Together in this seminar we will explore the themes and aesthetics of the Latin epigram, a genre (or is it?) best known for its brevity and wit but whose exact boundaries can be tantalizingly murky. After orienting ourselves in the epigrams of late Republican authors like the so-called “Neoterics” (Catullus, Cinna, Calvus, Caesar!), we will turn our attention to the poetry of Martial, whose accounts of Rome, its inhabitants, and their foibles exerted a profound influence on subsequent epigrammatists. We will consider Martial’s poetry both thematically (poems on the city; women; scoundrels; patrons; long poems) and as constituents of organized, multi-faceted libri. 

To deepen our appreciation of Martial’s poetic project, we will take occasional forays into para-epigrammatic genres and works (Priapea, Catalepton), as well as the scattered epigrams of authors both familiar (Ovid, Lucan, Seneca, Petronius) and obscure. We will also consider the evolution the epigram from its inscriptional and epitaphic origins in Greek and Latin, and its development as a literary form by Hellenistic authors. In the final weeks of the course, we will turn our attention to the reception of Martial by late antique (e.g. Ausonius, Claudian, Luxorius) and Neo-Latin poets (e.g. Pontano’s Baiae, Panormita’s Hermaphroditus, Marullo’s reception of Catullus, Thomas More, John Owen). 

Readings in the original will be supplemented with relevant scholarship throughout. Students will enhance their core work on Latin epigram by reading—independently or in small-groups—a complementary genre or author in the original related to their interests (e.g. Greek epigram, Horace’ Satires, Latin elegy, carmina epigraphica, Juvenal, Hellenistic or Flavian epic, Pliny’s Epistles, Christian epigram). You will refine your ability to read and describe scholarship and also design and execute a note, the refined jewel of classical scholarship, a small but exquisite investigate of a nettlesome crux or discrete point of interpretation.

As a class we will also engage in a collaborative work of public scholarship, laying the foundation for a digital commentary on Martial, Book 10. A collaborative lemmatization project and a final will allow you to demonstrate mastery of the Latin of these deceptively simple poems. A variety of activities and assignments—inside and outside of our class meetings, some designed by you—will support our collaborative endeavors.