Appian’s Roman History, Volume I

Name: Appian’s Roman History, Volume I
Author: Appian of Alexandria

Ancient Greek with Horace White’s English translation

Appian’s Roman History, Volume IBook VII · Sections 34–36

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English Page · Branch 172 of 315

Book VII · Sections 34–36

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Ancient Greek

p. 358

Μεταποντῖνοι δʼ, ἐξ οὗ σφῶν ὁ φρούραρχος τὸ ἥμισυ τῆς φρουρᾶς ἄγων ἐς Τάραντα ᾤχετο, τοὺς λοιποὺς ὀλίγους γενομένους ἀπέκτειναν καὶ Ἀννίβᾳ προσέθεντο. προσέθετο δὲ καὶ ἡ μεταξὺ Μεταποντίνων τε καὶ Θουρίων Ἡράκλεια, δέει μᾶλλον ἢ γνώμῃ. καὶ πάλιν ἦν ἐπικυδέστερα τὰ Ἀννίβου. τοῦ δʼ ἑξῆς ἔτους καὶ Λευκανῶν τινες ἀπέστησαν ἀπὸ Ῥωμαίων· οἷς Σεμπρώνιος Γράκχος ἀνθύπατος ἐπελθὼν ἐπολέμει. Λευκανὸς δέ τις ἐκ τῶν ἔτι Ῥωμαίοις ἐμμενόντων Φλάουιος, φίλος ὢν καὶ ξένος Γράκχου, προδιδοὺς αὐτὸν ἔπεισεν ἔς τι χωρίον ἐλθόντα συνθέσθαι Λευκανῶν τοῖς στρατηγοῖς ὡς μετανοοῦσι, καὶ δοῦναι καὶ λαβεῖν πίστεις. ὁ δʼ οὐδὲν ὑποτοπήσας εἵπετο μεθʼ ἱππέων τριάκοντα. Νομάδων δὲ πολλῶν αὐτὸν ἐξ ἐνέδρας κυκλωσαμένων, ὁ μὲν Φλάουιος ἐξίππευσεν ἐς ἐκείνους, ὁ δὲ Γράκχος συνεὶς τῆς προδοσίας καθήλατο μετὰ τῶν ἱππέων, καὶ πολλὰ καὶ γενναῖα δρῶν κατεκόπη μετὰ πάντων πλὴν τριῶν, οὓς μόνους εἷλεν ὁ Ἀννίβας, πολλὴν ποιησάμενος σπουδὴν λαβεῖν ζῶντα Ῥωμαίων τὸν ἀνθύπατον. αἰσχρῶς δʼ αὐτὸν ἐνηδρευμένον ἀγάμενος ὅμως τῆς τελευταίας ἀρετῆς ἔθαψε, καὶ τὰ ὀστᾶ Ῥωμαίοις ἔπεμψεν.

καὶ ἀπὸ τοῦδε αὐτὸς μὲν ἐν Ἰάπυξιν ἐθέριζε καὶ σῖτον πολὺν ἐσώρευε,

Ῥωμαίων δʼ ἐπιθέσθαι

Appian’s Roman History, Volume I: Book VII

p. 359

Carthaginians. The Roman garrison in Thurii escaped secretly by sea to Brundusium.

The Metapontines, whose prefect had taken half of his force to Tarentum, slew the remainder, who were few in number, and delivered themselves up to Hannibal. Heraclea, which lay midway between Metapontum and Tarentum, followed their example, being moved by fear rather than inclination. Thus Hannibal’s affairs again began to wear a flourishing aspect. In the following year some of the Lucanians revolted from Rome, and Sempronius Gracchus, the proconsul, marched against them. A certain Lucanian named Flavius, of the party that had remained faithful to the Romans, who had been also a friend and guest of Gracchus but was now his betrayer, persuaded him to come to a certain place to have a conference with the Lucanian generals, saying that they had repented and wished to return to the Roman allegiance. Suspecting nothing, he went to the place with thirty horsemen, where he found himself surrounded by a large force of Numidians in ambush, with whom Flavius then joined himself. When Gracchus discovered the treachery he leaped from his horse with his companions, and after performing many noble deeds of valor was slain with all the others, except three. These were the only ones captured by Hannibal, who had exerted himself to the utmost to take the Roman proconsul alive. Although he had basely entrapped him, nevertheless in admiration of his bravery in the final struggle he gave him a funeral and sent his bones to Rome. After this he passed the summer in Apulia and collected large supplies of corn.

The Romans decided to attack the Capuans,

About This Reading Edition

Appian’s Roman History asked readers of the Roman Empire to reckon with how conquest, ambition, and civil conflict created their world; its questions about political power, cultural encounter, civic division, and the human cost of expansion remain urgent today. This approximately page-aligned parallel-text edition pairs the Ancient Greek text with Horace White’s English translation, following the 1912 facing leaves while omitting translator’s notes, figures, fragment attributions, marginalia, and unnumbered appendices.

Historical Text and Translation

Appian, a Greek-speaking Roman historian from Alexandria, wrote in the second century CE and arranged Rome’s expansion by the peoples and regions it conquered rather than as one continuous chronology—a strikingly original design. Much of his twenty-four-book work is lost, making the surviving books and fragments especially valuable.

About Horace White

Horace White was an American journalist, editor, and financial writer rather than a university professor. He led the Chicago Tribune and later the New York Evening Post, yet his Greek scholarship produced the fluent two-volume Appian translation of 1899 that became the English text of the original Loeb edition in 1912.

Rights

Appian’s ancient work, Ludwig Mendelssohn’s 1879 Greek edition, Horace White’s 1899/1912 English translation, and the Eulogikon Greek Preface are in the public domain in the United States. The Perseus digital transcriptions are reused under CC BY-SA 4.0; their attribution and share-alike terms continue to apply.