Anne Lill, University of Tartu
Classical motives in Neo-Latin poetry at the Academia Dorpatensis (1632-1636)
The poetry of the academic circles at the Academia Dorpatensis during the first lustrum (1632-1636) after its foundation represents a mixture of Classical, Christian and humanist ideas. The aesthetical landscape of the 143 poems which are analyzed in this paper, is concentrated around two focal points: 1) the ancient mythological and philosophical models, and 2) the form and content of the baroque aesthetics.
Key words: fama, virtus, pietas, sophia, sapientia, ingenium, ars, labor, honor .
Gods and heroes of the Greek and Roman mythological world appear in the context of gratulations and eulogy as a recurrent motive: Musa-Camena, Apollo-Phoebus, Athena-Minerva (often as Pallas), Nestor etc. Some of the mythical figures are rare: Oedipus, Styx, Hercules, Janus, Pan, Ceres. Turning to the ancient gods at the beginning of the poem is often accompanied with addressing the Christian god at the end. A mixture of ancient and contemporary concepts appears in the phrase oracula Christi and in the description of the role of fate (the figures of Parcae ). The Greek and Roman realities are also represented by ancient writers (Homer, Socrates, Aristotle, Seneca, Cato), artists and painters (Zeuxis, Apelles, Phidias).
On the ideological level Christian piety, fear and chastity are combined with the ancient ideas of wisdom and magnanimity. To these the concepts modesty and justice are added. Together they form the basis of the four cardinal virtues of Ancient ethics. In the poems, the moral conduct of an academic person is described in terms of both Ancient and Christian virtues. The combination of these two leads to the occurrence in the same poem of the figures of pride, fame and excellence next to piety, humbleness and Protestant working ethics. The typical traits of the baroque poetry of the period (sixteenth and seventeenth centuries) are represented in the poems on the linguistic and stylistic levels. Rhetorical figures such as metaphor, paradox, antithesis, asyndeton, anaphora, figura etymologica (voveo votum ), oxymoron are used and mixed with the phonological effects of allitteration, assonance, homoioteleuton etc. (marte-arte, fide-vide, poli-soli, martis-mortis, nomina-numinis-hominis, nomen-omen etc.). An extreme form of artificiality and mannerism is represented by a poem where all the 75 words of the 14 verses begin with the letter M (the poem on the occasion of Magisterium ).
The general atmosphere of the poems is forceful, theatrical, playful, spectacular. The poets use Ancient metres. Thus, next to the common ones, i.e. the elegiac distich (88 poems) and the hexameter (36), there are also examples of the Sapphic stanza (5), the iambic dimeter(4), the adonius (3), the Asclepiad (3), the dactylic tetrameter (1) and the hendecasyllable (1).
A typical feature of Baroque poetry is the use of Horatian devices. There are quotations from Horace (contrahito ... turgida vela, bellaque matribus detestata, cingunt tempora lauru etc.). Constructed as a paraphrasis of Horace 1.1 and epod. 15 (Nox erat et coelo fulgebat luna sereno/inter minora sydera ).
The poems describe transgressions and changes in mood and emotion. They are carefully constructed with the purpose of offering a puzzle and a surprise to the reader (anagrams, eteosticha, metagrams). The leading tendency is to use paronomasia and puns through the use of the phonetical and lexical similarity of words. Unusual comparisons and surprising juxtapositions lead to semantical paradoxes. Dealing with opposites makes the poems highly ornamental which sometimes disturbs their balance and conceptual unity. The use of polyptoton goes sometimes to the extreme: licentia is repeated in 22 verses in 14 different forms.
Forceful metaphors are connected with the ideological and religious strife of the time: Papa sues Epicuri, Leo ranaeque coaxent, serpentis Calvi etc., (saevas moderatur habenas mors ... vomit dira venena ). There are such contemporary issues as war and peace, the university of Dorpat (as Lyceum ) and Livonia. Semantical change is exemplified by credula, used in a favourable sense.
The foundation of the university of Dorpat gave rise to occasional poetry written in academic circles. In these poems, the style and the figures of the Baroque poetry was used. The classical tradition was used in the framework of the seventeenth century. The result was ornamental poetry which used all possible devices to create a playful and artistic piece of literary work.