Theodore Antoniadis*
Beyond Impotence
Some unexplored Ovidian dynamics in Petronius’s sketch of the Croton episode ( Satyrica 126. 1–140. 12)
Abstract: Petronius’s debt to Ovid’s amatory works is frequently acknowledged when discussion comes to the so-called “Croton episode”, where Encolpius’s love affair with an aristocratic woman, named Circe, ends rather unsuccess- fully with the protagonist’s famous double sexual failure (Sat. 126.12–128.4 and 131.8–132.5). Although most scholars connect this event with the well-known impotence theme, especially as treated by Ovid in Am. 3.7, the purpose of this paper is to move beyond the impotentia, tracing some other, unexplored, elegiac allusions and illusions in the whole narrative. Thus, it will become apparent that it is Petronius’s use of erotic motifs as well as the depiction of (stock-) characters and roleplaying that is further indebted to Ovidian discourse and poetics.
Keywords: Ovid, Petronius, elegy, erotic motifs, stock figures, ancilla conciliatrix, Metamorphoses
Theodore Antoniadis: yyy, E-Mail: thantoni@lit.auth.gr
In almost all modern scholarship on Petronius’s literary sources, from J.P. Sul- livan’s now classical introductory book to Satyricon to the recent studies by Cathe- rine Connors, Gian Biagio Conte and Victoria Rimell, the Neronian court author’s debt to Ovid’s amatory works is frequently stressed, the lion’s share of references concerning the narrative of Encolpius’s love affair with Circe in the last section of the extant novel.¹ What usually claims considerable space is the protagonist’s double sexual failure during his encounter with that aristocratic woman (Sat.
I am grateful to Professors Theodore Papanghelis and Stavros Frangoulidis for their critical re- marks and suggestions.
1 Sullivan, 1968; Conte 1997, 99; Connors 1998; Rimell 2002, 148 ff.; Schmeling 2011, 471. For an extensive analysis of the Ovidian erotic vocabulary used by Petronius, see Collignon 1892, 258–267.
126.12–128.4 and 131.8–132.5), which recalls the well-known impotence theme, especially as treated by Ovid in the famous elegy Am. 3.7.² Costas Panayiotakis, in one of the most recent accounts of Petronius’s appropriation of the Roman literary tradition, observes that “Petronius drew heavily from Ovid in this section (i.e., the episode at Croton) because both he and Ovid treat sexual relations in a humorous, even ironic, fashion.”³ Based on the fact that Petronius indeed owes much to Ovid in his depiction of Encolpius’s sexual failure, the purpose of this paper is to elaborate further on this aspect by tracing other, unexplored, Ovidian allusions in this, the most sexually-charged section of the extant Satyricon. In this way, it will, I hope, become more clear that Petronius’s use of elegiac motifs when dealing with the erotic affairs at Croton, as well as the depiction of characters and role-playing in the whole episode, is somewhat more indebted to Ovidian discourse than had previously been acknowledged.
The female characters of the Satyricon have drawn scholarly attention mostly on account of their lustful and aggressive nature. Although it is possible that the Roman stereotype of women as arrogant or sensual, when set beside such historical paradigms of the Neronian age as the haughty and naughty Agrippina and the libidinous Messalina,⁴ might have contributed to the spirit of Petronius’s licentiousness in his representation of, for instance, Quartilla (see the orgy scene at Sat. 16–26.6), Tryphaena (Sat. 113.1) and the Woman of Ephesus (Sat. 111–112), it is obvious that the portraits/figures of Circe, her maid Chrysis and Oenothea, as illustrated in the Croton episode, have palpable literary antecedents that go beyond the simple theme of females yearning for sex.⁵ Much has already been written about Circe’s humorous association with the notorious Homeric witch, who had the power to enchant men by rendering them “unmanned” (Od. 10.341:
ἀνήνορας) with her magic powers,⁶ and, of course, with the Corinna of Am.
3.7, infuriated at the sight of the impotent Ovidian lover.⁷ By the same token, Oenothea, the priestess of Priapus who is later asked to cure Encolpius’s impo- tence, has been associated with the drunkenness and witchcraft powers of a
2 For a detailed account of Ovid’s Am. 3.7 and its influence on Petronius, see McMahon 1998, 77–81 and Rimell 2011, 148–151.
