A Dinner Invitation (Catullus 13)
Catullus’ mock dinner invitation to his friend Fabullus is really a compliment to his own girlfriend (probably to be identified as the Lesbia he addresses elsewhere in his work), argues Chris Heden. She is to bring the most important ingredient of the party: an unguent or perfumed oil, an expensive luxury item typically featured in fashionable Roman dinner parties. Catullus 13 discussed, translated, and read aloud by Chris Heden.
Roman fresco with banquet scene (detail) from the Casa dei Casti Amanti (IX 12, 6-8) in Pompeii. (Wikimedia Commons)
Cenabis bene, mi Fabulle, apud me
paucis, si tibi di favent, diebus –
si tecum attuleris bonam atque magnam
cenam, non sine candida puella
et vino et sale et omnibus cachinnis;
haec si, inquam, attuleris, venuste noster,
cenabis bene; nam tui Catulli
plenus sacculus est aranearum.
Sed contra accipies meros amores,
seu quid suavius elegantiusve est:
nam unguentum dabo, quod meae puellae
donarunt Veneres Cupidinesque;
quod tu cum olfacies, deos rogabis,
totum ut te faciant, Fabulle, nasum.