Talk:Ovid

Relegation?
What does it mean that Ovid's exile is "more properly known as relegation"? I removed this because I couldn't find an explanation of it anywhere. 72.66.124.57 (talk) 02:15, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Relegation is a less severe form of banishment in which the victim is allowed to keep property and some rights. I will emend the article accordingly when I have more time. El barty (talk) 00:10, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Why does the article refer to Ovid like this: "Ovid died at Tomis in AD 17 because he was such a BAMF." Does anyone reading this page know what a BAMF is? I assure you it's a deeply insulting term, and certainly not fit to be viewed by schoolchildren. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JohnOlsson (talk • contribs) 04:46, 16 June 2012 (UTC)


 * John Olsson, it's called wikipedia vandalism, a constant problem. You should fix it if you're so perturbed.Jdf8 (talk) 20:58, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * What's with meow, princess? Not used to that tone out of you. davidiad.: 02:56, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

Naming
Shouldn't this just be at Ovid? I mean, no one ever calls him Publius Ovidius Naso, or even just Ovidius. Virgil and Horace are at their common names, rather than their full ones (as are the Roman Emperors). Adam Bishop 06:03, 21 Sep 2003 (UTC)
 * I agree; I'll do the move (there's some history at the old Ovid page). If there are objections it's easily undone, and at any rate I'd be interested in seeing what any objections might be. - Hephaestos 06:37, 21 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Ovid's sainthood
I removed the following from the article...
 * Note: St. Ovidius, not recognized by the Catholic church, is in fact the same as Ovid. He supposedly showed an interest in Christianity near the end of life. A "book of St. Ovide" was denounced by John Calvin as a fake in his "Treatise on Relics", and Voltaire scorns the legend of St. Ovide resuscitating little children, so his legend was current in the 1600s. There is a section in Paris called St. Ovide.   Women in his natal town, Sulmonia, pray to him at "Ovid's villa" to help them become fertile.  Ovidio, Ovidius, and Ovide, which all derive from Ovid's name meaning "Lamb", remain boy's names in Europe and elsewhere.

...because it's unlikely to be completely true. Of course if its core facts can be confirmed by enough independent editors, it should be restored. -- Derek Ross | Talk 06:11, 5 September 2005 (UTC)

Are actual copies of Ovid's works (10 b.c. etc.) in existence and where are they? What is the earliest ms. of Metamorphoses in existence and where is it? Thanks BobIsaacs@sbcglobal.net

There is a problem in the chronology of Ovid's works. 'Fasti' appears two times, with different dates.

restoration of BC/AD dating system
The dating system was BC/AD for quite a while, and was sporadically changed by an anon IP - just check the history - so I restored the version that was previously in use. Chooserr 20:36, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Is Ovid a darling?
My Renaissance Lit Professor, the greatly-learned Dr. Richard Zacha at the University of Texas at Arlington way back in the 1960's, always referred to Ovid as "the darling of the Renaissance." I wonder if others agree with Dr. Zacha. Was Ovid as important to the Renaissance as he was in his own time? If so, he was surely one of the greatest literary influences in all of history. Cal1440. Cal1440 21:28, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Pronunciation: AH-vid? OWE-vid?
Can anyone shed light on the correct pronunciation of the name? Is it AH-vid? OWE-vid? Something else? More than one acceptable answer? --Imperpay 21:27, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
 * The correct pronunciation is more like AW-vid where AW rhymes with paw, raw or law. -- Derek Ross | Talk 23:58, 2 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Errm, it depends on whether or not you're trying to replicate his name in classical Latin. Ovidius, pronounced classically is /owe-WEE-dyus/, hence a classicizing pronunciation would be /OWE-vid/.  But most Anglophone classicists, even the Brits, usually say /AHH-vid/, or something like it.  Mr. Ross' /AW-vid/ sounds to me like a British-accented take on this. -- Crispinus211 17:00, 5 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Perhaps so, although since I'm Scottish, your American accent is probably closer to the "British" one than mine. However my Latin master never found the evidence for the classical pronunciation of V as W very convincing. Thus when preparing us for competition, he insisted that we use the V pronunciation. -- Derek Ross | Talk 18:45, 5 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I have never in my live heard anyone say /AHH-vid/, except in the Boston area where /AW/ (as in paw) is pronounced /AHH/. The standard modern pronunciation in English is /AW-vid/.  This Scottish Latin master sounds a bit old-fashioned...  IIRC, contemporary Greeks transliterated consonantal Latin V as "ou" not as beta (which was I think already becoming a fricative): thus in Greek "Varius" was "Ouarios."  Pretty convincing to me.  208.114.170.182 05:51, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

