Chapter 27

Gronovius seems to have realized that difficulties remained, and proposed to read NOVIT in 42 and make 41-42 a relative clause dependent on _tellus_ in 38, so that the concluding lines of the poem would mean 'mea tellus, Sulmo, Roma, Italia, me tuum esse audiet. sed audiet idem etiam, quaecumque sub alia quauis caeli parte terra posita est, et te, meum seruatorem, meque, libra et aere tuum, minus nouit'. Once again, _minus_ seems to weaken the poem fatally.

(ii) Ehwald (_KB_ 71) followed Gronovius' second explanation, retaining the manuscripts' _norit_, and glossing 'tellus, quae sub ullo caelo posita est et te, meae salutis seruatorem, meque, libra et aere tuum, minus norit'.

(iii) Némethy followed Gronovius' first explanation, adding as an illustration _AA_ I 643-44 'ludite, si sapitis, solas impune puellas: / hac _minus_ [_Burman_: magis _codd_] est una fraude tuenda [_Naugerius ex codd suis_: pudenda _codd_] fides'. The citation does not strengthen the case for _minus_.

(iv) André wrote '_Minus_ me paraît avoir le sens de _citra_ "sans aller jusqu'à", i.e. "sans même avoir recours à la mancipation": "tu es mon maître de ma propre volonté, et non, comme tu l'es de tes autres propriétés, par achat."' But the meaning seems to weaken the force of the poem.

I have with reluctance adopted _libra ... et aere magis_, taking it in the sense _magis quam libra et aere_ ('I am yours even more than I would be if I had been acquired through _mancipatio_'). The closest parallel I have found for this compressed use of the ablative is the idiom at v 7 'luce minus decima', 'before the tenth day'.

Of the other readings, _F1_'s _tuum ... datum_ cannot itself be correct, although it may offer a clue to the truth. Heinsius' _tuum ... tuum_ is grammatical enough, but (as Professor R. J. Tarrant points out to me) makes Ovid say that he is Pompeius' literally through _mancipatio_. As well, the repetition seems odd. Rappold's _tuae ... manus_ cannot be right, since _manus_ did not have the sense of _mancipium_, except for the limited meaning of a husband's authority over his wife. Still, Rappold's conjecture may be a step in the right direction, particularly in view of v 39-40 'pro quibus ut meritis referatur gratia, iurat / se fore _mancipii_ tempus in omne _tui_'.

XVI. To a Detractor

The anonymous detractor to whom Ovid apparently addresses this poem is probably fictional; at 47 he substitutes _Liuor_, dropping the pretence of speaking to a single enemy.

Ovid begins the poem by asking his detractor why he criticizes Ovid's verse. A poet's fame increases after his death; Ovid's fame was great even while he was still alive (1-4). There were many poets contemporary with Ovid (5-38). There were also younger poets, not yet published, whom he will not name, with the necessary exception of Cotta Maximus (39-44). Even among such poets, he had a reputation. Envy should therefore cease to torment him; he has lost everything but life, which is left only so that he can continue to experience pain (45-50).

The poem is of particular interest because of the catalogue of the poets of the earlier part of the reign of Tiberius. It is a reminder of how much Latin verse has been lost, for of the poets listed only Grattius survives.

Similar catalogues of poets are found at Prop II xxxiv 61-92 and _Am_ I xv 9-30, the poets listed being however not contemporaries but illustrious predecessors. _Tr_ IV x 41-54 is complementary to the present poem, being a list of the leading Roman poets at the beginning of Ovid's career. All of these poems come last in their book, and it seems clear enough that the present poem was meant to close a published collection. Other links exist with the earlier poems: mention is similarly made in them of the poet's fame after his death (Prop II xxxiv 94, _Am_ I xi 41-42, _Tr_ IV x 129-30), and _Am_ I xv (which Professor R. J. Tarrant suggests may have ended the original edition in five books of the _Amores_) is, like the present poem, addressed to _Liuor_.

=1. INVIDE, QVID LACERAS NASONIS CARMINA RAPTI.= Compare the question that opens _Am_ I xv 'Quid mihi, Liuor edax, ignauos obicis annos, / ingeniique uocas carmen inertis opus'. For _inuide ... laceras_ compare Cic _Brutus_ 156 '_inuidia_, quae solet _lacerare_ plerosque'.

=1. LACERAS.= _Lacerare_ 'attack verbally' is a prose usage, found in Cicero, the historians, and the elder Seneca (_OLD lacero_ 5; _TLL_ VII.2 827 50).

