propertius and antony j.griffin 1977

8/13/2019 Propertius and Antony J.griffin 1977

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Propertius and AntonyAuthor(s): Jasper GriffinSource: The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 67 (1977), pp. 17-26Published by: Society for the Promotion of Roman StudiesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/299915 .Accessed: 01/02/2014 01:54

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PROPERTIUS ANDANTONY*

By JASPER GRIFFIN

In a recent rticle, Augustan Poetry nd the Life of Luxury , JRS 66 (1976), 87, Iargued that much recent cholarship has misjudged the Augustan poets n certain mportantrespects, ecause it has been thought n principle ossible to separate literature and life ,as if they were clearly distinguishable ntities; in reality, he two affect ach other n aceaselessmutual nteraction. That argument was developed as a general treatment f thefios (pi2u78ovoss presented n Latin literature, nd as lived in reality n a society n whichGreek and Italian elements, poetical motifs nd real behaviour, were inextricably nter-mingled.

The present paper s devoted to a more particular nquiry nto one poet and one type ofhistorical figure. I argue that Propertius' presentation f himself n poetry as a lover-romantic, eckless nd obsessed-is closelyrelated o the figure n history f Mark Antony.1That historical igure s itself o be seen in a long tradition f great overs of pleasure, inwhich the actual ives of real men can be seen to be shaped and coloured by the nfluence f'literature'. The argument f my earlier paper does not depend for ts validity upon theacceptance of the present one, but they both pursue the same approach.

Like all the Augustan poets, Propertius f course follows he Augustan nterpretationof Actium, s a war between Octavian with the Senate at his back, and the degraded hordesof the East, eunuchs, Anubis, noxia Alexandria, nd the incestimeretrix eginaCanopi. Hegoes even further han Horace and Virgil n expressing piteful hostility nd loathing forCleopatra. Not only is she, in III. II . 39, a harlot queen, but also 'famulos inter feminatrita uos ' (1.30); when she takes to flight, v. 6. 64, it is 'hoc unum, usso non morituradie -but she would in any case have been unworthy o appear in a Roman triumph. Theself-consciously oble manner of Horace, Odes . 37 is far way, et alone the genuine magna-nimity o which Virgil rises at Aen. VIII. 7II.2 Such hostility o the formidable ueen isstrikinrg, nd there are other features f Propertius' poetry which make it even more sur-prising; for his treatment f Antony s much more interesting, more complex, and moresympathetic.

Propertius egins II. Ii:Quidmirare,meam i versat emina itam

et trahit ddictum ub sua iura virumThis highly typical Propertian opening is developed with a list of dominant women inhistory, Medea,3Omphale,4 emiramis,5 leopatra; and then turns, o the reader's urprise,into a lengthy ttack on Cleopatra and glorification f Augustus for his victory ver her.' The point of the elegy, which is a passionately developed encomium of the victory t

* This paper has benefited from the learning andkindness of my wife, f Professor Hugh Lloyd-Jones,of Dr. Oliver Lyne, and of Sir Ronald Syme. Itspresent form owes much to the creative 7rte6avcyicqof Professor Fergus Millar.I I have called him 'Mark Antony' rather than'M. Antonius because I am concerned with him asmuch for his literary esonance as for his historicalreality.

2 Some suggest W. Richter n WS 79 (I966),463)that n iv. 6 Propertius deliberately ttacks Horace'srestrained reatment f Cleopatra's death, with thesimple aim of the greatest ossible praise of Augustusat his enemies' expense. But encomium by Proper-tius too often fails to rise above the tepid for this tobe plausible; cf. iI. I. 25: 'bellaque resque tuimemorarem Caesaris', in a context where Prop.mentions the Perusine War (29), a piece of historywhich

might perhaps have endeared Antony ratherthan Octavian to the poet; ii. Io. 8: ' bella canam,quando scripta puella mea est'; and III. 4, a veryironical poem. On III. 4, rightly . P. Wilkinson n

Studi Castiglioni I, 1093-I I03, and MargaretHubbard, Propertius 1974), I03; by contrast F.Cairns, Generic ompositionx972), I86, sees only' unabashed admiration , while G. Williams, Tradi-tion and Originality i968), 433, thinks t 'may bemore pleasingly ronical than he intended'. Thesecareless elegists After 9 lines of iv. 6 Propertius sfrankly ired of his subject, and with a disarming' bella satis cecini turns to the more congenial topicof a party. See A. La Penna, Orazio e l'ideologia delprincipato I963), 133.

aMedea in the vocabulary of political abuse:Cic., Cael. I8 (of Clodia); de lege Manilia 22 (ofMithridates). See n. 79 below.

4 Omphale in the vocabulary of political abuse:Plutarch, Pericles Z4; idem, Comparatio Demetrii tAntonii 3. 2, (of Antony). Some modems assert thatit was applied to Alexander and Roxane (so H. Volk-

mann, Kleopatra 0953), I34), but I have found nosource.' Semiramis in the vocabulary of political abuse:

Cic., prov. cons. 9 (of Gabinius).

