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On Some Passages in Lucan Viii

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

J. P. Postgate
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Extract

These lines conclude the speech of Pompey to Cornelia when she met him on the shore of Lesbos after the disaster of Pharsalia. This speech Mr. Heitland in his excellent Introduction to Haskins' Lucan has stigmatised as ‘abominable’.1 So far as the bulk of the speech is concerned a plea may perhaps be urged in mitigation of this judgment. Cornelia has completely broken down at the sight of her unfortunate husband, and his first object should be to restore her to herself. For this purpose, as all, not excluding Lucan, know, a tone of sharp chiding would be most effectual, and we learn from the sequel that it succeeded : ‘uocibus his correpta uiri uix aegra leuauit | membra solo’ (86 sq.). For the crude brutality of the statement in the last four words there is however no excuse. But happily it is not to be charged to Pompey or to Lucan, but to the editions. We should punctuate:

quod defies, illud amasti?

2. Vv. 155 sqq.

tanto deuinxit amore

hos pudor hos probitas castique modestia uoltus

quod submissa nimis nulli grauis hospita turbae

stantis adhuc fati uixit quasi coniuge uicto.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 1 , Issue 1 , April 1907 , pp. 75 - 79
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1907

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References

page 75 note 1 P. lxiv, n. 14. Compare p. lxx ‘In worse taste are viii. 72–85 [Pompey upbraiding his wife]’.

page 77 note 1 It is easy to account for the singular as one of the islets is much larger than the rest.

page 78 note 1 To save the credit of the MSS. it will no doubt be said that the mistake is Lucan's. The possibility of this cannot be denied : its improbability has already been exposed.