Manilius: ASTRONOMICON

Carmine divinas artes et conscia fati
sidera, diversos hominum variantia casus,
caelestis rationis opus, deducere mundo
aggredior primusque novis Helicona movere
cantibus et viridi nutantis vertice silvas,
hospita sacra ferens nulli memorata priorum.
hunc mihi tu, Caesar, patriae princepsque paterque,
qui regis augustis parentem legibus orbem
concessumque patri mundum deus ipse mereris,
das animum viresque facis ad tanta canenda.
iam propiusque favet mundus scrutantibus ipsum
et cupit aetherios per carmina pandere census.

By song I set about to draw down for the world the divine arts and the stars conscious of fate, varying the diverse chances of men, the work of celestial reason, and first to move Helicon with new songs and the woods nodding with green summit, bearing alien sacred things told by none of the former men.
hunc for me you, Caesar, both princeps and father of the fatherland,
who rule the world obeying august laws, and you yourself, as a god, merit the world granted to your father,
you give spirit and forces and make me for singing such great things.
now too the world itself more closely favors those scrutinizing it and desires to lay open through songs the aetherial registers.

hoe sub pace vacat tantum; iuvat ire per ipsum
aera et immenso spatiantem vivere caelo
signaque et adversos stellarum noscere cursus.
quod solum novisse parum est. impensins ipsa
scire iuvat magni penitus praecordia mundi,
quaque regat generetque suis animalia signis,
cernere et in numerum Phoebe modulante referre.

only under peace is there leisure for this; it pleases to go through the very
air and to live, roaming, in the immense heaven,
and to know the signs and the adverse courses of the stars.
which alone to have known is too little. More intently it
pleases to know, deep within, the very inmost heart of the great world,
and by what signs it rules and generates animals,
to discern and to refer them into number, with Phoebe modulating.

bina mihi positis lucent altaria flammis,
ad duo templa precor duplici circumdatus aestu

two altars shine for me with flames set in place,
to two temples I pray, surrounded by a double heat

[22] carminis et rerum; certa cum lege canentem
mundus et immenso vatem circumstrepit orbe
vixque soluta suis immittit verba figuris.
quem primum interius licuit cognoscere terris
munere caelestum. quls enim condentibus illis
clepsisset furto mundum, quo cuncta reguntur?

[22] of song and of things; while chanting with a fixed law
the world, with its immense orb, surrounds the vates with clamor
and scarcely sends forth words loosened from their own figures.
him it was first permitted for the lands to know from within,
by the gift of the celestials. For who, as they were founding those things,
would have pilfered by stealth the world-order, by which all things are ruled?

quis foret humano conatus pectore tantum,
invitis ut dis cuperet deus ipse videri?
tu princeps auctorque sacri, Cyllenie, tanti;
per te iam caelum interius, iam sidera nota
sublimis aperire vias imumque sub orbem,
et per inane suis parentia finibus astra
nominaque et cursus signorum, pondera, vires,
major uti facies mundi foret et veneranda
non species tantum, sed et ipsa potentia rerum,
sentirentque deum gentes quam maximus esset.
[qui sua disposuit per tempora, cognita ut essent
omnibus et mundi facies caelumque supernum.]
et natura dedit vires seque ipsa reclusit,
regalis animos primum dignata movere
proxima tangentis rerum fastigia caelo,
qui domuere feras gentes oriente sub ipso,
quas secat Euphrates, in quas et Nilus inundat,
qua mundus redit et nigras super evolat urbes.

who would have with a human breast an endeavor so great,
that, with the gods unwilling, he would desire to be seen as a god himself?
you, leader and author of so great a sacred thing, Cyllenian;
through you now the inner heaven, now the stars are known,
to open aloft the ways and the lowest beneath the orb,
and the stars, obeying their own boundaries through the void,
and the names and courses of the signs, their weights, their forces,
so that the face of the world might be greater and venerable,
not appearance only, but even the very potency of things,
and the nations might feel how very great God was.
[who has disposed his own things through the times, so that they might be known
to all, both the face of the world and the supernal heaven.]
and Nature gave powers and disclosed herself,
deigning first to move royal minds,
touching the summits of things nearest to the sky,
who tamed the wild nations under the very east,
which the Euphrates cuts, and into which the Nile too overflows,
where the world returns and flies above the black cities.

tunc qui templa sacris coluerunt omne per aevum
delectique sacerdotes in publica vota
officio vinxere deum, quibus ipsa potentis
numinis accendit castam praesentia mentem,
inque deum deus ipse tulit patuitque ministris.
hi tantum movere decus primique per artem
sideribus videre vagis pendentia fata.

then those who cultivated the temples with sacred rites through every age
and the chosen priests, in public vows
by duty bound the god, for whom the very presence
of the mighty numen kindled a chaste mind,
and the god himself bore them into godhead and stood open to his ministers.
these alone set such honor in motion, and first, through art,
they saw the fates hanging upon the wandering stars.

[53] singula nam proprio signarunt tempora casu,
longa per assiduas complexi saecula curas:
nascendi quae cuique dies, quae vita fuisset,
in quas fortunae leges quaeque hora valeret,
quantaque quam parvi facerent discrimina motus.
postquam omnls caeli species redeuntibus astris
percepta in proprias sedes, et reddita certis
fatorum ordinibus sua cuique potentia formae,
per varios usus artem experientia fecit
exemplo monstrante viam speculataque longe
deprendit tacitis dominantia legibus astra
et totum aeterna mundum ratione moveri
fatorumque vices certis discernere signis.
nam rudis ante illos nullo discrimine vita
in speciem conversa operum ratione carebat
et stupefacta novo pendebat lumine mundi,
tum velut amissis maerens, tum laeta renatis
sideribus, variosque dies incertaque noctis
tempora nee similis umbras iam sole regresso,
iam propiore suis poterant discernere causis.

[53] for they marked individual times by their own proper occurrence, embracing long ages with assiduous cares:
what day for being born for each, what his life would be,
under what laws of Fortune each hour would prevail,
and how great—and how very small—the discriminations the motions would make.
after the whole appearance of the sky, with the stars returning,
was perceived in their proper seats, and to fixed orders
of the fates the proper potency of each form was restored,
through varied uses experience made an art—
example showing the way—and, having watched from afar,
it detected the stars ruling by tacit laws,
and that the whole world is moved by eternal reason,
and to distinguish the alternations of the fates by sure signs.
for before them life, untrained, with no discrimination,
turned into mere semblance of works, lacked ratio,
and, stupefied, hung upon the new light of the world—
now grieving as if for stars lost, now glad at their rebirth—
nor could they discern the various days and the uncertain periods of night
and the dissimilar shadows, whether with the sun drawn back or nearer,
by their proper causes.

necdum etiam doctas sollertia fecerat artes,
terraque sub rudibus cessabat vasta colonis;
tumque in desertis habitabat montibus aurum,
immotusque novos pontus subduxerat orbes;
nec vitam pelago nec ventis credere vota
audebant; se quisque satis novisse putabant.
sed cum longa dies acuit mortalia corda
et labor ingenium miseris dedit et sua quemque
advigilare sibi inssit fortuna premendo,

nor yet had cleverness fashioned the learned arts,
and the vast earth lay fallow beneath rude colonists;
and then gold dwelt in deserted mountains,
and the sea, motionless, had withheld new orbs;
they dared to entrust neither life to the deep nor their vows to the winds;
each man thought himself to know enough.
but when long time sharpened mortal hearts
and toil gave ingenuity to the wretched, and Fortune, by pressing,
bade each to keep watch for his own,

[82] seducta in varias certarunt pectora curas,
et quodcumque sagax temptando repperit usus,
in commune bonum commentum laeta dederunt.
tune et lingua suas accepit barbara leges,
et fera diversis exercita frugibus arva,
et vagus in caecum penetravit navita pontum,
fecit et ignotis itiner commercia terris.
tum belli pacisque artes commenta vetustas;
semper enim ex aliis alias proseminat usus.

[82] drawn off into various cares the hearts contended,
and whatever sagacious use discovered by attempting,
they gladly gave the contrivance for the common good.
then too the barbarian tongue received its own laws,
and the wild fields were exercised with diverse crops,
and the wandering mariner penetrated the blind sea,
and by journeys he made commerce with unknown lands.
then antiquity devised the inventions of the arts of war and of peace;
for use always disseminates others from others.

ne vulgata canam: linguas didicere volucrum,
consultare fibras et rumpere vocibus angues,
sollicitare umbras imumque Acheronta movere
in noctemque dies, in lucem vertere noctes.
omnia conando docilis sollertia vicit.
nec prius imposuit rebus finemque manumque,
quam caelum ascendit ratio cepitque profundam
naturam rerum causis viditque quod usquam est;
nubila cur tanto quaterentur pulsa fragore,
hiberna aestiva nix grandine mollior esset,
arderent terrae solidusque tremesceret orbis,
cur imbres ruerent, ventos quae causa moveret,
pervidit solvitque animis miracula rerum
eripuitque Iovi fulmen viresque tonantis
et sonitum ventis concessit, nubibus ignem.

let me not sing things made common: they learned the tongues of birds,
to consult the entrails and to burst serpents with voices,
to solicit the shades and to move deepest Acheron,
and to turn days into night, nights into light.
teachable ingenuity overcame everything by attempting.
nor did it earlier impose upon things both an end and a hand,
than when reason climbed the sky and seized the profound
nature of things by their causes and saw whatever is anywhere;
why clouds, when driven, were shaken with so great a crash,
why winter snow would be softer than summer hail,
why the lands would burn and the solid orb would tremble,
why showers rush down, what cause would move the winds—
she saw through and solved for minds the miracles of things,
and she snatched from Jove the thunderbolt and the powers of the Thunderer,
and conceded the sound to the winds, fire to the clouds.

quae postquam in proprias deduxit singula causas,
vicinam ex alto mundi cognoscere molem
intendit totumque animo comprendere caelum,

which, after it had led each thing down into its proper causes,
strove to know, from the heights, the neighboring mass of the world,
and to comprehend the whole heaven with the mind,

[109] attribuitque suas formas, sua nomina signis,
quasque vices agerent certa sub sorte notavit,
omniaque ad numen mundi faciemque moveri,
sideribus vario mutantibus ordine fata.
hoc mihi surgit opus non ullis ante sacratum
carminibus. faveat magno fortuna labori,
annosa et molli contingat vita senecta,
ut possim rerum tantas emergere moles
magnaque cum parvis simili percurrere cura.

