book
entirely
devoted to
Dionysius.
Incredibile dietu
,
and
yet true,
the
monograph
of Gabba
appears
to be the first book with
Dionysius' Antiquitates
as its sole
subject.
Domenico Musti's Tendenze nella
storiografia
romana e
greca
su Roma arcaica. Studi su Livio e
Dionigi
d'Alicarnasso
(Rome, 1970)
dealt
equally
with
Livy's
and
Dionysius' image
of
early Rome;3
it is
striking
that
nobody
seems to have been interested in the COn-
^These comments have been
prompted
by
the book
by
Emilio
Gabba, Dionysius
and the
History of
Archaic Rome
(Berkeley, University
of California
Press,
1991.
Pp.
XI + 253.
Cloth,
no
price
stated.
(Sather
Classical
Lectures,
vol.
56).
ISBN 0-520-07302-9.
Tney
are offered in lieu of a
formal review. The book is
composed
of six erudite
chapters:
1)
Greek
Historiography
and Rome
before
Dionysius 2)
Political and Cultural
Aspects
of the Classicistic Revival in the
Augustan Age
3) Dionysius's
Historical Tenets and Methods
4) History
and
Antiquarianism
5)
Dionysius
on the
Social and Political Structures of
Early
Rome
6)
The Political
Meaning
of
Dionysius's History.
The remarks here
presented
deal
mostly
with issues raised in
chapters
four and
six,
and
they
deal
with
them,
as befits this
journal, through
the
prism
of
Vergil
and
Vergilian
commentators. The
book of Gabba is an
outgrowth
of a
long-standing
interest: he has devoted
specifically
to
Dionysius
no less than
eight articles,
the first
dating
from 1966.
2On this
concept (though
he does not discuss its ties with
contemporary politics),
see A.
Alfldi, Early
Rome and the Latins
(Ann
Arbor
1965)
318-35. Detached from
political propaganda
this
catchy phrase
(it
was invented in
1936)
continues to flourish: see the recent exhibition
catalogue:
M. Crist
orani,
La Grande Roma dei
Tarquini (Rome 1990).
^The interest in
Dionysius
in
Italy
continues: see the recent
monograph by
L.
Fascione,
II
mondo nuovo. La costituzione romana nella storia di Roma arcaica di
Dionigi
d'Alicarnasso
(Naples, 1988,
222
pp.).
Its
topic
coincides with Gabba's fifth
chapter;
as Gabba's
preface
is dated
1987,
he was not able to take notice of Fascione's book. In
general,
Gabba
unfortunately
devotes
little attention to
Dionysius' terminology;
one can still consult with
profit (missing
from Gabba's
bibliography)
the
monograph by
V.
Nordstroem,
De institutionum Romanorum vocabulis
Dionysii
Halicarnassensis
(Diss. Helsingfors, 1890).
Here we should also record the conference at the
University
of
Dijon
in 1988 devoted
entirely
to
Dionysius.
The
papers
of this conference
appeared
in MEFRA 101
(1989)
7-242. Three contributions deal
directly
with the issues raised in Gabba's
book and in the
present
article: J.
Poucet, "Denys
d'Halicarnasse et Varron: le cas des
voyages
d'Ene"
(63-95);
D.
Briquel, "Denys,
tmoin de traditions
disparues:
l'identification des
Aborignes
aux
Ligures" (97-111);
P.M.
Martin,
"Ene chez
Denys
d'Halicarnasse. Problmes de
gnalogie" (113-42).
Vergilius
3
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J. Linderski
ceptual
links between
Dionysius
and
Vergil.
In Gabba
only
two
(but dense) pages (116-17) explore
those
links,
and
only
two
passages
from the Aeneid are called for
comparison: they
concern the
"return" of the
Trojan
Dardanidae to the
country
of their ancestor.4 The
prob-
lem is a central one:
nothing
less than the
origins
of the Roman ethnos. Where
do the
Aborigines,
the
Trojans,
the
Sabines,
the
Etruscans,
and most
impor-
tantly (for Dionysius)
the Greeks fit in?
