Augustan Age is the greatest period of Roman literature, adorned by the poets Virgil, Ovid,
Horace, and Propertius. It is named after the reign (27 BCE-14 CE) of the
emperor Augustus, but many literary historians prefer to date the literary
period from the death of Julius Caesar in 44 CE, thus including the early works
of Virgil and Horace. In English literary history, the term is usually applied
to the period from the accession of Queen Anne (1702) to the deaths of Pope and
Swift (1744-5), although John Diyden, whose major translation of Virgil's works
appeared in 1697, may also be regarded as part of the English phenomenon known
as Augustanism. The Augustans, led by Pope and Swift, wrote in conscious
emulation of the Romans, adopted their literary forms (notably the epistle
and the satire), and aimed to create a similarly sophisticated urban
literary milieu: a characteristic preference in Augustan literature, encouraged
by the periodicals of Addison and Steele.