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As we move back through time (insert appropriate time travel music here), we reach our good old friend Ennius. I’ve encountered him once before, back in a survey course in second year, but by now I’ve figured out that the Ennius text I read then was heavily edited to follow classic-era Latin orthography, even aside from all the footnotes. Now I get to translate pretty much all of his stuff that we still have available, in more or less the original spelling. Fun!
Anyway. Much as Cato is considered the first real author of Latin prose literature, Ennius is the “father” of Latin poetry. It is amusing to me--coming from Livy’s historical prose and Virgil’s poetry of farming advice--to move back through Cato’s prose on farming advice, and now Ennius’s history in poetry. He wrote things other than history, but he’s best known for his Annals, a ginormous eighteen-book poetic history of Rome, from the fall of Troy to around Cato the Elder’s time.
What we have left is not a hell of a lot. Certainly nothing complete of any of his works; what we have are quoted fragments preserved via other texts, and not a lot of those. You can see everything I’m working on translating this week--it’s basically all the chunks of the Annals that are long enough to be interesting--at this page here.
On a minor note of interest, Latin poetry of this time--or at least the poetry of Ennius, but I recall the prof of my survey course saying it was typical of this time period--was a lot more into alliteration than classic Roman poetry is. It’s sort of Beowulf-esque in that regard, and uses it to an extent that later poets would’ve found stilted and inelegant. (But then, try writing like Shelley in a modern poetry class and see how far that gets you.) Alas, virtually none of this will come through in my translations. Nor am I going to try to keep poetic lines, here; I’m striving for accuracy, not Poetry, in my translations.
Book 1 of the Annals
Ilia, daughter of Aeneas, addresses her sister
Sitting up, the old woman reached for the light with trembling hands; weeping, [Ilia] remembers such things, terrified from her sleep:
“Eurydica, the daughter whom our father loved, power and life now desert my whole body. For I dreamed of a pretty man who carried me away between the pleasant willow grove and the riverbanks and new places; thus afterward, my only full sister, I dreamed I was wandering, and slowly following the trail and seeking you; and I was not able to control my heart; no footpath steadied my foot.
“Then my father seemed to address me with his voice, with these words: ‘O daughter, beforehand you must endure hardships, afterward fortune will set you down out of the river.’ Having said these things our father, full sister, swiftly receded and did not give himself to my sight, though I was desiring it, and often, weeping, I stretched my hands to the blue temple sof the sky, and spoke in a coaxing voice. Sleep scarcely left me, with my sick heart.”
Auguries are given to Romulus
Taking care and desiring with great care, they gave labor to the king at the same time with auspice and augury.
...
From Remus devoted himself according to the auspice, and he alone saw the favorable bird. But pretty Romulus* went looking on the high Aventine, and saw a high-flying species. They were arguing over whether to call the city Roma or Remora. For the sake of which would be the commander of all the men.
They wait, just as when the spectators [at a race] wait for the consul to give the sign, and the chariots to emerge from the painted gates: thus the populace was waiting and holding their faces for matters, when victory was given to a great king. Meanwhile the white sun dropped into the darkness of night. From there the white light gave itself, cast out, with rays.
And at the same time from the long high place, the prettiest bird flew high out at the left side: at the same time the golden sun sprang up. There fell from the sky thrice-four holy bodies of birds, and they gave themselves to swift and pretty places. From there Romulus saw that they were given first to him, by the auspice, solid foundations and a place for the king.
The dirge of Romulus
For a long time he held the desire in his chest, at the same time he thus remembered to himself, “O Romulus, divine Romulus, the gods created you as such a guard of your nation! O father, O begetter, O blood sprung from the gods, you led us forth between the shores of light. Romulus lives always in the sky with the fruitful gods.”
Book 4
The war with King Pyrrhus of Epirus
Are you anyone able to roll out the boundaries of a huge war? Then the father of gods and king of men spoke from his heart.
Posthumus among the Tarentines
[It was] spoken against abusive and obscene words.
The Tarentines reach Pyrrhus
A diligent man discovered, Gaius of the father Gaius, a man, a king, Burrus by name as they remember him from the highest root. They were whispering within the darkness...
The oracle of Apollo given to Pyrrhus
I say that you are able to conquer the Romans at Aeacida.*** The stolid line of Aeacidians is more war-powerful than wisdom-powerful.