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I8 JASPER GRIFFIN

Actium, s only oosely connected with he poet's own love-life , comments Rothstein n hisedition,6 nd it may be that Propertius was trying o produce the sort of poem whichHorace sometimes ucceeds in writing, which combines a public, political theme with anincident of his own life as a lyric poet. Odes ii. I4 is a good example, where Horace openswith public ceremonies o greet Augustus on his return rom Spain, and via a central verseexpressing his personal trust n him concludes with a private celebration with Neaera.Odes V. 5 and I. I5, and (significantly) . 37 on Actium, are also in this mould.7 But theexquisite tact with which, n Odes iii. I4, Horace refers o his Republican role-now longover-at Philippi ('non ego hoc ferrem alidus iuventa/ onsule Planco ') is very differentfrom he way n which Propertius has allowed the ogic of his own poem, if read as a unity,to push him into the role of Antony; for he says ' no wonder if I am dominated by awoman-look at Cleopatra'.

Naturally we do not want to force his mplication, ut perhaps we should look furtherfor an explanation before accepting the laxness of thought-connection hich is charac-teristic f Roman elegy' (Rothstein d III. ii, init.). What of Propertius I. i6 ? In thispoem 8 Propertius complains: ' My venal mistress s excluding me for a richer rival;curses on wealth I should be ashamed of this humiliation-but a degrading ove is pro-verbially deaf. Look at Antony: infamis mor was his ruin; glory to Octavian for hisclemency. As for you, may your ill-gotten gains be swept away; and beware of divinepunishment oryour treachery'. The Actium episode here s described by G. Williams 9as' the conventional ccount of Actium, with ts denigration f Antony .. Propertius s luredinto the conventional public contrast of right with wrong, of Augustus with Antony orCleopatra . .' But is it so conventional Again, the poet draws a parallel between Antonyand himself; and at the end of the poem he is still persevering n his degrading ove , notbreaking ree. It is perhaps appropriate o look back with a fresh ye at 11. 9-ZI:

atqueutinamRomaenemo sset dives, t psestraminea ossetdux habitare asa

numquam enales ssent dmunus micae....The Princeps prided himself upon his unostentatious mode of life; 10 is not the natural

interpretation f these ines, n the context of this curious poem, an ironical and malicioussuggestion hat he ought to be really oor-to the end, not of correct moral edification, utof making more agreeable and less expensive the ife of ove ?11

How many swallows make a summer ? Twice we have found Propertius ommittingthe gaffe of identifying imself with Antony; will an appeal to the 'laxness of thought-connection characteristic f Roman elegy suffice o cover both ? I hope it will seemimplausible, when we have considered some references o Paris. The correct ttitude toParis for an Augustan poet was surely austere, and Horace treats him in this spirit. InOdes . x5he will run away ike a stag n battle; in Odes II. 3 he is the fatalis ncestusqueiudex who ruined his country; in Epp. I. 2. io the paradigm of a fool. In the Aeneidt isto Paris that-his itterest nemies compare Aeneas (Aen. V. 215). But Propertius nticipatesthe frivolous Ovid in sympathizing ith the Trojan seducer.

In IL.3-. 5 Cynthia s so beautiful

hatTroy

would have done better o fall for her thanfor Helen:

olimmirabar, uod tanti d Pergama elliEuropae tque Asiae causapuellafuit:

nunc, ari, usapiens t tu, Menelac, uisti,tu quia poscebas, u quia lentus ras.

6 L. Alfonsi, L'elegia di Properzio (I945) 66 f.thinks the two motifs blend better, and even finds'lo spirito 6 piuttosto virgiliano . Contra, MargaretHubbard, op. cit. (n. 2), 89: (in certain poems inBook III) 'the development of the topics is oftenderivative and unconvinced, like the Cleopatraepisode of iI. iI

7 cf. on this point A. La Penna, op. cit. n. 2), I27.

Prop. III. II is not mentioned in this connectioneither by him or by F. Solmsen, 'Propertius andHorace', CP 43 (1948), I05 = Kleine Schriften I,278.

8Discussed by Hubbard, op. cit. (n. 2), 58 f., withdifferent esults.9 Tradition nd Originality, 59.

cf. JRS 66 (1976), 95, n. 148."With the technique compare for example III. I4.

The poem opens with a straight-faced nnouncementthat 'there are many things we admire about theSpartan education ; but it turns out that, nstead of

the all too familiar praise of Spartan toughness andself-denial, we find an amusingly unexpected enco-mium on the unparalleled advantages it offered helover for getting lose to his girl.



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PROPERTIUSAND ANTONY I9

Paris is a model for Propertius' own erotic tastes at II. I5. I3; at iII. 8. 29 f. the poet saysthat Paris, like him, found his desire keenest mid the alarms of war:

dulcior gnis rat Paridi, um Graiaper armaTyndaridi oterat audia ferre uae:

dumvincunt anai, dum restat arbarus ector,

ille Helenae gremiomaxima ellagerit.(The last two lines, we note, could serve as a perfect ummary f the picture n our sourcesof the nactivity f Antony during he Perusine War.) Like Antony, he glamorous hedonistParis, who loses all for a woman, was not an expected subject for Augustan panegyric,however witty. t comes therefore s no surprise both that he moralistic radition xplicitlycompared Antony to Paris 'running away from the fighting nto Cleopatra's bosom ,12and also that Propertius' poem II. I5, in which at 1. I3 the poet compares himself o Paris,goes on to make the point 1. 4I) that if only everyonewould live the life of love and wine,there would be no Roman corpses floating n the sea at Actium':

qualem i cuncti uperent ecurrere itamet pressimultomembra aceremero,

non ferrum rudele eque essetbellicanavis,nec nostra Actiacum erteret ssamare,

nectotiens ropriis ircum ppugnata riumphislassaforet rinis olvere oma uos.

