Ovid (Routledge Revivals)

Routledge Revivals

Ovid

Ovid, Rome’s most cynical and worldly love poet, has not until recently been highly regarded among Latin poets. Now, however, his reputation is growing, and this volume is an important contribution to the re-establishment of Ovid’s claims to critical attention.

This collection of essays ranges over a wide variety of themes and works: Ovid’s development of the Elegiac tradition handed down to him from Propertius, Catullus and Tibullus; the often disparaged and neglected Heroides; the poetry of Ovid’s miserable exile by the Black Sea; the poetic diction of the Metamorphoses, Ovid’s lengthy mythological epic which codiﬁed classical myth and legend, and has strong claims to be considered, with the exception of Virgil’s Aeneid, Rome’s greatest epic poem; humour and the blending of the didactic and elegiac traditions in the Ars Amatoria and Remedia Amoris. Finally, Ovid’s incomparable inﬂuence in the Middle Ages and sixteenth cen- tury is examined. This pageintentionally left blank Ovid

Edited by J.W. Binns

ROUILEDGE Routledge Taylor & Francis Group REVIVALS First published in 1973 by Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd This edition ﬁrst published in 2014 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 1973 J.W. Binns

The right of J.W. Binns to be identiﬁed as editor of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Publisher’s Note The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this reprint but points out that some imperfections in the original copies may be apparent.

Disclaimer The publisher has made every effort to trace copyright holders and welcomes correspondence from those they have been unable to contact.

A Library of Congress record exists under LC control number 73083118

ISBN 13: 978-0-415-74017-3 (hbk) ISBN 13: 978-1-315-81575-6 (ebk)

Additional materials are available on the companion website at [http://www.routledge.com/books/series/Routledge_Revivals] Greek and Latin Studies ClassicalLiterature and its Influence Ovid

Edited by J. W. BINNS

Routledge& Kegan Paul: LONDON AND BOSTON First publishedin I97J by Routledge& Kegan Paul Ltd Broadwtry House, 68-74 Carter Lane, London EC4VJEL and 9 Park Street, Boston, Mass. 02I08, U.s.A. Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner Ltd, Frome and London © Routledge& Kegan Paul Ltd I97J No part of this book mtry be reproducedin atry form without permissionfrom the publisher, exceptfor the quotation of brief passagesin criticism

ISBN 0 poo 76J9 8

Library of CongressCatalog Card No. 7J/8JII8 Contents

Introduction vii J. W. BINNS, University of Birminghanl

I. The Amores 1 I. M. LE M. Du QUESNAY, University of Birmingham II. The Heroides 49 W. S. ANDERSON, University of California, Berkeley III. The Ars Amatoria and RemediaAmoris 84 A. S. HOLLIS, Keble College, Oxford IV. The Style of the Metamorphoses II6 E. J. KENNEY, Peterhouse,Cambridge V. The Tristia: Poetryin Exile 154 R. J. DICKINSON, University of Durham VI. Ovid in the Middle Ages 191 DOROTHYM.ROBATHAN

VII. Ovid in the SixteenthCentury 210 CAROLINE JAMESON, University of Birmingham SubjectIndex 243

Name Index 247

v This pageintentionally left blank Introduction

Thelast twenty yearshave seen important changes in the attitudes to Romanpoetry of scholarsand students,who are now, on the whole, more aware of techniquesof literary criticism forged in other disciplines, particularly in the study of English literature. These techniques,although they cannot usefully be brought to bear upon the study of Roman poetry in a merely mechanical way have, none theless, had their influence upon the mannerin which Romanpoetry is now approached,so that studiesof, say, its imagery, formal structure,ambiguity, subtlety, careful use of words, and poetic diction have done much in recent years to enhance a reader'sawareness of the range and complexity of many Romanpoets. The old Romanticattitude to Romanpoetry, which valued the poem chiefly as a documentillustrative of the author'slife, which placeda high premiumupon poetry which it was easy to regardas 'sincere',which was interestedin the per- sonality of the poetrather than in the poem,lavished the greatest praiseupon Catullus and Propertius,whom it was easyto regard as poetsof spontaneousemotion, whilst Ovid was discountedas shallow and insincere- heartlessalbeit artful. Conversely,Ovid is more likely to appeal to us today, as a poetfor the study of whom the biographicalapproach is so obviously unfruitful, yet whose mocking wit and verbal dexterity fit in with a conceptionof a poet as a brilliant and imaginative user of words. Perhapstoo, readers of the 1970s, which some would say are more coldly sensual,more 'unromantic'in affairs of the heart than any decadefor the last 200 years, are ideally suited to see in Ovid a kindred spirit. Ovid is, at any rate, a poet whosereputation has only recently vii INTRODUCTION begunto recoverfrom the disesteemof over a centuryand a half. The essaysin this volume will, I hope, contributestill further to the re-establishmentof Ovid's claims to our attention. The five discussionsof Ovid's original writings presented herereflect the changingapproaches to Romanpoetry of the last few years.Thus Mr 1. M. Le M. Du Quesnayin his essayon the Amores shows how Ovid developedthe elegiac tradition handeddown to him by Propertius,Tibullus andCatullus, and demonstrates the importanceof the arrangementof individual poems.Mr R. J. Dickinson is also concernedto show the importanceof the structuralprin- cipleswhich underliethe much-neglectedTristia; Mr E. J. Kenney investigatesOvid's poetic diction in the Metamorphoses;Professor w. S. Anderson demonstratesthe essential individuality of Ovid's treatmentof his heroinesand Mr A. S. Hollis writes on the humourand the blendingof the didactic andelegiac traditions in the Ars Amatoria and RemediaAmoris. Ovid was one of the Roman poets who enjoyed the greatest popularity and influencein the centuriesfollowing the fall of the RomanEmpire. The essaysby ProfessorDorothy Robathanand Caroline Jamesonexplain and discuss the effects of this in the Middle Ages and Renaissance.

vili I

The Amores

I. M. Le M. Du Quesnay

In the Amores! Ovid takes over and developsthe genre of per- sonalloveelegy which had alreadyreceived its essentialcharacter from his predecessors,Cornelius Gallus, Tibullus andPropertius, 2 and his originality lies in the new twist that he gave to this well- defined tradition. Like the poemsof his predecessors,his elegies are written in the first personand purport to tell of his amorous escapadesas a young man about town and especiallyof his ad- ventureswith the lady whom he calls Corinna. Moreoverhe puts himself into similar situations,expresses the samerange of emotions, borrowstheir imagery,and imitates and echoestheir work throughouthis poems.But he is not concernedsimply with re- peatingtheir achievement:one of the great pleasuresof reading the Amoresis to seehow Ovid turns the deeplyemotional, almost tragic persona of the elegiac lover into the robust and amusing characterthat is the hero of his poems.Before turning to a more detailed examination of the poems there are two preliminary mattersto be mentioned:the questionsraised by Ovid's heroine, Corinna, and the problem of the relationship of the second, extant, edition of the poemsto the first. Ovid's Corinna posesthe readerwith two quite distinct, if related,problems. First, in the Amores,the main actionis centredon the poet'svarious successesand disappointmentsin his relationship with Corinna, and so she occupiesa similar position in his poems to that of Cynthia in the poems of Propertiusor Delia and Nemesisin Tibullus. However, becauseOvid is relying on the analogywith his predecessorsand on the fact that his poems are to be read togetheras a collection, he names hisheroine only in a handful of poems.3 This is what causesthe problem.In some poemsit is quite obviousthat the lady is not Corinna,even though

I I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY she remains unidentified: this is clearly the case, for example, with the adulterouswife of II. 19, for sheis comparedunfavourably with Corinna.4 At other times such certainty is not possible.In 1. 4 Ovid instructs the unnamedlady how to flirt with him in the presenceof her husband:in 1. 8 Ovid overhearsa lena trying to corrupt his mistress(again unnamed)and yet in the courseof her lengthy advice she never suggeststhat the girl is married. But the difficulty is not insuperableif we acceptthat this would have been the last thing the lena would wish to remind her of while attemptingto persuadeher to be free with her favours and so to make herselfrich. In short,as long as we do not pressthese 'inconsistencies'too closely there seems no objection against allowing the lady in any poemto be identified as Corinna,except in those instanceswhere Ovid makes it quite clear that this is not the case.S Closely connectedwith this problemis the question of Corinna's social status. If, as suggested,we do identify the unnamedlady in 1. 4 as Corinna, then she is obviously married and Ovid's affair is an adulterousone. He is blatantly flouting bothtraditional Roman morality andthe clear desiresof Augustus himself. But since he never suggeststhat Corinna belongs to a noble family6 the effect of this is somewhatdiminished: adultery was less exceptionableif committed with one of the demi-mon- daines of Roman society. In view of Augustus'attempts to curb adultery by legislation this vaguenessmay even be deliberate: he would be able to shock (and so amuse) his readerswith his nequitia but no specific chargecould be levelled at him. The secondproblem connected with Corinnais that we cannot be surewhether she ever existed or whethershe merely represents an amalgamof all the women Ovid had ever known from both life and literature. The questionis in the end insoluble: but it is importantthat we accepther existencein the courseof readingthe poemsin the sameway that we acceptthe existenceof a character in a play or a novel, for without this they lose their impact. Of course that the poems are autobiographicalin form does not meanthat they are accuratedescriptions of eventsthat really took place. They are permeatedwith literary reminiscenceand it is almost impossibleto be sure that any detail was drawn from life rather than from Ovid's reading. But it is perhapsequally important to recognizethat the fact that an idea may be described as a literary topos doesnot necessarilymean that it doesnot coin- 2 THE lAMORES' cide with life. Thus Ovid, like his predecessors,rejects a life in the army or in the serviceof the state;7but we know that he did turn down the opportunityof a careerin the senateand avoided holding the military tribunate.s Again Ovid claims to have attemptedto write tragedyand that he was preventedfrom con- tinuing by the intervention of Cupid. Clearly this is a witty adaptationof the so-calledre-cusatio;9 but in this instanceit appears to be true. Ovid did indeedwrite a tragedy,the lost Medea, which Quintilian, at least, consideredto show Ovid at his best.10 With Corinna the situation is different only becausewe have no in- dependentinformation about her and so speculationon the relationship of the Amoresto life is pointless.If she did exist then Ovid succeededin keeping the secretof her identity to himself, for no ancientauthority tells us her name.ll Moreovereven if the poemswere written with a real womanin mind, Ovid is obviously not concerned'with expressinghis love for her or with immortal- izing their relationship.12The Cypassispoem, at least, would be incompatiblewith suchan intention. But the poemsmay be taken as a compliment to the wit and the artistic taste of our hypo- thetical Corinna, in much the same way as the witty poem on Tibullus' death is a delightful tribute to the memory of a poet whom Ovid genuinelyrespected and admired,13but clearly is not an emotionaloutpouring of grief at the deathof a friend. Prefixed to the extant collection is a four-line epigram which tells us that the Amoreshad previously circulatedin five books, and that Ovid himself has prunedthe work to three. More than this he doesnot sayand the natureof the relationshipof the second edition to the first has beenamong the most discussedproblems of Ovidian studies.14 In his autobiographicalelegy in the Tristia Ovid tells us that he gavehis first public readingof the poemssoon after he had started to shave, that is when he was about eighteen years old (i.e. 25 B.C.).15 The last datableevent referredto in the Amoresis the victory over the GermanicSygambri in 16 B.C.16 Thesedates in- dicate that the original Amores were composed at intervals throughoutthe decade25-15 B.C., and in all probability the five bookswere first publishedseparately. Whether at the end of this decadeOvid collected them togetherand published them as a single collection is unknown. However, some time before the composition of the third book of the Ars Amatoria he had 3 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY reducedthe numberof books of the Amoresto three.17 It may be that this secondedition was issued after the completion of the first two books of the Ars; this would give an approximatedate of I B.C. But it seemsmore likely that it was in the courseof re- vising the Amoresthat he conceivedthe idea of writing the Ars; that is to say that we should perhapsplace the revision earlier in the last decadeB.C. Neither in the introductory epigram nor anywhereelse does Ovid suggestthat he had any reasonfor the revision other than that he had becomedissatisfied with the artistic standardsof some of his earlier writing. IS He may have rejected as much as two- fifths of his earlier work. Whetherhe rewrote any of the earlier poems either in part or completely is unknown but is not impossible.It seemsless likely that he should have included wholly new poemsand thereis no firm evidenceto suggestthat he did.19 But suchspeculation is in the endfutile and all that seemscertain is that the Amoresas we have them must have beenrecognizable as a secondedition andnot as a completelyor evena substantially new work. The arrangementof the poems is clearly that of the second edition.!. 14, with the referenceto the Sygambri,and I. 8, which is modelled on a poem of Propertius'final book (IV. 5),20 must have originally belongedto one of the later books,and this suggeststhat therewas extensiverevision of the order of the poems. The Amoreswere clearly arrangedas a single collection, and Ovid shows considerableskill in combining the needsfor unity and variety in this arrangement.21 The balanceof the whole collection is assuredby the formal similarities of Books I and III. Eachof them containsfifteen poemsand eachhas one of the two longestpoems in the collection (1. 8; III. 6) and one diptych (I. II and 12; III. IIa and IIb). The central book is different in that it contains twenty poems; the poems are comparativelyshort and there is a heavy concentrationof diptych poems. Within this framework Ovid achievesan effect of unity by placing poemson relatedthemes in different books. SO I. 10 and III. 8 are both attackson Corinna'sauaritia: in I. 10 he attacksher for constantlydemanding presents and not being contentwith the poems he writes in her honour. In III. 8 he attacks her more savagely,for now her greedhas led her to prefer a soldier who has only recently been made an equestrianand she is quite in-

