I Will Never Be Yours: An Ace Daphne Confronts Apollo, M. Marullus

Daphne: I’ll Never Be Yours, Apollo

Name: Michele Marullo Tarchaniota Date: 1330 – 1408 CE Region:   Constantinople [modern Turkey] / Volterra [modern Italy] Citation:   Illustrated Myths of Ovid (1580) 17

I am now safe from your divinity,

As a newly transformed bay tree!

I, a maiden who stayed a maiden,

I, who was mean to her stalker.

And now he hugs my naked branches and tells me to rejoice that I am now his.

I may be your tree, but I’ll not be your spouse. [1]

 

Daphne: I’ll Never Be Yours, Apollo

Tuta suis monstris, et iam nova Laurea Daphne:

Aspera amatori sic quoque virgo suo:

Nunc ait, exulta ramos complexus inanes:

Ut tua sim, coniunx non ero nempe tua.

 

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[1] A reference to the famous line of the version in Ovid’s Metamorphoses 1.557-558 [“'at, quoniam coniunx mea non potes esse, /  arbor eris certe' dixit 'mea!” / “But since you cannot be my wife, you can be my tree!”].

Michele Marullo Tarcaniota [1458 – 1500 CE, Constantinople, modern Turkey / Volterra, modern Italy] was a famous scholar and author known for his Greco-Roman mythology-themed poetry.

M/M: In Honor of Cyparissus; Faustus Sabaeus

Name: Faustus Sabaeus Date: 16th century CE   Region:  Brixia [Brescia, modern Italy] Citation:   Illustrated Myths of Ovid

To the Sun:

Cherish this tree you see before you

upon this shore blossoming with flowers

beside these clear waters.

O Creator of All Things,

Who Knows What Fate holds,

Who Moves the Heavens of each solstice,

I consecrate this tree.

I beg you to defend the Cypress [Cyparissus] 

let neither the heat of summer

nor the ice of winter harm him.

May this beloved tree endure

formerly cherished by you, now even more so cherished by me. 

Ad Solem.

Hanc tibi, quam cernis, radiantem floribus oram,

propter aquae fluvium lucidioris habe.

Consecro, cunctorum o genitor, quae circuit orbis:

quae fati, et variant conscia signa poli.

Solstitiis utrisque, precor defende Cupressum;

ne noceant aestus, ne glacialis hiemis.

arbor enim Chariti nostrae dilecta perennet:

quondam cura tui, nunc mage cura mei.

Faustus Sabaeus [16th century, modern Italy] was a librarian of the Vatican library who composed numerous poems on mythology-based themes.

M/M: Cyparissus and Apollo. Lactantius Placidus Narr. 10.3

Name: Lactantius Placidus Date:  5th or 6th century CE Region:    Unknown Citation:  Plots of Ovid’s Myths, Book 10, Story 3

Cyparissus, the son of Amycleius, from the island of Cea. Apollo loved him and when he had tried to kill himself over the death of a pet stag he’d accidentally killed, Apollo snatched him from danger and turned him into a tree with the same name (Cypress tree).

Cyparissus, Amyclei filius, ex insula Ceae. hunc Apollo dilexit et propter cervum patientem manus, quem per inprudentiam sagitta transfixum interemerat, manus adferentem sibi periculo eripuit et protinus in arborem genetivi nominis vertit.

Lactantius Placidus [5^th or 6^th century CE] is the name of the author attributed to a prose summary of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, but little is known about the author or his time period.