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The Date of the Satyricon

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

K. F. C. Rose
K. F. C. Rose
Affiliation:
Exeter College, Oxford
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Extract

It is now generally agreed that the Satyricon was written in the age of Nero by the Emperor's Arbiter elegantiae. The view that it should be dated to the age of the Antonines has been reasserted since the war, and the work of scholars who have refuted it has produced several new arguments of value; notably in the matter of the economic and social background in the Satyricon. H. C. Schnur has recently restated the economic arguments for the Neronian date, with some new points, and with convincing force.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 12 , Issue 1 , May 1962 , pp. 166 - 168
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1962

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References

page 166 note 1 For the Antonine date, Marmorale, E. V., La questione petroniana (1948); with a few sad exceptions the reviews listed in ‘Marouzeau’ are rightly sceptical.Google Scholar

page 166 note 2 Latomus xviii (1959), 790 ff., using the work of Studer, Rostovtzeff, Maiuri, Browning, and Bagnani.Google Scholar

page 166 note 3 T.A.P.A. lxxxix (1958), 14 ff.Google Scholar

page 166 note 4 Menecrates, , Suet. Nero 30. 5Google Scholar; Apelles, , Suet. Gaius 33. 1Google Scholar, Dio, 59. 5. 2Google Scholar, Philo, , Leg. § 203. Presumably Ephesus (70. 13) is also an actual Neronian entertainer.Google Scholar

page 166 note 5 Individual criticism, Marmorale, , pp. 63–92Google Scholar (with many omissions); the mediod, Bagnani, G., Arbiter of Elegance (1954), pp. 3–14.Google Scholar

page 166 note 6 The most accurate conjectures, Terzaghi, N., Per la storia delta satura 1 (1932), p. 119Google Scholar; Paratore, E., Il Satyricon diPetronio, i (1933), 28, n. 1.Google ScholarBagnani, , op. cit., p. 25, not taking account of the evidence set out below, dates the Satyricon to A.D. 60.Google Scholar

page 167 note 1 For most of the parallels cf. Stubbe, H. (Phtiotogus, Supp. xxv [1933], 74 f.).Google Scholar

page 167 note 2 v. 295 is considered spurious by Ernout, following Heinse and Mössier-probably rightly. It is retained (oddly!) by Müller. It is so obviously an appendage to the poem that the present argument is scarcely affected even if the line is genuine.

page 167 note 3 Mus. Helv. xiv (1957), 118 ff.Google Scholar

page 168 note 1 It is usually thought that the omission of Lucan's name implies that Lucan was still alive. Cf., for instance, Enia, M., Il Satiricon e il suo autore Petronio Arbitro (1897), p. 93. It is only an assumption.Google Scholar

page 168 note 2 It is possible that the earlier reference to buried treasure in the Satyricon (88. 8, alius (donum promittit), si thesaurum effoderit) was inspired by the reports of Bassus' supposed discovery; but the passage is full of commonplaces.

page 168 note 3 Hirschfeld, O. (Rh.M. lii [1897], 294–6).Google Scholar

page 168 note 4 Petronius 118: Seneca, , Epp. 94. 68Google Scholar; 100. 5, 8; 108. 10; 114. 8. Cf. also Petr, . 116. 9Google Scholar: Ep. 95. 43 (a similar metaphor). For other echoes, Collignon, A., Étude sur Pétrone (1892), pp. 291 ff.Google Scholar, Faider, P., Études sur Sénèque (1921), pp. 15–24Google Scholar. Faider suggests that Seneca ‘retorts’ to Petronius and his dissipated friends in Ep. 122, an attack on lucifugae. At that time Petronius was the most notable lucifuga, cf. Tac, . Ann. 16. 18. 1Google Scholar, illi dies per somnum, nox qfficiis et oblectamentis vitae transigebatur.