dixeris egregie, notum si callida verbum
reddiderit iunctura novum. si forte necesse est
indiciis monstrare recentibus abdita rerum et
fingere cinctutis non exaudita Cethegis,
continget dabiturque licentia sumpta pudenter,
et nova fictaque nuper habebunt verba fidem, si
Graeco fonte cadent parce detorta. quid autem
Caecilio Plautoque dabit Romanus ademptum
Vergilio Varioque? ego cur, adquirere pauca
si possum, invideor, cum lingua Catonis et Enni
sermonem patrium ditaverit et nova rerum
nomina protulerit? licuit semperque licebit
signatum praesente nota producere nomen.
ut silvae foliis pronos mutantur in annos,
prima cadunt: ita verborum vetus interit aetas,
et iuvenum ritu florent modo nata vigentque.
debemur morti nos nostraque: sive receptus
terra Neptunus classes Aquilonibus arcet,
regis opus, sterilisve diu palus aptaque remis
vicinas urbes alit et grave sentit aratrum,
seu cursum mutavit iniquum frugibus amnis
doctus iter melius: mortalia facta peribunt,
nedum sermonum stet honos et gratia vivax.
multa renascentur quae iam cecidere cadentque
quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus,
quem penes arbitrium est et ius et norma loquendi.
Words and meanings come and go. Cf. too 'The missing plays of Sophocles will turn up piece by piece, or be written in another language. Ancient cures for diseases will reveal themselves once more. Mathematical discoveries glimpsed and lost to view will have their time again.' -- Tom Stoppard, Arcadia.
'The best words in the best order', as my English teacher used to quote.
Other notes from the AP shall follow. For now, there is the plural of the personal name Piso (ll. 6 and 235, in reference to the father and his sons) and of the toponym Anticyra (ll. 299-301): nanciscetur enim pretium nomenque poetae, | si tribus Anticyris caput insanabile numquam | tonsori Licino commiserit (Loeb: 'for surely one will win the esteem and name of poet if he never entrusts to the barber Licinus a head that three Anticyras cannot cure'). Cf. Persius 4.16.
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