Quintilian: DECLAMATIONES MAIORES

[Quidam, cui erat filius caecus, quem heredem instituerat, induxit illi novercam iuvenemque in secreta domus parte seposuit. Is noctu, dum in cubiculo cum uxore iaceret, occisus est inventusque postero die habens gladium filii defixum in vulnere, pariete ab ipsius ad filii cubiculum vestigiis palmae cruentato. Accusant se invicem caecus et noverca.]

[Certain man, who had a blind son whom he had instituted as heir, brought in for him a stepmother and secluded a youth in a secret part of the house. He, by night, while he lay in the bedroom with his wife, was found slain, and on the next day discovered having the son’s sword fixed in the wound, the wall, from his to the son’s bedroom, bloodied with the prints of a palm. The blind man and the stepmother accuse one another.]

[1] Si iuvenis innocentissimus, iudices, uti vellet ambitu tristissimae calamitatis, poterat allegare vobis amissam cum oculis cogitationum omnium temeritatem; sed, cum ostendere innocentiam suam moribus malit quam adversis, neque pietatis neque conscientiae suae gravem ferre contumeliam potest, ut parricidium non fecisse videatur beneficio caecitatis. Quare igitur non petit, ut illum miserum putetis, nisi et innocens fuerit; non petit, ut adflictum allevetis, nisi et probaverit esse se infeliciorem quod patrem amisit, quam quod oculos. Aestimate iuvenem his moribus, quibus videntem aestimaretis: vita, pudore, pietate.

[1] If the most innocent young man, judges, wished to avail himself of the ambit of his most sorrowful calamity, he could allege to you that together with his eyes he has lost the temerity of all counsels; but, since he prefers to show his innocence by his morals rather than by adversities, he cannot bear the grievous contumely to his pietas and his conscience, that he should seem not to have committed parricide by the benefit of blindness. Wherefore he does not ask that you consider him wretched, unless he also be innocent; he does not ask that you alleviate the afflicted, unless he shall also have proved that he is more unfortunate in that he lost his father than in that he lost his eyes. Appraise the youth by those morals by which you would appraise him were he seeing: life, modesty, piety.

Quae si omnia sibi, ut erant promissa, constiterint, nullo terrebitur crimine. Nec quod sceleratissima feminarum calamitatem nostram cruentato pariete imitata est, expavescimus: quo diligentia sollicitior fuit, ne deprehenderetur, hoc magis indicavit sibi oculos non defuisse. Gratias agimus, quod nimium avide suspiciones in nostram transtulit partem: non esse caeci scelus difficilius probaretur, nisi omnia sic acta essent, ut fecisse caecus videretur.

If all these points, as they were promised, hold good for him, he will be terrified by no charge. Nor do we quake because the most criminal of women has imitated our calamity with a blood-stained wall: the more solicitous her diligence was, lest she be apprehended, by so much the more she indicated that she herself had not lacked eyes. We give thanks that too avidly she transferred suspicions onto our side: it would be more difficult to prove that the crime is not the blind man’s, if everything had not been so managed that the blind man seemed to have done it.

[2] Quare igitur, iudices, non inprobe speraverim futurum, ut suspecta sint vobis quae tam inconsiderate ficta sunt contra miseram caecitatem: primum quod spatium illud ingens domus, quod in medio fuit, ita digesto cruore satiatum est usque ad cubiculum miserrimi iuvenis, tamquam plane timuerit parricida, ne non deprehenderetur. Deinde sceleri nox potissimum electa, quo tempore inveniri maritus sine uxore non posset. Tum caede, in qua nemo utitur suo ferro, nisi alienum, gladius adulescentis, ne argumentum deesset novercae, relictus.

[2] Why then, judges, should I not without impropriety have hoped that the things so inconsiderately fabricated against wretched blindness would be suspect to you: first, because that vast central space of the house, which was in the middle, was so saturated with blood disposed along the way up to the bedchamber of the most miserable youth, as if the parricide had plainly feared lest he not be apprehended. Next, night was chosen most of all for the crime, at which time a husband could not be found without his wife. Then, a slaughter in which no one uses his own blade unless he another’s, the young man’s sword, lest an argument be lacking to the stepmother, was left behind.

Postremo peractum vulnere uno scelus, quod obiceretur manibus errantis. Et tamen contra tam multa incredibilia solum advocat noverca testamentum, vultque illud esse pretium parricidii, ut rerum intellectu in diversum coacto occisum eo probet patrem, quod non meruit occidi. Nos vero istud, si crimen putatis, agnoscimus: iuvenis hic patris sui heres solus est.

Finally, the crime was accomplished with a single wound, so that it might be cast as a charge upon the hands of the errant one. And yet, against so many incredible points, the stepmother calls only the testament in her defense, and wants that to be the price of parricide, so that, with the understanding of the facts constrained into the contrary, she may prove that the father was slain for this reason—because he did not deserve to be slain. We indeed acknowledge this, if you deem it a crime: this youth is the sole heir of his father.

Hoc testamentum si vivente adhuc miserrimo sene notum esse in domo potuit, scitis, quis illi debuerit irasci. Nam quod invisum fuisse filium patri iactat, crimen novercae erat, si confiteremur; idque probari ex hoc putat, quod secretum non filius accepit a patre, sed caecitas. Quo loco dissimulare satis callide conatur invidiam suam: pater, qui filium caecum in semota penatium parte seposuit, eripuit novercae oculis voluptatem.

This will, if it could have been known in the house while the most wretched old man was still living, you know who ought to have been angry with him. For the fact that she vaunts that the son was hateful to the father would have been the stepmother’s crime, if we were to confess it; and she thinks that this is proven from this: that the secret was received not by the son from the father, but by blindness. At this point she tries quite cleverly to dissimulate her envy: the father, who sequestered his blind son in a secluded part of the household, snatched pleasure from the stepmother’s eyes.

Namque ista cum invasisse vacuos penates videretur, cum patri filium caecum hoc esse crederet quod orbitatem, excogitavit indulgentissimus senex, quemadmodum hic miser patri suo in eadem domo esset, novercae in alia: accepit secretum quod erat petiturus. Quo sit animo senis factum, potestis interrogare testamentum. Neque ego gravissimum patrem suprema sua iuveni iactasse crediderim; ut heredem filium scriberet, non est res quae inputetur.

