The Political Background in Ovid's Trisitia II

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The Political Background to Ovid's Tristia 2Author(s): Thomas WiedemannSource: The Classical Quarterly, New Series, Vol. 25, No. 2 (Dec., 1975), pp. 264-271Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Classical AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/638322 .

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THE POLITICAL BACKGROUND TO OVID'STRIS TIA 2

ALTHOUGHhe view dies hard that the poetry which Ovid wrote during hisyears in exile at Tomi consists argely of the 'querulousand sycophantic'com-plaintsof a weak man unable to come to termswith a personaldisaster,'it hasbeen recognized for many years that the Tristiaand the Epistolae x Pontoarenot mere expressionsof emotion but are as well thought out and constructedas any other of the doctus oeta'sproducts.2Of these poems, Tristia2 must beplaced in a category by itself-if only because of its length (578 lines-fourtimes the length of the next longest of the poems from exile) and because itpurportsto be a plea by Ovid to Augustus, the man responsiblefor his exile,on the very practicalmatter of mitigating the sentence.But with some notableexceptions3classical scholarshave been more interested in Ovid's attempt tojustify the poet's freedom of expressionby appealing to the exemrnplarovidedby earlier Greek and Latin literature4than in analysing what light this par-ticular poem throws on Ovid's own feelings for Augustus and his regime.Radically differentopinionshave been expressedon Ovid's attitude to Augus-tus; on the one hand he has been described as a political conformist whoseeulogy of the emperorat the end of the Metamorphosesfor example) was 'theresult of seriousconviction',s and on the other we have the view that a largepartof the Metamorphosesouldonly be interpretedas 'ananti-Augustanpoem'.6Whether Tristia2 was simply an attempt by an isolated if brilliant intellectualtojustify the independence of the artist, or whether what the poet wrote mayhave been influenced by political considerations,is a question which belongsto political history rather than literary criticism, and perhaps the politicalcontext of the years immediatelybeforeOvid wrote this poem can throw somelight on the poet's intentions.

i B. Otis, Ovidas an EpicPoet (ed. I, Cam-bridge, 1966), 339; cf. Schanz-Hosius,Geschichte er riimischen iteratur, i (Munich,I935), 243-9.2 e.g. W. Kraus, s.n. P. Ovidius Naso,R.E. xviii (1942), 1961; E. J. Kenney, 'Thepoetry of Ovid's exile', Proc. Camb. Philol.Soc. N.s. xi (1965), 37-49.3 R. Marache, 'La r6volte d'Ovide exil6contre Auguste', in Ovidiana (ed. N. I.Herescu, Paris, 1958), 412 ff.; W. Marg,'Zur Behandlung des Augustus in den"Tristien" Ovids', in Ovid (ed. M. v.Albrecht and E. Zinn, Wege der Forschungxcii [1968]), 502 ff.; E. Meise, Untersuchungenzur Geschichte er Julisch-ClaudischenDynastie(Munich, 1969), esp. Anhang I (p. 223):'Die Verbannung Ovids'. 4 313-572.s Otis, op. cit. (ed. I), 339. The suggestionthat literary opposition might be combinedwith political conformity had been made byothers, e.g. Gardthausen, Augustusund seineZeit (Leipzig, 1904), 1243 f. The conserva-

tive position that Ovid was an Augustanvatesin the line of Vergil and Horace whohad no interest in politics has recently beenrestated by N. V. Vulikh in VestnikDrevneiIstoriiciii (1968), 15i-6o: 'In the "Letters"Ovid speaks as a loyal citizen who serves hisstate and princepsn the city of Tomi . . . Inthe 'Tristia', Ovid speaks out against thedespotism of Augustus, attacking him notfor his statesmanship, but for his attitude toliterature and poets. Here, for the first timein literary history, Ovid sets the theme of'emperor and poet' and dwells on the con-flict between despotism and poetic genius.'6 Otis, op. cit. (ed. 2, 1968), 351, 368. Cf.Marache, loc. cit. 416, who says that thereference to dice in Trist. 2. 471 f. 'est uneattaque ouverte'. L. P. Wilkinson, OvidRecalled(Cambridge, i955), 303, says thatin Tristia2 Ovid attempts 'to discomfort hisnot invulnerable oppressor' and perhaps to'appeal over the emperor's head to publicopinion'.

