and contradictory are the records of this period, that it is impossible to arrange the events in regular order, or to speak with any certainty of the details. We should have imagined that little difficulty could have been found in fixing the precise date of the capture and sack of Antioch, the destruction of its edifices, and the massacre of its population, a catastrophe which must have caused a profound sensation throughout the civilised world, yet we cannot decide whether these things happened during the reign of Gallus, of Valerian, or of Gallienus. In like manner it is hard to decide in what year Valerian was made prisoner, although the weight of evidence is in favour of A. D. 260. (Trebell. Poll. Frag. Vit. Valerian.; Aurel. Vict. de Caes. xxxii., Epit. xxxii.; Eutrop. ix. 6; Amm. Marc. xxiii. 5; Zosim. i. 27, foll. iii. 32; Zonar. xii. 23; Eckhel, vol. vii. p. 387.) [W.R.] COIN OF VALERIANUS. tion of the bishop of Vaison (Episcopus Vasensis), and he is further believed to be the Valerianus who assisted at the councils of Ries (A. D. 439) and Arles (A. D. 455), but these and other suppositions rest upon no basis more stable than simple conjecture. The Sermo de Bono Disciplinae was first published as the work of Valerianus by Melchior Goldastus, 8vo. Gen. 1601, and ten years afterwards Sirmond discovered in a MS. belonging to the monastery of Corvey on the Weser nineteen discourses, together with an Epistola ad Monachos de Virtutibus et Ordine Doctrinue Apostolicae, purporting to be the production of Valerianus Episcopus. Although the codex in question did not contain the homily De Bono Disciplinae, nor indicate the site of the bishopric of this Valerianus, Sirmond concluded from the style that the whole of these pieces must unquestionably be ascribed to Valerianus Cemeliensis, and accordingly printed an octavo volume at Paris in 1612 with the title Sancti Valeriani Episcopi Cemeliensis Homiliae XX. Item Epistola ad Monachos de Virtutibus et Ordine Doctrinae Apostolicae. Omnia primum praeter uncam Homiliam post annos plus minus mille ducentos in lucem edita a Jacobo Sirmondo Societatis Jesu Presbytero anno M.DCXII. These tracts will be found also in the collected works of Sirmond, vol. i. p. 604. fol. Paris, 1696, in the Bibliotheca Patrum Maxima, vol. viii. p. 498, fol. Lugd. 1677, and under their best form in the Bibliotheca Patrum of Galland, vol. x. p. 123, fol. Venet. 1774. (Schoenemann, Biblioth. Patrum Lat. vol. ii. § 38.) [W. R.] VALERIA'NUS PAETUS, one of the many victims of the suspicious cruelty of Elagabalus. (Dion Cass. lxxix. 4.) [W. R.] VALERIA/NUS JU'NIOR, a son of the emperor Valerianus, but not by the same mother as Gallienus. He was remarkable for the beauty of his person, the modesty of his address, the high cultivation of his mind, and the purity of his morals in which he exhibited a marked contrast to his dissolute brother, along with whom he perished VALERIA'NUS, C. PLINIUS, a physician, at Milan in A. D. 268. [GALLIENUS.] Trebellius whose date is unknown, who died at the early age Pollio affirms that he received the title of Caesar of twenty-two, and whose name is preserved in a from his father, and of Augustus from Gallienus, Latin inscription found at Como. (Gruter, Inscr. i. but this assertion is not supported by the Fasti 635.) To him is attributed (but apparently withnor by any other historical evidence, while Eckhel out any very good reason) a Latin medical work has adduced many weighty arguments to prove entitled "Medicinae Plinianae Libri Quinque," that he never could have enjoyed either of these which is supposed to have been written about the appellations, and that all the coins ascribed to him fourth century after Christ. It is a book on dobelong in reality to his nephew Saloninus. (Trebell. mestic medicine, compiled from Pliny, Dioscorides, Poll. Valerian. jun.; Eutrop. ix. 8; Zonar. xii. 24, Galen, Alexander Trallianus, and others, and is according to whom young Valerianus was slain not not of much value. The first three books treat of at Milan, but at Rome, along with the son of different diseases, beginning with the head and Gallienus, after the death of the latter. See also descending to the feet, and contain an account of a Eckhel, vol. vii. pp. 432, 