Sulpicia II (fl. 1st c. CE)

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Sulpicia II (fl. 1st c. ce)

Roman poet. Flourished in the 1st century ce; married Calenus.

Nothing is known of Sulpicia II's life except what was written about her by the Roman poet Martial toward the end of the 1st century. Apparently she wrote graphic lyric poems celebrating her love for her husband Calenus, and Martial compared her favorably to the famous Sappho . Scholars believe that two somewhat garbled lines of poetry published in an ancient commentary on Juvenal are all that is left of her work. A satire of about 70 lines in hexameter verse about the expulsion of philosophers from Rome by the emperor Domitian (1st century ce) has also been tentatively attributed to her.

sources:

Buck, Claire, ed. The Bloomsbury Guide to Women's Literature. NY: Prentice Hall, 1992.

Wilson, Katharina M., ed. An Encyclopedia of Continental Women Writers. Vol. 2. NY: Garland, 1991.

B. Kimberly Taylor , freelance writer, New York, New York