has been so amply fulfilled, yet no greater injustice could be done to him than to rank him either as poet or critic with those who consider form everything in literature. With Horace the mastery over the vehicle of expression was merely an essential preliminary to making a worthy and serious use of that vehicle. The poet, from Horace’s point of view, was intended not merely to give refined pleasure to a few, but above all things, to be “utilis urbi.” Yet he is saved, in his practice, from the abuse of this theory by his admirable sense, his ironical humour, his intolerance of pretension and pedantry. Opinions will differ as to whether he or Catullus is to be regarded as the greater lyrical poet. Those who assign the palm to Horace will do so, certainly not because they recognize in him richer or equally rich gifts of feeling, conception and expression, but because the subjects to which his art has been devoted have a fuller, more varied, more mature and permanent interest for the world.
Authorities.—For the life of Horace the chief authorities are his own works and a short ancient biography which is attributed to Suetonius. The apparatus criticus is most fully described in O. Keller’s preface to vol. i. of the 2nd ed. (1899) of Keller and Holder’s recension of Horace’s works. This edition also gives by far the largest collection of variants and emendations to the text and of the testimonia of ancient writers.
What might have proved the most important manuscript of Horace, the so-called vetustissimus Blandinius, is now lost, and we know it only from the account of J. Cruquius who saw it in 1565. The relations of the extant MSS. to each other and the presumed archetype present an intricate problem; and Keller’s solution has not proved generally acceptable. See a résumé of the controversy Horazkritik seit 1880 by J. Bick (Leipzig, 1906) and F. Vollmer in Philologus. Supp. x. 2, pp. 261-322. Many MSS. of Horace contain ancient scholia which are copied or taken with abridgment from the commentaries of Porphyrio, who lived about A.D. 200, and Helenius Aero, a still earlier grammarian. These scholia also have been collected and edited—the Porphyrio scholia by A. Holder (1902) and the “Acronian” (or pseudo-Acronian) by O. Keller (1902-1904). R. Bentley’s epoch-making edition (1711) has been reprinted with an index by Zangemeister (1869). Of the modern commentaries the most useful are those of J. C. Orelli (4th ed., revised by O. Hirschfelder and J. Mewes, 1886-1890, with index verborum), and of A. Kiessling (revised by R. Heinze, Odes, 1901, 1908, Satires, 1906, Epistles, 1898). The best complete English commentary is that of E. C. Wickham (2 vols., 1874-1896). Other editions with English notes are those of T. E. Page (Odes, 1883), A. Palmer (Satires, 1883), A. S. Wilkins (Epistles, 1885), J. Gow (Odes and Epodes, 1896, Satires, i., 1901), P. Shorey (Odes and Epodes, 1898, Boston, U.S.A.). L. Müller’s elaborate edition of the Odes and Epodes was published posthumously (1900). Of the critical editions Keller and Holder’s still holds the field: to this Keller’s Epilegomena zu Horaz (1879) is a necessary adjunct. F. Vollmer’s text (1907) uses Keller’s materials on a new principle. Of illustrated editions H. H. Milman’s (1867) and C. W. King’s (1869, with text revised by H. A. J. Munro) deserve mention. The best verse translation is that of J. Conington lately reprinted with the Latin text from the recension in Postgate’s new Corpus poetarum. For further information see Teuffel’s Geschichte der römischen Litteratur (Eng. trans. by G. C. Warr), §§ 234-240, and M. Schanz’s excellent account in his Geschichte der römischen Litteratur, vol. ii. §§ 251-266.
(W. Y. S.; J. G*.)
[1] The date is determined by the poem on the death of Quintilius Varus (who died 24 B.C.), and by the reference in Ode i. 12 to the young Marcellus (died in autumn 23 B.C.) as still alive. Cf. Wickham’s Introduction to the Odes.
HORAE (Lat. hora, hour), the Hours, in Greek mythology Ὡραι, originally the personification of a series of natural phenomena. In the Iliad (v. 749) they are the custodians of the gates of Olympus, which they open or shut by scattering or condensing the clouds; that is, they are weather goddesses, who send down or withhold the fertilizing dews and rain. In the Odyssey, where they are represented as bringing round the seasons in regular order, they are an abstraction rather than a concrete personification. The brief notice in Hesiod (Theog. 901), where they are called the children of Zeus and Themis, who superintend the operations of agriculture, indicates by the names assigned to them (Eunomia, Dikē, Eirenē, i.e. Good Order, Justice, Peace) the extension of their functions as goddesses of order from nature to the events of human life, and at the same time invests them with moral attributes. Like the Moerae (Fates), they regulate the destinies of man, watch over the newly born, secure good laws and the administration of justice. The selection of three as their number has been supposed to refer to the most ancient division of the year into spring, summer and winter, but it is probably only another instance of the Greek liking for that particular number or its multiples in such connexions (three Moerae, Charites, Gorgons, nine Muses). Order and regularity being indispensable conditions of beauty, it was easy to conceive of the Horae as the goddesses of youthful bloom and grace, inseparably associated with the idea of springtime. As such they are companions of the Nymphs and Graces, with whom they are often confounded, and of other superior deities connected with the spring growth of vegetation (Demeter, Dionysus). At Athens they were two (or three) in number: Thallo and Carpo, the goddesses of the flowers of spring and of the fruits of summer, to whom Auxo, the goddess of the growth of plants, may be added, although some authorities make her only one of the Graces. In honour of the Horae a yearly festival (Horaea) was celebrated, at which protection was sought against the scorching heat and drought, and offerings were made of boiled meat as less insipid and more nutritious than roast. In later mythology, under Alexandrian influence, the Horae become the four seasons, daughters of Helios and Selene, each represented with the conventional attributes. Subsequently, when the day was divided into twelve equal parts, each of them took the name of Hora. Ovid (Metam. ii. 26) describes them as placed at equal intervals on the throne of Phoebus, with whom are also associated the four seasons. Nonnus (5th century A.D.) in the Dionysiaca also unites the twelve Horae as representing the day and the four Horae as the seasons in the palace of Helios.
See C. Lehrs, Populäre Aufsätze (1856); J. H. Krause, Die Musen, Grazien, Horen, und Nymphen (1871); and the articles in Daremberg and Saglio’s Dictionnaire des antiquités, J. A. Hild; and in Roscher’s Lexikon der Mythologie, W. Rapp.