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Greece & Rome, Vol. 50, No. 2, October 2003
UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3*
By VICTORIA BAINES
Modern scholarship has tended to resolve the presence of epic
material in Roman verse satire by viewing it as 'mock-epic' or
'parodic'. Juvenal, so the argument goes, like Lucilius, Horace,
and Persius before him, distances himself from the writing of epic
poetry in his first and programmatic satire by showing his disdain
for mythological epic content (particularly that of Valerius
Flaccus' Argonautica, 1.7-11), contrasting the comparative safety
of writing epic with the inflammatory nature of satiric production
(1.162-7), and branding his own efforts as falling far short of the
elevated ideal (farrago - 'pig swill' - at 1.86). This view,
however, does not take into account the fact that reference to epic
material is made by characters other than the satirist (allowing
for the construction of a literary persona that that term
entails).
It is my intention in this article to propose a reevaluation of
epic imagery deployed by Umbricius, the speaker for most of Satire
3, in his complaint against life at Rome. When read in the context
of the satire as a whole, individual appearances of epic words,
images, and motifs serve not only to shed light on Juvenal's
characterization of Umbricius, but also to challenge the
traditional view of epic material in verse satire as serving a
single purpose. As my chief example I take Umbricius' description
of an encounter at night between a poor man and a drunken young
thug itching for a fight (278-301). I have chosen to focus on this
episode first because its effect has in modern criticism been given
the knee-jerk identification of 'mock-epic', 'mock-heroic', or
'parodic'; secondly because it marks the climax of a series of
events that befall the Roman citizen in twenty-four hours.
Satire 3 concerns itself largely with the social and physical
incon- veniences of living at Rome for the free-born citizen of
modest means (pauper). After a prologue (1-20) in which the
narrator sets the scene of his friend Umbricius' departure from
Rome, Umbricius gives his
A version of this paper was presented at the Classical
Association Annual Conference 2002 in Edinburgh. I am most grateful
to my audience for their questions and comments. All translations
are my own unless otherwise stated.
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UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
reasons for moving to Cumae. His supposedly impromptu tirade is
organized rhetorically, not least in the systematic division
between the social disadvantages for the pauper and the physical
dangers. After a lengthy description of the pitiful state of
housing in the city and the dangers of collapse and fire (190-231),
he begins a run-through of twenty-four hours in the life of the
city. Opening with the inconveni- ence, even fatal threat, of sleep
deprivation, he passes from the crush of the morning salutatio to
collapse and death. Rome's daylight hours reach their tragic close
at 267 on the near bank of the river Styx. At 268 Umbricius turns
his attention to nocturnal perils, including burglary and
chamber-pots flung from upstairs windows - and concludes, in a
characteristically amplificatory tone, that a Roman would be well-
advised to make his will before venturing out for dinner (273f.).
The episode of the thug and the pauper (278-301) illustrates this
apparently far-fetched claim, but serves also as a finale to the
account of day and night at Rome, after which Umbricius, having
prolonged his complaint against criminal activity for another
thirteen lines, finally decides to leave the city.
Umbricius as Aeneas; Rome as Troy
From the beginning of the satire we are encouraged to associate
Umbricius' plight with that of Aeneas. Umbricius has determined to
retire to Cumae (2), the site of the fugitive Daedalus' landfall in
Vergil's account (Aeneid 6.14-19) and the gateway to the Underworld
in Aeneid 6. Both Umbricius and Aeneas flee Trojan cities that have
been overrun by Greeks (quos praecipue fugiam: Juv. 3.59; fato
profugus: Aeneid 1.2).1 The association of Umbricius with Aeneas
thus casts Rome as a second Troy. So when in 61 the Greeks are
identified as Achaei, we may take it to mean not just the
inhabitants of the Roman province of Achaea (as distinct from the
Eastern Greeks that follow) but also the Achaeans sent to Troy.2
Thus Umbricius sees the Greek invasion of Rome as so complete that
it is now a Greek city, a takeover which associates it with Troy's
demise (a reading encouraged by the epic style catalogue of the
Greek invaders at 69-72). We may not be too surprised, then,
when
1 See C. Edwards, Writing Rome: Textual Approaches to the City
(Cambridge, 1996), 127; G. A. Staley, 'Juvenal's Third Satire:
Umbricius' Rome, Virgil's Troy', MAAR 45 (2000), especially 91.
2 S. M. Braund, Juvenal: Satires Book I (Cambridge, 1996), ad
loc.
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222 UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
later in the satire Umbricius styles the thug encountered at
night by the pauper (278-301) as the best of the Achaeans,
Achilles.
The notion of Rome as urbs capta persists. Collapse (194-6) and
fire, stock features of the fall of a city, are, in Umbricius'
Weltanschauung, everyday occurrences. Public mourning over the loss
of possessions in a house fire (212-4) satirically reworks and
condenses the grief tradition- ally attendant on the fall of a
city.3 At 198f. Umbricius encourages associations of Rome with the
most famous urbs capta in Roman poetry, the Troy of Aeneid 2: jam
poscit aquam, iam friuola transfert/ Vcalegon, tabulata tibi iam
tertia fumant - 'now Ucalegon shouts "Fire!", rescues his bits and
pieces; your third floor is already smoking'.