W. A. Camps 13 calls this an extravagant aradox'; I cannot see why. It seems to be, infact, a bitter ruth, however unexpected such a thing may be in an Augustan poet men-tioning Augustus' greatest riumph. 'Had he lived like me-like Antony-the disaster ofActium need never have happened...'

In order to understand Propertius nd Antony, t is necessary o put the figure f theman of action who lived for pleasure into its full perspective, nd in accordance with myargument his must be done both in literature nd in life, n their reciprocal relationship.

To begin with iterature, e must be alive to the fact hat Hellenistic iterature id not con-sist only of high-brow oets. Propertius nd Virgil boast of certain Hellenistic precursors:Philetas, Callimachus, Theocritus, Euphorion. These were great poets and creditablenames, and a Gallus or a Propertius was proud to admit heir nfluence. By contrast, mytho-logical hand-books and short-cuts ike Parthenius' ittle work on the Sufferings aused byLove, perhaps more often ooked into by these poets than the works of Philetas,'4 did notreceive honourable mention n their poems. No more did they parade their acquaintancewith unedifying works of propaganda and scandal, but these too may turn out to be un-expectedly mportant; more especially when we remind ourselves hat the subjects and theattitudes which will be discussed here were even more pervasive n conversation han inwritten orm. The latter s only the one which we now can see and control, nd as we do sowe must allow for the vast and formless mass of sub-literary nd oral material which was

taken for granted by men of the time.Hellenistic iterature was rich n scandalous and scurrilous works on the great figures fclassical Greece,15 s well as on contemporaries. An ignoble mentality venged itself uponthe higher pretensions f great men by attaching ow or titillating tories to their names.Sexual scandal was assembled about philosophers,16 ome of which has got into DiogenesLaertius; some at least of the epigrams scribed to Plato seem to come from uch a source,17and it is significant hat Lucilius 18 can be seen to make use of a story f this sort about theAcademic philosophers Xenocrates and Polemon. Serious philosophers joined in:

12 Plutarch, Comparatio 3.13 Edition f Book II ad loc.14 I am sceptical about Propertius' knowledge of

Philetas; even of Callimachus, copies of whom musthave been easier to find, what he says n Books ii andiII is extraordinarily light. Outside the Aetia pro-logue, his knowledge of Callimachus before he wroteBook iv was hardly great.

15 Locus classicus on this: U. von Wilamowitz,Antigonos on Karystos i88I), 47 f.

16Susemihl, Gesch.d.gr.Lit. I89I-2) I, I48 f. The20,7Qoif Timon also are relevant: see fr. 9, 30, 54,56 and 59. See Wachsmuth on Anaxarchus andqpials bovoirTAi',picurus yaarTpi aptC61mvoStc.17 W. Ludwig in GRBS 4 (I963), 59 f.

18 Fr. 755 (Marx).



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20 JASPER GRIFFIN

Chrysippus or xample accused Epicurus of being a disciple of Archestratus n debauchery.Hieronymus f Rhodes and Idomeneus of Lampsacus circulated imilar candal about poetsand politicians; 19 in history, he cynical Theopompus ascribed to all comers n his hugeHistory nworthy nd sordid motives, while sensationalists ike Douris added lurid scenes ofimaginary ndulgence. The base work known s 'Aristippus TrEpi arazais- pilqps ' was thesource for a great deal of sensational material n the Thirteenth Book of Athenaeus. Suchpre-Hellenistic figures s Alcibiades were thickly ncrusted with anecdotes, mostly of sala-cious or luxurious character,20 nd so were Diadochi such as Demetrius Poliorcetes, nd notleast Alexander himself.

Another relevant genre is that concerned with the doings and sayings of Tcalpal.Machon 21versifies large number of more or less improper tories bout the mistresses fthe poets and the Hellenistic dynasts, nd such women as Lais, Lamia, Phryne and Thaisbecame celebrated, tories multiplying bout their behaviour; Lucilius made use of this,too.22 Plutarch s among the authors who tell us, for example, that Alexander burnt thepalace at Persepolis to please Thais; 23 his Life of Demetrius ncludes such material nabundance. Monographs were produced on luxurious dinners.24 The luxury ship ofHieron II was the subject of a special work,25 hose extant portions till make impressivereading. A more scholarly taste was gratified y such works as those On the AthenianCourtesans, dentifying hose who appeared n literature; 6 for he philosophically nclined,there were treatises On Pleasure,27 ith detailed accounts of the hedonism which the authorstook pleasure in condemning. Straightforward ornography was abundant.28

19 Susemihl, op. cit. (n. I6), I, I48.20 Its importance or he ancient conception of him

is realized by F. Taeger, Alkibiades I943), 86 n. io.The material goes back as far as Lysias xiv; [Ando-cides] iv, Against Alcibiades; and Antiphon fr. 67(Blass). Douris contributed some melodramaticflourishes. Cf. D. A. Russell, PCPhS 292 (I966), 37,who points out that material on Alcibiades' life wasquite unusually rich, and that he was early a subjectfor full-scale biographies. 'La m6moire d'Alcibiadeoccupait singulierement 'opinion publique pendantles dix premieres nn6es du IVe si6cle , G. Dalmeydain the Bude edition of Andocides (ig6o), I09.

