Uploaded November 2023 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago
Satire VI is the most famous of the sixteen Satires. The overarching theme of the poem is a dissuasion of the addressee Postumus from marriage; the narrator uses a series of acidic vignettes on the degraded state of (predominantly female) morality to bolster his argument. At c. 695 lines of Latin hexameter, this satire is nearly twice the length of the next largest of the author's sixteen known satires; Satire VI alone composes Book II of Juvenal's five books of satire.
Satire VI also contains the famous phrase "Sed quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" (but who will guard the guards themselves?), which is variously translated as "But who will guard the guards?", "But who will watch the watchmen?"
Decimus Junius Juvenalis , known in English as Juvenal , was a Roman poet active in the late first and early second century CE. He is the author of the collection of satirical poems known as the Satires. The details of Juvenal's life are unclear, although references within his text to known persons of the late first and early second centuries CE fix his earliest date of composition. One recent scholar argues that his first book was published in 100 or 101.
Satire 6
Satire VI is the most famous of the sixteen Satires. The overarching theme of the poem is a dissuasion of the addressee Postumus from marriage; the narrator uses a series of acidic vignettes on the degraded state of (predominantly female) morality to bolster his argument. At c. 695 lines of Latin hexameter, this satire is nearly twice the length of the next largest of the author's sixteen known satires; Satire VI alone composes Book II of Juvenal's five books of satire.
Satire VI also contains the famous phrase "Sed quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" (but who will guard the guards themselves?), which is variously translated as "But who will guard the guards?", "But who will watch the watchmen?"
Decimus Junius Juvenalis , known in English as Juvenal , was a Roman poet active in the late first and early second century CE. He is the author of the collection of satirical poems known as the Satires. The details of Juvenal's life are unclear, although references within his text to known persons of the late first and early second centuries CE fix his earliest date of composition. One recent scholar argues that his first book was published in 100 or 101.
Satire 6
