GCSE Latin: Horace: Spring and thoughts of mortality

Latin

diffugere nives, redeunt iam gramina campis
aboribusque comae;
mutat terra vices, et decrescentia ripas
flumina praetereunt;
Gratia cum Nymphis geminisque sororibus audet
ducere nuda choros.
immortalia ne speres, monet annus et almum
quae rapit hora diem:
frigora mitescunt Zeohyris, ver proterit aestas
interitura simul
pomifer autumnus fruges effuderit, et mox
bruma recurrit iners.
damna tamen celers reparant caelestia lunae:
nos ubi decidimus
quo pater Aeneas, quo Tullus dives et Ancus,
pulvis et umbra sumus.
quis scit an adiciant hodiernae crastina summae
tempora di superi?
cuncta manus avidas fugient heredis, amico
quae dederis animo.
cum semel occideris et de te splendida Minos
fecerit arbitria,
non, Torquate, genus, non te facundia, non te
restituet pietas;
infernis nenque enim tenebris Diana pudicum
liberat Hippolytum,
nec Lethaea valet Theseus abrumpere caro
vincula Pirithoo.

English

The snows have dispersed, now the grasses return to the fields
And the leaves [return] to the trees;
The earth changes its seasons, and the subsiding rivers
Flow between their banks;
A Grace with the Nymphs and her twin sisters dares
To lead the dancing naked.
So that you do not hope for immortality, the year gives warning
As does the flow of time which snatches away the life-giving day
[And] The Cold [spells] lessen with the sephyr breezes, summer tramples upon spring
As it will at once perish
When fruitful autumn pours our its bounty, and soon
Stiff winter returns.
Yet the swiftly-passing months make good the losses above:
When we fall below
To where the father Aeneas and wealthy Tullus and Ancus have gone,
We are dust and shadows.
Who knows whether the Gods above throw tomorrow's times
On to today's total?
All things will elude the inheritor's grasping hands,
All you would bequeath to your friend - I mean YOU.
That one time when you die and Minos makes
His dread judgement over you,
It won't be your breeding, Torquatus, or your smooth talk
Or your good nature which will bring you back;
For Diana cannot release the pure [paragon] Hippolytus
From the darkness down under,
Nor is Theseus strong enough to break free the chains of Lethe
From dear Pirithous.

Notes

Nymphs are woodland Godesses. In the first 6 lines Horace focuses on the delights of Spring. After this the tone changes and fears of mortality become the subject matter of the poem. Zephyr breezes are snall westerly breezes. Lethe means death.

Exam Suggestions

- In English, give four ways in which Horace describes the approach of spring in lines 1-4.
- immortalia...diem (lines 7-8): of what is warning being given? Why?
- Explain the point which Horace is making in lines 9-12.
- Translate lines 13-16.
- What question does Horace find himself unable to answer in lines 17-18?
- How far do you agree with Horace's attitude towards like and mortality?

Rhythm
Asclepiad metre -> each couplet finishes with the predictable rhythm -> inexorable sequence of the seasons. Heavy syllables (l.1) as winter departs, lightening (l.2) as spring appears immortalia ne speres (l.7): heavy syllables (and assonance of a, e) -> forbidding tone. ("don't go there") Succession of dactyls (l.13) -> tine runs on swiftly.

Sound
Assonance of u in l.16: hollow sound -> emptiness of final destiny

Arrangement of words
hodiernae...tempora (ll.17-18): jumbled noun-adjective pairs -> days inevitably running into each other.