Letter 2002: SIDONIUS TO HIS DEAR DOMITIUS, GREETINGS

Sidonius to his dear Domitius, greetings. 1. You complain that I am in the country, when it is rather I who have cause to complain that you are now detained in the city. Already spring is yielding to summer, and the sun, raised to its highest lines, stretches on a wandering ray toward the Scythian pole. What shall I say about the climate of our region? The divine Craftsman has so extended its spaces that we are subjected to the vapors of the western world all the more. What more? The world is ablaze: the Alpine ice is destroyed, and the earth is scored with the gaping cracks of dried-out fissures; gravel is parched in the shallows, mud on the banks, dust in the fields; every stream of water, however perpetual its flow, grows sluggish as it lingers — now the wave is not merely warm but cooked. 2. And now, while one man sweats in linen and another in silk, you — wrapped in a heavy cloak on the outside, bandaged within, and furthermore crammed into the curved seat of your school at Ameria — begin to expound with a yawn to pupils pale no less from the heat than from fear: "My mother was from Samos." Why not rather, if you have any care for your health, snatch yourself away from the stifling confines of the city and, gladly inserted into our company, cheat the cruelty of the Dog Star with our most merciful retreat? 3. Well then, if it pleases you, hear what the situation of the country estate to which you are invited is like. We are at Avitacum — this is the name of the property which, because it is my wife's, is dearer to me than my father's. This is the harmony I enjoy here with my family, God presiding, unless you fear some evil eye. A hill from the west, though earthen, yet steep, sends out from itself two lower ridges as though from a double source, separated from it by about four acres' breadth. But until a suitable vestibule-court opens before the house, the flanks of the slopes follow the middle valley in straight lines right up to the edge of the villa, which extends with its fronts facing north and south. 4. The bath clings on the south side to the roots of a wooded cliff, and if the timber on the ridge is cut, logs tumble as though of their own accord into the mouth of the furnace in falling heaps. From here rises the room of heated waters, which matches in equal dimensions the adjoining perfumery, except for the semicircle of the spacious tub, where the force of the steaming water, entangled in channels of flexible lead through a perforated wall, sobs and splutters. Within the heated chamber there is broad daylight and such an abundance of enclosed light that it compels every modest person to think themselves something more than naked. 5. From here the cold room widens out — one that would not be ashamed to rival pools built at public expense. First, its roof culminates in a pointed cone, and when the four ridgelines converge from the corners with tiles laid between them, it can receive as many chairs, with no hindrance to the attendants' service, as a semicircular couch usually holds guests. The builder placed two windows on opposite sides at the junction of the hanging vault, so that the crafted ceiling would open to the view of those looking up. The inner surface of the walls is content with the whiteness of polished cement alone. 6. Here no shameful story parades itself through the naked beauty of painted bodies — a thing which, however much it adorns the art, disgraces the artist. Absent are the absurd actors in their costumes and expressions, counterfeiting in multicolored paints the furniture of Philistion. Absent are the slippery wrestlers, twisting in their holds and grips — whose struggles, even when alive, if they become too indecent, are promptly broken up by the chaste rod of the gymnasiarchs. 7. In short, nothing will be found stamped upon those walls which it would be holier not to have seen. A few verses, however, will detain a visiting reader with a not unreasonable moderation, since they are neither worth rereading out of desire nor a burden to read through once. Now, if you ask about marble, no Paros, Carystos, Proconnesus, Phrygia, Numidia, or Sparta has laid its crusts of variegated stone there; nor do the rocks simulate a scattered bran for me, tinged with native purple dye along Ethiopian crags and broken purples. But even if we are not enriched by any rigor of foreign stone, my huts — my shacks, rather — have their own homegrown coolness. Come now, hear what we have rather than what we lack. 8. To this main hall a pool is attached on the outside — or baptistery, if you prefer to use Greek — on the east, holding about twenty thousand modii of water. Into this, for those coming clean from the heat, a triple entrance through the middle wall opens by arched intervals. The supports in the middle are not pillars but columns, which more skillful architects have called the purples of buildings. Into this pool, then, a river drawn from the brow of the mountain and channeled around the exterior sides of the swimming pool is poured by six projecting pipes in the likenesses of lions' heads, which to those entering unwarily will suggest real gratings of teeth, real fury of eyes, real manes on necks. 