Nepos: LIBER DE EXCELLENTIBUS DVCIBUS EXTERARVM GENTIVM

[1] Pausanias Lacedaemonius magnus homo, sed varius in omni genere vitae fuit: nam ut virtutibus eluxit, sic vitiis est obrutus. Huius illustrissimum est proelium apud Plataeas.

[1] Pausanias the Lacedaemonian was a great man, but changeable in every manner of life: for as he shone forth in virtues, so he was overwhelmed by vices. His most illustrious battle is at Plataea.

2 Namque illo duce Mardonius, satrapes regius, natione Medus, regis gener, in primis omnium Persarum et manu fortis et consilii plenus, cum CC milibus peditum, quos viritim legerat, et XX equitum haud ita magna manu Graeciae fugatus est, eoque ipse dux cecidit proelio. Qua victoria elatus plurima miscere coepit et maiora concupiscere.

2 For with him as commander Mardonius, a royal satrap, by nation a Mede, the king’s son-in-law, foremost among all the Persians, both strong in hand and full of counsel, with 200,000 infantry, whom he had selected man by man, and 20,000 cavalry, was driven in flight from Greece by a not-so-great force; and in that battle the leader himself fell. Elated by that victory, he began to stir up very many matters and to desire greater things.

3 Sed primum in eo est reprehensus, quod [cum] ex praeda tripodem aureum Delphis posuisset epigrammate scripto, in quo haec erat sententia: suo ductu barbaros apud Plataeas esse deletos, eiusque victoriae ergo Apollini id donum dedisse.

3 But first he was censured in this, that when he had placed at Delphi a golden tripod from the booty, with an epigram written on it, the sentiment of which was this: that by his own leadership the barbarians at Plataea had been destroyed, and that for the sake of that victory he had given this gift to Apollo.

4 Hos versus Lacedaemonii exsculpserunt neque aliud scripserunt quam nomina earum civitatum, quarum auxilio Persae erant victi.

4 The Lacedaemonians chiseled out these verses and wrote nothing other than the names of those cities, by whose aid the Persians were defeated.

[2] Post id proelium eundem Pausaniam cum classe communi Cyprum atque Hellespontum miserunt, ut ex his regionibus barbarorum praesidia depelleret.

[2] After that battle they sent that same Pausanias with the common fleet to Cyprus and the Hellespont, in order to drive out from these regions the garrisons of the barbarians.

2 Pari felicitate in ea re usus elatius se gerere coepit maioresque appetere res. Nam cum Byzantio expugnato cepisset complures Persarum nobiles atque in his nonnullos regis propinquos, hos clam Xerxi remisit, simulans ex vinclis publicis effugisse, et cum his Gongylum Eretriensem, qui litteras regi redderet, in quibus haec fuisse scripta Thucydides memoriae prodidit:

2 Enjoying equal felicity in that matter, he began to carry himself more loftily and to aspire to greater enterprises. For when, Byzantium having been taken by storm, he had captured several nobles of the Persians, and among them some relatives of the king, he secretly sent these back to Xerxes, pretending that they had escaped from public fetters; and with them (he sent) Gongylus the Eretrian, to deliver letters to the king, in which Thucydides has put on record that the following were written:

3 `Pausanias, dux Spartae, quos Byzantii ceperat, postquam propinquos tuos cognovit, tibi muneri misit seque tecum affinitate coniungi cupit. Quare, si tibi videtur, des ei filiam tuam nuptum.

3 `Pausanias, the leader of Sparta, after he learned that those whom he had taken at Byzantium were your kinsmen, sent them to you as a gift, and he desires to be joined with you by affinity. Therefore, if it seems good to you, give him your daughter in marriage.`

4 Id si feceris, et Spartam et ceteram Graeciam sub tuam potestatem se adiuvante te redacturum pollicetur. His de rebus si quid geri volueris, certum hominem ad eum mittas face, cum quo colloquatur.'

4 If you do this, he promises that he will, with you assisting, reduce both Sparta and the rest of Greece under your power. If you should wish anything to be done in these matters, see to it that you send to him a trusted man, with whom he may confer.'

5 Rex tot hominum salute tam sibi necessariorum magnopere gavisus confestim cum epistula Artabazum ad Pausaniam mittit, in qua eum collaudat petit, ne cui rei pareat ad ea efficienda, quae pollicetur: si perfecerit, nullius rei a se repulsam laturum.

5 The king, greatly rejoicing at the safety of so many men so necessary to himself, forthwith sends Artabazus with an epistle to Pausanias, in which he highly praises him and requests that he defer to nothing in achieving those things which he promises: if he accomplishes it, he will refuse him nothing in any matter.

