ginum Libri_ xv. Varro gave
short accounts in prose and verse of seven hundred famous Greeks and
Romans, with their portraits (Plin. _N.H._ xxxv. 11), the title being
derived from the arrangement in groups of seven. Aristotle's +Peplos+
had dealt similarly with the heroes of the Trojan War, and the
'+Peplographia+ Varronis' of Cic. _ad Att._ xvi. 11, 3 is usually
identified with the _Hebdomades_.

11. +Logistorikoi+, in seventy-six Books, were probably not a
mixture of fable and history, but essays enlivened by historical
examples. The titles were double, the chief speaker being named as
well as the subject of the essay, _e.g._ _Catus de liberis educandis_.
To this work Cicero probably refers, _Ac._ i. 9, 'Philosophiam multis
locis incohasti, ad impellendum satis, ad edocendum parum.'

12. Varro's poetical works are now represented only by fragments of
the _Saturae Menippeae_, a medley of prose and verse in one hundred
and fifty books (Cic. _Ac._ i. 9, 'Varium et elegans omni fere numero
poema fecisti'). They were so called by Varro himself (Gell. ii. 18,
7, 'In satiris quas alii Cynicas, ipse appellat Menippeas'), being
founded on the dialogues of Menippus, the Cynic of Gadara, of the
third century B.C. Their object was to present philosophy in a popular
dress: Cic. _Ac._ i. 8, 'Quae cum facilius minus docti intellegerent,
iucunditate quadam ad legendum invitati.' From the way in which they
are spoken of in the same passage ('in illis veteribus nostris'), most
of them must have been among Varro's earliest writings. The titles are
extremely curious, _e.g._ '+Dis paides hoi gerontes+,' 'Longe
fugit qui suos fugit.' Quintilian considers Varro as the founder of a
type of satire distinct from that of Lucilius, Horace, and Persius: x.
1, 95, 'Alterum illud etiam prius satirae genus sed non sola carminum
varietate mixtum condidit Terentius Varro, vir Romanorum
eruditissimus.' His other poetical works were ten books of _Poemata_,
four of _Satires_, and six of _Pseudotragoediae_ (tragi-comedy).

13. _Oratory._--Varro left twenty-two Books of _Orationes_ and three
of _Suasiones_, but he had no fame as an orator: Quint. x. 1, 95,
'Plus scientiae collaturus quam eloquentiae.'

14. _Letters._--Of these there seem to have been two collections: (_a_)
_Epistulae Latinae_, real letters to acquaintances; (_b_) _Epistolicae
Quaestiones_, discussing in epistolary form points of history,
grammar, etc.

The collection of maxims which