This ‘AH’ and ‘AW’ stuff is absurd. There are two possible pronunciations for a word spelt this way in English: and. The former starts like the word ‘over’, whilst the latter starts like word ‘of’. I use the former, but the latter seems perfectly reasonable, especially since that O is short in Latin. His full name was. Not only is it well-established that the sound did not exist in Latin, there was not even such a letter as v. The closest thing to it was the vowel u, which had three minor variations in pronunciation:, and  (short, long, and semi-consonsantal). Within this sphere of studies, doubting these facts is on a par with doubting that the Earth goes around the Sun. — Chameleon 03:14, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Obviously it is pronounced different ways in different places. There's obviously no "correct" pronunciation; it all depends on what your goals are in pronunciation (e.g. sound pretentious, sound American, sound British) and where you are. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jdf8 (talk • contribs) 00:02, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

At British universities, I have never heard any other pronunciation than. 79.246.254.205 (talk) 01:04, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Vegetarian
When categorising under "vegetarians" (or "Italian vegetarians" in this case), it is preferable to provide both the fact and a source for it in the article. Would anyone be willing to provide them? --Grimhelm 21:15, 24 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Ovid himself, provides the information which leads some people to believe that he may have been a (neo-)Pythagorean (and therefore a vegetarian). At the beginning of book 15 of his poem, Metamorphoses, he makes Pythagoras expound on Pythagorean philosopy, although it is a rather "popular" exposition, going into some detail about how wicked it is to kill animals and eat them but saying little about the more "difficult" concepts. It's not conclusive evidence but it is indicative. When combined with earlier passages on the Golden Age in Metamorphoses which make it clear that Ovid thought that eating animals was evil, it becomes quite compelling.
 * It's also worth noting that Ovid was a student of Seneca, who was himself a Pythagorean, so an influence can be found to explain Ovid's original exposure to Pythagoreanism. :To sum up, I'd love to provide a source once I find a good one. -- Derek Ross | Talk 06:38, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * But this is not the same as being a vegetarian. Ovid could quite easily have believed that it was wicked to slaughter animals, but still eaten meat.  Many people would probably agree that lying is wrong, but how many people can truly say they never ever lie?  Seneca wrote passionately about how slaves were just the same as anyone else, and how freemen were often slaves of their own desires, and how this voluntary slavery was truly the most shameful, and yet I have never heard that he released his slaves or demanded abolition.  — Chameleon 03:20, 12 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Understood. However since Neopythagoreanism was a religion its followers can be assumed to follow its tenets. And one of those tenets was "Thou shalt not eat meat", a much easier tenet to apply than "Thou shalt not bear false witness", or even than "Love thy neighbour as thyself". Even though we can't be certain, the evidence from Metamorphoses suggests that it is more likely that Ovid was a vegetarian for at least part of his life than that he was not. -- Derek Ross | Talk'' 05:51, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Nor do I think it safe to use the Metamorphoses as evidence for his views. Seadowns (talk) 23:42, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

Medea tragedy
Medea, a lost tragedy about Medea

It should be mentioned in the article: 1. There are two short fragments which have survived. 2. The tragedy was praised by ancient writers (for example by Quintilianus). --62.245.207.18 22:41, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Amores and Ovid's opinion of other poets
"Much of the Amores is tongue-in-cheek, and while Ovid appears to be taking the normal route of a love poem, he often uses this as a ploy before going against the norm and to a certain extent mocking the other love poets who he felt were not as good as himself, e.g. Propertius, Tibullus and Gallus". Hugh Davey 17:40, 22 March 2007 (UTC)