436, and the dissertation great number of medicines, taken partly from of Brequigny in the Mémoires de l'Academie de Pliny and partly from later writers. The fourth Sciences et Belles Lettres, vol. xxxii. p. 274.) [W.R.] book treats of the properties of plants, and is in a VALERIA NUS, CORNELIUS. [SALONI- great measure taken from Galen; and the fifth, NUS.] [W. R.] which is almost entirely taken from Alexander VALERIA'NUS, with the title Episcopus Trallianus, treats of the diet suitable to different Cemeliensis, is the name attached in a single MS. diseases. The work was first published at Rome to a discourse De Bono Disciplinae, frequently 1509, fol., edited by Th. Pighinuccius. There is printed among the works of St. Augustine, but no (according to Haller) a much more accurate ediauthor bearing this designation has been com- tion, published Bonon. 1516, fol. It is also inmemorated by Gennadius, by Isidorus, nor by any serted in Alban Thorer's (Torinus) Collection, other compiler of ecclesiastical biographies. Ceme- Basil. 1528, fol., and in the Aldine Collection of lium was a village in the neighbourhood of Nice," Medici Antiqui," Venet. 1547, fol. There is the episcopate of which was, by a decree of Pope Leo the Great, conjoined with that of Nice, so that after that period it did not form an independent diocese a fact which determines one limit with regard to the age of Valerianus. He is believed to be identical with the Valerianus to whom, in common with other bishops of southern Gaul, a letter was addressed by Leo touching the ordina VOL. III. a learned dissertation by J. G. Günz (which the Writer has never seen), entitled "De Auctore Operis de Re Medica, vulgo Plinio Valeriano adscripti," Lips. 1736, 4to, in which the author tries to prove that the work in question was written by Siburius. (See Fabricius, Bibl. Lat.; Haller, Bibl. Med. Pract.; Choulant, Handb. der Bücherkunde für die Aeltere Medicin; Penny Cyclop.) [W. A. G.] 41 VALERIUS, artists. 1. Of Ostia. The architect of the covered theatre erected at Rome for the games of Libo. (Plin. H. N. xxxvi. 15. s. 24.) Pliny does not say which Libo he refers to; but it is likely to have been L. Scribonius Libo, who in his curule aedileship, with his colleague C. Atilius Serranus, first celebrated the Megalesia as ludi scenici, B. C. 193. [LIBO, SCRIBONIUS, No. 3]. cuse him, and also instructed Sosibius, who was then a slave or a freedman in the palace, to caution Claudius against the power and wealth of Valerius. This was in A. D. 47, the year following his second consulship. Valerius had in the preceding year voluntarily resigned his consulship after holding it for a short time, in order to avoid the envy of which he was the subject. Suillius accused him of the part he had taken in Caligula's death, and of an intention of setting out to the German armies with a view of aspiring to the empire, since he was born at Vienna (Vienne) in Gaul and had many connections in that part of the Ro 2. M. VALERIUS M. F. ARTEMA, an architect, who is mentioned in an extant inscription. (Sillig, Cat. Artif. Append. s. v. Artema; R. Rochette, Lettre à M. Schorn, p. 422, 2d. ed.) 3. D. VALERIUS L. F., described as Vascula-man world. The weak and credulous emperor was rius, that is, a maker of bronze vases, in two inscriptions found at Tusculum, of which place he was a native or a citizen, for in one of the inscriptions he is styled Tusculan. (Muratori, Thes. vol. i. p. xii. 12, p. xiv. 6; R. Rochette, l. c.) easily persuaded. Valerius was apprehended at Baiae. The senate was not summoned, but he was brought into the emperor's chamber, where Suillius laid various crimes to his charge. Valerius defended himself with spirit, and the emperor would have acquitted him had it not been for Messalina, who got Vitellius, then consul for the third time, to persuade the emperor to sentence him to death. He was allowed the choice of his death, and died by opening his veins. (Dion Cass. lix. 30; Joseph. xix. 1; Sen. de Const. Sap. 18; Tac. Ann. xi. 1—3, xiii. 43; Dion Cass. lx. 27, 29, 31.) 4. C. VALERIUS ANEMESTIONE C. Ius, is the form in which a Cordovan inscription gives the name of an artist in metal, who made the embossed vessels called anaglypta. He is styled in the inscription Caelator Anaglytarius, but there can be no doubt that the last word is an error for Anaglyptarius. (Muratori, Thes. vol. ii. p. cmlxxxi. 