The proles are armed
The proletariat at public expense with shields and iron, it is decorated with iron, they keep safe the walls and city and forum with guards. They shake [like] bleating cattle; they all lack weapons.
Trees are felled for making funeral pyres
They cut through the tall groves, they chop down with axes, they throw down the huge oaks, they cut the holmoak, the ash-tree is fractured and the high silver-fir is strewn about. They overturn the long pines; the whole grove sounds with the roaring of a leafy forest.
The epigram of Pyrrhus at the temple of Tarentine Jove
Those who were before this unconquered, great father of Olympus, I both conquered these men and was conquered by the same men in battle.
The expressed opinion of Pyrrhus regarding returned captives
I do not demand my gold, nor did you pay my price. Not war-merchants but war-fighters, we determine life with iron, not gold, on all sides. Whether she wishes you or me to rule, or whatever Lady Chance brings, we experience it bravely. And at the same time accept this saying: whoever fortune spares in their bravery of war, it is resolved that I will spare the liberty of the same men. Take this as a gift, and I give it with the divine gods being willing.
The opinion spoken by Appius
Why are the souls which used to stand directly beforehand bending themselves to mad paths? But what do I lament in my soul here?
Cineas returns with the matter unfinished
The speaker returns without peace and refers the matter to the king.
Cineas refers the matter to Pyrrhus
...but they overcome by spirit, and disdain the first harsh wounds of battle. The decree is for the bodies to be pierced by weapons. Then indeed the first Roman man took up the toga.
Decius the grandson makes a vow at the house of Asculus
Divine gods, listen here for a short time, that for the sake of fighting for the Roman people very skillfully with weapons, knowing what I’m doing, I send my soul from my body.
Regarding the deeds towards Beneventus
Light... A sensible lackey is turned meanwhile in the sky with enormous signs. As it was first brightening the stretched shadows.
Praise of Marcus Curius
Whom no one was able to conquer, not by iron and not by gold.
Book 7
The opinion of Ennius regarding Navius
...other men wrote the thing with verses which Faunus and the soothsayer once sang; when no one at all had climbed the cliffs of the Muses, nor was anyone said to be zealous, before then we dared to unlock...
A friend of Geminius Servilius is described
Having said these things, he freely, often, well, anywhere, calls and he affably imparts his opinion and his own speeches and those of his friends, when, weary during the great part of the day, he had been a judge for the council regarding the direction of the highest matters in the wide forum and holy senate: to whom he boldly spoke matters large and small and jokes, and when speech of good and bad was spewed out all together, if he wished, he found the truth. Anywhere many pleasures and joys, both privately and publicly.
To him no opinion swayed him to wicked deed, that he commit a crime; a mild, not in the slightest wicked, learned, faithful, gentle man; eloquent, content with what he had, happy, well-known, speaking in favorable times, acting appropriately with peaceful speech, tending many ancient graves, whom the customs of his family, old and new, held firm, and the laws of many old men, both divine and human; from here between fights Servilius address him thus:
Book 8
About the War of Hannibal
...afterward foul Discord broke open the iron-shod doorposts and doors of war.^ Wisdom was driven out from the center, the matter was conducted with violence, the good orator was scorned, the bristling soldier adored. Struggling not with learned words but slanderous ones, they mixed loved ones and hatred among themselves. Joining the hand not from law but more to iron, they pursued the matter, and they sought rulership, they rushed on wholly by force.
Book 9
About the consulship of Cethigus and Tuditanus
The orator Cornelius Cethigus Marcus added the sweet-talking face, Tuditanus son of Marcus, as a colleague... He once said to those popular men, which men were then living and stirring up his grandfather, that he had tasted the flowers of the people and marrow of the sweet things.^^
The elegy of Fabius Cunctator^^^
One man restored the state by waiting for us; for he did not place rumors before safety. Therefore afterward and even more now he shines with the glory of a man.
About Hannibal
Fortune swiftly returned the highest mortal, from the highest rulership so that a servant became infamous.
Book 10
The Macedonian War
Muse, relate to my hand the leader of the Romans, each of whom waged war against Phillip, the extraordinarily wise, intelligent man Aelius Sextus.
The shepherd of Charop Epirus addresses Titus Quinctius
[That] you are harassed thus, Titus, through nights and days... O Titus, if I were to swear anything or lighten your cares, what things should I cook for you now and turn in a fastened chest, what at all would be first?
