Catullus in Roman Biography
Ca-tul'lus, [Fr. C atuli.e, kt'tiil',] (Catus Valerius,)
an eminent Latin poet, born at or near Verona about
77 B.C., (some authorities say 87 B.C.) He went to Rome
at an early age, and by bis literary merit obtained
admission
into the society of Cicero, Caesar, Pollio, and
others. His indulgence in vicious and expensive pleasures
soon reduced him to poverty, which, however, did
not subdue his hilarity. His superior genius as a poet is
generally admitted by ancient and modern critics. He
wrote numerous poems, which are still extant, including
odes and epigrams of great beauty and pathos. He also
excelled in heroic verse, and was the first Roman that
cultivated lyric poetry with success. His longest poem
is "The Nuptials of Peleus and Thetis," in hexameter
verse. Some critics estimate the "Atys" as the greatest
of his works. "His '
Atys,'
"
says Professor William
Ramsay,
" is one of the most remarkable poems in the
whole range of Latin literature. Rolling impetuously
along in a flood of wild passion, bodied forth in the
grandest imagery and the noblest diction, it
breathes
in
every line the fiery vehemence cf the Greek ditnyramb.
. . . We admire by turns, in the lighter efforts/ of his
muse, his unaffected ease, playful grace, vigorous
simplicity,
pungent wit, and slashing invective." He imitated
Greek models, and seemed like a Greek poet
writing in Latin. He is supposed to have died about
45 B.C. ; though Scaliger maintains that he lived about
thirty years after that date.
See Sellar, "Roman Poets of the Republic," chap. xii. ;
FarRicius,
" Bibliotheca Latina ;"
" Nouvelle Biographie Generate ;"
'Foreign Quarterly Review" for July, 1842;
" Fraser's Magazine"
for March, 1849.
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