Persius Flaccus

A well known Roman satirist, the third in order among the writers of that form of literature. He was born A.D. 34 at Volaterrae, in Etruria, of a good equestrian family. Losing his father when six years old, at the age of twelve he went to Rome, and enjoyed the instruction of the most eminent teachers, more especially of one for whom he had the greatest reverence, Annaeus Cornutus (q.v.), who initiated him in the Stoic philosophy and introduced him to the acquaintance of Lucan. After the first poetic attempts of his youth, which he himself burned, his energies were directed to satiric verse, under the influence of Lucilius and Horace. On his early death, in the year 62, the six satires which he left, after some slight revision by Cornutus, were published by his friend, the poet Caesius Bassus. A short introduction in fourteen scazonic trimeters is possibly spurious. In these Persius deals with the moral corruption of his age, from the standpoint of a Stoic preacher of ethics. Both in thought and expression a tendency to echo Horace is constantly apparent. (See Werther, De Persio Horatii Imitatore [Halle, 1883].) He composed slowly, and appears to be himself conscious that he has no true poetic faculty. His mode of expression is frequently difficult and involved to the verge of obscurity. The need of explanations was accordingly felt in comparatively early times; but the collection of scholia bearing the name of Cornutus shows hardly any traces of ancient learning. Many of the terse phrases and lines of Persius have passed into literature, the most famous being the O quantum est in rebus inane (i. 1); pulchrum est digito monstrari (i. 28); rara avis (i. 46); tecum habita; noris quam sit tibi curta supellex (iv. 52); and the striking lines in the Third Satire (35-38). In fact, many of the epigrammatic lines of Juvenal seem to have been suggested by the earlier satirist. (See Wilcke's monograph [Stendal, 1869].) The language of Persius is often tinged with the vocabulary and usage of the plebeian Latin, as he writes in the character of a plain, blunt man—the very opposite of his real self. See sermo plebeius.

The best MSS. of Persius are the Codex Montepessulanus (of Montpellier) and a Codex Vaticanus, of the ninth or tenth centuries. Few classic authors are represented by so many codices, as the moral tone of Persius made him a favourite throughout the Middle Ages. Famous editions are those of Pithoeus (Paris, 1585); Casaubon (Paris, 1605; ed. by Dübner with many additions, Leipzig, 1833); Orelli (Zürich, 1833); Hauthal (Leipzig, 1837); and especially Jahn (Leipzig, 1843, and Berlin, 1886), the last ed. by Bücheler; Hermann (Leipzig, 1854); and Gildersleeve (New York, 1875). An excellent idiomatic (prose) translation is that of Conington, with commentary (London, 1874), ed. by Nettleship. On Persius as a philosopher, see Knickenberg, De Ratione Stoica in Persio (Münster, 1869), and Schlüter, De Sat. Pers. Natura et Indole (Andernach, 1886).