Claudian

Claudian
Claudian
Born	c. 370; Alexandria
Died	c. 404
Occupation(s)	poet, writer
Notable work	De raptu Proserpinae

Claudius Claudianus, known in English as Claudian (Greek: Κλαυδιανός; c. 370 – c. 404 AD), was a Latin poet associated with the court of the Roman emperor Honorius at Mediolanum (Milan), and particularly with the general Stilicho.^[1] His work, written almost entirely in hexameters or elegiac couplets, falls into three main categories: poems for Honorius, poems for Stilicho, and mythological epic.^[2]

Life

Claudian was born in Alexandria. He arrived in Rome in 394 and made his mark as a court poet with a eulogy of his two young patrons, Probinus and Olybrius, consuls of 395.^[3] He wrote a number of panegyrics on the consulship of his patrons, praise poems for the deeds of the general Stilicho, and invectives directed at Stilicho's rivals in the Eastern court of Arcadius.

Little is known about his personal life, but it seems he was a convinced pagan: Augustine refers to him as the "adversary of the name of Christ" (Civitas Dei, V, 26), and Paul Orosius describes him as an "obstinate pagan" (paganus pervicacissimus) in his Adversus paganos historiarum libri septem (VII, 55).

He was well rewarded for his political engagement, being granted the rank of vir illustris. The Roman Senate honored him with a statue in the Roman Forum in 400.^[4] Stilicho's wife, Serena, secured a rich wife for him.^[5]

Scholars assume Claudian died in 404, for none of his poems record the achievements of Stilicho after that year. His works give no account of the sack of Rome, while the writings of Olympiodorus of Thebes have been edited and made known only in few fragments, which begin from the death of Stilicho.^[6]

As poet

Although a native speaker of Greek, Claudian is one of the best Latin poetry stylists of late antiquity. He is not usually ranked among the top tier of Latin poets, but his writing is elegant, he tells a story well, and his polemical passages occasionally attain an unmatchable level of entertaining vitriol. The literature of his time is generally characterized by a quality modern critics find specious, of which Claudian's work is not free, and some find him cold and unfeeling.

Claudian's poetry is a valuable historical source, though distorted by the conventions of panegyric. The historical or political poems connected with Stilicho have a manuscript tradition separate from the rest of his work, an indication that they were likely published as an independent collection, perhaps by Stilicho himself after Claudian's death.

His most important non-political work is an unfinished epic, De raptu Proserpinae ("The Abduction of Proserpina"). The three extant books are believed to have been written in 395 and 397. In the 20th and early 21st centuries, Claudian has not been among the most popular Latin poets of antiquity, but the epic De raptu influenced painting and poetry for centuries.^[7]

Works

Panegyricus dictus Probino et Olybrio consulibus
De raptu Proserpinae (unfinished epic, 3 books completed)
In Rufinum ("Against Rufinus")
De Bello Gildonico ("On the Gildonic revolt")
In Eutropium ("Against Eutropius")
Fescennina / Epithalamium de Nuptiis Honorii Augusti
Panegyricus de Tertio Consulatu Honorii Augusti
Panegyricus de Quarto Consulatu Honorii Augusti
Panegyricus de Consulatu Flavii Manlii Theodori
De Consulatu Stilichonis
Panegyricus de Sexto Consulatu Honorii Augusti
De Bello Gothico ("On the Gothic War" of 402–403)
Gigantomachy
Epigrams
Lesser poems: Phoenix, Epithalamium Palladio et Celerinae; de Magnete; de Crystallo cui aqua inerat

Editions and translations

Hall, J.B.. Claudian, De raptu Proserpinae (Cambridge University Press, 1969).
Dewar, Michael, editor and translator. Claudian Panegyricus de Sexto Consulatu Honorii Augusti (Oxford Clarendon Press, 1996).
Slavitt, David R., translator. Broken Columns: Two Roman Epic Fragments: The Achilleid of Publius Papinius Statius and The Rape of Proserpine of Claudius Claudianus, with an Afterword by David Konstan (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1997).
Gruzelier, Claire, editor (translation, introduction, commentary). Claudian, De raptu Proserpinae (Oxford Clarendon Press, 1997).
Baier, Thomas and Anne Friedrich, Claudianus. Der Raub der Proserpina, edition, translation and commentary (Darmstadt: WBG (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft), 2009), Edition Antike.
English verse translations of Claudian online:
- A. Hawkin's 1817 translation (rhymed couplet) via Google Books.^[9]
- Helen Waddell's 1976 translation of two Epigrams in "More Latin lyrics, from Virgil to Milton", ed. Felicitas Corrigan (NY: Norton). (Internet Archive)
- The rape of Proserpine: with other poems, from Claudian (1814).^[10] Translated into English blank verse, with a prefatory discourse, and occasional notes. By Jacob George Strutt (Internet Archive).^[11]
- The rape of Proserpine: a poem in three books (1854).^[12] Translated by Henry Edward John Howard (1795–1868) (Internet Archive).^[13]
- The rape of Proserpine (1714).^[14] With the story of Sextus and Erichtho, from the Pharsalia of Lucan. Translated by Jabez Hughes (c. 1685 – 1731) (Internet Archive).^[15]