9; R. Rochette, l. c.) [P.S.] VALERIUS AEDITUUS. In the ninth 2. P. VALERIUS ASIATICUS, the legatus of the chapter of the nineteenth book of the Noctes At-province of Gallia Belgica at the death of Nero, ticae a certain rhetorician Julianus, when challenged to point out anything in the Latin language worthy of being compared with the graceful effusions of Anacreon, and other bards of that class among the Greeks, quotes two short epigrams by Valerius Aedituus, who is simply described as "veteris poetae," one by Porcius Licinius, and one by Quintus Catulus. Upon these collectively A. Gellius pronounces "mundius, venustius, limatius, pressius, Graecumve Latinumve nihil quidquam reperiri puto." They unquestionably merit high commendation, but are so evidently derived from some Greek source, that they could scarcely be adduced with fairness as specimens of the Roman lyric muse. Judging from the language and versification we may assign them to a period about B. c. 100. (Gell. xix. 9; Anthol. Lat. iii. 242, 243, ed. Burmann, or Nos. 27, 28, ed. Meyer.) [W.R.] VALE'RIUS A'NTIAS. [ANTIAS.] VALERIUS ASIATICUS. 1. P. VALERIUS ASIATICUS, consul suffectus under Caligula, but in what year is uncertain, and a second time consul under Claudius in A. D. 46 with M. Junius Silanus. Valerius was a friend of Caligula, but, having received a gross insult from him, rejoiced at his death. When the praetorian troops, after the assassination of the emperor, were seeking for the murderer in order to wreak their vengeance on him, Valerius stood up in a conspicuous place❘ and exclaimed "Would that I had killed him," by which act of courage the soldiers were so astonished that they returned quietly to their quarters. Valerius was very wealthy and this proved his ruin. The empress Messalina coveted his splendid gardens, which were the same as Lucullus had originally laid out, and which Valerius had made still more magnificent. She also suspected him of being one of the paramours of the beautiful Poppaea Sabina, the mother of Nero's wife, whom she both feared and detested; and she therefore resolved to crush Valerius and Poppaea at the same time. She employed Suillius to ac espoused the cause of Vitellius at the beginning of A. D. 69, and soon afterwards married the daughter of Vitellius. On the fall of Vitellius he hastened to make his peace with the generals of Vespasian, and as consul designatus spoke in the senate in favour of their proposals. He was allowed in consequence to enjoy the consulship as suffectus in the following year, A. D. 70. (Tac. Hist. i. 59, iv. 4, 6.) 1 3. VALERIUS ASIATICUS, consul under Hadrian A. D. 125 with Titius Aquilinus (Fasti). VALERIUS BASSIA'NUS, slain by Commodus. (Lamprid. Commod. 7.) M. VALE RIUS BRA'DUA, consul under Commodus A. D. 191 with Pedo Apronianus (Fasti). C. VALE'RIUS CABURNUS. [PROCILLUS.] VALE'RIUS CA/PITO, banished by Agrippina, was after her death recalled from exile by Nero. (Tac. Ann. xiv. 12.) VALERIUS CATULI NUS, was sent by Julianus to succeed Septimius Severus in the govern ment of Illyricum, when the latter assumed the imperial title. Valerius was afterwards killed by Septimius. (Spartian. Julian, 5, Sever. 13.) VALERIUS CATO. [CATO.] VALERIUS CATULLUS. [CATULLUS] VALERIUS CONSTANTINUS. [CoxSTANTINUS I.] VALE RIUS CONSTANTIUS. [CONSTANTIUS.] VALE'RIUS DIOCLETIA'NUS. [DIOCLE TIANUS.] VALERIUS DIODO'RUS. literary, No. 2.] [DIODORUS, VALERIUS EUTYCHIA'NUS COMA- VALERIUS FÁBIA'NUS. [FABIANUS] VALGIUS. His joke against the emperor is recorded by Capitolinus (M. Ant. Phil. 6). He may have been a descendant of the Titius Homullus, whom the younger Pliny speaks of as one of the orators of his time (Ep. iv. 9, v. 20, vi. 19). VALERIUS, JULIUS. Angelo Mai printed in the seventh volume of his " Classici Auctores e Vaticanis codicibus editi" (8vo. Rom. 1835) from one Ambrosian and two Vatican MSS. an historical tract inscribed Julii Valerii viri clarissimi Res Gestae Alexandri Macedonis translatae ex Aesopo Graeco, and in his "Spicilegium Romanum" (8vo. Rom. 1842) he added some new matter obtained from a Turin MS. The work, as the title