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Propertius 4.1.8
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009
Extract
The manuscript version of this line, apart from a nonsensical variant tutus for bubus, is et Tiberis nostris advena bubus erat. The trouble here has been that scholars have taken advena to mean ‘stranger’, ‘foreigner’, ‘alien’, or German ‘fremd’. Clearly the sentence and Tiber was a stranger to our oxen makes no sense in the context, and for this reason many scholars have either produced strange translations (‘alien Tiber served our oxen’, Butler and Barber) or else have dabbled in dubious emendation (temptus Baehrens, tortus Postgate, Tuscus Havet in place of bubus).
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References
1 It may be noted that Rothstein (Berlin, 1924), although he says that the most important idea is that Tiber comes from a foreign land, nevertheless adds ‘aber auch bubus ist wichtig” and goes on to explain its significance. I agree entirely with Heyworth that Rothstein′s interpretation, in which emphasis is laid on two things at once, makes nonsense of the sentence. In any case, Ovid, Fast. 2.68 and 3.524, which refer to Tiber as advena in Ovid′s own times, show that advena does not mean that Tiber comes ‘from a foreign land’, only ‘from elsewhere’.Google Scholar
2 I am greatly indebted to Professor O. Skutsch, whose clear exposition introduced this problem to me in 1950.
* I am very grateful to Glenn Most for translating this note.