Telephus is probably taken from a lost play of Euripides, ridiculed by Aristophanes in his Acharnenses, from a scene of which it would seem that Telephus had appeared on the stage in tattered garments. The passages of the Latin play which remain, exhibit Telephus as an exile from his kingdom, wandering about in ragged habiliments. The lines of Horace, in his Art of Poetry, (a work which is devoted to the subject of the Roman drama,) are probably in allusion to this tragedy:

Yet this spiritless tragedy, was very popular in Rome, and continued to be frequently represented, till Varius treated the same subject in a manner, as we are informed by Quintilian, equal to the Greeks178.

It thus appears that Ennius has little claim to originality or invention as a tragic author. Perhaps it may seem remarkable, that a poet of his powerful genius did not rather write new plays, than copy servilely from the Greeks. But nothing is ever invented where borrowing will as well serve the purpose. Rome had few artists, in consequence of the facility with which the finest specimens of the arts were procured by plundering the towns of Sicily and Greece. Now, at the period in which Ennius flourished, the productions of Grecian literature were almost as new to the Romans as the most perfectly original compositions. Thus, the dramatic works of Ennius were possessed of equal novelty for his audience as if wholly his own; while a great deal of trouble was saved to himself. The example, however, was unfortunate, as it communicated to Roman literature a character of servility, and of imitation, or rather of translation, from the Greek, which so completely pervaded it, that succeeding poets were most faultless when they copied most closely, and at length, when they abandoned the guides whom they had so long followed, they fell into declamation and bombast. Probably, had the compositions of [pg 77]Ennius been original, they would have been less perfect, than by being thus imitated, or nearly translated, from the masterpieces of Greece. But the literature of his country might ultimately have attained a higher eminence. The imitative productions of Ennius may be likened to those trees which are transplanted when far advanced in growth. Much at first appears to have been gained; but it is certain, that he who sets the seedling is more useful than the transplanter, and that, while the trees removed from their native soil lose their original beauty and luxuriance without increase in magnitude, the seedling swells in its parent earth to immensity of size—fresh, blooming, and verdant in youth, vigorous in maturity, and venerable in old age.

Nor, although Ennius was the first writer who introduced satiric composition into Rome, are his pretensions, in this respect, to originality, very distinguished. He adapted the ancient satires of the Tuscan and Oscan stage to the closet, by refining their grossness, softening their asperity, and introducing railleries borrowed from the Greek poets, with whom he was familiar. His satires thus appear to have been a species of centos made up from passages of various poems, which, by slight alterations, were humorously or satirically applied, and chiefly to the delineation of character: “Carmen,” says Diomedes the grammarian, “quod ex variis poematibus constabat satira vocabatur, quale scripserunt Pacuvius et Ennius.” The fragments which remain of these satires are too short and broken to allow us even to divine their subject. That entitled Asotus vel Sotadicus, is the representation of a luxurious, dissolute man, and was so termed from Sotades, a voluptuous Cretan poet. Quintilian also mentions, that one of his satires contained a Dialogue between Life and Death, contending with each other, a mode of composition suggested perhaps by the celebrated allegory of Prodicus. We are farther informed by Aulus Gellius, that he introduced into another satire, with great skill and beauty, Æsop’s fable of the Larks179, now well known through the imitation of Fontaine180. The lark having built her nest among some early corn, feared that it might be reaped before her young ones were fit to take wing. She therefore desired them to report to her whatever conversation they might hear in the fields during her absence. They first informed her, that the husbandman had come to the spot, and desired his son to summon their neighbours and friends to assist in cutting the crop the next morning. The lark, on [pg 78]hearing this, declares, that there is no occasion to be in any haste in removing. On the following day, it is again reported, that the husbandman had desired that his relations should be requested to assist him; and the lark is still of opinion that there is no necessity to hurry away. At length, however, the young larks relate, that the husbandman had announced that he would execute the work himself. On hearing this, the old lark said it was now time to be gone. She accordingly removed her younglings, and the corn was immediately cut down by the master. From this tale Ennius deduces as the moral,

The great work, however, of Ennius, and of which we have still considerable remains, was his Annals, or metrical chronicles, devoted to the celebration of Roman exploits, from the earliest periods to the conclusion of the Istrian war. These Annals were written by our poet in his old age; at least, Aulus Gellius informs us, on the authority of Varro, that the twelfth book was finished by him in his sixty-seventh year181.

