P. Ovidius Naso, Ars Amatoria
various, Ed.

1 The poet here lays down the proposition of the work, which he comprehends in the two first verses: he then invokes the assistance of the gods and begins his narration.

2 One must learn to love, and what to love: for love is so far from being forbidden, that there is nothing so commendable, provided the object is good.

3 He speaks of love who is very seldom guided by reason.

4 This alludes to his killing Hector, as in the 22nd book of Homer's Iliads.

5 Achilles, when he was a lad, was put to this centaur to be educated.

6 Cupid was the son of Venus, and Achilles of Thetis. Both were children alike, and both hard to govern. For, indeed, the passions of love and glory are not easily overcome by reason, which ought always to be mistress.

7 This he says to show us that love may also be tamed by habit. Ovid is full of these sort of similes.

8 From whence the ancients drew their auguries. To which the poet here alludes.

9 Ovid names Clio only, of all the nine, in this place. The fable tells us, she and her sisters were born of Jupiter's caresses of Mnemosyne, that is, memory.

10 It has been before observed, that Ovid invokes the goddess of love to assist his song, as Lucretius does the same divinity for his world of nature, as being the mother of all generations, and all productions.

11 The author forewarns all virgins, and chaste persons, not to follow, in all things, the precepts of his book.

12 The poet here gives his advice as to three things: to seek after an amiable object: to win it by respect and complacency, and not to lose it after once gotten.

13 That is, while you are a freeman, unmarried, and not engaged to any other mistress. The truest meaning that can be given, is, that while you are young, and are not yet troubled with the infirmities of age (for an old man in love is ridiculous) choose where you please.

14 This was a shady walk which Pompey built for the people; and there were several in Rome of the same sort; but the most admirable one of all the porticos, was the Corinthian, near the Flaminian cirque, built by Cneius Octavius.

15 It was the custom among the Romans, to meet in the temples of Venus to mourn Adonis; of which the prophet Ezekiel speaks, (Ezek. viii. 14.); and infamous acts of lewdness were there committed, if we may believe Juvenal in his sixth satire.

16 There were great numbers of the Jews at Rome in Augustus's reign, who were allowed full liberty to exercise their ceremonies, according to the law of Moses. And the Roman ladies went often to see them out of curiosity, which gave occasion for assignations at their synagogues.

17 That is, many women were debauched by Isis's means, as she was by Jupiter under the name of Io.

18 The following verses are a happy paraphrase of Ovid; in whose time we find the long robe dealt as much with the stola, etc., as it does in our own.

19 We see these assemblies were composed of all sorts of persons; upon which our French author remarks thus: " This does not very well agree to the practice in our days; and I cannot comprehend how gallant women could frequent the courts of justice : where it is to be supposed, nobody came but such as had business and suits depending."

20 It must be owned, the theatres, amphitheatres, cirques, hippodromes, and all places where the public feasts and rejoicings were kept, were very fatal to the chastity of the women of old.

21 This idea of the Roman theatres in their infancy, may put us in mind of our own which we read of in the old poets, in Black-friars, the Bull-and-mouth, and Barbican, not much better than the strollers at a country-fair. Yet this must be said for them: that the audience were much better treated; their fare was good, though the house was homely. Which cannot be said of the Roman infant-stage, their wit and their theatres were alike rude; and the Shakspeares and Jonsons of Rome did not appear till the stage was pompous, and the scene magnificent.

22 At which the soldiers were to fall on the women. The poet and his translators make an agreeable description of this rape. Some say there were thirty of these Sabines ravished: others, as Valerius Antius, make the number to be four hundred and twenty-seven: and Jubas, as Plutarch writes in the life of Romulus, swells it to six hundred.

23 It is plain by this, the ancient Romans used to make love by signs on their fingers like the modern Spaniards and Portuguese; and this talking on the fingers is very common among us ever since Dr. Holder and Dr. Wallis taught by Mr. Popham, who was born deaf and dumb, with whom I have, however, myself held a conversation of many hours, and that many hundred times, by the help of our fingers. But the poet says there was no occasion of this dumb language at the cirque; for there was so much noise, that lovers might entertain one another as they pleased, without fear of being overheard.

