stylistic notes on the elder pliny's preface

Societe d’Etudes Latines de Bruxelles

Stylistic Notes on the Elder Pliny's PrefaceAuthor(s): Barry BaldwinSource: Latomus, T. 64, Fasc. 1 (JANVIER-MARS 2005), pp. 91-95Published by: Societe d’Etudes Latines de BruxellesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41544786 .

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Stylistic Notes on the Elder Pliny's Preface (')

Despite Mtinzer's pioneering study (2), Pliny's style continues to labour between the Scylla of neglect (3) and the Charybdis of contempt. Norden (4) ani- madverted upon him as the worst of stylists, a verdict echoed by Wight Duff (5), "Fanciful... exasperating maltreatment of the ablative... fortunately, the world has not judged Pliny by his style", and perpetuated by Goodyear (6) : "In truth Pliny had neither literary skill nor sense of propriety, and he failed to discipline his thoughts. The ornaments he parades differ somewhat from those employed by his contemporaries, mainly because they are more crude. He can be florid in the extreme, accumulating vacuous phrases, and he turns out epigrams of excep- tional extravagance and insipidity."

As a character in Anthony Powell's novel The Acceptance World (1955, ch. 3) remarks on style as a consequence of subject-matter : "What do you expect at Wimbledon ? To sit in the centre court listening to a flow of epigrams about foot- faults and forehand-drives ?" Pliny recognised the problem - it was one that famously bedevilled Lucretius, and drove Horace ( Ars Poetica 53) to admit et noua fictaque nuper habebunt uerba fidem si / Graeco fonte cadent parce detor- ta - thus (pref. 13) : sterilis materia , rerum natura, hoc est uita, narratur, et haec sordidissima sui parte , ас plurimarum rerum aut rusticis uocabulis aut externis, immo barbaris, etiam cum honoris praefatione pondendis.

(1) For affiliated matters, see my The Composition of Pliny's Natura History in Symb. Osi 70, 1995, p. 72-81 ; Pliny the Elder and Mucianus in Emerita 43, 1995, p. 291-305 ; Roman Emperors in the Elder Pliny in Scholia 4, 1995, p. 56-78. I am glad to have had the present offering invited by M. Carl Deroux, whom I was honoured to honour with Augustus the Poet in Hommages à Carl Deroux , Brussels, 2002, p. 40-47.

(2) F. Münzer, Der Stil des Alteren Plinius , Innsbruck, 1883. (3) Evidenced by the paucity of items in G. Serbat s survey in ANRW II, 2, 34, Berlin

& New York, 1986, p. 2069-2086, esp. p. 2083. For some useful remarks, cf. the often neglected edition of Book Two by D. J. Campbell, Aberdeen, 1936, esp. p. 5.

(4) E. Norden, Die antike Kuntsprosa , Leipzig, 1898, repr. Stuttgart, 1973, 1, p. 314, uncritically quoted by (e.g.) R. Syme, Tacitus , Oxford, 1958, p. 314 n. 5.

(5) J. Wight Duff, A Literary History of Rome in the Silver Age, London, 1966, p. 307- 309.

(6) F. R. D. Goodyear, Cambridge History of Classical Literature , Cambridge, 1982, II, 4, p. 175. M. Beagon, Roman Nature : the Thought of the Elder Pliny , Oxford, 1992, p. 21, makes a half-hearted attempt to defend him against these strictures.



92 В. BALDWIN

Yet, as Healy (7), one of his rare modern sympathisers, observes, "Pliny is his own worst reviewer. There are countless examples of vivid and imaginative writ- ing in the Natural History ". Since Healy largely restricts himself to the technical vocabulary, I shall avoid duplication of what little effort there has been and here eschew this. It should never be forgotten that the author of the NH was also a word fancier who penned three volumes on the theory and practise of oratory (Studiosi Tres) and eight on grammar ( Dubii Sermonis Octo ) which earned him much partisan abuse : istos (nam de grammaticis semper expectaui) parturire aduersus libellos quos de grammatica edidi (pref. 28). Also, a monograph on cavalry and javelins (smacking of Xenophon), a biography of the officer-poet- tragedian Pomponius Secundus (8) and, of course, his massive histories - 1 won- der what he would made of the 1950s BBC Goon Show's comic sketch The Histories of the Elder Pliny ?

