Bavius and Maevius (or Mevius) were two poets in the age of Augustus Caesar, whose names became synonymous with bad verse and malicious criticism of superior writers. Both are named together in Virgil's Eclogues (3.90). Maevius is also the object of Horace's tenth Epode, which invites the gods to drown him as he embarks on a sea voyage. The name M(a)evius is attested of several historical individuals, but whether Virgil's Bavius and Maevius are real writers or literary inventions is unclear.[1]
Alexander Pope mentions Bavius in his 1729 Dunciad Variorum and explains, in a note, that he drew the reference from Virgil.[2] Pope draws a parallel between these two critics and his own dunces by quoting John Dennis who thought it likely that Bavius "and Maevius had (even in Augustus's days) a very formidable Party at Rome, who thought them much superior to Virgil and Horace: For (saith he) I cannot believe they would have fix'd that eternal brand upon them, if they had not been coxcombs in more than ordinary credit" (Dunciad Variorum). Bavius and Maevius are also like the "dunces" in Pope's own Dunciad in that little is remembered of them except for their bad reputations. In the Dunciad, Book III, Pope has Bavius dip the transmigrating souls of poetasters in Lethe, making them doubly stupid before being born as hack writers. In his "An Essay on Criticism," Pope writes of Maevius:
Some are bewilder'd in the Maze of Schools,
And some made Coxcombs Nature meant but Fools.
In search of Wit these lose their common Sense,
And then turn Criticks in their own Defence.
Each burns alike, who can, or cannot write,
Or with a Rival's or a Eunuch's spite.
All Fools have still an Itching to deride,
And fain wou'd be upon the Laughing Side;
If Maevius Scribble in Apollo's spight,
There are, who judge still worse than he can write...
Maevius also features in the Earl of Roscommon's "An Essay on Translated Verse" as a symbol of poetic failure:
"Whoever vainly on his strength depends,
Begins like Virgil, but like Maevius ends."
(in J.E. Spingarn, ed., Critical Essays of the Seventeenth Century, II, p.299)
^Jan M. Ziolkowski; Michael C. J. Putnam (January 2008). The Virgilian Tradition: The First Fifteen Hundred Years. Yale University Press. pp. 200–. ISBN 0-300-10822-2.
^Alexander Pope; Alexander Dyce (1866). The Poetical Works of Alexander Pope. ... Bell and Daldy. pp. 151–.
individuals, but whether Virgil's Bavius and Maevius are real writers or literary inventions is unclear. Alexander Pope mentions Bavius in his 1729 Dunciad Variorum...
Pseudophilotes bavius, the Bavius blue, is a butterfly of the family Lycaenidae. It is found in Morocco, Algeria, Bulgaria, Romania, Greece, Asia Minor...
Damoetas praises Pollio and Menalcas replies by disparaging two minor poets, Bavius and Maenius. In his next three couplets Damoetas warns the slave boys to...
sees millions of souls waiting for new bodies as their souls transmigrate. Bavius dips each soul in Lethe to make it dull before sending it to a new body...
dreams and portents. Orelli refers to the dissertations on Antipater by Bavius Antius Nauta and G. Groen van Prinsterer, inserted in the Annals of the...
thersites Chapman's blue Polyommatus wagneri Wagner's blue Pseudophilotes baviusBavius blue Pseudophilotes vicrama Lesser chequered blue Satyrium abdominalis...
spendthrift son of the tragedian Clodius Aesopus. Either he or his cohort, Marcus Bavius, is thought to have written the Antibucolica, two pastoral poems written...
archias kisaga Frustorfer, 1910 (Lesser Sunda Islands) Taractrocera archias bavius Mabille, 1891 (Lesser Sunda Islands) Phylogeny and biogeography of the genus...
Mitchell Slingerland WG 5 Gijs Braanker FE 6 Jedidaih Timisela HB 7 Johannes Bavius PR 8 Julian Brigghe HK 9 Marvin Slingerland PR 10 Edson Neves SR 11 Jorge...
1840: Portrat James Albert Henry de la Sarraz (1787-1877) 1840: Portrat Bavius Gijsbertus Rinia van Nauta (1787-1860) 1841: Portrat Jan Corver Hooft (1779-1855)...