Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jn8rn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T20:03:54.089Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

IN BED WITH VIRGIL: AUSONIUS’ WEDDING CENTO AND ITS RECEPTION*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 September 2016

Sigrid Schottenius Cullhed
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Judging from its history of effect, the Wedding Cento produced by the fourth-century poet Ausonius is in fact not a poem about a wedding at all. It is a work about the ethics of textual recycling; about the impact of political power and patronage on literary production; about smut, or rather about where the responsibility lies when a reader sees smut when none was intended. It is also a poem about sexual violence, but this aspect of the text has been largely missing in its scholarly reception. Such an absence is perhaps to be expected. Sexual assault is a notoriously under-reported offence, and its invisibility tends to extend into the realm of artistic representation and its scholarly treatment. During the last couple of decades, for instance, film scholars have addressed the need to re-read cinematic portrayals of rape in order to unearth it from ‘metaphor and euphemism, naturalized plot device and logical consequence…restoring rape to the literal, to the body: restoring that is, the violence – the physical, sexual violation’. This issue must be addressed here, but first a few words about the Cento and the most prominent trends in its reception.

Type
Research Article
Information
Greece & Rome , Volume 63 , Issue 2 , October 2016 , pp. 237 - 250
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

This research was supported by a fellowship from the Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities. Translations are my own unless otherwise indicated.

References

1 Higgins, L. A. and Silver, B. R., ‘Introduction: Rereading Rape’, in Higgins, L. A. and Silver, B. R. (eds.), Rape and Representation (New York, 1991), 4 Google Scholar; Russell, D., Rape in Art Cinema (New York, 2010), 3 Google Scholar.

2 ‘etenim fabula de nuptiis est et, velit nolit, aliter haec sacra non constant’. Translation from Evelyn-White, H. G., Ausonius, Vol. I (Cambridge, 1919), 392–3Google Scholar.

3 McGill, S., Virgil Recomposed. The Mythological and Secular Centos in Antiquity (New York, 2005), 92, 105–106CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 Reeve, M. D., ‘The Tilianus of Ausonius’, RhM 121 (1978), 350–66Google Scholar; Reeve, M. D., ‘Ausonius’, in Reynolds, L. D. (ed.), Texts and Transmission. A Survey of the Latin Classics (Oxford, 1983), 26–28 Google Scholar; Green, R. P. H., The Works of Ausonius (Oxford, 1991), xliGoogle Scholar.

5 Cullhed, S. Schottenius, Proba the Prophet. The Christian Virgilian Cento of Faltonia Betitia Proba (Leiden, 2015), 82–112 Google Scholar.

6 H. Cazes, Le livre et la lyre. Grandeur et décadences du centon virgilien au moyen âge et à la renaissance, PhD thesis, Paris (1998), 309–10.

7 Schottenius Cullhed (n. 5), 95, n. 73, 99–100.

8 Erasmus, Adagia 2.4.58, in Mynors, R. A. B. (ed.), Erasmus. Collected Works. Adages 2.1.1 to 2. 6. 100 (Toronto, 1991), 221–2Google Scholar. See also Schottenius Cullhed (n. 5), 96–8; G. Tucker, H., ‘Mantua's ‘Second Virgil: Du Bellay, Montaigne and the Curious Fortune of Lelio Capilupi's Centones ex Virgilio (Romae, 1555)’, in Tournoy, G. and Sacré, D. (eds.), Ut Granum Sinapis. Essays on Neo-Latin Literature in Honour of Jozef IJsewijn (Leuven, 1997), 272, n. 21Google Scholar.

9 Erasmus, ‘The Institution of Marriage’, transl. Michael Heath, in Rummel, E. (ed.), On Women (Toronto, 1996), 17, 19Google ScholarPubMed.

10 Giraldi, G. G., Historiae poetarum tam Graecorum quam Latinorum dialogi decem (Basel, 1545), 514 Google Scholar.

11 Scaliger, J. C., Poetice (Geneva, 1561)Google Scholar, i.43; Cazes (n. 6), 165.

12 Estienne, H., Parodiae morales H Stephani (Geneva, 1575), 60 Google Scholar.

13 Ibid., 61: ‘Quod dicit (tamquam veniam petens) pigere se Virgiliani carminis dignitatem tam ioculari materia dehonestasse, est certem (ut antea quoque docui) quod eum pigeat et pudeat etiam, sed eorum quae in Centone illo obscoena potius sunt quam iocularia.’

