Horace Horace Quintus Horatius Flaccus (December 8, 65 BC – November 27, 8 BC), known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his "Odes" as just about the only Latin lyrics worth reading: "He can be lofty sometimes, yet he is also full of charm and grace, versatile in his figures, and felicitously daring in his choice of words." Horace also crafted elegant hexameter verses ("Satires" and "Epistles") and caustic iambic poetry ("Epodes"). The hexameters are amusing yet serious works, friendly in
Thomas Watson (poet) Thomas Watson (poet) Thomas Watson (1555–1592) was an English poet and translator, and the pioneer of the English madrigal. His lyrics aside, he wrote largely in Latin, being the first to translate Sophocles' "Antigone" from the Greek. His incorporation of Italianate forms into English lyric verse influenced a generation of English writers, including Shakespeare, who was referred to in 1595 by William Covell as "Watson's heyre" [heir]. He wrote both English and Latin compositions, and was particularly admired for the ones in Latin. His unusual 18-line sonnets were influential, although the form was not generally imitated. Thomas Watson was born