By naming the victim of a house fire Ucalegon, Umbricius reminds
the reader of a snapshot from Aeneas' recollections of Troy's
destruc- tion (Aeneid 2.31 If.): iam proximus ardet/ Vcalegon;
Sigea igni freta lata relucent- 'now Ucalegon's next door is
blazing, the broad Sigean straits are aglow with firelight' - the
situation of the proper name at the beginning of the line and the
anaphora of iam reinforcing the verbal echoes.4 Umbricius' Rome is
a city in which exceptional epic events are a constant presence,
are taken for granted.S
This allusion works also at a wider level: it casts Umbricius as
a reminiscent Aeneas, an epic hero-narrator.6 But whereas Aeneas'
audience, Dido's court, has not witnessed the events described at
first- hand, the indefinite second person tibi identifies
Umbricius' audience, and therefore also Juvenal's audience, as
Ucalegon's neighbour, as a Trojan victim. We too are Trojans. It is
possible to extend the associ- ation: for the identification of
Umbricius with Aeneas implies also that Juvenal, as the poet
responsible for creating such a character, is in some sense a
second Vergil. So in this case it is not enough to conclude that
Umbricius, like Don Quixote, is unable to distinguish between
'reality' and the literary scenarios with which he has become
obsessed. Juvenal himself assumes a role, which implies aspirations
to be a version of an epic poet.
The theme of Rome-as-Troy is further pursued in Umbricius' run
through twenty-four hours in the city. The account of Rome's
daylight
3 E.g. Lucan, Pharsalia 2.16-36. 4 G. B. Townend, 'The literary
substrata to Juvenal's Satires', JRS 63 (1973) 148, refers to
this
allusion rather awkwardly as 'straight burlesque'. 5 So Staley
(n. 1), 92 asserts that Umbricius '. .presents each night in Rome
as if it were Troy's
last'. 6 Cf. V. Estevez, 'Umbricius and Aeneas: a reading of
Juvenal III', Maia 48.3 (1996), 286;
C. Schmitz, Das Satirische in Juvenals Satiren (Berlin, 2000),
211.
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UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
hours depicts the poor cliens as hindered by the progress of
others. The litter of the rich man is a very fast galleon (Liburna,
240), cutting through the sea of people (unda, 244).7 The cliens is
trampled like a corpse in a pitched battle by a soldier in
hobnailed boots (planta mox undique magna/ calcor, et in digito
clauus mihi militis haeret - 'soon I am trampled from all sides by
a giant foot, and a soldier's hob-nail stamps on my toe' 247f.).
Through hyperbole the streets of Rome are transformed into a
theatre of war.8 Meanwhile the association of Rome with an epic
urbs capta is reinforced: the picture at 254-6 of a tree swaying on
a timber cart recalls Aeneas' simile for the razing of Troy in the
second book of the Aeneid (2.624-31).9 In using such imagery
Umbricius (as at 198f.) aligns social and physical disintegration
at Rome with the fall of Troy and his own experiences - and indeed
role as epic narrator - with those of Aeneas. Here, too, an emblem
for a unique event metamorphoses into an everyday occurrence, the
speaker into an epic warrior-narrator.
The subsequent fictive account of a traffic accident plays out
literally what is only a simile for the weight of wrestlers in
Statius' Thebaid, the death by crushing of a Spanish miner
(6.880-6),1? revealing Umbricius' presentation of Rome as capable
of outstripping anything in epic poetry in terms of the horror of
its reality. Meanwhile, preparations of unwitting household slaves
at 261ff. for the bath of one of the victims recall those of
Andromache in the Iliad for the dead Hector (22.442-6), importing
Homeric dramatic irony and pathos into an account of contemporary
Rome. The fate of the crushed man is thus identified with that of
the greatest Trojan warrior; by extension making one's way through
Rome's streets is equated with battle with the Achaeans. Even the
deceased's arrival in the Underworld recalls Aeneas' descent in
Book 6, especially 296-416.
7 Cf. Propertius 3.11.44. Liburna (240) is not, as has often
been asserted (on the basis of the scholiast's mention of a certain
liburnata), a type of litter. See E. L. Harrison, 'Neglected
Hyperbole in Juvenal', CR 10 (1960), 100f.; R. D. Brown, 'The
Litter: a Satirical Symbol in Juvenal and Others', in C. Deroux
(ed.), Studies in Latin Literature and Roman History III (Brussels,
1983), 278.
8 Cf. Lucilius 1228-34 M = 1145-51 W. For the pervasive military
imagery in this scene see Braund (n. 2), ad 243-6. 9 Clear verbal
reminiscences include nutant - 'sways' - and minantur - 'threatens'
(256; cf. Aen. 2.628-9), and coruscat - 'quivers' (254; cf.
tremefacta comam - 'with trembling leaves' - at Aen. 2.629).
10 Braund (n. 2) draws attention to this parallel ad loc.
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224 UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
The pauper as Aeneas; Rome as Troy
Over half of Umbricius' account of night-time at Rome is
occupied by an encounter between a 'poor' man and a drunken young
thug (278- 301):
ebrius ac petulans, qui nullum forte cecidit, dat poenas, noctem
patitur lugentis amicum Pelidae, cubat in faciem, mox deinde
supinus: 280 [ergo non aliter poterit dormire; quibusdam]l1 somnum
rixa facit. sed quamuis inprobus annis atque mero feruens cauet
hunc quem coccina laena uitari iubet et comitum longissimus ordo,
multum praeterea flammarum et aenea lampas. 285 me, quem luna solet
deducere uel breue lumen candelae, cuius dispenso et tempero filum,
contemnit. miserae cognosce prohoemia rixae, si rixa est, ubi tu
pulsas, ego uapulo tantum. stat contra starique iubet. parere
necesse est; 290 nam quid agas, cum te furiosus cogat et idem
fortior? "unde uenis" exclamat, "cuius aceto, cuius conche tumes?
quis tecum sectile porrum sutor et elixi ueruecis labra comedit?
nil mihi respondes? aut dic aut accipe calcem. 295 ede ubi
consistas: in qua te quaero proseucha?" dicere si temptes aliquid
tacitusue recedas, tantumdem est: feriunt pariter, uadimonia deinde
irati faciunt. libertas pauperis haec est: pulsatus rogat et pugnis
concisus adorat 300 ut liceat paucis cum dentibus inde reuerti.
