13 Facts About Tibullus

1.

Tibullus's status was probably that of a Roman eques, and he had inherited a considerable estate.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,346
2.

Tibullus had no liking for war, and though his life seems to have been divided between Rome and his country estate, his own preferences were wholly for the country life.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,347
3.

Tibullus died prematurely, probably in 19, and almost immediately after Virgil.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,348
4.

Tibullus's death made a deep impression in Rome, as is clear from his contemporary, Domitius Marsus, and from the elegy in which Ovid enshrined the memory of his predecessor.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,349
5.

Tibullus complains bitterly of his bondage, and of her rapacity and hard-heartedness.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,350
6.

Tibullus was an amiable man of generous impulses and unselfish disposition, loyal to his friends to the verge of self-sacrifice, and apparently constant to his mistresses.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,351
7.

Tibullus's ideal is a quiet retirement in the country with the loved one at his side.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,352
8.

Tibullus has no ambition and not even a poet's yearning for immortality.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,353
9.

Tibullus's clear, finished and yet unaffected style made him a great favourite and placed him, in the judgment of Quintilian, ahead of other elegiac writers.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,354
10.

Tibullus is smoother and more musical, but liable to become monotonous; Propertius, with occasional harshnesses, is more vigorous and varied.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,355
11.

Tibullus has a good many reminiscences and imitations of Tibullus, Propertius and Ovid, and they are not always happy.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,356
12.

Best manuscript of Tibullus is the Ambrosianus, which has been dated, whose earliest known owner was the humanist Coluccio Salutati.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,357
13.

Tibullus was first printed with Catullus, Propertius, and the Silvae of Statius by Vindelinus de Spira, and separately by Florentius de Argentina, probably in the same year.

FactSnippet No. 1,051,358