MANILA, Mark (Marcus Manilius)

(flowering of activity - beginning 1. BC)
Was famous unfinished didactic poem Astronomika in 5 songs (4258 hexameter lines) devoted to astronomy and astrology. The poem describes the shape of the Earth and its origin, the four elements, the position of Earth in the Universe, the zodiac, the constellations of the Northern and Southern Hemisphere and the nature of stars. With regard to the consequences of astrology for morality, then Manilius speaks about the power of the gods, that fate and character of a person identified the heavens, and the people deprived of freedom of will. Manilius considers man as a microcosm, and shows us signs of the zodiac constellations with. All work Manilius penetrate deep conviction in the existence once and for all the established order of the universe and the universal presence of the divine spirit, which determines the fate of people. The sky is the parent of humanity and the Earth - a reflection of the celestial world. Deprived of the free will of the people may only inquire about the stars of his destiny.
His knowledge of astronomy Manilius drawn from Posidonius and Arata, author of the phenomena, in the field of astrology, he seems to be Asclepiades of Bithynia, who taught grammar at Rome in the days of Pompey. Manilius - stoic in their convictions, although Astronomika reveals a noticeable effect Lucretius's poem On the Nature, in which he earnestly preaches Epicureanism. In the poem Manilius shows a tendency to rhetoric, it is a good versifier and sometimes he succeed expressive descriptions, but the prosaic topic makes it impossible to shine the poetic skill. Therefore Astronomiku, although it is one of the classics, read very seldom.