BOOK I

1

Ovid of Tomis — where by now he’s no new arrival —
sends you this opus from the Getic shore.
If you have leisure, Brutus, give harbourage and guest-room
to these overseas booklets, lodge them wherever you can:
they dare not enter a public library — that route	5
their author has closed to them, they fear.
The times I’ve said: ‘But surely you instil no shameful
lessons — get in there, the door stands wide
open for chaste verses!’ Yet, as you see, they’d rather
keep a low private profile, play it safe.	10
You’d like to know where to put them without causing
any offence? In the gap that my Art once filled.
The novelty of their arrival may prompt you to wonder
just why they’ve come: whatever the reason, please
accept them (only love’s barred!) — you’ll find, although the volume	15
bears no index of sorrow, these poems are no less sad
than what I sent you before: same theme but different title,
and these poems openly name their addressees.
While none of you will like this, you can’t prevent it —
unwilling recipients tagged by a dutiful Muse.	20
So add this, for what it’s worth, to my works. If an exile’s
offspring observe the law, why should they not
enjoy the City? Don’t worry: Antony’s disquisitions
are still read today; learned Brutus is on the shelves.
I’m not so mad as to place myself in competition	25
with such top names — but I never fought against
the gods. It’s true, too, that Caesar may not need my homage,
but he gets it in all my books. If it’s me
you feel doubtful about, then allow my praise of godhead,
accept the poem — just suppress my name.	30
The olive-branch of peace brings succour in wartime — shall my
praise of the peacemaker profit me nothing? When
Aeneas bore off his father shoulder-high, tradition
reports that the flames left the hero an open path:
all roads, then, should open to a book bearing Aeneas’ descendant —	35
father, too, of his country, not just of the man.
When a mendicant priest of Isis comes by rattling
his sistrum, who’d be so bold
as to show him the door? When before the Mother Goddess’s image
that fellow blows his horn, what cheapskate would grudge	40
a handful of coppers as alms? Though this scam’s not sanctioned
by Diana’s cult, her prophet still doesn’t starve.
It’s the high gods’ nod of power that moves our spirits —
to be thrall to such credulity brings no shame.
Look, I come with no sistrum, no pipe of Phrygian boxwood,	45
but rather the hallowed names of the Julian race —
a seer, a guide. Make way for the bearer of holy relics!
It’s a great god, not myself, who claims this right.
And because I have earned, and felt, the Prince’s anger,
think not that he’d refuse my worship! I’ve seen	50
a self-confessed blasphemer against linen-robed Isis
sitting in front of Isis’ shrine,
while another offender, struck blind, went down the highway
shouting that he’d deserved it. The gods delight
in such witnessing, there’s nothing like circumstantial	55
testimony to confirm the power of their will.
Often, too, when they see the offender truly repentant,
they’ll revoke their punishment, restore lost sight.
O, I repent, I repent! If the damned have any credence,
I repent, I’m tormented by the thing I did,	60
and though exile brings anguish, my fault’s more agonizing,
and enduring this punishment hurts less
than its just incurment: divine — and his most manifest — favour
may remit my term, but the fault
remains perennial — though death will conclude my exile,	65
not death itself can undo my offence.
No wonder, then, if my mind’s in dissolution, melting
like the water that drips off snow:
it’s being eaten away, like a ship by the hidden teredo,
as brine-salt waves scour hollows in the rocks,	70
as laid-up iron is rusted by scabrous corrosion,
or a book in storage feasts boreworms — so my heart
suffers in perpetuity the canker of anguish
with no end in sight. Sooner shall life itself
relinquish its hold on my mind than these agonizing torments,	75
sooner the victim’s demise than that of his pain.
If the high gods whose pawn I am believe my statement, maybe
I’ll be held worthy of some slight relief,
be granted a transfer to somewhere beyond Scythian bowshot —
to pray for more would be mere effrontery.	80

