100-24 BCE
Trans RMBullard
Latin (Republican Era/Golden Age of Latin Literature)
CORNELI NEPOTIS ARISTIDES
[1] ARISTIDES, Lysimachi filius, Atheniensis, aequalis fere fuit Themistocli.
[Aristides, son of Lysimachus, and an Athenian, was almost the equal of Themistocles.]
Itaque cum eo de principatu contendit;
[Therefore, he competed with him for top control of the state;]
namque obtrectarunt inter se.
[on that account, they bickered greatly among themselves.]
2 In his autem cognitum est,
[Nevertheless, it is known among these men,]
quanto antestaret eloquentia innocentiae.
[how far his innocence surpassed his eloquence.]
Quamquam enim adeo excellebat Aristides abstinentia,
[You see, although Aristides so far began to excel by virtue of his moderation,]
ut unus post hominum memoriam,
[such that only a single person in human memory,]
quem quidem nos audierimus,
[at least one that I've heard of,]
cognomine Iustus sit appellatus,
[might could have been given the nicknamed "One-eyed"]
tamen a Themistocle collabefactus,
[and yet the injury was done to him by Themistocles,]
testula illa exsilio decem annorum multatus est.
[but he was fined with a 10-year exile for that famous dust-up.]
3 Qui quidem cum intellegeret reprimi concitatam multitudinem non posse
[That is, he who in fact began to understand that the crowd of people that had gathered round could not be beaten back]
cedensque animadvertisset quendam scribentem,
[and as he began to leave, he turned his attention to a particular man who had set about to writing,]
ut patria pelleretur,
[that he should be kicked out of the country,]
quaesisse ab eo dicitur,
[it is said that he had asked from this man]
quare id faceret
[why in the world he was doing this]
aut quid Aristides commisisset,
[and what Aristides had done in the time before,]
cur tanta poena dignus duceretur.
[and why he should be worthy of receiving so harsh a crime.]
Cui ille respondit se ignorare Aristiden,
[ ...something for which that man replies that he doesn't know about Aristides,]
