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Pacuvius
Marcus Pacuvius (; 220 – c. 130 BC) was an ancient Roman tragic poet. He is regarded as the greatest of their tragedians prior to Lucius Accius. Biography He was the nephew and pupil of Ennius, by whom Roman tragedy was first raised to a position of influence and dignity. In the interval between the death of Ennius (169 BC) and the advent of Accius, the youngest and most productive of the tragic poets, Pacuvius alone maintained the continuity of the serious drama, and perpetuated the character first imparted to it by Ennius. Like Ennius he probably belonged to an Oscan stock, and was born at Brundisium, which had become a Roman colony in 244 BC. Hence he never attained to that perfect idiomatic purity of style, which was the special glory of the early writers of comedy, Naevius and Plautus. Pacuvius obtained distinction also as a painter; and Pliny the Elder (''Naturalis Historia'' xxxv) mentions a work of his in the Temple of Hercules in the Forum Boarium. He was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gaius Lucilius
Gaius Lucilius (180, 168 or 148 BC – 103 BC) was the earliest Roman satirist, of whose writings only fragments remain. A Roman citizen of the equestrian class, he was born at Suessa Aurunca in Campania, and was a member of the Scipionic Circle. Problem of his birthdate The dates assigned by Jerome for Lucilius' birth and death are 148 BC and 103 BC. But it is impossible to reconcile the first of these dates with other facts recorded of him, and the date given by Jerome must be due to an error, the true date being about 180 BC. His sister was Lucilia, being the mother of Roman Politician Sextus Pompeius and the paternal grandmother of Roman Triumvir Pompey. According to Velleius Paterculus, he served under Scipio Aemilianus at the siege of Numantia in 134 BC. Horace notes that he lived on the most intimate terms of friendship with Scipio and Laelius (Satire ii.1), and that he celebrated the exploits and virtues of the former in his satire ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gnaeus Naevius
Gnaeus Naevius (; c. 270 – c. 201 BC) was a Roman epic poet and dramatist of the Old Latin period. He had a notable literary career at Rome until his satiric comments delivered in comedy angered the Metellus family, one of whom was consul. After a sojourn in prison he recanted and was set free by the tribunes (who had the tribunician power, in essence the power of habeas corpus). After a second offense he was exiled to Tunisia, where he wrote his own epitaph and committed suicide. His comedies were in the genre of Palliata Comoedia, an adaptation of Greek New Comedy. A soldier in the Punic Wars, he was highly patriotic, inventing a new genre called '' Praetextae Fabulae'', an extension of tragedy to Roman national figures or incidents, named after the '' Toga praetexta'' worn by high officials. Of his writings there survive only fragments of several poems preserved in the citations of late ancient grammarians ( Charisius, Aelius Donatus, Sextus Pompeius Festus, Aulus Gel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brundisium
Brindisi ( , ) ; la, Brundisium; grc, Βρεντέσιον, translit=Brentésion; cms, Brunda), group=pron is a city in the region of Apulia in southern Italy, the capital of the province of Brindisi, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea. Historically, the city has played an important role in trade and culture, due to its strategic position on the Italian Peninsula and its natural port on the Adriatic Sea. The city remains a major port for trade with Greece and the Middle East. Its industries include agriculture, chemical works, and the generation of electricity. The city of Brindisi was the provisional government seat of the Kingdom of Italy from September 1943 to February 1944. Geography Brindisi is situated on a natural harbour, that penetrates deeply into the Adriatic coast of Apulia. Within the arms of the outer harbour islands are Pedagne, a tiny archipelago, currently not open and in use for military purposes (United Nations Group Schools used it during the interventio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lucian Müller
Lucian Müller (17 March 1836 – 24 April 1898) was a German classical scholar. Life Müller was born in Merseburg in the Province of Saxony. After studying at the universities of Berlin and Halle, he lived for five years in the Netherlands, working on his ''Geschichte der klassischen Philologie in den Niederlanden'' (1869). Unable to obtain a university appointment in Germany, he accepted (1870) the professorship of Latin at the Imperial Historico-Philological Institute in St Petersburg. He died in St Petersburg. Works Müller's works display great erudition and critical acumen, and also feature bitter attacks on eminent scholars whose opinions differ from his own. He was a disciple of the methods of Richard Bentley and Karl Lachmann. His ''De re metrica poetarum latinorum'' (1861; 2nd ed. 1894) represents a landmark in the investigation of the metrical system of the Roman poets (the dramatists excepted), and his ''Metrik der Griechen und Römer'' (2nd ed., 1885) is an excel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Praetexta
The ''praetexta'' or ''fabula praetexta'' was a genre of Latin tragedy introduced at Rome by Gnaeus Naevius in the third century BC. It dealt with historical Roman figures, in place of the conventional Greek myths. Subsequent writers of ''praetextae'' included Ennius, Pacuvius and Lucius Accius. The name refers to the ''toga praetexta'', purple striped, that was the official dress of Roman magistrates and priests. It was mainly a Roman garment. The ''toga praetexta'' was also worn by Roman freeborn girls before they came of age. All Roman Republican tragedies are now lost. From the Imperial era only one play has survived, the ''Octavia''. See also *''Fabula atellana'' *''Fabula crepidata'' *''Fabula palliata'' *''Fabula saltata'' *''Fabula togata'' *Theatre of ancient Rome The architectural form of theatre in Rome has been linked to later, more well-known examples from the 1st century BC to the 3rd Century AD. The theatre of ancient Rome referred to as a period of time in whic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Taranto
