Lays of Ancient Rome

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Macaulay was in his thirties serving as "the legal member" of the Governor-General’s Supreme Council for India. While ministering to the fledgling empire of the British, Macaulay reflected upon the origin of the Roman; he read closely the first five books of Livy, which are filled with the myths and legends preserved from Rome’s earliest days. Scholars of Macaulay’s time believed the theory—since rejected—that Livy based his history on ballads now lost—works of the early empire which praised the city’s ancient origins—and it was reflecting upon these lost ballads that sparked Macaulay’s creativity. What would these old ballads have looked like? How would they have treated their already mythic material? Would their writers’ view of the present have helped them organize the myths of the past?

Lays of Ancient Rome has been reprinted on numerous occasions. An 1881 edition, lavishly illustrated by John Reinhard Weguelin, has frequently been republished. Countless schoolchildren have encountered the work as a means of introducing them to history, poetry, and the moral values of courage, self-sacrifice, and patriotism that Macaulay extolled. The Roman ballads are preceded by brief introductions, discussing the legends from a scholarly perspective. Macaulay explains that his intention was to write poems resembling those that might have been sung in ancient times. I get a weekly allergy shot and have to wait in the doctor's office half an hour after each shot. This has been the treat that makes me look forward to those visits. I wouldn't allow myself to read it any other time.As a young man he composed the ballads Ivry and The Armada, which he later included as part of Lays of Ancient Rome, a series of very popular ballads about heroic episodes in Roman history which he composed in India and published in 1842. The Lays were composed by Macaulay in his thirties, during his spare time while he was the "legal member" of the Governor-General of India's Supreme Council from 1834 to 1838. He later wrote of them:

Just as fun as the poems themselves, though, are the essays that precede them, in which Macaulay discusses the characteristics of the Roman ballad tradition—which is of course his own fabrication—in a way that explains (and excuses) many features of his poems, including the occasional anachronism. Was I moved by this? Hard to tell, for I was already weeping. I had begun to weep the moment Churchill began his recitation, for I remembered how my Aunt Alice--a contemporary of Sir Winston's--had often recited the very same passage to me. She was of Irish heritage, daughter of an immigrant from England, and had memorized these verses in a Cincinnati grade school during the final years of the First World War. (Aunt Alice also possessed a foot-high iron statue, of a Roman warrior with upraised sword, which she called "Horatius" and used as a door stop. He is still in service to our family, having guarded my bookshelves for most of the last twenty years.)

As a teenager, Winston Churchill won a Harrow School award for memorising and declaiming all 1,200 lines [i] of Macaulay's text. [10] In the films Into the Storm (2009) [11] and Darkest Hour (2017), he is depicted reciting Horatius' speech while Prime Minister during the Second World War. [12] SCOTT EVIL: Thank you. I mean, hey, but this is totally not real. Like, how many archers you got there, Mister Tuscan General? It is certain, therefore, that the great Latin writers of the Augustan age did not possess those materials, without which a trustworthy account of the infancy of the republic could not possibly be framed. Those writers own, indeed, that the chronicles to which they had access were filled with battles that were never fought, and Consuls that were never inaugurated; and we have abundant proof that, in these chronicles, events of the greatest importance, such as the issue of the war with Porsena and the issue of the war with Brennus, were grossly misrepresented. The Roman ballads are preceded by brief introductions, discussing the legends from a scholarly perspective. Macaulay explains that his intention was to write poems resembling those that might have been sung in ancient times.The Lays were first published by Longman in 1842, at the beginning of the Victorian Era. They became immensely popular, and were a regular subject of recitation, then a common pastime. The Lays were standard reading in British public schools for more than a century. Here follows what he says about this legend: The Lays of Ancient Rome comprise four narrative poems comprised by Lord Thomas Babington Macaulay: recalling popular episodes from Roman historical-legends that were strongly moral in tone: exemplifying Roman virtue against Latine perfidy.

