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The question of authenticity still exercises scholars; one recent critic has even reduced the number of genuine Heroides to ten (namely 1—7, 10, 11, and 15). The poems chiefly under suspicion are 9 (Deianira), 15 (Sappho), and 16—21 (the double letters). The most cogent arguments against 9 and 16—21 are the metrical ones, but for the double letters these diminish with the later dating. The Sappho letter (15) has been transmitted separately from the rest of the Heroides; it may be that it was deliberately omitted because of its anomalous (non-mythological) subject-matter when the single and double letters were united into one collection, but there are still some linguistic oddities which need explaining. For the purpose of this discussion I have assumed that all twenty-one of the Heroides are genuine; I have also chosen to discuss the work as a single collection rather than as two separate ones.
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Footnotes
1.
Our understanding of the manuscript tradition of Her. has been greatly advanced by H. Dörrie, Untersuchungen zur Überlieferungsgeschichte von Ovids Epistulae Heroidum (Göttingen, i and ii 1960, iii 1972). However, both Dome’s own text (Berlin, 1971) and that of R. Giomini (Rome, i 1957, 2nd edn. 1963, ii 1965) are disappointing; the best plain text is now G. P. Goold’s thorough revision of the Loeb edition (London, 1977). There are no good modern English translations; H. C. Cannon’s version in heroic couplets (New York, 1971) is undistinguished. Apart from Döe’s commentary, that of A. Palmer (Oxford, 1898; repr. Hildesheim, 1967) is still very useful. We now have two good critical discussions, both confined to the single letters, by Oppel and Jacobson, which are fundamental to the literary appreciation of the work; see also the shorter accounts of Kraus (2), Dörrie, and Anderson. There is a comprehensive bibliography in Dome’s edition, 19 ff. and after each letter.
References
Notes
2. So Goold, G. P., Gnomon 46 (1974), 484 Google Scholar.
3. On Her. 9 see Vessey, D. W. T. C., CQ 19 (1969), 349-61CrossRefGoogle Scholar, whose statistics for 4w hexameter caesuras and for spondaic pentameter openings deserve respect (his other arguments are countered by Jacobson, 228 ff.). On Her. 16—21 Courtney, E., BICS 12 (1965), 63 Google Scholar—6, has revived and amplified the metrical objections, but the careful analysis of Clark, S. B., HSCPh 19 (1908), 121-55Google Scholar, is still persuasive; Tracy, V. A., CJ 66 (1971), 328 Google Scholar—30, has shown that the diction of the double letters is thoroughly Ovidian; for other arguments in favour of authenticity see Kraus (2). On Her. 15 we now have the extensive monograph of Dörrie, H., P. Ovidius Naso, der Brief der Sappho an Phaon (Munich, 1975)Google Scholar, who accepts the genuineness of the letter, as does Jacobson, 277 f.; on the transmission see also Baca, A. R., TAPhA 102 (1971), 29–38 Google Scholar.
4. On the dating of the single letters see Jacobson, 300 ff., who puts them in the period 10-3 B.C. The double letters belong to the period A.D. 1-8; see Kraus (2), 294.
5. On the relationship of Her. to the suasoria and controuersia see Oppel, 37 ff., 68 ff. (cf. Fränkel, 36 and n.); on ethopoeia see Jacobson, 325 ff. Ovid’s debt to rhetoric in general is minimized by R. F. Higham, Ovidiana, 32—48.
6. On Prop. 4. 3 see Dörrie, 50 f., and Merklín, H., Hermes 96 (1968), 461-94Google Scholar; on epistolography see Winniczuk, L., Publius Ovidius Naso (Bucharest, 1957), 39—70 Google Scholar, and Jacobson, 331 ff.
7. So Jacobson, 135 f., 168 ff., 191 f., 280 ff.; see also Bradley, E. M., CJ 44 (1969), 158 Google Scholar-62, on Oenone, and Treu, M., PP 8 (1953), 356 Google Scholar-64, on Sappho.
8. See Jacobson, 381 ff.
9. See Jacobson, 363 ff.; Oppel, 10 ff., has a useful formal analysis of each epistle.
10. See the discussions of Kraus (2), 278 ff., Anderson, 68 ff., and Frécaut, 206 ff.
11. On Ovid’s psychology see Oppel, 95 ff., and Jacobson, 371 ff. and passim. Jacobson illustrates well the possibilities, and the dangers, of the psychoanalytical approach.
12. Jacobson has a thorough discussion of the sources for each of the single epistles, but with few positive results.
13. On Her. 3 see Jacobson, 12 ff., and Wilkinson, 89 ff. (Jacobson gives the letter more psychological depth). On Her. 7 Jacobson, 76 ff., supports Wilkinson’s unfavourable verdict (92 f.), but other scholars have been more sympathetic, notably A. G. Lee, Atti ii. 408, Döpp, 26 ff., and Anderson, 49 ff. On Her. 20 and 21 see Coletti, M. L., RCCM 4 (1962), 294–303 Google Scholar, and Kenney, E. J., Arion 9 (1970), 388–414 Google Scholar. On contaminano see Döpp, 18 ff., 51 ff.
14. For examples of lyricism and pathos see Wilkinson, 99 ff., and A. Salvatore, Atti ii. 235-56.
15. For some examples, not all equally convincing, see Frécaut, 203 f.
16. On the epistolary form, and on the related question of the authenticity of the opening couplets, see Kirfel, E.-A., Untersuchungen zur Briefform der Heroides Ovids (Bern, 1969)Google Scholar.
17. We lack a sympathetic discussion of the style of Her. Cappechi, E., SIFC 39 (1967), 67—111 Google Scholar, and 41 (1969), 95—127, reaches negative conclusions on the effectiveness of Ovid’s alliteration and other forms of word-play.
18. See Jacobson, 407 ff. Dörrie, 45, sees a basic alternation in Her. 1 — 15 between heroines who survive and those who die as a result of their love.
19. On ‘the role of perspective’ see Jacobson, 349 ff.
20. For the anti-Augustan view see Jacobson, 7, 90, 354.