by Tibullus
XIII
SULPICIA
On her Love
1 AT last has come a love which, Rumour, it would shame me more to hide than to disclose to any one. Won over by my Muse’s prayers, Cythera’s queen has brought and placed him in my arms. What Venus promised she hath fulfilled. Let my joys be told by all of whom ’tis said that they have missed their own. Never would I choose to entrust my messages to tablets under seal, that none might read my thoughts before my lover. Nay, I love my fault, and loathe to wear a mask for rumour. Let all hear that we have met, each worthy of the other.
XIV
Before her Birthday
1 MY hated birthday is at hand, to be kept all joylessly in the odious country and without Cerinthus. What is more pleasant than the town? Would a grange be fit place for a girl, or the chill river of Arretium and its fields? Rest now, Messalla, from thy excessive zeal for me. Journeys, my kinsman, are oft ill-timed. They take me away, but here I leave my soul and heart, since force forbids my living mistress of myself.
XV
The Journey Abandoned
1 DOST thou know that the burden of that journey is lifted from thy girl’s heart? Now she can be at Rome upon her birthday. Let us all, then, keep that day [with gladness], which comes to thee this time by unexpected chance.
XVI
Cerinthus Unfaithful
1 IT is a pleasant thought that now in thy unconcern thou dost allow thyself so much at my expense, that I may not trip in some unhappy fit of folly. For thee toga and strumpet loaded with wool-basket may be worthier of thy preference than Sulpicia, Servius’ daughter. But they are distressed in my behalf, to whom this is the greatest cause of pain, that I may yield my place to an ignoble rival.
XVII
From her Sick-bed
1 CERINTHUS, hast thou any tender thought for thine own girl, now that fever racks her feeble frame? Ah, I would not pray to triumph over the drear disease if I thought not that thou wouldst wish it too. How should it profit me to master sickness if thou canst bear my troubles with a heart unmoved?
XVIII
An Apology
1 MY life, let me be no more to thee so hot a passion as few days ago methinks I was, if in my whole youth I have done any deed of folly of which I would own I have repented more, than leaving thee yesternight alone, through desire to hide the fire within me.
XIX
To his Mistress
1 No woman shall filch thy place of love with me such our covenant when first the love-tie joined us: Only thou dost please me; save thee no girl in the city is beauteous to my eyes. And, oh, might I be the only one to think thee fair! Mayst thou be unpleasing to all besides. So shall I be safe. No need for envy here; far from me be the vaunts of the common herd; let the wise man keep his joy hushed up within his bosom. Thus shall I live happily in forest depths where foot of man has never worn a path. For me thou art repose from cares, light even in night’s darkness, a throng amid the solitudes. Now, though a mistress be sent to Tibullus from the skies, she will be sent in vain, and desire be extinguished This I swear to thee by thy Juno’s holy power; for to me is she great above all gods beside. What mad thing am I doing? Alas! surrendering my hostages. That was an oath of folly. Thy fears were my gain. Now wilt thou take heart, now fan my flames more boldly. This, alas! is the mischief brought me by my chattering tongue. Now, do what thou wilt, I will remain thine always, nor flee from bondage to a mistress that I know, but will sit in my chains at the altar of holy Venus. She brands law-breakers and befriends the suppliant.
XX
Unkind Rumour
1 RUMOUR says that my girl is oft unfaithful. Now could I wish my ears were deaf. These charges are not made without suffering for me. Why dost thou torture thus thy victim, bitter Rumour? Peace!
DOMITIUS MARSUS
On the Death of Tibullus
1 THEE too, Tibullus, ere thy time hath Death’s unfeeling hand
Despatched to fare by Vergil’s side to dim Elysium’s land,
That none should be to plain of love in elegy’s soft lay
Or in heroic numbers sweep with princes to the fray.
