CATULLUS 68 - Scuola Normale Superiore

choose between these interpretations on the basis of the context. In view of in lecto caelibe I think that the
former is much more likely to be correct, but it is not possible to achieve certainty in this matter.
There has also been proposed a third interpretation: that desertum would mean ‘left behind’, ‘left alone’ and
would indicate no more than a temporary separation of the addressee from his partner (thus Coppel 1973:
22f.). In fact there is no evidence for such a usage, and the parallels that have been adduced are merely
apparent. At Cat. 66.21 (quoted above) Berenice, whose husband has left her temporarily to go on a
campaign, is called deserta: but there the poet uses strong language in a tongue-in-cheek attempt to
exaggerate Berenice’s predicament (note that in the same verse he writes about her ‘orphaned bed’, her
orbum … cubile). Nor is it relevant that in a series of passages imitating this one Propertius and Ovid always
speak of temporary separation and never of total abandonment (thus Prop. 3.6.23 gaudet me uacuo solam
tabescere lecto, Ov. Am. 3.19.42 cur totiens uacuo secubet ipsa toro and 3.10.2 secubat in uacuo sola puella
toro, Ars 2.370 et timet in uacuo sola cubare toro and Her. 16.317f. sola iaces uiduo tam longa nocte cubili /
in uiduo iaceo solus et ipse toro): Propertius and Ovid did not know any more than we did about Manlius’
personal circumstances, they were free to re-use Catullan phrases as they saw fit, and it is easy to see that
their plots are less radical in general than those of Catullus: Lesbia can betray or abandon Catullus and leave
him half dead, but long-term (if fickle) attachments are a characteristic feature of Augustan love elegy.
Likewise, abrepta desertus coniuge Achilles at Prop. 2.8.29 (Briseis has been taken from him by force, and
against her will) indicates not that in this version of the story she went to Agamemnon of her own accord, but
that Achilles felt no better than if she had done so. In general, it is possible to desertus (or any other word)
otherwise than literally as long as it is clear from the context how the word is to be understood: but if there is
no such indication, it has to be taken literally. Catullus 68a provides no such indication, so one has to take
desertus in one of the senses in which it is attested unambiguously in an erotic context, to mean ‘abandoned
by a lover’ or ‘shunned by all’.
G’s slip disertum is understandable in view of the attention Catullus pays elsewhere to eloquence (cfr. 22.2,
49.1 and 50.7f., and note disertum at 53.5).
in lecto caelibe Manlius’ bed is caelebs; that is, a term characterizing its owner has been transferred by
enallage to the bed itself. It is the question what caelebs tells us about Manlius’ personal circumstances.
Ovid writes of Pygmalion that sine coniuge caelebs / uiuebat thalamique diu consorte carebat (Met.
10.245f.). A man can be called caelebs if he is unmarried or, as Ovid puts it, sine coniuge: that is to say that
he can be a bachelor, a widower or a divorcé. This is the meaning of the term in legal texts at Gai. Inst. 2.111
and 2.286, cfr. 2.144, Ulp. Reg. 8.6 and 17.1, and see also CIL 2.1964 = Lex Municipii Malacitani at 2.35f.
In literary texts it is often contrasted with maritus: see Pl. Cas. 290 and Merc. 1018, Sen. Epist. 94.8, Quint.
Inst. 5.10.26 and Decl. Min. 247 p. 12 Ritter, Suet. Galba 5 and Calp. Decl. 22. In two cases the word is
found with the meaning ‘widower’, at Prop. 4.11.94 caelibis ad curas nec uacet ulla uia (Cornelia instructs
her children to take care of their father after her death) and at Pliny N.H. 10.104 nisi caelebs aut uidua nidum
non relinquit (of the dove).
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