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Ille Ego Qui Quondam

R. G. Austin

The Classical Quarterly / Volume 18 / Issue 01 / May 1968, pp 107 - 115

DOI: 10.1017/S0009838800029153, Published online: 11 February 2009

Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0009838800029153

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R. G. Austin (1968). Ille Ego Qui Quondam. The Classical Quarterly, 18, pp
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 ILLE EGO QJUI QUONDAM.. .
Ille ego qui quondam gracili modulatus auena
carmen, et egressus siluis uicina coegi
ut quamuis auido parerent arua colono,
gratum opus agricolis, at nunc horrentia Martis
arma uirumque cano . . .

O F these lines Markland wrote in 1728 (on Statius, S. 5. 3. 8) 'patet ignari

cuiusdam et barbari interpolatoris esse'; Dr. Trapp in 1735 found them 'in
themselves flat, and improper, and altogether unworthy of Virgil'; 'in his ipsis
miror qui factum sit ut Viri Doctissimi non agnouerint orationis uim et
elegantiam' (Wagner, 1832); 'finding in them . . . all Virgil's usual ease and
suavity . . . [we] hail those verses with joy, and reinstate them in their right-
f u l . . . position as the commencing verses of the great Roman epic' (Henry,
1873); 'uersus praeclarissimos iniuria poeta abiudicauerunt editores plerique'
(Hirtzel, OGT, 1901); 'die interpolate Ausgabe, die mit den abscheulichen
Versen ille ego qui quondam begann' (Leo, Plautinische Forsckungen2 42 (1912));
'ich brauche die lappischen vier Verse nicht hinzuschreiben' (Norden, Sitzb.
d. PreuB. Akad. d. Wiss., Phil.-Hist. Kl., 1934, 628 ( = Kleine Schriften, 470)):
thus, in sample form, the Streitfrage produced by these lines.1 The purpose of
this paper is to assemble the familiar data for reference, and to suggest that
Virgil did not write the verses.

I. T H E A N C I E N T EVIDENCE
(a) The lines are not in the early manuscripts: the earliest witness is Codex
Bemensis IJ2 (ninth-tenth century), where they are marginally inserted by
a later hand.
(b) Donatus (Suetonius), vita 42 : 'Nisus grammaticus audisse se a senioribus
aiebat, Varium duorum librorum ordinem commutasse . . . , etiam primi libri
correxisse principium, his uersibus demptis' (the lines follow). Nisus was a
first-century scholar of some standing (Schanz-Hosius, Gesch. d. rb'm. Lit. ii4.
731), referred to by Gharisius, Priscian, and Velius Longus (himself the author
of a commentary on Virgil); Macrobius names him as a commentator on the
fasti1 (Sat. 1. 12. 30). His precise date is not known; we may assign his floruit
to mid-century; seniores is an elastic term, but it could apply, presumably, to
men born about the turn of the century.
(c) Servius (praef. p. 2, ed. Harv.) states: 'Augustus uero, ne tantum opus
periret, Tuccam et Varium hac lege iussit emendare, ut superflua demerent,
nihil adderent t a m e n ; unde et semiplenos eius inuenimus uersiculos, u t hie
cursusfuit, et aliquos detractos, ut in principionam a b armis non coepit, sed
sic: ille ego qui quondam [etc.]'. As a second example of deletion Servius mentions
the 'Helen-episode' (2. 567-88). At the end of his praefatio he says 'sciendum
praeterea est quod, sicut n u n c dicturi thema proponimus, ita ueteres incipie-
bant carmen a titulo carminis sui, ut puta Arma uirumque cano, Lucanus Bella
1 2
Authenticity is now supported by G. E. Not on the Fasti of Ovid, as is some-
Duckworth, Structural Patterns and Proportions times stated (e.g. Rostagni, Riv. di Fil. lxvii
in Vergil's Aeneid ( A n n A r b o r , 1962), p . 8 4 . [1939], i ) -
 108 R. G. A U S T I N