 * "Who he felt were not as good as himself"? Really? Could you back this up (perhaps with quotes from poem 15 of book 1 of the Amores?) Mhmaudling 19:14, 21 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Propertius in particular was a very close friend of Ovid and clearly influenced many of the poems in the Amores. And, as Mhmaudling points out, Gallus and Tibullus both get extremely favourable mentions in Amores I, poem 15. I think it more likely that Ovid wished he was as good as these poets than that he felt he was better. Of course Posterity feels that he was a better poet than them, but that's not to say that he himself did. Anyway, "tongue-in-cheek" was part of Ovid's style and didn't mean that he thought he was better than anyone else. In fact you'll find that he was quite as likely to mock himself as to mock others. So if you want to add that "felt were not as good as himself" material to the article you will need to find some evidence of it that some one else has written about, and cite it. -- Derek Ross | Talk 18:57, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Merger proposed (Medicamina Faciei Feminae)
The result was: Redirect in lieu of merger. --B. Wolterding 16:49, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

I propose to merge the content of Medicamina Faciei Feminae into here, since the notability of that article has been questioned. The article is a very short stub, and it seems that it does not have much potential to grow. Would it not be better to merge it to the Ovid article?

Please add your comments below. Proposed as part of the Notability wikiproject. --B. Wolterding 17:30, 8 September 2007 (UTC)


 * There is so little in the Medicamina Faciei Feminae article that all the information from it already exists in the Ovid article. Hence there is nothing left to merge. Just redirect it. -- Derek Ross | Talk 17:41, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

I have written a new article on this poem under the correct spelling Medicamina Faciei Femineae. Aramgar (talk) 02:30, 3 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Kudos. Nice article! -- Derek Ross | Talk 04:25, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Major changes
The article is very badly written and was clearly penned by someone with, at best, limited knowledge of Ovid, his poetry, and Roman society. For example, Ovid didn't primarily write in elegaic couplets - his didactic poetry which forms a bulk of his work is written in dactylic hexameters. The entry has been changed accordingly. Also, I will soon make changes to comments about his exile. No one really knows why he was exiled and Ovid himself is very coy about it. The article offers reasons that are speculative at best. Surely other people also know more about Ovid? Please help improve this article! Ste175 09:53, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Dante references
There are more than just two Ovid references in Dante - I don't know if they all need to be enumerated. One missing example is a very blatant one - Dante actually uses Ovid's name in Canto XXV when comparing his own description of a metamorphosis to his own around line 100. Tommy.rousse (talk) 16:58, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Humour?
In poems such as Ars Amatoria book 1 where he advises that rape is fun, I have been told that he's not being entirely serious. Is this interpretation widely shared? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mrs.Dengler (talk • contribs) 22:00, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Although Ovid's attitude to the sexes is not in line with 21st century orthodoxy, nor is anyone else's from 2 millennia back. We can answer your question, but we need you to tell us what lines you interpret as Ovid saying "rape is fun", and what translation you're using. El barty (talk) 23:28, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

I assume you're referring to Ovid's suggestion that Romans have always found women at the theatre ever since the rape of the Sabine women. Perhaps, as El barty suggests, it's not what the modern reader might find funny, but the Ars Amatoria as a whole should not be taken too seriously. The comparison with the rape of the Sabine women is very clever as it is a generically suitable comparison and mimics historic comparisons found in other didactic works. It also gives Ovid a chance to show off his excellent poetic skills in describing the rape and, most importantly, it reminds the reader of Rome's morally dubious beginnings, an issue which other authors, such as Livy, had raised before him. ste175 (talk) 22:44, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the person is referring to this couplet:
 * Prīmus sollicitōs fēcistī, Rōmule, lūdōs,
 * Cum jūvit viduōs rapta Sabīna virōs.

which I might translate as:
 * You, Romulus, were the first to bring trouble to the theatre,
 * when a Sabine girl was carried off, for the pleasure of your wifeless men.