A drunken thug, who happens not to have murdered anyone, pays
the penalty, and endures the night of the son of Peleus mourning
his friend, lying now on his front, then a moment later on his
back: 280 [he won't be able to sleep otherwise: for some] A
brawl induces sleep. But although blessed with the ferocity of
youth and steaming with wine drunk neat he is wary of this one whom
a scarlet
cloak and a long, long file of comrades commands that he avoid,
and (as if this weren't enough) a flood of torchlight and brass
lamps. 285 But he's not afraid of me, whom the moon is used to
escorting or the short-lived flame of a candle, whose wick I ration
and conserve.
1 Of the commentators only J. E. B. Mayor (Thirteen Satires of
Juvenal, (London, 1901), ad loc.) does not suspect this line. The
line is over-explanatory; Heineke deletes it (rightly) as
spurious.
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UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
Listen to the prologue of the pitiful brawl, if brawl it is,
when you administer the beating, and I just take it. He stands firm
in front of me and commands me to do the same. You have
to obey; 290 for what can you do, when forced by a man who is
full of wrath and
stronger than you are? "Where do you come from?" he calls out,
"With whose vinegar, whose beans are you bloated? Which cobbler has
been gobbling chopped leek and sheep's head stew with you? Won't
you answer me? Say something or get a kicking. 295 Declare where
your stand is: in which synagogue am I to look for you?" If you try
to say something or fall back in silence it's all the same: they
beat you up anyway, then all indignant take you to court. This is
the sum total of a poor man's "freedom": beaten to a pulp and
knocked out by blows he begs and beseeches 300 to be allowed to go
home with a few remaining teeth.
The episode begins with a comparison: the thug's insomnia at
278-80 is that of Achilles grieving over Patroclus in the Iliad
(24.9-12):
TcoV IJlV7aCK6OtLEVOS OaA0Epov KaTa& 8alKpVOV ElEV aAAoT'
7rt' 7rAEVupas KaTaKeL?eVOS, aAAoTE 8' oavTE VerTTos, aAAoTe
7Tpv713- Tor ' TOpO3s apvaarTa 8tVVEK'JA dvwv srapa Ov' dAo's'
As he remembered these things he let fall heavy tears, lying now
on his side, now again on his back, now on his front. Then he would
get up and wander distraught along the seashore.
Umbricius has appropriated a very recognizable scene, so
recognizable that Seneca can refer to it in terms that imply its
familiarity.12 As both Braund and Courtney observe ad loc., forte
at 278 suggests that tonight has been the exception to the rule. In
this Umbricius perhaps recalls the frequentative imperfects of the
Homeric model, which denote repeated action, as Macleod notes: 'At
this point the description of one night merges into the description
of a series of nights.'13 Braund and Courtney stress the
incongruity of the Homeric allusion in Satire 3 - for them, its
object is to ridicule the thug by emphasizing his lack of heroism.
This does not tell the whole story. The pointed distance between
what we come to see of the behaviour and speech of the thug and the
character- ization of Achilles in the Iliad is certainly funny.
Nevertheless, it is evident that from the outset of this episode
(and indeed earlier in the
12 De Tranquillitate Animi 2.12: qualis ille Homericus Achilles
est, modo pronus, modo supinus - 'such is Homer's Achilles, now on
his front, now on his back'.
13 C. W. Macleod, Iliad Book XXIV (Cambridge, 1982), ad
24.12.
225
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226 UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
satire) Umbricius, here temporarily in the satirist's role as
moralist, equates physical collapse and moral ruin in contemporary
Rome with the destruction of Troy (as he does with Ucalegon at
198f. and in his account of the traffic accident). It is therefore
reasonable to expect that the transformation of the thug into
Achilles is not just 'funny'.
None of the commentators appear to consider the possible
implica- tion of this transformation for the pauper - if the thug
is a version of Achilles the suggestion is that his victim is also
a version of an epic warrior. And we may reasonably hazard that a
man who takes on Achilles is by dint of this association Trojan.
Just 11 lines before this episode, Umbricius recalls the death of
Hector in his account of the crushing to death of a man in the
street. It is not inconceivable that the pauper caught by the thug,
like the crushed man, thus faces a satiric version of Hector's
death.
This story is told by Umbricius, however, who throughout his
speech is not content with just one allusion when a fistful will
do. Estevez posits a further parallel: The epithet petulans
suggests more the behavior of Pyrrhus at Priam's palace than
Achilles in battle, and indeed, when he does rise to fight in the
streets of Umbricius' Rome, the drunken ruffian avoids those who
can protect themselves and attacks the helpless (283ff.), rather as
Pyrrhus does the terrified Polites and the impotent Priam.14
So also Pelides need not refer to Achilles: at Aeneid 2.263 it
describes his son Pyrrhus as he bursts out of the wooden horse in
Aeneas' recollection of the destruction of Troy. The Pyrrhus-Priam
parallel is highly appropriate to the context of Umbricius'
complaint: earlier in his speech he refers to his maturity (26-8)
and identifies himself with the older citizen (124f.); the thug, on
the other hand, is improbus annis - 'blessed with the ferocity of
youth' (282). More generally, the lack of parity between the two
parties in Satire 3 may reflect the vast difference in prowess of
Pyrrhus and Priam as emphasized by the pitiful - almost darkly
comic - portrayal in the Aeneid of Priam donning his armour
(2.506-11), and the ease and humiliation with which he is
despatched by his far younger and far stronger opponent (2.550-8),
to which the speaker of Satire 10 refers (267-70).
