The Regal Period in Propertius 4

Abstract In Propertius’ last book, his poetry takes subjects incongruous to the love-elegy of his earlier work. This new variety can be thought of as the major concern of the book. The bond between the elegiac metre and the figure of the love-poet marginal in society, preferring love to war in poetry as in life, dominated the earlier books. In book 4 this bond is dissolved as the poet broadens his scope to include Rome’s history. That history is the history of early Rome, and we shall see that the regal period has a particular place in the elegist’s conception of Rome’s past. Propertius explores in book 4 the dilemma of how the elegist can treat subjects which he had previous shown required a bombast and grandeur to which he was unsuited. This dilemma is recalled in Ovid’s Fasti, which is the subject of my next chapter. Ovid builds on Propertius 4, and there again, the regal period becomes the medium in which the elegist can celebrate Rome’s history.