ORIGO GENTIS ROMANAE. Die Ursprünge des römischen Volkes. Herausgegeben, übersetzt, kommentiert und mit Essays versehen von M. Sehlmeyer.
Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt, 2004. 176p. Hardbound. Series: Texte zur Forschnung, Band 82. Nice copy. 'The so-called Origo gentis Romanae (hereafter OGR), a critical exposition of the prehistory of Rome from Saturn's arrival in Italy through Romulus and Remus, survives with the De viris illustribus and Sextus Aurelius Victor's De Caesaribus in two fifteenth-century manuscripts, both perhaps copied from what was described by its owner, the sixteenth-century erudite Jean Matal, as a codex antiquissimus. OGR was first attributed to Victor, then pronounced a humanist forgery by Niebuhr, but the identity of the author of the OGR is now agreed to be beyond recovery, though he cannot be Victor or whoever produced the De viris illustribus or the compiler of the tripartite Corpus Aurelianum of which the OGR is the first segment. (...) Indeed, the translation, which has no literary pretensions, is of very high quality. This is no small feat, for the Latin of the OGR presents a range of challenges. (...) The Introduction first treats the schizophrenic character of the OGR - Part 1 (1.1-5.9) a sort of commentary on Vergil as a source for the history of Latium and the prehistory of Rome; Part 2 (10.5-23), after a transition (6-10.4), an antiquarian and historical overview of Aeneas, Ascanius, the foundation of Alba Longa, its early kings, and Romulus and Remus. It then discusses the OGR's transmission, language, and date; considers whether the OGR can be classified as an antiquarian or historical breviarium; describes the principles underlying Sehlmeyer's text and translation; and provides his rationale for the nature of his commentary. (...) Several of the Introduction's most important observations, especially those concerning the sources, character, and genesis of the OGR are developed in the seven Essays. (...) The book ends with a valuable glossary of Republican authors cited in the OGR (pp.160-164), an up-to-date bibliography, and an index which includes names, words, and subjects discussed in the Introduction, Commentary, and Essays, though not in the OGR itself follow. Maps of localities in Latium mentioned in the OGR (p.129), of the northern Gulf of Puteoli (p.130), and of Rome and its environs as they appear in the OGR (p.132) are a welcome feature, as is a table of variant traditions noted in the OGR (p.25). Sehlmeyer's major conclusions are three: that a fourth-century pagan grammarian (Sehlmeyer's Bearbeiter) combined what was essentially a commentary on Vergil with a revision of some now-unknown contemporary's (Sehlmeyer's Excerptor) epitome of Verrius Flaccus to produce the OGR; that the second part of the OGR is chiefly valuable for what it tells us about the revisionist and Augustan appropriation of Roman prehistory during the late Republic and early Principate; and that between 360-390 another anonymous hand joined the OGR to the De viris illustribus and De Caesaribus to form the Corpus Aurelianum. The forcefulness with which he argues these points will compel those who disagree to state their cases in at least as compelling a fashion. The result should be a more nuanced appreciation of the OGR as a suitably Janus-faced text, looking back on the one had to the Golden Age not of Saturn but of Augustus and forward to the dawn of Late Antiquity's golden age of antiquarian scholarship, the principal exemplars of which are Servius and Macrobius.' (THOMAS M. BANCHICH in Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2004.07.64).
€ 22.50
(Antiquarian)