21 Ed. with commentary y A. S. F. Gow, i965.Stories about Euripides and Sophocles (xviii),Diphilus (iII, xvi), Philoxenus ix, x), and the citha-rode Stratonicus xi), as well as the dynasts. InRome, Volumnia Cytheris is found dining withsenators, Cic., ad fam. IX, 26; cf. YRS 66 (1976),I00-4. Cf. G. Luck, 'Women's Role in Latin LovePoetry', in Perspectives f Roman Poetry I974).

22 Fr. 263M: 'Phryne nobilis illa ubi amatoremimprobius quem. . .'

23 Plut., Alexander 38, from Clitarchus, FGH I37fr. ii. RE, s.v. Thais, gives the efforts f modernhistorians to tone down, without rejecting, his ro-mantic story. Plutarch, Alexander 0 and 67, furtherexamples of his TpvJq). ' L'exemple de la chasteted'Alexandre n'a pas tant fait de continents ue celuide son ivrognerie a fait d'intemp6rants , observesPascal (Pensees, dn. de la P1eiade, p. 1134).

24 Plut., Demetrius 27: the dinner made byLamia for Demetrius oo-rcoasveae -r 566oBiarlv7roXv-reAstava-re mr8 UYKiCOSTOG latlovU avyyeyp6(peat.An account of a luxury meal by Hippolochus,Athenaeus 128-3 , cf. Susemibl, op. cit. (n. i6), I,486 f. All this is an obvious source for poems likeHorace, Serm. ii. 8, and for the conception, andreality, f the luxury of Sulla and Antony.

25Athenaeus zo6d-2oge. Susemihl speaks of'the fabulous luxury and still unequalled splendourof this ancient " Great Eastern ", built with the aid

of Archimedes' (i, 883). The luxuriousness ofCleopatra's shipping was still a conventional themecenturies ater; Pacatus, Pan. Lat. III, 33: ' quisannalium scriptor ut carminum uas illas, Cleopatra,

classes et elaborata navigia et purpurea cum auratisfunibus vela tacuit ?

26 We know of works by Ammonius, Antiphanes,Apollodorus, Aristophanes and Gorgias of Athens.Evidently there was a demand.

27 E. Bignone, L'Aristotele erduto la formazionefilosofica di Epicuro I (2936), 276 f. Speusippus,Xenocrates, Theophrastus, Heraclides Ponticus,Clearchus, Aristoxenus nd Strato all wrote on i1ovi.The long fragment 50, Wehrli) of Aristoxenus' Lifeof Archytas = Athenaeus 545 b seqq.) deals withluxury and pleasure in different arts of the world;cf. also Clearchus fr. I9 (Wehrli) (from his Gergi-thius), fr. 24, 25, 29, 30 etc. (from his Epu-TtK6s), andfr. i-62 (from his Biot). Fr. 47 of Clearchus gives anidea of the ostensible morality of such works-evAapiTyrov o?v -r?tv aAOvphdvlVpupiv, etc. HeraclidesPonticus 1rspi 8ovis praised pleasure as the highestgood (55), said Pericles lived for pleasure (59)-and sometimes gave the 'moral ' (fr. 6I, TOrlr-rrVTa Troto*aTIs fis aiKoXOrr0oI Tpuvqs). The philo-sopher Aristippus was a focus for anecdotes settingout with censorious relish his hedonistic life andphilosophy. Cicero invokes him ad;fam. X. 26) afterdining with Cytheris; Horace uses him (in Serm. i.3. ioo and Epp. i. i. i8; 2. 27. 24) as an emblematicfigure, ather han as a philosopher whose works oneread. That is to say, he was a creation of anecdote.His connection with Lais (tXco&AX&nKExopua)wasimportant to this picture. Cf. G. Giannantoni, Icirenaici 2958), 23: 'Tutto cooperava a fare di luiuna specie di simbolo, l'immagine piii coerentedell'uomo piXAAovos.

28 Sex-manuals etc., mostly published under thename of some famous ?-ralpa: 'Philaenis ', cf.P. OXY. 289I, Athenaeus 335b-e, 457; 'Elephantis':Polybius xii. 23, Athenaeus 220 f., i62b. Improperfiction xisted: Sisenna, praetor in 78 B.C., trans-lated into Latin the Mt;kTclaaiO of Aristides (theParthians were shocked to find t in the baggage ofCrassus' officers t Carrhae, Plut., Crassus 32). Forthe celebrity of these works at Rome, cf. Sueton.,

Tib. 43; Priapea4; MartialxII.43. On' Philaenis',see K. Tsantsanoglu, The Memoirs of a Lady fromSamos', in ZPE 22 (2973), 283 f.



