Book 1
Imperial Marcus Valerius Martialis Latinpr. I hope that in my little books I have observed such restraint that no one with a good conscience about himself can complain of them, since they make their jokes while keeping intact the respect owed even to persons of the humblest rank. This sense was so lacking in the old authors that they abused not only real names but great ones. Let my fame cost me less, and let wit be the very last thing approved in me. Far from the candour of our jests be the malicious interpreter, and let him not write my epigrams for me: it is a shameful thing to play the wit upon another man's book. As for the frank licence of the language—that is, the tongue of epigram—I would excuse it, were the precedent mine: but so writes Catullus, so Marsus, so Pedo, so Gaetulicus, so everyone who is read through. If, however, anyone is so ostentatiously severe that in his presence plain Latin may not be spoken on any page, he may content himself with the preface—or rather with the title. Epigrams are written for those who are in the habit of watching the Floralia. Let Cato not enter my theatre; or if he does enter, let him watch. I think I shall be within my rights if I close the preface with verses:
Since you knew the sweet rite of merry Flora, The festal games and the licence of the crowd, Why, stern Cato, did you come into the theatre? Or had you come for this alone—to walk out?
I This is he whom you read, the man you ask for, Martial, known the whole world over For his witty little books of epigram: To whom, devoted reader, the honour you have given While he yet lives and feels it Few poets have after their ashes.
II You who long to have my little books with you wherever you go, And want them as companions of a long road, Buy these, that parchment compresses into small leaves: Give book-cases to the great; one hand can hold me. Yet, that you may not be ignorant where I am for sale, and wander Astray through the whole city, with me for guide you shall be sure: Look for Secundus, the freedman of learned Lucensis, Behind the threshold of Peace and the forum of Pallas.
III You would rather live in the bookshops of the Argiletum, Little book, though our book-cases stand empty for you. You do not know, alas, you do not know the disdain of Rome our mistress: Believe me, the crowd of Mars is far too shrewd. Nowhere are there greater sneers: young men and old And boys too have the nose of a rhinoceros. When you have heard a great "Bravo!" and are blowing kisses, You will be tossed in a shaken blanket up to the stars. But you, that you may not so often suffer your master's erasures Nor have the grim pen mark down your jokes, Long, you wanton thing, to flit through the airs of heaven: Go, fly; but you could have been safer at home.
IV If by chance, Caesar, you should touch our little books, Lay aside the frown of the lord of the earth. Your triumphs too are used to bearing jests, And a general is not ashamed to be matter for a quip. With the same look with which you watch Thymele and the mimic Latinus, With that, I pray, may you read our songs. Your censorship can permit harmless games: Wanton is my page, but my life is honest.
V I give you a sea-fight, you give me epigrams: You wish, I think, Marcus, to swim along with your book.
VI While the eagle bore the boy through the airs of heaven, The freight clung unharmed to the fearful talons: Now its own prey prevails upon the lions of Caesar, And the hare plays safe within the enormous mouth. Which do you think the greater marvel? For each there stands The highest author: these are Caesar's deeds, those Jove's.
VII The Dove, the darling of my friend Stella— Though Verona hear me say it— Has beaten, Maximus, the Sparrow of Catullus. My Stella surpasses your Catullus By as much as a dove is greater than a sparrow.
VIII That you follow the doctrines of great Thrasea and perfect Cato In such a way that you would have yourself survive, And do not rush bare-breasted upon drawn swords— You do, Decianus, what I would wish you to do. I have no use for the man who buys his fame with blood cheaply given; The man I want is one who can be praised without dying.
IX You wish to be thought a fine fellow and a great man at once, Cotta: But the man who is a fine fellow, Cotta, is a trifling man.
X Gemellus seeks the hand of Maronilla in marriage, And longs and presses and entreats and gives. Is she so lovely? No—nothing is more hideous. What then is sought and pleases in her? She has a cough.
XI Since the knight has been given his twice five coins, why Do you alone, Sextilianus, drink twice ten times that? By now the hot water would have failed the slaves who fetch it, If you, Sextilianus, did not drink your wine neat.
XII Where you go up to the Herculean heights of cool Tibur, And the white Albula steams with its sulphurous waters, The fourth milestone from the city marks the farms, The sacred grove, and the acres dear to the Muses. Here a rough portico used to offer shade in summer— Ah, what an unheard-of crime that portico nearly dared! For suddenly it collapsed in ruin, just when, beneath that pile, Regulus had been carried by his pair of horses. Surely Fortune feared our complaints, Which were no match for so great a hatred. Now even the losses please us; the very danger is worth so much: Had the roof stood, it could not have proved the gods exist.
