Page:Juvenal and Persius by G. G. Ramsay.djvu/15

 

The only certain evidence as to the facts of Juvenal's life is to be found in casual allusions in his own Satires; such external authorities as there are possess only an uncertain value, and do not even give us the dates of his birth and death. The following passages give us what certain landmarks we possess:—

(1) Sat. iv. 153 refers to the murder of the Emperor Domitian, which took place upon the 18th of September, 96. Sat. ii. 29-33 contains a gross attack upon Domitian.

(2) Sat. i. 49, 50 mentions the recent condemnation of Marius Priscus for extortion in the province of Africa. That trial, made famous by the fact that the younger Pliny was the chief prosecutor, took place in January, 100.

(3) The allusion to a comet and an earthquake in connection with Armenian and Parthian affairs in Sat. vi. 407 has been held, with some probability, to refer to events in the year 115.

(4) Sat. vii. begins with a prophecy that bright days are in store for literature, since it has now xi