14 Pasquier, E., Les Recherches de la France (Paris, 1596), 656bGoogle Scholar.

15 Green (n. 4), xxxvii; Brancher, D., ‘Virgile en bas-de-chausse: Montaigne et la tradition de l'obscénité latine’, BiblH&R 70 (2008), 116 Google Scholar.

16 See Bureau, B., ‘Ausone’, in Furno, M. (ed.), La Collection Ad usum Delphini, ii (Grenoble, 2005), 505 Google Scholar.

17 M. Meibom, Virgilio-Centones auctorum notae optimae, antiquorum et recentium (Helmstadt, 1597), fol. 30v: ‘Quid enim à religione Christiana magis alienum, quam ea, quae natura arcana et tecta esse vult, ambitiosis verborum phaleris innoxiae iuventuti obijcere, eique ad peccandum occasionem praebere’.

18 Ibid.

19 On the impact of Ausonius’ preface, see Cazes (n. 6), 3–4, 24–5; Shorrock, R., The Myth of Paganism. Nonnus, Dionysus and the World of Late Antiquity (London, 2011), 6, 126Google Scholar.

20 The beginning of the imminutio on page 108 has been crossed out and the subsequent pages (109–10) are missing in Opuscula Varia (Lyon, 1540): <http://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb10995175_00109.html>, accessed 19 June 2015. Likewise, the imminutio on pages 107–10 are missing in Opuscula Varia (Lyon, 1549): <http://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb10170895_00108.html>, accessed 19 June 2015. Both editions are found in the Bayerische Staatsbibliotheek in Munich.

21 Souchay, J.-B., D. Magni Ausonii Burdigalensis Opera (Paris, 1730), 383, 12Google Scholar.

22 Souchay (n. 21), xxiv–xxvi; see also Bureau (n. 16), 504–5.

23 Jaubert, P., Oeuvres d'Ausone (Paris, 1769), iii.182–3Google Scholar.

24 Canal, P., Le opere di Decio Magno Ausonio volgarizzate da Pietro Canal (Venice, 1853), 440–4Google Scholar; Beltrani, P., Il Cento Nuptialis di Ausonio (Faenza, 1897), 7–14 Google Scholar.

25 Beltrani (n. 24), 14: Latin: ille autem: ‘Causas nequiquam nectis inanes’ / Praecipitatque moras omnis solvitque pudorem. Italian: Ma de'l vago garzon cui tutto accende / Amore ed ardon le amorose voglie, / la trepida preghiera in cor non scende / e il piú bel flor de la fanciulla coglie (emphasis added).

26 Dictionnaire de la conversation et de la lecture (1855), s.v. Ausone.

27 Cambridge, R. O., The Scribleriad (London, 1751), 15 Google Scholar; D'Israeli, I., Curiosities of Literature (New York, 1835 [1791–1807]), 79Google Scholar; N. N., The Ladie's Repository (1861), 563. See also Schottenius Cullhed (n. 5), 71.

28 Schenkl, C., D. Magni Ausonii Opuscula (Berlin, 1883), 140–6Google Scholar; Peiper, R., Decimi Magni Ausonii Burdigalensis Opuscula (Leipzig, 1886), 214–15Google Scholar.

29 Corpet, E. F., Œuvres complètes d'Ausone (Paris, 1842–3), ii.117–19Google Scholar.

30 N. N., ‘On the Writings of Ausonius’, Classical Journal 77 (1829), 111 Google Scholar.

31 Comparetti, D. P. A., Virgilio nel medio evo (Livorno, 1872), i.72Google Scholar.

32 de Gourmont, Remy, Le Latin mystique (Paris, 1892), 37 Google Scholar.

33 Rebenich, S., ‘Late Antiquity in Modern Eyes’, in Rousseau, P. (ed.), A Companion to Late Antiquity (Oxford, 2009), 81 Google Scholar. See also Formisano, M., ‘Reading Décadence: Reception and the Subaltern Late Antiquity’, in Formisano, M. and Fuhrer, T. (eds.), Décadence. ‘Decline and Fall’ or ‘Other Antiquity’? (Heidelberg, 2014), 11–12 Google Scholar; J. Uden, ‘Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Visions of Late Antique Literature’, forthcoming in S. McGill and E. Watts, Blackwell Companion to Late Antique Literature.