imports, is taken from the Greek of Aesopus, and the original must have been composed before the middle of the fourth century, and probably before the division of the empire, since the temple of Serapis which was destroyed in a. D. 389 by an edict of Theodosius, and the tomb of Alexander which had been removed in the age of Chrysostom, are both spoken of as if standing in their original state (i. 30, iii. 57), while in describing the dimensions of the most famous cities (i. 20) no notice is taken of Constantinople. We cannot determine with the same certainty a limit for the period when the translation was executed, but judging from the general tone of the Latinity it could not have been later than the beginning of the fifth century. This piece, although published for the first time by Mai, was known to Vincent of Beauvais, to Saumaise, to Chifflet, and to many other critics. It is by no means undeserving of attention; the style is lively and attractive, and, although many of the statements are evidently fabulous, much curious information may be gleaned from it with regard to the affairs of Egypt and especially of Alexandria. The author was probably a native of that city (i. 27); and it has been conjectured, from some peculiarities in the language, that Valerius was an African. (See the prefatory remarks of Mai in his "Classici Auctores.") [W.R.] VALERIUS LARGUS. [LARGUS.] VALERIUS LICINIA'NUS. NUS.] [LICINIA VALE'RIUS LIGUR, praefectus of the praetorian cohorts under Augustus. (Dion Cass. lx. 23.) VALERIUS MARCELLI'NUS, a Roman historian, who wrote the lives of some of the emperors. (Capitol. Maxim, et Balbin. 4.) VALERIUS MARINUS, had been named one of the consuls by Galba for the year 69 A. D., but was deprived of the intended honour by Vitellius. (Tac. Hist. ii. 71.) VALERIUS MARTIA'LIS. [MARTIALIS.] ANUS.] VALE/RIUS MAXIMI'NUS. [MAXIMINUS.] [PRAE VALERIUS PRISCUS. [PRISCUS.] VALERIUS THEON. [THEON, No. 6.] [VALENVALERIUS VALENTINUS. TINUS.] VALGIUS. 1. The father-in-law of Rullus, who proposed the agrarian law in the consulship of Cicero, which was opposed by the latter. It appears from Cicero that Valgius had obtained much confiscated property in the time of Sulla. (Cic. de Leg. Agr. iii. 1.) 2. A. VALGIUS, the son of a senator, deserted the Pompeian party in the Spanish war B. c. 45, and went over to Caesar. (Auctor, B. Hisp. 13.) 3. C. VALGIUS HIPPIANUS, the son of Q. Hippius, was adopted by a certain C. Valgius. (Cic. ad Fam. xiii. 76.) For details see HIPPIUS. C. VA'LGIUS RUFUS. 1. Horace, in the tenth satire of his first book, composed, according to Bentley, not later than B. c. 38, where he defends and explains the criticism he had formerly passed upon Lucilius, ranks Valgius (b. 81) along with Varius, Maecenas and Virgil among those friends of genius and sound judgment whose approbation far more than compensated for the annoyance caused by the attacks of his detractors. 2. Again, in the ninth ode of the second book, written about B. c. 23 or 20, he endeavours to congiving vent in sole Valgius whom he represents as tearful strains to the grief caused by the loss of his favourite Mystes. The personage here addressed is termed by the old scholiast upon Horace " Valgium consularem." 66 3. Servius, in his commentary on Virgil, twice refers (ad Virg. vii. 22, ad Aen. xi. 457) to " Valgius in elegis." From the expressions used in the first passage we might infer that this Valgius was a contemporary of Virgil, in the second a couplet is Another couplet from quoted from his poems. "Valgius" is to be found in Isidorus (Orig. xix. 4. s. v. remulcum). 4. C. Valgius appears from some Fasti to have been consul suffectus in B. c. 12. Comp. Gruter, p. ccxcviii. 1. 5. Pliny (H. N. xxv. 2) makes mention of a "C. Valgius eruditione spectatus," who commenced a treatise upon medicinal plants which he dedicated to Augustus, but did not complete the work. 6. In the Panegyric on Messala contained among the works of Tibullus we read (180) "Est tibi, qui possit magnis se accingere rebus, Valgius, aeterno propior non alter Homero," from which it has been concluded that Valgius was No epic poet of that the author of heroic strains. name, however, is mentioned by Quintilian, nor is any notice to be discovered in the grammarians of a work which, if the above couplet be not ridiculously hyperbolical, must have attracted general attention. This circumstance, however, need occasion little surprise when we recollect that the piece in which these lines occur is believed by the best critics not to be the production of Tibullus but a rhetorical essay belonging to a much later period. 