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Some Latin authors from the Greek East1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Joseph Geiger
Joseph Geiger
Affiliation:
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, [email protected]
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Extract

In a discussion of the spread of Latin in ancient Palestine it has been argued that, apart from Westerners like Jerome who settled in the province and a number of translators from Greek into Latin and from Latin into Greek, three Latin authors whose works are extant may have been, with various degrees of probability, natives of the country. These are Commodian of Gaza, arguably the earliest extant Christian Latin poet; Eutropius, the author of a breviarium of Roman history, who apparently hailed from Caesarea; and the anonymous author of the Descriptio totius mundi et gentium, who certainly was a native of the Syro-Palestinian region, and conceivably of one of the Palestinian cities. Here I wish to discuss another case, which seems to me characteristic of the reluctance of scholars to admit that Latin, and Latin authors, were more prevalent in the East than is usually acknowledged. In fact, it may be not misleading to assert that the invariably adduced exceptions of Ammianus Marcellinus and Claudian as Latin writers from the East are exceptions by virtue of the quality of their work rather than by its very existence.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 49 , Issue 2 , December 1999 , pp. 606 - 617
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1999

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References

2 Geiger, J., ‘How much Latin in Greek Palestine?’, in H., Rosen (ed.), Aspects of Latin. Papers from the Seventh International Colloquium on Latin Linguistics, Jerusalem, April 1993 (Innsbruck, 1996), pp. 39–57.Google Scholar

3 There are two modern editions and studies: Chauvot, A., Procope de Gaza, Priscian de Caesarée. Panegiriques de I'Empereur Anastase Ier, Textes traduils et commentes, Antiquitas 35 (Bonn, 1986)Google Scholar; Coyne, P., Priscian of Caesarea's De laude Anastasii Imperatoris, Transl., Comm., Introd. (Lewiston etc., 1991).Google Scholar

4 Cassiodorus, de orthographia 1.13, GLK 7.207: ex Prisciano grammatico qui nostro tempore doctor Constantinopoli fuit.

5 Hahn, L., ‘Zum Gebrauch der lateinischen Sprache in Konstantinopel’, Festgabe … Schanz (Würzburg, 1912), pp. 173–84;Google Scholar B. Hemmerdinger, ‘Les lettres latines a Constantinople jusqu'à Justinien’, Byz. Forsch. 1 (= Polychordia, Festschrift F. Dölger) (1966), 174–8 and bibliography quoted in Coyne (n. 3), p. 32, n. 34; Petersmann, H., ‘Vulgarlateinisches aus Byzanz’, in C.W., Miiller, K., Sier, J., Werner (edd.), Zum Umgang mit fremden Sprachen in der griechisch-römischen Antike, Palingenesia 36 (1992), 219–31.Google Scholar

6 These are the readings of the Caroliruhensis and the Sangallensis, respectively, according to Keil's apparatus criticus. However, well over 700 codices of the author seem to be known. For lists of Priscian's MSS see Gibson, M., ‘Priscian, “Institutiones Grammaticae”: A handlist of manuscripts’, Scriptorium 26 (1972), 105–24Google Scholar with the review of Ballaira, G., A & R 19 (1974), 189–93Google Scholar; id., Per il catalogo dei codici di Prisciano (Torino, 1982), expanding the earlier list of Passalacqua, M., I codici di Prisciano (Roma, 1978).Google Scholar

7 GLK 2.191–2, 2.451, 2.597, 3.208–9.

8 Paul. Diac, Hist.Lang. 1.25.

9 See Salamon, M., ‘Priscianus und sein Schiilerkreis in Konstantinopet’, Philologus 123 (1979), 91–6CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ballaira, G., Prisciano e i suoi amici (Torino, 1989).Google Scholar Priscian's connections with the Western aristocrat Symmachus do not necessarily relate to a life lived mostly in Constantinople.

