It is not unlikely that this is where Lucretius himself had
studied.
It is well to bear in mind that the ensuing years of philosophical study
were spent at Naples--a Greek city then--and very largely among Greeks.
This fact provides a key to much of Vergil. Our biographies have somehow
assumed Rome as the center of Siro's activities, though the evidence in
favor of Naples is unmistakable. Not only does Vergil speak of a journey
(Catal. V. 8):
Nos ad beatos vela mittimus portus
Magni petentes docta dicta Sironis,
and Servius say _Neapoli studuit_, and the _Ciris_ mention _Cecropus
horrulus_, and Cicero in all his references place Siro on the bay of
Naples,[1] but a fragment of a Herculanean roll of Philodemus locates the
garden school in the suburbs of Naples.
[Footnote 1: _De Fin_. II. 119, Cumaean villa; _Acad_. II. 106, Bauli;
_Ad. Fam_. VI. 11.2; Vestorius is a Neapolitan; of. _Class. Phil_.
1920, p. 107, and _Am. Jour. Philology_, XLI, 115. For other possible
references, see _Am. Jour. Phil_.1920, XLI, 280 ff.]
Even after Siro's death--about 42 B.C.--Vergil seems to have remained at
Naples, probably inheriting his teacher's villa. In 38 he with Varius and
Plotius came up from Naples to Sinuessa to join Maecenas' party on their
journey to Brundisium; Vergil wrote the _Georgics_ at Naples in the
thirties (_Georg_.
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