It may perhaps appear strange, that, when the fabulous exploits, the superstitions, the characters and the manners, of the heroic ages, were so admirably adapted for poetical imagery, and had been so successfully employed in Greece, the chief work of the Father of Roman Song should have been a sort of versified newspaper, like the Henriade of Voltaire, or the Araucana of Alonco de Ercilla: For in other countries poetry has been earliest devoted to the decoration of those marvels in which the amantes mira Camœnæ chiefly rejoice. In most lands, however, the origin of poetry was coeval with the rise of the nation, and every thing seems wondrous to an ignorant and timid race. The Greeks, in their first poetical age, peopled every grove and lake with fauns and naiads, or personified the primeval powers of nature. They sung the fables concerning their gods, and the exploits of heroes, in [pg 79]those ancient verses which have been combined in the Theogony attributed to Hesiod, and those immortal rhapsodies which have formed the basis of the Homeric poems. The marvellous vision of Dante was the earliest effort of the Italian muse; and some of the first specimens of verse in France and England were wild adventures in love or arms, interspersed with stories of demons and enchanters. But in Rome, though the first effort of the language was in poetry, five hundred years had elapsed from the foundation of the city before this effort was made. At that period, the Romans were a rude but rational race. The locks of Curius were perhaps uncombed; but though the Republic had as yet produced no character of literary elegance, she had given birth to Cincinnatus, and Fabricius, and Camillus. Her citizens had neither been rendered timid nor indolent by their superstitions, but were actively employed in agriculture or in arms. They were a less contemplative and imaginative race than the Greeks. Their spirit was indeed sufficiently warlike; but that peculiar spirit of adventure, (which characterised the early ages of Greece, and the middle ages of modern Europe,) had, if it ever existed, long ago ceased in Rome. By this time, the Roman armies were too well disciplined, and the system of warfare too regular, to admit a description of the picturesque combats of the Greek and Trojan charioteers. Poetry was thus too late in its birth to take a natural flight. In such circumstances, the bard, however rich or lofty might be his conceptions, would not listen to his own taste or inspiration, but select the theme which was likely to prove most popular; and the Romans, being a national and ambitious people, would be more gratified by the jejune relation of their own exploits, than by the speciosa miracula of the most sublime or romantic invention.

The Annals of Ennius were partly founded on those ancient traditions and old heroic ballads, which Cicero, on the authority of Cato’s Origines, mentions as having been sung at feasts by the guests, many centuries before the age of Cato, in praise of the heroes of Rome182. Niebuhr has attempted to show, that all the memorable events of Roman history had been versified in ballads, or metrical chronicles, in the Saturnian measure, before the time of Ennius; who, according to him, merely expressed in the Greek hexameter, what his predecessors had delivered in a ruder strain, and then maliciously depreciated these ancient compositions, in order that he himself might be considered as the founder of Roman poetry183. [pg 80]The devotion of the Decii, and death of the Fabian family,—the stories of Scævola, Cocles, and Coriolanus,—Niebuhr believes to have been the subjects of romantic ballads. Even Fabius Pictor, according to this author, followed one of these old legends in his narrative concerning Mars and the Wolf, and his whole history of Romulus. Livy, too, in his account of the death of Lucretia, has actually transcribed from one of these productions; since what Sextus says, on entering the chamber of Lucretia, is nearly in the Saturnian measure:—

But the chief work, according to Niebuhr, from which Ennius borrowed, was a romantic epopee, or chronicle, made up from these heroic ballads about the end of the fourth century of Rome, commencing with the accession of Tarquinius Priscus, and ending with the battle of Regillus. The arrival, says Niebuhr, of that monarch under the name of Lucumo—his exploits and victories—his death—then the history of Servius Tullius—the outrageous pride of Tullia—the murder of the lawful monarch—the fall of the last Tarquin, preceded by a supernatural warning—Lucretia—Brutus and the truly Homeric battle of Regillus—compose an epic, which, in poetical incident, and splendour of fancy, surpasses everything produced in the latter ages of Rome185. The battle of Regillus, in particular, as described by the annalists, bears evident marks of its poetical origin. It was not a battle between two hosts, but a struggle of heroes. As in the fights painted in the Iliad, the champions meet in single combat, and turn by individual exertions the tide of victory. The dictator Posthumius wounds King Tarquin, whom he had encountered at the first onset. The Roman knight Albutius engages with the Latin chief Mamilius, but is wounded by him, and forced to quit the field. Mamilius then nearly breaks the Roman line, but is slain by the Consul Herminius, which decides the fate of the day. After the battle of Regillus, all the events are not so completely poetical; but in the siege of Veii we have a representation of the ten years war of Troy. The secret introduction of the troops by Camillus into the middle of the city resembles the story of the wooden horse, and the Etruscan statue of Juno corresponds to the Trojan Palladium186.

Any period of history may be thus exhibited in the form of an epic cycle; and, though there can be little doubt of the [pg 81]existence of ancient Saturnian ballads at Rome, I do not think that Niebuhr has adduced sufficient proof or authority for his magnificent epopee, commencing with the accession of Tarquin, and ending with the battle of Regillus. With regard to the accusation against Ennius, of depreciating the ancient materials which he had employed, it is founded on the contempt which he expresses for the verses of the Fauns and the Prophets. His obligations, if he owed any, he has certainly nowhere acknowledged, at least in the fragments which remain; and he rather betrays an anxiety, at the commencement of his poem, to carry away the attention of the reader from the Saturnian muses, and direct it to the Grecian poets,—to Pindus, and the nymphs of Helicon.

