Letter 4: Aeneas passes along praise of Zonainus and asks for even a small letter.
May every good thing come to excellent Epiphanius, because he filled me with pleasure. When he called you a good orator, he was admiring your character even more than your style. The main point is this: he seemed a true friend. He greeted me many times in your name, joking as he spoke, because he was doing it on your behalf. You had told him to do this, and you know what kind of lover of grace he is. In fact he became almost troublesome, constantly telling me to rejoice in your name. But the fault is yours. If you had sent me even a small letter, I would gladly have received a small greeting, both speaking it and hearing it.
AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek below for scholarly use.
Latin / Greek Original
δ'. Ζωναίνῳ σοφιστῇ.
Πολλὰ κἀγαθὰ γένοιτο Ἐπιφανίῳ τῷ καλῷ, ὅτιπερ ἡμᾶς ἐνέπλησεν ἡδονῆς. ἀγαθὸν γάρ σε ῥήτορα καλῶν μᾶλλον σου τὸν τρόπον ἢ τὸν λόγον ἐθαύμαζε. φίλος ἐδόκει ἀληθινός, καὶ με προσεῖπε πολλάκις παίζων ἅμα τῷ λόγῳ, ὑπὲρ σοῦ τοῦτο ποιῶν. σὺ δὲ αἴτιος· εἰ γὰρ μικρὰν ἐπεπόμφεις ἐπιστολήν, ἀπέλαβον ἂν ἡδέως μικρὰ χαίρειν εἰπὼν καὶ ἀκούσας.
Revision history
- 2026-05-27v2.2.34-import
Initial corpus import from modern aeneas gaza hercher v1.
Fields: letter text, metadata, source links. Source: https://archive.org/download/epistolographoih00herc/epistolographoih00herc_djvu.txt
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