(3) The Annals.
(3) But the poem which was the chief result of his life, and made an epoch in Latin literature, was the Annals. On the composition of this work he rested his hopes of popular and permanent fame—
Hic vestrum panxit maxima facta patrum:
and again, apparently at the opening of the poem, he wrote,—
Latos per populos terrasque poemata nostra
Clara cluebunt.
At its conclusion, he claimed for his old age the repose due to a brave and triumphant career. He composed the eighteenth book, the last, in his sixty-seventh year, three years before his death[39]. The great length to which the poem extended, and the vast amount of materials which it embraced, imply a long and steady concentration of his powers on the task. It was one requiring much learning as well as original conception. The fragments of the poem afford proofs of a familiarity with Homer, and of acquaintance with the Cyclic poets[40]. It is impossible to say how much of the early Roman history, as it has come down to modern times, is due to the diligence of Ennius in collecting, and to his genius in giving life to the traditions and ancient records of Rome. He was certainly the earliest writer who gathered them up, and united them in a continuous narrative. The work accomplished by him required not only the antiquarian lore of a man
Multa tenens, antiqua, sepulta,
and the power of imagination to give a new shape to the past, but an intimate knowledge of the great events and the great men of his own time, and a strong sympathy with the best spirit of his age.