Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/433

PLINIUS. historical kind, and preserving several interesting and valuable facts (c. 9 — 19). In the 19th chapter he enumerates the chief works of the most cele- brated statuaries, but the barren inventory is en- livened by very few remarks which can satisfy the curiosity of the artist or the lover of art. The introduction of this digression, and the mention of some mineral pigments, leads Pliny to take up the subject of painting in the 35th book. His account, however, is chiefly that of the historian and anec- dote collector, not that of a man who understood or appreciated the art. The early stages of it he discusses very summarily ; but on its progress after it had reached some maturity, and the va- rious steps by which it rose in estimation among the Romans, he has many valuable and interest- ing records. In his account of the pigments era- ployed by the ancient painters, he mixes up the medical properties of some of them in a way peculiarly his own, though not very conducive to regularity of arrangement. His chronological no- tices of the eras of the art and of the most distin- guished painters are extremely valuable, and he notices, usually with tolerable clearness, the great improvers of the art, and the advances which they respectively made. Tlie reader will find in this part of the work many interesting anecdotes of the great painters of Greece ; but will often wish that instead of a great variety of unimportant details, and accounts of trivial processes and mechanical excellences, Pliny had given a more full and satis- factory account of many of the masterpieces of an- tiquity, which he only barely mentions. The ex- cellent materials which he had before him in the writings of several of the ancient artists, and others which he might have consulted, might have been worked up, in better hands, into a far more interesting account. After a short notice of the pliistic art, a few chapters at the end of the book are devoted to the medical and other properties of various mineral products, the use of bricks, &c. For the 36th book '" lapidum natwra restat,' as Pliny says, " hoc est praecipua morum insania.' Marble and the other kinds of stone and kin- dred materials used in buildings, or rather the admirable and curious works in which they have been employed (including a notice of sculpture and sculptors), occupy the greater portion of the book, the remainder of which treats of other minerals, and the medicinal and other uses to which they were applied. The 37th book treats, in a similar manner, of gems and precious stones, and the fine arts as connected with the department of engraving, the whole concluding with an energetic commend- ation of Italy, as the land of all others the most distinguished by the natural endowments and the glory of its inhabitants, by the beauty of its situ- ation, and its fertility in everything that can minister to the wants of man. The style of Pliny is characterised by a good deal of masculine vigour and elevation of tone, though its force is frequently rather the studied vehemence of the rhetorician than the spontaneous outburst of impassioned feeling. In his fondness for point and antithesis, he is frequently betrayed into harshness, and his pregnant brevity not un- commonly degenerates into abruptness and ob- scurity, though much of this latter characteristic which is found in his writings is probably due to the corrupt state of the text. The editions of Pliny's Natural History are PLINIUS. 421 very numerous. The first was published at Ve- nice 1469, and was rapidly followed by many- others ; but the first edition of any great merit was that by Hardouin (Paris, 1685, in 5 vols. 4to. ; 2nd edition 1723, 3 vols, fol.), which ex- hibits great industry and learning. The edition published by Panckoucke (Paris, 1829—1833, in 20 vols.) with a French translation by Ajasson de Grandsagne is enriched by mnny valuable notes by Cuvier and other eminent scientific and literary men of France. These notes are also appended, in a Latin form, in another edition in six volumes (Paris, 1836 — 38, Panckoucke). The most va- luable critical edition of the text of Pliny is that by Sillig (Leipzig, 1831— 36, 5 vols. I2mo.). The last volume of this edition contains a collation of a MS. at Bamberg of great value (containing, how- ever, only the last six books), which supplies words and clauses in many passages not suspected before of being corrupt, from which it may be in- ferred that the text of the earlier books is still in a mutilated state, and that much of the obscurity of Pliny may be traced to this cause. A consider- able passage at the end of the last book has been supplied by Sillig from this manuscript. It appears from his preface that Sillig is engaged upon a more extensive edition of Pliny. The Natural History of Pliny has been translated into almost all languages : into English by Holland (London, 1601) ; into German by Denso (1764 — ■ 65),and Grosse(1781 — 88, 12 vols.) ; besides trans- lations of parts by Fritsch and Kiilb ; into Italian by Landino (Ven. 1476), Bruccioli (Ven. 1548), and Domenichi (Ven. 1561) ; into Spanish by Huerta (Madrid, 1624 — 29); into French by Dupinet(]562), Poinsinet de Sivry (1771—82), and Ajasson de Grandsagne ; into Dutch (Arnheim, 1617); into Arabic by Honain Ibn Ishak (Joan- nitius). A great deal of useful erudition will be found in the Eocercitationes Plinianae on the Poly- histor of Solinus, by Salmasius. Another valuable work in illustration of Pliny is the Disquisitiones Plinianae, by A. Jos. a Turre Rezzonico. Parma, 1763 — 67, 2 vols. fol. (Ajasson de Grandsagne, Notice sur la Vie et les Ouvrages de Pline Imicien ; Bahr, Geschichte der Romischen Literatur, p. 471, &c.) [C. P. M.] C. PLI'NIUS CAECFLIUS SECUNDUS, was the son of C. Caecilius, and of Plinia, the sister of C. Plinius, the author of the Naturalis Historic^ His native place was probably Comum, now Corao, on the Lake Larius, Lake of Como, on the banks of which he had several villae {Ep. ix. 7). The year of his birth was A. d. 61 or 62, for, in a letter ad- dressed to Cornelius Tacitus (Ep. vi. 20), in which he describes the great eruption of Vesuvius, which happened a. d. 79, he says that he was then in his eighteenth year. His father died young, and after his death Plinia and her son lived with her brother, who adopted his nephew, Caecilius. Under the republic his name after adoption would have been C. Plinius Caecilianus Secundus. The education of Plinius was conducted under the care of his uncle, his mother, and his tutor, Verginius Rufus (Ep. ii. 1). From his youth he was devoted to letters. In his fourteenth year he wrote a Greek tragedy (Ep. vii. 4) ; but he adds, " what kind of a thing it was, I know not : it was called a tragedy." He studied eloquence under Quintilianus and Nicetes Sacerdos (Ep. vi. 6). His acquirements finally gained him the reputatioa E K 3