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PROPERTIUS AND ANTONY 21

Deliberate propaganda plays a large part here. Accusations of every kind of wantonnesshad always been part of the standard material of Greek oratory,29 nd Roman polemic wasno less slanderous.30 Yet even lies, as a constant tmosphere o live in, have an effect npublic morale and in the long run influence behaviour. The accusations made againstSulla, Catiline, Caesar,31 nd Antony,32 o select only the most eminent names-accusationsof a life of reckless, profligate ebauchery-were calculated to arouse in the audience aprurient nvy familiar o anyone who opens one of the more vulgar Sunday newspapers.That it was expected by competent udges to produce an effect merges learly rom he warof propaganda between Antony n the one hand, and Cicero and Octavian on the other. Itemerges from hat episode also that t did have an effect. Not only was Antony obliged towrite On My Drunkenness n self-defence, ut his eventual ruin was partly rought bout byskilful propaganda against him.33

Before reating Antony eriously, t is interesting o observe that the stereotype, f theman of action who lives a life of uxury, oes back a long way. It presents s with a strikingexample of the inter-play f experience nd literature. Already with Alcibiades there wasdoubtless both a spectacular personality nd a conscious playing up to the legend whichsurrounded him; Plutarch hows him performing n outrageous but trivial ct so that thepeople should talk about that and not say worse things about him .3 Thereafter, heexistence f the stereotype must tself have been important or he conception of themselvesentertained y Alexander, Demetrius, Sulla, Antony nd the rest-and of course t was self-reinforcing. Alexander's own example was an immensely powerful stimulus,35 while Isuspect that Antony, aking he East as hiis ortion nd emulating ulla in marching n dheWest, will have said to himself not only' Sulla potuit: ego non potero ? 36 but also ' Sullafecit; ego non faciam ? On the other hand, the fact hat polemic could present s sunk ndebauchery even men of undeniable and spectacular achievements Alexander, Sulla,Caesar, Antony) meant hat he stereotype ecameconstantlymore redible nd more apableof being used. The belief n the exemplum as powerful, nd there the exemplawere fordepicting s a voluptuary he powerful dversary, whoever he was, of today; while on theother ide his Ki6aKE5encouraged him to see himself n the glamorous nd congenial role ofthe man who loves his pleasures but at need is formidable n action. Meanwhile, historiansrevelled n depicting nd exaggerating is excesses.Thus it is a complex process which creates and repeats the type of which the periodfrom 350 B.C. to A.D. ioo presents o many examples. Sallust depicts Sulla 37 in just thisway, and, shifting he emphasis more completely n to his vices, Catiline 38 too. Velleius'characterization f Maecenas is in the same mould,39 nd Maecenas seems to have playedup to it, appearing n informal ttire nd unbuttoned even when left n charge of Italy.40Tacitus has a notorious affection or the type, discerning t in Sallustius Crispus,41 L.

29 W. Siiss, Ethos 1910), 249 f.30 R. G. M. Nisbet, edition of Cicero, In Pisonem,

192 f. If a prosecutor did not produce accusations ofdebauchery n youth, he omission was a striking ndtelling one: Cic., Font. 37.

31 The Bithynian candal was played up for all itwas worth, Plut., Caesar i ; Suet., D. Caes. 2 and 49.It was versified y Calvus (' Calvi Licini notissimosversus', Suet., D. Caes. 49), written p in prose byC. Memmius, ventilated n the actiones f Dolabellaand the elder Curio, published in edicts by Bibulus,joked of by Cicero, sung of at his triumph-vexinghim sufficiently o make him deny t on oath. Otherstories were gleefully xploited: M. Actorius Nasotold of his enormous presents to Queen Eunoe(Suet., D. Jul. 52) ; ' some Greek writers are quotedfor the assertion hat Caesarion really was his son byCleopatra and resembled him (ibid.).

32 K. Scott, Octavian's Propaganda and Antony'sDe sua ebrietate , CP 24 (1929), I33 f.: idem, ThePolitical Propaganda of 44-30 B.C.', MAAR i i

('933), 7 f.33Stahelin in RE XI 767. I2 f.: 'hat sich ...dieses Imponderabile . . . eben doch als schwerstesGewicht auf die Wage des Schicksals gelegt.'

34 Plut., Alcibiades 9.35 cf. 0. Wippert, Alexander-Imitatio und rom.

Politik n der rep. Zeit, Diss. Wiurzburg 1972).36 Said ' crebro by Pompey n the Civil War, Cic.,

ad Att. ix. I0. 2.37 By 95: ' animo ingenti, upidus voluptatum ed

gloriae cupidior; otio luxuriosus esse, tamen abnegotiis numquam voluptas remorata. . .'

