Dionysius was first printed by Robert Stephens, and indeed from a very bad manuscript. He had alreadybefore that been generally read in a Latin translation. A Florentine, Lapus[21]Biragus, translated him from a very good manuscript, probably a Roman one, in the time of Pope Sextus IV., who has done very great services to ancient literature. But Lapus was a bungling translator, with a very scanty knowledge of Greek; as also were Petrus Candidus, Raphael Volaterranus, Leonardus Aretinus. But the works of these men were much read; and to us they are of importance, because they represent the manuscripts which they made use of.[22]Sylburg has very judiciously used the translation of Lapus. It agrees almost throughout with the Vatican manuscript. H. Glareanus revised again the version of Lapus, and, as he states, corrected it in six thousand places. He likewise availed himself of a manuscript. S. Gelenius of Cologne made a new translation, and one far better than those of his predecessors. He too may serve as a manuscript. Now was the text itself first published. The second edition is that of Sylburg, 1586, one of the most excellent elucidations of an ancient author any where to be found. He had, as it seems, an incomplete collation of the Venetian manuscript; but beside that the translations only. It is a pity that Sylburg should not have restored the text, with the means which he possessed in his apparatus, and in his eminent talent for conjecturing. The annotations are done in a masterly style; and added to this moreover was the double work of a matchless philological index, and of an historical one almost as perfect. No editor has done as much for his author as Sylburg did for Dionysius. Sylburg is not yet sufficiently appreciated. This work, his Etymologicum Magnum, his Pausanias, his Clement of Alexandria, bear evidence that in the faculty of conjecturing, and in profound knowledge of the language, he was not inferior to any one philologian of the firstrenown, not even to J. Fr. Gronovius himself. He has contributed much to the Thesaurus of Henry Stephens. Particularly important, besides, is his edition and translation of the Syntaxis of Apollonius. His edition of Dionysius, which was published by Wechel at Frankfort, is rare. A reprint of it was made at Leipsic 1691. After Sylburg follows Hudson’s edition, 1704. Hudson was a friend of Dodwell, and passed in England for an eminent philologian. Bentley was at that time run down, as being a Whig; and therefore the whole University of Oxford had conspired against him, and opposed to him Hudson, whom they lauded as a great classical scholar. But Hudson was a sad bungler. He has not done the least thing for hisGeographi Græci Minores, just as Reiz did nothing for Lucian. Hudson had a collation of the excellent Vatican Codex of Dionysius, which is in the notes, but of which he made no use at all. The edition is beautifully printed. Sylburg’s annotations are for the most part not given, or else mutilated. But the book enjoyed some fame in Germany, and a bookseller of Leipsic had it reprinted. When the first volume was nearly finished, the publisher applied for the correction of the proof sheets to Reiske. The latter was a friend of my father, and I have a high regard for him; but I am not blind to his defects for all that. His mind was extremely versatile, he had an admirable talent for conjecture; but he was too hasty. He had previously only read Dionysius once; whilst correcting, he inserted into the text readings from the Vatican manuscript, sometimes also his own emendations, of which he gives an account at the conclusion. Yet they are often very unhappy, although now and then very spirited. In Grimme’s Synopsis nothing has been done for criticism. If I could get a collation of the Chigi manuscript, I might perhaps undertake some day to make a critical edition of Dionysius.
It prepossesses us in favour of Dionysius, who shows himself in his rhetorical writings to have been a manof fine judgment, that, as he tells us, he had devoted twenty-two years to that work; that he had learned the Latin language, and made researches into the annals. His history, which now reaches down only a little beyond the time of the decemvirs, extended, as already observed, to the beginning of the first Punic war; at which period Timæus also left off, and Polybius began. He was befriended by many distinguished Romans, and wrote with a true veneration for the greatness of the Roman people. The name of Archæology appears new in him. When we see that his history does not give in eleven books more than Livy’s does in three; that he takes up a whole book with what happened before the building of the city, and treats of the earliest times so much at length; this prolixity excites our mistrust not only of the credibility, but also of the judgment of the author. As far as regards this point, it is not to be denied that Dionysius has chosen a plan of which we cannot approve. Not to mention that he looks upon the time of the kings as historical, he made a mistake when he undertook to treat history pragmatically from the very earliest times. Yet the more carefully we examine the work, the more worthy of respect Dionysius appears to us, and the more we find his book to be a treasury of the most sterling information. As such it has been first acknowledged by genuine criticism only; before that, it was cried down as a tissue of absurdities. Setting his imperfections aside, we cannot indeed assign too high a rank to Dionysius, as a treasure of ancient history providentially preserved to us. He has borrowed, if not directly, at least indirectly, from the old law books and annalists; and without him we should not know any thing of the most important changes, to which, however, too often he only lends personifications. The careful use which he made of his sources renders him invaluable. Even the matter of his speeches he took from the old annalists; many circumstances at least, which were contained in them, andwhich he could not receive into the context of his history, he has introduced in his harangues, so that the latter, in which elsewhere the arbitrary fancy of the historian seems to prevail, often retain the traces of tradition. Thus, when there is a rising of the people, these words occur in the speech of a patrician, “If there is no more help for it, why should we not, rather than humble ourselves before these plebeians, grant Isopolity to the Latins?” Now this Isopolity, as we must take it for granted, is in the subsequent peace imparted to the Latins, which is, however, not mentioned in Dionysius. This is one of the passages in which he introduced a notice found in the annalists, on the occasion of the conclusion of the peace, as subject matter into a speech. Only we must discriminate between his mistakes, and the substance of the valuable information which he gives. If he had succeeded in comprehending the language of Fabius, all would have been correct; but he understood the Greek language as it was current in his own time, and thence all his mistakes arose. He has lost the clue in the history of the development of the Roman constitution: he is not aware of the difference between δῆμος and ὅμιλος, but he gives all, though it appears to him a riddle, and tries to find a solution. That he is a rhetorician and not a statesman, we indeed see only too clearly. In his criticism he is faulty, but, for all that, not bad: he was a very clear-headed man. With very little exception his language is correct and well suited to its purpose. What we may object to in him, are the harangues, in which the distinctness of individual character is entirely lost; an ill-timed imitation of those of Thucydides. I have worked through this author from my early youth, as no one perhaps has done since he has written, and I may say that I entertain infinite respect and veneration for him; and I am convinced that except in the speeches and pragmatical reflections, he has not by any means invented or intentionally omitted anything. He worked out his sources, it is true, withoutselection, and cared only for the abundance of the materials which were offered to him. Nothing is more unjust than the opinion formerly entertained, that all that Dionysius had more than Livy was merely the invention of his brain.