XIII When chaste Arria handed the sword to her own Paetus, The blade she had herself drawn from her own vitals, "If there be any faith," she said, "the wound I made does not pain me: But the wound you will make, Paetus—that one pains me."
XIV The dalliance, Caesar, the games and the sport of lions We have seen—the arena gives you this too— When the hare, caught again and again by the gentle tooth, Came back, and ran at large through the open jaws. How can the greedy lion spare the prey it has caught? And yet it is said to be yours: therefore it can.
XV O Julius, to be named before none of my companions, If long fidelity and grey old loyalty count for anything, Your sixtieth consul is now almost upon you, And your life counts scarcely a few more days. You will not do well to put off what you may see can be denied you, And to reckon that alone yours which has already been. Cares await you, and labours linked in chains; Joys do not stay, but fly away in flight. Grasp these with both hands and with your whole embrace: Even so they often slip and flow from the depths of your lap. It is not, believe me, the part of a wise man to say "I shall live": Tomorrow's life is too late; live today.
XVI Some things are good, some middling, more are bad, Of those you read here: no otherwise, Avitus, is a book made.
XVII Titus urges me to keep pleading cases, And often tells me, "It is a great thing." A great thing, Titus, is what the farmer does.
XVIII Why does it please you, Tucca, to mix with old Falernian The new must stored in Vatican jars? What great good have the worst of wines done you? Or what harm have the best of wines done you? About us it is easy; but it is a crime to slaughter Falernian And to give cruel poison to Campanian wine. Your guests, perhaps, have deserved to perish: But so precious a jar did not deserve to die.
XIX If I remember rightly, Aelia, you had four teeth: One cough spat out two, and another two. Now you can cough in safety the whole day long: A third cough has nothing left to do there.
XX Tell me, what madness is this? Before the summoned crowd that watches, You alone, Caecilianus, devour the mushrooms. What shall I pray for, worthy of so great a belly and gullet? May you eat such a mushroom as Claudius ate.
XXI When his right hand, aiming at the king, was deceived by the attendant, He thrust it, doomed to perish, into the sacred fire. But the kindly foe could not endure so cruel a marvel, And bade the man, snatched from the flames, depart: The hand that Mucius could burn with fire he scorned, Porsena could not bear to look upon. Greater is the fame and glory of the cheated right hand: Had it not erred, it would have done less.
XXII Why now, hare, do you flee the gentle mouth of a peaceful lion? It has not learned to crush such tiny beasts. Those claws are kept for mighty necks, Nor does so great a thirst rejoice in thin blood. The hare is prey for hounds; it does not fill those vast jaws. The Dacian boy need not fear the arms of Caesar.
XXIII You invite no one, Cotta, except a man you have bathed with, And the baths alone furnish you a dinner-guest. I used to wonder why you never asked me, Cotta: Now I know—it was naked that I displeased you.
XXIV You see that man there, Decianus, with unkempt hair, Whose grim brow even you yourself dread, Who talks of the Curii and the liberating Camilli? Do not trust the face: he was married yesterday—as a bride.
XXV Publish your little books at last, Faustinus, to the people, And bring out the polished work of your learned heart, Such as the Cecropian citadels of Pandion would not condemn Nor our old men pass over in silence. Do you hesitate to admit Fame as she stands before your doors, And does it irk you to bear off the rewards of your own labour? Let the pages, fated to outlive you, begin through you also To live: glory comes too late to the ashes.
XXVI Sextilianus, you drink as much, all by yourself, As five tiers of benches: you could be drunk so often on water; Nor do you beg only the coins of neighbours sitting near you, But the cash from benches further off. This vintage is not pressed by Paelignian wine-presses, Nor was that grape born on Tuscan slopes, But the lucky jar of old Opimius is drained dry, And the Massic cellar empties out its black casks. Go beg the dregs of Laletania from a tavern-keeper, If, Sextilianus, you drink more than ten times.
XXVII Last night I had told you— After ten half-pints downed, I think— That you should dine with me today, Procillus. At once you thought the thing as good as done, And made a note of my unsober words By a precedent far too dangerous: "I hate a drinking-mate with a good memory," Procillus.
XXVIII Whoever believes that Acerra reeks of yesterday's wine Is mistaken: Acerra always drinks till dawn.
XXIX Rumour reports, Fidentinus, that you recite my little books To the public no otherwise than as your own. If you want them called mine, I will send you the poems for nothing: If you want them called yours, buy this—that they may not be mine.
XXX Diaulus had been a surgeon, now he is an undertaker. He began to be a doctor in the only way he could.
XXXI To you, Phoebus, Encolpos vows all the hair from the crown of his head, The darling of his master the centurion, When Pudens shall have won the deserved reward of the first rank. Cut the long locks soon, Phoebus, While no down soils the tender face And while the milk-white neck becomes the flowing mane; And, that master and boy may long enjoy Your gifts, make him shorn quickly, a man late.
