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Metamorphoses III : an extract : 511-733 PDF

113 Pages·2014·0.436 MB·Latin
by  GodwinJohnOvid
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Ovid: Metamorphoses III Bloomsbury Latin Texts Other titles in the series: Ovid: Metamorphoses I, edited by A. G. Lee 9780862921446 Ovid: Metamorphoses VIII, edited by H. E. Gould and J. L. Whiteley 9781853997228 Ovid: Metamorphoses XI, edited by G. M. H. Murphy 9780906515402 Two Centuries of Roman Poetry, edited by E. C. Kennedy and A. R. Davis 9781853995279 Ovid: Metamorphoses III An Extract: 511–733 With introduction, commentary and vocabulary by John Godwin Bloomsbury Academic An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square 1385 Broadway London New York WC1B 3DP NY 10018 UK USA www.bloomsbury.com Bloomsbury is a registered trade mark of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published 2014 Introduction, notes and vocabulary © John Godwin, 2014 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. John Godwin has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on or refraining from action as a result of the material in this publication can be accepted by Bloomsbury or the author. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN: 978-1-4725-0776-1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Ovid, 43 B.C.-17 A.D. or 18 A.D., author. Metamorphoses III : a selection: 511-733 / Ovid ; with introduction, commentary and vocabulary by John Godwin. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-4725-0850-8 (pbk. : alk. paper) -- ISBN 978-1-4725-0807-2 (epub) -- ISBN 978-1-4725-0776-1 (epdf) 1. Ovid, 43 B.C.-17 A.D. or 18 A.D. Metamorphoses. I. Godwin, John, 1955- II. Title. PA6519.M4 G632014 873’.01--dc23 2013033628 Typeset by Fakenham Prepress, Fakenham, Norfolk, NR21 8NN Contents Preface vii Introduction 1 Text 29 Commentary 37 Vocabulary 83 Preface This book is intended to assist students preparing for public examina- tions in Latin who are required to study this text, but it can of course be used by any students of Latin who have mastered the basics and who are now ready to start reading some Latin verse and developing their skills and their understanding. The notes assume that the reader has studied the Latin language roughly as far as GCSE, but the vocabulary list glosses every word in the text and the Introduction assumes that the reader is coming to Ovid for the very first time. The commentary seeks to elucidate the background and the literary features of this highly artistic text, while also helping the reader to understand how the Latin words fit together into their sentences. My thanks are due above all to Charlotte Loveridge and Dhara Patel and their team at Bloomsbury who have been a model of efficiency and enthusiasm and a delight to write for. My thanks also go to Martin Thorpe and to Stephen Anderson who both read the whole of this book in draft form and made many highly useful comments which saved me from error as well as pointing me towards a better reading of the text. Professor Richard Tarrant of Harvard University was of great assistance with a knotty linguistic matter. All mistakes which remain are, of course, my own. John Godwin, Shrewsbury February 2013 Introduction Why read this text? The story This is a short extract from a long poem, telling a grisly tale of an impious king getting his just deserts from an angry god. The tale is simple: King Pentheus of Thebes is outraged that his people are worshipping this strange god Bacchus and is determined to put a stop to their revelry – for Bacchus is the god of wine and various forms of ecstasy and his worship was uninhibited and must have been alarming to onlookers and rulers. The king sends his men to sort out these Bacchic worshippers but the men come back defeated. Along with them comes a stranger, Acoetes, with his own tale to tell. He had been on a voyage when they put into the shore for the night: his men find a young boy wandering around and decide to kidnap him for a ransom, despite Acoetes’ demands that they do no such thing. The ship sets sail and suddenly the ‘boy’ turns out to be the god Bacchus himself who stops the ship with ivy growing up the oars and masts and then turns the sailors into dolphins. Acoetes warns King Pentheus to beware annoying this god – look what happened to my men when they tried a trick on him – but Pentheus takes no notice. He in fact gives orders for Acoetes to be tortured and killed for his impudence. The prisoner is miraculously set free, his chains slipping off his arms and the prison gates opening of their own accord. Pentheus is by now at the end of his tether and goes off to the mountainside to sort these Bacchants out himself once and for all. When he gets there he is spotted by his mother and her sisters who, in their divinely-induced hallucinatory trance, think he is a boar

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