Fulgentius (North African Roman: fl. Late 5th-early 6th century)
Fabius Planciades Fulgentius was most likely from North Africa during the last part of the era of Vandal rule there, but, despite persistent attempts to link the two, was probably not related to the Christian saint of that name who lived roughly in the same period. Fulgentius wrote several interesting works on history and mythography. But his importance to literary criticism consists of his writing on Vergil. Fulgentius, along with Servius (fourth century), was one of the first critics to devote a major piece of criticism to a single work, in both cases Vergil’s Aeneid. (Macrobius, who flourished in the early fifth century, also allegorized a major work, the Dream of Scipio section of Cicero’s De re publica). This contrasted with many of the ancient critical texts that have reached us, largely treatises on general rules of literature or rhetoric. Fulgentius set a precedent both in terms of detailed attention and moral/allegorical orientation that vitally influenced other medieval commentaries.
“The Exposition of Vergil According to Moral Philosophy” was at once a faithful attempt to try to, within the critic's given framework, attend to the literal meaning of the text, and a rewriting so audacious as to almost give us a fundamentally new work. Fulgentius, for instance, paid no attention to the poem’s major manifest theme of conquest and the proto-establishment of the Roman state, which for him, living under Vandal occupation and as a Christian, would not have been relevant anyway. But it was relevant to Vergil, a circumstance that Fulgentius nonetheless sidestepped. This was in contrast to Fulgentius’s “rival,” Servius, who treated Vergil’s epic as a historical treasure-trove and was much more attentive to literal fact. It was closer to Macrobius, whose transcendentalizing inclination went beyond that of Fulgentius, but who was closer in this respect to Fulgentius than Fulgentius was to Servius. Analyzing the poem’s first line, arma virumque cano, “Arms and the man I sing,” Fulgentius translated “arms” as the virtue of Vergil, the syntactic placement if the word indicates the particular merit of the character. Fulgentius saw language as connotative, symbolic. Though he did not read in a wholly allegorical manner, he did not just see words as representing what they literally meant. Fulgentius, near the beginning of his exposition, invoked the muses, much as an epic poet would, indicating his sense that criticism, like creative writing, required inspiration and was itself a kind of work of art.
Fulgentius forswore discussions of Vergil’s lyric poems, the Eclogues and the Georgics, on the grounds of their at once being too difficult and too dedicated to specific practices. But this decision is also in line with the general ancient emphasis on epic over lyric poetry. Fulgentius explicitly communes with the spirit of Vergil, which he has the Muses summon, feeling inspired not only by the Muse in general but with the soul of the author he is writing about. Fulgentius also eschewed a philosophical reading, disclaiming any intent to read Vergil in a Platonic or Pythagorean mode. He positioned himself as a more practical critic who will tell his reader what the text means, rather than trying to explicate—or posit--its higher mysteries.
Fulgentius proceeded by a combination of etymology, morality, and symbolism. He defined, or speculated on, the meaning of proper names, then suggested what those names symbolize and what their moral import was. For instance, he interpreted the name Palinurus from Latin words that make up its elements a “wandering vision,” and this explained for him why Palinurus falls into the sea--as Palinurus's vision was wandering, which it should not have been, it should have been steadfast. Fulgentius was halfway between ascribing a moral intent to Vergil and saying that this moral mode of reading was the reader’s way of making sense of the Aeneid and rendering the text ethically constructive.
Much of the “Exposition” dealt with interpreting names, linking names to characters. For instance, “Misenus” was seen as meaning “vain praise,” thus that character must die in Book Six in order for this false virtue to be overcome by the hero. But Fulgentius’s reading, though moral, does not reach full Christian allegory. Fulgentius, in a mock-dialogue with Vergil, proposed a Christian understanding, which Vergil does not disagree with, but of which he says that he can only say what he thinks. Fulgentius at once paraded his own Christian viewpoint and also indicated an understanding that the original text is not Christian in intent. This provided an important precedent for later critics—such as the twelfth-century scholar Bernardus Silvestris who wrote a more ambitious, though unfinished, commentary on Vergil-- who at once read texts in light of their own ideologies but also respected the spirit of the past. Fulgentius also provided ground for Dante’s treatment of Vergil in Dante’s great poem, the Comedy, and for the role played by Vergil as the connector between classicism, medieval times, and modernity, as sketched by scholars such as the polymathic comparatist Domenico Comparetti (1835-1927) and the eloquent cultural critic Theodor Haecker (1879-1945).
Bibliography
Merrills, Andrew H. Vandals, Romans and Berbers: New Perspectives on Late Antique North Africa. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004.
Bernardo, Aldo S. and Saul Levin, The Classics in the Middle Ages. Binghamton: Medieval and Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1990.
Comparetti, Domenico, Vergil in the Middle Ages, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997. Originally published 1895.
The virgil.org website written and maintained by David S. Wilson-Okamura is also a vitally important resource for Fulgentius, Servius, Macrobius, and all commentary on Vergil.
Bibliography
Merrills, Andrew H.
Vandals, Romans and Berbers: New Perspectives on Late Antique North Africa. Aldershot:
Ashgate, 2004.
Bernardo, Aldo S. and Saul Levin, The Classics in the Middle Ages. Binghamton: Medieval and
Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1990.
Comparetti, Domenico, Vergil in the Middle Ages, Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1997. Originally published 1895.
The virgil.org website written and maintained
by David S. Wilson-Okamura is also a vitally important resource for Fulgentius,
Servius, Macrobius, and all commentary on Vergil.