[109] and he assigned their own forms, their own names to the signs,
and noted what turns they should perform under a fixed lot,
and that all things are moved by the numen and the face of the world,
the fates changing with the stars in a varied order.
this work rises for me, hallowed by no songs before.
may Fortune favor the great labor,
and may life and a long-aged, gentle senectitude befall me,
so that I may be able to emerge through such great masses of things
and with like care to run through great things together with small.

et quoniam caelo descendit carmen ab alto,
et venit in terras fatorum conditus ordo,
ipsa mihi primum naturae forma canenda est,
ponendusque sua totus sub imagine mundus.
quem sive ex nullis repetentem semina rebus
natali quoque egere placet semperque fuisse
et fore principio pariter fatoque carentem:
seu permixta chaos rerum primordia quondam
discrevit partu, mundumque enixa nitentem
fugit in infernas caligo pulsa tenebras;
sive individuis in idem reditura soluta
principiis natura manet post saecula mille,
et paene ex nihilo summa est nihilumque futurum,
caecaque materies caelun, perfecit et orbem;
sive ignis fabricavit opus flammaeque micantes,
quae mundi fecere oculos habitantque per omne
corpus et in caelo vibrantia fulmina fingunt;
seu liquor hoc peperit, sine quo riget arida rerum
materies ipsumque vorat, quo solvitur, ignem;
aut nrque terra patrem novit nec flamma nee aer
aut umor, faciuntque deum per quattuor artus
et mundi struxere globum prohibentque requiri

and since the song descends from high heaven,
and the hidden order of fates has come upon the lands,
the very form of nature must first be sung by me,
and the whole world must be set down beneath its own image.
whether one prefers that, retrieving its seeds from no things,
it also lacked a natal origin, and has always been and will be,
equally without a beginning and without fate:
or that once, when the primordials of things were mingled as chaos,
by a birth it was separated, and, having brought forth a shining world,
the gloom, driven back, fled into infernal darknesses;
or that nature remains in indivisible principles, loosed to the same
to which it will return after a thousand ages,
and almost out of nothing the sum exists and will be nothing,
and blind matter perfected heaven and the orb;
or that fire fabricated the work, and the flickering flames,
which made the eyes of the world and dwell through the whole
body and in the sky fashion the quivering lightnings;
or that liquid begot this, without which the dry matter of things
stiffens, and which devours the very fire by which it is dissolved;
or neither earth knows a father nor flame nor air
nor moisture, and they make a god through four limbs
and have built the globe of the world and forbid that it be sought out

[140] ultra se quicquam, cum per se cuncta creentur,
frigida nec calidis desint, aut umida siccis,
spiritus aut solidis, sitque haec discordia concors,
quae nexus habilis et opus generabile fingit,
atque omnis partus elementa capacia reddit; --
semper erit genus in pugna, dubiumque manebit
quod latet et tantum supra est hominemque deumque;
sed facies quaecumque tamen sub origine rerum,
convenit et certo digestum est ordine corpus.
ignis in aetherias volucer se sustulit oras
summaque complexus stellantis culmina caeli
flammarum vallo naturae moenia fecit.
proximus in tenuis descendit spiritus auras
aeraque extendit medium per inania mundi;
ignem flatus alit vicinis subditus astris.

[140] anything beyond themselves, since through themselves all things are created,
and that the cold not be lacking to the hot, nor the moist to the dry,
nor the breath to the solid, and let this discord be concordant,
which fashions a fit nexus and a generative work,
and renders the elements capable of every birth; --
there will always be a kind in combat, and it will remain doubtful
what lies hidden and is so far above both man and god;
but whatever the face under the origin of things,
it fits, and the body has been arranged in a fixed order.
fire, winged, lifted itself to the aetherial borders
and, embracing the highest starry summits of heaven,
made the walls of nature with a rampart of flames.
next the spirit descended into the tenuous auras
and stretched the air through the voids of the world’s middle;
the breath, subjected to the neighboring stars, nourishes the fire.

tertia sors undas stravit fluctusque natantis
aequora per fudit toto nascentia ponto,
ut liquor exhalet tenuis atque evomat auras
aeraque ex ipso ducentem semina pascat.
ultima subsedit glomerato pondere tellus,
convenitque vagis permixtus limus harenis
paulatim ad summum tenui fugiente liquore;
quoque magis puras umor secessit in auras,
et siccata magis struxerunt aequora terram,
adiacuitque cavis fluidum convallibus aequor,
emersere fretis montes, orbisque per undas
exsiliit vasto clausus tamen undique ponto.

the third lot strewed the waves and poured the swimming billows
the sea-plains being born through the whole nascent ocean,
so that the tenuous liquid might exhale and spew out airs
and might feed the air drawing its seeds from itself.
the earth, last, settled with agglomerated weight,
and mingled slime with wandering sands came together
little by little to the surface as the thin liquid fled;
and the moisture withdrew the more into pure airs,
and, more dried, the sea-plains constructed the land,
and the fluid level lay adjacent to hollow valleys,
the mountains emerged from the straits, and the orb through the waves
leapt forth, yet enclosed on every side by the vast ocean.

[167] imaque de cunctis mediam tenet undique sedem,
idcircoque manet stabilis, quia totus ab illa
tantundem refugit mundus fecitque cadendo
undique ne caderet (medium totius et imum est),
ictaque contractis consistunt corpora plagis
et concurrendo prohibent in longius ire.
quodni librato penderet pondere tellus,
non ageret cursus mundi subeuntibus astris
Phoebus ad occasum et numquam remearet ad ortus,
lunave submersos regeret per inania cursus,
nec matutinis fulgeret Lucifer horis,
Hesperos emenso dederat qui lumen Olympo.
nunc quia non imo tellus deiecta profundo,
sed medio suspensa manet, sunt pervia cuncta,
qua cadat et subeat caelum rursusque resurgat.

[167] and the lowest of all holds the middle seat on every side,
and for that reason it remains stable, because the whole world recoils equally from it,
and by falling has made it so, from every side, that it should not fall (the middle of the whole is also the lowest),
and thus the bodies, their tracts contracted, come to a stand
and, by running together, forbid going farther.
if the earth were not hanging with balanced weight,
Phoebus would not drive his courses toward setting, with the stars going beneath the world,
and would never return to the risings,
nor would the Moon guide her submerged courses through the void,
nor would Lucifer shine in the matutinal hours,
Hesperus, who, with Olympus traversed, had given light.
now, since the earth has not been cast down into the lowest deep,
but remains suspended in the middle, all things are pervious,
so that the sky may fall and go under and again rise up.

nam neque fortuitos ortus surgentibus astris
nec totiens possum nascentem credere mundum
solisve assiduos partus et fata diurna,
cum facies eadem signis per saecula constet,
idem Phoebus eat caeli de partibus isdem,
lunaque per totidem luces mutetur et orbes,
et natura vias servet, quas fecerat ipsa,
nec tirocinio peccet circumque feratur
aeterna cum luce dies, qui tempora monstrat
nunc his nunc illis eadem regionibus orbis,
semper et ulterior vadentibus ortus ad ortum,
occasumve obitus, caelum et cum sole perennet.

for neither do I deem the risings of the stars to be fortuitous births,
nor can I believe the world to be so often nascent,
or the sun’s assiduous births and diurnal fates,
since the same facies abides for the signs through the ages,
the same Phoebus goes from the same parts of the sky,
and the moon is changed through just so many lights and orbits,
and Nature preserves the ways which she herself made,
nor does she err in her apprenticeship, and the day with eternal light is borne around,
which shows the times now to these, now to those regions of the orb,
and ever the sunrise is farther for those going toward the east,
or the setting for those going toward the west; and the heaven lasts perennial with the sun.

[194] nec vero natura tibi admiranda videri
pendentis terrae debet. cum pendeat ipse
mundus et in nullo ponat vestigia fundo,
quod patet ex ipso motu cursuque volantis,
cum suspensus eat Phoebus currusque reflectat
huc illue agiles et servet in aethere metas,
cum luna et stellae volitent per inania mundi,
terra quoque aerias leges imitata pependit.
est igitur tellus mediam sortita cavernam
aeris et tote pariter sublata profundo
nec patulas distenta plagas, sed condita in orbem
undiquo surgentem pariter pariterque cadentem.

[194] nor indeed ought the nature of the suspended earth to seem wondrous to you;
since the world itself hangs and sets its footprints on no foundation,
which is evident from its very motion and the course of its flight,
when Phoebus goes suspended and bends his agile chariot hither and thither and keeps his turning-posts in the aether,
when the moon and the stars flit through the voids of the world,
the earth too, imitating the aerial laws, has hung.
So then the earth, having been allotted the middle cavern
of the air and lifted equally from the whole deep,
not stretched into broad regions, but compacted into an orb,
on all sides rising equally and equally descending.

haec est naturae facies; sic mundus et ipse
in convexa volans teretes facit esse figuras
stellarum; solisque orbem lunaeque rotundum
aspicimus, tumido quaerentis corpore lumen,
quod globus obliquos totus non accipit ignes.
haec aeterna manet divisque simillima forma,
cui neque principium est usquam, nec finis in ipsa,
sed similis tote ore manet perque omnia par est.
sic tellus glomerata manet mundique figura.

this is nature’s face; thus the world itself,
flying in the convex spaces, makes the figures
of the stars to be terete; and the orb of the sun and the round
of the moon we behold, seeking the light with a swollen body,
because the globe does not wholly receive the slanting fires.
this eternal form remains, and most similar to the gods,
to which there is nowhere a beginning, nor an end in itself,
but it remains similar in its whole face and is equal through all things.
thus the earth remains conglomerated, and the figure of the world [does also].

idcirco terris non omnibus omnia signa
conspicimus. nusquam invenies fulgere Canopum,
donec Niliacas per pontum veneris oras;
sed quaerent Helicen, quibus ille supervenit ignis,
quod laterum tractus habitant, medioque tumore
eripiunt terrae caelum visusque coercent.
te testem dat, luna, sui glomeraminis orbis,
quae cum mersa nigris per noctem deficis umbris,

Therefore we do not behold all the signs in all lands;
you will nowhere find Canopus shining, until you come by sea to the Nilean shores;
but they seek Helice, for whom that fire comes over them,
who inhabit the tracts of the flanks, and by the middle swelling
snatch away the sky from the earth and constrain the sights.
you as witness it offers, Moon, of the orb’s glomeration,
you who, when immersed in black shadows through the night, do fail,

[223] non omnis pariter confundis sidere dempto,
sed prius eoae quaerunt tua lumina gentes,
post, medio subiecta polo quaecumque coluntur,
ultima ad hesperios infectis volveris alis
seraque in extremis quatiuntur gentibus aera.
quodsi plana foret tellus, semel orta per omnem
deficeret pariter toti miserabilis orbi.
sed quia per teretem deducta est terra tumorem,
his modo, post illis apparet Delia terris
exoriens simul atque cadens; quia fertur in orbem
ventris et acclivis pariter declivia iungit
atque alios superat gyros aliosque relinquit.

