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Passer Catulli: The Evidence of Martial

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 May 2015

R.A. Pitcher
R.A. Pitcher*
Affiliation:
University of New England
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Extract

Six epigrams of Martial are relevant to the question of his interpretation of passer in Catullus 2 and 3. Five of these, 1.7 and 109; 4.14; 7.14 and 11.6 are mentioned by Howell in his discussion of the problem in A Commentary on Book One of the Epigrams of Martial (London 1980), 122; to these must be added 14.77 which, although it does not specifically mention passer, certainly refers to it in the words qualem, dilecta Catullo, Lesbia plorabat. One of these epigrams, 11.6, is cited by Giangrande to support his argument that passer in Catullus is an equivalent for mentula on the grounds that Martial also used passer with the same meaning. On this point Howell comments: ‘if one accepts the interpretation of the passer poems recently persuasively reargued by G. Giangrande. . . then one must reinterpret not only this epigram [1.7], but the other four . . . in which M. refers to Catullus’ passer,’ and then proceeds to interpret Martial accordingly. A reading of the epigrams in question, however, reveals that such blanket reinterpretation is not only unnecessary, but also does grave injustice to the subtle ambiguity of Martial’s epigrammatic style.

Type
Research Article
Information
Antichthon , Volume 16 , 1982 , pp. 97 - 103
Copyright
Copyright © Australasian Society for Classical Studies 1982

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References

1 Giangrande, G. ‘Catullus’ Lyrics on the Passer’, Museum Philologum Londiniense 1 (1975), 137.Google Scholar

2 Howell, P.A Commentary on Book One of the Epigrams of Martial (London 1980), (henceforth Howell) 122.Google Scholar

3 Sextus Pompeius Festus p. 410.17 Lindsay. My thanks are due to Dr Peter Toohey for drawing my attention to this definition.

4 Howell 122: ‘IV 14 also gains extra point from it [the double entendre in passer]’.

5 The others are 6.64; 7.63; 8.66; 9.86; 11.48 and 50; and 12.67. For Silius Italicus, see PIR 1 C 474; RE IIIA 79, Silius 17; Vessey, D.W.T.C. ‘Pliny, Martial and Silius Italicus’, Hermes 102 (1974), 109–16;Google Scholar and , White, P.Aspects of Non-Imperial Patronage in the Works of Martial and Statius, diss. Harvard 1972, 95–101.Google Scholar

6 See 11.48 and 50, 12.67 and Pliny Epp. 3.7.8.

7 For the naming of books from the opening words, cf. 8.56.19 and 14.185.2 where arma uirumque stands as the title for Vergil’s Aeneid. See Wheeler, A.L.Catullus and the Traditions of Ancient Poetry (Berkeley 1934), 19.Google Scholar

8 On sparrows, see Page, D.L.Sappho and Alcaeus (Oxford 1955), 7;Google Scholar on doves see Citroni, M.M Valerii Martialis Epigrammaton Liber I (Florence 1975), 337.Google Scholar

9 Howell 122.

10 14.73–6 refer to a psittacus, a corvus, a luscinia and a pica. 77 is a rare classical reference to a cage for a pet bird; cages were usually associated with chickens, especially those used in divination. See Plaut. Curculio 449, Cic. Div. 2.73 and Nat. Deor. 2.7.

11 Giangrande in Howell 122.

12 On Stella, see PIR2 A 1151; RE II 1265, Arruntius 26 and P. White, op. cit. 105–13.

13 It is important to keep in mind the lower status of Martial, which makes nonsense of the Augustus-Horace parallel introduced by Giangrande in Howell 123. What Augustus called Horace is irrelevant: more relevant is the way Horace addresses Augustus, which is invariably deferential, with no trace of jocularity.

14 On Flaccus, , see my article ‘Flaccus, Friend of Martial’ in Latomus (forthcoming).Google Scholar

15 Cf. 1.44; 5.59; 7.36; 9.55.

16 Cf. Statius, Silvae Introduction to Book I and 1.2.

17 Statius, Silvae 1.2.

18 Cf. Catullus 61.139–41.

19 Cf. Tac. Ann. 15.37.

20 See Giangrande (note 1 above) 137 n. 4.

21 Cf. especially Horace Epist. 1.19, which begins ‘Prisco si credis, Maecenas docte, Cratino, nulla piacere diu nec vivere carmina possunt quae scribuntur aquae potoribus.’

For wine in Horace, see McKinlay, A.P. ‘The Wine element in Horace’, CJ 42 (1946), 161–8,229–36,Google Scholar and Commager, S. ‘The Function of Wine in Horace’s Odes’, TAPA 88 (1957), 68–80.Google Scholar

22 As, for example, Garthwaite, J. in Domitian and the Court Poets Martial and Statius, diss. Cornell 1978, 72Google Scholar who claims that ‘Martial invariably uses passer Catulli in the sense of membrum virile’.

23 I would like to thank Mr R. Baker, Dr P. Toohey and Dr C. Mayrhofer for helpful comments on earlier drafts of this paper.