Titus Quinctius before the battle against Cynoscephalus
He was gazing approvingly at the virtue of his own legion, watching to see if they would grumble at what pause had occurred in the fighting, or the end of their hard labor.
Book 11
...and which were neither able to go through the Dardanian camps, nor seized with their heads, nor burnt with fire.
Book 17
Or they assemble so that the winds, when the rain-giver spirit of the south wind and his dark breeze struggle against the mighty Indian ocean to lift up the current...
Book 18
The fight of Tribute Gaius Aelius
Like rain, the missiles came down from all sides towards the tribune. They pierced the shield, and the boss of the helmet rang with javelins, the sound of bronze; but no one was able to mangle the body from any side with harmful iron. He always broke the abundant shafts and shook them off; his whole body was covered in sweat and labored greatly, and there wasn’t space for breathing; the Histrians, flinging spears from the hand, were seeking him with swift iron.
About himself
We are Roman, who were Rudians before. Just as a strong horse, who often conquered the great racetrack of Olympia, now is prepared to settle down with old age.
The remaining uncertain fragments
The Roman state stands on ancient values and strengths. There are seven hundred years, give or take a little, after famous Rome was founded by that revered augury. Just like a horse which, after being crowded into a stable breaks the chains with its great spirits, and carries its through the blue-green joyous meadows of the fields with a lofty chest, and often shakes its mane high, its spirit draws white foam from its hot soul. Its pliant limbs crawl through the horse-beans and lie down.
---
* Okay, ‘pulcher’ is probably being used more in the sense of ‘handsome’ or even ‘glorious’, but it’s much more fun to just assume we’re talking about pretty, pretty men.
** ...maybe? I mean, they’re using the word “consul” here, which my dictionary says sometimes means Jupiter, but it’s a pretty iffy translation. Still, I don’t see Remus waiting for a consul of Republican Rome to send a sign of magic birds, so.
*** Or possibly “that the Romans are able to conquer you.” Knowing oracles, the ambiguity is probably deliberate.
^ If I recall correctly, there are doors to a particular temple that are closed during times of peace, and left open during times of war. So it’s not purely the metaphorical “doors of war” here so much as reference to that specific practice.
^^ I will not vouch for the accuracy of my translation here. At all.
^^^ “Cunctator” means “one who hesitates,” or thus, “a cautious man.” It can vary from “tardy!” to “admirably considerate!” depending on context.
Anyway. Much as Cato is considered the first real author of Latin prose literature, Ennius is the “father” of Latin poetry. It is amusing to me--coming from Livy’s historical prose and Virgil’s poetry of farming advice--to move back through Cato’s prose on farming advice, and now Ennius’s history in poetry. He wrote things other than history, but he’s best known for his Annals, a ginormous eighteen-book poetic history of Rome, from the fall of Troy to around Cato the Elder’s time.
What we have left is not a hell of a lot. Certainly nothing complete of any of his works; what we have are quoted fragments preserved via other texts, and not a lot of those. You can see everything I’m working on translating this week--it’s basically all the chunks of the Annals that are long enough to be interesting--at this page here.
On a minor note of interest, Latin poetry of this time--or at least the poetry of Ennius, but I recall the prof of my survey course saying it was typical of this time period--was a lot more into alliteration than classic Roman poetry is. It’s sort of Beowulf-esque in that regard, and uses it to an extent that later poets would’ve found stilted and inelegant. (But then, try writing like Shelley in a modern poetry class and see how far that gets you.) Alas, virtually none of this will come through in my translations. Nor am I going to try to keep poetic lines, here; I’m striving for accuracy, not Poetry, in my translations.
Book 1 of the Annals
Ilia, daughter of Aeneas, addresses her sister
Sitting up, the old woman reached for the light with trembling hands; weeping, [Ilia] remembers such things, terrified from her sleep:
“Eurydica, the daughter whom our father loved, power and life now desert my whole body. For I dreamed of a pretty man who carried me away between the pleasant willow grove and the riverbanks and new places; thus afterward, my only full sister, I dreamed I was wandering, and slowly following the trail and seeking you; and I was not able to control my heart; no footpath steadied my foot.
“Then my father seemed to address me with his voice, with these words: ‘O daughter, beforehand you must endure hardships, afterward fortune will set you down out of the river.’ Having said these things our father, full sister, swiftly receded and did not give himself to my sight, though I was desiring it, and often, weeping, I stretched my hands to the blue temple sof the sky, and spoke in a coaxing voice. Sleep scarcely left me, with my sick heart.”