6 Huius Pausanias voluntate cognita alacrior ad rem gerendam factus, in suspicionem cecidit Lacedaemoniorum. Quo facto domum revocatus, accusatus capitis absolvitur, multatur tamen pecunia; quam ob causam ad classem remissus non est.

6 With this man’s will having been learned, Pausanias, made more alacritous to prosecute the affair, fell under the suspicion of the Lacedaemonians. Whereupon, recalled home and accused on a capital charge, he is acquitted, nevertheless mulcted with a pecuniary fine; for which cause he was not sent back to the fleet.

[3] At ille post non multo sua sponte ad exercitum rediit et ibi non callida, sed dementi ratione cogitata patefecit. Non enim mores patrios solum, sed etiam cultum vestitumque mutavit.

[3] But he, not long after, of his own accord returned to the army, and there he laid bare designs conceived not by a clever but by a demented rationale. For he changed not only the ancestral mores, but also his grooming and dress.

2 Apparatu regio utebatur, veste Medica; satellites Medi et Aegyptii sequebantur, epulabatur more Persarum luxuriosius, quam, qui aderant, perpeti possent.

2 He used regal apparatus, in Median attire; Median and Egyptian bodyguards followed, he feasted in the Persian manner more luxuriously than those who were present could endure.

3 Aditum petentibus conveniundi non dabat, superbe respondebat, crudeliter imperabat. Spartam redire nolebat: Colonas, qui locus in agro Troade est se contulerat: ibi consilia cum patriae tum sibi inimica capiebat.

3 To those seeking access he did not grant an audience, he answered arrogantly, he commanded cruelly. He did not wish to return to Sparta: he had betaken himself to Colonas, a place which is in the territory of the Troad: there he was adopting counsels hostile both to his fatherland and to himself.

4 Id postquam Lacedaemonii rescierunt, legatos cum clava ad eum miserunt, in qua more illorum erat scriptum: nisi domum reverteretur, se capitis eum damnaturos.

4 After the Lacedaemonians learned this, they sent legates to him with a club, on which, according to their custom, it was written: that unless he returned home, they would condemn him to capital punishment.

5 Hoc nuntio commotus, sperans se etiam tum pecunia et potentia instans periculum posse depellere, domum rediit. Huc ut venit, ab ephoris in vincla publica est coniectus; licet enim legibus eorum cuivis ephoro hoc facere regi. Hinc tamen se expedivit; neque eo magis carebat suspicione.

5 Stirred by this message, hoping that even then by money and power he could drive away the pressing peril, he returned home. When he came here, he was cast by the ephors into the public prison; for by their laws it is permitted to any ephor to do this to the king. Yet from this he extricated himself; nor for that was he any the more free from suspicion.

Nam opinio manebat eum cum rege habere societatem.

For the opinion persisted that he had an association with the king.

6 Est genus quoddam hominum, quod Hilotae vocatur, quorum magna multitudo agros Lacedaemoniorum colit servorumque munere fungitur. Hos quoque sollicitare spe libertatis existimabatur.

6 There is a certain kind of men, called Helots, whose great multitude cultivates the fields of the Lacedaemonians and performs the function of slaves. He was thought to be stirring these also with the hope of liberty.

7 Sed quod harum rerum nullum erat apertum crimen, quo argui posset, non putabant de tali tamque claro viro suspicionibus oportere iudicari et exspectandum, dum se ipsa res aperiret.

7 But since in these matters there was no manifest charge by which he could be accused, they did not think it proper that such and so illustrious a man should be judged on suspicions, and that one must wait until the matter itself made itself manifest.

[4] Interim Argilius quidam adulescentulus, quem puerum Pausanias amore venerio dilexerat, cum epistulam ab eo ad Artabazum accepisset, eique in suspicionem venisset aliquid in ea de se esse scriptum, quod nemo eorum redisset, qui super tali causa eodem missi erant, vincla epistulae laxavit signoque detracto cognovit, si pertulisset, sibi esse pereundum.

[4] Meanwhile a certain very young man, Argilius, whom, as a boy, Pausanias had cherished with venereal love, when he had received an epistle from him to Artabazus, and it had come into his suspicion that something about himself was written in it, because none of those had returned who had been sent to the same place on such a matter, loosened the bindings of the epistle and, the seal removed, learned that, if he delivered it, he would have to perish.

2 Erant in eadem epistula, quae ad ea pertinebant, quae inter regem Pausaniamque convenerant. Has ille litteras ephoris tradidit.