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POLITICAL BACKGROUND TO TRISTIA 2 265Ovid was certainly not the only one to be discontentedwith Augustus'ruleafter his exile in December of A.D.8. Much of the evidence for opposition toAugustus' policies in these years is associatedwith the attempts to introduce

legislation to encourage marriage and the bringing up of children-under-standably unpopularwith the propertiedclassesin Italy, since the LexIuliadeMaritandisOrdinibus f 18 or 17 B.c. contained clauses restrictingthe right toaccept legacies, with the intention of encouragingcaelibeso marry, and otherprovisionsfavouringlarge families; a costly businessfor a land-owning gentle-man.I There had been considerableoppositionto the lexwhen it was originallyintroduced, and Augustus had been forced to compromise and accept sub-stantial amendments.2In A.D.9 he was induced to allow this Lex lulia to bereplaced by a much weaker law backed not by his own authoritybut by thatof the two suffect consuls, M. Papius Mutilus and Q. Poppaeus Secundus.Dio suggeststhat this revisionof the law was forced upon Augustusas the re-sult of an open demonstrationagainst the earlierlegislation by the equestrianorder,3 and Suetonius also mentions a demonstration by the equiteson theoccasion of a public spectacle attended by Augustus with Germanicus andhis sons.4Some commentatorshave found it somewhat surprisingthat so latein Augustus'reign there should have been a substantialbody of opinionamongthe propertied classeshostile to his attempt (whatever his real motives mayhave been) to restore that priscavirtuswhich the Italian municipalities aresupposedto have approvedof, and which Last seems to suggestwas symbolizedby the choice of a namesake of the Samnite chieftain Papius Mutilus as oneof the sponsorsof the finalstageof Augustus' 'attemptof unprecedenteddaringto change the outlookof society'.sHow are we to explain the fact that it shouldhave beenjust twenty-six years after the original leges uliaehad been promul-gated that this opposition finally became too strong for Augustus to be ableto ignore?The generalhistoricalcontext of theyearsA.D.6 to 9 may providean answer.These years were extremelycritical for Augustus; they were years of militarydisasterabroadcoupledwith famine at Rome, and rumourhad it thatAugustuseven contemplated suicide: 'iuncta deinde tot mala, inopia stipendii, rebellioIllyrici, servitiorum delectus, iuventutis penuria, pestilentia urbis, famesItaliae: destinatioexpirandi, et quadridui inedia maior pars mortis in corpusrecepta; iuxta haec Variana clades et maiestatis eius foeda suggillatio.'6Forsome years now the emperorhad found it difficult to find recruitsfor his ap-parently never-ending wars in the north,' in spite of the new conditions ofservice that had been instituted in 13 B.C.8 If Dio is right in saying that it wasto avoid disorders that Augustus omitted persons worth less than 200,000HS in his partial census of A.D.4, then there may have been fears on the

See, for example, H. Last, 'The SocialPolicy of Augustus', in C.A.H. x (I934),425-64; P. A. Brunt, Italian Manpower(Oxford, I971), Appendix 9 (p. 558): 'TheAugustan Marriage Laws'.

2 Suetonius, Div. Aug. 34. I.3 Dio 56. IO. i.4 Suet. Div. Aug.34. 2 'abolitionem (legis)publico spectaculo pertinaciter postulanteequite . . .'. Since Dio 56. i I. I explicitlystates that Germanicus was in Dalmatia

during the demonstration which he describes,there may (if Dio's chronology is right) havebeen two separate incidents.s Loc. cit. 455-6 Pliny, N.H. 7. 149.7 On the question of whether Augustushad any clear idea of calling a halt toRoman expansion at any particular point cf.P. A. Brunt, J.R.S. liii (1963), 170-6, andC. M. Wells, The GermanPolicy of Augustus(Oxford, 1972). 8 Dio 54. 25. 5 f-



