Variációk a kulturális identitásra: Catullus, carm. 39
Variations on cultural identity: Catullus, carm. 39

Summary/Abstract: In this paper, I interpret Catullus’ poem 39 as reflecting to the instability of Roman identity. Characteristically, the Catullan persona uses the concept of urbanitas to attack someone else as rusticus or inurbanus, while the language of his argumentation destabilizes his own position. In the end, the bad habit of smirking everywhere, every time and in every situation attributed to Egnatius by the Catullan speaker emerges as a highly suitable answer – the answer of a sophisticated (i.e. urbanus) reader of the poem’s “Catullus” – to the Catullan attack which tries to stabilize a cultural position for himself (“I am urbanus and I know what it is”) which cannot be stabilized at all. In my interpretation, I read the Catullan poem as participating in the identity struggles of the late republican Rome.

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