NEW YORK
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY
First Published in 1915
i> the Great, to the Reign of
Alexander Severus.
In Two Volumes
Done from the Greek, by Mr. Manning
Tametsi haudquaquam par gloria sequatur Scriptorem, & Authorem rerum,
tamen in primis arduum videtur res gestas scribere. Salust.
London: Printed for A. and J. Churchill, in Paternoster Row, 1704.
Four hundred and seven small pages, over and above the Epistle Dedicatory, are contained in Volume One. Really, however, this is not the true Dio at all, but merely his shadow, seized and distorted to satisfy the ideas of his epitomizer, the monk Xiphilinus, who was separated from him by a thousand years in the flesh and another thousand in the spirit. Of the little specimens here and there translated for this man's or that man's convenience no mention need here be made. Hence, practically speaking, Dio now for the first time emerges in his impressive stature before the English-speaking public after there has elapsed since his own day a period twice as long as then constituted the extent of that history which was his theme.
The present version, begun while I was serving as Acting Professor of Greek at St. Stephen's College, Annandale, N.Y., has been carried forward during such intervals of leisure as I could snatch from an overflowing schedule at the University of South Dakota. It has been my companion on many journeys and six states have witnessed its progress toward completion. In spite of the time consumed it seems in retrospect not far short of presumptuous to have tried in three or four years to put into acceptable English what Dio spent twelve in writing down. Yet the task was not quite the same, for half of this historian's books have been caught up and whirled away in the cyclone of time; and who knows whether they still possess any resting-place above or beneath the earth?
The text originally chosen as the basis for the translation was that of Melber, the idea of the translator being that the Teubner edition would be the most convenient and readily obtainable standard of reference for any one who wished to compare the Greek and the English. Hence the numbering of the Fragments is that of Melber (subdivisions are distinguished by a notation simpler than that of the original "sections"). Since no Teubner volumes beyond the second proved to be forthcoming, the rest of the work followed the stereotyped Tauchnitz edition, which also enjoys a large circulation. This text, however, contained so many cases of corruption and clumsiness that it seemed best to work over carefully nearly all of the latter portion of the English and to embody as many as possible of the improvements of Boissevain. Incidentally Boissevain's interior arrangement of all the later books was adopted, though it was deemed preferable (for mere readiness of reference) to adhere to the old external division of books established by Leunclavius. (Boissevain's changes are, however, indicated.) The Tauchnitz text with all its inaccuracies endeavors to present a coherent and readable narrative, and this is something which the exactitude of Boissevain does not at all times permit. In the translation I have striven to follow a conservative course, and at some points a straightforward narrative interlarded with brackets will give evidence of its origin in Tauchnitz, whereas at others loose, disjointed paragraphs betray the hand of Boissevain who would not willingly let Xiphilinus and Dio ride in the same compartment. My main desire through it all has been not so much to attain a logical unity of form as to present a history which shall look well and read well in English. For this reason also I have banished most of the Fragments (which must have only a comparatively limited interest) to the last volume and have replaced them in my first by portions of Zonaras (taken from Melber) which have their origin in Dio and are at the same time clear, comprehensible, and connected.
Should any person object that even so my text does not offer eye and ear a pellucid field for smooth advance, I must reply that the original is likewise very far from being a serene and joyous highway; and it has not appeared to me necessary or desirable to improve upon the form of Dio's record further than the difference in the genius of the two languages demanded. I am reminded here of what Francisque Reynard says regarding the difficulties of Boccaccio, and because of a similarity in the situation I venture to quote from the preface of his (French) version of the Decameron:
"Dans son admiration exclusive des anciens, Boccace a pris pour modÈle CicÉron et sa longue pÉriode acadÉmique, dans laquelle les incidences se greffent sur les incidences, poursuivant l'idÉe jusqu'au bout, et ne la laissant que lorsqu'elle est ÉpuisÉe, comme le souffle ou l'attention de celui qui lit.... Aussi le plus souvent sa phrasÉologie est-elle fort complexe, et pour suivre le fil de l'idÉe premiÈre, faut-il apporter une attention soutenue. Ce qui est dÉjÀ une difficultÉ de lecture dans le texte italien, devient un obstacle trÈs sÉrieux quand on a À traduire ces interminables phrases en franÇais moderne, prototype de prÉcision, de clartÉ, de logique grammaticale.... Je sais bien qu'il y a un moyen commode de l'Éluder...: c'est de couper les phrases et d'en faire, d'une seule, deux, trois, quatre, autant qu'il est besoin. Mais À ce jeu on change notablement la physionomie de l'original, et c'est ce que je ne puis admettre."