9. Here, when a crowd of household or guest stands around the master, because the din of the falling water prevents the exchange of voices from being clearly understood, people whisper in each other's ears; thus, forced down by the alien sound, public speech comically affects privacy. Leaving here, the front of the formal dining room presents itself, adjoined by a pantry continuous with the neighboring weaving room, separated only by a camp-style partition wall. 10. From the east the portico overlooks the lake, supported more by rounded collyria than by impressive monolithic columns. From the vestibule side a covered length stretches inward, uninterrupted by middle walls; since it looks out on nothing, it will be called by me, on my own authority, if not a hippodrome, at least a covered walkway. Yet this passage, cheating its own space at the far end of the promenade, creates a pleasantly cool chamber where, when a public couch is set up, the most talkative chorus of dependents and nurses sounds the retreat, while I and my family seek the sleeping quarters. 11. From the covered walkway one comes into the winter dining room, which a fire often kindled in the arched fireplace has stained with dark soot. But why tell you this, since I am hardly inviting you to the hearth just now? Let me rather speak of things that pertain to you and the season. From this dining room there is a passage into a sitting room or small supper room, which lies open almost entirely to the lake and the lake entirely to it. In this room there is a semicircular couch and a gleaming sideboard, to whose platform or dais one ascends from the portico below by gradually shortening and narrowing steps. Reclining there, if you have any leisure between courses, you are occupied with the pleasures of the view. 12. Now if that most celebrated boiled water from the springs is brought to you, you will see in the suddenly suffused cups the spots and fragments of snow-clouds, and that slippery light of the goblets dulled as if by a certain greasiness of sudden cold. Then the drinks matching the cups — whose rigid measures would be feared by any thirsty man, let alone by you, a grand abstainer! From here you will watch the fisherman push his skiff out into the deep, stretch his standing nets with their cork floats, or hang baited lines from ropes balanced at set intervals by markers — so that in nightly excursions across the lake the most ravenous trout are driven into traps set by their own kin. For what could I more fittingly say here, when fish is caught by fish? 13. When the meal is ended, a guest room will receive you — one that is most suitable for summer precisely because it is not at all stuffy. Since it opens only to the north, it has daylight but not sun, with a very narrow antechamber interposed, where the drowsiness of the valets has a place for dozing rather than sleeping. 14. Here, how delightful it is to hear the cicadas chattering at noon, the frogs croaking as twilight falls, the swans and geese honking in the dead of night, the roosters crowing in the small hours, the songbird crows greeting the crimson torch of rising Aurora with their triple call at dawn, and in the early morning the nightingale whistling among the bushes and the swallow twittering among the rafters! To this chorus you may add the pastoral song of the seven-holed pipe, which the sleepless Tityri of our mountains often perform in nightly singing contests, bellowing among their belled flocks through the grazed pastures. Yet these varied modulations of voices and songs will only serve to lull your sleep the more deeply. 15. Leaving the porticoes, if you make for the shore-landing, on a green lawn there is an ordinary but not distant grove: two great linden trees with interlocked branches but separate trunks produce one shade from more than one root. In the shade of this, when my dear Ecdicius brightens the scene with his presence, we play at ball — but only until the shadow of the trees, growing shorter, is beaten back and contained within the span of the branches; and there, when the ball game is done, a gaming table takes over for the weary. 