3 Panayotakis 2009, 55.
4 See in general Richlin 1992, 173–117, 202–207 and Sullivan 1968, 119.
5 On Circe’s persona, see especially Adamietz 1995.
6 See especially Fedeli 1998a, 29–32–1998b, 67–79, Connors 1998, 42, Rimell 2002, 144–146.
7 Rimell 2002, 151 who points out that Circe’s reaction at Encolpius’s failure recalls that one of Corinna: Cf. Sat. 128.1 {Circe ad Polyaenum} ‘quid est?’ inquit ‘numquid te osculum meum offendit?
and Αm. 3. 7. 77: ‘quid me ludis?’
lena, such as Ovid’s Dipsas.⁸ Chrysis, however, the maid who appears first in the episode and acts as an intermediary between her mistress Circe and Encolpius, has not yet been given the attention she deserves for the crucial part she plays in arranging the sexual encounters of the two lovers. Keith Preston, in an article examining the Satyricon’s relation to the New Comedy about a century ago, made an attempt to relate Chrysis with the stock figure of ancilla conciliatrix, who acts as bearer of proposals from a noble lady to a gorgeous slave in Plautus’ Miles Gloriosus.⁹ Despite Preston’s plausible remarks and citations, however, no further convincing parallels are to be found in New Comedy or even Mime.¹⁰ In addition, neither the subsequent readers of the Croton episode seem to have realised that Chrysis may be a comical combination of Nape and Cypassis, the maids who play analogous roles in two diptychs of Ovid’s Amores (Αm. 1.11 / 1.12–2.7 / 2.8). In Am. 1.11, Nape is the vital liaison in the poet-lover’s affair with Corinna, enjoying Ovid’s great appreciation for her services:
Colligere incertos et in ordine ponere crines docta neque ancillas inter habenda Nape, inque ministeriis furtivae cognita noctis utilis et dandis ingeniosa notis
saepe venire ad me dubitantem hortata Corinnam, 5 saepe laboranti fida reperta mihi –
accipe et ad dominam peraratas mane tabellas perfer et obstantes sedula pelle moras!
nec silicum venae nec durum in pectore ferrum,
et tibi simplicitas ordine maior adest. 10 credibile est et te sensisse Cupidinis arcus--
in me militiae signa tuere tuae!
8 On Circe, see further Adamietz 1995, 323 ff. and Connors 1998, 39–42. The description of Oenothea’s home (135.8) has also been found to recall the humble hut of Baucis and Philimon in the famous episode of Ovid’s Metamorhoses (8.611 ff.). See further, Garrido 1930, 10 and Connors 1998, 43–47.
9 See Preston 1915, 260–70. The most convincing parallel that Preston found in Plautean com- edy was the go-between ancilla in Miles Gloriosus Milphidippe, who brings messages from her mistress to Pyrgopolinices, making the latter believe at first, like Encolpius, that she herself was interested in him. See Mil. 1400: itaque ancilla conciliatrix quae erat internuntia, 986: haec celox illius quae egreditur inter-nuntia; Like Pyrgopolinices in the Miles, Encolpius fatuously affects to believe that the ancilla is herself in love with him; cf. Petr. 126. 8; itaque oratione blandissima plenus “rogo” inquam “numquid illa quae me amat, tu es ?” Cf. Miles 1038, Py.: “di tibi dent quaecumque optes.” Mil.: “tecum aetatem exigere ut liceat.” Py. “nimium optas.” Mil.: “non me dico, sed eram meam quae te demoritur.”
10 See Panayotakis 1995, 163–164; Schmeling 2011, 472 quotes for the figure of ancilla callida also Pl. Asin. 183 ff. and Men. 540 ff. without further justification.
