Two more for Caesarius

Following on from my last blog post, two more of Gregory's laments for his kid brother. The first is addressed to their father, also named Gregory; the second ventriloquises the collective statement of Gregory Senior and Nonna, his wife, for whom 'our' Gregory wrote many epitaphs.

8.86

On the same

Gregory, your good fortune was to gain

A son who soared above all mortal men

In looks and wisdom, and our Emperor’s friend:

Yet he was powerless to overcome

Pitiless death. My fears were all too true.

What says the tomb, though? ‘Suffer and endure:

Caesarius is dead, yet you possess

The mighty reputation he had won,

To compensate you for your own dear son.’

8.87

On the parents of Gregory the Great and Caesarius

‘We two were ripe for burial, when here

The masons set this stone for our old age;

They set it for our use; but out of joint

Caesarius possesses it instead,

The last-born of our children. O our child,

Our child, we suffer grief beyond compare:

Make haste to welcome us into your tomb.’

Gregory: two for Caesarius

Gregory's brilliant younger brother, Caesarius, was the first of his family to die: he predeceased their parents and was laid to rest in the tomb that Gregory Senior and Nonna had commissioned in anticipation of their own demise.

There are a couple of Gregory's laments for Caesarius in the selection I have coming out this November, but here are two more, quickly done this morning. The sequence in which they are presented in the Anthology is probably as Gregory intended: the second poem picks up on and contradicts the first. I am missing my own brother, and fretting for his safety.

8.85

On Caesarius his brother

The tomb is merciless. I never dreamed

That it would swallow up the latest-born

Before their elders; nonetheless it took

Caesarius, our parents’ famous son,

Before the ones who had preceded him.

What kind of justice, this? What kind of right?

8.85b

On the same

The tomb is not at fault; don’t call it names.

The deed was Envy’s, for how could it bear

To see a young man wiser than the old?

A jeweller at the ivory gate

A couple of mornings ago I awoke from an unusually vivid dream. In it, I had been weeping over a Greek epigram, one of the selection that I had included in my forthcoming Epigrams from the Greek Anthology for the World's Classics.

The epigram packed a lot into its two lines, which knowing me will have become three lines in translation. On the surface, its form was straightforward: the narrator simply remarked upon how attractive had been the jewellery made by his son to the deities of the sea. Whether he was the young craftsman's father by blood or adoption, or they were patron and client (a relationship often articulated through the language of senior and junior generations in surviving ancient letters), the bond between them had clearly been close, and the feeling of loss profound. For this was a poem of loss, from the Anthology's large collection of epitaphs. By inescapable implication, the sea-gods' and -goddesses' desire to possess the younger man's craft had been made manifest in his loss at sea, drowned in shipwreck.

I have used past tenses to describe the epigram because it is lost, gone for good. It was there in my dream, but it is most certainly not in my translated selection. I doubt that any such poem is to be found in the Anthology; but if it should somehow be there, I am certain I have never read it.

It feels plausible, though; and for however long I dreamed of it two nights back, it felt very real indeed: real enough to weep at.

Martial winds up his fourth book (4.89)

There's one by Martial I've been meaning to take a stab at, and the first line worked well enough in verse that I carried on, since I would get to reuse it at the end.

This is the last poem of Book 4, of interest for its terminology of the book's bits and pieces. Martial's reader has made it all the way to the centre of the book, the umbilicus, where the end of the roll is fixed to the central winding-stick with a strip of papyrus called a schida -- a word I had never met before.

Whoa, little book! That’s quite enough for now.

Whoa! We have made it to the finish-line;

But you are keen to venture ever on,

And will not let the binding hold you back.

You act as if your work was incomplete,

That you accomplished even on Page One.

By now your reader wearies and complains;

By now your copyist himself must say:

Whoa, little book! That’s quite enough for now.

