Lucius Ateius Praetextatus

Lucius Ateius Praetextatus (surnamed "Philologus"—Φιλόλογος), (died c. 29 BC) was a Roman freedman, rhetorician, and grammarian.

Ateius Praetextatus was born in Athens. He was brought to Rome as a prisoner by Marcus Ateius following the sack of Athens in 86 BC.^[1] He tutored members of the nobility such as the brothers Appius Claudius Pulcher and Publius Clodius Pulcher, and later accompanied the former to Asia and Cilicia around the 50s BC.^[1]

He wrote that he was a pupil of Marcus Antonius Gnipho,^[2] He gave himself the epithet "philogus" (lover of words), "because like Eratosthenes, who was first to lay claim to that surname, he regarded himself as a man of wide and varied learning."^[2] The jurist Gaius Ateius Capito called him “a rhetorician among grammarians and a grammarian among rhetoricians.”^[2]

He was a friend and collaborator with

philologist" with his research for Sallust into archaic terms. Asinius Pollio writes that Sallust made excessive use of archaisms "abetted in this by a certain Ateius, when I was a boy a Latin grammarian and later a critic and teacher of declamation, in short a self-styled ‘Philologus.’”^[2]

Works

All of Ateius Praetextatus' work has been lost, except for brief quotations in later authors.

breviarium rerum omnnium Romanarum, previously mentioned
A collection of archaic words and figures for Asinius Pollio
Hylae, his principal work consisting of "material of every kind"
liber glossematorum
an amaverit Dido Aeneas (whether Aeneas loved Dido)

References

^ ^a ^b ^c Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft. Retrieved January 16, 2024.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Suetonius. DE GRAMMATICIS. p. 397. Retrieved January 16, 2024.

[Pauly-1] Paulys Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft. Retrieved January 16, 2024.

[Suetonius-2] Suetonius. DE GRAMMATICIS. p. 397. Retrieved January 16, 2024.

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