24 Young men are apt enough to do this of themselves, and need no advice; yet Juvenal, like Ovid, puts them in mind of it.

25 The naval combats were represented in a place dug on purpose on the banks of the Tiber; it was called Naumachia; and when occasion required the river water was let into it. Tacitus, in his twelfth book, makes mention of a representation of the naval battle of Actium.

26 Augustus having put an end to the war in Spain, undertook an expedition into Asia, and began the Parthian war; in which he recovered the ensigns that had been taken from the Romans in the defeat of Crassus, which these verses refer to.

27 He alludes to the triumphs of the Roman conquerors: they were wonderfully magnificent, accompanied with rich spoils and pictures of rivers, mountains, cities, and provinces conquered by them: not to speak of the captive kings and great captains that followed the victor's car in chains: but there is so much insolence in this custom, that, with all its magnificence, we cannot in our own times relish it.

28 The night is an ill time to choose a mistress in. We have a saying in England, "Women and linen look best by candle-light."

29 The Phrygian shepherd, to judge the beauty of these three goddesses demanded to see them naked; and the goddess were so eager to have the question decided by him, that they made no scruple to satisfy his demands.

30 This temple was in the neighbourhood of Rome, in a valley, where there is also a sacred wood. There were abundance of candles used in it, as we read in Ovid de Fastis.

31 The sovereign priest of Diana, Aricina, called himself king, and often got that dignity by gaining the better of his opponent in single combat.

32 The celestial Venus is more charming than the terrestrial, and divine love soon extinguishes carnal, which burns with an obscure fire: whereas the divine enlightens those that it warms with holy desires; it leaves no string behind it and never has an end.

33 Myrrha's love of her father Cinyras is not a fable. At least Pliny relates this adventure as a memorable story, and says Cinyras lived two hundred and ten years, and that his daughter took her mother's place, while she was busied about the sacrifices to Ceres. But that her father discovering her insolence, ran after her a long time with a sword in his hand. The fable adds, she got away by favour of the night, and fled to the Sabeans, where she was changed into a tree, which bears her name. See the 10th book of the Metamorphoses.

34 Pasiphae, daughter of the sun, and wife to Minos king of Crete, is fabled to be enamoured of a bull: and Daedalus, the famous mechanic, assisted her to enjoy her detestable desires, by making a machine like a cow; within which she was caressed by her gallant. From this intrigue the Minotaur was born, half man and half bull, who was enclosed in a labyrinth, and by the assistance of Ariadne killed by Theseus.

35 This known fable is told us thus: Jupiter falling in love with Europa daughter of Agenor, king of Phoenicia, and taking the shape of a bull, ravished her in the Dictaean cave; and begot Minos and Radamanthus. The fable of Io is this; she is said to be the daughter of Inachus debauched by Jupiter and turned into a cow ; which jealous Juno perceiving, she begged the cow; and commanded Argos, who had a hundred eyes, to watch her; but Mercury killed her keeper by Jupiter's orders. Upon which Juno struck Io with madness, and she flung herself into the sea, which from her was called the Ionian, and swimming to Egypt, was there worshipped by the name of Isis, having first resumed her shape, and married king Osiris.

36 Atreus's wife's name was Aeropa. She suffered herself to be debauched by her brother-in-law, Thyestes.

37 Her name was Scylla, and she betrayed her father, in favour of her gallant, Minos.

38 Clytemnestra, and the adulterer Aegistheus, murdered Agamemnon: upon whose death Seneca wrote the tragedy called Agamemnon.

39 Phoenix the son of Amyntor, enjoyed a woman whom his father loved. His father was so enraged at him, that he imprecated all the miseries he could think of to light upon his son: whose children dying, he withdrew to Peleus, father of Achilles, who committed to him the care of his son's education.

40 Hippolytus, the son of Theseus, was pulled to pieces by horses. Our author in his French observations says this fable is admirably well represented in the tragedy of Seneca.

41 That was a very unfortunate day for the people of Rome, their army being cut in pieces by the Gauls near the river Allis, the 15th of the calends of August, in the year of the city 363.

42 On the mistress's birthday: these presents were commonly cakes; but we find the ladies were not satisfied with cakes only, they wanted pendants for the ears; and the way to get them is much the same in the gallant world now as in Ovid's days.

