Ego Emphatic and Unemphatic, in Rises and Falls of Old Latin Dramatic Verse

Abstract

It is commonly believed that pronouns ego, tu, etc., are only expressed when emphatic; and this dogma has recently been made one of foundation stones of a doctrine of recessive words in OL. verse by Professor Phillimore in Classical Review. My object here is not to criticize Professor Phillimore's doctrine as a whole; but present inquiry was suggested to me by his Terentiana, and it has resulted in convincing me that dogma that ego is always and necessarily emphatic is a mere a priori assumption.' This is, indeed, a paradox; but the time shall give it proof. In this article I have made only a beginning of demonstration. Ego occurs over two thousand times in Plautus alone. But I have examined all Plautine and Terentian instances in which it is used with common verbs eo, eam, ibo, abeo, abeam, and a great many of those with verbs of knowing, perceiving, and like (e.g., scio, nescio, novi, audio, video), and a few with sum. My examination has been conducted entirely without prejudice; I have included all examples as they came to hand. If anyone is sceptical, let him experiment with ego facio or ego with a verb of saying. But I have attempted more than making of a list of emphatic and unemphatic instances; I have classified them in such a way as to show relation of emphasis and non-emphasis to rise' and fall' of foot. It is commonly asserted that Plautus and Terence tried to secure in every foot coincidence of word-accent or sentence-accent with so-called ictus of verse. But, as Professor Housman said to me last summer, if they aimed at this, how is it that they were not more successful? I cannot, of course, deal with this big question here; but my instances will provide material for considering to what extent Ritschlian doctrine is true in