2

Maximus — big enough to fill out your name’s great measure,
who match your blood with nobility of mind,
to permit whose birth, one day (though on it three hundred
fell) did not destroy the whole Fabian clan —
perhaps you may be asking yourself who sent this letter,	5
who am I to converse with you? Alas,
what can I do? I fear that once my name’s discovered
you’ll read the rest in harsh mood, with hostile mind.
That’s up to you. I’ll dare to confess that I’ve written
.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .	10
and though I admit I deserved a harsher visitation,
I can scarcely suffer one worse. Beset on all sides
by dangers I go my ways, in the midst of hostile natives
(as though with my country I’d also forfeited peace)
who, to double the chance of death in a grim wound, poison	15
their every arrow-tip with viper’s gall.
Thus armed, the horseman circles our nervous ramparts,
a wolf prowling round penned sheep:
his light bow, once it’s arched taut to its string of horsegut,
remains bent for all time, will not ever relax.	20
The rooftops bristle with a stubble of old arrows
and the gate with its heavy bar
barely holds off attack. What’s more, the land’s protected
by neither leaf nor tree: dead winter runs
into winter. Here, struggling with cold, with arrows,	25
with my grim fate, I’m drained
of strength by this fourth season: my tears flow uninterrupted
except when I pass out, when a sleep like death
stuns my senses. Niobe was lucky, despite all her bereavements,
whose troubles froze her to an insentient rock;	30
lucky, too, Phaëthon’s sisters, their lament for him soon muffled
as the fresh poplar-bark crusted their mouths.
But I am he to whom timber grants no admittance,
I am he who yearns in vain to be stone.
Were Medusa herself to intrude upon my vision	35
even Medusa’s powers would fail.
What is my life? Stark bitterness never-ending,
torment exacerbated by time.
Thus Tityus’ liver, unconsumed, for ever regrowing,
remains unperished, to perish time and again.	40
Ah, but when rest and sleep, care’s common medicine,
claim me, doesn’t night come
minus its usual ills? But then I’m terrified by nightmares
that conjure up real events; awake
to my loss and torment. Either I seem to be dodging native	45
arrows, or submitting a prisoner’s hands
to cruel shackles, or, when some pleasanter dream beguiles me,
I glimpse the houses of the land I’ve left,
hold converse with you, with all those friends I honoured,
with my dear wife — but as soon	50
as I’ve had the experience of this fleeting, unreal pleasure,
the reminder of happiness exacerbates
my grim condition. So whether it’s bright daylight scanning
this wretched head of mine, or Night
urging her frosty steeds, my heart melts with perpetual	55
cares like fresh wax in the flame:
often I pray for death, then pray to avert it, fearful
lest the earth here claim my bones.
When the thought of Augustus’s mercy stirs my remembrance
I’m convinced my shipwreck could find a friendly shore;	60
but the sight of my fate’s tenacity destroys me,
my faint hope’s eclipsed by fear.
I neither hope nor pray, though, for anything further
than to quit this ill-defended place —
it’s that or nothing your cautious support can venture	65
(with no loss of propriety) on my behalf.
So, Maximus, embodiment of true Roman eloquence,
take on this tough brief, make a persuasive plea!
It’s a bad case, I admit, but your advocacy will redeem it —
just aid this poor exile with a kind word or two!	70
Though gods are all-knowing, Caesar, you see, has no notion
of what life’s like here at the world’s end.
The weight of great undertakings absorbs his godhead,
and such a concern’s too slight for his heavenly heart:
he’s no leisure to ascertain the location of Tomis —	75
scarce known by many of the neighbouring tribes —
or learn what the natives are up to, what may be happening
in this Tauric wasteland where Iphigeneia served
a savage Artemis, or identify the horsemen
galloping over the Danube’s hard-packed ice.	80
The bulk of mankind cares nothing for sweet Rome’s dominion,
has no fear of her armed might. These people’s bows,
their full quivers, their ponies (tough enough for the longest
overland trek), their capacity to endure
hunger and thirst, to leave the pursuing foeman	85
waterless — these give them courage. The ire
of a merciful man would never have sent me to this place
had he truly known its terrain;
nor is he pleased by my, or any Roman’s, capture
at enemy hands: mine least of all, since he	90
himself spared my life: his slightest nod could have doomed me
but did not; no need of Getae for my death!
Yet he found no act of mine to merit execution,
and may be less threatening — or threatened — than he was;
even then he took only the action to which I forced him, his anger	95
falls — almost — short of my just deserts.
So may the gods (among whom he stands unmatched for justice)
grant that earth’s bounty bring forth nothing more great
than Caesar: long under his sway, may this earth be ever Caesar’s,
pass on through the hands of his kin!	100
Do you, when my judge’s mood’s as mild as I found it,
speak up for my tears: don’t seek a full reprieve,
but greater safety merely in my grim condition,
a place of exile remote from these fierce foes,
that the life spared to me by his present godhead	105
may not be snuffed by some squalid native’s sword.
Lastly, if I should die, may I come to burial under
more peaceable soil, may no Scythian clods oppress
my bones, may no wild Thracian mustangs with their drumming
hooves spurn my ill-interred ashes (all	110
an exile deserves, no doubt), no local spirits scare my
poor ghost — if any awareness outlasts death.
To hear such a story might stir Caesar’s compassion,
Maximus — but only if it stirred yours first.
Speak up for me, I beg you, make those august ears receptive	115
with the voice that supports and soothes
nervous defendants; turn your skilled tongue’s practised sweetness
to soften the heart of this man we must treat as a god.
No Therómedon he, no Diomedes, no bloody Atreus, serving
manflesh as fodder to wild beasts,	120
wild horses — or guests, but a ruler slow to punish,
quick to reward, in agonies when he’s forced
into fierceness, conquering only so he can spare the conquered,
who’s slammed the bolts for ever on civil war,
whose coercion more often rests on the fear of reprisal	125
than on reprisal itself, whose lightnings are hurled
unwillingly, and seldom. Thus since you’ll be pleading
with so mild a judge, petition to have my place
of exile moved nearer home! I’ve supported you always,
been a regular guest at your board;	130
it was I who brought down Hymen to bless your marriage,
I who sang the epithalamium that matched
your dazzling union, whose books I recall your praising
(those always excepted that did their author harm),
who admired the writings of yours that you sometimes read me,	135
who was given a bride from your house.
She from first youth won your Marcia’s love and approval,
ranks as one of her friends;
Caesar’s aunt had already welcomed her in her circle —
any woman approved by them is proven indeed!	140
With such praise even a Claudia (outshining her reputation)
would have had no need of divine support.
I too have spent my past life without spot or blemish —
just skip over the last few years.
But — never mind about me — my wife’s your proper burden:	145
neglect her, and your good faith’s lost.
With you she seeks refuge, she embraces your altars —
each to his own god: a proper choice —
and weeping begs you to plead with Caesar, coax him
into bringing her husband’s burial nearer home.	150

