Even the names by which two of the Camenae were known—Postvorta and Antevorta—suggest the prosaic and practical functions which they were supposed to fulfil. The Romans had no native word equivalent to the Greek word ἀοιδός, denoting the primary and most essential of all poetical gifts, the power to awaken the music of language. The word vates, as was seen, denoted a prophet. The title of scriba was applied to Livius Andronicus; and Naevius, who has by some been regarded as the last of the old race of Roman bards, applies to himself the Greek name of poeta,—
Flerent divae Camenae Naevium poetam.
The commemorative odes appear to have been recited or sung at banquets, not by poets or rhapsodists, but by boys or guests. There is one notice, indeed, of a class of men who practised the profession of minstrelsy. This passage, which is quoted by Aulus Gellius from the writings of Cato, implies the very lowest estimation of the position and character of the poet, and points more naturally to the composers of the libellous verses forbidden by the laws of the Twelve Tables, than to the authors of heroic and national lays:—'Poetry was not held in honour; if anyone devoted himself to it, or went about to banquets, he was called a vagabond[17].'
It appears that, on this ground also, there is no reason for believing in the existence of any golden age of Roman poetry before the time of Ennius, or in the theory that the legendary tales of Roman history were created and shaped by native minstrels. To what cause, then, can we attribute their origin? These tales have a strong human interest, and represent marked and original types of antique heroism. They have the elements of true tragic pathos and moral grandeur. They could neither have arisen nor been preserved except among a people endowed with strong capacities of feeling and action. But the strength of the Roman mind consisted more in retentive capacity than in creative energy. Their art and their religion, their family and national customs, aimed at preserving the actual memory of men and of their actions: not like the arts, ceremonies, and customs of the Greeks, which aimed at lifting the mind out of reality into an ideal world. As one of the chief difficulties of the Homeric controversy arises from our ignorance of the power of the memory during an age when poetry and song were in the fullest life, but the use of letters was either unknown, or extremely limited; so there is a parallel difficulty in all attempts to explain the origin of early Roman history, from our ignorance of the power of oral tradition in a time of long established order, but yet unacquainted with any of the forms of literature. The indifference of barbarous tribes to their past history can prove little or nothing as to the tenacity of the national memory among a people far advanced towards civilisation like the Romans after the establishment of their Republican form of government. Nor can the analogy of early Greek traditions be fairly applied to those of Rome, owing to the great difference in the circumstances and the genius of the two nations. Many real impressions of the past might fix themselves indelibly in the grave and solid temperament of the Romans, which would have been lost amid the inexhaustible wealth of fancy that had been lavished upon the Greeks. The strict family life and discipline of the Romans, the continuity of their religious colleges, the unity of a single state as the common centre of all their interests, the slow and steady growth of their institutions, their strong regard for precedent, were all conditions more favourable to the preservation of tradition than the lively social life, the numerous centres of political organisation, and the rapid growth and vicissitudes of the Greek Republics.
It cannot, indeed, be disputed that although the legendary tales of Roman history may have drawn more of their colour from life than from imagination, yet there is no criterion by which the amount of fact contained in them can be separated from the other elements of which they were composed. Oral tradition among the Romans, as among other nations, was founded on impressions originally received without any careful sifting of evidence; and these first impressions would naturally be modified in accordance with the feelings and opinions of each generation, through which they were transmitted. Aetiological myths, or the attempt to explain some institution or memorial by some concrete fact, and the systematic reconstruction of forgotten events, have also entered largely into the composition of Roman history. But these admissions do not lead to the conclusion that the art or fancy of any class of early poets was added to the unconscious operation of popular feeling in moulding the impressive tales of early heroism, partly out of the memory of real events and personages, partly out of the ideal of character, latent in the national mind. It has been remarked by Sir G. C. Lewis that many even of the Greek myths, abounding 'in striking, pathetic, and interesting events,' existed as prose legends, and were handed down in the common speech of the people. In like manner, such tales as those of Lucretia and Virginia, of Horatius and the Fabii, of Cincinnatus, Coriolanus, and Camillus, which stand out prominently in the twilight of Roman history, may have been preserved in fama vulgaris, or among the family traditions of the great houses, till they were gathered into the poem of Ennius and the prose narratives of the early annalists[18]. In so far as they are shaped or coloured by imagination, they do not bear traces of the conscious art of a poet, but rather of an unconscious conformity to the national ideal of character. The most impressive of these legendary stories illustrate the primitive virtues of the Roman character, such as chastity, frugality, fortitude, and self-devotion; or the national characteristics of patrician pride and a stern exercise of parental authority. There is certainly no internal evidence that any of them originated in a pure poetic impulse, or gave birth to any work of poetic art deserving a permanent existence in literature.
