[NOTE 41.]
Nævius.
Cneus Nævius flourished about the year 500, and acquired great fame by some successful comedies which are now lost: he offended Lucius Cæcilius Metellus, a man of great power, and consular dignity, by whose influence the unfortunate poet was banished to Africa, where he died. Volcatius assigns to Nævius the third place.
[NOTE 42.]
Plautus.
Marcus Accius Plautus was a native of Sarsina, a town of Umbria, near the Adriatic sea, and died at Rome, 182 B. C., at the age of forty, leaving behind him a literary reputation which very few, of any age or county, have ever been able to equal. Of those who refused to allow Plautus the title of the First comic poet of Rome, scarcely any have disputed his right to be second in the list, where Terence holds the first place: some critics, indeed, have gone so far as to prefer Plautus, even to Terence himself; but Volcatius Sedigitus, whose judgment did Terence great injustice, makes Plautus second only to Cæcilius. The saying of Ælius Stilo is worthy of being recorded; “Musas Plautino sermone locuturas fuisse, si Latinè loqui vellent,” that if the Muses wished to speak in Latin, they would speak in the language of Plautus. This celebrated man wrote 27 or 28 comedies, which, notwithstanding the change of manners, kept possession of the stage for nearly 500 years; and were performed with applause as late as the reigns of Carus and Numerian. Only 20 of them are now extant. The following is the poet’s epitaph, written (as is supposed) by Varro, though Pietro Crinito affirms it to be the production of Plautus himself, of whom Crinito has written a biographical account.
“Postquam est morte captus Plautus,
Comœdia luget, scena est deserta,
Deinde risus, ludus jocusque et numeri
Innumeri simul omnes collacrymarunt.”
The comic muse bewails her Plautus dead,
And silence reigns o’er the deserted stage;