4 THE'AMORES' different to the fact that his social advancementhas beenachieved solely throughthe bloodyspoils of war. Sometimeshowever the poemsare more closely related by deliberateverbal echoes,and the effect of making the comparisonis almost invariably to enhancethe humour.In I. 3 he seeksto win Corinnaby offering her his undying fidelity and fame throughhis poetry. This approach obviously meetswith success.In II. 17 he expandsand develops this theme round the new point that if Corinna does not cease to be so haughtywith him he will no longer write poemsin her honour.22A more pointed and elaborateuse of this same technique can be seenin the much more closely related poems,I. 4 and II. 5, II. 19 and III. 4. Here the poemsare connectedby many more detailedechoes 23 thanwas the casein 1.3 andII. 17, andthe fact that in II. 5 and III. 4 the advice Ovid gavein I. 4 and II. 19 respectivelyhas reboundedon himselfgreatly enhancesthe comic effect of thosepoems. In I. 4 Ovid gives his mistressdetailed in- structions on how to flirt with him at a banquetat which her husbandwill be present.In II. 5 he finds that shehas learnedher lessononly too well and now it is he who is being duped. Simi- larly in III. 4 the husbandhas followed the advice Ovid gave in II. 19 that he shouldguard his wife more rigorously, with the result that Ovid canno longerrendezvous with her at all. The close inter-relationshipof thesepoems makes a major contribution to the unity of tl;1e whole work. Yet eachpoem has sufficient point to be enjoyed for itself and the differencesbetween the poems underlinethe quite different moodsof the individual books. The fussinessand over-eagerconcern to securethe slightest contact with his mistressin I. 4 is suited to the beginningsof his love affair as describedin Book I. In Book II he is unfaithful to Corinna in II. 19 andshe to him in II. 5, while Ovid's complacencyis illustrated by his ability to drop off to sleepat the party in II. 5 andhis complaint in II. 19 that the husbandis making life too easy for him. Finally, in III. 4 we see Ovid strugglingwith an apparently insuperableproblem, and this well suits the disintegrationof the love affair in this book. The series of programmatic poems also lends unity to the collection, while the differencesbetween them createan effect of movement,from the acceptanceof elegy in I. 1 in its final rejection in III. 15.24 So in Book I Ovid willingly submitsto Cupid; he is happyto reject epicin favour of elegy and convincedthat it 5 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY will bring him immortality. In Book II his commitmentto elegy and love begins to waver as he attemptsfirst a gigantomachiaand then a tragedy. And finally in Book III it is clear that he has de- cided to abandonelegy for the greaterchallenge of tragedy. In each of the books the attitude to elegy revealedin these pro- grammepoems helps to define the attitude to love. Having thus effected the unity of the collection Ovid is concernedto impart variety to his work. This he does mainly by constantlychanging the moodsand situations he depicts.Here one of the chief devices used is juxtaposition. Sometimesthe effect achievedis contrast,as when in Book I he placesthe short poem describinghis noon-timerendezvous with Corinna (1. 5) next to the longer poemin which he spendsthe whole night outsideher door (1. 6). This contrastmay producea comic piquancy,as when he juxtaposesIII. 7, in which he has managedto seducea girl but then finds that he is impotent,with III. 8, in which he is now eagerto make love to Corinna, who is, however, already in the arms of her rich soldier. The most fully developedand effective use of this deviceoccurs in the diptych poemssuch as the famous Cypassispoems (II. 7 and 8). Here the two poems are centred round a single dramatic incident, for example an exchangeof letters with Corinna (1. II and u), and their impact dependson the surpriseof finding the mood or basic idea of the first poem completely reversedin the second.25 Apart from this desire for uariatio it is occasionallypossible to seeother considerations which may haveaffected the arrangement,as whenthe poemon Tibullus' death is placed among others especially rich in echoesof that poet'swork. 26 On the other hand there appearsto be no simple schematicpattern underlying the collection, nor any concernwith dramatic or narrative continuity. Perhapsthe most significant aspectof the Amoreswhen viewed as a single collection is Ovid's obvious desire to recall to the readerthe first threebooks of Propertius.Every poemin the collection contains echoesof Propertianimagery and phraseology: many of the poems clearly have a single model in Propertius; othersare expansionsand variations of themeswhich form only part of a single poemin his predecessor.27 Eachof the bookshas its own introduction and conclusiondealing with the choice of elegy as a genreon the patternestablished by Propertiusin Books II and III, and in the third book of the Amores Ovid includes 6 THE'AMORES' poemswhich have only a tenuousconnection with his personal love life or no connectionat all, in the sameway as Propertius doesin Book III.28 His whole affair with Corinnamirrors that of Propertius with Cynthia. He finds himself locked outside her door; he seesher off on a journey; he is elated when successful, wretched when separatedfrom her; he has affairs with other women;he is deceivedby herand attacks her for usingcosmetics. 29 The relationship between the two poets is not, however, a simple one, for Ovid is concernedneither with repeatingwhat Propertius has achieved nor with deriding everything he has written. None the less the persona which Ovid adopts in the poemsis clearly a parodyofPropertius. But it is, at leastprimarily, the kind of parodyin which the laughteris directedat the parody itself rather than at what is being parodied.For all that Ovid's persona is modelled on the characterof Propertiusit is a comic figure in a way that Propertius'is not. This is brought about partly by simplification and exaggerationof Propertiantraits 30 and partly by magnifying the characterof his predecessorby the addition of characteristicsof lovers portrayedelsewhere in literature. For these he draws mainly on Tibullus; but Catullus, Hellenistic epigram and comedy all make their contributions.31 Thus in the end Ovid's personaappears to be a caricatureof the elegiac lover generally and not simply of the Propertianlover, andit hasno more, but perhapsno less, reality than the character of Corinna. This kind of parody or caricaturedepends for its main impact on the use of incongruity, and in the Amoresthis incongruity lies chiefly in the prevalentmood of gaiety and light-heartedfrivolity which is quite at odds with Ovid's poseas a lover seriousin his protestationsof undying love and tormentedby frustration and despairat the immorality of his mistressand at being continually kept from the fulfilment of his desires.It is not that Propertius and Tibullus are not themselvesat times humorousand witty; far from it.32 But oneleaves those poets convinced of the sincerity andthe seriousnessof their love andtheir bitternessat finding that fulfilment of their ideal is impossible.This is not the casewith Ovid. One leaves the Amoresconvinced that Ovid has enjoyed being in love, that he has relishedhis difficulties, chiefly because he remains always in control of his emotions, always aware of the impact he is having on his addresseeand his audience. 7 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY This moodof irrepressiblegood humour is createdin a number of ways. Ovid avoids the darker subjects of his predecessors, especiallytheir concentrationon death33 and the tensionbetween their private world of love and the public world of the Augustan state, which finds a focal point in their work in the figures of Maecenasand Messalla.34 In a more positive vein Ovid's humour lies in his treatmentof his difficulties. Thus in 1. 6 when Ovid finds himself locked out of his mistress' house the reader's attentionis focusednot on his despairand frustration but on his witty attemptsto persuadethe doormanto let him in. This aspect of the Amoresis best illustrated in Book III. Here Ovid is con- fronted by a whole seriesof difficulties, but he never allows the readerto feel genuineconcern. In III. 3 he expresseshis indignation that the godsallow his mistressto deceivehim with impunity. His amusingrealization that the gods are just like him and help- less before the might of female charmsprevents us from taking him seriously.In III. 4 the humourlies in the fact that the problem is of his own making; in III. 6 it lies, at least in part, in the ab- surdity and unreality of his attempts to flatter and cajole the flooding river to subside;in III. 10 in the impudenttone in which he addressesCeres and the shocking proposal that she should make love-makingand generalfestivity part of her worship in- steadof demandingsexual abstinence. In the last resort Ovid's use of a comic lover does imply a criticism of Propertius,at least in so far as it ridicules excessive emotionality and the folly of demandingtoo much from love. But it is perhapsbetter to think of it as offering an alternativeto Propertiusrather than a criticism of him. Ovid's idea of love is less noble, less idealizedthan that of Propertius,but at least it is possible:it may be that he reduceslove to a game,but the partici- pantsin it canat leastbe happyas long as they adhereto the rules. In the main this meansaccepting difficulties as just a part of love's warfare.35 At the end of the AmoresOvid takeshis leave of elegy with the same wit and panache that characterizedhis initial acceptanceof it. Unlike Propertiushe is able to accept the infidelities of his mistressas long as she co-operatesand does not insist on bringing them to his attention.36 On the other hand he rejects personal love elegy in III. 12 as being responsiblefor Corinna'sunfaithfulness: by advertisingher beautyand the poet's deep love for her it has brought her irresistible temptation. So 8 THE 'AMORES' finally his positionis exactly the reverseof that of Propertius,who rejectsa Cynthia whoseimmorality he can no longer endurebut who makesno explicit rejection of elegy.37 Howeverserious the situationin which he finds himself, however tortured the despair which he is expressing,Ovid never allows the readerto take him seriously for long. He undercuts himselfdirectly eitherin parenthesisor by introducingsome quite irrelevant argument;38 or more subtly by over-reactingor indulging in some delightful but absurdhyperbole. 39 He distracts the reader'sattention from what is being said to how it is being expressedby playing with words and form, and he comments obliquely on the antics of his personaby the use of imitation both of the earlier elegistsand the older Augustans,especially Horace. In short the chief sourceof humour in Ovid's parody lies in the incongruity of the style with the situations and the moods it purports to describe.It is in his style that the reader will find Ovid's real originality and the real pleasure that reading the Amorescan give. The individual poemsare usuallyconfined to a single situation or propositionand, for all the variety of treatment,the poemsun- fold in a clearly definedand orderly fashion. The poemmay con- sist of a seriesof argumentswith eachcouplet or pair of couplets presentinga new point. Sometimesthere is a simple accumulative processwhich determinesthe structureas in the famous miNtat omnis amans (I. 9) or the catalogueof all the women he finds attractive(II. 4). More frequently the shapeof the poemdepends on the shifting emotionalreactions of the speaker.This may take the form of a simple volte-face as in II. 5: the poet begins with a hurt and indignantoutcry againsthis flirtatious mistressbut ends by forgiving her. Frequently,however, the shifts and changesin the attitude of the speakerare more complex. In II. 2 Ovid is attemptingto persuadeBagoas to admit him to his mistressand he employs every techniquefrom the cordial politenessof the openinglines to the scarcelyconcealed threats at the end. Even in a poemas subtlein its changesof mood as the propempticonto Corinna (u. II) the readeris never in doubt in what direction the poemis moving. This essentialclarity and simplicity of structureis quite distinct from the mannerboth of Tibullus with his subtle digressions and of Propertiuswith his harsh transitions. It makes a major

0-8 9 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY contributionto the speedof theaction and thus sharpens the impact of the suddentwists and reversalswhich Ovid uses to make a humorouspoint. It is a necessarycounterpart to his tendencyto use the couplet as his main unit of composition.Finally it leaves the readerfree to concentrateon the subtlety of the verbal texture, the imitations of earlierwriters andthe touchesof irony with which Ovid undercutsthe persrh1a of lover that he assumes. The deviceswhich Ovid employsto makethe readeraware that he is striking a poseare various. This awarenessis broughtabout primarily by his constantplay on the reader'sexpectations. So at the beginningoEI. 2 (1-4): Essequid hoc dicam, quod tam mihi dura uidentur strata,neque in lecto pallia nostrasedent, et uacuussomno noctem, quam longa, peregi, lassaqueuersati corporis ossadolent? (What am I to say is the trouble?My couch seemsso hard, my coverswon't stay on the bed- I've spentthe whole night long unableto sleep and my bonesare weary and aching from my constanttossing and turning.) The readerof courseknows that these symptomsmust mean that Ovid is in 10ve.40 But then Ovid deflateshis confidence: nam, puto, sentirem,si quo temptareramore - (for I think I would know if I were being assailedby love -) He obviously knows as well as the readerhow to diagnosesuch symptomsbut he has already dismissedthe possibility that he is in love. But now, having temporarily confusedhis audience,he continues(6-8): an subit et tecta callidus arte nocet? sic erit: haeserunttenues in corde sagittae, et possessaferus pectorauersat Amor. (Or does love creepin and with stealthyskill cunningly perform its mischief?That must be it: the tiny arrows are implantedin my heartand cruel Cupid causesturmoil in my conqueredbreast.) Of course this new twist confirms the reader's originaldiag- nosis.The deliberatelymisleading statement in line 5 now appears

10 THE 'AMORES' to havebeen included for comic effect. And having thus sharpened the reader'sreactions by this surprisetactic he increasesthe impact of the witty conceit: the arrows of Cupid must indeedhave been tenuesfor him not to havenoticed them piercing his heartand, in view of his previousuncertainty, the final line is clearly an extrava- gant over-statement. Ovid shows the sameawareness of his audienceand the same playful control of their reactionsin poem1. 5, the descriptionof the rendezvouswith Corinna. The beginning of the poem is againdeliberately misleading. The mid-day settingand the indica- tion that he is quite alone and not expectingany visitors41 com- bine to suggestthat we are about to witness the poet indulging in erotic day-dreamswhile he takes his siesta. Ecce, Corinna (1. 9) introducesthe suddenrealization of his dreamsas Corinnastands beforehim, enticingand willing. Thesuddenness of herappearance may quicken the reader'spulse but Ovid simply surveys her with his cool and professionaleye. Finally, however, excitement overcomeshim and he clutchesher to him. Cetera quis nesci!, who doesnot know the rest?With this remarkhe deliberatelyfrustrates the curiosity of his audiencewhich he has just as deliberately arousedin the increasingly excited and intimate description of Corinna'scharms which precedesit. Howeverit is frequently the end of a poemwhich revealsthat Ovid's pose is insincere. This revelation is sometimesbrought aboutby his obviousawareness of the impacthe is making on his audience.So at the endof III. 4 his final outrageouspiece of advice to the kill-joy husbandis evidentlyconcerned less with persuading him to comply with Ovid's wishesthan with shockingand amusing the audience(III. 4. 45-8):

et cole quos dederit (multos dabit) uxor amicos: gratia sic minimo magnalabore uenit; sic poteris iuuenumconuiuia semperinire et, quaenon dederis,multa uidere domi.