Taranto (, also ; ; nap, label= Tarantino, Tarde; Latin: Tarentum; Old Italian: ''Tarento''; Ancient Greek: Τάρᾱς) is a coastal city in Apulia, Southern Italy. It is the capital of the Province of Taranto, serving as an important commercial port as well as the main Italian naval base. Founded by Spartans in the 8th century BC during the period of Greek colonisation, Taranto was among the most important in Magna Graecia, becoming a cultural, economic and military power that gave birth to philosophers, strategists, writers and athletes such as Archytas, Aristoxenus, Livius Andronicus, Heracleides, Iccus, Cleinias, Leonidas, Lysis and Sosibius. By 500 BC, the city was among the largest in the world, with a population estimated up to 300,000 people. The seven-year rule of Archytas marked the apex of its development and recognition of its hegemony over other Greek colonies of southern Italy. During the Norman period, it became the capital of the Principality of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roman Tragedy
Tragedy (from the grc-gre, τραγῳδία, ''tragōidia'', ''tragōidia'') is a genre of drama based on human suffering and, mainly, the terrible or sorrowful events that befall a main character. Traditionally, the intention of tragedy is to invoke an accompanying catharsis, or a "pain hatawakens pleasure", for the audience. While many cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, the term ''tragedy'' often refers to a specific tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of Western civilization. That tradition has been multiple and discontinuous, yet the term has often been used to invoke a powerful effect of cultural identity and historical continuity—"the Greeks and the Elizabethans, in one cultural form; Hellenes and Christians, in a common activity," as Raymond Williams puts it. From its origins in the theatre of ancient Greece 2500 years ago, from which there survives only a fractio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Theodor Mommsen
Christian Matthias Theodor Mommsen (; 30 November 1817 – 1 November 1903) was a German classical scholar, historian, jurist, journalist, politician and archaeologist. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest classicists of the 19th century. His work regarding Roman history is still of fundamental importance for contemporary research. He received the 1902 Nobel Prize in Literature for being "the greatest living master of the art of historical writing, with special reference to his monumental work, ''History of Rome (Mommsen), A History of Rome''", after having been nominated by 18 members of the Prussian Academy of Sciences. He was also a prominent German politician, as a member of the Prussian and German parliaments. His works on Roman law and on the law of obligations had a significant impact on the Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch, German civil code. Life Mommsen was born to German parents in Garding in the Duchy of Schleswig in 1817, then ruled by the king of Denmark, and gr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Terence
Publius Terentius Afer (; – ), better known in English as Terence (), was a Roman African playwright during the Roman Republic. His comedies were performed for the first time around 166–160 BC. Terentius Lucanus, a Roman senator, brought Terence to Rome as a slave, educated him and later on, impressed by his abilities, freed him. It is thought that Terence abruptly died, around the age of 25, likely in Greece or on his way back to Rome, due to shipwreck or disease. DEAD LINK He was supposedly on his way to explore and find inspiration for his comedies. His plays were heavily used to learn to speak and write in Latin during the Middle Ages and Renaissance Period, and in some instances were imitated by William Shakespeare. One famous quotation by Terence reads: "''Homo sum, humani nihil a me alienum puto''", or "I am human, and I think nothing human is alien to me." This appeared in his play '' Heauton Timorumenos''. Biography Terence's date of birth is disputed; Ael ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Persius
Aulus Persius Flaccus (; 4 December 3424 November 62 AD) was a Roman poet and satirist of Etruscan origin. In his works, poems and satires, he shows a Stoic wisdom and a strong criticism for what he considered to be the stylistic abuses of his poetic contemporaries. His works, which became very popular in the Middle Ages, were published after his death by his friend and mentor, the Stoic philosopher Lucius Annaeus Cornutus. Life According to the ''Life'' contained in the manuscripts, Persius was born into an equestrian family at Volterra (Volaterrae, in Latin), a small Etruscan city in the province of Pisa, of good stock on both parents' side. When six years old he lost his father; his stepfather died a few years later. At the age of twelve Persius came to Rome, where he was taught by Remmius Palaemon and the rhetor Verginius Flavus. During the next four years he developed friendships with the Stoic Lucius Annaeus Cornutus, the lyric poet Caesius Bassus, and the poet Luc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ancient Roman Tragic Dramatists
Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history to as far as late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient history covers all continents inhabited by humans in the period 3000 BCAD 500. The three-age system periodizes ancient history into the Stone Age, the Bronze Age, and the Iron Age, with recorded history generally considered to begin with the Bronze Age. The start and end of the three ages varies between world regions. In many regions the Bronze Age is generally considered to begin a few centuries prior to 3000 BC, while the end of the Iron Age varies from the early first millennium BC in some regions to the late first millennium AD in others. During the time period of ancient history, the world population was already exponentially increasing due to the Neolithic Revolution, which was in full progress. While in 10,000 BC, the world population stood ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lucretius
Titus Lucretius Carus ( , ; – ) was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is the philosophical poem ''De rerum natura'', a didactic work about the tenets and philosophy of Epicureanism, and which usually is translated into English as ''On the Nature of Things''—and somewhat less often as ''On the Nature of the Universe''. Lucretius has been credited with originating the concept of the three-age system that was formalised in 1836 by C. J. Thomsen. Very little is known about Lucretius's life; the only certainty is that he was either a friend or client of Gaius Memmius, to whom the poem was addressed and dedicated. ''De rerum natura'' was a considerable influence on the Augustan poets, particularly Virgil (in his ''Aeneid'' and ''Georgics'', and to a lesser extent on the ''Eclogues'') and Horace. The work was almost lost during the Middle Ages, but was rediscovered in 1417 in a monastery in Germany by Poggio Bracciolini and it played an important role both ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
