Grammatici Latini, VI. Scriptores artis metricae. Marius Victorinus, Maximus Victorinus, Caesius Bassus etc., ex recensione H. Keilii, Hildesheim 1961, 638, 23-639, 12 (reprografischer Nachdruck der Ausgabe Leipzig 1874)

Grammatici Latini VI. Scriptores artis metricae. Marius Victorinus, Maximus Victorinus, Caesius Bassus etc., ex recensione H. Keilii, Hildesheim 1961, 638, 23-639, 12 (scanned reprint of the 1874 Leipzig edition).

The codex of Sankt-Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek 876 (S) is the unique witness for the texts edited by Keil in the Fragmenta Sangallensia (for a description of the codex and its contents, Holtz 1981, De Paolis 2003, Romanini 2007, CXXXVII-CXXXIX; the manuscript is available through the link http://www.e-codices.unifr.ch/it/list/one/csg/0876). Probably copied at St. Gall at the end of the eighth century or the beginning of the next, this manuscript was the result of the union of more contemporary grammatical collections, or fragments thereof, which occurred in the same St Gall scriptorium in the first years of the ninth century (Holtz 1981, 365). Holtz distinguished four sections of texts there: the first, second, and fourth include all the works of Donatus or writings connected to them, while the third (pp. 129-284) is a collection of more and less ancient texts on prosody and metre, from Mallius Theodorus to Bede. In this third section, which spans pages 137-144, the Fragmenta Sangallensia appear under the title De scansione heroyci versus et specia eorum. The Fragmentum Berolinese de speciebus hexametri heroici is inserted between the two sections de scansione heroici versus and de iambico trimetro, though it is mutilated at the end. In GL VI 634, 10-636, 23 it is edited by Keil based on the Berlin codex, Staatsbibl. Preussicher Kulturbesitz, Dietz B. Sant. 66.

            We do not possess information on the author of the fragment, which is dedicated to the reading of iambic trimeter. It examines the resolutions and possible substitutions of the iamb, namely the tribrach and the four morae feet, dactyl, spondee, and anapest. Keil already observed how the anonymous compiler reshapes the teaching relevant to tragic verse that is found in Aphthonius, GL VI 80.7-30: the iambic trimeter is suited to the tragic style if the iambs are found in an even-numbered position — it remains understood in the St Gall text that improbatur autem apud tragicos versus ex omnibus iambis compositus (Aphthonius, GL VI 80, 27-28) and that then tetrabrachic feet are inserted in odd-numbered intervals. More generally, the entire fragment appears to be a synthesis of a passage in the second book of Aphthonius’ ars, which addresses the possible positions of the different feet in iambic verse. The examples lead us to believe that the anonymous grammarian did not lack in a certain originality: even when they are borrowed from Horace’s Epodes (Hor. Ep. 1.1; 2.33; 2.35), following the scholastic tradition, and when they recur among the ancient scholars who studied meter (Terentianus Maurus, Aphthonius, Atilius Fortunatianus), the verses are repurposed in a new way, because they are altered to illustrate the scansion of the trimeter. The fact that Hor. Ep. 2.33 is not otherwise attested among the grammarians testifies in favour of the author’s direct knowledge of Horace’s text. In these aspects and in the reorganization of Aphthonius, the author’s methodology in this fragment bears similarities to that of the author of the later chapters de pentametro and de epodo octosyllabo. [M. Callipo, tr. C. Belanger]