Minor Latin poets; with introductions and English translations

IINTRODUCTIONTO LAUS PISOXISThe Paiiegyric on Piso, by a young poet who pleadspoverty but covets literary fame in preference towealth, is addressed to one Calpurnius Piso, who iseulogised as eloquent in the law-courts, in the senateand in private declamation ; as generous, musical,athletic, and an adept in the chess-like game oflatrnncuU. Such qualities agree ^\^th the descriptionin Tacitus {An7i. XV. 48) of that Gaius CalpurniusPiso who was the ill-fated figure-head of the abortiveplot in A.D. 65 against Nero : they also agree withthe scholiimi on Juvenal's Piso bonus (V. 109), whichmentions this particular Piso's power of drawingcrowds to see him play the Indus latrunculorum. Theidentification with the noble conspirator is plausible,though we can prove neither that Piso bonus was theconspirator nor that Piso the conspirator had beenconsul, as the person addressed in Laus Pisonis, 70,clearly had been. This latter point decided Hubaux{Les Themes Bucoliques, p. 185) to see in the personaddressed Lucius Calpurnius Piso, consul with Neroin A.D. 57.The authorship is still more doubtful. In the nowmissing Lorsch manuscript the poem was erroneouslyassigned to Virgil. Certain similarities to Lucan'sstyle indicate identity rather of period than ofauthorship, though the old ascription to Lucan hasVOL. I.U289