[223] you do not alike confound all when the star is taken away,
but first the Eastern peoples seek your lights,
afterwards, whatever lands are inhabited under the middle pole,
last you are rolled to the Hesperians with stained wings,
and late the airs are shaken in the farthest nations.
but if the earth were flat level, once risen, it would fail alike at once
for the whole pitiable orb.
but because the earth is drawn out along a rounded swelling,
now to these lands, after to those, the Delian appears,
rising and also setting; because it is borne around the girth
and, being inclined, it joins the declivities equally,
and overpasses some gyres and leaves others behind.

ex quo colligitur terrarum forma rotunda.
hanc circum variae gentes hominum atque ferarum
aeriaeque colunt volucres. pars eius ad arctos
eminet, austrinis pars est habitabilis oris
sub pedibusque iacet nostris supraque videtur
ipsa sibi fallente solo declivia longa
et pariter surgente via pariterque cadente.

whence it is gathered that the form of the lands is round.
around this various tribes of men and of wild beasts
and the airy birds dwell. a part of it toward the Bears
projects, a part along the southern shores is habitable;
and it lies beneath our feet and is seen above as well,
the ground itself deceiving itself with long declivities,
and the way equally rising and equally falling.

hanc ubi ad occasus nostros sol aspicit ortus,
illio orta dies sopitas excitat urbes
et cum luce refert operum vadimonia terris;
nos in nocte sumus somnosque in membra vocamus.
pontus utrosque suis distinguit et alligat undis.
hoc opus immensi constructum corpore mundi
membraque naturae diversa condita forma
aeris atque ignis terrae pelagique iacentis
vis animae divina regit, sacroque meatu
conspirat deus et tacita ratione gubernat
mutuaque in cunctas dispensat foedera partes,
altera ut alterius vires faciatque feratque,

when the sun, having risen, looks upon this toward our west,
there the day, arisen, rouses the slumbering cities
and with the light restores to the lands the appointments of works;
we are in night and we call sleep into our limbs.
the sea with its waves both separates and binds the two.
this work, constructed in the body of the immense world,
and the members of nature, diverse, established in form—
of air and of fire, of earth and of the sea lying low—
a divine animating force governs; and with a sacred course
God harmonizes and by silent reason steers,
and he dispenses mutual compacts into all the parts,
so that the one may both make and bear the forces of the other,

[255] summaque per varias maneat cognata figuras.
nunc tibi signorum lucentis undique flammas
ordinibus certis referam, primumque canentur
quae media obliquo praecingunt ordine mundum
solemque alternis vicibus per tempora portant
atque alia adverso luctantia sidera mundo;
omnia, quae possis caelo numerare sereno;
e quibus et ratio fatorum ducitur omnis,
ut sit idem mundi primum quod continet arcem.
aurato princeps Aries in vellere fulgens
respicit admirans aversum surgere Taurum
summisso vultu Geminos et fronte vocantem.

[255] and let the kindred whole abide through various forms.
now I will recount to you, in fixed orders, the flames of the shining constellations on every side, and first shall be sung
those which gird the world in the middle with a slanting order
and carry the sun by alternating turns through the seasons
and other stars struggling with the contrary world;
all which you can number in a clear sky;
from which too the whole reckoning of fates is derived,
so that the same which contains the citadel of the world may be its first principle.
the leader Aries, shining in a gilded fleece,
looks back in wonder at the Bull rising averted,
at the Twins with lowered face, and one calling with his brow.

quos sequitur Cancer, Cancrum Leo, Virgo Leonem.
aequato tum Libra die cum tempore noctis
attrahit ardenti fulgentem Scorpion astro.
in cuius caudam contento dirigit arcu
mixtus equo volucrem missurus iamque sagittam.

whom Cancer follows, Leo Cancer, Virgo Leo.
then Libra, the day made equal with the time of night,
draws the gleaming Scorpion with the ardent star.
into whose tail he directs with a taut bow,
mixed with a horse, now about to send forth the winged arrow.

tum venit angusto Capricornus sidere flexus;
post hunc inflexa defundit Aquarius urna
Piscibus assuetas avide subeuntibus undas,
quos Aries tangit claudentis ultima signa.
at qua fulgentis caelum consurgit ad Arctos,
omnia quae summo despectant sidera mundo,
nec norunt obitus unoque in vertice tendunt.
in diversa situ caelumque et sidera torquens
aera per gelidum tenuis deducitur axis
libratumque regit diverso cardine mundum,

then comes the bend of Capricorn in its narrow sign;
after this the bent urn of Aquarius pours out
the waves accustomed to the Fishes as they eagerly come up,
which Aries touches, the final signs that close the circle.
but where the sky rises toward the shining Bears,
all the stars that look down from the summit of the world,
and know not settings and tend toward a single vertex.
twisting, by its position, the sky and the stars in different directions,
the slender axis is drawn through the gelid air
and by an opposite pivot it rules the balanced world,

[281] sidereus circa medium quem volvitur orbis
aetheriosque rotat cursus; immotus at ille
in binas Arctos magni per inania mundi
perque ipsum terrae directus constitit orbem.
nec vero e solido stat robore corporis eius,
nec grave pondus habet, quod onus ferat aetheris alti;
sed cum aer omnis semper volvatur in orbem,
quoque semel coepit, totus volet undique in ipsum,
quodcumque in medio est, circa quod cuncta moventur,
usque adeo tenue, ut verti non possit in ipsum
nec iam inclinari nec se convertere in orbem,
hoc dixere axem, quia motum non habet ullum,
ipse videt circa volitantia cuncta moveri.
summa tenent eius miseris notissima nautis
signa per immensum cupidos ducentia pontum:
maioremque Helice major decircinat arcum,
septem illam stellae certantes lumine signant,
qua duce per fiuctus Graiae dant vela carinae.

[281] the sidereal axis, around the middle of which the orb is revolved
and it rotates aetherial courses; yet that one is unmoved,
set straight through the twin Arctoi through the voids of the great world
and through the very orb of the earth itself.
nor indeed does it stand by the solid strength of its body,
nor does it have a heavy weight to bear the burden of the high aether;
but since all air is ever rolled in a circle,
and wherever once it has begun, the whole will fly from every side into that
whatever is in the middle, around which all things are moved,
so exceedingly thin that it cannot be turned upon itself
nor now be inclined nor turn itself into a circle—
this they have called the axis, because it has no motion at all;
it itself sees all things flitting around being moved around it.
its extremities hold signs most well-known to wretched sailors,
signs leading the eager through the immense sea:
and Greater Helice circumscribes the greater arc;
seven stars, vying in brilliance, mark that one,
under whose guidance through the waves Greek keels set sail.

angusto Cynosura brevis torquetur in orbe
quam spatio, tam luce minor; sed iudice vincit
maiorem Tyrio. Poenis haec certior auctor,
non apparentem pelago quaerentbus orbem.
nec paribus positae sunt frontibus; utraque caudam
vergit in alterius rostro sequiturque sequentem.

the short Cynosura is twisted in a narrow orbit
as much smaller in extent, so also in light; but by the judgment
of the Tyrian it surpasses the greater. For the Poeni this is the surer authority,
for those on the sea seeking the not-appearing circle.
nor are they set with equal fronts; each inclines its tail
toward the other's snout and follows the follower.

has inter fusus circumque amplexus utramque
dividit et cingit stellis ardentibus Anguis,
ne coeant abeantve suis a sedibus umquam.
hune inter mediumque orbem, quo sidera septem

between these, spread out and, having embraced each,
the Serpent, Anguis, divides and girds with ardent stars,
lest they either cohere or go away ever from their own seats.
between this one and the middle circle, where the seven stars

[309] per bis sena volant contra nitentia signa
mixta ex diversis consurgunt viribus astra
hine vicina polo Phoebique hinc proxima flammis;
quae quia dissimilis, qua pugnat, temperat aer,
frugiferum sub se reddunt mortalibus orbem.
proxima frigentis Arctos boreamque rigentem
nixa venit species genibus sibi conscia causae.
a tergo nitet Arctophylax, idemque Bootes,
quod stimulis iunctis instat de more iuvencis;
Arcturumque rapit medio sub pectore secum.

[309] through twice-six they fly against the shining signs
mingled stars arise out of diverse forces
on this side near to the pole, and on that side nearest to Phoebus’s flames;
and since the air, dissimilar where it struggles, tempers,
they render the orb beneath them fruit-bearing for mortals.
next to the freezing Bears and the rigid North(-wind),
there comes a figure, leaning on her knees, aware of her own cause.
at her back shines Arctophylax, and the same is Boötes,
who, with goads, presses, as is the custom, upon the yoked bullocks;
and he carries Arcturus with him beneath the middle of his breast.

at parte ex alia claro volat orbe Corona,
luce micans varia; nam stella vincitur una
circulus, in media radiat quae maxima fronte
candidaque ardenti distinguit lumina flamma:
Gnosia desertae fulgent monimenta puellae.
at Lyra diductis per caelum cornibus inter
sidera conspicitur, qua quondam ceperat Orpheus
omne quod attigerat cantu manesque per ipsos
fecit iter domuitque infernas carmine leges.
hinc caelestis honos similisque potentia causae:
tunc silvas et saxa trahens, nunc sidera ducit
et rapit immensum mundi revolubilis orbem.

but on another side the Crown flies in a bright orb,
glittering with varied light; for the circle is girded by a single
star, which, greatest, radiates in the middle of its brow
and with a burning flame distinguishes its bright lights:
the Gnosian memorials of the deserted girl gleam. But the Lyre, with its
horns drawn apart, is seen through the sky among the stars, with which once Orpheus
captured all that he touched by song, and through the Manes themselves
made a journey and subdued the infernal laws by his song. Hence a celestial honor
and a power similar to the cause: then dragging woods and rocks, now it leads
the stars and snatches the immense orb of the world in revolution.

Serpentem magnis Ophiuchus nomine signis
dividit, ut tote cingentem corpore corpus
explicet et nodes sinuataque terga per orbes:

Ophiuchus, by name, among the great signs divides the Serpent,
so that, encircling body with body entirely, he may unfold it,
and its nodes and sinuated backs through the orbs:

[334] respicit ille tamen molli cervice reflexus
et redit effusis per laxa volumina palmis:
semper erit paribus bellum, quia viribus aequant.
proxima sors Cycni, quem caelo Iuppiter ipse
imposuit, formae pretium, qua cepit amantem,
cum deus in niveum descendit versus olorem
tergaque fidenti subiecit plumea Ledae.
nunc quoque diductas volitat stellatus in alas.

[334] he, however, looks back, his pliant neck bent,
and returns with palms poured out through the slack coils:
there will always be war between equals, because they match in forces.
next is the lot of the Swan, whom Jupiter himself
set upon the sky, a price of beauty, by which he captured his lover,
when the god descended, turned into a snowy swan,
and beneath trusting Leda he put his feathery back.
now also, starred, he flies on wings drawn apart.

hinc imitata nitent cursumque habitumque Sagittae
sidera. tum magni Iovis ales fertur in altum,
assueto volitans gestet ceu fulmina mundo,
digna Iove et caelo, quod sacris instruit armis.
tum quoque de ponto surgit Delphinus ad astra,
oceani caelique decus, per utrumque sacratus.

from here shine the stars, imitating the course and the aspect of the Arrow.
then the bird of great Jove is borne on high,
flitting in its accustomed way, as though it were bearing the thunderbolts for the world,
worthy of Jove and of heaven, which he equips with sacred arms.
then too from the deep the Dolphin rises to the stars,
the ornament of ocean and of sky, consecrated through both.

quem rapido conatus Equus comprendere cursu
festinat pectus fulgenti sidere clarus.
et finitur in Andromeda; [quam Perseus armis
eripit et sociat sibi, cui] succedit iniquo
divisum spatio, quod tertia lampada dispar
conspicitur paribus, Deltoton nomine sidus,
ex simili dictum; Cepheusque et Cassiepia
in poenas signata suas iuxtaque relictam
Andromedam vastos metuentem pristis hiatus,

whom the Horse, attempting to seize with rapid course,
hastens after, famous with his chest bright with a gleaming star.
and it is bounded in Andromeda; [whom Perseus with his arms
rescues and unites to himself, to whom] there succeeds, at an unequal
interval divided by space, because a third lamp, unlike to the equal pair,
is seen—the constellation by the name Deltoton,
so called from the likeness; and Cepheus and Cassiopeia,
marked for their own punishments, and, next to them, the abandoned
Andromeda, fearing the vast gaping jaws of the sea-monster.