For indeed, when that woman seemed to have invaded the vacant household, when she believed that for the father his blind son amounted to bereavement, the most indulgent old man contrived how this poor fellow should be, for his father, in the same house, for the stepmother, in another: he received the seclusion he was going to request. With what disposition of the old man it was done, you can ask the testament. Nor would I believe that a most grave father had vaunted his last dispositions to a youth; that he wrote his son as heir is not a thing that can be imputed.

Istam magis oportet vel aliquo indicio vel suspicione muliebri arcana mariti deprehendisse et statim omnibus nuptiarum renuntiasse pignoribus. Nam cum propter pecuniam ames, idem amoris et spei finis est.

It is more fitting to suppose that that woman detected the husband’s secrets either by some indication or by womanly suspicion, and straightway renounced all the pledges of marriage. For when you love on account of money, the same is the end of love and of hope.

[3] Habuerat adulescens gladium in cubiculo suo semper, sive antequam in hanc fortunam incideret, paratum, sive quia caecitatis miserae solacium est habere rem videntium. Certe numquam illum pater timuerat, numquam noverca obiecerat; palam positum est, sub oculis omnium tota domo notissimum ferrum. Scitis, quanto neglegentius custodiat ferrum bona conscientia, quam etiam extra suspicionem sit res sine usu.

[3] The adolescent had always kept a sword in his cubicle, whether prepared before he fell into this condition, or because for wretched blindness it is a solace to have a thing of the seeing. Certainly his father had never feared it, his stepmother had never cast it up; it lay openly, under everyone’s eyes, a most well-known iron throughout the whole house. You know how much more negligently a good conscience guards iron, seeing that a thing without use is even beyond suspicion.

Innocentia facit, ut ferrum subtrahi possit etiam videnti. Sive igitur aliquis ex servulis corruptus est, praesertim [e] tam facili occasione, sive ipsi novercae non defuit audacia ad ferendum, quod facere poterat etiam praesente privigno, utique (quod dubitari non potest, quod facit certum sceleris auctorem) mavult in caede alieno uti quam suo gladio quisquis illum relicturus est. Reliqua, iudices, si fieri possunt, facta aestimate: dicitur caecus sine rectore, sine duce ex illa penatium parte secreta et paene ex alia domo per inane longum, per tot offensa limina, per excubantes servulos errasse cum ferro; cubiculum deinde patris ingressum in neutram deflexisse partem, sed recto gradu, sicut ducere oculi solent, ad lectulum accessisse leviter, non in torum incidisse, non ante pervenisse, quam crederet.

Innocence makes it so that the iron can be removed even from one who sees. Whether therefore some one of the little servants was corrupted, especially [e] by so easy an occasion, or the stepmother herself did not lack audacity for carrying it—something she could do even with the stepson present—certainly (a thing which cannot be doubted, which makes the author of the crime certain) whoever is going to leave it prefers in a killing to use another’s rather than his own sword. The rest, judges, if it can be done, assess as facts: it is said that the blind man, without a rector, without a leader, from that secret part of the household-gods’ quarter, and almost from another house, through a long empty space, over so many thresholds to be struck against, past servants keeping watch, wandered with the iron; then, having entered his father’s bedchamber, he did not swerve to either side, but with a straight step, as eyes are wont to lead, he approached the little bed lightly, did not fall upon the couch, did not arrive before he supposed.

[4] Vos, iudices, criminum tumultum ex rerum fide ducite. Dormiens senex, quem caecus percussor quaereret, excitatus ante esset quam inveniretur. Iungunt his multo incredibiliora, ut occiderit patrem, pepercerit novercae, parricidium autem uno ictu explicuerit, quod fere vix etiam his contingere solet, qui oculos manu sequuntur.

[4] You, judges, deduce the tumult of crimes from the trustworthiness of the facts. A sleeping old man, whom a blind assailant was seeking, would have been awakened before he was found. To these they add things much more incredible: that he killed his father, spared his stepmother, and that he accomplished parricide with a single stroke—something which scarcely is wont to happen even to those who make the hand follow the eyes.

Nulla ergo luminum virtus, sed homo ferrum missurus in casum, satis felix, si percussisset quamcumque corporis partem, in ipsam protinus animam incidit et, an morti satisfecisset, intellexit? Officium, iudices, oculorum est renuntiare manibus, quid actum sit. Caeci percussoris una securitas fuerat saepius ferire.

Therefore no power of the lights, but a man about to send the iron at random, fortunate enough, if he had struck whatever part of the body, straightway fell upon the very soul, and knew whether he had satisfied Death? The office, judges, of the eyes is to report back to the hands what has been done. For a blind striker the one security would have been to strike more often.

Negat praeterea quicquam se ex his noverca sensisse, cum iuxta iaceret, nec explicat, unde illud acciderit maximae signum trepidationis, si et pater uno ictu peri[er]it neque ista vigilabat: numquam gladium reliquit percussor securus.

Moreover the stepmother denies that she sensed anything of these events, though she was lying nearby, nor does she explain whence that sign of very great trepidation occurred, if both the father perished by a single blow and that woman was not awake: a confident assailant never leaves the sword behind.

[5] Reliqua, iudices, nimium suspecta, inprobe adsimulata: spatiosissimus paries et longissimum domus latus habuit notas sanguinis, quas reliquisse videretur manus revertentis. o quam bene, quicquid volunt, imitantur oculi! Stupeo, si qua est fides.

[5] The rest, judges, are too suspect, shamelessly simulated: a most spacious wall and the very longest side of the house bore marks of blood, which the hand of the returning man would seem to have left. o how well the eyes imitate whatever they want! I am stupefied, if there is any believing it.

omnia privignus illa nocte fecisse dicitur ad votum novercae: gladium in vulnere reliquisse, quem suum negare non posset, deinde per totum parietem quid aliud inscripsisse quam se parricidam? Sanguinem patris usque ad cubiculum suum perduxisse et viam sequentibus reliquisse. Haec fecit aliquis negaturus?

the stepson is said to have done everything that night to the stepmother’s wish: to have left the sword in the wound, which he could not deny was his, then over the whole wall to have inscribed what else but that he was a parricide? to have led his father’s blood all the way to his own bedchamber and left a path for those following. did someone intending to deny it do these things?

