Context: Horace is giving notes on the history of dramatic poetry, as he understands that history. Here he presents an idea of the origin of satiric drama out of tragic drama. [ As I understand, but am not sure of, Horaces has this backward.]
Carmine qui tragico uilem certauit ob hircum, 220
mox etiam agrestis Satyros nudauit et asper
incolumi grauitate iocum temptauit eo quod
inlecebris erat et grata nouitate morandus
spectator functusque sacris et potus et exlex.
Translation:
The poet who [qui] competed for the prize of a lowly goat
Soon also undressed his rustic Satyrs [on stage] and roughly
tested crude joking with his dignity intact, because
it took lures and new [stage] tricks to hold the playgoer [in his seat]
tipsy and restless after religious rites [involving wine-drinking].
This was a pretty hard sentence for me. I list below the grammar problems that delayed me, with my suggested solutions.
asper: adjective used adverbially
incolumi gravitate: ablative absolute?? “with seriousness unharmed”
inlecebris . . . et grata novitate: ablative of cause: “by means of lures and charming novelty”, in relation to the verb “erat . . . morandus”.
erat . . . morandus: “had to be delayed or kept in place”. I believe this is an instance of the passive periphrastic. The idea is that playwrights must keep the audience amused or the play fails.
I want to ask another question about this passage:
eo quod
inlecebris erat et grata nouitate
But first I want to see how I did on the above.