3

Greetings, Rufinus, from your Ovid — if so wretched
a creature can be any man’s friend.
The solace you lately sent for a disordered spirit
brought succour and hope to my ills,
and just as Philoctetes, through the arts of Macháon,	5
felt easement in his wound with medicine’s aid,
so I, downcast in heart, by an ill wound stricken,
have begun to recover some strength
through your guidance: I was down, but your message revived me,
just as the pulse will pick up with a swig of wine,	10
yet your eloquence failed to exhibit power sufficient
for my heart to be healed by those words alone —
you may have drained off much from the maelstrom of my troubles
but no less will still remain: perhaps with time
the scar will cicatrize, where now a raw wound flinches	15
from the touch of a human hand.
No doctor can always ensure that the patient recovers — sometimes
the disease will win despite (or because of) his skill.
You know how blood hawked up from a spongy lung’s one certain
signpost straight to Death River; even though	20
Aesculapius in person should apply his holy herbals,
wounds of the heart he cannot cure;
no medicine known can banish knotty podagra,
or reduce the dreaded hydrocele; grief, too,
at times lies beyond the reach of any doctor’s healing,	25
is chronic at best, can only be worn down
into a slow remission. When your precepts have strengthened
my faltering spirit, when I’ve borrowed your heart’s
armour — why then once more love for my country, stronger
than all reason, undoes the work your words achieved.	30
Call this what you prefer — loyalty, womanish softness —
I admit I’ve a weak resolve in my distress.
No doubt of Ulysses’ good sense, yet he prayed he might be granted
to behold the smoke of his native hearth: the land
of their birth draws all men by some sweet enchantment,	35
will never let them forget.
What’s better than Rome? what worse than Scythia’s ice-chill?
Yet the native will flee that City, hasten back here:
though her cage be never so comfortable, yet Philomela
still strives to return to her native woods.	40
Bulls seek familiar pastures, lions — and their fierceness
offers no impediment — familiar caves;
yet you hope by your lenitives to evict the biting
agony of exile from my breast! Contrive
rather to diminish the affection in which I hold you,	45
make your absence that much easier to bear.
I suppose you’ll tell me that though I’m severed from the country
where I was born, I’m still among humankind?
But I lie at the world’s end, in a lonely wasteland,
its topsoil overlaid with perpetual snow:	50
no fruitful orchards here, no clustering vineyards,
no riverside willow-trees, no mountain oaks.
The sea’s as bad as the land, its waters ever heaving,
gale-whipped, under a sunless sky.
Wherever you look, the same flat uncultivated landscape,	55
huge vistas of empty steppe.
Turn right, turn left, a dangerous enemy threatens,
encroaches: terror on either flank: one side’s
always expecting a charge by Bistonian lancers,
the other, volleys of Sarmatian shafts.	60
So quote me examples of veteran oldtimers
who braved fate with a steadfast mind,
admire the oaklike fortitude of great-hearted Rutilius
in refusing repatriation — yet he
chose Smyrna: not Pontus with its hostile badlands, but Smyrna,	65
almost the sweetest spot on earth!
Diogenes shed no tears for his distant birthplace: Athens
was where he chose to live instead.
Themistocles, whose arms laid low the arms of Persia,
first knew exile in Argos; expelled	70
from his homeland Aristeides sought refuge at Sparta —
which of the two was better’s a moot point.
After killing a man the young Patroclus left Opus
for Thessaly, became Achilles’ guest,
while Jason, Argo’s captain to Colchis, exiled from Thessaly	75
found refuge in Corinth, by Pirene’s spring.
Agenor’s son Cadmus abandoned Sidon’s ramparts
to raise new walls at a better site;
driven from Calydon, Tydeus came to Adrastus,
the island Venus loves took Teucer in.	80
Why catalogue all those ancient Roman exiles
whose world’s end was Tivoli? It makes no odds —
list the lot, you’ll find there’s no one, right down the ages,
dumped in a more remote or nastier spot.
More reason, then, why your wisdom should forgive grief’s failure	85
to pay more than lip-service to your advice:
yet I don’t deny that if my wounds could heal, the healing
would be worked by your precepts. No, I only fear
lest your efforts to save me are labour lost, nor in my desperate
sickness am I helped by the aid you bring.	90
I don’t say this because mine is the greater wisdom,
but — better than any doctor — I know myself.
Yet be that as it may, I’m overwhelmed by your kindness,
and accept the help you offer in good part.

