Institutio Oratoria

I think I hear my readers on all sides suggesting the names of hosts of other poets. What? Did not Pisandros [*](A Rhodian poet of the seventh century B.C.) tell the story of Hercules in admirable style? Were there not good reasons for Virgil and Macer taking Nicander [*]( Nicander of Colophon (second century B.C.), author of didactic poems, Theriaca and Alexipharmaca and Metamorphoses ( ἑτεροιούμενα ). Virgil imitated him in the Georgics, Aenilius Macer, the friend of Ovid, in his Theriaca. ) as a model? Are we to ignore Euphorion? [*]( Euphorion of Chalcis (220 B.C. ) wrote elaborate short epics. See Ecl. x. 50. The words are, however, put into the mouth of Gallus with reference to his own imitations of Euphorion. ) Unless Virgil had admired him, he would never have mentioned

1. verses written in Chalcidic strain

in the Eclogues. Again, had Horace no justification for coupling the name of Tyrtacus [*]( See Hor. A. P. 401. Tyrtaeus, writer of war songs (seventh century B.C.). ) with that of Homer?

To which I reply, that there is no one so ignorant of poetic literature that he could not, if he chose, copy a catalogue of such poets from some

library for insertion in his own treatises. I can therefore assure my readers that I am well aware of the existence of the poets whom I pass over in silence, and am far from condemning them, since I have already said that some profit may be derived from every author. [*](§ 45.)