ABSTRACT
At the time the Alexandrian savant Apollonius was writing for his learned North African audience Rome was without a literate culture. Yet, within ten or twenty years of when Apollonius may have died, Roman writers had made their first attempts at epic, drama, and comedy. The victory in the first Punic war seems to have provided the impulse. Increased stability at home, a horizon extending beyond Italian borders, a rise in the number of foreigners, especially Greeks (Gruen 1986:250ff.), visiting Rome, and, particularly, a burgeoning mercantile class represent some of the stimuli for literature created by the aftermath of the conflict. Epic began at Rome in the 240s and 230s BC.
