Astronomicon, Volume 1

by Marcus Manilius, A.E. Housman (editor)

Marcus Manilius is a Latin author of the early 1st century CE, who wrote a five book astrological and Stoic poem, dedicated to the emperor Augustus. Little is known about the author, even his full name is uncertain, and his poem has received scant academic interest.

The latest firm date of the poem is the disastrous defeat of Varus' legions by the German tribes in 9 CE. The writing shows the author to be well read and knowledge of his subject, but the work is not referred to by any subsequent writer, suggesting that it was never widely disseminated.

A manuscript was rediscovered by Poggio Bracciolini in 1416 or 1417, and editions of the poem were produced by Scaliger and Bentley, however, the definitive text of the poem is the erudite version by the distinguished Latin scholar and poet A. E. Housman (1859-1936).

Housman's five-volume critical edition of Marcus Manilius's Astronomicon has long been regarded as the definitive work on the subject. The task of bringing the edition together was one of considerable proportion which took Housman twenty-seven years to complete (1903-1930). It is now considered one of his most enduring and important contributions to scholarship.

Volume 1 covers the creation and arrangement of the heavens and their division into spheres.

202 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1903

About the author

Marcus Manilius is an enigma, and an enigma not often sought out. Even his name is uncertain, the "Marcus" is partly conjectural. All that we know of this man comes from his sole, known work, his didactic monograph, the "Astronomica", a five book Latin poem that discusses astrology and Stoicism.

The poem is bereft of direct biographical content, however, we can deduce that he was intelligent, knowledgeable of his subject matter, and a devotee of both astrology and the philosophy of the Stoa—the two are one and the same, each an expression of the other—to Manilius.

It is also likely that he was well connected. The imperial family of Augustus delved into astrology and philosophy from time to time. Augustus' successor, the dour Tiberius, had his own, personal astrologer, the famous Thrasyllus, while occasionally persecuting and exiling other astrologers due to the potential social upsets (speculating on the date of the emperor's death) they might cause.

It is most likely that the poem was first composed in the last years of Augustus (~10-14 CE), and completed under Tiberus (the 20s CE). The first book of the poem is dedicated to Augustus, and the latest date is the 9 CE defeat of the three legions of Varius, governor of Germany, by rebellious tribes.