The primary meaning of _lacerare_ behind this usage is _mordere_; _lacerare_ is found in this literal sense at Cic _De or_ II 240 '_lacerat_ lacertum Largi _mordax_ Memmius', Phaedrus I xii 11 '_lacerari_ coepit _morsibus_ saeuis canum', and Sen _Clem_ I 25 1.

For _mordere_ in the same transferred sense, see at xiv 46 _mordenda_ (p 424).

=1. NASONIS ... RAPTI.= 'Of Ovid, who is now dead'. For _rapti_, see at xi 5 _rapti_ (p 362).

=2. NON SOLET INGENIIS SVMMA NOCERE DIES.= The same thought at _Am_ I xv 39-40 'pascitur in uiuis Liuor; post fata quiescit, / cum suus ex merito quemque tuetur honos' and _EP_ III iv 73-74 'scripta placent a morte fere, quia laedere uiuos / Liuor et iniusto carpere dente solet'.

=3. CINERES= = _mortem_. Bömer at _Met_ VIII 539 _post cinerem_ (where _cinerem_, as Bömer saw, means 'cremation'), cites among other passages Prop III i 35-36 'meque inter seros laudabit Roma nepotes: / illum _post cineres_ auguror esse diem', Martial I i 2-6 'Martialis ... cui, lector studiose, quod dedisti / uiuenti decus atque sentienti, / rari _post cineres_ habent poetae' and Martial VIII xxxviii 16 'hoc et _post cineres_ erit tributum'.

=3. AT= is my correction for the manuscripts' ET. The point that Ovid was famous _even_ while alive is made by _tum quoque_ later in the verse; the only meaning that could therefore be given to _et mihi nomen_ is 'even I had a name, even when I was alive', which is inappropriate, since in this poem Ovid is not belittling his poetic talent.

_At_ seems to be the obvious solution, giving the sense 'poets usually become famous after they die; I, _however_, was famous even while alive'. Compare _Tr_ IV x 121-22 (to his Muse) 'tu mihi, quod rarum est, uiuo sublime dedisti / nomen, ab exequiis quod dare fama solet' and Martial I i 2-6 (cited in the previous note). The more usual situation of obscurity during the poet's lifetime followed by posthumous fame is described at Prop III i 21-24.

Professor C. P. Jones points out to me that _et_ can have an adversative sense (_OLD et_ 14a). But the two instances there cited from Augustan verse are examples of _nec ... et_ (_Fast_ V 530; _Tr_ V xii 63 'nec possum _et_ cupio non nullos ducere uersus'). Where _et_ alone carries the adversative sense, it is generally used to join two opposing verbs or verbal phrases: compare Cic _Tusc_ I 6 'fieri ... potest ut recte quis sentiat _et_ id quod sentit polite eloqui non possit' and Sen _NQ_ II 18 'quare aliquando non fulgurat _et_ tonat?'.

=4. CVM VIVIS ADNVMERARER.= For Ovid's considering himself already dead, compare _EP_ I ix 56 'et nos extinctis adnumerare potest' and _EP_ I vii 9-10 'nos satis est inter glaciem Scythicasque sagittas / uiuere, si uita est mortis habenda genus'.

Ovid is the first poet to use _adnumerare_ in this sense ('reckon in with'), and only in his poems of exile; it is afterwards found at _Her_ XVI 330 and Manilius V 438.

=5-36.= It is possible to discern a rough order in the catalogue of names; first come the writers of epic and Pindaric verse (5-28), then the dramatists (29-31), and finally the writers of lighter verse (32-36).

=5. CVM FORET ET= _FHT_ CVMQVE FORET _BCMIL_. Clearly either _et_ or _-que_ was lost, and one or both inserted to restore the metre. _Cumque_ would be a continuation of _at mihi nomen ..._, which seems an inelegant construction. _Cum foret et_, introducing a sentence of forty-two lines ending in 'dicere si fas est, claro mea nomine Musa / atque inter tantos quae legeretur erat' seems preferable; this very long sentence serves not as a continuation of the statement in 3-4, but as evidence for it.

=5. MARSVS.= Domitius Marsus[29] is often mentioned by Martial as a writer of epigram, sometimes being coupled with Catullus and Albinovanus Pedo (I praef, II lxxi 3 & lxxvii 5, V v 6, VII xcix 7). A friend of Maecenas, he wrote an epic poem on the Amazons (Martial IV xxix 8), and at least nine books of _fabellae_ (Charisius I 72 Keil). Quintilian quotes from his treatise on _urbanitas_ (VI iii 102 ff.); and he is cited as an authority by the elder Pliny (_NH_ I 34).