43 There are few coquets who will lose anything for want of asking; they borrow what they never tend to restore; and this jilting humor is so livelily painted here by the poet, that one would think he had lived in another reign than that of Augustus.

44 In this expression, which is Ovid's in the main, the Romans bore with an idea that perhaps the delicacy of the moderns will be offended with. The smell of a ram or goat is very rank, and from those animals the proverb came.

45 Wine is favourable to lovers, inspiring them at once with boldness and vigour.

46 Cymbals. drums, little bells, and pipes, were Bacchus and mother Cybele's consort.

47 It was an ancient custom to sing hymns of joy at weddings; which hymns were called epithalamius, or hymeneans, from a certain Athenian named Hymen, who, as Servins reports, delivered maids from a terrible trouble, or which they used to invoke him when they married, as the god who eased them of the burden of their maidenheads: le liberateur de leur virginité as my French author has it; and whether it is more a slavery or a burden, let the satirists determine.

48 The poet's directions how the lover should behave himself at table, are very considerable in the affair he is speaking of.

49 Spill some wine and write her name. This is not worthy the Roman elegance in all things; and, as a late commentattor observes upon this occasion they could have no tablecloths; for otherwise Ovid's advice is not feasible.

50 This and the verses that follow show that Ovid did not mean very honestly, and the decree of the senate was obtained against him for this crime, as it is pretended, because it was strictly forbidden by the Roman laws to corrupt married women, to prevent the abuses which might happen in succession, and the injuring another man in taking from him what only belongs to himself.

51 Eurythus, or Eurytion, was one of the centaurs at Pirithous's wedding, who got so drunk that he attempted to ravish Hippodamia, the bride; but Theseus knocked him down with a bowl, and made him bring up his wine again with blood.

52 Modesty is a vice, when it hinders us from doing anything that is profitable to us; and the misfortune is, it generally comes upon us most unseasonably, and when it should not. When it should, we commonly miss it; and when we do not want it, it is impertinent.

53 He talks of modesty, and says, if the lover banishes it, he has no occasion for eloquence; for love and fortune favour the bold.

54 Speaking of the gods, according to the stoics' opinion, which, contrary to the Epicureans, asserted that the deities concerned themselves in the affairs of this world.

55 This is a very severe reflection on the sex, and it is hoped, whatever it might be in Ovid's time, the scandal will not stick now.

56 To their dull mates the noble ravisher. Phoebe and Ilara were two daughters of Leucippus, both famous for their beauty. Their father promised them in marriage to Idas and Lynceus, but Castor and Pollux stole them away from him. Idas and Lynceus pursuing the ravishers, Caster fell by the hands of Lynceus, and Lynceus was himself slain by Pollux: Idas running upon the latter to revenge the death of his companion, was struck to the ground thunder at Pollux feet; which Ovid has elegantly described in his de Fastis.

57 Minerva or Pallas was not only the goddess of arms, but of arts and manufactures. The poet means he has learnt of her enough to spin, let him now learn of her the more glorious exercise of arms.

58 Orion fell in love with the nymph Lyrice, some name her Lynce, from a lynx, a wild beast so called, which is Merula's interpretation. But though who this Lyrice was is not very well known, yet it is not likely that Orion should be so passionately enamoured of a wild beast, and it is very probable he might be so charmed with a beautiul damsel.

59 Patroclus, son of Menoeceus, and grandson of Actor, who having killed Clytonymus, son of Amphidamus, was banished his country, and came to Phthia, where he remained with Peleus, Achilles's father, his kinmnan. By these means he contracted a strict friendship with Achilles, and accompanied him to the siege of Troy, where he was killed.

60 Hermione, daughter of Menelaus and Helen, who married her cousin-german, Orestes. Pylades was her husband's friend, and therefore he would not offer to corrupt his wife. This king was the son of Strophius king of Phocis.

61 This is one of Ovid's happy ways of making use of common similes, and this and others are brought in here, to show a lover must comport himself variously, according to the various humors of women.

