Odes 3.7

Gyges’s constancy

Gyges, a Roman merchant, has been caught out in Greece when the sailing season has ended and will not get home until spring, to the dismay of his wife or lover, Asterie (four syllables, long “e” at the end). Horace’s omniscience about the details in both locations implies that they are largely or wholly imaginary, though the overall scenario is plausible. The poem stands up well as a Roman literary treatment of circumstances which would not be out of place in Greek epigram. The characters have Greek names: they too are very likely to be imaginary, though the possibility cannot be excluded that Asterie stands for a real lady who could benefit from advice of the kind that Horace gives at the end. Oricus was a port on the Greek side of the Adriatic; the myths that the go-between mentions imply a threat that Chloe may make false accusations to her husband about Gyges if he refuses to sleep with her.

Metre: (third) Asclepiad.

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Quid fles, Asterie, quem tibi, candidi
primo restituent vere Favonii
Thyna merce beatum,
constantis iuvenem fide

Gygen? ille Notis actus ad Oricum
post insana Caprae sidera frigidas
noctis non sine multis
insomnis lacrimis agit.

atqui sollicitae nuntius hospitae,
suspirare Chloen et miseram tuis
dicens ignibus uri,
temptat mille vafer modis:

ut Proetum mulier perfida credulum
falsis inpulerit criminibus nimis
casto Bellerophontae
maturare necem, refert;

narrat paene datum Pelea Tartaro,
Magnessam Hippolyten dum fugit abstinens,
et peccare docentis
fallax historias movet.

frustra: nam scopulis surdior Icari
voces audit adhuc integer. at tibi
ne vicinus Enipeus
plus iusto placeat cave;

quamvis non alius flectere equum sciens
aeque conspicitur gramine Martio,
nec quisquam citus aeque
Tusco denatat alveo.

prima nocte domum claude neque in vias
sub cantu querulae despice tibiae
et te saepe vocanti
duram difficilis mane.

Why do you weep, Asterie, for the one the cloudless west winds will bring back to you as soon as spring arrives, Gyges, a young man of constant fidelity, flushed with success in his Bithynian trading? Driven by the south winds to Oricum after the [rising of the] violent stars of Capricorn, unable to sleep, he is passing cold nights, and not without many tears. And now a go-between from his anxious hostess is craftily tempting him in a thousand ways, saying that she, Chloe, is in misery and sighing, and burning for your man. He reminds Gyges that credulous Proetus’s unfaithful wife drove him with false accusations to plot the death of Bellerophon [because he was] too chaste; he tells how Peleus was almost sent to Tartarus when he refused Magnesian Hippolyta and fled, and the deceiver deploys other tales that teach a man to sin. But in vain, since Gyges is deafer to the talk that he hears than the rocks of the Icarian Sea, and still remains blameless. But you too, Asterie, take care that you do not like your neighbour Enipeus more than is right, though there is no-one else who draws peoples’ gaze as much on the Campus Martius for his skill in horsemanship, and no-one who swims as swiftly down the Tiber’s stream. As soon as night falls, shut up the house, don’t look out into the street when you hear the song of the plaintive flute, and if he keeps calling you cruel, keep discouraging him.

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