# J'aime le souvenir de ces époques nues · I love the memory of those naked ages

Les Fleurs du mal · Charles Baudelaire · Spleen and Ideal

Source: https://1732studios.com/books/baudelaire/j-aime-le-souvenir-de-ces-epoques-nues. Data: https://1732studios.com/books/baudelaire/j-aime-le-souvenir-de-ces-epoques-nues.json.

**1** J'aime le souvenir de ces époques nues,  
I love the memory of those naked ages,

**2** Dont Phoebus se plaisait à dorer les statues.  
whose statues Phoebus took pleasure in gilding.
> «se plaire à» + infinitive: «se plaire à faire qqch.» is a pronominal idiom meaning 'to take pleasure in doing something, to delight in'. «se plaisait» is the imperfect of «se plaire»; the relative «Dont» (= of which) links back to «ces époques nues», so the sun-god Phoebus delighted in gilding the statues of those ages.

**3** Alors l'homme et la femme en leur agilité  
Then man and woman, in their agility,

**4** Jouissaient sans mensonge et sans anxiété,  
took their pleasure without lie and without anxiety,
> «jouir»: «jouir» means 'to enjoy, to take pleasure, to delight in (life, the senses)'; «jouissaient» is the imperfect, an ongoing state in this lost golden age. The word carries a frank sensual charge that the negatives «sans mensonge ... sans anxiété» (without lie, without anxiety) deliberately purify.

**5** Et, le ciel amoureux leur caressant l'échine,  
and, the loving sky caressing their spines,
> Possessive dative with the body: French marks the body part with the article «l'échine» (the spine) and signals the owner with the indirect-object pronoun «leur» (to/for them): «leur caressant l'échine» = 'caressing their spines'. «caressant» is the present participle of «caresser»; «échine» is the backbone, ridge of the spine.

**6** Exerçaient la santé de leur noble machine.  
they exercised the health of their noble engine.

**7** Cybèle alors, fertile en produits généreux,  
Cybele then, fertile in generous yields,
> Cybele: Cybele is the ancient Anatolian and Greco-Roman mother-goddess, the «Magna Mater» of the earth and all living things. Baudelaire makes her the nourishing principle of the golden age; in the next lines she becomes a «louve» (she-wolf) suckling the whole universe — an echo of the wolf that nursed Romulus and Remus.

**8** Ne trouvait point ses fils un poids trop onéreux,  
did not find her sons too onerous a burden,
> «ne ... point» (emphatic negation): «ne ... point» is a literary, more absolute equivalent of «ne ... pas» — 'not at all, by no means'. Here «Ne trouvait point ses fils un poids trop onéreux» = 'did not find her sons too burdensome a weight at all'. The construction «trouver + object + attribute» means 'to find someone/something to be (such)'.

**9** Mais, louve au coeur gonflé de tendresses communes  
but, a she-wolf with heart swollen with shared tendernesses,

**10** Abreuvait l'univers à ses tétines brunes.  
she watered the whole universe at her brown teats.
> «abreuver»: «abreuver» means 'to water (animals), to give to drink, to slake the thirst of'; «abreuvait» is the imperfect. Properly used of leading livestock to water, the verb fits the «louve» (she-wolf) suckling «l'univers» — the whole creation drinking at her «tétines brunes» (brown teats).

**11** L'homme, élégant, robuste et fort, avait le droit  
Man, elegant, robust, and strong, had the right

**12** D'être fier des beautés qui le nommaient leur roi;  
to be proud of the beauties who named him their king;

**13** Fruits purs de tout outrage et vierges de gerçures,  
Fruits pure of all outrage and virgin of cracks,
> «vierge de» / «gerçure»: «vierge de qqch.» means 'untouched by, free of, innocent of' something. A «gerçure» (f.) is a crack or chap in skin or fruit-rind. So «vierges de gerçures» = 'free of any cracks' — the bodies of that age are figured as flawless «fruits» (the metaphor continues into the next line's «chair lisse»).

**14** Dont la chair lisse et ferme appelait les morsures!  
whose smooth, firm flesh invited the bite!


**15** Le Poète aujourd'hui, quand il veut concevoir  
The Poet today, when he wishes to conceive

**16** Ces natives grandeurs, aux lieux où se font voir  
those native grandeurs, in the places where there are shown
> Pronominal passive «se faire voir»: «se faire voir» literally 'to make themselves seen' works here as a passive: «aux lieux où se font voir / La nudité ...» = 'in the places where the nakedness ... is shown / on display'. The pronominal «se» + «faire» + infinitive lets the grandeurs be exhibited without naming an agent — the impersonal display of modern bodies.

**17** La nudité de l'homme et celle de la femme,  
the nakedness of man and that of woman,
> Demonstrative «celle de»: «celle» is the feminine demonstrative pronoun standing in for «la nudité» to avoid repeating it: «la nudité de l'homme et celle de la femme» = 'the nakedness of man and that of woman'. «celui/celle/ceux/celles de» = 'the one(s) of / belonging to'.

**18** Sent un froid ténébreux envelopper son âme  
feels a tenebrous cold envelop his soul
> Verb of perception + infinitive: A verb of perception such as «sentir» (to feel) takes a direct infinitive for the action perceived: «Sent un froid ... envelopper son âme» = 'feels a cold ... envelop his soul'. The subject is «Le Poète» from the stanza's opening line; «ténébreux» means dark, shadowy, gloomy.