per Emathios, Statius Fraternas acies altemaque regna prof ants'. This is followed by
a comment on i. i 'multi uarie disserunt cur ab armis Vergilius coeperit;
omnes tamen inania sentire manifestum est, cum eum constet aliunde sumpsisse
principium'. Servius was evidently not entirely clear in his own mind. Macro-
bius says unequivocally (Sat. 5. 2. 8) 'cum primo uersu promisisset producturum
se de Troiae litoribus Aenean, "Troiae qui primus ab oris"'.
(d) Priscian quotes ille ego . . . carmen several times (Keil, GL ii. 583. 16,
iii. 143. 21, 180. 2, 191. 22, 201. 16, 206. 22, 211. 12).
() The canonical opening of the Aeneid was plainly arma uirumque cano. This
is clear from the evidence of the capital manuscripts, and from literary sources.1
The earliest allusion is indirect, but plain: Propertius 2. 34. 63 f. 'qui nunc
Aeneae Troiani suscitat arma / factaque Lauinis moenia litoribus'.2 Ovid is
explicit (Tr. 2. 533 f. 'ille tuae felix Aeneidos auctor / contulit in Tyrios arma
uirumque toros'); so too Persius (1. 96 'arma uirum: nonne hoc spumosum?')
and Martial (8. 56. 19 'protinus Italiam concepit et arma uirumque', 14. 185
'accipe facundi Culicem, studiose, Maronis / ne nucibus positis arma uirumque
legas'). Seneca, concocting a Stoic syllogism, suggests (Epp. 113. 25) 'prudens
uersus bonum est, bonum autem omne animal est; uersus ergo animal est. ita
arma uirumque cano animal est, quod non possunt rotundum dicere cum sex
pedes habeat'.

I I . T H E A P P R O P R I A T E N E S S OF T H E L I N E S IN AN E P I C P R O O E M I U M
The purpose of these lines is commonly explained by their defenders as being
an intentional link between the Aeneid and the Georgics, following on G. 4.
559-66.3 Now those concluding lines of the Georgics form a ac/>payis, of estab-
lished Hellenistic type, such as appears at the end of Nicander's Theriaca and
Alexipharmaca, where the poet names himself as author. 4 The proposed explana-
tion of the ille ego lines implies that they too act as a a<f>payis, the poet's actual
name being now omitted. One might compare Ovid, Ars 2. 741 f, where the
'seal' runs
arma dedi uobis; dederat Vulcanus Achilli:
uincite muneribus, uicit ut ille, datis.
sed, quicumque meo superarit Amazona ferro,
inscribat spoliis NASO MAGISTER ERAT ;5
this is picked up in Ars 3. 1-2,
arma dedi Danais in Amazonas; arma supersunt,
quae tibi dem et turmae, Penthesilea, tuae.
1 3
The words occur among the Pompeian So N. W. DeVVitt, CP xvi (1921), 344;
graffiti: see R. P. Hoogma, Dei Einflufi Ver- the argument there made, that Virgil meant
gils auf die Carmina Latina Epigraphica (Am- the lines to 'guarantee for all time the unity
sterdam, 1959), pp. 222 f. of authorship', is absurd. Virgil needed no
2
For a wild idea that Propertius' nunc such 'guarantee'; if nothing else showed
here echoes at nunc in these lines (with other this, it is shown by Propertius' reference to
'echoes' also) see T. Fitz-Hugh, TAPA the imminent Aeneid (2. 34. 65-66).
xxxiv (1903), xxxii; Rostagni agreed (Riv. di * See Fraenkel, Kleine Beitrdge, ii. 2i4f.,
Fil. lxvii [1939], 6ff.). The theory is de- and Horace, p. 362; Leo, Kleine Schriften, ii.
servedly attacked by E. Brandt, Philologus 170; Funaioli, Studi di letteratura antica, ii.
lxxxiii (1928), 330, and by G. Funaioli, 1. 145.
AteneeRoma, N.S. viii (1940), 97 ff.(= Studi di s Cf. Ars 3. 812, Am. 2. I. 1-2.
letteratura antica (Bologna, 1958),ii. 1. 149ff.).
 ILLE EGO QUI QJJONDAM... 109

