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CLAUDIAN, DE RAPTU PROSERPINAE 1.82 AND GEORGICS 3.68*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2014

Cillian O'Hogan
Cillian O'Hogan*
Affiliation:
The British Library
*
cillian.o'hogan@bl.uk
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Extract

That Claudian imitates Virgil's Georgics in the De raptu Proserpinae is well known. Most of his allusions are restricted to Golden Age or Underworld imagery, largely from Books 1, 2, and 4. However, one imitation of the third Georgic that appears not to have been noted previously occurs at De raptu Proserpinae 1.82. The context is Claudian's famous description of Pluto enthroned:

      ipse rudi fultus solio nigraque uerendus
      maiestate sedet: squalent inmania foedo
      sceptra situ; sublime caput maestissima nubes
      asperat et dirae riget inclementia formae;
      terrorem dolor augebat.     (De raptu Proserpinae 1.79–83)
I argue that this recalls the following passage in Virgil:
      optima quaeque dies miseris mortalibus aeui
      prima fugit; subeunt morbi tristisque senectus
      et labor, et durae rapit inclementia mortis.   (Georgics 3.66–8)
Inclementia occurs some twenty times in extant classical and late antique Latin verse. Claudian himself uses it three other times. None the less, the construction of Claudian's line makes it clear that the line from the Georgics is being imitated here: the lines are metrically equivalent, and the sound-pattern and identical grammatical structure make the imitation unmistakable (¯˘˘ | et d¯rae r˘˘t inclementia ¯x).

Type
Shorter Notes
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 64 , Issue 2 , December 2014 , pp. 866 - 868
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 2014 

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Footnotes

*

I am grateful to Michael Dewar, Catherine Ware, and the anonymous reader for CQ for their comments on an earlier version of this note.

References

1 See e.g. Clarke, A.K., ‘Claudian's method of borrowing in De raptu Proserpinae’, PCPhS 181 (1950–1), 4–7Google Scholar; Dilke, O.A.W., ‘Patterns of borrowing in Claudian's De raptu Proserpinae’, RBPh 43 (1965), 60–1CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ware, C., Claudian and the Roman Epic Tradition (Cambridge, 2012), 171–97CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

2 On the word, see further Austin, R.G., P. Vergili Maronis Aeneidos Liber Secundus (Oxford, 1964)Google Scholar, on Aen. 2.602. For Claudian's use of it, see Dewar, M., Claudian: Panegyricus de Sexto Consulatu Honorii Augusti (Oxford, 1996)Google Scholar, on VI Cons. Hon. 445. Gasti, H., ‘Divum inclementia’, CQ 56 (2006), 629–30CrossRefGoogle Scholar, suggests that the phrase at Aen. 2.602 is a translation of θεῶν ἀγνωμοσύνην at Soph. Trach. 1266.

3 See the excellent comments ad loc. in Gruzelier, C., Claudian: De raptu Proserpinae (Oxford, 1993)Google Scholar, as well as Schwarz, G., ‘Nigra maiestas: Bryaxis – Sarapis – Claudian’, in Schwarz, G. and Pochmarski, E. (edd.), Classica et provincialia: Festschrift Erna Diez (Graz, 1978), 189–210Google Scholar, and Kellner, T., Die Göttergestalten in Claudians De raptu Proserpinae (Stuttgart, 1997), 244–5CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 On Claudian's poetic technique see especially Gualandri, I., Aspetti della tecnica composita in Claudiano (Milan, 1968)Google Scholar; Fo, A., Studi sulla tecnica poetica di Claudiano (Catania, 1982)Google Scholar; Gruzelier, C., ‘Temporal and timeless in Claudian's De raptu Proserpinae’, G&R 35 (1988), 56–72Google Scholar.