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Calpurnius Siculus

The Texts on LacusCurtius

The Latin texts and their English translations by J. Wight Duff and Arnold M. Duff, as well as the Introduction, are those found in Volume I of the Loeb Classical Library's Minor Latin Poets, pp207‑285.

As almost always, I retyped the text by hand rather than scanning it — not only to minimize errors prior to proofreading, but as an opportunity for me to become intimately familiar with the work, an exercise which I heartily recommend: Qui scribit, bis legit. (Well-meaning attempts to get me to scan text, if success­ful, would merely turn me into some kind of machine: gambit declined.)

This transcription has been minutely proofread. In the table of contents below, the items are therefore shown on blue backgrounds, indicating that I believe the texts to be completely errorfree. As elsewhere onsite, the header bar at the top of each chapter's webpage will remind you with the same color scheme. Should you spot an error, however . . . please do report it.

Introduction
Latin Text
English Translation

I: Corydon, Ornytus

1: A golden age is coming under the current emperor.

II: Idas, Astacus, Thyrsis

2: The farmer and the herder duel in verse: Abel and Cain without the murder.

III: Iollas, Lycidas

3: He beats his girl-friend; sensibly, she runs off to another man. His friend will try and persuade her back.

IV: Meliboeus, Corydon, Amyntas

4: Thanks to our patron and the favourable climate under the current emperor, we can write verse but still eat.

V: Micon

5: Advice on raising sheep.

VI: Astylus, Lycidas, Mnasyllus

6: Two shepherds, ostensibly over poetry, are close to coming to blows; there's a lot of subtext though, and the older man refuses to arbitrate.

VII: Lycotas, Corydon

7: A visit to the amphitheatre games in Rome.

As mentioned, text and translation are those printed in Volume I of the Loeb Classical Library's Minor Latin Poets, first published in 1934 and revised in 1935. It is now in the public domain pursuant to the 1978 revision of the U. S. Copyright Code, since the copyrights expired in 1962 and 1963 and were not renewed at the appropriate time, which would have been in 1961 thru 1963. (Details here on the copyright law involved.)

In the Latin, each line is a local link; in the translation, each paragraph. The links follow a consistent scheme, for which you should see the sourcecode; you can therefore link directly to any passage. As elsewhere in the texts on my site, the little flags allow you to toggle back and forth between the languages: each language opens in its own window.

Apparatus

The Loeb edition attaches to the Latin text a bit of apparatus criticus; it's surely not comprehensive. I've reproduced it.

[image ALT: A group of standing sheep. It is my icon for Calpurnius Siculus.]

Not much of Calpurnius' Eclogues, or indeed of any pastoral author, is about sheep. Still, I take him at his word, and my icon for the poems is a group of those noble animals bathed in the evening light of Umbria. For the whole flock, facing off against the cameraman, see my diary, March 4, 2004.

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Site updated: 11 Feb 09