
LES DIVINES PAROLLES NE SE
CONTRARIENT.
EPIGRAMME DE PULEX POETE.
ANTIQUE.[1]
L’hermaphrodit parle.
Ma mere estant de moy encore enceincte,
Demande feit en devotion saincte
A trois des Dieux, quel fruyct elle feroit?
Phoebus luy dist, qu’enfant masle il seroit.
Mars, au rebours, que fille estoit à naistre.
Et puys Junon ne l’un ne l’autre n’estre
Ce que gisoit au ventre: respondit.
Quand je fu né, i’estoie Hermaphrodit.
Puys de rechief se volut enquerir,
De quelle mort je devoie mourir?
Junon respond, que je serois tué.
Mars que pendu. Apollon que noyé.
Vray d’un chescun le dict fut, à la preuve.
Link to an image of this page [G8v p112]
Un arbre estoit, qui ombrageoit un fleuve
Dessus je monte: & mon espée ceincte
Se deguayna. Je tombay sur la poincte
Tout au travers de mon corps embroché
Pendant d’un pié à la branche accroché.
La teste en bas plongée en la Riviere.
Ainsi mouru par estrange maniere,
Masle, femelle, & ce que neutre semble.
Tué, pendu, & Noyé tout ensemble.
1. The nickname ‘Pulex’ refers in fact to the same author as the poem’s ‘translator’, below, Poliziano, a play on his name in Latin, Politianus (or Pulicianus), and the word for ‘flea’. Angelo Ambroghini Poliziano (d. 1494), was an early Italian humanist, whose interest in the more bawdy side of Classical poetry (notably Catullus), sometimes got him into trouble, much like his predecessor, Panormita (Antonio Beccadelli), whose Hermaphroditus (Latin epigrams that evoke Catullus) may have inspired this text - though the poem is much older, “The Epigram of the Hermaphrodite”, attributed to the 12th-century poet, Mathieu de Vendôme. It is also worth noting that this image appears very much like the ‘Hanged Man’ in Tarot, a man hanging upside-down from a tree above water, an image also associated with dual nature.
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- casting weapons (with NAME) [45C11(SPEAR)] Search | Browse Iconclass
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Relating to the text:
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