Tag: horace

Faunus, the Roman God of the countryside associated with the Greek Pan is a friendly presence for Horace – who believes that he owes him his escape from a falling tree – but he is unpredictable and needs to be handled with care and consideration. In this Ode, Horace offers him sacrifice and a holiday for the farm in his honour. In the illustration, a fresco from Pompeii represents the dancing ditcher, whom Horace describes during the celebrations as “stamping three times on his enemy the earth”.

Hear Horace’s Latin and follow in English here.

In a piece which seems to have been written at a dangerous point some years before Horace launched his first three books of odes in 23 BCE, he turns for help to the Goddess Fortuna, while recognising that the fortunes that she has in store for Rome after a long period of civil wars could be bad as well as good. This ode seems as deeply and personally felt as any that Horace wrote, and is surely no mere literary exercise.

In the illustration, from a mediaeval manuscript of the Carmina Burana, Fortuna governs the cycle of life.

Hear Horace’s Latin and follow in English here.

Are the Olympian Gods – if they exist – too remote to take an interest in human affairs, as the followers of the Philosopher Epicurus thought? An awe-inspiring natural event causes Horace to think again about his beliefs. Hear Horace’s Latin and follow in English here.

In this wall painting from Herculaneum, Zeus and Hera celebrate their marriage; see photo credits for licensing details.

On Horace’s Sabine farm, unmolested by her brutal urban boyfriend, Tyndaris sings of Penelope and Circe among the peace and joys of the countryside.

Hear Horace’s Latin and follow in English here.

Anticipating literary immortality, Horace imagines himself as a swan whose song will be heard all over the known world. Hear his Latin and follow in English here as he concludes his second book of Odes.

This Roman fresco of Leda and the swan was found in Pompeii in 2018.