About the same time, 743 according to Cato, and 745 according to Varro, Livy began to write. That he commenced so late seems authenticated. He was born 693 according to Cato, in the consulship of the great Cæsar, at Patavium, and lived during the reign of Tiberius, until 772 according to Cato (774 according to Varro),A.D.20. Livy commenced his career as a rhetorician. Of his early life nothing is known. He has written on rhetoric also. There are several grounds for fixing the period in which he began to compose his history at so late a date. His first decade has been called the work of his youth, but the following proofs are against it. Mentioning Numa, he speaks of Augustus as the restorer of all the temples, consequently after 730; moreover he talks of the closing of the temple of Janus, of the building of the temple of Jupiter Feretrius, and he names Cæsar Augustus in relating the war of Cossus. Dodwell very seldom hits upon the right conclusion, but in this point we must agree with him. In hisAnnales Velleianihe remarks, that from the manner in which Livy wrote about Spain, it is evident that that country had already then been conquered by Augustus. The ninth book is of later date than the campaign of Drusus; for he says in it concerning theSilva Ciminia, that it had been just as impassablequam nuper fuere Germanici saltus, and the latter were first entered by Domitius Ahenobarbus and Drusus after 740 only. It might be attempted to make this out to be a later revision; but it is easy to tell what books are written in one flow of the pen, and which are revised, and those of Livy undoubtedly belong to the former sort.—It is in accordance with our supposition, that Dionysius did not know him; for if a book written in such a masterly style as that of Livy had existed,Dionysius could not have been ignorant of it; and it would then have been impossible also for him to complain of the utter want of any thing like the working out of the materials of Roman history. In the last books of the first decade, on the other hand, we find several traces that Livy had known Dionysius. From theExcerpta de Legationibuswe learn, in what manner Dionysius treated the second Samnite war; the relation of it by Livy cannot possibly have been taken from Roman Annals, but from Greek sources, especially the account how Naples fell into the power of the Romans, which Dionysius seems to have got from a Neapolitan Chronicle. Livy could not know the latter himself, and yet he gives a circumstantial description of the event. He must therefore have had a Greek source, and this is certainly no other than Dionysius. The comparison also of the might of Alexander with that of Rome leads to the same conclusion. And certainly the histories of Pyrrhus king of Epirus, and of the plundering expedition of Cleonymus, are likewise from the Greek; so much the rather, as Livy here calls the Sallentines Messapians,[23]probably because he did not know that this was the Greek name for the Sallentines. Already from the eighth book, Livy must have made use of Dionysius.—Let no one say that his history has too much freshness for it to be deemed the work of an old man: this depends entirely upon the character of the individual. He had yet, even with his mode of working, nearly thirty years’ time for the accomplishment of his immense undertaking. That he did not cut it off where it finishes, but that he died before he had reached his goal, is evident from several circumstances. His history consisted of a hundred and forty-two books, and ended with the death of Drusus without any marked close. The feeling against disproportion in a divisionby numbers was among the ancients quite decided and developed, and therefore the number itself bears witness to the books not having been completed. There can be no question, but that the division into decades is an original one, and we might see it yet more clearly if we had the second decade left. Even the Greek worddecaswould not have been invented in later times. The twentieth book must have been double the size of the rest, in order that the war with Hannibal might not begin with the twenty-second book. At the end of the war with Hannibal, the books are extremely short, in order that it might finish with the thirtieth book. He cannot therefore have intended to close the work in the middle of a decade. At least the epitome reaches only as far as book 142, so that at all events we should be obliged to assume, that as two books in the middle, thus also at the conclusion some are still wanting.
When we attentively consider the work of Livy, we find it written in an astonishingly uneven style. The several decades essentially differ from each other, and in the first decade, the first book from the rest. This one is the very perfection of his manner, and shows how matchless he would have been, had his history been more condensed. Throughout the first decade, a high strain of eloquence prevails. In the third, the monotony of the events constantly checks its display; yet beautifully written are the battles on the Trasimene Lake, and at Cannæ. Here, however, is the turning point. In the fourth, the prolixity gains ground more and more, in which traces of extreme old age are to be recognised. The more freely Livy relates, the more beautiful is his composition. The fourth decade is far below the third; in the fourth and fifth he has to a great extent paraphrased Polybius. He could not have chosen better with regard to credibility; but here he is hurried, and it happens also that he contradicts himself, and that, telling the same things twice over, he becomes prolix, which he never is in the first and thirddecades. But particularly remarkable is the fragment from the ninety-first book; which is written in such a manner, that if it were not inscribedT. Livî liber XCI, and that some circumstances bore evidence for it, one would not take it for a work of Livy. Here we understand how the old grammarians could have reproached him with tautology and palilology;[24]here we see how a great writer may become old and garrulous. If the second decade had not been lost also, it would be easy to explain how the later ones have perished, viz. by their being excluded from the grammatical schools. His preface is characteristic, belonging to the worst parts of the whole work, whilst on the contrary the introductions in those great practical historians, Thucydides, Sallust, Tacitus, are masterpieces. This is to be explained from the fact, that Livy began without being conscious of any definite object, and those other writers with a bold stroke of the pencil drew the results of long lucubration.
It is evident that when Livy commenced his work, he was far from being well versed in Roman history; he had read some of the old books, and he may have been, compared with others, well acquainted with ancient history: but he was entirely deficient in general and comprehensive historical knowledge. He wrote it, as he himself states in the preface, from the pleasure which he took in history, and for consolation in a cheerless and most gloomy period; the rising generation were to be refreshed with the remembrance of the glorious times of old; after having once resolved upon this work, he had set about it in the first exultation of enthusiasm. In writing the history of the kings, he apparently followed Ennius. We perceive that clearly it is consistent, and of a piece. As he went on, he gradually got hold of more authors, but always a very limited number. As in Dionysius every thing is connected, soin Livy all is isolated. He had not at all made it his task to write a learned and scrupulously sifted history. With foreign histories he is altogether unacquainted. He could not have written that the Carthaginians first came to Sicily in 324, if he had known that fifty years before they had already undertaken their first great expedition thither. That of Alexander of Epirus would, according to him, have lasted eighteen years. He also mistakes Heraclitus, Philip’s ambassador to Hannibal, for the philosopher of the same name.
