Elio Donato Biography

Elio Donato

(4th century AD) Latin grammarian.Preceptor of Saint Jerome, he wrote some Commentaries to the works of Terence and Virgil and a grammar considered one of the most complete works of its kind in Antiquity.

Donato (right) with Terence and his commentators

The famous grammarian Elio Donato was considered the" grammaticus urbis Romae "par excellence.Together with the rhetorician Victorino, through severe studies he tutored a whole generation of diligent disciples; Among them was Saint Jerome himself, who repeatedly quotes Elio Donato with the reverent title of "praeceptor meus", speaks of his unusual doctrine and places it at its peak in the year 353.His work must be understood as that of a master that he wrote for his school.

From Donato we keep an Ars grammatica in two versions, both due to the same author: a "minor", of a catechetical nature, for initiates or "infants" and referring to the eight parts of speech; and another "major" or "secondaries" for the benefit of all, "pro omnibus".The latter consists of three parts, dedicated respectively to phonology, morphology and stylistics, and constitutes the most exhaustive course in Latin grammar of antiquity.Although it collects and elaborates traditional material and presents many points in common with Diomedes and Carisio, Donato's Ars grammatica stands out for its methodology and its pedagogical value, and therefore deserved an extraordinary diffusion and the honor of to be commended with praise among its contemporaries and even later, until and after the Middle Ages.

No less important are your Comments .We know those dedicated to Terence only incompletely, since they have come to us through recasts.The Commentary on Virgil included the study of the Bucolic , the Georgian and the Aeneid .Only a few fragments remain: the dedication to Munacio, the "Life of Virgilio" (inspired by Suetonius) and the introduction to the Bucolic .The main nucleus of the commentary seems to be able to be reconstructed through Servio Danielino, in which it appears essentially recast.

These few fragments give a glimpse of the vast culture of Donato, which, starting the exegetical tradition of the Middle Ages, credits the long study and love with which he approached Virgil's work.The poet, who appears already idealized in his biography, becomes in the comments a master of style, and his work is elevated to a paradigm.The same poetic evolution of Virgil, from the eclogues of the youthful years to the epic of the mature age, appears hidden in a necessary and gradual progress of human society from the almost savage state of the shepherds to the already more cultured of the farmers, and from the latter to the most civilized of the Trojan-Roman heroes.

Elio Donato has often been mistakenly confused with another Virgilian commentator, Tiberio Claudio Donato (4th century AD), a master of rhetoric who recognized in the Aeneid a true and authentic repertoire of rhetorical teachings; but, even pursuing ideals in its own aesthetic way, it does not forget the historical-archaeological and legal references.

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