VERSE TRANSLATION
Translated by Theodore C. Williams
CONTENTS
PREFACE
BOOK I
ELEGY THE FIRST
ELEGY THE SECOND
ELEGY THE THIRD
ELEGY THE FOURTH
ELEGY THE FIFTH
ELEGY THE SIXTH
ELEGY THE SEVENTH
ELEGY THE EIGHTH
ELEGY THE NINTH
ELEGY THE TENTH
ELEGY THE ELEVENTH
BOOK II
ELEGY THE FIRST
ELEGY THE SECOND
ELEGY THE THIRD
ELEGY THE FOURTH
ELEGY THE FIFTH
ELEGY THE SIXTH
BOOK III
ELEGY THE FIRST
ELEGY THE SECOND
ELEGY THE THIRD
ELEGY THE FOURTH
ELEGY THE FIFTH
ELEGY THE SIXTH
BOOK IV
ELEGY THE THIRTEENTH
OVID’S LAMENT FOR TIBULLUS’ DEATH
TO WILLIAM COE COLLAR
HEAD MASTER OF THE ROXBURY LATIN SCHOOL
Our old master ever young to his old boys:
Did Mentor with his mantle thee invest,
Or Chiron lend thee his persuasive lyre,
Or Socrates, of pedagogues the best,
Teach thee the harp-strings of a youth’s desire?
PREFACE
Albius Tibullus was a Roman gentleman, whose father fought on Pompey’s side. The precise dates of his birth and death are in doubt, and what we know of his life is all in his own poems; except that Horace condoles with him about Glycera, and Apuleius says Delia’s real name was Plautia.
Horace paid him this immortal compliment: (Epist. 4 bk. I).
“Albi nostrorum sermonum candide judex,
Non tu corpus eras sine pectore; Di tibi formam,
Di tibi divitias dederant, artemque fruendi.”
After his death, Ovid wrote him a fine elegy (); and Domitius Marsus a neat epigram. The former promised him an immortality equal to Homer’s; the latter sent him to Elysium at Virgil’s side. These excessive eulogies are the more remarkable in that Tibullus stood, proudly or indolently, aloof from the court. He never flatters Augustus nor mentions his name. He scoffs at riches, glory and war, wanting nothing but to triumph as a lover. Ovid dares to group him with the laurelled shades of Catullus and Gallus, of whom the former had lampooned the divine Julius and the latter had been exiled by Augustus.
But in spite of this contemporary succès d’estime, Tibullus is clearly a minor poet. He expresses only one aspect of his time. His few themes are oft-repeated and in monotonous rhythms. He sings of nothing greater than his own lost loves. Yet of Delia, Nemesis and Neaera, we learn only that all were fair, faithless and venal. For a man whose ideal of love was life-long fidelity, he was tragically unsuccessful.
If this were all, his verse would have perished with that of Macer and Gallus. But it is not all. These love-poems of a private gentleman of the Augustan time, show a delicacy of sentiment almost modern. Of the ribald curses which Catullus hurls after his departing Lesbia, there is nothing. He throws the blame on others: and if, just to frighten, he describes the wretched old age of the girls who never were faithful, it is with a playful tone and hoping such bad luck will never befall any sweet-heart of his. This delicacy and tenderness, with the playful accent, are, perhaps, Tibullus’ distinctive charm.
His popularity in 18th century France was very great. The current English version, Grainger’s (1755) with its cheap verse and common-place gallantries, is a stupid echo of the French feeling for Tibullus as an erotic poet. Much better is the witty prose version by the elder Mirabeau, done during the Terror, in the prison at Vincennes, and published after his release, with a ravishing portrait of “Sophie,” surrounded by Cupids and bil
ling doves. One of the old Parisian editors dared to say:
“Tons ceux qui aiment, ou qui ont jamais aimé, savent par coeur ce délicieux Tibulle.”
