the Metamorphoses is a long Latin poem epic of Ovide, whose composition probably begins in the year 1. Work includes/understands more than 15 pounds and twelve thousand worms (hexameters dactylic) and described the birth and the history of the world gréco-Roman until the time of the emperor Auguste.

Analyzes

The authors which Ovide takes as a starting point are poets of the hellenistic time who thought of gathering the Greek legends presenting the metamorphoses of the gods, or the men, of the Mythologie. Among these poets it is necessary to quote Nicandre de Colophon ({{IIIe}} - second century BC), Antigonos de Carystos and Parthénios de Nicée (first century BC). The revival of the Pythagorisme gives also a certain topicality to the doctrines of the transformism.

Ovide puts in scene hundreds of Fable S (approximately 250) since the original Chaos until the apotheosis of Jules César, in a way either developed or allusive. Most difficult is to give to this heterogeneous matter a certain unit. Ovide reaches that point, not without artifices, while taking as a starting point the catalogs and the antiquated genealogies (as the Catalog of the women of Hésiode). All qualities of Ovide, natural liveliness, art of the development, effects of surprise, addresses in the transitions, elegance and lightness of key are found in the Métamorphoses but with a particular proportioning in order to correspond to the duration of the poem. Thus Ovide seeks the picturesque one with happiness and pushes sometimes until a brutal realism as in this portrait of the Faim (VIII, v.  740-749):

“(...) She sought the Hunger: she saw it in a stony field, from where she endeavoured to tear off, of the nails and the teeth, of rare grass bits. Its hair was hirsutes, its hollow eyes, its livid face, its gray and spoiled lips, its rough teeth of tartar. Its skin dries would have let see its entrails; emaciated bones bored under the curve of the kidneys. Belly, only the place; the knees stand out enormous round, and the heels lengthened, deformed, without measurement…”

The psychology of the characters is varied and is accompanied when it is necessary resources of the rhetoric even of the declamation (argument of Ajax and Ulysses around the weapons of Achille (XIII)). As for the engagements, they take sometimes the epic form of the great epopees. However, Ovide does not give up its frivolity nor with the mischievousness of the poet who does not wish to be easily deceived of his account, which harms sometimes the overall harmony of work. Finally Ovide, although it was in contact with the pythagorism which at that time does not cease making progress in the Roman high society, utilizes it only with its last song with a magnificence of terms but without great depth.

the Metamorphoses are not completely finished when Ovide is exiled with Tomes (current the Constanţa in Romania, at the edge of the Black Sea). It is in this place, which for him is an infernal exile, that it finishes on a vague date, undoubtedly around the year 9 or 10, its work.

Principal episodes

• Book I: Creation, ages of humanity, Giant S, Daphne, Io;

• Book II: Phaéton, Callisto, Jupiter and Europe;
• Book III: Cadmus, Actéon, Echo and Penthée;
• Book IV: Pyrame and Thisbé, girls of Mined, Persée and Andromède.
• Book V: Phinée, the Abduction of Proserpine;
• Book VI: Arachné, Niobé, Philomèle and Procné;
• Book VII: Médée, Céphale and Procris;
• Book VIII: Nisus and Scylla, Maze and Icare, Philémon and Baucis;
• Book IX: the myth of Hercules, Byblis;
• Book X: Eurydice, Hyacinthe, Pygmalion, Adonis, Atalante, Cyparissus;
• Book XI: Orphée, Midas, Alcyone and Céyx;
• Book XII: Iphigénie, the Centaur S, Achilles;
• Book XIII: the head office of Troy, Énée;
• Book XIV: Scylla, Énée, Romulus;
• Book XV: Pythagore, Hippolyte, Esculape, César.

Source

• Jean Bayet, Latin Literature , Armand Hake-collection U, 1965.

See too

Related articles

• Ovide

External bonds

• Latin The library Texte in Latin in line
• Biblioteca classica selected French Traduction on line.
• Juxta.free.fr Line by line translation (French-Latin side-by-side) with format pdf.
• Course and documents on '' the Metamorphoses ''