Prayers to Pater Liber

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[[Category:Roman religion]]
 
==Anomynous Elegy to Maecenus 1.57-68==
 
  
O Bacchus, after we defeated the dark tanned Indians, You drank sweet
 
wine from Your helmet and, carefree, You loosened Your tunic. It was
 
then I suppose that You dressed in rich purple finery. I am mindful
 
of those times, and certainly recall those snow-white arms shining
 
brightly that led the thyrsus and how You adorned it with gems and
 
gold, and ivy wound thereon as well. Surely silver slippers bound
 
you feet, this, I think, Bacchus, You will not deny. Softer than You
 
usually gave in the many times You counseled me, then was brought
 
forth new words upon Your lips
 
 
==Caesius Bassius Hymn of Callimachus==
 
 
Come, O Lyaeus, bihorned Bassareus, two-mothered Maenalius, come into
 
this place I prepare with sleek, shiny hair. May You arouse with a
 
crown of ivy and golden clusters of grapes, and bear shaft of new
 
green wood, O Gentle One, may You come to this altar, Bacchus,
 
Bacchus, Bacchus.
 
 
==Flores Carmina 2==
 
 
Bacchus, inventor of vines, may you arrive full of wines,
 
may you pour forth the sweet liquid, to be compared with nectar,
 
and make the old pleasant, and turned to another use,
 
may it not lead harsh flavor to our spiteful veins
 
 
==Grattius Cynegetica 475-76==
 
 
Liber expels light cares from the heart, Liber brings soothing relief
 
from distress.
 
 
Liber expels pains from the chest, Liber bears medicine to soothe a
 
fever.
 
 
==Horace Carmina 2.19.7-8 ==
 
 
Euhoe! Save me Liber, spare me grave master of the fearful ivy-rod.
 
 
==Horace Carmina 3.25.19-20==
 
 
In spring, O Lenaeus Bacchus, I follow You, a god wreathed with ivy.
 
 
==Nemesianus Eclogue 2.20-24==
 
 
O Dryades who live in the forest, and Napaeas who live in caves, and
 
Naides whose gleaming white feet pass through waves upon the shore
 
and promote purple violets to grow on grassy slopes, tell me of my
 
Donaces who I came upon under the shadows, in the meadow where she
 
plucked up roses and the shoots of lilies pruned?
 
 
==Ovid Fasti 3.789-90==
 
 
Turn Your head with complacent horns to me, Father Bacchus, and give
 
my genius a fair wind to follow
 
 
==Ovid Metamorphoses 4.11-21; 31 ==
 
 
Bacchus they call you, and Bromius, and Lyaeus, born in fire, and
 
Savior also, who alone was born of two mothers. Revered as a God in
 
Nyseus, unshorn Thyoneus, joyful Lenaeus, the sower of grapes, Lord
 
of Nocturnal Revelries, the Bullroarer, and by many more names,
 
Liber, are You known among the Greeks. Adored for your eternal
 
youth, a youth everlasting, you the most beautiful among the
 
celestial Gods high above, to You are sacrifices made when You,
 
without horns upon Your most virgin head, are near and lend us Your
 
assistance. Arising victorious in the East, illuminating those
 
distant lands faded in memory, to outermost India as far as the banks
 
of the Ganges.
 
 
Calm and mild, may you come to us.
 
 
==Ovid Metamorphoses 11.131-32==
 
 
Forgive me, Father Bacchus, I was mistaken, but have pity, I pray,
 
and command that I should be torn from your beauty.
 
 
==Propertius Eligiae 3.17.1-20 ==
 
 
O Bacchus, humbly now I approach Your altar.
 
Grant tranquil seas for me, Father, and a fair wind in my sails.
 
You are able to tame even the rages of Venus; Your wine a cure for
 
our sorrows.
 
By You are lovers bound to one another; by You are their bonds
 
dissolved.
 
O Bacchus, cleanse my soul of fault.
 
 
Truly also You cannot attest to be ignorant of my sorrow
 
when it was your lynxes that carried Ariadne off to the stars,
 
like You there is an old flame still burning in my bones.
 
Only wine or death may rid us of our ills.
 
 
Truly an empty night alone and sober spent always torments lovers;
 
where hopes and fears churn in the mind of one or the other.
 
But if, Bacchus, Your gift could soothe my fevered mind and bring
 
sleep to my wearied bones, then I'll plant vines and fasten them in
 
orderly rows upon my hills, and myself stand guard less wild beasts
 
should pluck them.
 
 
When my vats fill foaming purple with must, and new wine presses have
 
stained my feet with grapes, then it will be enough for me to live
 
with Your vines and in Your horned presence,
 
O Bacchus, I, Your poet, shall sing.
 
 
==Statius Thebaid 4.383-404==
 
 
Almighty Father of Nysa, who long has passed from loving your
 
ancestral rites in distant India, who now is swiftly borne beneath
 
the frozen North to shake warlike Ismara with your thyrsus, you,
 
Bacchus, who now urges the grapevines to overgrow the realm of
 
Lycurgus, or you who is swelling the Ganges and the Red Sea, to the
 
farthest Eastern lands, rushing forward and shouting in triumph, or
 
who from the springs of Hermus rises forth golden, but we, your
 
progeny, have had to lay aside such arms that do you honor at
 
festivals, instead to bear war and tears, alarm and similar horrors,
 
the burdens of unjust reigns. Rather than speak to you once more of
 
the monstrous acts of these leaders and of their vulgar progeny,
 
rather would I have you carry me across the eternally frozen lands
 
beyond the Caucasus Mountains where Amazons howl out their war cries.
 
Behold, you press me hard, Bacchus. Far different from the frenzy I
 
had sworn to you, I saw the clash of two bulls, both alike in honor
 
and sharing one lineage, butting heads and locking their horns in
 
fierce combat and both perish in their shared wrath. You are the
 
worse evil. You depart. Guilty are you who pray that he alone should
 
gain possession of ancestral pastures and hills whose ownership is
 
shared with others. Evil one, born of the wretched, so much has
 
warfare and bloodshed brought you; now another leader holds your
 
glades and pastures.
 
 
==Sulpicia 4.5.9==
 
 
Grant, O natal Genius, all my heart's desires, and expensive incense
 
I shall burn upon your altar.
 
 
==Tibullus 2.1.3-4; 17-20==
 
 
Come to us, Bacchus, with clusters of grapes dangling from your
 
horns, and you, too, Ceres, a wreath of newly ripened wheat for your
 
temples, come!
 
 
Gods of our fathers, we purify our farmers and our fruitful fields;
 
we ask that you drive away harm from our borders. Let not the now
 
sprouting plants succumb before harvest, let not the timid lambs be
 
outrun by swift wolves.
 
 
==Tibullus 3.6.1-4==
 
 
Splendid Liber, draw near to me! With your forever mystical vine,
 
and your ivy bound head, carry off my sorrows, in the same manner as
 
you have so often used wine's healing powers to overcome the pangs of
 
love.
 
 
==Virgil Georgics 2.2-8==
 
 
Now shall I sing of you, Bacchus. Without you there would be no
 
woodland or thicket, or slow growing olive grove. Come hither, O
 
Lenaean Father, all things here beckon to be nurtured by your many
 
gifts, the autumn vineshoots laden the countryside with blossoms, the
 
vintage grape harvest foams plentiful to the lips of the wine vats.
 
Hasten, O Lenaean Father, come and, stripped down, tinge your naked
 
feet in new wine must with me.
 

Revision as of 20:40, 13 March 2011

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