The ancients were generally in the habit of dictating their works; this is to be seen in none more clearly than in Livy. He worked out each of the years separately; and very often the later ones are in contradiction to those which go before, so that we find that he did not even once submit the whole to a connected revision. Fabius, Valerius Antias, Tubero, and Quadrigarius,—whether this last from the beginning cannot be ascertained,—are the authors whom he made use of; and perhaps, though I doubt it, Cato’sOriginesalso. He read himself, or had some one to read to him, the events of a year, and then dictated his narrative from it, taking one annalist in preference as his groundwork; and therefore in most cases there are no contradictions in the history of the same year. As he went on, he got hold of authors whom he had not known originally; for instance, theAnnales Pontificumfor the first time just before the end of the first decade, Polybius not earlier than the middle of the war of Hannibal. The account of the siege of Saguntum, which is so poor in incident, and that of the passage of Hannibal over the Alps, would surely have been differently told by him, if instead of Cœlius Antipater, he had availed himself of Polybius. It was only when he reached the history of Philip of Macedon, that he looked into Polybius; in the fourth decade, he translates from him every thing that he has not taken from the next annalists concerning the internal affairs of Rome. Thus he certainly hadbefore him Posidonius after Polybius, and then the Memoirs of Rutilius and of Sylla; in later times, perhaps Asinius Pollio, Theophanes, and others. The farther he advanced, the nearer he came to the work for which he was really fitted, only he had unfortunately become old in the meanwhile. The delineation of the character of Cicero from Livy in M. Seneca’sSuasoria, is done in a masterly style. One is more and more convinced how richly Livy was endowed with a talent for description and narration of the kind which we prize in the novelists of our time. What he is utterly deficient in, is comprehensiveness of view. He often takes from an annalist an account, which presupposes quite different circumstances from those which he himself has set forth. Wherever he wants to give a summary, one sees that what a little while since he had written, nay, even what he had quite close before him, was not at all present to his mind. Thus the enumeration of the nations which fell off immediately after the battle of Cannæ is entirely wrong, there being several among them who only revolted some years afterwards. He shows himself to be no critic in the war of Hannibal, where he repeats the tales which Cœlius Antipater only could have devised; and moreover we find in him an entire absence of judgment with regard to an event and the actors in it, whether they were right or wrong. In early life, he was on Pompey’s side; that is to say, a partisan of that chaos which had grown up out of the Roman constitution. He was then very young, being only ten years old when Cæsar came to Italy. This bygone time before the dictatorship of Cæsar, appeared to his imagination as a golden age. Thus a friend of my youth, a Frenchman and a staunch royalist, remarked to me, that the French nobles who at the outbreak of the Revolution were still young, were the most fiercely zealous against its ideas, and looked upon the period immediately preceding it as a time of the highest felicity. Livy seems to have been one of those men whonever put to themselves the question, What ought then to have happened, if matters had not come to a crisis? Yet it is natural that after Cæsar’s victory noble minds should have inclined to Pompey, who seemed to uphold the ancient usages and constitution; and it is only now that we are able to recognise Cæsar to have been the most beneficial of the two leaders. Livy, moreover, applies his party names to persons and to circumstances which were quite different, and he looks upon every thing that belongs to the tribunes as seditious. When he tells us of Tarquin the Proud, how he usurped the dominion over the Latins, and how Turnus Herdonius, evidently with the greatest justice, withstood him, he calls the latterhomo seditiosus, iisque artibus potentiam nactus. Thus Livy must have proverbially become what is called in France an Ultra. In this sense Augustus called him a Pompeian; though he did not fear him, because no real effects were to be expected from such daydreams.
Whether the Patavinity with which Asinius Pollio has taxed him, had reference to his history, or to the speeches which he was heard to deliver as a rhetorician, we are no longer able to ascertain. The latter supposition is very likely. Pollio may have said, “one still perceives from the pronunciation of Livy, that he was not bred in Rome,”—just as in Paris also one can tell provincials. I myself think that I can make out whether the author of a work lived in Paris or at Geneva, and a Frenchman of course discovers it yet more quickly. There may, therefore, have existed some nice shades of distinction, even in style itself, which now-a-days escape our observation. The Latin of Livy in a grammatical point of view is perfectly classical and correct; yet for all that, it is by no means impossible that either in speaking or in writing, he may have ventured upon many an expression which was not usual at Rome. There remains yet another question. Have we any reason to believe with regard to Livy’s history, which was commencedthirty-one years after Pollio’s consulship, that Asinius Pollio could have known it? It is possible. We have an account of his being still living after Caius Cæsar’s death.[25]Yet this can hardly be true, as Pliny would in that case have certainly mentioned him among thelongævi.
Particularly worthy of notice is the amiable disposition of Livy. The whole of his work breathes a kindliness and serenity which does one’s heart good in reading it. Perhaps we should observe this yet more clearly, if we had the later books. Few writers have had such an influence as Livy. He forms an epoch in Roman literature: with him every attempt ceases to write Roman annals. When Quintilian compares him with Herodotus, this is only correct with regard to the amenity of style which is common to both. Otherwise Livy is particularly deficient in those qualities which Herodotus possesses, than whom none was ever richer in remembrances and ancient lore; than whom there never was a more gifted investigator; and who was indeed a master both in observing and in research. Livy’s great talent, on the contrary, is that of arranging details, and of narration. Of the old Roman constitution he had no notion whatever. Even of the constitution which still existed during his youth, he seems to have had no very accurate knowledge; but whatever in the old institutions bore the same name as in his time, he always confounds with what was more recent. On the other hand, he gives accounts which are inappropriate as applying to his own era, but quite correct with reference to the olden time. He had a wonderful reputation in his day: it is a known fact that a man came from Cadiz to Rome merely to see him, and then immediatelywent back again. This fame lasted. He was the historian Κατ’ ἐξοχήν, and Roman history was learned from him alone. Whatever in after times was written by Latins, was scarcely more than extracts from him. Wherever in the later Roman authors any thing is quoted from history, it is taken from Livy: Silius Italicus, the most wretched of all poets, has done nothing but paraphrase him. And therefore he was read in the rhetorical and grammatical schools, particularly, as it seems, his first and third decades. These grammatical schools existed in Rome until beyond the seventh century, in Ravenna even down to the eleventh. It is, however, remarkable that all the manuscripts of the first decade may be traced back to a single one, which was written in the fourth century by a certain Nicomachus for Symmachus and his family, but is most wretchedly done.
We have no manuscript in which all the books which have been preserved are contained. Where the first, third, and fourth decade are together, the fourth is never entire; and all the manuscripts are very recent, dating from the fourteenth century. One sees that he was little read during the middle ages, as they made shift with the most trivial extracts. Of the first books we have manuscripts of the tenth century. At the restoration of learning, the first and third decades existed in pretty many manuscripts; the fourth in few only, and those mutilated. Yet the fourth decade was indeed known and read before that time, as may be seen from a novel of Francesco Sacchetti. But the thirty-third book was entirely wanting; and the fortieth, from the third paragraph of chapter 37. The latter gap was filled up from a Mentz manuscript in the edition printed in that town,A.D.1518; but the one in the thirty-third book, from the sixth paragraph of the seventeenth chapter only. The last five books were published from a manuscript of the monastery of Lorsch, of the seventh or eighth century (codex Laurishamensis), now at Vienna,in the Basle edition of the year 1531. The first sixteen chapters of the thirty-third book have been published at Rome in 1616, from a Bamberg manuscript, and again collated by Gœller (as the Laurishamensis for the last five books was by Kopitar), who has found some important various readings. Yet these have always remained defective.
The desire to obtain the missing parts of Livy’s history was universal; and in the days of Louis XIV. especially, people allowed themselves to be taken in by the most extravagant stories. At one moment, they were said to be in existence at Constantinople;[26]at another, at Chios; and then, in an Arabic[27]translation, at Fez. Only a short time ago, one heard of a translation, which was said to have been found at Saragossa. At Lausanne there formerly existed a complete manuscript of the fifth decade; but it has been lost. A real treasure was found by Bruns of Holstein, who lived at Rome in 1772 and 1773. He discovered a little volume in which some books of the Old Testament, in the Vulgate version but with very differing readings, were contained; and which almost entirely consisted of re-written leaves, originally from the Heidelberg Library to judge from the handwriting, perhaps a Bobbian manuscript. In this he foundM. Tullî Ciceronis Oratio pro Roscio incipit feliciter; and seeing that it began differently from the speeches as they usually were, he considered it to be the lost commencement of the orationpro Roscio Comœdo. He called in the learned and ingenious Italian Giovenazzi, and asked him to examine it; the latter decided that it was theOratio pro Roscio Amerino, yet did not observe the excellent various readings, nor discover in what preceded the lost orationpro Rabirio perduellionis. They turned over some more leaves, and found some very elegant hand writing with the superscriptionT.Livî liber nonagesimus primus. The aid of chemical means being as yet unknown in those days, they read it with incredible exertions. It was reserved for me, to do what they could not accomplish. I have read it all through, and completed it.