The reigns of the kings, and the contests of the republic with the neighbouring states previous to the Punic war, occupy the metrical annals to the end of the sixth book189, which concludes with the following noble answer of Pyrrhus to the Roman ambassadors, who came to ransom the prisoners taken from them by that prince in battle:—

Cicero, in his Brutus, says, that Ennius did not treat of the first Punic war, as Nævius had previously written on that subject191; to which prior work Ennius thus alludes:—

P. Merula, however, who edited the fragments of Ennius, is of opinion, that this passage of Cicero can only mean that he had not entered into much detail of its events, as he finds several lines in the seventh book, which, he thinks, evidently apply to the first Carthaginian war, particularly the description of naval preparations, and the building of the first fleet with which the Carthaginians were attacked by the Romans. In some of the editions of Ennius, the character of the friend and military adviser of Servilius, generally supposed to be intended as a portrait of the poet himself192, is ranged under the seventh book:—

The eighth and ninth books of these Annals, which are much mutilated, detailed the events of the second Carthaginian war in Italy and Africa. This was by much the most interesting part of the copious subject which Ennius had chosen, and a portion of it on which he would probably exert all the force of his genius, in order the more to honour his friend and patron Scipio Africanus. The same topic was selected by Silius Italicus, and by Petrarch for his Latin poem Africa, which obtained him a coronation in the Capitol. “Ennius,” says the illustrious Italian, “has sung fully of Scipio; but, in the opinion of Valerius Maximus, his style is harsh and vulgar, and there is yet no elegant poem which has for its subject the glorious exploits of the conqueror of Hannibal.” None of the poets who have chosen this topic, have done full justice to the most arduous struggle in which two powerful nations had ever engaged, and which presented the most splendid display of military genius on the one hand, and heroic virtue on the other, that had yet been exhibited to the world. Livy’s histo[pg 85]rical account of the second Punic war possesses more real poetry than any poem on the subject whatever.

a passage which has been closely imitated in the seventh book of Virgil:

The fifteenth book related the expedition of Fulvius Nobilior to Ætolia, which Ennius himself is said to have accompanied. In the two following books he prosecuted the Istrian war; which concludes with the following animated description of a single hero withstanding the attack of an armed host:—

Connected with his Annals, there was a poem of Ennius devoted to the celebration of the exploits of Scipio, in which occurs a much-admired description of the calm of Evening, where the flow of the versification is finely modulated to the still and solemn imagery:—

With this first attempt at descriptive poetry in the Latin language, it may be interesting to compare a passage produced in the extreme old age of Roman literature, which also paints, by nearly the same images, the profound repose of Nature:—

Horace, in one of his odes, strongly expresses the glory and honour which the Calabrian muse of Ennius had conferred on Scipio by this poem, devoted to his praise:

The historical poems of Ennius appear to have been written without the introduction of much machinery or decorative fiction; and whether founded on ancient ballads, according to one opinion199, or framed conformably to historical truth, according to another200, they were obviously deficient in those embellishments of imagination which form the distinction between a poem and a metrical chronicle. In the subject which he had chosen, Ennius wanted the poetic advantages of distance in place or of time. It perhaps matters little whether the ground-work of a heroic poem be historical or entirely fictitious, if free scope be given for the excursions of fancy. But, in order that it may sport with advantage, the event must be remote in time or in place; and if this rule be observed, such subjects as those chosen by Camoens or Tasso admit of as much colouring and embellishment as the Faery Queen. It is in this that Lucan and Voltaire have erred; and neither the soaring genius of the one, nor brilliancy of the other, could raise their themes, splendid as they were, from the dust, or steep the mind in those reveries in which we indulge on subjects where there is no visible or known bound to credulity and imaginings. Still the Annals of Ennius, as a national work, were highly gratifying to a proud ambitious people, and, in consequence, continued long popular at Rome. They were highly relished in the age of Horace and Virgil; and, as far down as the time of Marcus Aurelius, they were recited in theatres and other public places for the amusement of the people201. The Romans, indeed, were so formed on his style, that Seneca called them populus Ennianus—an Ennian race,—and said, that both Cicero and Virgil were obliged, contrary to their own judgment, to employ antiquated terms, in compliance with the reigning prejudice202. From his example, too, added to the national character, the historical epic became in future times the great poetical resource of the Romans, who versified almost every important event in their history. Besides the Pharsalia of Lucan, and Punica of Silius Italicus, which still survive, there were many works of this description which are now lost. Varro Atacinus chose as his subject Cæsar’s war with the Sequani—Varius, the deeds of Augustus and Agrippa—Valgius Rufus, the battle of Actium—Albinovanus, the exploits of Germanicus—Cicero, those of Marius, and the events of his own consulship.

Homer’s lines are the following:—

In order to afford an opportunity of judging of Ennius’s talents for imitation, I have subjoined from the two poets, who carried that art to the greatest perfection, corresponding passages, which are both evidently founded on the same Greek original—