62 This gives us a various idea, and livelily expresses the author's thoughts, that women are to be caught several ways.

63 To cast anchor, as Ovid says, “Hic teneat nostras anchora iacta rates”, as one arrived at a port, where, though he is not to stay long, he intends to refresh himself.

64 The Chaonian bird is a dove. Chaonia is part of Epirus, so called from the fate of Chaon, an Athenian. There wasa temple of Dodonian Jupiter, where doves dispensed the sacred oracles with human voices. In the forest of Dodona, in Epirus, not far from the temple, there were doves thatprophecied. From whence, says Servius, comes the fable that Peliades, in the Thessalian tongue, signifies prophet and dove. Pausanias says that these doves gave answers from the Dodonean oaks. But Herodotus, in his Euterpe, writes, that these doves were prophecying women.

65 That is, riches will do all things, and interest easily gains a woman's heart, because the sex is generally covetous.

66 It is certain, no creature is so stately and fierce as a lion who, when he is hunted by dogs and huntsmen in the open field, seems to despise his pursuers, and flies slowly from them; but when he is in the woods, and thinks his shame may be saved by flight, he runs with great speed to avoid them. The first that ever tamed a lion, was a noble Carthaginian, whose name was Hanno; and he was condemned for that very reason: the Carthaginians not thinking their liberty could be secure, while a person lived who was able to tame so fierce an animal.

67 Speaking of Hercules, who for the love of Omphale used the distaff and basket, according to the fashion of the Ionian damsels.

68 This fable of Hero and Leander is as well known as any in Ovid; he treats of it in his epistles: we find it also in Musaeus's poem, and in Martial's epigrams.

69 This has allusion to a festival celebrated at Rome by the servants, in remembrance of a great piece of service their predecessors had done the Romans, soon after the invasion of the Gauls; the time of celebrating it was in July. It was done in honour of Juno Caprotina according to Macrobius, in his Saturnalia, book i. chap. 2. The free maidens and servants, says the same author, sacrificed on that day to Juno, under a wild fig-tree, called in Latin Caprilicus, in memory of that complaisant virtue which inspired the servant maids to expose themselves to the lust and revenge of the enemy for the preservation of the public honour. For after the Gauls had taken the city, and were driven out again, when things were restored to their former order, the neighbouring nations believing the Romans were very much weakened by the late invasion, siege, and sack, took hold of that opportunity to invade them, choosing Posthumius Livius of Fidenes for their chief, and demanded of the senate, that if they would preserve their city and authority, they should send them their wives and daughters. The senators taking the matter into consideration, could not tell what answer to return. They knew their own weakness and the strength of their enemies; and in this uncertainty a servant-maid called Tutelar, or Philotis. offered to go with some other maids of the same condition to the enemy. This proposal was generally liked, and accordingly the maids were dressed like the wives of the senators, and the daughters of free citizens, and went weeping to put themselves into the hands of the invaders. Livius ordered them to be dispersed into several quarters; and, as they had agreed among themselves, they tempted their new husbands to drink, pretending that day ought to be celebrated as a festival; and when they were almost dead drunk they gave the Romans a signal from the top of a fig-tree to fall on. The latter were encamped not far off; and at this signal they assautled and easily mastered the enemy's camp. putting most of them to the sword. The senate, to reward this important service, ordered that the servants should be made free, that they should have portions paid to them out of the public treasury, and allowed them to wear the ornaments they had taken. The day on which this happy expedition was executed, was called the Caprotine nones, from the wild fig-tree Caprificus, from whence the signa was given to the Romans to sally out and gain so glorious a victory; in remembrance of which action the servants sacrificed every year under this or some other fig-tree. Plutarch relates the same story in the life of Camillus.

70 We may perceive that either ladies were not so nice in managing their hair before their lovers in Ovid's time, or that the ladies he speaks of were not the nicest. They curled their hair with a bodkin, and sometimes with a hot iron, as in our lays; but they showed more of it than is the fashion with the modern ladies.

71 This and the following similes are taken from country affairs, which have an agreeable effect on this occasion, when the poet speaks of the tendency of every living thing to love.

72 Aonia is taken here for Boeotia, of which Thebes was the capital, where Bacchus was born; and the fury that transports people when they are drunk, is very well compared to that of wild beasts and vipers.