The text is very different in different decades. As far as regards the first of these, all the manuscripts which hitherto have been deemed authentic only follow the recension of Nicomachus Dexter Flavianus, whose subscription is found beneath the Florentine copy, the first of Leyden, and some others. These manuscripts, the text of which that of Florence gives very accurately, are all of them bad. Some various readings are exhibited by several English, Harleyan and Lovel manuscripts; but these are extremely recent, from philologists of the time of the restoration of learning, who made very free with the text, and therefore they are not of a good description. One single manuscript, of which we have only extracts, shows some quite extraordinary readings, theCodex Clockianus, concerning which we know not where it now is. These variations are so peculiar, that I often doubted whether they were always authentic, and whether Clockius really had a manuscript. The Veronese palimpsests exhibit no deviation of consequence from the Florentine manuscript. We cannot therefore hope to get beyond the recension of Nicomachus, at least as far as our present knowledge of the manuscripts enables us to judge. Of the Paris manuscripts, not one as yet has been collated. It is otherwise with the third decade, for which theCodex Puteanus, which Gronovius has made use of, is excellent. The text here is sounder than in the first; for the fourth, the Bamberg and the Mentz manuscripts, and theEditio Ascensianahave a strong claim on our regard. For the fifth decade, theCodex Laurishamensis, now preserved at Vienna, is the only source. From Italian libraries, we can no longer expect much; as the first editions generally represent the manuscripts, and thebest manuscripts of Latin authors are, on the whole, not in Italy, but in France and in Germany.
As far as regards commentaries, it is really astonishing how little has been done in the way of criticism for Livy; and yet he is one of the first who has been subjected to any elaborate criticism. Already was this done by the ingenious Laurentius Valla, whose learning was of the true philological cast, and who even before the invention of printing, wrote short scholia, and likewise an historical disquisition concerning Tarquin the Proud, whether he was a son, or a grandson of Tarquinius Priscus? Then follows M. Antonius Sabellicus, a Venetian, of whom some annotations still exist, which, considering his great ability, are very trifling. Glareanus was a very ingenious and acute man. His attention was especially directed to the historical part, and in his remarks he frankly pronounces much of it to be untenable. The emendation of the text was then taken in hand by many persons whose names are not known. Gelenius has certainly aided in the Basil edition, without his name being mentioned. When Glareanus had finished, Sigonius of Modena wrote his scholia on Livy. His work is very good and praiseworthy,—his criticisms chiefly historical. He most unaccountably bore a strong grudge against Glareanus, and the latter replied in an edition in which he had Sigonius’ notes reprinted. Sigonius has contributed much towards the criticism of the text; but he has also interpolated a great deal that is untenable, part of which still stands in the text. Then follow almost a hundred years, during which nothing was done for Livy, until John Frederick Gronovius, sprung from an Holstein family at Hamburgh, appeared; who, when philology was in a dying state, might have given it a new impulse, had the age been susceptible of it. His Livy is a masterpiece. He is one of the earliest who conscientiously searched into manuscripts. His careful grammatical and historical commentary gains for him the palm among all who haveoccupied themselves with Livy; only, when he speaks of the constitution and laws of the State, he has sometimes made mistakes, and unjustly censured Brissonius. After him came Clockius, whose conjectures are most unlucky; and then Tanaquil Faber of Saussure, who, though he was very intelligent, has done very little for Livy; nor is his criticism much to be relied on. Duker’s and Drakenborch’s edition holds the first rank among all the editions which we have of ancient authors. Duker’s notes are excellent,—a striking contrast to his Thucydides,—he shows likewise a very correct judgment concerning the subject-matter. Drakenborch is far from possessing the same penetration and ability, but for all that he has very good common sense; his application, which is scrupulously conscientious, is admirable, and he scrutinizes every thing most accurately. The treasure of philological remarks which he has hoarded up is really astonishing, and his indices are very much to the point. Drakenborch is a model in this also, that he had already completed the whole of his work before he began to publish it. The subject-matter is quite evenly disposed all through the work.
After this, little was done for the criticism of Livy. The emendations of Professor Walch of Berlin are beautiful, and it is a pity that he has not realized his intention of editing the whole of Livy. Yet a very great deal remains to be done, especially in the first decade. The nations of Roman language have gained for themselves little or no distinction with regard to Livy.
Livy is one of those authors whose fate it was, like all who form an epoch in literature, that his influence was not wholly beneficial, but also pernicious. He became from henceforth an authority, although he was no critic; people read the Roman history in Livy only, and the old historians were almost entirely forgotten. The only exception which we know of Roman history being written independently of Livy, is that of Velleius Paterculus, who began from the mythic legends, andwrote as far as the year 783. He divided his work into two books, the first of which ended with the destruction of Carthage; and besides the Roman, treated also of the earliest Greek history. Unfortunately the second book only is any thing like complete, as in the first the whole of the earlier history is wanting, a loss which is very much to be regretted. Velleius belongs to the writers of evil repute, and it is not to be denied but that a dismal time has crushed him and his independent spirit. He crouches before the tyrant Sejanus; but one must not overlook the fact, that he was much more ingenious than his contemporaries. He is exceedingly witty, and there is something choice in his remarks; besides which he is perfectly master of his subject, and shows himself to be a deeply read and deeply learned scholar. He reminds one of the authors in the time of Louis XV.
It is not quite decided that Fabius Rusticus has not written the earliest history. He was perhaps the only man in his time who could have done it.
The manner in which from henceforth Roman history was written was to epitomize it, of which we have several examples.
There is extant an old table of contents of all the books of Livy, of which two only, the hundred and thirty-sixth and the hundred and thirty-seventh, are wanting,—a sort of index for those who wished to search for any thing in the great work, and perhaps nothing more than a collection of the heads which were written in the margin. This epitome bears quite inappropriately the name of Florus. The author is unknown, and it is certainly only the work of some copyist. But to us it is invaluable, as many things have been preserved in it alone.
Well known and much read was the Roman history of Florus in four books, which, written in the reign of Trajan, is a very wretched piece of work. Yet at the side of many glaring mistakes, there is something which may be turned to use. Florus may have written fromwhat he read in Livy; yet there is in one single passage a deviation from him, so that he must have read others also.
Eutropius has evidently every where followed the track of Livy; but he is so bad a writer, that one cannot believe that he has read Livy. I therefore conjecture that there must have existed an abstract besides, forming a sort of medium between the work itself and our epitome; which Orosius no doubt also read, who likewise implicitly follows Livy, but assigns dates which clash with him, a practice quite in keeping with his ignorance in changing the dates by consuls into those by years. Such an abstract was like that of Trogus from Justin. Orosius’ object was simply this, to console his contemporaries in the state in which they were by means of perversions and sophisms in describing the wretchedness of the olden time. Yet there are many points in which his statements have great value, only one must not allow oneself to be misled by him.
