This translation has been done in the play-time of many busy years. I have used what few helps I could find, especially the Mirabeau, above alluded to. The text is often doubtful. But in so rambling a writer it has not seemed to me that the laborious transpositions of later German editors were important. I have rejected as probably spurious all of the fourth book but two short pieces. While I agree with those who find the third book doubtful, I have included it.
But from scholars I must ask indulgence. I have translated with latitude, considering whole phrases rather than single words. But I have always been faithful to the thought and spirit of the original, except in the few passages where euphemism was required. If the reader who has no Latin, gets a pleasing impression of Tibullus, that is what I have chiefly hoped to do. In my forth-coming translations of the Aeneid I have kept stricter watch upon verbal accuracy, as is due to an author better-known and more to be revered.
THEODORE C. WILLIAMS.
New York, 1905.
CONTENTS
[Preface]
[BOOK I]
I. [The Simple Life]II. [Love and Witchcraft]III. [Sickness and Absence]IV. [The Art of Conquest]V. [Country-Life with Delia]VI. [A Lover's Curses]VII. [A Desperate Expedient]VIII. [Messala]IX. [To Pholoë and Marathus]X. [To Venal Beauty]XI. [War is a Crime]
[BOOK II]
I. [A Rustic Holiday]II. [A Birthday Wish]III. [My Lady Rusticates]IV. [On His Lady's Avarice]V. [The Priesthood of Apollo]VI. [Let Lovers All Enlist]VII. A Voice from the Tomb
[Transcriber's Note: Elegy VII listed in Contents, but not in text.]
[BOOK III]
I. [The New-Year's Gift]II. [He Died for Love]III. [Riches are Useless]IV. [A Dream from Phoebus]V. [To Friends at the Baths]VI. [A Fare-Well Toast]
[BOOK IV]
XIII. [A Lover's Oath]
[Ovid's Lament for Tibullus' Death]