Saturnian meter or verse is an old Latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

 and Italic

Italic languages

The Italic subfamily is a member of the Indo-European language family. It includes the Romance languages derived from Latin , and a number of extinct languages of the Italian Peninsula, including Umbrian, Oscan, Faliscan, and Latin.In the past various definitions of "Italic" have prevailed...

 poetic

Poetry

Poetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...

 form, of which the principles of versification

Versification

Versification may be*the art of making verses, see poetry*the theory of the phonetic structure of verse, see meter *the rendition of a prose work into verse, especially of classical works during the Middle Ages, see medieval poetry...

 have become obscure. Only 132 complete uncontroversial verses survive. 95 literary verses and partial fragments have been preserved as quotations in later grammatical writings, as well as 37 verses in funerary or dedicatory inscriptions. The majority of literary Saturnians come from the Odysseia (more commonly known as the Odissia or Odyssia), a translation/paraphrase of Homer

Homer

In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...

's Odyssey

Odyssey

The Odyssey is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is, in part, a sequel to the Iliad, the other work ascribed to Homer. The poem is fundamental to the modern Western canon, and is the second—the Iliad being the first—extant work of Western literature...

by Livius Andronicus

Livius Andronicus

Lucius Livius Andronicus , not to be confused with the later historian Livy, was a Greco-Roman dramatist and epic poet of the Old Latin period. He began as an educator in the service of a noble family at Rome by translating Greek works into Latin, including Homer’s Odyssey. They were meant at...

 (ca. 3rd century BC), and the Bellum Poenicum, an epic on the First Punic War

First Punic War

The First Punic War was the first of three wars fought between Ancient Carthage and the Roman Republic. For 23 years, the two powers struggled for supremacy in the western Mediterranean Sea, primarily on the Mediterranean island of Sicily and its surrounding waters but also to a lesser extent in...

 by Gnaeus Naevius

Gnaeus Naevius

Gnaeus Naevius was a Roman epic poet and dramatist of the Old Latin period. He had a notable literary career at Rome until his satiric comments delivered in comedy angered the Metelli family, one of whom was consul. After a sojourn in prison he recanted and was set free by the tribunes...

 (ca. 3rd century BC).

The meter was moribund by the time of the literary verses and forgotten altogether by classical

Classical Latin

Classical Latin in simplest terms is the socio-linguistic register of the Latin language regarded by the enfranchised and empowered populations of the late Roman republic and the Roman empire as good Latin. Most writers during this time made use of it...

 times, falling out of use with the adoption of the hexameter

Hexameter

Hexameter is a metrical line of verse consisting of six feet. It was the standard epic metre in classical Greek and Latin literature, such as in the Iliad and Aeneid. Its use in other genres of composition include Horace's satires, and Ovid's Metamorphoses. According to Greek mythology, hexameter...

 and other Greek

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...

 verse forms. Quintus Ennius is the poet who is generally credited with introducing the Greek hexameter in Latin, and dramatic meters seem to have been well on their way to domestic adoption in the works of his rough contemporary 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...

. These Greek verse forms were considered more sophisticated than the native tradition; 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:...

 called the Saturnian horridus. Consequently, the poetry in this meter was not preserved. 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...

 regretted the loss in his Brutus

Brutus (Cicero)

Cicero's Brutus is a history of Roman oratory. It is written in the form of a dialogue, in which Brutus and Atticus ask Cicero to describe the qualities of all the leading Roman orators up to their time. It was composed in 46 B.C.-Further reading:*G. V...

:

Atque utinam exstārent illa carmina, quae multīs saeclīs ante suam aetātem in epulīs esse cantitāta ā singulīs conuīuīs dē clārōrum uirōrum laudibus in Orīginibus scrīptum relīquit Catō.

'I heartily wish those venerable Odes were still extant, which Cato

Cato the Elder

Marcus Porcius Cato was a Roman statesman, commonly referred to as Censorius , Sapiens , Priscus , or Major, Cato the Elder, or Cato the Censor, to distinguish him from his great-grandson, Cato the Younger.He came of an ancient Plebeian family who all were noted for some...

 informs us in his Antiquities, used to be sung by every guest in his turn at the homely feasts of our ancestors, many ages before, to commemorate the feats of their heroes.'

However, it has been noted that later poets like Ennius (by extension Virgil

Virgil

Publius Vergilius Maro, usually called Virgil or Vergil in English , was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He is known for three major works of Latin literature, the Eclogues , the Georgics, and the epic Aeneid...