[357] expositam ponto deflet scopulisque revinctam,
ni veterem Perseus caelo quoque servet amorem
auxilioque iuvet fugiendaque Gorgonis ora
sustineat spoliumque sibi pestemque videnti.
tum vicina ferens nixo vestigia Tauro
Heniochus studio mundumque et nomen adeptus,
quem primum curru volitantem Iuppiter alto
quadriiugis conspexit equis caeloque sacravit.
hunc subeunt Haedi claudentes sidere pontum,
nobilis et mundi nutrito rege Capella,
cuius ab uberibus magnum ile ascendit Olympum.

[357] he bewails her, exposed to the sea and re-bound to the crags,
unless Perseus should preserve even in the sky his old love
and help with aid, and endure the Gorgon’s face that must be fled,
both as spoil for himself and a pest to the onlooker.
then the Charioteer, bearing his steps near, leaning on Taurus,
by zeal has obtained both the world and his name,
whom Jupiter first beheld flying in his high chariot
with four-yoked horses and consecrated in the sky.
to him there draw near the Kids, closing the sea with their star,
and Capella, noble for the king of the world having been nursed,
from whose udders he ascended to great Olympus.

lacte fero crescens ad fulmina vimque tonandi;
hanc ergo aeternis merito sacravit in astris
Iuppiter et caeli caelum mercede rependit.
Pleiadesque Hyadesque feri pars utraque Tauri
in boream scandunt. haec sunt aquilonia signa.

growing by wild milk to fulminations and the force of thundering;
therefore Jupiter deservedly consecrated her among the eternal stars
and repaid with the heaven of the sky as a reward.
And the Pleiades and the Hyades, each part of the fierce Bull,
climb into the north. These are the Aquilonian signs.

aspice nunc infra solis surgentia cursus,
quae super exustas labuntur sidera terras
quaeque inter gelidum Capricorni sidus et axe
imo subnixum vertuntur lumina mundum,
altera pars orbis sub quis iacet invia nobis
ignotaeque hominum gentes nec transita regna,
commune ex uno lumen ducentia sole
diversasque umbras laevaque cadentia signa
et dextros ortus caelo spectantia verso.
nec minor est illis mundus nec lumine peior,
nec numerosa minus nascuntur sidera in orbem.
cetera non cedunt; uno vincuntur in astro,

Behold now below the sun’s rising courses,
the stars which glide above the parched lands,
and the lights which are turned between the icy sign of Capricorn and the world
supported on the lowest axis,
the other part of the orb beneath which lies, for us, an untraveled land,
unknown peoples of men and kingdoms not traversed,
drawing a common light from the one sun,
and diverse shadows and the signs setting on the left,
and right-hand risings, with the sky reversed.
nor is that world smaller than ours nor poorer in light,
nor are fewer stars born into its sphere.
the rest do not yield; they are surpassed in one constellation,

[385] Augusto, sidus nostro quod contigit orbi,
Caesar nunc terris, post caelo maximus auctor.
cernere vicinum Geminis licet Oriona,
in magnam caeli tendentem bracchia partem
nec minus extento surgentem ad sidera passu,
singula fulgentis umeros cui lumina signant
et tribus obliquis demissus ducitur ensis.
at caput Orion excelso immersus Olympo
per tria subducto signatur lumina vultu,
non quod clara minus, sed quod magis alta recedunt.

[385] Augustus, the star that has fallen to our orb,
Caesar now on the lands, afterward in heaven the greatest author.
one may behold Orion near the Twins,
stretching his arms to a great portion of the sky
and, with stride no less outstretched, rising toward the stars,
whose single lights mark his gleaming shoulders,
and a sword is borne, let down by three oblique (lights).
but Orion’s head, plunged in lofty Olympus,
is marked by three lights in his lifted countenance,
not because they are less bright, but because they recede higher.

hoc duce per totum decurrunt sidera mundum.
subsequitur rapido contenta Canicula cursu,
qua nullum terris violentius advenit astrum
nec gravius cedit; nunc horrida frigore surgit,
nunc vacuum soli fulgentem deserit orbem:
sic in utrumque movet mundum et contraria reddit.
hanc qui surgentem, primo cum redditur ortu,
montis ab excelso speculantur vertice Tauri,
eventus frugum varios et tempora dicunt,
quaeque valetudo veniat, concordia quanta;
bella facit pacemque refert varieque revertens
sic movet, ut vidit mundum, vultuque gubernat.

with this as leader the stars run through the whole world.
the Canicula, taut in a rapid course, follows after,
than which no star comes upon the lands more violent,
nor withdraws more heavy; now it rises bristling with cold,
now it deserts the shining orb left empty of the sun:
thus it stirs the world both ways and renders contraries.
those who watch this rising, when it is restored in its first rising,
from the lofty summit of Mount Taurus keep watch,
foretell the various outcomes of crops and the seasons,
and what health will come, how great concord;
it makes wars and brings back peace, and returning in various ways
thus it moves, as it has seen the world, and with its visage it governs.

magna fides hoc posse color cursusque micantis
in radios: vix sole minor, nisi quod procul haerens
frigida caeruleo contorquet lumina vultu.
cetera vincuntur specie, nec clarius astrum
tinguitur oceano caelumve revisit ab undis.
tunc Procyon veloxque Lepus, tum nobills Argo

great credibility that its color and the course of the glittering one can break into rays:
scarcely less than the sun, except that, clinging far off, frigid, it contorts its lights with a cerulean visage.
the rest are conquered in appearance, nor is a star more clearly tinged in the ocean or revisits the sky from the waves.
then Procyon and the swift Hare, then noble Argo

[413] in caelum subducta mari, quod prima cucurrit,
emeritum magnis mundum tenet acta periclis,
servando dea facta deos. cui proximus Anguis
squamea dispositis imitatur lumina flammis.
et Phoebo sacer Ales et una gratus Iaccho
Crater et duplici Centaurus imagine fulget,
pars hominis, tergo pectus commissus equino.

[413] raised into heaven from the sea, because it was the first to run,
having earned discharge after great perils undergone, it holds the world,
made a goddess by saving the gods. Next to it the Serpent
with scaly lights set in order imitates flames. And the Bird sacred to Phoebus
and, together with it, the Crater pleasing to Iacchus,
and the Centaur with a double image shines,
part of a man, his breast joined to a horse’s back.

ipsius hinc mundo templum est, victrixque solutis
Ara nitet sacris, vastos cum terra gigantes
in caelum furibunda tulit. tum di quoque magnos
quaesivere deos; dubitavit Iuppiter ipse,
quod poterat non posse timens, cum surgere terram
cerneret, ut verti naturam crederet omnem,
montibus atque aliis aggestos crescere montes,
et tam vicinos fugientia sidera colles,
* arma importantis et rupta matre creatos,
* discordes vultum permixtaque corpora partus.
necdum pestiferum sibi quemquam (aut) numina norat
si qua forent maiora suis.

from here there is a temple for the world itself, and the Ara shines, victorious with the rites discharged,
when the earth, furious, lifted the vast Giants into heaven. then the gods too sought great gods; Jupiter himself doubted,
fearing that what could might not be able, when he saw the earth rising,
so that he believed all nature to be overturned,
and mountains to grow with mountains heaped upon others,
and the fleeing stars so near to the hills,
* bringing in arms and created with their mother torn,
* a discordant brood in countenance and bodies commingled.
nor yet did he know any pestiferous foe to himself (or) whether there were divine powers greater than his own.

tunc Iuppiter Arae
sidera constituit, quae nunc quoque maxima fulgent.
quam propter Cetus convolvens squamea terga
orbibus insurgit tortis et fluctuat alvo,
intentans morsum, similis iam iamque tenenti,
qualis ad expositae fatum Cepheidos undis
expulit adveniens ultra sua litora pontum.

then Jupiter set the stars of the Altar, which even now shine most brightly.
because of which Cetus, rolling its scaly backs,
rises in twisted coils and billows with its belly,
threatening a bite, like one on the very point of seizing,
such as, coming for the doom of Cepheus’s exposed daughter to the waves,
drove the sea beyond its own shores.

[438] tum notins Piscis venti de nomine dictus
exsurgit de parte noti; cui iuncta feruntur
flexa per ingentis stellarum flumina gyros.
alterius capiti coniungit Aquarius undas
amnis, et in medium coeunt et sidera miscent.
his, inter solisque vias Arctosque latentes
axem quae mundi stridentem pondere torquent,
orbe peregrino caelum depingitur astris,
quae notia antiqui dixerunt sidera vates.

[438] then the Notian Fish, named from the wind,
rises up from the quarter of Notus; to which are joined
the streams of stars, bent through vast gyres.
Aquarius joins the waters of a river to the head of the other,
and into the midst they come together and mingle their stars.
among these, between the paths of the sun and the hidden Bears
which by their weight twist the axis of the world, making it creak,
with a foreign orbit the sky is painted with stars,
which the ancient bards called the Notian constellations.

ultima quae mundo semper volvuntur in imo,
quis innixa manent caeli fulgentia templa,
nusquam in conspectum redeuntia, cardine verso
sublimis speciem mundi similisque figuras
astrorum referunt. et versas frontibus Arctos
uno distingui medias claudique Dracone
credimus exemplo. quamvis fugientia visus
hunc orbem caeli vertentis sidera cursu
cardine tam simili fultum, quam vertice, pingunt.

the furthest which are always revolved in the lowest part of the world,
on which, leaning, the shining temples of heaven rest,
never returning into view, as the hinge turns,
aloft they render back the aspect of the world and the like figures
of the constellations. And the Bears, with brows turned,
we believe to be marked out by a single exemplar, and to be enclosed in the midst by the Dragon,
although, fleeing our sight,
the stars by the course of the turning heaven paint this orb,
propped upon a cardinal pivot no less than upon a pole.

haec igitur magno divisas aethere sedes
signa tenent mundi totum deducta per orbem.
tu modo corporeis similis ne quaere figuras,
omnia ut aequali fulgentia membra colore
deficiat nihil aut vacuum qua lumine cesset.
non poterit mundus sufferre incendia tants,
omnia si plenis ardebunt sidera membris.

these seats therefore, sundered by the great aether,
are held by the signs of the world, drawn out through the whole orb.
only, do not seek shapes similar to corporeal ones,
for all the members shine with equal color,
nothing fails or is void where the light might cease.
the world could not endure conflagrations so great,
if all the stars were to burn with their full members.

quicquid subduxit flammis, natura pepercit
succubitura oneri, formas disiungere tantum
contenta et stellis ostendere sidera certis.
linea designat species, atque ignibus ignes

whatever she withdrew from the flames, nature spared,
destined to succumb to the burden, content only
to disjoin forms and to show to fixed stars the constellations.
a line designates the shapes, and with fires the fires

[467] respondent, media extremis atque ultima summis
creduntur; satis est, si se non omnia celant.
praecipue medio cum luna implebitur orbe,
certa nitent mundo tum lumina, conditur omne
stellarum vulgus, fugiunt sine nomine signa.
pura licet vacuo tum cernere sidera caelo,
nec fallunt numero, parvis nec mixta feruntur.

