Abstract
The article focuses on Ovid’s Tristia 3.9. The poem offers a dramatic portrayal of the mythical fratricide perpetrated by Medea at Tomi, when she killed her brother Absyrtus. The passages taken into account present an imagery very close to descriptions of the massacres of the Civil wars. Absyrtus’ severed head and torn limbs are details that remind of the reports of Cicero’s death, a theme that was also very popular in the schools of declamation. The connection between Medea and Civil wars was made by Horace too, especially in his Iambi, and by Lucan.