, who follows him in both time and technique) preserve something of the Saturnian aesthetic in hexameter verse. Ennius explicitly acknowledges Naevius

Gnaeus Naevius

Gnaeus Naevius was a Roman epic poet and dramatist of the Old Latin period. He had a notable literary career at Rome until his satiric comments delivered in comedy angered the Metelli family, one of whom was consul. After a sojourn in prison he recanted and was set free by the tribunes...

' poem and skill (lines 206–7 and 208–9 in the edition of Skutsch, with translations by Goldberg):

[...] scrīpsēre aliī rem

uorsibus quōs ōlim Faunei uātesque canēbant

'[...] Others have given an account

in rhythms which the Fauns and seers sang.'

nam neque Mūsārum scopulōs ēscendit ad altōs

nec dictī studiōsus fuit Rōmānus homō ante hunc.

'For no Roman scaled the Muses' lofty crags

or was careful with his speech before this man.'

Ancient grammarians sought to derive the verse from a Greek model, in which syllable weight

Syllable weight

In linguistics, syllable weight is the concept that syllables pattern together according to the number and/or duration of segments in the rime. In classical poetry, both Greek and Latin, distinctions of syllable weight were fundamental to the meter of the line....

 or the arrangement of light and heavy syllables was the governing principle. Scholars today remain divided between two approaches:

1. The meter was quantitative (but not borrowed from Greek).
2. The meter was accentual
   Accent (poetry)
   In poetry, accent refers to the stressed syllable of a polysyllabic word, or a monosyllabic word that receives stress because it belongs to an "open class" of words or because of "contrastive" or "rhetorical" stress. In basic analysis of a poem by scansion, accents are represented with a slash...
   
    or based on accented and unaccented syllables.

Despite the division, there is some consensus regarding aspects of the verse's structure. A Saturnian line can be divided into two cola or half-lines, separated by a central caesura

Caesura

thumb|100px|An example of a caesura in modern western music notation.In meter, a caesura is a complete pause in a line of poetry or in a musical composition. The plural form of caesura is caesuras or caesurae...

. The second colon is shorter than or as long as the first. Furthermore, in any half-line with seven or more syllables, the last three or four are preceded by word-end. This is known as Korsch's caesura or the caesura Korschiana, after its discoverer.

The Saturnian as quantitative

Most—but not all—Saturnians can be captured by the following scheme:

• ∪ = light syllable
• – = heavy syllable
• ∪∪ = two light syllables that occupy the space of one heavy
• || = caesura
• ∪ over – (x at verse-end) = position can be occupied by either light or heavy syllable
• ∪∪ over – over ∪ = position can be occupied by any of the three

Examples

Numeration of literary fragments is according to Warmington's edition; translations are also by Warmington (see bibliography infra).

(1) Livius Andronicus, Odissia fragment 1

Virum mihī Camēna īnsece uersūtum

∪ – ∪ – || ∪ – ∪ || – ∪ ∪ – – x

'Tell me, O Goddess of song, of the clever man'

(2) Naevius, Bellum Poenicum fragments 2–4

Postquam auem aspexit in templō Anchīsa

sacr(ā) in mēnsā Penātium ordine pōnuntur

immolābat auream uictimam pulchram

– ∪ ∪ ∪ || – – ∪ || – – – – – x

∪ – – – || ∪ – (∪) – || – ∪ – – – x

– ∪ – – || – ∪ – || – ∪ – – x

'After Anchises had seen a bird within the range of view,

hallowed offerings were set in a row on the table of the Household Gods;

and he busied himself in sacrificing a beautiul golden victim.'

(3) Epitaph of Lucius Cornelius Scipio Barbatus

Lucius Cornelius Scipio Barbatus

Lucius Cornelius Scipio Barbatus was one of the two elected Roman consuls in 298 BC. He led the Roman army to victory against the Etruscans near Volterra...

 (ca. 270–150 BC)

                         GNAIVOD•PATRE

PROGNATVS•FORTIS•VIR•SAPIENSQVE—QVOIVS•FORMA•VIRTVTEI•PARISVMA

FVIT—CONSOL CENSOR•AIDILIS•QVEI•FVIT•APVD•VOS—TAVRASIA•CISAVNA

SAMNIO•CEPIT—SVBIGIT•OMNE•LOVCANA•OPSIDESQVE•ABDOVCIT

In regularized orthography (note the punctuation on the stone, viz. — = verse-end):

Gnaeuō patre / prōgnātus, fortis uir sapiēnsque

cuius fōrma uirtūtī parissuma / fuit

cōnsul, cēnsor, aedīlis quī fuit apud uōs

Taurāsiam, Cisaunam, / Samnium cēpit

subigit omnem Lūcānam, opsidēsque abdūcit.

