15
So much for him. Another, a keen emulator of Thucydides, modelling himself closely on his original, like him began with his own name—the most graceful of all beginnings, redolent of Attic thyme. Listen: “Crepereius Calpurnianus of Pompeiopolis wrote the history of the war between the Parthians and the Romans beginning at its very outset.” An adaptation of the opening sentence of Thucydides’ History. After a beginning like that why should I tell you the rest—the sort of speech he made in Armenia (he brought in the Corcyrean orator I.e., he took the speech from Thucydides I, 32, where the Corcyrean delegation addresses the Athenian assembly. in person for that) or what sort of plague he brought down on the people of Nisibis who declined to take the Roman side (he lifted that from Thucydides in its entirety except just for the Pelasgicum and the Long Walls where those who had at that time caught the plague had settled. Thuc. II, 47–54. References to Athenian topography were omitted. )? Then again it even “began in Ethiopia,” as in Thucydides, then “descended into Egypt” and “the vast territory of the great King,” where it stayed—and a good thing too! For my part I left him still burying his wretched Athenians at Nisibis and went away knowing just what he was going to say after I had gone. But this is quite a fashion just now, to suppose that you’re following Thucydides’ style if you reproduce, with some small alterations, his own expressions. Oh, here is a point I almost left out: this same historian has called many arms and war-engines by their Latin names, as well as the words for ditch, bridge and so on. Imagine please the high quality of his history and how it suits Thucydides to have these Italic words mixed up with the Attic, adding a distinctive touch of colour like purple dye—a perfect match!