[467] they correspond, the middles to the extremes and the ultimate to the supreme
are believed; it is enough, if not all hide themselves.
especially when the moon will be filled at mid-orb,
then certain luminaries shine for the world, the whole
vulgar crowd of stars is hidden, the nameless signs flee.
yet it is permitted then to discern pure stars in the vacant sky,
nor do they deceive in number, nor are they borne mixed with the small ones.

et quo clara magis possis cognoscere signa,
non varios obitus norunt variosque recursus,
certa sed in proprias oriuntur sidera luces,
natalesque suos occasumque ordine servant.
nec quicquam in tanta magis est mirabile mole,
quam ratio et certis quod legibus omnia parent.
nusquam turba nocet, nihil ullis partibus errat,
laxius aut brevius mutatove ordine fertur.

and that you may more clearly be able to recognize the signs,
they know not various settings nor various returns,
but the stars arise with certain lights into their own proper lights,
and they keep their births and their setting in order.
nor in so great a mass is anything more marvelous
than reason, and that all things obey fixed laws.
nowhere does a crowd harm; nothing errs in any parts,
is borne more loosely or more briefly, or with changed order.

quid tam confusum specie, quid tam vice certum est?
ac mihi tam praesens ratio non ulla videtur,
qua pateat mundum divino numine verti
atque ipsum esse deum nec forte coisse magistra,
ut voluit eredi, qui primus moenia mundi
seminibus struxit minimis inque illa resolvit,
e quis et maria et terras et sidera caeli
aetheraque immensis fabricantem finibus orbes
solventemque alios constare et cuncta reverti
in sua principia et rerum mutare figuras.
quis credat tantas operum sine numine moles,
ex minimis caecoque creatum foedere mundum?

What is so confused in appearance, what so certain in succession?
And to me no reasoning seems so immediate as that by which it is plain that the world is turned by divine numen and is itself a god, and not that it coalesced with Chance as instructress,
as was the will of him who first built the ramparts of the world from the least seeds and resolved them into the same,
from which both the seas and the lands and the stars of the sky and the ether, fabricating orbs within immense boundaries and loosening others, consist, and that all things return
into their first principles and change the figures of things.
Who would believe such great masses of works without a numen, a world created from the least things and by a blind compact?

si fors ista dedit nobis, fors ipsa gubernet;
at cur dispositis vicibus consurgere signa

if chance has given these things to us, let chance itself govern;
but why do the signs rise in arranged turns

[496] et velut imperio praescriptos reddere cursus
cernimus ac nullis properantibus ulla relinqui?
cur eadem aestivas exornant sidera noctes
semper et hibernas eadem, certamque figuram
cuisque dies reddit mundo certamque relinquit?
iam tum, cum Graiae verterunt Pergama gentes,
Arctos et Orion adversis frontibus ibant,
haec contenta suos in vertice flectere gyros,
ille ex diverso vertentem surgere contra
obvius et toto semper decurrere mundo.

[496] and we perceive them to render courses prescribed as by command
and, with none hastening, that none are left behind?
why do the same stars always adorn the summer nights
and the same the winter, and does each day give to the world a fixed figure
and leave it fixed? already then, when the Greek peoples overturned Pergama,
the Bears and Orion were going with opposing fronts,
this one content to bend her own gyres at the vertex,
that one from the opposite quarter rising to meet the turning one
in encounter, and ever running down through the whole world.

temporaque obscurae noctis deprendere signis
iam poterant, caelumque suas distinxerat horas.
quot post excidium Troiae sunt eruta regna!
quot capti populi!

and already they could apprehend the times of the dark night by signs,
and the sky had distinguished its own hours.
how many kingdoms have been uprooted after the downfall of Troy!
how many peoples captured!

quotiens fortuna per orbem
servitium imperiumque tulit varieque revertit!
Troianos cineres in quantum oblita refovit
imperium! fatis Asiae iam Graecia pressa est.

How often has Fortune through the world borne servitude and imperium, and in various ways re-turned!
To what extent, forgetful, has she rekindled the Trojan ashes to empire!
Greece is now pressed by the fates of Asia.

saecula dinumerare piget, quotiensque recurrens
lustrarit mundum vario sol igneus orbe.
omnia mortali mutantur lege creata,
nec se cognoscunt terrae vertentibus annis
exutas variam faciem per saecula gentes.
at manet incolumis mundus suaque omnia servat,
quae nec longa dies auget minuitque senectus,
nec motus puncto curvat cursusque fatigat:
idem semper erit, quoniam semper fuit idem.

It irks me to enumerate the ages, and how often, recurring
the fiery sun has traversed the world with its varying orbit.
all things created under the mortal law are changed,
nor do the lands recognize themselves as the years turn
the peoples through the ages having shed their varied visage.
but the world remains unharmed and keeps all its own things,
which neither long day increases nor old age diminishes,
nor does motion by a point bend it or weary its courses:
it will always be the same, since it has always been the same.

non alium videre patres aliumve nepotes
aspicient: deus est, qui non mutatur in aevo.

not another did the fathers see, nor will the grandsons gaze upon another:
he is a god, who is not changed in the aeon.

[524] numquam transversas solem decurrere ad Arctos
nec mutare vias et in ortum vertere cursus
auroramque novis nascentem ostendere terris,
nec lunam certos excedere luminis orbes
sed servare modum, quo crescat quove recedat,
nec cadere in terram pendentia sidera caelo
sed dimensa suis consumere tempora signis:
non casus opus est, magni sed numinis ordo.
haec igitur texunt aequali sidera tractu
ignibus in varias caelum laqueantia formas.
altius his nihil est; haec sunt fastigia mundi;
publica naturae domus his contenta tenetur
finibus amplectens pontum terrasque iacentis.

[524] that the sun never runs crosswise down toward the Bears,
nor changes its ways and turns its courses into the east,
and shows Dawn being born to new lands,
nor that the moon exceed the fixed orbs of her light
but keep the measure by which she grows and by which she recedes,
nor that the stars hanging from the sky fall to the earth,
but, measured to their own signs, consume their seasons:
it is not the work of chance, but the order of a great numen.
therefore the stars weave these things with equal tract,
netting the sky with fires into various forms.
nothing is higher than these; these are the gables of the world;
the common house of nature is held content within these
bounds, embracing the sea and the lands that lie outspread.

omnia concordi tractu veniuntque caduntque,
qua semel incubuit caelum versumque resurgit.
ipse autem quantum convexo mundus Olympo
obtineat spatium, quantis bis sena ferantur
finibus astra, docet ratio, cui nulla resistunt
claustra nec immensae moles, ceduntque recessus,
omnia succumbunt, ipsum est penetrabile caelum.
nam quantum a terris atque aequore signa recedunt,
tantum bina patent.

all things come and fall with a concordant sweep,
where once the heaven has brooded and, turned, rises again.
but moreover how much space the world holds in the convex Olympus,
within what twelve limits the stars are borne,
reason teaches, to which no bars nor immense masses resist, and the recesses yield,
all things succumb; the heaven itself is penetrable.
for by as much as the constellations withdraw from the lands and the sea,
by so much they lie open twofold.

quacumque inciditur orbis
per medium, pars efficitur tum tertia gyri,
exiguo dirimens solidam discrimine summam.
summum igitur caelum bis bina refugit ab imo
astra, <e> bis senis ut sit pars tertia signis.
sed quia per medium est tellus suspensa profundum,
binis a summo signis discedit et imo.

wherever the orb is cut through the middle
a third part of the gyre is then made,
dividing the solid sum by a slight distinction.
therefore the highest heaven retreats by twice two stars from the lowest,
so that, out of twice six, there may be a third part for the signs.
but because through the middle the earth is suspended in the deep,
by two signs it departs both from the top and from the bottom.

hinc igitur quodcumque supra te suspicis ipse,
qua per inane meant oculi quaque ire recusant.

Hence therefore whatever you yourself look up at above you,
wherever through the void the eyes go and wherever they refuse to go.

[554] binis aequandum est signis, sex tanta rotundae
efficiunt orbem zonae, qua signa feruntur
bis sex aequali spatio texentia caelum.
nec mirere vagos partus eadem esse per astra
et mixtum ingenti generis discrimine fatum,
singula cum tantum teneant tantoquo ferantur
tempore; sex tota surgentia sidera luce

[554] must be equated to two signs; six such zones of the round orb
form the circle, along which the signs are borne,
twelve in number, weaving the heaven with equal interval.
nor marvel that the wandering nativities are the same under the stars,
and that fate is commingled with an immense distinction of kind,
since each holds only so much and is carried for just so much
time; six stars rise in the whole light

* * * * * * *

restat ut aetherios fines tibi reddere coner
filaque dispositis vicibus comitantia caelum
per quae dirigitur signorum flammeus ordo.
[circulus a summo nascentem vertice mundum
permeat Arctophylaca petens per terga draconis]
circulus ad boream fulgentem sustinet Arcton
sexque fugit solidas a caeli vertice partes.
alter ad extremi decurrens sidera Cancri,
in quo consummat Phoebus lucemque moramque
tardaque per longos circumfert lumina flexus,
aestivum medio nomen sibi sumit ab aestu
temporis et titulo potitur metamque volantis
solis et extremos designat fervidus actus
et quinque in partes aquilonis distat ab orbe.
tertius in media mundi regione locatus
ingenti spira totum praecingit Olympum
parte ab utraque videns axem, quo limite Phoebus
componit paribus numeris noctemque diemque
veris et autumni currens per tempora mixta,
cum medium aequali distinguit limite caelum

it remains that I try to render to you the ethereal bounds
and the threads accompanying the heaven in disposed turns,
through which the fiery order of the signs is directed.
[circle from the topmost vertex permeates the nascent world,
seeking Arctophylax along the back of the dragon]
a circle toward the north sustains the shining Arctos,
and is distant by six whole parts from the summit of the sky.
another, running down to the stars of farthest Cancer,
in which Phoebus consummates both his light and his delay,
and bears his slow lights around through long flexures,
takes for itself the estival name from the mid-heat
of the season, and obtains the title and the turning-post of the flying
sun, and, fervid, it designates the extreme courses,
and is distant by five parts toward Aquilo from the circle.
a third, placed in the middle region of the world,
with a vast coil girds the whole Olympus,
seeing the axis from either side; by which boundary Phoebus
composes in equal numbers both night and day,
running through the mingled seasons of spring and of autumn,
when he distinguishes the mid-sky with an equal boundary.

[581] quattuor et gradibus sua fila reducit ab aestu.
proximus hunc ultra brumalis nomine limes
ultima designat fugientis limina solis
invidaque obliqua radiorum munera flamma
dat per iter minimum nobis; sed finibus illis,
quos super incubuit, longa stant tempora luce,
vixque dies transit candentem extenta per aestum,
bisque iacet binis summotus partibus orbis.
unus ab his superest extremo proximus axi
circulus, austrinas qui stringit et obsidet Arctos.

