Agricola and Germania

Finally after 91 years of "scholarly" and mediocre translations of The Agricola by self appointed "learned academics" A. R. Birley has produced a work that demonstrates why Tacitus has been regarded as among the best historians and rhetoricians of antiquity. The beauty and the elegance of the original is apparent in this translation, that has been lacking since the translation of W. H. Fyfe in 1908. The love and the sense of loss that Tacitus had for his father in law is still apparent to us, who live two thousand years after them. To illustrate the superiority of this translation a few examples follow: The first example is the translation of the term "divus" as in "divus Augustus" or "divus Claudius". Fyfe translated this term as sainted, and Birley as deified. Both of these seem to be adequate renditions of the term. However the Leob Classical Library's translation, by M. Hutton, translates the term as "of happy memory." This is curious because in their edition they compare the original Latin on the left with the English on the right. One would think that one of Leob's editors would have just looked at the Latin to see if it at least resembled the English. But this is even preferable to the Penguin translation, by H. Mattingly revised by S. A. Handford, wherein they just dropped the term altogether. Apparently Messrs. Mattingly, Handford, and Hutton felt that we the reading public wouldn't understand roman titles of respect and sought to protect us from this pagan ritualism. A second example occurs near the end of the third chapter when Tacitus laments the passage of fifteen years due to the tyranny of Domitian. Birley's (and Fyfe's was similar) translation reads; "So many years have been stolen from the middle of our lives, years in which those of us who were youths have become old men and the old men have reached almost the end of their allotted span - in silence." The Penguin translation reads; "since so many of our best years have been taken from us - years in which men in their prime have aged and old men have reached the extreme limit of mortality, without ever uttering a word." The Leob translation has, "for out of our prime have been blotted fifteen years, during which young men reached old age and old men the very bounds almost of decrepitude, and all without opening their lips." Apparently the Leob and Penguin translators wanted us (the reading public) to understand that the young are now old and the old almost dead, but in their haste to "dumb-down" the original they sacrificed the beauty, the brevity and the profound nature of Tacitus. Furthermore the Leob and Penguin translators apparently didn't realize that it was "us" that had aged and not other "young men" who had aged. The final example is from the last paragraph of the Agricola. Birley's translation reads; "Many of the men of old will be buried in oblivion, inglorious and unknown. Agricola's story has been told for posterity and he will survive." The P

This book contains a pair of early works by the great Roman historian Tacitus. Agricola is an homage to the historian's father-in-law, a Roman governor in Britain during the 1st century A.D. Germania describes the German people and their culture during the same period.The author's admiration for his late father-in-law is manifest in Agricola. Sometimes his admiration comes across as tender, sometimes as fawning. Tacitus writes near the crest of Roman world-domination (Americans take note). He frequently adopts the tone of a tourist in a third-world country -- sometimes looking down his nose at local customs, sometimes in fascination at a primitive culture that compares favorably to a Roman empire suffering decay and corruption. He is a loyal Roman and an educated man. As such, he can glorify Rome and, in the same breath, criticize Rome's tyranny and empathize with the empire's victims. Tacitus lends an eloquent voice to Rome's enemies and those facing enslavement. The speech (probably apocryphal) of Caledonian warlord Calgacus before the climactic battle of the Graupian mountain may be the best section of either book. Backed up to the northern tip of modern Scotland, Calgacus tries to rally his men before battle. "Now there is no people beyond us," he says, "nothing but tides and rocks and, more deadly than these, the Romans ... They have pillaged the world ... They plunder, they butcher, they ravage, and call it by the lying name of empire. They make a desert and call it peace." Tacitus has no personal connection to any person in the second book, Germania. His writing is more sterile here, but he provides a captivating description that seems part based on observation and part on rumor.Tacitus is a pithy writer, given to understatement and the wry aside. The translator does a tremendous job of carrying these qualities across in English. Important books both, Agricola and Germania provide some of our only glimpses of the early ancestors of the English people, the Anglo-Saxons and the Britons.

This wonderful little book by Tacitus translated by Harold Mattingly into easily understandable English for the modern man provides a good insight not only into Roman times of the 1st Century but the style and wit of Tacitus himself who must have been widely read in his own times simply for his engaging style, especially because, not in spite of, the moralisation which is promoted throughout the book. Although Mattingly takes some liberties with the translation inserting words or phrases which certainly were not current in Roman times nonetheless he tries to let the book talk of the times and give the correct impression so that a modern reader can understand it, a task which is very difficult and needs considerable thought which is one reason for praising the translator himself. Every translation contains some inputs from the culture and character of the translator, this cannot be avoided.Tacitus describes the exploits of his father in law Agricola who to all accounts was a very successful Governor of Britain, although Tacitus gives the impression that Agricola was just about the be all and end all as a man there must have been some truth to this since such respect must be earned rather than imposed. The Germania is also fascinating almost bringing to life the way of life of Germans living beyond the frontiers, remarkably he manages to portray even those Germans living a long way beyond the frontiers describing even the people who lived in Denmark and Lithuania, this is amazing since no Roman expeditions ever reached this far unless the historians obtained merely heresay or himself travelled the area in question. But then surprises abound since even the Chinese ambassador was known to have visited the Roman Empire in 160 AD and a similar Roman delegation arrived in China in 180 AD. A remarkable book giving no end of joy in the reading.

Tacitus' opens up a lost world before the Christians in what was, for many of us, our mother countries - Britian and Germany. The book is divided in two; the first piece `Agricola' (farmer)is named after the father-in-law of Tacitus. Tacitus gives us part biography and part eulogy in order to confer immortality on Agricola's memory at the edge of Empire among the barbarians. Agricola was loved and honoured by Tacitus, and Tacitus gives an account of his military and political triumphs before being called to Rome. For anyone interested in early British history, warfare or pagan themes observed first hand, this is a must have.The second part is an amazing series of geograpgical, religious, and general cultural observations among the Germans. In this age of political correctness, Tacitus' observations are a delicious treat of unfettered notation of racial difference and character that still ring guiltily true about the Germans (good and bad), especially in the first half of the last century. "Their holy places are the woods and groves, and they call by the name of god that hidden presence which is seen only by the eye of reverence." ... "They count, not like us, by days, but by nights." ... "No form of approval can carry more honour than praise expressed by arms."Great stuff. Short, entertaining and informative of another time and place.

Agricola was one of the Roman governor's in Britain. He was also Tacitus' father-in-law. So he set down Agricola's great life down for posterity. With some brief descriptions of Britain that they had recently found was an island, there are accounts of battles that Agricola made to push the edge of the Empire even further. In Germania, Tacitus gives a fascinating account of the German people, and as far as I know a unique account of their "barbarian" society. As may be typically Roman, Tacitus speaks with a Romo-centric tone, but these works provide a lot of basic information of the world at the time, without being as Tacitus' very long (and incomplete) Histories and Annals.