Santra

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Santra was a Roman scholar and playwright who lived around the middle of the 1st century BC. Worked.

Overview and works

The name Santra is of neither Italian nor Greek origin, which is why an Etruscan origin is assumed. The dates of his life are unknown, but are derived from his work and its aftermath.

Santra wrote at least three works of different genres:

  • De antiquitate verborum ("On the antiquity of words"), a treatise in at least three books on the age and origin of Latin words, in which the author devoted himself to etymological , lexical and antiquarian questions
  • De viris illustribus (“About famous men”), which, according to references in ancient literature, dealt with famous writers
  • Nuntii Bacchi ("The Messengers of Bacchus"), a tragedy from the myths of Dionysus

interpretation

In his chronological listing of Latin authors who published before him on viris illustribus ("famous men"), namely literature (gentilium litterarum) , the church father Hieronymus names Santra after Varro and before Cornelius Nepos , Gaius Iulius Hyginus and Suetonius Tranquillus , the model for the church father's own script. He will therefore have been a younger contemporary of Varros and worked in the time of Marcus Tullius Cicero . At least the Curtius Nicia, which Santra praises in a preserved fragment, was until 53 BC. Befriended Pompey and was still in 44 BC. In personal contact with Cicero.

Although Santra's works themselves are lost, he is one of the most frequently cited authorities, and Aulus Gellius places him as a recognized expert on the Latin language and its pronunciation rules, alongside Cincius , one of the first Roman historians, and Aelius Stilo , the oldest known philologist of the Roman Republic .

In the work of the lexicographer and grammarist Festus , a large part of the fragments that can be assigned to Santra's De antiquitate verborum have been preserved. The script was also mentioned by Nonius and the Veronese scholiast of Virgil's Aeneid . They testify to Santra's tendency to derive remote words from Greek , which Terentius Scaurus directly confirms.

The text De viris illustribus des Santra mentioned by Hieronymus cannot be explored more precisely. Three scattered statements by Santra are assigned to the work. First, there is a short note in Suetonius that Santra Scripture Lucilius about Gaius Lucilius Curtius Nicia, a freedman and friend of Pompey , have vowed. On the other hand, Suetonius quotes him in his Vita des Terence, handed down by Aelius Donatus, with regard to the relationship of this poet to the Scipions and his share in the poetic work of Terence. Finally, the work is assigned a statement by Santra on the origin of Asianism in rhetoric and its relationship to atticism , which has been preserved by the rhetorician Quintilian .

In addition to these philological and biographical writings, Nonius also passed on a poetic work of which he also quotes four verses in two fragments. They appear to be part of a tragedy, although it is not uncommon for scholars of this era to try their hand at producing literary works themselves. Martial demands of his overly strict readers that they should learn the “bumpy Santra” (salebrosum Santram) by heart.

Fragments

  • Hyginus Funaioli : Grammaticae Romanae fragmenta. Volume 1. Teubner, Leipzig 1907, pp. 384-389 ( digitized version ).
  • Otto Ribbeck : Scaenicae Romanorum poesis fragmenta. Third edition. Volume 1. Teubner, Leipzig 1897, p. 264.

literature

Remarks

  1. ^ Wilhelm Schulze : On the history of Latin proper names (= treatises of the Royal Society of Sciences in Göttingen. Philological-historical class. New series, volume 5,2). Weidmann, Berlin 1904, p. 342 ( digitized version ).
  2. ↑ Hieronymus, De viris illustribus Praefatio 3.
  3. ↑ Cicero, ad familiares 9.10; ad Atticum 12.26.
  4. ↑ Aulus Gellius, Noctes Atticae 7,15,5.
  5. ↑ With mention of the book title: Festus, De verborum significatu 173; 277. Without mentioning: Ibid. 170; 194; 254; 257.
  6. ^ Nonius, De compendiosa doctrina 117 M; 170 M.
  7. ↑ Scholion Veronensis to Virgil, Aeneid 5.95; 2.171.
  8. ↑ Terentius Scaurus 20.7.
  9. ↑ Suetonius, De grammaticis et rhetoribus 14 ( online ).
  10. ^ Donatus (= Suetonius), Vita Terenti 4.
  11. ↑ Quintilian, Institutionis Oratoriae 12,10,16.
  12. ^ Nonius, De compendiosa doctrina 78 M; 104 M.
  13. ↑ Martial 11,2,7.


personal data
SURNAME Santra
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Roman scholar and playwright
DATE OF BIRTH 2nd century BC BC or 1st century BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH 1st century BC Chr.