XXXII I do not love you, Sabidius, nor can I say why: This only can I say—I do not love you.
XXXIII Gellia does not weep for her lost father when she is alone, But if anyone is present, the bidden tears leap forth. He does not mourn who seeks to be praised for it, Gellia; He grieves truly who grieves with no witness by.
XXXIV With your doors unguarded and forever open, Lesbia, You sin, and do not hide your stolen pleasures, And the onlooker delights you more than the lover himself, Nor are your joys agreeable to you if they lie hidden. But the courtesan drives off the witness with a curtain and a bolt, And rarely does a chink gape in the brothel of Summemmius. From Chione at least, or from Ias, learn some modesty: Even the tombs hide their filthy harlots. Does my censure seem to you too harsh? I forbid you, Lesbia, to be caught—not to be had.
XXXV You complain, Cornelius, that the verses I write are too little severe, And not such as a schoolmaster might read aloud in class: But these little books, like husbands with their wives, Cannot please without a cock. What if you bade me write a wedding-hymn In language not of a wedding-hymn? Who clothes the Floralia, and grants To courtesans the modesty of the matron's robe? This is the law laid down for jesting songs: They cannot give pleasure unless they tickle. So lay aside your severity, I beg, And spare my sports and jokes, And do not seek to castrate my little books. Nothing is uglier than a Priapus gelded.
XXXVI If to you, Lucanus, or to you, Tullus, there were given Such a destiny as the Spartan sons of Leda have, There would be a noble contest of devotion between the two, Since each would wish to die before the other for his brother, And the first to go down to the shades below would say: "Live out your time, brother; live out mine."
XXXVII You receive the burden of your belly in wretched gold—and feel no shame— You drink from glass, Bassus: so it costs you more to shit.
XXXVIII The book you recite, Fidentinus, is mine: But when you recite it badly, it begins to be yours.
XXXIX If there is anyone to be numbered among rare friends, Of the kind that old fidelity and ancient fame have known; If anyone is steeped in the arts of Cecropian and Latin Minerva, And good with a true plainness of heart; If anyone is a guardian of the right, an admirer of the honourable, And one who asks the gods nothing with a secret mouth; If anyone is upheld by the strength of a great mind: May I perish if that man is not Decianus.
XL You who draw down your face and do not read these lines with pleasure, May you envy everyone, you spiteful man, and no one envy you.
XLI You think yourself a wit, Caecilius. You are not, believe me. What then? A vulgar slave— The kind that hawker across the Tiber is, Who barters pale sulphur-matches For broken glass; the kind who sells Soaked chickpeas to the lounging crowd; The kind who keeps and owns the vipers; The kind the cheap boys of the salt-sellers are; The kind that hoarse cook is who carries round Steaming sausages through the lukewarm cook-shops; The kind some second-rate street-poet is; The kind that shameless dancing-master from Gades is; The kind the chattering mouth of an aged catamite is. So cease at last to seem to yourself What only to yourself, Caecilius, you seem— You who could outdo Gabba in your salt, And Tettius Caballus himself. It is not granted to everyone to have a nose: He who jests with stupid impudence Is no Tettius—but a horse.
XLII When Porcia had heard the fate of her husband Brutus, And her grief sought the weapons taken from her, "Do you not yet know," she said, "that death cannot be denied? I had believed my father taught this by his fate." She spoke, and drank with eager mouth the burning coals. Go now, you tiresome crowd, and deny her steel.
XLIII We were twice thirty, Mancinus, summoned by you, And nothing was set before us yesterday but a boar, No grapes kept from the late-bearing vines, Nor honey-apples to rival the sweet combs, No pears that hang tied to the long broom-shoots, Nor pomegranates that mimic short-lived roses; Rustic Sassina sent no milk-white cones of cheese, Nor came the olive from Picene jars: The boar alone—and that the smallest, such as could be killed By an unarmed pygmy. And nothing was given from it; we all only looked on: That is how the arena too serves us up a boar. After such deeds, may no boar be set before you, But may you be set before the boar that took Charidemus.
XLIV That the wanton runs of hares and the games of lions Are carried by my larger sheet and my smaller, And that I do the same thing twice—if that, Stella, seems Too much to you, then you too serve me a hare twice over.
XLV That the labour I publish may not perish in little books, Let it rather be said, "Him then in answer he addressed."
XLVI When you say, "Quick, do it if you're doing it," Hedylus, at once My passion droops and falters, weakened. Bid me wait: held back, I will go the faster. Hedylus, if you're in a hurry, tell me—not to hurry.
XLVII Lately he was a doctor, now Diaulus is an undertaker: What the undertaker does, the doctor too had done.
