An Introduction to Octavia Prætexta: Submitted in Partial Fulfilment, of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy, in the Faculty of ... in the City of New York (Classic Reprint) - Tapa blanda

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Excerpt from An Introduction to Octavia Prætexta: Submitted in Partial Fulfilment, of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy, in the Faculty of Philosophy at Columbia University in the City of New York

By most writers upon Latin literature the opinion has been held, and defended with more or less vigor, that Roman tragedy was very inferior in quality, and of little importance in comparison with other productions of the Latin writers. This view is due in part to the almost complete disappearance of the works of the tragedians, in part to the idea that the value of such Roman productions may be estimated by applying to them the standard imposed by Greek environment, or by modern. A sympathetic study of the development of the Latin drama cannot fail at least in some degree to modify this view.

That the Greek influence was strong, and that Latin tragedy derived its main outlines from Hellas, is not to be denied. There were plays before foreign influence was felt at all: the word hister is Etruscan, and the Atellanes, Oscan dialect pieces, were familiar long before 240 B. C. But the very fact that Livius Andronicus, Nævius, Ennius, and Pacuvius were none of them Roman citizens by birth would make an autochthonous Roman tragedy out of the question.

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