4

Now, already, white hairs have brindled my waning
age, the lines of senility score my face;
now strength and vigour abate in my broken body,
the games that delighted my youth no longer please.
If you came upon me now, you’d no longer recognize me,	5
such ruin’s been wrought on my looks.
I admit the years are responsible — yet there’s a second
cause: unremitting hardship, distress of mind.
Spread out my misfortunes to match the year’s long tally
and I’d be older than Nestor, believe you me.	10
You see how oxen, working iron-hard ploughland
(and what’s more tough than an ox?) are broken, worn down
by toil; the earth that’s never allowed to lie fallow
is exhausted through overcropping, decays.
Run a horse in every race, without intermission,	15
and it’s bound, eventually, to collapse.
A ship, however strong, that’s never dried out will founder
during some deep-sea voyage: so I too
am debilitated by an unmeasured load of troubles,
made an old man before my time.	20
Leisure sustains the body, the mind too feeds upon it,
but excessive toil wears both
to nothing. Observe what praise later ages heaped on Jason
for venturing into these parts!
Yet his effort, compared to mine, was lightweight, unimportant	25
(let’s hope those ‘great names’ don’t suppress the truth!):
He set out for Pontus at the bidding of Pelias,
whose rule scarce reached the borders of Thessaly;
but it was the wrath of Caesar that wrought my downfall — Caesar
whose name strikes awe from dawnlands to furthest west!	30
Thessaly’s nearer Pontus than Rome to the Danube delta —
his voyage was briefer than mine.
He had as his companions the flower of Achaean manhood,
but in my exile I was abandoned by all;
I ploughed the vasty deep in fragile timbers — but solid	35
the hull that bore Aeson’s son.
I had no Tiphys as helmsman, no Phineus to teach me
which routes to follow, which to shun;
Queen Juno and Pallas offered him protection,
no gods safeguarded my life; he obtained	40
assistance from Cupid’s clandestine arts — far better
had Love never learnt them from me!
He came back home, but I shall die in this land, if the heavy
wrath of that injured deity persists.
So, most faithful of wives, my task is surely harder	45
than that which Jason endured.
You too, who were young when I left the City, doubtless
have been aged by my troubles: may the gods
let me see you as now you are, bestow fond kisses
on your brindling hair, fold my arms	50
round your far-from-plump body, assure you that ‘It’s worry
on my account that’s thinned you down so much —’,
tell, amid mingled tears, the full tale of my sufferings,
enjoy an unhoped-for colloquy, offer those
true gods the Caesars — also the wife who’s worthy of Caesar —	55
due debt of incense from my grateful hand.
May the Prince be appeased, may Memnon’s mother Aurora
with rosy lips call forth this day — soon, soon!

