A Treatise on Fishing, The Walnut Tree, Consolation to Livia, and Other Spurious Works

By Ovid

The Roman poet known to the English speaking world as Ovid is best known for his work Metamorphoses, a mythological epic which chronicles the history of the world from its creation to the deification of Julius Caesar. Widely considered as one of the most important authors of Latin literature, Ovid produced an extensive body of work. Some of these works have been lost to history and in the case of the works of this volume have a doubtful attribution to the author. "Halieutica" or "A Treatise on Fishing," "Nux" or "The Walnut Tree," and "Consolatio ad Liviam" or "Consolation to Livia" are amongst the works that at one time were contributed to Ovid but are now considered to be spurious. These works are presented here in this volume in an English prose translation by Henry T. Riley. "A Treatise on Fishing" is a short work which as one would assume details the manner and method by which fish might be caught. The Walnut Tree is a monologue spoken by a walnut tree urging a group of young boys not to pelt her with stones in order to get at her nuts. "Consolation to Livia" is a consolation to Augustus' wife Livia on the death of her son Drusus. Also included in this volume are a handful of fragmentary works. While the attribution of these works may be in doubt their inclusion in the corpus of Ovid provides meaningful insight into the scholarship of the author.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Digireads.com Publishing
• Release date: Jan 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9781420951004

Ovid

Ovid (43 BC-17/18 AD) was a Roman poet. Born in Sulmo the year after Julius Caesar’s assassination, Ovid would join the ranks of Virgil and Horace to become one of the foremost poets of Augustus’ reign as first Roman emperor. After rejecting a life in law and politics, he embarked on a career as a poet, publishing his first work, the Heroides, in 19 BC. This was quickly followed by his Amores (16 BC), a collection of erotic elegies written to his lover Corinna. By 8 AD, Ovid finished his Metamorphoses, an epic narrative poem tracing the history of Rome and the world from the creation of the cosmos to the death and apotheosis of Julius Caesar. Ambitious and eminently inspired, Metamorphoses remains a timeless work of Roman literature and an essential resource for the study of classical languages and mythology. Exiled that same year by Augustus himself, Ovid spent the rest of his life in Tomis on the Black Sea, where he continued to write poems of loss, repentance and longing.

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A TREATISE ON FISHING, THE WALNUT TREE, CONSOLATION TO LIVIA, AND OTHER SPURIOUS WORKS

BY OVID

TRANSLATED BY HENRY T. RILEY

Print ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-5099-1

ebook ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-5100-4

This edition copyright © 2015

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CONTENTS

THE HALIEUTICON; or, TREATISE ON FISHES.

NUX; OR, THE WALNUT-TREE.

THE CONSOLATION TO LIVIA AUGUSTA,

DEATH OF HER SON DRUSUS CLAUDIUS NERO.

FRAGMENTS OF THE LOST WRITINGS OF OVID,

COLLECTED BY HEINSIUS.

THE HALIEUTICON; or, TREATISE ON FISHES.

A FRAGMENT.

——————

This fragment is full of lacunæ and corrupt readings. Ovid seems to have intended to depict in this poem the points of resemblance in terrestrial and aquatic animals. From its treating on the nature of fishes, he calls the work Halieuticon, from the Greek word ἀλιεὺς, 'a fisherman.' Some writers have attributed this fragment to Gratius Faliscus, a Roman poet, the author of the Cynægeticon, a treatise, in verse, on hunting; but Pliny the Elder (Book xxxii. c. 2) distinctly says, that Ovid is the author; his words are—'The disposition of fishes, which Ovid has mentioned in his work called Halieuticon, appears to me really wonderful.' Commentators generally believe this poem to have been written by him during his exile at Tomi.{1}

* * * * The world received the law; and he gave arms to all beings, and reminded them of their self-preservation; for thus it is that the calf threatens, which, not yet bears horns on its tender forehead; for this reason the hinds flee, the lions fight valorously, the dog defends himself by his bite, the scorpion by the sting of its tail, and the light bird flies away with agitated wings.

All have a vague fear of a death that is unknown to them; to all it has been granted to be sensible of the enemy, and the means of defence that have been given them, and to know the power and the manner of using their weapons: and thus too, the scarus{2} is caught by stratagem, beneath the waves, and at length dreads the bait fraught with treacherousness. It dares not strike the sticks{3} with an effort of its head; but, turning away, as it loosens the twigs with frequent blows of its tail, it makes its passage, and escapes safely into the deep. Moreover, if perchance any kind scarus, swimming behind, sees it struggling within the osiers, he takes hold of its tail in his mouth, as it is thus turned away, and so [it escapes.]

* * * * * * *

The cuttle-fish, slow in flight, when perchance, it has been caught under the buoyant wave, and every moment is in dread of the hands of the spoiler, vomits from its mouth a black blood, that tints the sea and hides its path, deceiving the eyes of those that follow.

The pike, taken in the net, though huge and bold, sinks down, crouching in the sand which it has stirred up with its tail. * * * *{4} It leaps into the air, and uninjured, with a bound it escapes the stratagem. The fierce lamprey, too, conscious of the smoothness of its round back, turning its head, in preference,{5} towards the loosened meshes of the net, with its slippery body at last escapes clear through the multiplied windings, and, injurious in the example it has set, it alone slips through them all. But, on the other hand, the sluggish polypus sticks to the rocks with its body provided with feelers, and by this stratagem it escapes the nets, and, according to the nature of the spot, it assumes and changes its colour, always resembling that place which it has lighted upon; and when it has greedily seized the prey hanging from the fishing-line, it likewise deceives the angler, on his raising the rod, when, now emerging into the air, it loosens its feelers, and spits forth the hook that it has despoiled of the bait.

But the mullet, with its tail, beats off the pendant bait, and snatches it up when thus struck off. The pike, lashed into furious rage, is carried along with its flounderings on every side, and follows the current that carries it on, and wriggles about its head, until the cruel hook falls from the loosened wound, and leaves its opened mouth. The lamprey, too, is not ignorant of its own powers of attack,