34 Glover, T. R., Life and Letters in the Fourth Century (Cambridge, 1901), 115 Google Scholar.

35 H. G. Evelyn-White (n.2), xvii.

36 Slavitt, D. R., Ausonius. Three Amusements (Philadelphia, 1998), 69–73 Google Scholar; Murray, A. M., From Roman to Merovingian Gaul. A Reader (Peterborough, Ontario, 1999), 53–4Google Scholar; Evelyn-White, H. G., Ausonius (Cambridge, MA, 2002)Google Scholar; S. Ehrling, ‘De Inconexis Continuum. A Study of the Late Antique Latin Wedding Centos’, PhD thesis, University of Gothenburg (2011), 128–33.

37 See Pollmann, K., ‘Sex and Salvation in the Vergilian Cento of the Fourth Century’, in Rees, R. (ed.), Romane Memento. Vergil in the Fourth Century (London, 2004), 79–96 Google Scholar; Formisano, M. and Sogno, C., ‘Petite poésie portable’, in Horster, M. and Reitz, C. (eds.), Condensing Texts–Condensed Texts (2010), 387–8Google Scholar.

38 See, for instance, Lamacchia, R., ‘Dall'arte allusive al centone’, A&R (1958), 208–9Google Scholar; Verweyen, T. and Witting, G., ‘The Cento’, in Plett, H. F. (ed.), Intertextuality (Berlin and New York, 1991), 169 Google Scholar; Ehrling (n. 36), 166, 179; Rondholz, A., The Versatile Needle. Hosidius Geta's Cento ‘Medea’ and Its Tradition (Berlin, 2012), 22 Google Scholar.

39 Schmidt, P. L., Herzog, R., and Divjak, J. (eds.), Handbuch der lateinischen Literatur der Antike (Munich, 1989), 296 Google Scholar. See also Consolino, F. E., ‘Da Osidio Geta ad Ausonio e Proba: le molte possibilità del centone’, A&R 28 (1983), 146–7Google Scholar.

40 Polara, G., ‘I centoni’, in Cavallo, G. (ed.), Lo spazio letterario di Roma antica (Rome, 1990), iii.268–9Google Scholar. See also Consolino (n. 39), 146–7; Gioseffi, M., ‘Due note su Ausonio (Auson. Ecl. 4, p. 99 Prete; Cent. vv 103–31)’, Maia 46 (1994), 331 Google Scholar.

41 Lamacchia (n. 38), 208–9: Herzog, R., Die Bibelepik der lateinischen Spätantike. Formgeschichte einer erbaulichen Gattung (Munich, 1975), 12, 21–6Google Scholar; Polara (n. 40 [1990]), iii.268–9; Schnapp, J., ‘Reading Lessons: Augustine, Proba, and the Christian Détournement of Antiquity’, Stanford Literary Review 9 (1992), 112–15Google Scholar. See also discussion on ‘typology’ in Proba's cento in Schottenius Cullhed (n. 5), esp. 15–16.

42 Horstmann, S., ‘Spätantike Hochzeitscentones’, in Das Epithalamium in der lateinischen Literatur der Spätantike (Munich, 2004), 299 Google Scholar. In contrast to Adams, J. N., ‘Ausonius Cento Nuptialis 101–31’, SIFC 53 (1981), 199–202 Google Scholar; Consolino (n. 39), 147. See also, for instance, Yeager, R. F., John Gower's Poetic. The Search for a New Arion (Woodbridge, 1990), 60 Google Scholar; Mansfeld, J., Heresiography in Context. Hippolytus’ Elenchos as a Source for Greek Philosophy (Leiden, 1992), 154 Google Scholar: ‘For the connoisseur it is fun to read Ausonius’ Cento nuptialis, especially the pornographic section’; Burnier, A., ‘Démonter Virgile et bâtir un classique: le Centon nuptial d'Ausone comme jeu de re-construction’, Ítaca. Quaderns Catalans de Cultura Clàssica 21 (2005), 87–8Google Scholar.

43 Caldwell, L., Roman Girlhood and the Fashioning of Femininity (Cambridge, 2014), 161–4Google Scholar.

44 Hersch, K. K., The Roman Wedding. Ritual and Meaning in Antiquity (Cambridge, 2010), 61–2Google Scholar. See also Pierce, K. F., ‘The Portrayal of Rape in New Comedy’, in Deacy, S. and Pierce, K. F. (eds.), Rape in Antiquity. Sexual Violence in the Greek and Roman Worlds (London, 2002), 163–84Google Scholar.