Vergilian echoes at 283-5 encourage associations with Aeneas:
the coccina laena ('scarlet cloak') of the rich man looking back to
the cloak of Aeneas in Book 4 - Tyrioque ardebat murice laena -
'the cloak glowed with Tyrian purple'; comitum longissimus ordo -
'the long, long file of
14 Estevez (n. 6), 289.
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UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
comrades', echoing the description of Pallas' funeral cortege in
Aeneid 11; perhaps also aenea lampas (not just brass lamps, but
those of Aeneas).15 In addition the stress Umbricius places at 292
on the superior strength of the Achilles-thug - he is fortior,
stronger, than the pauper - encourages the reader to think of
Aeneas. The language of mismatch recalls Neptune's description in
the Aeneid of Aeneas' encounter with Achilles (5.808-10) - Pelidae
tunc ego forti/ congressum Aenean nec dis nec uiribus aequis/ nube
caua rapui - 'then, when Aeneas met brave Achilles in battle
without sufficient strength or the help of the gods, I snatched him
away in a cloak of cloud' - a statement which itself looks back to
Poseidon's description of Achilles at Iliad 20.334: aevl a'a
KpElaUcwv Kat f)t'A,epos aOavadroatv - 'both a stronger man than
you and dearer to the immortals'. In fact, superiority in battle is
a consistent characteristic of Achilles, as Aeneas himself
recognizes in his reply to Apollo disguised as Lycaon at Iliad
20.97-100:
7T) OVK i'aT' 'AXthAog S vav-rov avopa /Ja.XeaOat? alet yap
rdapa Ets yE ?OEv, o0 Aotyov dtJivvet. KaL ' aAACs0 TOV y' lO e3Aos
7TErTET', o0V' roAyEl 1Tptv XpOOS avvpofEoto OtEAOE6LEV.
It is not possible for any man to fight Achilles; one of the
gods is always at his side to protect him from ruin. And besides,
his spear flies straight and does not stop until it has pierced
human flesh.
All these references point to an identification of the pauper as
the Aeneas of Homer and Vergil, the Aeneas who in the Iliad is no
match for Achilles and who in the Aeneid flees a city overrun by
the Achaeans.'6 Like Aeneas, Umbricius evaluates the ascendancy of
the Greeks in terms of a personal mismatch (3.104-8):17
non sumus ergo pares: melior, qui semper et omni nocte dieque
potest aliena sumere uultum a facie, iactare manus, laudare
paratus, si bene ructauit, si rectum minxit amicus, si trulla
inuerso crepitum dedit aurea fundo.
15 Vergil, Aeneid 4.262; 11.94 - postquam omnis longe comitum
praecesserat ordo, 'after the procession of comrades had passed by
from afar'; 11.143f. - lucet uia longol ordine flammarum, 'the
route shone with a long line of torches'.
16 So also furiosus at 291 and irati at 299 recall Achilles
oxO-qoaas (II. 20.343) when cheated of battle with Aeneas. The
pauper also gets away, but not unscathed.
17 Cf. 119f.: non est Romanum cuiquam locus hic, ubi regnat/
Protogenes aliquis uel Diphilus aut Hermarchus regnat- 'there is no
place here for any Roman, where some Protogenes or Diphilus or
Hermarchus rules'.
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228 UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
And so we are not fairly matched: he is superior, who always
every night and day can put on an expression from someone else's
face, ready to gesticulate wildly, and to applaud if his friend has
given a resounding belch, if he has pissed straight, if the golden
bowl with base upturned has rung true.
In expressing his predicament in terms similar to those used by
Aeneas in the Iliad and of him in the Aeneid, and by emphasizing
the lack of parity between the thug and the pauper Umbricius
depicts Rome as the locus for single epic combat. Henderson (in
reference to Statius' Thebaid) also notes the importance of parity
for the epic duel: The absolute difference between life and death
which is the stake and productivity of Combat is founded on an
initial parity, the opponents must interlock in a blur of proximate
interchangeability, and we and they must find each other's values
from a mutuality in the 'fairness' of fight. The hero 'knows
himself' through the foe he merits.18
He continues, 'The "wrong" scene would be the killing of the
wrong - unfairly matched - victim, as when Aeneas' sword pierces
the body of the female commandant Dido.'19 According to Henderson's
schema the 'duel' between the thug and the pauper is exactly the
wrong kind of encounter, as is evident especially at 289 - ubi tu
pulsas, ego uapulo tantum.
The helplessness expressed through the inaction of one party
finds an analogue at Aeneid 10.907f., where Aeneas' sword is
attacked by Mezentius' throat - iuguloque haud inscius accipit
ensem - 'in full realization he received the sword in his throat';
also in Lucan's description of the battle of Pharsalus (Pharsalia
7.533f.): nulla secuta est/ pugna, sed hinc iugulis, hinc ferro
bella geruntur - 'what followed was no battle, but war was waged on
this side with throats, on that with swords'; and in Silius
Italicus' Punica (16.70f.): nec pugnae species sed poenae tristis
imago/ illa erat, hinc tantum caedentum atque inde ruentum - 'that
was no kind of battle, but a tragic scene of punishment, with so
much slaughter on that side and flight on that'. But at the same
time we may note that uapulo is the word used to describe the fate
of slaves in Roman comedy, a word which implies the pauper's loss
of citizen rights and identity.20 The reader is encouraged to see
the fight as an epic duel and a piece of comic slapstick at one and
the same time. Juvenalian satire has fused two genres which would
normally be diametrically opposed.
