Pro Traiano

My roommate Zev Eisenberg, a New Media major at UMaine, has at last completed a type-story animation. Using Trajan Pro font, he animates a history of Rome, from Aeneas to the Western Empire’s fall at the hands of the Goths. I was the linguistic and historical consultant for this project.

Requiem Miseni

Less than a week remains in my summer vacation, and the rendering is essentially complete. What remains is endless polishing, especially for the earlier lines of the poem. For example, here are the reworked lines 148-189 & 214-237, describing the death and funeral of Misenus. While the most irrelevant section of Book VI with regards to L’Inferno, it does put Aeneas in a despondent position comparable to Dante’s plight before he began his own descent.

…nor cold steel may vanquish. But splayed without breath’s
thy comerade’s cold corpse—but alas! thou art clueless—
polluting the whole of thy navy with death,

while seekst thou my auguries, hangst in our homes.
This poor man, entomb him, may rest he in peace.
By cows’ immolation shalt first thou atone.

Thus only shalt see thou the swamps of the Styx
and realms barred to mortals.” She closes her lips.
Then exits Aeneas, his mournful face fixed,

and leaving the cavern, these myst’ries he turned
all o’er in his conscience as loyal Achates,
his comrade, plants footsteps with equal concerns.

And various matters they shared in their speech:
which friend’s fated dead and whose corpse to entomb?
And see they Misenus left dry on the beach,

destroyed by a death so unworthy of him,
Misenus of Ae’lus, whose trumpet’s unmatched
to kindle like fire men and Mars with war hymns:

a friend of great Hector, to battle ‘round Hector
he charged with the fame of both trumpet and lance.
Despoiled of his life by Achilles the victor

he left to Aeneas this brave hero bound,
confed’rate to one of no lesser pursuits
But when with his conch he made Ocean resound,

his tune tried to rival the gods—what a fool!—
his challenger, Triton, if canst thou believe,
submerged him in surf ‘twixt the spray and the shoals.

Around him all gathered, with grief-stricken clamor,
Aeneas especially. Then Sibyl’s edicts
he hastened in tears, raising funeral altars

towards heavenly summits with trunk upon trunk.
They log ancient forests and dens of wild beasts,
down crashing the spruces and elms the ax struck.

They split by a wedge trunks of oak trees and ash;
on mountainous slopes loads of timber roll down.
Nor’s first’s not Aeneas, amidst all these tasks,

encouraging comrades and girding their blades.
His heart’s in a whirlwind of troublesome thoughts,
beholding great forests these things now he prays:

“if only should now that gold bough in a tree
reveal itself in this great forest, too truly
fulfilled be the prophetess’ sayings of thee…

…A pyre they build first out of pine and oak lumber,
the sides veiled in garlands of dark vegetation,
and for its façade, native cypress-tree timber.

Its peak’s ornamented with weapons agleam.
Some ready hot fluids and lavas of bronze,
anoint the cold body and lather it clean.

Then wailing arises. A bier bears his corpse
enshrouded in purple, traditional cloaks.
By others a hearse great in size him supports.

By ancestral custom, a ministry tearful,
averting their faces turned down in respect,
they blazed oil and incense and meats sacrificial.

Collapsed into ashes the flames ceased to burn,
and wine cleansed the relics and thirst-stricken embers.
The bones Corynaeus concealed in an urn.

He blessed all the fighters with pure water sprinkling
so lightly with dew from an olive tree’s branch,
comrades consecrated the requiem sing.

Then pious Aeneas builds his mausoleum,
a tomb for his trumpet, his oars and his arms,
beneath a tall mountain, now known as Misenum,

exalting his name through the centuries past.
Accomplished in haste are the Sibyl’s commands.
There was a deep cavern, its orifice vast…

benedicti qui sedeant hic

I am very close to finishing the entire rendering and have already gone back to revise earlier parts. I realized that the first 250 or so lines need a lot of work rhythmically, since it wasn’t until that point that I “found my groove” and the standard rhythm to each line came naturally. For now, I welcome ye to the Elysian fields, on the “right-hand path” where the virtuous pagans have their haunts, lines 634-702.

And having accomplished the goddess’ service,
they reach cheerful places and blithe promenades:
The Havens of Holy Ones, dwellings of bliss.

