Quintus Horatius Flaccus
Sermonum
Liber Primus

Egressum magna me accepit Aricia Roma
hospition modico: rhetor comes Heliodorus,
Graecorum longe doctissimus; inde Forum Appi,
differtum nautis, cauponibus atque malignis.

hoc iter ignavi divisimus, altius ac nos (5)
praecinctis unum: minus est gravis Appia tardis.
Hic ego propter aquam, quod erat deterrima, ventri
indico bellum, cenantis haud animo aequo
exspectans comites. iam nox inducere terris

umbras et caelo diffundere signa parabat. (10)
tum pueri nautis, pueris convicia nautae
ingerere. “huc apelle!” “trecentos inseris: ohe
iam satis est!” dum aes exigitur, dum mula ligatur,
tota abit hora. mali culices ranaeque palustres

avertunt sumnos, absentem ut cantat amicam (15)
multa prolutus vappa nauta atque viator
certatim: tandem fessus dormire viator
incipit, ac missae pastum retinacula mulae
nauta piger saxo religat stertitque supinus.

iamque dies aderat, nil cum procedere lintrem (20)
sentimus, donec cerebrosus prosilit unus
ac mulae nautaeque caput lumbosque saligno
fuste dolat. quarta vix demum exponimur hora.
ora manusque tua lavimus, Feronia, lympha.

milia tum pransi tria repimus atque subimus (25)
impositum saxis late candentibus Anxur.
huc venturus erat Maecenas optimus atque
Cocceius, miss magnis de rebus uterque
legati, aversos soliti componere amicos.

hic oculis ego nigra meis collyria lippus (30)
illinere. interea Maecenas advenit atque Cocceius Capitoque simul
Fonteius, ad unguem
factus homo, Antoni non ut magis alter amicus.
Fundos Aufidio Lusco praetore libenter

linquimus, insani ridentes praemia scribae, (35)
praetextam et latum clavum prunaeque vatillum.
in Mamurrarum lassi deinde urbe manemus,
Murena praebente domum, Capitone culinam.
postera lux oritur multo gratissima; namque

Plotius et Varius Sinuessae Vergiliusque (40)
occurrunt, animae qualis neque candidiores
terra tulit neque quis me sit devinctior alter.
o qui complexus et gaudia quanta fuerunt!
nil ego contulerim iucundo sanus amico.

proxima Campano ponti quae villula, tectum (45)
praebuit, et parochi quae debent ligna salemque.
hinc muli Capuae clitellas tempore ponunt.
lusum it Maecenas, dormitum ego Vergiliusque;
namque pila lippis inimicum et ludere crudis.

hinc nos Coccei recipit plenissima villa, (50)
quae super est Caudi capuponas. nunc mihi paucis
Sarmenti scurrae pugnam Missique Cicirri,
Musa, velim memores, et quo patre natus uterque
contulerit litis. Messi clarum genus Osci;

Sarmenti domina exstat: ab his maioribus orti (55)
ad pugnam venere. prior Sarmentus: “equi te
esse feri similem dico.” ridemus, et ipse
Messius “accipio,” caput et movet. “o, tua cornu
ni foret exsecto frons” inquit, “quid faceres, cum

sic mitilus minitaris?” at illi foeda cicatrix (60)
saetosam laevi frontem turpaverat oris.
Campanum in morbum, in faciem permulta iocatus,
pastorem saltaret uti Cyclopa rogabat:
nil illi larva aut tragicis opus esse cothurmis.

multa Cicirrus ad haec: donasset iamne catenam (65)
ex voto Laribus, quaerebat; scriba quod esset,
nilo deterius dominae ius esse. rogabat
denique cur umquam fugisset, cui satis una
farris libra foret, gracili sic tamque pusillo.

prorsus iucunde cenam producimus illam. (75)
tum rapere, atque omnis restinguere velle videres.
incipit ex illo montis Apulia notos.
ostentare mihi, quos torret Atabulus et quos
numquam erepsemus, nisi nos vicina Trivici

villa recepisset, lacrimoso non sine fumo, (80)
udos cum foliis ramos urente camino.
hic ego mendacem stultissimus usque puellam
ad mediam noctem exspecto: somnus tamen aufert
intentum Veneri; tum immundo somnia visu

nocturnam vestem maculant ventremque supinum. (85)
quattuor hinc rapimur viginti et milia raedis,
mansuri oppidulo quod versu dicere non est,
signis perfacile est: venit vilissima rerum
hic aqua; sed panis longe pulcherrimus, ultra

callidus ut soleat umeris protare viator; (90)
nam Canusi lapidosus, aquae non ditior urna
qui locus a forti Diomede est conditus olim.
felntibus hinc Varius discedit maestus amicis.
inde Rubos fessi pervenimus, utpote longum

carpentes iter et factum corruptius imbri. (95)
postera tempestas melior, via peior adusque
Bari moenia piscosi; dein Gnatia Lymphis
iratis exstructa dedit risusque iocosque,
dum flamma sine tura liquescere limine sacro

persuadere cupit. credat Iudaeus Apella, (100)
non ego: namque deos didici securum agere aevum,
nec, si quid miri faciat natura, deos id
tristis ex alto caeli demittere tecto.
Brundisium longae finis chartaeque viaeque est.

Horace
The Satires
Book One

(1) Aricia received me, who had left great Rome, with modest hospitality:
teacher Heliodorus, my companion, by far the most learned of the Greeks;
from this place we arrived at Forum Appi
crowded with boatmen and nasty shopkeepers.

