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Catvllvs and Horace on Svffenvs and Alfenvs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Tenny Frank
Affiliation:
Johns Hopkins University

Extract

Alfenvs Varvs of Cremona, a quondam friend of Catullus, studied law with the great Seruius Sulpicius—some of whose lectures he published—served to the advantage of Vergil as land commissioner in Cisalpine Gaul, became consul suffectus in 39 B.C., and provided Horace with the point of a joke. He seems also—hence this note—to have been the versifier whom Catullus calls Suffenus in c. 14 and 22. If he is, we have here a somewhat rare instance of Horace's adapting to his own use a suggestion from Catullus.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1920

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References

page 160 note 1 Servius Dan. ad Ecl. IX. 27: ‘blanditur Alfeno Vero, qui, Pollione fugato, legatus Transpadanis praepositus ab Augusto’; Probi Vita Verg.: ‘postea restitutus beneficio Alpheni Vari, Asinii Pollionis et Cornelii Galli.’ The accuracy of these statements has been questioned repeatedly in recent essays.

page 161 note 1 licet iuris consultus et successor Seruii Sulpicii esset, etiam carmina aliqua composuisse dicitur.

page 162 note 1 The Varus of the sixth Eclogue seems to be Quintilius, see Class. Phil., 1920, pp. 114, 115.