Here fields th’ether clothes in a lavender dawn,
its own constellations and sun it perceives.
Some work on gymnastics, train limbs on the lawn,

competing in sports, wrestling on golden sands;
some dance to a rhythm and canticles sing.
That priest with long surplice come from Thracian lands,

the sevenfold melody’s measures he plays,
with ivory plectra, now fingers he plucks.
Here Teucer’s great scions of our ancient race,

Troy’s founder and men of superior years:
there’s Dardanus, Ilus, Assaracus too.
He marvels at arms, cars without charioteers.

In earth planted spears, horses graze everywhere,
set loose through the pasture. Of war-cars and arms,
what grace was in life of these things and what care,

to feed shimm’ring steeds, when here follows the same.
He glimpses all ‘round: merry men on the green;
glad hymns to Apollo a chorus exclaims.

The plains smell of laurel, whence th’upper world’s flood,
the stream Eridanus through forests above.
Here patriot troops who in battle shed blood,

and those who in life holy orders took part,
those worthy of Phoebus, those prophets devout,
th’ennoblers of life by discov’ry of arts,

those risen by merits and mem’rable tasks.
Their temples by snowy-white fillets are fringed,
whom poured all around them the Sibyl thus asked

Musaeus midway through the plenteous throng,
whose loftier shoulders she spied over all:
“Please tell, joyful shades, and thou, bard, best with song,

which region’s the place where Anchises’ soul haunts?
For him navigated we Erebus’ depths.”
And straightway the hero returned this response

“no home here is fixed; live we in shady groves,
make pillows of riverbanks, meadows made lush.
But ye, if your hearts such ambition behoves,

ascend to this ridge; down a path I’ll point then.”
He showcased the luminous fields from above;
and hence from the prominent heights they descend.

And father Anchises in verdurous vales,
surveying the souls who’ll return to the light,
reflecting with zeal he reviews the detail

of kinsfolk, descendants, posterity prized,
their fates and their fortunes, their manners and deeds.
And heading through grasslands Aeneas he spies.

With palms both outstretched with familial desire,
tears pour down his cheek and he speaks with this voice:
“Art here thou, has piety, hope of thy sire,

surmounted thy quest? May thy face I behold,
my son, and hear answers of speech that I know?
Indeed I was reck’ning the future foretold,

and numb’ring the times; not my worry deceives.
I welcome my son, many perils thou braved,
who voyaged through myriad nations and seas!

How feared I, lest Libya injured thee so!”
Moreover Aeneas: “oh father, thy ghost,
so often did haunt me, urged me here to go.

My fleet tastes Tyrrhenian salt. Your embrace,
please give it, dear father, and do not withdraw!”
He burst into tears then, bedewing his face,

thrice throwing his arms ‘round his neck as he weeps:
thrice fleeing the ghost from his futile caress,
like tender, soft breezes and fluttering sleep.

Si Monumentum Requires, Circumspice

From time to time I like to keep my Latin skills sharp by doing English-to-Latin translations. So one day I decided to translate the Wikipedia article of my favorite band, Deathspell Omega, into Latin. This was a fun exercise, especially concerning a band which makes extensive use of Latin themselves. It was a challenge finding Latin equivalents of modern and musical vocabulary, such as “split album” (album partitum) and “compilation” (congries), but if better terms exist, there appear to be plenty of Latinists like myself scouring Vicipaedia Latina for errors and inconsistency. Some of the vocab I borrowed from Metallica’s Latin page, such as words for “band” (grex) and guitarist (citarista). So let this be another monument to my quest to unite Latin and Metal, the marriage of my two worlds. 

Latin article
English article 

Ecce Tartarus

The image you see above is not only the cover to arguably the greatest Thrash Metal album of all time, it is also a fitting backdrop to what I’m about to present here. This is my favorite part of Aeneid VI, lines 547-627, the ESSENCE of Dante’s Inferno, and thus the centerpiece of my thesis project. I’ve really gotten in the zone in terms of poetic rendering, and am already well ahead of what is here. So another update should happen in a week or two. But for now, strap yourself in for a Classical Hell-ride. Again, those interested can find the full Latin text here.