The Rome of
Dionysius
was
ultimately
a Greek
city;
even the
Aborigines
came from Greece. This entailed various
consequences:
first of all
Dionysius
had to
reject
the
theory
of
autochthony (and
the
etymology
ab
origine)
propounded (so
the communis
opinio) by
the
greatest
lumen of Roman anti-
quarian science,
by
Varro in his various works.5
Here we have our first link with
Vergil,
or rather with the
Vergilian
anti-
quarian
lore for
Vergil
himself at the outset of his
poem
does not mention the
Aborigines
at
all;
he introduces Aeneas to Latium
already
in the sixth line:
"inferretque
dos
Latio; genus
unde Latinum
/ Albanique patres atque
alta
moenia Romae"
(1.6-7;
cf. 1.31: "arcebat
longe Lati");
and over Latium rules
the rex Latinus
(7.38, 45).
For the commentators this
posed
a
problem.
The
canonical version was enshrined
by Livy:
the loca where the
Trojans
dis-
embarked were held
by
"Latinus rex
Aboriginesque" (1.1.5);
and it was
only
after the death of Latinus that Aeneas "Latinos
utramque gentem appellavit"
(1.2.4)6
On the
phrase "genus
unde Latinum" Servius remarks
sensibly:
"si iam
fuerunt Latini et iam Latium
dicebatur,
contrarium est
quod
dicit ab Aenea
Latinos
originem
ducere." A
two-pronged disquisition
follows,
grammatical
and
historical. The
grammatical argument
centers on the
meaning
of the adverb
unde : it does not
apply
to
persons
but to
places.
So
Servius;
but a
grammarian
gnalogie" (113-42).
Aen. 7.205
(in
fact
206-8),
240. We
may
add that Gabba adduces
only
four
passages
of
Servius and Servius auctus : ad Aen. 1.378 and 3.148
(dealing
with Varro's ideas of the
Penates);
7.176
(Varro
on the Roman
borrowings
from other
nations);
8.638
(the
origin
of the
Sabini).
This
neglect
of the scholiast in modern literature is not unusual. A
pity: antiquarian
controversies
about the
early history
of
Italy
continued to live in the
exegesis
of
Vergil
as
practiced
in schools.
There is still much work to be done. For an
appraisal
of Servius and of his
commentary (and
of
Servius auctus
),
see R. A.
Kaster,
Guardians
of Language.
The Grammarian and
Society
in Late
Antiquity (Berkeley 1988)
169-97.
^Gabba
(114)
mentions
only
the
Antiquitates
rerum humanarum
(cf.
Dion. Hal.
1.14.1;
Servius and Servius auctus
,
ad Aen.
8.51),
but Varro discussed the
Aborigines
also in the De
lingua
Latina
(5.3
and in the De
gente populi
Romani
(Servius,
ad Aen.
7.657);
and he also wrote a
satura entitled
Aborigines ,
on which see J.-P.
Cbe, Varron,
Satires
Mnippes.
Edition
,
traduction
et commentaire 1
(Rome 1972)
1-35. For a
dissenting view,
see
below,
n. 20.
"On
Liv/s version,
cf. R.M.
Ogilvie,y4 Commentary
on
Livy.
Books I-V
(Oxford 1965)
38.
4
Vergilius
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Vergil and Dionysius
hiding
in the text of Servius auctus
rightly
adverts: "sed veteres uncle etiam ad
personam adplicabant."
Thus in the school edition of the
commentary
the
meaning
of unde
,
and hence also the
question
of the
origin
of the
genus
Latinum
was
neatly solved,
and it was solved in
conformity
with the Livian
account;
in
the more extended edition
containing opiniones
variorum it was left
hanging
in
the
air,
as it should: the verbal
ambiguity
is
genuine,
and it cannot be
conjured
away solely by
the
grammatical learning.7
Hence the historical
disquisition.
Here Servius invokes the
mighty
names
of Cato and Sallust: "Cato in
originibus
hoc
dicit,
cuius auctoritatem Sallustius
sequitur
in bello
Catilinae,8 primo
Italiam tenuisse
quosdam qui appellabantur
Aborigines
. hos
postea
adventu Aeneae
Phrygibus
iunctos Latinos uno nomine
nuncupates"9
Thus the
pueri
in the school learned this:
"ergo
descendunt Latini
non tantum a
Troianis,
sed etiam ab
Aboriginibus."
This
presupposes
unde
applying
to loca
;
but what if the
poet really
meant
the adverb to refer
directly
to Aeneas? Was he
historically wrong?
