Everything about Petronius Arbiter totally explained
» This article is about the Roman author Petronius. For other uses of the name, see Petronius (disambiguation).
Petronius (ca. 27–66) was a
Roman writer of the
Neronian age; he was a noted
satirist. He is identified with
Gaius Petronius Arbiter, but the
manuscript text of the
Satyricon calls him
Titus Petronius.
Life and work
The historian
Tacitus describes a Petronius who was the
elegantiae arbiter, "judge of elegance" in the court of the emperor
Nero. This Petronius is generally thought to be the same Petronius who is named in manuscripts as author of the
Satyricon, a fragmentary
novel in
Latin describing the adventures of a
homosexual pair, Encolpius and Giton. The work itself reveals nothing directly of Petronius' fortunes, position, or even century, so the identification of the author with Nero's courtier must remain speculative. Some lines of
Sidonius Apollinaris, from his
Carmen XXIII, refer to him and are often taken to imply that he lived and wrote at
Massilia. If, however, one accepts the identification of this author with the
Petronius of
Tacitus, Nero's courtier, it follows either that he was born in Massilia, or that Sidonius refers to the novel itself and that its scene was partly laid at Massilia.
The chief personages of the story are evidently strangers in the towns of
Southern Italy. Their Greek-sounding names (Encolpius, Ascyltos, Giton, etc.) and literary training accord with the characteristics of the old
Greek colony in the
1st century. The high position among Latin writers ascribed by Sidonius to Petronius, and the mention of him by
Macrobius beside
Menander among the humorists, when compared with the absolute silence of
Quintilian,
Juvenal and
Martial, seem adverse to the opinion that the
Satyricon was a work of the age of Nero. But Quintilian was concerned with writers who could be turned to use in the education of an orator.
In fiction
There are many references to and elaborations on Petronius'
Satyricon, which can be found there. Petronius himself appears as a character in:
In recent times, a popular quote on reorganization is often (but spuriously) attributed to a Gaius Petronius. In one version, it reads:
We trained hard ... but it seemed that every time we were beginning to form up into teams we'd be reorganized. I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganizing; and a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress while producing confusion, inefficiency, and demoralization.
In film
Fellini Satyricon (1969) is a stylized adaptation of Petronius' novel.
In the 1951 film of Quo Vadis, Petronius is portrayed by Leo Genn, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.Further Information
Get more info on 'Petronius Arbiter'.
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