He’d spoken this much, then reversed his footfalls.
Aeneas looks back, under cliffs to the left,
at castles colossal embraced by three walls,
 
surrounded by rapids, a torrent of fire,
the Phlegethon, twisting, resounding through rocks.
Him facing the gates, solid adamant spires,
 
which men nor immortals could cut down with swords;
a tower of iron stands fast ‘gainst the winds;
Tisiphone dwells there, her gown stained with gore,
 
who keeps o’er the narthex insomniac vigil.
Such wailings arise, savage torture resounds:
the dragging of chains and the grinding of metal.
 
Aeneas in shock pandemonium views:
“Oh virgin, describe all the sins of these men.
What pain fills the air! Who deserve such abuse?”
 
The prophetess spoke: “king of Teucrian blood,
no pure man by law on these thresholds sets foot.
When Hecate gave me th’Avernian wood,
 
she taught me in full retribution divine.
Crete’s king Rhadamanthus commands these abodes,
his lash draws confessions, he hears of their crimes,
 
the fraud for which men in superior lands
delayed to atone and in death missed their chance.
Forthwith that avenger, a scourge in her hands,
 
Tisiphone torments the guilty with snakes,
and summons her sisters, a Furious host. 
The thund’rous gates open, the hinges they quake.
 
Dost see thou what sentry keeps watch o’er these halls?
That figure surveilling the vestibule there?
Huge Hydra, with fifty black jaws, worst of all,
 
in Tartarus lingers, whose very abyss,
which downwardly reaching extends twice as far
as th’heavenly heights gazed on mount Olympus.
 
Here Earth’s ancient brood of the Titanic spawn,
cast down by a thunderbolt, writhe in these pits.
Aloeus’ twin scions beheld I, whose brawn
 
attempted to sunder the sky into shreds,
and topple great Jove from the kingdom of Heav’n.
I saw Salmoneus pay penalties dread.
 
Th’Olympian thund’rer he dared masquerade;
conveyed by four horses and brandishing torches
through Elis and cities of Greece on parade
 
he claimed laud and honor reserved for the gods,
with horn-hoofed stampeding and cymbals of bronze,
insanely lampooning the lightning and clouds.

But th’Almighty Father on high missiles hurled,
not torch-lights and smoke but the genuine fire,
which plunged him to Hell in a hurricane swirl.
 
Indeed also Tityos, stepson of Earth,
whose body entire o’er six acres is stretched;
Gigantic the vulture with beak sharp and curved

devouring his liver for vengeance e’er fresh;
it gropes at its banquet, his ribcage its nest;
nor’s respite permitted to immortal flesh.
 
Remember the Lapiths, Pirithoüs, Ixion?
There hangs a black crag o’er them now, now it’s slipping,
seems likely to fall: here piled high festal cushions
 
on couches of gold, kingly feasts ‘fore their eyes;
next to it the greatest of Furies reclines,
who laying their hands on these tables denies,
 
her deafening voice in eruption, enraged.
Despisers of brothers in life suffer here,
whose parents they beat, and whose clients betrayed,
 
those lolling in riches, who mined their rewards,
yet slighting their kinsfolk, the largest this throng;
adulterers, fighters of unholy wars,
 
and men who the hands of their lords they deceived,
awaiting reprisal them all. Do not ask
the fortunes for which retribution’s received.
 
Some stripped strapped to wheels, or big boulders make roll.
Poor Theseus broods for eternity long,
and Phlegyas, most wretched, admonishes all,
 
and testifies this, crying out to the shades:
“learn justice, be warned not the gods to offend.”
His homeland he sold to a master of slaves,
 
forged edicts for bribes, forged them multiple times,
and ravished his daughter and marital hymns.
All dared monstrous sins, for which judgment’s assigned.
 
Not if I possessed hundred mouths, hundred tongues,
and unyielding speech, count I couldn’t all these sins,
and run through the penalties fit for such wrongs.”

Campi Lugentes

I am over half-way through my rendering of Book VI, having put nearly 500 lines into rhyme and meter. And I feel my grasp on the rhythm further strengthening. Looking back at the first hundred lines I rendered, it looks embarrassingly clumsy. So by the time I finish the initial rendering, it won’t be too hard going back and bringing those lines up to the current level, or better. Inspired by a 19th-century translation of Aeschylus, I’m making sparing use of eliding the’s as th’ and such, plus extending the meter to 12 syllables if absolutely necessary. So to mark my progress I present lines 430-474, freshly rendered. They cover Aeneas’ entrance into the Fields of Mourning and his encounter with the shade of Dido. This is one of the more emotional scenes in the poem, so keep the tissues at hand.

