Love, Lust, and Longing

The Timeless Art of Love

In a world obsessed with the idea of finding love, it feels surreal to realise that two thousand years ago, the mighty ancient Romans were using similar strategies to secure a match. Their desires were similar to our own. Despite the vast differences in technological and scientific knowledge, we have not changed much at our core. At least not when it comes to love. This, I intend to prove by examining the most famous portrayal of love from ancient times. The Ars Amatoria is an ancient piece of literature written by the famous poet Publius Ovidius Naso. His Ars can be considered an instructional manual on all things related to love. This elegy consists of three books, in which Ovid defies the conventions of ancient Rome, by writing about this unconventional and controversial topic. Here is how it begins:

Si quis in hoc artem populo non novit, amandi, hoc legat et lecto carmine doctus amet.

[Book I, 1f]

“Should anyone amongst the people not know how to love, they should read these lines and learn the art of love.”

With this rather bold and hubristic statement, Ovid introduces his Ars. He lays out a sort of game plan – a lover’s guide. Initially, he says that you must search for the object of your desires. He lists different places and the strategies we can employ there. Then it is a matter of wooing them, for which he also offers advice. The ultimate goal is to achieve a state of love that will last – ideally, forever. I imagine that these instructions seem familiar. This is further proof of my theory that our behaviour has not changed all that much since Ovid’s time. In the following chapters, we will look at his guide more closely and highlight the parallels between ancient and modern times.

Nota bene: It goes without saying that the similarities I point out cannot be completely identical, since the world we live in today is vastly different from the one back then. But as we will see, the essence and desire behind behaviours are certainly the same. For all that has changed, the fact that we are human to our core, has not.