Aurora and Phoebe

Pulter often personifies the planets and astronomical events (dusk, dawn). This is a convention in Latin and Renaissance English poetry. Here we see Christopher Marlowe’s translation of an Ovid elegy addressed to Aurora and an excerpt from an Aemelia Lanyer poem in which she links Aurora and Phoebe, as Pulter does.

Ovid
Elegy 13, “Ad Aurorem ne properet” [“Do not hurry toward the dawn”]

Now o’er the sea from her old love comes she
That draws the day from heaven’s cold axeltree.
Aurora, whither slid’st thou? Down again,
And birds from Memnon* yearly shall be slain.
*son of Aurora and Tithonus
Now in her tender arms I sweetly bide
If ever; now well lies she by my side.
The air is cold, and sleep is sweetest now,
And birds send forth shrill notes from every bough.
Whither run’st thou, that men and women love not?
Hold in thy rosy horses that they move not.
Ere thou rise, stars teach seamen where to sail,
But when thou come they of their courses fail.
Poor travelers, though tired, rise at thy sight,
And soldiers make them ready to the fight.
The painful hind by thee to field is sent;
Slow oxen early in the yoke are pent.
Thou cozens* boys of sleep, and does betray them
*cheats
To pedants* that with cruel lashes pay them.
*teachers
Thou mak’st the surety* to the lawyer run,
*person posting bail
That with one word hath nigh himself undone.
The lawyer and the client hate thy view,
Both whom thou raisest up to toil anew.
By thy means women of their rest are barred;
Thou set’st their laboring hands to spin and card.
All could I bear, but that the wench should rise
Who can endure save him with whom none lies?
How oft wished I night would not give thee place,
Nor morning stars shun thy uprising face.
How oft that either wind would break thy coach,
Or steeds might fall, forced with thick clouds’ approach.
Whither go’st thou hateful nymph? Memnon the elf
Received his coal-black color from thyself.
Say that thy love with Cephalus* were not known,
*Aurora or Dawn’s lover
Then thinkest thou thy loose life is not shown?
Would Tithon might but talk of thee a while,
Not one in heaven should be more base and vile.
Thou leav’st his bed, because he’s faint through age,
And early mount’st thy hateful carriage,
But held’st thou in thine arms some Cephalus,
Then would’st thou cry: “stay night and run not thus!”
Dost punish me, because years make him wane?
I did not bid thee wed an aged swain!
The moon sleeps with Endymion every day;
Thou art as fair as she––then kiss and play.
Jove, that thou should’st not haste but wait his leisure,
Made two nights one to finish up his pleasure.
I chid no more; she blushed and therefore heard me.
Yet lingered not the day, but morning scared me.

C.M. [Christopher Marlowe], Ovid’s Elegies: Three Books (London, 1603), sigs. B4v-B5v. [modernized]

Aemelia Lanyer
Excerpt of “The Morning” from “The Author’s Dream to the Lady Mary, the Countess Dowager of Pembroke”

Aurora rising from her rosy bed,
First blushed, then wept, to see fair Phoebe graced,
And unto Lady May these words she said:
“Come, let us go, we will not be outfaced.

I will unto Apollo’s wagoner,*
*driver pulling the sun across the sky
A bid him bring his master presently,
That his bright beams may all her beauty mar,
Gracing us with the luster of his eye.

Come, come, sweet May, and fill their laps with flowers,
And I will give a greater light than she;
So all these ladies’ favors shall be ours,
None shall be more esteemed than we shall be.”

Thus did Aurora dim fair Phoebe’s light,
And was received in bright Cynthia’s* place,
*moon goddess
While Flora, all with fragrant flowers dight,*
*decked
Pressed to show the beauty of her face.

Aemelia Lanyer, Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum (London, 1611), sigs. c4r-c4v. [modernized]