5

He who was once not last among your friends — he, Ovid,
asks you now, Maximus, to peruse his words.
Forbear to search them for my former talent, lest you
seem unaware of my exile. You know well
how idleness corrupts a slothful body, how stagnant	5
water goes brackish: so with me:
whatever skill I once had as a spinner of verses
is now wanting, atrophied by neglect.
Even these words you’re reading, friend Maximus, believe me,
were written unwillingly, forced out.	10
There’s no joy in stretching the mind for such undertakings,
and appeals to the Muse to visit the rude Goths
fall on deaf ears. But still, as you see, I struggle
to spin verse, though it comes no softer than my fate.
Reading it over, I blush at the stuff I’ve written —	15
so much deserves erasure, even in my,
the maker’s, judgement. And yet, I don’t correct it: the labour’s
greater than writing, my sick mind can’t endure
any hard task. I suppose my file should start biting deeper,
I should challenge each individual word.	20
Has Fortune racked me too little? Only if Thracian rivers
have African tributaries, only if the Alps
are littered with leaves of Athos! The heart that nurses
a wretched wound should be spared: so oxen ease
the load from their chafed necks. But isn’t a fine harvest	25
the best reason for work, don’t fields return their seed
with abundant interest? To this day there isn’t a single
work of mine that’s showed profit, and would that none
had wrought me harm! So why write? you wonder: I also
wonder myself. Like you, I often ask	30
what I hope to get out of it — or is the popular picture
of the crazy poet true, and I the best
proof of the saying, so often deceived by barren
soil, yet persistently sowing in the ground
that’s my ruin? Truth is, each man has his own obsessions,	35
loves to spend time on his familiar art:
the gladiator, wounded, swears off the Games, yet later
forgets his former hurt, takes arms once more;
the shipwrecked sailor vows he’ll stay clear of water,
but in no time returns to pulling an oar	40
where late he swam: so I keep my profitless endeavour,
turn back to the goddesses whom I could wish
I’d never worshipped. Yet — what else can I do? I’m not one
to idle my life away. The way I see it,
inaction is death. Yet drinking till sunrise bores me,	45
the lure of the dice-box leaves me cold.
When I’ve given such time to sleep as my body calls for,
how spend those long hours of wakefulness? Shall I
forget my country’s customs, be seduced by indigenous
practices, learn to bend a Sarmatian bow?	50
From this pursuit too my lack of strength debars me —
my mind is stronger than its meagre frame.
Ponder my options well, you’ll find nothing more useful
than this art of mine that has no use —
from it I win oblivion to my misfortunes:	55
harvest enough if my soil yield only this!
Renown may spur you on; you should pay court to the Muses
if you want your recitations approved.
Enough for me to compose what comes without effort —
I lack a motive for concentrated work.	60
Why should I polish my poems with care and labour?
Need I fear lest the natives disapprove?
An audacious claim, perhaps, but I boast that the Danube
has no greater talent than mine!
In this region where I live, it suffices if I manage	65
to be a poet among the uncultured Goths.
Why should I want my fame to reach that distant country?
Let the quarter Fate’s assigned me be my Rome:
my unhappy Muse looks no further than this theatre —
such my deserts, so have the high gods willed.	70
And how could my books, from here, make the journey thither
when even the North Wind’s wings
fail by the time he arrives? The heavens divide us,
and the Bear, so remote from Rome, shines all too close
on the shaggy Goths. That some hint of my work has surmounted	75
so much land, all those seas, is hard
for me to believe. And yet, suppose it read, suppose it
(miraculously) enjoyed: the help this gives
to its author is nil. If you were praised where the Indian
Ocean laps round Ceylon, or in torrid Assuan,	80
would you care? Suppose you aim higher: if the distant
stars of the Pleiad praised you, what good would that do?
But my poor scribblings don’t even get to the City:
when their author left town, so did his fame,
and all you for whom I died when my reputation was buried	85
now too, I’m sure, keep silence about my death-in-life.