7. Philargyrius (ad Virg. Georg. iii. 176) cites two hexameter lines from "Valgius" which appear to be taken from a pastoral. 8. Charisius (p. 84, ed. Putsch.) produces a verse from "Valgius in epigrammate " to illustrate the gender of the word margarita. 9. Donatus, in his life of Terence, quotes three Iambics from "Valgius in Actaeone," which affirm that Terence published, under his own name, dramas 412 which were in reality the property of Scipio, and hence Valgius has been ranked among the writers of comedy, although there is no proof that Actaeon was a play of any kind. 10. Quintilian tells us (iii. 1. § 18, comp. iii. 5. § 17, v. 10. § 4) that the precepts of the Greek rhetorician Apollodorus who gave instructions at Apollonia to Augustus (Suet. Octav. 89) may best be learned from his disciples, of whom the most diligent in translating them into Latin "fuit C. Valgius Graece Atticus." He adds that the only genuine production of Valgius upon this subject was entitled Ars edita ad Matium, that others had indeed been ascribed to him, but that he had not acknowledged them in his letter to Domitius. 11. Gellius (xii. 3) speaks of "Valgius Rufus " and Charisius (p. 84, ed. Putsch.) of " Valgius" as the author of some grammatical investigations called Res per epistolam quaesitae. They extended to two books at least, and probably were something of the same kind as the Epistolicae Quaestiones of Varro (Gell. xiv. 7). 12. Festus (s. v. secus) and Charisius (p. 116, ed. Putsch.) refer to Valgius on matters connected with grammar. 13. Diomedes (p. 382, ed. Putsch.) gives two words from "Valgius de Tralatione." 14. Finally, Seneca says (Ep. xli. § 1) that "Valgius" applied the epithet unicus to mount Aetna, and Charisius (p. 79, ed. Putsch.) gives an example from "Valgius" of lacte as a nominative. It is perfectly manifest that the evidence contained in the above paragraphs is far from being sufficient to enable us to decide anything with certainty regarding the person or persons named. We may fairly surmise that the Valgius of (1) is the same with the Valgius of (2) and perhaps of (3) and (4) also. Beyond this we cannot advance without losing ourselves in a haze of dim conjecture. The assertion of Broukhusius (ad Tibull. iv. 1. 80) that there were two distinguished writers in the Augustan age both named Valgius Rufus, but distinguished from each other by difference of praenomen, namely, C. Valgius Rufus, the consular and prose writer, and T. Valgius Rufus, the poet, is altogether destitute of any firm foundation, for no authority whatsoever can be adduced for the existence of a T. Valgius Rufus. (All the matters connected with this inquiry are very fully discussed by Weichert, in his Poetarum Lat. Reliquiae (8vo. Lips. 1830, p. 203-240), who in p. 233, foll. has collected a few mutilated fragments bearing the name of Valgius.) [W.R.] VA'LLIUS SYRIACUS. [SYRIACUS.] VA'NGIO. [VANNIUS.] attempt to murder Cn. Varenus. He was defended by Cicero in a speech which is lost, but was condemned. (Quintil. x. 13. § 28, vii. 1. § 9, ix. 2. § 56; Cic. Fragm. vol. iv. p. 443, Orelli; Drumann, Geschichte Roms, vol. v. pp. 244, 245.) 2. A centurion in Caesar's army distinguished himself, along with T. Pulfio, by a daring act of bravery, when the camp of Q. Cicero was besieged by the Nervii in B. c. 54. (Caes. B. G. v. 45.) VA'RGULA, a friend of C. Julius Caesar Strabo, was noted as a wit. (Cic. de Orat. ii. 60.) VARGUNTEIUS. 1. L. VARGUNTEIUS, a senator and one of Catiline's conspirators, undertook, in conjunction with C. Cornelius, to murder Cicero in B. c. 63, but their plan was frustrated by information conveyed to Cicero through Fulvia. He was afterwards brought to trial, but could find no one to defend him, not even Hortensius, who had defended him on a former occasion when he was accused of bribery. (Sall. Cat. 17, 28, 47, pro Sull. 2.) 