18 J. Henderson, 'Form Remade: Statius' Thebaid' in A. J. Boyle
(ed.), Roman Epic (London, 1993), 172. 19 Ibid. 173.
20 For which see Braund (n. 2), ad loc.
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UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
The thug as Tydeus; Rome as Thebes
There is another, more recent, epic parallel for the mismatch
and for other epic formulaic features which has gone entirely
unnoticed. It is an episode in Book 2 of Statius' Thebaid. Tydeus
is ambushed at night on the way back from Thebes by fifty of
Eteocles' men, an attack which the poet marks as very different
from the single combat around which the narration of epic conflict
might traditionally be expected to centre (Thebaid 2.489-95):
o caeca nocentum consilia! o semper timidum scelus! exit in unum
plebs ferro iurata caput; ceu castra subire apparet aut celsum
crebri arietis ictibus urbis inclinare latus: densi sic agmine
facto quinquaginta altis funduntur in ordine portis. macte animi,
tantis dignus qui crederis armis!
O blind counsels of the guilty! 0 ever cowardly crime! A band of
the plebs sworn by the sword go out against one man, as if
preparing to approach a camp or to bring down the heights of a city
with the blows of a solid battering ram: thus in close formation
fifty stream in order through the towering gates. May the gods
honour your bravery, Tydeus, who are believed worthy of such a
foe!
Statius amplifies the mismatch so that it appears rather like an
attempt to swat a fly with a sledgehammer. He uses the word plebs
to denote the band of men sent out to destroy the lone hero,
emphasizing the scale of the force sent out. In the event Tydeus
polishes off forty-nine of the fifty - a rather unlikely aristeia,
as Chromis, one of the attackers, remarks (Thebaid 2.620f.):
unusne, uiri, tot caedibus unus/ ibit ouans Argos? uix credet fama
reuerso! - 'Shall one man, one man, warriors, go to Argos rejoicing
in so many slain? The people will hardly believe him on his
return!' The stress here on unus reflects similar emphasis in
Lucan's Pharsalia in the context of another improbable aristeia -
that of the Caesarian anti-hero Scaeva (6.140-2): quem non mille
simul turmis nec Caesare totol auferret Fortuna locum uictoribus
unus/ eripuit, 'the post which Fortune with a thousand squadrons
and the whole might of Caesar could not take, one man seized from
the conquerors and prevented it from being captured.' Juvenal's
depiction of Umbricius - and Umbricius' of himself and of the
unnamed cliens - as isolated thus stands foursquare within a Silver
epic - and, indeed, rhetorical - tradition.
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By imposing the language of mismatch on daily, or rather
nightly, life at Rome, Umbricius transforms the walk home in the
dark into a contest from which the greatest glory to be gained is a
safe return. In this respect the pauper appears to have most in
common with Tydeus - Statius' hero wants merely to get back to
Argos. Such a clear-cut identification becomes impossible, however,
thanks to the complexity of Umbricius' allusion to epic material.
As will become evident, other parallels align the behaviour of
Statius' Tydeus not with that of the pauper, but with that of
Umbricius' thug.
Much is made of the nocturnal nature of the ambush in Thebaid 2
as emblematic of its status as scelus, crime: the exclamation in
the lines cited above marks as unusual the nocturna proelia -
'night-time battles' - conceived by Eteocles at 485.21 Statius is,
of course, not the first epic poet to highlight the exceptional
nature of nocturnal combat: the aristeiai of Nisus and Euryalus are
arguably the most tragic in the Aeneid, and themselves recall those
of Diomedes and Odysseus and the Doloneia in Iliad 10. Both Statius
and Juvenal rework the theme. But whereas in the Thebaid the
aristeia is amplified beyond all proportion and plausibility, in
the vision of Rome in Juvenal 3 the night-time battle, exceptional
in epic, becomes routine, a nightly battle. Umbricius sees Rome's
horror in epic terms, but epic which has been deheroized in so far
as it is now commonplace. An aristeia devoid of the exceptional is
no aristeia at all.
The Statian passage exhibits epic formulaic characteristics: the
Ho- meric greeting rks 7Tr60E Els acvpCv; 77-0L TOt yevoS 8e TOKES
- 'Where do you come from, and who are your parents?' - is issued
by Achilles to Asteropaeus in the Iliad in an openly hostile tone
(21.150); and in the Aeneid Pallas calls out to the Trojans, qui
genus? unde domo? pacemne huc fertis an arma? - 'To what family do
you belong? Where is your home? Do you bring us peace or war?'
(8.114). It is therefore in keeping with epic expectation that in
the Thebaid the ambushed Tydeus addresses his assailants in a
similar fashion: unde, uiri, quidue occultatis in armis?- 'Where
have you come from, warriors, and what do you mean by lurking
armed?' (2.535). Although these greetings have different out- comes
- Achilles is intent on a fight, much like Umbricius' thug; the
Trojans are welcomed into Evander's kingdom; Tydeus is met by
silence and ambush - in each of the three scenarios the
interrogation
21 Cf. D. W. T. C. Vessey, 'Flavian Epic' in E. J. Kenney (ed.),
Cambridge History of Classical Literature II (Cambridge, 1982),
576, on Polynices' journey to Argos at Theb. 1.336ff.
