Canidia Channels Medea: Rereading Horace’s Epode 5

This article examines the implications Medea has for the witch Canidia in Horace’s Epode 5. Although Medea employed magic to kill Jason’s new bride Creusa, she never used erotic magic and instead murdered her children to enact her revenge. Via references to Medea’s nonerotic magic (Creusa’s gifts, 5.61–66) and parallels between Medea and Canidia (abandoned by their lovers, they resort to child-murder), Horace reveals that Canidia is an ineffectual practitioner of erotic magic, explaining why her lover has not returned, and an anti-mother figure, suggesting that she will kill the boy she has kidnapped for a new love potion.