Latin lyric poet and one of the literary elite of the Augustan age, Quintus Horatius Flaccus (8 December 65 BC-27 November 8 BC) was the son of a freedman from the Italian town of Venusia (Venosa). His father was a middleman at auctions, a profession gainful enough to allow his son to study in Rome, Athens and Rhodes. Although initially opposed to Augustus (he fought against him at Philippi), he was later admitted to the literary circle of Maecenas and was highly regarded by the emperor. Horace wrote many different sorts of poems (iambs, satires, metrical letters), but is best known for his 4 books of Odes and is rightly regarded as the leading composer of Latin lyric poetry.