Of course
not;
an iron tenet of
Vergilian interpretes
was that the vates was
always right.
But
Cato could not be
wrong
either. Hence this
piece
of
sophistic explanation:
Aeneas and his
Trojans
were the
victors;10
consequently
Aeneas could
impose
on the Latins the name of his
people:
"novimus
quod
vieti victorum nomen
accipiunt."
Aeneas chose a different course: to conciliate the Latins he not
only
did not
deprive
them of their name but even extended it to the
Trojans.
Aeneas
could
rightfully
obliterate the nomen Latinum
;
he chose to
preserve
it.11 In this
7No
progress
in modern
commentaries;
cf.
e.g.
R.G.
Austin,
P.
Vergili
Moronis Aeneidos
Liber Primus
(Oxford 1971)
30 ad loc.: The reference in unde could be to the whole
process just
described,
but uirum is the more natural antecedent"
(examples
of unde with a
personal
reference
follow).
Observe that the modern
commentator,
unlike his ancient
colleague, entirely disregards
the
only point
of real
importance,
the
controversy
over the historical substance of
Vergil's
line.
The text of Sallust
(Cat. 6.1)
reads: "Urbem
Romam,
sicuti
ego accepi,
condidere
atque
habuere initio Troiani
qui
Aenea duce
profugi
sedibus incertis
vagabantur,
cum
que
iis
Aborigines,
genus
hominum
agreste,
sine
legibus,
sine
imperio,
liberum
atque
solutum. Hi
postquam
in una
moenia convenere . . . incredibile memoratu est
quam
facile coaluerint." Salluss una moenia
finds an echo in
Vergil's
alta moenia
(curiously
not observed
by
Austin ad
loc.).
On Salluss
characterization of the
Aborigines,
cf. P.
McGushin,
C. Sallustius
Crispus,
Bellum Catilinae. A
Commentary (Leiden 1977)
70-1.
Frg.
1.5 in H.
Peter,
Historicorum Romanorum
Reliquiae
fi
(Lipsiae 1914)
52. For a
detailed
commentary,
see W.A.
Schrder,
M. Porcius Cato. Das erste Buch der
Origines
(Meisenheim am Glan 1971) 102-8.
10This
p resupposes
the version mentioned in
passing by Livy (1.1.5):
"alii
proelio
victum
Latinum . . . tradunt."
Livy,
Cato and Varro favored the
story
of an amicable encounter of Aeneas
and Latinus
(cf. Ogilvie, Commentary [n.
6
above] 38). Vergil's story
is more
complicated:
first a
friendly encounter, (170 ff.),
then the
ravages
of
war,
Aeneas'
victory,
and divine command that
the Latins should not
perish,
but
preserve
their name and their
language,
and absorb the
Trojans
(Aen.
12.819-40).
^Servius,
ad Aen 1.6: "volens sibi favorem Latii conciliare
(this
echoes
Livy, 1.2.4)
nomen
Latinum non solum illis non sustulit sed etiam Troianis
imposuit.
merito
ergo
illi tribuit
quod
in
ipso
fuerat ut
posset perire."
Vergilius
5
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J. Linderski
perspective
he takes the
place
of a new founder of the nomen Latinum
,
the vir
from whom the Latins descended. Whatever the
application
of
unde, Vergil
was
right.
But
invoking
and
quoting
Cato,
the commentators also edited him. For
Cato,
if we are to believe
Dionysius (1.1.11),
saw in the
Aborigines
not an
autochthonous
population
but,
surprisingly,
arrivals from
Greece,
and this view
was shared also
by
another
early
annalist,
C.
Sempronius
Tuditanus.12
They
dated the arrival of the
Aborigines
to a time before the
Trojan
War,
and led
them to
Italy
from
Achaia;
Dionysius
devoted a
lengthy
excursus to the
refinement of this
theory ultimately opting
for the
Aborigines being
a
colony
of
the
Arcadians,
and
connecting
their
migration
with the
story
of Oenotrus
(1.
II-
IS).
But in the end he
expresses doubt,
and asks his readers to
suspend
judgement (1.13.4);
as Gabba
(115) observes,
it was not an
easy
task to
displace
Varro's autochthonous
theory.