Next those with death’s sentence whose charge true was not,
Assigned weren’t these realms without judge, without lot:
For Minos th’ inquisitor stirring the pot,

calls silent assemblies whose sins they confess.
Here sorrowful shades by whose own hand brought death,
despising the light of the sun, though guiltless,

their spirits discarded. How now they think better
to’ve borne in the aether both begg’ry and toil!
The sorrowful swamp by decree keeps them fettered;

the Styx them imprisons nine times circling round.
Not far off stretched in all directions outpoured
the places they call Fields of Mourning are found,

of those by love’s ruthless decaying consumed,
sequestered in forests of myrtle and glades:
from cares not released by the hour of doom:

See Phaedra and Procris, Eriph’lë in tears,
displaying the wounds of her barbaric son;
Evadne, Pasiphë, Laodamia’s here,

a youth named Canaeus, in womanly flesh,
by fate to her earlier figure transformed.
Phoenician queen Dido, the stab-wound still fresh,

was wand’ring this forest: whom Ilium’s knight
through shadows obscure standing there recognized,
as one at the fall of the month’s op’ning night

thinks sees he or saw the moon clouds rising through.
Tears falling with love he addresses her thus:
“Sad Dido, the message, therefore it was true

that thou perished, pursuing thine end with a sword.
Did this cause thy death? Oh, if there’s any faith
under earth’s furthest depths, by the stars and their lords,

unwillingly, queen, did I exit thy shores.
The mandates of gods through these shades bid me go,
through lands of deep night, realms of ruins ignored,

from thine empire freed; lo! I cannot believe
that I brought thee such grief, when disembarked I.
Withdraw not from sight, halt thy step, do not leave!

Whom dost thou avoid? Fate makes these words my last.”
The words of Aeneas her animus cooled,
her grimness relaxed by his tears flowing fast.

But turned she away with her eyes downward locked.
No more is her countenance moved by his speech:
it stood like hard flint or as Marpesian rock.

She stole herself off, so averse to Aeneas,
to shadowy groves in retreat to her spouse,
who soothes her concerns with his love, dear Sychaeus.

aestatis legenda

I’m free! Summer has begun and I am back in Westport Island, Maine for a month of R&R before I begin working at the Squire Tarbox Inn. So while I will continue the terza rima rendering, I’ll have time to read a whole bunch of fun stuff in preparation for my dream semester of Fall ‘09. That’s right, all my classes taught by Drs. Passman, Bregman, Palmer and Howard. So in preparation for this holy tetrarchy of philology, history, politics and philosophy I have compiled a summer reading list of various classical and contemporary works. 

For Dr. Palmer’s Classical Political Thought I will be re-reading works by Plato, Thucydides and Aristotle, mainly the Republic, Histories and Politics. I will also look into the works of Xenophon and modern commentaries on these cornerstones of ancient political science. 

Some of these works will also help the thesis project, as Vergil (and Dante to a lesser extent) certainly drew influence from Plato and Aristotle to some degree. I am currently reading Plato’s Timaeus and Critias, and will follow it up with a recent work by Gregory Vlastos called Plato’s Universe. Other helpful texts have come through my audiobook subscription, such as The Dream of Reason, a history of ancient philosophy by Anthony Gottlieb. And in parallel to re-reading the Divina Commedia I am listening to a Modern Scholar lecture series on it delivered by Dr. Timothy Shutt. 

For Dr. Bregman’s History of Greece I will re-read parts of Herodotus and Thucydides, and pick up Xenophon’s Persian Expedition. I’ve also found a lecture series on Greek history through Audible.com.

Lastly, I will be “sitting in” on Dr. Passman’s online summer course for Ovid’s Metamorphoses, as a means to keep my Latin skills sharp before we dive into Vergil this fall. 

Please drop me a note if you have any other texts to recommend. I’m counting on devouring more literature than I have listed here, so if I missed anything, ancient or modern, bring it to my attention. Thank you and happy summer to all.

