Varro Atacinus

Publius Terentius Varro Atacinus (Latin: [ˈpuːbliʊs tɛˈrɛntiʊs ˈwarːoː atakiːnʊs]; 82 – c. 35 BC) was a Roman poet, more polished in his style than the more famous and learned Varro Reatinus, his contemporary, and therefore more widely read by the Augustan writers.^[1] He was born in the province of Gallia Narbonensis, the southern part of Gaul with its capital at Narbonne, on the river Atax^[2] (now the Aude), for his cognomen Atacinus indicates his birthplace.

Writings

Only fragments of his works survive. His first known works are Bellum sequanicum,^[3] a poem on Julius Caesar's campaign against Ariovistus, and some satires; these should not be confused with the Menippean Satires of the other Varro, of which some 600 fragments survive. He also wrote a geographical poem, Chorographia;^[2] Ephemeris, a hexameter poem on weather-signs after Aratus, from which Virgil has borrowed^[2] and (late in life) elegies to Leucadia.^[3]

His translation of the Alexandrian poet Apollonius Rhodius' Argonautica into Latin has some fine surviving lines;^[3] and was singled out for praise by Ovid: “Of Varro too what age will not be told/And Jason’s Argo and the fleece of gold?”.^[4] Oskar Seyffert considered that the poem to have been “the most remarkable production in the domain of narrative epic poetry between the time of Ennius and that of Vergil”.^[5]

Of Varro's fragments, the epigram on "The Tombs of the Great" is well-known; whether or not it is truly Varro's is debatable:

Marmoreo Licinus tumulo iacet, at Cato nullo, Pompeius paruo: credimus esse deos?

In a marble tomb [the freedman] Licinus lies; yet Cato lies in none and Pompey in but a small: Do we believe there are gods?

Patrons

Cicero as well as Caesar have been suggested as possible patrons of Varro's writings.^[6]

See also

• Ennius
• Priscian