Monæses,[1] and the band of Pacorus, twice repelled our inauspicious attacks, and exults in having added the Roman spoils to their trivial collars. The Dacian and Æthiopian[2] have almost demolished the city engaged in civil broils, the one formidable for his fleet, the other more expert for missile arrows. The times, fertile in wickedness, have in the first place polluted the marriage state, and [thence] the issue and families. From this fountain perdition being derived, has overwhelmed the nation and people. The marriageable virgin delights to be taught the Ionic dances,[3] and even at this time is trained up in [seductive] arts, and cherishes unchaste desires from her very infancy. Soon after she courts younger debauchees when her husband is in his cups, nor has she any choice, to whom she shall privately grant her forbidden pleasures when the lights are removed, but at the word of command, openly, not without the knowledge of her husband, she will come forth, whether it be a factor that calls for her, or the captain of a Spanish ship, the extravagant purchaser of her disgrace. It was not a youth born from parents like these, that stained the sea with Carthaginian gore, and slew Pyrrhus, and mighty Antiochus, and terrific Annibal; but a manly progeny of rustic soldiers, instructed to turn the glebe with Sabine spades, and to carry clubs cut [out of the woods] at the pleasure of a rigid mother, what time the sun shifted the shadows[4] of the mountains, and took the yokes from the
- ↑ Alluding to two Parthian commanders who had proved victorious over the Romans. Monæses, more commonly known by the name of Surena, is the same that defeated Crassus. Pacorus was the son of Orodes, the Parthian monarch, and defeated Didius Saxa, the lieutenant of Mark Antony. Monæses, here, is a proper name, but Surena is an oriental term of dignity, indicating the person next in authority to the monarch.
- ↑ We are not to understand this passage as if the Dacians and Æthiopians had twice attempted to destroy the city of Rome. Horace means the army of Antony and Cleopatra, which was cheifly composed of those nations. Bond.
- ↑ The Ionians were the most voluptuous people of the world; their music, their dances, and their poetry were formed with a peculiar softness and delicacy. Even their laughter had something so dissolute, that Ἰωνικός γέλως became a proverb. The poet mentions the marriageable virgin, because it was shameful for a girl of that age to learn to dance. That exercise was only permitted during their infancy. Todd.
- ↑ The sun changes the shadows, in proportion as he declines to his
