Kyle Gervais of the University of Otago is working on a commentary on Statius Thebaid book 2, and emailed comments on his use of Tesserae. It’s encouraging to see scholars putting the system to use in this way, and to get some perceptive feedback.
I’ve been using Tesserae in writing my commentary on Statius, Thebaid 2. Of course, it’s not my primary tool for tracking down intertexts, since it doesn’t understand context and doesn’t do synonyms or sound-alike words very well (although I understand that these are areas under development). I typically use it after I’ve written notes on a hundred lines or so, to help me catch any intertexts I’ve missed through traditional methods. I work at a slow pace (no more than two lines of poetry per day) and am very thorough in searching for intertexts (constant searches of the PHI database, consulting half a dozen ancient and modern commentaries and editions, trolling through papers on Statius and commentaries on other authors, and of course my own knowledge of the ancient sources)–so it’s impressive how many new intertexts Tesserae picks up. An example:
After finishing Theb. 2.1-101, I ran the lines against the Aeneid on Tesserae (using the basic search mode). I got 740 hits, and within 30-45 min. skimmed through to find 10 promising hits that I hadn’t found in the traditional ways (I’m sure I could have cut out a lot of the poor quality hits by manipulating the search settings, but I worry about missing things, and find it just as easy to skim). Of the ten, four led nowhere. Of the remaining six:
One reinforced an intertextual frame I already recognized (Hector’s epiphany in Aen. 2 as a frame for Laius’ epiphany): Theb. 2.101 pectora et has uisus fatorum expromere uoces, Aen. 2.280 compellare virum et maestas expromere voces. Obviously no one (including me) had thought to search for expromere uoces.
One helped to flesh out Laius’ role as an agent of discord: Theb. 2.99 infula per crines, glaucaeque innexus oliuae [/ uittarum prouenit honos], Aen. 6.281 ‘[Discordia] vipereum crinem vittis innexa cruentis‘. On a slow day, I might have searched the PHI for innex-, but on most days it would have seemed like a waste of time. Even if I had, I might have skimmed by Aen. 6.281 (since crinem wouldn’t have been highlighted).
Two revealed a subtle link between the underworld at Theb. 2.48ff. and Priam’s palace at Aen. 2.486ff.: 2.49 uacua atria ditat, 2.528 uacua atria lustrat; 2.51 stridor ibi et gemitus poenarum, atroque tumultu…, 2.486 at domus interior gemitu miseroque tumultu…. Never thought to search for uacua atria; never would have searched for gemit– + tumult-.
Two were really exciting:
Baccho + matres pointed to: Theb. 2.79f. ipse etiam gaudens nemorosa per auia sanas / impulerat matres Baccho meliore Cithaeron and Aen. 7.580ff. tum quorum attonitae Baccho nemora avia matres / insultant thiasis (neque enim leue nomen Amatae) / undique collecti coeunt Martemque fatigant. A clear intertext, and more importantly, a good (very modern and very much in Statius’ style) explanation for Baccho meliore, which has been a crux: Bacchus is ‘better’ than he was in the Aeneid.
Finally, Theb. 2.42 (a mountain’s shadow on the water) exigit atque ingens medio natat umbra profundo and Aen. 5.422f. (Entellus) magna ossa lacertosque / exuit atque ingens media consistit harena (note the added correspondence between exigit and exuit, which Tesserae can’t [yet?] pick up). It’s a genuine and interesting intertext, I think, but I never would have found it myself: the contexts aren’t obviously similar, I wouldn’t have had time to search the PHI for atque, ingens, or medius (too many hits), and it wouldn’t have occurred to me to search for combinations of any of those three words. It’s most exciting to me because it’s the kind of intertext that always gets missed since we’re not very good at thinking in the proper way (my comment on the link: ‘An intertext perhaps best *read in reverse*, as an augmentation of Virgil: thanks to Statius the mighty Entellus casts a shadow big as a mountain’).