The spot where Pliny could shine was his Preface (9). Healy selects a handful of examples therefrom : complex chiasmus, 15, res ardua uetustatis nouitatem dare, nouis auctoritatem, obsoletis nitorem, obscuris lucem, fastiditis gratiam, dubiis fidem, omnibus uero naturam et naturae sua omnia ; the epigram omnis uita uigilia est , 18 ; an "unusual image", ingenti fascibus, 4 ; the proverbial mola tantum salsa titani , qui non habent tura , 1 1, echoing perhaps not only Persius 2, 75 (as Healy suggests), but also Horace, Odes 3, 22,19, molliuit aversos Penates farre pio et saliente mica ; where Healy should have added the balance of this last, пес ulti fuit uitio deos colere quoquo modo posset , a typical Plinian 'sound- bite', one that incorporates a play upon uitium' s sense of a defect in religious rit- ual.

There are many other nuggets to be mined from this quarter. Obviously, I can- not here repoduce the entire Preface. Readers should have to hand Mayhoff's Teubner (10), or Rackham's Loeb ("), or the Budé (12). Since my emphasis is on Pliny's opening, where one expects him to pull out all the stops, I give the first two paragraphs : Libros Naturalis Historiae, nouicium Camenis Quiritium tuo- rum opus , natos apud me próxima fetura licentiore epistula narrare constitui tibi , iucundissime Imperator ; sit enim haec tui praefatio, uerissima, dum maxi-

(7) J. F. Healy, The Language and Style of Pliny the Elder in Filologia e Forme Lette- rarie, Studi Offerti a Francesco Della Corte , Urbino, 1988, IV, p. 3-24.

(8) Syme, Roman Papers , Oxford, 1979, II, p. 297, guessed that this contained "curious sidelights upon literary and social life at Rome under Caligula".

(9) I have no present access to G. Pastucci, La Lettera praefatoria di Plinio alla N.H. in Plinio il Vecchio = Atti del Convegno di Como, 5-7 ottobre 1979, Como, 1982, p. 171- 197. Healy, whose paper originated at this conference, notably never mentions it ; Beagon [n. 6], p. 175, n. 28, alludes to its concentration on pref. 13.

(10) C. Mayhoff, Leipzig, 1899-1906, replacing its 1854-1865 predecessor by L. Jan. (11) H. Rackham, Cambridge, Mass., 1938, though text and translation are sometimes

a bit dodgy. (12) J. Beaujeu and others, Pans, 1947-.



STYLISTIC NOTES ON THE ELDER PLINY'S PREFACE 93

mi consenescit in pâtre, namque tu solebas nugas esse aliquid meas putarey ut obiter emolliam Catullum conterraneum meum (agnoscis et hoc castrense uerbum) : ille enim, ut seis , permutatis prioribus syllabis duriusculum se fecit quam uolebat existiman a Veraniolis suis et Fabullis, simul ut hac mea petulantia fiat quod proxime non fieri questus es in alia procaci epistula nostra, ut in quaedam acta exeat sciantque omnes quam ex aequo tecum uiuat impérium.

Since Pliny is often berated for prolixity, it should be at once stressed how compact a case of multum in paruo is/are his opening sentences. First, the title of his book, though omitting the number of volumes, a contrast with the bibli- ography provided by his nephew (Ep. 3, 5). Next, the self-advertising nouicium opus , a novelty spelled out later (pref. 13) at greater length, the Latin innovation doubly pointed up by Camenis , the Greek Muses in Roman dress dating back to Numa (Livy 1, 21, 3), and the equally nationalistic Quiritium.

Pliny's figurative use of f etura is the only one cited in LS and the OLD ; the TLL adds one from Varro, f etura pecuniae, via Aulus Gellius 16, 12, 7. There are two variations in pref. 5 ,fecunditas animi and potestas facundiae, also the con- trasting sterilis materia (pref. 13) ; I would now add these expressions to my defence against Syme of the controversial reading opimum casibus in Tacitus, Hist. 1, 2, 1 (13).

