Le paysage des offrandes votives chez Léonidas de Tarente

Abstract

This paper offers an analysis of references to landscapes in Leonidas' epigrams. A comparison with Demetrius' paragraphs on enargeia enables us to shed light on the stylistics of his votive epigrams. Leonidas developed a series of strategies that encouraged his readers to visualize the landscapes in which the votive offerings that he describes supposedly took place ; one of these techniques consists in referring to an internal viewer. By studying these techniques, we also gain a better understanding of the reasons for which Roman readers of Leonidas' epigrams admired his poems and quoted them : specific emphasis is given to Propertius' translation of AP 9.337 and to the painted inscriptions discovered in the Casa degli Epigrammi (Pompeii) and in Suasa.

Keywords

• Leonidas of Tarentum
• epigram
• votive offerings
• hunting
• landscapes in Roman art
• enargeia