Luxorius

The kind of literature that is called cento is studied in this thesis with a special focus on two late antique Latin wedding poems, Cento Nuptialis written by Ausonius in the late 4th century A.D., and Epithalamium Fridi probably written in Carthage some hundred years later. These two poems are the only late antique Latin centos which belong to the same genre; they are therefore investigated with the aim of showing how centos belonging to the same genre may relate in different ways to both their text of origin and their genre. The method used is based on the belief that centos are best described as ‘open works,’ with a wide ‘field of possibilities.’ In the analyses a hermeneutical approach is applied, and the Model Reader’s interpretations are in focus. The two wedding centos relate in different ways to text of origin and genre. Associations which forecast the events of the part of the poem called Imminutio, a ‘notion of combat’, and the double circumstances lying behind the composition of the poem are found crucial for the interpretation of Cento Nuptialis. The humour of the Imminutio part is explained as a result of incongruity between cento, text of origin and genre-expectations. In Epithalamium Fridi, it is shown that the text of origin is sub- ordinated to the panegyric scope of the epithalamium of occasion. Some general conclusions are cautiously suggested. These concern: various kinds of reinterpretation of the text of origin through the lens of a cento; different kinds of guidance for the interpretation of a cento; and different functions for which centos may be particularly apt, e.g. subversive and humorous poems.

This paper examines Ausonius’s epitaph XIV Green, dedicated to Hector, focusing on some issues of textual criticism. A particular attention is paid to the intertextual relationship between this epigram and some similar poems of Latin Anthology, concerning the same topos.

Luxorius’ book opens with a series of four texts in which the auctorial dimension and the poet’s reflection on the epigram are concentrated. In this paper, I study different literary positions present in these texts: first, the topos of the epigram as a minor genre, when the author fully assumes the heritage of Catullus and Martial; then, Luxorius also uses the locus humilitatis propriae, which does not belong to the classical epigram and which he found in more recent and/or heterogeneric literary forms; finally, in the very constitution of his prefacial sequence, Luxorius closely interacts with Martial, whose he imitates – but also reorganizes and synthesizes – important patterns. Thus, he makes the initial place of his book a complex one, where epigrammatic heritage and non epigrammatic influences intersect and which has no equivalent in the epigrammatic tradition.

Luxorius, who is presumably the compiler of the so-called Salmasian Anthology, is the most important Latin epigrammatist of Vandalic Carthage. Often named the ‘Carthaginian Martial’, he is indeed comparable to his famous predecessor in terms of literary, in particular generic, self-consciousness and a focus on autothematism. His poetic world, however, is quite extraordinary, abounding in abnormal personages and unbelievable phenomena, and as such somewhat different from Martial’s. Rather than reflecting the everyday doings of the sixth century Carthaginians, Luxorius’s Liber epigrammaton (287-375 R) places the emphasis only on the extremes, often exploiting the figure of paradox. As such, it offers an intriguing, yet metaphorical rather than realistic, view of the Roman life under the Vandals.
Apparently, epigrammatic poetry was quite popular in Vandal Carthage. Anthologia Salmasiana includes several single poems and two other epigrammatic collections quite safely datable to the Vandal period. They all seem to have been composed by Luxorius’s fellow-literati. The Unius poetae sylloge (90-197 R) is in certain aspects similar to Luxorius’s Liber, whereas Anonymi versus serpentini (38-80 R) constitute a specific kind of epigrammatic poetry: two-verse pieces based on the figure of epanalepsis.

RESUMO:

Refletir acerca do luxo e do lixo na interdisciplinaridade, analisar as novas circunstâncias comunicativas diante da ameaça de escassez de recursos naturais e do crescente aquecimento global, investigar estratégias empresariais e forças sociais que impulsionam o “consumo verde”, é o objetivo desse estudo que se constitui pela pesquisa qualitativa e quantitativa nas áreas de
Administração, Comunicação, Design, Geologia, Marketing, Moda, Psicologia e Sociologia, seus desdobramentos em relação ao mercado de consumo e as novas formas de estabelecer sentido ao consumo sustentável. Anúncios da Campanha Primavera/ Verão 2007 da Diesel: Are You Global Warming Ready? (Você está preparado para o aquecimento global?) e An Inconvinient Truth (Uma Verdade Inconveniente –– documentário acerca das mudanças climáticas, mais especificamente a respeito do aquecimento global, lançado por Al Gore, em 2006), são objetos de investigação deste estudo.

Palavras-chave: Consumo. Luxo. Lixo. Aquecimento Global. Responsabilidade Socioambiental.