Book I

., embracing the first five satires, was written in the freshest vigour of the author's powers, and is animated with the strongest hatred of Domitian. The publication of this book belongs to the early years of Trajan. The mention of the exile of Marius (49) shows that it was not published before 100. In the second satire, the lines 29 seq.,

"Qualis erat nuper tragico pollutus adulter Concubitu,"

show that the memory of one of the foulest scandals of the reign of Domitian was still fresh in the minds of men. The third satire, imitated by Samuel Johnson in his _London_, presents such a picture as Rome may have offered to the satirist at any time in the 1st century of our era; but it was under the worst emperors, Nero and Domitian, that the arts of flatterers and foreign adventurers were most successful, and that such scenes of violence as that described at 277 seq. were most likely to occur;[2] while the mention of Veiento (185) as still enjoying influence is a distinct reference to the court of Domitian. The fourth, which alone has any political significance, and reflects on the emperor as a frivolous trifler rather than as a monster of lust and cruelty, is the reproduction of a real or imaginary scene from the reign of Domitian, and is animated by the profoundest scorn and loathing both of the tyrant himself and of the worst instruments of his tyranny. The fifth is a social picture of the degradation to which poor guests were exposed at the banquets of the rich, but many of the epigrams of Martial and the more sober evidence of one of Pliny's letters show that the picture painted by Juvenal, though perhaps exaggerated in colouring, was drawn from a state of society prevalent during and immediately subsequent to the times of Domitian.[3]