Ad Portas Inferni

The semester’s end approaches, and so far I’ve rendered 400 lines of Aeneid VI into terza rima. I hope to have the whole rendering done by mid summer. As a taste, here are lines 268-312, describing Aeneas and Deiphobe’s descent through upper Hell all the way to the shores of the Styx. For the enlightened, the Latin text is here.

They passed through the shadows of solit’ry night,
through vacuous, hollow dominions of Dis,
as under the glare of the moon’s obscure light,
 
in forests where Jove hides the realms that he rules,
by nocturnal darkness all color’s purloined.
Foremost in those jaws, there in Hell’s vestibule, 
 
Depression and vindictive Cares have their haunts,
here pallid Diseases, and woeful Old Age,
and Fear, tempting Hunger, dishon’rable Want, 
 
and here Toil and Death, ghastly sights to behold,
then Death’s brother Sleep, and the mind’s evil Joys,
and death-dealing War in the facing threshold,
 
Eumenides’ strongholds and mindless Discord;
blood-drenched is her hair, with dread vipers asnare.
An elm midway down stretches branches outward.
 
False Dreams hold in throng the abodes of this tree,
and cling fast beneath all its manifold leaves.
Diverse come these bestial monstrosities:
 
Stabled are Centaurs, and double-formed Scyllas,
Briareus hundred-armed, and with her hiss,
the bane of Lerna and flaming Chimaera,
 
Gorgons, and Harpies, and Geryon formed triple.
Aeneas in dreadfulness unsheathes his sword,
to what may draw nigh, his eyes are kept watchful;
 
and lest his wise partner advise that these shades
are bodiless ghosts, but mere phantoms in flight,
in vain he’d rush forth slicing air with his blade.
 
Hence leads to Acheron, stream of Tartarus,
a whirlpool of muck seething through the abyss,
which all its silt vomits into Cocytus.
 
a ferryman watches o’er these waterways,
called Charon, in squalor: upon whose gray chin
hangs a long scraggly beard; his eyes stand ablaze,
 
and down to his knees filthy clothes he displays,
propels with a pole and attends to the sails.
The rusty old skiff ev’ry spirit conveys.
 
Though ancient his green immortality’s fresh.
And hither a multitude flooded the banks,
of mothers and men, and the shades stripped of flesh:
 
magnanimous heroes, boys and unwed girls,
and youths placed on pyres before parents’ faces:
like as autumn’s cold casts off leaves in a whirl
 
or birds forced by troublesome waters to land
when wintery weather takes flight ‘cross the sea
unleashing itself on the sun-loving sands. 

De Tacito

While Livy wrote at the empire’s consolidation, Publius Cornelius Tacitus wrote at the zenith of Roman conquest under Trajan. Through his Annals and Histories he is the authority on the years from the death of Augustus (14 CE) to that of Domitian in 96. The former work bears heavy focus on the personalities of emperors and their role in a post-Republican society. In Book XII we find the British king Caratacus at the court of Claudius. In a short speech, this noble savage examines the Roman right of subjugation and the dignity of foreign peoples:

Si quanta nobilitas et Fortuna mihi fuit, tanta rerum prosperarum moderatio fuisset, amicus potius in hanc urbem quam captus venissem, neque dedignatus esses claris maiorbius ortum, plurimis gentibus imperitantem foedere in pacem accipere. Praesens sors mea ut mihi informis, sic tibi magnifica est. Habui equos viros, arma opes. Quid mirum si haec invitus amisi? Nam si vos omnibus imperitare vultis, sequitur ut omnes servitutem accipiant? Si statim deditus traderer, neque mea Fortuna neque tua gloria inclaruisset; et supplicium mei oblivio sequeretur; at si incolumem servaveris, aeternum exemplar clementiae ero. (Tacitus, Annals XII.xxxvii.92-103)
 
If moderation of successes had been as great as my nobility and Fortune, I might be coming to this city more preferably a friend than a captive, nor would you have disdained to receive in peace by treaty one having risen from brilliant ancestors and commanding several nations. My present lot, disfiguring as it is to me, is magnificent to you. I had horses, men, weapons and wealth. What wonder is it if I have lost these things unwillingly? For if you wish to command all peoples, does it follow that they all accept slavery? If I were handed over in immediate surrender, neither my Fortune nor your glory would have seemed so brilliant; and my punishment would be followed by oblivion; but if you keep me free from harm, I will be an eternal example of your clemency.