XLVIII From these jaws the keepers have not rescued bulls, Through which the fleeing prey, the hare, goes and returns; And, what is more wondrous, it comes out swifter than its foe, And carries off something from so great a nobility. It is not safer when it runs on the empty sand, Nor is it shut up in its cage with such good faith. If you seek to escape the bites of hounds, you reckless hare, You have the mouth of a lion to flee to for refuge.
XLIX Man not to be left unspoken among the Celtiberian peoples, And glory of our Spain, You shall see lofty Bilbilis, Licinianus, Renowned for horses and for arms, And old Caius white with snows, and Vadavero Holy with its broken crags, And the sweet grove of delicate Boterdus, Which fruitful Pomona loves. You shall swim the gentle ford of warm Congedus And the soft lakes of the Nymphs, And brace your slackened body in the brief Salo, that hardens iron. There Voberca itself shall offer to the man at lunch Wild beasts to be shot close by. You shall break the clear heat in the golden Tagus, Shaded by the shadows of trees; The chilly Derceita shall quench your greedy thirst, And Nutha, that surpasses snows. But when grey December and winter's unbridled storm Bellow with the hoarse north wind, You shall seek again the sunny shores of Tarraco And your own Laletania. There you shall slaughter does entangled in soft nets, And boars bred at home, And burst the cunning hare with a strong horse, And leave the stags to your bailiff. The neighbouring wood shall come right down to your hearth, Ringed with grimy children. The huntsman shall be called, and the guest shall come to you At a shout from close at hand. Nowhere a crescent-marked boot, nowhere the toga, Nor garments rank with purple dye; Far off the bristling Liburnian and the querulous client, Far off the imperious commands of widows; No pale defendant shall break your deep sleep, But you shall sleep the whole morning through. Let another earn a great and frantic "Bravo!": Pity you the fortunate, And enjoy true joy without pride, While your Sura is being praised. Not shamelessly does my life ask what is left to it, When my fame has what is enough.
L If your cook, Aemilianus, is called Mistyllus, Why should not mine be called Taratalla?
LI No neck but the first will do for the fierce lions. Why do you flee these teeth, you ambitious hare? No doubt you wish them to descend from mighty bulls To you, and to break necks they cannot see. You must despair of the glory of a mighty fate: You cannot die thus, a slender prey, beneath such a foe.
LII I commend to you, Quintianus, my own books— If I may still call them my own, The books your poet recites: If they complain of harsh slavery, Come as their liberator and give security enough, And, when that man calls himself their owner, Say they are mine, manumitted by my hand. If you cry this out three and four times, You will put shame upon the plagiarist.
LIII There is one page in our little books that is yours, Fidentinus— But marked with the sure stamp of its true owner, Which exposes your poems for the manifest theft they are. So, set among them, a Lingonian hooded cloak, with its greasy nap, Pollutes the city's violet-purple stuffs; So Arretine pots violate vessels of crystal; So, when by chance the black raven strays on the banks of Cayster, It is laughed at among the swans of Leda; So, where the sacred grove resounds with the many-voiced nightingale, The wicked magpie offends the Cecropian laments. Our books need no informer, no judge: Your page stands against you and says to you, "You are a thief."
LIV If, Fuscus, you have still any room to be loved— For you have friends on this side, friends on that— We ask one place, if one is left, And do not refuse me because I am new to you: All those old friends of yours were once new. Only look at the one newly offered for the part, And see whether the new friend can grow old in it.
LV If you wish to know briefly the prayer of your Marcus, Fronto, bright ornament of camp and toga, This is what he seeks: to be the ploughman of his own, not a great, estate, And he loves homely leisure among small things. Does any man, fool that he is, court the painted cold of Spartan marble, And carry the morning greeting "Good day," When he could—blessed with the spoils of wood and field— Spread out his full nets before the hearth, And draw up the leaping fish on the quivering line, And bring out yellow honey from the red jar? When his plump farm-wife loads his uneven table, And ash, bought from no one, makes ready his own eggs? Let no one love this life who does not love me—that is my wish— And let him live, pale, among the duties of the town.
LVI The vintage, harassed by unceasing rains, is sodden: You cannot, much as you wish, sell unwatered wine, tavern-keeper.
LVII You ask, Flaccus, what sort of girl I would have, or not? I want one neither too easy nor too hard. What lies between, and between the two, is what I approve: I want neither what torments nor what cloys.
LVIII A slave-dealer asked me a hundred thousand for a boy: I laughed, but Phoebus paid it on the spot. This grieves my cock, and it complains of me in private, And Phoebus is praised to my disgrace. But my cock has just made Phoebus a present of Two million: give me that, and I will buy at a higher price.