It’s simply a reference to the idea that women have been causing trouble in the theatre ever since there have been women in Rome. And the trouble in question is tongue-in-cheek. He just means that people attend such public events in order to naughtily flirt with the opposite sex. — Chameleon 04:45, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Working on this article
This will be a work in progress for a bit.Jdf8 (talk) 00:45, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Looks good, Jdf8! Nice work!--Abie the Fish Peddler (talk) 01:29, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Finished a lot of what I planned; still need to add some info about how the exile poetry is viewed by scholars. I think it is more informative and less biased than it was. Hope you enjoy. Jdf8 (talk) 20:18, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Aureola's edits
The reason I removed some of your edits were these: First Ovid is not the last elegiac poet in Roman literature; elegy remained a popular meter throughout Latin literature and is used by Martial, several minor Latin poets, and even late antique writers. Second, although one may say Ovid was the "last poet of the Augustan age", to do so is a contentious statement, which does not represent fact. The Augustan age is a shadowy concept and many poets alive and active during the "Augustan age" outlived Ovid, such as Germanicus, Manilius, and probably Grattius. Third, the paragraph you added under "Literary Success" on the literary climate of Ovid's time and his inclusion in Messalla's circle was unnecessary because that information was already covered in the "Life" section. Plus, calling Ovid the most famous and respected poet of Rome after Horace's death is more a statement of opinion than fact. I believe all the information on the literature of the Augustan age can be easily found on other wikipedia entries.Jdf8 (talk) 01:57, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I also feel that the section on Ovid and Romania goes best under the general heading of Ovidian influence rather than in a biographical section. His influence on the literary and cultural traditions of Romania is a part of his lasting reputation.Jdf8 (talk) 02:01, 17 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, you're right... But Ovid was really the most famous poet after Horace's death. We can see his words in the Art of Love about his relationship with the city and what he called "Pupils", boys and girls of Rome (my information about his fame was referenced but was removed by you...) Also, it's impossible to imagine an erotic poet in obscurity in a Rome of worldly, lovers, baths, parties and luxury. And, about the adjective "respected", well, the end of his Metamorphoses was agreed with the court's vanity (deitificacion of Caesar... glorification of Augustus...) while its ambitious character must have excited the poets of the time... Auréola (talk) 04:16, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Jdf8, I have many books and links that confirm my statement (but unfortunately you never will read it, except if you wanna to learn Portuguese...) One of these books is a translation imported from Portugal of 443 pages, whose in introduction we can read (literally translated by me): "[...] Ovid is banished by decree of Augustus. At fifty, was by far the most prestigious poet, unrivaled since the extraordinary generation of Virgil and Horace had disappeared." Auréola (talk) 04:16, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
 * You said that Ovid was not the last elegiac poet of Latin literature; ok, cite the others... Auréola (talk) 04:24, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
 * An important information: Ovid is commonly portrayed with a laurel wreath, and this proves his academic importance in his time. Auréola (talk) 05:14, 17 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, Ovid does say at the end of the Ars Amatoria that he hopes that his "pupils" will spread his fame, and at the end of the Metamorphoses Ovid does aspire to fame, but classicists and scholars do not take what a poetic persona says about his own fame as a serious and unbiased representation of the literary climate of their time. Any poet of Rome has a reason to exaggerate their importance. I would say that you are probably right that Ovid was very famous, however, there is no way to prove that he was the most famous poet after Horace's death, and that is an extremely subjective statement to make anyways one that is inherently unprovable. How can you gauge who is the most famous at anything? There is no objective criteria. Just because it is likely that he as an erotic poet was important in Rome, does not mean we can say that for sure. Avoid conjecture. The Encyclopedia Britannica, which you cited, is over a century old, from a time when subjective opinions were considered fact, and its opinions on Roman literature are considered extremely biased today. In removing that I was trying to maintain the NPOV standard of Wikipedia and the neutral tone which good scholarship tries to take when discussing the merits and importance of authors. Plus, you should also know that scholars tend to assume that the discussion of the deification of Caesar is not entirely without irony in the Metamorphoses and thus not simply playing to the court's vanity. Also, you should know that there are no portraits of Ovid from antiquity, no sculptures, mosaics, or statues. The laurel crown and the "portraits" of Ovid are the fabrication and fantasies of later artists of the middle ages, renaissance, and later, but there is nothing to suggest his appearance from the ancient world. So you cannot use that as evidence. My issue is just that if you are going to say Ovid was the most famous poet at Rome after the death of Horace, you have to say "later scholars have considered Ovid the most famous poet of the Augustan Age after the death of Horace." If you are going to have a statement like that, you have to cite the bias of that statement in the "later scholars have considered". I am a professional classicist, by the way, I have read a great deal of secondary scholarship on Ovid and have worked with some of the most important classicists who study Ovid in the academic field. I read Latin and have read his works in the original languages.Jdf8 (talk) 14:46, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Other Latin elegiac poets? Well there are two meanings here. If you mean Latin love elegy, Ovid is the last love elegist whose poetry survives, but with all the lost texts from antiquity I do not think