From the a<f>payis proper it was an easy step to such extensions of the device
as may be seen in Horace, Epp. 1. 20. 20 ff., Propertius 1. 22, Ovid, Arrwres
3.15, where the poet ends his work with a passage of autobiographical content;'
Ovid, Tristia 4. 1 o shows an even longer development of the idea. It will be
seen, therefore, that the o<f>payls and its extensions belong to didactic and
personal poetry.
A defence of the Me ego lines based on the 'link' theory must fail, because it
ignores the distinction between poetic genres. The didactic poet is himself the
teacher, he speaks in his own right; but the epic poet is the mouth-piece of the
Muses, an instrument of a god, and his own personality is something quite
apart. 2 When Ovid writes (Am. 2. 1. 1-2)
hoc quoque composui Paelignis natus aquosis
ille ego nequitiae Naso poeta meae,
that is appropriate to the genre; for Virgil to begin an epic with ille ego qui
quondam gracili modulatus auena would go against all ancient literary convention.
Even in the few passages in the Aeneid where Virgil alludes to himself he is
following a formal epic manner, not telling the reader something about himself:
so 1. 8, 6. 266, 7. 44, 9. 528; in 9. 446, 10. 793 the self-allusion is no more than
superficial, being simply an assertion of the power of epic to make the brave
immortal. A personal allusion such as the ille ego lines postulate is something
quite out of place in epic, and glaringly so as a prooemium. It is sometimes
argued that both Milton (in Paradise Regained) and Spenser (in the Faerie
Queene) imitate the ille ego opening; but this proves no more than that they
knew the lines in current texts ;3 they were not Roman poets. Neither Lucan
nor Valerius Flaccus nor Statius nor Silius begins with a personal advertise-
ment ; nor did Ennius introduce his dream in his very first line.
The primary pattern for epic prooemia was set by Homer, in the openings
of the Iliad and the Odyssey, with their invocations to the goddess-muse. But
there was also the 'cyclic' type of opening such as that of the Ilias Parua,
"IXiov aelSa) Kal Aaphavlrjv ivnuiXov (Kinkel, EGF 39), in the vein of which
Horace (AP 137) quotes the anonymous 'Fortunam Priami cantabo et nobile
bellum'. Apollonius makes a fusion of the two in the opening of the Argonautica,
I . I f. apx6[A,evos aeo, 0oij3e, TraXaiyeveaiV KXSCL <f>iDrcbv j jxvrjaofi<u; a t 3 . I h e h a s
t h e H o m e r i c t y p e , ci 8' dye vvv, 'Epard), Trapd 6' ZCTTCKJO, Kal /not evicme. I t is
relevant to glance at certain other points in the Aeneid where Virgil, for special
reasons, breaks off his narrative to make an invocation for further poetic power
to be granted him. In 7. 641 (before the Catalogue, as in II. 2. 484 ff.) he ad-
dresses the Muses, 'pandite nunc Helicona, deae cantusque mouete' (cf.
6. 266 f. 'sit numine uestro / pandere res alta terra et caligine mersas', where
he addresses the chthonic deities). In 9. 525 (before the description of Turnus'
deeds in battle) he prays 'Vos, o Calliope, precor, aspirate canenti'. In 10. 163
he repeats the words of 7. 641, before listing the names of Aeneas' companions.
In these passages, all at crucial points in the poem, Virgil employs the Homeric
method. But in 7. 37 ff. there is something different: here, in the exordium
to the second half of his epic, Virgil first addresses the Muse as elsewhere, in
1
Cf. Fraenkel, Horace, p . 36a. Callimachus, h. 3. 186.
3
* See Kroll, Studien zum Verstandnis der Thus the lines appear in the sixteenth-
romischen Literatur, p . 2 7 ; Norden on Am. 6. century translations made by Gavin Douglas,
264 ff.; //. 2. 485 f., Apoll. Rhod. 4. 1381, Phaer, and Stanyhurst.
no R. G. AUSTIN
a line that plainly recalls Apollonius 3. 1, and then continues in the 'cyclic'
tradition, 'expediam, et primae reuocabo exordia pugnae'. The two traditions
are quietly blended.1 Now, if such are Virgil's ways at the various crises of the
poem, and if at the pivotal point of the poem (7. 37 ff.) he chooses the particular
form of exordium that he does, it is inconceivable that the exordium of the
epic as a whole should follow any other pattern. Arma uirumque cano repeats
the 'cyclic' type, then, after a noble period (see below), the Homeric invocation
begins at Musa mihi causas memora: it is the pattern of 7. 37 ff. in reverse. The
ille ego lines, once they are seen in a context which is ritual both from a religious
and from a Literary point of view, have absolutely no place here: they are
a vulgar intrusion.

