OVID: Metamorphoses

Question 1

When was it written?

Answer 1

8AD

Question 2

What is its significance?

Answer 2

Provides a narrative account of the deification of Julius Caesar and the reasons for his promotion to godhood

Question 3

There is no…

Answer 3

There is no greater achievement among Caesar’s actions than that he stood father to our emperor.

• Stresses JC’s relationship to Augustus

Question 4

Conquered the sea-going…

Answer 4

Conquered the sea-going Britons… led his victorious ships… to have earned many triumphs

• Outlining the reason why Caesar was made a God
• Very brief account of his achievements- ensures the reader isn’t reminded of JC’s dictatorship, nor his civil wars

Question 5

Now Diomede’s Calydonian…

Answer 5

Now Diomede’s Calydonian spear wounds me: now… seeing my son Aeneas driven to endless wandering

• Venus catalogues the pain she had to suffer at the hands of Diomedes in the Trojan war, then as her son Aeneas was forced to find a new city
• JC’s assassination is elevated to mythological status by association with these moments from legends

Question 6

Augustus… as the…

Answer 6

Augustus… as the most courageous avenger of his father’s murder

• Underlines aspect of Aug’s relationship with JC- Augustus as his avenger

Question 7

What conflicts of Augustus’ are named?

Answer 7

Mutina
Philippi
Pompey civil war
Cleo foreign war

• By putting these prophecies for battle in Jupiter’s mouth, Ovid legitimaises Octavian’s civil wars, as if the King of the gods said it will happen, then O can’t be blamed for it

Question 8

Augustus as Pater Patriae?

Answer 8

He will direct morality by his own example

Question 9

Seeing his son’s…

Answer 9

Seeing his son’s good works, Caesar acknowledges they are greater than his own, and delights in being surpassed by him.

Question 10

Brought the rebellious Numidians?

Answer 10

Numidians
- People in North Africa, conquered by Caesar at the battle of Thaspus

Question 11

Under Juba of Cinyps:

Answer 11

Juba
- A King of Numidia.
- Aligned with Scipio and beaten by Caesar in North Africa

Question 12

Swollen with the name of Mithridates:

Answer 12

• King of Pontus
• Defeated by Lucullus and Pomepy
• Caesar crushed his son Pharnacas at a battle in 47BC- this is when he said veni, vidi, vici

Question 13

Quirinus:

Answer 13

Deified Romulus

Question 14

Iulus

Answer 14

The son of Aeneas, from whom the Iulian clan claimed their origin

Question 15

Waging war against Turnus?

Answer 15

• King of the Rutuli in Italy, who opposed Aeneas

Question 16

The ancient sisters?

Answer 16

The fates

Question 17

Stygian owl?

Answer 17

Stygian- of the underworld

Question 18

Lucifer

Answer 18

The morning star (the planet Venus_

Question 19

Cytherean?

Answer 19

Of Cythera, the Aegean island sacred to Venus