words at the bottom of the depicted ‘‘altar’’ constitute a palindrome:
iereiaierei. Either way they read ‘‘the priestess to the priest.’’
We can understand thetabulae iliacaeas part of a more widespread
interest in acrostics, word-squares, and palindromes that characterizes—
again—both literary and nonliterary writing.^49 As is well known, acrostic
plot summaries survive from antiquity for most of the plays of Plautus,
such as the following that precedes the text of thePseudolus:
Praesentis numerat quindecim miles minas
Simul consignat symbolum, ut Phoenicium
Ei det leno qui eum cum relicuo adferat.
Venientem caculam intervortit symbolo
Dicens Syrum se Ballionis Pseudolus
Opemque erili ita tulit; nam Simmiae
Leno mulierem, quem is supposuit, tradidit.
Venit harpax verus: res palam cognoscitur
Senexque argentum quod erat pactus reddidit.(A soldier counts out fifteen minae in ready money
At the same time he seals a token, so that the pimp
Will hand over Phoenicium to the person who approaches with the
remainder [i.e., of the token].
Pseudolus intercepts the soldier’s servant coming with the token
Claiming that he is Syrus, slave of Ballio.
Thus he aided his master’s [son]. For the pimp
Handed over to Simmia the woman whom he [Pseudolus] supplied instead
The true plunderer arrives: the affair becomes public knowledge
And the old man made good on the money that was pledged.)The content of the plot summary, here as elsewhere, sacrifices a
strict logic of explanation (e.g., the identity of Ballio with the leno,
the importance of the master’s son within the action) to the generation
of a visual pattern that expresses the title of the play. As one scholar puts it,
the acrostic summary is ‘‘really only intelligible if one already knows
the play.’’
50
The presence of acrostics in the didactic poetry of Aratus and Vergil
has also received widespread acknowledgement by scholars. In these
instances, the acrostics seem to reinforce, rather than obscure the linguis-
tic meaning of the text. One Aratean acrostic emphasizes a characteristic,
fineness orleptotes, that unites subject matter (the crescent moon) and
poetic style (noteºåðôcacross and down):
- For a survey of Greek and Latin acrostics, including a number of epigraphic
examples, see Courtney 1990. - Willcock 1987, 95.
Situating Literacy at Rome 129