[581] and by four degrees it draws back its own threads from the heat.
next beyond this, the limit by the name brumal
marks the farthest thresholds of the fleeing sun,
and with an envious flame, the oblique gifts of the rays,
grants to us along the least path; but in those boundaries
upon which it has brooded above, long times stand by light,
and scarcely does the day cross the glowing zone, stretched out through heat,
and the circle lies twice removed by two parts.
one beyond these remains, a circle nearest the farthest axis,
which grazes and besieges the austral Bears.

hic quoque brumalem per partes quinque relinquit,
et quantum a nostro sublimis cardine gyrus,
distat ab adverso tantundem proximus illi.
[sic tibi per binas vertex a vertice partes
divisus duplici summa circumdat Olympum
et per quinque notat signantis tempore fines.]
his eadem est via quae mundo pariterque rotantur
inclines sociosque ortus occasibus aequant,
quandoquidem secti, qua totus volvitur orbis,
fila trahunt alti cursum comitantia caeli
intervalla pari servantes limite semper
divisosque semel fines sortemque dicatam.
sunt duo, quos recipit ductos a vertice vertex,
inter se adversi, qui cunctos ante relatos
seque secant gemino coeuntes cardine mundi
transversoque polo rectum ducuntur in axem,
tempora signantes anni caelumque per astra
quattuor in partes divisum mensibus aequis.

here too it leaves the brumal by five parts,
and by as much as the circle, lofty from our cardine, is distant from the opposite,
by just so much the nearest is to that.
[thus for you, through two parts the vertex from the vertex,
divided with a double sum, encircles Olympus,
and through five marks the bounds of the time that makes the signs.]
to these the path is the same as the world’s, and they are rotated equally,
inclined, and they make equal their companion risings to their settings,
since, being cut where the whole orb is rolled,
the threads draw their course accompanying the high heaven,
always preserving the intervals with an equal boundary
and the bounds once divided and the allotted lot.
there are two, which the vertex receives, drawn from the vertex,
opposite to each other, which, joining at the twin cardine of the world,
cut all those previously related and themselves,
and with a transverse pole are led into a straight axis,
marking the seasons of the year and the sky through the stars
divided into four parts by equal months.

alter ab excelso decurrens limes Olympo

the other boundary running down from lofty Olympus

[610] serpentis caudam siccas et dividit Arctos,
et iuga Chelarum medio volitantia gyro
extremamque secans Hydram mediumque sub austris
Centaurum adverso concurrit rursus in axe
et redit in caelum squamosaque tergora Ceti
Lanigerique notat fines clarumque Trigonum
Andromedaeque sinus imos, vestigia matris
principiumque suum repetito cardine claudit.
alter in hunc medium summumque incumbit in axem
perque pedes primos cervicem transit et Ursae,
quam septem stellae primam iam sole remoto
producunt nigrae praebentem lumina nocti,
et Geminis Cancrum dirimit stringitque flagrantem
ore Canem clavumque Ratis, quae vicerat aequor.
inde axem occultum per gyri signa prioris
transversa atque illo rursus de limite tangit
te, Capricorne, tuisque Aquilam designat ab astris,
perque Lyram inversam currens spirasque Draconis:
posteriora pedum Cynosurae praeterit astra
transversamque secat vicino cardine caudam.

[610] it cuts the tail of the Serpent and the dry Bears,
and the yokes of the Chelae flitting in the middle gyre,
and, cutting the farthest Hydra and the middle Centaur beneath the south winds,
it meets again in the opposite axis and returns into the sky,
and marks the scaly backs of Cetus and the borders of the Wool-bearer,
and the bright Triangle and the lowest folds of Andromeda, the mother’s footprints,
and with the pole revisited it closes its own beginning.
the other leans upon this middle and highest axis
and passes through the foremost feet and the neck of the Bear,
which seven stars, with the sun now withdrawn, first bring forth,
offering lights to the black night,
and between the Twins it separates Cancer and skims the burning Dog at the mouth
and the rudder of the Ship which had conquered the sea.
thence across the hidden axis through the signs of the earlier gyre
and from that boundary again it touches
you, Capricorn, and marks the Eagle by your stars,
and, running through the inverted Lyre and the coils of the Dragon,
it passes by the hind stars of Cynosura’s feet
and cuts the crosswise tail near the pole.

hic iretum coit ipse sibi memor, unde profectus.
atque hos aeterna fixerunt tempora sede
immotis per signa modis statione perenni.
hos volucris fecere duos; namque alter ab ipsa
consurgens Helice medium praecidit Olympum
discernitque diem sextamque examinat horam
et paribus spatiis occasus cernit et ortus.

here again it unites to itself, mindful of whence it set out.
and eternal times have fixed these in a seat,
with unmoved modes through the signs, in an everlasting station.
the swift courses made these two; for the one, rising
from Helice herself, cuts Olympus through the middle
and discerns the day and examines the sixth hour,
and with equal spaces it discerns settings and risings.

[637] hic mutat per signa vices; seu si quis eoos
seu petit hesperios, supra se circinat orbem
verticibus super astantem mediumque secantem
caelum et diviso signantem culmine mundum
(quando aliis aliud medium est; volat hora per orbem),
cumque loco terrae caelumque et tempora mutat.
atque ubi se primis extollit Phoebus ab undis,
illis sexta manet, quos tum premit aureus orbis.
rursus ad hesperios sexta est, ubi cedit in umbras;
nos primam ac summam sextam numeramus utramque
et gelidum extremo lumen sentimus ab igni.

[637] here it changes its turns through the signs; whether someone seeks the Eoans
or the Hesperians, above himself he circles the vault
standing over the poles, cutting the middle of the sky
and marking the world with a divided summit
(since for others another middle exists; the hour flies through the orb),
and with the place he changes the earth and the heaven and the times.
and when Phoebus lifts himself from the first waves,
for those whom the golden orb then presses, the sixth abides.
again toward the Hesperians it is the sixth, where he yields into shadows;
we count as both the first and the extreme sixth, each of the two,
and we feel a chilly light from the far-off fire.

alterius fines si vis cognoscere gyri,
circumfer faciles oculos vultumque per orbem.
quicquid erit caelique imum terraeque supremum,
qua coit ipse sibi nullo discrimine mundus
redditque aut recipit fulgentia sidera ponto,
praecingit tenui transversum limite mundum.
haec quoque per totum volitabit linea caelum,
non tantum ad medium vergens mediumque repente
orbem, nunc septem ad stellas nec mota sub astra,
sed quacumque vagae tulerint vestigia plantae
has modo terrarum nunc has gradientis in oras,
semper erit novus et terris mutabitur arcus;
quippe aliud caelum ostendens aliudque relinquens
dimidium teget et referet varioque notabit
fine et cum visu pariter sua fila movente.

if you wish to know the bounds of the other gyre,
carry around your unstrained eyes and your countenance over the orb.
whatever will be the lowest of heaven and the highest of earth,
where the world itself coalesces with itself with no distinction
and to the deep returns or from it receives the gleaming stars,
girds the world crosswise with a thin boundary.
this line too will flit through the whole heaven,
not only inclining to the middle and straightway
dividing the orb, now toward the seven stars and under the unmoved stars,
but wherever the steps of your wandering foot shall have borne you,
now to these borders of lands, now to those of the traveler,
there will always be a new arc and it will change for the lands;
indeed showing one sky and leaving another,
it will cover half and bring back half, and will mark it with a varied
limit, and as the sight likewise moves its own threads along.

[663] hic terrestris erit, quia terram amplectitur orbis,
[et mundum pleno praecingit limite gyrus]
atque a fine trahens titulum memoratur horizon.
his adice obliquos adversaque fila trahentis
inter se gyros, quorum fulgentia signa
alter habet, per quae Phoebus moderatur habenas,
subsequiturque suo solem vaga Delia curru,
et quinque adverso luctantia sidera mundo
exercent varias naturae lege choreas.
hunc tenet a summo Cancer, Capricornus ab imo,
bis recipit, lucem qui circulus aequat et umbras,
Lanigeri et Librae signo sua fila secantem.

[663] this will be the terrestrial one, because the orb embraces the earth,
[and a gyre girds the world with a full boundary]
and, drawing its title from the border, it is called the horizon.
to these add the oblique gyres drawing opposite threads among themselves,
of which the one has the shining signs,
through which Phoebus moderates the reins,
and wandering Delia follows the Sun with her own chariot,
and the five stars, wrestling against the adverse world,
perform various dances by the law of nature.
this one Cancer holds from the top, Capricorn from the bottom,
it twice receives the circle which makes light and shadows equal,
cutting its own threads at the sign of the Ram and of the Balance.

sic per tres gyros inflexus ducitur orbis
rectaque devexo fallit vestigia clivo;
nec visus aciemque fugit tantumque notari
mente potest, sicut cernuntur mente priores,
sed nitet ingenti stellatus balteus orbe
insignemque facit caelato lumine mundum
et ter vicenas partes patet atque trecentas
in longum; bis sex latescit fascia partes,
quae cohibet vario labentia sidera cursu.
alter in adversum positus succedit ad Arctos
et paulum a boreae gyro sua fila reducit
transitque inversae per sidera Cassiepiae.
inde per obliquum descendens tangit Olorem
aestivosque secat fines Aquilamque supinam
temporaque aequantem gyrum zonamque ferentem
Solis equos inter caudam, qua Scorpius ardet,
extremamque Sagittari laevam atque Saglttam.

thus through three gyres the bent orb is led,
and, though straight, on a sloping incline it beguiles its footprints;
nor does it flee the sight and the keen gaze, to be noted
only by the mind, as the former are discerned by the mind,
but a star-studded belt shines on the vast orb
and makes the world conspicuous with chased light,
and it extends in length through three times twenty and three hundred parts (360);
the band widens by twice six parts (12),
which confines the gliding stars in their various course.
another, set opposite, advances toward the Arcti (the Bears)
and draws back its threads a little from Boreas’s gyre,
and passes through the stars of the inverted Cassiopeia.
thence, descending on the slant, it touches the Swan (the Olor),
and it cuts the summer bounds and the upturned Eagle,
and the circle that equalizes the seasons and the zone bearing
the Sun’s horses, between the tail where Scorpius burns
and the far left of the Sagittary and the Sagitta (the Arrow).

inde suos sinuat flexus crura pedesque
Centauri alterius rursusque ascendere caelum

thence it sinuates its own flexures among the legs and feet
of the other Centaur, and again to ascend the sky

[694] incipit Argivumque Ratem per aplustria summa
et medium mundi gyrum Geminosque per ima
signa secat, subit Heniochum, teque, unde profectus,
Cassiepia, petens super ipsum Persea transit
orbemque ex illa coeptum concludit in ipsa
trisque secat medios gyros et signa ferentem
partibus e binis, quotiens praeciditur ipse.
nec quaerendus erit: visus incurrit in ipsos
sponte sua seque ipse docet cogitque notari.
namque in caeruleo candens nitet orbita mundo
ceu missura diem subito caelumque recludens.

