Do you ask me why this girl prefers
Eunuchs, that race defiled?
She’d rather get her fill of sex
Then fill her belly with child.[Cur tantum eunuchos habeat tua Caelia, quaeris,
Pannyche? Volt futui Caelia nec parere.]Martial (AD c.39-c.103) Spanish Roman poet, satirist, epigrammatist [Marcus Valerius Martialis]
Epigrams [Epigrammata], Book 6, epigram 67 (6.67) (AD 91) [tr. Marcellino (1968)]
(Source)
(Source (Latin)). Alternate translations:
Pannicus, dost wish to know
Why thy Gellia favours so
The priests of Cybele? To sport
She loves, and pay no suffering for't.
[tr. Anon.]
Do you ask, Pannicus, why your wife Caelia has about her only priests of Cybele? Caelia loves the flowers of marriage, but fears the fruits.
[tr. Bohn's Classical (1859)]
Do you ask, Pannychus, why your Caelia consorts with eunuchs only? Caelia looks for the license of marriage, not the results.
[tr. Ker (1919)]
Do you ask whyt your Caelia has only eunuchs, Panychus? Caelia wants to be fucked, but not to have children.
[tr. Shackleton Bailey (1993)]
Why, with eunuchs, is Caelia beguiled?
Because she wants sex, with no chance of a child.
[tr. Ericsson (1995)]
Your Celia keeps company with eunuchs:
Pannychus, do you find this odd?
It’s the child she hopes to be spared,
Pannychus, not the rod.
[tr. Matthews (1996)]