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266 THOMAS WIEDEMANNpart of the peasantsthat he intended to conscriptthem for servicein northernEurope.' In the following year, unwillingnesson the part of the soldiers toserve for longer than the term set in 13 B.c. forced Augustus to promise in-creased donatives to thosewho would serve for an extra fouryears;2the alter-native would have been to increase the rate of conscription. The revolt inPannonia left him no choice but to take some unprecedentedand humiliatingsteps, which had to be repeated after the Varus disasterin A.D.9: the lack ofsufficient volunteers and the need to enlist and train men in the shortestpossible time meant that freedmen and others from Rome itself were calledup-a 'vernacula multitudo' in Tacitus' words.3Suetonius refers to the twooccasions in A.D. 6 and 9/10 when Augustusenlisted freedmen to serve in thearmy, and it is interestinghow these troops were raised: 'servosadhuc virisfeminisquepecuniosioribus ndictos, ac sine mora manumissos.'4Velleius alsodescribes the measures taken in A.D. 6: 'habiti itaque delectus, revocati un-dique et omnes veterani, viri feminaeque ex censu libertinum coactae daremilitem. audita in senatu vox principis,decimo die, ni caveretur,possehostemin urbis Romae venire conspectum. senatorum equitumque Romanorumexactae ad id bellum operae: pollicitati.'s Velleius is of course keen to stressthe seriousnessof the situation in order to enhance Tiberius' achievement inputting down the rebellion-and no doubt Augustushimselfhad some interestin leading the senatorsand equiteso believe that their property might soonbe overrun by the Pannonians if they did not contribute to the war. In anycase it is clear that it was the landownerswho had to foot the bill when Augus-tus' expansionist policy ran into trouble. Certainly this policy brought gloryto the Roman commonwealth as a whole, but howevermany nobilesmight beawarded triumphalhonours,it was a policy calculated to increasethe prestigeoftheJulio-Claudiansto the pointwhere no otherfamilywould be in a positionto challenge it. Now that that prestigewas threatened, the wealthy generallyhad to provide their own slaves to fight (even if compensated).6They had toservethemselves as officers-it is hardly surprising hat there shouldhave beenattempts to evade this.7And when more money was needed to keep the legionsup to strength, the propertied classes had to pay. At first they were veryuncooperative: Lr7elS 7rdpoSpUKWV 7TU VEgplKETO.8 TO inanceOWhe increasedpraemia,Augustus had to institutean aerariummilitare n his own account, butnot even this led to sufficientspontaneousgenerosityon the part of individualsenators,and the Senate's own proposalsto raise funds were unsatisfactory.9Finally a 5 per cent tax on inheritances by others than near relatives wasinstituted (A.D. 6)10 followed by a 2 per cent sales tax on slaves (A.D. 7)."1

Dio 55. 13- 4. On conscription in theearly empire cf. P. A. Brunt, 'Conscriptionand Volunteering in the Roman ImperialArmy', Scripta Classica Israelica i (I974), 90 ff.

2 Dio 55. 23. I. On the need to revise theterms of service cf. P. A. Brunt, Italian Man-power,334 f.3 Tac. Ann. I. 31. The call-up is also men-tioned by Macrobius Sat. I. I I. 32. Cf. P. A.Brunt, Zeitschrift iir Papyrologieund Epigra-phik xiii (I974), 16I ff.; Dio 56. 23. 2 f. It ishardly surprising that the Pannonian legionswere continually on the point of mutiny:Dio 56. 12. 2, I3. I (A.D. 9).

4 Suet. Div. Aug. 25. 2.s Velleius 2. III. 6 Dio 55. 3I. I.7 Suet. Div. Aug. 24. I tells of an equeswhowas punished 'quod duobus filiis adulescenti-bus causa detrectandi sacramenti pollices

amputasset'.8 Dio 55. 24. 9 and 25. I. Dio notes in thiscontext that ex-quaestors and ex-tribuneshad to be forced by lot to take on the expen-sive office of aedile in A.D. 5.9 Dio 55. 25. 2. Cf. Res Gestae Divi Augusti17. 2. xo Dio 55 25- 51 Dio 55. 31. 4.



