Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 10, 2025
Severe simplicity was favored by Calvus in his orations, Catullus in his lyrics 5 while a more polished and well-nigh précieuse plainness was illustrated in the speeches of Calidius and in the Alexandrian epyllion of Catullus' Peleus and Thetis and in Vergil's Ciris and Bucolics. Demetrius, Philodemus, Cicero; of. Class.
The poems of Catullus are full of references to his friends and his enemies among this group of writers. Two of the former, Cinna and Calvus, were poets of considerable importance.
It is not unlikely that Quintilius Varus, Vergil's elder friend and fellow-Transpadane, who had grown up an intimate friend of Catullus and Calvus, had in these matters a stronger influence than Philodemus. There are, however, certain turns of sentiment in Vergil which betray a non-Roman flavor to one who comes to Vergil directly from a reading of Lucretius, Catullus, or Cicero's letters.
But impeachments by men who knew how to wield the sword of dialectics and the lash of sarcasm as did Gaius Licinius Calvus and Gaius Asinius Pollio, did not miss their mark even when they failed; nor were isolated successes wanting.
XLIX. The only stain upon his chastity was his having cohabited with Nicomedes; and that indeed stuck to him all the days of his life, and exposed him to much bitter raillery. I will not dwell upon those well-known verses of Calvus Licinius: Whate'er Bithynia and her lord possess'd, Her lord who Caesar in his lust caress'd.
Custom and the schoolmaster then completed what the power of language had begun. Opposition to Ciceronianism Calvus and His Associates Cicero's contemporaries however were, as may readily be conceived, far less involved in this strange idolatry than many of their successors.
Amid this resentment of the commons against the patricians, though the tribunes asserted that now was the time for establishing liberty, and transferring the sovereign dignity from the Sergii and Virginii to plebeians, men of fortitude and energy, still they proceeded no further than the election of one of the commons, Publius Licinius Calvus, military tribune with consular power for the purpose of establishing their right by precedent: the others elected were patricians, Publius Mænius, Lucius Titinius, Publius Mælius, Lucius Furius Medullinus, Lucius Publius Volscus.
The last had a very brilliant career as an orator, although his orations were too florid to be read. Caesar was also distinguished for his eloquence, the characteristics of which were force and purity. Caelius was noted for lofty sentiment; Brutus for philosophical wisdom; Callidus for a delicate and harmonious style, and Calvus for sententious force.
Pollio had stood close to Calvus as well as to Caesar, and had witnessed the revulsion of feeling against Cicero's style which continued to move in its old leisurely course even after the civil war had quickened men's pulses. Messalla and Pollio were the dictators of prose style during this period. We find Vergil, therefore, in a peculiar position.
But Calvus did not threaten to become a political force, Calidius was too even-tempered, and Caesar was now in the north, fighting with other weapons. Cicero's prestige still seemed unbroken. It was not till Caesar crossed the Rubicon in 49, after Hortensius had died, and Cicero had been pushed aside as a futile statesman, that Atticism gained predominance in the schools.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking