Not farre fro thence there is a poole which rather
   Had bene dry ground inhabited, but now it is a meare
   And moorecocks, cootes, and cormorants doo breede and nestle there.
   The mightie Jove and Mercurie, his sonne, in shape of men
   Resorted thither on a tyme...
    
      Book VIII, 798-802

Arthur Golding (1536-1606), translated the Metamorphoses of Ovid into vigorous, supple English 'fourteeners', beguiling readers with the pace and freshness of the ancient narrative. His was the translation that Shakespeare knew, and like the magical forest of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Golding's stories unfold in a landscape at once homely and enchanted. Here Philemon and Baucis entertain two great gods to a meal of boiled bacon and radishes; Actaeon, out hunting with his hounds Greedigut, Patch, Beautie and Snatch, stumbles upon the goddess Diana; farm labourers flee in fear from the mob of bacchantes tearing Orpheus to pieces, scattering their 'mattocks, rakes and shovells'; and like the Brueghel painting, Icarus' doomed flight is witnessed by amazed 'shepeherdes leaning then / On sheepehookes and the ploughmen on the handles of their plough'. Golding captures Ovid's delight in the variety of the physical world; its strangeness, beauties and horrors, in human psychology and divine transformations.

Peter Scupham provides an introduction to the text, a full bibliography and background notes on stories and characters.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Bibliography



Ovid's Metamorphoses translated by Arthur Golding



The Preface to the Reader

    Golding on Ovid's Purpose (lines 1-222)



from Book I

    The Creation and the Four Ages of Man (lines 1-170)

    Apollo and Daphne (lines 545-700)



from Book II

    Phaeton and Phoebus Apollo (lines 142-274)

    The Death of Phaeton (lines 333-458)



from Book III

    Diana and Actaeon (lines 150-304)

    Echo and Narcissus (lines 431-644)



from Book IV

    Pyramus and Thisbe (lines 67-201)

    Hermaphroditus and Salmacis (lines 346-481)



from Book VI

    Tereus, Philomela and Procne (lines 540-855)



from Book VII

    Jason, Medea, Aeson and Pelias (lines 1-452)

    The Plague at Aegina (lines 652-852)



from Book VIII

    Daedalus and Icarus (lines 201-342)

    Philemon and Baucis (lines 795-909)



from Book IX

    Byblis and Caunus (lines 541-786)



from Book X

    Orpheus and Eurydice (lines 1-160)

    Pygmalion (lines 261-327)

    Myrrha and Cinyras (lines 328-595)

    Venus and Adonis, Hippomenes and Atalanta (lines 596-863)



from Book XI

    The Death of Orpheus, King Midas (lines 1-216)

    Ceyx and Alcyone (lines 471-864)



from Book XIII

    Acis, Galatea and Polyphemus (lines 885-1052)



from Book XV

    Pythagoras: Vegetarianism and Transmigration (lines 66-291)

    Pythagoras: Metamorphosis in Nature and History (lines 375-532)

    Ovid's Farewell (lines 984-995)



Notes on the Text

Names and Places

Glossary