(And cultivate thosefriends your wife brings you (she'll bring you plenty): then you'll enjoy great esteemfor doing next to nothing; then you'll always be able to go to the young people'sparties and see many things aroundthe housewhich you have not provided.42)

II I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY At other times the insincerity of the pose is revealed by a final couplet which deflatesthe mood of the whole poem. In r. 7 he pours out his great remorseand expressesat length his self- disgust at having struck his darling Corinna, but he ends the poem (67-8): neuemei sceleristam tristia signa supersint, pone recompositasin stationecomas. (And lest anyof thesehideous traces of my crime remain, go and straightenyour hair.43) This techniqueof undercuttingthe emotionality of his persona occursalso within the body of the poems,though the effect here is less complete;for if he did not allow us to retain some belief in the characterhe is portrayingthe subtletyof the parodywould be lost. So in the samepoem (I. 7) the highly emotionalcolouring is intensifiedby his comparisonof his crimewith that of Diomedes striking Venus(r. 7. 31-4): pessima Tydides scelerummonimenta reliquit: ille deamprimus perculit; alter ego. et minus ille nocens:mihi quamprofitebar amare laesaest; Tydides saeuusin hostefuit. (Diomedesleft a hideousprecedent for crimes: he was the first to strike a goddessand I'm the second.In fact his crime was less: I struck the girl I professedto love; Diomedes displayedhis brutality againstan enemy.) It is almost, but not quite, conceivablethat the extensionof the mythological exemplumreflects his intense despair. In the end, however,the fact that Ovid first pinpoints the inappropriateness of the parallel and then makesthe point explicit revealsthat he is scrutinizing closely everythinghe says for the effect it will have. Similarly in II. 16, where the poet, although at home in his beautiful native Sulmo, poursout his tormentsof despairat being separatedfrom Corinna: the emotional outburst is prefaced by (II-U): at meusignis abest- uerbo peccauimusuno: quaemouet ardores, est procui; ardor adest. (But my flame is absent- I've chosenthe wrong word: she who fans the flames of my love, is far away; the fire is present.)

12 THE'AMORES' This techniqueappears in a modified form in Ovid's frequent use of asides and parentheticalcomments 44 and combines with more subtle meansof distracting the readerfrom the seriousness of what he is saying.In II. II he first attemptsto dissuadeCorinna from going away on a sea voyage and suggeststhat she should stay on shorewith him and learn of the horrors of the deepfrom others. She may believe eventheir most fantasticyarns and come to no grief (2.1-2): haecalii referant; at uos, quod quisqueloquetur, credite: credentinulla procella nocet. (Let others tell theseyarns; but whateveranyone says, you believe them: no storm harms you just for believing.) But his pleasare unsuccessful,so he wishes her well and looks forward to her returnwhen shewill tell him all the hardshipsshe has endured.(53-4): omnia pro ueris credam,sint ficta licebit: cur ego non uotis blandiar ipse meis? (I shall treat it all as gospel truth, even if it is lies: why should I not flatter myself at the effectivenessof my prayers?) In theselines he makestwo witty points: the implicit comparison of his position here with his earlier advice to Corinna, and the amusingparadox in the thought: he is going to deceivehimself deliberatelyinto believing her so that he may feel proud that his prayershave savedher from harm. The samedelightful incongruitybetween playful stylistic effects and the poseof deepemotionality characterizes Ovid's use of lists and catalogues.As with the other devices it is just possible to regard them as being producedby the deep emotion felt by the persona. So the lists of mythological exemplaat III. 6. 23-44 or III. 12. 19-40are in a sensepart of the (supposed)indignation that the lover feels. But this technique really distracts the reader's attentionfrom what is being said (this is usually establishedat the beginning anyway) and makes him concentrateon the elegance and skill with which it is expressed.This device occursfrequently within poems,and sometimes,as in r. 9 (militat omnis amans), it takesup the whole poem. In III. 3 Ovid complainsthat the gods 13 1. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY allow his mistressto perjureherself with impunity.45 The opening of the poem statesthe theme(1-2): Essedeos, i, crede: fidem iurata fefellit, et facies illi quaefuit ante manet. (Go on, believe that gods exist: she has sworn and gone back on her oath, yet her beautyremains what it was before.) His 'indignation'causes him to expandthis point by point: but there is no real developmentof the thought and the reader's attention is held by the magnificent display of Ovid's skill in handling language(3-10): quamlongos habuit nondumperiura capillos, tam longos, postquamnumina laesit, habet. candida,candorem roseo suffusa rubore, 5 antefuit: niueo lucet in ore rubor. pes erat exiguus: pedis est artissimaforma. longa decensquefuit: longa decensquemanet. argutoshabuit: radiant ut sidus ocelli, per quos mentita est perfida saepemihi. 10 (Long hair she had before she perjuredherself and hair just as long she has even now that she has misusedthe gods. Before then she was fair, her fairnesstinged with the red of roses: on her snow-whitecheeks the red still blushes.Her foot was tiny: it is still of a shapemost slender.Long and lithe shewas: long and lithe she remains.Sparkling eyes she had: the eyes by which she has often treacherouslylied to me, still shine like stars.) The parallelism of the first couplet is achievedby balancing quam longos and tam longos, nondum periura and postquamnumina laesit and by shaping the two lines in a similar way: in both casesthe senseof Jongosis not completeduntil the end of the line, in the hexameterby capillos, in the pentameterby habet.46 The next couplet has a quite different shape,since the thought of the hexameterflows over into the pentameter.The participial phrase expandsand qualifies candida. Exactly the sameidea is expressed in niueo lucet in ore rubor,47 but the elegantvariation in the wording producesan effect of antithesis.The contrastof red and white has a long pedigreein Latin poetry48 and the resulting 'poetic' 14 THE'AMORES' effect is enhancedby a seriesof stylistic devices: the repetitions; the intricate pattern of assonanceand alliteration; the Greek accusativeconstruction, candorem ... suffusa; and the antithesis of roseo •.. niueo.49 The third coupletis different again, for now the balanceis betweenthe two halves of the individual line: pes erat exiguus is amplified into the ornate periphrasispedis est artissima forma, while in the pentameteronly fuit changes to become manet. A further contrast is achieved by balancing the smallnessof her feet in the hexameterwith her tallnessin the pentameter.The hexameterof the final couplet is perhapsthe most elaborateof all: there is the bold ellipse of ocellos in argutos habuit; the striking appositionof the singularsid us with the plural ocelli and finally the vivid use of radiant with ocelli rather than sidera. With the pentameterthe thought returns to that of the openingline, thus closing the circle and defining the limits of the passage,while the new idea that this deception has happened frequentlylooks forward to the rest of the poem. The generalimpression of playfulnessand irrepressiblegaiety which the poems create is due in no small measureto Ovid's obvious enjoymentand skill in manipulating the languageand the elegiaccouplet, the raw materialsof his art. Someaspects of this elementof his style havealready been mentioned in the above analysis.But the questionis important enoughto justify further comment. When Ovid began to write, the elegiac couplet had already received its essential character from the practice of his predecessors.5o His realization that the couplet has a natural rising and falling rhythm, more suited to effects of balanceand antithesis than to continuous narrative, led him to accentuatethis tendencyrather than to attempt to overcomeit. Thus he took over from his predecessorsand rigidly appliedthe 'rule' of ending the pentameterwith a disyllabic word, and so ensureda firm senseof completionat the end of the couplet.To a greaterextent than his predecessorsOvid isolatesthe coupletby avoiding both enjambment and anaphora, and treats it as his basic unit of composition.Within its strict confines, however, he uses every opportunityto vary the sensepauses and to exploit the separative possibilities of the languagein order to achieve variety, as the analysis of III. 3. 1-10 clearly revealed. It is indicative of his masteryof the form that he can producewithin the spaceof a 15 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY single couplet such a brilliant thumb-nail sketch as (ur. ITa. 25-6): dicta erat aegramihi: praecepsamensque cucurri; ueni, et riuali non erat aegrameo. (I was told she was ill: quite besidemyself I ran along there at full speed;I arrived: and for my rival she was not ill.) It is becauseOvid generallyuses the coupletas a separateentity that he showsa markedtendency to divide the pentameterfrom the hexameter.The effect thus achieved is one of balance: the pentametermay expandand restatethe idea of the hexameteror it may contrastwith it as in (m. 10. 21-2): illic sidereammundi qui temperatarcem exiguus tenerolac bibit ore puer. (There, as a baby, he who rules the starry citadel of the heavensgently suckedhis milk.) This constantdesire for balancewithin the couplet led Ovid finally to develop the so-calledreciprocal couplet 51 in which the first half of the hexameteris repeatedexactly in the last half of the pentameteras in (1. 9. 1-2): Militat omnis amans,et habetsua castraCupido; Attice, credemihi, militat omnis amans. (Every lover is a soldier and Cupid has his own army; Atticus, believe me, every lover is a soldier.) Ovid takesan obvious delight in words. His diction revealshis inventivenessand willingness to experimentwith the language, and from this the verbal texture of his poems derives much of its freshnessand individuality. His originality in this respectis apparentthroughout the poems, but its effects are subtle and unobtrusive.His vocabularyincludes many words like credulitas (ur. 3.24) or moderatius(III. 3.47) which, thoughquite colourless in themselves,gain a certain novelty from finding a place in poetry for the first time.52 But more significant is his creationof new words. Most, like populifer (n. 17. 32), are formed on well- establishedprinciples and in fact most frequently his method is to add a new prefix or suffix to an 'ordinary' word. Sometimes 16 THE'AMORES' this increasesits expressivenessas when he coins emodulanda (1. 1. 30) to convey the undulatingprogress of the elegiacMuse. Alternatively, it may increasethe vividness and the precision of the word: thus he coins praetepuisset(n. 3. 6) to describethe hot excitementthat comeswith the anticipationof love, and subrubet (n. 5. 36) for the red glow of sunrisestarting at the horizon and graduallyfilling the sky and for the blush of a young girl spread- ing upwardsfrom the neck. Other coinageshave a less definable quality, like the impressive and mysterious incaedua (m. 1. I) or the slightly extravagantsemiadaperta (1. 6. 4). At other times his inventivenesstakes the form of using an establishedword in a new way: thus he calls tablets with the letters cut into the wax peraratas... tabellas (I. II. 7), 'ploughed'or perhaps'furrowed' tablets. The lucid simplicity of Ovid's style, which is such a fitting vehicle for the clarity of his thoughtand the naIvety of his lover persona,is due, at leastin part, to his sparinguse of any metaphors exceptthose which form a naturalpart of the lover'sdiction. They are rarely sustainedor complex but used to enhancethe force- fulness of his language. So at 1. 3. 15 he employs the word desultor, literally a switchback-riderin a circus, in the phrase desultor amoris to describe a fickle lover. But the effects of his metaphorsare various. They may underline the intenseemotion of the lover as when he refers to Corinna'snew lover as sanguine pastuseques (III. 8. 10), an equestriangorged with blood. Here the bestiality of the man is broughtout by the use of pastus,a word normally usedof animals.At other times they are usedfor comic effect as in Dipsas' witty deflation of prudish hypocrisy in (I. 8. 45-6): has quoque,quae frontis rugasin uerticeportant, excute,de rugis crimina multa cadent. (Also searchthose women who wear wrinkles on their brows and much incriminating evidencewill fall from the folds.) The humour lies in the play on the two meaningsof ruga, 'wrinkle' or 'fold of a garment'(in which things could be hidden), and of excute,'shake out' or 'scrutinize'.53 However,in accordancewith his desirefor simplicity he prefers to broaden the perspectivesof his poems by the more direct 17 1. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY devices such as similes and series of exemplataken from myth- ology, city life or nature.54 These may achieve an almostlyrical beautyas in (I. 14. 11-12): qualem[sc. colorem] cliuosaemadidis in uallibus Idae arduaderepto cortice cedrushabet. (Like the colour of the lofty cedarin the lush valleys of steep Ida when strippedof its bark.) A further source of humour in the Amores lies in the incongruity of the cynically realistic outlook of the hero and his naivety, his flights of sheerfantasy. Ovid can acceptthe blatant infidelities of his mistress(II. 5; III. 14); he can coolly lie his way out of a corneras in the Cypassisincident (II. 7 and 8); or say to Corinna when she has lost her hair after excessiveuse of dyes (I. 14. 55-6): collige cum uultu mentem: reparabiledamnum est: postmodonatiua conspicierecoma. (Recoveryour complexionand your composure:the loss is not final and you will soon attractattention again with your very own hair.55)

