The Beginnings of a Literature in Latin
Feeney, Denis
Journal of Roman Studies, Volume 95, Number 1, October 2005 , pp. 226-240(15)
Abstract
I the dilemmas of literary history
As part of the ongoing renewal of the Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft, the old five volumes of Band VIII, Geschichte der römischen Litteratur, known to all its users as ‘Schanz-Hosius’, are being replaced in eight volumes, in a plan conceived by Reinhart Herzog and Peter Lebrecht Schmidt. The fifth volume in chronological order, edited by Herzog and covering 284–374 c.e., was published in 1989; the fourth, edited by Klaus Sallmann and covering 117–283 c.e., came out in 1997. In 2002 appeared the first volume in chronological order, under the editorship of Werner Suerbaum. The volume is a massive document of collaborative learning, and its utility to students of Latin literature is going to be very great for the foreseeable future. We shall all be plundering its great stores of testimonia and bibliography, and turning to it as a first resource when dealing with any of the authors or texts it covers; many a dissertation will be floated on the waves of bibliography between its covers. Since much of my discussion will be in disagreement, it is important to stress at the outset that I have nothing but admiration and gratitude for the enterprise as a whole. Suerbaum and his team have merited well of Latin studies: they have succeeded magnificently in their primary objective of selflessly providing their colleagues and successors with the material with which to work on this period.
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