Publius
Ovidius Naso known better to us as 'Ovid' was a Roman Poet in the
time of emperor Augustus. He was born on the 20th
of March 43BC at Sulmo (modern Sulmona), Italy, a small town about
90 miles (140 km) east of Rome. He lived during the period of other
great poets such as Virgil and Horace, who were much older than Ovid.
Ovid came from a respectable, well to do, established family. He and his brother were educated in Rome and growing up Ovid's father wanted him to learn rhetoric (the art of persuasion) to prepare him to become a lawyer. In Rome, Ovid had the makings of a good orator, great for a poet, but neglected his studies for his natural talent of verse writing. After Rome, he moved to Athens to attend a notable finishing school for upper-class young men. When Ovid's brother died at the age of 20 he gave up on the idea of law!
Ovid came from a respectable, well to do, established family. He and his brother were educated in Rome and growing up Ovid's father wanted him to learn rhetoric (the art of persuasion) to prepare him to become a lawyer. In Rome, Ovid had the makings of a good orator, great for a poet, but neglected his studies for his natural talent of verse writing. After Rome, he moved to Athens to attend a notable finishing school for upper-class young men. When Ovid's brother died at the age of 20 he gave up on the idea of law!
Photo
socionicsdatabase
Ovid
at Constanta
By the age of thirty Ovid had been married three times and divorced twice. He had one daughter who gave him grandchildren. The first two marriages were short but his third lasted until his death and he does mention love, respect and affection within that marriage.
The first work of Ovid was the Amores (The Loves) followed by the Epistolae Heroidum (Epistles of the Heroines), The Medicamina Faciei (The Art of Beauty), The Ars Amatoria (The Art of Love), and The Remedia Amoris (Remedies for Love). These early poems have a theme of love and sexual desire. It probably doesn't reflect Ovid's own life. After these works Ovid became established, so he went on to write more ambitious works like The Metamorphoses and The Fasti.
The Fasti was not finished due to the fact that a decree by Emperor Augustus in 8AD Banished Ovid to Tomis on the Black Sea (now Constanţa, Romania). What had Ovid done wrong to upset the Emperor? Ovid describes Augustus's reason for exile as a “carmen et error” meaning "a poem and an error", not a crime. What could this be? Probably the Ars Amatoria (The Art of Love) and a personal indiscretion or mistake. The indiscretion or mistake might have been his adultery with Augustus’s granddaughter, Julia the younger, who was banished at the same time to Tremirus, a small Italian island in the Adriatic Sea. In 2BC Julia the elder, mother of the Younger was also banished for immorality, Julia the Elder was sent to Pandateria, a very small Island in the Tyrrhenian Sea. She was denied male company and forbidden to drink wine. The Ars Amatoria had been released whilst this scandal was still fresh and being talked about by the public. It's possible that Ovid had gone against Augustus’s moral reforms which he had introduced and this led to his banishment. We may never know the full reasons why!
This is an instructional elegy
series in three books by Ancient Roman poet Ovid. It was written in 2
AD. It is about teaching basic gentlemanly male and female relationship
skills and techniques.
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Ovid
had a lighter version of Banishment called relegation, which meant
that he kept his citizenship and property. His well-connected wife
stayed in Rome looking after his interests.
Tomis
was a semi-Hellenized port and was open to attacks from neighbouring
people. There were few books and no high society. Latin was not
spoken much there and the weather was bad. This
was a cruel punishment for a man like Ovid. The Tristia and The
Epistulae ex Ponto (“Letters from the Black Sea”) are a series of
grovelling letters he wrote to Augustus via his wife and friends
asking for a Pardon or at least a mitigation of sentence. Augustus
and his successor Tiberius did not change the sentence and later Ovid
seems reconciled with his fate as later poems hint at this. Ovid died
in Tomis in 17 or 18 AD.
Statue (1887) by Ettore Ferrari commemorating Ovid's exile in Tomis (Constanța, Romania)
Ovid's letters make out Tomis is unbearable, but he learnt the local language, made friends with the locals and read poetry to them. They exempted him from taxes and treated him well. The weather cannot be as bad as Ovid makes out as today its a seaside resort.
Even today, his banishment remains one of the great mysteries of ancient Rome! After 2000 years Ovid is still missed and on Thursday 14th of December 2017, Rome's City Council overturns the banishment.
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© 2020 David Lee
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Ovid - The Metamorphoses: (Penguin Classics)
Ovid - The Metamorphoses: (Penguin Classics)
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