73 Progne, the wife of Tereus, king of Thrace, killed her own daughters and presented them to her husband, because he had ravished her sister Philumela.

74 Especially hens and partridges, which, as Almansor teaches, are wonderfully provocative. Pliny says they are very nourishing if not eaten to excess.

75 The sun sees all things, and nothing can avoid being seen by it, any more than it can dispense with being warmed by it.

76 He means intercepting a rival's letter, and discovering the contents. To intercept letters, and divulge a secret, was a crime punishable by the laws, by banishment, or interdiction of fire and water, by which was understood exile.

77 This is a simile, and shows us it was not lawful to reveal the mysteries of Ceres. Macrobius in the 11th chapter of his first book upon Scipio's dream, writes that the philosopher Numenius, being too curious to know the secrets of hidden things, incurred the wrath of the gods by divulging the Eleusinian mysteries, which were the same with those of Ceres.

78 He proves by the example of Tantalus, that no man should reveal secrets. Tantalus, so Diodorus tells us, was the son of Jupiter and the nymph Plota, equally rich and renowned. He dwelt in Paphlagonia, and was favoured by the gods for the dignity of his birth ; but having been told some of their secrets, and divulging them to mortals, he was thrown into hell for his crime, where his punishment was what Ovid tells us.

79 And who is there so ignorant as not to know that the fops of our age are exactly like those of Ovid's?

80 That is, as this poet elsewhere says, she was swarthy, or had not a good skin and complexion, yet Perseus liked her, delivered her from a sea-monster and married her.

81 The poet means she was very tall; so much so, that it was rather a disadvantage than a beauty, yet Hector thought she was of a moderate height. This princess was the daughtor of Aetion king of Thebes, and Hector's wife. Ovid is not the only author who takes notice of her tallness. Juvenal, in his sixth satire, wherein he rallies a lady of his time, who dressed her head very high, says she affected to have the air of Andromache.

82 Blacker than Illyrian pitch, says Ovid. by which we find Illyria was famous for it. The Greeks called the people who lived above Macedonia and Thrace, as far as Chaonia and Thesprotus to the Danube, Illyrians, according to Appian.

83 He speaks of obscene pictures representing nudities, and different postures, such as Carraccio's and Aretin's in latter days. For there was as bad in old times composed by Elephantis, from which Tiberius took the figures that were painted in his bed-chamber and closet.

84 From this we may perceive our poet abhorred the gallantry too much practiced among the Romans then, and Italians now, as well as in the eastern countries. Indeed, we can find nothing like it in all his writings, which can hardly be said of any of his contemporary poets, or scarcely in one of their authors at all, before or after him, until the Romans embraced Christianity. He says it is true, he is only less touched with that beastly passion; and by that is to be understood he was not touched at all.

85 Ovid, who was advanced a little too far, checks his muse, and bids her give back. It is certain, he ought to have stopped here: but he could not forbear telling what he had in his head. He, however, says but a little, and it is not necessary to explain it: the subject is too well known already. If our moralizing was convenient at any time, it must be now, for fear our imagination should out-run the poet's. As Ovid tells his muse here, so every man should tell himself, even in the most excellent things: when we are arrived at a certain point, we should abstain from saying any more, we should enioy the charms of philosophy retired. and by ourselves : for as the way of the world is now. it is scandalous in some companies to talk of it: and there are men even so stupid, as a ways to turn it in into ridicule. I shall be glad if my author's arguments have the effect he pretends to on this occasion.

86 As he could observe the flights of birds, or the entrails of beasts. Calchas was the son of Thestor, as Homer writes in his lst Iliad, famous for his skill in the art of divination, which he learnt of Apollo.

87 This he speaks by way of metaphor for some lady hard overcome, as if all lovers were warriors.

88 Agamemnon and Menelaus, two brothers, married two sisters: both the sisters preferred gallants to their husbands.

89 Her chastity is often mentioned to the reputation of the fair.

90 Protesilaus, Laodamia's husband, was the first Greek who was killed in the Trojan War. When his wife heard the news she desired to see his ghost; which being granted by the gods, she embraced it so closely, that she perished in its embraces.