And it was this
theory
that was to live on in
Pliny,
in Johannes
Lydus,
in the
compilers
of the Glossae
,
and in the
Vergilian
commentaries.13
In the Aeneid the crucial
passage
comes in Book 7
(170-248).
Latinus
receives the
Trojans
in his
palace,
the ancient
regia
Pici
(171);
in the vestibulum
there stood the
imagines
of
Italus, Sabinus, Saturnus, Ianus, "aliique
ab
origine
reges" (181).
The commentator
explains
"ab
origine"
as
"pro Aboriginum reges"
He
may
well be
right;
Picus and Saturnus were in fact
explicitly
described as
reges Aboriginum.1*
The ancestors of Latinus were Italian
gods
and
kings,
not
any
Greek arrivals
(Aen. 7.47-9):
"hunc Fauno et
nympha geni
tum Laurente
Marica
/ accipimus;
Fauno Picus
pater, isque parentem /
te Saturne
refert,
tu
sanguinis
ultimus auctor."
Were all other
etymological
efforts
effectively
excluded from the Roman
schools?
Dionysius
writes that some authorities described the
Aborigines
as
*2C.
Sempronius
Tuditanus was consul in
129,
and the author of the Annales
(in
which he
will have dealt with the
Aborigines),
and of a treatise de
magistratibus ,
in at least thirteen books.
See
Peter,
HRR 1. 142-46.
^For a collection of
references,
see TLL s.v.
"aborigines."
i4Festus 228
Lindsay (Picus);
Iustinus 43.1.3: "Italiae cultores
primi Aborigines fuere,
quorum
rex
Saturnus''; Suet.,
Vit.
1,
and Dion. Hal. 1.31.2
(Faunus;
at Aen. 7.213 Latinus is
addressed as
"genus egregium Fauni").
Varro
(De ling.
Lat.
5.53)
derived the
Aborigines
from his
native Reate in the land of the Sabines: hence the rex Sabinus. Cf. B.
Rehm,
Das
geographische
Bild des alten Italien in
Vergils
Aeneis
(
=
Philologus Suppl.
24.2
(Leipzig 1932) ) 63,
n. 135
(sceptical
if
Vergil really
hints at the
Aborigines);
G.J.M.
Bartelink, Etymologisering bij Vergilius
(
=
Mededelingen
der
Koninklijke
Nederlandse Akad. van
Wetenschappen,
Afd.
Letterkunde,
N.R.
28,
3
(Amsterdam 1965)
61-2. On the tradition
concerning
the
reges Aboriginum (
=
the
reges
Laurentum
),
see P.
Fraccaro,
Studi Varroniani. De
gente populi
Romani libri IV
(Padova 1907)
175-83.
6
Vergilius
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Vergil and Dionysius
wanderers and
vagabonds,
and
suitably
called them
Aberrigines (1.10.2).
Who
were those Roman authorities?
Were all other
etymological
efforts
effectively
excluded from the Roman
schools?
Dionysius
writes that some authorities described the
Aborigines
as
wanderers and
vagabonds,
and
suitably
called them
Aberrigines (1.10.2).
Who
were those Roman authorities?
Gabba avers
(114):
"The
damaging theory
of the
people
with no fixed
abode was
championed by
Saufeius." As his source Gabba adduces Cornelius
Nepos' Life ofAtticus (12.3).
15
From the
passage
of
Nepos
we learn that L.
Saufeius was a rich
eques,
a friend and
aequalis
of Atticus. We learn of his
philosophical
studies in
Athens,
and of his
pretiosas possessiones
in
Italy (which
were confiscated
by
the triumvirs and restored to him
through
the efforts of
Atticus),
but
Nepos
has no word of Saufeius'
etymological pursuits.16
It is Ser-
vius auctus who
provides
this information in his notice on Aen. 1.6. He writes:
"Saufeius Latium dictum
ait,
quod
ibi latuerant incolae
qui, quoniam
in cavis
montium vel occultis caventes sibi a feris beluis vel a valentioribus vel a
tempes-
tatibus
habitaverint,
Casci vocati
sunt, quos posteri Aborigines cognominarunt,
quoniam
+ aliis ortos esse
recognoscebant,
ex
quibus
Latinos etiam dictos."
