Lucilia (wife of Lucretius)

This article is about the wife of Lucretius. For other uses, see Lucilia (disambiguation).

Lucilia is the wife of the Roman philosopher Lucretius and is mentioned in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in "The Wife of Bath's Prologue". According to legend, in order to make her husband love only her, Lucilia prepared an aphrodisiac which killed him.

In his poem "Lucretius", Tennyson follows the tradition that Lucretius was driven mad by a love-potion, which was given to him by Lucilia, and perished by his own hand, His poem first imagines Lucilia greatly dissatisfied with the cooling of her husband's ardor for her after the first bloom of their marriage has passed, and her scheme to reinvigorate that flame:

She brook'd it not; but wrathful, petulant,
Dreaming some rival, sought and found a witch
Who brew'd the philtre which had power, they said.
To lead an errant passion home again.
And this, at times, she mingled with his drink,
And this destroy'd him; for the wicked broth
Confused the chemic labour of the blood,...