10 As well as a number of other, lesser towns; for a survey of these, see e.g. Leveau, P., Caesarea de Maurétanie. Une ville romaine et ses campagnes. Collection de I'École Francaise de Rome 70 (Rome, 1984), 17–19.Google Scholar

11 Among works of reference Helm, R., RE 44 (1954)Google Scholar, s.v. no. 1, 2328; Schanz-Hosius 4.2 (1920), 222;PLRE II, s.v. no. 2; R. H. Robins, OCD s.v.; among others e.g. Jeep, L., ‘Priscianus’, Philologus 67 (1908), 12–51CrossRefGoogle Scholar at 18; Momigliano, A., ‘Gli Anicii e la storiografia latina del VI secolo d.C.’, Entretiens Hardt 4 (Vandoeuvres/Genève, 1956), 247–76Google Scholar at 260; Glück, M., Priscians Partitiones und ihre Stellung in der spätanliken Schule, Spudasmata 12 (Hildesheim, 1967), 53Google Scholar; Petersmann, H., ‘Die Urbanisierung des römischen Reiches im Lichte der lateinischen Sprache’, Gymnasium 96 (1989), 406–428Google Scholar at 411; Dihle, A., Die griechische und lateinische Literatur der Kaiserzeit (München, 1989), 451Google Scholar; Hahn (n. 5), p. 174; Chauvot (n. 3), pp. xii, 92; Salamon (n. 9); Kaster, R. A., Guardians of Language: The Grammarian and Society in Late Antiquity (Berkeley etc., 1988), pp. 146–8Google Scholar, n. 126; Leveau (n. 10), p. 109; Potter, T. W., Towns in Late Antiquity: Iol Caesarea and its Context (Sheffield, 1995), p. 19.Google Scholar I have not specially listed those among the above who pile hypothesis on assumption and assert that Priscian, a Catholic, had to leave Africa because of religious persecution. Needless to say, there is no shred of evidence for this.

12 Ballaira (n. 9), pp. 17–19.

13 Coyne (n. 3), p. 6 refers to a paper on ‘Priscian and the West’ delivered by Marie Taylor Davis at the Byzantine Studies Conference, Chicago 1982. I could not discover a written version of the paper and failed in my efforts to establish contact with Ms Davis, who appears to have anticipated some of my arguments.

14 B. G. Niebuhr, CSHB 1 (Bonn, 1829), p. xxxiv.

15 One may adduce here Rufinus of Antioch, to be discussed at the end of this paper. His text is very short and consists, in the main, of quotations of classical authors and earlier grammarians. Twice he refers to Greeks in the third person: GLK 6.567.6 de ambitu sive circuitu, quem Greci periodon dicunt and GLK 6.573.23 apud Graecos (reproducing a list of writers on rhetorical rhythm).

16 For a survey see Jones, A. H. M., The Cities of the Eastern Roman Provinces (Oxford, 1971 2), pp. 183–90.Google Scholar

17 Leveau (n. 10), pp. 109–10. For bilingualism in Africa in the High Empire, see Sandy, G., The Greek World of Apuleius. Apuleius and the Second Sophistic, Mnem. Suppl. 174 (Leiden etc., 1997), 9–12.Google Scholar

18 M.-P. Arnaud-Lindet in her Belles-Lettres edition of Ampelius (Paris, 1993), pp. xx-xxiv, as well as in ‘Le Liber Memorialis de L. Ampelius’, ANRW 2.34.3 (1997), 230–32 conjectures that the author under consideration hailed from Mauretanian Caesarea.

19 Kadman, L., The Coins of Caesarea Maritima (Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, 1957), pp. 46–7.Google Scholar

20 CIL III 12082 = ILS 7206: M. Flavium Agrippam pontif. Hviral. Col. I Fl. Aug. Caesareae oratorem, ex dec dec. pec. publ.

21 Const, omnem 7: audivimus etiam in Alexandria splendidissima civitate et in Caesariensium et in aliis quosdam imperitos homines devagare et doctrinam discipulis adulterinam trahere.

