Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 1.djvu/505

Rh BIBACULUS. BIBA'CULUS, M. FU'RIIJS, who is classed l»y Qiiintilian (x. 1. § OG) alonjCf with Catullus and Jlorace as one of the most distinguished of the Ilonuin satiric iambographera, and who is in like manner ranked l)y Diomedes, in his chapter on iambic verse (p, 482, ed. Putsch.) with Archilochus and Ilipponax, among the Greeks, and with Luci- lius, Catullus, and Horace, among the Latins, was bom, according to St. Jerome in the Eusebian chronicle, at Cremona in the year B. c. 103. From the scanty and unimportant specimens of his works transmitted to modem times, we are scarcely in a condition to fomi any estimate of his powers. A single senarian is quoted by Suetonius (de Jllustr. Gr. c. 9), containing an allusion to the loss of me- mory sustained in old .age by the famous Orbilius Pupillus ; and the same author (c. 11) has pre- served two short epigrams in hendecasyllabic' mea- sure, not remarkable for good taste or good feeling, in which Bibaculus sneers at the poverty to which his friend, Valerius Cato [Valerius Cato], had been reduced at the close of life, as contrasted with the splendour of the villa which that unfortunate poet and grammarian had at one period possessed at Tusculum, but which had been seized by his importunate creditors. In addition to these frag- ments, a dactylic hexameter is to be found in the Scholiast on Juvenal (viii. 16), and a scrap consist- ing of three words in Charisius (p. 102, ed. Putsch.). We have good reason, however, to believe that Bibaculus did not confine his efforts to pieces of a light or sarcastic tone, but attempted themes of more lofty pretensions. It seems certain that he published a poem on the Gaulish wars, entitled Pragmatia Belli Gallici, and it is probable that he was the author of another upon some of the legends connected with the Aethiopian allies of king Priam. The former is known to us only from an unlucky metaphor cleverly parodied by Horace, who takes occasion at the same time to ridicule the obese ro- tundity of person which distinguished the com- poser. (Hor. Serm. ii. 5. 41, and the notes of the Scholiast ; comp. Quintil. viii. 6. § 17.) The ex- istence of the latter depends upon our acknowledg- ing that the "turgidus Alpinus" represented in the epistle to Julius Florus (1. 103) as "murdering" Memnon, and polluting by his turbid descriptions the fair fountains of the Rhine, is no other than Bibaculus. The evidence for this rests entirely upon an emendation introduced by Bentley into the text of the old commentators on the above passage, but the correction is so simple, and tallies so well with the rest of the annotation, jmd with the circumstances of the case, that it may be pro- nounced almost certain. The whole question is fully and satisfactorily discussed in the disserta- tion of Weichert in h's Poet. Latin. Reliqu. p. 331, &c. Should we think it worth our while to inquire into the cause of the enmity thus mani- fested by Horace towards a brother poet whose age might have commanded forbearance if not re- spect, it may perhaps be plausibly ascribed to some indisposition which had been testified on the part of the elder bard to recognise the merits of his youthful competitor, and possibly to some expres- sion of indignation at the presumptuous freedom with which Lucilius, the idol and model of the old school, had been censured in the earlier productions of the Venusian. An additional motive may be found in the fact, which we learn from the well- kiK)wn oration of Cremutius Cordus as reported by BIBULUS. 48; Tacitus {Ann. iv. 34), that the writings of Biba- culus were stuffed Avith insults against the first two Caesars — a considemtion which will serve to explain also the hostility displayed by the favourite of the Augustan court towards Catullus, whose ta- lents and taste were as fully and deservedly appre- ciated by his countrjTnen and contemporaries as they have been by modem critics, but whose praises were little likely to sound pleasing in the ears of the adopted son and heir of the dictator Julius. Lastly, by comparing some expressions of the elder Pliny (Praef. H. N.) with hints dropped by Suetonius {delllustr. Gr. c. 4) and Macrobius {Sa- turn, ii. 1), there is room for a conjecture, that Bibaculus made a collection of celebrated jests and witticisms, and gave the compilation to the world under the title of Lucubrutioncs. We must carefully avoid confounding Furius Bibaculus with the Furius who was imitated in several passages of the Aeneid, and from whose Annals, extending to eleven books at least, we find some extracts in the Saturnalia. (Macrob. Sor turn. vi. 1 ; Compare Mernla, ad Enn. Ann. p. xli.) The latter was named in full Aulus Furius Antias. and to him L. Lutatius Catulus, colleague of M. Marius in the consulship of B. c. 102, addressed an account of the campaign against the Cimbri. (Cic. Brut. c. 35.) To this Furius Antias are at- attributed certain lines found in Aulus Gellius (xviii. 1 1 ), and brought under review on account of the affected neoterisms with which they abound. Had Ave any fair pretext for calling in question the authority of the summaries prefixed to the chapters of the Noctes Atticae, we should feel strongly disposed to follow G. J. Voss, Lambinus, and Heindorf, in assigning these follies to the am- bitious Bibaculus rather than to the chaste and simple Antias, whom even Virgil did not disdain to copy. (Weichert, Poet. Latin. Reliqu.) [W.R.] BI'BULUS, a cognomen of the plebeian Cal- pumia gens. 1. L. Calpurnius Bibulus, obtained each of the public magistracies in the same year as C. Julius Caesar. He was curule aedile in b. c. 65, praetor in 62, and consul in 59. Caesar was anxious to obtain L. Lucceius for his colleague in the consulship ; but as Lucceius was a thorough partizan of Caesar's, while Bibulus was opposed to him, the aristocratical party used every effort to secure the election of the latter, and contributed large suras of money for this purpose. (Suet. Goes. 19.) Bibulus, accordingly, gained his election, but was able to do but very little for his party. After an ineffectual attempt to oppose Caesar "'s agrarian law, he withdrew from the popular assemblies al- together, and shut himself up in his owti house for the remainder of the year ; whence it was said in joke, that it was the consulship of Julius and Cae- sar. He confined his opposition to publishing edicts against Caesar's measures : these were widely circulated among his party, and greatly ex- tolled as pieces of composition. (Suet. Caes. 9. 49 ; Cic. ad Att. ii. 19, 20; Plut. Pomp. 48 ; comp. Cic. Brid. 77.) To vitiate Caesar's measures, he also pretended, that he was observing the skies, while his colleague was engaged in the comitia (Cic. pro Dom. 15); but such kind of opposition was not likely to have any effect upon Cjiesar. On the expiration of his consulship, Bibulus re- mained at Rome, as no province had been assigned him. Here he continued to oppose the measures