Dios Rome, Volume 1 | Page 3

sometimes I have cleft and
hacked and wrenched them out of all semblance of their original shape,

and sometimes I have hauled them almost entire, like a cable, tangled
with particles, out of the sea-bed of departed days.
This principle of inconsistency which I have pursued in varying the
rendering of long sentences, periodic or loose, according to external
modifying conditions, may be observed also in certain other features of
the book. For I have felt obliged to allow inconsistency of letter in the
hope of approaching a consistency of spirit. I suppose that the ideal
plan to follow in a translation would be to let a given English word
represent a given Greek word, so that "beautiful" should occur as many
times in the English version as [Greek: kalos] in the original, and
"strength" as many times as [Greek: rhômê]. Such a scheme, however,
is not feasible in a passage of any length, and its impossibility simply
goes to show what a makeshift translation is and always has been, after
all. Therefore single Greek words will be found reproduced by various
English terms, but with that color which seems best adapted to the
context.
Again, in spelling I have chosen a method not unknown to recent
historians, which consists in anglicising familiar proper names that are
household words, like Antony, Catiline, etc., but keeping the classical
Latin form for persons less well known, as Antonius the grandfather of
Mark Antony. To the names of gods I have given a Latin dress unless a
particular god happened to be named by a Greek on Greek soil.
Similarly in geographical or topographical designations the translator
of Dio must needs confront a more difficult situation than did Dio
himself. Greek reduces all names to its own basis. In English one must
often select from the Latin form, Greek form, Native form, or
Anglicised form. Since Dio lived in Italy and was to all intents and
purposes a Roman I decided to make the Latin form the standard, and
admit rarely the Anglicised form, less often the Greek, and least often
the Native. As to the minutiæ of spelling I need scarcely say that I have
been tremendously aided by Boissevain's exhaustive studies, briefly
summarized in his notes. This painstaking care, for which he feels
almost obliged to apologize, will lend a permanent lustre to his
invaluable work.

That many errors must have crept into an undertaking of this magnitude
I have only too vivid forebodings, and this in spite of no inconsiderable
efforts of mine to avoid them: herein I can but beg the clemency of my
readers and judges and hope that such faults may be found to be mostly
of a minor character. And perhaps I can do no better than to make
common cause at once with Mr. Francis Manning whose book I
recently mentioned; for, in his Epistle Dedicatory "To The | Right
Honourable | CHARLES | Earl of Orrery", he voices as well as possible
the feelings with which I write on the dedication page the name of
Professor Gildersleeve:
"Your Lordship will forgive me for detaining you thus long with
relation to the Work I have made bold to present you with in our own
Tongue. How well it is perform'd, I must leave entirely to my Readers.
I assume nothing to myself but an endeavour to make my Author speak
intelligible English. I shall only add what my Subject leads me to, and
what for my Reader's sake I ought to mention: That as there are but few
Authors that can present any Book to your Lordship in most other
Languages, and on most of the Learned Subjects, but might wish they
had been assisted by your Lordship's Skill and Knowledge therein, as
well as Patronage and Protection; so the Translator of this Greek
Historian in particular must lament, that notwithstanding all his
Industry and Pains, he is faln infinitely short of that great Judgment,
Nicety and Criticism in the Greek Language, which your Lordship has
in your Writings made appear to the World."
* * * * *
Dio has long served as a source to writers treating topics of greater or
less length in Roman history. He is now presented entire to the casual
reader: his veracious narrative must ever continue to interest the
historical student, who may correct him by others or others by him, the
ecclesiastic, to whom is here offered so graphic a picture of the
conditions surrounding early Christianity, and the literary man, who
finds the limpid stream of Hellenic diction far from its source grow
turbid and turgid in turning the mill wheels for this dealer in [Greek:
onkos]. Dio's faults are patent, but his excellencies, fortunately, are

patent, too; and the world may rejoice that in an age of lust