91 She was represented at Rome in a woman's habit, and a temple and stars were dedicated to her.

92 Phyllis despairing of the return of Demophoon, to whom she had granted her last favours, was about to hang herself, when, as the fable says. the gods, in compassion to her, turned her to an almond tree without leaves: Demophoon, some time after this. returning, went and embraced his metamorphosed mistress, and the tree afterwards put forth leaves.

93 It is certain that none can make too much haste to acquire the good graces of philosophy and fine learning; for which, youth, genius, and the strength of maturity are necessary.

94 Though Ovid has gone very far out of the way for this simile, yet in this place it has a good effect.

95 The capitol was a hill in Rome, so called from a man's head which was found there as the Romans were digging the foundation of the temple of Jupiter. So Livy and Dionysius write. It first went by the name of Saturnian, and afterwards by that of Tarpeian, from the name of the vestal Tarpeia, who was crushed to death by the weight of the arms of the Sabines that were thrown upon her, after she had delivered the place to them on condition those arms should be given to her. Tarquin built a temple there, which was dedicated by the consul Horatius. This edifice being, as Appius writes, destroyed in the civil wars, Scylla rebuilt it, and Catullus dedicated it. Vespasian restored it after he had put an end to the war against the Vitellians, or the party of Vitellius. It was not many years before it was burnt : and Domitian rebuilt it again, as Tacitus reports in his 10th book.

96 Varro writes that there were two sorts of courts in the capitol; one for the delivering of sacred matters, and the other for affairs of state. Both the one and the other were called Curia, a cunando, from the care that was taken there: one went by the name of Hostilia. from Hostilius. the fourth king of Rome: and before this were the Rostra; which took their names from the heads of ships that were hung up there, as may be seen by the eighth book of Livy.

97 By this we perceive the Roman ladies were as fond of fashions as the French, or the English, too much their imitators.

98 Women rarely shed their hair; eunuchs not at all. And no animal, with the exception of man, becomes bald about the temples and ears.

99 They dyed their hair with the juice of herbs. according to the fashion of the Germans, who make use of certain herbs to darken their hair, or dye it any other colour to disguise their age, and appear young. The Gauls made use of an herb which is called guesde, or woad, as Caesar reports in the third book of his commentaries.

100 The Tyrian scarlet was the finest dye in the world; preferable to that of Amyclea near Sparta, though that was also excellent. This scarlet is often confounded with purple, of which there were two sorts, one of a pomegranate colour, as the African, and the other of a reddish scarlet, as the Tyrian. Tibullus speaks of them distinctly.

101 The colour like that of Phryxus's ram. He was the son of Athamas king of Thebes, and to avoid the anger of Ino, his mother-in-law, fled with his sister Helle upon a ram with a golden fleece. His sister tumbling into the sea gave it the name of Hellespont, but he arriving at Colchos sacrificed the rain to Mars, who placed it in the zodiac. The golden fleece was hung in a temple, consecrated to Mars, and under the keeping of a dragon.

102 It is thought he means that Venus of which Pliny speaks, and which was in Octavia's portico in the temple of Jupiter. She is described as rising out of the sea with her hair still wet; such as Apelles painted her.

103 Semele was daughter of Cadmus, and mother of Bacchus by Jupiter, whom having the curiosity to enjoy in all his celestial majesty, she was burnt by lightning. Leda was the daughter of Thestius and mother of Castor and Pollux, whom she had by Jupiter, who in the shape of a swan enjoyed her as she bathed in the river Eurotas.

104 The Sidonian Europa, daughter of Agenor, king of Phoenicia, whom Jupiter fell in love with, and ravished her in the shape of a bull.

105 The story of Paris and Helen, and the Trojan war, is so common that we shall say no more of it.

106 Bolsters are yet in use, both for this defect in women, and in calved stockings for the men. And it is satisfactory to the curious to know that this fashion is 1800 years old.

107 Ovid here advises the ladies to learn to sing, and takes his comparisons from the Sirens. They were three in number, half women and half fish; one made use of her voice, another her lyre. and another her flute. Their haunt was on the coast of Sicily, where they charmed voyagers by their singing, but Ulysses escaped them.

