Letter 9012: Other letters of mine have been chasing you across Spain -- I had assumed you were living there because of the...
Other letters of mine are seeking you throughout the Spains; for I had reckoned that you were residing there on account of the extent of your private estate. After a more reliable report brought word that you were taking your leisure among your ancestral household gods, I gave thanks to this mistake of mine, which granted me the chance to address you once again. And yet this doubling of letters, although it ought to satisfy your heart, does not yet suffice for mine; for I should wish to honor your friendship with letters as continuously as I have never failed to cultivate it unceasingly in my mind. I append a request. The praetorship of my son, long since commended to your good will, now presses upon us with its public spectacle, if the saying may be favored by fortune. That occasion admonishes us to procure noble four-horse teams for the contest, such as might be culled, the better ones, from the herds of many men. Let it not work against my confidence that you have dwelt in the Spains in so distant a seat; only assist with your letters the men whom I have set to the purchasing of horses. The delegating of the matter to your care will avail on our behalf, as I hope, among your friends. [Book] 24 (XXII), year 399.
AI-assisted translation - This translation was produced with AI assistance and has not been peer-reviewed.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
Requirunt te per Hispanias aliae litterae meae; illic enim te degere ob rei fa-
miliaris amplitudinem duxeram. postquam te in avitis penatibus otiari constantior
fides adtulit, egi huic errori gratias, qui mibi praestitit, ut te rursus adloquerer. et *
tamen ista geminatio, quamvis satisfacere animo tuo debeat, nondum meo sufGcit;
vellem quippe ita continue honorare amicitiam tuam litteris, ut mente iugiter colere
r 2 numquam dissimulaverim. | subiungo postulatum. iampridem commendata sensibus
tuis praetoria filii mei, si fors dictum iuvet, instat editio. ea nos admonet, ut qua-
drigas nobiles in certamen quae posset ex multorum gregibus edecumare me- lo
liores. non obsit securitati meae, quod Hispanias longinqua sede Twu/asti; admotos a
me equorum coemptioni tantum litteris iuva. valebit pro nobis, ut spero, apud ami-
cos curae tuae delegatio.
xxnn (XXH) a. 399.
Revision history
- 2026-05-27v2.2.34-import
Initial corpus import from modern symmachus retranslated v1.
Fields: letter text, metadata, source links. Source: https://archive.org/details/qaureliisymmach00seecgoog
Related Letters
I take great pleasure whenever I receive one of your letters.
I reap annual harvests of joy from your letters -- this is the return, these are the riches that Spain pays me.
I was grieved to find on reading your ladyship's letter that you are involved in the same difficulties. What is to be done to men who show such a shifty character, saying now one thing now another and never abiding in the same pledges? If, after the promises made in my presence, and in that of the ex-prefect, he now tries to shorten the time of ...
In a letter sweeter than any reproach, you scold me for my neglected duty, and I thank you for it.
It is my habit to be the first to seek out the friendship of worthy men.