(Marcus Valerius), a famous Latin poet, born at Bilbilis, now called Babiera, in the kingdom of Arragon in Spain, was of the order of knights. He went to Rome at the age of 21, and stayed there 35 years, under the reign of Galba and the succeeding emperors, till that of Trajan; and having acquired the esteem of Titus and Domitian, he was created tribune. At length, finding that he was neglected by Trajan, he returned to his own country Bilbilis, where he married a wife, and had the happiness to live with her several years. He admires and commends her much, telling her that she alone was sufficient to supply the want of everything he enjoyed at Rome. "Romam tu mibi sola facis," says he, in the 21st epigram of the 12th book. She appears likewise to have been a lady of a very large fortune; for, in the 31st epigram of the same book, he extols the magnificence of the house and gardens he had received from her, and says that she had made him a little kind of monarch."

Munera sunt domino: post septima lustra reverso, Has Marcella domos, parvaeque regna dedit.

There are still extant 14 books of his epigrams, filled with points, a play upon words, and obscenities. The style is affected. However, some of his epigrams are excellent; many of them are of the middling kind; but the greatest part of them are bad: so that Martial never spoke a greater truth, than when he said of his own works,

Sunt bona, sunt quaedam mediocra, sunt mala plura.

There is also attributed to him a book on the spectacles of the amphitheatre; but the most learned critics think that this last work was not written by Martial. The best editions of Martial are, that in Ufius Delphini, 4to, Paris, 1617, and that cum Notis Variis.