“It is not enough that poems be beautiful; they should be pleasant, too.”
“Non satis est pulchra esse poemata; dulcia sunto”
Tag: Horace
Horace Criticizes a Cyclic Poet: Ars Poetica 136-44
“Don’t begin, as a certain Cyclic poet once did, ‘I will sing the fortune of Priam and that noble war…’ What could he produce worthy of such an opening? The mountains would part, and out would pop a ridiculous mouse. How much more proper the poet who labored at nothing foolishly: ‘Tell me, Muse, about the man who, in the time after Troy was captured, saw the cities and ways of many men.’ He had a mind, not to produce smoke from lightning, but to let the fire come forth from the smoke…”
Nec sic incipies, ut scriptor cyclicus olim:
“Fortunam Priami cantabo et nobile bellum”.
Quid dignum tanto feret hic promissor hiatu?
Parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus.
Quanto rectius hic, qui nil molitur inepte: 140
“Dic mihi, Musa, uirum, captae post tempora Troiae
qui mores hominum multorum uidit et urbes”.
Non fumum ex fulgore, sed ex fumo dare lucem
cogitat
Horace, Ars Poetica 31
Snow in Words, Battle and, In season, On the Ground–Ancient Words for Modern Snow
This is a re-post for all of our friends in the Northeast. Stay safe and warm!
(And if you have any favorite ancient lines about snow or storms, add them to the mix…)
Homer Il. 3.222-3
“Yet, then a great voice came from his chest And [Odysseus’] words were like snowy storms”
ἀλλ’ ὅτε δὴ ὄπα τε μεγάλην ἐκ στήθεος εἵη καὶ ἔπεα νιφάδεσσιν ἐοικότα χειμερίῃσιν,
Homer, Il. 13.754
“And then Hector surged up like a snowy mountain”
῏Η ῥα, καὶ ὁρμήθη ὄρεϊ νιφόεντι ἐοικὼς
Cicero, in Catilinam 2.23
“How will they bear the Appenines covered in frosts and snow? Maybe they think that they can tolerate the cold, because they learned to dance naked at dinner parties.”
Quo autem pacto illi Appeninum atque illas pruinas ac nivis perferent? Nisi idcirco se facilius hiemem toleraturos putant, quod nudi in conviviis saltare didicerunt.
Solon, fr.9 1-4: Causation–Lightning comes from Thunder?
“The fury of snow and hail comes from a cloud
and thunder comes from bright lightning.
A city is destroyed by great men and the people fall
into the slavery of monarchy thanks to ignorance.”
ἐκ νεφέλης πέλεται χιόνος μένος ἠδὲ χαλάζης,
βροντὴ δ’ ἐκ λαμπρῆς γίγνεται ἀστεροπῆς·
ἀνδρῶν δ’ ἐκ μεγάλων πόλις ὄλλυται, ἐς δὲ μονάρχου
δῆμος ἀϊδρίηι δουλοσύνην ἔπεσεν.
From a commenter named Luke:
Xenophon. 4.4.11:
νυκτερευόντων δ’ αὐτῶν ἐνταῦθα ἐπιπίπτει χιὼν ἄπλετος, ὥστε ἀπέκρυψε καὶ τὰ ὅπλα καὶ τοὺς ἀνθρώπους κατακειμένους· καὶ τὰ ὑποζύγια συνεπόδισεν ἡ χιών· καὶ πολὺς ὄκνος ἦν ἀνίστασθαι· κατακειμένων γὰρ ἀλεεινὸν ἦν ἡ χιὼν ἐπιπεπτωκυῖα ὅτῳ μὴ παραρρυείη.
But there came such a tremendous fall of snow while they were bivouacked there that it completely covered both the arms and the men as they slept, besides hampering the baggage animals; and everybody was very reluctant to get up, for as the men lay there the snow that had fallen upon them–in case it did not slip off–was a source of warmth.
From Palaiophron::
iam satis terris nivis atque dirae grandinis misit pater? -Horace
From PlatoSparks:
Daphnis and Chloe by Longus.
Γίνεται δὲ χειμὼν Δάφνιδι καὶ Χλόῃ τοῦ πολέμου πικρότερος: ἐξαίφνης γὰρ περιπεσοῦσα χιὼν πολλὴ πάσας μὲν ἀπέκλεισε τὰς ὁδούς, πάντας δὲ κατέκλεισε τοὺς γεωργούς.