But it was unjust to classify Tibullus merely as an erotic poet. The gallants of the ancien régime were quite capable of writing their own valentines. Tibullus was popular as a sort of Latin Rousseau. He satirized rank, riches and glory as corrupting man’s primitive simplicity. He pled for a return to nature, to country-side, thatched cottages, ploughed fields, flocks, harvests, vintages and rustic holidays. He made this plea, not with an armoury of Greek learning, such as cumber Virgil and Horace, but with an original passion. He cannot speak of the jewelled Roman coquettes without a sigh for those happy times when Phoebus himself tended cattle and lived on curds and whey, all for the love of a king’s daughter.
For our own generation Tibullus has another claim to notice. All Augustan writers express their dread and weariness of war. But Tibullus protests as a survivor of the lost cause. He has been, himself, a soldier-lover maddened by separation. As an heir of the old order, he saw how vulgar and mercenary was this parvenu imperial glory, won at the expense of lost liberties and broken hearts. War, he says, is only the strife of robbers. Its motive is the spoils. It happens because beautiful women want emeralds, Indian slaves and glimmering silk from Cos. Therefore, of course, we fight. But if Neaera and her kind would eat acorns, as of old, we could burn the navies and build cities without walls.
He was indeed a minor poet. He does not carry forward, like Virgil, the whole heritage from the Greeks, or rise like him to idealizing the master-passion of his own age, that vision of a cosmopolitan world-state, centred at Rome and based upon eternal decrees of Fate and Jove. But neither was he duped, as Virgil was, into mistaking the blood-bought empire of the Caesars for the return of Saturn’s reign. Sometimes a minor poet, just by reason of his aloofness from the social trend of his time, may also escape its limitations, and sound some notes which remain forever true to what is unchanging in the human heart. I believe Tibullus has done so.
This translation has been done in the play-time of many busy years. I have used what few helps I could find, especially the Mirabeau, above alluded to. The text is often doubtful. But in so rambling a writer it has not seemed to me that the laborious transpositions of later German editors were important. I have rejected as probably spurious all of the fourth book but two short pieces. While I agree with those who find the third book doubtful, I have included it.
But from scholars I must ask indulgence. I have translated with latitude, considering whole phrases rather than single words. But I have always been faithful to the thought and spirit of the original, except in the few passages where euphemism was required. If the reader who has no Latin, gets a pleasing impression of Tibullus, that is what I have chiefly hoped to do. In my forth-coming translations of the Aeneid I have kept stricter watch upon verbal accuracy, as is due to an author better-known and more to be revered.
THEODORE C. WILLIAMS.
New York, 1905.
BOOK I
ELEGY THE FIRST
THE SIMPLE LIFE
Give, if thou wilt, for gold a life of toil!
Let endless acres claim thy care!
While sounds of war thy fearful slumbers spoil,
And far-off trumpets scare!
To me my poverty brings tranquil hours;
My lowly hearth-stone cheerly shines;
My modest garden bears me fruit and flowers,
And plenteous native wines.
I set my tender vines with timely skill,
Or pluck large apples from the bough;
Or goad my lazy steers to work my will,
Or guide my own rude plough.
Full tenderly upon my breast I bear
A lamb or small kid gone astray;
And yearly worship with my swains prepare,
The shepherd’s ancient way.
I love those rude shrines in a lonely field
Where rustic faith the god reveres,
Or flower-crowned cross-road mile-stones, half concealed
By gifts of travellers.
Whatever fruit the kindly seasons show,
Due tribute to our gods I pour;
O’er Ceres’ brows the tasseled wheat I throw,
Or wreathe her temple door.
My plenteous orchards fear no pelf or harm,
By red Priapus sentinelled;
By his huge sickle’s formidable charm
The bird thieves are dispelled.
With offerings at my hearth, and faithful fires,
My Lares I revere: not now
As when with greater gifts my wealthier sires
Performed the hallowing vow.
No herds have I like theirs: I only bring
One white lamb from my little fold,
While my few bondmen at the altar sing
Our harvest anthems old.
