Selected Epigrams

by Martial

  9.44. According to Shackleton Bailey, this poem concerns a statuette of Hercules owned by the poet Novius Vindex and written about by both Martial and Statius. The statuette was supposedly made by Lysippus for Alexander the Great (2:270n). By pretending to think it was made instead by Phidias, whom Martial consistently mentions as one of the greatest Greek artists (Henriksén 200), Martial is complimenting the statuette. For a poet not to know Greek would have been extremely embarrassing (199). Here Martial pretends ignorance partly to turn the joke on himself and partly to set up the compliment.

  9.50. Martial compares his poems to two famous bronze statuettes that were acknowledged masterpieces: Brutus’ boy, a statuette by Strongylion that was a favorite of Brutus the Tyrannicide, and Langon, a statuette of a boy by Lyciscus (Henriksén 222–23). The Greek name Gaurus means “haughty, disdainful” (219), which fits the attitude of the poet described in this epigram.

  9.52. Quintus Ovidius, one of Martial’s best friends, had a farm next to his in Nomentum. Martial alludes to the custom of using a white pebble to mark an especially fortunate day on the calendar (Henriksén 229).

  9.53. This poem is also addressed to Quintus Ovidius, a close friend of Martial’s who is mentioned in 9.52 and in several other poems (Shackleton Bailey 3:372). He was a close enough friend that he would not be offended by the joking reference to his imperiousness or the suggestion that he give Martial a gift instead of receiving one from him.

  9.60. Henriksén notes that floral garlands were common gifts between friends; the recipient, Caesius Sabinus, was mentioned as well in several other epigrams of Martial’s. Paestum, Praeneste, and Campania were all famous for their roses, and Tusculum for its violets, whereas Martial frequently complains of the meager output of his farm at Nomentum. Nevertheless, he suggests that the gift will seem more personal if Sabinus thinks the flowers come from his own garden than if they were bought from a more prestigious source (256–57).

  9.62. Henriksén comments that Tyrian purple dye was very expensive, so purple garments were often worn to show off one’s wealth. The dye, however, also had a strong odor, which is here used to mask the nasty smell of Philaenis herself, possibly from incontinence (268–69).

  9.63. There are several possible meanings of “fed by a cock” in this epigram. Martial suggests that Phoebus is invited to dinner by effeminate men in return for participating in sex with them. He is thus fed by his own cock, but may also, as Henriksén notes, be performing fellatio or being buggered, which were considered unclean, or buggering adult men, which was also looked down on (270).

  9.66. As in his epigram 8.31, Martial is making fun of married men who petition Caesar for the Right of Three Children, when they should be able to beget children on their own. Martial implies that such a man must be impotent.

  9.67. The “boy way” is anal intercourse; the next thing he asks for is fellatio, which was considered an act that defiled those who performed it. Since the girl is still pure as far as Martial is concerned, that implies that he does not follow through because of the condition she demands. A. E. Housman suggested that the girl demands that Martial perform oral sex on her in return; whereas Martial finds the condition to be outrageous and refuses, he implies that Aeschylus would not refuse it (cited in Henriksén 282).

  9.69. Though the epigram is posed as a riddle, Henriksén suggests that the first line gives the answer to the second: that the cock of the sodomizer will be fouled by shit (290).

  9.74. Henriksén notes that in epigram 6.85 Martial had stated that Camonius Rufus of Bononia (now Bologna) was a friend of his and knew many of his poems by heart. That poem mourned the early death of his friend in Cappadocia (305). In this epigram Martial alludes to the only portrait of his friend being from childhood, suggesting that the father of Camonius had avoided having a portrait made before the son left, either because it would distress him to be reminded of his son’s absence or because he had a superstitious fear that the speechless image might foreshadow the speechlessness of death. The Roman custom of preserving busts of ancestors might reinforce the association of portraits with death.

  9.78. The suggestion is that Galla poisoned her first seven husbands, but has now married a poisoner who will do the same to her (Shackleton Bailey 2:301n).

  9.80. Martial implies that the old woman is so desperate for a husband that she is willing to perform oral sex on him, and he is so desperate for money that he is willing to fuck an old woman.

  9.81. Aulus Pudens was a friend of Martial’s and is addressed often in his epigrams (Shackleton Bailey 3:378). Martial often writes poems defending his writing against critics of various sorts, as in 9.50.