Gratulor tibi, adulescens; si non potuisti parricidium illud admittere, nisi ut relinqueres argumentum caecitatis, habuisti innocentiae necessitatem.Causam igitur miserrimi adulescentis sic apud vos agere proposui, ut primum ipsum defendam, quasi reus tantum sit, deinde cum esse securus de huius innocentia coepero, tunc ingrediar novercae accusationem. Spectabitis utrumque suis moribus, suis causis; erit facilior via vestrae religionis: quamquam duos indicia complexa sint, vos tamen tamquam de singulis cognoveritis.

I congratulate you, adolescent; if you could not commit that parricide except so as to leave behind an argument of blindness, you had the necessity of innocence.Therefore I have proposed to plead the cause of the most wretched adolescent thus before you: that first I defend him himself, as if he were only the defendant; then, when I begin to be secure about this one’s innocence, then I will enter upon the stepmother’s accusation. You will behold each by his own morals, his own causes; the way of your conscientious duty will be easier: although the proofs have encompassed two, you nevertheless will have taken cognizance as if about individuals.

[6] Et primum sic agam tamquam iuvenis habeat oculos, tamquam impetus eius nulla corporis debilitate frangantur. Interrogabo, quid ante perdite, quid flagitiose, quid impie fecerit, per quae se parricidam scelera promiserit. Innocentia per gradus certos ab homine discedit, et, ne in maximis trepidet audacia, diu vires in minoribus colligit.

[6] And first I will proceed thus, as though the young man has eyes, as though his impulses are broken by no debility of the body. I will ask what previously he has done profligately, what flagitiously, what impiously, by which crimes he has promised himself a parricide. Innocence departs from a man by fixed steps, and, lest audacity tremble in the greatest matters, for a long time it gathers strength in lesser ones.

Nemo inde coepit, quo incredibile est pervenisse. Dicas necesse est, quae huic cum patre odia fuerint, quam violenta dissensio inter sacrorum infinita nominum pignora, crede, mulier, etiam tua causa: nam si facile est patrem filio occidere, facilius est uxori maritum. Loquar nunc de infirmitate miserae caecitatis.

No one began from that point to which it is incredible that he has arrived. You must say what hatreds this man had with his father, how violent a dissension amid the pledges of sacred names without end—believe it, woman, on your own account as well: for if it is easy for a son to kill his father, it is easier for a wife to kill her husband. I will now speak of the infirmity of wretched blindness.

Temeritas omnis animorum calamitate corporum frangitur, et frigescunt impetus mentium, quos non explicant ministeria membrorum; ad solum se alligat destituta maerorem. Vultus ille perpetua nocte coopertus ac timidus non concipit nefas, ad quod ducibus oculis pervenitur. Cogitat semper errare et offendere, cogitat eundi redeundique difficultatem.

All temerity of spirits is broken by the calamity of bodies, and the impulses of minds grow cold, which the ministrations of the limbs do not carry out; forsaken, it binds itself to the ground in mourning. That countenance, covered with perpetual night and timid, does not conceive a nefarious deed, to which one comes with the eyes as guides. He is always thinking to err and to stumble, he thinks of the difficulty of going and of returning.

Magna innocentiae necessitas est neminem facilius posse deprehendi. Semper sibi custodiunt miseri, ne esse miserabiles desinant, et quisquis amisit oculos, laborat, ne merito perdiderit. Quid aliud caecitas discit quam rogare, blandiri?

A great necessity of innocence is that no one can more easily be detected. The wretched always keep watch over themselves, lest they cease to be pitiable; and whoever has lost his eyes strives that he did not lose them deservedly. What else does blindness learn than to ask, to blandish?

Odium omne adiuvant oculi, et hunc in pectoribus humanis furorem lumina accendunt, nec levis animis accedit insania, quotiens quem execreris, aspicias. Caecus miserior est, quam ut invisus sit, timidior est, quam ut oderit. Praeterea nocentibus liberis frequentissimas ad parricidium causas suggessit illud quod videbant.

The eyes aid all hatred, and the lights kindle this fury in human breasts, and no slight madness comes upon minds, whenever you behold one whom you execrate. A blind man is too wretched to be hated, too timid to hate. Moreover, to guilty children, that which they saw suggested the most frequent causes to parricide.

Vitiis enim nostris in animum per oculos via est. Aliis tradidit in parentum sanguinem luxuria ferrum: luxuria videntium crimen; aliis meretriculae amor inmodica poscentis: amor, cui renuntiant oculi. Caecus infelix patrem occidit?

For by our vices there is a road into the mind through the eyes. To some, luxury has delivered the steel into the blood of their parents: luxury, a crime of the seeing; to others, the love of a little harlot, immoderately demanding: a love which the eyes report. Did the unhappy blind man kill his father?

Deinde cui manum porriget securior? Cuius humeris levior incumbet? Quis contumelias servorum castigabit severius?

Then to whom will he extend his hand more securely? Upon whose shoulders will he lean more lightly? Who will more severely castigate the contumelies of the slaves?

Quis calamitatem tam obnoxiam maiore reverentia proteget? Inter felices alius est ordo votorum; caecus filius optat superstitem patrem.

Who will protect so exposed a calamity with greater reverence? Among the fortunate there is a different order of vows; a blind son prays for a surviving father.

[7] Volo nunc scire, quemadmodum dicat explicitum tam difficile facinus. Caecus parricidium cogitavit? Cum quo?

[7] I wish now to know how he says that so difficult a crime has been explicated. Did a blind man cogitate parricide? With whom?

Cuius se commisit oculis? Iturus per domum totam quem ducem elegit? Ille, qui erat in cubiculo suo solus, secum, opinor, secum deliberat, sufficit: sibi: cum homine expeditissimo loquitur.

To whose eyes did he commit himself? About to go through the whole house, whom did he choose as a leader? That man, who was alone in his own bedchamber, with himself, I suppose, with himself he deliberates, he suffices: for himself: he speaks with the most expeditious man.

Cur enim socium conscientiae quaerat? Omnia potest scire. Primum, nox quando sit.

Why, indeed, should he seek a partner in his conscience? He can know everything. First, when it is night.

Deinde prospicere sollicite, an omnis familia dormiat, gradu suspenso ponere certa vestigia et in omnem timoris sui partem sollicitum circumagere vultum. o quam parum est in metu ipsos etiam oculos habere! Ita non iste sibi dixit: "occidere quidem patrem volo, sed quem sequentur hae manus?