Winter came more bitter than the war to Daphnis and Chloe. For a large amount snow falling suddenly blocked off all the roads and shut all the farmers indoors.
Longus 3.3.1
Felix Dies Natalis — Sententiae Antiquae: A Pu Pu Platter from our Infancy
This site and its twitter feed is three years old today. We have passed from diapers (nappies in the UK!) and a liquid diet to full sentences and a different kind of liquid diet. Here are some quotations from our first few months.
The first post we ever put up:
Homer, Iliad 22.304-5
“May I not die without a fight and without glory but after doing something big for men to come to learn about”
μὴ μὰν ἀσπουδί γε καὶ ἀκλειῶς ἀπολοίμην,
ἀλλὰ μέγα ῥέξας τι καὶ ἐσσομένοισι πυθέσθαι.
A good one for Halloween:
“No one can wear a mask for very long; affectation soon returns to true nature”
nemo enim potest personam diu ferre, ficta cito in naturam suam recidunt
And this made an appearance again in our aggregation of Seneca quotes.
A reminder to carpere diem, but in Greek:
Semonides, Fragment 3
“We have ample time to be dead yet we live our few years badly”
πολλὸς γὰρ ἥμιν ἐστι τεθνάναι χρονος
ζῶμεν δ᾿ ἀριθμῷ παῦρα κακῶς ἔτεα
One of our many lines about friendship:
Sallust, Catilinae coniuratio 20.4
“Wanting the same thing and also not wanting the same thing: this, ultimately, is true friendship”
idem velle atque idem nolle, ea demum firma amicitia est
Proof that U2 plagiarizes:
Martial, Epigrams 12.46.2
“I can’t live with you or without you”
nec tecum possum vivere nec sine te
A necessary does of humility:
Heraclitus, Fragment 40
“Knowing much doesn’t teach you how to think.”
πολυμαθίη νόον ἔχειν οὐ διδάσκει.
Existential Angst:
Pindar, Pythian 8.95
“What is a person? What is not a person? Man is a dream of a shadow”
τί δέ τις; τί δ’ οὔ τις; σκιᾶς ὄναρ / ἄνθρωπος.
Pithy Rumsfeldian Response:
Tacitus, Agricola 30.4
“Every unknown is overblown”
omne ignotum pro magnifico est
Because we still don’t understand this:
Pisander, fr. 9 (Hesychius 683)
“You can’t reason with Centaurs”
νοῦς οὐ παρὰ Κενταύροισι
Because to err is human:
Cicero, Philippics 12.5
“All men make mistakes; but it is fools who persist in them”
cuiusvis hominis est errare; nullius nisi insipientis perseverare in errore
This is for Cicero and Seneca who came to unhappy ends:
Sophocles, Electra 1007-8
“Death isn’t the most hateful thing. Worse is when someone wants to die but cannot.”
οὐ γὰρ θανεῖν ἔχθιστον, ἀλλ᾽ ὅταν θανεῖν
χρῄζων τις εἶτα μηδὲ τοῦτ᾽ ἔχῃ λαβεῖν.
A rejected motto:
Ovid, Ars Amatoria 1.159
“Trivialities occupy fickle minds”
para leves capiunt animos
From a quotable but less well-known sage:
Publilius Syrus, Sententiae M.54
“A bad plan is one that can’t be changed”
malum est consilium quod mutari non potest
The eternal troll of anonymous wit:
CIL IV, 1904
“I am amazed, wall, that you have not fallen in ruins,
you who bear the weight of so many boring inscriptions.”
admiror, paries, te non cecidisse ruinis,
qui tot scriptorum taedia sustineas.
Something that may or may not be true about quotation:
Horace, Ars Poetica 309
“The origin and source of good writing is good judgment”.
scribendi recte sapere est et principium et fons.
As good a way to start as to end:
Parmenides, fr. 6.16
“The path of all things goes backwards.”
…πάντων δὲ παλίντροπός ἐστι κέλευθος.
Thanks to everyone who has read, commented and retweeted over the past three years!
Πόλλ’ ἀγαθὰ γένοιτό ὑμῖν!