Thus
Saufeius,
who
probably
descended from the
family
of Saufeii
domiciled and influential at the Latin
Praeneste,
was above all interested in the
etymology
of the name of his native
region;
a follower of
Epicurus,
he
may
have
written an
Epicurean
account of the
development
of civilization from the cave-
dwellers to the
higher forms,
but a work of a
purely antiquarian
character is also
possible.17
Saufeius was not the first to connect Latium with
lateo'
but
according
to the more
popular explanation
it was Saturn who was there
hiding
after he
was
expelled
from
Olympus.
The
Epicurean
Saufeius substituted in a
rationalistic vein the incolae for the
god.
In the shorter edition of the com-
mentary
the reference to Saufeius was
excised,
and
only
this information was
offered to the
pueri
: "Latium autem dictum
quod
illic Saturnus latuerit."
Oddly
enough,
the commentator does not remark in this
place
that it was this
explana-
tion that was favored
by Vergil,
Aen. 8.319-23: Saturnus
.../... Latiumque
vocari
/ maluit,
his
quoniam
latuisset tutus in oris."18
^The reference
(114, p. 45)
reads:
Nepos,
Att. 12.3
=
Fr. 2 Peter. This is
doubly
inaccurate. On
Nepos,
see above in the
text;
and in Peter's HRR
(vol. 2, p. 8)
there is
only
one
fragment
of Saufeius listed
(culled
from Servius auctus
,
ad Aen.
1.6).
16On Saufeius'
possible family connections,
and his
philosophical
interests and attach-
ments
(he was,
like
Atticus,
an
Epicurean),
see F.
Mnzer,
"Ein rmischer
Epikureer,"
RhM 69
(1914) 625-29;
A.E.
Raubitschek,
"Phaidros and his Roman
Pupils," Hesperia
18
(1949) 96-103;
C.
Nicolet,
L'ordre
questre

l'poque rpublicaine ,
vol. 2:
Prosopographie
des chevaliers Romains
(Paris 1974)
1012-13.
l
'Cf. E.
Rawson,
Intellectual
Life
in the Late Roman
Republic (Baltimore 1985) 9,
n. 26.
18Servius ad loc. records the
etymology
of
Varro,
"quod
latet Italia inter
praecipitia
Alpium
et
Apennini,"
and Servius auctus returns to the
troubling question
of Latinus:
"quidam
Vergilius
1
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J. Linderski
The
passage concerning
the
Aborigines
is
corrupt;
Thilo obelizes
it,
the
Editio Harvardiana
accepts
the
reading "quoniam
<nullis> aliis ortos"
pro-
posed
in 1879
by
A. Riese. Thus this emendation
(as
also all other emendations
listed
by
Thilo in his
apparatus)19 presupposes
the
etymology
ab
orgine ;
no
Aberrigines
in Saufeius.20
Thus
Vergil,
and his
commentators,
stood
firmly
in the
camp
of
Varro;
they
embraced his
interpretation
to the exclusion and oblivion of all others. The
contrast with
Dionysius
is
perfect.
In his
Antiquitates
the
Pelasgians
form the next wave of
immigrants
to
Italy (1.17-30). They
came from
Thessaly,
but
originated
in the
Peloponnesus,
and thus were bound
by
ties of
kinship
to the
Aborigines. Together
with the
Aborigines they
made a war on the
Sicels,
and
expelled
them from their abodes
(in
the
territory
of the future
Latium,
Campania
and
Etruria).21
But
they
suf-
fered the wrath of
gods,
and
only
small relics of them remained in
Italy. Vergil
mentions the
Pelasgi
seven
times,
and
he,
and the
commentators, firmly identify
them as the
Greeks;
but in six
passages (1.624; 2.83, 106, 152; 6.503; 9.154) they
are the Greeks at
Troy
and their treacherous arts. It is
only
once,
at
8.600-2,
ferunt a Latino dictum Latium
(this
was the
opinion
of
Livy),
alii
ipsum
Latinum a Latio"
(this
was in fact the
interpretation
that
Vergil embraced).
Cf. Bartelink
(n.
14
above) 49-50;
R.
Maltby,
A Lexicon of Ancient Latin
Etymologies (Leeds 1991)
329.
19Maltby
in his
very
useful book
(n.
