graecisms

Updated: June 20, 2025

He never resorts to strange words, uncouth compounds, puns, or Graecisms for producing effect; his diction is smooth and chaste, and even indelicate subjects are alluded to without any violation of the proprieties; indeed it is at first surprising that with so few appeals to the humourous instinct and so little witty dialogue, Terence's comic style should have received from the first such high commendation.

Charles Thomas Cruttwell - The History of Roman Literature : From the earliest period to the death of Marcus Aurelius

Nevertheless, Plautus never uses Greek words in the way so justly condemned by Horace, viz. to avoid the trouble of thinking out the proper Latin equivalent. He is as free from this bad habit as Cato himself: all his Graecisms, when not technical terms, have some humourous point; and, as far as we can judge, the good example set by him was followed by all his successors in the comic drama.

Charles Thomas Cruttwell - The History of Roman Literature : From the earliest period to the death of Marcus Aurelius