[Footnote 29: _PIR_1 D 131; _PIR_2 D 153; Schanz-Hosius 174-76 (§ 275-76); Bardon 52-57.]

The scholiasts and grammarians preserve seven fragments (Morel 110-11), the most interesting being the four lines on the death of Tibullus: 'Te quoque Vergilio comitem non aequa, Tibulle, / Mors iuuenem campos misit ad Elysios, / ne foret aut elegis molles qui fleret amores / aut caneret forti regia bella pede'.

=5. MAGNIQVE RABIRIVS ORIS.= Similar phrasing at Virgil _G_ III 294 'magno nunc ore sonandum', Prop II x 12 'magni nunc erit oris opus', and _AA_ I 206 (to Gaius) 'et magno nobis ore sonandus eris'. In the last two passages, as here, there is a specific reference to epic verse.

=5. RABIRIVS.= Velleius Paterculus (II 36 3) mentions Rabirius (Schanz-Hosius 267-68 [§ 316]; Bardon 73-74) alongside Virgil: 'paene stulta est inhaerentium oculis ingeniorum enumeratio, inter quae maxima nostri aeui eminent princeps carminum Vergilius Rabiriusque'. Quintilian speaks of him with rather less admiration: 'Rabirius ac Pedo non indigni cognitione, si uacet' (X i 90). Seneca (_Ben_ VI 3 1) quotes a passage of his with Mark Antony speaking; presumably one of his poems dealt with the civil war.

Five short fragments of Rabirius survive (Morel 120-21).

=6. ILIACVSQVE MACER.= Pompeius Macer[30] was one of Ovid's closest friends; he is the addressee of _Am_ II xviii and _EP_ II x. The son of Theophanes of Mytilene, Pompey's confidant, he was intimate with Tiberius (Strabo XIII 2 3); under Augustus he had served as procurator of Asia and had been placed in charge of the libraries at Rome (Suet _Iul_ 56 7). Two poems in the Greek Anthology are generally attributed to him (VII ccxix; IX xxviii).

[Footnote 30: _PIR_1 P 473; Syme _HO_ 73-74; Bardon 65-66; J. Schwartz, "Pompeius Macer et la jeunesse d'Ovide", _RPh_ XXV (1951) 182-94. Macer is discussed in the section of Schanz-Hosius dealing with Ovid's catalogue of poets (269-72; § 318); I give references to Schanz-Hosius below only for poets dealt with outside this section.]

_Iliacus_ is explained by _Am_ II xviii 1-3 'Carmen ad iratum dum tu perducis Achillem ['while you are writing a poem about the Trojan war up to the starting-point of the _Iliad_'] / primaque iuratis induis arma uiris, / nos, Macer, ignaua Veneris cessamus in umbra' and _EP_ II x 13-14 'tu canis aeterno quicquid restabat Homero, / ne careant summa Troica bella manu'; Macer had written poems narrating those parts of the Trojan war not covered by the _Iliad_.

The Macer mentioned at Tr IV x 43-44 must be a different person, for he is described as already being _grandior aeuo_ in Ovid's youth.

=6. SIDEREVSQVE PEDO.= On Albinovanus Pedo, see at x 4 _Albinouane_ (p 327).

For _sidereus_ ('divine' or 'resplendent'), Bardon aptly cited Columella X 434 (written in hexameters) '_siderei_ uatis ... praecepta Maronis'.

=7. ET, QVI IVNONEM LAESISSET IN HERCVLE, CARVS.= This is the Carus to whom xiii is addressed: compare xiii 11-12 'prodent auctorem uires, quas Hercule dignas / nouimus atque illi quem canis ipse pares'.

As Jupiter's son by Alcmene, Hercules suffered from Juno's enmity until his deification.

=8. IVNONIS SI IAM NON GENER ILLE FORET.= Perhaps Carus' poem included Hercules' marriage to Hebe.

=9. SEVERVS.= On Severus, the addressee of poem ii, see the introduction to that poem; for _quique dedit Latio carmen regale_, see at ii 1 _uates magnorum maxime regum_ (p 162).

=10. SVBTILI ... NVMA.= Numa is otherwise unknown. _Subtilis_ means 'clean and elegant in style'; compare Cic _De or_ I 180 'oratione maxime limatus atque _subtilis_' and _Brutus_ 35 'tum fuit Lysias ... egregie _subtilis_ scriptor atque elegans, quem iam prope audeas oratorem perfectum dicere'.

=10. PRISCVS VTERQVE.= Only one poet of this name is known, Clutorius (Tac _Ann_ III 49-51) or C. Lutorius (Dio LVII 20 3) Priscus. All that is known of him is the manner of his death: in AD 21 he was put to death for composing and reciting a premature poem on the death of Drusus.

=11. IMPARIBVS NVMERIS ... VEL AEQVIS.= Like Ovid, Montanus wrote both elegiac and hexameter verse.

For _impar_ used of elegiac verse, compare Hor _AP_ 75 (the earliest instance) 'uersibus _impariter_ iunctis', _Am_ II xvii 21, _Am_ III i 37, _AA_ I 264, _Tr_ II 220, _EP_ II v 1 (_disparibus_), _EP_ III iv 86 (_disparibus_), _EP_ IV v 3 (_nec ... aequis_), and line 36 of the present poem.

=11. MONTANE.= Iulius Montanus is mentioned in passing at Sen _Cont_ VII 1 27, where he is called _egregius poeta_; in Donatus' life of Virgil (29) his admiration of Virgil's manner of reciting is mentioned, on the authority of the elder Seneca. The younger Seneca, calling him 'tolerabilis poeta et amicitia Tiberi notus et frigore', tells some amusing anecdotes about the length of his recitations and his fondness for describing sunrises and sunsets (_Ep_ CXXII 11-13). He quotes from him twice (Morel 120).

=13-14. ET QVI PENELOPAE RESCRIBERE IVSSIT VLIXEM / ERRANTEM SAEVO PER DVO LUSTRA MARI.= All that is known of Sabinus is what Ovid says here and in his list of Sabinus' poems at _Am_ II xviii 27-34 'quam cito de toto rediit meus orbe Sabinus / scriptaque diuersis rettulit ille locis! / candida Penelope signum cognouit Vlixis; / legit ab Hippolyto scripta nouerca suo. / iam pius Aeneas miserae rescripsit Elissae, / quodque legat Phyllis, si modo uiuit, adest. / tristis ad Hypsipylen ab Iasone littera uenit; / det uotam Phoebo Lesbis amata lyram' (this line, like the letter of Sappho, has been considered suspect; see R. J. Tarrant, "The Authenticity of the Letter of Sappho to Phaon (_Heroides XV_)", _HSPh_ 85 [1981] 133-53).

Since the letter of Ulysses is the first one mentioned in the list at _Am_ II xviii 29, it was presumably the first poem in Sabinus' collection of epistles; hence Ovid's use of it here to indicate the entire collection.

Line 14 may be an echo of one of Sabinus' poems.

=15. TRISOMEN= _C_ TRISOMEM _B1_. For the many other variants, see the apparatus. The word is clearly corrupt; correction is difficult in the absence of further information on Sabinus. TROEZENA (a conjecture reported by Micyllus) seems unattractive. Heinsius had difficulty with the passage: 'an _Tymelen_? opinor certe nomen puellae a Sabino decantatae hic latere'. TROESMIN, suggested by Ehwald (_JAW_ CIX [1901] 187), is unlikely--why would Sabinus have wished to recount Vestalis' capture of the city?--but not, as claimed by Vollmer (PW I A,2 1598 34), unmetrical: lengthening is common enough before the main caesura (although I have found no example of lengthened _-in_). Bardon (61) wished to read TROEZEN (which is in fact the reading of _T_), apparently not realizing that an accusative form is required.

=15-16. DIERVM ... OPVS.= Sabinus apparently started work on a calendar-poem, which may have resembled the _Fasti_; compare _Fast_ I 101 'uates operose _dierum_'.

=16. CELERI= = 'premature'.

=17. INGENIIQVE SVI DICTVS COGNOMINE LARGVS.= For the play on the name compare xiii 2 'qui quod es, id uere, Care, uocaris, aue'. Nothing is known of Largus beyond what Ovid here tells us.

=18. GALLICA QVI PHRYGIVM DVXIT IN ARVA SENEM.= Largus described Antenor's migration to Venetia and founding of Patavium, for which see _Aen_ I 242-49 and Livy I 1.

=18. GALLICA ... ARVA.= Patavium was in Cisalpine Gaul.

=18. PHRYGIVM ... SENEM.= At _Il_ III 149-50 Antenor is listed among the '[Greek: dêmogerontes ... gêraï dê polemoio pepaumenoi]' sitting on the Trojan wall who see Helen approach.

