Statius Caecilius, also known as Caecilius Statius (c. 220 BC - c. 166 BC) was a Roman comic poet.

A contemporary and intimate friend of Ennius

Ennius

Quintus Ennius was a writer during the period of the Roman Republic, and is often considered the father of Roman poetry. He was of Calabrian descent...

, he was born in the territory of the Insubrian Gaul

Gaul

Gaul was a region of Western Europe during the Iron Age and Roman era, encompassing present day France, Luxembourg and Belgium, most of Switzerland, the western part of Northern Italy, as well as the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the left bank of the Rhine. The Gauls were the speakers of...

s, probably in Mediolanum

Mediolanum

Mediolanum, the ancient Milan, was an important Celtic and then Roman centre of northern Italy. This article charts the history of the city from its settlement by the Insubres around 600 BC, through its conquest by the Romans and its development into a key centre of Western Christianity and capital...

, and was probably taken as a prisoner to Rome (c. 200), during the great Gallic war. Originally a slave, he assumed the name of Caecilius from his patron, probably one of the Metelli. He supported himself by adapting Greek plays for the Roman stage from the New Comedy writers, especially Menander

Menander

Menander , Greek dramatist, the best-known representative of Athenian New Comedy, was the son of well-to-do parents; his father Diopeithes is identified by some with the Athenian general and governor of the Thracian Chersonese known from the speech of Demosthenes De Chersoneso...

, a genre called Palliata Comoedia

Fabula palliata

Fabula palliata or Palliata are names assigned by the Romans to a genre of comedy that reworked in Latin the themes of Greek New Comedy. The genre began with the comedies of Livius Andronicus, who also initiated Roman literature and Roman drama...

. If the statement in the life of Terence

Terence

Publius Terentius Afer , better known in English as Terence, was a playwright of the Roman Republic, of North African descent. His comedies were performed for the first time around 170–160 BC. Terentius Lucanus, a Roman senator, brought Terence to Rome as a slave, educated him and later on,...

 by Suetonius is correct and the reading sound, Caecilius's judgment was so esteemed that he was ordered to hear Terence's Andria (exhibited 166 BC) read and to pronounce an opinion upon it.

After several failures, Caecilius gained a high reputation. Volcatius Sedigitus

Volcatius Sedigitus

Volcātius Sedīgitus was the titulus of a Roman literary critic who flourished around 100 , noted for his ranking of those he considered the best Latin comics....

, the dramatic critic, places him first amongst the comic poets; Varro

Marcus Terentius Varro

Marcus Terentius Varro was an ancient Roman scholar and writer. He is sometimes called Varro Reatinus to distinguish him from his younger contemporary Varro Atacinus.-Biography:...

 credits him with pathos and skill in the construction of his plots; Horace

Horace

Quintus Horatius Flaccus , known in the English-speaking world as Horace, was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus.-Life:...

 (Epistles, ii. I. 59) contrasts his dignity with the art of Terence. Quintilian

Quintilian

Marcus Fabius Quintilianus was a Roman rhetorician from Hispania, widely referred to in medieval schools of rhetoric and in Renaissance writing...

 (Inst. Orat., x. I. 99) speaks somewhat disparagingly of him, and Cicero

Cicero

Marcus Tullius Cicero , was a Roman philosopher, statesman, lawyer, political theorist, and Roman constitutionalist. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the equestrian order, and is widely considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists.He introduced the Romans to the chief...

, although he admits with some hesitation that Caecilius may have been the chief of the comic poets (De Optimo Genere Oratorum, I), considers him inferior to Terence in style and Latinity (Ad Atticum vii. 3), as was only natural, considering his foreign extraction.

The fact that his plays could be referred to by name alone without any indication of the author (Cicero, De Finibus, ii. 7) is sufficient proof of their widespread popularity. Caecilius holds a place between Plautus

Plautus

Titus Maccius Plautus , commonly known as "Plautus", was a Roman playwright of the Old Latin period. His comedies are the earliest surviving intact works in Latin literature. He wrote Palliata comoedia, the genre devised by the innovator of Latin literature, Livius Andronicus...

 and Terence in his treatment of the Greek originals; he did not, like Plautus, confound things Greek and Roman, nor, like Terence, eliminate everything that could not be romanized.

The fragments of his plays are chiefly preserved in Aulus Gellius

Aulus Gellius

Aulus Gellius , was a Latin author and grammarian, who was probably born and certainly brought up in Rome. He was educated in Athens, after which he returned to Rome, where he held a judicial office...

, who cites several passages from Plocium (The Necklace) together with the original Greek of Menander, affording the only opportunity, apart from Plautus' Bacchides

Bacchides (play)

Bacchides is a Latin play by the early Roman playwright Titus Maccius Plautus. The title has been translated as The Bacchises, and the plot revolves around the misunderstandings surrounding two sisters, each called Bacchis, who work in a local house of ill-repute...

, to make a substantial comparison between a Roman comedy and its Greek model. Caecilius' version, diffuse and by no means close as a translation, does not reproduce the spirit of the original.

Surviving Titles And Fragments

Forty-two titles are known, about half based on Menander, and half on other Greek authors. Approximately 280 fragmentary verses survive. Plocium is the best preserved (45 verses).

Aetherio (or, Aetherio) Andrea Androgynos ("The Hermaphrodite") Asotus ("The Debauched Man") Ephesio Epiclerus ("The Heiress") Epistathmos Epistula ("The Letter") Ex Hautu Hestos Exul ("The Exile") Fallacia ("The Trick") Gamos ("Marriage") Harpazomene ("The Captured Woman") Hymnnis ("Hymnis") Hypobolimaeus, or Subditivus Hypobolimaeus Chaerestratus Hypobolimaeus Rastraria Hypobolimaeus Aeschinus Imbrii ("Men From Imbros Imbros Imbros or Imroz, officially referred to as Gökçeada since July 29, 1970 , is an island in the Aegean Sea and the largest island of Turkey, part of Çanakkale Province. It is located at the entrance of Saros Bay and is also the westernmost point of Turkey... ")

Karine ("The Carian Caria Caria was a region of western Anatolia extending along the coast from mid-Ionia south to Lycia and east to Phrygia. The Ionian and Dorian Greeks colonized the west of it and joined the Carian population in forming Greek-dominated states there...  Woman") Meretrix ("The Prostitute") Nauclerus ("The Ship's Captain") Nothus Nicasio ("Nicasio the Bastard") Obolostates, or Faenerator Pausimachus Philumena Plocium ("The Necklace") Polumeni ("Men Being Sold") Portitor ("The Door-keeper") Progamos Pugil ("The Boxer") Symbolum ("The Symbol, or Token") Synaristosae ("Woman Having Lunch Together") Synephebi Syracusii ("Men From Syracuse") Titthe ("The Wet-Nurse") Triumphus ("The Triumph")

External links

• Google Books copy of Otto Ribbeck
  Otto Ribbeck
  Johann Carl Otto Ribbeck , was a German classical scholar.He was born at Erfurt in Saxony. Having held professorial appointments at Kiel and Heidelberg, he succeeded his tutor, Friedrich Ritschl, in the chair of classical philology at Leipzig, where he died.Ribbeck was the author of several...
  
  's Latin edition of the fragments (Scaenicae Romanorum Poesis Fragmenta, 3rd ed., 1898, vol. 2, pp. 40ff.)