Letter 2022: It is right that royal devotion should accommodate itself to those wounded by the blow of fate, because those whom...

XXII. King Theoderic to Festus, vir illustris and patrician. [1] It is right that royal devotion should make itself available to those wounded by the blow of fate, since those whom the adversities of their lot have pressed down deserve all the more to be raised up. And therefore by the present authority we declare to Your Magnificence that you are to order the sons of Ecdicius, whom we earlier decreed should reside in the City [Rome], to return to their homeland together with their father's funeral procession -- by a return that is indeed longed-for, yet through a bitter misfortune -- lest, their wishes being denied them, the wound be doubled for the afflicted, and -- a thing wicked even to say -- we who always wipe away the clouds of grief with our serenity should now seem to refuse pious tears to the wretched. [2] For that weeping is insatiable which is not permitted to be present at the burial of the bodies, since one who does not render the due rites to the ashes ever judges himself guilty. At how great a price did Priam ransom Hector for burial? He begged the raging man, he supplicated the armed man, and he preferred to lay down his own life rather than deny to the corpse what was owed to it. And since in these persons the duties of devotion are mutual, it is unjust that a son should not freely render to his father that which it cost the father great talents to accomplish.

XXII. FESTO V. I. PATRICIO THEODERICUS REX. [1] Aequum est ut se commodet pietas regalis fati vulnere sauciatis, quia erigi plus merentur, quos sortis suae adversa presserunt. atque ideo magnificentiae tuae praesenti auctoritate declaramus, ut Ecdicii filios, quos in urbe primitus residere censuimus, ad patriam cum genitoris sui funere, votivo quidem reditu, sed acerbo casu, remeare iubeatis, ne eorum desideriis abnegatis vulnus geminetur afflictis et, quod nefas dictu est, qui dolorum nubila nostra semper serenitate detergimus, nunc miseris pias lacrimas denegare videamur. [2] Insatiabilis quippe fletus est, qui humandis non sinitur corporibus interesse, dum semper se reum iudicat, qui cineribus iusta non praestat. Priamus quanto pretio sepeliendum Hectorem redemit? rogavit furentem, supplicavit armato vitamque suam exponere maluit, ut cadaveri debita non negaret. et quoniam in his personis mutua sunt officia pietatis, iniquum est filium genitori gratuito non impendere, quod patrem magnis talentis constitit effecisse. XXIII. AMPELIO DESPOTIO ET THEODULO VVV. SSS. THEODERICUS REX. [1] Decet nostri temporis disciplinam, ut, qui publicis utilitatibus serviunt, superfluis oneribus non graventur. nec dignum est, ut cuiusquam laedat invidia nostris motibus ordinata. quapropter figulinis regia vobis auctoritate concessis operam navanter impendite, nec vereamini ad alias actiones posse traduci, a quibus iniuncta praesentia vix credimus explicari. cessabit ergo circa vos improborum nefanda praesumptio et obscuris dolis effectum nostra tollit auctoritas. in cassum enim odit, cui se clementia principalis obiecerit.