16. But since, as I have described the building, I owe you the lake as well, learn what remains. The lake flows out to the east, and its swelling flood, driven by shifting winds, wets with its wash the foundations of the house that are set into the sand. Around its beginnings the ground is indeed marshy, treacherous with boggy depths, and impassable to the foot of an explorer: so thick grows the richness of the absorbent mud amid the encircling cold springs and the weedy shores. Yet the mobile plain of the open water is widely cut by wandering boats, if the breezes have settled; if a southerly gale has risen, it swells enormously, so that the crashing spray rains upon the tops of the trees that stand at its edge. 17. The lake itself extends for about seventeen stadia, as nautical measures reckon, entered by a river which, dashed roughly against barriers of rocks, whitens with foamy force and, not long freed from its precipitous crags, is swallowed by the lake — whether by chance it runs into it, creates it, or merely passes through it, at any rate it is forced to be filtered through underground channels, impoverished not of its waves but of its fish. These, driven back into the lazier depths, stretch their red flesh over white bellies: thus, unable to return and not permitted to exit, their very corpulence creates for them a kind of living, circumambient prison. 18. The lake itself, where it lies to the right, is indented, winding, and wooded; where to the left, open, grassy, and level. The water is green along the southern shore, because the foliage reaching out over the waves drenches the shallows with shade as the water drenches them. An equal crown of forests continues this color from the east. Along the northern side, nature has given the lake both the character and the appearance of open sea. From the west, common and untidy shrubs frequently bent by the weight of passing boats; around these the slippery curls of rushes are folded, and the thick leaves of seaweed float, and the bitterness of grey-green willows, always nourished by sweet waters. 19. In the middle of the deep there is a small island, where above naturally heaped millstones a turning-post juts up, worn by the thrusts of struck oars in their naval circuits — against which the delightful shipwrecks of players collide. For it was the custom of our elders here to imitate the Drepanian games of the Trojan superstition. The land itself, moreover — though this is beyond what I owe — spreads in forests, is painted in meadows, rich in cattle on its pastures and wealthy in its herdsmen. 20. But I delay no longer, lest, if the end of my pen is too far off, autumn should find you still reading. Therefore grant me the speed of your coming — for you will provide the delay of your return yourself — and pardon this: that a somewhat too meticulous letter has exceeded the brevity due to it, while it anxiously probes the whole layout of the countryside; yet, in its eagerness to dispel boredom, it has not touched upon everything. Therefore a fair judge and skillful reader will pronounce not the page that describes the spaces, but the villa that is spaciously described, to be large. Farewell.

EPISTULA II Sidonius Domitio suo salutem. 1. Ruri me esse causaris, cum mihi potius queri suppetat te nunc urbe retineri. iam ver decedit aestati et per lineas sol altatus extremas in axem Scythicum radio peregrinante porrigitur. hic quid de regionis nostrae climate loquar? cuius spatia divinum sic tetendit opificium, ut magis vaporibus orbis occidui subiceremur. quid plura? mundus incanduit: glacies Alpina deletur et hiulcis arentium rimarum flexibus terra perscribitur; squalet glarea in vadis, limus in ripis, pulvis in campis; aqua ipsa quaecumque perpetuo labens tractu cunctante languescit, iam non solum calet unda sed coquitur. 2. et nunc, dum in carbaso sudat unus, alter in bombyce, tu endromidatus exterius, intrinsecus fasciatus, insuper et concava municipis Amerini sede compressus discipulis non aestu minus quam timore pallentibus exponere oscitabundus ordiris: 'Samia mihi mater fuit.' quin tu mage, si quid tibi salubre cordi, raptim subduceris anhelantibus angustiis civitatis et contubernio nostro aventer insertus fallis clementissimo recessu inclementiam canicularem? 