LIX The dole at Baiae gives me a hundred farthings. What does such starvation do amid such luxuries? Give me back the dark baths of Lupus and Gryllus: When I dine so badly, why, Flaccus, should I bathe so well?
LX Though you enter the wide mouth of the grim lion, hare, The lion still thinks its tooth is idle. On what back will it rush, on what shoulders fall? Where will it fix the deep wounds it deals to bullocks? Why do you weary in vain the lord and king of the woods? He feeds on nothing but the beast he has chosen.
LXI Verona loves the verses of her learned bard, Mantua is blessed in Maro, The land of Aponus is reckoned rich in its Livy And its Stella, no less than in Flaccus, The rainy Nile applauds Apollodorus, The Paeligni resound with Naso, And eloquent Corduba speaks of its two Senecas And of its one and only Lucan, Merry Gades delights in its Canius, Emerita in my Decianus: In you, Licinianus, our Bilbilis shall glory, And it will not be silent about me.
LXII Laevina, chaste, and yielding to none of the ancient Sabine women, And, though her husband is gloomy, gloomier still herself, While she gives herself now to the Lucrine, now to Avernus, And while she is often warmed by the waters of Baiae, Fell into the flames: pursuing a young man, she left Her husband and came as Penelope—and departed Helen.
LXIII You ask me to recite my epigrams to you. I will not. You do not want to listen, Celer, but to recite.
LXIV You are beautiful—we know it—and a girl, that is true, And rich, for who can deny it? But when you praise yourself too much, Fabulla, You are neither rich nor beautiful nor a girl.
LXV When I say "ficus," you laugh as at a barbarous word, And bid me say "ficos," Laetilianus. We will say "ficus" for the figs we know grow on the tree, We will say "ficos," Caecilianus, for yours.
LXVI You are mistaken, you greedy thief of my books, Who think a poet can be made for the cost That a copying and a cheap roll come to: A "Bravo!" is not got for six or ten coins. Seek out unpublished poems and rough drafts, Which one man alone knows, and which the father of the virgin page Keeps sealed in his book-case, himself the guardian, Pages that have not yet bristled at a hard chin. A book once known cannot change its master. But if there is one with its brow not yet pumiced, Not yet adorned with bosses and parchment wrapper, Buy it: such I have; and no one will know. Whoever recites another's work and seeks fame Ought to buy not the book, but silence.
LXVII "You are too free a man," you always tell me, Cerylus. The man who says that against you, Cerylus—is he a free man?
LXVIII Whatever Rufus does, it is nothing but Naevia to Rufus. If he rejoices, if he weeps, if he is silent, of her he speaks. He dines, he toasts, he asks, refuses, nods: there is one Naevia; if there were no Naevia, he would be dumb. When yesterday at dawn he was writing a greeting to his father, "Naevia my light," he wrote, "Naevia my lamp, good morning." Naevia reads this and laughs with downcast face. There is more than one Naevia: why, you fool of a man, do you rave?
LXIX Maximus, the Tarentos that once was wont to show a Pan Now shows a Canius.
LXX Go and pay my respects for me, book: you are bidden to go, Dutifully, to the gleaming home of Proculus. You ask the way? I will tell you. You will pass the Castor Near grey-haired Vesta and the home of the virgins; Thence by the sacred slope you shall seek the venerable Palatine, Where many an image of the supreme leader gleams. Let not the radiant mass of the marvellous colossus delay you, That rejoices to surpass the work of Rhodes. Turn your way here, where stand the roofs of dripping Lyaeus And the dome of Cybele with its painted Corybant. Straightway on the left, with bright front, are the household gods And the halls of the lofty house you must approach. Make for this house: fear no pride, no haughty threshold: No door stands more open with every post thrown wide, Nor any that Phoebus and the learned sisters love more nearly. If he says, "Why has he not come himself, then?" You may excuse me thus: "Because, whatever the quality Of what is read here, a mere caller could not have written it."
LXXI Let Laevia be drunk in six measures, Justina in seven, Lycas in five, Lyde in four, Ida in three. Let every mistress be counted out in poured Falernian, And, since none of them comes, you, Sleep, come to me.
LXXII Do you think, Fidentinus, that by my verses you are a poet, And do you wish to be believed so? So Aegle thinks she has teeth, With bones and Indian horn she has bought; So Lycoris, who is blacker than a falling mulberry, Pleases herself with white lead. By the same reasoning by which you are a poet, When you are bald, you will have a head of hair.
LXXIII There was no one in the whole city who would touch Your wife for free, Caecilianus, while it was allowed: But now, with guards posted, there is a huge Crowd of seducers: you are a man of resource.
LXXIV He was an adulterer: yet you could deny it, Paula. Now, look, he is your husband: can you deny it now, Paula?