38 BC 5, I4-I6, 6o (his heroic ast fight). Cicero, atneed, gives the same picture, pro Cael. 12-13: (ofCatiline), ' flagrabant vitia libidinis apud illumvigebant etiam studia rei militaris , etc. ' The oldRepublic knew that vice and energy re not incom-patible , R. Syme, Tacitus , 545.

39 ii. 88. 2: ' ubi res vigiliam exigeret, ane in-somnis, providens atque agendi sciens; simul veroaliquid ex negotiis remitti posset, otio et mollitiispaene ultra feminam fluens .

40 Seneca, Epp. I14. 6. The tutor of Nero is neverweary of attacking hevices of the friend f Augustus.

41 Tac., Ann. III. 30. 4: 'per cultum et munditias

copiaque et affluentia uxu propior. suberat tamenvigor animi . .'



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liance; 75 it is the shame and the glory f the elegiac poet to do likewise.76 He cannot go onservice, his fate s idleness and ignominy-

me sine,quem emper oluit ortuna acere,hanc nimam xtremae eddere equitiae.77

This is the meaning of his long servitium 8 and the infamia t has brought him.Above all, Antony s the slave of the woman. This is meant to be a bitter nd cruel

taunt, n utter ondemnation f a degraded man,79 ut for he elegiac poet it is a boast: hisbeloved is his domina, nd a cruel and arbitrary ne. The conception s alien to Greek ovepoetry until a much later period, and scholars speak of the existence of a gap between theGreek and Roman writers, ot only of time, but also of deas .'80 That gap is in part to befilled by the rhetorical nd political material n which a man is accused of this relationship;that the poets accept and glory n it is a symptom f their whole attitude owards properRoman values, of their boasting of a life which the respectable would altogether egard snequitia, nertia nd infamia.

It was indeed implicit n that attitude hat the eers of the world should become theirslogans. Another pleasing example can be found n the only piece of Gallus' poetry boutwhich we really know anything. At the end of the tenth Eclogue, Virgil presents Galluswandering n the mountains f Arcadia, amenting n mellifluous nd sentimental erse hisloss of Lycoris: she has left him and will cross the icy Alps (11.46 f.):

tu procul patria nec sit mihi redere antum)Alpinas, dura, nives t frigora henime sine solavides. , te ne frigora aedanta, tibi ne teneras lacies ecet speraplantas

It has long been agreed that there ies behind these lines a poem of Gallus himself, s isimplied by the famous note of Servius on 1. 46 (' hi omnes versus Galli sunt, de ipsius trans-lati carminibus ) and this s confirmed 1 by the use of the same motifs n Prop. I. 8; cruellyabandoning me, says Propertius 1. 7):

tu pedibus eneris ositas ulcire ruinas,tu potes nsolitas, ynthia, erre ives?

Cicero's speeches against Catiline do not seem the obvious place to look for a parallel, butin the second Catilinarian he declaims against the fashionable nd vicious young men who

Plut., Antony 28 (during the Perusine War):o'XwaO ?pEp6pEvov*rn' axrs Eis A?ME6vbpEav, &KEl8? psi-paKiov aXoXfv dyovros Bicarpfpa3cSKal rrai8iaSe Xp6psVov

vacioaKlv imaiKaO6Tuvrra6Elv 6 -ro?wv-rAia-rccrov cbS 'Av-nip65vElrreV v56kwpa, 6ov p6vov.

76 cf. also Tibullus I. I. 57. The point s wittily utby Ovid, Ars I. 504: ' arbitrio dominae temporaperde tuae.'

77 Prop. I. 6. 25.78 e.g. F. 0. Copley, 'Servitium Amoris in the

Roman Elegists , TAPA 78 (I947), 285 f.9 As when Creon calls Haemon yvvauKo65 O6Avupa,Soph., Ant. 756, or when the historian records ofClaudius that he g6ovAoKpa-rljTO Kal 9yvvauKoKpaipafljl,Cassius Dio LX. 2. 4. The disgrace of being domina-ted by a woman is a common theme of Roman ora-tory. Cic., Verr. i. I. I40: ' Non te pudet, Verres,eius mulieris rbitratu essissepraeturam ; ibid. ii.3. 30; ibid. 77: 'Herbitenses cum viderent ... sead arbitrium libidinosissimae mulieris spoliatumiri .; ibid. 78 on Tertia; ibid. I. 4. 136: ' Mulie-rurn nobilium et formosarum gratia, quarum istearbitrio praeturam per triennium gesserat'; ibid.38; the role ascribed to Clodia in the pro Caelio, e.g.32; 67: 'Fortisvirosabimperatrice ... conlocatos'78: ' Ne patiamini M. Caelium libidini muliebricondonatum ; pro Cluentio 8, dominant role of thewicked Sassia; Philipp. VI. 4, (Antony) 'muliericitius avarissimae paruerit quam senatui populoqueRomano'. See nn. 3-5 above for the appearance inpolitical invective of the dominant women Medea,

Omphale, Semiramis--who are for Propertius paral-lels to his mistress.

