That the Vergilian commentary by Aelius Donatus – one of the most influential late-antique commentaries that have not survived – was extant in the ninth century and available to some Carolingian scholars is still a widespread belief. The evidence in support of this thesis is said to have been provided by the Harvard Servianist J. J. H. Savage in three articles published between 1925 and 1931. In these articles, Savage claimed that a few marginal notes in one of (...) the ninth-century primary witnesses to the DS scholia, the so-called ‘Vergil of Tours’ (Bern, Burgerbibliothek, Ms. 165), were drawn almost directly from Donatus’ commentary and that a marginal note in a roughly coeval Servian witness (Bern, Burgerbibliothek, Ms. 363) provided information about a place where a copy of the commentary could be found. A re-examination of the two manuscripts shows that the evidence adduced by Savage does not stand scrutiny and that the terminus post quem for the loss of Donatus’ commentary should be antedated by at least one century. (shrink)

In the first act of Terence'sAndria, we find a dialogue between the old man Simo and Sosia, the freedman, with the former explaining why he has decided to arrange a false wedding for his young son Pamphilus. He has, in fact, learned that his son, despite being betrothed, has had a relationship with another girl and that—quite a serious matter—the fiancée's father, Chremes, has heard about the clandestine affair. In verses 144–9 Simo reports on the not-altogether friendly meeting he has (...) had with Chremes, who is furious about the complete disrespect that has been shown to his daughter; Simo's only defence is to attempt to deny the truth (146:ego illud sedulo negare factum). (shrink)

The spirit of Aelius Donatus must be uneasy of late years; so many scholars have attempted to evoke his ghost. Professor H. J. Thomson professes to see in the additional notes to Servius an image once removed from the true Donatus. ‘The question’, he writes, ‘how far we can assume that the words of Donatus are directly reproduced [in the additions first published by Daniel ] can hardly be satisfactorily answered.’ That Donatus was not the (...) immediate source of D, Thomson endeavours to show from three instances, in two of which we know for certain, either from the Glossaries or from Servius himself, the substance of a part, at least, of the note of Donatus on these passages. In the other the argument rests on the comparative meagreness of the note in the enlarged Servius. In all three cases, according to this theory, we have a rehandling of the D comment. The note on the passage from the Aeneid has already been discussed by Professor Thomson in his study of the Virgil scholia in the Abstrusa glossary. The conclusions reached there are repeated, though perhaps not so positively, in the article under discussion. I hold with Professor Rand that we have in Servius auctus substantially the voice of Donatus, though in a fragmentary form, due to the work of a compiler who, with Servius as a basis, has worked in with more or less success explanatory matter which departed from, or was an addition to, the information supplied by an interpreter who himself derived most of his material from Donatus. (shrink)

Based on a new and complete collation of manuscripts and ancient editions, this paper will discuss some stemmatic and textual problems concerning the “Excerpta de comoedia” attributed to Aelius Donatus.

Read audit in artes for the transmitted audet in artes in Gratt. 498. The correction has the effect that the phrase audere (ardere Gronovius) in proelia in Verg. Aen. 2,347 no longer has linguistic support.

Late Antiquity witnessed intense scholarly activity on Virgil's poems. Aelius Donatus’ commentary, the twelve-bookInterpretationes Vergilianaecomposed by the fourth-century or fifth-century rhetorician Tiberius Claudius Donatus and other sets of scholia testify to the richness of late ‘Virgilian literature’. Servius’ full-scale commentary on Virgil's poetry marked a watershed in the history of the reception of Virgil and in Latin criticism in general. Primarily ‘the instrument of a teacher’, Servius’ commentary was intended to teach students and readers to read and (...) write good Latin through Virgil. Lauded by Macrobius for his ‘learning’ and ‘modesty’, Servius attained supremacy as both a literary critic and an interpreter of Virgil, the master of Latin poetry. Hisauctoritashad a profound impact on later Virgilian erudition. As Cameron notes, Servius’ commentary ‘eclipsed all competition, even Donatus’. Significantly, it permeated non-Virgilian scholarship from the fifth century onwards. The earliest bodies of scholia on Lucan, the tenth-century or eleventh-centuryCommenta BernensiaandAdnotationes super Lucanumand thescholia uetustioraon Juvenal contain material that can be traced as far back as Servius’ scholarly masterpiece. (shrink)

Few critics can ever have shown more light-hearted thoughtlessness towards an anxious posterity than Servius in his casual preservation of the ‘Helen-episode’, lacking in our ancient manuscripts of Virgil and primarily extant only in this precarious form. A pity that Servius spoke at all, if he could not tell us more; and to make matters worse, he ignored the lines in his commentary. Aelius Donatus says nothing of them. Tiberius Claudius Donatus passes peacefully in his interpretatio from (...) 2. 566 to 2. 589; his prosy conscientiousness nowhere else allows him to skip so much. The passage so rashly preserved forms an exasperating Tummelplatz for students of Virgil: ‘quadereviridoctiiampridem inter se certarunt semperque, ni fallor, certabunt.’ The purpose of this paper is to suggest that Servius told the truth about the lines, and was not planting a forgery on a credulous world. (shrink)

