Difficult to classify, unknown but for one extant manuscript and of uncertain authorship, the Versus Eporedienses (VE), an eleventh-century medieval Latin love poem, receives close study by K. Ascribed to a cleric Wido in the see of Ivrea, the poet's 150 elegiac couplets weave the story of his amorous encounter with a nymph at the river Po and his attempt to woo her with gifts. Interwoven with the poet's elaborate descriptions of these worldly gifts lies the metapoetic promise of his poem, the nymph's eternal fame: any girl who desires to give herself to the poet will be immortal (immortalis erit, 290). K. addresses new aspects of the poem along with ideas explored in three earlier studies. In the first, ‘The Love Elegy in Medieval Latin Literature (Pseudo-Ovidiana and Ovidian Imitations)’ (2013), K. contends that the VE is a sterling representative of the ‘Aetas Ovidiana’. In the second, ‘The Elegiac Love Poems Versus Eporedienses and De Tribus Puellis and the Ovidian Backdrop’ (2013), K. argues that the VE, rather than a prototype of the vernacular pastourelle, served as one model of medieval elegiac comedies. More recently, in ‘Amores 3.6 and the Versus Eporedienses’ (2016), K. speculates that the nymph of the VE's love duet might be Rhea Silvia. All three topics reappear in the introduction (pp. 13–23), but readers who familiarise themselves with the prior publications will more readily follow K.'s arguments.

In highlighting the Ovidian references in the VE, K. takes the view of Ludwig Traube, who coined the term Aetas Ovidiana over a century ago, characterising it as a twelfth-century literary movement localised in the Loire Valley. K. takes for granted that the VE is part of that Ovidian revival when he asserts that in the VE ‘Ovid dominates’ (p. 21). While his commentary predominantly cites conscious allusions, imitations and references to Ovid's themes and metres, K. also demonstrates that the VE is no simple parody and that the poet creatively appropriates a range of Roman auctores.

Many scholars have considered the VE a proto-pastourelle, a vernacular poem first found in twelfth-century France (pp. 14–15). Characterised by its lyric seduction of a maiden, elements of the pastourelle that appear in the first 36 verses of the VE are discussed in detail in a subsection of the commentary entitled ‘Introductory Remarks on VE 1–36’ (pp. 47–50). Despite these ‘pastoral traits’, K. considers the VE more akin to the so-called elegiac comedies than a proto-pastourelle (p. 50 n. 15). Another twelfth-century Loire literary movement, these dramas also echo the amorous themes and language of Ovid. K. finds striking similarities with one particular comedy, the De Tribus Puellis, enough to suggest that the VE may have been its model.

The identification of the Trojan maiden, the topic of K.'s 2016 article, is taken up again in the introduction (p. 17) and commentary (p. 53). At first reluctant to respond to the poet's importuning, the maiden finally identifies herself as of Trojan ancestry (25–30) and explains that she is collecting flowers along the river because she is fleeing an assailant (31–2). K. finds a strong parallel situation in Ovid, Amores 3.6, a lover's address to a swollen stream (amnis) that he needs to cross in order to meet his inamorata. The only Roman story (3.6.49–82) in this catalogue of Greek mythological encounters is that of Rhea Silvia and the river Tiber. Like the nymph in the VE, Rhea Silvia at first rejects beckoning protestations of love, is fleeing an assailant (3.6.49) and claims Trojan lineage (3.6.65); and like the poet of the VE, the lover promises rich gifts (3.6.66). More than simply a poetic pendant to Amores 3.6 K. argues that the presence of Rhea Silvia in the VE's northern Italian setting is also an assertion of political power: the foundation of Rome by Romulus is here transferred to the Po region in the period of the poem's composition (1080s), when emperors were crowned at Pavia. In a relevant article that K. seems to have overlooked (‘Ennius, Ovid and Representations of Ilia’, MD 32 [1994], 99–112), C. Connors makes a similar argument about Rhea Silvia's role in political foundation and poetic productivity. Tracing the fluvial seduction of Ilia from Homer to Ennius to Ovid, Connors senses a new female subjectivity in the post-Homeric narratives – Ilia's own awareness of her plight. This depiction of female self-consciousness should not be interpreted as sympathy on the part of the poets, Connors cautions, so much as an opportunity to exploit their metaliterary power to ensure their own fame.