The influence which Livy had exercised upon the Romans, in putting an end to every thing like originality in writing history, did not extend to the Greeks. They directed their attention more and more to Roman history, and found in it a theme for rhetorical and elegant composition. One of those who at that time more or less engaged in this task, was Plutarch, who composed his historical works in the reign of Trajan. He had a definite moral purpose, his was a fine soul: yet neither was he a practical man, nor had he a turn for speculative thought, but he was made for quiet and cheerful contemplation, like Montaigne. He had an unaffected aversion to all that was vulgar; and he wrote in this spirit for himself and his friends, the parallels of distinguished Romans and Greeks. He is just to every body. He loves the Greeks and respects the Romans, and this makes his Lives most delightful reading. But his qualities as an historian are of a very secondary order. He is no critic, and does not discriminate between conflictingopinions; but he follows at one time one authority, and at another time another. In Pyrrhus and Camillus, one sees that he has used Dionysius; in Marius and Sylla, Posidonius; and wherever we are able to make this out, his history gains a much more important character for authenticity. The task of ascertaining this point is as yet far from being accomplished. Plutarch, as he himself tells us, understood little of Latin, and was particularly ignorant of the grammar, owing to which mistakes are found in him here and there, though indeed but seldom.
About a generation after Plutarch, Appian wrote. He was a jurist from Alexandria, who in the reigns of Adrian and Antoninus Pius, lived in Rome as an agent for his native town, and had the management of lawsuits. He was greatly befriended by Fronto, and by his interest got the office of aProcurator Cæsaris. Although he had lived a long time at Rome, and had a great opinion of his Latin, yet it is not to be supposed that he was very conversant with that language; as, owing to Adrian’s predilection for Greek, he surely was allowed to plead in it, especially for thetransmarini. Having made a fortune at Rome, he returned to Alexandria, and was in his old age treated with much distinction by the Romans. According to one account, he has written twenty-four books on Roman history; among them four on Egypt, in which he treated with particular prolixity of the Lagides. It was not a continuous history, but arranged after the plan of theOriginesof Cato. The first book was called Βασιλική, the second Ἰταλική, the third Σαυνιτική. The first twenty-one books of his work went as far as the battle of Actium; then the subsequent times down to Trajan he disposed of in one book Ἑκατονταετία; besides which he wrote a book on the Dacian, and another on the Arabian war of Trajan. He is a compiler, and knew well how to choose his sources. In the earlier history he chiefly follows Dionysius; in the second Punic war, perhaps also in the first, he followsFabius; then Polybius, and afterwards Posidonius. In using these sources, he displays great ignorance, particularly of geography. Thus, for example, he believes that Britain was quite close to the northern coast of Spain, and he places Saguntum on the northern bank of the Iberus. We must discriminate with regard to him. Wherever he copies without thinking, we find in his work the best sources for history. The greater half of the books of Appian are lost. We possess eleven of them, and besides these, there are extracts in theEclogæ de Legationibus, andde Virtutibus et Vitiis, collected by Ursinus and Valesius. Spurious is the Παρθική, as Schweighäuser has correctly demonstrated.
There are of Appian, properly speaking, only three editions, those of Stephens, Tollius, and Schweighäuser, the last of them being by far the best. Much remains to be done for theBellum Illyricum, as Spaletti has kept his collation for it from Schweighäuser. A good source also made use of by the latter, is the Latin version of Petrus Candidus, which though barbarous is faithful.
About eighty years after Appian, wrote Dio Cassius, surnamed Cocceianus, who was born in the reign of Antoninus Pius at Nice in Nicomedia, of a family which was of very high standing in the Roman State. Very likely Dio Chrysostom was his grandfather on the mother’s side. He came as a young man to Rome, at a time when the provincials of the east were already admitted to the highest offices, which was much earlier the case with those of the west. Whilst the latter soon assimilated themselves in language and address to the Romans, the former amalgamated much later, and from sheer necessity. In the eastern provinces they still let the beard grow, as we see from the likeness of the statuary Apollodorus in the Trajan column, the most ancient likeness of an artist. From the time of Adrian the Greeks met in Rome with a different reception from that which they had before; this emperor favouredthem, as did also the Antonines. Marcus Antoninus even married one of his daughters to Pompeian a Greek.
Dio came early to Rome, where he lived forty years engaged in business, and then retired to Capua. He wrote, when about forty years old, the history of Commodus, which he dedicated to Severus, who received it with favour, and encouraged him to write the whole Roman history. He became consul under Septimius Severus, and a second time under Alexander Severus. He reached an age of nearly eighty years, and had, according to Fabricius’ computation, already reached that of seventy when he was for the second time invested with the consulship. He spent twelve years in collecting materials, and during ten he worked. If this account be correct, the last books must be a continuation of his work. Being a statesman, he paid attention to many things in history which his predecessors had not cared for. He had a true vocation for writing history, and declared that in his dreams the gods had commanded him to do so. He was a perfect master of the Latin language, thoroughly acquainted with all the Roman affairs, and he felt an interest in political concerns. He is every where at home, in the laws, in the constitution, and in matters connected with warfare. Livy had no idea of either the economy of a state, or of a battle; the commonest rules for the array of an army escape him. Surely he can never have looked on, when the soldiers were drilling at Rome.
