Sobre Marcial, 1 praef.1-3(1)/On Martial, 1 praef.1-3

This article offers a defense and interpretation of scribat in Mart. 1.praef.3, based on a partially new explanation of improbe...est. The argument elaborates on observations made mainly by the commentators of the Lemaire edition (1825), Citroni (1975) and Fitzgerald (2007). The juridical implications of ingeniosus in libro alieno esse are also explored with particular attention to hitherto unnoticed legal overtones in improbe facit. It is thus concluded that the malignus interpres can be viewed, fromMartial's perspective, as deserving the punishment of censorship for libel-writing; and at the same time, nec epigrammata mea scribat, far from needing textual emendation, should be read as a deliberate paradox which brilliantly prefigures modern theories about the role of readers in the creation of meaning. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]