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POLITICAL BACKGROUND TO TRISTIA 2 267With this background of increasing taxation on senators and equites,t isless surprisingthat a period of military disastersin Pannonia and Germanyshould have been the occasion for the opposition to express itself openly. InA.D. 7, Augustus cancelled the travectioequitum'-perhaps he was afraid of justsuch a demonstrationas did actually occur in A.D. 9.2 It became clear to theemperorthat he would have to compromise.Since any concessionswith regardto the new taxes might impair the efficiency of the armed forces, the coursesopen to him were very limited. One thing he could do was remove the leastpopular provisions of his social legislation while widening the scope of theprivileges,and this was what the LexPapiaPoppaean fact did.3Augustus' position was not assisted by the famine from which Italy wassufferingduringtheseyears. In A.D.6, aftera particularlyserious ire at Rome,Augustusconscriptedseven thousandfreedmento form the vigiles;4 lthoughitwas officially claimed that their function was merely to prevent furthercon-flagrations,and that they were soon to be disbanded, the sudden realizationthat Rome's fire-brigade required seven thousand men under the centralcontrol of a praefectusesponsible directly to Augustus, rather than the sixhundred slaves granted to the curule aediles for this purpose in 22 B.c.,5may well reflect the need to control serious disordersamong the disaffectedurban population-as our sourcesrealize.6Reynolds'ssurprise7hat the vigilesshould from an early date have had police functions like the urban cohortsis surely misplaced. The same fear of major disturbances as a result of thefamine will have lain behind Augustus' decision to expel gladiators, mostcategoriesof aliens, slaves on sale, and even some domestic slaves from Rome;arrangementsweremade to enable as many senators o leave the city with theirhouseholds as was possible without disrupting the business of government.8To symbolize his concern for the well-being of the Roman people, Augustusthought it advisable to dedicate an altar to Ceres and to the earth-goddessunder the title of 'Ops Augusta' on 18 October A.D. 7.9There were some who were not displeasedat the fact that Augustus foundhimself in a precariousposition.There were disorders n several areas duringthese years, involving members of the provincial aristocracies.Ix In Rome toothere are hints that the discontent was fomented or at least exploited by thosehostile to Augustus.Admittedly we do not hear of the elimination of a wholegroupofaristocratsas had occurredin 2 B.c., when,withAugustus' climacteric'sixty-thirdyear approaching, members of several distinguishedfamilies triedto takeadvantageofTiberius'disgraceto manoeuvreinto a positionwheretheycould possessAugustus' daughter Julia and through her, after the emperor'sdeath, control the fortunes of his grandsonsand of the empire." One at least

Dio 55. 3I. 2 says that this was due tothe 'needs of the war'; in the context, itcould be taken to refer to the need to avoidunrest during the crisis.2 Cf. Dio 56. . 2-10o. 3 and Suet. Div. Aug.34. 2.3 C.A.H. x. 452 ff. Cf. Dio 56. Io. But dis-content at the high level of taxation con-tinued: Dio 56. 28. 4 (A.D. I3).4 Dio 55. 26. 4- s Dio 54. 2- 4.6 Dio 55. 27. I; cf. Suet. Div. Aug. 25. 2,where the clause 'praeterquam incendiorumcausa et si tumultus in graviore annona

metueretur' presumably refers to the vigiles.7 P. K. B. Reynolds, The Vigiles of Im-perial Rome(Oxford, I926), 17 f.8 Suet. Div. Aug. 42.3; Dio. 55. 26. I.9 Dio 55. 31. 3 f.; cf. J. Wilhelm, 'Dasr6mische Sakralwesen unter Augustus alsPontifex Maximus' (Diss. Strassburg, 1915),84 f.10Dio 55. 28. 2; cf. G. Bowersock, Augustusand the Greek World (Oxford, 1965), 105(Thessaly), 1o5 ff. (Athens, A.D. 13).II Velleius 2. 1oo names lullus Antonius,Quinctius Crispinus, Appius Claudius,



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268 THOMAS WIEDEMANNof these conspiratorsactually wanted to kill Augustus.ILater, after the plotof Pompey's grandson Gnaeus CorneliusCinna Magnus,2Dio tells us that inA.D.6 one PubliusRufus was involvedin organizinga conspiracy,although it isnot clear on whose behalf he was operating.3And then in A.D.7 Augustuswasforced to remove his grandsonAgrippa Postumusout of the reach of any con-spiratorwho might use him as a figure-head.4Others too were exiled in thisyear, including the orator CassiusSeverus,who had written verses attackingcertain aristocrats.s n the followingyearJulia the Youngerwas sent into exilefor virtually the same reasons as her mother had been. It is of courseconceiv-able that Livia's machinations on behalf of her son Tiberius played a part inthese events; but surely only the fear that his grandchildren might becomefocal points of opposition can have induced Augustus to take such drasticmeasures.

