Новый взгляд на античную традицию светониево-донатовых жизнеописаний (биография Элия Доната, составленная в IX веке)

* Research for the present paper was carried out as a part of the Russian Foundation for the Humanities project (# 14-06-00123а) The Educational Text in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages: Contents and Structure of a School Canon of the 3^d - the 11^th Centuries . This publication is based on my paper: A 9-th century biography of Aelius Donatus, delivered at the International Medieval Congress (UK, Leeds, 6-9 July. 2015).

This article treats a medieval text Vita Donati grammatici ( The Life of Donatus ), containing biographical information concerning [Aelius] Donatus, an author of Ars grammatica (the Art of grammar ) and commentaries on the texts of Terence and Virgil. The history of the scholarship of Vita Donati , as well as its contents, possible reasons of creation, its genre, and some eccentric and parodic features are under consideration.

ΣΧΟΛΗ Vol. 10. 1 (2016) © Maya Petrova, 2016

Regrettably, we do not have any evidences about the life of Donatus.1 For this reason it is possible only to reconstruct the major milestones of his life on the basis of a comparison of indirect evidences and references about him by his con-temporaries.2 So, he was born about the year of 310 in North Africa. In his mature years, in the middle of the 4-th century, Donatus taught grammar in Rome and held a high position in society, having the title “vir clarissimus”. Donatus was a teacher of Jerome. Marius Victorinus was one of his senior colleagues. Donatus died around the year of 391.3

In the Middle Ages the name of Donatus was not only very well known, but he had an established image as an outstanding teacher of his time. However, there were many gaps in the medieval “biography” of Donatus, so medieval scholars desired to fill them. An example is the Life of Donatus , composed by a Carolingian scholar named Flaccus Rebius (9-th c.). The author of this biography wrote that he was often asked⁴ about the identity of the grammarian, in connection with which he decided to answer the questions put to him. He dedicates his narration to a certain Minucius Rutilus, probably his pupil. The author, on the one hand, wants to give his due to Donatus, highlighting his indefatigable industry, on the other — to instruct in such diligence his disciple.⁵

Briefly, the manuscripts of The Life of Donatus , publications and investigations of this text, its genre and connotations should be mentioned. This text is preserved only in three manuscripts:

• 1)    MS Parisinus Latinus 7730 [saec. IX²] (henceforth, P);

• 2)    Landesbibliothek und Murhardsche Bibliothek der Stadt Kassel Philologus 4^o 1 [saec. XI] (henceforth, К);

• 3)    Codex Berniensis 189 [saec. XVI] Petri Danielis philological (henceforth, В).

A French scholar and church leader Pierre Daniel Huet (1630–1721) was the earliest scholar of this text. He compared two early manuscripts of the 9-th and 11-th centuries and took into account the notes, which had been written down in the margins of the Paris Codex.6

At first, the biography of Donatus was published by Johann Fabricius in 1773, in a series of books, named “Bibliotheca latina”.7 Then, it was published in 1870 by Hermann Hagen in the eighth and final volume of series of books “Grammatici latini”,8 the first seven volumes of which were published by Heinrich Keil. Both of these researchers (Fabricius and Hagen) took the Paris manuscript (P) as a basis for their publications, offering their own reading.

Since 1989, this text has attracted the attention of Italian scholars. Giorgio Brugnoli⁹ not only published this biography of Donatus (using the same Parisian manuscript as his predecessors), but accompanied it by additional reading, and also considered the sources of this text and the reasons for its appearance. In 2003–2004 there appeared a new edition of The Life of Donatus , published by Luigi Munzi. He analyzed the previous readings of J. Fabricius, H. Hagen and G. Brunyoli and offered a number of new ones.¹⁰ In 2005 and 2007 this biography of Donatus was explored by Silvia Conte,¹¹ who was complementing preceding studies (in particular, the works of G. Brugnoli and L. Munzi) and published the text of The Life of Donatus in that form in which it was written in the codex of the 9th century (K).

The genre of this text is obvious. This is a biography, which is built according to the rules of the genre. Initially the origin and lifetime of Donatus are discussed, then – his activities and occupation, death, place of burial. There is a traditional physical description of his character, his social status, clothing, personal traits. However, this biography has some unusual features, that do not allow adoption of this text as authentic evidence. These features begin to appear from the beginning of narration. It is no coincidence that H. Hagen after H. Keil called this text as curiosity;12 and most of all subsequent scholars regarded it as an eccentric fantasy and parody.13

G. Brugnoli took The Life of Donatus in the tradition of Suetonius-Donatus’s biographies, citing the fact that, on the one hand, this text is compiled in burlesque genre, and on the other hand, it contains expressions similar to those of Suetonius.¹⁴

L. Munzi suggested that the medieval author had attempted to create an image of a martyr, ignoring the image of the great teacher.15

It was also observed that the biography (and this is typical for the Middle Ages) is characterized by anachronisms and the ambivalence of the image (in which are presented simultaneously love and hate, dirt and cleanliness, and so on¹⁶), which is also present in The Life of Donatus .

In my opinion, it is important to pay attention to the names of the author of this “biography” (Flaccus Rebius) and its intended recipient (Minucius Rutilus). They are more like Roman names than German ones (such as Moduin, Muredak, Angil-bert, Geyrik, Raban, Valafrid Strub and so on), or Anglo-Saxon ones (such as Al-cuin), or Irish ones (such as Seduly Scott, John Scott), which belonged to those, who were in the courts of the Carolingian rulers and in the monasteries of Francia.

It is quite possible that in the biography composed by a person, belonging to some academic circle, say this created at the court of Charlemagne, personages were given nicknames: Biblical names or the names of the Latin poets.¹⁷ Then the purpose of the author – a member of this academic circle – could be the creation of a text, somewhat imitating ancient biographies (e.g. those of Suetonius¹⁸), or a text written in the genre of defilement¹⁹ (although this is not a classic psogos ).

As an attachement, we offer the Latin original as well as an English and a Russian translations of the Vita Donati .