Tibullus, Elegies 2.1 and 2.2

Rūra canō rūrisque deōs: "I sing of the countryside and the country gods." Through the genre of love elegy, Tibullus praises his ideal existence: a rustic, simple life in the country. The two poems in this selection—a humble religious festival in 2.1, birthday well-wishes to the poet’s friend in 2.2—are full of the hope, charm, and respect for ancient tradition that was a hallmark of literature during the age of Augustus. Tibullus writes in elegant, straightforward elegiac couplets that make his poetry quite accessible for intermediate students.

This reader includes several appendices, including:

• A translation of the next poem in Book 2, in which Tibullus ties together the rural themes with more conventional tropes of Roman elegy
• Poems influenced by Tibullus from the pastoral traditions of England and Ireland
• A poem on similar themes from twelfth-century China, including a character-by-character gloss

 

See the about page for more information about this series based on the IB companion texts.

I am releasing this reader under the Creative Commons BY-NC-ND 4.0 license, meaning that you are free to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format with attribution and for non-commercial purposes. Find out more about this license here.

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