To a Painter | Paint, I pray, O painter, this girl with such beauty

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by Anonymous / Unidentified Author

Translation © by Grant Hicks

Ad pictorem

Language: Latin

Our translations: ENG

Pinge, precor, pictor, tali candore puellam,
qualem finxit amor, qualem meus ignis anhelat.

nil pingendo neges: tegat omnia Serica vestis,
quae totum prodat tenui velamine corpus:

te quoque pulset Amor, crucient pigmenta medullas.
si bonus es pictor, miser in suspiria pinge.

Text Authorship:

by Anonymous / Unidentified Author, from Anthologia Latina, no. 10. [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

by Jan Novák (1921 - 1984), "Ad pictorem", from Cantica latina, no. 15 [sung text checked 1 time]

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

ENG English (Grant Hicks) , "To a Painter", copyright © 2025, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 6
Word count: 41

To a Painter

Language: English after the Latin

Paint, I pray, O painter, this girl with such beauty
as love has fashioned, as my fire breathes forth.

Leave nothing out while painting; let silken clothing cover all,
revealing the whole body thinly veiled:

and may Love strike you too, may the pigments torment the marrow.
If you're a good painter, paint like a poor man driven to sighing.

Text Authorship:

Translation from Latin to English copyright © 2025 by Grant Hicks, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you may ask the copyright-holder(s) directly or ask us; we are authorized to grant permission on their behalf. Please provide the translator's name when contacting us.
Contact: licenses@email.lieder.example.net

Based on:

a text in Latin by Anonymous/Unidentified Artist , from Anthologia Latina, no. 10.
- Go to the text page.

This text was added to the website: 2025-10-05
Line count: 6
Word count: 60