So far as I know, there is no English prose translation of Claudian already in the field, though various of his poems, notably the “De raptu,” have found many verse translators, and in 1817 his complete works were put into English verse by A. Hawkins. An Italian version was published by Domenico Grillo in Venice in 1716, a German one by Wedekind in Darmstadt in 1868, and there exist two French prose translations, one by MM. Delatour and Geruzez (éd. Nisard, Paris, 1850) and one by M. Héguin de Guerle (Garnier frères, Collection Panckoucke, Paris, 1865).
Of Claudiana may be mentioned Vogt, De Claudiani carminum quae Stilichonem praedicant fide historica (1863); Ney, Vindictae Claudianeae (1865); T. Hodgkin’s Claudian, the last of the Roman Poets (1875); E. Arens’ Quaestiones Claudianae (1894); two studies by A. Parravicini, (1) Studio di retorica sulle opere di Claudio Claudiano (1905), and (2) I Panegirici di Claudiano (1909); J. H. E. Crees’ Claudian as an Historical Authority (Cambridge Historical Essays, No. 17, 1908); Professor Postgate’s article on the editions of Birt and Koch in the Class. Rev. (vol. ix. pp. 162 et sqq.), and the same scholar’s Emendations in the Class. Quarterly of 1910 (pp. 257 et sqq.). Reference may also be made to Professor Bury’s appendix to vol. iii. of his edition of Gibbon (1897, under “Claudian”) and to Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, vol. xxx. The Encomiums of Claudius Claudianus. Vollmer’s article in Pauly-Wissowa’s Lexicon is a mine of information, but for completeness Birt’s introduction (over 200 pp. long) stands alone.
The curious may find an interesting light thrown[xxv] on Claudian and his circle by Sudermann’s play, Die Lobgesänge des Claudian (Berlin, 1914).
All Claudian’s genuine works are translated in the present volumes with the exception of the two-line fragment “De Lanario” (Birt, c.m.c. lii [lxxxviii.]). The appendix “vel spuria vel suspecta continens” has been rejected both by Birt and Koch, and I have in this followed their example. The eight Greek poems attributed to Claudian are at least of doubtful authenticity, though Birt certainly makes out a good case for the “Gigantomachia” (a fragment of 77 lines). The remainder consists of short epigrams, two on the well-worn theme of the water enclosed in the crystal and two Christian ones. These last are almost certainly not the work of Claudius Claudianus but of Claudianus Mamertus, presbyter of Vienne circ. 474 A.D. We know from Sidonius (Ep. iv. 3. 8) that this Claudian was a writer of sacred poetry both in Greek and Latin—indeed the famous “Pange lingua” is attributed to him.
A word should perhaps be said as to the numbering of the poems.
It is much to be regretted that Birt did not cut adrift from Gesner’s system, or at least that he only did so in the “Carmina minora.” The resultant discrepancy in his (and Koch’s) edition between the order of the poems and their numbering is undoubtedly a nuisance, but I have not felt justified, in so slight a work as the present one, in departing from the now traditional arrangement.