The Roman Poets of the Augustan Age: Virgil
9781465599346
213 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
The Augustan Age, regarded as a critical epoch in the history of the world, extends from the date of the battle of Actium, when Octavianus became undisputed master of the world, to his death in the year 14A.D. But the age known by that name as a great epoch in the history of literature begins some years earlier, and ends with the death of Livy and Ovid in the third year of the following reign. Of the poets belonging to that age whose writings have reached modern times—Virgil, Horace, Tibullus, Propertius, and Ovid—all were born, and some had reached manhood, before the final overthrow of the Republic at the battle of Philippi. The earlier poems of Virgil and Horace belong to the period between that date and the establishment of the Empire. The age of the Augustan poets may accordingly be regarded as extending from about the death of Julius Caesar in 44 B.C. to the death of Ovid 17 A.D. The whole of this period was one of great literary activity, especially in the department of poetry. Besides the writers just mentioned, several others were recognised by their contemporaries as poets of high excellence, though there is no reason to doubt that the works which have reached our time were the most distinguished by original genius and finished execution. These works, though differing much in spirit and character as well as in value, have some common characteristics which mark them off from the literature of the Republic. It seems remarkable, if we consider the short interval which divides the Ciceronian from the Augustan Age, and the enthusiasm with which poetry was cultivated by the younger generation in the years immediately preceding the battle of Pharsalia, that so few of the poets eminent in that generation lived on into the new era. The insignificant name of Helvius Cinna is almost the only poetic link between the age of Catullus and the age of Virgil. Perhaps, also, the Quintilius whose death Horace laments in the twenty-fourth Ode of Book I. may be the Varus of the tenth poem of Catullus. The more famous name of Asinius Pollio also connects the two eras; but in Catullus he is spoken of, not as a poet, but simply as ‘a youth of wit and graceful accomplishments,’ and in his later career he was more distinguished as a soldier, statesman, and orator than as a poet. It is remarked by Mr. Munro that there are indications that the new generation of poets would have come into painful collision with those of the preceding generation had their lives been prolonged.