Then to look out anxiously whether the whole household is asleep, to set sure footsteps with a suspended step, and to turn his visage, anxious, to every quarter of his fear. o how little it avails, in fear, to have even one’s own eyes! Thus this man did not say to himself: "I do indeed wish to kill my father, but whom will these hands follow?"

Nocte solus egrediar, sed quando perveniam?" Putes nos iunctis habitare liminibus? Domus inter patrem filiumque media; quantum erroris, quantum morae! Spatium ingens et vix metiendum.

By night I shall go forth alone, but when shall I arrive? Would you think that we live with joined thresholds? A house lies between father and son; how much wandering, how much delay! An immense space and scarcely measurable.

Caecitas inconsulta, quid agis? Nox ante deficiet. Quid, si deinde uterque vigilaverint?

O unadvised blindness, what are you doing? Night will fail first. What if then both have kept vigil?

Quid, si noverca? "Age limen inveniam, cardinem sine strepitu movebo, dormientis cubiculum intrabo, quiescentem feriam patrem, semel satis erit, nec noverca vigilabit; securus egrediar, sciente nullo revertar." Vota sunt ista, sed oculorum; caecus desperaret, etiamsi tam multa nox polliceretur.

What, if the stepmother? "Come, I will find the threshold, I will move the hinge without a creak, I will enter the sleeping man’s bedchamber, I will strike my father at rest—once will be enough—and the stepmother will not be wakeful; I will go out secure, with no one knowing I will return." Those are vows, but of the eyes; a blind man would despair, even if the night were promising so many things.

[8] Hoc loco quaeram necesse est, quae ratio fuerit, ut iuvenis ad parricidium suo potissimum gladio uteretur. Nimirum illud in mentem venit, quia erat relicturus. Nam si alienum et ignotum in vulnere patris gladium reliquisset, potuerat de percussore dubitari.

[8] At this point I must inquire what the rationale was, that the young man should use his own sword, rather than any other, for parricide. Surely this came to mind: because he was going to leave it behind. For if he had left an alien and unknown sword in his father’s wound, there could have been doubt about the assailant.

Hic attulit suum, ut, etiamsi evasisset, tamen ferro suo teneretur. "Cur ergo", inquis, "gladium in cubiculo tuo habebas?" Quia habueram semper, quia usurus illo non eram. Ferrum ego parricidio meo tot ante annos praeparavi et secundum illum, quem minabar patri, <gladium> tamdiu innocens fui?

Here he brought his own, so that, even if he had escaped, nevertheless he would be held by his own steel. “Why then,” you ask, “did you have a sword in your bedroom?” Because I had always had it, because I was not going to use it. Did I prepare the iron for my parricide so many years before, and, with that <sword>—the very one I was threatening against my father—at my side, have I been innocent for so long?

Ego eram ferro ac mente paratus, et tot abiere noctes? Ante gladium illum familiarem oculis tuis feci, ante omnibus servulis notum? Pependit in cubiculo tamquam testis conscientiae meae, palam, in medio, neglegenter, sic ut subtrahi posset.

I was ready with steel and with mind, and so many nights have passed? Did I beforehand make that sword familiar to your eyes, beforehand known to all the house‑servants? It hung in the bedchamber as though a witness of my conscience, openly, in the midst, carelessly, so that it could be taken away.

Non illum conscientia trepida velavit; tam notus in cubiculo fuit quam caecitas domini. Quisquis ferrum praeparat sceleri, sic illud habet, ut possit suum negare.

Not did a trembling conscience veil it; it was as well known in the bedchamber as the master’s blindness. Whoever prepares the steel for crime has it thus, so that he can deny it is his own.

[9] Ponite nunc ante oculos actum parricidii; deprehendetis difficultatem. Dono illud: dum a suo limine egreditur, dum illos quos accepit a patre, servulos fallit, ecce cubiculum senis invenit aliquando, ecce paries ille defecit et percussoris manus subito destituit, cessere fores sine strepitu; quid postea agit? Utrum ipsum cubiculi parietem circumit, an se committit in medium et per spatia tenebrarum armatam manum iactat?

[9] Set now before your eyes the enactment of the parricide; you will detect the difficulty. I grant this: while he goes out from his own threshold, while he eludes those little slaves whom he received from his father, behold, he at last finds the old man’s bedchamber, behold, that wall gives way and suddenly deserts the striker’s hand, the doors yielded without a noise; what does he do afterward? Does he go around the very wall of the bedchamber, or does he commit himself into the midst and through the spaces of the darkness fling his armed hand about?

Ecce patris lectulum tenet et iam dormientium anhelitus imminens audit; unde sciet, quo dirigat ferrum, quem potius feriat ex duobus? Temptabit ergo vultus et pectus obiectum, brevissimam periturae animae viam quaeret? Et quantus erit sopor, qui ista non sentiat?

Behold, he reaches his father’s little bed, and now, bending over, he hears the breath of the sleepers; whence will he know where to direct the iron, which of the two he should rather strike? Will he then feel out the faces and the chest set before him, seek the very shortest way for the soul about to perish? And how heavy will the sleep be that does not perceive these things?

Dices: "neque ego sensi." Ideo intellegis, quam malam causam habeas, cuius et una et incredibilis defensio est. Ita feritur in sinu tuo maritus, et tu nihil sentis? Ad latus tuum fata hominis peraguntur; tu iaces, tamquam te privignus occiderit priorem.

You will say: "neither did I sense it." Therefore you understand how bad a case you have, whose defense is both single and incredible. Thus a husband is struck in your bosom, and you sense nothing? At your side the man’s fate is carried out; you lie there, as though your stepson had killed you first.

Ita non ille percussus est, homo quem caecus occidit? Te vero, si nihil aliud, calens ille denique cruor suscitasset. Sed quam manifesta est conscientia, quae te ad hanc conpellit necessitatem, ut, cum occisum a privigno tuo patrem videri velis, cogaris dicere nihil sensisse!

Thus he was not struck, the man whom a blind man slew? You, however—if nothing else—that hot blood, at last, would have aroused. But how manifest is the conscience which compels you to this necessity, that, when you wish the father to seem to have been slain by your stepson, you are forced to say that you felt nothing!

Sufficit, vicimus, innocentes sumus! Cum in eodem lectulo fueris, cum amplexa sis forsitan illum, qui occisus est, tam incredibilem profiteris soporem? Cur ergo tu incolumis es? Quae tam iratis manibus sanguinem tuum fortuna subtraxit?