3. sane si placet, quis sit agri, in quem vocaris, situs accipe. Avitaci sumus: nomen hoc praedio, quod, quia uxorium, patrio mihi dulcius. haec mihi cum meis praesule deo, nisi quid tu fascinum verere, concordia. mons ab occasu, quamquam terrenus, arduus tamen inferiores sibi colles tamquam gemino fomite effundit, quattuor a se circiter iugerum latitudine abductos. sed donec domicilio competens vestibuli campus aperitur, mediam vallem rectis tractibus prosequuntur latera clivorum usque in marginem villae, quae in Borean Austrumque conversis frontibus tenditur. 4. balineum ab Africo radicibus nemorosae rupis adhaerescit et si caedua per iugum silva truncetur, in ora fornacis lapsu velut spontaneo deciduis struibus impingitur. hinc aquarum surgit cella coctilium, quae consequenti unguentariae spatii parilitate conquadrat excepto solii capacis hemicyclio, ubi et vis undae ferventis per parietem foraminatum flexilis plumbi meatibus implicita singultat. intra conclave succensum solidus dies et haec abundantia lucis inclusae, ut verecundos quosque compellat aliquid se plus putare quam nudos. 5. hinc frigidaria dilatatur, quae piscinas publicis operibus extructas non impudenter aemularetur. primum tecti apice in conum cacuminato, cum ab angulis quadrifariam concurrentia dorsa cristarum tegulis interiacentibus imbricarentur, ita ut ministeriorum sese non impediente famulatu tot possit recipere sellas, quot solet sigma personas, fenestras e regione conditor binas confinio camerae pendentis admovit, ut suspicientum visui fabrefactum lacunar aperiret. interior parietum facies solo levigati caementi candore contenta est. 6. non hic per nudam pictorum corporum pulchritudinem turpis prostat historia, quae sicut ornat artem, sic devenustat artificem. absunt ridiculi vestitu et vultibus histriones pigmentis multicoloribus Philistionis supellectilem mentientes. absunt lubrici tortuosique pugilatu et nexibus palaestritae, quorum etiam viventum luctas, si involvantur obscenius, casta confestim gymnasiarchorum virga dissolvit. 7. quid plura? nihil illis paginis impressum reperietur, quod non vidisse sit sanctius. pauci tamen versiculi lectorem adventicium remorabuntur minime improbo temperamento, quia eos nec relegisse desiderio est nec perlegisse fastidio. iam, si marmora inquiras, non illic quidem Paros Carystos Proconnesos, Phryges Numidae Spartiatae rupium variatarum posuere crustas; neque per scopulos Aethiopicos et abrupta purpurea genuino fucata conchylio sparsum mihi saxa furfurem mentiuntur. sed etsi nullo peregrinarum cautium rigore ditamur, habent tamen tuguria seu mapalia mea civicum frigus. quin potius quid habeamus quam quid non habeamus ausculta. 8. huic basilicae appendix piscina forinsecus seu, si graecari mavis, baptisterium ab Oriente conectitur, quod viginti circiter modiorum milia capit. huc elautis e calore venientibus triplex medii parietis aditus per arcuata intervalla reseratur. nec pilae sunt mediae sed columnae, quas architecti peritiores aedificiorum purpuras nuncupavere. in hanc ergo piscinam fluvium de supercilio montis elicitum canalibusque circumactis per exteriora natatoriae latera curvatum sex fistulae prominentes leonum simulatis capitibus effundunt, quae temere ingressis veras dentium crates, meros oculorum furores, certas cervicum iubas imaginabuntur. 9. hic si dominum seu domestica seu hospitalis turba circumstet, quia prae strepitu caduci fluminis mutuae vocum vices minus intelleguntur, in aurem sibi populus confabulatur; ita sonitu pressus alieno ridiculum affectat publicus sermo secretum. hinc egressis frons triclinii matronalis offertur, cui continuatur vicinante textrino cella penaria discriminata tantum pariete castrensi. 10. ab ortu lacum porticus intuetur, magis rotundatis fulta + collyriis quam columnis invidiosa monolithis. a parte vestibuli longitudo tecta intrinsecus patet mediis non interpellata parietibus, quae, quia nihil ipsa prospectat, etsi non hippodromus, saltim cryptoporticus meo mihi iure vocitabitur. haec tamen aliquid spatio suo in extimo deambulacri capite defrudans efficit membrum bene frigidum, ubi publico lectisternio exstructo clientularum sive nutricum loquacissimus chorus receptui canit, cum ego meique dormitorium cubiculum petierimus. 11. a cryptoporticu in hiemale triclinium venitur, quod arcuatili camino saepe ignis animatus pulla fuligine infecit. sed quid haec tibi, quem nunc ad focum minime invito? quin potius ad te tempusque pertinentia loquar. ex hoc triclinio fit in diaetam sive cenatiunculam transitus, cui fere totus lacus quaeque tota lacui patet. in hac stibadium et nitens abacus, in quorum aream sive suggestum a subiecta porticu sensim breviatis angustatisque gradibus ascenditur. quo loci recumbens, si quid inter edendum vacas, prospiciendi voluptatibus occuparis. 