LXXV The man who would rather give Linus half than lend him the whole, Would rather lose the half.
LXXVI O Flaccus, no cheap reward of my cares, Hope and nursling of the Antenorean home, Put off the Pierian songs and the choirs of the sisters; None of those girls will give you a copper. What do you seek from Phoebus? Minerva's chest has the cash; She is the shrewd one, she alone lends to all the gods. What can the ivy of Bacchus give? The tree of Pallas, Black with weight, bows down its various foliage. Besides waters, Helicon has nothing but garlands And the lyres of the goddesses, and a grand but empty "Bravo!" What have you to do with Cirrha? What with naked Permessis? The Roman forum is nearer and richer. There the coins ring out: but round our stages And barren professors' chairs only kisses click.
LXXVII Charinus is in fine health, and yet he is pale. Charinus drinks sparingly, and yet he is pale. Charinus digests well, and yet he is pale. Charinus takes the sun, and yet he is pale. Charinus dyes his skin, and yet he is pale. Charinus licks a cunt, and yet he is pale.
LXXVIII When the wasting plague gripped his undeserving throat And the black pest crept over his very face, With dry cheeks himself, exhorting his weeping friends, Festus resolved to go to the Stygian pools. Yet he did not defile his pious lips with hidden poison, Nor torment his sad fate with lingering starvation, But ended a holy life by a Roman death, And sent forth his soul by a nobler pyre. Fame may set this death above the fate of great Cato: For of this man Caesar was the friend.
LXXIX You always plead cases and always drive at business, Attalus: Whether there is or is not something to drive at, Attalus, you always drive. If business and cases fail, Attalus, you drive mules. Attalus, that you may not lack something to drive—drive out your life.
LXXX The last night of your life, Canus, you went out to beg the dole: You died, I think, Canus, because there was only one.
LXXXI You know you were born of a slave, and sweetly confess it, When you call your father master, Sosibianus.
LXXXII This portico, scattered in much dust, That unfolds its long ruins, See by what a chance it lies, finished off. For only just now Regulus had been Carried beneath those roofs, and had withdrawn, When suddenly it was overcome by its own weight, And, after it had nothing to fear for its master, It fell, bloodless, in a harmless loss. After such fear, such a complaint, Regulus— Who would deny that you are the care of the gods, For whose sake the very ruin was innocent?
LXXXIII Your little dog licks your mouth and lips, Manneia: No wonder, if a dog enjoys eating filth.
LXXXIV Quirinalis does not think he should take a wife, Though he wants to have sons, and has found A way to manage it: he beds his maidservants, And fills his house and lands with home-bred knights. Quirinalis is a true father of a family.
LXXXV When the witty auctioneer was selling well-tended hills And the lovely acres of suburban soil, "He is wrong," he said, "who thinks Marius is forced To sell: he owes nothing—rather, he is a lender." "What is the reason, then?" "He lost all his slaves there, And his cattle and crops; he does not like the place." Who would set a price, except a man who wanted to lose Everything? So the unlucky land clings to Marius.
LXXXVI Novius is my neighbour, and from our windows He can be touched by the hand. Who would not envy me, and think me Blessed at every hour, For having a yoked companion to enjoy? He is as far from me as Terentianus, Who now governs Nilotic Syene. I cannot dine with him, nor even see him, Nor hear him, nor in the whole city Is anyone so near to us and so far. One of us must move further off. Let a man be Novius's neighbour or lodger If he does not wish to see Novius.
LXXXVII That you may not reek heavily, Fescennia, of yesterday's wine, In your excess you devour the lozenges of Cosmus. That breakfast coats your teeth, but stops nothing When the belch comes back from the depths below. What of it, that the poison, mixed with perfume, smells the worse, And the doubled odour of your breath travels further? So drop these tricks now too well known, these thefts found out, And be simply, honestly drunk.
LXXXVIII Alcimus, snatched from your master in your growing years, Whom the Labican earth covers with light turf, Receive no nodding weight of Parian marble, Which empty toil gives the ashes, doomed to fall, But pliant box and the dark shade of the vine And meadows green and dewy with my tears Receive, dear boy, as memorials of my grief: Here for all time shall your honour live. When Lachesis brings me to my final years, No otherwise do I bid my own ashes lie.
LXXXIX You always whisper in everyone's ear, Cinna, Whispering even what may be said before a crowd of witnesses. You laugh in the ear, complain, accuse, lament, You sing in the ear, you judge, you are silent, you shout, And so deep has this disease settled in you, That often, Cinna, you praise Caesar in the ear.
XC Because I never saw you, Bassa, joined to men, And no story gave you a lover, But a crowd of your own sex was always Performing every service round you, with no man coming near, You seemed to us, I admit, a Lucretia: But you, Bassa—the shame of it—were a fornicator. You dare to bring two female parts together, And your monstrous lust counterfeits a man. You have devised a marvel worthy of the Theban riddle: Here, where there is no man, there is adultery.