[694] it begins and cuts the Argive Ship by the highest aplustria
and the middle gyre of the world, and the Twins through the lowest
signs; it goes under Heniochus, and you, Cassiepia, whence he set out,
seeking, it passes right above Perseus himself,
and the circle begun from her it concludes in her herself,
and it cuts the three middle gyres and the bearer of the signs
into parts by twos, as often as it is itself intersected.
nor will it need to be sought: it rushes upon the very eyes
of its own accord and teaches itself and compels to be noted.
for in the cerulean world the glowing orbit shines
as if about to send day suddenly and unclose the sky.

ac veluti virides discernit semita campos,
quam terit assiduo renovans iter orbita tractu;
[inter divisas aequalibus est via partis]
ut freta canescunt sulcum ducente carina
accipiuntque viam fluctus spumantibus undis,
quam tortus verso movit de gurgite vertex,
candidus in nigro lucet sic limes Olympo
caeruleum findens ingenti lumine mundum.
utque suos arcus per nubila circinat Iris,
sic superincumbit signato culmine limes
candidus et resupina facit mortalibus ora,
dum nova per caecam mirantur lumina noctem
inquiruntque sacras humano pectore causas,
num se diductis conetur solvere moles
segminibus, raraque labent compagine rimae
admittantque novum laxato tegmine lumen; --

and just as a path discerns the green fields,
which the rut, by assiduous tract, wears, renewing the journey;
[there is a way between parts divided equally]
as the straits grow hoary with the keel drawing a furrow
and the billows take the way with foaming waves,
which a twisted vertex, turned from the deep, set in motion,
so a shining boundary gleams in black Olympus,
cleaving the cerulean world with immense light.
and as Iris circles her own arcs through the clouds,
so the boundary overhangs with a marked summit,
bright, and makes mortals’ faces resupine,
while with new lights they marvel at the blind night
and inquire with a human breast the sacred causes,
whether the mass tries to unloose itself by segments drawn apart,
and whether the cracks glide, the structure being rare in its compaction,
and, the covering relaxed, admit a new light; --

[724] quid sibi non timeant, magni cum vulnera caeli
conspiciant, feriatque oculos iniuria mundi? --
an coeat mundus, duplicisque extrema cavernae
conveniant caelique oras et sidera iungant,
perque ipsos fiat nexus manifesta cicatrix
fusuram faciens mundi, stipatus et orbis
aeriam in nebulam clara compagine versus
in cuneos alti cogat fundamina caeli.
an melius manet illa fides, per saecula prisca
illac solis equos diversis cursibus isse
atque aliam trivisse viam, longumque per aevum
exustas sedes incoctaque sidera flammis
caeruleam verso speciem mutasse colore,
infusumque loco cinerem mundumque sepultum?

[724] what should they not fear for themselves, when they behold the wounds of the great heaven,
and the injury of the world strike their eyes? --
or is the world coalescing, and do the extremes of the double cavern
come together and join the borders of the sky and the stars,
and through them is a nexus made, a manifest cicatrix
making a seam of the world, and the orb, compressed,
its bright compagings turned into an airy nebula,
force the foundations of the high heaven into wedges?
or does that belief stand better, that through ancient ages
that way the horses of the sun went by different courses
and wore another road, and that for a long aeon
the burned seats and the stars steeped with flames
changed their appearance to cerulean, with the color reversed,
and ash was poured into the place and the world was entombed?

fama etiam antiquis ad nos descendit ab annis
Phaethontem patrio curru per signa volantem,
dum nova miratur propius spectacula mundi
et puer in caelo ludit curruque superbus
luxuriat mundo, cupit et maiora parente,
monstratas liquisse vias orbemque rigenti
imposuisse polo; nec signa insueta tulisse
errantis meta flammas cursumque solutum,
* deflexum solito cursu curvisque quadrigis.
quid querimur flammas totum saevisse per orbem,
terrarumque rogum cunctas arsisse per urbes,
cum vaga dispersi fluitarunt lumina currus,
et caelum exustum est? luit ipse incendia mundus,

a report too has descended to us from ancient years
that Phaethon, in his patrial chariot, flying through the constellations,
while he admires more closely the new spectacles of the world,
and the boy plays in heaven and, proud of the chariot,
he luxuriates in the world, and desires things greater than his parent,
to have left the shown ways and to have imposed the orbit upon the rigid pole;
nor did the unaccustomed signs endure
the flames of the errant turning-post and a loosened course,
* deflected from the customary course and by the curved quadrigae.
why do we complain that flames raged throughout the whole orb,
and that the pyre of the lands burned through all the cities,
when the wandering lights of the scattered chariot drifted,
and the heaven was scorched? the world itself paid the penalties for the conflagrations,

[748] et nova vicinis flagrarunt sidera flammis
nunc quoque praeteriti faciem referentia casus.
nec mihi celanda est famae vulgata vetustas
mollior: e niveo lactis fluxisse liquorem
pectore reginae divum caelumque colore
infecisse suo. quapropter lacteus orbis
dicitur, et nomen causa descendit ab ipsa.

[748] and new stars flared with neighboring flames,
even now too recalling the visage of the past mishap.
nor is the gentler antiquity, made common by fame, to be concealed by me:
that from the snow-white breast of the queen of the gods there flowed a liquor of milk,
and she dyed the heaven with her own color. Wherefore the lacteal orb
is said, and the name descends from the cause itself.

an maior densa stellarum turba corona
convexit flammas et crasso lumine candet,
et fulgore nitet collato clarior orbis?
an fortes animae dignataque nomina caelo
corporibus resoluta suis terraeque remissa
huc migrant ex orbe suumque habitantia caelum
aetherios vivunt annos mundoque fruuntur?
atque hic Aeacidas, hic et veneramur Atridas
Tydidemque ferum terraeque marisque triumphis
naturae victorem Ithacum Pyliumque senecta
insignem triplici Danaumque ad Pergava reges,
[castra ducum et caeli victamque sub Hectore Troiam]
Auroraeque nigrum partum stirpemque Tonantis
rectorem Lyciae; nec te, Mavortia virgo,
praeteream regesque alios, quos Thraecia misit
atque Asiae gentes et Magno maxima Pella;
quique animi vires et strictae pondera mentis
prudentes habuere viri, quibus omnis in ipsis
census erat, iustusque Solon fortisque Lycurgus,
aetheriusque Platon et qui fabricaverat illum

Or has a larger crown, by the dense throng of stars, arched together flames and, with thick light, glares white, and does the circle shine with collected splendor, brighter? Or do brave souls, and names deemed worthy of heaven, released from their bodies and sent back from the earth, migrate hither from the globe, and, inhabiting their own heaven, live ethereal years and enjoy the world? And here the Aeacids, here too we venerate the Atreids and the fierce Tydides, and the Ithacan, conqueror of nature by triumphs of land and sea, and the Pylian marked by triple old age, and the kings of the Danaans against Pergama, [the camps of the captains and the sky, and Troy conquered under Hector], and the black offspring of Dawn and the stock of the Thunderer, the ruler of Lycia; nor will I pass you by, Mavortian maiden, and other kings whom Thrace sent, and the nations of Asia, and Pella, greatest thanks to the Great; and the prudent men who possessed the forces of spirit and the weight of a disciplined mind, whose whole wealth was in themselves—just Solon and brave Lycurgus, and ethereal Plato and he who had fashioned him—

[775] damnatusque suas melius damnavit Athenas,
Persidis et victor, strarat quae classibus aequor.
Romanique viri, quorum iam maxima turba est:
Tarquinioque minus reges, et Horatia proles,
tota acies partus, nec non et Scaevola trunco
nobilior, maiorque viris et cloelia virgo,
et Romana ferens, quae texit, moenia Cocles,
et commilitio volucris Corvinus adeptus
et spolia et nomen, qui gestat in alite Phoebum,
et Iove qui meruit caelum Romamque Camillus
servando posuit, Brutusque a rege receptae
conditor, et Pyrrhi per bella Papirius ultor,
Fabricius Curiusque pares, et tertia palma
Marcellus, Cossusque prior de rege necato,
certantesque Deci votis similesque triumphis,
invictusque mora Fabius, victorque necantis
Livius Hasdrubalis socio per bella Nerone,
Scipiadaeque duces, fatum Carthaginis unum,
Pompeiusque orbis domitor per trisque triumphos
ante deum princeps, et censu Tullius oris
emeritus caelum, et <tu,> Claudi magna propago,
Aemiliaeque domus proceres, clarique MeteIli,
et Cato fortunae victor, matrisque sub armis
miles Agrippa suae. Venerisque ab origine proles
Iulia descendit caelo caelumque replevit,

[775] and, condemned, he better condemned his own Athens,
and the victor of Persia, which had strewn the sea with fleets.
And the Roman men, of whom now the greatest throng there is:
and kings less than Tarquin, and the Horatian offspring,
a whole battle-line brought forth; and Scaevola too, more noble by his maimed stump,
and the maiden Cloelia greater than men,
and Cocles bearing the Roman walls which he covered,
and Corvinus, in comradeship with a bird, having gained both spoils and a name,
he who bears Phoebus upon a winged creature;
and Camillus, who by Jove merited heaven and, by saving Rome, established it,
and Brutus, founder when it was recovered from a king,
and Papirius, avenger through the wars of Pyrrhus,
Fabricius and Curius, peers, and Marcellus the third palm,
and Cossus first from a slain king,
and the Decii, contending by vows and alike in triumphs,
and Fabius unconquered by delay, and Livius, victor over the slayer Hasdrubal,
with Nero his ally through the wars, and the Scipio-leaders, the single fate of Carthage,
and Pompey, world-tamer through three triumphs, and as princeps before the gods,
and Tullius, by the valuation of his speech, meriting heaven, and <you,> great offspring of Claudius,
and the nobles of the house of Aemilius, and the famed Metelli,
and Cato, victor over Fortune, and Agrippa, a soldier beneath the arms of his mother.
And the Julian progeny, from the origin of Venus, descended from heaven and filled heaven,

[800] quod regit Augustus socio per signa Tonante,
cernit et in coetu divum magnumque Quirinum
altius aetherii quam candet circulus orbis.
illa deum sedes, haec illis proxima, divum
qui virtute sua similes vestigia tangunt.
ac prius incipiam stellis quam reddere vires
signorumque canam fatalia carmine iura,
implenda est mundi facies, corpusque per omne
quid, quod ubique nitet, vigeat quandoque, notandum est.

