Fall 1999: Week 9

C. PLINIUS SURAE SUO S.
EPISTULAE PLINII LIBER VII, XXVII

GAIUS PLINY TO HIS FRIEND SURA
LETTERS OF PLINY BOOK 7, #27

Et mihi discendi et tibi docendi facultatem otium praebet. Igitur perquam velim scire, esse phantasmata et habere propriam figuram numenque aliquod putes an inania et vana ex metu nostro imaginem accipere.

The present recess from business affords you leisure to give, and me to receive, instruction. I am extremely desirous therefore to know your sentiments concerning spectres, whether you believe they actually exist and have their own proper shapes and a measure of divinity, or are only the false impressions of a terrified imagination?

   Ego ut esse credam, in primis eo ducor, quo daudio accidisse Curtio Rufo. Tenuis adhuc et obscurus obtinenti Africam comes haeserat. Inclinato die spatiabatur in porticu; offertur ei mulieris figura humana grandior pulchriorque: perterrito Africam se futurorum praenuntiam dixit; iturum enim Romam honoresque gesturum atque etiam cum summo imperio in eandem provinciam reversurum ibique moriturum. Facta sunt omnia. Praeterea accedenti Carthaginem egredientique nave eadem figura in litore occurrisse narratur. Ipse certe implicitus morbo futura praeteritis, adversa secundis auguratus spem salutis nullo suorum desperante proiecit.

   What particularly inclines me to give to their existence, is a story which I heard of Curtius Rufus. When he was in low circumstances and unknown in the world, he attended the newly-made governor of Africa in that province. One afternoon as he was walking in the public portico he was extremely daunted with the figure of a woman which appeared to him, of a size and beauty more than human. She told him she was the tutelar Genius that presided over Africa, and was come to inform him of the future events of his life:–that he should go back to Rome, where he should hold office, and return to that province invested with the proconsular dignity, and there should die. Every circumstance of this prophecy was actually accomplished. It is said farther, that upon his arrival at Carthage, as he was coming out of the ship, the same figure accosted him upon the shore. It is certain, at least, that being seized with a fit of illness, though there were no symptoms in his case that led his attendants to despair, he instantly gave up all hope of recovery; judging, it should seem, of the truth of the future part of the prediction, by that which had already been fulfilled; and of the misfortune which threatened him, by the success which he had experienced.

   Iam illud nonne et magis terribile et non minus mirum est, quod exponam, ut accepi? Erat Athenis spatiosa et capax domus, sed infamis et pestilens. Per silentium noctis sonus ferri et, si attenderes acrius, strepitus vinculorum longius primo, deinde e proximo reddebatur. Mox apparebat idolon, senex macie et squalore confectus, promissa barba, horrenti capillo; cruribus compedes, manibus catenas gerebat quatiebatque. Inde inhabitantibus tristes diraeque noctes per metum vigilabantur; vigiliam morbus et crescente formidine mors sequebatur. Nam interdiu quoque, quamquam abscesserat imago, memoria imaginis oculis inerrabat, longiorque causis timoris timor erat. Deserta inde et damnata solitudine domus totaque illi monstro relicta; proscribebatur tamen, seu quis emere seu quis conducere ignarus tanti mali vellet.

   To this story, let me add another as remarkable as the former, but attended with circumstances of greater horror; which I will give you exactly as it was related to me. There was at Athens a large and spacious, but ill-reputed and pestilential house. In the dead of the night a noise, resembling the clashing of iron, was frequently heard, which, if you listened more attentively, sounded like the rattling of fetters; at first it seemed at a distance, but approached nearer by degrees; immediately afterward a phantom appeared in the form of an old man, extremely meagre and squalid, with a long beard and bristling hair, rattling the gyves on his feet and hands. The poor inhabitants consequently passed sleepless nights under the most dismal terrors imaginable. This, as it broke their rest, threw them into distempers, which, as their horrors of mind increased, proved in the end fatal to their lives. For even in the daytime, though the spectre did not appear, yet the remembrance of it made such a strong impression upon their imaginations that it still seemed before their eyes, and their terror remained when the cause of it was gone. By this means the house was at last deserted, as being judged by everybody to be absolutely uninhabitable; so that it was now entirely abandoned to the ghost. However, in hopes that some tenant might be found who was ignorant of this great calamity which attended it, a bill was put up, giving notice that it was either to be let or sold.

   Venit Athenas philosophus Athenodorus, legit titulum auditoque pretio quia suspecta vilitas, percunctatus omnia docetur ac nihilo minus, immo tanto magis conducit. Ubi coepit advesperascere, iubet sterni tibi in prima domus parte, poscit pugillares, stilum, lumen; suos omnes in interiora dimittis, ipse ad scribendum animum, oculos, manum intendit, ne vacua mens audita simulacra et inanes sibi metus fingeret. Initio, quale ubique, silentium noctis; deinde concuti ferrum, vincula moveri; ille non tollere oculos, non remittere stilum, sed obfirmare animum auribusque praetendere. Tum crebrescere fragor, adventare et iam ut in limine, iam ut intra limen audiri; respicit, videt agnoscitque narratam sibi effigiem. Stabat innuebatque digito similis vocanti. Hic contra, ut paulum exspectaret, manu significat rursusque ceris et stilo incumbit. Illa scribentis capiti catenis insonabat. Respicit rursus idem quod prius innuentem nec moratus tollit lumen et sequitur. Ibat illa lento gradu quasi gravis vinculis. Postquam deflexit in aream domus, repente dilapsa deserit comitem. Desertus herbas et folia concerpta signum loco ponit. Postero die adit magistratus, monet, ut illum locum effodi iubeant. Inveniuntur ossa inserta catenis et implicita, quae corpus aevo terraque putrefactum nuda et exesa reliquerat vinculis. Collecta publice sepeliuntur. Domus postea rite conditis manibus caruit.

   It happened that Athenodorus the philosopher came to Athens at this time, and reading the bill ascertained the price. The extraordinary cheapness raised his suspicion; nevertheless, when he heard the whole story, he was so far from being discouraged, that he was more strongly inclined to hire it, and, in short, actually did so. When it grew towards evening, he ordered a couch to be prepared for him in the fore-part of the house, and after calling for a light, together with his pen and tablets, he directed all his people to retire within. But that his mind might not, for want of employment, be open to the vain terrors of imaginary noises and apparitions, he applied himself to writing with all his faculties. The first part of the night passed with usual silence, then began the clanking of iron fetters; however, he neither lifted up his eyes, nor laid down his pen, but closed his ears by concentrating his attention. The noise increased and advanced nearer, till it seemed at the door, and at last in the chamber. He looked round and saw the apparition exactly as it had been described to him: it stood before him, beckoning with the finger. Athenodorus made a sign with his hand that it should wait a little, and bent again to his writing, but the ghost rattling its chains over his head as he wrote, he looked round and saw it beckoning as before. Upon this he immediately took up his lamp and followed it. The ghost slowly stalked along, as if encumbered with its chains; and having turned into the courtyard of the house, suddenly vanished. Athenodorus being thus deserted, marked the spot with a handful of grass and leaves. The next day he went to the magistrates, and advised them to order that spot to be dug up. There they found bones commingled and intertwined with chains; for the body had mouldered away by long lying in the ground, leaving them bare, and corroded by the fetters. The bones were collected, and buried at the public expense; and after the ghost was thus duly laid the house was haunted no more.