amores 1.3

Amores 1.3

Iusta precor: quae me nuper praedata puella est,

aut amet aut faciat, cur ego semper amem!

Amores 1.3

military imagery

Amores 1.3

a, nimium volui—tantum patiatur amari; audierit nostras tot Cytherea preces!

Amores 1.3

Accipe, per longos tibi qui deserviat annos; accipe, qui pura norit amare fide!

Amores 1.3

si me non veterum commendant magna parentum

nomina, si nostri sanguinis auctor eques,

Amores 1.3

nec meus innumeris renovatur campus aratris, temperat et sumptus parcus uterque parens

Amores 1.3

at Phoebus comitesque novem vitisque repertor

hac faciunt, et me qui tibi donat, Amor,et nulli cessura fides, sine crimine mores

nudaque simplicitas purpureusque pudor.

Amores 1.3

non mihi mille placent, non sum desultor amoris:

tu mihi, siqua fides, cura perennis eris.

Amores 1.3

The metaphor of the promiscuous lover as a desultor amoris (Am. 1. 3. 15) is one of the most striking in Ovid's Amores, and it is therefore of some interest to students of Ovid's style to assess its originality. As the commentators have noted (Paul Brandt ad loc.; A. E. Housman ad Manil. 5. 85), the desultor image can be traced back to Homer (Il. 15. 679), who compares Ajax, as he leaps from one Greek ship to another to keep off the Trojan attackers, to a trick-rider entertaining the crowds on the roadside by leaping from horse to horse. But there is no need to suppose that Ovid had Homer in mind rather than the Roman circus-riders described, for example, by Livy (44. 9. 4= 169 B.c.) and Varro (Rust. 2. 7. 15). It is clear from these passages that the desultores were established in the Roman circus by the earlier second century B.C., and that for the Romans the word desultor was a technical term needing no further explanation or qualification.J. A. Barsby: “Desultor Amoris in Amores 1. 3” (44)

Amores 1.3

tecum, quos dederint annos mihi fila sororum, vivere contingat teque dolente mori!

Amores 1.3

te mihi materiem felicem in carmina praebe— provenient causa carmina digna sua.

Amores 1.3

carmine nomen habent exterrita cornibus Io et quam fluminea lusit adulter ave,

quaeque super pontum simulato vecta iuvenco virginea tenuit cornua vara manu.

Amores 1.3

To whom does Ovid liken himself?

Amores 1.3

To whom does Ovid liken himself?“non sum desultor amoris”

Amores 1.3

To whom does Ovid liken himself?“non sum desultor amoris”

“quae me nuper praedata puella est”

Amores 1.3

nos quoque per totum pariter cantabimur orbem,

iunctaque semper erunt nomina nostra tuis.

Amores 1.3

“Ambiguity of behavior - trick seduction, disguise, and, especially, verbal prevarication -

play a central role in the first poem of the Amores that is addressed to a girl, for these motifs are key elements of the literary love game that Ovid and she play throughout the

work.”Katherine Olstein: “Amores 1.3 and Duplicity

as a Way of Love” (246-7)

amores 1.3

Documents