XCI Though you publish nothing of your own, you carp at my poems, Laelius. Either stop carping at ours, or publish your own.
XCII Cestos often complains to me, with eyes not dry, That he is touched by your finger, Mamurianus. There is no need of a finger: have Cestos whole for yourself, If that, Mamurianus, is the only thing you lack. But if there is neither a hearth nor the frame of a bare cot, Nor the chipped cup of Chione or Antiope, If a threadbare and patched cloak hangs from your loins And a Gallic kilt covers half your buttocks, And you feed on the mere smell of a black kitchen And drink filthy water, bent down beside the dog: Then not your arse—for it is no arse that never shits— But the one eye you have left, that I will gouge with my finger: And do not call me jealous, or call me malicious. In short, Mamurianus, bugger on a full belly.
XCIII Aquinus rests, joined to faithful Fabricius, Who rejoices to have reached the Elysian homes first. A double altar attests the gifts of the first rank: But there is more in what you read in the shorter line: "Each joined in the sacred bond of a praised life, And—what fame rarely knows—he was a friend."
XCIV You sang badly, Aegle, while you were being had. Now you sing well; but you are not to be kissed.
XCV That you always shout, Aelius, that you bawl over the pleaders, You do not do this for nothing: you are paid to keep quiet.
XCVI If it is no trouble, and you do not mind, limping verse, We ask you to say a few words to our Maternus, Whispered in his ear, that he alone may hear. That lover of gloomy cloaks, Dressed in Baetic grey and dull dun, Who thinks men in scarlet are no men And calls amethyst-purple the garb of women, May praise the natural and have, if he likes, forever His dusky colours—his morals are pale green. He will ask why I suspect a man is soft. We bathe together: he looks at nothing above, But watches the athletes with devouring eyes And cannot keep his lips off the sight of their cocks. You ask who this is? The name has slipped my mind.
XCVII When everyone is shouting, then alone do you speak, Naevolus, And you think yourself an advocate and a pleader. By that method no one could fail to be eloquent. Look, all are silent now: Naevolus, say something.
XCVIII Diodorus goes to law, Flaccus, and suffers from gout. But he hands his counsel nothing: that is gout of the hand.
XCIX Lately you had not a full two million, But you were so lavish and so liberal And so splendid, Calenus, that all Your friends wished you ten million. The god heard our vows and prayers, And within, I think, seven months, Four deaths gave you this. But you, as if it had not been left But snatched from you, your ten million, went off Into such wretched starvation That the more sumptuous dinners, Which once a year you get up for the whole year, You unfold with the dirt of black coin, And we seven, your old companions, Cost you half a pound of lead. What worthy of such merits shall we pray for you? We wish you a hundred million, Calenus. If this should fall to you, you will die of hunger.
C Afra has her "mammas" and "papas," but she herself Can be called the greatest mamma of papas and mammas.
CI That hand, once faithful to my studies, And blessed in its master, and known to the Caesars— Demetrius, in his green years, has forsaken the prime of life: A fourth harvest was added to his three lustres. Yet, that he might not go down a slave to the Stygian shades, When the wicked plague was burning him in its grip, I took thought, and remitted to the sick man all a master's rights: He deserved by my gift to have recovered. Failing, he felt his reward, and called me his patron, Free, as he went to the infernal waters.
CII The painter who painted your Venus, Lycoris, Was flattering Minerva, I think.
CIII "If the gods above should give me ten times a hundred thousand"— So you used to say, Scaevola, when not yet a proper knight— "How I would live, how lavishly and how blessedly!" The easy-going gods laughed and granted it. After this your toga is much dingier, your cloak worse, Your shoe patched in its leather three and four times: And of ten olives, more are always kept back, One table unfolds two dinners, And the thick dregs of red Veientan are drunk, A penny buys warm chickpeas, and a penny a girl. Let us go to law, you cheat and welsher: Either live, Scaevola, or give the gods back their million.
CIV That the leopard bears the dainty yoke On its painted neck, and the savage tigers Submit patiently to the whip, That the stags bite the golden bit, That Libyan bears are tamed by reins, And a boar as huge as Calydon is said to have borne Obeys the purple halter, That ugly bisons drag the chariots And the beast, bidden to give soft dances, Does not refuse its black master: Who would not think these the shows of gods? Yet a man passes all this by as lesser, Whoever sees the humble huntings of lions, Whom the swift fear of hares tires out. They let go, they fetch back, they love their captives, And the prey is safer in the mouth, To which they delight to give loose, open jaws And to hold their timid teeth, Ashamed to crush so soft a spoil, Just when they have come from slaughtered bullocks. This clemency is not got by art, But the lions know whom they serve.