For the very earliest times, Dio Cassius draws from the very fountain-heads. He wrote quite independently of Livy from Fabius, and he perfectly understood the old Roman constitution. On the other hand, he is reproached with κακοήθεια, and ἐπιχαιρεκακία, with its being a pleasure to him to bring to light the hollowness of men’s pretensions to political virtue, and such like things. Indeed he is in a bitter mood against the false pretences to virtue in a thoroughly corrupted age; but this is quite different from showing an infamous delight in it.The former only is the real character of Dio Cassius. When a man scoffs at religion, it is the sign of a bad heart; but when he snatches the mask from the face of a hypocrite, he is quite in the right. When one hears the language of so-called patriots of the time of George the First and Second, and then learns how they intrigued for places, how in spite of their boasted integrity they kept up a secret correspondence with the Pretender, and when they came into power did the very self-same things as their predecessors, it is very natural to speak with disgust of such sham patriots. In the time also of Louis XV. such a state of feeling as we find in Dio Cassius was universal. Dio, owing to his experience in a most abandoned age, may have judged many a man too harshly; but at bottom his view of things is sound and enlightened. That he was no friend to tyranny, is shown every where in his history, when one reads it without prejudice. His style, however, is not flowing; his peculiarities are sometimes faults (examples of it are given in the index of Reimarus). He is one of the few who at that time wrote as men really spoke; on which account the study of his language is very instructive. There is no affectation in him, as in Pausanias; his language is the Greek, as it was then used in familiar conversation. His history was much read. It was for a long time a common source of Roman history, and was continued by an anonymous writer to the time of Constantine, as we know from theExcerpta de Legationibus. He himself divided his eighty books into decades. The twentieth book he concluded with the destruction of Carthage; the fortieth went as far as the outbreak of the civil war between Cæsar and Pompey; the sixtieth, to the death of Claudius. Of these there were left in the twelfth century, when Johannes Zonaras wrote, only the first twenty, and from the thirty-sixth to the end. In the tenth century when Constantinus Porphyrogenitus caused theexcerptato be made, the whole was still extant. Afterwards, in the eleventh century, themonk Xiphilinus made extracts beginning from the thirty-sixth book, with the exception of the history of Antoninus Pius, and a part of M. Aurelius’ reign. Whether he had the rest or not, is no more to be ascertained. It is, however, probable, as Zonaras fifty years later had still the first twenty books. It has therefore been unjustly said that the loss of the books of Dio was the fault of Xiphilinus. His manuscript was still complete as regards the reigns of Augustus, Tiberius, and Claudius, where the Venetian is full of gaps. The very late author of theLexicon Syntacticum, which Bekker has edited, already in all probability had no more the first five and thirty; as from these, in comparison with the other books, he gives scarcely any extracts at all. We have a fragment which is generally thought to be of the thirty-fifth book, but which, according to Reimarus, most likely belongs to the thirty-sixth; then from the thirty-seventh to the fifty-fourth complete, and the fifty-fifth and fifty-sixth mutilated. Of the first twenty books we have the abstract of Zonaras, with slight admixtures from Plutarch; of the last forty-five, that of Xiphilinus likewise with admixtures. Of books 78, 79 and 80, we have an important fragment from the Vatican library. In books 55 to 60, the manuscripts are full of gaps: Xiphilinus, however, had yet a complete copy of them. Morelli, an excellent philologist, found these books in the year 1797, when, to console himself for the downfall of his republic, he took to ancient history as a refuge, in a very old manuscript in the library of St. Mark, and discovered that it had formerly been complete, but had suffered much from the destruction of part of the fascicles and leaves; that this was the mother-manuscript for these six books; but that when the copyist in his transcript had come to a stop in some story, and the beginning of the next was mutilated, he had entirely dropped such incomplete narrations, and disguised the gaps. Morelli has collected these defective passages, so that we see how at one place some leaves,at another, whole quaternions are missing. From what he communicated, the remarkable expedition of Ahenobarbus to Germany was first brought to light, which had till then been unknown. Thus also in Diodorus, the halves of two books are entirely wanting, a circumstance which is nowhere noticed. In a third passage, Perizonius and others have discovered it. Such a thing was by no means of rare occurrence among the volatile Greeks of the fifteenth century, who gained their livelihood by copying.—What remains of the three last books of Dio Cassius, has been edited by Fulvius Ursinus. The manuscript is of the seventh or eighth century; yet the centre column only has been preserved entire: the two others along the margins are illegible. Nevertheless something may be gleaned from it. In the excerptade Legationibus,de Virtutibus et Vitiis, andde Sententiis, many pieces from Dio are to be found. We have also many fragments elsewhere, as Dio was very much read. There are besides the abridgments of Xiphilinus and Zonaras. It is surprising that the latter is not also reprinted in the edition of Reimarus. This Zonaras,[28]under Alexius and Kalojohannes Comnenus, was a man of business, and wrote a history from the beginning of the world to the death of Alexius Comnenus. The first volume of it is an abstract from Josephus, the second from Dio, and the third from several, particularly from Cedrenus, Skylitzes, and others; as to the later books of Dio, he could not procure them in spite of all his inquiries. He was imperial secretary, and commander of the body-guard. Nor was he a fool, though his judgment is exceedingly narrow; but his extracts from Dio, whom he does not mention as his authority, are of the highest importance. He was formerly overlooked, and I was the first to direct attention to him. Freinsheim made use of him where Livyis wanting, but no further. The excerptade Sententiisespecially, show with what accuracy he selected from Dio.
Dio has been edited by Stephens at Basle, and by H. S. Reimarus. A collation of the Venetian manuscript would be infinitely important. The annotations of Fabricius and Reimarus are of extraordinary value in an historical point of view. What is defective in Fabricius, as well as in his son-in-law Reimarus, is grammatical knowledge. Yet this deficiency has not prevented Reimarus from directing the whole of his attention to the index, which is excellent. If he had made the index before the edition was completed, he would have arranged quite differently the strictly philological part of his work. Philological indices are a most useful aid in study, and infinitely heighten the value of an edition. The task of compiling them leads to a great number of questions and inquiries, which otherwise would never have been thought of.[29]
After Dio, nothing original was any more written by Greeks on Roman history. In the middle ages, works were lost. Of Livy, the first and third decades were read in the schools for theprovectiores, and for history men contented themselves with Florus, Eutropius, Rufus, Victor, and Orosius. Eutropius was read also, but spuriated, in a continuation of Paul Warnefrid and Sagax; besides which, as a chrestomathy of fine actions, Valerius Maximus, one of the most wretched of writers, was very much in vogue. People in those days generally cared only for what was ready at hand, and that they diligently worked at; but about any thing that was unknown they did not at all trouble themselves.If the glossators had not been tainted with the defects of their age, they might have got access to quite different sources, from which the law books were to be explained. Some men in the middle ages read indeed and collected manuscripts; but they had no comprehensive views—no sort of symmetry—no striving after any thing that was not at once within reach. Since Priscian, there is no direct quotation from Livy, except in Johannes Saresberiensis; and in him moreover, only from the books now extant. When in the fourteenth century the light was dawning, people began again to read Livy; as we see from a strange novel of Francesco Sacchetti, in which he speaks of a Florentine who was so absorbed in the study of Livy, that, when one Saturday, the workmen came to him for their wages, he spoke to them as though they were living in the time of Cato. Petrarch read the war of Hannibal in Livy, and also Cæsar’s Commentaries, with an ardour and a passionate fondness, with which they certainly had not been read since the times of the great Boëthius,—consequently for eight centuries. He in vain wished to have more of Livy; he had as yet only the epitome, of which, perhaps, he was the discoverer. Now awoke in the hearts of the Italians the desire of considering themselves as the successors and heirs of the ancient Romans, and they began to collect books wherever they found them. The letters of congratulation which were written by Leonardus Aretinus, Bartholomæus, and others, to Poggius, when he had discovered new books, are most affecting. The Roman history was read with an interest which beggars belief; and yet they kept to the works which they already had. But now they began to convince themselves that with the means which they had hitherto possessed, they were not capable of understanding the Roman history: and thus the study of Archæology grew up, to which Pomponius Lætus in particular gave an impulse; who, however, did much mischief by the negligent way in which he set about it. In the beginningof the sixteenth century, the study of Roman antiquities made rapid progress; and collections of inscriptions and of antiquities were now first made in Italy and France by Mazocchi and others, who lived at that period. In Italy an equal degree of attention was not bestowed upon the ancient science of jurisprudence, which, strange to say, did not flourish in that country, though the interpretation of the civil law had originally sprung from thence. At that time scientific jurisprudence was the province of the French, while the Italians applied themselves to history, and to the investigation of authorities for that purpose. People also began to make remarks on particular parts of the history. Glareanus, a strange character, but of an acute and penetrating mind, began freely to examine and to scrutinize Livy. Panvinius, an Augustinian at Verona, and Sigonius of Modena, have first done something by arranging the Fasti, and elucidating the Roman antiquities; owing to them, the knowledge of Roman affairs advanced with colossal strides. They dwelt especially on the times of Cicero and Cæsar, for which there existed contemporary accounts; but they did not work their way into the earliest times. They fostered the tree, but there was no root to it. Both of them, and Panvinius in particular, were weak in Greek literature, and had a very deficient knowledge of Greek affairs. Both have done much; yet they were wanting in practical experience. The State, as it existed, was to them a mystery, although in some respects they had greater facilities than a foreigner, since many things presented themselves to their observation which were still continuing under the old names. They did not take a sufficiently clear view of things, and therefore they generally blundered in the exposition of details. Panvinius’ Fasti are a fine work; his supplements to them admirable, considering what his means were. It was his good fortune that in his time fragments of the Capitoline Fasti were found, when a church was building, which led to manyresults. Under my own eyes also some pieces were found, from which important hints may be gathered concerning the times in which Livy fails us.