References

^ Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Claudianus, Claudius". Encyclopædia Britannica. 6. (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 463-464.
^ Gian Biagio Conte, Latin Literature: A History (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994, originally published 1987 in Italian), p. 658.
^ Roberts, Michael. "Rome Personified, Rome Epitomized: Representations of Rome in the Poetry of the Early Fifth Century", The American Journal of Philology, vol. 122, no. 4, 2001, p. 533.
^ Conte, Latin Literature, p. 658.
^ Barnes, Michael H. (2009). "Claudian". In Foley, John Miles (ed.). A Companion to Ancient Epic. Wiley-Blackwell. p. 541. ISBN 978-1405188388.
^ Sass, Katie Lynn (January 1, 2012). Alaric: King of Visigoths and Tool of Romans (PDF). Marquette University. p. 2. OCLC 855973352. Retrieved June 28, 2021.^{[permanent dead link]}
^ Andrew D. Radford, The Lost Girls: Demeter-Persephone and the Literary Imagination, 1850–1930 (Editions Rodopi, 2007), p. 22 et passim.
^ Amy Golahny, "Rembrandt's Abduction of Proserpina", in The Age of Rembrandt: Studies in Seventeenth-Century Dutch Painting (Penn State Press, 1988), pp. 31ff.
^ Claudianus, C., Hawkins, A. (1817). The works of Claudian. London: Printed for J. Porter ..., and Langdon and Son ....
^ Claudianus, C., Strutt, J. George. (1814). The rape of Proserpine: with other poems, from Claudian; translated into English verse. With a prefatory discourse, and occasional notes. London: Printed by A. J. Valpy, sold by Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown [etc.].
^ Freeman Marius O'Donoghue (1898). "Strutt, Jacob George". In Dictionary of National Biography. 55. London. p. 64.
^ Claudianus, C., Howard, H. Edward John. (1854). The rape of Proserpine: a poem in three books. Incomplete. To which are added, the Phoenix: an idyll and the Nile: a fragment. [n.p.].
^ George Clement Boase (1898). "Howard, Henry Edward John". In Dictionary of National Biography. 28. London. pp. 37-38.
^ Claudianus, C., Hughes, J., Lucan, 3. (1716). The rape of Proserpine: from Claudian ... With the story of Sextus and Erichtho, from Lucan's Pharsalia, book 6. 2d ed. London: Printed by J.D. for J. Osborne [etc.].
^ George Fisher Russell Barker (1898). "Hughes, Jabez". In Dictionary of National Biography. 28. London. p. 178.

Library resources about
Claudian

By Claudian

External links

Works by Claudian at Project Gutenberg
Full Latin text on Divus Angelus Archived 2016-03-04 at the Wayback Machine
Complete Latin text and English translation (Platnauer, 1922), at LacusCurtius, Bill Thayer's edition
Michael Hendry, critical edition (Latin Archived 2013-01-22 at the Wayback Machine)

[1] Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Claudianus, Claudius". Encyclopædia Britannica. 6. (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 463-464.

[2] Gian Biagio Conte, Latin Literature: A History (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994, originally published 1987 in Italian), p. 658.

[3] Roberts, Michael. "Rome Personified, Rome Epitomized: Representations of Rome in the Poetry of the Early Fifth Century", The American Journal of Philology, vol. 122, no. 4, 2001, p. 533.

[4] Conte, Latin Literature, p. 658.

[5] Barnes, Michael H. (2009). "Claudian". In Foley, John Miles (ed.). A Companion to Ancient Epic. Wiley-Blackwell. p. 541. ISBN 978-1405188388.

[6] Sass, Katie Lynn (January 1, 2012). Alaric: King of Visigoths and Tool of Romans (PDF). Marquette University. p. 2. OCLC 855973352. Retrieved June 28, 2021.^{[permanent dead link]}

[7] Andrew D. Radford, The Lost Girls: Demeter-Persephone and the Literary Imagination, 1850–1930 (Editions Rodopi, 2007), p. 22 et passim.

[8] Amy Golahny, "Rembrandt's Abduction of Proserpina", in The Age of Rembrandt: Studies in Seventeenth-Century Dutch Painting (Penn State Press, 1988), pp. 31ff.

[9] Claudianus, C., Hawkins, A. (1817). The works of Claudian. London: Printed for J. Porter ..., and Langdon and Son ....

[10] Claudianus, C., Strutt, J. George. (1814). The rape of Proserpine: with other poems, from Claudian; translated into English verse. With a prefatory discourse, and occasional notes. London: Printed by A. J. Valpy, sold by Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown [etc.].

[11] Freeman Marius O'Donoghue (1898). "Strutt, Jacob George". In Dictionary of National Biography. 55. London. p. 64.

[12] Claudianus, C., Howard, H. Edward John. (1854). The rape of Proserpine: a poem in three books. Incomplete. To which are added, the Phoenix: an idyll and the Nile: a fragment. [n.p.].

[13] George Clement Boase (1898). "Howard, Henry Edward John". In Dictionary of National Biography. 28. London. pp. 37-38.

[14] Claudianus, C., Hughes, J., Lucan, 3. (1716). The rape of Proserpine: from Claudian ... With the story of Sextus and Erichtho, from Lucan's Pharsalia, book 6. 2d ed. London: Printed by J.D. for J. Osborne [etc.].

[15] George Fisher Russell Barker (1898). "Hughes, Jabez". In Dictionary of National Biography. 28. London. p. 178.

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7]

[8]

[9]

[10]

[11]

[12]

[13]

[14]

[15]

Claudian

Life

As poet

Works

Editions and translations

See also

References

Further reading

External links

Sabun cuci piring

Stasiun Nishi-Ogikubo

Источники по истории Африки

Phyllo

Gua Restaurant

Katedral Asti

(21900) Orus

Aldabra

Katedral Grado

Alex Albon

Bivak

Albrecht Altdorfer

Take a Chance (1933 film)

Titicus River

Botswana Unified Revenue Service

Yakeen (film 2005)

The Terminator (wrestler)

Jonathan Pryce

نهائي كأس إيطاليا 1990

منتخب الهند لكرة السلة للسيدات