Poetry of Catullus - Sources and Organization

Sources and Organization

Catullus's poems have been preserved in three manuscripts that were copied from one (of two) copies made from a lost manuscript discovered around 1300. These three surviving copies are stored at the National Library in Paris, the Bodleian Library at Oxford, and the Vatican Library in Rome. These manuscripts recorded Catullus's 116 carmina (three of which are now considered spurious — 18, 19 and 20 — although the numbering has been retained), which can be divided into three formal parts: sixty short poems in varying metres, called polymetra; eight longer poems; and forty-eight epigrams.

There is no scholarly consensus on whether or not Catullus himself arranged the order of the poems. The longer poems differ from the polymetra and the epigrams not only in length but also in their subjects: there are seven hymns and one mini-epic, or epyllion, the most highly prized form for the "new poets"

The polymetra and the epigrams can be divided into four major thematic groups (ignoring a rather large number of poems eluding such categorization):

• poems to and about his friends (e.g., an invitation like poem 13).
• erotic poems: some of them indicate homosexual penchants (48, 50, and 99), but most are about women, especially about one he calls "Lesbia" (in honour of the poet Sappho of Lesbos, source and inspiration of many of his poems); philologists have taken considerable efforts to discover her real identity, and many concluded that Lesbia was Clodia, sister of the infamous Publius Clodius Pulcher and a woman known for her generous sexuality, but this identification rests on some rather fragile assumptions. In the 116 poems found of Catullus, the poet displays a wide range of highly emotional and seemingly contradictory responses to Lesbia, ranging from tender love poems to sadness, disappointment, and bitter sarcasm.
• invectives: some of these often rude and sometimes downright obscene poems are targeted at friends-turned-traitors (e.g., poem 16) and other lovers of Lesbia, but many well-known poets, politicians (e.g., Julius Caesar) and orators, including Cicero, are thrashed as well. However, many of these poems are humorous and craftily veil the sting of the attack. For example, Catullus writes a poem mocking a pretentious descendant of a freedman who emphasizes the letter "h" in his speech because it makes him sound more like a learned Greek by adding unnecessary Hs to words like insidias (ambush).
• condolences: some poems of Catullus are, in fact, serious in nature. One poem, 96, comforts a friend for the death of his wife, while several others, most famously 101, lament the death of his brother.

All these poems describe the lifestyle of Catullus and his friends, who, despite Catullus's temporary political post in Bithynia, lived withdrawn from politics. They were interested mainly in poetry and love. Above all other qualities, Catullus seems to have sought venustas (attractiveness, beauty) and lepidus (charm). The ancient Roman concept of virtus (i.e. of virtue that had to be proved by a political or military career), which Cicero suggested as the solution to the societal problems of the late Republic, are interrogated in Catullus.

But it is not the traditional notions Catullus rejects, merely their monopolized application to the vita activa of politics and war. Indeed, he tries to reinvent these notions from a personal point of view and to introduce them into human relationships. For example, he applies the word fides, which traditionally meant faithfulness towards one's political allies, to his relationship with Lesbia and reinterprets it as unconditional faithfulness in love. So, despite the seeming frivolity of his lifestyle, Catullus measured himself and his friends by quite ambitious standards.