Enough; we have prevailed; we are innocent! When you were in the same bed, when you perhaps embraced the man who was slain, do you profess so unbelievable a sleep? Why, then, are you unharmed? What fortune withdrew your blood from such wrathful hands?

Certe dormiebas, certe nihil senseras; ita privignus te reliquit, qui deprehendi non timebat?

Surely you were asleep, surely you had sensed nothing; so your stepson, who did not fear being apprehended, left you?

[10] Occidit ergo aliquis patrem et novercae pepercit? Maximum omnium nefas fortiter fecit, minori sceleri statim par non fuit? Omnia humana sacra confudit, violare non ausus est pectus odiosum?

[10] Did someone therefore kill his father and spare the stepmother? He boldly committed the greatest nefarious crime of all, and was not immediately a match for the lesser crime? He confounded all human sacred things, and did not dare to violate the odious breast?

Incredibile est, sine fide est non occidere novercam cui inputes quod patrem occidat. Quid ais, adulescens? Tune circa illum sanguinem defecisti?

It is incredible, it is without credence, not to kill the stepmother to whom you would impute that she killed your father. What say you, young man? Did you then collapse at the sight of that blood?

Illa te blandius rogavit anima? Perdidisti ergo illud, quod nihil senserat, quod nox, quod silentium, quod tempus supererat sceleris alterius? Tu si facere parricidium posses, ideo patrem tantum occidisses, ut tibi et novercam liceret occidere.

Did that soul beg you more flatteringly? Did you then destroy that which had sensed nothing, which the night, which the silence, which the time remaining for another crime had left over? You—if you were able to commit parricide—would for that reason have killed only your father, so that it might be permitted you to kill your stepmother as well.

Non video, cur videri velint relictam mulierem ideo tantum, ut videretur illud nefas illa fecisse. Callide satis, sed hoc alio protinus argumento subvertetur: non est eiusdem consilii novercae parcere, ut substituat ream, et gladium relinquere, quo ipse deprehendatur. Saepius uti necesse habeo argumento caecitatis, et hoc etiam loco, quo de illo vulnere disputandum est.

I do not see why they should wish it to seem that the woman was spared for this reason only, so that that nefarious deed might seem to have been done by her. Clever enough, but this will be immediately subverted by another argument: it is not of the same counsel to spare the stepmother, in order to substitute a defendant, and to leave the sword by which he himself is apprehended. I must more often employ the argument of blindness, and in this place as well, where that wound must be debated.

<si> mehercule percussor intrasset, qui videret, qui lumen prae se tulisset, non tamen tam feliciter librasset ictum, quem, etiamsi nullae fallerent tenebrae, metus et conscientia incertum magni sceleris tremore fecissent. Raro contigit semel ferire carnifici, quamvis conponat ipse cervicem, et spectata manus homicidium novissime velut quoddam genus artis exerceat. Sic ergo libravit manum caecus, ut ipsam protinus feriret animam?

<if> by Hercules, an assassin had entered, who could see, who had carried a light before him, nevertheless he would not have so felicitously poised the stroke, which, even if no darkness deceived, fear and conscience would have made unsure with the tremor of a great crime. Rarely does it befall the executioner to strike once, although he himself sets the neck in place, and a well-tried hand practices homicide at the last as though a certain kind of art. Thus, then, did a blind man so poise his hand as straightway to strike the soul itself?

Ego mehercules etiam illud admiror, quod, cum patrem vellet, non novercam percussit. Praeter animum nil virium habet parricidae primus ictus; ille trepidat, ille cogitat, ille erubescit, ille est ab innocentia proximus, ille praestat hoc solum, ut sequens fortius feriat.

I, by Hercules, even marvel at this, that, when he wanted the father, he did not strike the stepmother. The first stroke of a parricide has no strength beyond spirit; he trembles, he thinks, he blushes, he is nearest to innocence, he affords only this: that the next may strike more strongly.

[11] Interrogare nunc volo, quae iuveni causa fuerit, ut reliquerit gladium. Scilicet noluit novercam suam infamari, abstulit sibi omnem defensionem et se parricidam confessus est. Ferrum in vulnere reliquit: si nondum occiderat, iterum feriret, si iam perfectum nefas intellegebat, auferret indicium.

[11] I wish now to ask what reason the youth had to have left the sword. Of course he did not wish his stepmother to be defamed; he removed from himself all defense and confessed himself a parricide. He left the iron in the wound: if he had not yet killed, he should strike again; if he already understood the nefarious deed to be complete, he should remove the evidence.

Sed quid ego rem manifestissimam colligo? Si vultis, iudices, scire, a quo sit relictus gladius, cogitate, cui expedierit, ut inveniretur. "Sed paries usque ad cubiculum privigni vestigio manus cruentatus est." Cogitate, iudices, ante omnia non esse incallidum hominem neque consilii iacentis, qui caecus explicare conetur facinus etiam oculis difficile.

But why am I piecing together a most manifest matter? If you wish, judges, to know by whom the sword was left, consider for whom it was expedient that it be found. “But the wall, all the way to the stepson’s bedchamber, was bloodied with the trace of a hand.” Consider, judges, before all, that the man is not uncunning nor of supine counsel, who, blind, attempts to unfold a deed difficult even for eyes.

Ille ergo non aestimat, cum manum cruentam parieti adplicat, vestigium a se parricidii sui relinqui? Cum dexteram, qua duce utebatur, veste tegere atque ita abire sine vestigio posset, totum parietem cruentabat et ubique aliquid de patre misero relinquebat. Quid futurum esset postero die, quantam exspectaret invidiam luce, non cogitabat, sed disponebat indicium certum, indubitatum, sine errore quod noverca sequeretur usque ad cubiculum suum, usque ad limen ipsum.

Does he then not reckon, when he applies his blood-stained hand to the wall, that a vestige of his own parricide is being left by him? When he could cover his right hand, which he was using as his guide, with his garment and thus depart without a trace, he was blood-smearing the whole wall and everywhere leaving something of the wretched father. He was not thinking what would happen on the next day, how great an ill-will in the light would await him; rather, he was disposing evidence sure, indubitable, without error, which the stepmother would follow up to her own bedchamber, to the very threshold.

o admirabilem casum! Nec cruor ante defecit? Utar hoc loco natura ipsius rei: palmatus sanguine paries inventus sic est: totam manum explicuit, omnes digitos diligenter expressit.

