MANILIUS, MARCUS

flourished 1st century AD last of the Roman didactic poets. Little of his life is known. He was the author of Astronomica, an unfinished poem on astronomy and astrology probably written between the years AD 14 and 27. Following the style and philosophy of Lucretius, Virgil, and Ovid, Manilius stresses the providential government of the world and the operation of divine reason. He exercises his amazing ability for versifying astronomical calculations to the extreme, often forcing unnecessarily complex constructions upon his lines. The poem's chief interest lies in the attractive prefaces to each book and in the mythological and moralizing digressions. The five extant books, consisting of 4,000 hexameters, are rarely read completely.