Sulpicia

Sulpicia the Elder, Servius Sulpicius Rufus daughter, niece of Marcus Valerius Messala Corvinus, was a Roman poet in the time of Emperor Augustus. You apparently was in close contact with the poet circle around her uncle Messala, which included also Tibullus and Ovid.

Together with the elegies Tibullus are six shorter poems epigrammartige Sulpicias get in elegiac couplets ( Corpus Tibullianum III 13-18), in which she talks about her love for a certain Cerinthus, possibly with cornutus, a friend of Tibullus ( Tibullus II 2 and 3) is identical. The longest poem covers only ten lines, the shortest just one sentence. The language of the verses sounds at times colloquial and somewhat clumsy and thus gives the appearance that gives here a young, inexperienced in the art of poetry girl immediately expressed his feelings. However, this is entirely in keeping tradition of Roman epigrams, as can be seen already in Catullus, so that the artless spontaneity of the Sulpicia poems could represent a careful poetic stylization in truth.

Noteworthy are also the the Sulpicia poems preceding elegies in the collection of the corpus Tibullianum (III 8-12) that describe their relationship with Cerinthus from the perspective of a third party and thus constitute, an introduction to her poetry. In the research it was therefore assumed sometimes that even the poems Sulpicias not originate from itself, but from this unknown poet, the same subject from different angles is poetic. However, evidence for this theory can not provide themselves.

Expenditure

Text:

• Tibulli Aliorumque Carminum Libri Tres. Recognovit brevique adnotatione critica instruxit IP Postgate. Editio altera. Oxford 1915.

Translation:

• Johann Ferdinand Koreff: The Sulpicia Elegies and some elegiac fragments of others. Paris 1810