Epic crowned the classical hierarchy of genres, in large part because of the prestige of its subject matter—the establishment and maintenance of divine and human order. In ancient Rome, epic’s significance begins with Ennius, who adaptated Greek dactylic hexameter into Latin, securing the genre’s primacy as a narrative vehicle for celebrating Roman achievements. From these beginnings Latin hexameter was refined in the poetry of Lucretius and Catullus; the form flourished in the hands of Vergil and his successors.
This edition offers twenty-seven selections from a rich corpus of ten Latin epic poets. Though the focus is on republican and Augustan epic, a sample of later imperial epic allows exploration of the full expanse of Rome’s responses to her own history and political culture, and to the art, history, and literature of ancient Greece.
Special Features
- Introduction to the Latin epic genre and its authors, Latin style, and meter
- 624 lines of unadapted Latin text selected from ten epics: Ennius, Annales 34–50, 72–91, 175–79; Lucretius, De rerum natura 1.1–43, 1.936–50; Catullus, carmen 64.50–93; Vergil, Aeneid 1.1–11, 1.148–56, 1.338–68, 4.1–30, 4.160–72, 6.14–33, 6.179–82, 6.456–66, 8.625–34, 12.697–724; Ovid, Metamorphoses 1.1–20, 1.89–112, 4.706–39, 8.155–82, 8.741–76; Manilius, Astronomica 5.574–615; Lucan, Bellum Civile 2.1–15; Valerius Flaccus, Argonautica 2.497–537; Statius, Thebaid 1.401–27, 6.84–117; Silius Italicus, Punica 1.1–28
- Notes at the back and complete vocabulary
- Suggested readings, glossary of literary terms, and three maps
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