12. iam si tibi ex illo conclamatissimo fontium decocta referatur, videbis in calicibus repente perfusis nivalium maculas et frusta nebularum et illam lucem lubricam poculorum quadam quasi pinguedine subiti algoris hebetatam. tum respondentes poculis potiones, quarum rigentes cyathi siticuloso cuique, ne dicam tibi granditer abstemio, metuerentur. hinc iam spectabis, ut promoveat alnum piscator in pelagus, ut stataria retia suberinis corticibus extendat aut signis per certa intervalla dispositis tractus funium librentur hamati, scilicet ut nocturnis per lacum excursibus rapacissimi salares in consanguineas agantur insidias: quid enim hinc congruentius dixerim, cum piscis pisce decipitur? 13. edulibus terminatis excipiet te diversorium, quia minime aestuosum, maxime aestivum. nam per hoc, quod in Aquilonem solum patescit, habet diem, non habet solem, interiecto consistorio perangusto, ubi somnulentiae cubiculariorum dormitandi potius quam dormiendi locus est. 14. hic iam quam volupe auribus insonare cicadas meridie concrepantes, ranas crepusculo incumbente blaterantes, cygnos atque anseres concubia nocte clangentes, intempesta gallos gallinacios concinentes, oscines corvos voce triplicata puniceam surgentis Aurorae facem consalutantes, diluculo autem Philomelam inter frutices sibilantem, Prognen inter asseres minurientem! cui concentui licebit adiungas fistulae septiforis armentalem Camenam, quam saepe nocturnis carminum certaminibus insomnes nostrorum montium Tityri exercent, inter greges tinnibulatos per depasta buceta reboantes. quae tamen varia vocum cantuumque modulamina profundius confovendo sopori tuo lenocinabuntur. 15. porticibus egresso, si portum litoris petas, in area virenti vulgare quamquam non procul nemus: ingentes tiliae duae conexis frondibus, fomitibus abiunctis unam umbram non una radice conficiunt. in cuius opacitate, cum me meus Ecdicius inlustrat, pilae vacamus, sed hoc eo usque, donec arborum imago contractior intra spatium ramorum recussa cohibeatur atque illic aleatorium lassis consumpto sphaeristerio faciat. 16. sed quia tibi, sicut aedificium solvi, sic lacum debeo, quod restat agnosce. lacus in Eurum defluus meat, eiusque harenis fundamenta impressa domicilii ventis motantibus aestuans umectat alluvio. is quidem sane circa principia sui solo palustri voraginosus et vestigio inspectoris inadibilis: ita limi bibuli pinguedo coalescit ambientibus sese fontibus algidis, litoribus algosis. attamen pelagi mobilis campus cumbulis late secatur pervagabilibus, si flabra posuere; si turbo austrinus insorduit, immane turgescit, ita ut arborum comis, quae margini insistunt, superiectae asperginis fragor impluat. 17. ipse autem secundum mensuras quas ferunt nauticas in decem et septem stadia procedit, fluvio intratus, qui salebratim saxorum obicibus affractus spumoso canescit impulsu et nec longum scopulis praecipitibus exemptus lacu conditur; quem fors fuat an incurrat an faciat, praeterit certe, coactus per cola subterranea deliquari, non ut fluctibus, sed ut piscibus pauperaretur; qui repulsi in gurgitem pigriorem carnes rubras albis abdominibus extendunt: ita illis nec redire valentibus nec exire permissis quendam vivum et circumlaticium carcerem corpulentia facit. 18. lacus ipse, qua dexter, incisus flexuosus nemorosusque, qua laevus, patens herbosus aequalis. aequor ab Africo viride per litus, quia in undam fronde porrecta ut glareas aqua, sic aquas umbra perfundit. huiusmodi colorem ab oriente par silvarum corona continuat. per Arctoum latus ut pelago natura, sic species. a Zephyro plebeius et tumultuarius frutex frequenterque lemborum superlabentum ponderibus inflexus; hunc circa lubrici scirporum cirri plicantur simulque pingues ulvarum paginae natant salicumque glaucarum fota semper dulcibus aquis amaritudo. 19. in medio profundi brevis insula, ubi supra molares naturaliter aggeratos per impactorum puncta remorum navalibus trita gyris meta protuberat, ad quam se iucunda ludentum naufragia collidunt. nam moris istic fuit senioribus nostris agonem Drepanitanum Troianae superstitionis imitari. iam vero ager ipse, quamquam hoc supra debitum, diffusus in silvis pictus in pratis, pecorosus in pascuis in pastoribus peculiosus. 20. sed non amplius moror, ne, si longior stilo terminus, relegentem te autumnus inveniat. proinde mihi tribue veniendi celeritatem (nam redeundi moram tibi ipse praestabis), daturus hinc veniam, quod brevitatem sibi debitam paulo scrupulosior epistula excessit, dum totum ruris situm sollicita rimatur; quae tamen summovendi fastidii studio nec cuncta perstrinxit. quapropter bonus arbiter et artifex lector non paginam, quae spatia describit, sed villam, quae spatiosa describitur, grandem pronuntiabunt. vale.