I Thirst While Drowning in Waves: Iphis Yearns to Marry
Ianthe
|
Name: Ovid Date: 43 BCE – 17 CE Region: Sulmo [modern Italy] Citation: Metamorphoses 9.735, 742 – 744, 755 – 763 |
In Ovid’s mythology-based
epic, The Metamorphoses, Iphis prays to be transformed into a man in
order to marry the love of their life, Ianthe:
“I wish I weren’t a girl! … Daedalus, the most intelligent man in the entire world, the one who flew away with waxen wings, could he do the same for me: make a girl into a boy? Could he even change you, Ianthe?
“Look, the
perfect occasion is here; the wedding day is here. Ianthe will soon be mine.
But it’s no use! I thirst while drowning in waves. What’s the purpose of my
matron of honor Juno being here? Why has Hymenaeus come? The groom is absent,
but two brides are here.”
I Thirst While
Drowning in Waves: Iphis Yearns to Marry Ianthe
Vellem
nulla forem!
...ipse
licet revolet ceratis Daedalus alis,
quid
faciet? Num me puerum de virgine doctis
artibus
efficiet? Num te mutabit, Ianthe?
...Nunc
quoque votorum nulla est pars vana meorum,
dique
mihi faciles, quicquid valuere, dederunt;
quodque
ego, vult genitor, vult ipsa, socerque futurus.
At non
vult natura, potentior omnibus istis,
quae
mihi sola nocet. venit ecce optabile tempus,
Luxque
iugalis adest, et iam mea fiet Ianthe—
nec mihi
continget: mediis sitiemus in undis.
Pronuba
quid Juno, quid ad haec, Hymenaee, venitis
sacra,
quibus qui ducat abest, ubi nubimus ambae?”
Ovid [Publius Ovidius Naso; 43 BCE – 17 CE, modern Italy] was
one of the most famous love poets of Rome’s Golden Age. His most famous work,
the Metamorphoses, provides a history of the world through a series of
interwoven myths. Most of his poetry is erotic in nature; for this reason, he
fell into trouble during the conservative social reforms under the reign of the
emperor Augustus. In 8 CE he was banished to Bithynia [modern Turkey], where he
spent the remainder of his life pining for his native homeland.
