Letter 456
Libanius→Hellespontius|libanius
To Hellespontius. (355/356)
The loss in not having such a listener was mine, the speaker's. You will have no trouble finding a more skillful orator, but I will not find a more sympathetic judge.
We have been expecting your son for some time and still have not seen him -- though he is a young man and we are his father's old friends. There is a place here ready to receive him, one that would welcome even his father.
Ἑλλησποντίῳ. (355/56)
Τοῦ λέγοντος ἦν τὸ μὴ τοιοῦτον λαβεῖν ἀκροατὴν ἡ ζη-
μία. σὺ μὲν γὰρ οὐκ ἀπορήσεις δεξιωτέρου ῥήτορος, ἡμεῖς δὲ
κριτὴν οὐχ εὑρήσομεν εὐνούστερον.
τὸν υἱὸν δὲ πάλαι προσ-
δοκῶντες ὁρῶμεν οὔπω, καίτοι νεανίσκος μὲν ἐκεῖνος, ἡμεῖς
δὲ αὐτῷ πατρικοὶ φίλοι. τόπος δὲ αὐτόν, ὃς καὶ τὸν τοκέα
δέξαιτο.
◆
To Hellespontius. (355/356)
The loss in not having such a listener was mine, the speaker's. You will have no trouble finding a more skillful orator, but I will not find a more sympathetic judge.
We have been expecting your son for some time and still have not seen him -- though he is a young man and we are his father's old friends. There is a place here ready to receive him, one that would welcome even his father.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.