230
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UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
serves as a prelude to potential combat. The question in 292 of
Umbricius' description, unde uenis? ('Where are you from?' or,
perhaps, 'Where have you been?') is thus a satiric version of the
formula.22
Both Tydeus and Umbricius' thug receive no reply: so Statius
writes, nec reddita contra/l uox, fidamque negant suspecta silentia
pacem - 'no voice returned in answer, and suspicious silence denied
the certainty of peace' (Thebaid 2.536f.).23 At Juvenal 3.295 the
thug asks the pauper, nil mihi respondes? And whilst at 297
Umbricius entertains the possibility of a reply - dicere si temptes
aliquid tacitusue recedes - none of the pauper's speech is
recorded. The epic model is again reworked, menace in Statius
turning to tongue-tied terror in Juvenal. At the same time the
expected dynamic is inverted, the roles confused: the pauper's
progress through Rome at night had initially cast him in the role
of hero embarking on a perilous nocturnal aristeia. But in the
context of the inquisition the thug is the challenging Tydeus, the
pauper identified ironically by his silence as a skulking
assailant.
At 290 in Umbricius' tale the thug orders the pauper to stand
and face him. Stare contra is literally 'to stand against', and
comes to mean 'face in battle'.24 It appears in Book 11 of the
Aeneid, where Diomedes replies to the Latins' request for
assistance in fighting the Trojans: stetimus tela aspera contra/
contulimusque manus - 'We have already faced his (Aeneas') harsh
weapons and fought him hand to hand' (282). Else- where contra,
either on its own or with other verbs of standing such as sisto and
its compounds, denotes making a stand, and is used of both Turnus
and Aeneas respectively (Aeneid 10.308f.; 12.887). Statius adapts
the topos: at Thebaid 2.547 the beleaguered Tydeus challenges his
attackers: ferte gradum contra campoque erumpite aperto - 'Come out
and face me! Burst out onto the open plain!', a heroic posture of
readiness for combat which in Umbricius' description is transformed
into the thug's instruction not to scarper.
This epic, or at least militaristic, colouring makes it tempting
to see a secondary allusion in consistas in 296, which Rudd
translates, 'where your pitch is',25 but which in an epic military
context means, 'to stand one's ground, take up position, take aim':
it is so used of the Trojans at Aeneid 9.788f.: talibus
accensifirmantur et agmine densol consistent - 'fired
22 For more on this see Estevez (n. 6), 289. 23 Cf. Volscens'
challenge to Nisus and Euryalus at Aen. 9.377-9. 24 It is listed by
both the OLD and Lewis and Short as a phrase which (unsurprisingly)
implies
hostility. 25 N. Rudd & W. Barr, Juvenal: The Satires
(Oxford, 1992), 24.
231
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232 UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
by these words they stand firm and take up position in close
formation' - and of Tydeus at Thebaid 2.583-5: tergoque et uertice
tegmina notal saeptus et hostili propugnans pectora parma/
constitit - 'with his back and head covered with the customary
armour and protecting his chest with an enemy shield he stood his
ground'. In conjunction with ede, often used of epic
proclamation,26 the thug's instruction is double-edged, the epic
usage reworked with a black comedy typical of the entire
passage.
Both the Juvenalian and the Statian episodes include an epic
for- mulaic supplication by the defeated party. Umbricius at Juv.
3.300f. describes the pauper as begging and pleading with the thug
- rogat and adorat - whilst Statius describes Menoetes at the mercy
of Tydeus as follows: pariterque manus distractus in ambas/ orat et
a iugulo nitentem sustinet hastam - 'and he prays with both hands
stretched out, and keeps the shining spear from his throat'
(Thebaid 2.647f.). But whilst such supplication in epic poetry
traditionally determines life or death, in Umbricius' account the
pauper can only beg not to be beaten quite so badly. Both the
defeated party and the audience are cheated of the relief of being
spared, the heroic code perverted in Umbricius' Rome.
Recourse to the Statian passage illustrates that epic parallels
extend beyond those in Homer and Vergil and include more recent
literary models. That Juvenal may have the Thebaid in mind here may
not come as a total shock - most commentators agree that the fourth
satire engages in some way with Statius' lost De Bello Germanico.
But more arresting than this is the possibility that Umbricius,
Juvenal's construct, the speaker of Satire 3, may well be thinking
of Statius, as he appears to be in the passage on the man crushed
in the street by a load of marble, and earlier in the street scene.
At 243-5 nobis properantibus obstat/ unda prior ('the wave in front
blocks the way as we hurry along') and magno populus premit agmine
lumbos/ qui sequitur ('the people behind in a large troop crush my
hips') echo preparations for battle within Thebes in Statius' epic
(Thebaid 8.348-52):
iam trepidas Bellona fores armataque pulsat limina, iam multo
laxantur cardine Thebae. turbat eques pedites, currus properantibus
obstant, ceu Danai post terga premant: sic omnibus alae artantur
portis septemque excursibus haerent.
26 Cf. Ovid, Metamorphoses 3.579-81, where Pentheus addresses
the disguised Bacchus: o periture tuaque aliis documenta dature/
morte ... ede tuum nomen nomenque parentum/ et patriam - 'You who
are about to die and provide an example to others by your death ...
declare your name, the names of your parents and your native
land.'
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UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
Now Bellona beats at the quivering gates and fortified doors,
now Thebes is released through many a doorway. The cavalry throw
the infantry into turmoil, chariots block the way of hurrying
soldiers, as if the Danaans pushed them on from behind: so troops
are packed into every gateway and stick fast in seven lines
out.
This echo further emphasizes that we are to see the crowd as a
body of troops, the Roman citizen as 'a mere soldier in the
military machine'.27
The scenes of nocturnal ambush in Juvenal 3 and in the Thebaid
exhibit common epic formulaic features: greeting, supplication,
evalu- ation of the relative prowess of both parties. Beyond this
Statius' particular contribution to the episode in the third satire
is the implication of the urban population in the attack on Tydeus.
