otio exsultas nimiumque gestis’. This translates as: ‘Idleness, Catullus, does you harm,
you riot in your idleness and want too much’. Here he is saying she is too good for him and she would never like him. He tells himself she doesn’t like him and he wouldn’t have a chance. This shows Catullus is deep in love with her.
The next two poems I am going to analyse are poems 2 and 3 in the anthology. These poems are about Lesbia’s pet sparrow and her love for it. The first one, poem 2, talks about how she treats and cares for her pet sparrow: ‘quicum ludere, quem in sinu tenere’. This means: ‘with whom she often plays whilst she holds you in here lap’. Here Catullus is writing about the sparrow showing us that Lesbia cares for it by letting it sit on her knee, this also shows that she treats it with care. Here Catullus is showing Lesbia’s soft and gentle side, so he is really writing about Lesbia and thinking how they care for each other as Lesbia and her pet sparrow. In poem 3, the second and last of the two ‘sparrow’ poems, Lesbia’s sparrow dies: ‘passer mortus est’, the translation is: ‘My lady’s sparrow is dead’. This is stating that the sparrow is dead. Catullus continues to say: ‘nam mellitus erat suamque norat
ipsam tam bene quam puella matrem’. This means the following:
‘For honey-sweet he was, and knew his
mistress as well as a girl knows her mother’. Here Catullus is saying that the sparrow knew that Lesbia cared for it, as Catullus thinks Lesbia cares for him. Lesbia starts to hear her pet sparrow chirping, but really she is just hearing things: ‘nec sese a gremio illius movebat
sed circumsiliens modo huc modo illuc
ad solam dominam usque pipiabat.’ The translation to this is:
‘nor would he stir from her lap,
but hoping now here, now there,
would still chirp to his mistress alone.’
The beginning of the translation says she would have her pet sparrow on her lap, still petting it as if it was alive. Catullus feels the same way about Lesbia, if anything happened to her.
The next set of poems I am going to study, are poems comparing Lesbia to other women: ‘nec bello pede nec nigris ocellis
nec longis digitis nec ore sicco
nec sane nimis elegante lingua’. This translates to: ‘nor a pretty foot, nor black eyes,
nor long fingers, nor dry mouth,
nor indeed a very fine tongue’
Here Catullus is talking to another women comparing her to Lesbia. He’s saying her physical appearance isn’t as stunning or breath taking as Lesbia’s. Catullus is saying he wouldn’t want to be with any other women, this shows his feelings for Lesbia. In the second poem of this section, poem 86, he compares another women to Lesbia: ‘QUINTIA Formosa est multis’. The translation of this is: ‘QUINTIA is thought to be beautiful by many’. This states that quintia is a very beautiful women adored by many men, but he writes it as though he does not like her or have any attraction to her at all. He then goes on: ‘totum illud formosa nego’. Which translate as following: ‘but I demur to “beautiful”, for she has no grace’. Here he says she is beautiful, but has no grace, which means she is very pretty but is very feminine and lady-like, but Lesbia is.
The last section I am going to analyse are abusive poems directed against Lesbia and her family. The first one I will look at in this section is poem 79:
‘Lesbius est pulcher, quid ni? Quem Lesbia malit
quam te cum tota gente, catulle, tua.
Sed tamen his pulcer vendat cum gente catullum,
Si tria notorum suarsia reppererit.’
The translation is: ‘Lesbius is a pretty boy, why not? Lesbia prefers him
to you and all your clan, Catullus. But this pretty
boy would sell Catullus and his clan if he could get
three kisses from his friends.’
In this poem, “pretty boy” (Latin: pulcher) is assumed to be a pun on the name of Clodia’s brother P. Clodius Pulcher with whom, according to Cicero, she had an incestuous relationship with her brother. The next poem, possibly the last Catullus wrote about Lesbia, is poem 11. here he describes how he tells Lesbia that he doesn’t want to have anything to do with her. He tells the two people he trusts the least to give her a message; to tell her never go near him again:
‘cum suis uiuat ualeatque moechis Qous simul complexta tenet trecentos’.
this translates to: ‘let her live and be happy with her paramours,
three hundred of whom she holds at once in her embrace’.
Catullus is saying here that Lesbia has been with hundreds of men, which is considered to be common. She may have sold herself for sex at one point. I think Catullus is also trying to get across that Lesbia is a women of few morals and has little respect for herself and her body.
In conclusion to all this evidence and analysis, I think Catullus was just another man in Lesbia’s life. I think she felt a little love for him and just used him for his love and devotion towards her. She used his money and kindness against him Catullus loved her dearly and wanted to marry her but never admitted to the marriage thought. These are all my personal opinions of the Catullus and Lesbia love affair, and I think it was just an affair.