Gods of my hearth! ye never learned to slight
A poor man’s gift. My bowls of clay
To ye are hallowed by the cleansing rite,
The best, most ancient way.
If from my sheep the thief, the wolf, be driven,
If fatter flocks allure them more,
To me the riches to my fathers given
Kind Heaven need not restore.
My small, sure crop contents me; and the storm
That pelts my thatch breaks not my rest,
While to my heart I clasp the beauteous form
Of her it loves the best.
My simple cot brings such secure repose,
When so companioned I can lie,
That winds of winter and the whirling snows
Sing me soft lullaby.
This lot be mine! I envy not their gold
Who rove the furious ocean foam:
A frugal life will all my pleasures hold,
If love be mine, and home.
Enough I travel, if I steal away
To sleep at noon-tide by the flow
Of some cool stream. Could India’s jewels pay
For longer absence? No!
Let great Messala vanquish land and sea,
And deck with spoils his golden hall!
I am myself a conquest, and must be
My Delia’s captive thrall.
Be Delia mine, and Fame may flout and scorn,
Or brand me with the sluggard’s name!
With cheerful hands I’ll plant my upland corn,
And live to laugh at Fame.
If I might hold my Delia to my side,
The bare ground were a happier bed
Than theirs who, on a couch of silken pride,
Must mourn for love long dead.
Gilt couch, soft down, slow fountains murmuring song —
These bring no peace. Befooled by words
Was he who, when in love a victor strong,
Left it for spoils and swords.
For such let sad Cilicia’s captives bleed,
Her citadels his legions hold!
And let him stride his swift, triumphal steed,
In silvered robes or gold!
These eyes of mine would look on only thee
In that last hour when light shall fail.
Embrace me, dear, in death! Let thy hand be
In my cold fingers pale!
With thine own arms my lifeless body lay
On that cold couch so soon on fire!
Give thy last kisses to my grateful clay,
And weep beside my pyre!
And weep! Ah, me! Thy heart will wear no steel
Nor be stone-cold that rueful day:
Thy faithful grief may all true lovers feel
Nor tearless turn away!
Yet ask I not that thou shouldst vex my shade
With cheek all wan and blighted brow:
But, O, to-day be love’s full tribute paid,
While the swift Fates allow.
Soon Death, with shadow-mantled head, w
ill come,
Soon palsied age will creep our way,
Bidding love’s flatteries at last be dumb,
Unfit for old and gray.
But light-winged Venus still is smiling fair:
By night or noon we heed her call;
To pound on midnight doors I still may dare,
Or brave for love a brawl.
I am a soldier and a captain good
In love’s campaign, and calmly yield
To all who hunger after wounds and blood,
War’s trumpet-echoing field.
Ye toils and triumphs unto glory dear!
Ye riches home from conquest borne!
If my small fields their wonted harvest bear,
Both wealth and want I scorn!
ELEGY THE SECOND
LOVE AND WITCHCRAFT
Bring larger bowls and give my sorrows wine,
By heaviest slumbers be my brain possessed!
Soothe my sad brows with Bacchus’ gift divine,
Nor wake me while my hapless passions rest!
For Delia’s jealous master at her door
Has set a watch, and bolts it with stern steel.
May wintry tempests strike it o’er and o’er,
And amorous Jove crash through with thunder-peal!
My sighs alone, O Door, should pierce thee through,
Or backward upon soundless hinges turn.
The curses my mad rhymes upon thee threw, —
Forgive them! — Ah! in my own breast they burn!
May I not move thee to remember now
How oft, dear Door, thou wert love’s place of prayer?
While with fond kiss and supplicating vow,
I hung thee o’er with many a garland fair?
In vain the prayer! Thine own resolve must break
Thy prison, Delia, and its guards evade.
Bid them defiance for thy lover’s sake!
Be bold! The brave bring Venus to their aid.
’Tis Venus guides a youth through doors unknown;