Iucundissimey the first of many flatteries heaped upon Titus, is a vocative that in Suetonius is applied only to Tiberius, twice in a letter form Augustus (Tib. 21, 4) that interestingly also combines mention of military matters and the Muses (in Greek). The biographer, though, does describe Titus' banquets as iucunda ( Titus 7, 2).

Such Catullan editors as Fordyce and Quinn do not comment on Pliny's 'improvement' of poem 1, 3-4. It is appropriate that his Preface should exploit Catullus' envoi to the latter's collection. Rackham (not Mayhoff) records that unspecified editors wished to alter putare to nuncupare. No need to tamper thus : Pliny has made his point with the word order, promoting nugas from the line's end to its beginning (14). The familar ut seis , soon offset by sciantque omnes , in this context neatly flatters Titus' own poetic pretensions, later amplified by the apostrophising О quanta in poetica es ! At NH 2, 89, Pliny rhapsodies over Titus' praeclaro carmine on a comet ; Suetonius ( Titus 3, 2), giving no concrete example, lauds him as Latine Graeceque. . . in fingendis poematibus promptus et facilis ad extemporalitatem usque. Since poetry was considered as fit only for a Roman gentleman' s hobby, not a profession, and since Pliny would not want to make Titus appear too much of an artife x - Suetonius ( Titus 7, 1) says that before accession people feared him as a second Nero, there is a clever reminder of his

(13) In Eranos 87, 1989, p. 79-80, against Syme in Eranos 85, 1985, p. 111-114. (14) Catullus is otherwise invoked by Pliny at 28, 19 (omitted from Mayhoff' s Index)

for his now lost Love Chants (coupled with Virgil, Eclogue 8), 36, 48 (his abuse of Mamurra), and 37, 81 (abuse of Nonius).



94 В. BALDWIN

military side in agnoscis hoc castrense uerbum ; cf. Suetonius, Calig. 9, castrensi ioco as the source for that emperor's nickname. The uerbum in question is the rare conterraneum , as in Mayhoff and the dictionaries ; Rackham printed concerraneum (supposedly = congerronem), unattested and senseless, not even mentioning conterraneum.

Two further stylistic details. The adjective duriusculus is very rare, only here and in a literary judgement of Pliny junior ( Ep . 1, 16, 5) where a friend's Catullan verses are thus rebuked ; nephew is clearly imitating the avuncular vocabulary (15). Emollio in this present sense is unusual as well, with the OLD citing only this passage and LS none at all ; cf. the TLL for what else there is.

The next three paragraphs respectively joke about his own 'saucy' addresses to Titus - a clever self-advertisement of his intimacy with the great man, a spelling-out of the latter's titular powers, further tribute to his military days (et nobis quidem qualis in castrensi contubernio and laudation of his oratory, poetry, and all-round genius. In all this, the most ear and eye-catching effect is the welter of words and phrases beginning with P and prae. A good twenty in all, e.g. potestatis, particeps, patri , pariter, prae stas, praefectus praetorii (this last trinity together) within the space of two lines. True, such things can be uncon- scious ; but surely not on this scale. That P is our author's initial is not likely to be a coincidence. In (again, e.g.) perfricui faciem , пес tarnen profeci , the assonance provides a joke-cum-pun of sorts. There is otherwise one notable expression : fulgurat in nullo umquam uerius dictatoria uis eloquentiae. Neither LS nor the OLD register this figurative use of the adjective ; the TLL gives a strong Livian parallel (6,13), to which I subjoin fulmen dictatorium from the same his- torian (6, 39) Pliny will later (pref. 16) import Livy as auctorem celeberrimum (cf. Tacitus, Agrie. 10, 2), a worthy model for himself. This metaphorical use of the verb is uncommon. Again, speaking of Periclean oratory (Ep. 1, 20, 19), nephew imitates uncle's language. A subsidiary question : is this mere rhetoric, or a glimpse of Titus' speaking manner ? Neither Suetonius nor the Epitome of Dio Cassius give any details of this.

