- 232 pages
- English
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Canidia, Rome's First Witch
About This Book
Canidia is one of the most well-attested witches in Latin literature. She appears in no fewer than six of Horace's poems, three of which she has a prominent role in. Throughout Horace's Epodes and Satires she perpetrates acts of grave desecration, kidnapping, murder, magical torture and poisoning. She invades the gardens of Horace's literary patron Maecenas, rips apart a lamb with her teeth, starves a Roman child to death, and threatens to unnaturally prolong Horace's life to keep him in a state of perpetual torment. She can be seen as an anti-muse: Horace repeatedly sets her in opposition to his literary patron, casts her as the personification of his iambic poetry, and gives her the surprising honor of concluding not only his Epodes but also his second book of Satires. This volume is the first comprehensive treatment of Canidia. It offers translations of each of the three poems which feature Canidia as a main character as well as the relevant portions from the other three poems in which Canidia plays a minor role. These translations are accompanied by extensive analysis of Canidia's part in each piece that takes into account not only the poems' literary contexts but their magico-religious details.
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Table of contents
- Cover
- Half-title
- Title
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Figures and Tables
- Acknowledgments
- A Note on the Text/Translation
- I. Canidia, or What Is a Witch?
- II. Satire 1.8: Canidia in the Gardens of Maecenas
- III. Hag and Snatcher: Canidia as Child-killing Demon in Epode 5
- IV. Routing the Empusa: The Iambic Canidia of Epode 17
- V. Venefica Minor: Canidia in Epode 3, Satire 2.1 and 2.8
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index