L’uso della citazione poetica in Petronio e negli altri romanzieri antichi

Abstract

Poetic quotation is a feature of several ancient novels. In Chariton and in the Historia Apollonii regis Tyri (and even in the Iolaus fragment), for example, the quotations from Homer, Virgil, and tragedy are closely intertwined with the narrative, as is often the case in the Satyrica too. In Petronius, however, the purpose of quotations is not attaining higher literary dignity, but almost invariably the parody and desecration of lofty literary genres, as well as of a typical trait of Greek love novels.