Sagae Thessalae

• iuvenis ego Mileto profectus ad spectaculum Olympicum, cum haec etiam loca provinciae clarae visitare cuperem, peragrata tota Thessalia Larissam perveni. ac dum urbem pererrans tenuato viatico paupertati meae fomenta quaero, medio in foro senem conspicio. insistebat lapidem magnaque voce praedicabat, si quis mortuum custodire vellet, magnum praemium accepturum esse. et cuidam praetereunti "Quid hoc" inquam "audio? Hic mortui solent aufugere?"

  I as a young man, having set out to the Olympic Games from Miletus, since I was wanting also to visit these places of the famous province with all Thessaly, having been wandering through I came to Larissa. And while wandering through the city, with my travelling money having been thinned out, I was seeking remedies for my poverty. I caught sight of, in the middle of the forum, an old man. He was standing on a rock and he was proclaiming in a big voice, if anyone wanted to guard a dead man, he would receive a great prize. And to someone passing by I said, "What's this I hear? Are the dead accustomed to flee here?"
• "tace," respondit ille. "nam puer et satis peregrinus es, meritoque nescis in Thessalia te esse, ubi sagae ora mortuorum semper demorsicant, quae sunt illis artis magicae supplementa."

  "Be quiet," he replied. "For you are a boy and well enough a foreigner, and naturally you do not know you are in Thessaly, where witches always bite pieces out of the faces of the dead, which are to them the extra ingredients of their magic art."
• Contra ego "quali custodela" inquam "opus est?"

  In response, I said, "There is need for what sort of guard?"
• "iam primum" respondit ille "totam noctem eximie vigilandum est apertis et inconivis oculis semper in cadaver intentis nec acies usquam devertenda est, cum illae pessimae sagae latenter arrepant, forma in quodvis animal conversa. nam et aves et rursum canes et mures immo vero etiam muscas induunt."

  "Now first," he replied, "it is needing to be guarded extraordinarily for the whole night with open and unsleeping eyes always directed at the corpse, and your gaze is not to be turned away anywhere, since those worst witches creep up secretly, with their form turned into any animal. For they put on the form of birds and dogs and mice, rather indeed even flies."
• his cognitis animum meum conmasculo et statim accedens senem "clamare" inquam "iam desine. adest custos paratus." vix finieram, et statim me perducit ad domum quandam, ubi demonstrat matronam flebilem fuscis vestimentis contectam. illa surrexit et ad cubiculum me induxit. ibi corpus splendentibus linteis coopertum manu revelavit. ubi singula anxie demonstravit, exiit.

  With these things having been discovered, I strengthened my mind, and immediately going up to the old man, I said, "Now stop shouting, a guard is here ready." I had scarcely finished, and immediately he led me through to a certain home, where he pointed out a weeping wife covered in dark clothes. She got up and led me to the bedroom. There she uncovered a corpse covered by white sheets. When she had anxiously pointed out the individual features, she left.
• sic desolatus ad cadaveris solacium, perfrictis oculis et paratis ad vigiliam, dum animum meum permulcebam cantationibus, usque ad mediam noctem pervigilabam. tum autem mihi formido cumulatior cum repente introrepens mustela contra me constitit oculosque in me fixit. tanta fiducia in tantillulo animali mihi turbavit animum. denique sic illi "abi," inquam "scelesta bestia, antequam meam vim celeriter experiaris! abi!"

  Thus abandoned to the consolation of the corpse, with my eyes having been rubbed and prepared for the watch, while I was soothing my mind with songs, I was keeping my watch right up to the middle of the night. Then, however, for me my fear was greater, when suddenly creeping in a weasel halted opposite me and fixed its eyes onto me. Such great confidence in so small an animal routed my mind. Finally, I said thus to it, "Go away, wicked beast, before you quickly experience my force! Go away!"
• mustela terga vertit et cubiculo protinus exit. sine mora, somnus tam profundus me repente demergit, ut ne deus quidem Delphicus ipse facile discernere posset ex duobus nobis iacentibus, quis esset magis mortuus. tandem prima luce expergitus et magno pavore perterritus cadaver accurro, et admoto lumine revelatoque eius vultu, omnia diligenter inspicio: nihil deest. ecce uxor misera flens introrumpit: cadavere inspecto reddit sine mora praemium.

  The weasel turned its back and immediately left out of the bedroom without delay. A sleep so deep suddenly plunged me in, that not even the Delphie god himself could easily make out from us two lying there, who was the more dead. At last, awoken at first light, and terrified by big fear, I ran over to the corpse, and with the light moved towards it and with his face having been uncovered, I inspected everything diligently: nothing was gone. Look, the wretched wife weeping bursts in: with the corpse having been inspected she returned without delay the reward.
• "per fidem vestram," inquit "cives, per pietatem publicam perempto civi subsistite et extremum facinus istius feminae nefariae scelestaque severiter vindicate. haec enim nec ullus alius miserum iuvenem, sororis meae filium, in adulteri gratiam et ob praedam hereditariam extinxit veneno."

