BMCR 2008.12.32, Gernot Krapinger, [Quintilian] Der Gladiator

Gernot Krapinger (ed.), [Quintilian] Der Gladiator (Groessere
Deklamationen, 9). Collana Scientifica, 18.  Cassino:  Universita\
degli Studi di Cassino, 2007.  Pp. 203.  ISBN 9788883170416.  EUR 22.00 
(pb).

Reviewed by Stefanie A. H. Kennell, American School of Classical
Studies at Athens ([email protected])
Word count:  737 words
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To read a print-formatted version of this review, see
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After centuries of languishing in disrepute, the scholarly reception of
declamation as a fully-fledged literary genre is at last proceeding
apace, propelled by an ever-increasing number of journal articles,
monographs, and collaborative volumes.[[1]] Whereas scholars working in
English have in recent years taken an interest in declamations from the
viewpoints of both Latin philology and Roman social history, the
tradition of philological analysis continues to be cultivated
fruitfully by European scholars. Among its most notable products is the
University of Cassino's series of translations and commentaries on the
Quintilianic Major Declamations directed by Antonio Stramaglia, who
published the first two volumes, on Decl. Maj. 8 (Gemini languentes)
and  12 (Cadaveribus pasti), in 1999 and 2002 respectively. Two more
volumes have appeared in the meantime, on Decl. Maj. 3 (Miles Marianus)
and 13 (Apes pauperis). The last of these, the case of "the poor man's
bees," was the work of Gernot Krapinger, who has also authored this
present book.[[2]]

The foreword (9-10) promises a self-contained volume that does not
assume the reader has Krapinger's edition of Decl. Maj. 13 to hand for
remarks about textual criticism, or "a philological library" to supply
literary parallels, but rather attempts "to maintain a balanced,
user-friendly happy medium between linguistic and stylistic commentary,
rhetorical remarks and clarifications of substantive points,
predominantly those connected with piratical and gladiatorial matters"
(10). Walking sturdily on the path trodden by the soundest
practitioners of philological scholarship, Krapinger keeps his promise
in the main.[[3]] He frequently acknowledges his debt to the work of
commentators and translators such as Burman, Ritter, Sussman, and
Winterbottom. The basic text is that of Hakanson's 1982 Teubner
edition; on the few occasions where it does diverge, the decisions are
explained in the commentary. Some readings reaffirm the text as
transmitted (nn. 253, 259, 270 [with Winterbottom's approval], 380),
while the rest adopt emendations proposed by various scholars
(Winterbottom: nn. 39, 65, 140, 392; Russell: n. 79; Hakanson: nn. 135,
198; Stramaglia: nn. 250 [with Winterbottom], 278 [with Pagliaro], 363
[with Hakanson], 438, 439; Ellis: n. 236; but cf. 116 n. 176, where
Krapinger retains the transmitted crux praemium scribitur but
translates Schultingh's conjecture). Accurate and expressive, the
translation avoids the twin pitfalls of archaizing pedantry and
untoward colloquialism. The commentary, meticulous and thoughtful,
offers abundant parallels for characteristic turns of phrase and draws
on both time-tested philological observations (e.g. 83 n. 34, 106 n.
131, 121 n. 200, 160 n. 386) and more recent philological and
historical scholarship (e.g. 76-78 nn. 4-6, 99-100 n. 102, 130 n. 240,
156 n. 368). The author's close contact with Stramaglia and
Winterbottom, manifest in the commentary's frequent quotations per
litteras, enriches the value of the book. Like its predecessors, this
edition's greatest virtue is its sober matter-of-factness in taking its
subject seriously, giving Roman declamation the respectability it has
long deserved.

This declamation's title, "the Gladiator," refers to a son captured by
pirates, sold to a gladiatorial school, and, rather than being ransomed
by his own father, freed by a poor friend who journeyed to take his
place only to be killed in combat. Thus, its theme might seem to
revolve around issues of respectability and infamy in addition to the
traditional declamatory battleground of father-son conflict. But in
addition to the circumstance that the unwilling gladiator's father has
now disowned him for taking care of the dead friend's impoverished
father, it is the clash between friendship and filial piety that unpins
the basic argument. Krapinger's introduction accordingly addresses
these themes with discussions of the legal and social ramifications of
Greek apokeryxis and Roman abdicatio (13-19), as well as remarks on the
motif of friendship in rhetoric (19-22). He also offers a few general
remarks on the continuing popularity of gladiators from antiquity to
the present day, noting both Ridley Scott's 'Gladiator' and the late
antique dictiones of Ennodius.[[4]] A useful analysis of the work's
structure and lines of reasoning rounds off the front matter (22-26).
The bibliography is divided into two sections, one on Ps.-Quintilian,
rhetoric, and the declamatory genre, the other entitled "Sonstige
Literatur" (everything else). Given the approach Krapinger takes to the
subject, the selection of scholarship is solid and for the most part
conservative, but not as inclusive as it might be.[[5]]

Table of Contents:

Foreword (7-10)

Introduction (11-26)

Text and translation, on facing pages (27-73)

Commentary (75-174), in the form of endnotes to the translated text

Bibliography (175-196)

Abbreviations (197-200)


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Notes:


1.   Representative of the trend are the contributions by A. Corbeill
and M. Bloomer in the recent Companion to Roman Rhetoric, W. Dominik,
J.M. Hall (eds.) (Oxford and Malden, Mass., 2007), reviewed in BMCR
2008.09.33, and D. van Mal-Maeder's La fiction des declamations
(Leiden, 2007).

2.   Krapinger's 2005 translated and commented edition of [Quint.]
Decl. Maj. 13 has already been reviewed in BMCR: 2006.10.08.

3.   Though when it comes to the "Arm-Reich Problematik" (82 n. 19),
Krapinger does in fact refer readers to the discussion of the topos in
his commentary on Decl. Maj. 13.

4.   In regard to Ennodius, Krapinger hews to the traditional
interpretative line, which rejects the possibility of topical
references, championed by Schroeder and Winterbottom in B.-J. Schroeder
and J.-P. Schroeder (eds.), Studium declamatorium: Untersuchungen zu
Schuluebungen und Prunkreden von der Antike bis zur Neuzeit (2003).

5.   Excepting C. A. Barton's The Sorrows of the Ancient Romans
(Princeton, 1993). Strangely missing: D. Konstan,  Friendship in the
Classical World (Cambridge,1997); M. Peachin (ed.), Aspects of
Friendship in the Graeco-Roman World (JRA Supplementary Series 43).
(Portsmouth RI, 2001)