And at I. 10. 53-4 he evenhas this comment: nec tamenindignum est a diuite praemiaposci: muneraposcenti quod dare possit habet. (But it is not shamefulto demandrewards from a rich man: he has the wherewithalto be able to give the presentsyou demand.) His naivety appearsoften as an over-literal interpretationof the cliches of elegiac topoi as in the reductio ad absurdum of the idea that an emaciatedappearance is characteristicof lovers at (I. 6. 3-6):56 quod precor exiguumest: aditu fac ianua paruo obliquum capiat semiadapertalatus. longus amor tales corpustenuauit in usus aptaquesubducto corpore membra dedit; (It is a tiny favour I am asking: open the door - just a little: even if it is only half-ajar I can slip through sideways.Being 18 THE 'AMORES' so long in love has trimmed down my figure for just such feats as this: my body has been wastedaway and I'm now in splendidshape.) At other times the (supposed)strength of his emotionsblinds him to the limits of physical possibility as when at II. 16. 51-2 he cries: at uos, qua ueniet, tumidi subsiditemontes, et faciIes curuis uallibus esteuiae. (But you, you swelling hills, shrink down where she passes and you roads in the winding valleys make her journey easy.) Alternatively it may causehim to misinterpretreality as when in III. 2 he assumesthat the fact that the citizens'call for the race to be re-run is due to his demand(73-5): fauimus ignauo.sed enim reuocate,Quirites, et dateiactatis undiquesigna togis. en reuocant; (The fellow we are backinghas no spirit. Come now, citizens, call them back, throw up your togasaltogether and give the signal. Look they are calling them back.57) This effect, achieved by the constant contrast of these two incompatible characteristics,his realism and his naivety, can be seenin miniaturewhen he says of the goddessAurora, the rising sun (I. 13.47-8): iurgia finieram. sciresaudisse: rubebat, nec tamenadsueto tardius orta dies. (I finished my complaints.You might know she had heard me: she blushed.And yet the day broke no more slowly than usual.) The most complex aspectof Ovid's art in the Amoresis his imitation of earlier writers. This does not, of course,mean that he slavishly copiedhis predecessorsbecause he lackedimagination and originality. On the contrary his is a creative imitation: out of the raw materials of the genre, its language,metaphors and themes Ovid created something quite new. In fact he exploits the traditional nature of his material for his own advantage:it 19 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY createsin the reader certain expectationswhich Ovid can then manipulate. In a seriesof poemsPropertius attacks Cynthia for her use of cosmetics.58 His complaints are not without sarcastic humour and even irony, but we take him seriously. That she uses these artificial aids to beautyshows how much sheis taintedby the base valuesof her age,how far removedshe is from being Propertius' ideal lover. To see her so made up reminds him that she is not contentwith his love but anxious to attract other men.59 Ovid's use of the theme in 1. 14 is very different. He is too urbaneto be really shocked or offended by Corinna's use of hair dyes, though as an elegiac lover he has to say that he is. But since the poem openswith the information that Corinna is now bald from her excessiveuse of these dyes, the lengthy moralizing servesonly to ridicule the folly of her actions, and not to attack them for their immorality. Of coursethis meansthat Ovid does not have to fear her attractingany suitors. And yet he does not omit the idea completely but gives it a brilliant twist to fit his context (47-50): o quam saepecomas aliquo mirante rubebis et dices 'emptanunc ego merceprobor: nescioquampro me laudatnunc iste Sygambram; fama tamenmemini cum fuit ista mea.' (0 how often will you blush when somegentleman admires your hair and say: 'So now I'm found attractivefor my wig, this piece of merchandiseI've bought. Now it's not me he's praising but someSygambrian woman. Yet I rememberthe time when I really deservedthese compliments.') The reader'snatural expectationthat he will find this motif in the context of an attack on the use of cosmeticsis more than satisfied. He can hardly fail to be amazedat the ingenuity with which Ovid hasfound it a place,given the initial fact that Corinna has gone bald, and delighted by the new use to which it is put. Ovid shows no jealousy nor even triumphant joy that he will no longer have to fear any rivals. Instead he makes the motif blend in perfectly with the mocking sympathy he uses in this poem to suggest that Corinna is really making a fuss about nothing.

20 THE 'AMORES' Here Ovid is not following Propertius at all closely but combininga numberof elementsfrom a whole seriesof his poems on this and related themes, and he is able to capitalize on the reader'sknowledge of the tradition with which he is working. At the other extremehe may base a poem on a single elegy of Propertius.60 In II. zza Propertiustells his friend Demophoonthat he is now in love with many women; they are all so beautiful and owing to a flaw in his characterhe cannotresist them. Thereis no needto worry, he continues,that his frail physique will not stand up to the exertionsof sucha life: love does not drain one'sstrength as the examplesof Achilles andHector show, who rosefrom their beds to wreak havoc on the enemy. In fact, it is safer to have two lovers than one: if one refusesyou, you can turn to the other. With this last remark Propertiusmakes it clear that his promis- cuity is part of an attemptto escapefrom the love of Cynthia,61 and this emotional context colours our reading of the poem. Ovid makesuse of this poemboth in II. 4 where he claims to find all women irresistible and again in II. 10. The latter opens with Ovid telling his friend Graecinusthat he has fallen in love with two girls at the sametime. This establishesa similarity with Propertius.At first, however, it seems that Ovid is going to reversethe attitude of his predecessor.Love for two women brings, not relief or security,but twice as much pain andanguish. But after a brief complaint against the cruelty of Venus for so punishing him he suddenlyperforms a complete voItelace (I 5): sed tamenhoc melius, quam si sine amoreiacerem: (but this is still betterthan if I had to lie alone and without love.) The comic effect of this suddenswitch in direction is greatly enhancedfor the reader who has caught the allusion to the Propertianpoem, by his awarenessthat Ovid has given a new twist to Propertius' suggestionthat two lovers are better than one: in Ovid the comparisonis betweentwo lovers and none at all. Then, like Propertius,he goes on to claim that the effort will not prove too great for his slenderphysique and that love does not drain away the lover's strength. But unlike Propertius he draws his examplenot from the heroesof old but from his own personalexperience, and so Ovid's bold impudenceis heightened

ZI r. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY by the implicit suggestionthat he is to be comparedwith Achilles or Hector. This mood of exuberantself-confidence is continued to the end of the poem. In completecontrast to the Propertian model Ovid breaksoff with the shockingwish (35-8): at mihi contingatVeneris languesceremotu, cum moriar, medium soluar et inter opus; atquealiquis nostro lacrimansin funere dicat 'conueniensuitae mors fuit ista tuae'. (But let me passaway in the act of love; when I die let me go in the midst of my performance;and let someoneshed a tear at my funeral and say, 'your deathmade a beautiful end to your life'.) FrequentlyOvid takes a short passagein one of the poemsof his predecessorsand with wit and ingenuity expandsit into a whole poemof his own.62 Suchpoems make a major contribution to the general impression that his characteris a caricature of the elegiaclover: sentimentsthe earlier elegistsutter in passingor situations to which they allude appearin Ovid fully developed and their minor and unobtrusivetraits are exaggerated.63 When Tibullus found it impossible to realize his dream of idyllic happinesswith Delia, he turned for relief to drink and other women (1. 5· 39-42): Saepealiam tenui, sed iam cum gaudiaadirem, admonuitdominae deseruitque Venus. Tunc me discedensdeuotum femina dixit et pudetet narrat scire nefandameam. (I have often held anotherwoman in my arms but just as I was approachingthe sweetclimax Venus would bring my mistressto my mind and desertme. Then as the woman left she said I was bewitched.Smarting at her treatment, she put it aboutthat my darling knows the black arts.) Thesefew lines of Tibullus providethe frameworkfor Amores, III. 7. Ovid has seduceda girl but found himself impotent. The girl is obviously not Corinna, whom he mentions specifically64 by way of illustrating his normal prowessin love-makingand to highlight the unprecedentednature of his presentpredicament. But she is not part of an attemptto alleviate the misery Corinna has broughthim. Freefrom any suchsombre overtones the poem 22 THE 'AMORES' becomesmore amusing and ironic than the Tibullan passage.The mood of mock indignation and the tone of withering irony is sustainedthroughout. But Ovid does not forget, nor allow the readerto forget, his model. At the endof his poemthe unfortunate girl suggeststhat he mustbe deuotum- or that he has at leastspent his energieselsewhere - and leaves. But unlike Tibullus' friend Ovid's girl is eagerto keepher secret(III. 7. 83-4): neuesuae possent intactam scire ministrae, dedecushoc sumptadissimulauit aqua. (and so that her maids would not know that I had not touchedher, she camouflagedher dishonourwith a little water.) The irreverentreversal of normalmorality, enhancedby the use of the words intactam and dedecus, makes a witty ending to the poem. But the comic effect is sharpenedby comparisonwith the different, but still ironic tone in the Tibullan passage. The effects of Ovid's creative imitation may be felt not only in whole poems but within short passagesand even occasional lines and phrases.This is not to suggestthat all echoesof the earlier elegists contribute positively to the enjoyment of the poems.Many serveonly to lend generalcolour to the poems,to keep the readeraware that the poemsare following an established tradition. Many are perhapsunconscious or merely arisefrom the fact that Ovid is talking of similar topics and expressingsimilar emotionsin the samelanguage and in the samemetre. The only criterion can be the effectivenessof the echo: if it adds to the impact of a phrase or a passagewe can treat it as imitation. Obviously on such mattersit is impossiblenot to be, at least to some extent, subjective: the author's intentions can never be ascertained.Thus when Ovid says (III. IIa. 5): uicimus et domitum pedibuscalcamus amorem: (I am victorious and trample conqueredlove beneathmy feet:) we cannot be sure that he is intending us to catch the echo of Propertius,r. I. 4: et caputimpositis pressitAmor pedibus.