Perhapswe should not overestimate the extent of oppositionto the policiesof the regime;6 it is sufficient to note that, for a variety of causes, discontentwas more widespreadthan it had been formany years. In the event, Augustuswas able to weather the storm, and members of his family and of Livia's con-tinued to direct the destinies of the empire for a furthersixty years. But thatmay have been far from obvious to Ovid in A.D. 9; and it was in this contextthat he decided to circulate a majorwork setting out to show that it was un-reasonable and unjust for Augustus to punish one particular poet on thegrounds that his verses were immoral.In supportof his argument, Ovid makes a number of interestingreferencesto Augustus himself. It would be rash to assume that every rhetorical com-parison of the princeps toJupiter is bound to be sarcasticin intention, meantas an attack on a claim to which the emperor'sactual behaviour does not en-title him, rather than as a seriousrhetoricaladornment.Thus he tellsAugustus'utere more dei nomen habentis idem' (33-4)-it is not easy to make up one'smind whether this is meant to be criticism or flattery.7This is equally true ofSempronius Gracchus, and a Scipio. Cf.Meise, op. cit. (above p. 264 n. 3), 5-27.Pliny, N.H. 7. 149 'consilia parricidaepalam facta'; Seneca, de brev.vit. 4. 6 con-firms that Augustus was threatened ('iterumtimenda cum Antonio mulier'). Cf. Dio 55.10. 15.

2 Dio 55- I4 f. Cf. Groag, R.E. iv. 1288.3 Dio 55. 27. 2; if this is the PlautiusRufus of Suet. Div. Aug. 19, the plot will haveinvolved L. Aemilius Paullus (cos. A.D. I)and his wife, Augustus' granddaughter Julia,who-according to the Scholiast to Juvenal6. I58-had already been banished oncebefore she was finally exiled in A.D. 8. Per-haps this was the occasion in A.D.6 to whichSuetonius refers in Claud. 26: 'AemiliamLepidam Augusti proneptem . . . quodparentes eius Augustum offenderant, vir-ginem adhuc repudiavit.' Suetonius' com-ment suggests that Julia's husband sharedher disgrace. The L. Aemilius Lepidus whodied as an Arval Brother in A.D. 13 or 14(C.I.L. vi. 2023) was not the same person: cf.Fritzler, R.E. x (1917), 906 ff., and Meise,

op. cit. 35-48, who suggests that Julia wasonly banished once, the Scholiast beingconfused by the fact that there was an'official' as well as a 'real' explanation forher banishment. He also thinks that Ovidwas involved (223 ff.).* Cf. Gardthausen, R.E. x (1917), 183 f.s Tac. Ann. I. 72.4.6 Tacitus, in his summary of the hostilecomments at Augustus' death (Ann. i. Io),does not give the impression that he thoughtthe regime was threatened in these years (heonly mentions the Varus disaster and Livia'smachinations).7 Another Augustan poet to liken theprinceps to a god was Horace (Odes 3. 5. 1,I. 12. 49). Such comparisons were not madeonly of emperors-cf. Horace, Sat. I. 7. 24(Brutus, while in Asia). Regrettably, thereseems to be no evidence that the attitude ofAugustan poets was inspired by Hellenisticpanegyric. There is epigraphical evidencethat divine honours were still being paid toproconsuls in their own provinces as late as8 B.C., and it was not until A.D. II that



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270 THOMAS WIEDEMANNdescribesAugustus'care forRome, it should be preciselythe moral legislationwhich encountered such opposition during these years that he mentions:

Urbs quoque te et legum lassattutela tuarumet morum, similesquos cupis esse tuis (233 f.).In the next couplet of this appeal, Ovid leaves us with the impressionthatAugustus' foreign policy has yet to be brought to a satisfactoryconclusion:nec tibi contingunt, quae gentibus otia praestas,bellaque cum multis inrequietageris (235 f.).

The implicationis that the emperoris occupiedwith warsand social legislationwhen he should rather be examining carefully the cases he has taken it uponhimself to judge:at si quodmallem,vacuum tibi forte fuisset (239).

In the following section, Ovid claims that, if his poetry was morally unde-sirable,sowas the storyof Ilia in Ennius'Annales r that of Venus andAnchisesreferred o in Lucretius'deRerumNatura.There were other 'seminanequitiae';why had Augustusnot acted against these (280: 'tolli tota theatraiube')? Thetemples are anothersourceof vice (a theme later taken up with glee by Chris-tian writers)-but Augustus himself had built so many of them (295: 'tuamunera'). Ovid's assertionmay, as a matter of fact, have been true, but it doesseem peculiar that he should repeat many of the points he had made aswitticisms in the Ars in a work in which he is supposedlyaskingAugustus topardon him for writing this carmen.'He goes on to list all the foreign writerswho had dealt with erotic themes and then says (419 f.) :suntque ea doctorum monumentismixta virorummuneribusqueducum publica facta patent

--one of these duceswas Augustus,who had founded a famous library in thetemple of Apollo on the Palatine. Ovid then lists Roman poets who hadtreated similarthemes, ending with Tibullus (463 f.):non fuit hoc illi fraudi, legiturqueTibulluset placet et iam te principe notus erat.