45 For an exception see Caldwell (n. 43), 161–4.

46 See, for instance, Montalant-Bougleux, L. A., Études sur les poètes dans leur relations avec les cours (Versailles, 1854), 184 Google Scholar; Ermini, F., Il centone di Proba e la poesia centonaria latina. Studi (Rome, 1909), 51 Google Scholar; Byrne, M. J., Prolegomena to an Edition of the Works of Decimus Magnus Ausonius (New York, 1916), 61–2Google Scholar; Rose, H. J., A Handbook of Latin Literature (London, 1936), 529 Google Scholar; von Albrecht, M., A History of Roman Literature (Leiden, 1997), ii.1327Google Scholar. See also discussion in Malamud, M., A Poetics of Transformation. Prudentius and Classical Mythology (Ithaca, NY, 1989), 37 Google Scholar.

47 Nugent, S. G., ‘Ausonius’ Late-Antique Poetics and “Post-Modern” Literary Theory’, Ramus 19 (1990), 37–41 Google Scholar; Polara (n. 40), 270–1 (cf. L. Mondin, ‘Dieci anni di critica Ausoniana [1984–1993]’, BStudLat 24 [1994], 242); Burnier (n. 42), 87–90; Moretti, P. F., ‘Proba e il Cento nuptialis di Ausonio’, in Moretti, P. F., Torre, C., and Zanetto, G. (eds.), Debita Dona. Studi in onore di Isabella Gualandri (Naples, 2008), 334–9, 346Google Scholar; Williams, M. S., ‘Sine numine nomina: Ausonius and the Oulipo’, in Kelly, C., Flower, R., and Williams, M. S. (eds.), Unclassical Traditions (Cambridge, 2010), i.96–105Google Scholar; S. Hinds, ‘The Self-conscious Cento’, in Formisano and Fuhrer (n. 33), 193–5.

48 See Pollmann (n. 37), 91. See also Schottenius Cullhed (n. 5), 15.

49 Herzog, (n. 41) 12, 21–6. See also Schottenius Cullhed (n. 5), 17.

50 101: Aen. 11. 631; 103: Aen. 10.892,  Aen. 9.398; 104: Aen. 10.699, Aen. 12.748; 107: Aen. 12.312; 109: Aen. 10. 788; 110: Aen. 11.524; 115: Aen. 11.530; 116–17: Aen. 9.743–4; 118: Aen. 11.804; 120: Aen. 11.816; 121: Aen. 11.817; 123: Aen. 10.770; 127: 12.276; 131: Aen. 11.818.

51 See Tucker, G. H., ‘Le Gallus de Lelio Capilupi’, in Sacré, D. and Papy, J. (eds.), Syntagmatia. Essays on Neo-Latin Literature in Honour of Monique Mund-Dopchie and Gilbert Tournoy (Leuven, 2009), 332, 341–2Google Scholar; Cueto, A. S., ‘Las lágrimas de la nova nupta’, Minerva 24 (2011), 141 Google Scholar; Caldwell (n. 43), 162; Hardie, P., The Last Trojan Hero. A Cultural History of Virgil's Aeneid (New York, 2014), 177–8Google Scholar.

52 118: Aen. 11.804; 120: Aen. 11.816; 121: Aen. 11.817; 131: Aen. 11.818.

53 Fowler, D., ‘Vergil on Killing Virgins’, in Whitby, M., Hardie, P., and Whitby, M. (eds.), Homo Viator. Classical Essays for John Bramble (Bristol, 1987), 196 Google Scholar.

54 Grig, L., ‘The Paradoxical Body of Saint Agnes’, in Hopkins, A. and Wyke, M. (eds.), Roman Bodies. Antiquity to the Eighteenth Century (London, 2005), 116 Google Scholar; Uden, J., ‘The Elegiac Puella as Virgin Martyr’, TAPhA 139 (2009), 212 Google Scholar. See also Adams, J. N., The Latin Sexual Vocabulary (Baltimore, MD, 1982), 19–22 Google Scholar; Caldwell (n. 43), 161–2.

55 See Hinds (n. 47), 194.

56 B. Moroni, ‘L'Imperatore e il Letterato nel “Cento Nuptialis” di Ausonio’, Acme 54 (2006), 84–5, notes that the wedding night is a prerequisite for the survival of the dynasty.

57 McGill (n. 3), 92; Hinds (n. 47), 194–5.

58 J. A. Arieti, ‘Rape and Livy's View of Roman History’, in Deacy and Pierce (n. 44), 209–18.

59 Ibid., 220.

60 Ibid., 225–6.

61 Ibid., 226.