– – ∪ ∪ || – – – || – – – || ∪ ∪ – x

– ∪* – ∪ || – – – || ∪ – ∪ ∪ ∪ x

– – – ∪† || – – ∪* || – ∪ ∪† ∪ –** x

– – ∪ – || ∪ – – || – ∪ – – x

∪∪ ∪ – – || – – ∪ || – ∪ – ∪ || – – x

* As in early Latin poetry, if not – as in later.

** Some early Latin poetry treats this as ∪.

† This syllable is historically –.

'Sprung from Gnaeus his father, a man strong and wise,

whose appearance was most in keeping with his virtue,

who was consul, censor, and aedile among you,

he captured Taurasia, Cisauna, Samnium,

he subdued all Lucania and led off hostages.'

The Saturnian as accentual

W.M. Lindsay formalizes the accentual scheme of the Saturnian as follows:

• ´ = accented syllable
• ∪ = unaccented

Handbooks otherwise schematize the verse as 3+ || 2+ stresses. This theory assumes Classical Latin accentuation. However, there is reason to believe that the Old Latin accent may have played a role in the verse. Afterwards, Lindsay himself abandoned his theory.

Examples

Here are the same texts from above, scanned accentually.

(4) Livius Andronicus, Odissia fragment 1

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪ ∪ (Old Latin)

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪ (Classical Latin)

(5) Naevius, Bellum Poenicum fragments 2–4

(Old Latin)

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ ´ ∪ ∪

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ (∪) ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪ ∪

´ ∪ ` ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪

(Classical Latin)

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ (∪) ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪

` ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪

(6) Epitaph of Lucius Cornelius Scipio Barbatus

(Old Latin)

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ || ´ ∪ ´ || ´ ∪ ` ∪

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ || ´ ´ ∪ ´ ∪ ´

´ ∪ ∪ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪

´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ || ´ ∪ ` ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪

(Classical Latin)

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ´ || ` ∪ ´ ∪

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ´ ∪ ´ ∪ ´

∪ ´ ∪ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪

´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ || ` ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪

The Saturnian in non-Latin Italic

Despite the obscurity of the principles of Saturnian versification in Latin, scholars have nonetheless attempted to extend analysis to other languages of ancient Italy

Italic languages

The Italic subfamily is a member of the Indo-European language family. It includes the Romance languages derived from Latin , and a number of extinct languages of the Italian Peninsula, including Umbrian, Oscan, Faliscan, and Latin.In the past various definitions of "Italic" have prevailed...

 related to Latin.

(7) Faliscan

Faliscan

Faliscan may refer to:*Falisci, an ancient Italian people group*Faliscan language...

 (two nearly identical inscriptions on cups from Civita Castellana

Civita Castellana

Civita Castellana is a town and comune in the province of Viterbo, 65 km north of Rome.Mount Soracte lies about 10 km to the south-east.-History:...

, 4th century BC)

FOIED•VINO•(PI)PAFO•CRA•CAREFO

In Latin orthography

Latin alphabet

The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most recognized alphabet used in the world today. It evolved from a western variety of the Greek alphabet called the Cumaean alphabet, which was adopted and modified by the Etruscans who ruled early Rome...

:

foiiēd uīnom (pi)pafō. crā(s) carēfō.

– – – – (||) ∪ (∪) – || – ∪ – x (Quantitative)

´ ∪ ´ ∪ (||) ´ (∪) ∪ || ´ ∪ ´ ∪ (Accentual)

'Today, I shall drink wine. Tomorrow, I shall go without.'

(8) Oscan (one of several similar inscriptions in Etruscoid

Old Italic alphabet

Old Italic refers to several now extinct alphabet systems used on the Italian Peninsula in ancient times for various Indo-European languages and non-Indo-European languages...

 script on vessels from Teano

Teano

Teano is a town and comune of Campania, Italy, in the province of Caserta, 30 km north-west of that town on the main line to Rome from Naples. It stands at the south-east foot of an extinct volcano, Rocca Monfina.- Ancient times and Middle Ages:...