Gregory of Nazianzus on Basil: the box set

Following on from my last blog post, I've now translated all eleven surviving epigrams by Gregory on the death of his close friend and colleague, Basil, the bishop of Caesarea Mazaca (modern Kayseri) in what is now Turkey but was then Cappadocia. Basil was subsequently canonised as St Basil 'the Great'. Gregory 'the Theologian' followed him into sainthood, but not quickly enough for his own liking.

Gregory was a crucial figure in the formation of Christian doctrine and helped shape the Byzantine church: you can read about his achievements on Wikipedia. His poetic epitaphs for family and friends don't get a lot of love, but I think they're rather wonderful. He felt deeply, and his life was shaken by repeated and devastating personal losses.

Two of these translations appear in my forthcoming World's Classics translation, but the rest are new for the blog. He signs off the sequence as a 'dozen epigrams', so one has probably dropped out along the way.

Further epigrams from Gregory of Nazianzus

8.2

On the great Basil, Bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia

I sooner thought body could outlive soul

Than I could live without you, Basil, friend,

Christ’s workman. Yet I bore it, and remained.

So must we wait? Will you not take me up,

And place me in the chorus of the Blessed,

Where you are stationed? Do not leave me here;

Do not, I beg: I swear upon your tomb,

Never will I forget you and move on;

I could not, if I wanted. Gregory.

8.3

On the same Basil the Great

When godly-minded Basil sped away,

Snatched by the Trinity and glad to go,

The whole of Heaven’s host rejoiced he came;

But all of Cappadocia’s city sighed.

And not alone; the world cried out in pain:

Gone is our messenger, and with him gone

The one who bound us in majestic peace.

8.4

On the Same

Now all the world is rocking to and fro,

The portion due to balanced Trinity, 

As rival words fight for the upper hand.

It is disgraceful. And I cry in pain —

For Basil’s lips are sealed and speak no more.

Only awake, and all the storm will cease

To hear your sermon, know your ministry.

For you alone were seen to be your match:

Living, you matched the legend told of you;

And your own legend rose to meet your life.

8.5

On the Same

There is one God, who rules us from on high;

And our age knew but one exalted priest:

You, Basil, angel shouting forth the truth,

A blazing eye for Christians everywhere,

Resplendent in the beauties of your soul,

Pontus’ and Cappadocia’s greatest pride.

Now as before, I pray, stand firm for us

And offer up your talents for the world.

8.6

On the Same

Basil’s son, Basil, their exalted priest,

The citizens of Caesarea laid

Within this tomb; and I was Gregory’s friend.

I loved him from the bottom of my heart.

I pray that God may grant him every boon,

But most of all to change his life for this,

That we enjoy. What good to tarry long

On earth, and pine away, missing your friend

Who has become a citizen of Heaven?

8.7

On the Same

You only breathed on earth a little time,

But you laid all your gifts before the Christ:

Body and soul, words and accomplishments;

Basil, Christ’s glory and the priests’ defence,

And to this day a bastion filled with truth

Against the blossoming of heresy.

8.8

On the Same

You conversations, and you home we shared

In friendship, and you Athens that we loved;

You mutual bond we swore at long remove

To lead a godly life: know Basil now

Is up in Heaven, as his heart desired;

Gregory is on earth, his lips in chains.

8.9

On the Same

Great hymn of Caesarea, shining friend:

Basil, your voice was thunder, and your life

A flash of lighting. Yet despite all this

You left your holy seat: for Christ desired

Your company in Heaven urgently.

8.10

On the Same

You knew the furthest reaches of the soul,

And all such wisdom as this earth can claim;

You were a holy temple come to life.

8.10b

On the Same

Eight years you grasped the reins and steered the folk

Whose care is God; and, Basil, of your deeds

This was the only one that counted small.

11

On the same

Fond greeting, Basil, though you went away.

This little epitaph is Gregory’s;

Mine was the talk you liked to listen to.

My Basil, please accept from your friend’s hand

The gift I prayed never to have to give.

My godly Basil, to your mortal dust

I dedicate these dozen epigrams.