The Fasti are preserved in many separate collections, and also for those periods in which history forsakes us. At the end of the sixteenth century, Stephen Pighius of Campen in Overyssel, secretary of Cardinal Granvella, and afterwards priest at Xanten,[30]conceived the idea of restoring the Roman history in the form of annals, including the times for which Livy fails us; and with this view he subjected the latter to a searching criticism. He was a man of very great learning,—hisHercules Prodicius, his notes on Valerius Maximus, &c. are excellent,—yet his annals are based on a mistaken idea. I tried once in my youth to learn the Fasti by heart, and I believe that the young Romans were used to do so; it is, however, of no great value. If the Fasti were all preserved, such annals as Pighius intended would be very important for us, but interesting in details only. Pighius, however, entered upon quite a chimerical undertaking. He wished to restore the lost periods of the Fasti; and in so doing, not only to mark the few notices which we possess, but also to fill up the gaps from possibilities, calculating what people might at that time according to theleges annaleshave held the offices. Yet he had no desire to deceive his readers, but he indicated his supplements as such; nevertheless G. J. Vossius has allowed himself to be misled by them, and after him even some scholars of the present day, as for example, Schubert of Königsberg in his book on the Ædiles. In spite of all this, Pighius’ book cannot be dispensed with, inasmuch as he availed himself of inscriptions, and made many acute combinations. Unfortunately his work was not completed; he died before its publication. Andreas Schottus finished and published it; but his continuation is far inferior.
The account of the manner in which Roman history was handled affords us an image of the progress of philology itself. In the fifteenth century it had scarcely awakened, and it was still uncritical; in the sixteenth, men penetrated quickly and deeply into the study of antiquity, without, however, fully securing the results; but the golden age of philology vanished in the beginning of the seventeenth, and in Germany, where it had blossomed only late, it was blighted by the thirty years’ war. It was now combined with other studies, and works were produced, which were laboriously and diligently executed, but of inferior philological merit, and devoid of genius. The Strasburg school of philologists especially, still maintained a certain pre-eminence. At the end of the thirty years’ war, John Freinsheim of that town wrote his supplements to the books of Livy. Of particular facts, he has left few unnoticed; yet he has but imperfectly succeeded in arranging the events of the obscure ages, and in entering more deeply into the spirit of the times. He had no idea of the Roman state either in relations of peace or of war, though he prided himself not a little on hisprudentia civilis. For the second decade, especially books 11-15, and perhaps also four books 46-60, he had more complete materials, and made an energetic use of them; afterwards, he becomes more and more careless, and from the period of the Social War decidedly bad. Notwithstanding which, no one who works at Roman history can do without his book. Unfortunately, the quotations are very inaccurate, even in the original edition; and in that of Drakenborch, they are either made worse, or at least not corrected. Freinsheim, like his fellow citizens Boecler and Obrecht, is to be reckoned among the ornaments of Germany of that time. That he did not continue his immense work with equal care is very pardonable, and the preposterousness of the undertaking itself is to be charged to the taste of the age in which he lived.
About twenty years after him, quite a different man began a work on Roman history which is thoroughly classical. James Perizonius, in hisAnimadversiones Historicæ, undertook a critical review of Roman history, which, however, extended only to detached parts of it, though what he did was ably and beautifully executed. He first conceived the fruitful idea, that the Roman history, like that of the Jewish people, had arisen out of lays: an idea which we cannot sufficiently admire, when we consider the time in which he wrote, and that he was moreover a Dutch philologist; for such national songs are entirely wanting in the Netherlands. A Dane might much more easily have been its author, as Saxo Grammaticus and the songs of the Edda would have led to it. Perizonius had a perfectly unbiassed mind, incredible philological learning, and a real genius for history. Yet hisAnimadversioneshave not had the influence which they deserved, as they were reprinted only once, and altogether forgotten.
After 1684, in a strictly philological point of view, little better than nothing was done for Roman history. Bentley and J. M. Gesner are almost the only exceptions to the wretched condition of philology during the first half of the eighteenth century. In the meanwhile there spread itself in Europe more and more a certain general mental cultivation, which laid claim to classical history as a part of the universal one; and in consequence, even men who had none of the deeper philological knowledge, occupied themselves with ancient history. Thus arose that little masterly work of president Montesquieu,Sur les causes de la grandeur des Romains et de leur décadence, which in spite of many mistakes is an excellent book.
At the end of the seventeenth century, scepticism had awakened in Europe; it originated with Bayle, and attacked history also. It did not, however, aim at establishing profound results; but was content with disclosing the mistakes in what had previously been considered as authentic history. In this spirit wrote a veryingenious man, a refugee who had lived a long time in England, Monsieur de Beaufort. His work on the Roman Antiquities, however much may be objectionable in it, considered as a whole is the best which has been written on the subject. It was clear to him, that the early Roman history was a poem, and no history; and this conviction of his he made known in hisDissertation sur l’incertitude des quatre premiers siècles de l’histoire Romaine. The work bears the stamp of an ingenious and well read man, who was no philologist by profession, and on the whole, not inured to accurate research; there is manifested in it that spirit of scepticism, which only destroys and does not attempt to rebuild; and therefore it excited much opposition. But the book has been of use. All that has been written since is based upon it.
What the worthy Rollin has compiled from Livy and from Freinsheim’s supplements, is not to be reckoned a Roman history. With very little talent, he shows such a respectable, virtuous, and upright disposition, that men were perfectly justified in putting it into the hands of youth; yet it is a dry book, which now-a-days scarcely any one would read through. His learning is very defective; he is destitute of all critical judgment, and without any insight into the state of affairs. People at that time, as a very witty writer remarks, treated ancient history as if it had never really happened.
Somewhat later,[31]Hooke wrote a work, with which indeed I am but slightly acquainted, and which, generally speaking, is not known in Germany. He took notice of Beaufort’s views, without, however, entering into any deeper questions; and he treated the history of those times only which he held to be historical.
This is no less the case in Ferguson’s history of the Roman Republic, which is a complete failure. He was judicious and honest, but unlearned; and he had notthe remotest conception of the constitution. He gives full details only from the times of the Gracchi, and treats history pragmatically and morally. For the knowledge of history the book is of no value. Levesque’s history is downright trash: he deems the account of the earliest times to be nonsensical stuff, but quite in an arbitrary manner makes exceptions in favour of particular events. There is a low tone about the book, and there is no erudition in it. Micali’sItalia avanti il dominio de’ Romaniis likewise a wretched work. He rouses himself into a strange passion against the Romans, and invents histories of the Italian States which could not be arrived at by any. Micali wrote at the time of the French ascendancy, and so he was glad to be able on this occasion to say something against the exclusive dominion of any one people; but he thus allowed himself to be betrayed into an unreasonable heat, and into unfairness against the Romans. Besides which, he is quite an unlearned man.
