2.1 The story of a manuscript  (Page 2/2)

In the age of Tiberius (14-37 AD), another copy of the Romuleid appears in a new state library, in the Templum Novum. Tiberius also had a copy he kept at Sperlonga for dinner parties, where those in attendance would play trivia games about the poem. Calamus' poem also becomes a school text throughout the west. This means that many cheap editions are made for students; these are riddled with errors.

Life remains good for the Romuleid throughout the first century AD and into the second century, despite the vagaries of taste. Copies of the poem appear in private libraries, in public baths, as well as in Trajan's new library (dedicated ca. 112/113). Martial even finds a copy of the poem in codex-form rather than a roll! Calamus then enjoys an even greater vogue in the age of Hadrian and later in the second century, when archaizers read and studied the poem with great enthusiasm. (In Hadrian's circle, a game develops in which one opens the Romuleid at random and determine one's fortune from the line upon which the eye lands. History books record the lines.) Aulus Gellius even claims to have seen not one but two copies of the Romuleid written in Calamus' hand; at least one was a forgery, however. Gellius also hears of an original edition that a friend of a friend saw in Athens.

In the third century, several abridgements of the poem appear. In the fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries, meanwhile, several grammarians quote lines of the Romuleid , as do Church Fathers, particularly Augustine. The poet Ausonius writes about grammarians who cherish their texts of Calamus in Gaul; it is a poignant tableau, since those figures, as teachers, could afford only school editions. (The grammarians have an inkling that something is amiss when they compare their texts and find several variant readings; each thinks his version is the correct one.)

Sometime around 384, a de luxe edition of Calamus' poem appears in codex form, according to Macrobius. This does not survive.

At Vivarium ca. 560, Cassiodorus saw to it that the Romuleid was copied and preserved at the monastery. Isidore of Seville, meanwhile, notes that his library contains Calamus' poem ca. 615. Around 700, an Irish monk collects (writes?) scholia on the poem; these find some popularity in the Middle Ages and survive.

Scribes copy and keep the Romuleid in many monasteries for the next several hundred years. Most are ultimately lost forever. In fact, it is only through one copy, found in the monastery of Monte Cassino, that the poem survives. This edition is one step removed from the fourth-century de luxe edition. From that archetype, many copies are made, with mistakes inevitably resulting for several reasons: haplography and dittography; substitution of one word for another; a tired or inattentive eye that skips a few lines; the repetition of a line or word; misunderstanding of an abbreviation; and simple misreading of a word. Other changes also occur: Christian bowderlization; glosses; interpolation; "correction"; and the incorporation of marginalia.

Printed editions begin to appear in the Renaissance. Textual critics try to secure what the poet actually wrote-ideally, the goal of all textual criticism. This involves comparing the manuscripts that can be found and assessing their relative quality.

Over time, more and more critics undertake this task, developing stemmata along the way, which for a time have to be changed as more manuscripts are discovered. The abridgements, grammatical treatises, and scholia are also looked at more carefully (and some are rediscovered), with variants between their quoted lines and those in the manuscripts considered. Quotation by ancient sources undergoes the same scrutiny. Finally, the emendations and conjectures by earlier scholars becomes a body of material through which to sift.

In early 2004, an undergraduate at Rice University, having learned some first principles of textual criticism from a somewhat obtuse but well-intentioned professor, decides that someday he/she will produce a critical edition of the Romuleid . This work appears in 2020. While he/she cannot know it, the text reproduces exactly what Calamus wrote in his second edition of his poem.

Questions and discussion

A broad question, but not so broad, I hope, as to be meaningless:

How does textual criticism relate to the issue of authorship and ownership?

Possible talking points:

The quest for the original text, or as near to it as possible.

The two perspectives on authorship and ownership that emendation offers.

Copying without copyright.

The ways that copying can become composing.