(and love has boweddown my neck beneathhis feet.65) 23 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY But in this instance it does seem probable: the impact of the Ovidian line is intensified when it is seenas an exact reversalof Propertius' situation. And there is further pleasurein noticing how Ovid has substituted the vivid calcamus for Propertius' rather vaguepressit. At other times, however, virtual certainty is possible. In his elegy on Tibullus' death Ovid depicts the meeting of Delia and Nemesisat their lover's funeral (III. 9· 55-8): Delia discedens'felicius' inquit 'amata sum tibi: uixisti, dum tuus ignis eram.' cui Nemesis'quid' ait 'tibi sunt mea damnadolori? me tenuit moriensdeficiente manu.' (As she was leaving Delia said 'Thosewere happierdays when it was I that you loved. While I fanned your passions you still lived.' Nemesisanswered her 'And why does my loss causeyou grief? It was I he held with weakeninggrasp as he lay dying.') Here the point of Nemesis'retort to Delia's sly innuendois lost if we do not rememberTibullus' own wish addressedto the latter (I. 1. 59-60): Te spectem,suprema mihi cum uenerit hora, te teneammoriens deficiente manu. (Delia, may I gaze on you when my final hour comes,may I hold you in my weakening graspas I lie dying.) More often, however, the wit is less sharp and the effect of the allusion to a model less definable. In III. 1066 Ovid is com- plaining to Ceres that her requirementof sexual abstinenceto honour her festival is interfering with his love-life: her demands are also hypocritical since she has herself enjoyed the love of !asion.Before making this last point he suggeststhat her demand is not in keepingwith her reputationas a benefactorof mankind (III. 10. 11-14): prima Ceresdocuit turgesceresemen in agris, falee coloratassubsecuitque comas. prima iugis tauros subponerecolla coegit et ueteremcuruo dentereuellit humum. 24 THE 'AMORES' (Cereswas the first to teachthe seedto swell in the fields and to harvestwith the sickle the ripenedcrop. Shewas the first to force the oxen to submit their necks to the yoke and to tear up the ancientearth with the curved plough-share.) This is clearly an adaptationof Tibullus, r. 7· 29-34: primus aratra manu sollerti fecit Osiris et teneramferro sollicitauit humum, primus inexpertaecommisit seminaterrae pomaquenon notis legit ab arboribus. hic docuit tenerampalis adiungereuitem, hic uiridem dura caederefalee comam; (Osiris was the first to fashion a plough with his skilful handsand to turn over the tenderearth with the iron share; he was the first to entrustseed to the virgin soil and to pick fruit from previously unknown trees.It was he who taught men to fastenthe young vines to stakesand to cut away the greenfoliage with the hard sickle.) But even here the pleasureis not simply that of recognition. It is satisfying to our aesthetic sense to note how Ovid has transformedTibullus' praiseof Osiris to fit in with his complaints against Ceres. This he does by changing the tender pathos of Tibullus67 into a sharperirony throughemphasizing the violence of Ceres' innovations by his use of the word turgescereand the ideasin coegit and above all in ueterem ... reuel/it humum. Here, despite the fact that the imitation is put to a purposewhich is almostthe reverseof the model's,the effect is not humorous.Even the irony is barely enhancedby the comparison.None the less the allusion is pleasingand effective for all that it is unobtrusive. In r. 7 Propertius contrastshis choice of elegy as his genre with epic, the choice of his friend Ponticus. The theme was a favourite one with Propertius,but here he treatsit less seriously than later, after he had been subjectedto the ideas and sug- gestionsof Maecenas.He begins (I. 7. 1-12): Dum tibi Cadmeaedicuntur, Pontice,Thebae armaquefraternae tristia militiae, atque,ita sim felix, primo contendisHomero, (sint modo fata tuis mollia carminibus:)

o-c 25 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY nos, ut consuemus,nostros agitamus amores, 5 atquealiquid duram quaerimusin dominam; nec tantumingenio quantumseruire dolori cogor et aetatistempora dura querL hic mihi conterituruitae modus,haec mea fama est, hinc cupio nomencarminis ire meL 10 me laudentdoctae solum placuissepuellae, Pontice,et iniustassaepe tulisse minas; (While you, Ponticus,tell the tale of CadmeanThebes and the tragic battles of fraternal strife - and, I vow, you rival evenHomer, prince of poets,if only the Fatesare kind to your poems- I, as usual, am occupiedwith my love and with finding somethingto soften the hard heartof my mistress;I am forced to servemy passionrather than my talent and to lamentthe unhappinessof my life. Thus I wasteaway my life's span,this is my glory, from this I hope my poetry will win a reputation.Ponticus, let them say in praiseof me that this cultured girl loved me alone and that I often bore her angry outbursts,though they were undeserved.) Pretendingto adopt the traditional scale of values according to which elegy was intrinsically inferior to epic, Propertius attributes his 'failure' as a poet to his overruling passion. But his praise of Ponticus and his self-depreciationare ironic: he is clearly confident that he will win fame as a poet and as an exem- plary lover. This passageserves as a model for Ovid's very different treatmentof the same theme in Amores,II. 18 (1-12): Carmenad iratum dum tu perducisAchillem primaqueiuratis induis arma uiris, nos, Macer, ignauaVeneris cessamusin umbra, et tenerausuros grandia frangit Amor. saepemeae 'tandem' dixi 'discede' puellae: 5 in gremio sedit protinus illa meo; saepe'pudet' dixi: lacrimis uix illa retentis 'me miseram,iam te' dixit 'amarepudet?' implicuitque suos circum mea colla lacertos et, quaeme perdunt,oscula mille dedit. 10 uincor, et ingenium sumptis reuocaturab armis, resquedomi gestaset mea bella cano. 26 THE 'AMORES' (While you advanceyour poem down to the 'Wrath of Achilles' and while you equip the heroes,who have now taken their oath, with their first issueof weapons,I, Macer, laze aroundin the enervatingshade of Venus, and young Cupid shattersmy grandiosedesigns. 'Now' I said to my girl on many an occasion,'it really is time you were off'; she just continuedto sit on my knee; often I said 'it's shameful'.She was hardly able to keep back her tearsand

said~ 'I'm terribly hurt: so now even you are ashamedto be a lover, are you?' Then she flung her arms round my neck and gave me a thousandkisses. That did the trick. I am beatenand my talent is called back from the campaign it had started.Now I'm a poet of home affairs and sing of private wars.)

Both poets are making the same point, that their inability to write epic is due to the power of love. Propertius,however, is unhappyand is forced to write elegy becauseonly that kind of poetry will securehis mistress'love. Ovid, on the contrary, has already so well securedthe devotion of his mistress that she tries to prevent him from sendingher away- and succeeds.He is not held captivein a miserableand confining love, he is simply unable to resist the pleasure it affords. Even more forcefully than Propertius,Ovid concedesthat his choice of genre is im- moral:68 but only so that he can highlight the impudenceof his choice. Unlike his model he makesfull use of his ingenium in his love poetry,69 and as he goes on to mention the successof his Medea and Heroides it is clear that although love may shapehis handling of epic material it doesnot precludehim from using it successfully.In all this Ovid seemsto imply a playful criticism both of Propertius'view of love as somethingwhich may bring fame but only at the cost of misery, and also of his pretencethat elegiacpoetry is not only morally less worthwhile than epic but also that the fame it can confer is less. In Ovid it is clear that he remainswithin the power of love becausehe finds it irresistibly delightful, and that his fame and his achievementhave not sufferedat all becauseof this. This playful criticism of Propertius characterizesmany of Ovid's allusions to his work, though it is frequently very difficult to define. The Amores also contain allusions to the work of the older 27 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY Augustans,Virgil and Horace, though they are obviously less frequent. Ovid is usually concernedto contrast Virgil's ideals and morality with his own to shock and amusehis audience.7o So in III. I; he describesHalaesus, the founder of Falerti, as an anti-Aeneas~anti-Aeneas~ he is Greek,devoted to Iuno andthe murdererof his father Agamemnon. The allusions to the poetry of Horace are more numerous. Frequently it is the incongruity of Ovid's application of the allusion that adds to the comic effect. In Epistles, I. 5 Horace invites Torquatusto a party to celebrateCaesar Augustus' birth- day. To explain his burst of 'extravagance'he says (12-14): quo mihi fortunam, si non concedituruti? parcusob herediscuram nimiumqueseuerus adsidetinsano. (What point is there in having a fortune if I'm not allowed to use it? The man who is miserly and too austereout of considerationfor his heir comesclose to being a madman.) To this passageOvid ironically alludes when he is remonstrat- ing with himself over his wastedopportunity with the beautiful and willing girl he has seducedin III. 7 (49-50): quo mihi fortunaetantum? quo regnasine usu? quid nisi possedidiues auarusopes? (What point is there in my having such a fortune? What point in a kingdom that you don't enjoy? What is it but to sit over my wealth like a rich miser?) Here the effect of the allusion is to deflate Ovid's indignation by emphasizinghis incongruouspomposity. A more sophisticated techniqueis employedwhen Ovid uses the Horatian echo to poke fun at himself by making his persona behavein a way which Horace has ridiculed. In II. 9a Ovid, tired at last of his suffering, has decidedto give up love. But in II. 9b he changes his mind, having realizedthat such a celibateexistence would be unbearable,and he begins (1-2): 'Viue' deus 'posho'si quis mihi dicat 'amore', deprecer:usque adeo dulce puella malum est. (If somegod were to say 'Put love asideand live', I should decline: a girl is always such sweetanguish.) 28 THE'AMORES' This constantwavering betweenacceptance and rejection of love is characteristicof the elegiac lover, but Ovid here levels implicit criticism at his behaviourqua lover by alluding to Horace Satires,I. 1.71 Horacepoints out that for all their constantgrumb- ling and envy of the lot of others,people would not changetheir occupationseven if they were able (15-19): si quis deus 'en ego' dicat, 'iam faciam, quod uoltis: eris tu, qui modo miles, mercator;tu consultusmodo, rusticus; hinc uos, uos hinc mutatis discederepartibus: eia! quid statis?'- nolint. atqui licet essebeatis.

(If somegod were to say 'Here I am~ I shall make you whateveryou like: you who are now a soldier, shall be a merchant;you who are at presenta lawyer, shall be a farmer. Off you go - and you! Changeroles and go your ways: Come onI Why are you just standingthere?' - They would not want to. But it's their chanceto be happy.) Now it is possibleto see that the lover's constantlack of re- solve is ridiculous and, perhapsas important,that in it he is just like everyoneelse, no worse but certainly no better. The allusion is an important device in Ovid's attemptto guide our reactions to the antics of his persona: it enableshim to deflate and ridicule the normal behaviourof the elegiaclover indirectly and without breakingthrough his persona. Imitation and allusion, then, are amongthe most sophisticated aspectsof Ovid's art. They make a considerabledemand on the reader's memory and knowledge of earlier literature, and because they are techniqueswhich Ovid uses creatively they are intellectually stimulating and aestheticallysatisfying. Moreover becausethe intention of the allusions and the imitations is never madeexplicit Ovid is able to suggestand stimulatereactions both to his own personaas a lover and to the model without limiting and confining them.Indirectly they help to define the originality of his contributionto the elegiacgenre and to reveal the implications that his parody has for the understandingof love as an elementin humannature. Sucha piecemealapproach to poetryas that offered abovemust in the end prove inadequate;it is only within the poem as a 29 1. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY whole that the interaction of the various elementsof the poet's art can really be appreciated,and it therefore seemsappropriate to concludethis survey of Ovid's style with an attemptto illus- trate and justify this assertion. Thefirst diptych in the collection (1. I I and 12) is centredround an incident in the lover's life that is frequently referredto by the elegists.Ovid has written a letter to Corinnato arrangea rendez- vous; in the first poemwe seehim trying to persuadeher coiffeuse, Nape, to act as messengerand we follow the steadyescalation of his hopes; in the next we witness his dejection and despair at being refused.72 The scene opens directly with his addressto Nape (1. II. 1-8): Colligere incertoset in ordine ponerecrines docta nequeancillas inter habendaNape inque ministeriis furtiuae cognitanoctis utilis et dandisingeniosa notis, saepeuenire ad me dubitantemhortata Corinnam, 5 saepelaboranti fida repertamihi, accipeet ad dominamperaratas mane tabellas perfer et obstantessedula pelle moras. (0 Nape, you show such skill in gatheringtogether the straying locks and setting them in order, you are not to be consideredjust anotherslave girl: at the nocturnalrites of illicit love you have proved your worth and you have shownyourself resourcefulin delivering letters. Often you havepersuaded a hesitatingCorinna to come to me, often provedfaithful to me at times of distress.Please Nape take thesetablets which I inscribedthis morning and deliver them to our mistress:diligent and dutiful thrust asideany obstacleor causefor delay.) The purposeof the whole of this openingsentence is to flatter Nape,and to ensureher servicesand her goodwill for the mission he wishesher to undertake.73 To this endhe flatters her vanity by praising her skill as a hairdresserand by encouragingher to feel superiorto the other slave girls. Moreoverto preventher feeling that her services are taken for granted he expresseshis deep gratitudefor everythingshe has donefor him; this also servesto prepareher for his new requestand makesit doubly difficult for 30 THE'AMORES' her to refuse. The sentenceunfolds inexorably and with great dignity to its climax in the final couplet.The senseof expectation arousedby the vocative, Nape, itself held back until the end of the pentameter,is not satisfied until we reach the imperatives aeeipe ••• peifer, and this tensionbinds the period together.The impressionof unhurrieddignity is createdby the use of parallelism in the structureof the first two couplets74 andin the shapeof the hexameterand pentameterin the third.75 Then the new feeling of urgencyat the end of the sentenceis createdby structuring the coupletround the threeimperatives aeeipe ...perfer .•• pelle. The tone of this openingaddress is reinforcedin every detail of the style: the theme and variation of the opening line closely linked by the interlocking word order; the grecizing infinitives with doeta; the anaphorasaepe . . . saepe; the striking syntax of dandis ingeniosa notis;76 the solemnity of the archaic anastrophe aneillas inter, and the sacral connotationsof ministeriis: all these playapart. The urgencyof the final coupletis emphasizedby the vividness of peraratas77 and obstantes... pelle moras.78 Nape could hardly fail to be flattered and impressedby sucha display. Yet it is obviously playfully ironic: it is only Nape's senseof self-importancethat preventsher realizing that to use such lofty languagefor sucha lowly creatureis incongruous. Now that Ovid has so eloquently conveyedthe suitably high esteemin which he holds her he can relax a little and adopt a more conversationaland comradelyapproach (9-12): nec silicum uenaenec durum in pectoreferrum nec tibi simplicitas ordine maior adest; credibile est et te sensisseCupidinis arcus: in me militiae signa tuere tuae. (Yours are not veins of flint nor is your heartof hard iron: you are no more innocentthan you ought to be; I can quite believe that you too have known the arrows of Cupid: in helping me, defendyour legion's colours.) The comparativebrevity of the phrasesand the commonplace metaphorsbring a lighter tone: but thereis still a certainformality in the repetitionsnee . .. nee ... nee, the impersonaleredibile est, and the antiquity of the formula79 in the first hexameter.But the playful hints that to refuse his requestwould reveal her to be 3I I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY either insensitive(1. 9) or deplorably unsophisticated(1. 10), and the new twist he gives to the commonplaceidea of the warfare of love finally make his persuasionirresistible. The control and the expertisewhich Ovid showsin winning Napeover to his side are highly amusing in themselves and reveal Ovid's great dramatic skill: at the finish we have a clear impressionboth of the characterof Nape with all its weaknessesand of the meticu- lous attentionto detail that characterizesOvid's approachto his amorousadventures. He turns at last to his real purposeand issuesdetailed orders. Having overcomehis problem of finding a meansto deliver his letter he can now concentrateon the consequences(13-24):

si quaeretquid agam, spe noctis uiuere dices; ceterafert blandacera notatamanu. dum loquor, hora fugit: uacuaebene redde tabellas, I 5 uerum continuo fac tamenilla legato aspiciasoculos mandofrontemque legentis: et tacito uultu scire futura licet. nec mora, perlectis rescribatmulta, iubeto: odi cum late splendidacera uacat. 20 comprimatordinibus uersus,oculosque moretur marginein extremolittera rasa meos. quid digitos opus est graphio lassaretenendo? hoc habeatscriptum tota tabella 'ueni.'

