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When did Virgil write the Eclogues?

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Ancient Roman mosaic showing the poet Virgil seated and writing, flanked by the muses Clio and Melpomene, displayed in a decorative border. — Virgil Virgil (centre) holding a scroll with a quotation from the *Aeneid* and flanked by the muses Clio and Melpomene, mosaic, early 3rd century ce; in the Bardo National Museum, Tunis, Tunisia.

The Roman poet Virgil composed his Eclogues—a collection of 10 pastoral poems—between 42 and 37 BCE.1

These poems, which marked his earliest certain work, were influenced by the Greek poet Theocritus but introduced a new direction to the genre by blending idealized pastoral settings with contemporary Roman realities and allegories. Notably, the fourth eclogue, which prophesies the return of a Golden Age, is firmly dated to 41–40 BCE.12