Tag Archives: Ovid

Doorkeeper, though it’s embarrassing to ask this, loose your hard chain and swing the surly outer door inward a trifle on its hinges. I ask but a little thing: that you make enough room on the threshold for me to … Continue reading →

Amores I:4 Your husband is going to the same dinner party as we are; I pray that this is the last dinner he lives to eat! How shall I react when I see my beloved mistress as a fellow guest? … Continue reading →

Amores I:1 EPIGRAM: We who once were five books by Naso now are three. The author himself has trimmed us. Now even if you don’t like what you read, at least you’re spared the punishment of two more books. I … Continue reading →

Since my wife comes from the fruit-bearing Faliscan region, we journeyed to the city of Falerii which you conquered, Camillus. There priestesses were preparing the chaste festival of Juno, featuring famous games and locally-raised cattle. 

You must find a new bard, mother of the little Cupids: my elegies will go no farther. I am the offspring of the Paelignian countryside, and I’m not ashamed of the sophisticated verses which I’ve composed to date. If it’s … Continue reading →

Since you are so beautiful I do not plead with you not to sin; but only that you not force miserable me to know about it. I don’t require that you be chaste, but I ask that you make an … Continue reading →

Why must there always come the day on which you black birds caw sad omens to a lover? What star shall I blame for my fate, against which gods shall I rail for waging war against me? She who was … Continue reading →

Amores III:11A Long have I borne your slights, but your insults have finally overcome my patience. I have liberated myself, broken my chains, and now am ashamed to have borne what I wasn’t ashamed to bear. I have revolted from … Continue reading →

It is the time of the Cerealia, so my girlfriend sleeps in her bed alone. Blond Ceres with your fine hair tied with wheat straw, why do you inconvenience us for your rites? All peoples call you generous, Goddess–a person … Continue reading →

Memnon’s mother and Achilles’ mother both wept over their sons. If such grief could touch great goddesses, then you too, Elegy, shall loose your hair now in unfamiliar grief. Ah, now you must become a funeral elegy: the empty husk … Continue reading →

Does anybody still think that distinguished art and delicate poetry are sufficient to win a lover? Once genius was more valuable than gold, but today’s universal barbarism counts it for nothing. Once my brilliant little poetry collections pleased my mistress, … Continue reading →