Why Is Publius Ovidius Naso?
Publius Ovidius Naso
Publius Ovidius Naso , known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was born at Sulmo in the Abruzzi on 20 May, 43BC . The events of his life are chiefly known from his own writings, and more particularly from the tenth elegy of the fourth book of the "Tristia."As the son of an old equestrian family, Ovid was sent to Rome with his brother for their education. At Rome he embarked, under the best teachers of the day, on the study of rhetoric .As a member of the Roman knightly class (whose rank lay between the commons and the Senate) Ovid was thought to have the makings of a good orator, but in spite of his father’s admonitions he neglected his studies for the verse-writing that came so naturally to him. After a Grand Tour …show more content…
The first 25 years of Ovid's literary career were spent primarily writing poetry in elegiac meter with erotic themes. The exact chronology of his works is beyond recovery , but his career falls into three main periods. The first (mid- to late 2os BC to AD 2) includes his literary debut Amores , in which are presented the autobiographical misadventures of a poet in love and the aspects of love, the single letters of the Heroides, mythological female figures who are writing letters to their absence husbands or lovers, the lost tragedy Medea and the didactic cycle comprising the Ars amatoria ( arts of courtships and erotic intrigue), the partially preserved work on cosmetics Medicamina faciei femineae and Remedia amoris (instructions about how could somebody extricate from a love affair). The second period is brief ( AD 2 or somewhat earlier to AD 8), but it is believed that this is the most important period of Ovid’s literary work, since in this time he leaves his best writings (diakatexontai apo wrimothta). The Metamorphoses , Ovid's most ambitious and popular work, consists of a 15-book catalogue about transformations in Greek and Roman mythology set within a loose mytho-historical framework. On the other hand the Fasti is a poetical calendar of the Roman year with one book devoted to each month. These large-scale compositions ended abruptly
Publius Ovidius Naso , known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was born at Sulmo in the Abruzzi on 20 May, 43BC . The events of his life are chiefly known from his own writings, and more particularly from the tenth elegy of the fourth book of the "Tristia."As the son of an old equestrian family, Ovid was sent to Rome with his brother for their education. At Rome he embarked, under the best teachers of the day, on the study of rhetoric .As a member of the Roman knightly class (whose rank lay between the commons and the Senate) Ovid was thought to have the makings of a good orator, but in spite of his father’s admonitions he neglected his studies for the verse-writing that came so naturally to him. After a Grand Tour …show more content…
The first 25 years of Ovid's literary career were spent primarily writing poetry in elegiac meter with erotic themes. The exact chronology of his works is beyond recovery , but his career falls into three main periods. The first (mid- to late 2os BC to AD 2) includes his literary debut Amores , in which are presented the autobiographical misadventures of a poet in love and the aspects of love, the single letters of the Heroides, mythological female figures who are writing letters to their absence husbands or lovers, the lost tragedy Medea and the didactic cycle comprising the Ars amatoria ( arts of courtships and erotic intrigue), the partially preserved work on cosmetics Medicamina faciei femineae and Remedia amoris (instructions about how could somebody extricate from a love affair). The second period is brief ( AD 2 or somewhat earlier to AD 8), but it is believed that this is the most important period of Ovid’s literary work, since in this time he leaves his best writings (diakatexontai apo wrimothta). The Metamorphoses , Ovid's most ambitious and popular work, consists of a 15-book catalogue about transformations in Greek and Roman mythology set within a loose mytho-historical framework. On the other hand the Fasti is a poetical calendar of the Roman year with one book devoted to each month. These large-scale compositions ended abruptly