Two plays of Menander are mentioned as having been thus ill-treated—the Phasma (Phantom,) and the Thesaurus (Treasure.) How he spoilt the plot of the former is not stated; but in the version of the Thesaurus, Terence convicts Luscius of a legal blunder. A young prodigal has sold his inheritance, on which his father’s tomb stands, to an old miser. The father, foreseeing the consequence of his son’s extravagance, had, before his death, bid him open the tomb after the expiration of ten years. He does so, and finds a treasure. The old man claims the treasure as his own, and the young man brings an action to recover it. The mistake of which Luscius was guilty, was, that in the conduct of the cause he made the defendant open the pleadings instead of the plaintiff.
Of the works of Q. Trabea no fragments remain except the short passages quoted by Cicero,[[234]] and the time at which he flourished is unknown. There is an anecdote which relates that Muretus presented to Jos. Scaliger a translation in Latin verse from a poem of Philemon, preserved by Stobæus, which he pretended was by Trabea. Scaliger was imposed upon; and in his notes on Varro, quoted the verses of Muretus as the work of Trabea. When he discovered the trick, he suppressed them in the Latin editions of his notes, and revenged himself on Muretus by a libellous epigram.[[235]]
The last of these dramatic writers who remains to be mentioned is Sextus Turpilius. A few fragments, as well as the titles of some of his plays, are still extant. All the titles are Greek, and, therefore, probably his comedies were Fabulæ Palliatæ. He flourished during the second century B. C., and died, according to the Eusebian Chronicle, at the commencement of the first century.[[236]]
CHAPTER VIII.
WHY TRAGEDY DID NOT FLOURISH AT ROME—NATIONAL LEGENDS NOT INFLUENTIAL WITH THE PEOPLE—FABULÆ PRÆTEXTATÆ—ROMAN RELIGION NOT IDEAL—ROMAN LOVE FOR SCENES OF REAL ACTION AND GORGEOUS SPECTACLE—TRAGEDY NOT PATRONISED BY THE PEOPLE—PACUVIUS—HIS DULORESTES AND PAULUS.
From what has been already said, it is sufficiently clear that the Italians, like all other Indo-European races, had some taste for the drama, but that this taste developed itself in a love for scenes of humorous satire. Whilst, therefore, Roman comedy originated in Italy, and was brought to perfection by the influence of Greek literature, Roman tragedy,[[237]] on the other hand, was transplanted from Athens, and with the exception of a very few cases, was never anything more than translation or imitation.
In the century, during which, together with comedy, it flourished and decayed, it boasted of five distinguished writers—Livius, Nævius, Ennius, Pacuvius, and Attius. The only claim of Atilius to be considered as a tragic poet is his having been the translator of one Greek tragedy. But, in after ages, Rome did not produce one tragic poet unless Varius can be considered an exception. His tragedy, Thyestes, which enjoyed so high a reputation amongst the critics of the Augustan age, that Quintilian, whose judgment generally agrees with them, pronounces it as able to bear comparison with the productions of the Greek tragic poets. It was acted on one occasion, namely, after the return of Octavius from the battle of Actium, and the poet received for it 1,000,000 sesterces (about 8,000l.)[[238]] The tragedies attributed to Seneca were never acted, and were only composed for reading and recitation.
Some account has already been given of Livius, Nævius, and Ennius, because their poetical reputation rests rather on other grounds than on their talents for dramatic poetry. But, before proceeding with the lives and writings of Pacuvius and Attius, it will be necessary to examine the causes which prevented tragedy from flourishing at Rome.
In endeavouring to account for this phenomenon, it is not sufficient to say, that in the national legends of the Hellenic race were imbodied subjects essentially of a dramatic character, and that epic poetry contained incidents, characters, sentiments, and even dramatic machinery, which only required to be put upon the stage. Doubtless the Greek epics and legends were an inexhaustible source of inspiration to the tragic poets. But it is also true that the Romans had national legends which formed the groundwork of their history, and were interwoven in their early literature. These legends, however, were private, not public property; they were preserved in the records and pedigrees of private families, and ministered to their glory, and were therefore more interesting to the members of these houses than to the people at large: they were not preserved as a national treasure by priestly families, like those of the Attic Eumolpidæ, nor did they twine themselves around the hearts of the Roman people, as the venerable traditions of Greece did around those of that nation. The Romans did not live in them—they were embalmed in their poets as curious records of antiquity or acknowledged fictions—they did not furnish occasions for awakening national enthusiasm. Although, therefore, they existed, they were comparatively powerless over the popular mind as elements of dramatic effect.
They were jealously preserved by illustrious houses, furnished materials in a dry and unadorned form to the annalists, and were embellished by the graphic power of the historian; but it is not probable that they ever constituted, in the same sense as the Greek legends, the folklore of the Roman people. In themselves, the lays of Horatius and of the lake Regillus were sufficiently stirring, and those of Lucretia, Coriolanus, and Virginia sufficiently moving, for tragedy, but they were not familiar to the masses of the people.
A period at length arrived in which there was a still further reason why Roman national legends, however adapted for tragedy they might be abstractedly, had not power to move the affections of the Roman populace. It ceased to have a personal interest in them. The masses had undergone a complete change. The Roman people of the most flourishing literary eras were not the descendants of those who maintained the national glory in the legendary period. Not only were almost all the patrician families then extinct, but war and poverty had extinguished the middle classes, and miserably thinned the lower orders. The old veterans of pure Roman blood who survived were settled at a distance from Rome in the different military colonies. Into the vacancy thus caused had poured thousands of slaves, captives in the bloody wars of Gaul and Spain, and Greece and Africa. These and their descendants replaced the ancient people. Many of them received liberty and franchise, and some by their talents and energy arrived at wealth and station. But they could not possibly be Romans at heart, or consider the past glories of their adopted country as their own. They were bound by no ties of old associations to it. The ancient legends had no especial interest in their eyes. It mattered little whether the incidents and characters of the tragedy which they witnessed were Greek or Roman. It was to the rise of this new element of population, and the displacement or absorption of the old race, that the decline of patriotism was owing—the careless disregard of everything except daily sustenance and daily amusement,[[239]] which paved the way for the empire, and marked the downfall of liberty. From this cause, also, resulted in some degree the non-influential position which national traditions occupied at Rome; and tragedy, though for a time popular, could not maintain its popularity. Thus it entirely disappeared; and, when it revived, it came forth, not as the favourite of the people, but under the patronage of select circles, and took its place, not like Athenian tragedy, as the leading literature of the age, but simply as one species of literary composition.