It was to celebrate the opening of the Roman Colosseum in 80 CE
that Martial published his first book of poems, "On the
Spectacles." Written with satiric wit and a talent for the
memorable phrase, the poems in this collection record the broad
spectacle of shows in the new arena. The great Latin epigrammist's
twelve subsequent books capture the spirit of Roman lifeboth public
and privatein vivid detail. Fortune hunters and busybodies, orators
and lawyers, schoolmasters and street hawkers, jugglers and
acrobats, doctors and plagiarists, beautiful slaves, and generous
hosts are among the diverse characters who populate his verses.
Martial is a keen and sharp-tongued observer of Roman society.
His pen brings into crisp relief a wide variety of scenes and
events: the theater and public games, life in the countryside, a
rich debauchee's banquet, lions in the amphitheater, the eruption
of Vesuvius. The epigrams are sometimes obscene, in the tradition
of the genre, sometimes warmly affectionate or amusing, and always
pointed. Like his contemporary Statius, though, Martial shamelessly
flatters his patron Domitian, one of Rome's worst-reputed
emperors.
D. R. Shackleton Bailey now gives us, in three volumes, a
reliable modern translation of Martial's often difficult Latin,
eliminating many misunderstandings in previous versions. The text
is mainly that of his highly praised Teubner edition of 1990.
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