The Last Poems of Ovid

by Ovid

35. SANGVINE BISTONIVM QVOD NON TEPEFECERIT ENSEM. Another instance of high poetic diction: compare Her I 19 'sanguine Tlepolemus Lyciam tepefecerat hastam', Aen IX 333-34 'atro tepefacta cruore / terra', Aen IX 418-19 'hasta ... traiecto ... haesit tepefacta cerebro', and Hor Sat II iii 136.

37-38. ADDITA PRAETEREA VITAE QVOQVE MVLTA TVENDAE / MVNERA. The dative expresses purpose. For the sense of tueri 'sustain', compare Tr V ix 13 'uitam ... quam dedit ille tueris', Cic Deiot 22 'atque antea quidem maiores copias alere poterat; nunc exiguas uix tueri potest', Livy V 4 5, XXIII 38 12 & XXXIX 9 5, and Pliny NH XXXIII 134 'M. Crassus negabat locupletem esse nisi qui reditu annuo legionem tueri posset'.

38. NE PROPRIAS ATTENVARET OPES. This may be a reference to the financial burden of living in exile, but more probably refers to the actual financial loss Ovid suffered in exile: 'ditata est spoliis perfida turba meis' (EP II vii 62). It is clear from Tr I vi 7-8 that Ovid had feared such losses from the beginning of his exile.

Attenuare is a very strong verb: compare Met VIII 843-45 (of Erysichthon) 'iamque fame patrias altique uoragine uentris / attenuarat ['had exhausted'—Miller] opes, sed inattenuata manebat / tum quoque dira fames'.

39. PRO QVIBVS VT MERITIS REFERATVR GRATIA. Similar language to Pompeius at i 21 'et leuis haec meritis referatur gratia tantis'.

40. MANCIPII ... TVI (CB²) 'belonging to your property' seems a much more elegant construction than the other manuscripts' MANCIPIVM ... TVVM 'your slave', and was conjectured by Heinsius; in support of mancipium ... tuum Burman cited viii 65-66 'si quid adhuc igitur uiui, Germanice, nostro / restat in ingenio, seruiet omne tibi'.

41-44. Ovid uses the common device of listing adynata; the second version of the device at Tr I viii 1-10, where Ovid says that now his friend has betrayed him he expects to see the adynata occur. Comprehensive listings of adynata in ancient literature given by Smith on Tib I iv 65-66, Shackleton Bailey on Prop I xv 29, Nisbet and Hubbard on Hor Carm I ii 9, xxix 10 & xxxiii 7, and by Gow on Theocritus I 132-36.

42. VELIVOLAS occurs once more at xvi 21 'ueliuolique maris uates', and nowhere else in Ovid's poetry. It is found at Lucretius V 1442 and Aen I 224 'mare ueliuolum', and was from old Latin poetry: Macrobius (Sat VI v 10) cites instances from Livius Andronicus (Morel 58) and Ennius (Ann 380 Vahlen³; Andromache 74 Ribbeck³).

43. SVPINO. 'Backwards'; almost the reverse of praeceps. The same sense at Med Fac 40 'nec redit in fontes unda supina suos'.

45. DIXERITIS. See on 6 transieritis.