, 3rd century BC)

minis:beriis:anei:upsatuh:sent:tiianei*

* Sabellian

Italic languages

The Italic subfamily is a member of the Indo-European language family. It includes the Romance languages derived from Latin , and a number of extinct languages of the Italian Peninsula, including Umbrian, Oscan, Faliscan, and Latin.In the past various definitions of "Italic" have prevailed...

 inscriptional texts in native

Old Italic alphabet

Old Italic refers to several now extinct alphabet systems used on the Italian Peninsula in ancient times for various Indo-European languages and non-Indo-European languages...

 orthography are conventionally transcribed in bold-face minuscule, and those in the Latin script italicized.

In Latin orthography:

Minis Beris ā(n)nei opsātō sent Teānei.

(scansion of first three words uncertain) || – – – – || ∪ – x (Quantitative)

´ ∪ ´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ – ∪ – || ∪ – ∪ (Accentual)

' (these) were made at Teanum in Minius Berius' (workshop?).' (meaning of anei uncertain)

(9) Umbrian (inscription on a bronze plate from Plestia, 4th century BC)

cupras matres pletinas sacrụ [esu]**

** In epigraphy

Epigraphy

Epigraphy Epigraphy Epigraphy (from the , literally "on-writing", is the study of inscriptions or epigraphs as writing; that is, the science of identifying the graphemes and of classifying their use as to cultural context and date, elucidating their meaning and assessing what conclusions can be...

, graphemes transcribed with an underdot are of uncertain reading, and restorations are enclosed in square brackets.

In Latin orthography:

Cuprās Mātris Plestīnās sacrum esum.

∪ – – – || – – – || ∪ ∪ ∪ x (Quantitative)

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ∪ ´ ∪ (Accentual)

'I am a sacred object of Mother Cupra from Plestia.' (Cupra was a Sabine

Sabine

The Sabines were an Italic tribe that lived in the central Appennines of ancient Italy, also inhabiting Latium north of the Anio before the founding of Rome...

 goddess)

(10) Paeligni

Paeligni

The Paeligni or Peligni were an Italic people who lived in the Valle Peligna, in what is now Abruzzo, central Italy.-History:The Paeligni are first mentioned as a member of a confederacy which included the Marsi, Marrucini and Vestini, with which the Romans came into conflict in the Second Samnite...

an (final verse in an inscription on a stone from Corfinium

Corfinium

Corfinium was a city in Ancient Italy, on the eastern side of the Apennines, due east of Rome. It is now near the modern Corfinio, in the province of L'Aquila .-History:...

, 1st century BC)

lifar dida uus deti hanustu herentas

In Latin orthography:

Līfar dida(t) uūs deti hanustō herentās.

– – ∪ – || – (scansion of deti uncertain) || ∪ – – ∪ – x (Quantitative)

´ ∪ ´ ∪ || ´ ´ ∪ || ∪ ´ ∪ ∪ ´ ∪ (Accentual)

'May Liber

Dionysus

Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...

 grant you ... (good?) will ....' (meanings of deti and hanustu unknown)

Prehistory of the Saturnian

A large number of the verses have a 4 || 3 || 3 || 3 syllable count and division, which scholars have been inclined to take as underlying or ideal. This has permitted comparison with meters from related Indo-European poetic traditions outside Italic, such as Celtic

Celtic languages

The Celtic languages are descended from Proto-Celtic, or "Common Celtic"; a branch of the greater Indo-European language family...

, and a few scholars have tried to trace the verse back to Proto-Indo-European

Proto-Indo-European language

The Proto-Indo-European language is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European languages, spoken by the Proto-Indo-Europeans...

. John Vigorita derived the 4 || 3 || 5-6 syllable Saturnian from:
a Proto-Indo-European 7- or 8-syllable line combined with a shorter 5- or 6-syllable line, which is itself derivable from the octosyllable by undoing truncations (noted in metrical schemes by one or more ^'s, wherever in the meter the truncation has occurred).

M.L. West schematized this subset of verses as:
which he then traces to two Proto-Indo-European octosyllables:
one giving the Saturnian's heptasyllabic half-line by acephaly (truncation of line-beginning), the other yielding the hexasyllabic colon both by acephaly and catalexis (truncation of line-end). Ultimately, owing to the difficulties of describing and analyzing the Saturnian without taking its history into account, attempts at reconstruction have not won acceptance.