(5) We, lazy ones, divided this journey, it would have been a one-day journey
for those girded up higher than we were: Appia is less burdensome for
those who are slow. I, not with an even mind (impatiently), waiting for
my dining companions, declare war on my stomach on account of water
that was the worst. Now night was preparing to bring shadows of the lands

(10) and to diffuse constellations in the sky.
Then slaves heap insults upon the boatmen, boatment heap insults upon
the slaves "Put in here!" "You are packing in hundreds: hey, now it is
enough!" While the fare is collected, while the mule is being tied,
a whole hour passes. Annoying gnats and frogs of the marshes

(15) turn away sleep, while sailor and traveller soaked
in flat wine sing in competition a lot about an absent
girlfriend: at last the tired traveller falls asleep, and
lazy sailor ties the traces of the mule, who is sent out
to pasture, then snores, lying on his back.

(20) And already the day was approaching, we feel nothing while proceeding in the boat,
while a hot-headed (man) alone jumps forward and with a willow stick
inflicts blows on the head of the mule and loins of the boatman.
at last at the fourth hour we disembark with difficulty.
We washed our faces and hands with your water, Feronia.

(25) Then we, having eaten, crawl and climb 3 miles to
Anxur laid out with far dazzling-white stones.
Here was to come the best Maecenas and Cocceius,
both sent about great things, and they are accustomed
to rejoin their estranger friends.

(30) here I covered my sore eyes with black eye lotion.
Meanwhile Maecenas arrived, and also Cocceius and at the same time
Capito Fonteius, a man of perfect finish (a man without a flaw),
a friend to Antony, as one more is not.

(34) We left Fundi with pleasure, crazily laughing at the praetor
Aufidius Luscus, at the rewards of a scribe, and at the purple-bordered
toga, and at the wide-striped tunic, and at the can of coles (insense burning).

(37) Next we tired stayed in the city of Mamurra, Murena
supplying us with a home, Capitone supplying us with food.

(39) the next light (of day) arises many very pleasing things; for Plotius and Varius
and Vegilius meet at Sinuessa, earth has borne no such souls whiter nor is
anybody more tied to them than me.

(43) o what embraces and how much joys there was!
I sane have collected nothing to a delightful friend
Little villa which is close to the Campanian sea, provided us with roof, and the commissaries that
ought to (provide us with) firewood and salt.
From here mules after a time lay down the packsacks in Capua.
Maecenas went to play, I and Vergilius went to sleep;
For indeed it is unfriendly for people with inflamed and bleeding eyes to play ball.

(50) From this place a very plentiful villa of Cocceius,

(51) which is above the inns of Caudus, receives us. Now, my muse,
I beg of you briefly to relate a fight of jesters Sarmentus and Messius Cicirrus;
and from what ancestry descended each began the contest. The illutrious race
of Messius-Oscan: Sarmentus's mistress is still alive. From these ancestors
of origin to the fight they came. First, Sarmentus:

(56) "I say that you have a look of a wild horse." We laugh;
(57-61) and Messius himself says “I approve” and shakes his head.
He says, “oh, if your horn was not cut out from your forehead,
what would you do, when you hornless threaten us so?”
Moreover, that beastly scar had disfigured
the hairy eye-brow on the left side of his face.

(62) Having laughed at his campanian disease, he
asked him to dance the Cyclops shepherd dance:
and he said that he had no need for a mask or tragic buskins

(65) Cicirrus said much to this: he already presented a chain
from wish/prayer to the household gods, he asked whether;
the fact that he is a scribe, his mistress has no less rights over him.

(68-69) Finally he asked why he had ever fled, he, so slender
and tiny, to whom one pound of grain would have been enough.

(70) We prolong the dinner pleasantly.

(71) From here we aim straight to Beneventum; where attentive host
nearly set his house on fire, while the thrushes meagrely keep turning in the fire;

(73-74) For wondering through the old kitchen, Fire, having slipped away from the
stove, a flame hastening to lick the highest part of the roof through the old kitchen.

(75-76) You might have seen the greedy guests and the frightened
slaves trying to snatch off dinner plates and trying to extinguish the fire.

(77-81) Next Apulia begins to show to me mountains
known to me, which Atabulus scorches, and which
we would have never climbed, if the villa has
not received us, not without tearful smoke furnace
burning wet branches along with the leaves.

(82-85) Here I, very stupid, wait continuously until
the middle of the night for a deceitful girl; sleep
at last steals me eager to Venus; then dream with
a dirty sight spots my night clothes and my belly.

(86) From here we are dragged along by chariots for 24 miles,
we will stay in a small town, which cannot be said by verse, by
a sign can be said easily: here water the most worthless of things
is sold; but the bread is by far the finest, so that the cunning traveller
is accustomed to willingly carry it on his shoulders further;

(91) for at Canusium bread is stony, the water is not better,
which place was once found by brave Dionysus.

(93) From here sad Varius leaves his friends with tears.

(94) From that place we tired arrived at Rubi, in as much
as we pluck the long journey and rain made very incorrectly

(96) The next day’s weather was better, the road is worse all
the way to the walls of Bus (Bari?), teeming with fish; then Gnatia,
built upon angry waters, offered us both laughter and jokes,
while the town wants to persuade us that here incense melts without fire

(100) Let Apella the Jew believe this, not me:
For I have learned that gods live an untroubled life,
that if nature were to do anything miraculous, the gods
in their misery do not send it down from the high vault of heaven.

(104) Brundisium is the end of both the long story and long journey.