THE EPIGRAMS OF MARTIAL
BOOK ONE
Marcus Valerius Martialis (AD 38/41-102/4) was a Roman poet born in Bilbilis in Hispania Tarraconensis (Tarragonese Spain) of Spanish stock. He lived in Rome from 64 to ca. 100, then returned home. His Epigrams, much his most celebrated and substantial work, were published in Rome in twelve books, and have since been very highly valued for both their wit and what they reveal about life in Rome. Presented here are all references to Greek love in Book I, published in 85 or early 86.
The translation, the first in English to include frank translation of passages considered obscene by modern people, is by D. R. Shackleton Bailey for the Loeb Classical Library volumes 94, published by the Harvard University Press in 1993. Older translations either omitted the sexually most interesting epigrams or, much worse, misled as to their content by omitting or distorting critical phrases. The webpage editor would like to draw attention to the footnotes as being particularly important for this article, at least for readers not deeply familiar with Roman customs.
6
| As the eagle bore the boy through the airs of heaven, the timid talons did not harm their clinging freight.[1] [… The epigram continues by comparing this to the tameness of the Emperor Domitian’s lions] |
Aetherias aquila puerum portante per auras |
31
| These locks, all he has from crown down, does Encolpus, the darling of his master the centurion, vow to you, Phoebus, when Pudens shall attain the rank of Chief Centurion which he wants and deserves.[2] Cut the long tresses as soon as may be, Phoebus, while no down darkens his soft cheeks and flowing locks grace his milk-white neck. And so that master and lad may long enjoy your bounty, make him soon shorn, but late a man.[3] | Hos tibi, Phoebe, vovet totos a vertice crines Encolpos, domini centurionis amor, grata Pudens meriti tulerit cum praemia pili. quam primum longas, Phoebe, recide comas, dum nulla teneri sordent lanugine vultus dumque decent fusae lactea colla iubae; utque tuis longum dominusque puerque fruantur muneribus, tonsum fac cito, sero virum. |
46
| Hedylis, when you say “I’m in a hurry, do it if you’re going to,” forthwith my passion languishes; crippled, it subsides. Tell me to wait, and I shall go all the faster for the check. Hedylis, if you are in a hurry, tell me not to be in a hurry.[4] | Cum dicis ‘propero, fac si facis,’ Hedyle, languet protinus et cessat debilitata Venus. expectare iube: velocius ibo retentus. Hedyle, si properas, dic mihi ne properem. |
58
| The salesman asked me a hundred thousand for a boy. I laughed, but Phoebus gave it right away. My cock is hurt and grumbles about me to himself, and Phoebus gets a commendation at my expense. But Phoebus’ cock presented him with a tidy two million.[5] Give me that much, you, and I’ll go higher. | Milia pro puero centum me mango poposcit: risi ego, sed Phoebus protinus illa dedit. hoc dolet et queritur de me mea mentula secum laudaturque meam Phoebus in invidiam. sed sestertiolum donavit mentula Phoebo bis decies: hoc da tu mihi, pluris emam. |
[1] This refers to the Trojan boy Ganymede whom the king of the gods fell in love with and came down in the form of an eagle to abduct to Mount Olympus, where he was made cupbearer of the gods. [Website footnote]
[2] Cf. 5.48, where the vow was fulfilled. For Pudens’ interest in capillati cf. 5.48; 8.63; 13.69. [Translator’s footnote]
Aulus Pudens, a native of Umbria was a boy- and poetry-loving friend of Martial, who mentions his marriage in Epigrams IV 13 (AD 88), probably the Briton in Epigrams XI 53 who had by then borne her husband three children. Encolpus’s vow to cut his hair is reported as just carried out in V 48, published in December 90, nearly five years later and when he was still Pudens’s loved boy (despite the marriage). From this one can reasonably guess that he was aged 12 or 13 in Book I and 17 or 18 at the end of 90. [Website footnote]
[3] The last sentence means Martial wishes first that Encolpus may soon have to cut his long hair (habitually worn by slave-boys for sensual reasons as explained by Philo, On the Contemplative Life 50-53, and never by freeborn Roman boys), as this will imply he has been granted his wish that Pudens, his master and lover, has been made a Chief Centurion. Secondly, Martial wishes that Encolpus long remain a boy so that his love affair with Pudens may last long. [Website footnote]
[4] The translator changes the well-attested masculine Latin “Hedyle” to the ill-attested feminine “Hedyli” following Richard Bentley (ad Hor. Carm. 3.23.2), who had no better reason than that he could not imagine a boy (or his urgency) on the verge of an orgasm brought on by being pedicated. Bentley would seem to have forgotten Petronius, Satyricon 85-90, where the boy of Pergamon orgasms from just this. Admittedly, it was most unusual for the boy’s excitement to be mentioned in ancient literature; generally, the subject was taboo: there was a polite fiction that boys agreed to pedication only as a duty (if they were Roman slave-boys) or for the good of their souls (if they were Greek and free). However, as Bentley exemplifies, amongst modern writers, silence has often been replaced by simple sexual ignorance: many seem not to realise boys were likely (near certain, if they or their lovers so determined) to orgasm while being pedicated (with or without accompanying manual stimulation) from a combination of physical and emotional excitement. In any case, as Craig A. Williams puts it, Bentley’s amendment “has no manuscript support and seems unnecessary at best.” (Roman Homosexuality, 2nd edition, Oxford, 2010, p. 313)
[5] Gift of a rich widow or the like. [Translator’s footnote]
Given Phoebus’s past as a prostitute and his Greek name, he may have been a wealthy freedman. [Website footnote]
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