18
above) 2,
attributes this
phrase directly
to Servius
auctus
(and
not to
Saufeius),
and
prints
"ab iis ortos"
(he
does not indicate that this is a con-
jectural reading).
2"We do not know who was the
originator
of this curious
interpretation;
in addition to
Dionysius
it is recorded in
Origo
gentis
Romanae 4.2: "Alii volunt
eos, quod
errantes ilio
(
=
in
Italiani) venerint, primo Aberrigines, post
mutata una littera altera
aaempta Aborigines
cog-
nominatos";
cf. Festus 328.9-10
L.;
Paulus ex Festo 17 L. J.-C.
Richard, "Varron, POrigo gentis
Romanae et les
Aborignes,"
RPh 57
(1983) 29-37, argues
that it was in fact Varro who invented
this
etymology.
I do not see how this conclusion can be reached on the basis of
Macrobius,
Sat.
1.7.28
(quoting Varro),
where the
phrase
"cum Latium
post
errores
plurimos adpulissent"
refers
to the
Pelasgi
and not to the
Aborigines;
on the other hand Varronian echoes reverberate in the
Origo
: in
particular
the
etymological
method of this treatise
closely
resembles the
practice
of
Varro (see the
examples
adduced
by
Richard
35-6).
In the
Origo
the newcomers are
greeted by
Picus; tney may
have come errantes
,
but
they
were the first human
occupants
of
Italy (cf.
Paulus ex
Festo 17 L.: "fuit enim
gens antiquissima Italiae"),
and thus it was in
Italy
that
they changed
from
Aberrigines
to
Aborigines.
This scheme we
perhaps
can ascribe to
Varro,
who would thus become
the
originator (or
at least
propounder)
of both
etymologies.
But this should not mean that Varro
regarded
the
Aborigines
as the Greeks: so P.L.
Schmidt,
"Das
Corpus
Aurelianum und S.
Aurelius
Victor,"
RE
Suppl.
15
(1978)
1617
(again
one wonders how this conclusion can be
derived from
Varro,
De
gente popui
Romani
frg.
25 Fraccaro
(n.
14
above)
=
August.,
De civ. Dei
18.15).
21Servius, preserving
the
autochthony
of the
Aborigines
in
Italy,
has a curious construc-
tion of the Siculi
(Sicani)
expelling
the
Aborigines
and
being
in turn
"pulsi
ab illis
quos
ante
pepulerant" (adAen. 8.328,
cf.
7.795).
Cf.
Briquel (n.
3
above)
108-9. Gabba
(114) disregards
this
version.
8
Vergilius
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Vergil and Dionysius
that
Vergil
mentions the
Pelasgians
in
Italy:
"veteres
Pelasgos
. . .
qui primi
finis
aliquando
habuere Latinos"
(we
also learn that the
Pelasgians possessed
a
sacred
grove
near the
city
of
Caere,
historically
a
major
Etruscan
city22.
Commenting
on these lines Servius
(and
Servius auctus
)
adduce various
theories
concerning
the
origin
of the
Pelasgians (the
commentators
opt
for
Thessaly),
and aver: "hi
primi
Italiani tenuisse"
(apparently
not
perceiving any
contradiction between this statement and their comments on the
Aborigines).
Again
a stark contrast with
Dionysius:
as the allies of the
Aborigines,
the
Pelasgians
are for
Dionysius
an
important ingredient
of the
early history
of
Italy
and of Roman
ethnogenesis;
in the Aeneis
they
are
totally insignificant,
and
they
are
largely neglected
also
by
the scholiasts.23
Next came the celebrated Evander with his
Arcadians; they
were
peace-
fully accepted by
the
Aborigines,
and established themselves on the Palatine. It
was
they
who
brought
to
Italy ingredients
of
higher
civilization:
music, crafts,
and
laws,
and the Greek
alphabet.24
So
Dionysius (1.31-33).
Now
Vergil
men-
tions Evander
twenty-eight times;
if the
Pelasgians only tangentially
touched
upon
the
history
of
Rome, Evander,
the
possessor
of the
Palatine,
was an essen-
tial
part
of Rome's
past.
But in
Vergil
the stress is on the
description
of the
future site of Rome
(
Aen .
