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Some Certain or Possible Examples of Literary Reminiscence in Tacitus

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 October 2009

G. B. A. Fletcher
Affiliation:
King's College, Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

Abstract

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Type
Review Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1945

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References

page 45 note 1 Cf. R. Reitzenstein, Nadir, von d. künigl. Gesellschaft d. Wiss. zu Göttingen, Phil.-Hist. Klasse, 1914, p. 267.

page 45 note 2 On Tacitus and Livy there is a valuable contribution by Andresen, G. in Wochenschrift für klassische Philologie, 1916, 210214, 401–6, 688–94, 758–66.Google Scholar

page 47 note 1 Klebs, E., Philol. 71, 1890, p. 302Google Scholar, cites what he regards as instances of borrowing by Tacitus from Velleius. Of the eight pairs of passages only one is striking, and they find no acceptance from Norden, Antike Kunstprosa, p. 338, or Teuffel–Kroll–Skutsch, Geschichte der römischen Literatur, iii, p. 19. Similarly, Gudeman, on p. 351 of his edition of the Agricola and Germania, denies ‘the faintest trace of any indebtedness’ of Tacitus to Velleius. The passages which I cite above and at Hist. i. 73, iv. 81. 2, Germ. 14. 1 and 28. 4 at least deserve to be considered. See also on Hist. iii. 58. 2.

page 47 note 2 In Thes. Ling. Lat. ii. 1514. 61 Mr. Sinko writes ‘Tac. dial. 40 populi pronis … auribus uti’. This is copied from Gerber and Greef's Lexicon Taciteum, p. 119 b, ‘D 40 populi pronis … auribus uti’; but there is no authority for it, and when Gerber and Greef reach the word pronus the passage does not appear. On p. 467 a they write under finio ‘intrs⃜de vita 2. 83.10 quo in loco finierat’. This is an error, for the words are ‘quo in loco uitam finierat’. But again Mr. Bacherler copies into the Thesaurus vi. 784. 58 under finio ‘intransitive’ ‘Tac. ann. 2, 83 quo in loco-ierat’. On p. 4 b Gerber and Greef write under abnuo ‘12. 46 pacem et condiciones’. This is also an error, for the words there are ‘non abnuere pacem Hiberos quamquam in tempore ualidiores’. But again Mr. Diehl copies into the Thesaurus i. 113. 26 under abnuo ‘Tac. ann. 12. 46 pacem et condiciones’. Housman once observed that a column and a half of the Thesaurus, chosen at random, will generally contain a good many errors; but nothing is more discreditable to that work than this copying from a lexicon on the part of compilers who are too lazy to verify what they find in it.