My purpose in this paper is to reassert the traditional view that Athenian women of the classical period regularly had an association with phratries. As part of my argument I adduce an overlooked piece of evidence, a much discussed passage from the Donatus commentary on Terence; for this I provide a new interpretation.There is some evidence that Athenian women were introduced to their fathersphrateresat birth, or to their husbands'phrateresat marriage, or both. The speaker of Isaeus 3 repeatedly asserts that (...) a certain Pyrrhus would have presented his daughter to hisphrateresif she had been legitimate. A scholium on Aristophanes,Acharnians146 may refer to such a practice. Euxitheus calls as witnesses of his mother's citizenshipphrateresfor whom his father celebrated the wedding feast, thegamelia, on her behalf ; celebration of thegameliais regarded as proof of the legitimacy of the speaker's mother at Isaeus 8.19. Neither Demosthenes nor Isaeus says that women were formally registered among thephrateresor even present at the feast; but notices in the lexicographers do connect thegameliawith registration among or introduction to thephrateres. Many scholars have accepted these passages as evidence for normal practice at Athens in the classical period. (shrink)

Terence was studied, though not so much as Virgil, in monastery-schools. Their magistri bestirred themselves to get aid for pupils. Some famous magister— we know not who—had written, between the lines or in the margins, interpretations of difficult words in at least the three opening plays of the MS. which he used—Andr., Ad., Eun.—if not in all. These interpretations were collected from his MS. and found their way into many monastery-libraries. Goetz has published these glossae collectae of Terence from a (...) tenth century MS. in Vol. V. of his Corpus Glossariorum Latinorum, pp. 529–539; Mr. Austin has added more from a Leyden MS. , written apparently in Belgium or Holland, c. 800–815 A.D. . Probably Dr. Theander will add a further batch from a Paris MS. (shrink)

Among the works of Aelius Aristides is preserved one entitled the Rhodian It concerns an earthquake which has recently struck the city of Rhodes, and since Keil's edition of 1898 it has usually been considered spurious. The work reproduces a true speech, not something like an open letter: the clearest sign is when the author uses the deictic pronoun τοετ, ‘this here’, of the place in which he is speaking. One question is best discussed at the outset, since later (...) it will prove vital to the question of authenticity: does the speaker claim to have been in Rhodes at the moment of the earthquake? Keil assumed without argument that he does. He had clearly visited the city before the disaster as well as after it, but despite the vividness of his descriptions he nowhere says that he was present, and this reticence surely implies that he was not; and if he had been it is odd that he should talk of ‘the actual climax of the thing that befell you’, using the second person plural. I infer that the speaker had not been present, but gave the speech several months after the event ; in the last part of this paper I will argue that he is Aristides, stopping at Rhodes on his wayback from Egypt to Smyrna in or about 142. (shrink)

Among Aristides' extant works there are five speeches concerning the city of Smyrna, namely the first Smyrnaean oration (17), a monody for Smyrna (18), a letter to I Marcus and Commodus concerning Smyrna (19), a palinode for Smyrna (20) and the second Smyrnaean oration (21). The historical context and purpose of Orr. 18, 19 and 20 are well known and uncontroversial. In contrast, although the dating of Orr. 17 and 21 relative to the others is not in doubt, their context (...) and purpose have been divergently interpreted. In this note I will reargue the case that the dominant modern scholarly tradition, which conceives the speeches as invitations to the emperors Marcus and Commodus respectively to visit Smyrna, is wrong. Rather the speeches were addresses of welcome to two proconsuls, father and son, on their respective arrivals in Smyrna. Secondly, I will briefly indicate the general significance of this identification. (shrink)

Among Aristides' extant works there are five speeches concerning the city of Smyrna, namely the first Smyrnaean oration , a monody for Smyrna , a letter to I Marcus and Commodus concerning Smyrna , a palinode for Smyrna and the second Smyrnaean oration . The historical context and purpose of Orr. 18, 19 and 20 are well known and uncontroversial. In contrast, although the dating of Orr. 17 and 21 relative to the others is not in doubt, their context and (...) purpose have been divergently interpreted. In this note I will reargue the case that the dominant modern scholarly tradition, which conceives the speeches as invitations to the emperors Marcus and Commodus respectively to visit Smyrna, is wrong. Rather the speeches were addresses of welcome to two proconsuls, father and son, on their respective arrivals in Smyrna. Secondly, I will briefly indicate the general significance of this identification. (shrink)

In CQ 45 , 547–50, S. J. Harrison and M. Winterbottom propose a series of emendations to the text of the recently discovered passage of Donatus which contains his commentary on Aen. 6.1–157. I offer some further emendations.

In CQ 45, 547–50, S. J. Harrison and M. Winterbottom propose a series of emendations to the text of the recently discovered passage of Donatus which contains his commentary on Aen. 6.1–157. I offer some further emendations.