[524]
About the year 50 B.C., as we have seen in the chapter on education,
there came to Italy the Syrian Publilius, who began to write mimes in
verse, thus for the first time giving them a literary turn. Caesar,
always on the look-out for talent, summoned him to Rome, and awarded
him the palm for his plays.[525] These must have been, as regards wit
and style, of a much higher order than any previous mimes, and in fact
not far removed from the older Roman comedy (fabula togata) in manner.
Cicero alludes to them twice: and writing to Cornificius from Rome in
October 45 he says that at Caesar's ludi he listened to the poems of
Publilius and Laberius with a well-pleased mind.[526] "Nihil mihi
tamen deesse scito quam quicum haec familiariter docteque rideam";
here the word _docte_ seems to suggest that the performance was at
least worthy of the attention of a cultivated man. Laberius, also
a Roman knight, wrote mimes at the same time as Publilius, and was
beaten by him in competition; of him it is told that he was induced by
Caesar to act in his own mime, and revenged himself for the insult, as
it was then felt to be by a Roman of good birth, in a prologue which
has come down to us.
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