As is Boccaccio to Cicero, so is Cassius Dio, mutatis mutandis, to Thukydides; and of course the imitator improves upon the model. Imagine a man who out-Paters Pater when Pater shall be but a memory, and you begin to secure a vision of the style of this Roman senator, who accentuates every peculiarity of the tragic historian's packed periods; and whereas his great predecessor made sentences so long as to cause mediÆval scholars heartily to wish him in the Barathron, books and all, comes forward six hundred years later marshaling phrase upon phrase, clause upon clause, till a modern is forced to exclaim: "What, will the line stretch out to the crack of doom?" Now I have dealt with these complexes in different ways; and sometimes I have cleft and hacked and wrenched them out of all semblance of their original shape, and sometimes I have hauled them almost entire, like a cable, tangled with particles, out of the sea-bed of departed days.
This principle of inconsistency which I have pursued in varying the rendering of long sentences, periodic or loose, according to external modifying conditions, may be observed also in certain other features of the book. For I have felt obliged to allow inconsistency of letter in the hope of approaching a consistency of spirit. I suppose that the ideal plan to follow in a translation would be to let a given English word represent a given Greek word, so that "beautiful" should occur as many times in the English version as καλος in the original, and "strength" as many times as 'ρωμη. Such a scheme, however, is not feasible in a passage of any length, and its impossibility simply goes to show what a makeshift translation is and always has been, after all. Therefore single Greek words will be found reproduced by various English terms, but with that color which seems best adapted to the context.
Again, in spelling I have chosen a method not unknown to recent historians, which consists in anglicising familiar proper names that are household words, like Antony, Catiline, etc., but keeping the classical Latin form for persons less well known, as Antonius the grandfather of Mark Antony. To the names of gods I have given a Latin dress unless a particular god happened to be named by a Greek on Greek soil. Similarly in geographical or topographical designations the translator of Dio must needs confront a more difficult situation than did Dio himself. Greek reduces all names to its own basis. In English one must often select from the Latin form, Greek form, Native form, or Anglicised form. Since Dio lived in Italy and was to all intents and purposes a Roman I decided to make the Latin form the standard, and admit rarely the Anglicised form, less often the Greek, and least often the Native. As to the minutiÆ of spelling I need scarcely say that I have been tremendously aided by Boissevain's exhaustive studies, briefly summarized in his notes. This painstaking care, for which he feels almost obliged to apologize, will lend a permanent lustre to his invaluable work.
That many errors must have crept into an undertaking of this magnitude I have only too vivid forebodings, and this in spite of no inconsiderable efforts of mine to avoid them: herein I can but beg the clemency of my readers and judges and hope that such faults may be found to be mostly of a minor character. And perhaps I can do no better than to make common cause at once with Mr. Francis Manning whose book I recently mentioned; for, in his Epistle Dedicatory "To The " Right Honourable " CHARLES " Earl of Orrery", he voices as well as possible the feelings with which I write on the dedication page the name of Professor Gildersleeve:
"Your Lordship will forgive me for detaining you thus long with relation to the Work I have made bold to present you with in our own Tongue. How well it is perform'd, I must leave entirely to my Readers. I assume nothing to myself but an endeavour to make my Author speak intelligible English. I shall only add what my Subject leads me to, and what for my Reader's sake I ought to mention: That as there are but few Authors that can present any Book to your Lordship in most other Languages, and on most of the Learned Subjects, but might wish they had been assisted by your Lordship's Skill and Knowledge therein, as well as Patronage and Protection; so the Translator of this Greek Historian in particular must lament, that notwithstanding all his Industry and Pains, he is faln infinitely short of that great Judgment, Nicety and Criticism in the Greek Language, which your Lordship has in your Writings made appear to the World."
Dio has long served as a source to writers treating topics of greater or less length in Roman history. He is now presented entire to the casual reader: his veracious narrative must ever continue to interest the historical student, who may correct him by others or others by him, the ecclesiastic, to whom is here offered so graphic a picture of the conditions surrounding early Christianity, and the literary man, who finds the limpid stream of Hellenic diction far from its source grow turbid and turgid in turning the mill wheels for this dealer in ογκος. Dio's faults are patent, but his excellencies, fortunately, are patent, too; and the world may rejoice that in an age of lust and bloodshed this serious-minded magistrate bethought him to record with religious exactness what he believed to be the truth respecting the Kingdom, the Republic, and the Empire of Rome even to his own day.
I desire in conclusion to express especial gratitude and appreciation for assistance and suggestions to Professor C.W.E. Miller of Johns Hopkins University, Professors J.H. Wright and A.A. Howard of Harvard University, and to Mr. A.T. Robinson of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Likewise I must acknowledge my obligations, in the elucidation of particularly vexed and corrupt passages, to the illuminative comments of Sturz, or Wagner, or Gros, or BoissÉe, or all combined. Additional thanks are due to many others who have helped or shall yet help to make Dio in English a success.
HERBERT BALDWIN FOSTER.
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania,
June, 1905.
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