Whenever we read about Bavius or Mevius we are informed, on the basis of the ancient commentaries on Vergil and Horace, that they were bad poets and literary critics hostile to the Augustan poets. A close evaluation of the sources, however, reveals that Vergil and Horace seem to have attacked them first; their roles as ‚obtrectatores‘ actively criticizing Vergil or Horace have just been attributed to them in late antiquity.