AP 15.15: Constantine at Lindos

On the Cross he erected at Lindos

The son of John and of Eudocia

Wrought me here famous: he was Constantine,

Whom vaunting Lindos bore, the foremost man

Of all the generation that has gone,

And sceptred Leo’s trusty adjutant.

His brother, Alexander, and his son,

Also a Constantine, both carried forth

The kingdom’s sceptres warranted by God.

Lindos is a historic town of Rhodes. Alan Cameron has argued strongly that Constantine of Rhodes oversaw the production of the manuscript of the Palatine Anthology in the generation after Cephalas, and suggests that Book 15 was added by him. Leo VI died in 912, and was succeeded by his brother Alexander (emperor 912-13) and his son, Constantine VII ‘Porphyrogenitus’, sired out of wedlock but ‘born in the purple’ of the Imperial bedroom suite (913-959).

Another oldie: Martial 1.90 (NSFW)

A translation I first posted in 2015.

I never used to see you in company with men, Bassa; the gossip never gave you a lover. Instead you were always surrounded by women, a mob of them. They did everything for you; no man got close. And so, I admit, I took you for a Lucretia: but — shock, horror — Bassa, you’re a fucker. You dare set cunt to cunt, and your mega-clit fakes manliness. You've invented a crime against nature worthy of a Theban riddle: ‘There’s no man here — and yet, adultery.’

(Lucretia is famous from the exemplary early Roman history of Livy as preferring death to sexual dishonour; Thebes was terrorised by the Sphinx till Oedipus answered its riddle.)

AP 1.11, on a Church of the Holy Anargyri

On the Holy Anargyri in the district of Basiliscus

Unto your servants I, your servant too,

Sophia, make this gift. Accept your own,

Christ, and repay Justinian my lord

In victories piled upon victories

Against the plagues and the barbarians.

Justinian I 'the Great', Eastern Roman emperor from 525-561, was an aggressive and successful conqueror, but an outbreak of bubonic plague devastated Byzantium during his reign. The Anargyri, ‘Unmercenary Physicians’, were Saints Cosmas and Damian, two brothers martyred in Cilicia in the late third century. They won many converts by charging no fee for their services. Their story was too good to use just once: tradition attests the martyrdom near Rome a couple of years earlier of a separate Cosmas and Damian, who were also brothers and Unmercenary Physicians.

An oldie: Martial 1.41

A translation I originally posted early in this blog’s history (2015) and not included in the selection published by The World’s Classics.

You think you’re smart, Caecilius. Trust me: you’re not. So what are you? A troll. A bridge-and-tunnel hawker who barters yellow sulphur matches for broken glassware — that’s what you are. The bloke who sells soggy chickpeas to the tourists — that’s what you are. 

That’s you — the jumped-up snake-charmer, 

That’s you — the vile spawn of the salt-vendors,

That’s you — the bawling cook who touts charred sausages round the cheap tavernas, 

That’s you — a pasquinader, and second-rate at that,  

That’s you — a Cadiz whoremonger, 

That’s you — the big mouth of a clapped-out poof. 

So stop thinking you’re something, Caecilius: no-one else does. Reckon your jokes outperform Gabba, even Tettius Caballus? It’s not just anyone who gets to have style. The man whose ‘jokes’ are stupid smut doesn’t have sass; he’s just an ass.

Reddit AMA on Martial

This is from a few years back, when the World's Classics translation was freshly out. Newer readers might find it interesting background.
https://www.reddit.com/r/history/comments/41uff1/i_am_gideon_nisbet_classics_professor_and_editor/

An elephant at Rome

9.285

Philip of Thessalonica, anthologist and poet of the first century AD, witnesses an imperial triumph or pageant:

No longer, tower-girt and phalanx-bred,

The elephant with its prodigious tusk

Charges unchecked and eagerly to fight.

He sets his stout neck fearful to the yoke,

And draws the car of Caesar deified.

Even a beast can see the fruits of peace:

He casts aside the gear of bloody war,

Escorts the father of good governance.

The Greek Anthology at Thinktank, Birmingham

A couple of weeks ago I took a selection from my selection from the Greek Anthology to this:

https://www.birminghammuseums.org.uk/thinktank/whats-on/thinktank-lates-with-the-university-of-birmingham

It was great fun! I walked people round a couple of the rooms, repurposing modern science exhibits as ancient sites and structures on which to pin the Anthology's little texts. I'd had the opportunity to plan some routes before hand (thanks, Thinktank!) and though I didn't use all of them, it gave me enough structure that I could improvise for the particular twos and threes of people I was catering for. Almost all the other University of Birmingham contributors were from the sciences (and were amazing) and I was pleased to have the chance to represent literature and the arts.

Taking these poems to an interested, non-specialist public with no educational background in classics, and seeing and hearing them 'get it', was a wonderful experience. It has filled me with enthusiasm for finding new audiences for this amazing ancient material.