80 Copley, loc. cit. (n. 78), 29I. It is surely odd todiscuss such a theme with no mention of Antony.I take this opportunity o comment on the theory fF. Della Corte, Cleopatra, M. Antonio e Ottavianonelle allegorie storico-umoristiche el tesoro diBoscoreale (I95I), 43, accepted by I. Becher, DasBild der Kleopatra in der gr. und lat. Lit. (I966), 57n. 3, that the striking ilver dish from Boscoreale

depicts Cleopatra, in a satirical light (good photo-graph n Monuments iot v (I899), P1. i). His theorywould suit my argument well, especially the sugges-tion that a lion, representing Antony, s shown astamed and bewitched by a female panther, epresent-ing Cleopatra: ' in posa decisamente pacifica, docilee incantato, come sotto il fascino dell'occbio d'undomatore (p. 38). In fact the lion is not looking atthe panther at all, and the identification f the mainfigure with Cleopatra seems most improbable. I amgrateful o Professor Martin Robertson for he follow-ing note: 'The figure ooks to me like a personifica-tion. In principle t could very well be a portrait tthe same time, but it doesn't look to me very per-sonalized and certainly ot ike Cleopatra . The olderview, that t represents Africa or Egypt, seems muchmore likely. Other representations n art remain;cf.A. Oxe n Bonn. ahrb. 38 (I933), 8i f., sp. 94 f.-H. Volkmann, leopatra 1953), 134.

81P. J. Enk, edition of Propertius I (I946), 79.J. Hubaux in Miscellanea Properziana I957), 34.



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will, he hopes, eaveRome and oin Catiline: ' qui nisi exeunt, nisi pereunt, tiam iCatilina erierit, citote oc n re publica eminarium atilinarum uturum. erum amenquidsibi sti miseri olunt num uasmulierculas unt n castra ucturi quem d modumautem llis arere oterunt, ispraesertim amnoctibus quoautem acto lli Appenninumatque llaspruinas t nives erferent (23). As with slavery o a woman', tender feetamid he ce appears rom pposite resuppositionss a cutting okeor as a tender ament.For us it s interesting hat hemost haracteristic oteof the elegiac emperament an beso closely elated o a device f rhetoric y which n orator, n the realworld, ctually otimportant hings one. Cicero s not rying otransport is audience nto n ideal realm fexoticfictions, ut to present ecognizable nd real people n a special way, to lead todecisive action.

Eventhe ensibility f Propertius or eath 2 finds armore f n echo n Antony hanin Augustus. On his death-bed, e are told, Augustus askedhis friends whether heythought e had played well the comedy f ife, nd asked hem, n the familiar reek agof the actors, o" dismiss imwith pplause" ; he died n the arms f his wifewith hewords Livia, nostri oniugiimemor ive, c vale '83 This death, oexquisitelyn harmonywith his ife,makeshim departwith rony nd uxoriousness. or Propertius, n dramaticcontrast, eath s envisaged s romantically ragic.84 Sometimes he overs re to crownlife f suffering nd devotion y dying ogether: whether s a threat,

sednon ffugies: ecummoriaris portet;hoc odem errotillet terque ruor,85

or as a promise,ossa ibi uro ermatris t ossapareintis..me ibi d extremas ansurum,ita, enebras;

ambos na fides uferet, nadies.86Sometimes he will survive im, nd then her vividly magined riefwillconsolehim fordeath; 7 beyond he grave heywill be together.88 ibullus too prays o die in Delia'sarms:

te spectem,uprema ihi um enerit ora,te teneam orienseficiente anu.89

Long before is death Antony ad provided n his will that his body hould be sent toAlexandria nd buried eside Cleopatra's 0-an instruction hichOctavian urned o goodaccount n propaganda; nd n the end we find hat, s Alcibiadeswasaccompanied othelast by his faithful istress imandra 1 nd was buried by her, o in their ast few daysAntony nd Cleopatra issolved heir ociety f nimitable ivers and founded nother,not t all nferior n daintiness nd uxury nd extravagance, hich hey alled hePartnersin Death', cUvaTro0avoVlpEVOI.2 Antony ied n her rms, nd Plutarch makes er ddressa passionate rayer o his spirit efore he took her own ife: 3 ' . . . Hide me there withyou and bury me with you, for f all my many ufferings onehas been so great nd socruel s this hort ime hat have ivedwithout ou .Howearlywas this tory f the death f Antony nd Cleopatra We know hat herphysician lympuswrote n account f her ast days, which Plutarch sed,94 nd it isnatural osuppose hat hiswasproducedwhen nterest asat ts height, hortly fter he

82 e.g. Boucher, op. cit. (n. 6i), ch. 3: 'Le senti-ment de la mort'.

83 Suetonius, D. Aug. 99.84Prop. I. 17. 19f.; 19; II. I. 7I; 24. 35f.85 Prop. ii. 8. 25.86 Prop. II. 20. I7 f.; cf. I. 28. 39: 'una ratis fati

nostros portabit mores.'87 Prop. I. 17. 21.88 Prop. I.

Ig.iI f.; IV. 7. 93 f.

9 Tibull. I. I. 59 f.90Dio L. 3. 5: -r6aapa r6 Eav-roQv 78 -r 'AXE.avSpeia

Kai OCil) 67V)EVaI raiK6K8p81Iv; Plutarch, nt. 8.8.