we can say for sure that he was the last elegist ever. For other works written in elegiac meter, we have the epigrams of the poet Martial in the late first century, the four spurious poems ascribed to Ovid which are in elegy and are forgeries. Some of the "Catalepton" which are probably not by Virgil are in elegiac meter, many epigrams in the "Anthologia Latina" are later than Ovid (at least 100) and are in elegiac meter, the fables of Avianus (3rd century CE at least) are elegiac, as are the works of Namatianus, in the 4th century CE. The "Phoenix" poem is later than Ovid and in elegiac meter.Jdf8 (talk) 15:03, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Also consider your own quote "At fifty, was by far the most prestigious poet, unrivaled since the extraordinary generation of Virgil and Horace had disappeared" Who's to say that the generation of Virgil and Horace was so "extraordinary"? Is there any way you can measure whether a generation is extraordinary objectively? If you can't then it's a point of view. Also Ovid was one of many poets of his time. You can't say that Ovid was unrivaled with other important poets like Manilius (whose work was respected enough to survive) writing at the same time as him. Manilius was certainly a "rival" to Ovid.Jdf8 (talk) 15:03, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I added a line in the opening which supports Ovid's canonical status as a love elegist while keeping the designation in perspective.Jdf8 (talk) 15:19, 17 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Ok, I thank you for added this line, unknown to me... And by the way, what do you think about the Delacroix's paintings? Auréola (talk) 03:04, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I want to specify the influence of Ovid in the Middle Ages and in the Renaissance, both in painting and literature, with more texts. Would you like to help me? We can also write something about his legacy. Maybe you disagree again, but I read in a book that the metamorphosis take a magical character through his poem... Auréola (talk) 03:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I very much like the paintings; having a gallery is a really good idea for a page on Ovid, especially because he had such an influence on the arts and I like what you've chosen. I think it's a good idea to work on the section on Ovid's influence. While the list format is convenient, this section should be specified further. I would probably suggest creating subsections for each period under the "Ovid's Influence" section, so having a section with a title like "Middle Ages and Renaissance" and then discussing some authors and artists who were influenced by Ovid, maybe giving some examples from their works. The website listed offers some good information. The information that is up there already is pretty good and should be kept. I would expand it. I think some good chapters can be found in the latter part of "A Companion to Ovid" ed. Peter Knox (Blackwell, 2009), which has a limited preview on Google books, also some chapters in "Ovid" ed. J. W. Binns (Routledge, 1973). Just remember to avoid opinions, and if you do cite an opinion to use langauge like "some scholars have interpreted..." etc. Write something up, if you like, and I'll help you work on it. As for your source on the Met. I am unfamiliar with it; what is your source? Jdf8 (talk) 03:58, 18 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, have you ever saw the Metamorfoses in wiki pt? I did it all alone, with most references in Portuguese and some in English (very significant, by the way). In my research, I had to go to the site http://warj.med.br/pub/mini/metamorfose.asp (I don't kwnow if this site has English version) that provides information on mythological transformation. This page (written by W. A. Ribeiro Jr.) says that Apollonius of Rhodes, Eratosthenes, Nicander, Pseudo-Apollodorus, Antoninus Liberalis, Boii, and of course, Ovid, are the main authors who describes transformations in classical mythology, while in Homer, Hesiod and Pindar these reports are a little more rare. Ok... I took this information and added in the article. Later, I found in SCRIPTA, Belo Horizonte, v. 4, n. 8, p. 319-329, 1º sem. 2001 (and available in http://www.ich.pucminas.br/cespuc/Revistas_Scripta/Scripta08/Conteudo/N08_Parte05_art02.pdf) a text about a poet unknown to me, but what makes analogy with metamorphoses presents in Apuleius' The Golden Ass and, thereafter, citing the influence of Ovid on Apuleius. There are in this text at one point: "é com Ovídio que a metamorfose assume o caráter mágico que hoje possui" ("Ovid made the metamorphosis take the magical character it has today".) The author states this because, you know, in The Golden Ass a magical transformation occurs with an animal (and this magic narrative is the result of metamorphoses written by Ovid as in the history of Daphne, which becomes a tree). I hope you have understand this paragraph ... Hehehe! Auréola (talk) 06:13, 18 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Now, I will put my findings on your idea of dividing our work into sub-sections as "Middle Ages and Renaissance". I propose to divide these two sub in "Middle Ages" and "Renaissance". Do you know why? Because these two times are very different before the art of Ovid. First, the Middle Ages, you know, changed many of his texts. I knew in my research for article "Metamorfoses" on the wiki.pt that some Jesuits schools from Portugal have banned its students to read Ovid 'cause he was too mundane (we can added it, although this information has nothing about "Influence") The Renaissance, in turn, adheres to the works of Ovid (and, in particular, Metamorphoses) both in music and literature and architecture! Later I will introduce my sources about its influence on these three fields. Now I want to talk about the influence on Shakespeare (sub-section "Renaissance"). I have some sources that you will be able to see because "they" are in English. One is Shakespeare's Ovid. Others, Jonathan Bate, Shakespeare and Ovid (Clarendon Press, 1994) and Caldecott: Our English Homer (pp. 9-10) speculating that in the schools of the time circulated texts of Latin literature and that Shakespeare was familiar with Ovid since he was a child. In 1567, Arthur Golding published his translation of the 15 books of the Metamorphoses into English. Link http://www.germinaliteratura.com.br/officina9.htm (in Portuguese) states that probably Shakespeare believed that this was the most beautiful book of the language. Auréola (talk) 06:13, 18 January 2010 (UTC)


