Nunc est bibendum

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Horace? Fragment of a contemporary marble relief
Reginald Arthur: The Death of Cleopatra , 1892

Nunc est bibendum ( Latin for "Now let's drink" or literally: "Now is the time to drink") is a sentence from 30 BC. Song (lat .: carmen ) 1.37 by the Roman poet Horace (65 - 8 BC):

translation

Original:
Nunc est bibendum, nunc pede libero
pulsanda tellus, nunc Saliaribus
ornare pulvinar deorum
tempus erat dapibus, sodales.

Translation:
Now let's drink, now at bare feet,
stomp the ground! Friends, now it is time to decorate the
gods' upholstery
with a Saliaric sacrificial meal !

origin

Horace begins his ode in the meter named after Alcaios of Lesbos , the Alkaean stanza , with the exclamation of joy and relief with which this poet, banished from his homeland Lesbos by the tyrant Myrsilus of Mytilene , reacted ( Greek : Nyn chrê methysthēn - Νῦν χρῆ μεθύσθην ). With this, Horace answers the question that he had asked a year earlier, after the battle of Actium , at the beginning of the 9th epode : “When, Caesar's glad, the victor, do I drink Cäkuber / Stored for ceremonies [...]? “Now after the conquest of Alexandria and the death of Cleopatra , he can“ answer the hesitantly questioning when of the epode with a triumphant now sounding triumphantly in three repetitions ”. "Originally a drinking song, the ode 1.37 turns into a dramatic tale of Cleopatra's threat to Roman existence and of Octavian's victory". Until then, “as long as the Capitol / the mad queen was threatened with doom / and destruction was threatening the empire”, one was not allowed to fetch the wine from the cellar, now “freedom triggers the festive frenzy, as it is said in the first verse [.. .], while in the last verses, in stark contrast, Cleopatra's body drinks the snake poison ”.

“The reason for joy for Horace was nothing more than the death of Cleopatra and the liberation of the Roman people from the danger of tyranny that went with it. The choice of words is drastic and is clearly directed against female rule ”, which is devalued as“ unnatural and dangerous ”.

The words " Nunc est bibendum" later became a well-known toast in student associations . In the Horatian sense, "wine is not just a stimulant, but a supportive means [...]: inspiring power to tell stories ( 1.27 ) and stimulus to celebrate, and to express joy in suitable words (1.37)".

The name of the advertising character Bibendum goes back to this toast that has become a popular saying.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ JC Schmitt-Blank: Review of the Latin Grammar (Volume II of the Parallel Grammar .) In: Heidelberger Jahrbücher der Literatur , 1870, p. 955 ( Google Books ).
  2. ^ Carmina Horatii / Liber I / Carmen XXXVII in Vicifons, the Latin Wikisource
  3. ^ KF Preiß, Leipzig 1837, p. 40 (Google Books); Q. Horatii Flacci: carmina Hor.c.1,37: Cleopatra, or: call to the celebration of victory. Gottwein.de
  4. ↑ Dr. Löning: Classical pre-school for Greek and Roman poetry for educated people of all classes. Frankfurt am Main 1861, p. 132 (Google Books).
  5. ↑ Alkaios: Fragment 332 (39D) . Loretana de Libero : The Archaic Tyranny . Stuttgart 1996 (Habil. Göttingen 1995), p. 319 (Google Books).
  6. ↑ Horace: Odes and Epodes . Translated by Johann Heinrich Voss . New edition Edited by Karl-Maria Guth, Berlin 2016, p. 111 (Google Books); see also Q. Horatii Flacci: epodon Hor.epod.9: An Maecenas. Gottwein.de.
  7. ↑ Hans Peter Syndikus: Die Lyrik des Horace. An interpretation of the odes. Darmstadt 1972, p. 331.
  8. ^ Manfred Clauss : Cleopatra. Genesis of a beauty. In: Michael Neumann (Ed.): People who made history. 2013, p. 155 (Google Books).
  9. ↑ Bernard Andreae : Cleopatra and the historical personalities around them. In: Ortrud Westheider, Dorothee Böhm, Karin Rhein u. Dorothee Gall (ed.): Cleopatra and the Caesars. Catalog for the exhibition of the Bucerius Kunst Forum. Hamburg 2006-2007, p. 120 (Google Books).
  10. ↑ Kerstin Weiand: Images of rulers and political norm formation: The representation of Elizabeth I in England in the 17th century. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht 2015, p.112 (Google Books).
  11. ↑ Veronika Oberparleiter: Simon Rettenpacher's comedy "Judicium Phoebi, de nostri saeculi vatibus". Salzburg 2004, p. 278 (Google Books); Carmen 1.27 , German by Johann Heinrich Voss for the Gutenberg project .