A Woman's Choice: Marcia Remarries Cato, Lucan, Pharsalia 2.326-353

A Woman Says “I Do…” Again

Name:  Lucan Date:  d. 65 CE Region:  Corduba [modern Spain] / Rome [modern Italy] Citation:  Civil War 2.326-353

As the sun was chasing away the cool twilight,

A knock shook Cato’s front door.

It was the widowed Marcia, still grieving,

Who came straight from her husband's pyre.

[She was originally married to Cato, a much better man,

But when she had paid the price of three children,

Her fertile self was used to provide offspring to another's home,

By joining families with a mother's blood.]

After that husband's final funeral rites, 

With tear-stained face, her hair disheveled,

Her flesh mangled with grief's blows,

She begged Cato, upset:

“When I was still fertile,

I followed your orders, Cato.

I took another husband. 

I had this other husband's babies.

Now, post-menopausal, I return to you,

Unable to be bartered out again.

Let me return to our original marriage,

Let us return to our original pledge (even if only in name).

Let my tombstone read, ‘Here lies Marcia, *Cato's* husband,’

Don't let anyone question why I left your household the first time—guessing whether I left in shame or in duty.

I'm not here ‘for the good times,’

I come in bad times, to support you in your troubles.

I'll follow you into battle.

Why should I be left behind, sheltered in peace,

And not just as close—or closer—than Cornelia was in times of war?”

Cato heeded her words. And, although it wasn't an appropriate time for a wedding,

(Destiny was playing a reveille for war), they had a quiet ceremony.

There wasn't much fuss; the gods were the only guests to the wedding.

A Woman Says “I Do...” Again

Interea Phoebo gelidas pellente tenebras

pulsatae sonuere fores, quas sancta relicto

Hortensi maerens inrupit Marcia busto.

Quondam virgo toris melioris iuncta mariti,

mox, ubi conubii pretium mercesque soluta est                  

tertia iam suboles, alios fecunda penates

inpletura datur geminas et sanguine matris

permixtura domos; sed, postquam condidit urna

supremos cineres, miserando concita voltu,

effusas laniata comas contusaque pectus                  

verberibus crebris cineresque ingesta sepulchri,

non aliter placitura viro, sic maesta profatur:

“Dum sanguis inerat, dum vis materna, peregi

iussa, Cato, 

Et geminos excepi feta maritos:

visceribus lassis partuque exhausta revertor                  

iam nulli tradenda viro. Da foedera prisci

inlibata tori, da tantum nomen inane

conubii; liceat tumulo scripsisse ‘Catonis

Marcia’, nec dubium longo quaeratur in aevo

mutarim primas expulsa an tradita taedas.   

Non me laetorum sociam rebusque secundis

accipis: in curas venio partemque laborum.

Da mihi castra sequi: cur tuta in pace relinquar

et sit civili propior Cornelia bello?”

     Hae flexere virum voces, et, tempora quamquam                  

sint aliena toris iam fato in bella vocante,

foedera sola tamen vanaque carentia pompa

iura placent sacrisque deos admittere testes.

Lucan [Marcus Annaeus Lucanus, 39 – 65 CE, modern Spain] was a Roman poet born in Corduba [modern day Spain]. He was an influential poet during the reign of the Roman emperor Nero, but his involvement in the Pisonian Conspiracy of 65 CE cut his life short. His most influential work, the Pharsalia, is an epic poem that recounts the Civil War of 49/48 BCE with Julius Caesar as the antagonist.