6

When you heard about my misfortune — you were abroad then —
is it true that your heart was sad?
Dissimulate if you will, avoid the admission,
but if I know you, Graecinus (I do, and well),
sad it was. Hateful brutality’s not in your nature,	5
sits at variance with your pursuits.
The liberal arts, your greatest passion, soften
the heart, drive harshness out:
and no man embraces them with more unswerving devotion
than you (within the demands of a military career).	10
Certainly when I first faced up to my position —
for long I was stunned, couldn’t think —
I felt an extra blow in that you, my friend, were absent
who would have been my great bulwark: with you
there was lost all that solaces a soul in anguish,	15
and much of my courage and advice.
But now (this alone remains) provide me, from a distance,
with comforting words for the heart —
a heart that (if you believe your friend, who shuns all falsehood)
deserves to be thought of as foolish rather than bad.	20
No brief matter, nor safe, to set down the whole background
of my offence: those wounds shrink from the touch.
Stop asking me what they are, how I came by them: don’t disturb them
if you’re anxious that they should heal.
Yet don’t talk of a ‘crime’, say rather, ‘culpable error’ —	25
unless any such offence against the high gods
counts as a crime. So I’ve not lost hope, Graecinus,
not completely, of easing my fate.
That deity, Hope, when all other gods abandoned
the wicked earth, remained: it’s she who fills	30
even the shackled ditcher with zest for the future,
faith that his legs will lose their chains;
it’s she who keeps shipwrecked sailors swimming in mid-ocean
with no land anywhere in sight.
Often the skill and care of doctors fail a patient,	35
yet though his heartbeat wavers, his hopes stay high.
Those in prison are said to hope for deliverance,
a crucified man still prays.
Many men, as they knotted the rope round their throat, this goddess
headed off from the death they sought: me too,	40
when I tried, with a sword, to put an end to my sufferings,
she laid hands on, restrained, reproved,
crying: ‘What are you at? This calls for tears, not bloodshed:
tears often turn a prince’s wrath aside.’
So though it’s in no way indebted to my merits,	45
my trust in the God’s goodness runs high.
Pray that he may not be deaf to me, Graecinus,
add some words of your own to the prayer I make!
And may I lie entombed in the sands of Tomis
if you fail in your bid on my behalf,	50
for sooner will doves avoid their wonted dovecots,
wild beasts their caves, cows pasture, gulls the sea,
than my Graecinus treat his old friend poorly —
the world is not that altered by my fate.

7

Letters, not spoken words, have brought you, Messalinus,
this greeting you read — all the way from the wild Goths.
Does the locale give away the writer? Or must I spell out
my name to make clear to you
that your correspondent is Ovid? Yet does any acquaintance	5
of yours (one excepted, and I pray that I’m your friend!)
lie at the world’s far edge? God grant that all who hold you
in love and respect know nothing of these tribes!
Enough that I should live amid ice and Scythian arrows
(if such a version of death can be called ‘life’).	10
Let war assail me on land, or cold from heaven,
fierce natives in arms, or battering winter hail,
let me dwell in a region bare of vines or orchards,
ever threatened by enemies on every side —
but may all your other supporters remain in safety,	15
amongst whom, one of the crowd,
I had my small niche. If you find such words offensive
and deny any link with me — that’s my bad luck.
Even if it were true, you should pardon the falsehood:
my boast detracts nothing from your praise.	20
What acquaintance of the Caesars fails to claim their friendship?
Forgive the confession: you were a Caesar to me.
Not, of course, that I burst in where I’m debarred: suffice it
if you don’t deny I possessed
the entrée to your house. If you drop me now, you’re short of	25
one salutation you enjoyed before.
Your father, the guiding light, cause, spur, of my vocation
did not refuse me as a friend:
over him I shed those tears that are death’s last office,
wrote his obituary dirge.	30
Your brother, too, as close-joined in your affections
as Castor to Pollux, as the twin Atreids,
has not disdained me as friend or as companion —
at least, if you think such words
won’t bring him harm: if not, here too I’ll admit to falsehood —	35
better that that whole house should be closed to me!
Yet it should not be closed; no authority has the power
to guarantee that a friend will do no wrong.
Again, though I’d be glad if my fault could be denied, still
everyone knows that I committed no crime;	40
and unless the offence were in part excusable, exile
would have been scant punishment.
But he himself, Caesar, saw — who sees through all things —
that folly was the word for my ‘crimes’,
and as far as I or the matter allowed, he spared me,	45
using his fiery bolt with mild restraint.
Neither life nor wealth he took from me, nor the chance of
reversion — if his anger were conquered by your prayers.
Yet mine was a heavy fall. Small wonder if one smitten
by Jove suffers no slight wound:	50
though Achilles himself should hold in his strength, the Pelian
spear that he cast still inflicted heavy blows.
Thus since my punisher’s judgment stands in my favour,
there’s no reason why your door should ever deny
having known me: I admit I frequented it too seldom,	55
but that too, I believe, was in my stars.
Your brother’s house did not win my greater sense of duty —
it was always your household god stood over me,
and your loyalty’s such that (though he attend you not in person)
your brother’s friend still retains some claims on you.	60
Think, too, that just as thanks are due to those who render
services, so it becomes
your state to deserve them — and if you’ll let me advise you
what you should want, then pray the gods you bestow
more than you get. So you do, as (as I recall) you garnered	65
loyal service from many because of that.
So class me as you will, Messalinus, provided only
I’m not an alien element in your house;
and as for Ovid’s ills — since he clearly deserves them — though you
don’t grieve that he bears them, yet grieve for his deserts!	70

