Discordant harmonies: Ovid's musomachia (Fastos V, 1-110) and the politics of Hesiodic reception

The traditionally harmonious Muses disagree on the etymology of the month May at the beginning of Ovid's Fasti 5. This scene has attracted scholarly attention, following the reappraisal of the Fasti, with critics focusing on the implications of the Muses' disharmony for Ovid's poetic authority. Building on previous discussions of discourse discrepancy, I argue that each of Ovid's Muses employs a different type of Hesiodic poetry; Polyhymnia (who etymologizes Maius from Maiestas) gives a version of the.eogony, Urania (who etymologizes Maius from maiores)recalls the myth of the ages from the Works and Days, and Calliope (who etymologizes Maius from Maia) evokes the diction, motifs, and structure of the Catalogue of Women. Thespeeches of the Muses are framed with a version of Hesiod's poetic initiation, the Dichterweihe of the.eogony. In an inversion of the initiation scene, the Muses leave the poet of the Fasti dumbstruck instead of instructing and inspiring him. Ovid's reception of Hesiod is political. The poet's hesitation to choose one of the Muses is related to Augustus' politics of intolerance; the article aims to highlight not only the literary but also the political repercussions of Hesiodic appropriation.