2. VARGUNTEIUS, legatus of Crassus, in the Parthian war, in which he perished, B. c. 54. (Plut. Crass. 28.) 3. Q. VARGUNTEIUS, a Roman grammarian, who used to lecture on the Annals of Ennius. (Suet. de Ill. Gram. 2.) 4. M. VARGUNTEIUS, is mentioned on coins, a specimen of which is annexed. The obverse represents the head of Pallas with M. VARG., the reverse Jupiter in a quadriga with ROMA below. (Eckhel, vol. v. p. 335.) ROMA COIN OF VARGUNTEIUS. VARI'LIA, APPULEIA. [APPULEIUS, VARI'NIUS GLABER. [GLABER.] VA'RIUS. 1. Q. VARIUS HYBRIDA, tribune of the plebs, B. C. 90, was a native of Sucro in Spain, and received the surname of Hybrida, because his mother was a Spanish woman. He is called by Cicero vastus homo atque foedus, but nevertheless obtained considerable power in the state by his eloquence. In his tribuneship he proposed a lex de majestate, in order to punish all those who had assisted or advised the Socii to take up arms against the Roman people. He brought forward this law at the instigation of the equites, who made common cause with the people against the reforms of Drusus; and as they possessed the judicia at this time, they hoped by banishing the most distinguished senators to get the whole power of the state into their hands. The senators used all their influence to prevent the proposition from passing into a law. The L. VARE NUS. 1. Was accused, probably other tribunes put their veto upon it, but the about B. c. 80 or 79 under the Cornelia law de equites with drawn swords compelled them to Sicariis, of the murder of C. Varenus, and of angive way, and the law was carried. The equites VA'NNIUS, a chief of the Quadi, was made king of the Suevi by Germanicus in A. D. 19; but after holding the power for thirty years he was driven out of his kingdom in the reign of Claudius, A. D. 50, by Vibillius the king of the Hermunduri, and his own nephews Vangio and Sido, the sons of his sister. Vannius received from Claudius a settlement in Pannonia, and his kingdom was divided between Vangio and Sido. (Tac. Ann. ii. 63, xii. 29, 30; Vannianum regnum, Plin. H. N. iv. 25.) VARANES, the name of six Persian kings of the dynasty of the Sassanidae. [SASSANIDAE, p. 715.] quickly put the law into execution. Bestia and Cotta went voluntarily into exile, and other distinguished men were condemned. Varius even accused M. Scaurus, the princeps senatus, who was then seventy-two years of age, but was obliged to drop this accusation. [SCAURUS, p. 736, b.] Varius himself was condemned under his own law in the following year, and was put to death. (Appian, B. C. i. 37; Val. Max. viii. 6. §4; Cic. de Orat. i. 25, Brut. 62; Val. Max. iii. 7. § 8; Cic. pro Scaur. i; Ascon. in Scaur. p. 22, ed. Orelli; Cic. Brut. 56, de Nat. Deor. iii. 33.) Cicero in the passage last quoted accuses Varius of the murder of Drusus and Metellus. 2. M. VARIUS, or M. MARIUS, as he is called by Plutarch and Orosius, a Roman senator, was sent by Sertorius to Mithridates in B. c. 75, when he made a treaty with him, in order that Varius might command the forces of the king. Varius is afterwards mentioned as one of the generals of Mithridates in the war with Lucullus. (Appian, Mithr. 68, 76, foll.; Plut. Sert. 24, Lucull. 8; Oros, vi. 2.) 3. P. VARIUS, defrauded Caecilius, the uncle of Atticus, of a large sum of money. (Cic. ad Att. i. 1.) 4. Q. VARIUS, one of the witnesses against Verres. (Cic. Verr. ii. 48.) 5. P. VARIUS, a judex at the trial of Milo, had been ill-treated by P. Clodius. (Cic. pro Mil. 27.) VARIUS COTYLA. [COTYLA.] VA'RIUS LIGUR. [LIGUR.] VA'RIUS MARCELLUS. [MARCELLUS.] L. VARIUS RUFUS, one of the most distinguished poets of the Augustan age, the companion and friend of Virgil and Horace. By the latter he is placed in the foremost rank among the epic bards, and Quintilian has pronounced that his tragedy of Thyestes might stand a comparison with any production of the Grecian stage. But notwithstanding the high fame which he enjoyed among his contemporaries, and which was confirmed by the deliberate judgment of succeeding ages, there is scarcely any ancient author of celebrity concerning whose personal history we are more completely ignorant. We cannot determine the date of his birth, nor of his death, nor are we acquainted with any of the leading events of his career. This has arisen partly from the absolute silence of those from whom we might reasonably have hoped to glean some information, partly from the circumstance that he upon no occasion mingled in the business of public life, and partly from the confusion which prevails in MSS. between the names Varius, Varro, and Varus, the last especially being an appellation borne by several remarkable personages both political and literary towards the downfal of the republic, and under the early emperors. If we dismiss mere fanciful conjectures the sum total of our actual knowledge may be expressed in a very few words. 