From the Life of Horace that appears in several codices containing ancient commentaries (different than Suetonius’ Life of Horace), we know that Porphyrion, Modestus, and Helenius Acron were among his major ancient exegetes (Commentati in illum sunt Porphyrion, Modestus et Helenius Acron; p. 3 ed. Keller 1902). Since Modestus was cited by Martial (10.21.1-2) as a commentator of poets, along with Claranus, and since these three were roughly contemporary, it follows that a first commentary on Horace can be attributed to the age of Domitian. In his commentary on Sat. 2.5.92, Porphyrion cites a commentary on Horace by a Virgilian exegete, Terentius Scaurus, who dates from the beginning of the 2nd century (STES CAPITE OBSTIPO Tristi ac severo. Scaurus “inclinato” dicit), but this has likely been lost. The text attested under the name of Porphyrion seems to be, in fact, a reworking and abbreviation of an original, fuller redaction: for example, Porphyrion refers to a Life of Horace while commenting on v. 41 of Satire 1.6 (Patre libertino natum esse Horatium et in narratione, quam de vita illius habui, ostendi), but this Life is absent from the current text. The commentary cites Terentius Scaurus (Porph. Hor. sat. 2.5.92) and Suetonius (Porph. Hor. epist. 2.1.1); Porphyrion is cited by Charisius, who referred to him indirectly via Julius Romanus’ Ἀφορμαί. On the basis of such chronological references, then, it is possible to anticipate by several decades Porphyrion’s usual dating, the beginning of the 3rd century. While Porphyrion is cited as a fons in a scholium on Lucan 1.214, which has invited the conjecture that he also composed a commentary on this poet, this can be rebutted by hypothesising that the citation derived from a lost passage of his commentary on Horace.

            It is evident, however, that the text as it has come down to us is a concise adaptation of an original, longer commentary on Horace. These scholia, “discendenti per vari rami da Porfirione e trascritti in margine ad un esemplare oraziano” (Lenchantin 1937 p. 161), were gathered into commentated editions, which then circulated independently of the Horatian text, and whose use began to spread only from the 8th-9th century. We can, in fact, identify some cultural tendencies typical of late antiquity in the commentary, foremost among which is the rhetorical character of the proposed exegesis. [C. Longobardi; trad. C. Beranger]