Below you can enjoy translations of ancient latin invocations to the Olympians.

Venus

“O Venus, queen of Cnidus and Paphos,

Scorn your beloved Cyprus, and come

To the beautiful shrine of Glycera,

Who summons you with much incense.

Let your fiery boy make haste along with you-

The Graces, too, with girdles undone-

The Nymphs, and Youth (who without you lacks grace)-

And Mercury as well.”

-Horace, odes

Mercury

“Mercury, Atlas’ eloquent grandson,

You who in your cunning shaped

The savage ways of primitive man

With language and the customs of

The comely wrestling-ground,

I shall sing of you- the messenger

Of great Jove and of all the gods,

Creator of the curving lyre,

Cunning at hiding in joking theft

Whatever’s caught your fancy.

Once, when Apollo, with threatening voice,

Was terrifying you, still a boy,

If you did not return his cattle

Stolen through a trick, he saw

His quiver gone, and laughed.

And, too, it was with you as guide

That wealthy Priam left Ilium

And slipped past Atreus’ haughty sons,

Thessalian watch-fires too, and the camp

Pitched to level Troy.

You set pious souls in their happy seat

And with your golden wand corral

The insubstantial throng of dead;

You please not only the gods above

But those below as well.”

-Horace, the odes

Apollo and Diana

“”O Phoebus, and Diana ruler of the woodlands,

Radiant glory of the sky, O ye who are to be worshiped

Always, and venerated, grant what we pray for

In this sacred season

In which the Sibylline verses admonished

Chosen girls and spotless boys

For the gods who favor the seven hills

To sing a song.

Fostering Sun, thou who in shining chariot the day

Dost reveal and conceal and art as another

Yet the same reborn, may you than the city of Rome be able

To behold nothing greater!

Gentle to bring to light issue

In due season, O Ilithyia (Goddess of Birthing), protect mothers,

Whether thou dost delight to be called Lucina (Radiant Goddess)

Or Genitalis (Birth Goddess).

Goddess, may you bring forth offspring, and make our fathers’

Decrees prosper on the joining

Of women, and with new progeny fruitful

The law on marriage. 20

That each ten times eleven years the fixed

Circuit return the songs and games

For three bright days and as many pleasant

Nights in throngs.

And ye, O Fates, truthful in having sung 25

What was once ordained (and may the firmly fixed

Boundary keep it so), do ye now to deeds past

Join fair fortune.

Fertile in fruit and flocks, the earth,

May she endow Ceres with crown of grain; 30

May both healthful waters nourish the harvests,

And Jove’s breezes.

Mild and peaceful, thy spear laid aside,

Heed the suppliant boys, O Apollo;

Horned queen of the stars, heed, 35

O Moon, the girls.

If Rome is your handiwork, and Trojan

Throngs held the Tuscan shore,

A remnant bidden to move their household gods and city

In a passage to safety,

For which, without harm through burning Troy,

Unsullied Aeneas, surviving his fatherland,

Did secure a free path, bound to give

More than what was left behind,

Ye gods, honest ways to teachable young,

Ye gods, to serene old age quiet rest,

To Romulus’ people grant substance and issue

And every glory.

And what with white bulls the famous

Blood of Anchises and Venus of you doth entreat,

May he obtain, master o’er the warrior, yet

Gentle to the prostrate foe.

Already on sea and land his mighty armies

The Mede doth fear, and his Alban axes,

Already the Scythians seek his response, proud

Only recently, and the Indians.

Already Loyalty and Peace and Honor and Ancient

Modesty and neglected Virtue to return

Doth venture, and blessed Plenty appear

With full horn. 60

Augur, and splendid in gleaming bow,

Phoebus, beloved of the nine Muses,

Who with healing art doth uplift

The body’s weary limbs,

If favorably he doth behold Palatine altars,

Roman wealth and Latium kindly

Into another cycle prolong and

Into a better age,

And she who guards the Aventine and Mount Algidus,

Diana, the prayers of the Fifteen Men

Doth heed and to the vows of children doth

Lend kindly ears,

That these prayers Jove and all the gods must hear,

Homeward I do bear good and certain hope,

I, the chorus, taught both of Phoebus and Diana

The praises to tell.”

-Carmen Saeculare

Apollo

“Thou god, whom the offspring of Niobe experienced as avenger of a presumptuous tongue, and the ravisher Tityus, and also the Thessalian Achilles, almost the conqueror of lofty Troy, a warrior superior to all others, but unequal to thee; though, son of the sea-goddess, Thetis, he shook the Dardanian towers, warring with his dreadful spear. He, as it were a pine smitten with the burning ax, or a cypress prostrated by the east wind, fell extended far, and reclined his neck in the Trojan dust. He would not, by being shut up in a [wooden] horse, that belied the sacred rights of Minerva, have surprised the Trojans reveling in an evil hour, and the court of Priam making merry in the dance; but openly inexorable to his captives, (oh impious! oh!) would have burned speechless babes with Grecian fires, even him concealed in his mother’s womb: had not the father of the gods, prevailed upon by thy entreaties and those of the beauteous Venus, granted to the affairs of Æneas walls founded under happier auspices. Thou lyrist Phœbus, tutor of the harmonious Thalia, who bathest thy locks in the river Xanthus, O delicate Agyieus, support the dignity of the Latian muse. Phœbus gave me genius, Phœbus the art of composing verse, and the title of poet. Ye virgins of the first distinction, and ye youths born of illustrious parents, ye wards of the Delian goddess, who stops with her bow the flying lynxes, and the stags, observe the Lesbian measure, and the motion of my thumb; duly celebrating the son of Latona, duly [celebrating] the goddess that enlightens the night with her shining crescent, propitious to the fruits, and expeditious in rolling on the precipitate months. Shortly a bride you will say: “I, skilled in the measures of the poet Horace, recited an ode which was acceptable to the gods, when the secular period brought back the festal days.””

