That March Boy Martial

Today is March 1st, the birthday of the Roman poet Marcus Valerius Martialis, commonly called Martial. I would often teach about Martial and his poetry to my Latin students as they were making the transition between textbook Latin and authentic Latin literature.

In honor of the poet's birthday, here is the less-than-humble epigram he wrote to introduce his work:

Hic est quem legis ille, quem requiris,

toto notus in orbe Martialis

argutis epigrammaton libellis:

cui, lector studiose, quod dedisti

uiuenti decus atque sentienti,

rari post cineres habent poetae.

                                                                    Martial, Epigrams I.1 

And my translation:

Here's that guy you read, who you're looking for,

Martial, known in the whole, wide world

for his witty little books of epigrams.

The props you have given him, eager reader,

while still alive and awake,

few poets get after they're dead. 

 

Here is the information about his life and works I would distribute to my students:

Marcus Valerius Martialis, known commonly as Martial, perfected the Latin epigram as a literary artform. He penned well over 1,500 poems, each one on a single, specific topic. His work became popular among the Romans and was imitated by the poets of the empire and Renaissance and it still serves as the model for writers of epigrams today.

HISTORY AND CAREER

Martial was born around AD 40 in Bilbilis in the Roman province of Hispania.  He was given the cognomen Martialis because he was born on the Kalends of March. After spending most of his life in and around Rome, he returned to his hometown late in life and died there around 104.

After receiving a good education, Martial made his way to Rome in about 64.  There he made the acquaintance of several of the notable authors of the day, including Juvenal and fellow Spaniards Quintilian, Seneca the Younger, and Lucan. He quickly learned of life in the center of the empire after both Seneca and Lucan were ordered to commit suicide upon being linked with the conspiracy of Lucius Calpurnius Piso in 65.

Martial, of humble, provincial origins, had to rely upon his writing talent to make ends meet in the big city. In his own poetry he writes of being poor and having to climb up three flights of stairs to his humble apartment. He also writes that his patrons were not very generous. As his fame grew, his conditions improved and he makes mention of a small house on the Quirinal Hill and a cottage in nearby Nomentum, a small town in Latium. He was also awarded the honorary rank of military tribune and, although not married, was granted the ius trium liberorum, giving him tax exemption and other privileges usually reserved for fathers of three children.

HIS WORKS

The term epigram comes from the Greek epi meaning “upon” and graphein meaning “to write.” Its origins lie in the precision and economy of inscriptions on monuments and tombstones, but it was later developed into its own genre by the Greeks. Before Martial, Catullus from the 1^st century BC, reigned as the king of epigrams, often writing about love and hate and the struggles with his relationships. Following Catullus’ inspiration, many writers of the late republic and early empire penned epigrams, but very few of their works have survived. Martial perfected the form, writing to the point and without the weighty mythological similes and allusions so common in Latin lyric and epic poetry. Many of his poems consist of a single couplet with only a few exceeding twenty lines. Most of his epigrams are written in elegiac couplets; a sixth in hendecasyllabics, some 80 are choliambics, a few in iambics and hexameters.

Martial’s first known work was the Liber Spectaculorum, a collection of poems commemorating the opening of the Colosseum in Rome in AD 80. Thirty-six of the poems have survived, most of them praising the emperor Titus and providing valuable information about his inaugural games.

Around 84, Martial published a series of elegiac couplets used as labels on gifts given to friends and guests attending banquets during the Saturnalia. These gifts included food, drinks, clothing, stationary, furniture, toys, artwork, pets, and even slaves. Later, these epigrams would become Books XIII and XIV of his complete collection of Epigrams.

In the ensuing years 86-98, Martial produced eleven volumes of his most famous work of Epigrams. Like all good authors, Martial wrote about the world around him, including the memorable characters and follies he saw every day in the bustling, cosmopolitan streets of Rome. His subject matter includes poignant anecdotes and affections for true friends, acquaintances, admirable heroes from Roman history, faithful wives and slaves, the joys of country life and his Spanish homeland.  He is better known for his commentary on the seedier inhabitants of Rome: fortune-tellers, drunks, lovers, critics, and hypocrites. He also wrote in praise and complaint about his patrons and fellow poets. Finally, as a dutiful client, some of his poems are addressed to the emperor Domitian. They are marked by obvious flattery or overt praise, most likely as a means of insuring preservation and support from the principate.

A large number of Martial’s epigrams are obscene, causing him to preface several of his books with defensive comments and he cites Catullus as a precedent. Perhaps in response to criticism, he dedicated Book V to matronae puerique virginesque and Book VIII has no poems on objectionable subjects. While most of his poems are addressed to an individual, many of the names are probably pseudonyms. He wrote that it was his custom parcere personis, dicere de vitiis = “to spare the people but reveal their vices.”

Around 100, Martial had exhausted his material and tired of Rome. He returned to Bilbilis and settled down comfortably on a farm given to him by a patroness. It was there that he wrote his twelfth book in the winter of 101. While the specific date is not known, Pliny the Younger, in one of his epistles, praises Martial and mentions his death in 104.

SOURCES

Lilian Feder, The Meridian Handbook of Classical Literature. New York: New American Library, 1986.

M. C. Howatson, ed., The Oxford Companion to Classical Literature, 2^nd edition. New York: Oxford University Press, 1989.