III. T H E S T Y L E OF T H E L I N E S
At first sight, the lines do not look un-Virgilian. With modulates auena cf.
E. 5. 51 'carmina pastoris Siculi modulabor auena'; with egressus siluis (i.e.
'passing from the subject of the Eclogues') cf. E. 4. 3 'si canimus siluas, siluae sint
consule dignae'; with auido colono cf. G. 1. 47 f. 'ilia seges demum uotis respondet
auari / agricolae'. The enjambment auena j carmen is in Virgil's manner; and
the sweep of the unit to a resting-place in mid-line at cano shows a Virgilian
technique. Yet there is nothing that could not have been produced by an
imitator familiar with Virgil's language and method: there is none of the
Virgilian originality and power of phrasing that mark the 'Helen-episode'.2
But closer consideration of details brings out a different and far less accept-
able picture.
(a) ille ego qui . . . at nunc
The natural sense of ille ego qui . . . cano would be 'I, the one-time pastoral
poet, am now writing an epic'. Such a way of drawing a contrast between past
and present is frequently found, but no adversative particle introduces the new
situation: e.g. Ovid, 7V. 5. 7. 55 f. 'ille ego Romanus uates. . . / Sarmatico
cogor plurima more loqui', Met. 1. 757 f. 'ille ego liber, / ille ferox tacui';
Statius, S. 5. 5. 38 fF. 'ille ego, qui (quotiens!) blande matrumque patrumque /
uulnera, qui uiduos potui mulcere dolores / . . . / deficio', Th. 9. 434 fF. 'ille
ego clamatus sacris ululatibus amnis, / qui mollis thyrsos Baccheaque cornua
puro / fonte lauare feror . . . / in freta quaero uias'; Silius 11. 177 ff. 'ille ego
sanguis / Dardanius, cui sacra pater, cui nomina liquit / ab Ioue ducta Capys
. . . / ille ego semihomines inter Nasamonas et inter / saeuum atque aequantem
ritus Garamanta ferarum / Marmarico ponam tentoria mixtus alumno?'. It
will be noticed, incidentally, that all these examples represent the new situation
as a fall from grace: not a recommendation for such a contrasting method
here (Ovid, Am. 2. 1. 1-2, quoted previously, is a different turn). None of them
supports the intrusion of at in this passage. Henry (p. 112) brushes aside the
difficulty as 'anacoluthon', a remarkable thing to occur only four lines from the
start of an epic. Conway explains it as 'the archaic use of at in apodosi',
quoting in support 1. 543 'at sperate deos': this would make it a solitary
example of such a use with no preceding si or concessive particle (in Lucr. 2.
532, Prop. 3. 2. 11 quod precedes, with concessive force), apart altogether
1
See Fraenkel, Kleine Beitrdge, ii. 148 f. Angang sind sie nicht' (Plautinische For-
2
I cannot agree with Leo, who observes schungen2, p. 42).
of the 'Helen' lines 'besser als der unechte
 ILLE EGO QJJI QUONDAM.. . m
from the contortions involved by the interpretation of Me ego qui, etc., on such
lines.
We are forced, therefore, to supply sum with Me ego. It is denied by S. G.
Owen (on Ovid, Tr. 2. 533) that this ellipse occurs where the sense is 'I am
the man', but this is disproved by Stat. Th. 5. 34 ff. 'ilia ego nam, pudeat ne
forte benignae / hospitis, ilia, duces, raptum quae sola parentem / occului'.
Thus the Aeneid is made to open with a passage in which Virgil himself gets the
spotlight, with the theme of the epic in the wings.