(Should she ask what I'm doing, tell her I live only in hope of tonight; the wax tablet bearsa letter from my hand that will touch her heartand tell her everythingelse. While I speak,time flies: when she'snot busy chooseyour moment and give her the tablets: perhapsyou had still better make sure she readsthem at once. Now I'm trusting you to watch her eyes and her brow as she reads: evenfrom a silent face one can seewhat will happen.Do not delay, tell her to write me a long letter as soon as she has read mine: I hate it when the wax staresback at me all shiny and unbroken.Tell her to write the lines close together,let a letter erasedon the outermostedge cause my eyes to linger. But her fingersI What need to tire them with holding a pen? Let the whole tablet contain just this one word: 'Come.' 32 THE'AMORES' His first instructionis simple and businesslike.But his mention of the letter and his realizationthat the time for his meetingwith Corinna is growing ever closer begin to arousehis excitement. At first he is unsureof the outcomeand his anxiety is expressed in the ebb and flow of the next three couplets (15 -20), where eachof the pentametersqualifies the instructionin the hexameter. Even here, however, his eagernessis beginning to affect his judgment: his plea that Nape should watch Corinna'sexpression as she reads will not help him to know her answerany sooner and that he should even suggestthat Nape should order her mistress to do anything indicates how far he has lost contact with reality. In the next couplet (21-2) he no longer envisages anything but a favourablereply. His eageranticipation of a long and loving letter is reflectedin the style: the separationof oculos and meos and the surprising change of subject from comprimat (Corinna) to moretur (/ittera). With this new confidencecomes an upsurgeof exaggeratedsentimentality as he thinks of her fingers tired andaching from the effort of writing sucha letter. The effect is conveyedby the emphaticplacing of digitos and the choice of the grecism grapbio to expresshis contemptfor the instrument that can cause his darling so much pain. It is a brilliant and witty parody of the excitability and emotionality of the elegiac lover. Twice in the courseof this section Ovid usesallusions to the poemsof Horace to suggestappropriate reactions to the antics of his persona and to anticipate the turn events will take in the next poem. Dum loquor, bora fugit is clearly modelledon Horace's words to Leuconoe(Odes, I. 1 I. 7-8): dum loquimur, fugerit inuida aetas:carpe diem, quamminimum credulapostero. (Even while we converse,hateful time will alreadyhave fled past: grasp today and put as little trust as you can in tomorrow.) At first it is merely amusingto see Ovid flying in the face of such soundadvice as he looks forward with growing confidence to a night of pleasurewith Corinna. Only in the next poem do we realize the full implications of the allusion: if Ovid had not so fondly convincedhimself that the outcomewould be favourable he would have beenless vulnerableto being rejected.

33 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY The other allusion reinforces the effect and the implications of this one. si quaeret quid agam, spe noctis uiuere dices (I;) is probablyan echo of HoraceEpistles, I. 8. 3-4: si quaeretquid agam,dic multa et pulchra minantem uiuere nec recte nec suauiter. (If he asks what 1 am doing, say that for all my fine talk I live neitherwisely nor pleasantly.) Horace admits that he is finding it difficult to live as a wise man should but that his ambitions to do so prevent him: from giving himself up to pleasure.At first Ovid again seemsto be mocking Horace'sefforts: at this stagehe feels that he is at least happy. Only when the consequencesof his foolishnessare made apparentin the next poemdo we realize that Horacewas correct in believing that wisdom, howeverdifficult it may be to achieve, is an absoluteprerequisite for real happiness. Now Ovid ends the poem in complete confidence that his wishes will be fulfilled (25-8): non ego uictrices lauro redimeretabellas nec Veneris media ponerein aedemorer. subscribamVENERI FIDAS SIBI NASO MINISTRAS DEDICAT. AT NVPER VILE FVISTIS ACER.

(I would not hesitateto bind my victorious dispatcheswith laurel nor to place them right in the middle of Venus' temple. I would write beneaththem: To Venus Naso dedicates his faithful servants.But you were only recently nasty maple-wood.) The excited confidence conveyed by the playful figurative languageand the detailed prediction of the vow he will pay to Venus quite outweighthe hesitation impliedby the subjunctives. But even here he arousesour doubts as he refers to the true natureof the tablets,uile acer, in unconsciousanticipation of the following poem. Theselines also allude to the end of Propertius, II. I4a (2;-8): haec mihi deuictis potior uictoria Parthis, haecspolia, haecreges, haec mihi currus erunt. 34 THE'AMORES' magnaego donatua figam, Cytherea,columna, talequesub nostro nomine carmenerit: HAS PONO ANTE TVAS TIBI, DIVA, PROPERTIVSAEDIS EXVVIAS, TOTA NOCTE RECEPTVS AMANS. (This victory is dearerto me than the conquestof Parthia, thesedelights will count as my spoils, my captive kings, my triumphal chariot. Rich offerings shall I hang on your column, Cytherea,and beneathmy namethere will be some suchepigram as this: thesespoils, I, Propertius,place before your shrine in your honour, my goddess.For a whole night she took me as her lover.) The allusion is again significant. It confirms that Ovid is utterly confident of successbut it also suggeststhat the confidence may be premature.Propertius is expressinghis triumphant happinessat having just spenta night with Cynthia, while Ovid's joy is only in the anticipationof the event. Secondly,the allusion reinforces the impressionthat the persona Ovid presentsin the poemis that of a Propertianlover: hencethe excitability and the sentimentality.But at the same time the difference in the situations of the two poetsmakes it clear that Ovid's personais really a parody,not merely an imitation of his predecessor. The poem is simply constructed. Ovid's intelligent self- control in the first half as he cleverly manipulatesNape is a perfect foil to the progressionin the secondhalf from anxiety to ill-founded confidencein the outcome.The poem as a whole provides an excellent counterpointto the reactions in the next poem where Ovid has learnedof his rejection. Sometimein the course of 1. II we must presume that Nape has left on her errand.so Before 1. 12 opens she has returned with the answer. All this happens off-stage and the next poem opens with Ovid's woeful lament (1. 12. 1-2): Flete meos casus:tristes redieretabellae; infelix hodie littera possenegat. (Bewail my fate: my tabletshave returnedwith gloomy news; the unhappyletter says that she cannotmake it today.) This openingcouplet informs us directly that the situation has now completely changed. The information comes as a sharp contrastto the end of the precedingpoem, thoughin fact it only 35 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY fulfils the forebodingssuggested by the allusions. The rest of the poem depicts Ovid's emotional reactionsto this new situation, but their intensity would be unintelligible had we not seen his high hopesand confidenthappiness in the earlier poem. These opening words are clearly a reminiscence of Pro- pertius, III. z 3. I: Ergo tam doctaenobis perieretabellae. (So my tablets,my eloquenttablets, are lost.) At the same time as he focuses our attention on the writing tablets, the main subject of the poem, he also directs us to his Propertian model. The misery and wretchednesswhich Ovid expressesis however undercut by the awarenessthe allusion brings that Ovid is wittily reversing Propertius' situation: Propertiusis depressedbecause his tablets have beenlost; Ovid becausehis havebeen returned. There is further irony in the fact that Propertius is anxious becausehe does not know whether the reply that the tablets were carrying was favourable or not, while Ovid is even more distressedbecause he knows for certain that the answeris 'no'. Once he has establishedthe tone of the poem and its situation Ovid now tries to understandwhy his hopesand his plans have beenfrustrated (3-6): omina suntaliquid: modo cum discedereuellet, ad limen digitos restitit icta Nape. missaforas iterum limen transirememento cautiusatque alte sobria ferre pedem. (So omensdo mean something:when she was just aboutto leave Nape stubbedher toe on the thresholdand stopped. Next time you are sent on an errandremember to cross it more carefully: act like a soberwoman and pick your feet up properly.) As he searchesfor a reasonto help him in his presentdistress he remembersthat Nape had stumbledas she.turned to go: in his presentstate of mind he is willing to believe that this bad omen causedthe failure of his plans. Having found her the cause of his unhappinesshe seemsready to vent his spleen on Nape: the peremptory commandsand the barely-veiled insults in the 36 THE'AMORES' suggestionthat she is slovenly and a drunkardmake an amusing contrastwith the excessivedeference of the last poem. But she is not really a suitabletarget since she has alreadyleft and in any case it would obviously be foolish to alienate a slave whose servicesmay be of usein the future.81 In part the clarity of Ovid's motives in finding a new object on which to pour his wrath is responsiblefor the effect of bathosin what follows. Even more however it is due to the incongruity of expending his lofty eloquenceon such trivial objects(7-14): ite hinc, difficiles, funebria ligna, tabellae, tuque, negaturiscera refertanotis, quam, puto, de longaecollectam flore cicutae melle sub infami Corsicamisit apis. 10 at tamquamminio penitusmedicata rubebas: ille color uere sanguinulentuserato proiectaetriuus iaceatis,inutile lignum, uosquerotae frangat praetereuntisonus. (Away with you, cruel tablets,you coffin planks, and you, you wax crammedfull with words of refusal. I seeit now, you were gatheredfrom the flower of the long-stalked hemlockand sent by the Corsicanbee as the comb for its notorioushoney. Yes you blushednice and pink as though deeply dyed with cinnabar:but in fact that was the colour of blood. Lie thereat the crossroadswhere I've tossedyou, you uselessblock, and mayapassing wheel grind you to splinters beneathits load.) Ovid's indignant angerfinds expressionin this steadystream of withering contemptdirected at the writing tablets.The whole passagegains its effectivenessfrom the carefully balancedstruc- ture. The first couplet introduces the tablets, their wooden casing and the wax surface. The next two coupletsare devoted to the wax and the final one returns to the wooden casing. The tightness of structure is supported by the pervasive use of alliteration. Within this frameworkeach of the first threecouplets moves from eleganceand formal beauty in the hexameterto harshbitterness in the following line. This ironic effect of beauty is createdby the elaborateand stylized word order of difliciles, {unebria ligna, tabellae (7)82 and especially de longae colleetam 37 1. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY flore cicutae (9)83 and the choice of the words minio and medicata (11).84 This is then undercutin the harshnessof the soundand of the words negaturis,referta and sanguinulentus,all rare in poetry. In the next section this control has broken and the emotional outburstreaches its climax (15-20): illum etiam, qui uos ex arboreuertit in usum, conuincampuras non habuissemanus; praebuitilla arbor misero suspendiacollo, carnifici diras praebuitilla cruces; illa dedit turpes raucis bubonibusumbras, uolturis in ramis et strigis oua tulit. (I'll also wager that he who convertedyou from a tree into an object for use had uncleanhands. That tree offered a branchfor somewretch to hang himself; it provided hideous crossesfor the executioner;it gave its foul shadeto hooting hornedowls and supportedthe eggs of the vulture and screechowl in its branches.) The effect of rising emotionality is achieved by the gradual intensification of alliterative patterns and by constructing the whole passageround the repetitions ilium . . . praebuit ilia . . . praebuit ilia ... ilia. The last two sections (7-20) together form an amusingcontrast with the high honourswhich Ovid had promisedto confer on the tabletsat the end of the previouspoem and this amusementundercuts the agonized misery he is ex- pressinghere. The contrast also serves to caricaturethe way a lover'soutlook is totally dependenton the stateof his relationship with his mistress,while the incongruity betweenthe emotionand the object at which it is directedachieves an effect of parody.85 Ovid's denunciationof the wax tablets has beenso persuasive and completethat he can no longerunderstand why he usedthem for his love letters in the first place (21-6): his ego commisi nostrosinsanus amores molliaque ad dominamuerba ferenda dedi? aptius hae capiantuadimonia garrula cerae, quas aliquis duro cognitor are legat; inter ephemeridasmelius tabulasqueiacerent, in quibus absumptasfleret auarusopes.