The ambush in Juvenal 3 takes place within the city walls. The
attack on Tydeus in Thebaid 2 does not. He is on his way back from
Thebes, procul urbe (2.498) - at a distance from the city; on his
return to Argos he describes the dead lying in their own gore ante
urbem uacuam (3.360) - before an empty city. Nevertheless, the city
is a looming - and hellish - presence throughout the work: in the
second line the poet proposes to tell of sontes ... Thebas, 'guilty
Thebes'. As the adjective suggests, the city is stained with the
crimes of its inhabitants, in particular of its rulers. It thus
becomes an emblematic hell on earth, a metaphor for urban
dysfunction.28
Above all, Statius stresses citizen involvement in the conflict
- the fifty sent out by Eteocles are plebs, not individual heroes
but a band of citizens. Consequently I wonder whether this episode
does not con- stitute a step closer to the satiric treatment we
find in Juvenal. For whilst the Thebaid records a fratricidal
conflict, the goal of which is control over the city, for Umbricius
the city of Rome is the epic battlefield, its combatants an urban
population who are literally at each other's throats. The perilous
journey home is made not to another encampment, or to another city
(as in the Thebaid) but to a street within the same city. In
Juvenal 3 epic combat is simultaneously internalized and
deheroized.
According to this line of thinking Juvenalian, urban, satire is
not so much antithetical to epic as its natural successor.
Umbricius' suggestion that making your way through Rome is
tantamount to epic combat is, of course, funny: the thug is by no
means heroic in any accepted sense - he exhibits neither the tragic
motivation of Achilles nor the physical bravery of Tydeus. In fact,
the thug avoids the kind of large company which makes Tydeus'
achievement so remarkable, preferring to enjoy an
27 W. S. Anderson, 'Studies in Book 1 of Juvenal', YCS 15
(1957), 61. 28 For which see Henderson (n. 18), especially 167 and
188.
233
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234 UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
aristeia over one poor citizen who could not possibly be a
threat. But it does not follow that we can describe such reference
as 'mock-epic' pure and simple. The literary models alluded to are
not themselves subverted or held up to satiric scorn - the process
is more complex than that. In the context of a moralistic narrative
which seeks to amplify urban horrors, Umbricius' manipulation of
epic material in the description of the encounter between the thug
and the pauper is not uni-directional. The Rome of Juvenal's
Satires consumes epic combat and transforms it into something which
is commonplace and noticeably lacking in heroism, but still
horrific, still powerful. Satire and epic inform each other: whilst
Umbricius renders epic unexceptional, he also epicizes satiric
comment and content.
Umbricius (re-)writes epic
The density of Umbricius' epic frame of reference suggests not
only that he is closely acquainted with such material, but that he
sees his world in epic terms, that he thinks epic: hence La Fleur
writes of Umbricius' 'heroic imagination'.29 Again Cervantes' Don
Quixote comes to mind: the eponymous hero convinces himself after
reading too many romances that he is a chivalrous knight who must
embark on a heroic campaign to curry the favour of his lady.
Cervantes makes explicit what may be implicit in Juvenal 3. When
the doctor and the surgeon consider keeping some of the less
romantic books in Don Quixote's library, his niece protests (Pt. 1,
Ch.6): 'Oh, sir,' cried the niece, 'please have them burned like
the rest, because it could well happen that once my uncle gets over
his chivalry illness he starts reading all these other books and
takes it into his head to become a shepherd and wander about the
forests and meadows singing and playing music and, what would be
even worse than that, turn into a poet, which they say is a
catching and incurable disease.'30
Just as Don Quixote's niece expresses the fear that the more
intellectual books in her uncle's library may turn him into a poet,
so the reader of Satire 3 may feel that Umbricius is not simply an
epic character but the creator of an epic literary artefact.31 So
La Fleur observes, '... one of the
29 R. A. La Fleur, 'Umbricius and Juvenal Three', Ziva Antika 26
(1976), 423; see also Staley (n. 2), 97. 30 J. Rutherford,
Cervantes: Don Quixote (London, 2000), 56.
31 Edwards' observation ((n. 1), 126) that Umbricius' speech as
a whole is a 'catalogue of complaint about life in the city . . .'
highlights its literary quality.
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UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
satirist's chief aims in this poem may well have been to poke
fun at Umbricius' fustian poesis'.32 At 288 Umbricius introduces
miserae ... prohoemia rixae. prohoemium (prooemium) is 'a prelude,
overture ... the introductory part (of an epic poem, speech, etc.)'
(OLD). Its appear- ance at this point in Satire 3 is, I would
argue, mistakenly listed under the more general definition of
'beginning, prelude (of a period or process)'; for this scene is
not just reminiscent of epic combat but is itself a piece of
literature, prohoemia referring not only to epic content but to the
business of writing epic poetry.33 The word jars with rixae - 'a
violent or noisy quarrel, altercation, brawl' (OLD). The latter is
by no means an elevated term: at 15.5 If. a similar contrast is
achieved for the fight between the Ombi and the Tentyrites: sed
iurgia prima sonare/ incipiunt; animis ardentibus haec tuba rixae-
'insults first begin to sound; to their fiery tempers these are the
clarion blasts for the fight' (the scuffle then transforms into a
pugna (74)). Its immediate impact here in 3 must to some extent be
bathetic.34
At the same time the admixture of high and low elements in the
line advertizes the facility of Juvenalian satire for generic
blending. Juvenal has Umbricius draw on material from a wide range
of genres to express his indignation. His creation of a new product
from traditional material identifies his work as aggressively
parasitic, an identification which begs the question whether satura
can itself be accorded the status of genre; and if it can be, what
special identity or characteristics it may be deemed to
possess.
