=44. PRINCIPIBVS ... VIRIS.= A fixed colloquial idiom: _OLD princeps1_ 5 cites Plautus _Amphitruo_ 204 'delegit _uiros_ primorum _principes_' and Hor _Ep_ I xvii 35 '_principibus_ placuisse _uiris_ non ultima laus est'. There was a parallel expression _principes feminae_: see Pliny _NH_ VIII 119 and Tac _Ann_ XIII 42 (Suillius compares himself to Seneca) 'an grauius aestimandum sponte litigatoris praemium honestae operae adsequi quam corrumpere cubicula principum feminarum?'. =45. CARMINA VESTRARVM PERAGVNT PRAECONIA LAVDVM.= _Praeconia_ in a similar context at _Tr_ II 65 'inuenies uestri _praeconia_ nominis illic [in the _Metamorphoses_]'; used with _peragere_ at _Tr_ V i 9 'ut cecidi, subiti _perago praeconia_ casus'. =45. LAVDVM.= 'Deeds meriting praise'; compare 87 'tuas ... laudes ... recentes'. The meaning is found even in prose: see Caesar _BC_ II 39 4 'haec tamen ab ipsis inflatius commemorabantur, ut de suis homines _laudibus_ libenter praedicant' and the other passages cited at _OLD_ _laus1_ 3b. =46. ACTORVM.= AVCTORVM (_BCHL_) is possible enough; but _actorum_ accords better with the preceding _laudum_. =46. CADVCA.= 'Impermanent'. The sense is frequent in Cicero: see _Rep_ VI 17 'nihil est nisi mortale et _caducum_ praeter animos' and _Phil_ IV 13. Elsewhere in Ovid the usual sense of the word is 'ineffectual': see _Fast_ I 181-82 'nec lingua _caducas_ / concipit ulla preces, dictaque pondus habent' and _Ibis_ 88 'et sit pars uoti nulla caduca mei'. Similar uses at _Her_ XV 208 & XVI 169. =47. CARMINE FIT VIVAX VIRTVS, EXPERSQVE SEPULCRI / NOTITIAM SERAE POSTERITATIS HABET.= For the immortality given by verse, compare from Ovid _Tr_ V xiv 5 (to his wife) 'dumque legar, mecum pariter tua fama legetur' and _EP_ III ii 35-36 (to those friends who assisted him) 'uos etiam seri laudabunt saepe nepotes, / claraque erit scriptis gloria uestra meis'. The topic is closely related to that of the poet's own immortality, for which, in Ovid, see xvi 2-3 'non solet ingeniis summa nocere dies, / famaque post cineres maior uenit' and _Met_ XV 871-79. For other poets' treatment of the immortality given by verse, see Prop III ii 17-26, Hor _Carm_ IV ix, Pindar _Nem_ VII 11-16, Gow on Theocritus XVI 30, and Murgatroyd on Tib I iv 63-66. =47. VIVAX VIRTVS.= Compare Hor _AP_ 68-69 'mortalia facta peribunt, / nedum sermonum stet honos et gratia _uiuax_'. =47. EXPERSQVE SEPVLCRI.= The diction of this line is very elevated: Professor R. J. Tarrant compares _Met_ IX 252-53 (Jupiter speaking of Hercules) 'aeternum est a me quod traxit, et _expers_ / atque immune _necis_' and _Cons Liu_ 59-60 'Caesaris adde domum, quae certe _funeris expers_ / debuit humanis altior esse malis'. The following line's _notitiam ... habet_ is in comparison an anticlimax.