(b) modulatus . . . et coegi

With modulatus, another sum must be supplied, increasing the discomfort of
Me ego (sum):. Virgil often has such an ellipse with a deponent participle, even
in the first person as here: cf. 2. 25 'nos abiisse rati et uento petiisse Mycenas',
2. 792 'ter conatus ibi collo dare bracchia circum'. The co-ordination of
modulatus (sum} with coegi may be illustrated from Plautus, Most. 84 'recordatus
multum et diu cogitaui', where the finite nature of recordatus is shown by the
parallel line 87 'earn rem uolutaui et diu disputaui'. There are Virgilian
examples, both with deponent and passive participles (cf. Leo, SenecaeTragoediae,
i. 186 n. 3, 188 n. 9): 4. 704 f. 'omnis et una / dilapsus calor atque in uentos
uita recessit', 6. 226 'postquam conlapsi cineres et flamma quieuit'; with
a passive, 2. 545 f. 'quod protinus aere repulsum, / et summo clipei nequiquam
umbone pependit', 4. 280 'arrectaeque horrore comae et uox faucibus haesit',
6. 686 'effusaeque genis lacrimae et uox excidit ore'. In these passages there
is a clear correlation between the two co-ordinated statements, and the result
is a sense-unit. In modulatus . .. et coegi the correlation becomes clear only when
the way to take coegi is realized (see below); and there is no underlying unity of
sense because modulatus and coegi refer to two unrelated actions and to two
different occasions (the writing of the Eclogues and the later composition of the
Georgics). The co-ordination is harsh, to say the least: and the discomfort is
increased by the appearance of egressus (participle) between modulatus (finite)
and coegi.

(c) coegi
Virgil has no example of cogere with ut, as has often been noted. It occurs
in Ennius (Ann. 171), Lucretius (1. 976, 5. 484, 6. 127), Horace (Epp. 1. 9. 2,
combined with rogare). But it is essentially a prose-usage, and it is surprising
here.
Coegi is, presumably, an example of the figure by which a singer or poet
is described as doing the action about which he sings or writes: 1 so Silenus in
E. 6. 46 'Pasiphaen niuei solatur amore iuuenci' (again in 62, 63, circumdat,
erigit); Horace, Sat. 1.10. 36 'turgidus Alpinus iugulat dum Memnona', AP 221
'mox etiam agrestis Satyros nudauit'; Martial 4.14.1 ff. 'Sili, Gastalidum decus
sororum, / qui periuria barbari furoris / ingenti premis ore perfidosque / astus
Hannibalis leuesque Poenos / magnis cedere cogis Africanis'; Culex 26 ff. 'canit
non pagina bellum / . . . (29) nee Centaureos Lapithas compellit in enses'.
In these examples2 (the two last are noteworthy) the figure is used by the
1
Cf. J. S. Phillimore, Me ego: Virgil and 4. 2. 2; Claudian, iv Cons. Hon. 38, Cons. Stil.
Professor Richmond (Oxford, 1920), p. 16: an 1. 105, in Eutrop. 1. 294; Prudentius, Symm.
entertaining but wickedly biased polemic. 2. 52, 55 (see Gronovius, In P. Papinii Statii
1
For other examples cf. Stat. S. 2. 7. 57, Siloarum Libros VDiatribe [1637], pp. 1 ig ff.).
iia R. G. AUSTIN
writers to predicate an action 'done' by someone else. But in coegi it is the
writer's own action that is predicated ('in my Georgics I made the fields
obedient'); by using the figure in the first person, the writer draws attention to
his own virtuosity, with incongruous and jarring effect.1
(</) gracili. . . auena
Virgil has gracilis only in E. 10. 71 'gracili fiscellam texit hibisco'. Its only
occurrences in epic are Lucan 1. 101 (of the Isthmus of Corinth), 5. 546 (of the
moon's crescent), Val. Flacc. 1. 123 (of a saw's blade); Ovid uses it in the
Metamorphoses of goats, chains, threads, and the stem of a tree; Statius has it
(S. 3. 2. 80) of a ship. The only parallels for this passage are Manilius iv. 153 f.
'per uarios cantus modulataque uocibus ora / et gracilis calamos et neruis insita
uerba', and Nemesianus, Ed. 1. 3 f. 'gracili sub harundine carmen / composi-
tum', together with Ciris 20 'gracilem molli liceat pede claudere uersum' and
Culex 1 'lusimus, Octaui, gracili modulante Thalia'. Naturally, gracili auena
could be regarded as a deliberate variation on E. 1.2 'siluestrem tenui musam
meditaris auena': but, apart from stylistic considerations, the change is just
what one would not expect; in G. 4. 566 it is the repetition of patulae from
E. 1. 1 that gives the full allusiveness to the evocative line.

