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 VIII · Section 2

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Book VIII · Section 2

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Ancient Greek

p. 404

χρόνῳ δʼ, ἐντεῦθεν ὁρμώμενοι καὶ τῶν περιοίκων ἀμείνους ὄντες ἐς χεῖρας ἐλθεῖν, ναυσί τε χρώμενοι καὶ τὴν θάλασσαν οἷα Φοίνικες ἐργαζόμενοι, τὴν πόλιν τὴν ἔξω τῇ Βύρσῃ περιέθηκαν. καὶ δυναστεύοντες ἤδη Λιβύης ἐκράτουν καὶ πολλῆς θαλάσσης, ἐκδήμους τε πολέμους ἐστράτευον ἐς Σικελίαν καὶ Σαρδὼ καὶ νήσους ἄλλας ὅσαι τῆσδε τῆς θαλάσσης εἰσί, καὶ ἐς Ἰβηρίαν. πολλαχῇ δὲ καὶ ἀποικίας ἐξέπεμπον. ἥ τε ἀρχὴ αὐτοῖς ἐγένετο δυνάμει μὲν ἀξιόμαχος τῇ Ἑλληνικῇ, περιουσίᾳ δὲ μετὰ τὴν Περσικήν. ἑπτακοσίοις δʼ αὐτοὺς ἔτεσιν ἀπὸ τοῦ συνοικισμοῦ Ῥωμαῖοι Σικελίαν ἀφείλοντο, καὶ Σαρδὼ μετὰ Σικελίαν, δευτέρῳ δὲ πολέμῳ καὶ Ἰβηρίαν. ἔς τε τὴν ἀλλήλων ἐμβαλόντες μεγάλοις στρατοῖς, οἱ μὲν Ἀννίβου σφῶν ἡγουμένου τὴν Ἰταλίαν ἐπόρθουν ἑκκαίδεκα ἔτεσιν ἑξῆς, οἱ δὲ Λιβύην Κορνηλίου Σκιπίωνος τοῦ πρεσβυτέρου σφῶν στρατηγοῦντος, μέχρι τὴν ἡγεμονίαν Καρχηδονίους ἀφείλοντο καὶ ναῦς καὶ ἐλέφαντας, καὶ χρήματα σφίσιν ἐπέταξαν ἐσενεγκεῖν ἐν χρόνῳ. δεύτεραί τε σπονδαὶ Ῥωμαίοις καὶ Καρχηδονίοις αἵδε διέμειναν ἐς ἔτη πεντήκοντα, μέχρι λύσαντες αὐτὰς τρίτον πόλεμον καὶ τελευταῖον ἀλλήλοις ἐπολέμησαν, ἐν ᾧ Καρχηδόνα Ῥωμαῖοι κατέσκαψαν Σκιπίωνος τοῦ νεωτέρου σφῶν στρατηγοῦντος, καὶ ἐπάρατον ἔγνωσαν. αὖθις δʼ ᾤκισαν ἰδίοις ἀνδράσιν, ἀγχοτάτω μάλιστα τῆς προτέρας, ὡς εὔκαιρον ἐπὶ Λιβύῃ χωρίον. τούτων τὰ μὲν ἀμφὶ Σικελίαν ἡ Σικελικὴ γραφὴ δηλοῖ, τὰ δʼ ἐν Ἰβηρίᾳ γενόμενα ἡ Ἰβηρική, καὶ ὅσα Ἀννίβας ἐς Ἰταλίαν

Appian’s Roman History, Volume I: Book VIII

p. 405

upper hand of their neighbors, as they were more adroit, and engaging in traffic by sea, like the Phoenicians, they built a city around Byrsa. Gradually acquiring strength they mastered Africa and the greater part of the Mediterranean, carried war into Sicily and Sardinia and the other islands of that sea, and also into Spain. They sent out numerous colonies. They became a match for the Greeks in power, and next to the Persians in wealth. But about 700 years after the foundation of the city the Romans took Sicily and Sardinia away from them, and in a second war Spain also. Then, assailing each the other’s territory with immense armies, the Carthaginians, under Hannibal, ravaged Italy for sixteen years in succession, but the Romans, under the leadership of Cornelius Scipio the elder, carried the war into Africa, crushed the Carthaginian power, took their ships and their elephants, and required them to pay tribute for a time. A second treaty was now made between the Romans and the Carthaginians which lasted fifty years, until, upon an infraction of it, the third and last war broke out between them, in which the Romans under Scipio the younger razed Carthage to the ground and forbade the rebuilding of it. But another city was built subsequently by their own people, very near the former one, for convenience in governing Africa. Of these matters the Sicilian part is shown in my Sicilian history, the Spanish in the Spanish history, and what

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.