Nape, apart from being Corinna’s charismatic hairdresser, is mostly exalted for her excellent services (ministeriis -3) as an utilis and ingeniosa go-between in the typically elegiac furtivum opus (1–6). It is not just the fact that Nape efficiently delivers the love letters (tabellas -7) the two lovers exchange; she is also a “critical contributor” to the letters’ perfect timing and content, and ensures that a pleas- ing and promising answer is brought back to the amator (Am. 1.11.7–8: accipe et ad dominam peraratas mane tabellas / perfer et obstantes sedula pelle moras!. . . 19–22: nec mora, perlectis rescribat multa, iubeto; odi, cum late splendida cera vacat / conprimat ordinibus versus, oculosque moretur / margine in extremo littera rasa meos). On a metapoetic level, her sympathy for her master’s erotic sorrows and her underscored comprehension of the anxieties of elegiac love (Am. 1.11.11–
12: credibile est et te sensisse Cupidinis arcus -- in me militiae signa tuere tuae!) suggest a certain familiarity with the norms of the elegiac discourse (Cupid’s arrows, militia amoris), which appears to be the reason that she is further elevated by Ovid as docta and simplex, to a higher “class” than that of an ordinary ancilla (neque ancillas inter habenda Nape- 2, et¹¹tibi simplicitas ordine maior adest-10).¹² The same goes for another of Corinna’s hairdressers, the talented Cypassis of Am.
2.7–2.8:
Ponendis in mille modos perfecta capillis, comere sed solas digna, Cypassi, deas, et mihi iucundo non rustica cognita furto, apta quidem dominae, sed magis apta mihi – quis fuit inter nos sociati corporis index? 5 sensit concubitus unde Corinna tuos?
Cypassis is also “highly rated” as non rustica (3) and apta (4) for being an astute and insightful participant in the furtive love game (iucundo non rustica cognita furto-3), though in this case she is herself involved in a secret love affair with the amator, which is eventually discovered by Corinna (5).
Now, if we turn to the depiction of Chrysis in the Satyricon by Petronius, we can see that it might be an intended caricature of the two maids of the Amores.
Chrysis performs towards Enclopius a kind of “sophistication” or, to put it in Ovid’s words for Nape (Am. 1.11.10), a simplicitas that goes beyond the limits of her humble class and is exemplified throughout the episode in various ways. As
11 I follow here ΜcKeown’s (1998, ad loc) preference for et (Pa και Ph) instead of nec (PYSω) in the beginning of v. 3.
12 For an account of the diptych’s (Am. 1. 11–12) metapoetic echoes see particularly Antoniadis 2009, 98–107.
Rimell has already pointed out, she speaks to Encolpius in a stylish, ingenious and highly metaphorical way that outstrips the standards of a humble ancilla, especially in the very beginning of the episode, when she captures playfully his gorgeousness in terms evocative of literary criticism.¹³ Furthermore, when Encolpius fatuously believes that Chrysis is herself enamored of him (Sat. 126.8.1 itaque oratione blandissima plenus ‘rogo’ inquam ‘numquid illa, quae me amat, tu es?’), the maid thwarts him with fine irony, saying that it’s her mistress who is passionate for him, whereas she only goes for equites:
Sat. 126. 9–11: Multum risit ancilla post tam frigidum schema et ‘nolo’ inquit ‘tibi tam valde placeas. Ego adhuc servo numquam succubui, nec hoc dii sinant, ut amplexus meos in crucem mittam. Viderint matronae, quae flagellorum vestigia osculantur; Ego etiam si ancilla sum, numquam tamen nisi in equestribus sedeo.’
Beyond the sexual pun/innuendo that may be lurking in Chrysis’s preference for equites (in equestribus sedeo), we should remember that such was the case in Αm.