  9.82. As Shackleton Bailey notes, Martial here puns on two meanings of perire, which could mean both “to die” and “to be ruined” (2:304). Munna thinks his death is predicted and spends all of his money, only to learn that he has caused his own financial ruin.

  9.83. All reading was done aloud, but Martial is here satirizing those who recited their poetry to others; while they are watching shows in the arena, they are at least not boring their listeners (Shackleton Bailey 2:304n).

  9.85. The Atilius mentioned here may be Atilius Crescens, who is mentioned as a man of letters by Pliny (Henriksén 334). Paulus pretends to be ill to get out of hosting a dinner, but Martial complains to Atilius, another friend of Paulus, that though the illness is fake, the dinner is dead. An ill man might be expected to fast (as in “feed a cold, starve a fever”), but Paulus makes his guests fast instead.

  9.87. The wine Martial says he is drinking, Opimian, was proverbial as being one of the best vintages, though Henriksén suggests that there was little, if any, Opimian left in Martial’s day, because the vintage it signified dated from 121 BCE (342). Martial hints that Lupercus is trying to take advantage of Martial’s drunkenness by getting Martial to put his seal on a legal document that may be something other than what Lupercus says it is. By sealing the flask instead, Martial is signaling that he has drunk enough for one night. The practice also prevents servants from stealing wine (Shackleton Bailey 2:308n).

  9.88. Martial describes a frequent practice of sending gifts to wealthy people in the hope of getting legacies from them. Here he implies that after the will is written, the gifts stop, but he reminds Rufus that one can change one’s will.

  9.89. Lucius Arruntius Stella was a friend and patron of Martial’s and is mentioned in a number of his epigrams (Shackleton Bailey 3:383). Here he seems to have required Martial, as a dinner guest, to improvise verses on the spot. When Martial complains that improvising is too difficult, he is told that the verses needn’t be good ones.

  9.91. This epigram is an elaborate compliment to Domitian, implying that Martial would rather be his guest than the guest of Jupiter himself. Henriksén argues that the epigram was probably written to commemorate the completion of Domitian’s new dining room in 94 CE, but the poem does not necessarily imply that Martial was invited to dinner there (353–54).

  9.96. In epigram 6.78, Martial mentions a doctor ordering a patient to stop drinking in order to save his eyesight. Here, the doctor, caught stealing a wine ladle, pretends that he is doing it to protect his patient’s health.

  9.100. Although three denarii is almost twice the normal dole for a client (Shackleton Bailey 2:319n), the duties that Martial is expected to perform in return are so onerous that he does not think the extra money to be worth the bother.

  9.102. Martial frequently writes about loans of money from wealthy men to those with less money. According to Henriksén, though it was assumed that such loans would be repaid, Martial often takes the humorous position that the wealthy can afford to lose the money and that paying it back is therefore a sign of virtue (415). Here Martial makes fun of a lender who tries to make canceling a bad debt look like a generous gift; he suggests that a true gift would be to offer another loan, knowing it too would not be repaid (413).

  Book Ten

  10.1. The tenth book is a revised and enlarged editi
on (Shackleton Bailey 2:325n). Martial often mentions readers who complain about the length of his poems or books.

  10.8. As in many other epigrams of Martial’s, the joke here is that old women want husbands, but that men would only marry an old woman if she were wealthy and likely to die soon.

  10.9. Poetry of eleven syllables per line is hendecasyllabics, one of Martial’s common forms. His most common form, elegiacs, is what he means by “poetry of eleven feet,” because it is organized into alternating lines of dactylic hexameter (six feet) and dactylic pentameter (five feet). Martial’s comparison of his own fame to the racehorse’s is typical of his self-deprecating humor.

  10.16. Martial suggests that the archery mishap was no accident, but meant to dispose of the wife while retaining her dowry.

  10.21. Modestus and Claranus are clearly scholarly commentators on literary texts, and Sextus, by writing so obscurely, is out to stump them. Shackleton Bailey suggests that the books of Sextus need Apollo because “they are as obscure as Delphic oracles” (2:345n). The poet C. Helvius Cinna wrote his Smyrna in an elaborate style, full of obscure allusions that would need explication (3:348). Martial implies that only someone as wrongheaded as Sextus could consider Cinna a greater writer than Vergil.