(e) gratum opus agricolis

If this is in apposition to parerent arua colono, it is very awkwardly brought in,
since opus ought to refer to what the colonus does (or can obedience be an
opus ?); and, in any case, gratum opus alone would have sufficed. If (as seems
more likely) it is in apposition to coegi ('a poem grateful to the greedy swain',
Dryden, in his Dedication), it is in the same tone of self-advertisement as Me ego
(sum), and as objectionable. The confusing ambiguity is at least enough to
suggest that the writer was himself confused.

IV. T H E E F F E C T OF T H E L I N E S ON T H E PERIOD-STRUCTURE
The structure of the seven-line period arma uirumque cano . . . altae moenia
Romae is splendidly conceived for its purpose: a straightforward opening
statement extending to just over two lines, then a central narratio in just over
three lines, inserted with consummate skill as a parenthesis, then a retrospective
conclusion occupying just under a line and a half. It is built up carefully from
the naming of Troy in the first line to that of Rome in the last. Consider now the
opening of the Iliad.2 Here too is a seven-line period, starting with two lines
setting out the subject, then three lines of expository detail, finally a retrospec-
tive conclusion in two lines. Achilles is named in the first line, Agamemnon
1
It could reasonably be argued further G. W. Williamsmore suo, he has helped
that the idea of 'forcing' obedience is out of me a great deal with this paperand also to
keeping with Virgil's feeling for the soil. Suetonius, vit. HOT. (p. 2. 21ff.,Klingner)
However, cogere sometimes has a weakened 'ut non modo saeculare carmen conponen-
sense ('prevail upon', or the like, as in Hor. dum iniunxerit, sed et Vindelicam uic-
Epp. 1. 9. 2 'rogat et prece cogit'; cf. Roth- toriam . . . priuignorum suorum, eumque
stein on Prop. 1. 4. 2). Nor need it imply coegerit propter hoc tribus carminum libris
even an unwilling object: cf. Vitruvius 7, . . 2. quartum addere.'
praef. 13 'quorum artis eminens excellentia See the valuable discussion by H. Fuchs,
coegit ad septem spectaculorum eius operis Museum Helveticum iv (1947), 191, n. 114;
peruenire famam', quoted by Shackleton and cf. V. Buchheit, Vergil iiber die Sendung
Bailey in his defence of cogis at Prop. 2. 1.5. Roms, 13 ff. [Gymnasium Beihefte 3, 1963).
My attention was drawn to this by Professor
 ILLE EGO QJUI QUONDAM. .. 113
and Achilles are named in the last. The inference from the comparison is
obvious. Assume now that the four ille ego lines are prefixed to arma uirumque
cano: not only is Virgil's acknowledgement to Homer blurred, but the entire
period is ruined, and we are no longer conscious of the magnificent antithesis
of Troy and Rome. The shapely, balanced, comprehensible rhythm has be-
come top-heavy, ungainly, a burden to ear and breath alike.1 Quintilian,
discussing the proper way to read the opening lines of the Aeneid (11. 3. 36),
knew a fine period when he saw one : he does not begin with ille ego qui quondam.
Some defenders of the alleged opening have argued that without horrentia2- as
an epithet for arma there is lack of balance against uirum with its relative clause
attached: they, and others who uphold the ille ego lines, would have done
well to remember the precept of Probus, aurem tuam interroga (Aul. Gell. 13.
21. 1). The effect of adding these lines is disastrous.

