Note 38 — III. TO L. ANNAEUS SENECA
Mario Emilio Cosenza translation
Teuffel, par. 290: “The praetexta entitled Octavia is certainly not by Seneca.” With this compare par. 290, n. 7, which gives a discussion of the above, and the bibliography. Teuffel says that l. 630 of the Octavia describes the death of Nero, and consequently could not have been written by Seneca, who died some years earlier. It is these lines to which Petrarch refers when he says: “In this play there is a passage that gives rise to the suspicion of authorship.”