38 THE 'AMORES' (Was I so crazy that I entrustedmy love letters to these, that I gave them my tenderwords to take to my mistress? This wax should rather be usedfor the verbiageof legal undertakingsfor somepinch-faced lawyer to read; betterthat they shouldlie amid the accountbooks and ledgersover which the miser weepsfor his squanderedwealth.) The changein the tone and the direction of the attack coupled with the ironic comments on his own foolishness is in itself amusing. The comic effect and the consequentundercutting of the persona is strengthenedby the allusion to Propertius,III. 23. 17-20: et quaecumqueuolens reperit non stulta puella garrula, cum blandis dicitur hora dolis. me miserum,his aliquis rationemscribit auarus et ponit diras inter ephemeridas! ([My tablets carried this message]and whateverelse a willing, talkative and cultured girl can invent when an appointment is being madefor secretlove. Alas! now somemiser is enteringhis accountson them and placing them amonghis odious ledgers.) Ovid shows a delightful ingenuity in his adaptationof this passage:his vignetteof the weepingmiser is much morevivid and amusingthan Propertius'; his introductionof the cognitor with the implied contrastbetween him and the gentle lover intensifiesthe contemptuoustone; and it was a brilliant stroke to transfer the epithet garrula from the puella to the uadimonia. Even more important is the fact that Ovid has completely reversed the sentimentsof Propertius.The latter is emotionallyattached to his writing tabletsand fears that they are now being used for some menial task. Ovid, on the contrary, wishes that his tablets were used for such work so that they could not ruin his happiness. Again the allusion is used to reveal that Ovid's persona is a caricature,a parodyof the Propertianlover. Ovid finishes with a parting curse on the offensive tablets (2.7-30 ): ergo ego uos rebus duplices pro nomine sensi: auspicli numerusnon erat ipse boni. 39 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY quid preceriratus, nisi uos cariosasenectus rodat, et immundo cera sit alba situ?

(So now I realize that you are as two-facedin your dealings as your namesuggests: the numberitself was a bad omen. What shouldI pray for in my presentrage exceptthat decayingold age gnaw at you, that your wax grow white with filthy mould?)

The contemptuoustone is sustainedby the word-play with duplices,86the balancedmalevolence of the final curse87 and, above all, the striking phrasecariosa senec/usroda/. 88 But the emotion is no longer credible. The attack on the tablets has been too prolonged,the incongruity too great. Above all, however, it is the constant awarenessof the play with the Propertianmodel that preventsus taking it seriously, and the effects of the pre- cedingallusion are felt to the end of the poem. Propertiusfinally sends his slave off to post a notice offering a reward for the return of the tablets(III. 23. 21-4); Ovid endsby viciously cursing his tablets. Taken together the two poems form a satisfying unit. Their effectivenessis due only in part to surprise and reversal; on a closerreading it canbe seenequally to lie in the fact that the second poem properly fulfils all the expectationsaroused by the use of allusion to Horaceand Propertiusin the first. It is clear that the insincerity and imitativeness is deliberate and subserves the creationof an amusingand delightful parody. Ovid's persona in the Amores displays amusing impudencein his persistentflaunting of the values and the morality of the establishment.Religion and the gods are mere butts for his wit;89 the life of the soldierand martial prowessare deridedeither directly or by being comparedto the life and virtues of a lover.90 The buildings and gamesof which Augustuswas so proudare for him only suitable places to pick up a girl. 91 His affairs are, on occasionat least,adulterous and in all probability we are to think of Corinna herself as married.92 Ovid's vaguenesson this issue may be deliberateand reflect his awarenessthat such behaviour would be disapprovedof, even to the point of his poemsbeing used in evidenceagainst him.93 It hardly matters that Corinna may never have existed or may not have belongedto a noble 40 THE'AMORES' family~ in tone and spirit Ovid is defying the wishesof Augustus andhis attemptsto legislateagainst adultery.94 But the Amoresare not a bitter attack on the Augustanregime nor a lament for the lost republic. Ovid's prime intention is to shockand amuse:he presentshimself as the eloquentpoet of the 'other Augustans', the rich and leisured young Romans too irresponsibleor disillusioned to put their servicesat the disposal of the state. This was a period of peaceand sophisticationand it was irksome to confine pleasureby practising an old-fashioned morality (ur. 4. 37-40): rusticusest nimium, quemlaedit adulteraconiunx, et notos mores non satis urbis habet, in qua Martigenaenon sunt sine crimine nati RomulusIliades IliadesqueRemus. (The man who is offendedby a wife's adultery is far too provincial and not well enoughacquainted with the well- known ways of the capital, where eventhe offspring of Mars, Romulus, son of Ilia, and Remus,Ilia's other son, were born as a result of a misdemeanour.) When Ovid does mention the princeps specifically the compliments are glib and the tone one of mocking admiration: he is held up as an example of leniency to his brother, Cupid; Ovid duly expresseshis gratitude that Venus did not abort Aeneas and so deprive posterity of its beneficiaries,the family of Caesar. Such complimentswould hardly satisfy the man who had let it be known that he wantedtributes to be madeonly in the serious work of the best poets.95 This anti-establishmentpose is, in part at least, a more pointedexpression of the generalopposition to the ideals of the new regime in Tibullus and Propertius,96 and as such is only part of Ovid's caricatureof the elegiaclover. Ovid, however,was known to haverejected the opportunityof an excellent political careerand the glory of becomingthe first Paeligniansenator. 97 But having withdrawn from public service he refused to fade into obscurity and insteadparaded his 'life', his devotion to the trivial, in his poetry. He boastsof his eques- trian status and pays homageto no patron: he is proud to be a Paelignian,one of that race which was spurred on by its love of fibertas to attack Rome.98

O-D 41 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY The Amores are, however, only implicitly poems of protest againstthe AugustanEstablishment. Ovid is eagerto enjoy the fruits of the peace,not to brood over the cost of achievingand maintainingit. The existencehe portrays in thesepoems is one devotedto the trivial, to love, Amor. Yet his attitude to love is quite original, distinct at oncefrom the views of the philosophers and of the traditional Romanthat it is morally evil and foolish,99 and from the noble but impossiblevision of the earlier elegists. From them, and perhapsfrom personalexperience,lOO he knew that uncontrolled passion could bring anguished misery and worse. But throughhis wit and his parodyOvid showshow it is possible to remain unscathedby its ravagesand also enjoy its pleasures,lOl Nor does his defiant refusal to serve the new republic meanloss of personalglory. Love has inspiredhis poetry and throughhis poetry he is confident of achievinga fame more lasting and more valuable than that gained by kingS.102 Thus, althoughthe Amoresare hardly profound, they do containinter- esting and intelligent insights into the reactionsof the individual to his society,and into the natureoflove as a humanphenomenon. But aboveall they deserveto be read becausethey contain some of the most witty and polishedwork of one of the most creative and thoroughlyenjoyable Roman poets. 103

Notes 1 All quotationsin this paper are taken from the text of E. J. Kenney, P. Ovidi Nasonis Amoresetc. (Oxford [correctededition], 1965). I have followed him in consideringII. 9a and II. 9b, III. IIa and II b as separate elegiesand III. 5 as spurious.On III. 5 see now E. J. Kenney, 'On the Somniumattributed to Ovid', Agon: Journal of ClassicalStudies (Berkeley), 3 (1969), 1-14. But thesequestions are still controversial. 2 Cf. Tristia, IV. 10. 53-4. 3 See G. Williams, Tradition and Originality in Roman Poetry (Oxford, 1968), pp. 5I3f. The heroine is namedas Corinnain 1.5, II; II. 6, (7), 8, II, 12, 13, 17, 19; III. 1,7, 12. 4 Cf. III. 7. The lady in III. 4 is probably the sameas the lady of II. 19. For Ovid's infidelity to Corinnasee II. 4, II. 10, and especiallyII. 8. The identity of the girl in III. 2 is one of the most difficult to decideon but Williams (op. cit., 515f.) has suggestedthat Ovid may here be depicting his first meeting with Corinna. 6 There is at presentno generalagreement as to the social status of the elegists' mistressesand each case must be judged independently,since we know that Catullus' Lesbiawas marriedand a noble woman; Gallus' Lycoris a freedwomanand an actress. 42 THE

7 See, e.g., I. 15. 1-8; II. 10. 29-38; cf. Tibullus, 1. I; Propertius,I. 6. 8 Tristia, IV. 10. 35-40: it is perhapsmore probablethat Ovid designed his careerto avoid the military tribunaterather than that he withdrew from politics in order to avoid holding this position as suggestedby L. R. Taylor, 'Republicanand Augustanwriters enrolledin the Eques- trian centuries', Transactions of the American Philological Association (Cleveland,Ohio), 99 (1968), 480. Seenow T. P. Wiseman,New Men in the RomanSenate (Oxford, 1971), p. 151. 9 II. 18; cf. III. I, 15. For the recusatio cf. W. Wimmcl, Kallimachos in Rom (Wiesbaden,1960). 10 Quintilian, Inst., x. 1. 98. II Ovid seemsto have enjoyed his secret; cf. Am., II. 17. 29; Ars Am., III. 538. For theselines to have point we must assumethat Corinnadid exist (cf. Am., III. 12). Apuleius, Apologia, 10, fails to mention her. Sidonius Apollinaris (Carm., 23. I 59-60) seemsto have guessedthat she was none other than Julia, Augustus'daughter: an interestingbut wild conjecture. 12 If Tristia, II. 339ff. refer to the Amoresthen Ovid tells us specifically that the love he professesis a pretence(for falsus amor cf. Ars Am., I. 618). This has no bearing on the reality of Corinna, and the reference may be to the Ars Amatoria. 13 Cf. Tristia, IV. 10. 51-2. 14 Most recently A. Cameron, 'The first edition of Ovid's Amores', ClassicalQuarterly (Oxford), n.s. XVIII (1968), 320-33, with references to earlier discussions. 15 Tristia, IV. 10. 57-8, but the date 25 B.C. can only be approximate. 16 A vexed problem. The Sygambri had made war briefly against the Romansin 16 B.C. and Augustus secureda diplomatic victory and a few hostages.The peacedid not last. In I I B.C. Drusus campaigned against them and celebratedan ouatio in the following year. But the tribe was not really put down until after Tiberius' campaign and resettlementin 8 B.C. which was followed by a triumph in 7 B.C. It is sometimesmaintained that Amores,1. 14.45-50must havebeen written, or at least rewritten, after the triumph of Tiberius or at least the ouatio of Drusus, i.e. for the secondedition. But the phrasetriumphatae ... genlis (l. 46) may only be a daring hyperbole (cf. the strong language used by Horace, Odes, IV. 2. 36; 14. 51 and Propertius,IV. 6. 77) and refer, perhapssarcastically, to Augustus' diplomatic successof 16 B.C. The objectionthat the Romanwig-makers would not be able to usethe hair of captive women of the tribe until after a more substantialdefeat hasbeen countered by H. L. Levy (Classical World [Bethlehem,Pa.], 62 [1968], 135) who draws attentionto a Germaniccustom of shavingthe headand sendingthe hair to the conqueroras a gestureof submission. (He cites Martial, XIV. 26; Claudian,De Quarto ConsulatuHonorit~ 446-7; In Eutropium, I. 383.) Such a witticism is at homein this poem. 17 Ars Am., III. 343. 18 Cf. Tristia, IV. 10. 61-2; with poena of the epigram (1. 4) cf. suppliciis at Catullus, 14. 20.

