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Latin Literature: A History cover

Literature

Literature

Latin Literature: A History

Gian Biagio Conte; Joseph B. Solodow (translator); Don Fowler (reviser); Glenn W. Most (reviser)

A full literary history of Latin writing from its archaic beginnings to late antiquity, translated from the Italian. Arranged chronologically by period and author, it combines biography, accounts of works and genres, and critical discussion of style and literary models, setting Roman writers such as Virgil firmly within their Greek and Roman traditions.

Prerequisites: Some reading of Latin or Greek literature in translation; knowledge of Latin helps but is not required.

Difficulty Level
Advanced
Academic Level
Graduate
latin literatureclassicsroman literatureliterary historyReferenceTextbook

01 / Reading Guide

Reading Guide

Citation

Conte, G. B. (1999). Latin Literature: A History (J. B. Solodow, Trans.; D. Fowler & G. W. Most, Rev.). Johns Hopkins University Press. (English edition first published 1994.)

Chapter Summary

Context and Argument

Conte's book is a translation of his Italian handbook Letteratura latina. The English edition, about 830 pages, surveys the thousand years from the beginnings of written Latin to the early Middle Ages, ending with Gregory of Tours in the sixth century and the Venerable Bede in the seventh. The publisher describes it as at once a reference work, a bibliographic guide, a literary study and a reader's handbook, giving names, dates, edition citations and detailed summaries and combining the virtues of an encyclopedia with critical argument. It is arranged chronologically in five parts, with entries on individual authors and on periods, genres and movements, and it closes with appendixes and an index of names.

Introduction: Literary History and Historiography

The introduction is devoted to how literary history is written and what historiography of literature involves, before the survey of authors and periods begins.

Part I: The Early and Middle Republics

This part begins with the origins of written Latin. It covers the early Roman theatre and its playwrights (Livius Andronicus, Naevius, Plautus, Caecilius Statius, Terence, and Pacuvius and Accius on tragedy), oratory and historiography in the archaic period, Ennius, Cato, the development of epic poetry from Ennius to Virgil, Lucilius, and the politics and culture between the era of the Gracchi and Sulla's restoration.

Part II: The Late Republic

Beginning with "The Age of Caesar (78–44 B.C.)", this part treats neoteric poetry and Catullus, Lucretius, Cicero, philology, biography and antiquarianism at the end of the republic, Caesar and Sallust.

Part III: The Age of Augustus

The part opens with the characteristics of the period from 43 B.C. to A.D. 17 and is devoted to Virgil, Horace, the elegists Tibullus and Propertius, Ovid and Livy. It then covers directions in historiography, scholarship and technical disciplines, and legal literature from its beginnings to the early empire.

Part IV: The Early Empire

The part starts with the culture and spectacle of the early empire and continues through Seneca, the poetic genres of the Julio-Claudian period, Lucan, Petronius, the satirists Persius and Juvenal, Flavian epic, Pliny the Elder and specialist knowledge, Martial and the epigram, Quintilian, the age of the adoptive emperors, Pliny the Younger, Tacitus, Suetonius and the minor historians, Apuleius, philology, rhetoric, literary criticism and law, and developments in poetry through the Poetae Novelli.

Part V: The Late Empire

The last part runs from the Severans to Diocletian (193–305) and from Constantine to the sack of Rome (306–410), then treats the apogee of Christian culture, the period from Honorius to Odoacer (410–476) and the dawn of the Middle Ages.

Key Concepts

Introduction and Parts I–II

  • Literary history and historiography: the introduction considers how a history of literature should be written.
  • Early Roman theatre: the survey's account of Livius Andronicus, Plautus, Terence and the development of tragedy.
  • Neoteric poetry: the late-republican poetry that the survey treats together with Catullus.

Parts III–IV

  • The Augustan age as a period: the survey treats 43 B.C. to A.D. 17 as a distinct stretch, with its own characteristics.
  • Specialist and technical writing: scholarship, legal literature and the learned work of Pliny the Elder sit alongside poetry and history.
  • Satire under the Principate: Persius and Juvenal in the early empire.
  • Poetae Novelli: the "new poets" treated at the end of Part IV.

Part V

  • Christian culture: the late-empire section treats the apogee of Christian culture beside the end of the Western empire.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

  • Comprehensive coverage. The contents list runs from archaic theatre to the late empire and the early Middle Ages, and includes technical writers, jurists and scholars as well as poets and historians.
  • Built for reference. The publisher stresses names, dates, edition citations and summaries, and the contents list shows bibliographies within the volume and an index of names, so the book can be consulted for any author.
  • Current scholarship in its time. The publisher notes that many entries, such as those on Virgil and Petronius, give compact formulations of work at the frontier of current study, and that virtually all entries interest both lay readers and experts.
  • Literary study, not only a catalogue. The publisher describes the book as combining the virtues of an encyclopedia with Conte's critical intelligence, so entries aim at judgement as well as summary.

Limitations

  • A handbook, not a reader. The book is a history organised by period and author. It cannot replace reading the Latin texts or translations, and it does not give extended extracts.
  • Dated in its bibliography. The English edition was first published in 1994 from an Italian handbook whose third enlarged edition appeared in 1993, so recent scholarship is absent. Check recent work in the field before relying on its bibliographies.
  • Heavy to read straight through. At more than 800 pages and dense with names and dates, it suits consultation more than cover-to-cover reading.
  • Organised by period and author. A reader following one genre across the centuries, such as epic, satire or historiography, must gather entries from several Parts, although some entries trace a genre's development.

Where It Fits in the Course

In the classical literature course Conte is the large reference on Latin writing. Richard Rutherford's Classical Literature: A Concise History and William Allan's Classical Literature: A Very Short Introduction are the gentler starting points: Rutherford covers Greece and Rome from Homer to Augustine, organised by genre, and Allan asks what makes a text classical. Albin Lesky's A History of Greek Literature is the Greek counterpart to Conte, a comprehensive survey of authors and genres, and the natural companion for a reader who wants both literatures at the same depth.

The primary texts in the course give the authors that Conte discusses: Virgil's Aeneid in Robert Fitzgerald's translation, and the Greek epics, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, that Roman writers answered. Conte is most useful beside these works, for the entry on an author you are reading, as a place to put the author in context and find a starting bibliography.

How to Use This Book

The book suits advanced undergraduates and graduate students in classics and comparative literature, and serious general readers. Some Latin is helpful but not required.

Do not read it from cover to cover. Read the introduction and the opening of each Part for the framework, then consult the entry for each author you study, whether Plautus, Catullus, Virgil, Seneca or Tacitus. Use the bibliographies to find editions and commentaries, and use the index of names to trace an author across the book. When you have read a few Parts, a quick pass through the whole sequence of contents shows how the Latin literary tradition fits together.