2.7–2.8 with Cypassis and the poet-lover (Ovid, in fact, was an eques), who though – in Am. 2. 7 – had declared to Corinna that he, himself a free citizen, would never go for a slave (Di melius, quam me, si sit peccasse libido, / sordida contemptae sortis amica iuvet! / Quis Veneris famulae conubia liber inire / tergaque conplecti verbere secta velit?,19–22), in Αm. 2. 8 reversed the argument in favor of going with a slave. In Petronius’s humorous adaptation of the Am. 2.7–2.8 erotic trian- gle, Circe, in a way, does with her abnormal preference for a “lowly” lover what the free citizen “Ovid” does in Am. 2.8, while the slave Chrysis sticks firmly to the position adopted (duplicitously and ironically) by “Ovid” in Am. 2.7.¹⁴ This is enough to make even Encolpius himself think that her behavior surpasses indeed
13 See Sat. 126.2 [Chrysis ad Polyaenon]: Quia nosti venerem tuam, superbiam captas vendisque amplexus, non commodas. Quo enim spectant flexae pectine comae, quo facies medicamine at- trita et oculorum quoque mollis petulantia; quo incessus arte compositus et ne vestigia quidem pedum extra mensuram aberrantia, nisi quod formam prostituis ut vendas? For the metaliterary and rhetorical dynamics of facies, attritus, pectine, flexus, pes and mensura see Rimell 2002, 143.
Chrysis’s ecstatic portrayal of Encolpius’s splendor, and particularly her emphasis on his artfully composed gait (incessus arte compositus), seems also to allude to passages in Propertius and Ovid where the dandy lover is described. Very similar, however, is the image of a dandy with perfumed hair and a slightly affected walk that Propertius projects for himself in 2.4.5–6, as well as the portrait of the dandy lover Ovid advises his male readers to avoid in the Ars Amatoria 1.510–524.
14 Not accidentally again, when Chrysis finds out Polyainus’s real social status, she falls in love with him too, despite his impotence (Sat. 139.4).
the standards of her lowly social status and matches those of a matrona (quod ancilla haberet matronae superbiam et matrona ancillae humilitatem, Sat. 126. 12).
Furthermore, after Encolpius’s failure in his first encounter with Circe (Sat.
128. 1–2), Chrysis takes on Nape’s role by bringing him a letter from her distressed – if not offended – mistress (Sat. 129.3–9), to whom she encourages Encolpius to write back:
Sat. 129.10–11: Ut intellexit Chrysis perlegisse me totum convicium: “Solent, inquit, haec fieri, et praecipue in hac civitate, in qua mulieres etiam lunam deducunt. <. . .> Itaque huius quoque rei cura agetur. Rescribe modo blandius dominae, animumque eius candida humanitate restitue. Verum enim fatendum: ex qua hora iniuriam accepit, apud se non est”.
By asking Encolpius to send a mollifying answer (Rescribe modo blandius), Chrysis adopts a compassionate and heartening attitude very similar to Nape’s in Am. 1.11 (5–6, 11–12, see above) and initiates him in the elegiac strategy of arguta blanditia. The imperative form of her advice (rescribe, restitue) seems to recall the “spirit” of the advice “Ovid” gave to Nape to act properly so that a fortunate answer is brought back to him from Corinna (accipe et ad dominam peraratas mane tabellas / perfer et obstantes sedula pelle moras!, Αm. 1.11.7–8). The fact that Encolpius follows Chrysis’s counsel straight away (Libenter quidem parui ancil- lae, verbaque codicillis talia imposui, Sat. 129.12), qualifies her humorously as an utilis, ingeniosa and non rustica ancilla by virtue of her seemingly elegiac experi- ence and her sophisticated role-playing as an intermediary, which outdoes the simple task of a letter carrier performed by slaves in New Comedy.¹⁵ Thus, though Chrysis may lack the real qualities of Nape and Cypassis, she still “pretends” fan- cifully to be one like them.
Now, if Chrysis’s role in the Croton erotic affairs is more complex than just that of an ancilla conciliatrix, and seems to have an Ovidian touch, Circe, for her part, appears to be a scripta puella (to use the term coined by Wyke¹⁶), imported from the elegiac world again through Ovidian poetics. Beyond her incensed reaction at Encolpius’s double sexual failure (which, as mentioned above, draws heavily on Am. 3. 7) and other verbal echoes from Ovid’s amatory works,¹⁷ the whole erotic narrative would appear to be systematically evoking Ovidian texts, beginning with Encolpius’s description of Circe’s charms at their first meeting in a grove of plane-trees. J.P. Sullivan, influenced by Freudian psychoanalytical studies, spoke
15 See Gagliardi 1981, 189–192 who argues for the influence of Plautine letters on Circe’s and Polyainus’ letter exchange. For other theatrical influences here see Panayotakis 1996, 169–171 16 Wyke 2002, 46–77.