He will admit that the most important parts of the narrative have some foundation in truth. But he will distrust almost all the details, not only because they seldom rest on any solid evidence, but also because he will constantly detect in them, even when they are within the limits of physical possibility, that peculiar character, more easily understood than defined, which distinguishes the creations of the imagination from the realities of the world in which we live. Langworth, Richard M. (2009). "End of Glory: "Into the Storm" ". winstonchurchill.org. The International Churchill Society . Retrieved 16 July 2021. This book is simply good. It is quality poetry that begs to be read aloud (or at the very least subvocalized if you are reading in a doctor's office like I was). Macaulay's introduction gives a fascinating description of the role of ballads and song in establishing and passing on culture. Each poem is then introduced with a description of the period and events it is describing. To read them is to be immersed in the contemplation of honor, love, courage, and sacrifice.The plan occurred to me in the jungle at the foot of the Neilgherry hills; and most of the verses were made during a dreary sojourn at Ootacamund and a disagreeable voyage in the Bay of Bengal. [1] The Prophecy of Capys - Romulus and Remus return triumphant to the home of their grandfather Capys. When they arrive, Capys - blind and well advanced in years - is seized by a prophetic frenzy: Capys declaims a series of portents describing the future battles and victories destined as the lot of Romulus' descendants.

Lays of Ancient Rome is an 1842 collection of narrative poems, or lays, by Thomas Babington Macaulay. Four of these recount heroic episodes from early Roman history with strong dramatic and tragic themes, giving the collection its name. Macaulay also included two poems inspired by recent history: Ivry (1824) and The Armada (1832). The poems themselves are fun, in an old-fashioned bumptious way. They aren’t first-rate poetry, but they are first-rate second-rate poetry, and that’s good enough for me. (“The Raven,” “The Charge of the Light Brigade,” and “The Highwayman” are all excellent examples of my idea of first-rate second-rate verse.) Horatius' speech is included at the Chushul war memorial at Rezang La in memory of the 13th Battalion, Kumaon Regiment of the Indian Army. The phrase "how can man die better" was used by Benjamin Pogrund as the title of his biography of anti-apartheid activist Robert Sobukwe. That what is called the history of the Kings and early Consuls of Rome is to a great extent fabulous, few scholars have, since the time of Beaufort, ventured to deny. It is certain that, more than three hundred and sixty years after the date ordinarily assigned for the foundation of the city, the public records were, with scarcely an exception, destroyed by the Gauls. It is certain that the oldest annals of the commonwealth were compiled more than a century and a half after this destruction of the records.

Richard Corliss (19 April 2013). "Tom Cruise in Oblivion: Drones and Clones on Planet Earth". Time . Retrieved 31 August 2013. Believe it or not the epigram “Rome was not built in a day”, meaning that some things cannot be done at once, but require time and patience, was not coined by Romans. As a matter of fact it first appeared in England in John Heywood’s “A Dialogue Containing the Number in Effect of All the Proverbes in the English Tongue” (1546). It was also used in “Don Quixote” (1605) by Miguel de Cervantes. Nowadays modern Romans usually do as they like, and do not expect others do as they do. The Armada was sent by Philip II of Spain with the goal of conveying an army of invasion to England, and deposing the Protestant Queen Elizabeth. The supposedly invincible fleet was thwarted by a combination of vigilance, tactics that took advantage of the size and poor maneuverability of the Armada's ships, and a series of other misfortunes. Their leader was false Sextus, / That wrought the deed of shame: / With restless pace and haggard face / To his last field he came. / Men said he saw strange visions / Which none beside might see; / And that strange sounds were in his ears / Which none might hear but he. / A woman fair and stately, / But pale as are the dead, / Oft through the watches of the night / Sat spinning by his bed. / And as she plied the distaff, / In a sweet voice and low, / She sang of great old houses, / And fights fought long ago. / So spun she, and so sang she, / Until the east was gray. / Then pointed to her bleeding breast, / And shrieked, and fled away."