 * On second thought, I think the section "Influence" will not be needed because all the influence that Ovid had was mainly caused with his "Metamorphosis", so that there is almost nothing to say about all of his other work and, thus, we shall work later in the article of this poem and not in the article of his biography. Anyway, in the new sub-section "Middle Ages and Renaissance" we can write somewhat briefly on the various interpretations that his works have caused all those time and just add a few words about his influence on painting, art, music, and leave it to do then in Metamorphoses. What do you think? I'm very confused ... Auréola (talk) 06:32, 18 January 2010 (UTC)


 * It does indeed sound like what you want to write belongs on the "Metamorphoses" page and should be on the Ovid page only in summary form. I think that interpretations of poems by themselves should be on the Ovid page only in an extremely truncated form, which gives only the most mainstream currents of scholarship. Remember to check into the chronology of the authors you mention. As for the Apuleius, I would say you should write something brief like "one scholar has seen a connection between the magical nature of the transformations in Ovid's "Metamorphoses" and the transformation in Apuleius' novel, the "Metamorphoses." (citation) Those texts are certainly related, although it must be remembered that Apuleius' Met. is a different genre than Ovid's Met. For Shakespeare and Ovid there is a wealth on information. I think if we are talking about Ovid's influence, we should not talk about scholars' interpretations (which should be under a heading like "Criticism"), rather we should focus on the arts and literature that take inspiration from his work (which I think belong under "Influence"). In that case much of the information up there is still good. What I'd suggest is just for you to focus on the Met. page for now. Jdf8 (talk) 15:57, 18 January 2010 (UTC)