17 See Collignon 1892, 264 ff. and Sullivan 1968, 216–217, 236–237.
of scopophilia and exhibitionism in this as well as other scenes of the Satyricon, where the protagonists are looking on at an object of sexual desire or peeping in on a sexual act.¹⁸ However, it might be more accurate in certain cases to view things in terms of fetishistic scopophilia, as Philip Hardie does when discussing Ovid’s poetics of illusion, wherein “a male gaze fragments a woman into a blazon of body parts (hair, eyes, mouth, fingers, hands, arms, legs) and phantasises about what remains hidden.”¹⁹ As Hardie has shown, this is the case with both Corinna’s naked beauty in Am. 1. 5 and the portrayal of Daphne’s seductive body, which provokes Apollo’s desire in the first erotic tale of the Metamorphoses, as well as with Pygmalion’s fixation on the idealized statue of a woman, again in the Metamorphoses (Book 10).²⁰ A brief look at the above passages against the background of the ecstatic description of Circe by Encolpius, at their first meeting in a plane-grove, should help:
18 See Sullivan’s 1968, 238–245 analysis of the scene in which Quartilla catches sight of Giton’s charms (Sat. 24. 5–7), following which both she and Encolpius watch as he deflowers the seven- year-old Pannychis (Sat. 26. 4–5), as well as the Philomela episode, where Eumolpus, while hav- ing sex with Philomela’s daughter, is watched through a keyhole (Sat. 140–151).
19 Hardie 2002, 46–47.
20 As Encolpius is enchanted by Circe’s “scripta persona,” thus Pygmalion is fixed consciously in by the plasticity and, later, by the bodily reality of his statue. Cf. also Papanghelis 2009, 268–
269 and Hardie 2002, 186–193.
Ov. Am. 1.5.9–10, 17–26 (Ovid and Corinna)
ecce, Corinna venit, tunica velata recincta, candida dividua colla tegente coma–
. . . . Ut stetit ante oculos posito velamine
nostros, in toto nusquam corpore menda fuit.
Quos umeros, quales vidi tetigique lacertos! forma papillarum quam fuit apta premi!
Quam castigato planus sub pectore venter! quantum et quale latus!
quam iuvenale femur!
Singula quid referam? nil non lauda- bile vidi et nudam pressi corpus ad usque meum.
Cetera quis nescit? lassi requievimus ambo. proveniant medii sic mihi saepe dies!
Οv. Met. 1.497–502 (Apollo and Daphne)
Spectat inornatos collo pendere capil- los et 'quid, si comantur?' ait. Videt igne micantes sideribus similes oculos, videt oscula, quae non est vidisse satis;
laudat digitosque manusque brac- chiaque et nudos media plus parte lacertos; si qua latent, meliora putat.
Ov. Met. 10. 247–258, 281–282 (Pygmalion’s statue)
Interea niveum mira feliciter arte sculpsit ebur formamque dedit, qua femina nasci nulla potest, operisque sui concepit amorem. virginis est verae facies, quam vivere credas, et, si non obstet reverentia, velle moveri: ars adeo latet arte sua. miratur et haurit pectore Pygmalion simulati corporis ignes. saepe manus operi temptantes admovet, an sit corpus an illud ebur, nec adhuc ebur esse fatetur. oscula dat reddique putat loquiturque tenetque et credit tactis digitos insidere membris et metuit, pressos veniat ne livor in artus . . . ut rediit, simulacra suae petit ille puellae
incumbensque toro dedit oscula: visa tepere est
Sat. 126.13–15: Nec diu morata dominam producit e latebris laterique meo applicat, muli- erem omnibus simulacris emendatiorem. Nulla vox est quae formam eius possit compre- hendere, nam quicquid dixero, minus erit. Crines ingenio suo flexi per totos se umeros effuderant, frons minima et quae radices capillorum retro flexerat, supercilia usque ad
malarum †scripturam† currentia et rursus confinio luminum paene permixta, oculi clari- ores stellis extra lunam fulgentibus, nares paululum inflexae et osculum quale Praxiteles habere Dianam credidit. Iam mentum, iam cervix, iam manus, iam pedum candor intra auri gracile vinculum positus: Parium marmor extinxerat.