The analogy of other nations might suggest the inference that a race which in its maturity produced a genuine poetic literature must, in the early stages of its history, have given some proof of poetic inspiration. It is natural to associate the idea of poetry with youth both in nations and individuals. Yet the evidence of their language, of their religion, and of their customs, leads to the conclusion that the Romans, while prematurely great in action and government, were, in the earlier stages of their national life, little moved by any kind of poetical imagination. The state of religious feeling or belief which gives birth to or co-exists with primitive poetry has left no trace of itself upon the early Roman annals. It is generally found that a fanciful mythology, of a bright, gloomy, or grotesque character, in accordance with the outward circumstances and latent spirit or humour of the particular race among whom it originates, precedes and for a time accompanies the poetry of romantic action. The creative faculty produces strange forms and conditions of supernatural life out of its own mysterious sympathy with Nature, before it learns to invent tales of heroic action and of tragic calamity out of its sympathy with human energy and passion, and its interest in marking the course of destiny, and the vicissitudes of life. The development of the Roman religion betrays the absence, or at least the weaker influence of that imaginative power which shaped the great mythologies of different races out of the primeval worship of nature. The later element introduced into Roman religion was due not to imagination but to reflection. The worship of Fides, Concordia, Pudicitia, and the like, marks a great progress from the early adoration of the sun, the earth, the vault of heaven, and the productive power of nature; but it is a progress in understanding and moral consciousness, not in poetical feeling nor imaginative power. It shows that Roman civilisation advanced without this vivifying influence,—that the mind of the race early reached the maturity of manhood, without passing through the dreams of childhood or the buoyant fancies of youth.
The circumstances of the Romans, in early times, were also different from those by which the growth of a romantic poetry has usually been accompanied. Though, like all races born to a great destiny, they had much latent imaginative ardour of feeling, this was employed by them, unconsciously, in elevating and purifying the ideal of the State and the family, as actually realised in experience. Their orderly organisation,—the early establishment of their civic forms,—the strict discipline of family life among them,—the formal and ceremonial character of their national religion,—and their strong interest in practical affairs,—were not calculated either to kindle the glow of individual genius, or to dispose the mass of the people to listen to the charm of musical verse. The wars of the young Republic, carried on by a well-trained militia, for the acquisition of new territory, formed the character to solid strength and steady discipline, but could not act upon the fancy in the same way as the distant enterprise, the long struggles for national independence, or the daring forays, which have thrown the light of romance around the warlike youth of other races. The tillage of the soil, in which the brief intervals between their wars were passed, was a tame and monotonous pursuit compared with the maritime adventure which awoke the energies of Greece, or with the wild and lonely, half-pastoral, half-marauding life, out of which a true ballad poetry arose in modern times. Some traces of a wilder life, or some faint memories of their Sabine forefathers, may be dimly discerned in the earliest traditions of the Roman people; but their youth was essentially practical,—great and strong in the virtues of temperance, gravity, fortitude, reverence for law and the majesty of the State, combined with a strong love of liberty and sturdy resistance to wrong. These qualities are the foundations of a powerful and orderly State, not the root or the sap by which a great national poetry is nourished[19].
If the pure Roman intellect and discipline had spontaneously produced any kind of literature, it would have been more likely to have taken the form of history or oratory than of national song or ballad. It was from men of the Italian provinces, and not from her own sons, that Rome received her poetry. The men of the most genuinely Roman type and character long resisted all literary progress. The patrons and friends of the early poets were the more liberal members of the aristocracy, in whom the austerity of the national character and narrowness of the national mind had yielded to new ideas and a wider experience. The art of Greece was communicated to 'rude Latium,' through the medium of those kindred races who had come into earlier contact with the Greek language and civilisation. With less native strength, but with greater flexibility, these races were more readily moulded by foreign influences; and, leading a life of greater ease and freedom, they were more susceptible to all the impulses of Nature. While they were thus more readily prepared to catch the spirit of Greek culture, they had learned, through long years of war and subsequent dependence, to understand and respect the imperial State in which their own nationality had been merged. It is important to remember that the time in which Roman literature arose was not only that of the first active intercourse between Greeks and Romans, but also that in which a great war, against the most powerful State outside of Italy, had awakened the sense of an Italian nationality, of which Rome was the centre. The great Republic derived her education and literature from the accumulated stores of Greek thought and feeling; but these were made available to her through the willing service of poets who, though born in other parts of Italy, looked to Rome as the head and representative of their common country.
[1] Epist. ii. 1. 157.
[2] Georg. ii. 385.