SOURCE: “The Pioneers of Roman Poetry” in A Literary History of Rome: From the Origins to the Close of the Golden Age, Ernest Benn Limited, 1960, pp. 87-113.

In the following excerpt, Duff examines some examples of what he considers inspired verses of Naevius.

In Cn. Naevius (circ. 270-circ. 199) greater independence and originality are recognisable.¹ He may be called home-born, and the native spirit is strong in him. Especially in the historical plays (fabulae praetextae or praetextatae) invented by him, and in his epic, he proves himself inspired by the greatness of the national life. His truly Latin genius is testified to by the epitaph in Saturnians (according to Gellius, of his own composition²) in which he pitches his claims at their highest, as a poet to be mourned by the divine Camenae, one after whose passing men ‘forgat to speake the Latin tongue at Rome’:

Immortales mortales...