G.-B. Conte has already noticed Petronius’s use of the common elegiac motif
“lovely as a goddess” (note also libuit deae nomen quaerere, Sat. 127.5) in the Satyricon,²¹ but even this motif here (see below) seems to be part of the broader fetishistic scopophilia theme that is inherent in the Ovidian erotic narratives.
Encolpius, like the poet-lover of the Amores and the Apollo and Pygmalion of the Metamorphoses, takes on the role of another literary voyeur envisaging Circe’s body in its constituent parts (hair, shoulders, forehead, eyebrows, cheeks, eyes, nose, mouth, chin, neck, hands, feet), which presumably make up an ecphras- tic amalgam of Corinna, Daphne and Pygmalion’s statue. More particularly, Encolpius loves the way Circe’s naturally wavy hair flows over her shoulders (Crines ingenio s[‘uo flexi per totos se umeros effuderant) and her eyes that shine brighter than stars (oculi clariores stellis extra lunam fulgentibus), just as Apollo is fascinated by Daphne’s disordered hair hanging about her neck (Spectat inor- natos collo pendere capillos, Ov. Met. 1.497), and her eyes, which sparkle like star- light (Videt igne micantes sideribus similes oculos, Ov. Met. 1.498–9).²² Moreover, by asserting that Circe’s flawless beauty outshines the most perfect statues (muli- erem omnibus simulacris emendatiorem), Encolpius seems to provoke the Ovidian dialectics of naturalness and artifice by recalling Pygmalion’s female statue, whose beauty the sculptor believed to be unmatched by any living woman (sculp- sit ebur formamque dedit, qua femina nasci nulla potest, Ov. Met 10.248–9). Thus, although Ovid’s Pygmalion is fascinated by the power of artifice against nature (at least before the statue becomes flesh-and-blood woman), Petronius’s Encolpius may be deliberately challenging the idea that art is superior to life. He does not
“need” to phantasise about what remains hidden, as Apollo does with Daphne in Met. 1.501–2, and the vocabulary of his description is more realistic and less erotic – though equally exalting – than the poet-lover’s in Am. 1.5.²³ However, even this position is not held fast throughout, as Encolpius will soon obsess over Circe’s
21 Conte 1997, 91–92. On the contrary, Panayotakis 1995, 167 believes that the ἔκφρασις of Circe’s beauty evokes similar descriptions of other heroines in the Greek Romances or courtsesans and meretrices in the New Comedy. However, he does not elaborate further on his parallels.
22 Schmeling 2011, 479–480 also quotes the lines from Apollo’s description of Daphne at Met.
1.497–502.
23 See Schmeling 2011, 478–479 who notes ad Sat. 126. 13–17 (my selection): “In fact E. describes only those parts of Circe which are open to everyone’s gaze, i.e. those parts not covered by any form of clothing”.
little mouth by suggesting a momentary notion of art as model that recalls Ovid’s poetics of illusion in the Metamorphoses’ scenes we have just seen (et osculum quale Praxiteles habere Dianam credidit, Sat. 126.14 – videt oscula, quae non / est vidisse satis, Οv. Met. 1.499–500, oscula dat reddique putat, 282: incumbensque toro dedit oscula: visa tepere est, Ov. Met. 10.256).²⁴
Petronius’s challenging or “refashioning” through Encolpius’s voyeurism of the “classical” Ovidian interplay between naturalness and artifice will be transformed into a very Ovidian “bathos” at the time the two lovers, Encolpius and Circe, lie down together on the grass: In hoc gramine pariter compositi mille osculis lusimus quaerentes voluptatem robustam (Sat. 127.10). The whole scene has already been recognized as an erotic locus amoenus with emphasis on the surrounding grove of plane-trees (platanona, Sat. 126.12; platanus, Sat. 131.8:), which creates in the reader the false expectation that their embrace will lead to a “successful” ending.²⁵ Many commentators also quote to the preceding inter- lude by Encolpius, which hymns the blossoming nature that surrounds him and Circe (Idaeo quales…, Sat. 127.9) the well-known Homeric passage with the
“ἱερούς γάμους” οf Zeus and Hera on Mount Ida²⁶ or even the famous epigram of Archilochus from P. Colon. 7511, where the male “beds” his girl on the grass too.²⁷ One could add here, as even more fitting, another epigram by Dioscourides (AP 5. 55) that describes vividly a couple making love on the grass with both partners “coming” to climax with emission of “λευκόν μένος”.²⁸ Encolpius also places Circe on the grass, making the reader expect full completion of the erotic opus under the auspices of the literary tradition of epic and epigram; he also exchanges 1,000 Catullan kisses with her (mille osculis lusimus), but at the very
