Of all the poetry Marcus Annaeus Lucanus, better known to English readers as Lucan, wrote during his short life, only his unfinished epic Pharsalia survives. The little known about Lucan comes from two biographies that circulated in some manuscripts of Pharsalia and from the historian Tacitus's Annals. Lucan was born in Cordova in Spain on November 3, A.D. 39. He committed suicide at the order of the emperor Nero on April 30, A.D. 65. The grandson of a famous rhetorician, Seneca the Elder, and the nephew of philosopher, writer, and financier Seneca the Younger, Lucan...
Source: Epics for Students, ©2012 Gale Cengage. All Rights Reserved. Full copyright.
(The entire page is 433 words.)
Want to read the whole thing?
Subscribe to eNotes for access to this content as well as thousands of study guides and critical materials. SUBSCRIBE
