The Astronomica of Manilius: a five-book didactic poem at least partly written under Augustus. General first impressions might lead one to think that Manilius has much to attract critical attention from the Anglophone world. For the classical scholar, both the Augustan age and the ‘golden’ nature of its literary production are of course central to research and teaching. For the more general enthusiast, Manilius claims to be—and the extant literary record would support him—the first Roman to set out the workings of natal (or genethlialogical) astrology, a topic to whose enduring popular interest any daily western newspaper will testify.