More mock self-deprecation follows, also the P - assonance continues, though on a reduced scale. Pliny characterises his book as written uulgo, agri - colarum, opificum turbaey denique studiorum , where Rackham (not Mayhoff) records a variant studiosorum for the last word, perhaps to be preferred since it could allude to his own earlier-mentioned Studiosi volume. Cicero is dragged in as comic ballast for some jokes on court procedure (16), the stylistic shining hour being improved by a striking phrase hard to parallel in the dictionaries that

(15) A point not made in A. N. Sherwin-White's Commentary, Oxford, 1966, though other aspects of Pliny's critique are discussed.

(16) This tempers Healy's accusation (p. 13) that the influence of Silver Latin "gives rise in Pliny to affectation and artificiality as in the apostrophe of Cicero".



STYLISTIC NOTES ON THE ELDER PLINY'S PREFACE 95

describes him as extra отпет ingenii aleam positus. Pliny is fond of such snap- py character judgements, e.g. Nero is alterum uenenum (22, 92) and with Caligula one of two faces generis humani (7,45), a term usefully similar to fae- ces (17). They are sometimes at the expense of consistency : here, we have Lucilius, qui primus condidit stili nasum , which is true enough, but at odds with the statement (11, 158) nasus , quem noui mores subdolae inrisioni dicauere . Cicero is further invoked for his courtroom nobilis suspirado over Cato, for which the closest parallel seems to be Quintilian 11,3, 158, suspiratione sollici- tudinem f aterí.

Next, Pliny's previously-discussed correlation of subject-matter and style, It includes the idiom studiorum amoenitates (pref. 14), perhaps influencing Aulus Gellius' ingenii amoenitates ( NA 7,7, 1). It is notable that his quotation of Livy here comes from a lost book, as does that in Tacitus, Agrie. 9, 2. Rackham's doubts over inquies animus (pref. 16) can be put to rest by the same phrase's appearance in Seneca, Dial. 9, 2, 9.

A final miscellany, ut ait Domitius Piso, thesauros oportet esse , non libros (pref. 17) : cf. Pliny junior, Ep. 1, 22, 2, of Titius Aristo, quotiens abditum quaero , Ule thesaurus est. For subsciuis temporibus ista curamus (pref. 18), cf. the nephew's ut aliquid subsciui temporis studiis meis subtraham {Ep. 3, 15, 1), also Gellius, pref. 23, omnia subsciua tempora ad colligendas...conferam , plus 18, 10, 8, quantum habui temporis subsciui, libros attigi. The verb musinamur (pref. 18, quoted from Varro) is a hapax that clearly caught his fancy, uita uigilia (pref. 19) is paralleled in expression by the younger Pliny's praise (Ep. 1, 3, 3) of the bookish life, and amplified in his account (Ep. 3, 5, 7-19) of avuncular literary energy. Vergiliana uirtute (pref. 22) is conceivably a pun (18) ; cf. Vergiilii uatis (14, 7 and 14, 18), also uergiliarum... Vergilius (18, 321). Nouissima (pref. 27) is a superlative applied with notable frequency (e.g. 12, 83) by Pliny to Nero, thereby ignoring Cicero's studied avoidance of the form mentioned by Gellius (NA 10, 21). By dubbing Plancus' cum mortuis non nisi laruas luctari as пес inlepide (pref. 31), and Cato's coinage of the noun uitilitigator as eleganter (pref. 32 - it did not catch on with later authors, nor did his cognate verb uitilitigare ), Pliny yet again parades his own literary tastes.

"Le style, c'est l'homme même." According to his nephew (Ep. 3, 5, 10), old Pliny opined nullum esse librum non malum ut non aliqua parte prodesset ; one hopes this perhaps optimistic view may extend to modern articles on him.

University of Calgary, Canada. Barry Baldwin.

(17) Cf. my Scholia article for many more examples. (18) Cf. Healy [n. 7], p. 17-18 and 21, on Pliman paronomasia.



stylistic notes on the elder pliny's preface

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