8

Sevérus, dear strand of my heart, accept this greeting
sent you by the Ovid you used to love.
Don’t ask how I fare — should I tell you the whole story
you’d weep: enough if you know the sum of my ills.
I live bereft of peace, amid incessant warfare:	5
sharpshooting natives, fierce raids.
Of so many banished from Rome I alone am on active service
in exile: the rest (I don’t grudge it them) sleep safe.
One more reason why you should make allowances for these poems —
what you read was written on stand-by. There’s an old	10
city stands close to the banks of binomial Danube,
made near-unapproachable by its walls and site,
founded (if we believe the local tale) by a Caspian,
Aegisos, who gave it his own name.
This place the wild Goths, knocking out its Thracian defenders	15
with a lightning raid, took, and warred against its king.
But he, well mindful of the great race that his valour
enhances, was there at once with a countless host,
nor withdrew till a well-earned massacre of the guilty
had [beaten down the aggressors’ presumptuousness].	20
May you ever, most valiant king of our age, be granted
to wield your sceptre, ever in honour to reign!
May warlike Rome, with great Caesar, extend approval to you
as they do now: what more could I ask on your behalf?
(End of digression.) My complaint, dear erstwhile comrade,	25
is that my misfortunes are compounded by war.
Since I’ve been sundered from you, thrust down to Stygian waters,
the Pleiads’ rising has brought four autumns round.
Don’t get the idea, either, that Ovid longs for the comforts
of urban civilization — yet he does, he does.	30
Sometimes it’s you, my dear friends, whom I remember; sometimes
it’s my wife, my daughter who come to mind —
or I’m walking from home once more to visit our fine City’s
high-spots, yet all in my mind’s eye —
now the public squares, now the temples, and now the marble theatres	35
float before me; now I imagine each portico
with its levelled promenade, or the view from the grassy Campus
across to those splendid gardens; the ponds, the canals,
the damp Virgin Conduit. Yet though I’m robbed of urban pleasures
why not (you’ll say) enjoy being countrified?	40
Yet does not my heart still yearn for those long-lost meadows,
those rich Paelignian fields,
those gardens set amid pine-clad hills at the junction
of the Clodian and Flaminian Ways, which I
tilled for I know not whom, where I used to work in person	45
(and glad to) irrigating the crops,
where — if they’re alive still — are orchard trees that I planted
whose fruit I shall never pluck?
To compensate for their loss how I wish I possessed here,
even in exile, some patch to till — I’d be	50
the herdsman myself, watch she-goats scale their dizzy rock-face,
drive sheep to pasture leaning on my crook,
and to stop my heart dwelling on its constant troubles
I’d harness the oxen to their crescent yoke,
learn the words of command that these local bullocks	55
respond to, throw in the usual threats;
with my own hand on the stilt I’d guide the deep ploughshare,
try my hand at scattering seed on the upturned soil;
I wouldn’t balk at hoeing weeds, or channelling
water for the thirsty garden to drink —	60
but how can I have these things, when all that’s holding
the enemy off me is a wall, a shut gate?
For you at birth, though (something at which my heart rejoices),
the Fate-goddesses spun strong threads.
Now the Campus claims you, now some well-shaded cloister,	65
now (though you rarely go there) the Forum; but soon
Umbria summons you back, or you’re speeding down the Appian
Way, hot-axled, to your Alban estate.
There, perhaps, you may wish for Caesar to abate his
just anger, for me to be a guest	70
in your villa: ah friend, that’s too much to ask, be modest,
reef in the sails of your prayer!
What I want is some land nearer home, not exposed to warfare:
with that a good part of my trouble is removed.

