Remnants of Catullus's Villa on a wintry, foggy day
"Grotte di Catullo, Garda Lake, Sirmione"
Garda Lake=Benācus
Sirmione= Sirmio
The Villa was built near a thermal spring (that explains the colour of the water).
Below this spot, if memor serves, there was his own Tepidarium.
Catullus comes back from a travel in Anatolia (Bithynia and Thynia) , where he accompanied Gaius Memmius (a praetor).
1.Paeninsularum, Sirmio, insularumque
2.Ocelle, quascumque in liquentibus stagnis
3.Marique vasto fert uterque Neptunus
4.Quam te libenter quamque laetus invīso
5.Vix mi ipse credens Thuniam atque Bithūnos
6.Liquisse campos et videre te in tuto.
7.O quid solutis est beatius curis,
8.Cum mens onus reponit, ac peregrino
9.Labore fessi vēnĭmus larem ad nostrum
10.Desideratoque acquiescĭmus lecto.
11.Hoc est, quod unumust pro laboribus tantis
12.Salve, o venusta Sirmio, atque hero gaude:
13.Gaudete vosque, O Lydiae lacūs undae:
14.Ridete, quidquid est domi cachinnorum
Not an easy poem, there are several figures of speech:
5-6. Thuniam atque Bithunos... campos: accusative case, related to liquisse (linquo= relinquo, definitely not from liqueo)
9. larem ad nostrum = ad nostrum larem "At our home". Metonymy. Lar, Laris and Lares, Larium. Laries were were home deities and denote the house itself in this case.
13. O Lydiae undae: Enallage. He calles "Lydiae" the waters of the lake because on its shore Etrurians established themselves. Etrurians were believed to be of anatolian origin.
Caro m’è ’l sonno, e più l’esser di sasso, mentre che ’l danno e la vergogna dura;
non veder, non sentir m’è gran ventura; però non mi destar, deh, parla basso.
Caro m’è ’l sonno, e più l’esser di sasso, mentre che ’l danno e la vergogna dura;
non veder, non sentir m’è gran ventura; però non mi destar, deh, parla basso.
In both cases those female bodies look ver much manly-athletic alike My guess is that gender swap was a last minute decision.... or perhaps
as @Terry S. once said
Terry S. dixit:
Those were the days when men were men and so were the women.
It's interesting, I've seen those statues many times, but I never really paid attention to how muscular are the features (& broad the breasts). I guess Aurora's thighs are feminine.
But Caravaggio did distort proportions although he wasn't trying to from what I've read. Which means they're mistakes? Dunno.
He constructed a looking tunnel using a mirror and various things, so maybe his suspect proportions that crop up from time to time are because of this.
I think it's safe to assume Michelangelo's ideal was the male rather than the female form.
Michelangelo's contemporaries Leonardo da Vinci, Sandro Botticelli, Benvenuto Cellini and Giovanni Antonio Bazzi (Il Sodoma) were publicly charged with sodomy (Leonardo was even imprisoned for two months), and Michelangelo, like them, was offered sexual "services" by the ragazzi or street boys who worked as apprentices in the art studios. (Rictor Norton, "Michelangelo and the label "Homosexual")
I think it's safe to assume Michelangelo's ideal was the male rather than the female form.
Michelangelo's contemporaries Leonardo da Vinci, Sandro Botticelli, Benvenuto Cellini and Giovanni Antonio Bazzi (Il Sodoma) were publicly charged with sodomy (Leonardo was even imprisoned for two months), and Michelangelo, like them, was offered sexual "services" by the ragazzi or street boys who worked as apprentices in the art studios. (Rictor Norton, "Michelangelo and the label "Homosexual")
Interesting, a fair few there I'm still not familiar with. But on form, I'll take one of Rubens' lovely lumps of femininity over those chiselled babes, all day long.