Author: VIRGIL
Biography:
VIRGIL (70-19 BCE: OCD)
The most widely read and beloved Latin author of the period, Virgil (Publius Virgilius Maro) had so many translators that there is room for only the briefest capsule biographies. He was born near Mantua in the Veneto and educated at Cremona and Milan. In Rome he enjoyed the patronage of Maecenas and of the emperor Augustus; his major works were the pastoral Eclogues or Bucolics, the didactic Georgics, and the epic Aeneid. He died at Brundisium on his way back to Rome after a journey, and was buried at Naples. Legend has it that he wanted the ms of the incomplete Aeneid destroyed but was over-ruled by Augustus; friends provided the finishing touches. Twelve translators have separate headnotes: James Beresford, Samuel Jones, Capel Lofft, James Mason, John Ring, John Miller Russell, Lucius Manlius Sargent, Percy Clinton Smythe, William Sotheby, Charles Symmons, Arthur W. Wallis, and Francis Wrangham. Nine do not. The life of William Green is outlined under HORACE. Charles Boyd (fl 1808) published in Dublin and might be the Charles Boyd who graduated BA from Trinity College Dublin in 1809 (MA 1832). James Russell Deare (c. 1775-1824), was a clergyman with a Cambridge LLB who became Vicar of Bures in Suffolk and chaplain to the King. Thomas Kirkland Glazebrook, “gentleman” (1780-1855), married in 1801 and had eleven children who survived infancy. William Graham (c. 1725-95) was the Rector of Stapleton, Cumberland, from 1771 until his death; he also published a discourse on predestination (1788). The Cornishman Robert Hoblyn (c. 1751-1839) graduated from Christ Church, Oxford (BA 1771, MA 1774), and was ordained priest in 1776, but his only recorded living was as perpetual curate of West Molesey, Surrey, 1830-39. William Mills (fl 1780-1808) also translated Ovid, q.v. John Morrison was a schoolboy aged 12 at the Wolverhampton grammar school when he composed his translations, which were later published to promote the school. If he was a native of Staffordshire, he might have been the son of Ann and James Morrison baptised at Tipton on 23 May 1768. William Stawell (fl 1808) was perhaps another graduate of Trinity College Dublin (BA 1785, MA 1805). (OCD 3Apr. 2025; ancestry.com 3 Apr. 2025; findmypast.com 3 Apr. 2025; TCD Catalogue of Graduates [1869]; ACAD; Alumni Oxonienses; CCEd 3 Apr. 2025) HJ