  10.22. White lead and medicinal pastes were used to treat various ailments, but Martial here claims to use them when he is healthy as a way of keeping his distance from one he would rather not kiss (the implication, as usual, is that the one he would avoid performs oral sex).

  10.23. Marcus Antonius Primus of Tolosa (now Toulouse) was a friend of Martial’s (Shackleton Bailey 3:340). Fifteen Olympiads equals seventy-five years (2:345n).

  10.27. Shackleton Bailey points out that thirty sesterces is four to five times the normal dole (2:349n). The last line of the epigram says literally “Yet nobody thinks you were born, Diodorus” (2:349). Diodorus is a nouveauriche nobody who thinks he is important because patricians attend his lavish parties.

  10.29. Martial often mentions that the Kalends of March (March 1) is his birthday. It was also the day on which gifts were customarily given to women (Shackleton Bailey 2:346n). Martial expected a gift of a toga, but Sextilianus gives a dining outfit to his mistress instead.

  10.31. Mullet were an expensive fish in ancient Rome, and the larger they were, the more expensive they were. Shackleton Bailey notes that Martial puns on two meanings of “dining well”: Calliodorus dines lavishly, but his actions are morally repugnant (2:353n).

  10.32. Caedicianus is mentioned four times by Martial as being a friend of his (Shackleton Bailey 3:344). Marcus Antonius Primus is also mentioned in 10.23.

  10.39. Shackleton Bailey identifies the Brutus mentioned here as Lucius Junius Brutus (3:344), who became consul in 509 BCE. That would make Lesbia close to six hundred years old. Martial goes on to even greater absurdities for comic effect. Numa Pompilius (753–673 BCE) was the second king of Rome (after Romulus), and Prometheus was the creator of humankind, whom he molded from clay.

  10.40. Friendships between a wife or mistress and a male concubine were often suspected of leading to infidelity precisely because the effeminacy of the male concubine would be good cover for an affair (Shackleton Bailey 2:363n).

  10.43. Martial’s joke has several meanings: first, that to lose one wife is lucky, but to lose seven of them is extraordinarily fortunate; second, that each wife would be bringing a dowry with her, so the death of each allows Phileros to acquire another dowry; and third, that no crop Phileros could grow on the land could possibly produce as much income as he gets from his wives’ deaths. Sullivan notes that the Greek name Phileros means “fond of love,” an appropriate name for one who had found it to be so lucrative (246).

  10.44. Scotland was known as Caledonia to the Romans. Atropos, one of the three Fates, is the one who cuts the life thread. Quintus Ovidius, mentioned also in other epigrams such as 1.105, was a close friend who owned property near Martial’s Nomentan farm.

  10.45. Laurentum, a town on the coast of Latium, is the source of the boar (Shackleton Bailey 3:362). Vatican wine had a very low reputation (3:388).

  10.47. Lucius Julius Martialis was Martial’s closest friend, a lawyer who owned a small estate on the Janiculum, a hill across the Tiber from Rome (Sullivan 17). Martial desires the strength that would be appropriate for a gentleman, Shackleton Bailey observes, not for an athlete or laborer (2:368n). This poem is the most often translated of all of Martial’s epigrams (Sullivan 50).

  10.49. Opimian wine was an extremely old and famous vintage, dating from 121 BCE, when Opimius was consul (Shackleton Bailey 1:61n). Though there was probably not much left of it by Martial’s day, he uses the term to denote excellent old wine. Sabine wine was cheap and young (2:371n).

  10.52. Shackleton Bailey notes that the toga, which was worn on formal occasions by men, was also the garb that prostitutes and women convicted of adultery were forced to wear, by law, to differentiate them from respectable women. The eunuch Thelys is so effeminate that when he wears a toga he looks like an adulteress, not like a man. The joke may also imply that Thelys is guilty of having sexual contact with someone’s wife, but isn’t manly enough to be called an adulterer (2:375n).

  10.53. Scorpus was a famous chariot racer who is mentioned repeatedly in Martial’s epigrams (Shackleton Bailey 3:381). This poem is presented as if it were his epitaph.

  10.54. Beautifully inlaid tables are frequently mentioned by Martial as a luxury item of the wealthy, doubtless to be displayed at dinner parties. Here he focuses on the absurdity of owning such tables and then covering them up with tablecloths.