2 In the same letter were the items that pertained to those matters which had been agreed between the king and Pausanias. He handed this letter over to the ephors.

3 Non est praetereunda gravitas Lacedaemoniorum hoc loco. Nam ne huius quidem indicio impulsi sunt, ut Pausaniam comprehenderent, neque prius vim adhibendam putaverunt, quam se ipse indicasset.

3 The gravity of the Lacedaemonians is not to be passed over at this point. For not even by this very man’s evidence were they impelled to apprehend Pausanias, nor did they think force should be applied before he himself had made the indication.

4 Itaque huic indici, quid fieri vellent, praeceperunt. Fanum Neptuni est Taenari, quod violari nefas putant Graeci. Eo ille [index] confugit in araque consedit.

4 And so to this informer they gave instructions as to what they wanted to be done. There is a fane of Neptune at Taenarus, which the Greeks consider it sacrilege to violate. Thither he [index] fled and sat down upon the altar.

Hanc iuxta locum fecerunt sub terra, ex quo posset audiri, si quis quid loqueretur cum Argilio. Huc ex ephoris quidam descenderunt.

Next to this they made a place underground, from which it could be heard, if anyone should say anything with Argilius. Hither some of the ephors descended.

5 Pausanias ut audivit Argilium confugisse in aram, perturbatus venit eo. Quem cum supplicem dei videret in ara sedentem, quaerit, causae quid sit tam repentini consilii.

5 Pausanias, when he heard that Argilius had taken refuge at the altar, came there perturbed. When he saw him, a suppliant of the god, sitting on the altar, he asks what the cause is of so sudden a counsel.

6 Huc ille, quid ex litteris comperisset, aperit. Modo magis Pausanias perturbatus orare coepit, ne enuntiaret nec se meritum de illo optime proderet: quod si eam veniam sibi dedisset tantisque implicatum rebus sublevasset, magno ei praemio futurum.

6 Thither he discloses what he had learned from the letters. Now more perturbed, Pausanias began to beseech that he not divulge it nor betray one who had deserved most excellently of him; that if he granted him that pardon and would relieve a man entangled in such great affairs, it would be for him a great reward.

[5] His rebus ephori cognitis satius putarunt in urbe eum comprehendi. Quo cum essent profecti et Pausanias placato Argilio, ut putabat, Lacedaemonem reverteretur, in itinere, cum iam in eo esset, ut comprehenderetur, ex vultu cuiusdam ephori, qui eum admoneri cupiebat, insidias sibi fieri intellexit.

[5] When these matters were learned by the ephors, they judged it better that he be apprehended in the city. For this, when they had set out, and Pausanias, with Argilius appeased, as he thought, was returning to Lacedaemon, on the road, when he was now at the point of being apprehended, from the countenance of a certain ephor, who wished that he be warned, he realized that a plot was being laid against him.

2 Itaque paucis ante gradibus, quam qui eum sequebantur, in aedem Minervae, quae Chalcioicos vocatur, confugit. Hinc ne exire posset, statim ephori valvas eius aedis obstruxerunt tectumque sunt demoliti, quo celerius sub divo interiret.

2 And so, a few steps ahead of those who were following him, he fled for refuge into the temple of Minerva, which is called the Chalcioecus. From there, lest he be able to go out, the ephors immediately blocked the doors of that temple and demolished the roof, so that he might more quickly perish under the open sky.

3 Dicitur eo tempore matrem Pausaniae vixisse eamque iam magno natu, postquam de scelere filii comperit, in primis ad filium claudendum lapidem ad introitum aedis attulisse.

3 It is said that at that time the mother of Pausanias was alive, and that she, already of great age, after she had ascertained the crime of her son, was among the first to bring a stone to the entrance of the temple for shutting in her son.

4 Hic cum semianimis de templo elatus esset confestim animam efflavit. Sic Pausanias magnam belli gloriam turpi morte maculavit.

4 Here, when half-alive he had been carried out of the temple, he immediately breathed out his life. Thus Pausanias stained the great glory of war with a shameful death.

5 Cuius mortui corpus cum eodem nonnulli dicerent inferri oportere, quo ii, qui ad supplicium essent dati, displicuit pluribus, et procul ab eo loco infoderunt, quo erat mortuus. Inde posterius dei Delphici responso erutus atque eodem loco sepultus est, ubi vitam posuerat.

5 When some were saying that the body of the dead man ought to be carried into the same place as those who had been consigned to punishment, it displeased the majority, and they interred it far from the place where he had died. Thereafter, by the response of the Delphic god, he was exhumed and buried in the same place where he had laid down his life.