THE SATIRES OF D. JUNIUS JUVENAL.

SATIRE I.

AM I to be a listener only, forever? Shall I never reply,
Vexed so often by the Theseid epic poem about Theseus of hoarse Codrus?
Shall that man have recited his togatas comedies featuring Roman citizens to me with impunity,
And this one his Elegies? Shall the huge Telephus have consumed the day with impunity? Or the full margin of a book already...

Shall I be a listener only, perpetually?
Shall I never give anything in return, having been so often agitated by the Theseid of the clamorous Codrus?
Shall one man therefore have read his comedies to me without punishment, another his elegies? Shall the great Telephus have worn out the day without punishment...

1. Am I to be a listener only.] An abrupt beginning, as is common in Satires: for in other poems there is usually some preparation.

Listener.] Meaning of the poets reciting at Rome. Regarding this custom of reciting and the rivalry involved, Pliny speaks abundantly in Letter 13, Book 1. Regarding the staging and display, we shall treat this at length in the first Satire of Persius, verse 17, at the words: You will read from a high seat.

Shall I never reply?] Shall I neither write nor recite anything, so that I may pay back measure for measure to those who so often dull my senses?

2. Vexed so often.] Affected by annoyance. Horace to the Pisones:
The harsh reciter drives away the learned and unlearned alike;
Whomever he has seized, he holds and kills by reading, etc.

Theseid.] Codrus had written a poem about Theseus and his deeds so long that it equaled the Aeneid in length and had to be recited over many days. For the famous deeds of Theseus, see Plutarch, Diodorus Siculus, Book 5, ch. 5, and others.

Codrus.] The old scholiast reads Cordus: and says that Cordus was a faulty poet who composed a tragedy of Theseus: but everyone disagrees; and they maintain that this Codrus lived in the time of Juvenal, and was a humble and obscure poet, but so poor that he gave rise to the proverb, poorer than Codrus. Juvenal certainly marks him as such in Satire 3, verse 203, and Martial in Book 3, Epigram 15.

3. Togatas.] Horace to the Pisones:
Whether those who teach the praetextae, or those who teach the togatae.
Praetextae indicate tragedies, in which persons in the toga praetexta the formal robe worn by Roman magistrates and high-ranking boys and nobles are introduced, treating grave and public business. Togatae are called the Latin comedies, in which men in togas act and deal with private matters. Thus also Palliatae are called the Greek comedies, from the Greek cloak pallium Greek mantle.

4. Consumed the day.] Shall he have kept me the entire day by listening? Martial:
A poet is often heard for the whole day.

Huge Telephus and Orestes.] Immense tragedies woven with bombastic verses. Such as Horace argued against in his Art [of Poetry], with these words:

When Telephus and Peleus are both poor and exiled,
They cast aside their high-flown language and foot-and-a-half words.

Who the poets were, it is not certain. But it is certain that Roman poets loved to seek subjects from afar, and we see that this is still done today. Which Horace touched upon to the Pisones:

Nor did they deserve the least glory for daring to leave behind
The Greek tracks, and to celebrate domestic deeds.

Therefore, even in the time of Juvenal, certain poets were snatching those noble subjects of the Greeks from the street, in which many grand things, and some even miraculous, occurred to be celebrated in speech. But in treating them, they often sinned either against decorum, which Horace notes in the place cited above: or against the just length of the poem, which Juvenal complains of here.

5. Telephus.] The son of Hercules and Auge, who, as an infant abandoned by his mother among the thickets, is said to have been suckled by a hind: and later, as King of the Mysians, when he refused the Greeks passage through his region, he was wounded by Achilles, and healed by the same according to the oracle's command, whether by the rust of the spear, or by a remedy made from herbs.

Full margin.] By this the poet indicates verbosity, because he writes not only on the inner membrane, but also fills the margin, and the outer membrane, which was rarely done. Martial, Book 8, Epigram 62.

A Picentine writes epigrams on the back of the parchment,
And suffers because the god is turned away.