Lament in Lucan’s Bellvm civile

Abstract Lament in Classical antiquity has been studied extensively in Greek ritual and literature, primarily from the perspectives of anthropology, feminism, and literary criticism. Roman codes and conventions of funerary lamentation, however, have received far less attention, although Vergil’s Aeneid has been the focus of some discussion. In this study I explore the literary representation of lament in Classical Rome but press the investigation beyond Vergil to Lucan, beyond female lamentation to male, and beyond public lament to private lament. In a stimulating article surveying lament in the growth and eclipse of Roman epic, Elaine Fantham has suggested that “[c]ommunal public lament is . . . used by Lucan . . . to anticipate the catastrophe of Pompey’s death” throughout his epic. My study complements her discussion of public lament by focusing on the private personal laments for Pompey of his wife Cornelia and of his quaestor Cordus in conjunction with Cato’s public eulogy of Pompey.