Sallust's Splendid And Masterful Speeches Resemble The Speeches Of Cato, And

Sallust's splendid and masterful speeches resemble the speeches of Cato, and his truthfulness in the interpretation of historical facts reminds Ennius' works. However, Sallust is also unique in his mature ways of expression that lack any superstition and reveal profound research of Roman history; this is especially obvious in Sallust's work the Jugurtha. Sallust's language demonstrates an unusual combination of Latin archaisms and Greek adoptions; Sallust's style greatly influences further generations of Roman writers.
Thus, analysing the formation of Latin literature in Rome, the essay suggests that although the period of the late Roman Republic and the early Empire was characterised by two Punic Wars and the destruction of old values, this was also an era of cultural revival for Rome. Such authors of the late Republic as Cicero, Catullus and Lucretius intensified the importance of Roman literature, mastering earlier Latin writing and simultaneously reflecting Roman history in their literary works. The works of such earlier Latin authors as Plautus, Ennius, Naevius, Andronicus, Lucilius and Cato served as the basis for Sallust, Cicero, Virgil, Horace, Catullus, Propertius and Lucretius who successfully advanced such literary genres as poetry, oratory, comedies, tragedies and epic. While the poets of earlier Latin writing utilised a rather low Latin form, the authors of the late Republic and the early Empire created a more purified form of expression. Satire was considered to be a complete invention of Roman literature; starting with the satirical elements of Ennuis' works, literature of the late Republic and the early Empire reflected the utilisation of satire in the works of Cicero, Lucretius, Virgil and Horace who transformed satire into an entirely didactic form.
Endnotes
1. Gordon Williams, Tradition and Originality in Roman Poetry (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968), pp.11-17.
2. J.W. Mackail, Latin Literature (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1895), p.1.
3. Sander M. Goldberg, 'The Early Republic: the Beginnings to 90s BC, in Stephen Harrison, A Companion to Latin Literature (Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing House, 2005), p.19.
4. Goldberg, p.20.
5. Richard Jenkyns, Three Classical Poets (Harvard: Harvard University Press, 1982), pp.130-132
6. John Godwin, Lucretius. Ancients in Action (London: Bristol Classical Press / Duckworth Press, 2004), pp.72-75.
7. Gian Biagio Conte, Latin Literature A History (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994), p.29.
8. Robert Leonard Palmer, The Latin Language (London: Faber & Faber Limited, 1954), p.74.
9. Goldberg, p.26.
10. Jeri Blair DeBrohun, Roman Propertius and the Reinvention of Elegy (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2003), p.4.
11. Conte, p. 29.
12. Plutarch, Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans (New York: Dell, 1962), p.416.
13.