  "Through your faith," he said, "citizens, through your public duty, come to the aid of a murdered citizen, and avenge the last crime of that sinful and wicked woman severely. For she and not any other extinguished the wretched young man, the son of my sister, for the sake of adultery and because of the prize of an inheritance, with poison."
• illa, lacrimis effusis quamque sanctissime poterat adiurans cunctos deos, tantum scelus abnuebat. ergo igitur ille: "veritatis arbitrium in divinam providentiam ponamus. Zatchlas adest Aegyptius propheta notissimus, qui mihi promisit se pro magno praemio spiritum istius cadaveris paulisper ab inferis reducturum esse corpusque animaturum."

  She, with tears poured out as holily as she was able, swearing by all the gods, was denying so great a crime. Therefore he the old man said, "Let us place the judgement of the truth in divine providence. Zatchlas is here, a very well known Egyptian prophet, who promised me that he for a big reward for a short while, would lead back from the shades and that the spirit of that corpse he would bring to life the body."
• immitto me turbae socium et pone ipsum lectulum lapidem insistens omnia curiosis oculis spectabam. iam tumore pectus cadaveris extolli, iam spiritu corpus impleri. et surgit cadaver et profatur: "cur, oro, me post Lethea pocula iam Stygiis paludibus innatantem ad momentariae vitae reducitis? desine iam, precor, desine, ac me in meam quietem permitte."

  I sent myself into the crowd and standing on a rock behind the bier itself, I was watching everything with curious eyes. Now the chest of the corpse seemed to be raised by swelling, now the body to be filled by breath. And the corpse rose and said, "Why, I beg, after the cups of Lethe already swimming the Stygian marshes do you lead me back to the duties of momentary life? Stop now, I pray, stop and let me go through into my rest."
• haec audita vox de corpore, sed propheta aliquanto commotior: "quin narras" inquit "populo omnia de morte tua? respondit ille de lectulo et imo cum gemitu populum sic adloquitur: "malis novae nuptae artibus peremptus et addictus noxio poculo, torum tepentem adultero reddidi. dabo vobis documenta veritatis perlucida et quod prorsus alius nemo cognoverit vel ominavertit indicabo."

  This voice was heard from the body, but the prophet somewhat more forcefully said, "Why do you not tell everything to the people about your death?" He replied from the bier and with a deep groan he addressed the people as follows, "Having been killed by the evil arts of my new bride, and sacrificed to a poisoned cup, I gave over the warm bed to the adulterer. I will give to you very clear proofs of the truth and what absolutely no one else could know or predict I will show."
• tunc digito me demonstrans: "nam cum corporis mei custos hic sagacissimus exsertam vigiliam mihi teneret,sagae quaedam exuviis meis imminentes forma mutata apparuerunt. cum industriam sedulam eius fallere non potuissent, postremo iniecta somni nebula eum in profundam quietem sepultiverunt. tum me nomine excitare coeperunt neque prius desierunt quam dum hebetes artus et membra frigida ad artis magicae obsequia segniter nituntur.

  Then, pointing me out with his finger, he said, "For when this most keen-witted guard of my body was keeping a prolonged watch for me, certain witches pressing for my remains appeared in changed form. When they had not been able to deceive his dedicated work, finally, with a cloud of sleep having been thrown upon him, they buried him into a deep rest. Then they began to rouse me by my name and they did not stop before my sluggish joints and cold limbs slowly struggled to deference to their magic art."
• hic autem, qui vivus erat, et tantum sopore mortuus, idem mecum nomen forte habet. ad suum nomen ignarus exsurgit, et, in exanimis umbrae modum ultro gradiens, ianuam adit. quamquam fores cubiculi diligenter obclusae erant, per quoddam foramen prosectis naso prius ac mox auribus lanienam pro me passus est. tum sagae ceram in modum prosectarum formatam aurium ei applicant nasumque similem prosecto comparant. et nunc stat miser hic, praemium non industriae sed lanienae consecutus."

  He, however, who was alive, and only dead with sleep, by chance had the same name as me. Therefore unknowing, he rose to his name and, stepping spontaneously in the manner of a lifeless ghost, he went to the door. Although the doors of the bedroom had been carefully shut up, through a certain hole, with his nose first and soon his ears cut off, he suffered mutilation instead of me. Then the witches attached to him wax moulded in the form of the cut-off ears and they put together a nose similar to the one cut off. And now here stands the wretched man, who has earned a reward not for his industry but for his mutilation.
• his dictis perterritus temptare formam incipio. Iniecta manu nasum prehendo: sequitur; aures pertracto: deruunt. ac dum directis digitis et nutibus praesentium me denotat, inter pedes circumstantium frigido sudore defluens evado. nec postea debilis ac sic ridiculus me patrio reddere potui, sed capillis hinc inde laterum deiectis aurium vulnera celavi, nasi vero dedecus linteolo isto pressim adglutinato decenter obtexi."

  With these things having been said, terrifed, I began to try the form. I took my nose with my hand: it followed; I grabbed onto my ears: they rushed off. And while the crowd was marking me out with pointed fingers and with nods, I escaped among the feet of the people standing round pouring forth with a cold sweat. And afterward, thus debilitated and thus ridiculous, I could not return to my country, but with hair thrown down here and there, I hid the wounds of my ears, indeed I covered fittingly the shame of my nose with this bandage.