Following the introduction is K.'s edition, a revision of E. Dümmler's 1872 edition with some references to his 1869 edition. The facing prose translation, which K. concedes is at times obscured by ‘unusual or awkward syntax and vocabulary’ (p. 22) necessitated by the bisyllabic leonine rhyme, updates W.D. Paden's translation (The Medieval Pastourelle, vol. 1 [1987], pp. 13–25). The comprehensive, erudite and informative verse-by-verse commentary is preceded by a caveat lector, which explains K.'s rather complex scale for identifying and assessing the classical and medieval allusions and intertexts he discusses. In the three appendices K. details lexical matches with classical and late Latin poetry; contemporary poetry; and later twelfth- and thirteenth-century love poetry. From this meticulous and comprehensive assemblage of similar texts and verses K. extrapolates insightful conclusions about the development of Latin love poetry in ecclesiastical and secular centres of education throughout northern Italy and central France: the new imaginary geography these poets construct amounts to a translatio of ancient poetry into their own locations and poems.

K. divides the poem into five sections: ‘I. The poet's meeting with the Trojan maiden (1–36); II. The invitatio (37–244); III. The poet's self-praise (245–56); IV. Descriptio puellae (257–80); V. Dichterstolz: the poet's eternal glory (281–300)’. The invitatio's extended descriptions of seductive gifts emphasise east–west trade and economic growth in the eleventh century (pp. 15–16). Among the gifts are royal tents (tentoria) of a thick variegated weave (151–2). In tracing their legacy from King Darius through Henry IV to himself, the poet also links his literary legacy to that of his fellow Po poet Virgil. The tents, however, may lead readers to another line of inquiry not considered by K.: the Ides of March rites of Anna Perenna (Fasti 3.523–696) (S.J. Heyworth, Ovid Fasti Book III [2019], pp. 187–224). This popular spring festival celebrated with drinking and lusty love games by couples along the Tiber's banks recalls the story of Anna Perenna's rescue by the Tiber and her transformation into a nymph. When the VE's poet invites the nymph to join him ‘for some fun and joy under the sunshade’ (40), he offers to construct a canopy from branches and foliage (148) or, instead, from tents (tentoria, 149). In Ovid's account (3.527–8) revellers pitch tents (tentoria, 527) or construct a covering from leafy branches. The festival includes a drinking contest – the couples pray for as many years as the cups (cyathos) they drink (3.531–2) – in honour of Anna Perenna's role as a divinity of the year (annus + per+annus). In the VE's drinking contest the nymph may drink a thousand wines (53) in the poet's cups (ciathi, 57) ‘purchased for a thousand shillings’. Both poems describe the nymph as fleeing an unwanted pursuer and paint a picture of her airborne hair streaming around her as she dances, and both conclude with the promise of immortality. Swept up by the river, Anna is transformed into a nymph hidden in that amne perenne (‘perennial stream’), another reference to her name (3.654). In the VE the poet promises his nymph the fame of Ovid's Corinna (297–8), everlasting in his song (carmine perpes, 300). This connection with Anna Perenna is just one example of the ways in which the rich intertextuality K. has traversed in this slim volume will invite readers to further literary connections.

There are a few minor errors in, for example, spelling (langue, 137; detials, 138; scholares, 170), an incomplete note (p. 141 n. 31), a missing line number in the apparatus (p. 38 251 forma). But these do not detract from the exciting banquet of ancient and medieval comparanda that K. has compiled, as thickly woven and as rewarding to read as the operis varii delicie (152) of the VE.