1. We may conclude with certainty that he was senior to Virgil. This seems to be proved by the well-known lines of Horace (Sat. i. 10. 44), "forte epos acer Ut nemo Varius ducit: molle atque facetum Virgilio adnuerunt gaudentes rure Camoenae," for from these we may at once infer that Varius had already established his reputation in heroic song while Virgil was known only as a pastoral bard. 2. He enjoyed the friendship of Maecenas from a very early period, since it was to the recommendation of Varius in conjunction with that of Virgil, that Horace was indebted for an introduction to the minister, an event which took place not later than B. C. 39, for we know that the three poets accompanied the great man upon his mission to Brundisium B. c. 38. 3. He was alive subsequent to B. c. 19. This cannot be questioned, if we believe the joint testimony of Hieronymus (Chron. Euseb. Olymp. exc. 4) and Donatus (Vit. Virg. xiv. § 53, 57), who assert that Virgil on his death bed appointed Plotius Tucca and Varius his literary executors, and that they revised the Aeneid, but in obedience to the strict injunctions of its author made no additions. It has been supposed from a passage of Horace in the Epistle to Augustus (Hor. Ep. ii. 1. 247), that Varius was dead at the time when it was published, that is, about B. c. 10, but the words do not warrant the conclusion. The only works by Varius of which any record has been preserved are:- I. De Morte. Macrobius (Sat. vi. 2) informs us that the eighty-eighth line of Virgil's eighth eclogue was borrowed from a poem by Varius, bearing the singular title De Morte. Hence this production must have been written in heroic verse, and it seems highly probable that the chief subject was a lamentation for the death of Julius Caesar on whose glories, John of Salisbury assures us (Policrat. viii. 14), the muse of Varius shed a brilliant lustre. Four fragments have been preserved by Macrobius (Sat. vi. 1, 2), in all of which Varius had been copied or imitated by Virgil. The longest, extending to six lines, contains a description of a hound couched in highly spirited and sonorous language. II. Panegyricus in Caesarem Octavianum, from which Horace, according to the Scholiasts, borrowed the lines inserted by him in the sixteenth Epistle of his first book (27, foll.). "Tene magis salvum populus velit, an populum tu, Servet in ambiguo, qui consulit et tibi et urbi Jupiter." No other specimen has been preserved. III. Thyestes. The admiration excited by this drama, the last probably of the works of Varius, was so intense that it seems to have overshadowed the renown which he had previously acquired in epic poetry, and this may account for the omission of his name by Quintilian when enumerating those who had excelled in this department. A strange story grew up and was circulated among the mediaeval scholiasts, that Varius was not really the author of the Thyestes, but that he stole it, according to one account (Schol. ad Hor. Ep. i. 4. 4), from Cassius of Parma, according to another from Virgil. (Serv. ad Virg. Ecl. iii. 20; comp. Schol. ad Virg. Ecl. vi. 3; Donat. Vit. Virg. xx. § 81.) Weichert has with much ingenuity devised a theory to account for the manner in which the mistake arose, but it is scarcely worth while to refute a fable which has ever been regarded as ridiculous. No portion of the tragedy has descended to us except a few words, and one sentence quoted by Marius Victorinus (A. G. p. 2503, ed. Putsch.), which critics have in vain endeavoured to mould into verse. It appears from a Codex rescriptus in the royal library of Paris, of which Schneidewin |