I" Plut., Alcib. 39.6. Scholars give what seems tome rather urprising redence to the vaguely reportedstory A?youva,ays Plutarch) that this Timandra wasthe mother of one of the courtesans called Lais: soG8ber in RE sv. Timandra (3), Geyer in RE sv.Lais (2). In view of the contradictory eports boutthese women, uch a natural piece of gossipy rosopo-graphy s probably worth nothing.

92Plut., Antony 1.93 bid. 84.14 bid. 8z.



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26 JASPERGRIFFIN

event.95 Oral sources, particularly mportant or this Life of Plutarch,96 will have beencopious and fascinating; and of course a version had to exist to explain to Rome hersuicide,97 nd the representations f her at the triumph n 29 B.C. If, as seems most ikely,Propertius ublished Book I in 29 B.C., and Book II by 25 B.C.,98 it seems pretty ertain hatthe Liebestod f this pectacular pair, who after ll had attempted o rule the world, will havebeen immediately resent o him. And Antony, n that story, s shown dying a romanticPropertian death, after iving, n many respects, he life which Propertius wished to live;while conversely he Roman audience will have found the ife Propertius laimed to live allthe more plausible, because such recent history fforded uch a sensational nstance of t inAntony. 9

Of course t is not being claimed that Propertius was inspired to his conception of thelife of ove only by the career of Antony. In history, atirists ad long ago compared Peri-cles' relationship with Aspasia to that of Heracles with Omphale,100 nd the Successors ofAlexander offered lenty of examples of men overcome with the life of pleasure. The lateRepublic, too, was familiar with the type ong before Antony. And quite apart from hissort of source, Propertius draws on other ypes of model: on contemporary xperience, nhis Latin predecessors, on Hellenistic poetry. But such a life as that of Antony does, Ithink, have a particular nterest. Antony was no doubt influenced, n pursuing he sort oflife he led, by examples both from ife and from literature', as well as by natural nclina-tion; and in terms f self-interest, ven, the role of the dashing and careless oldier was onewhich made him popular with the troops-for a time.-01 Where his life took a particularlyinteresting urn was in concentrating t the end on one woman, and also in its tragic con-clusion.

Antony, n the atter art of his career, was driven on not only by his own impulses andpolitical calculations, but also by the existence of literary tereotypes, which from he oneside lured him into the role of the dashing hedonist, nd from he other pilloried him as atypical monster f vice. Such a career s itself great example of the way ife nd literatureaffected ach other. It is a further urn of the same spiral when Propertius finds literarypersona for himself which so strikingly ecalls the career of Antony; and yet another whenin poems actually bout Antony he expresses n attitude t variance ndeed with that properto an Augustan poet, but in harmony with other lements f his poetry. After ll, if Antonyhad won the Battle of Actium, Propertius would have been an Antonian poet.'02

Balliol College, xford

96Jacoby observes, on Socrates of Rhodes (FGHno. 192), that .very many Greeks must have writtenof Antony's career, immediately fter Actium, in asense acceptable to Octavian, to explain to the Easternworld what had happened. D. A. Russell, Plutarch,140, conjectures that Antony's companions at the

end, Aristocrates nd Lucilius, may have left writtenaccounts (for p. i ' read ' 69.I ').96 cf. H. J. Rose in Annals of Arch. and Anthrop.,

Liverpool I (1924), 25 f.97 Some (Nisbet and Hubbard, Commentary n

Horace, Odes I, p. 41O) doubt the historical eality fCleopatra's suicide.

98So Margaret Hubbard, op. cit. (n. 2), 43 f.99It is pleasing that Antony's son Jullus Antonius

was a close friend f the witty nd indiscreet Julia.100Plutarch, ericles 4. The same image s used by

Plutarch of Antony: Comparatio . 2.101Plut., Antony 6 and 43. V. Gardthausen,

Augustus und seine Zeit (I89I) I, 429, speaks ofAntony's 'sinnliche Sultansnatur und sein ritter-licher Charakter ; despite the charm of this descrip-

tion, think F. Taeger is nearer to the truth, t leastof his final period, when he says, Charisma I (I960),92: ' In masslos barbarischer teigerung Aberschlugsich in Antonius das spiithellenistische ebensge-fiuhl , and finds in him a deracinated Roman lostbetween Rome and Greece. 0. Wippert, Alexander-

Imitatio, 205, is at least premature to say that eskann heute als allgemeine Ansicht gelten, dassAntonius keineswegs ein entarteter Romer gewesenist'; and his own account n pp. 205-13 of Antony's'Absicht einer dynastischen Politik and his con-ception of himself as a successor of Alexander ('erwar mehr als K6nig oder Grossk6nig, denn er hattedie Titel gegeben', 210), especially p. 212, seemseffectively o concede what he denies.

102 Professor Millar points out the suggestivenessfor Augustan iterature f the anecdote n Macrobius,Sat. II. 4. 29-30: a man produced to Octavian afterActium a trained row, which could say Ave Caesarvictor mperator', but was forced to reveal that healso had a second, which had been taught o say' Avevictor mperator Antoni .

propertius and antony j.griffin 1977

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