8.50ff.);
furthermore whereas in
Dionysius
the
Arcadians live in
peace
with the
Aborigines,
in
Vergil they
"bellum adsidue
ducunt cum
gente
Latina"
(8.55);
the
story
of their future
amalgamation
with
the Latins and the
Trojans
is not told.
In
Vergil (and
in
Livy)
Hercules comes to
Italy
and Pallantium alone
with his
cattle;25
in
Dionysius ( 1.39-44)
he and his followers constitute another
wave of Greek
immigrants;
when Hercules
departed
from
Italy
he left behind
him the
Epeans (from Elis)
and the Arcadians from
Pheneus,
who
ultimately
mingled
with the Arcadians of Evander and the
Aborigines.
And
finally
there arrived the
Trojans:
for
Dionysius (1.57-8, 61-2, 68-9)
unmistakably
still another
group
of Greeks. For
Vergil (and
the Romans of the
Augustan age)
this was
heresy.
Aeneas and his line was connected
(through
gods)
with the line of Evander: Aeneas stresses this himself in his address to the
22No comment
here,
but ad Aen. 10.183 Servius auctus attributes to the
Pelasgians
the
foundation of Caere. Cf. also ad 8.479 where he hesitates between
Pelasgus, Telegonus
and
Tyrrhenus.
2^We will be able to
appreciate
better how little
Vergil
and his
interpreters
have to
say
of
the
Plasgians
in
Italy
if we consider that D.
Briquel,
Les
Plasges
en Italie. Recherches sur
l'histoire de la
lgende (Rome 1984)
devoted to the
subject
full six hundred
fifty-nine pages.
z^That the letters were Greek
Dionysius
states
explicitly (1.33.4);
in
Livy (1.7.8)
Evander
is "venerabilis vir miraculo
litterarum,"
and in Tacitus
(Ann. 11.14.3)
"litterarum formas . . .
Aborigines
Arcade ab Evandro didicerunt."
~
Aen .
8.190-265; Livy 1.7.3-12,
and cf.
Ogilvie, Commentary (n.
6
above)
55-61.
Vergilius
9
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J. Linderski
Arcadian
king (
Aen .
8.134-142),
but he was not a Greek.
Vergil
and the com-
mentators
emphasize
the
overriding
fact that
Dardanus,
the ancestor of
Aeneas,
originated
in
Italy.26 Dionysius,
on the other
hand,
is firm in
asserting
the
Arcadian
origin
of Dardanus
(1.61, 68).
He could look
upon
an illustrious
Roman
predecessor:
"Graeci et Varro humanarum rerum Dardanum non ex
Italia,
sed de
Arcadia,
urbe
Pheneo,
oriundum dicunt."27
Gabba
(117) points
out that the
story
of the Italian
origin
of Dardanus
may
have been based "on traditions of Etruscan
nobility."28
This leads us to the
role of the Etruscans in
Dionysius
and in
Vergil.
More differences here:
Dionysius
is a notorious
champion
of Etruscan
autochthony
in
Italy (1.16-30);
Vergil
remains
firmly
anchored in the Herodotean tradition
deriving
the
Tyrrhenians
from
Lydia,
and so are his commentators.29
Gabba stresses
(117)
that the Etruscans "are
assigned
a
decidedly posi-
tive role
by Dionysius"
whereas
they
"are divided
by Vergil
into friends and
enemies of Aeneas." But in the Aeneid the enemies of Aeneas are not the
Etruscans
per
se but rather the Etruscan outcasts: the cruel Mezentius was
chased
away by
the inhabitants of
Caere,
and found
refuge
with Turnus in the
Rutulian Ardea
(Aen. 8.479-93).
To
fight
Mezentius and Turnus Aeneas
acquired
as allies the whole of Etruria
(Aen. 10.148-214), including
Mezentius'
native Caere.30
Vergil
here stands
strikingly opposed
to the annalistic tradition:
in
Livy (1.3-4; 3.4-5)
Mezentius is not an
exile,
but rules the
opulent
Caere;
the
Aborigines
and the
Trojans
have to
cope
with the
overbearing power
of
Etruria,
the
florentes opes
Etruscorum. And
Dionysius
sides with
Livy,
not
Vergil:
his
Mezentius is a
powerful king
of the
Tyrrhenians (1.64-65).