24 See further Hardie 2002, 186–193.
25 Schmeling 2011, 478, 485, 502.
26 Cf. Sat. 127. 9: Idaeo quales fudit de vertice flores / terra parens, cum se concesso iunxit amori / Iuppiter et toto concepit pectore flammas: / emicuere rosae violaeque et molle cyperon, / albaque de viridi riserunt lilia prato: / talis humus Venerem molles clamavit in herbas / candidiorque dies secreto favit amori with Hom. Ιl. 14.347–351: τοῖσι δ' ὑπὸ χθὼν δῖα φύεν νεοθηλέα ποίην, / λωτόν θ' ἑρσήεντα ἰδὲ κρόκον ἠδ' ὑάκινθον / πυκνὸν καὶ μαλακόν, ὃς ἀπὸ χθονὸς ὑψόσ' ἔεργε. / τῷ ἔνι λεξάσθην, ἐπὶ δὲ νεφέλην ἕσσαντο / καλὴν χρυσείην· στιλπναὶ δ' ἀπέπιπτον ἔερσαι. See further Rimell 2002, 146; Conte 1997, 92–93; Connors 1998, 40–41.
27 Cf. Archil. 196a (PColon 7511) 42–44 West: τοσ]αῦτ᾽ ἐφώνεον· παρθένον δ᾽ ἐν ἄνθε[σιν/τηλ]
εθάεσσι λαβὼν/ ἔκλινα·; see further Setaioli 1999, 247–257 and, more recently, Setaioli 2011, 199–
209.
28 AP 5. 55 (Διοσκουρίδης): Δωρίδα τὴν ῥοδόπυγον ὑπὲρ λεχέων διατείνας / ἄνθεσιν ἐν χλοεροῖς ἀθάνατος γέγονα. / ἡ γὰρ ὑπερφυέεσσι μέσον διαβᾶσά με ποσσὶν / ἤνυεν ἀκλινέως τὸν Κύπριδος δόλιχον, / ὄμμασι νωθρὰ βλέπουσα· τὰ δ', ἠύτε πνεύματι φύλλα, / ἀμφισαλευομένης ἔτρεμε πορ- φύρεα, / μέχρις ἀπεσπείσθη λευκὸν μένος ἀμφοτέροισιν, / καὶ Δωρὶς παρέτοις ἐξεχύθη μέλεσι.
critical moment, Petronius chooses to give a purely Ovidian dimension to his love-making scene: Perfusus ego rubore manifesto etiam si quid habueram virium perdidi, totoque corpore velut laxato (Sat. 128.2).
Encolpius’s impotence, however, is more than a simple literary trick with reader’s expectations and goes beyond the limits and the symptoms of the Ovidian lover’s failure in Am. 3.7.²⁹ T.D. Papanghelis has shown that the hour of noon is often the time of extraordinary events, such as divine epiphanies;³⁰ and in Ovid’s Metamorphoses aestus and umbra constitute “a recurring polarity that sets the scene for events of violent sensuality or pronounced sensuousness,” as when Jupiter suggests to Io the time and place for their encounter (pete’ dixerat
‘umbras / altorum nemorum’ -et nemorum monstraverat umbras- / ‘dum calet, et medio sol est altissimus orbe! Met. 1.590–2) or when he encounters Callisto (Ulterius medio spatium sol altus habebat, / cum subit illa nemus, quod nulla cecid- erat aetas; Met. 2.417–418).³¹ This is also confirmed in the urban setting of Am. 1.5, where the sensory tension between aestus and umbra (Aestus erat, mediamque dies exegerat horam, 1) creates the perfect atmosphere for Corinna’s elevation to an elegiac divina puella and the half-light (quale fere silvae lumen habere solent, 4) makes Ovid’s room idyllic for a sexual encounter
.
