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m More concise: the previous statement about friends implies that he did not consider Horace the same. |
m →Birth, early life, and marriage: corrected a minor error: this page linked to Aemilianus Macer, who is actually a different Macer than Ovid is talking about. |
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His father wanted him to study [[rhetoric]] so that he might practice law. According to Seneca the Elder, Ovid tended to the emotional, not the argumentative pole of rhetoric. Following the death of his brother at 20 years of age, Ovid renounced law and travelled to [[Athens, Greece|Athens]], [[Asia Minor]], and [[Sicily]].<ref>''Trist.'' 1.2.77</ref> He held minor public posts, as one of the ''[[Triumviri#Roman triumvirates|tresviri capitales]]'',<ref>''Trist.'' 4.10.33–34</ref> as a member of the [[Centumviral court]]<ref>''Trist.'' 2.93ff.; ''Ex P.'' 5.23ff.</ref> and as one of the ''[[Decemviri#Decemviri Litibus Iudicandis|decemviri litibus iudicandis]]'',<ref>''Fast.'' 4.383–34</ref> but resigned to pursue poetry probably around 29–25 BC, a decision of which his father apparently disapproved.<ref>''Trist.'' 4.10.21</ref>
Ovid's first recitation has been dated to around 25 BC, when he was eighteen.<ref>''Trist.'' 4.10.57–58</ref> He was part of the circle centered on the esteemed patron [[Marcus Valerius Messalla Corvinus]], and likewise seems to have been a friend of poets in the circle of [[Gaius Maecenas|Maecenas]]. In ''Tristia'' 4.10.41–54, Ovid mentions friendships with
He married three times and had divorced twice by the time he was thirty. He had one daughter and grandchildren through her.<ref name="HornblowerSpawforth2014">{{cite book|last1=Hornblower|first1=Simon|last2=Spawforth|first2=Antony|last3=Eidinow|first3=Esther|title=The Oxford Companion to Classical Civilization|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AIgdBAAAQBAJ|year=2014|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0198706779|page=562|access-date=27 December 2015|archive-date=23 January 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230123103142/https://books.google.com/books?id=AIgdBAAAQBAJ|url-status=live}}</ref> His last wife was connected in some way to the influential ''[[gens Fabia]]'' and helped him during his exile in Tomis (now [[Constanța]] in Romania).<ref>''Brill's New Pauly: Encyclopaedia of the Ancient World'' s.v. Ovid</ref>
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