-Horace, Odes

Diana

“Diana’s faith inbred we bear

Youths whole of heart and maidens fair,

Let boys no blemishes impair,

And girls of Dian sing!

O great Latonian progeny,

Of greatest Jove descendancy,

Whom mother bare ‘neath olive-tree,

Deep in the Delian dell;

That of the mountains reign thou

Queen And forest ranges ever green,

And coppices by man unseen,

And rivers resonant.

Thou art Lucína,

Juno hight

By mothers lien in painful plight,

Thou puissant Trivia and the Light Bastard, yclept the Lune.

Thou goddess with thy monthly stage,

The yearly march doth mete and guage

And rustic peasant’s messuage,

Dost brim with best o’ crops,

Be hailed by whatso name of grace,

Please thee and olden Romulus’ race,

Thy wonted favour deign embrace,

And save with choicest aid.”

-Gaius Valerius Catullus

Bacchus

“I saw in mountain glades

Retired (believe it, after years!)

Teaching his strains to Dryad maids,

While goat-hoof’d satyrs prick’d their ears.

Evoe! my eyes with terror glare;

My heart is revelling with the god;

‘Tis madness! Evoe! spare, O spare,

Dread wielder of the ivied rod!

Yes, I may sing the Thyiad crew,

The stream of wine, the sparkling rills

That run with milk, and honey-dew

That from the hollow trunk distils;

And I may sing thy consort’s crown,

New set in heaven, and Pentheus’ hall

With ruthless ruin thundering down,

And proud Lycurgus’ funeral.

Thou turn’st the rivers, thou the sea;

Thou, on far summits, moist with wine,

Thy Bacchants’ tresses harmlessly

Dost knot with living serpent-twine.

Thou, when the giants, threatening wrack,

Were clambering up Jove’s citadel,

Didst hurl o’erweening Rhoetus back,

In tooth and claw a lion fell.

Who knew thy feats in dance and play

Deem’d thee belike for war’s rough game

Unmeet: but peace and battle-fray

Found thee, their centre, still the same.

Grim Cerberus wagg’d his tail to see

Thy golden horn, nor dreamd of wrong.

But gently fawning, follow’d thee,

And lick’d thy feet with triple tongue.”

-Horace, Odes

“Whither, Bacchus, tear’st thou me.

FiIl’d with thy strength? What dens, what forests these,

Thus in wildering race I see?

What cave shall hearken to my melodies,

Tuned to tell of Caesar’s praise

And throne him high the heavenly ranks among?

Sweet and strange shall be my lays,

A tale till now by poet voice unsung.

As the Evian on the height,

Roused from her sleep, looks wonderingly abroad,

Looks on Thrace with snow-drifts white,

And Rhodope by barbarous footstep trod,

So my truant eyes admire

The banks, the desolate forests. O great King

Who the Naiads dost inspire,

And Bacchants, strong from earth huge trees to wring!

Not a lowly strain is mine,

No mere man’s utterance. O, ’tis venture sweet

Thee to follow, God of wine,

Making the vine-branch round thy temples meet!”

-Horace, Odes

Hercules

“With your hand you slew, unconquered one,

Hylaeus and Pholus, double-formed creatures

Born of clouds; you slew Crete’s monsters

And the tremendous lion under Nemea’s crag.

The Stygian waters trembled in fear at you,

So too did the door-keeper of Orcus, reclining

In his bloody cave atop half-eaten bones;

No sight frightened you, not even Typhoeus himself,

Tall as a mountain, gripping arms; and when

Lerna’s serpent surrounded you

With its mob of heads, you did not lose your wits.

Hail, true offspring of Jove, now added

To the gods to give them glory; come propitious,

With favoring step, to us and to your rites.”

-Vergil, aenid

Faunus

“Faunus, lover of the fleeing Nymphs,

May you go gently through my lands

And sunny fields, and may you depart

Fair-minded toward my tiny nurslings,

If a tender kid is sacrificed to you

At year’s end, if generous wine

Is never lacking from the mixing-bowl

That is companion to Venus, and if

The ancient altar smokes with strong odors.

All the flock plays in the grassy field

When the Nones of December- your holiday-

Come round; the festive village rests

In the meadows with the leisurely ox;

The wolf wanders amidst the bold lambs,

The forest sprinkles its rustic leaves for you;

The digger delights in striking

The earth he hates three times with his foot.”

-Horace, Odes