Claudian, volume 1 (of 2): With an English translation by Maurice PlatnauerClaudianus, Claudius
General
Claudian, volume 1 (of 2): With an English translation by Maurice Platnauer
Claudianus, Claudius
Claudianus, Claudius -- Translations into English
They stamp on that face of greed and while yet he lives pluck out his
eyes; others seize and carry off his severed arms. One cuts off his
foot, another wrenches a shoulder from the torn sinews; one lays bare
the ribs of the cleft spine, another his liver, his heart, his still
panting lungs. There is not space enough to satisfy their anger nor
room to wreak their hate. Scarce when his death had been accomplished
do they leave him; his body is hacked in pieces and the fragments borne
on the soldiers’ spears. Thus red with blood ran the Boeotian mountain
when the Maenads caused Pentheus’ destruction or when Latona’s daughter
seen by Actaeon betrayed the huntsman, suddenly transformed into a
stag, to the fury of her Molossian hounds. Dost thou hope, Fortune,
thus to right thy wrongs? Seekest thou to atone by this meting out
of punishment for favour ill bestowed? Dost thou with one death make
payment for ten thousand murders? Come, portion out Rufinus’ corpse
among the lands he has wronged. Give the Thracians his head; let Greece
have as her due his body. What shall be given the rest? Give but a limb
apiece, there are not enough for the peoples he has ruined.
The citizens leave the town and hasten exulting to the spot from every
quarter, old men and girls among them whom nor age nor sex could keep
at home. Widows whose husbands he had killed, mothers whose children he
had murdered hurry to the joyful scene with eager steps. They are fain
to trample the torn limbs and stain their deep pressed feet with the
blood. So, too, they eagerly hurl a shower of stones at the monstrous
head, nodding from the summit of the spear that transfixed it as it
* * * * *
Page 90
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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