AR GALIME PRISKIRTI PRETEKSTĄ OKTAVIJĄ SENEKAI?
CAN WE ATTRIBUTE THE PRAETEXTA OCTAVIA TO SENECA?

Summary/Abstract: The article explores the problems of the authorship of the Roman tragedy Octavia. The aim of the article is to introduce and analyse research carried out by scientists on the problems of the authorship of Octavia and to answer to the question on whether this praetexta could have been written by Seneca. For literary critics the greatest doubt about the authorship of Seneca’s Octavia raises the shadow of Agrippina, Nero’s dead mother, who correctly foretells the death of Nero – the emperor will become a victim of revenge and be killed by being stabbed in the neck. The doubt stems from the fact that Seneca had died three years before Nero. However, the future revenge is defined using typical words (iugulum dare – jab to the throat), which are used by Seneca in his other tragedies to describe nonheroic death, such as in Agamemnon (43), Oedipus (1036–1037), Thyestes (721–723), etc. So iugulum dare can be treated as locus communis in Seneca’s tragedies, meaning revenge, violent death. On the other hand, according to historians (Tacitus, Dio Cassius), Seneca was aware of the planned assassination of Nero in 65 CE by Piso’s conspirators. At the beginning of a conspiracy, conspirators would gather to talk about Nero’s crimes and Seneca maintained close relationships with many of them. Therefore, Seneca could have written Octavia at the beginning of 65 CE and read it at the gathering of Piso’s circle, where everyone spoke of Nero’s crimes supporting the need for a conspiracy. Nero’s dethronement was also predicted by astrologers. Rolando Ferri doubts whether astrologers could have predicted to the Princeps that he would become a criminal (animam nocentem sceleribus) (Octavia, 630) and fugitive (turpem fugam) (Octavia, 620). It is these two lines of Octavia, according to Ferri, that do not allow attributing Octavia to Seneca. The author of the article argues Ferri’s claims. If Seneca wrote the praetexta in the spring of 65 CE when Piso’s conspiracy was organised, the poet knew that Nero was a criminal. Aeschylus’ tragedy The Eumenides could have helped Seneca create the image of Nero shamefully fleeing from the furies. Aeschylus portrayed in a very similar manner the shadow of the dead mother, Clytemnestra, cursing Orestes, waking up the sleeping furies, and constantly encouraging them to run after the fleeing son who had killed his mother. As Svetonius writes, in public places in Rome, notices comparing Nero with Orestes and Alkmeon were popular. The article rebuts other arguments of the critics against Seneca’s authorship. C. John Herington says that Seneca could not have written Octavia, because it has a nice, symmetrical structure which is not characteristic of any of Seneca’s other tragedies. The author of the article however notes that Seneca’s Troades and Octavia have a very similar structure and the characters have similar features.

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