43 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY

19 Am., I. 14, 15; II. 18; III. 9, 15 inter alia have been credited to the secondedition. On I. 14 see above n. 16. Am., II. 18. 19-20 may as easily apply to the Amoresas the Ars Amatoria. For examplesof prae- cepta in the Amoressee II. 19 (with III. 4); I. 4 (with II. 5) etc. For the phraseand the idea cf. Tibullus, I. 6. 9-10. To believe with F. Munari (P. Ovidi Nasonis Amores [ed. 5. Florence, 1970], p. xv) that the first edition was publishedin 20 B.C. leads to the strangeresult of having to attribute all the datable elegies (I. 14, 15; III. 9, 15) to the second edition. 20 The latestdate in Propertius,Book III is 23/22 B.C.; in Book IV, 16 B.C. H. Trankle (Die Sprachkunstdes Properz [Wiesbaden,1960], p. 106, n. 2) is almostalone in believing that Propertiusis herefollowing Ovid. 21 Amores, I. I and 2 seem to be two separateaccounts of how Ovid came to write love elegy and Cameron (op. cit., 320ff.) suggeststhat they originally belongedto two separatebooks. But the inconsistency is slight and becomesless important when we recall that the poet's Dichterweihe (I. I) is usually assumedto take place in a dream (cf. E. J. Kenney, 'Doctus Lucretius', Mnemosyne [Leiden], Ser. 4. 23 [1970], esp. 375ff.). Another problem is the. ack of a formal conclusion to Book II. G. Luck (Antike Lyrik, ed. W. Eisenhut [Darmstadt, 1970], 464-5, n. I) has recently suggestedthat an epilogue has fallen out in the transmissionof the text but such a hypothesisseems unwarranted. The false senseof ending createdby II. 18 leads to an amusingplay on the reader'sexpectations and is perhapsintended to emphasizethe continuity of the collection. In any casea formal conclusionis not obliga- tory, cf. Horace, Odes, I. In short neither of these points is adequate evidenceof clumsy editing. 22 With II. 17. (5-6; 27; 33; 34) cf. I. 3. (I; 7-12; 25-6; 20 respectively). 23 With II. 5. (15; 16; 17-18; 2Iff.; 29ff.) cf. I. 4. (19; 17; 20; 55ff.; 39ff. respectively)and with III. 4. (25-6; 21-2; 32; 3I; 45ff.) cf. II. 19. (4; 27- 28; I9ff.; 52; 59-60). 24 Amores,I. I, 2, 15; II. I, 18; III. I, 15. 25 Cf. I. II and 12; II. 2. 3; II. 7. 8; II. 9a. 9b; II. 13. 14; III. lIa. lib. 26 III. 7 develops the situation describedat Tibullus, I. 5. 39-42; with III. 8. 35-44 cf. Tibullus, I. 3. 35ff.; with III. 10. 7-14 cf. Tibullus, II. 1. 37-48; and with III. 10. 11-14cf. Tibullus, I. 7. 29ff. This is not to neglectthe Propertianmodels for thesepoems: for Am., III. 8 and III. 10, cf. Propertius,II. 16 and II. 33 respectively. 27 For full detailssee the edition of Munari, op. cil. (n. 19). The older work of A. Zingerle, Ovidius und sein Verhallnis zu den Vorgangern und gleich- zeitigen ramischen Dichtern (Hildesheim [repr.], 1967) and C. Ganzen- muller, 'Aus Ovids Werkstatt', Philologus (Berlin), 70 (191 I), 274-3II is still useful. The basic treatmentof this aspectof the Amoresremains R. Neumann,Qua ratione Ovidius in Amoribus scribendis Properl; ElegiiJ usus sit (Diss. Gottingen, 1919). 28 Ovid, Am., III. 9 and 13; Propertius,III. 7; 14; 19 and 18 (the epicedion for Marcellus,the counterpartto Ovid's poem on the deathof Tibullull 44 THE' AMORES'

[III. 9]). For poems not primarily connectedwith the poet's love-life see Am., III. 6, 10; cf. Propertius,III. II, 17. 2.9 SeeOvid, Am., I. 6, II. 2., III. 8; II. II; I. 5; II. 16; II. 4, 8, 10, 19; II. 5, III. 8, 12.; I. 14; cf. Propertius,I. 16; I. 8; II. 14, 15; II. 19, 32.; II. 2.2.; II. 17; II. 18c. 30 Propertius'problems are almost invariably related to the infidelity of Cynthia; Ovid's are usually imposed from outside his relationship (cf. I. 6; II. 2.; III. 6; III. 10) and are thereforeless seriousin themselves. 31 Nor should we forget the works of Cornelius Gallus and Valgius Rufus etc. 32. For Propertiussee E. Lefevre, Propertius Ludibundus(Heidelberg, 1966). But there is a more pervasiveand subtle humour and irony in both thesepoets than has beengenerally recognized. 33 For Ovid's treatmentof death see II. 10. 35-8; II. 6; III. 9; contrast Tibullus, I. 3; I. 10 or Propertius,I. 19; II. 8. 34 His attitudeto Augustanismis alwaysirreverent. None of the addressees in his poems is of any political consequencealthough C. Pomponius Graecinuswas cos. suff. in A.D. 16 (see Wiseman,op. cit., 2.53). Contrast Tibullus, I. I, or Propertius,e.g., II. I, 10. 35 See Am., I. 9; II. 19, especially 5-2.6; III. 14. 36 Am., III. 14. 37 Cf. W. Stroh, Die romische Liebeselegieals werbendeDichtung (Amsterdam, 1971), I nff. 38 Cf. III. 7. 82.; I. 8. 2.2.; II. 5. 33-42.. 39 Cf. I. 7; II. 16. 40 For sleeplessnessas a sign of love see, e.g., Virgil, Aeneid, IV. Iff.; cf. Ovid, Am., II. 9b. 39-42., and often in the elegists. 41 For medio •.. toro cf. Am., II. 10. 18. For the setting cf., however, Ars Am., II. 617-24; III. 807-8. 42 For the full impact of theselines cf. Horace,Odes, III. 6. 17-32. 43 Despite the bathos of the thought in the pentameterthe languageis still striking: statio is usedin a slightly unusualsense; recompositas occurs first here. 44 Seen. 38. 45 The theme is of course a commonplace;cf. Horace, Odes, II. 8. But the reasonsOvid suggestsare amusingand different, since proverbially lovers' vows did not reachthe gods' ears. 46 But within the parallelismthere is variation, which can be represented schematicallyas: AbC DI B / A b D2 C. 47 The colour effect Ovid seems to be describing is that produced by sunriseon a snowscape. 48 Ennius, Ann., 352. V.s: cf. Propertius,II. 3. 10-12.. 49 Adjectives in -eus have a poetic colour. 50 For a full discussionof Ovid's treatment of the elegiac couplet see M. Platnauer,Latin Elegiac Verse (Cambridge,1951). 51 Also Am., III. 2.. 2.7-8, 43-4; III. 6. 61-2.; cf. I. 4. 13-14. 52. But the loss of so much earlier poetry makesit difficult to estimatethe extent of this practice. 45 I. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY

53 The point is made by A. G. Lee, Ovid's Amores(London, 1968), 183. 54 See,e.g., Am., 1. 2. II-17; 1. 7.13-18,51-6;I. 13. 11-24. 55 Again the style is vivid: note the zeugmain collige cllm 11111111 menlem; reparabile makesits first appearancehere. 56 For thinness as a symptom of love see, e.g., Theocritus, 2. 89-90; Virgil, Eel., 3. 100-1; Propertius,I. 5. 22; Ovid, Am., II. 9a. 14. 57 The mock-solemnityof the tone is emphasizedby the use of the formal Quirites and the archaismsed enim. 58 Propertius,I. 2; 1.15; II. 18c; cf. Tibullus, I. 8. 9-16. 59 Propertius,I. 2. 23-6; 1. 15. 1-2; II. 18c. 35ff. 60 An outstandingexample is Am., 1. 8, and Propertius,IV. 5. 61 For promiscuityas a cure for love cf. Cicero, Tusc. Disp., IV. 75; Ovid, Rem., 44I ff. 62 Or he may take a passagefrom an earlier poem as a starting point, e.g., Am., II. 4 and Propertius,II. 22a. 4-10; Am., 1. 10. 1-8 and Pro- pertius,1. 3. 1-8; Am., III. IIa and IIb and Catullus, 85. 63 Cf. especially Am., 1. 9, mililat omnis amans with Tibullus, I. 1. 75 or Propertius,I. 6. 29-30; Am., II. 12 and Propertius,II. 14. 64 III. 7. 25-6. 65 This is in turn basedon Meleager,A.P., 12. 101. 66 The whole poem is modelled on Propertius,II. 33a. 67 Note especiallythe juxtaposition teneramferro (1. ~o). 68 With Propertius,1. 7. 9, hic mihi conteritllr uilae modlls, cf. Am., II. 18. 3, ignaua Veneris cessamusin umbra. 69 With Am., II. 18. II, contrastPropertius, I. 7. 7. 70 E.g. Am., 1. 1. 1., cf. Virgil, Aeneid,1. I; Am., 1. 2. 31-6; cf. Virgil, Aeneid, I, 292-6. 71 This seemspossible despite the appearanceof the idea at Cicero, De Sen., 83 etc. 72 With this diptych comparePropertius, III. 6. 73 For the importanceof the mistress' slaves to a lover, especially her hairdresser,cf. Ars Am., I. 35 Iff. 74 docta and IItilis are both held over to the pentameter. 75 saepe. .. hortala,. saepe... reperta. 76 This constructionwith ingenioSlisis unique to Ovid; cf. T.L.L. s.v. For the phrasecf. Ars Am., III. 470. For the ingenuity neededin passing lovers' letters cf. Ars Am., III. 619-28, Tibullus, II. 6. 45-6. 77 Not used of writing letters before this passage. 78 Perhaps a deliberate variant for the Virgilian coinage rumpe moras (Georgics, III. 43). 79 Cf. Homer, Od., XXIII. 103; Iliad, XXII. 357; Tibullus, I. I. 64 etc. 80 It is just possible that we are to imagine her leaving after the brief commandat 1. 14. This would give the poem a symmetricalstructure, with Ovid shouting the other commandsafter her or muttering them to himself. Othersmay prefer to haveher presentat least until 1. 24 or evenright to the end. In any caseit is obviousthat after 1. 14 Ovid pays less and less attention to her. 81 Seeabove, n. 73. 46 THE'AMORES'

82 On this type of word-order see Williams, op. cit., 317; 726-8. 83 This elaborate dislocation is paralleled only elsewherein Ovid: see Platnauer,op. cit., 102, who comparesIbis, 443; Ex P., II. 10. I; II. 2. 2. 84 minio is a Spanish loan word and medicata seems to be an archaism revived by the Augustan poets. For the concept of poetic diction in Latin poetry cf. Cicero, De Or., III. 153; Horace,Epistles, II. 2. 1II-21; A.P., 46-72. But the question is a complex one; see now Williams, op. cit., 736f.; 743-50. 85 The passagemay be a consciousadaption of Horace,Odes, II. 13. Iff. 86 duplex meaning deceitful is rare; cf. Catullus, 68. 5I; Horace, Odes, 1.6·7· 87 Note the interlacing word order: b A caB. 88 cariosa is used as an epithet for age for the first time here: normally it is used of material things. rodat almost personifiessenectus. 89 Cf. Am., I. 13; III. 3, 6, 10. 90 See especially Am., I. 9; II. 12, and cf. R. Syme, The Roman Revolution (Oxford, 1939), 467f. 91 Am., II. 2. 3-4; the portico at the temple of Apollo on the Palatine: for more seriousappreciation cf. Horace,Odes, I. 31; Propertius,II. 3I. Am., III. 2; for the gamescf. Augustus,Res Gestae, 22. 92 At least in I. 4; II. 2; II. 19; III. 4. See abovep. If. Of course he also revealsthat he was married himself (III. 13. I). 93 As indeed they were - although Augustus seemsto have been con- cernedrather with the Ars Amatoriawhen he relegatedOvid to Tomi. 94 On Augustus'marriage laws and their importancefor Romanelegy see Williams, op. cit., 532ff.; cf. 58ff.; 63 Iff. 95 Suetonius,Divus Augustus, 89. 3; the allusion to Augustus in (III. 9. 63-4) tu quoque, si fa/sumest temerati crimen amici, Sanguinis atque animae prodige Galle Juae may contain a sarcasticreference to Augustus' own lament on hearing of the deathof Gallus: quod sibi soli non li,eret amicis, qua/enusuellet, irasci (Suetonius,op. cit., 66. 2). temerare is normally used of offencesagainst the divine and the sacred;cf. Virgil, Aeneid, VI. 840; Ovid, Met., VIII, 742. Seealso Am., III. 8. 51-2: this would be the most outspokencriticism but the authenticityof theselines has beendoubted. 96 Seeespecially Propertius, II. 7; 15. 41-8. 97 See Wiseman, op. cit., 152 and n. 3. For Q. Varius Geminus, the first Paeligniansenator, see ibid., 270. 98 Cf. Am., I. 15; II. I. 1-2; 111.15 etc. 99 See Cicero, Tusc. Disp., IV. 68-76; Lucretius, D.R.N., IV. I037ff.; Horace,Sat., I. 2. 100 At least he had two unsuccessfulmarriages (Tristia, IV. 10. 69-72). 101 Cf. Ars Am., III. 41-2. 102 Am., I. 15. 31-42.For a detailedanalysis of this poemsee now F. Stoessl, 'Ovids Lebensentscheidung'in: FestschriftK. Vretskazum 70 Geburtstag (Heidelberg, 1970), 250-75. But he goes too far in suggestingthat Livor is a pseudonymfor Caesar(267). 103 For reasonsof spacefootnotes contain few bibliographical references. This is not intendedto concealmy greatdebt to other writers on Ovid. 47 1. M. LE M. DU QUESNAY Full details can be found in the edition of Munari, op. cit. (n. 19). There are two excellenttranslations of the Amores: A. G. Lee, Ovid's Amores (London, 1968) and ChristopherMarlowe, The Elegies of Ovid (c. 1597). The latter will be of special interest to those interestedin Ovid's influence upon English literature- seechapter VII below.