Auguries are given to Romulus
Taking care and desiring with great care, they gave labor to the king at the same time with auspice and augury.
...
From Remus devoted himself according to the auspice, and he alone saw the favorable bird. But pretty Romulus* went looking on the high Aventine, and saw a high-flying species. They were arguing over whether to call the city Roma or Remora. For the sake of which would be the commander of all the men.
They wait, just as when the spectators [at a race] wait for the consul to give the sign, and the chariots to emerge from the painted gates: thus the populace was waiting and holding their faces for matters, when victory was given to a great king. Meanwhile the white sun dropped into the darkness of night. From there the white light gave itself, cast out, with rays.
And at the same time from the long high place, the prettiest bird flew high out at the left side: at the same time the golden sun sprang up. There fell from the sky thrice-four holy bodies of birds, and they gave themselves to swift and pretty places. From there Romulus saw that they were given first to him, by the auspice, solid foundations and a place for the king.
The dirge of Romulus
For a long time he held the desire in his chest, at the same time he thus remembered to himself, “O Romulus, divine Romulus, the gods created you as such a guard of your nation! O father, O begetter, O blood sprung from the gods, you led us forth between the shores of light. Romulus lives always in the sky with the fruitful gods.”
Book 4
The war with King Pyrrhus of Epirus
Are you anyone able to roll out the boundaries of a huge war? Then the father of gods and king of men spoke from his heart.
Posthumus among the Tarentines
[It was] spoken against abusive and obscene words.
The Tarentines reach Pyrrhus
A diligent man discovered, Gaius of the father Gaius, a man, a king, Burrus by name as they remember him from the highest root. They were whispering within the darkness...
The oracle of Apollo given to Pyrrhus
I say that you are able to conquer the Romans at Aeacida.*** The stolid line of Aeacidians is more war-powerful than wisdom-powerful.
The proles are armed
The proletariat at public expense with shields and iron, it is decorated with iron, they keep safe the walls and city and forum with guards. They shake [like] bleating cattle; they all lack weapons.
Trees are felled for making funeral pyres
They cut through the tall groves, they chop down with axes, they throw down the huge oaks, they cut the holmoak, the ash-tree is fractured and the high silver-fir is strewn about. They overturn the long pines; the whole grove sounds with the roaring of a leafy forest.
The epigram of Pyrrhus at the temple of Tarentine Jove
Those who were before this unconquered, great father of Olympus, I both conquered these men and was conquered by the same men in battle.
The expressed opinion of Pyrrhus regarding returned captives
I do not demand my gold, nor did you pay my price. Not war-merchants but war-fighters, we determine life with iron, not gold, on all sides. Whether she wishes you or me to rule, or whatever Lady Chance brings, we experience it bravely. And at the same time accept this saying: whoever fortune spares in their bravery of war, it is resolved that I will spare the liberty of the same men. Take this as a gift, and I give it with the divine gods being willing.
The opinion spoken by Appius
Why are the souls which used to stand directly beforehand bending themselves to mad paths? But what do I lament in my soul here?
Cineas returns with the matter unfinished
The speaker returns without peace and refers the matter to the king.
Cineas refers the matter to Pyrrhus
...but they overcome by spirit, and disdain the first harsh wounds of battle. The decree is for the bodies to be pierced by weapons. Then indeed the first Roman man took up the toga.
Decius the grandson makes a vow at the house of Asculus
Divine gods, listen here for a short time, that for the sake of fighting for the Roman people very skillfully with weapons, knowing what I’m doing, I send my soul from my body.
Regarding the deeds towards Beneventus
Light... A sensible lackey is turned meanwhile in the sky with enormous signs. As it was first brightening the stretched shadows.
Praise of Marcus Curius
Whom no one was able to conquer, not by iron and not by gold.
Book 7
The opinion of Ennius regarding Navius
...other men wrote the thing with verses which Faunus and the soothsayer once sang; when no one at all had climbed the cliffs of the Muses, nor was anyone said to be zealous, before then we dared to unlock...
A friend of Geminius Servilius is described
Having said these things, he freely, often, well, anywhere, calls and he affably imparts his opinion and his own speeches and those of his friends, when, weary during the great part of the day, he had been a judge for the council regarding the direction of the highest matters in the wide forum and holy senate: to whom he boldly spoke matters large and small and jokes, and when speech of good and bad was spewed out all together, if he wished, he found the truth. Anywhere many pleasures and joys, both privately and publicly.
