This thesis begins by outlining the origins of the elegy as a literary form, passing from the fragmentary remains of the Greek elegy, and of Roman love—poets before Catullus, to a brief discussion of the poetry of Catullus, Propertius and the elegists of the <u>Corpus Tibullianum</u>, indicating in each case the main differences between the literary attitudes of these posts and those of Ovid. A detailed analysis is made of the Ovidian erotic code, as contained in the <u>Amores</u>, the <u>Ars</u> and the <u>Remedia</u>, and other of the <u>Amatoria</u> such as the <u>Heroides</u> and the pseudo-Ovidiun <u>Pulex</u>, demonstrating inter-relationships between these works, and also any correspondences to particular components of Ovid's code in the works of earlier Greek and Roman love-poets. Some attempt is next made to show to what sitent Ovid's themes and mannerisms were adopted by continental poets of the sixteenth century. Neo-Latin poetry is first dealt with, as represented by Joannes Secundus, Beza, Bonnefonius and the writers included in the <u>Carmina Illustrium Poetarum Italorum</u>, 1576, the <u>Delitiae CC. Italorum Poetarum</u>, 1608, the <u>Delitiae c. Poetarum Gallorum</u>, 1609, and the <u>Delitiae Poeterum Bel icorum</u>, 1614. Vernacular writers discussed in this context include Alamanni, Ariosto, Bembo, Berni, Boiardo, della Casa, Chiabrera, Guarini, Marino, Mauro, Poliziano, Serafino, Tasso and Varchi in Italy and de Balf, du Bellsy, Belleau, Marat, Ronsard and Théophile in France.