O admirable occurrence! And did the gore not fail sooner? I will in this place use the nature of the thing itself: the wall was found palm-marked with blood in this way: he spread out the whole hand, he carefully pressed out all the fingers.

Totum ergo sanguinem consumet intra prima vestigia. Pone enim manum cruentatam atque adeo, ut istis etiam blandiar, madentem, pone mensuram itineris, spatium parietis (diu enim in secretam domus partem revertendum est): debet proxima pars a cubiculo patris habere plurimum sanguinis, sequens minimum, ultima nihil.

Therefore he will consume all the blood within the first footprints. For suppose a blood-stained hand—and indeed, so that I may even flatter those men, a dripping one—set the measure of the journey, the span of the wall (for one must for a long time return into the secret part of the house): the section nearest to the father’s bedchamber ought to have the most blood, the next the least, the last none.

[12] Nam cruor, quotiens admotus est, transit, aut in manu tarde reptantis arescit. Hoc quid esse dicamus, quod circa cubiculum utrumque sanguinis istius vestigium quasi incipit, hinc est paries palmatus et illinc? Quomodo pertulit manus quod relinquebat?

[12] For gore, whenever it is applied, transfers, or else it dries upon the hand of one creeping slowly. What are we to say this is, that around the bedchamber on either side the vestige of that blood, as it were, begins—here there is a palmed wall, and there as well? How did the hand carry what it was leaving behind?

Noverca istud, noverca securis conposuit oculis, illa miserum dextra sanguinem tulit et manum subinde renovavit. Palmatus est paries, habet distantiam, vacat aliquid loci, integrum ubique vestigium est; caecus manus traxisset. Quaero nunc, unde tantum sanguinis in manu; tunc enim ex omni vulnere cruor profluit et effunditur, cum ferri recentem viam sequitur.

The stepmother did this; the stepmother, with untroubled eyes, arranged it: she with her right hand carried the wretched blood and kept renewing her hand. The wall is palm-marked, it has intervals, some space is vacant, the trace is intact everywhere; a blind man would have dragged his hand. I ask now, whence so much blood in the hand; for then from every wound gore flows forth and is poured out, when it follows the fresh path of the iron.

At quotiens eodem, quo factum est, cluditur telo, latet tota mortis invidia. Praeterea cum manus ex parte, qua palmare vestigium potest, plicetur in capulo et se, dum telum occupat, claudat, necesse est exteriore ut parte respersa sit. Tuus autem qui palmatus est paries?

But whenever it is shut with the same weapon by which it was done, all the invidious suspicion of the death lies hidden. Moreover, when the hand, on the side by which it can leave a palm imprint, is folded upon the hilt and, while it seizes the weapon, closes itself, it must be spattered on the outer side. But how is your wall palm‑marked?

Vestigium eius partis ostendit, ad quam cruor pervenire non potuit! Vestrum est nunc omnia ista conparare, perpendere. Cur prudentior sit iudex in deprehendendo scelere quam reus in admittendo, hoc esse in causa puto, quod alter tantum pro se cogitat, alter pro parte utraque.

It shows the trace of that part to which the gore could not have reached! It is now yours to compare all those things, to weigh them. As to why the judge is more prudent in detecting the crime than the defendant in committing it, I think this to be the cause: that the one thinks only for himself, the other for both sides.

[13] Tuitus sum adulescentis miserrimi causam. Nunc inspicere volo, quanto certioribus argumentis noverca teneatur. Transeo illum vulgarem et omnibus notum de conparatione personarum locum.

[13] I have defended the case of a most wretched adolescent. Now I wish to inspect by what more certain arguments the stepmother is held. I pass over that commonplace and known-to-all topic about the comparison of persons.

Alius diceret maritum et uxorem, nisi liberis initiarentur, non fortissimis corporum vinculis inhaerere. Ego illud potius dicam: decepta est, mulier, exspectatio tua. Veneras quasi in vacuam domum et sine herede, exspectaveras, ut infelix iste iuvenis ab ipsis protinus nuptiarum tuarum expelleretur auspiciis, extorrem et inopem summoveret pater blando corruptus amplexu et ominosum calamitate corporis occurrere delicatis uxoris oculis vetaret.

Another would say that husband and wife, unless they were initiated by children, do not adhere with the very strongest bonds of bodies. I will rather say this: deceived, woman, has been your expectation. You had come as if into an empty house and without an heir; you had expected that that unhappy young man would straightway be driven out under the very auspices of your nuptials, that the father, corrupted by a coaxing embrace, would remove him as an exile and destitute, and would forbid that ominous, by the calamity of his body, to come before the delicate eyes of the wife.

Invenisti pium et devotum unico senem, et de omnibus coniugis tui desperasti obiter affectibus. Miserrimus est maritus, quisquis inducit filio novercam, quod uxori non videtur posse utrumque amare. Quaero igitur ante omnia: ubi occisus est maritus?

You found an old man pious and devoted to his only son, and you despaired of all the incidental affections of your husband. Most wretched is the husband, whoever introduces a stepmother for his son, since to a wife it does not seem possible to love both. I ask therefore before all things: where was the husband slain?

In cubiculo suo. Hoc paulo ante privigno defendendum non fuit. occisus est in cubiculo senex: ita ille percussor non timuit uxorem?

In his bedroom. This, a little earlier, was not to be defended by the stepson. the old man was killed in the bedroom: so then that assassin did not fear the wife?

[Audio] secretum nuptiarum et matrimonialis lectuli solitudinem occisurum intrare; quem quaeram ubi relinquitur maritus ab uxore innocens~ noctem autem ad scelus quis elegit? Nox tuum tempus est. Quid, si accedit huc etiam sceleris occasio?

[Audio] for a would‑be slayer to enter the secrecy of nuptials and the solitude of the matrimonial bed; whom should I seek, when the husband is left by the wife, innocent~ but who chose the night for the crime? Night is your time. What, if even an occasion for the crime is added to this?

Non venire debes a secreta domus parte, nec tota tibi penatium sacra peragenda sunt; tu non cogitas, quemadmodum suspensa manu sonantem blande cardinem flectas. Iaces secundum occasionem, et expeditum tibi in proximo facinus est. Non times, ne quis deprehendat.

You ought not to come from the secret part of the house, nor are all the sacra of the Penates to be performed by you; you do not think how, with your hand held suspended, you might gently turn the sounding hinge. You lie in wait for the opportunity, and the crime is ready for you close at hand. You do not fear lest someone apprehend you.