The general tendency of philology in Germany could not but lead to a critical treatment of Roman history, based on research. For the last forty years it has gained a settled character. The movement in it began on several quite distinct points, it lay in the very essence of the whole development of our literature. Men like Lessing, who, without any accurate philological learning, was endowed with a most philological spirit, and Winkelmann, are to be considered as the true fathers of modern improved philology. Thus also the attempts of Heyne and Ernesti, although very imperfect ones; the revival of historical jurisprudence;[32]as well as that of grammatical philology, by Reiz, Wolf, Hermann, the translations of Voss and others, have contributed much to Roman history. The spirit was awakened,the language moulded by Lessing and Goethe, and the age with its gigantic changes and revolutions filled every thing with life; and exertion was felt to be a necessity. All this must have reacted upon Roman history, and the more so as political affairs assimilated to those of the ancient Romans. By these circumstances especially, my attention was directed to the Roman state as it really was, and first turned to inquire into the question, why those violent struggles had taken place in Rome. Thus Roman history was now no more treated merely sceptically, but critically; results took the place of exploded inventions; it was shown what we are to believe, and what to reject as invention or interpolation; and, moreover, this advantage has been gained, that people know what they may receive as truth, with regard to ancient Roman history in general, without engaging in vain attempts to pursue it into all its details, with the dates accurately specified. In this immense labyrinth, these researches, as far as they regard the early times, could not succeed at once. He who entered into them was still fettered by many prejudices: he saw the goal, but got bewildered on his way. Thus it was imperatively demanded by good faith and conscientiousness, not to remain satisfied with what was already found, and to take courage to find the solution of enigmas. What could be gained for the early times, is now gained in all essential points; and it is time that these researches should not grow too much into fashion. Not that I am afraid, that the results obtained may be shaken; but since this work is limited by the extent of the sources, until fresh ones be discovered, nothing, on the one hand, can have been missed; and, on the other, nothing essential yet remains to be done. It is to be wished that men’s energies may now be directed to those points, from which important results are to be expected, especially within the range of the later periods. To know and to understand these, one should necessarily be acquainted with the ancientages and forms; but one ought not to believe that the interest of the Roman history leaves off where contemporary accounts begin; as if those things only were interesting which are to be guessed. The Roman history is a whole. Emerging from the darkest ages, where it can be only restored by combinations, comparisons, and analogies, it reaches that stage in which it is borne out by the evidence of persons who are well informed. The remainder of Roman history, from the time when it becomes historical, must likewise be investigated, in order to gain settled results; or where they are already gained, calmly to examine them, and to make use of the materials which have been brought to light.
The study of ancient history requires for its basis a sound, able, philological, and grammatical spirit, which is proof against every temptation to indulge in fanciful etymologies; a well cultivated and practised taste, so as to distinguish possibilities or probabilities, and realities; a matured judgment; a knowledge of human and civil affairs, of those things which have happened in different ages, according to the same laws; and above all,conscientiousness and uprightness, free from all feelings of display and vanity,—a blameless walk before God. The adage of former times ought well to be laid to heart, that learning is the fruit of uprightness and piety.
When once we have a correct system of Roman antiquities, it will belong to scientific Roman history as an introduction to it. Now they are treated very differently from each other. The older works contain much that is excellent concerning those times for which Roman literature is coeval. In ancient geography also, a chorography of ancient Italy is still wanting; as to Mannert’s work, it can only receive a very qualified recommendation. Much better are Cluver’sItalia AntiquaandSicilia, colossal works, which are, however, so rare, and so costly, that one cannot refer the student to them. In the details little is to be added, almost every thing in the classical writers which happens tobear upon the settlement of chorographical points being incorporated in them. What is decidedly deficient is the survey of the ancient nations; all his general views are vague. Yet the description of the country is admirable for his times.
As to maps, that of d’Anville is unquestionably to be recommended. D’Anville was a genius: he possessed the acuteness to discriminate among conflicting statements those which were worthy of belief; he was like a great artist, who, with very simple instruments, does more than another with the most perfect ones. His works on the interior of Africa are extraordinary, considering the few notices which he had. Not to be excelled are his maps of Gaul, Spain, and Britain; unsurpassed is his map of Italy, although much might be improved in it. He is less perfect with regard to Greece. For Epirus and Macedon, he was of course unable to make use of the more correct information of modern times, the interior of these countries not being then explored by travellers; the Peloponnesus he worked out mostly from the Portulan maps. Barbié du Bocage, his pupil, was likewise highly to be esteemed; but with such a predecessor, he was in a disadvantageous position. He continued several of d’Anville’s works with little success. He found, for instance, that Patras in d’Anville’s map was placed 30 minutes too far north, and he accordingly changed the position; yet, although he was in the right, he twenty years afterwards restored it to d’Anville’s original position. D’Anville has in Italy one single mathematical error with regard to the south-eastern part of Naples, where the country of the Sallentines lies about 20 minutes too little to the east. For d’Anville had as yet no other maps at hand but the Venetian ones, in which the outlines are generally excellent, but the longitudes for the most part incorrect. The comparison of d’Anville’s maps with those of his predecessors, as those of Delisle and others, makes him still more admirable. His map of Egypt is an extraordinaryperformance, if we consider that he had only the rude outlines of the Arabian and Turkish maps to work from. An apparent defect in his map of Italy is this, that it represents a distinct period, about that of Augustus, and in consequence there is a discrepancy in the settlement of the confines which might make one inclined to censure him; and yet one ought to be very careful not to do so. Samnium, for instance, according to Livy, still included a very large tract which d’Anville draws into Apulia, because he follows the description of Italy by Pliny.
Thoroughly bad is Reichardt’s map of Italy. Reichardt has no idea of ancient geography, and his map is a medley of ignorance and impudence. Places which never existed are described by him as towns of importance;—this he does in the case of Sublanuvium, Subaricia, stages for changing horses laid down in ancient itineraries beneath Lanuvium and Aricia, towns which were built on hills. A place of this kind happens to be calledad bivium, from which Reichardt makes a townad Birium, of the size of Præneste and others in Latium. Aquila, founded during the middle ages, is described by him as an old Sabine town, merely because it bears a Roman name. Politorium, Medullia, and other towns in the immediate neighbourhood of Rome, the accurate position of which is no more by any means to be made out, are placed by him just as fancy leads him, and on sites besides where they certainly could not have stood. He brings the Volscians as far as the mouth of the Tiber, whilst no one makes them extend farther than to Antium. Could I have overcome my disgust, and looked over the map of this man yet more accurately, I might have found many other similar blunders. Its only recommendation is the beauty of the engraving. D’Anville as yet remains unsurpassed. My father, who was certainly a competent judge in this matter, never spoke of him but in the highest terms of acknowledgment.