An Ambiguity in limine: faveo in Two Incipit of Tibullus and Propertius

The article aims to analyse an intertextual link in the ambiguous use of faveo between Tib. 2.1.1 and Prop. 4.6.1, both elegies classifiable as ‘mimetic’ hymns and both ‘thresholds’ of the respective two books of elegies. It is intended to show how Tibullus, inspiring Propertius in this, understood the implicit resources of a verb like faveo in the context of ‘mimetic’ fiction, by which the officiating poet can simultaneously address the imaginary participants of the religious ceremony and the actual readers of the poem. The aim is to show how this Tibullian use of faveo , suggested by the poeta-sacerdos mimesis, not only instilled in Propertius, also in the role of officiant, the need to enfranchise a sequence such as favete linguis from its formular rigidity, but illustrated the expressive potential of the verb in the incipit position of an elegy as a source of metapoetic reflection, being able to subtly express an ambivalence suitable for defining an angle of privileged sharing between poet and readers, carved out at crucial points in Tibullus’ second book and Propertius’ fourth in which precisely faveo can make itself the bearer of a message transcended from the literal plane.