 * A paperback edition of The Art of Love and Remedia Amoris and Medicamina Faciei Femineae (all in just one volume) cleared my mind. Unfortunately, these three books have been translated into Portuguese in prose, but the introduction of this book can help us to create the sub "Criticism". For this, we need to research whether this informations are true in other books. The introduction states three points that I will list here:


 * 1. In the Middle Ages, the fame of the poem and its popular worship make Ovid banned by the Reformation and Counter-Reformation.
 * 2. In the Renaissance, we have a huge range of painters who will portray the beautiful stories of Metamorphoses in paintings (this issue will be on "Influence" as you and I already agreed on. It also has the influence on Shakespeare.) On the other hand, still in "Criticism", we can talk about how Renaissance humanism not ignored him. Montaigne in his Essais wrote: "The first joy I found in the books was given by the pleasure of the fables of Ovid's Metamorphoses."
 * 3. Later in the 19th century, the Romantics preferred his poetry of exile (perhaps by sadness, loneliness, the concept of misunderstood genius ...) The Delacroix's painting of Ovid among the Scythians, which I found and added in this article, was appreciated by Baudelaire, Gautier and Edgar Degas.


 * I find it interesting to begin now to add these various "reappearances" of Ovid's over the decades in a new section called "Criticism". But for that, we need some sources, do you have some that confirms these 3 points? I have only this paperback edition, which is'nt a good source, and link http://www.metmuseum.org/TOAH/hd/roma/ho_2008.101.htm that confirms the last sentence... Auréola (talk) 22:08, 18 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I want you read this: Ovid and Hungarian Literature (both about Reformation and Counter-Reformation point of view of Ovid's works). Thank you. Auréola (talk) 22:48, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

New topic
Well, I wrote a few things. Here are:

Criticism
Ovidian works have been interpreted in various ways over the centuries in reappearances that depended of the social, religious and literary contexts of theses times. He was the best known and most loved than any other Roman poet (save Virgil) during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. The authors of the Middle Ages faced his work as a way to write and read about sex and violence without orthodox "scrutiny routinely given to commentaries on the Bible" and he also influenced many Renaissance painters. In the Middle Ages comes the volumous Ovide Moralisé, a French work that moralises 15 books of the Metamorphoses and that influenced Chaucer. Renaissance humanism also not ignorated him. Montaign, in his Essais, alludes in several times the Roman poet, for example in Book I/Chapter II, and wrote in his view on Education of children:


 * "The first taste I had for books came to me from my pleasure in the fables of the Metamorphoses of Ovid. For at about seven or eight years of age I would steal away from any other pleasure to read them, inasmuch as this language was my mother tongue, and it was the easiest book I knew and the best suited by its content to my tender age."

In the 16th century, some Jesuit schools of Portugal cut several passages from his Metamorphoses and saw his poems elegant and worthy of being presented to students with school purposes, but that was able to corrupt young people. Jesuits took much of the knowledge to the Portuguese colonies. According to Serafim Leite (1949), the ratio studiorum had effect in Colonial Brazil in the early seventeenth century and that in this period students read in schools works like Epistulae ex Ponto for learning grammar. Ovid's works took a curious paradox in that time, particularly in England. The Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of London ordered that a translation of Ovid's love poems of the time were publicly burned in 1599 and the Puritans of the following century saw him as a pagan and then, immoral. But, John Dryden held a famous translation of his Metamorphoses into stopped rhyming couples during the eighteenth century, when Ovid was "refashioned [...] in its own image, one kind of Augustanism making over another." Romantic movement, in contrast, considered him and his poems "stuffy, dull, over-formalized and lacking in genuine passion." Romantics might have preferred his poetry of exile. The painting on right, Ovid Among the Scythians, painted by Delacroix, was seen by Baudelaire, Gautier and Edgar Degas.