To him no opinion swayed him to wicked deed, that he commit a crime; a mild, not in the slightest wicked, learned, faithful, gentle man; eloquent, content with what he had, happy, well-known, speaking in favorable times, acting appropriately with peaceful speech, tending many ancient graves, whom the customs of his family, old and new, held firm, and the laws of many old men, both divine and human; from here between fights Servilius address him thus:
Book 8
About the War of Hannibal
...afterward foul Discord broke open the iron-shod doorposts and doors of war.^ Wisdom was driven out from the center, the matter was conducted with violence, the good orator was scorned, the bristling soldier adored. Struggling not with learned words but slanderous ones, they mixed loved ones and hatred among themselves. Joining the hand not from law but more to iron, they pursued the matter, and they sought rulership, they rushed on wholly by force.
Book 9
About the consulship of Cethigus and Tuditanus
The orator Cornelius Cethigus Marcus added the sweet-talking face, Tuditanus son of Marcus, as a colleague... He once said to those popular men, which men were then living and stirring up his grandfather, that he had tasted the flowers of the people and marrow of the sweet things.^^
The elegy of Fabius Cunctator^^^
One man restored the state by waiting for us; for he did not place rumors before safety. Therefore afterward and even more now he shines with the glory of a man.
About Hannibal
Fortune swiftly returned the highest mortal, from the highest rulership so that a servant became infamous.
Book 10
The Macedonian War
Muse, relate to my hand the leader of the Romans, each of whom waged war against Phillip, the extraordinarily wise, intelligent man Aelius Sextus.
The shepherd of Charop Epirus addresses Titus Quinctius
[That] you are harassed thus, Titus, through nights and days... O Titus, if I were to swear anything or lighten your cares, what things should I cook for you now and turn in a fastened chest, what at all would be first?
Titus Quinctius before the battle against Cynoscephalus
He was gazing approvingly at the virtue of his own legion, watching to see if they would grumble at what pause had occurred in the fighting, or the end of their hard labor.
Book 11
...and which were neither able to go through the Dardanian camps, nor seized with their heads, nor burnt with fire.
Book 17
Or they assemble so that the winds, when the rain-giver spirit of the south wind and his dark breeze struggle against the mighty Indian ocean to lift up the current...
Book 18
The fight of Tribute Gaius Aelius
Like rain, the missiles came down from all sides towards the tribune. They pierced the shield, and the boss of the helmet rang with javelins, the sound of bronze; but no one was able to mangle the body from any side with harmful iron. He always broke the abundant shafts and shook them off; his whole body was covered in sweat and labored greatly, and there wasn’t space for breathing; the Histrians, flinging spears from the hand, were seeking him with swift iron.
About himself
We are Roman, who were Rudians before. Just as a strong horse, who often conquered the great racetrack of Olympia, now is prepared to settle down with old age.
The remaining uncertain fragments
The Roman state stands on ancient values and strengths. There are seven hundred years, give or take a little, after famous Rome was founded by that revered augury. Just like a horse which, after being crowded into a stable breaks the chains with its great spirits, and carries its through the blue-green joyous meadows of the fields with a lofty chest, and often shakes its mane high, its spirit draws white foam from its hot soul. Its pliant limbs crawl through the horse-beans and lie down.
---
* Okay, ‘pulcher’ is probably being used more in the sense of ‘handsome’ or even ‘glorious’, but it’s much more fun to just assume we’re talking about pretty, pretty men.
** ...maybe? I mean, they’re using the word “consul” here, which my dictionary says sometimes means Jupiter, but it’s a pretty iffy translation. Still, I don’t see Remus waiting for a consul of Republican Rome to send a sign of magic birds, so.
*** Or possibly “that the Romans are able to conquer you.” Knowing oracles, the ambiguity is probably deliberate.
^ If I recall correctly, there are doors to a particular temple that are closed during times of peace, and left open during times of war. So it’s not purely the metaphorical “doors of war” here so much as reference to that specific practice.
^^ I will not vouch for the accuracy of my translation here. At all.
^^^ “Cunctator” means “one who hesitates,” or thus, “a cautious man.” It can vary from “tardy!” to “admirably considerate!” depending on context.
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The temple of Mars, I believe. Although I am not sure. I can look it up for to find out which one.
(You are awesome. This is all.)
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The Gates of War