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CINNA, GAIUS HELVIUS

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Originally appearing in Volume V06, Page 375 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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CINNA, See also:GAIUS HELVIUS , See also:Roman poet of the later Ciceronian See also:age. Practically nothing is known of his See also:life except that he was the friend of See also:Catullus, whom he accompanied to See also:Bithynia in the See also:suite of the See also:praetor See also:Memmius. The circumstances of his See also:death have given rise to some discussion. Suetonius, See also:Valerius See also:Maximus, See also:Appian and Dio See also:Cassius all See also:state that, at See also:Caesar's funeral, a certain Helvius Cinna was killed by See also:mistake for See also:Cornelius Cinna, the conspirator. The last three writers mentioned above add that he was a See also:tribune of the See also:people, while See also:Plutarch, referring to the affair, gives the further See also:information that the Cinna who was killed by the See also:mob was a poet. This points to the identity of Helvius Cinna the tribune with Helvius Cinna the poet. The See also:chief objection to this view is based upon two lines in the 9th See also:eclogue of See also:Virgil, supposed to have been written 41 or 40 B.C. Here reference is made to a certain Cinna, a poet of such importance that Virgil deprecates comparison with him; it is argued that the manner in which this Cinna, who could hardly have been any one but Helvius Cinna, is spoken of implies that he was then alive; if so, he could not have been killed in 44. But such an See also:interpretation of the Virgilian passage is by no means absolutely necessary; the terms used do not preclude a reference to a contemporary no longer alive. It has been suggested that it was really Cornelius, not Helvius Cinna, who was slain at Caesar's funeral, but this is not See also:borne out by the authorities. Cinna's chief See also:work was a mythological epic poem called See also:Smyrna, the subject of which was the incestuous love of Smyrna (or Myrrha) for her See also:father Cinyras, treated after the manner of the Alexandrian poets. It is said to have taken nine years to finish.

A Propempticon Pollionis, a send-off to [Asinius] See also:

Pollio, is also attributed to him. In both these poems, the See also:language of which was so obscure that they required See also:special commentaries, his See also:model appears to have been See also:Parthenius of See also:Nicaea. See A. Weichert, Poetarum Latinorum Vitae (183o); L. See also:Muller's edition of Catullus (187o), where the remains of Cinna's poems are printed; A. Kiessling, " De C. Helvio Cinna Poeta " in Commentationes Philologicae in honorees T. See also:Mommsen (1878); O. See also:Ribbeck, Geschichte der romischen Dichtung, i. (1887) ; See also:Teuffel=See also:Schwabe, Hist. of Roman Lit. (Eng. tr. 213, 2-5) ; Plessis, Poisie latine (1909).

See also:

great pest on See also:young See also:plants, and can only be kept down by fumigating or vaporizing the houses, and syringing with a See also:solution of See also:quassia chips, soft See also:soap and See also:tobacco.

End of Article: CINNA, GAIUS HELVIUS

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