It's about the past and the present, having been this way or that, let them now be this way or that.
"Meaning is not intellectual, meaning is depth of experience."
"Meaning is not intellectual, meaning is depth of experience."
"When you know, you have choices."
The Parthian advanced
Befigured in plate armour
Ravenous and frightfully baying
He marched on with steady step
Bellowing and booming
Drums echoed throughout the accursed desert
More Parthians listed forth, these mounted and similarly armoured
They had with them long lances
They tore through the front line, piercing the soldiers' chests through heavy shields
They repelled all counterattacks with facility of motion, relieving the valiants of their heads, they spun atop their mounts unleashing a volley of arrows, rendering immobile the sturdy central phalanx soldiers
They pierced knees and punctured heels
Delighting in the inglorious discharge of blood
With all peremptoriness, they sounded their war horns
Beckoning forth thundering elephants
The men were absolutely frazzled
Our army three fifths decimated
The lumbering animals loomed overhead dispatching with easy gait and facile trample
Our men were veritably ground up in their own bodies
The Parthian laughed, mocking our outrage
Our cries of sorrow
Never was a memory sweeter than when at that hour I recalled the steps of Jupiter Capitolinus
Never was there another day when I craved the Tarpeian Rock
O Mars! Why hast thou forsaken us?
Old Crassus, cantankerous Crassus thought to himself they'd swift run out of arrows
Crassus commanded we hold our positions
We steadily awaited our deaths
Watching the massacre at the central lines
Crassus was mistaken, thoroughly so
A scout had spied arrow-laden camels
The Parthian boys could slaughter till dawn
The sun swayed feebly growing dimmer, night was approaching
The gloom encased us and we heard above the din of Parthian barbarisms that sweet sound
Retreat!
And so we did, for the mountains headed
Knowing not where to flee in this strange Parthian land
Crassus, in all earnest and without a flicker of doubt, said he reckoned we ride for Carrhae atop the equestrian mounts, Crassus was as flimsy in reckoning as he was feeble of form
Crassus would dispatch with all of our souls
We agreed, obligated by sacred oath
Though our hearts knew nothing but dissent, the slaughter continued and at that forlorn place, they fell upon us, seizing us captive
Minerva mea!
The Parthians gathered us round and without hint of recoil or apprehension, displayed mounted the caput of dear Crassus' son atop a wheted lance
Our Crassus fell upon his knees, fairly weakened and took to moaning and gasping
Composing himself thereafter and issuing a decisive command
He ordered we surrender and accept the Parthians' terms
He ordered the aqile of Rome to be joined at a future time in razing Carrhae to embers
He ordered mortus upon the last Parthian who thought to tread the earth
We consented in earnest
Crassus was called before the rex of Parthians and his reins were seized, his person contumelied, his throat opened, filled with molten gold, in abject mockery, before that distateful bunch
A most odious deed
A violation of verbal contract
No terms of surrender were offered, a venalicius made speedy purchase of us and thus it is that I found myself errating Ctesiphon
After purchasing myself from my master, a Greek scribe of venerable texts tutored in astronomical science, I made my way to Helios and set sail from Alexandria, arriving at Ostia and setting afoot for Rome
Never to see my presumably slain companions
Never to forget the Parthian desert.
Can you please provide me with Latin and Classical Greek translations of these, if anyone knows Classical Greek, something Pindaric