It is not by accident that in the idyllic grove of Croton, Circe appears before the amazed Encolpius as a divine epiphany (libuit deae nomen quaerere, Sat. 127.5) in a natural environment as ideal for love as the sylvan landscapes of the Metamorphoses (has inter ludebat aquis errantibus amnis / spumeus et querulo vexabat rore lapillos. / Dignus amore locus, Sat. 131.8). Moreover, both romantic encounters also take place about the hour of noon, as is elegantly implied by Encolpius, just before their second inter- course (Mobilis aestivas platanus diffuderat umbras, Sat. 131.8.1–5).³² Seen in this light, pariter compositi, describing himself and Circe lying down together on the grass, strikes as a metapoetic pun that calls upon the reader to imagine two per-29 On this, see the bibliography in n. 2.
30 See further Papanghelis 1989, 55–58, where he mentions as examples of midday supernatural events and divine epiphanies the scene of Jason’s vision of the Libyan nymphs in Apollonius’s Argonautica (4. 1312–1314: ἔνδιον ἦμαρ ἔην, περὶ δ' ὀξύταται θέρον αὐγαί / ἠελίου Λιβύην· αἱ δὲ σχεδὸν Αἰσονίδαο / ἔσταν, ἕλον δ' ἀπὸ χερσὶ καρήατος ἠρέμα πέπλον) and the unfortunate noon when Tiresias unwittingly saw Athena bathing at Heliconian Hippocrene in Callimachus's Fifth Hymn (72–75: μεσαμβρινὰ δ' εἶχ' ὄρος ἁσυχία. / ἀμφότεραι λώοντο, μεσαμβριναὶ δ' ἔσαν ὧραι, / πολλὰ δ' ἁσυχία τῆνο κατεῖχεν ὄρος.)
31 See further Papanghelis 1989, 57–59.
32 Schmeling (2011, 478, 501) also maintains that both sexual encounters take place in the after- noon (“Sex in the afternoon, 1 – 2”), without, however, further reasoning.
fectly designed lovers,³³ finely prepared to make love right to the end like Zeus- Hera, the couples of the Greek epigrams, Ovid and Corinna in Am. 1.5 or even Jupiter with his female victims in the Metamorphoses.³⁴ After all, pariter com- positi seems to comprise all the illusions Ovid creates and preserves in his erotic texts, just before Encolpius’s impotence emerges (straight after the text resumes) bringing the erotic narrative to a very typical Ovidian bathos. This will eventually give things an altogether different turn that perhaps only the reader who knows Ovid and has read Am. 3.7 and others elegies with erotic anti-climax³⁵ might well expect.
To summarize, Encolpius’s double sexual failure appears to be part of an intricate game of allusions Petronius is playing with his readers’ expectations, a game only Ovid could have inspired. The amount and, especially, the quality of Ovidian traces in the erotic affairs at Croton suggest Petronius’s tribute to the poet whose wit and puns have inspired perhaps more than anything else the role- playing and development of Satyricon. If Encolpius’s depiction as mythomaniac narrator and mock-hero owes much to Homer’s Odysseus and Virgil’s Aeneas, his representation as gorgeous lover as well as that of Circe as a literary femme fatale crosses a wide spectrum of genres, themes and motifs, only to end with Ovid, due to Encolpius’s impotence and too much else beyond it.
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34 Similarly Connors 1998, 41.
35 Cf. the ending of Am. 1. 5. 25: Cetera quis nescit? (see above) and 2. 15. 25 ff, where Ovid phan- tasises himself in the place of his mistress’s ring enjoying its intimacy with her, before he comes back to reality: sed, puto, te nuda mea membra libidine surgent, / et peragam partes anulus ille viri. / Inrita quid voveo? parvum proficiscere munus; / illa datam tecum sentiat esse fidem! See further Antoniadis 2009, 214–216.
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