108 Those airs were a sort of sarabands, in vogue among the Egyptian and Gades. The movement was dissolute and provoked to lust, as one may see by Martial.

109 He means the wall of Thebes, built by the sound of Amphion's lyre. He was the son of Jupiter and Antiope. Eusebius writes that Amphion reigned at Thebes, and made rocks move with the sound of his lyre.

110 Arion was a celebrated musician of antiquity. of whom Ovid in the second book makes mention. Some say he was a poet and musician of Lesbos. Having got a great deal of money, and returning from his travels home by sea. the sailors robbed and threw him over-board; when a dolphin charmed with his music, conveyed hin safe to Peloponesus; where he procured Periander to put the sailors to death. The poet, by all these instances of the power of music, would persuade the ladies to learn it, as the version tells us.

111 Callimachus was a considerable poet, and, according to Quintilian, the first that wrote elegies in Greek. He was the son of Battus, who built Cyrene.

112 Philetas was a native of the island of Cos in the AEgean sea; a celebrated poet and writer of elegies, and flourished under Philip and his son Alexander the Great. Ovid calls Anacreon the old man of Teios, who loved drinking so well. He was a lyric poet, and Pliny tells us he choked himself with a grape-stone as he was drinking.

113 The ancients used to call their servants by the names of the countries from whence they came, as Lydus, Syrus. Dacus; so Geta comes from the country of Getae. The French to this day do the same, and call their footmen Champagne, le Picard, le Gascon, le Bourginon. etc. And Sir George Etheridge, in his Sir Fopling Flutter, the Hampshire, etc., speaking to his valet imitates this custom.

114 Sappho is made famous by almost all the poets of antiquity, as well as by her own writings. She was born at Mytelene in the Isle of Lesbos, and was contemporary with Alceus. She wrote nine books of elegy, and several epigrams and satires. The Sapphic verges took their name from her. There is nothing of her compositions extant, besides a hymn to Venus, and an ode to a young girl whom she loved. According to some authors, she flung herself into the sea because Phaon neglected her. Her sentiments were very tender in her verses, wherefore Ovid advises lovers to read them.

115 Sextus Aurelius Propertius was a native of Umbria, that rude part of Italy; so that we find genius and politeness are not confined to places. He was very much esteemed by Maecenas, and his works are still extant.

116 Every body who is the least acquainted with antiquity, knows he was one of the first wits of the Augustan age, and a man of gallantry and profusion, wasting his estate, even while he was in his youth, on his extravagancies and pleasures. Horace speaks of him as his friend; and Ovid reckons him amongst the best writers of his time.

117 The Romans were great encouragers of their dancers and mimes; some of them grew very eminent, such as Roscius Amerinus, for whom Cicero pronounced that fine oration; some of them also grew prodligiously rich, as Clodius Aesopus, of whose luxury Pliny makes mention; and Horace in the third satire of his second book, speaks of the son of this Aesopus, who swallowed a pearl of great price in one of his frolics.

118 Latronum praelia ludet, is the same which the version renders chess; but what the Tessara Missa, of which we have spoken, is, none of the critics are clear in; those who come nearest suppose them to be billiard balls. Merula's explanation is very obscure; nor is Mycillus's much clearer. The latronum proelia is with more certainty interpreted to be chess. There is another game mentioned by the poet Reticuloque, etc., which none of the commentators have explained clearly; but the tunos lapillos is by all of them agreed to be what we call merills, a boyish game which Ovid describes so well, there is no doubt but it is the same. The dye spoken of here is supposed to refer to a game like the modern trick-track.

119 The sun is the master planet, and Leo the fifth sign in the zodiac, by astronomers called the House of the Sun, which therein causes the greatest heats.

120 They were the most noted in Rome, and in the Field of Mars.

121 It is said Phoebus descended at the battle of Actium, and was present on the Roman side when Augustus beat Mark Antony.

122 Thamyras son of Philamon, of whom it is said, that as he returned from the city of Aetolia, he met with the muses by the way, and was so proud of his singing he fancied he could out-do them in that art; at which the daughters of Jupiter were so enraged that, in revenge, they deprived him of the use of his reason; as Homer writes in his second Iliad. Diodorus says they only took away his voice, and his art of playing on the lyre. The Latins say they struck him blind.

