Varro on the Latin Language/Books Viii-X/Loeb Classical Library, No. 334

Kent, Roland G.

ISBN 10: 0674993683 / ISBN 13: 9780674993686

Published by Harvard University Press, 1938

About this Item

Seller Inventory # 623683-n

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Varro on the Latin Language/Books Viii-X/Loeb Classical Library, No. 334
• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Publication Date: 1938
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0674993683
• ISBN 13: 9780674993686
• Binding: Hardcover
• Condition: New

About this title

Synopsis

Ancient Roman word lore.

Varro (M. Terentius), 116–27 BC, of Reate, renowned for his vast learning, was an antiquarian, historian, philologist, student of science, agriculturist, and poet. He was a republican who was reconciled to Julius Caesar and was marked out by him to supervise an intended national library.

Of Varro’s more than seventy works involving hundreds of volumes we have only his treatise On Agriculture (in LCL 283) and part of his monumental achievement De Lingua Latina (On the Latin Language), a work typical of its author’s interest not only in antiquarian matters but also in the collection of scientific facts. Originally it consisted of twenty-five books in three parts: etymology of Latin words (Books 1–7); their inflections and other changes (Books 8–13); and syntax (Books 14–25). Of the whole work survive (somewhat imperfectly) Books 5–10. These are from the section (Books 4–6) that applied etymology to words of time and place and to poetic expressions; the section (Books 7–9) on analogy as it occurs in word formation; and the section (Books 10–12) that applied analogy to word derivation. Varro’s work contains much that is of very great value to the study of the Latin language.

The Loeb Classical Library edition of On the Latin Language is in two volumes.

About the Author

Roland Grubb Kent (1877–1952) was Professor of Indo-European Linguistics at the University of Pennsylvania.