  10.59. In several other poems (such as 1.110 and 3.83) Martial complains about readers who like his short poems more than his longer ones. However, as he points out in 8.29, it is hard to fill a book if all of your poems are short ones. Here he compares a book to a meal, saying it can’t all be tasty morsels; there needs to be some bread as well.

  10.61. This poem is in the form of an epitaph, such as Martial might have written for the tomb of his slave girl Erotion, whose death he mourns in 5.34. He here invokes a blessing on anyone who will continue to make offerings to the spirit of the dead girl when he is no longer around to do so.

  10.64. This poem is addressed to Argentaria Polla, the widow of the poet Lucan and one of Martial’s earliest (Sullivan 317) and most generous patrons (102). The poem concerns her husband, author of an epic on the civil war between Julius Caesar and Pompey, and cites a line of his that may have come from an epigram that has not survived (Shackleton Bailey 2:383n). Helicon, a mountain in Greece associated with the Muses, is symbolic of poetic achievement, though “our Helicon” refers to the achievement of Latin poets. Literally, the last line of the Latin is “If I’m not even sodomized, Cotta, what am I doing here?” (2:383).

  10.65. The Tagus is a river in Spain, a tributary of which, the Tagonius, flowed near Martial’s home of Bilbilis (Sullivan 177). Corinth is in Greece. Martial claims to be descended from the Celts and Iberians who populated northeastern Spain. Iberians were noted for hairiness (172). Silia is Shackleton Bailey’s suggested replacement for filia in the text; he assumes that it refers to a loud-voiced woman (2:385n).

  10.66. Martial appears to be writing about the same boy, though unnamed, in epigram 12.64. Ganymede was a beautiful Trojan prince whom Jupiter abducted to be his cupbearer and catamite.

  10.74. Shackleton Bailey notes that the plains of Apulia were famous for their wool (2:393n). Hybla was likewise noted for its honey, and much of the wheat consumed in Rome grew in the Nile region. Setia produced a famous wine, mentioned in many of Martial’s epigrams. Scorpus was a famous charioteer whose death had already been the subject of Martial’s elegy in 10.53, so it is not surprising that Martial does not want the wins of Scorpus at the price of an early death, but merely wants to be able to sleep late instead of spending his mornings visiting a series of patrons. The poem also looks forward to Martial’s announcement at the end of book 10 that he plans to retir
e to his childhood home of Bilbilis in Hispania.

  10.77. Martial suggests that the fever, which was also naughty, should have been a quartan fever, a malarial fever that returns every four days, instead of such a deadly fever that it killed Carus at once. The desire to see Carus under a doctor’s care is not meant kindly, since Martial consistently portrays medical care as being a fate worse than death.

  10.80. Eros, named after the Greek god of love, is probably a freedman, judging from his Greek name; it suits him because he desires everything he sees. The Saepta Julia (“the Enclosure”) was located in the Campus Martius and contained shops (Shackleton Bailey 1:144–45n). Speckled murrine cups were carved from a semiprecious stone and were quite expensive. Fancy tabletops of citrus wood were also a luxury item, as were handsome slave boys.

  10.81. Phyllis, whose Greek name suggests that she is a prostitute, takes on two customers at once by being sodomized by one while being fucked by the other.

  10.84. This poem is addressed to Caedicianus, a friend of Martial’s, possibly fictitious (Shackleton Bailey 3:344). Shackleton Bailey observes that there are two possible interpretations of the epigram: that the woman next to Afer at dinner is beautiful and he doesn’t want to leave her, or that she is ugly and he doesn’t want to go to bed with her (2:401n).

  10.90. Ligeia is one of many lustful old women satirized by Martial. Depilation of pubic hair was considered attractive in young women.

  10.91. Martial suggests that Almo is foolish to expect his wife Polla to have children when he himself is impotent and his male slaves are all eunuchs; if they weren’t eunuchs, Martial implies, she would be having sex with them.

  10.94. The “serpent of Numidia” is an allusion to the giant snake that guarded the golden apples of the Hesperides (Shackleton Bailey 2:411n). The gardens of Alcinous, described in The Odyssey, produced luscious fruit at all seasons. Martial jokes that the apples grown on his farm are too poor to steal or to give as a gift, so he has bought his gift of apples in the Subura, a bustling shopping district in Rome, not where they were actually grown.