This passage discusses the role of pomp and circumstance in sustaining the emperor’s reputation. Citizens prefer triumphs rather than preemptive diplomacy. It is the contrast of the enemy’s humiliation that glorifies the victor. Caratacus makes this specific point directly to Claudius (esses) before addressing the Romans in general on the question of domination (vos omnibus imperitare vultis). Thus Tacitus renders advice both to his patron and his people. He reminds the latter audience that their affluent society is built on slave labor, and that these slaves were once dignified men like themselves. The only difference was the vicissitude of Fortune. This also counters Aristotle’s view that people are masters and slaves by nature; the Politics favored patricians, who equated birth with merit. Tacitus favored merit, his patrons’ system of succession, after a century of calamitous family rule. Caratacus doesn’t revile Claudius as would Mithridates; but the majority of Tacitus’ imperial characters would get such treatment. From the “uncivilized” perspective, the spectacle of supremacy becomes a “vanity of vanities.”            

           

While historians are products of their environment, they can still weave common threads across time and space. What we find are deeper philosophical and ethical questions, the answers to which determine an entire view of the past and present. Sallust wrote among the turbulence of civil strife, the consequence of a spoiled state. Through Mithridates he exposes Roman virtues as the vices that were tearing his fatherland to pieces, with such rhetoric that Pompey or Sulla would never use. Livy wrote in a cheerful aftermath. He lacked the cynicism to condemn the past; rather he reopened the debate over preordination. But Tacitus saw imperial calamity equal to that of the late Republic. He compromised distaste for enslavement with the meritocracy of his Good Emperors.

Rome’s enemies were at variance with the idea that Rome was superior both by destiny and nobility. The course of events was unkind to them. Thus they more credited the goddess Fortuna’s work than any other. She is the patron saint of humanism. Through her, Sallust can censure the bestial rapacity of Roman conquest; Livy can raise Hannibal to Scipio’s level; likewise Caratacus to Claudius through Tacitus. Removing divine favor accentuates human achievement, however inhumane.

The proper historian does not simply relate facts. He offers multiple perspectives and the lessons wherefrom. Without a look from without, history becomes mere propaganda. Voicing an alternative worldview through adversaries is how the narrator places himself in the narrative, without the perils of sedition. The prosperity of Rome from Scipio to Claudius is at first glance providential. Therefore Sallust, Livy and Tacitus took Romans’ heads out of the clouds, brought them down to earth, and let them face their fellow human beings, even those across the battlefield. 

De Livio

And that brings us to Titus Livius. His monumental Ab Urbe Condita, a full compendium of Roman history, survives only to cover the monarchy, early Republic, and Punic Wars. Of the latter he pens an exhaustive account of how two Mediterranean superpowers vied for world domination. Livy represents the Augustan program of re-foundation by reliving Rome’s glorious, virtuous past. To justify his patron’s reign, he established models such as Numa, Camillus, and Scipio; the latter of which was the hero of the Second Punic War. In Book XXX we find his arch nemesis Hannibal offering an armistice before the pivotal battle of Zama. The name of Hannibal to Roman society was equal to that of Hitler to ours. As the greatest threat to the physical welfare of the city of Rome herself, Hannibal was popularized as a barbarian butcher. So for Livy to grant him such civil discourse tells his readers to take his viewpoint seriously.

Si hoc ita fato datum erat, ut qui primus bellum intuli populo Romano quique totiens prope in manibus victoriam habui, is ultro ad pacem petendam venirem, laetor te mihi sorte potissimum datum a quo peterem. Tibi quoque inter multa egregia non in ultimis laudum hoc fuerit, Hannibalem, cui tot de Romanis ducibus victoriam di dedissent, tibi cessisse…hoc quoque ludibrium casus ediderit Fortuna…optimum quidem fuerat eam patribus nostris mentem datam ab dis esse ut et vos Italiae et nos Africae imperio contenti essemus; neque enim ne vobis quidem Sicilia ac Sardinia satis digna pretia sunt pro tot classibus, tot exercitibus, tot tam egregiis amissis ducibus. Sed praeterita magis reprehendi possunt quam corrigi. Ita aliena adpetivimus ut de nostris dimicaremus, nec in Italia solum nobis bellum, vobis in Africa esset, sed et vos in portis vestris prope ac moenibus signa armaque hostium vidistis et nos ab Carthagine fremitum castrorum Romanorum exaudimus. Quod igitur nos maxime abominaremur, vos ante omina optaretis, in meliore vestra Fortuna de pace agitur. (Livy, Ab Urbe Condita XXX.xxx.3-9)
 
