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 IV · Fragment I

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Book IV · Fragment I

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Ancient Greek

p. 98

Κελτοὶ Ῥωμαίοις ἐπεχείρησαν πρῶτοι, καὶ τὴν Ῥώμην εἷλον ἄνευ τοῦ Καπιτωλίου, καὶ ἐμπεπρήκασιν. Κάμιλλος δὲ αὐτοὺς ἐνίκησε καὶ ἐξήλασε, καὶ μετὰ χρόνον ἐπελθόντας αὖθις ἐνίκησε, καὶ ἐθριάμβευσεν ἀπʼ αὐτῶν ὀγδοήκοντα γεγονὼς ἔτη. καὶ τρίτη δὲ Κελτῶν στρατιὰ ἐμβέβληκεν ἐς τὴν Ἰταλίαν, ἣν καὶ αὐτὴν οἱ Ῥωμαῖοι διεφθάρκασιν ὑφʼ ἡγεμόνι Τίτῳ Κοϊντίῳ. μετὰ δὲ ταῦτα Βοιοί, Κελτικὸν ἔθνος θηριωδέστατον, ἐπῆλθε Ῥωμαίοις, καὶ αὐτοῖς Γάϊος Σουλπίκιος δικτάτωρ μετὰ στρατιᾶς ἀπήντα, ὅς τις καὶ στρατηγήματι τοιούτῳ χρήσασθαι λέγεται· ἐκέλευσε γὰρ τοὺς ἐπὶ τοῦ μετώπου τεταγμένους ἐξακοντίσαντας ὁμοῦ συγκαθίσαι τάχιστα, μέχρι βάλωσιν οἱ δεύτεροι καὶ τρίτοι καὶ τέταρτοι, τοὺς δʼ ἀφιέντας ἀεὶ συνίζειν, ἵνα μὴ κατʼ αὐτῶν ἐνεχθείη τὰ δόρατα· βαλόντων δὲ τῶν ὑστάτων ἀναπηδᾶν ἅπαντας ὁμοῦ, καὶ σὺν βοῇ τάχιστα ἐς χεῖρας ἰέναι· καταπλήξειν γὰρ

Appian’s Roman History, Volume I: Book IV

p. 99

AT an early period the Gauls waged war against the Romans, took Rome itself, except the Capitol, and burned it. Camillus, however, overcame and expelled them. At a later period, when they had made a second invasion, he overcame them again and enjoyed a triumph in consequence, being then in his eightieth year. A third army of Gauls which invaded Italy was destroyed by the Romans under Titus Quintius. Afterwards the Boii, the most savage of the Gallic tribes, attacked the Romans. Gaius Sulpicius, the dictator, marched against them, and is said to have used the following stratagem. He commanded those who were in the front line to discharge their javelins, and immediately crouch low; then the second, third, and fourth lines to discharge theirs, each crouching in turn so that they should not be struck by the spears thrown from the rear; then when the last line had hurled their javelins, all were to rush forward suddenly with a shout and join battle at close

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.