Umbricius satiricus
Consideration of Umbricius' very literary articulation of the
grievances of so-called 'ordinary' Romans, raises concerns about
how far he convinces us that he is a credible witness. The reader
of Latin literature is often faced with the difficulty of reading
descriptions of even mundanity as anything more than a literary
construct, something that by its very nature reshapes and
reconstructs so-called 'reality' in a flamboyantly literary
fashion. But Umbricius poses even more of a problem. For in a genre
in which personal comment is a key feature
32 La Fleur (n. 29), 416. 33 Some MSS have praemia, leadingJ.
Ferguson, Juvenal: The Satires (New York, 1979), ad loc., to
conjecture in the light of the outcome of the scuffle that
prohoemia is perhaps a pun.
34 Cf. Cic., Verr. 4.148; Hor., 0. 1.18.8; Tac., Ger. 22.2.
235
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236 UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
Umbricius, drawing on a poet's knowledge and vocabulary to
describe the city, usurps the moralistic stance of the satirist.
The episode of the thug and the pauper is one of a number of points
in Satire 3 at which the voice of Umbricius and that of Juvenal are
far from distinct.
Umbricius assumes a public role to attack vehemently moral
degen- eration at Rome.35 He seeks to persuade not only his friend
the 'satirist' but the Roman citizen body - at 60 he addresses his
complaint against Greeks to Quirites and at 162f. advises: agmine
factol debuerant olim tenues migrasse Quirites - 'poor Romans
should have banded together and departed long ago'. Braund
interprets this address as undermining Umbricius' message: The most
blatant example of the angry speaker forgetting where he is and
departing from the framework occurs in Satire 3, when Umbricius
begins addressing the entire body of Roman citizens, as if he were
delivering a political speech to a public meeting, instead of
enjoying a quiet and private farewell conversation with a friend,
which is how the poem is intitiated.36
This assertion fails to take into account the fact that by
indignantly and vehemently attacking the corrupt city of Rome and
those who thrive in her Umbricius behaves as a moralizing
satirist.37
That he expresses his experience of Rome in terms similar to
those of an epic poet of civil war not only amplifies the horrors
of the city for Umbricius' audience but also necessarily has
implications for Juvenal's audience. We may be swayed by Umbricius'
exaggerated picture. We may also keep in mind that Umbricius is a
character carefully con- structed by Juvenal, and consequently
modify our appreciation of him in light of his persistent
employment of epic language and imagery, according to whether we
think it is unconscious or used as an amplificatory tool. In
manipulating epic material in this way Umbricius is himself
creating a literary artefact; in striving to persuade his audience
of his view and experience of Rome he draws on the rhetoric of
invective; and in assuming a public role to denounce moral
corruption he is a phantom satirist.
Umbricius' description of the horrors of life in Rome seeks to
amplify them beyond the tolerable. Combined with the
internalization of epic conflict, the staging of a form of epic
combat within the city walls, such amplification serves to blur the
distinction between satire, the supremely
35 For which see A. Hardie, 'Juvenal, the Phaedrus, and the
truth about Rome', CQ 24 (1998), 244.
36 S. M. Braund, The Roman Satirists and their Masks (Bristol,
1996), 14. 37 For more on this see Hardie (n. 35), 245; Staley (n.
1), 86.
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UMBRICIUS' BELLUM CIUILE: JUVENAL, SATIRE 3
urban form, and epic, a form in which traditionally battles are
not fought by the entire urban population. In so far as he
constructs a character who so readily employs epic topoi and
terminology in his account of contemporary Rome, Juvenal's
conception of the relationship between satire and epic transgresses
and transcends traditional generic bound- aries. Consequently the
knee-jerk identification of reference to such material in Satire 3
as 'mock-epic' or 'parodic' no longer seems appropriate.38
Umbricius' allusion to epic motifs, vocabulary, and imagery may
be appreciated on a number of levels. First it passes comment on
how epic is read: as Frueland Jensen notes, Homer's and Vergil's
Troy and Statius' Thebes provide useful analogies and vocabulary
which enable Umbricius to articulate his suffering.39 Secondly, it
reveals much about how epic is written, exposing the universality
and transferability of its formulae and imagery but also
illustrating how epic reinvents itself through these very same
characteristics. At the same time, detailed analysis of how Satire
3 incorporates epic material provides a new perspective on how
Juvenalian satire is written, and - with a nod to the pseudo-epic,
pseudo-satirist Umbricius - who can write it. This in turn suggests
a new kind of reading - namely, that reference to epic material is
not, as we may have come to expect of satura, univocal, but rather
reflects an amalgamation of different literary perceptions and
identities.
38 For a similar view see Schmitz (n. 6), 218f. 39 B. F. Jensen,
'Martyred and beleaguered virtue: Juvenal's portrait of Umbricius',
C&M 37
(1986), 197.
237
Article Contentsp. [220]p. 221p. 222p. 223p. 224p. 225p. 226p.
227p. 228p. 229p. 230p. 231p. 232p. 233p. 234p. 235p. 236p. 237
Issue Table of ContentsGreece & Rome, Second Series, Vol.
50, No. 2 (Oct., 2003), pp. 151-296Volume Information [pp. 294 -
296]Front Matter'The Most Marvellous of All Seas'; The Greek
Encounter with the Euxine [pp. 151 - 167]Teaching and Learning in
Classical Athens [pp. 168 - 190]A Sickness of Discourse: The
Vanishing Syndrome of Leptosune [pp. 191 - 205]Drowning by Numbers
Pythagoreanism and Poetry in Horace Odes 1.28 [pp. 206 -
219]Umbricius' Bellum Ciuile: Juvenal, Satire 3 [pp. 220 -
237]Reviewuntitled [pp. 238 - 240]
Subject Reviews [pp. 241 - 284]Books Received [pp. 285 -
290]Back Matter [pp. 291 - 293]