**19** Devant ce noir tableau plein d'épouvantement.  
before this black picture full of dread.

**20** Ô monstruosités pleurant leur vêtement!  
O monstrosities weeping for their clothing!

**21** Ô ridicules troncs! torses dignes des masques!  
O ridiculous trunks! torsos fit for masks!
> «digne de»: «digne de» means 'worthy of, fit for, deserving of'. «torses dignes des masques» = 'torsos worthy of masks' — bodies so grotesque they belong in the carnival or the anatomy of caricature. The exclamatory «Ô ...!» piled up across these lines is Baudelaire's apostrophe to modern, deformed flesh.

**22** Ô pauvres corps tordus, maigres, ventrus ou flasques,  
O poor bodies twisted, scrawny, potbellied or flabby,

**23** Que le dieu de l'Utile, implacable et serein,  
whom the god of the Useful, implacable and serene,

**24** Enfants, emmaillota dans ses langes d'airain!  
swaddled as children in his swaddling-bands of bronze!
> «emmailloter» / «langes»: «emmailloter» = 'to swaddle (a baby) in cloth'; «emmaillota» is the literary past historic (passé simple). «langes» are an infant's swaddling-clothes. The «dieu de l'Utile» (god of the Useful — modern utilitarian industry) binds children from birth in «langes d'airain», bands of bronze: a brutal image of bodies cramped by an iron, mercantile age.

**25** Et vous, femmes, hélas! pâles comme des cierges,  
And you, women, alas! pale as altar candles,

**26** Que ronge et que nourrit la débauche, et vous, vierges,  
whom debauchery gnaws and feeds at once, and you, virgins,
> Inverted subject after relative «que»: «que» is the object relative ('whom'); the subject «la débauche» (debauchery) is inverted to the end of the clause, after its two verbs: «Que ronge et que nourrit la débauche» = 'whom debauchery gnaws and nourishes'. The paradox is deliberate: the same vice that consumes these women is what keeps them alive.

**27** Du vice maternel traînant l'hérédité  
dragging the heredity of your mothers' vice

**28** Et toutes les hideurs de la fécondité!  
and all the hideousnesses of fecundity!


**29** Nous avons, il est vrai, nations corrompues,  
We have, it is true, corrupted nations that we are,

**30** Aux peuples anciens des beautés inconnues:  
beauties unknown to the ancient peoples:
> «inconnu à» + displaced word order: «inconnu à qqn» = 'unknown to someone'. The natural prose order is «des beautés inconnues aux peuples anciens» ('beauties unknown to the ancient peoples'); the verse fronts «Aux peuples anciens» across the line break for the rhyme. «Nous avons ... des beautés» from the previous line completes the sentence.

**31** Des visages rongés par les chancres du coeur,  
faces eaten away by the cankers of the heart,

**32** Et comme qui dirait des beautés de langueur;  
and, as one might say, beauties of languor;
> «comme qui dirait»: «comme qui dirait» is a fixed colloquial phrase meaning 'so to speak, as it were, something like'. It softens or hedges the phrase that follows — here «des beautés de langueur» ('beauties of languor') — letting Baudelaire half-ironically grant the modern age its own sickly, drooping kind of beauty.

**33** Mais ces inventions de nos muses tardives  
But these inventions of our belated muses

**34** N'empêcheront jamais les races maladives  
will never prevent our sickly races
> «empêcher qqn de» + infinitive: «empêcher quelqu'un de faire» = 'to prevent someone from doing', always with «de» before the infinitive — which here arrives only on the next line («De rendre à la jeunesse un hommage profond»). «N'empêcheront jamais» is the future of «empêcher» negated by «ne ... jamais» (never).

**35** De rendre à la jeunesse un hommage profond,  
from rendering deep homage to youth,

**36** — À la sainte jeunesse, à l'air simple, au doux front,  
— to holy youth, with its simple air, its gentle brow,

**37** À l'oeil limpide et clair ainsi qu'une eau courante,  
to the eye limpid and clear as running water,
> «ainsi que» = comme: «ainsi que» here means 'just as, like' (a literary equivalent of «comme»), introducing the comparison «limpide et clair ainsi qu'une eau courante» = 'limpid and clear as running water'. Elsewhere «ainsi que» can mean 'as well as'; context — a likeness, not an addition — settles the sense.

**38** Et qui va répandant sur tout, insouciante  
and which goes scattering over everything, carefree,
> «aller» + present participle: «aller» + a present participle expresses a continuing, gradually spreading action: «qui va répandant sur tout» = 'which keeps scattering / goes on spreading over everything'. The relative «qui» refers to «la sainte jeunesse»; «insouciante» (carefree, heedless) agrees with it in the feminine.

**39** Comme l'azur du ciel, les oiseaux et les fleurs,  
like the blue of the sky, the birds, and the flowers,

**40** Ses parfums, ses chansons et ses douces chaleurs!  
its perfumes, its songs, and its sweet warmths!

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Source text: public domain (Charles Baudelaire, d. 1867). English translation: © 2026 1732 Studios, LLC — original draft, pending editorial review.