FLORUS, JULIUS, poet, orator, and jurist of the Augustan age. His name has been immortalized by Horace, who dedicated to him two of his Epistles (i. 3; ii. 2), from which it would appear that he composed lyrics of a light, agreeable kind. The statement of Porphyrion, the old commentator on Horace, that Florus himself wrote satires, is probably erroneous, but he may have edited selections from the earlier satirists (Ennius, Lucilius, Varro). Nothing is definitely known of his personality, except that he was one of the young men who accompanied Tiberius on his mission to settle the affairs of Armenia. He has been variously identified with Julius Florus, a distinguished orator and uncle of Julius Secundus, an intimate friend of Quintilian (Instit. x. 3, 13); with the leader of an insurrection of the Treviri (Tacitus, Ann. iii. 40); with the Postumus of Horace (Odes, ii. 14) and even with the historian Florus.
FLORUS, PUBLIUS ANNIUS, Roman poet and rhetorician, identified by some authorities with the historian Florus (q.v.). The introduction to a dialogue called Virgilius orator an poëta is extant, in which the author (whose name is given as Publius Annius Florus) states that he was born in Africa, and at an early age took part in the literary contests on the Capitol instituted by Domitian. Having been refused a prize owing to the prejudice against African provincials, he left Rome in disgust, and after travelling for some time set up at Tarraco as a teacher of rhetoric. Here he was persuaded by an acquaintance to return to Rome, for it is generally agreed that he is the Florus who wrote the well-known lines quoted together with Hadrian’s answer by Aelius Spartianus (Hadrian 16). Twenty-six trochaic tetrameters, De qualitate vitae, and five graceful hexameters, De rosis, are also attributed to him. Florus is important as being the first in order of a number of 2nd-century African writers who exercised a considerable influence on Latin literature, and also the first of the poëtae neoterici or novelli (new-fashioned poets) of Hadrian’s reign, whose special characteristic was the use of lighter and graceful metres (anapaestic and iambic dimeters), which had hitherto found little favour.
The little poems will be found in E. Bährens, Poëtae Latini minores (1879-1883); for an unlikely identification of Florus with the author of the Pervigilium Veneris (q.v.) see [E.H.O. Müller], De P. Annio Floro poëta et de Pervigilio Veneris (1855), and, for the poet’s relations with Hadrian, F. Eyssenhardt, Hadrian und Florus (1882); see also F. Marx in Pauly-Wissowa’s Realencyclopädie, i. pt. 2 (1894).
FLOTOW, FRIEDRICH FERDINAND ADOLF VON, Freiherr (1812-1883), German composer, was born on his father’s estate at Teutendorf, in Mecklenburg, on the 27th of April 1812. Destined originally for the diplomatic profession, his passion for music induced his father to send him to Paris to study under Reicha. But the outbreak of the revolution in 1830 caused his return home, where he busied himself writing chamber-music and operetta until he was able to return to Paris. There he produced Pierre et Cathérine, Rob Roy, La Duchesse de Guise, but made his first real success with Le Naufrage de la Méduse at the Renaissance Théâtre in 1838. Greater, however, was the success which attended Stradella (1844) and Martha (1847), which made the tour of the world. In 1848 Flotow was again driven home by the Revolution, and in the course of a few years he produced Die Grossfürstin (1850), Indra (1853), Rübezahl (1854), Hilda (1855) and Albin (1856). From 1856 to 1863 he was director (Intendant) of the Schwerin opera, but in the latter year he returned to Paris, where in 1869 he produced L’Ombre. From that time to the date of his death he lived in Paris or on his estate near Vienna. He died on the 24th of January 1883. Of his concert-music only the Jubelouvertüre is now ever heard. His strength lay in the facility of his melodies.
FLOTSAM, JETSAM and LIGAN, in English law, goods lost at sea, as distinguished from goods which come to land, which are technically designated wreck. Jetsam (the same word as jettison, from Lat. jactare, to throw) is when goods are cast into the sea, and there sink and remain under water; flotsam (floatson, from float, Lat. flottare) is where they continue floating on the surface of the waves; ligan (or lagan, from lay or lie) is where they are sunk in the sea, but tied to a cork or buoy in order to be found again. Flotsam, jetsam and ligan belong to the sovereign in the absence only of the true owner. Wreck, on the other hand (i.e. goods cast on shore), was by the common law adjudged to the sovereign in any case, because it was said by the loss of the ship all property was gone out of the original owner. This singular distinction which treated goods washed ashore as lost, and goods on and in the sea as not lost, is no doubt to be explained by the primitive practice of plundering wrecked ships. (See [Wreck].)
FLOUNDER, a common term for flat-fish. The name is also more specially given to certain varieties, according to local usage. Thus the Pleuronectes flesus is the common flounder of English terminology, found along the coasts of northern Europe from the Bristol Channel to Iceland. It is particularly partial to fresh water, ascending the Rhine as far as Cologne. It rarely exceeds a length of 12 in. or a weight of 1½ ℔ In American terminology the principal fish of the name are the “summer flounders” or “deep-sea flounders,” also known in America as “plaice” (Paralichthys dentatus), as long as 3 ft. and as heavy as 15 ℔; the “four-spotted flounders” (Paralichthys oblongus); the “common” or “winter” flounder (Pseudopleuronectes americanus); the “diamond flounder” (Hysopsetta guttulata); and the “pole flounder” (Glyptocephalus cynoglossus).