Ipsi quoque servuli longius quiescunt, et praestatur grande secretum genio loci, tibique ferire, cum velis, scire, an dormiat, licet, nox et ferrum et securus maritus, quid isto deli- catius scelere? Occisum esse miserum senem, cum tu volueris, scimus.

Ipsi too the little servants rest longer, and a great secrecy is afforded to the genius of the place, and for you it is permitted to strike, when you wish, to learn whether he sleeps—night and the steel and the carefree husband—what more deli- cate crime than this? We know that the wretched old man is slain whenever you will.

[14] "Quomodo tamen," inquit, "gladius pervenit in meam potestatem, qui privigni fuit?" Haeremus; hic difficilis expugnandus est locus. Quis credet mihi, si dixero: "gladium perdidit caecus, illae perpetua nocte clausae genae non custodierunt? Fingere nimirum ad tempus videbor et rem nimium manifestam inpudenter colorare.

[14] "How, however," he says, "did the sword come into my power, which belonged to my stepson?" We hesitate; here is a position difficult to be stormed. Who will believe me, if I should say: "the blind man lost the sword, those lids shut in perpetual night did not keep watch?" Plainly I shall seem to be fashioning something for the moment and impudently coloring a matter all too manifest.

Scilicet semper isti adposita capulo manus, hae diebus ac noctibus curae. Nolo tamquam callido glorieris ingenio: non decepisti trucem horridumque latronem; nostri tibi occasionem praebuere mores. Nam quod uno ictu occisus est senex, ad quem suspicio magis respicit?

Naturally, those hands of his were always set on the hilt; these were his cares by day and by night. I do not want you to boast as though with a crafty ingenuity: you did not deceive a truculent and horrid bandit; our mores furnished you the occasion. For the fact that the old man was killed with one stroke—toward whom does suspicion rather point?

Tu praeparare corpus illuc ad ictus potes, dum videris amplecti, tu blanda manu praetemptare pectus, ubi adsiduo visceris pulsu non quiescat anima, ubi statim mors sit. <t>ibi [de spiritu sanguinis] hoc cum explorare ante et cognoscere licet, potes et uno ictu, mulier, occidere.

You can prepare the body there for strokes while you seem to be embracing; you, with a coaxing hand, can pre-test/probe the chest, where by the assiduous pulse of the viscera the spirit does not rest, where death is at once. <t>you [about the spirit of the blood], since it is permitted to explore this beforehand and to come to know it, you also can, woman, kill with a single stroke.

[15] Venio nunc ad vestigia parietis cruentati, quibus te satis abundeque pressimus, dum adulescentem defendimus. Haec sunt tamen, quae contra te reservata sunt: cum maritus tuus in cubiculo occideretur, sciebas nullum tibi relictum patrocinium, nisi aliquid caecitatis simile fecisses, ideoque sanguinem in illam partem induxisti, in quam quaeri volebas, ut postero die omnis invidia sanguinis notas et vestigia praeparata sequeretur. Infamas caecum consilium ex calamitate sumpsisti; sciebas illum non aliter, si dux defecisset, ingredi posse quam vestigia parietis perpetuitate dirigeret.

[15] I come now to the vestiges of the blood-stained wall, with which we have pressed you sufficiently and abundantly, while we defend the adolescent. Yet these are what have been reserved against you: when your husband was being killed in the bedchamber, you knew no patronage, no defense, was left to you unless you had done something like cecity; and so you drew the blood into that quarter to which you wanted the search to be directed, so that on the next day every suspicion would follow the prepared marks and vestiges of the blood. Infaming, you took up a blind plan from the calamity; you knew that otherwise, if the guide failed, he could not make his way except as he would be directed by the continuity of the wall’s traces.

Simulasti itaque caecitatem, et, ne quid sceleri impio deesset, mariti tui cruore lusisti. omnia tibi conposita atque simulata sunt per otium et securitatem, tamquam scelus transferretur ingenio: nunc enim tu innocens, quia privigni gladius in vulnere, quia paries cruentatus; hoc sufficere utrumque iudicio putabas. Quam facili momento causae fata vertuntur, quod fecisse etiam is scelus frequenter inventus est, qui obiciebat!"Sed causas," inquit, "parricidii iste habuit, quem iratus pater in secretam domus partem relegaverat." [Mulierum] illa forsitan ignominia felicioris videretur esse privigni; caecitatis beneficium est, cum illi secretum datur.

You therefore simulated blindness, and, lest anything be lacking to the impious crime, you dallied with your husband’s gore. All things for you were composed and simulated in leisure and security, as though the crime were being transferred to cleverness: for now you are the innocent, because the stepson’s sword is in the wound, because the wall is blood-stained; you supposed that each would suffice for the court. How in an easy moment the fates of a case are turned, since even he who was objecting has frequently been found to have committed this crime! “But causes,” he says, “for parricide this fellow had, whom an angry father had relegated to a secret part of the house.” [Of women] that ignominy would perhaps seem to belong to the more fortunate stepson; it is a benefit of blindness, when seclusion is given to him.

o praeclaram senis optimi singularemque pietatem! Quam blando ille seposuit miserum suum, quam diligenter uxoris gaudentis exclusit oculos, quam multo caecum pudore donavit! "Si felicior" inquit "essem" pater, "ego tibi potius cederem domo tota.

o the preeminent and singular piety of the best old man! How kindly he secluded his poor one, how diligently he shut out the eyes of the rejoicing wife, how greatly he endowed the blind man with modesty! "If I were more fortunate," says the father, "I would rather yield to you the whole house."

Nunc miser illam occupa partem, in qua nemo te videat, in quam solus ego veniam. Sint circa te servuli fideles. Non gemitus tuos audiat quisquam, non flebili maerore pascatur.

Now, poor one, occupy that part where no one may see you, into which I alone may come. Let faithful little servants be around you. Let no one hear your groans, let no one be nourished on your tearful grief.

Nihil est, quod te sollicitet conversatio[ne] nostri." Secretum, quod caecitati praestatur, ideo praestatur, ut minus oculi desiderentur.

"There is nothing that should trouble you in our conversation." The seclusion that is afforded to blindness is afforded for this reason: that eyes may be less missed.