=19. DOMITO ... AB HECTORE TROIAM.= 'The story of Troy after the death of Hector'. _Gothanus II 121_ has the interpolation DOMITAM ... AB HECTORE, which Korn printed.

=19. CAMERINVS.= Nothing is known of this poet.

=20. SVA PHYLLIDE.= Presumably Tuscus' equivalent of Gallus' Lycoris. However, as Professor A. Dalzell points out, the reference to love poetry is odd in a sequence of epic and didactic writers.

=20. TVSCVS= is not otherwise certainly known. Kiessling (_Coniectanea Propertiana_, Greifswald, 1875) proposed that he was the "Demophoon" addressed in Prop II xxii; this suggestion has won support from Birt [_RhM_ XXXII [1877] 414), Bardon (61; I owe these references to him), and André, but does not seem extremely convincing, especially since Propertius had been writing some three decades earlier. Merkel, in his edition of the _Tristia_ (p. 373), identifies him with the grammarian Clodius Tuscus, without offering a reason.

=21. VELIVOLIQVE MARIS VATES.= It is not known who this was, or what the precise subject of the poem might have been; perhaps it resembled the _Halieutica_. André mentions that Varro Atacinus has been proposed, but does not name the author of the suggestion, which seems rather fanciful; as he points out, Varro had died some fifty years previously. Luck in his edition has proposed Abronius Silo, of whom two hexameters survive (Sen _Suas_ II 19 = Morel 120), but, as André remarks, the fact that he, like Ovid, was a follower of the rhetor Porcius Latro is hardly sufficient evidence for the identification.

For _ueliuolique_ see at v 42 _ueliuolas_ (p 224).

=22. CAERVLEOS ... DEOS= = 'the gods of the sea'. Compare _Met_ II 8 '_caeruleos_ habet unda deos'.

=23. ACIES LIBYCAS ROMANAQVE PROELIA.= The poem may have concerned the Jugurthine war, or Caesar's African campaign; compare _Fast_ IV 379-80 'illa dies Libycis qua Caesar in oris / perfida magnanimi contudit arma Iubae'.

For the juxtaposition of opposing proper adjectives (_Libycas Romana_), see Tarrant on Sen _Ag_ 613-13a _Dardana tecto / Dorici ... ignes_.

=24. ET MARIVS SCRIPTI DEXTER IN OMNE GENVS.= For the phrasing compare _Tr_ II 381-82 '_omne genus scripti_ grauitate tragoedia uincit: / haec quoque materiam semper amoris habet' and _Tr_ II 517-18 'an _genus hoc scripti_ faciunt sua pulpita ['stage'] tutum, / quodque licet, mimis scaena licere dedit?'. _C_'s MARIVS SCRIPTOR and _B_'s SCRIPTOR MARIVS were no doubt induced by the hyperbaton of _scripti ... genus_.

Marius is not otherwise known.

=25. TRINACRIVSQVE ... AVCTOR.= In view of the following _auctor ... Lupus_, _Trinacrius_ should be taken as a proper name, and not as an adjective. The adjectival form of the name is, however, suspicious, and may be a corruption far removed from what Ovid wrote.

=25. SVAE= seems strange, and is probably corrupt. Wheeler translated 'Trinacrius who wrote of the _Perseid_ he knew so well', while André ignored _suae_ altogether: 'l'auteur trinacrien de la "Perséide"'.

=25-26. AVCTOR / TANTALIDAE REDVCIS TYNDARIDOSQVE LVPVS.= Lupus (otherwise unknown) apparently wrote of the return of Menelaus and Helen to Sparta.

_Tantalides_ is used only here of Menelaus. Elsewhere in Latin verse it is used of Agamemnon, Atreus, and Pelops: see _OLD Tantalides_. Ovid is here using the diction of high poetry.

=27. ET QVI MAEONIAM PHAEACIDA VERTIT.= Tuticanus; his translation of the Phaeacian episode of the Odyssey is mentioned at xii 27-28. As that poem explains, his name could not be used in elegiac verse: hence the periphrasis in this passage.

=27. ET VNE= _HLB2_ ET VNe _M2c_ ET VNA _IT_ ET VNI _B1C_ IN ANGVEM _F_. _Vne_ was liable to corruption because of the hyperbaton with _Rufe_ in the next line, and because of the rarity of the vocative of _unus_. For _unus_ in the sense 'unique, outstanding', compare Catullus XXXVII 17 'tu praeter omnes _une_ de capillatis' ('you outstanding member of the long-haired set'--Quinn) and Prop II iii 29 'gloria Romanis _una_ es tu nata puellis'.

