Alexander Barclay's Translation of Sallust's Jugurtha: A Note on Sources

Abstract

AROUND 1522, Richard Pynson published Alexander Barclay's prose translation of Sallust's Bellum Iugurthinum under the head: Here begynneth the famous cronycle of the warre/ which the romayns had against Iugurth vsurper of the kyngdome of Numidy.1 This publication is noteworthy as one of the earliest major translations of a classical author into English, and as a departure by Barclay himself from literary composition in verse, for which he is best known.2 The work appears to mark the close of Barclay's literary career, an ending possibly accompanied by his withdrawal from the Benedictine monastery of Ely, and his entry into the reformed or Observant branch of the Franciscan order between 1522 and 1528. Barclay's Jugurtha came at the end of a thirteen-year period of writing and publication, beginning with The Shyp of Folys in 1509.3 Thus, his public literary career began and ended with works of translation, published by Richard Pynson in bilingual editions: the Jugurtha has Sallust's Latin text printed in columns parallel with the English, while The Shyp of Folys provides each section of Jacob Locher's 1497 Latin translation of Sebastian Brant's original German Narrenschiff (1494), followed ‘alternatim’ (as Barclay puts it) by the English.4 These were not the only works arising out of this productive collaboration of writer and printer, nor the only ones involving elaborately formatted bilingual texts.5 It is likely that the first editions of Barclay's Eclogues, of which only later reprints survive, were also published by Pynson in bilingual format with their Latin source, as is the single edition of the Life of St George, which survives in one imperfect copy.6