V. CONCLUSIONS
The authenticity of the ille ego lines fails on every count. They have no
satisfactory manuscript authority; they offend in an epic prooemium; their
style and expression bristle with difficulties; they destroy the structure of
a splendid period. If this is accepted, it is obvious that they cannot have ap-
peared in the text that Varius3 edited with such scrupulous care. What then
of the statements of Donatus (Suetonius) and Servius ?
Donatus states (41) that Varius published Virgil's scripta (i.e. what had
hitherto not been published)4 'summatim emendata'; he adds, to illustrate
the respect with which Varius carried out his work, that the incomplete lines
were left untouched. Emendatio in such a context means something roughly
analogous to proof-correctingseeing that no mistakes in copying have crept
in, that the text is a true one: not 'emendation' in the modern sense.5 Donatus
continues with the story that Nisus used to tell (aiebai): 'audisse se a senioribus,
Varium duorum librorum ordinem commutasse, . . . etiam primi libri cor-
rexisse principium, his uersibus demptis'. This is plainly anecdotic; obviously
such a remarkable tale is quite incompatible with Donatus' words 'summatim
emendata'. It was not Varius' business to rearrange the order of the books,6
nor to delete anything on purely subjective grounds (nor to add 'improvements'
either; hence the allusion to the incomplete lines 'quos multi mox supplere
conati non perinde ualuerunt'). The gossip attributed to Nisus is worthless as
evidence of what Varius did.
Servius does not name Nisus, but his statement is plainly based on Donatus;
1
Cf. Norden, Aeneis VI, Anh. ii ('Perio- joint editor with Varius; but see Leo,
dik'), p. 376: 'Vergil hat die Gesetze der PlautinisckeForschungen2, p.41,Norden,Hermes
kunstmaBigen Prosa auf die Poesie iiber- xxviii (1893), 501.
4
tragen und fur sie verbindlich gemacht: Cf. Sparrow, Half-lines and Repetition in
begreiflich genug, denn diese Art von Poesie Virgil (Oxford, 1931), p. 13-
5
war ja, wie rhetorische Prosa, zum lauten See Leo, loc. cit. 40 f.: Donatus (35)
Lesen und Horen bestimmt'; see also p. 379, shows that emendare was equivalent to sum-
n. 1. mam manum imponere, a very different matter
2
D. van Berchem (RL. XX [1942], 73 ff.) for a conscientious editor from what it was
propounded, apparently seriously, the view for the author himself; Servius says of the
that the lines are a riposte by Virgil to Georgics 'scripsit emendauitque', of the
Horace, Sat. 2. 1. 13 ff. 'neque enim quiuis Aeneid 'nee emendauit nee edidit'.
6
horrentia pilis / agmina . . . describat', to- Nisus' story of this has caused endless
gether with other absurdities. confusion, which fortunately does not con-
3
The Servian tradition made Tucca cern me here.
4599.1 I
H4 R. G. AUSTIN
he is in any case confused and inconsistent (see above, I). His words 'ut super-
flua demerent, nihil adderent tamen' amount to no more than his own gloss
on the meaning of emendare in the context of editorial responsibility. The story
of the ille ego lines accounts for the first phrase, the existence of the incomplete
lines explains the second. We are left with the Aeneid 'summatim emendata'
as the reliable picture.1 Here it would be disingenuous of me to ignore the fact
that Servius adds a statement that is independent of Donatus, that the 'Helen-
episode' (2. 567-88) was also excised by Virgil's editors (named by Servius on
2. 566, not here). I have defended that passage as authentic,2 an opinion which
I still hold. I regard it as a draft, or series of drafts, that never received the
Virgilian emendatio. My present study has led me to realize that no more
credence can be put in the statement that Varius 'removed' the passage than
can be given to the story of the ille ego lines. The 'Helen-episode', in its un-
finished state, cannot have been incorporated in the text that Varius received,
or he would have left it there, summatim emendatum. Servius has linked two quite
different matters: an anecdote about the 'removal' of some lines that Virgil
never wrote and so were never in the text to be 'removed', and an example of