[16] Aliquis odit filium caecum et hac tantum ultione contentus est, ut illi adsignet quietam et sepositam et meliorem domus partem? Ista ergo sic intellegenda, quasi abdicares, quasi expelleres? Iratus igitur senex tenet iuvenem suum velut interiore conplexu et a limine obstat?

[16] Does anyone hate a blind son and is content with this vengeance only, to assign to him a quiet and secluded and better part of the house? Are those things, then, to be understood thus, as if you were disowning, as if you were expelling? An angry old man, therefore, holds his young man, as it were, with a more inner embrace and bars him from the threshold?

Rogo, quod duos separat media domo, te integram, sanam, illum infelicem, caecum, contumeliae opportunum, iniuriae facilem, utrum filio irascatur an uxori. "Nolo," inquit, "iuvenis, utaris amoena domus parte, ne sic quae nitidioribus tectis elaborata sunt, pertineant ad oculos tuos." Quis tam stulte irascitur caeco, ut putet illius interesse, ubi habitare iubeatur? Te potius ille summovit, tuis invidiam fecit odiis, tibi dixit: "sufficiat, satis est, habeas maiorem domus partem.

I ask whether that which separates the two of you in the middle of the house—you whole, sound, him unhappy, blind, apt for contumely, easy for injury—shows anger against the son or against the wife. “I do not wish,” he says, “young man, that you make use of the pleasant part of the house, lest thus the things elaborated for the more polished roofs pertain to your eyes.” Who is so foolish as to be angry at a blind man as to think it is of his concern where he is ordered to dwell? He rather removed you, cast odium upon your hatreds, said to you: “let it suffice, it is enough, have the greater part of the house.”

Absentem puta miserum, in paternis sedibus aliquem angulum relinque." Pater, qui filio sub noverca adsignat secretam domus partem, confitetur uxori se abdicare non posse. Transit ad aliud genus defensionis: sibi causam caedis non fuisse, cum hic heres inventus sit omnium bonorum. Quis enim alius esse debe<b>at, ut huic properandum fuerit ad hereditatem?

"Count him as absent, a wretch; leave him some angle in the paternal dwelling." A father who, with a stepmother in the house, assigns to his son a secluded part of the home, confesses to his wife that he cannot disown her. He passes over to another kind of defense: that he had no cause for killing, since this man was found heir of all the goods. For who else ought to be [heir], such that there should have been any need for him to hurry to the inheritance?

Filius scriptus non timet paenitentiam testamenti. omnium bonorum heres relictus est: non ergo irascebatur pater, cum daret secretam domus partem. Non possunt tibi diversa prodesse; eadem obiceres reo, si exheredatus esset.

The son written in does not fear repentance of the testament. he has been left heir of all the goods: therefore the father was not angry, since he gave a secret part of the house. Different things cannot profit you; you would allege the same against the defendant, if he had been disinherited.

Elige utrum voles: si scivit se esse heredem, amare patrem debuit; si ignoravit, non habuit, quod speraret ex patris morte. Reliquum est, ut intueamur, ille, qui periit, ab utro magis vestrum desideretur.

Choose whichever you will: if he knew that he was heir, he ought to have loved his father; if he did not know, he had nothing to hope for from his father’s death. It remains that we consider by which of you he who has perished is more missed.

[17] Te, opinor, hic gravius afficit dolor, inpatientius hic luctus exanimat, te, quae absoluta protinus nubes, et tempori accommodata lugubria flammeo revertente mutabis. At hic vero iuvenis, qui, si fortunae suae mala cum praeteritis comparet, caecus coepit esse nunc primum, quid non miser in hoc sene perdidit! Vivebat illi magna pietas, aderant, quodcumque iusserat, de facie patris oculi; non inludere infelicibus tenebris contumaces servuli poterant, nec, quod extremum contumeliarum genus est, ut dominum ageret, rogabant, nunc quanta, di boni, ludibria sunt ineunda!

[17] You, I suppose, the pain here afflicts more gravely; this grief here, more impatient, knocks the breath out of you—you, who, once released, will forthwith change the nuptial veils, and the mourning garb accommodated to the time, when the flammeum (bridal veil) returns. But this young man, who, if he compare the evils of his fortune with what has gone by, has only now for the first time begun to be blind—what has the wretch not lost in this old man! For him there lived a great piety; for him the eyes of his father’s face were at hand for whatever he bade; the stubborn little servants could not mock his unhappy darkness, nor, which is the extreme kind of contumely, did they ask him to play the master; now, good gods, what mockeries must be undergone!

Iunxere se pariter caecitas et solitudo. Quid tibi nunc, miserrime adulescens, hereditas prodest, quam tantum audis? Quid enim circa te pecunia potest?

Blindness and solitude have joined together. What now does the inheritance, which you only hear of, avail you, most wretched adolescent? For what, indeed, can money do for you?

Quae fruendi voluptates, quid aliud quam spoliorum facilis occasio? Quam bene ista omnia paterni oculi custodiebant! Quam facile decipi, quam facile denudari, quam sine labore falli potes, quam cito inops fieri!

What pleasures of enjoyment are there, what other than an easy occasion of spoils? How well your father’s eyes were safeguarding all those things! How easily you can be deceived, how easily denuded, how without labor you can be beguiled, how quickly to become impoverished!

Morte patris exheredatus es. Quid nunc tibi nisi perpetuus inminet maeror et execratio vitae? Miser post omnia et lacrimas perdidit, nec dolentem adiuvant oculi. Incipit apud te gladius habere, quod agat.

You have been disinherited by the death of your father. What now overhangs you except perpetual grief and an execration of life? Wretched, after everything, he has even lost his tears, nor do the eyes aid the one in pain. The sword begins, in your case, to have something to do.

Quaerit, ecce quaerit miser ferrum: "nunc," inquit, "huc reddite illud, innocens, donec habuit meas manus tantum. Si mori necesse est, illi potissimum incumbam. Hoc illa iam olim gravis et infelix anima quaerebat.

He seeks—behold, the wretch seeks—the iron: "now," he says, "give that back here, innocent, so long as it had only my hands. If it is necessary to die, upon that I will most of all fall. This was what that heavy and ill-fated soul had long since been seeking."

Ubi nunc meae vires, ubi impetus, ubi dextra tam fortis? Uno ictu, puto, ne me quidem ipsum mihi continget occidere."

Where now are my powers, where my impetus, where my right hand so strong? With a single stroke, I think, it will not even befall me to kill myself."