,

Catholic Library Home

▾

,

The Poems and Fragments of Catullus

Table of Contents

In these the classical laws of position are most carefully observed every dactyl ending in a consonant is followed by a word beginning with a vowel o

hexameters like

are too alien from ordinary pronunciation to please either an average reader or a classically trained student. The same may be said of the translation

The following stanzas are from a Sapphic ode into which Webbe translated, or as we should say, transposed the fourth Eclogue of Spenser's Sheepheardes

There are many faults in these verses over quaintnesses of language, constructions impossible in English, quantities of doubtful correctness, harsh e

or the hendecasyllables immediately preceding,

It is obvious that a very little more trouble would have converted these into very perfect and very pleasing poems. Had Sir Philip Sidney written ever

blossoms , though only accented on the first syllable, counts for a spondee, the shortness of the second o in thesi a beautiful bounteous all of you,

forĕst , murmurĭng pines ănd the acc all ass diss ness pass aff app ann betray beslime besmear depress dethrone agree disōrdĕrly̆ tēnăntlĕss heavĕnly̆

and this would be a fair representation of a pure iambic line, according to the views of most German and most English writers. Yet not only is Die no

whatever its defects, is at least a pretty exact representation of a pure iambic line. xxix. 6-8, are thus translated by Heyse:-

The difference is purely negative I have bound myself to avoid certain positions forbidden by the laws of ancient prosody. To some I may seem to have

CATULLUS.

I am indebted for this expression to a translation of this poem by Dr. J.A. Symonds, the whole of which I should have quoted here, had it not been unf

Browning , Ring and Book

The round plate of iron which, according to Rich, Companion to the Latin Dictionary, p. 609, formed the lower part of the sock worn by horses, mules,

Tickell , Theristes or the Lordling

For a spirited, though coarse, version of this poem, see Cotton's Poems, p. 608, ed. 1689.

Browning , Flight of the Duchess

Ring and Book , v. 701.

move quickly over the road. So Shakespeare:

2nd Part of Henry IV. , Act i. sc. 1.

A member of the Saraceni family at Vicenza, finding that a beautiful widow did not favour him, scribbled filthy pictures over the door. The affair was

easily running over.

Properly green-eyed. The epithet would seem to be not merely picturesque the glaring of the eyes would be more marked in proportion as the beast wa

Tennyson , Eleänore

This line is quoted as Catullus's by Porphyrion on Hor. c. 1. 16, 24. His words, Catullus cum maledicta minaretur , compared with the last lines of th

This is the only instance where Catullus has introduced a spondee into the second foot of the phalaecian, which then becomes decasyllabic. The alterna

There seems to be no authority for the meaning ordinarily assigned to libellis , book-shops. I prefer to explain the word placards, either announcin

In the rhythm of this poem, I have been obliged to deviate in two points from Catullus. (1) In him the first foot of each line is nearly always a troc

Ben Jonson , The Barriers

In the metre of this poem Catullus observes the following general type -

Troilus and Cressida , Act iv. sc. 5.

abide as, I think, in Spenser's Faerie Queene , vi. 2, 19.

Below, lxiv. 297, I have used it in its more common meaning of atoning for, Faerie Queene , iv. 1, 53.

Midsummer Night's Dream , iii. 2.

Longfellow's Dante Inf

Tennyson , Tithonus

Keats , Endymion

I have combined thou with your uestras potuisti

bent as they move rapidly through the water.

I have attempted here to give what I conceive Catullus may have meant to convey by the remarkable collocation At roseo niueae residebant uertice uitta

A verse seems to have been lost here, which I have thus supplied.

LXVII. CATULLUS.

- Pope , Epitaph on the children of Lord Digby.

clearness, transparency.

Browning , Ring and Book

Sir Philip Sidney thus translates this poem:-

LXXXVII & LXXV.

Ben Jonson , The Fox

LIII.

How I laughed at a wag amid the circle!

He, when Calvus in high denunciation

Of Vatinius had declaim'd divinely,

Hands uplifted as in supreme amazement,

Cried 'God bless us! a wordy cockalorum!'