=27-28. VNE / PINDARICAE FIDICEN TV QVOQVE, RVFE, LYRAE.= An imitation of Hor _Carm_ IV iii 21-23 'totum muneris hoc tui est / quod monstror digito praetereuntium / _Romanae fidicen lyrae_'.

=28. RVFE.= Otherwise unknown. André correctly points out that he is unlikely to be the Rufus addressed in _EP_ II xi, 'dont Ovid n'aurait pas manqué alors de vanter le talent poétique'. Bardon (59) mentions that A. Reifferscheid ("Coniect. noua", _Ind. lect. Bresl._, 1880/81, p. 7) identified this Rufus with the Pindaric poet Titius of Hor _Ep_ I iii 9-10, thereby creating 'le très synthétique Titius Rufus'. But there is nothing very compelling about the identification.

=29. MVSAVE TVRRANI.= The poet is not otherwise certainly known. Bardon (48) reports the conjectures of Hirschfeld ("Annona", _Philologus_, 1870, p. 27) identifying him with C. Turranius, _praefectus annonae_ at the time of Augustus' death (Tac _Ann_ I 7) and of Munzer (_Beitr. zur Quellenkritik_ 387-89), identifying him with the geographical writer Turranius Gracilis mentioned by the elder Pliny (_NH_ III 3, IX 11).

=29. INNIXA COTVRNIS.= The _coturnus_ was distinguished by its high sole; hence _innixa_ ('supported by'). Compare _Am_ III i 31 (of Tragedy) 'pictis _innixa coturnis_' and Hor _AP_ 279-80 'Aeschylus ... docuit magnumque loqui _nitique coturno_'.

=29. COTVRNIS.= As Brink at Hor _AP_ 80 points out, _coturnus_ (not _cothurnus_) is the spelling favoured by the best manuscripts of Virgil and Horace.

=30. ET TVA CVM SOCCO MVSA, MELISSE, LEVIS.= _H_ offers LEVI, also conjectured by Heinsius, which may be right: the epithet with _socco_ would provide a pleasing balance with the preceding _tragicis ... coturnis_. On the other hand, Professor R. J. Tarrant in support of _leuis_ cites _RA_ 375-76 'grande sonant tragici, tragicos decet ira coturnos: / usibus e mediis _soccus_ habendus erit' and Hor _AP_ 80 '_socci_ ... grandesque coturni'; in both passages _soccus_ has no adjective.

Propertius uses _Musa leuis_ of his verse (II xii 22); compare as well _Tr_ II 354 'Musa iocosa' (Ovid's amatory verse), _EP_ I v 69 'infelix Musa', Lucretius IV 589 & _Ecl_ I 2 'siluestrem ... Musam', and Quintilian X i 55 'Musa ... rustica et pastoralis' (the poetry of Theocritus).

_Leuis_ is used of comedy at _Fast_ V 347-48 'scaena _leuis_ decet hanc [_sc_ Floram]: non est, mihi credite, non est / illa coturnatas inter habenda deas' and Hor _AP_ 231 'effutire _leues_ indigna Tragoedia uersus'.

=30. MELISSE.= Thanks principally to Suetonius _Gram_ 21, we are comparatively well informed about Melissus (Schanz-Hosius 176-77 [§ 277]; Bardon 49-52). Brought up a slave (his father had disowned him at birth), he was given a good education by the man who accepted him, and was given to Maecenas, who manumitted him. He wrote one hundred and fifty books of _Ineptiae_. 'Fecit et nouum genus togatarum inscripsitque trabeatas'; it is no doubt these plays that Ovid is here referring to.

=31. VARIVS.= Possibly the famous author of the _Thyestes_ and editor of the _Aeneid_ (Schanz-Hosius 162-64 [§ 267]; Bardon 28-34; fragments at Morel 100-1 and Ribbeck 265). Riese objected to the identification on chronological grounds (the _Thyestes_ was produced in 29 BC), but the date of his death is unknown, and he may have survived to the time of Ovid's exile.

=31. GRACCHVSQVE.= The manuscripts omit the aspirate, and Ehwald cites _CIL_ VI 1 1505 for a mention of _Ti. Sempronius Graccus_, but in his discussion of the aspirate Quintilian makes it clear that _Graccus_ was an obsolete spelling (I v 20).