123 Every one has heard of Apelles, the famous painter. He was a native of Cos, or, as others write, Ephesus, and born in the 112th Olympiad, about the 422nd year of Rome. For his great skill in his art he was called the prince of painters; and so industrious, that Nulla dies sine linea is his known motto. Alexander forbad any painter but him to draw his portrait. His master-piece was reckoned the Venus rising out of the sea, of which Ovid speaks, and which the Emperor Augustus dedicated in the temple of his father Julius Caesar. This piece was at last ruined by time, and Nero put another in its place, drawn by Dorotheus. Apelles had begun another Venus for the inhabitants of Cos, which would have excelled the first, but he was hindered by death from finishing it; and after him none had the boldness to put the last hand to it, as Pliny informs us.

124 Homer's name, and the contention of seven cities for him, are so well known, that there is no need of saying much about it; he was so called from his blindness. He was the most famous of all the Greek poets, but poor to the extermity of begging. His Iliads and Odyssey are to this day in the first rank of heroic poems, and the Aeneids only dispute with them the pre-eminence.

125 Danae, daughter of Acrisius king of Argos; who having consulted the oracle, and being told that she should be killed by her son, shut her up in a brazen tower to prevent it. Jupiter transforming himself into a golden shower, bribed her keepers, and got her with child; which. beingborn, was the renowned Perseus. Her father commanded both the babe and the mother to be thrown into the sea; but being unfortunately cast ashore on one of the islands called Cyclades, the king of the island married the mother; and Perseus, when he was grown up, unwittingly killed his grandfather.

126 Priam king of Troy, and father of Paris, who stole Helen, was for restoring her to the Greeks, when they demanded her by their ambassadors; but other courses prevailing, the war ensued, which ended in the destruction of Troy and the death of Priam, who was killed by Pyrrhus, son of Achilles, after forty years' reign.

127 The temple of Venus stood in the Appian way, and the gallant women used to frequent it to meet their sparks.

128 The poet, in his advice to the men, has given them the same caution, when they write letters to show their passion, and not their wit, which is a rule that will last as long as truth and reason.

129 This is very delicate, and shows of what importance it is to beauty to be well bred, if it would be victorious.

130 Minerva playing on her flute by the river side, and seeing in the water what grimaces it obliged her to make, she flung away the instrument in a passion, and cursed it so much that he who made use of it afterwards had cause to repent it.

131 Nemesis was the goddess of justice; Adrastus built the first temple to her. The Romans invoked here before they went to battle, and returned her thanks after victory. But the Nemesis here is the woman whom Tibullus loved and celebrated in his poems, while Cynthia is the woman about whom Propertius wrote.

132 In the verses of the poet Gallus, who was greatly enamoured of her.

133 Ovid sung his mistress by that name, which is supposed to be a nom de guerre taken from the Grecian poetess, who, as we are told, won the prize for poetry four or five times from Pindar; however, those who say so, own her beauty contributed much to that advantage. There were two Corinnas, one a Theban, who wrote epigrams and lyric poems, and contended with Pindar; the other was a Thespian, whom some call Corinthia. Ovid gave the name of Corinna to his mistress on account of her beauty and wit.

134 Ladies must keep out both husbands and lovers to raise their passion, which is apt to be cloyed when admittance is too easy.

135 Thais was a name given to all sorts of lewd women who affected discretion.

136 The fable of Argus has been spoken of before; he had a hundred eyes, and kept Io from Jupiter by Juno's order; for which Mercury killed him by command of his father Jove. To make him amends Juno turned him into a peacock, and placed his eyes in the tail.

137 Alluding to those wicked women who rose against the men, and did not spare their own husbands.

138 The priestesses and priests of Bacchus, who celebrated the festival of that god, did it with the noise of shouts, drums, timbrels, and cymbals, were crowned with ivy, vine, etc., and carried a thyrsus or staff wove with it in their hands; they were frantic and outrageous in their actions during the cerremony.

139 To show that he treats of love affairs, represented by the swans that are said to draw Venus' car sometimes; though doves are more often harnessed on this occasion. As to swans, Ovid observes in his Metamorphoses, that they were put to this use.