Article
Museum as Muse: To His Wine Jug
TO HIS WINE JUG
Round, well-turned , one-eared, long-necked, with ample voice from a narrow throat and small mouth, happy handmaid of Bacchus and the Muses and the Goddess of Love, sweet-laughing treasurer of our drinking parties, why, when I'm sober, are you full of wine, and why, when I'm loaded, do you turn sober? That surely violates the friendship code of drinkers.
--Anonymous, 3d Century B. C.E.
Women make fun of me for being old, tell me to study the remnants of my age in a mirror, but I don't care one bit if my hair is white or black now that I'm nearing the end. With fragrant lotions and beautiful petaled crowns and Dionysiac wine, I kill all painful thoughts.
--Palladas, 360-430 C.E.
Translated from the Greek by Edmund Keeley
Round, well-turned , one-eared, long-necked, with ample voice from a narrow throat and small mouth, happy handmaid of Bacchus and the Muses and the Goddess of Love, sweet-laughing treasurer of our drinking parties, why, when I'm sober, are you full of wine, and why, when I'm loaded, do you turn sober? That surely violates the friendship code of drinkers.
--Anonymous, 3d Century B. C.E.
Women make fun of me for being old, tell me to study the remnants of my age in a mirror, but I don't care one bit if my hair is white or black now that I'm nearing the end. With fragrant lotions and beautiful petaled crowns and Dionysiac wine, I kill all painful thoughts.
--Palladas, 360-430 C.E.
Translated from the Greek by Edmund Keeley