22 Geiger(n. 2), pp. 48–51.

23 Const, omnem 7 (quoted n. 21); cf. also Dig. 50.15.8.7 (Paulus);Codlust. 2.3.30 (a. 531); CTh 2.33.1.

24 See Coyne (n. 3), pp. 6 and 31, n. 28 with references (the date of Luscher's dissertation should be 1911); add Mueller, Ernestus, De auctoritate et origine exemplorum orationis solutae Graecorum quae Priscianus contulit (Diss. Königsberg, 1911)Google Scholar; Glück (n. 11), pp. 55–60, 161–2.

25 Printed in GLK 3.430ff; Hermogenes in Rhetores Graeci (Rabe), 6.1ff.

26 Both printed in GGM 2.103–76 and 190–9. The only reference in the poem to Palestine, 11. 910–12, is translated literally at GGM 2.197, so that it does not betray local attachments, if any.

27 See Inst. 5.10–12, 5.6.22, GLK2.141–8, 2.214.

28 Kaster (n. 11), p. 348, n. 126, adduces GZX2.238 and De laude Anast. 211 (Joseph in Egypt), on which see Coyne (n. 3), pp. 153–5 with further references.

29 Keil's apparatus adduces Non. 416.28 for the same quotation. Maurenbrecher counts this as no. 3 among Fragmenta dubia vel falsa, and believes that the original place of the passage was in the ethnographic discussion in lug. 18–19 (where the text differed from our tradition) rather than in the Historiae. Priscian may have erred in the ascription, a commonplace error for an ancient writer quoting from memory.

30 184–5: Quorum [scil. populorum] prostratas recreasti funditus urbesl Portibus et muris, undarum et tractibus altis.

31 Proc. Gaz., Paneg. 19.

32 Chauvot (n. 3), p. 159.

33 On this issue see Geiger, J., ‘Local patriotism in the hellenistic cities of Palestine’, A., Kasheret al. (edd.), Greece and Rome in Eretz Israel (Jerusalem, 1990), pp. 141–50.Google Scholar

34 GLK 3.231 teste sapientissimo domino et doctore meo Theoctisto, quod in institutione artis grammmaticae docet; GLK 3.238 doctissime attendit noster praeceptor Theoctistus, omnis eloquentiae decus, cui quicquid in me sit doctrinae post Deum imputo.

35 Ps.-Acro ad Hor. Sat. 1.5.97; cf. Cassiod., GLK 7.213.

36 P. Wessner, RE 2. Reihe 5, 1704, s.v. It must have been convenient for Wessner that in the entries of the RE there is only a single Theoctistus—there are, however, nineteen Theoktistoi enumerated in the same volume (2028–30), needless to say all Easterners. He is followed, among others, by Ballaira (n. 9), pp. 36–7; the sole dissenting voice seems to have been that of Davis (n. 13), quoted by Coyne (n. 3), p. 6.

37 Wessner (n. 36), pp. 1704–5, himself draws attention to the noticeable interest in Greek in the pseudo-Acronian scholia and favours the theory that this may derive from the pupil of Theoctistus (Ps.-Acro ad Hor. sat. 1.5.97), who lived among a Greek, or Graeco-Roman, populace. If so, why Constantinople rather than Palestinian Caesarea? See G. Noske, Quaestiones Pseudoacroneae (Diss. München, 1969), pp. 251–3 for a discussion of the Greek element in the scholia, conceding that the place of composition may have been Constantinople, or even Antioch (this, because of a reference at Sat. 2.5.65, to Syrorum lingua). Indeed, even Caesarea.

38 Hagen, H., Anecdota Helvetica, GLK Suppl. (Leipzig, 1870), cl xviii.Google Scholar

39 Cf. Gibson, M., ‘The collected works of Priscian: the printed editions 1470–1859’, Studi medievali s. 3, 18 (1972), 249–260.Google Scholar

40 The editions of Francini, Florence 1525; the Aldina, Venice 1527; the Ascensiana, Paris 1527. None of the incunabula I was able to inspect contains a biographical note.

41 (Roma, 1506), p. cclix.