[800] which Augustus governs through the signs with the Thunderer as associate,
he also discerns in the gathering of the gods great Quirinus
higher than the circle of the ethereal orb gleams white.
that is the seat of the gods; this, next to it, for those divinities
who by their own virtue touch upon similar footsteps.
and first I shall begin, before rendering the powers to the stars
and I shall sing in song the fateful laws of the constellations,
the face of the world must be completed, and throughout the whole body
it must be noted what of that which shines everywhere is in vigor at what times.

sunt alia adverso pugnantia sidera mundo,
quae terram caelumque inter volitantia pendent.
[Saturni, Iovis et Martis Solisque, sub illis
Mercurius Venerem inter agit Lunamque locatus.]
sunt etiam raris orti natalibus ignes,
protinus et rapti. subitas candescere flammas
aera per liquidum tractosque perire cometas
rata per ingentis viderunt saecula motus.

there are other stars warring against the world in a contrary course,
which, flying between earth and heaven, hang suspended.
[of Saturn, of Jupiter and of Mars and of the Sun; beneath these
Mercury moves, stationed between Venus and the Moon.]
there are also fires sprung from rare nativities,
and forthwith swept away. that sudden flames incandesce
through the liquid air, and that comets, drawn along, perish—
the ages have seen as established by their enormous motions.

sive, quod ingenitum terra spirante vaporem
umidior sicca superatur spiritus aura,
nubila cum Iongo cessant dispulsa sereno,
et solis radiis arescit torridus aer,
apta alimenta sibi demissus corripit ignis
materiamque sui deprendit flamma capacem. --
et quia non solidum est corpus, sed rara vagantur
principia aurarum volucrique simillima fumo,

or, because an inborn vapor, with the earth breathing,
the moister breath is overcome by a dry aura,
when the clouds, driven away, cease, with a long serene sky,
and the torrid air dries with the sun’s rays,
the fire, having descended, snatches for itself apt aliment
and the flame detects matter capable of itself. --
and because the body is not solid, but rarefied there wander
the principles of the auras, most similar to winged smoke,

[825] in breve vivit opus coeptaque incendia fine
subsistunt pariterque cadunt fulgentque cometae.
quod nisi vicinos agerent occasibus ortus
et tam parva forent accensis tempora flammis,
alter nocte dies esset caelumque rediret
inversum et somno totum deprenderet orbem.
tum quia non una specie dispergitur omnis
aridior terrae vapor et comprenditur igni,
diversas quoque per facies accensa feruntur
lumina, quae subitis exsistunt nata tenebris.

[825] the operation lives only briefly, and the fires once-begun halt with an end,
and the comets alike fall and gleam.
but unless their risings were driven near to their settings,
and the spans for the kindled flames were so small,
there would be another day in the night, and the heaven would return inverted
and would catch the whole orb in sleep.
then, because not by one species is all the drier vapor of the earth
dispersed and is comprehended by fire,
the luminaries too, once kindled, are borne through diverse faces,
which come to exist, born from sudden darkness.

nam modo, ceu longi fluitent de vertice crines,
flamma comas imitata volat, tenuisque capillos
diffusos radiis ardentibus explicat ignis.
nunc prior haec facies dispersis crinibus exit,

for sometimes, as if long tresses were streaming from the crown,
the flame, imitating the locks, flies, and the tenuous fire
unfolds the hair diffused by ardent rays. Now this former aspect emerges
with tresses dispersed,

[839] et glomus ardentis sequitur sub imagine barbae

[839] and a ball of burning follows under the image of a beard

[845] hirta figurantis tremulo sub lumine menta.

[845] the bristly chins of the forming figure beneath a tremulous light.

[840] interdum aequali laterum compagine ductus
quadratamve trabem fingit teretemve columnam.
quin etiam tumidis exaequat dolia flammis
procere distenta uteros, parvosque catillos

[840] at times, guided by an equal joining of the sides,
it fashions a square beam or a smooth, terete column.
nay even it equalizes great jars to the swelling flames—
bellies stretched out to height—and little saucers

[844] mentitur curvos ignis glomeratus in orbes.

[844] the fire, glomerated into orbs, feigns curved orbs.

[846] lampadas et fissas ramosos fundit in ignes.
praecipites stellae passimque volare videntur,
cum vaga per nitidum scintillant lumina mundum

[846] it casts torches and split, branchy fires into the flames.
headlong stars seem to fly everywhere,
when wandering lights scintillate through the shining world

[849] et tenuem longis iaculantur crinibus ignem;
excurruntque procul volucris imitata sagittas,
arida cum gracili tenuatur semita filo.
sunt autem cunctis permixti partibus ignes,
qui gravidas habitant fabricantis fulmina nubes
et penetrant terras Aetnamque minantur Olympo
et calidas reddunt ipsis in fontibus undas
ac silice in dura viridique in cortice sedem
inveniunt, cum silva sibi collisa crematur:
ignibus usque adeo natura est omnis abundans.
ne mirere faces subitas erumpere caelo
aeraque accensum flammis lucere coruscis
arida complexum spirantis semina terrae,
quae volucer pascens ignis sequiturque fugitque,
fulgura cum videas tremulum vibrantia lumen,
imbribus e mediis et caelum fulmine ruptum, --
sive igitur ratio praebentis semina terrae
in volucres ignes potuit generate cometas,
sive illas natura faces ut cuncta creavit
sidera per tenues caelo lucentia flammas,
(sed trahit ad semet rapido Titanius aestu
involvitque suo flammantis igne cometas,
ac modo dimittit, sicut Cyllenius orbis
et Venus, accenso cum ducit vespere noctem,
saepe nitent falluntque oculos rursusque revisunt)
seu deus instantis fati miseratus in orbem
signa per affectus caelique incendia mittit;
numquam futtilibus excanduit ignibus aether:
squalidaque elusi deplorant arva coloni,
et sterilis inter sulcos defessus arator
ad iuga maerentis cogit frustrata iuvencos.

[849] and they hurl slender fire with their long tresses;
and they stream forth afar, in imitation of winged arrows,
when their dry pathway is attenuated into a slender thread.
but fires are intermixed in all parts,
which inhabit the gravid clouds of the forger of thunderbolts
and penetrate the lands and with Etna threaten Olympus,
and make the waters hot in the very springs,
and in hard flint and in green bark they find a seat,
when a woodland, rubbed together, is burned:
to such a degree is all nature abundant in fires.
do not marvel that sudden torches burst from the sky
and that the air, enkindled, shines with flashing flames,
having embraced the dry seeds of the breathing earth,
which the winged fire, feeding, both pursues and shuns,
when you see lightnings brandishing a trembling light,
from the midst of rains, and the sky rent by a thunderbolt, --
whether therefore the rationale of the earth supplying seeds
has been able to beget comets as winged fires,
or nature created those torches as it created all
stars shining in the sky through tenuous flames,
(but the Titanian draws to itself with rapid heat
and wraps in its own fire the flaming comets,
and now sends them forth, just as the Cyllenian orb
and Venus, when, the evening-star enkindled, she leads on the night,
often gleam and deceive the eyes and then return again)
or if a god, pitying the world for impending fate,
sends signs by influences and the incendia of the sky;
never has the ether flared with futile fires:
and the squalid fields the deluded husbandmen lament,
and, the land sterile, amid the furrows the wearied plowman
drives to the yoke the thwarted young oxen of his mourning team.

[880] aut gravibus morbis et lenta corpora tabe
corripit exustis letalis flamma medullis
labentisque rapit populos, totasque per urbes
publica succensis peraguntur fata sepulcris.
qualis Erechtheos pestis populata colonos
extulit antiquas per funera pacis Athenas,
alter in alterius labens cum fata ruebant.
nec locus artis erat medicae nec vota valebant;
cesserat officium morbis, et funera deerant
mortibus et lacrimae; lassus defecerat ignis,
et coacervatis ardebant corpora membris,
ac tanto quondam populo vix contigit heres.

[880] or with grievous morbidities and a slow wasting
the lethal flame, with the marrows burned, seizes bodies
and snatches collapsing peoples, and through whole cities
public dooms are carried out by sepulchers set ablaze.
such as the pestilence of Erechtheus, having ravaged the settlers,
carried off ancient Athens, in the funerals of peace,
as one fate, slipping into another’s, was rushing down.
nor was there place for the medical art, nor did vows prevail;
duty had yielded to the diseases, and funerals were lacking
to the deaths, and tears; the weary fire had failed,
and bodies were burning with limbs heaped together,
and to so great a people once, scarcely did an heir fall by lot.

talia significant lucentes saepe cometae:
funera cum facibus veniunt terrisque minantur
ardentis sine fine rogos, cum mundus et ipsa
aegrotet natura, hominum sortita sepulcrum.
quin et bella canunt ignes subitosque tumultus
et clandestinis surgentia fraudibus arma,
externas modo per gentes, -- ut foedere rupto
cum fera ductorem rapuit Germania Varum
infecitque trium legionum sanguine campos,
arserunt toto passim minitantia mundo
lumina, et ipsa tulit bellum natura per ignes
opposuitque suas vires finemque minata est.
nec mirere graves rerumque hominumque ruinas:
saepe domi culpa est; nescimus credere caelo; --
civilis etiam motus cognataque bella
significant.

such things do the shining comets often signify:
funerals come with torches and they threaten the lands
blazing pyres without end, when the world and nature herself
fall sick, having drawn the lot of men—a sepulchre.
nay, the fires even chant wars and sudden tumults
and arms rising through clandestine frauds,
foreign now among the nations, -- as, the pact broken,
when fierce Germany snatched the leader Varus
and stained the fields with the blood of three legions,
lights, menacing, burned everywhere through the whole world,
and nature herself bore war through fires
and set her forces in opposition and threatened an end.
nor marvel at the heavy ruins of things and of men:
often the fault is at home; we do not know how to trust the sky; --
civil commotion also and kindred wars
they signify.

nec plura alias incendia mundus
sustinuit, quam cum ducibus iurata cruentis
arma Philippeos implerunt agmine campos.

nor did the world at any other time sustain more conflagrations than when arms sworn to blood-stained leaders filled the Philippian fields with their battle-line.

[910] vixque etiam sicca miles Romanus harena
ossa verum lacerosque prius superastitit artus,
imperiumque suis conflixit viribus ipsum,
perque patris pater Augustus vestigia vicit.
necdum finis erat: restabant Actia bella
dotali oommissa acie, repetitaque rerum
alea, et in ponto quaesitus rector Olympi,
femineum sortita iugum cum Roma pependit,
atque ipsa Isiaco certarunt fulmina sistro.
restabant profugo servilia milite bella,
cum patrios armis imitatus filius hostis
aequora Pompeius cepit defensa parenti.

[910] and scarcely even upon dry sand did the Roman soldier
stand over bones—nay first over mangled limbs—,
and empire itself clashed with its own forces,
and Father Augustus conquered along his father’s tracks.
nor yet was there an end: the Actian wars remained,
joined in a dowry battle-line, and the die of affairs
was cast again, and upon the deep was sought the rector of Olympus,
when Rome hung, having drawn the feminine yoke,
and even the thunderbolts themselves contended with the Isiac sistrum.
there still remained servile wars with a fugitive soldiery,
when the son of the enemy, Pompeius, imitating his father in arms,
seized the seas that had been defended for his parent.

sed satis hoc fatis fuerit. iam bella quiescant,
atque adamanteis discordia vincta catenis
aeternos habeat frenos in carcere clausa.
sit pater invictus patriae, sit Roma sub illo,
cumque deum caelo dederit, non quaerat in orbe.

but let this be enough for the fates. now let wars grow quiet,
and let Discord, bound with adamantine chains,
shut in a prison, hold eternal reins.
let him be the unconquered father of the fatherland, let Rome be beneath him,
and, when he has given a god to heaven, let him not seek one upon the world.