[23] A collection ascribed to Antonius Diogenes, compiled by Aristides of Miletus, was translated into Latin by Cornelius Sisenna (119–67 B.C.). The translation is lost.
[24] The Cena of Petronius has more consistency, is in form more like the longer tales of antiquity.
[25] The object of Lucian is always satire. This, not any purely narrative end, determines his method. But it is worth observing that The Ass is picaresque. For the rest, no single adventure of the string is more than anecdote.
[26] The Greek title is ποιμενικά.
[27] E. g., the fifteenth idyl of Theocritus, and the opening of the seventh oration of Dio Chrysostom. The latter, though brought in as anecdote, has extraordinary ingenuity and finish of form.
[28] See the introduction by Joseph Jacobs to Old French Romances done into English by William Morris.
[29] This, perhaps, is typically the novella; but Boccaccio will not fix the term: “intendo di raccontare cento novelle, o favole o parabole o istorie, che dire le vogliamo ... nelle quali novelle....”—Preface to Decameron.
[30] For reference in more detailed study of mediæval forms, this tentative classification of the Decameron may be tabulated as follows:—
| anecdote | 55 |
| (a) simple anecdote | 34 |
| I, all but nov. 4; III, nov. 4; V, nov. 4; VI, entire; VIII, all but nov. 7 & 8; IX, nov. 1 & 7–10. | |
| (b) anecdote more artistically elaborated | 21 |
| III, nov. 1, 2, 3, 5, 6; V, nov. 10; VII, entire; VIII, nov. 7; IX, nov. 2–5. | |
| scenario or summary romance | 40 |
| II, nov. 3–10; III, nov. 7–10; IV, entire; V, all but nov. 4 & 10; X, entire. | |
| approaching short story | 3 |
| I, nov. 4; II, nov. 1; VIII, nov. 8. | |
| short story | 2 |
| II, nov. 2; IX, nov. 6. | |
| 100 |
[31] E. Gilbert, Le roman en France pendant le xixe siècle, page 65; A. France, La vie littéraire, Ire série, page 47.