42 The one about the book on Natural Questions is a confusion with Priscianus Lydus, one of the philosophers who left for Persia in 531 and whose Solutiones earum de quibus dubitavit Chosroes Persarum rex is extant, see W Ensslin, RE xliv.2348, s.v. Priscianus no. 9.

43 Viz. Cornelius Nepos.

44 Viz. the Black Prince.

45 The story of Priscian's reputation may be of some interest; one may remember that Dante, Inf. 15.109 puts him among the sodomites.

46 Another important author for whom an Eastern provenance has been claimed is Macrobius, see most recently Rochette, B., Le latin dans le monde grec. Recherches sur la diffusion de la langue et des lettres latines dans les provinces hellenophones de I'Empire romain, Collection Latomus 233 (Bruxelles, 1997), p. 59Google Scholar, n. 51.

47 Cameron, A., ‘Wandering poets: a literary movement in Byzantine Egypt’, Historia 14 (1965), 470–509.Google Scholar

48 Cameron, A., Claudian. Poetry and Propaganda at the Court of Honorius (Oxford, 1970)Google Scholar; see also, for a survey, Bagnall, R. S., Egypt in Late Antiquity (Princeton, 1993), pp. 231–4.Google Scholar

49 Cf. Cameron (n. 48), pp. 6–7 for the conclusion that Claudian's native tongue must have been Greek; see c m. 41.13–14: Romanos bibimus primum le consule fontesl et Latiae cessit Graia Thalia togae.

50 See N. Hopkinson, Studies in the Dionysiaca of Nonnus, PCPhS Suppl 17, esp. his intr., p. 3, and A. Hollis, ‘Nonnus and Hellenistic poetry’ (ibid.), pp. 43–62 at 60, n. 16.

51 Marcovich, M., Alcestis Barcinonensis, Text and Commentary, Mnem. Suppl. 103 (Leiden etc., 1988), 4.Google Scholar

52 Ibid., p. 101.

53 On balance the evidence for Antioch prevails in recent discussion, see now Matthews, J. F., ‘The origin of Ammian’, CQ 44 (1994), 152–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

54 Lib. Ep. 1036, 11.161,7; cf. Wolf, P., Vom Schuhvesen der Spätantike. Studien zu Libanius (Baden-Baden, 1952), p. 36.Google Scholar Cf. also Matthews, J., The Roman World of Ammianus (London, 1989), p. 71Google Scholar on Latin in Antioch and Libanius' insulation from it, and on John Chrysostom's acknowledging (PG 47.357) the advantages of Latin in the imperial administration; add, most recently, Rochette (n. 46), pp. 7If.

55 Lib. Or. 43,3ff, 3.338,17; cf. the detailed discussion with many more references in Wolf (n. 54), pp. 53–5, and a resumption of the argument in id., ‘Libanios’ Kampf um die hellenische Bildung', in G., Fatouros and T., Krischer (edd.), Libanios (Darmstadt, 1983), pp. 68–83Google Scholar (= MH 11 [1954], 231–42).

56 Strategius Musonianus, PLRE 1 s.v. He was PPO 354–8 and according to Amm. Marc. 15.13.1 facundia sermonis utriusque clarus; Antoninus, PLRE no. 4, protector c. 357/8; see on his education Amm. Marc. 18.5.7. Drijvers, J. W., ‘Ammianus Marcellinus 15.13.1–2: some observations on the career and bilingualism of Strategius Musonianus’, CQ 46 (1996), 532–7CrossRefGoogle Scholar, questions the bilingualism of Strategius Musonianus, apparently wishing us to believe that utraque lingua may refer to either three languages or to Greek and Aramaic.

