I pray for justice: Let the girl who has recently taken me as plunder
Either love me or make me know why I should always love (her).
Ah, I wished for too much! Let her at least allow herself to be loved,
(then) Venus will have heard my many prayers!
Accept (me), one who shall be a slave to you through long years;
Accept (me), one who knows [how] to love you with spotless faith.
If great names of ancient ancestors do not commend
Me, if the founder of my blood is an equestrian,
Nor is my field renewed by countless plows,
And each thrifty parent regulates (my) expenses:
Yet Apollo and his nine companions and the inventor of the vine
Act on my side, and Love, who gives me to you
And loyalty [which] will yield to no-one, morals without fault,
And bare simplicity and blushing modesty.
One thousand [women] do not please me, I am not a horse-jumper of love:
If there is any faith, you will be in my constant care;
Let it come to pass that I may live with you those years which the
Threads of the sisters have given to me, and that I die with you grieving (for me).
Offer yourself to me as worthy material for poems:
Songs will issue forth worthy of their cause.
Because of poetry they have a name, Io frightened by her horns
And she whom the adulterer tricked as a river bird
And she who, having ridden over the sea on a pretend young bull,
Held the curved horns in her virgin hand.
We too shall be sung about equally throughout the whole world
And my name will always be linked to yours.
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iusta precor: quae me nuper praedata puella est,
aut amet aut faciat cur ego semper amem!
a, nimium volui—tantum patiatur amari;
audierit nostras tot Cytherea preces!
accipe, per longos tibi qui deserviat annos;
accipe, qui pura norit amare fide!
si me non veterum commendant magna parentum
nomina, si nostri sanguinis auctor eques,
nec meus innumeris renovatur campus aratris,
temperat et sumptus parcus uterque parens—
at Phoebus comitesque novem vitisque repertor
hac faciunt, et me qui tibi donat, Amor,
et nulli cessura fides, sine crimine mores
nudaque simplicitas purpureusque pudor.
non mihi mille placent, non sum desultor amoris:
tu mihi, si qua fides, cura perennis eris.
tecum, quos dederint annos mihi fila sororum,
vivere contingat teque dolente mori!
te mihi materiem felicem in carmina praebe—
provenient causa carmina digna sua.
carmine nomen habent exterrita cornibus Io
et quam fluminea lusit adulter ave,
quaeque super pontum simulato vecta iuvenco
virginea tenuit cornua vara manu.
nos quoque per totum pariter cantabimur orbem,
iunctaque semper erunt nomina nostra tuis.
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1.3.1
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1.3.5
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1.3.22
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1.3.24
1.3.25
1.3.26
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