CV The wine that is born, Ovidius, in Nomentan fields, As often as it has gained long years, Strips off, in its aged old age, its character and its name: And whatever it pleases, the old jar is called.
CVI You keep adding water now and then, Rufus, And if forced by a comrade, you drink a scant Ounce of diluted Falernian. Has Naevia promised you a blessed Night, and do you prefer the sober Naughtiness of a sure embrace? You sigh, you keep silent, you groan: she has said no. So you may drink your goblets thick and fast And throttle the harsh grief in wine. Why spare yourself, Rufus? You must sleep alone.
CVII You often tell me, Lucius Julius, dearest of friends, "Write something great: you are an idle fellow." Give me leisure—such as Maecenas once made For his Flaccus and his Virgil: I would try to fashion works to live through the ages And to snatch my name from the flames. The oxen will not bear the yoke onto barren fields: A rich soil tires, but the labour itself delights.
CVIII You have a house—and long may it stand and grow through the years, I pray— Lovely, indeed, but across the Tiber: But my garret looks out on the Vipsanian laurels, And in this quarter I have grown old already. I must move, to greet you at home in the morning, Gallus: It is worth it, even if it were further off. But it is no great thing to you if I furnish one client in a toga: It is much, Gallus, if I deny you that one—my own self. I myself will greet you, often, at the tenth hour: In the morning my book shall say "good day" to you for me.
CIX Issa is more naughty than Catullus's sparrow, Issa is purer than a dove's kiss, Issa is more winning than all girls, Issa is dearer than Indian pearls, Issa is the pet, the lapdog of Publius. If she whimpers, you will think she is speaking; She feels both sorrow and joy. She lies leaning on his neck and takes her sleep, So that no breathing can be heard; And when forced by the need of her belly, She has never stained the coverlet with a drop, But with a coaxing paw rouses him and warns him She must be set down from the couch, and asks to be lifted. So great a modesty is in the chaste lapdog: She knows nothing of love; nor have we found A mate worthy of so tender a girl. That the last day may not snatch her away entire, Publius renders her in a painted tablet, In which you will see an Issa so like That she herself is not so like to herself. In short, set Issa beside the picture: Either you will think both are real, Or you will think both are painted.
CX You complain, Velox, that I write long epigrams. You yourself write nothing: you make shorter ones.
CXI Since your fame for wisdom equals your devotion to the gods, And your piety is no less than your genius, He knows nothing of giving gifts to merit, who wonders That a book is given you, Regulus—or incense.
CXII When I did not know you, I called you lord and king: Now I know you well: now you shall be plain Priscus to me.
CXIII Whatever I trifled at, a young man and a boy once, And our trifles, which now I myself no longer know, If you wish to misspend good hours And grudge your leisure, reader, You may seek them from Quintus Pollius Valerianus, Through whom my nothings are not allowed to perish.
CXIV These gardens near you, Faustinus, Telesphorus Faenius holds, and a small estate and watery meadows. Here he buried the ashes of his daughter and consecrated the name You read, Antulla's—though he himself were worthier to be read. It had been just that the father should have gone to the Stygian shades: But since that was not allowed, let him live, to tend her bones.
CXV A certain girl desires me—envy me, Procillus!— A girl whiter than the washed swan, Than silver, snow, the lily, the privet. But I want a certain girl blacker than night, Than the ant, than pitch, the jackdaw, the cicada. Already you were plotting a cruel hanging: If I know you well, Procillus, you will live.
CXVI This grove Faenius consecrated to the eternal honour of the ashes, And the lovely acres of well-tilled soil. In this tomb Antulla, snatched too soon from her own, is covered; In this both parents shall be mingled with Antulla. If anyone desires this little field, I warn him: let him not hope for it: That land shall serve its own masters forever.
CXVII Whenever you meet us, Lupercus, "Shall I send my boy," you keep saying, "To whom you may hand the little book of epigrams, Which, once read, I will return to you at once?" There is no need, Lupercus, to trouble your boy. It is a long way, if he should want to come to the Pear-tree, And I live up three flights of stairs—and high ones. What you seek you may look for nearer. You often go down, I suppose, to the Argiletum: Opposite Caesar's forum there is a shop, With its doorposts written over on this side and that, So that you may quickly read through all the poets. Seek me from there. You need not ask Atrectus— That is the name the master of the shop bears: From the first or second pigeon-hole he will give you Martial, smoothed with pumice and adorned with purple, For five denarii. "You are not worth so much," you say? You are wise, Lupercus.
CXVIII The man for whom it is not enough to have read a hundred epigrams, For him no amount of trouble is enough, Caedicianus.