If this was thus granted by fate, that I, first to have waged war on the Roman people and who so often nearly had victory in my clutches, at the end would be coming to you to beg for peace, and I rejoice that it is you, most preferably granted by destiny, from whom I might seek it. For you also, among your many distinctions, this will have been not the least of your honors, that Hannibal, to whom the gods had granted victory over so many Roman generals, has surrendered to you…Fortune also may prove these events to be her mere sport…indeed it would have been best that an attitude had been granted to our fathers by the gods that you might be content with control of Italy and us of Africa; for not even Sicily and Sardinia are worthy enough prizes for us at the cost of so many fleets, so many armies, and so many such excellent generals being lost. But the past can be more easily disgraced than corrected. Thus grasping at foreign lands it resulted that we fight for our own, and that our war was not solely in Italy, nor yours in Africa, rather you have seen the standards and arms of the enemy near your walls and we from Carthage have heard the rustle of a Roman camp. Consequently that which we most abominate, you pray for before all things: a suit for peace while Fortune is in your favor.

This speech discusses the Livian conflict of Fata versus Fortuna. Is history fatalistic and divinely predetermined? Or does chance and probability govern events? The first sentence reinforces the historical irony that Hannibal, who decimated entire armies on Italian soil, on his own faces defeat. Thus he entertains the question whether such an improbable event was willed supernally (si hoc ita fato datum erat). Vergil would say yes, and his colleague Livy was sure to let his audience imagine the teleology behind Augustus’ rise to power. Also arguing for this is Hannibal’s certitude, in the second sentence, that the gods were once on his side (victoriam di dedissent).

But then he considers the other argument, that Fortuna held superior sway, mockingly impartial (ludibrium). Perhaps no logos governs events, only chaos. Favoring this contradicts the Stoic cosmos manifested in the Augustan regime, whereby a single mind maintains cosmopolitan order. But attributing such thoughts to a fiend like Hannibal keeps the historian innocent. Livy does humanize Hannibal as he expresses his wish (optimum quidem) that divine intervention were possible (mentem datam ab dis), especially to avoid tragic losses (pro tot classibus…amissis). However, keeping the two empires at peace would not fulfill a fatalistic teleology of history. 

How you answer this central question is essential to understanding Hannibal’s role in the narrative. If the Fates are to blame, then Hannibal appears a fool to have opposed Rome’s destiny. The moral is not to impede (aliena adpetivimus) those whom Heaven favors. But if dame Fortune was the culprit, he offers one of the greatest lessons of Livy’s masterpiece: don’t push your luck! It was mere chance that there was a polar shift in circumstances, that both peoples faced doom. The scales of Fortune balance unpredictably and impartially. It was equally probable that Scipio would be the one begging for peace, while Fortune favored the Carthaginians (in meliore vestra Fortuna de pace agitur).

Lastly, note the shift from singular to plural. The speech begins as a direct address to Scipio, describing the feats of Hannibal alone. This matches the Vergilian epic paradigm of gods and heroes entertained simultaneously. So as he shifts from Fata to Fortuna, he widens the scope of history from the one to the many. For an ancient scholar reading out loud, to start speaking vos and vobis got the attention of his fellow Romans. Likewise Hannibal represents the Carthaginian worldview speaking nos and nobis. What starts as a theatrical heroic monologue becomes a cultural exposition, that Carthage was just as likely to rule the world as Rome, and that the Carthaginians felt the same terrors as Romans with the enemy at the gates. Through the adversary’s perspective, Livy clears his compatriots’ eyes of the God complex reinforced by centuries of unrivaled success. What they see is a time before being Roman afforded universal reverence.