The
alignment pitting Livy
and
Dionysius against Vergil (and
in the case
of the
all-important origin
of Aeneas also
Dionysius
and Varro
against Vergil)
should serve as a
warning
to those scholars who would wish to detect in often
26
Aen .
3.94-6, 166-8; 7.205-7, 239-40;
Servius and Servius auctus
,
ad locc.
2
'Servius auctus ad Aen. 3.167. Cf. H.
Hill, "Dionysius
of Halicarnassus and the
Origins
of
Rome,"
JRS 51
(1961))
88-93 at 92. But as Poucet
(n.
3
above) 73, points out,
this does not
mean that
Dionysius directly
follows
Varro;
he
may
have used one of the unnamed Graeci
scrip-
tores. On the stemma of Aeneas in
Dionysius,
see now Martin
(note
3
above) esp. 120-22,
140-41.
^As
argued by
G.
Colonna, "Virgilio,
Cortona e la
leggenda
etrusca di
Dardano,"
Arch.
Class. 32
(1980)
1-15. Cf.
Briquel,
Les
Plasges (n.
23
above)
161-65.
Aen .
8.479-80, 499,
and Servius and Servius auctus
,
ad loc. Cf. also the comment on
2.781. See now the voluminous treatment
(576 pp.) by
D.
Briquel, L'origine Lydienne
des
Etrusques.
Histoire de la doctrine dans
VAntiquit (Rome 1991),
and
specifically
on
Dionysius,
see
the article of the same
scholar,
"L'autochtonie des
Etrusques
chez
Denys d'Halicarnasse,"
REL
61
(1983)
65-83.
3See the scholiast's comment on 10.183: at 7.652 "ducit
Agyllina nequiquam
ex urbe
secutos
/
mille viros"
(of
Mezentius' son
Lausus)
refers to those who followed Mezentius and
Lausus when
they
had fled from Caere
(= Agylla).
10
Vergilius
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Vergil and Dionysius
minor
divergences
in
mythical history
either
signs
of
Augustan ideology
or of
veiled
opposition
to
Augustus.31
The truth of the matter is that
Dionysius
represents
the
pre-Augustan layer
of Roman
mythology
of the
origines
;
he does
not criticize
Vergil's
vision or the official version of the new
regime:
he dis-
regards
them.32
As Gabba demonstrated in his marvelous
chapter
on "The Political
Meaning
of
Dionysius^ History" (190-216),
the aim of the Greek historian was
to bolster the
pride
of the Greeks: Greece was not ruled
by
a barbarian nation
but
by
a
city
that was a Greek
colony.
Gabba concludes
(117):
"within the overall framework of Italian eth-
nography
the distance
separating Virgil
and
Dionysius may
indeed be smaller
than one
might expect
at first
glance."
We have tried to take a second
glance,
and the distance is as
great
as ever.33
J. Linderski
University
of North
Carolina,
Chapel
Hill
31As
does, e.g.,
Hill
(n.
27
above)
92.
32Cf. Poucet
(n.
3
above)
93: "l'historien d'Halicarnasse traite son
sujet,
comme si
l'nide de
Virgile
n'existait
pas."
Martin
(n.
3
above) 136,
concludes: "Le rcit de
Denys
est
donc un rcit
l'usage
du monde
grec."
33American
university presses notoriously
overedit
manuscripts,
but at the same time in
the case of Gabba's book the California Press was not able to create a decent index. The indices
bristle with
irritating
mistakes:
p.
249: Diocles of
Peparethus
is
presented
as Diocles
Peparethus;
p.
251: Festus and Pauli
excerpta
ex Festo are
conflated; Livy's Praefatio
to his Ab urbe condita is
listed as a
separate work; p.
252: no distinction between Servius and Servius auctus
although
Gabba in the text of his book
distinguishes
them
carefully; p. 253;
the
compiler
of the index con-
flated Mirsch's edition of Varro's
Antiquitates
rerum humanarum and Cardauns' edition of
Antiq-
uitates rerum
divinarum; p.
253: we note the
entry:
Xanthus of
Lydia, Lydiaca
I. 28.2. As should be
clear from Gabba's discussion
(p. 112),
and as was
easy
to
check,
the reference 1.28.2 is not to
Xanthus but to
Dionysius' Antiquitates (where Dionysius
mentions
Xanthus).
Vergilius
11
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