57 Euagrius no. 4, RE vi (1907), 830–2 (Seeck, Juelicher).

58 Printed beneath the Greek text PG 26.839–975 and PL 73.125–1701.

59 Cf. Jerome, Epist. 57.5.

60 Garitte, G., Un temoin important du text de la vie de S. Antoine par S. Athanase. La version latine inedite des archives du chapitre de S. Pierre a Rome (Brussels/Rome, 1939)Google Scholar; Hoppenbrouwers, H. W. F. M., La plus ancienne version latine de la vie du S. Antoine par S. A thanase. Etude de critique textuelle (Utrecht/Nijmegen, 1960).Google Scholar

61 PLRE 1, no. 3, PUR 371–2. Curiously enough Matthews (n. 54), p. 467 refers to his being among the Easterners conversant with Latin without mentioning his Antiochene provenance, attested by Amm. Marc. 28.4.3.

62 This would go, of course, also for Hypatius, PUR 378–9, according to Matthews (n. 54), pp. 15, 467 an Antiochene; however, he probably belonged to a family from Thessalonica (PLRE 1, no. 4), though his Antiochene connections may have been extensive.

63 PLRE 2, Attalus no. 2; Symm. Ep. 7.18.3: lectitusse autem te in multo otio utriusquc linguae auctores. But of course the recipient of a number of letters from Symmachus (ep. 7.15–25) must have been expected to appreciate Latin style.

64 PLRE 1, Hierius no. 5; Matthews (n. 54), p. 467.

65 Aug. Conf. 4.14.21.

66 For the emendation see PLRE 1, s.v. no. 5, p. 431.

67 See PLRE 1, Dracontius no. 5; cf. Lehnert, G., ‘Zur Textgeschichte der grösseren Pseudo-Quintilianischen Deklamationen’, RhM 60 (1905), 154–173.Google Scholar

68 Proc. Gaza Ep. 145; cf. Diog. Ant. Ep. 32 (epistolographi gr. [Hercher], p. 265);PLRE 2, no. 8; Raster (n. 11), p. 293, n. 75.

69 A = Parisinus 7496, R = Reginensis 733 as well as Voss. 33.3 of Priscian have: Commentarium Rufini viri dissertissimi grammatici Antiochensis in metra Terentiana.

70 GLK 6.565.9, 6.566.6, 6.575.26 and cf. Kaster (n. 11), p. 351, n. 130.

71 Keil in GLK 6.553; PLRE 1, no. 8 would make him L IV/E V; Schanz-Hosius no. 1104, though doubtful about the use by Priscian, still put him in the fifth century. Kaster (n. 11), pp. 351–2, n. 130, is the best evaluation. His dating: ‘As a Latin gramm. at Antioch, R. is perhaps more likely to belong to the fifth than to a later century, although s. VI is also possible’.

72 An obvious starting point are the Latin papyri from Egypt, collected in CPL. For a very useful survey of Eastern papyrological material outside Egypt, which incidentally provides a good estimate of the use of Latin (employed in about 100 documents out of 600), see Cotton, H. M., Cockle, W E. H., and Millar, F. G. B., ‘The papyrology of the Roman Near East: a survey’, JRS 85 (1995), 214–35.Google Scholar One rather intriguing epigraphic instance worth mentioning is a six-line Greek epigram honouring Oikoumenios, the governor of Caria, praising him for mingling the Italian Muse with the mellifluous Attic one. I must confess that in the long discussion of the poem and the governor's bilingualism by Ihor Ševčenko I could not detect a definite stance as to which was, actually, the governor's first, and which his acquired, language. See I. Ševčenko, ‘A late antique epigram’, Synthronon: Receuil d'eludes par André Grabar et un groupe de ses disciples (Paris, 1968), pp. 29–41.

73 See e.g. Baldwin, B., ‘Vergil in Byzantium’, Antike und Abemlland 28 (1982), 81–93Google Scholar (= Studies on Late Roman and Byzantine History, Literature and Language [Amsterdam, 1984], 445–57); Kramer, J., ‘Der lateinisch-griechische Vergilpalimpsest aus Mailand’, ZPE III (1996), 1–20Google Scholar, with previous bibliography.

74 Peregr. Eg. 15.3.

75 This is not the place to engage in a question that is now in the forefront of scholarly interest, though it may be indicated that the prevailing pessimistic view, dominated by Harris, seems to me most excessive.