Best known as...?
Can it really be said that Ovid is "best known as the author of ... Heroides, Amores, and Ars Amatoria" and is "also well known for the Metamorphoses (etc.)"? I am not speaking as a classicist, but I would have thought, not only in a general sense but also in other fields of art and scholarship (art, literature, painting and so on) the Metamorphoses to be the best known and more notable by far. Johncurrandavis (talk) 17:03, 25 January 2011 (UTC)


 * That's probably true. -- Derek Ross | Talk'' 19:40, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

The Fasti was deliberately unfinished?
I'm not a specialist in the subject at all, but when we read the Fasti my professor of Latin literature pointed out that Augustus changed the name of "July" to Julius in honor of Julius Caesar, and then later named "August" after himself. Thus that stopping the poem before these months might be a deliberate hostility on Ovid's part. This:

"It seems that Ovid planned to cover the whole year, but was unable to finish because of his exile, "

seems pretty unequivocal. Is this a widely held conception, and if so should the wording be revised or the deliberate nature mentioned? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.125.139.115 (talk) 06:27, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Claims about Ovid seen by Romanian nationalists as Romanian hero and poet are irrelevant to his death (and to the whole article)
In the section titled “Death” I’ve deleted the lines where the ludicrous claims of Romanian nationalists on Ovid as “Romanian poet” were referred, because they’re not only irrelevant to the section treating the historical event of his death but also to the historical person as well. Besides no external link was visible: the content was not only irrelevant but it was not even confirmed by any external link. Even the whole text of an inscription on a contemporary Romanian statue representing Ovid was fully written… What do have this to do with Ovid and his death?

The part on those nationalist claims could be added on the “Legacy” section, If anything: but I find it still irrelevant. These are the main lines: ''As Ovid spent the last years of his life and literary work in what is now Romania, Romanian nationalists have adopted him as "The First Romanian Poet" and placed him in the pantheon of Romanian national heroes. Ovidiu is a common male first name in Romania. Also, a statue commemorates him in the Romanian city of Tomis (contemporary Constanța).''

I think it’s not even a matter of discussion that the fact that Romanians claiming him as a national hero and their own poet (but the lines are not confirmed by any external link) is totally irrelevant to the reality of Ovid as historical individual and to the encyclopedic information about his death.

Decastitch
What about his Decastiches of each of the books of the Aeneid? learnergenius 01:40, 21 November 2019 (UTC)

Style
I make some points: i. His Latin is very pure. Any word or expression you find in him is good canonical Latin. ii. His metrical practice is extremely strict, especially in elegiacs. This can lead to a certain monotony. iii. He is very smart and pointed. iv. He shows great ingenuity in conforming to his metre, especially in the use of parabasis. E.g., the first line of the Ars Amatoria, Si quis in hoc artem populo non novit amandi, where artem is inserted between hoc and populo to save the metre. This is a minor example.

Tens of thousands of schoolboys must have sweated to imitate him, at least up to the mid -20th century. Seadowns (talk) 22:40, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

Death date
I see that some "sources" on the net give 2 January 17 as his exact date of death. Does this have any validity? --  Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  21:58, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

Age at death
The article states Ovid was born on 20 March 43 BC, and died in 17 or 18 AD at age 59–61. If he died no later than 31 December 18 CE, he could not have been older than 60.

Macrons
I've removed the macrons from Ovid's name in the lead section. Another editor removed these but was reverted without comment. His point stands though. These aren't standard for the lead on Wikipedia. Most Roman names would require them if they became the standard. Although they sometimes appear in dictionaries as an aid to metre and pronunciation, they aren't part of normal written Latin and Ovid wouldn't have used any accents to write his name. They look pedantic. Furthermore, I'm not even sure they are correctly used. It would be tricky to verify from primary sources that the u in Publius was long. The o of Naso was definitely short, as proved by this pentametre from Tristia: 'quam procul a nobis Naso sodalis abest!'. 90.254.238.121 (talk) 18:17, 30 December 2022 (UTC)