The comedies of Plautus and Terence have served as the originals for almost countless plays in later times, and through them the Greek comedy has survived until our own day. Turpilius. There were other Latin writers of comedies derived from the Greek after Terence, most noted of whom was Turpilius, who died in 103 B. C., but of their works, which were unimportant, little remains. Of the fabula togata, Roman comedy in Roman dress, little need be said. It never attained great popularity, and it lasted but a comparatively short time. Fabula togata. Titinius, Atta, Afranius. The first writer of comedies of this sort was Titinius. About one hundred and eighty lines of fragments and fifteen titles of his plays are preserved, from which we can learn little about the quality of his works. He seems to have written a little later than Terence. Titus Quinctius Atta has left to us the titles of eleven plays and about twenty-five lines of fragments. Little is known of him except the date of his death, 77 B. C. Lucius Afranius, the last and most important writer of this kind of comedies, was born probably not far from 150 B. C. Forty-two titles and more than four hundred lines of fragments now remain to attest his activity. The scenes of the plays are laid in the smaller towns of Italy, and the characters belong for the most part to the lower social classes. In these respects Afranius seems to have differed little from Titinius and Atta, but his plays had apparently less local color than theirs, and thus approached more nearly the character of the fabula palliata as developed by Terence.
Three other kinds of dramatic composition deserve brief mention, though little now remains of them and their literary importance was never very great. Fescennine Verses. The Fescennine Verses, named from the town of Fescennium in Etruria, were originally sung at rustic festivals and weddings and consisted of jokes and sarcasms directed by the country folk at each other. Fabulæ Atellanæ. They never became regular stage performances, and gradually lost their dramatic qualities, until they were nothing more than wedding songs. The Fabulæ Atellanæ, named from the Oscan town of Atella, in Campania, had some sort of plot, carried out with more or less dramatic unity. The characters were conventional—Maccus, the fool, Pappus, the old man, Bucco, the talker and liar, Dossenus, the clever man and boaster, and the like—and the whole performance was a popular burlesque comedy, somewhat like our Punch and Judy. This sort of performance was introduced at Rome after the conquest of Campania, in 211 B. C., and Roman youths of good family took the parts for amusement. Somewhat later, the custom arose of performing an Atellan piece at the end of a tragedy. The performers were now regular actors, and presently the Fabulæ Atellanæ became a regular branch of literature, the chief writers of which were Lucius Pomponius, from Bononia, and Novius, both of whom flourished in the time of Sulla, about 90 B. C. Few fragments of their works remain. The Atellan plays continued to be performed even after the beginning of the empire, but the words became less and less important, and the performance became mere pantomime. Mimes. Another kind of burlesque performance was the Mime, which was introduced into Rome from the Greek cities of Italy and Sicily. It had less consistent plots than comedy, and was more popular in its character. Though doubtless introduced at Rome as early as comedy itself, it hardly appears as a branch of literature until about the time of Cicero, when mimes serve as afterpieces at tragic performances. In imperial times mimes were performed independently. The chief authors of mimes were Decimus Laberius (105-43 B. C.), a Roman knight, and Publilius Syrus, a slave from Antioch, both belonging to the time of Cæsar, about the middle of the first century B. C. No mimes are extant, nor is their loss to be greatly regretted, for their humor was generally coarse, their plots often indecent, and their literary qualities of a low order. Some of the fragments of the mimes of Laberius show, however, considerable merit, and in those of Publilius so many sensible precepts and wise utterances were embodied that a collection of his sayings was made, part of which is preserved to us.
CHAPTER III
EARLY PROSE-THE SCIPIONIC CIRCLE—LUCILIUS
Greek influence upon Roman prose—Fabius Pictor, 216 B. C.—Cincius Alimentus, 210 B. C.—Cato, 234-149 B. C.—Cato’s works—Orators—Jurists—Latin annalists—Scipio Africanus the younger, 185-129 B. C.—The Scipionic circle—Lucilius, 180(?)-126 B. C.—Satire—Satires of Lucilius—Literature in the fifty years before Cicero—Poetry—History—Learned works—General writers—Jurists—Oratory—Rhetoric addressed to Herennius—Great development of prose in this period.
Tragedy and comedy began, reached their full development, and decayed in the short period of a century and a half between the first play of Livius Andronicus and the death of Accius. It was therefore advisable to give a connected account of dramatic literature at Rome for this entire period, and to reserve for separate treatment the beginnings of prose literature, which, though less rapid in its growth, had a far longer life and was a much truer expression of the national genius.
The rudiments of a strictly native prose literature, the twelve tables of the laws, the various lists and records, and the speeches delivered on public and private occasions, mark the lines along which Roman prose was destined to advance—history, jurisprudence, and eloquence. Greek influence upon Roman prose. But Roman prose, like Roman poetry, came under the influence of Greek literature as soon as the Romans began to pay any attention to literary style. It was when the conquest of southern Italy brought Rome into closer contact than before with the cities of Magna Græcia that Livius Andronicus was brought to Rome, and it was in the years immediately after the first Punic war that he produced the first Latin plays in imitation of Greek originals. To about the same or a little later time belong the earliest Roman prose writers. Some of these men, regarding the Latin language as too imperfect for use in prose literature, wrote in Greek, recording the events of Roman history for the enlightenment of foreigners and of educated Romans. Q. Fabius Pictor. Such was Quintus Fabius Pictor, a man of much distinction at Rome, who was sent by the state to consult the oracle at Delphi after the battle of Cannæ in 216 B. C. He wrote in Greek prose a history of Rome from the days of Æneas to his own times, selecting the same subject chosen by his contemporary Ennius for his Annales in Latin verse. This work of Fabius Pictor was very soon translated into Latin, and remained one of the chief sources from which later historians, such as Livy, derived their information. L. Cincius Alimentus. Lucius Cincius Alimentus, who was prætor in command of a Roman army in the second Punic war, wrote Roman history in Greek prose, as did also Publius Cornelius Scipio, the son of the elder Africanus, Aulus Postumius Albinus, and Gaius Acilius, about the middle of the second century B. C. Their works, being in Greek, had little direct influence on Latin literature, but show how powerful the Greek influence was among the cultivated men at Rome in the years following the second Punic war. Greek influence. This influence was not confined to literature, but affected dress, manners, ways of thinking—in short, all sides of life—especially among the upper classes. The Greeks of this time were no longer the hardy citizen-soldiers of the old days of Marathon and Thermopylæ, but were now distinguished for culture, refinement, and scholarship, too often accompanied by effeminacy, luxury, and dishonesty. Not by any means all the Romans were ready to profit by contact with Greek civilization, with its mixture of good and bad qualities, and there was naturally a party at Rome which opposed everything Greek, and wished to preserve the old Roman simplicity. The most important man of this party was Cato.