Tempore commodus, et verborum vir paucorum.
Multa tenens antiqua sepulta, et sæpe vetustas
Quæ facit, et mores veteresque novosque tenentem
Multorum veterum leges, divumque hominumque
Prudentem, qui multa loquive, tacereve possit.
Hunc inter pugnas compellat Servilius sic[193].”
The eighth and ninth books of these Annals, which are much mutilated, detailed the events of the second Carthaginian war in Italy and Africa. This was by much the most interesting part of the copious subject which Ennius had chosen, and a portion of it on which he would probably exert all the force of his genius, in order the more to honour his friend and patron Scipio Africanus. The same topic was selected by Silius Italicus, and by Petrarch for his Latin poem Africa, which obtained him a coronation in the Capitol. “Ennius,” says the illustrious Italian, “has sung fully of Scipio; but, in the opinion of Valerius Maximus, his style is harsh and vulgar, and there is yet no elegant poem which has for its subject the glorious exploits of the conqueror of Hannibal.” None of the poets who have chosen this topic, have done full justice to the most arduous struggle in which two powerful nations had ever engaged, and which presented the most splendid display of military genius on the one hand, and heroic virtue on the other, that had yet been exhibited to the world. Livy’s histo[pg 85]rical account of the second Punic war possesses more real poetry than any poem on the subject whatever.
The tenth, eleventh, and twelfth books of the Annals of Ennius, contained the war with Philip of Macedon. In the commencement of the thirteenth, Hannibal excites Antiochus to a war against the Romans. In the fourteenth book, the Consul Scipio, in the prosecution of this contest, arrives at Ilium, which he thus apostrophizes:
“O patria! O divûm domus Ilium, et incluta bello
Pergama!”