conscientious editorial refusal to put into the text lines that Virgil had com-
posed but had not yet himself worked up for inclusion. Again we can see
Varius acting within his brief.
But the ille ego lines existed, on the authority of Nisus. It is impossible to
know who wrote them, or why they were written. A theory has been suggested
by E. Brandt,3 that they were meant as an inscription beneath a portrait of
Virgil, forming a frontispiece to a manuscript copy. He adduces Martial 14. 186
'quam breuis inmensum cepit membrana Maronem! / ipsius uultus prima
tabella gerit',4 and the prefatory poem to Martial's ninth book, written to
a friend who had a portrait of him:
Hoc tibi sub nostra breue carmen imagine uiuat,
quam non obscuris iungis, Auite, uiris:
ille ego sum nulli nugarum laude secundus,
quem non miraris sed, puto, lector, amas,
together with a number of inscriptions from the Carmina Epigraphica.s This has
its attractions: but it would be odd for such an inscription to end in mid-line.
I doubt whether such an explicit purpose lies behind the lines.
The words 'Nisus . . . audisse se a senioribus aiebat' have a marked re-
semblance to the comment of Servius on E. 4. 11, 'Asconius Pedianus a Gallo
se audisse refert hanc eclogam in honorem eius factam'; as Syme observes,6
there is no evidence that Asconius believed Gallus, nor do we believe him.
Nisus' reminiscence does not prove that he believed his seniores, only that it
was they who started the hare, and we cannot believe them. Both passages show
that in the first century 'Virgil problems' were always cropping up in literary
gossip. It is plain that quite soon after the publication of the Aeneid a fashion
1
Cf. Leo. loc. cit. 41. Servius'language is his critical notes, p. xxxii), and he does not
odd: 'semiplenos eius inuenimus uersiculos admit it to his text.
3
. . . et aliquos detractos': how could inuenire Philologus lxxxiii (1928), 331 ff.
apply to what is detractum ? * Cf. Friedlander, Sittengeschkhte Rorrufl,
2
C.Q.. N.S. xi (1961), 185 ff. I should iii. 55.
5
like to correct here an inaccuracy on p. 192 Cf. Hoogma, op. cit. 222.
6
n. 5, where I stated that Thilo reads ultoris Roman Revolution, p. 219.
Jama in ii. 587: this is a conjecture only (see
 ILLE EGO OJUI QUONDAM... 115
for producing Virgilian apocrypha began: witness the significant statement of
Donatus about the unfinished lines, 'multi max supplere conati' (already Seneca
could quote Aen. 10. 284 with the supplement 'piger ipse sibi opstat', Epp.
94. 28). It seems to me possible that the ille ego lines were a product of some
such Vergiliaster, in the first half of the first century (Nisus' seniores could point
to a period up to the death of Tiberius). If the question is asked, why should
such a forgery have been made and passed off as authentically Virgil's work,
I am inclined to think that there may be a clue in Servius' comment on 1. 1,
'multi uarie disserunt cur ab armis Vergilius coeperit'.1 It may seem strange
to us that such a question should ever have been asked (Servius gives some
indication of the 'problems'), but it was asked at least up to the nineteenth
century: James Henry found the beginning arma uirumque cano 'essentially and
in itself a bad beginning, bad as being brusque, abrupt, turgid'. When the
question was asked, the next step was dictated by the law of demand and
supply: someone produced a 'beginning' of the Aeneid that dovetailed into the
troublesome arma. And so the legend began. Fraenkel has shown this law at
work in connexion with the Culex.2 It may be significant that there is a certain
resemblance between ille ego qui quondam gracili modulatus auena and Culex 1
lusimus, Octaui, gracili modulante Thalia; as Fraenkel observes, 'unfortunately
we cannot say whether the first line of the Culex depends on the first line of the
faked proem to the Aeneid, or whether this proem draws on the Culex'; that
there is no ground for assigning the ille ego lines to a period much before the
time of Tiberius seems to me reasonably certain.

University of Liverpool R. G. AUSTIN

1 2
Cf. Marx, Lucilius i, proleg. p. li. Kleine Beitrage, ii. 192 ff.