et quasi diu tacens ab indignatione coepit sic dicens: "Semper ego auditor tantum." Fecit quosdam versus in Paridem pantomimum, qui tum apud imperatorem plurimum poterat. Hac de causa venit in suspicionem quasi ipsius [istius Jahn] imperatoris tempora notasset, a quo sub obtentu militiae pulsus est urbe: [tandem Romam cum veniret et Martialem suum non videret] ita tristitia et angore periit [anno aetatis suae altero et octuagesimo].

GROUP III. contains one Life (Jahn iv.), first published by Ruperti.

Marcus Iunius Iuvenalis, ex municipio Aquinati, ordinis, ut fertur, libertinorum, Romae literis operam dedit. Declamavit non mediocri fama, ut ipse scribit : "Et nos consilium dedimus Sullae." Extremis Domitiani temporibus missus in exilium expertus est quantum unius histrionis ira valeret. Exulavit in Aegypto sub specie honoris nec inde a novis principibus revocatus est. In exilio ampliavit satyras et pleraque mutavit, invehiturque in cineres Domitiani. Decessit longo senio confectus exul Antonino Pio imperatore.

GROUP IV. contains two Lives (Jahn v. and vi.)

Cum ex Aquino municipio Romam se contulisset et ad dignitatem equestris ordinis pervenire sua virtute meruisset, ad mediam fere aetatem declamavit et in Paridem pantomimum, qui in deliciis apud [Traianum] imperatorem habebatur, quaedam carmina fecit, quae deinde inseruit in eam satyram, "Et spes et ratio.” Sunt autem haec: "Quod non dant

Philomela

tribunos." Quae cum ad aures [Traiani] tyranni venissent, sui temporis vitia carpi intellexit. Qua ex re commotus, nulla alia occasione reperta struendae mortis in

1

1

Iuvenalem, sub honoris praetextu fecit eum praefectum militis contra Scotos, qui bellum contra Romanos moverant, ut ibi interficeretur Iuvenalis. Sed tamen paulo post, ut sciret sibi iratum principem, in codicillis suis ad eum in exercitu mittendis inseruit. "Et te Philomela promovit." Quo effectum est ut ipse animo consternatus ex mentis aegritudine diem suum obierit.

GROUP V. contains four Lives (among them Jahn vii.) I give the one discovered by Rühl in a Harley MS. at the British Museum.

Iunius Iuvenalis Aquinas, id est de Aquino oppido oriundus et natus, qui ad mediam fere aetatem satirice declamavit et in Paridem pantomimum apud aulam imperatoris Domitiani sese in deliciis habentem quosdam versus non absurde composuit hos scilicet: "Quod non dant . . . Philomela tribunos." Paris ista carmina irrecitata emebat et suum titulum apponebat, et pro suis recitabat. Hi versus per aliquantulum temporis aures imperatoris latuerunt. Sed postea cum hoc opus aggrederetur Iuvenalis, occasione accepta in quadam satira, hac scilicet: "Et spes et ratio; "satis competenter eosdem versus interseruit. Quibus publicatis Domitianus sua tempora sentiens denotari, pudore et ira correptus qualiter Iuvenalem deprimeret apud se excogitavit, sed cum tantae auctoritatis virum publice punire non auderet, militibus Romanis in extremas partes Aegypti tendentibus, in expeditionem quasi sub obtentu honoris, sub dignitatis simulatione illum praefecit, ut si aliquo modo periret, sub specie dilectionis animi malignitas compleretur. Iuvenalis vero hoc opus primum peregit. Unde in ultima satira multa de militaribus commodis scripsit, ut sic in exercitum ituros animaret.

Deinde hoc opere completo eo profectus tandem causa profectionis comperta taedio et angore vitam finivit.

To these Lives one more is to be added, recently found by Dr. Dürr in a MS. in the Palazzo Barberini at Rome (Cod. Barberinus, viii. 18), of which the first sentence is important.

Iunius Iuvenalis Aquinas Iunio Iuvenale patre, matre vero Septumuleia ex Aquinati municipio Claudio Nerone et L. Antistio consulibus natus est. Sororem habuit Septumuleiam quae Fuscino nupsit.

Now that there is some close relationship between these Lives is evident from the large number of similar or identical phrases occurring in all or most of them, and that some of the Lives were copied from others within the same group is quite possible. At the same time, the differences between the various groups are too great for us to suppose that any one of the extant Lives was the origin of the rest. That some of the statements, especially those which give reasons rather than facts, may have been the invention of medieval grammarians is probable, and also that others were derived from references in the Satires; but after deducting all these there remains a residuum of definite and precise statements-some found in all the Lives, others in several of them

some of which receive indirect confirmation from other sources, and all of which in all probability date back to some common authority not at any rate later in date than the Scholia found in Codex P., which, as will be seen later, belong probably to the fourth or fifth century. This is substantially the view of Dr. Dürr, who, in a very able monograph on the Life of Juvenal, subjects the Lives to a very thorough criticism, and

shows how a biography written from ancient tradition by a grammarian of the third or fourth century might be dealt with by later scholars in such a way as to take the form of the various groups given above. On the one hand, the original matter would be abbreviated by a process of selection, and in this way statements originally unconnected would be brought into a close and misleading relation to one another; while, on the other hand, the narrative would almost certainly be gradually decked out with various interpolations, some being pure inventions, others more or less ingeniously pieced in from the Satires. No doubt the attempt to rediscover the kernel of the original biography, and so to reconstruct it by a process of analysis and synthesis, is not without its difficulties and uncertainties, and the result, as I have already said, must be partly hypothetical; but with the indirect aid of the other sources of evidence, the task is not an impossible one.

In order to prepare the way for a reconstruction of the Life, I will first of all put down in order the statements which, because of their repetition in all or most of the Lives, or because of their definite and precise character, would seem to be taken from the original account, and then I will consider how far these are confirmed or at least rendered probable by other kinds of evidence.

1. Juvenal was born at Aquinum (12 Lives).

2. His father or foster-father was a freedman (4 Lives).

3. He was born in Nero's reign (4 Lives).

4. Till the middle period of his life he practised declamation (8 Lives).

5. He composed some verses under Domitian against Paris (12 Lives).

6. He was sent as praefect against the Scotch as a punishment (2 Lives).

7. He was sent under the pretence of a military command to Egypt (8 Lives).

8. This was at the age of eighty (3 Lives).

9. He was not banished at the time he wrote the verses, but after he had inserted them in the seventh Satire (4 Lives).

10. He died in exile of mortification and grief (7 Lives).

1. BIRTHPLACE

That Juvenal was born at Aquinum, a colony founded by the triumvirs, is certain not only from the consensus of the Lives, but also from Sat. iii. 318-321, and from the inscription, in which Juvenal is mentioned, found on the site of Aquinum. See p. xxvii.

2. JUVENAL'S POSITION IN LIFE

That Juvenal was the son or adopted son of a freedman is probable enough in itself, though it is not strongly attested. It, however, perhaps derives some probability from his Gentile name Junius. This was, of course, the name of two distinguished Gentes-one patrician and one plebeian-to neither of which Juvenal, who writes throughout as the representative of the middle classes, could have been related by blood. But if his father had been a freedman of some one belonging to the Gens, he would on his emancipation take the Gentile name, just as Cicero's freedman Tiro became M. Tullius Tiro. It is a