9

The letter I had from you on the death of Celsus
was at once made moist by my tears,
and though I shouldn’t say this, never thought it could happen,
I read what you had to say with reluctant eyes.
No more grievous news has reached me since my arrival	5
in Pontus, nor (I pray) ever will.
His image, as though he were really there, still lingers
before my eyes: love pictures him still alive
though he’s snuffed out. I often recall his light-hearted
fun, the times with transparent trust he’d perform	10
matters of serious moment. Yet there’s no time I remember
more often (would that those hours had been my last!)
than when my house, in great and sudden ruin, crumbled
about me, collapsed upon its master’s head.
He stood by me, Maximus, when the majority dropped me,	15
did not truck to fortune: I saw
him weeping at my fate as though called to abandon
his own brother to funeral flames.
He hugged me close, he consoled me as I lay prostrate,
kept mingling his tears with mine.	20
How often — a hated guardian of my bitter existence —
he restrained these hands, too eager to cut me off!
How often he told me: ‘Gods’ anger can be placated;
don’t say you haven’t a chance of pardon — live!’
Yet what he most often said was: ‘Think what a godsend	25
Maximus should be to you:
Maximus, such is his loyalty, will lean on Caesar, beg him
not to sustain his wrath to the bitter end;
will enlist his brother’s influence as reinforcement,
will try every option to alleviate your distress.’	30
These words, Maximus, diminished my repugnance
for the sad life I faced: take care they weren’t in vain!
He used to swear that he’d visit me, all this distance,
only if you approved his plan to make
so lengthy a trip: he had the reverence for your household	35
that you display for the gods who rule this world.
Believe me, though you enjoy many friends — and, yes, deserve them —
he stood second to none, if only it’s true
that what makes men great is not property, not illustrious
ancestors, but high honour, natural parts.	40
So it’s right that I should drop tears for Celsus dead, as he did
for me alive, when I was setting forth
to exile; right that my verses should bear witness
to his rare spirit, that generations unborn
may learn, Celsus, of your name. This is all I can send you	45
from the Getic land; all, in Rome, I can call my own.
I couldn’t attend your funeral, anoint your body:
between your pyre and me a whole world lies.
But Maximus, whom in life you worshipped, could, and did it:
bestowed on you every service, duly performed	50
your funeral obsequies with ceremony and honour,
poured out on your cold breast
rare balm, mingled in grief with that chrism his falling
tears, laid your bones to rest in local ground.
Since he thus discharges his debts to dead friends, he can reckon	55
me also among the number of the dead.

10

Ovid the exile sends you his wish for good health, Flaccus —
if one can send something one lacks oneself!
Persistent lassitude robs of its natural vigour
a body already sapped by bitter cares.
I have no pain, no breathless fever roasts me,	5
my pulse keeps its normal beat,
but my palate is dull, the food I’m served repels me,
I detest mealtimes, complain when they arrive.
Set before me any product of sea, air, or ocean —
nothing will serve to sharpen my appetite.	10
Let nectar, ambrosia, the food and drink of heaven
be offered me by the fair hand
of bustling Hebe, yet the savour won’t stir those torpid
taste-buds of mine, a weight will long remain
in my sluggish stomach. All this I wouldn’t dare — bare truth	15
though it be — to write to everyone, lest my ills
be labelled ‘mere fancies’. As though my condition, my circumstances
were such as had room for fancies! Oh I pray
for fancies like these to beset any man who’s worried
that I’ve been let off too lightly by Caesar’s wrath!	20
Sleep, too, essential sustenance for a meagre body,
denies its balm to my unnurtured frame;
instead, I keep vigil: vigilant, too, my unending
sufferings — and this place keeps them well supplied.
If you saw me you’d scarcely recognize my features,	25
you’d ask where my old complexion has gone, so scant
the sap that reaches my lean limbs, so much paler
my person than new wax. Nor did I bring
these troubles on myself by immoderate potations —
you know that water’s almost my only drink —	30
nor do I gorge myself with rich food: even had I a mind to,
there’s none to be got in these parts.
My strength’s not impaired by the ruinous passions of Venus —
that goddess stays far from sad beds.
Bad water, a bad environment — it’s these pull me down; a stronger	35
cause yet is that persistent distress of mind
which stays with me always. Unless you and your brother
were easing my sufferings, my mind could scarce have borne
so grim a load. Kind haven you are to a sprung vessel,
bringing me the help that so many refuse.	40
Keep on, keep on, I beseech you: I shall always need it
while Caesar’s godhead still remains wroth with me.
That he may lessen — not terminate — his righteous anger
let each of you, suppliant, implore your gods!