Ancient history

No ancient Latin poet was born in Rome

Recently reading that unique compendium of Roman history that is Veni, vidi, vici written by Professor Peter Jones, an enigmatic phrase caught my attention:

Note that it says we know of no Latin poet who was born in Rome Come on, absolutely none.

It is not that no poet was born in the city of Rome during the approximately 1,200 years that passed between its foundation and the fall of the Western Empire, but those who were born in it must not have been very good, because neither their works were preserved nor his name is cited in the works of other authors.

The three most important Latin poets write during the reign of Augustus, between 23 B.C. and 14 AD They are Virgil, Horace and Ovid. To them must be added Catullus, Juvenal, Lucretius, Martial, Persius, and Propertius, among others, who wrote before or after that time and make up the group of great Latin poets.

Virgil

The greatest Roman poet, Publius Vergilius Maro (Publio Virgilio Marón), was born on October 15, 70 BC. in the town of Andes (later called Pietole and today known, precisely in his honor, as Virgilio).

Currently the city of Virgilio belongs to the province of Mantua, in the Lombardy region. But in the time of Virgilio himself it was framed in the Regio X Venetia .

A friend of Augustus since before his political rise, he studied in Cremona, Milan, and Rome, but lived most of his life in Naples.

Horace

Quintus Horatius Flaccus (Fifth Horace Flaccus) was the most important satirical and lyrical poet in Latin. He was born on December 8, 65 BC. on Venusia (the current Venosa in the region of Basilicata), in the Regio III Lucania of Emperor Augustus, in the south of the Italian peninsula.

Horace studied in Athens, but then lived most of the time in Rome, under the protection of the famous Maecenas, and curiously enough, he died the same year as the latter.

Ovid

The author of The Metamorphoses , one of the most influential works of Western literature, was also not born in Rome. Publius Ovidius Naso (Publio Ovidio Nasón) was born on March 20, 43 BC. in Sulmo (present-day Sulmona), in his own words the country of the pelignos (a town in central Italy that lived in the heart of the Apennines).

The bitter controversy of him with Emperor Augustus in AD 8. It ended with the poet exiled in the city of Tomis (today Constanta, in present-day Romania), where he would die nine years later.

In January 2018, the city of Rome revoked his sentence to exile, more than 2,000 years later.

Other poets

Gaius Valerius Catullus (Gaius Valerius Catullus ) was born around 87 B.C. in Verona. Decimus Iunius Iuvenalis (Tenth June Juvenal ) around 60 B.C. in Aquinum (the current Aquino, where centuries later Saint Thomas would also be born). Titus Lucretius Carus (Titus Lucretius Caro) around 98 B.C. in Pompeii or Herculaneum.

Marcus Valerius Martialis (Marcus Valerius Martial ) was from Bílbilis (current Calatayud in Spain), where he was born on March 1, 40 AD. Aulus Persius Flaccus (Aulo Persius Flaco) was born in Volterra, Etruria, in the year 34 AD

In short, not one of the great Roman poets he was originally from the city of Rome, although they were Roman citizens, some even patricians, senators, or knights.

Moreover, as we said at the beginning, Jones is right that of the well-known Latin poets there is none who was born in Rome. Although there are many Latin poets whose place of birth is unknown, and it is possible that some were born in Rome. The opposite would certainly be a rather strange coincidence.