Marcus Tullius Cicero→Titus Pomponius Atticus|c. 46 BC|Cicero|From Rome|To Rome/Athens|AI-assisted
I have not missed getting a letter from you on any single day; for I could see what you keep writing, and yet I suspected, or rather understood, that there was nothing for you to write about. On the sixth day before the Ides, however, I both supposed you were away and saw plainly that you had nothing. Still, I shall send to you almost every day; for I prefer to do it in vain rather than have you with no one to give a letter to, in case there happens to be something you think I ought to know. And so on the sixth day before the Ides I received your empty letter. For what did you have to write about? Yet that letter, whatever it was, was not unwelcome to me, since, if nothing else, it let me know that there was no fresh news for you to report.
You did, however, write something or other about Clodia. So where is she, or when is she going to come? The matter pleases me in such a way that, after Otho, nothing pleases me more. But I do not think she will sell (for she enjoys the property and is well off), and you are well aware how difficult that other course is. But, I beg you, let us strive to devise some way to reach what I so much desire.
I think I shall leave here on the day after the Ides, but heading either to my place at Tusculum or home, and from there perhaps to Arpinum. When I know for certain, I will write to you.
I think I shall conquer my feelings and go from Lanuvium to Tusculum.
For I must either give up that estate for ever (for my grief will remain
the same, only less visible), or it does not matter a straw whether I go
there now or ten years hence. The place will not remind me of her any
more than the thoughts that harass me day and night. "Oh!" you will say,
"so books do not help." In this respect I am afraid they make it worse:
perhaps I should have been braver without. For in a cultivated mind
there is no roughness and no insensibility.
So you will come to me as you said, and only that if convenient. A
letter apiece will be enough. I will even come to meet you, if
necessary. So that shall be as you find possible.
nullum a te desideravi diem litterarum; videbam enim quae scribis, et tamen suspicabar vel potius intellegebam nihil fuisse quod scriberes; a. d. vi Idus vero et abesse te putabam et plane videbam nihil te habere. ego tamen ad te fere cotidie mittam; malo enim frustra quam te non habere cui des, si quid forte sit quod putes me scire oportere. itaque accepi vi Idus litteras tuas inanis. quid enim habebas quod scriberes? mi tamen illud quicquid erat non molestum fuit, <ut> nihil aliud, scire me novi te nihil habere. scripsisti tamen nescio quid de Clodia. Vbi ergo ea est aut quando ventura? placet mihi res sic ut secundum [2] Othonem nihil magis. sed neque hanc vendituram puto (delectatur enim et copiosa est), et illud alterum quam sit difficile te non fugit. sed, obsecro, enitamur ut aliquid ad id quod cupio excogitemus. [3] ego me hinc postridie <id.> exiturum puto sed aut in Tusculanum aut domum, inde fortasse Arpinum. cum certum sciero, scribam ad te.
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I have not missed getting a letter from you on any single day; for I could see what you keep writing, and yet I suspected, or rather understood, that there was nothing for you to write about. On the sixth day before the Ides, however, I both supposed you were away and saw plainly that you had nothing. Still, I shall send to you almost every day; for I prefer to do it in vain rather than have you with no one to give a letter to, in case there happens to be something you think I ought to know. And so on the sixth day before the Ides I received your empty letter. For what did you have to write about? Yet that letter, whatever it was, was not unwelcome to me, since, if nothing else, it let me know that there was no fresh news for you to report.
You did, however, write something or other about Clodia. So where is she, or when is she going to come? The matter pleases me in such a way that, after Otho, nothing pleases me more. But I do not think she will sell (for she enjoys the property and is well off), and you are well aware how difficult that other course is. But, I beg you, let us strive to devise some way to reach what I so much desire.
I think I shall leave here on the day after the Ides, but heading either to my place at Tusculum or home, and from there perhaps to Arpinum. When I know for certain, I will write to you.
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
nullum a te desideravi diem litterarum; videbam enim quae scribis, et tamen suspicabar vel potius intellegebam nihil fuisse quod scriberes; a. d. vi Idus vero et abesse te putabam et plane videbam nihil te habere. ego tamen ad te fere cotidie mittam; malo enim frustra quam te non habere cui des, si quid forte sit quod putes me scire oportere. itaque accepi vi Idus litteras tuas inanis. quid enim habebas quod scriberes? mi tamen illud quicquid erat non molestum fuit, <ut> nihil aliud, scire me novi te nihil habere. scripsisti tamen nescio quid de Clodia. Vbi ergo ea est aut quando ventura? placet mihi res sic ut secundum [2] Othonem nihil magis. sed neque hanc vendituram puto (delectatur enim et copiosa est), et illud alterum quam sit difficile te non fugit. sed, obsecro, enitamur ut aliquid ad id quod cupio excogitemus. [3] ego me hinc postridie <id.> exiturum puto sed aut in Tusculanum aut domum, inde fortasse Arpinum. cum certum sciero, scribam ad te.