Page:EB1911 - Volume 16.djvu/275

Rh 60. Livy.—In the singularly varied and beautiful style of Livy we find Latin prose in rich maturity. To a training in the rhetorical schools, and perhaps professional experience as a teacher of rhetoric, he added a thorough familiarity with contemporary poetry and with the Greek language; and these attainments have all deeply coloured his language. It is probable that the variety of style naturally suggested by the wide range of his subject matter was increased by a half-unconscious adoption of the phrases and constructions of the different authorities whom he followed in different parts of his work; and the industry of German critics has gone far to demonstrate a conclusion likely enough in itself. Hence perhaps comes the fairly long list of archaisms, especially in formulae (cf. Kühnast, Liv. Synt. pp. 14-18). These are, however, purely isolated phenomena, which do not affect the general tone. It is different with the poetical constructions and Graecisms, which appear on every page. Of the latter we find numerous instances in the use of the cases, e.g. in genitives like via praedae omissae, oppidum Antiochiae, aequum campi; in datives like quibusdam volentibus erat; in accusatives like iurare calumniam, certare multam; an especially frequent use of transitive verbs absolutely; and the constant omission of the reflexive pronoun as the subject of an infinitive in reported speech. To the same source must be assigned the very frequent pregnant construction with prepositions, an attraction of relatives, and the great extension of the employment of relative adverbs of place instead of relative pronouns, e.g. quo = in quem. Among his poetical characteristics we may place the extensive list of words which are found for the first time in his works and in those of Virgil or Ovid, and perhaps his common use of concrete words for collective, e.g. eques for equitatus, of abstract terms such as remigium, servitia, robora, and of frequentative verbs, to say nothing of poetical phrases like haec ubi dicta dedit, adversum montium, &c. Indications of the extended use of the subjunctive, which he shares with contemporary writers, especially poets, are found in the construction of ante quam, post quam with this mood, even when there is no underlying notion of anticipation, of donec, and of cum meaning “whenever.” On the other hand, forsitan and quamvis, as in the poets, are used with the indicative in forgetfulness of their original force. Among his individual peculiarities may be noticed the large number of verbal nouns in -tus (for which Cicero prefers forms in -tio) and in -tor, and the extensive use of the past passive participle to replace an abstract substantive, e.g. ex dictatorio imperio concusso. In the arrangement of words Livy is much more free than any previous prose writer, aiming, like the poets, at the most effective order. His periods are constructed with less regularity than those of Cicero, but they gain at least as much in variety and energy as they lose in uniformity of rhythm and artistic finish. His style cannot be more fitly described than in the language of Quintilian, who speaks of his mira iucunditas and lactea ubertas.

61. Propertius.—The language of Propertius is too distinctly his own to call for detailed examination here. It cannot be taken as a specimen of the great current of the Latin language; it is rather a tributary springing from a source apart, tinging to some slight extent the stream into which it pours itself, but soon ceasing to affect it in any perceptible fashion. “His obscurity, his indirectness and his incoherence” (to adopt the words of J. P. Postgate) were too much out of harmony with the Latin taste for him to be regarded as in any sense representative; sometimes he seems to be hardly writing Latin at all. Partly from his own strikingly independent genius, partly from his profound and not always judicious study of the Alexandrian writers, his poems abound in phrases and constructions which are without a parallel in Latin poetry. His archaisms and Graecisms, both in diction and in syntax, are very numerous; but frequently there is a freedom in the use of cases and prepositions which can only be due to bold and independent innovations. His style well deserves a careful study for its own sake (cf. J. P. Postgate’s Introduction, pp. lvii.-cxxv.); but it is of comparatively little significance in the history of the language.

62. Ovid.—The brief and few poems of Tibullus supply only what is given much more fully in the works of Ovid. In these we have the language recognized as that best fitted for poetry by the fashionable circles in the later years of Augustus. The style of Ovid bears many traces of the imitation of Virgil, Horace and Propertius, but it is not less deeply affected by the rhetoric of the schools. His never-failing fertility of fancy and command of diction often lead him into a diffuseness which mars the effect of his best works; according to Quintilian it was only in his (lost) tragedy of Medea that he showed what real excellence he might have reached if he had chosen to control his natural powers. His influence on later poets was largely for evil; if he taught them smoothness of versification and polish of language, he also co-operated powerfully with the practice of recitation to lead them to aim at rhetorical point and striking turns of expression, instead of a firm grasp of a subject as a whole, and due subordination of the several parts to the general impression. Ovid’s own influence on language was not great; he took the diction of poetry as he found it, formed by the labours of his predecessors; the conflict between the archaistic and the Graecizing schools was already settled in favour of the latter; and all that he did was to accept the generally accepted models as supplying the material in moulding which his luxuriant fancy could have free play. He has no deviations from classical syntax but those which were coming into fashion in his time (e.g. forsitan and quamvis with the indic., the dative of the agent with passive verbs, the ablative for the accusative of time, the infinitive after adjectives like certus, aptus, &c.), and but few peculiarities in his vocabulary. It is only in the letters from the Pontus that laxities of construction are detected, which show that the purity of his Latin was impaired by his residence away from Rome, and perhaps by increasing carelessness of composition.

63. The Latin of Daily Life.—While the leading writers of the Ciceronian and Augustan eras enable us to trace the gradual development of the Latin language to its utmost finish as an instrument of literary expression, there are some less important authors who supply valuable evidence of the character of the sermo plebeius. Among them may be placed the authors of the Bellum Africanum and the Bellum Hispaniense appended to Caesar’s Commentaries. These are not only far inferior to the exquisite urbanitas of Caesar’s own writings; they are much rougher in style even than the less polished Bellum Alexandrinum and De Bello Gallico Liber VIII., which are now with justice ascribed to Hirtius. There is sufficient difference between the two to justify us in assuming two different authors; but both freely employ words and constructions which are at once antiquated and vulgar. The writer of the Bellum Alexandrinum uses a larger number of diminutives within his short treatise than Caesar in nearly ten times the space; postquam and ubi are used with the pluperfect subjunctive; there are numerous forms unknown to the best Latin, like tristimonia, exporrigere, cruciabiliter and convulnero; potior is followed by the accusative, a simple relative by the subjunctive. There is also a very common use of the pluperfect for the imperfect, which seems a mark of this plebeius sermo (Nipperdey, Quaest. Caes. pp. 13-30).

Another example of what we may call the Latin of business life is supplied by Vitruvius. Besides the obscurity of many of his technical expressions, there is a roughness and looseness in his language, far removed from a literary style; he shares the incorrect use of the pluperfect, and uses plebeian forms like calefaciuntur, faciliter, expertiones and such careless phrases as rogavit Archimedem uti in se sumeret sibi de eo cogitationem. At a somewhat later stage we have, not merely plebeian, but also provincial Latin represented in the Satyricon of Petronius. The narrative and the poems which are introduced into it are written in a style distinguished only by the ordinary peculiarities of silver Latinity; but in the numerous conversations the distinctions of language appropriate to the various speakers are accurately preserved; and we have in the talk of the slaves and provincials a perfect storehouse of words and constructions of the greatest linguistic value. Among the unclassical forms and constructions may be noticed masculines like fatus, vinus, balneus, fericulus and lactem (for lac), striga for strix, gaudimonium and tristimonium, sanguen, manducare, nutricare, molestare, nesapius (sapius = Fr. sage), rostrum (= os), ipsimus (= master), scordalias, baro, and numerous diminutives like camella, audaculus, potiuncula,