He then notes that there were other pastimes 'ad nostros non leve crimenavos' (472), includingswimming,ball games, playing with a hoop, and parti-cularly dice, all of which had been describedin verse.As Marache pointsout,this cannot but have reminded the reader that Augustus himself enjoyedgaming immensely,in completedefianceof the standardsofpriscavirtus: aleaerumorem nullo modo expavit, lusitque simpliciter et palam oblectamenticausa etiam senex . ..'2 But there are worsethingseven than gaming-mimes,for instance: nubilis hos virgo matronaquevirque puerquespectat, et ex magna parte senatusadest (501f.).

I It may of course be that in the absenceof opportunities for research at Tomi Ovidhad to make as much use as he could of hisown works.Z Suet. Div. Aug. 71. I, who goes on to

quote a letter of Augustus' to Tiberius. Cf.Plut. Ant. 33, Moralia319 f-32o a; Marache,416; K. Scott, 'Another of Ovid's Errors',C.J. xxvi (1930/1), 293 if.



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POLITICAL BACKGROUND TO TRISTIA 2 271Not only had Augustusnot forbiddenmimes; they were actually paid for bystate officials:

quodque minus prodest,scaena est lucrosapoetae,tantaque non parvo crimina praetor emit (507 f.)and attended by the emperor:

et mea sunt populo saltata poemata saepe,saepe oculos etiam detinuere tuos (519 f.).Not to mention pornographicpicturesin the houses of the aristocracy (whetherwe read 'domibus vestris' r 'nostris'n 521). In other respects too Augustus'patronage of the arts might be thought liable to the charge of aiding andabetting immorality:

et tamen ille tuae elix Aeneidos auctorcontulit in Tyrios 'arma virumque' toros (533 f.)and Ovid reminds the emperorthat Vergil had writtenerotic pastoral poetry,

too" Phyllidis hic idem teneraequeAmaryllidis ignesbucolicis iuvenis luseratante modis (537 f.).1If we are to assume that Ovid's intention really was to flatterAugustus inorder to obtain a mitigation of his sentence,we must conclude either that thepoet was somehow unable to hide his bitterness towardsAugustus in a poemintended to be read by him, or that he thought the princepswould for somereasonnot notice the embarrassingreferencesto famine, wars, and unpopularlegislation.No doubt any conclusionwe may reach on this subjectis bound tobe subjective,but neither of these solutions seemsvery convincing. The alter-native is that Tristia2 was not intended forAugustus'eyes at all; it was meantto influence the circle of educated Roman aristocratsto whom Ovid's other

poems from Tomi were addressed, and Ovid hoped that theywould be theones who, recognizing the absurdity of Augustus' grounds for exiling Ovid,would do their best to see that he was recalled.2In remindingthose of his ad-mirers who were in a positionto put some pressureon Augustus ust how weakthe emperor'spolitical position had become, and just how much discontentthere was in theseyears of famine and militarydisaster,Ovid may have hopedthat they would exploit this political weakness to force Augustus to accepta compromise. If Ovid in A.D.9 thought that he had nothing more to hopefor from a direct appeal to Augustus himself, his pessimismturned out to beentirelyjustified.HertfordCollege,Oxford THOMAS WIEDEMANN

I It is interesting that when Pliny defendshimself against the charge that as a senatorhe should refrain from writing poetry, herefers to the precedent of Augustus, amongothers (Ep. 5. 3. 2). The specimen ofAugustus' verses quoted by Martial I I. 20suggests that these compositions could be asspicy as anything we find in Ovid; but thisexample was written as propaganda duringthe war against M. Antonius, and belongsto the different, and traditionally Roman,

genre of political invective.2 For Ovid's connections with the aristo-cratic family of M. Valerius Messalla Cor-vinus, in whose household he had beeneducated, cf. A. L. Wheeler, 'Topics fromthe life of Ovid', A.J.P. xlvi (1925), pp. 1-28.I must express my particular thanks forcomments and corrections to Prof. P. A.

Brunt, Prof. E. J. Kenney, Dr. O. Murray,Prof. W. J. N. Rudd, Prof. Dr. J. Vogt, andDr. M. Winterbottom.

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The Political Background in Ovid's Trisitia II

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