VIII.
Nam (nam: the particle is here explanatory; it introduces an example to illustrate the negligence of some historians whom Tacitus has just blamed for passing over important events like this trial.) ea tempestate qua Seiani amicitiam ceteri falso exuerant ausus est eques Romanus M. Terentius, ob id reus, amplecti, (ea tempestate qua Seiani amicitiam ceteri falso exuerant ausus est eques Romanus M. Terentius, ob id reus, amplecti: ‘at the moment in which [all] others falsely cast off Sejanus’ friendship, the Roman knight Marcus Terentius, accused of that crime, dared to embrace it.’ ob id reus: word for word, ‘a defendant because of it’; id refers to Seiani amicitiam; amplecti is the present infinitive of amplector. Marcus Terentius is otherwise unknown.) ad hunc modum apud senatum ordiendo: (ad hunc modum apud senatum ordiendo: ‘…by beginning to speak in the senate in the following manner’; ordiendo is instrumental use of the gerund; being a noun, though a verbal one, the gerund can express means or instrument in the abl.) ‘fortunae quidem meae fortasse minus expediat adgnoscere crimen quam abnuere: (fortunae quidem meae fortasse minus expediat adgnoscere crimen quam abnuere: ‘perhaps it may indeed help my chances less to admit the crime than to deny it.’ expediat is potential subjunctive and the two infinitives, adgnoscere and abnuere are its subject; fortunae is dative of the indirect object with the intransitive expedio.) sed utcumque casura res est, (utcumque casura res est: ‘no matter how things are about to fall out’; the conjunction utcumque is here with the active periphrasis (future participle + form of sum) to indicate imminent occurrence or fatality.) fatebor et fuisse me Seiano amicum et ut essem expetisse et postquam adeptus eram laetatum. (fatebor et fuisse me Seiano amicum et ut essem expetisse et postquam adeptus eram laetatum: ‘…I shall confess both that I (me) had been a friend to Sejanus, that I had longed to be [his friend], and that I rejoiced when I had attained [his friendship].’ postquam adeptus eram: one would expect adeptus essem after the verb of saying fatebor, but, as Ernout explains (p. 426), temporal, causal, and relative clauses enjoy a certain degree of autonomy, in that they are peripheral to the main thought and intent expressed by the accompanying infinitive clause. Such nuances depend on the writer. Another author might well have chosen the subjunctive in the same case. et …et…et: ‘both …and …and’) videram collegam patris regendis praetoriis cohortibus, mox urbis et militiae munis simul obeuntem. (videram collegam patris regendis praetoriis cohortibus, mox urbis et militiae munis simul obeuntem: ‘I had seen [him] the colleague of his father for the management of the praetorian cohorts, afterwards taking on urban as well as (simul) military duties.’ urbis et militiae munis obe3untem: urbis and militae are appositional genitives (nouns defining another noun); obeo, in the sense used here, takes dat., munis. regendis praetoribus cohortibus: use of dat. gerundive to indicate the function or purpose of an office: lit. ‘for the praetorian cohorts to be governed’; cf. A. G. 505, b.) illius propinqui et adfines honoribus augebantur; ut quisque Seiano intimus ita ad Caesaris amicitiam validus: contra quibus infensus esset, metu ac sordibus conflictabantur. nec quemquam exemplo adsumo: (nec quemquam exemplo adsumo: ‘I do not bring in anyone for an example.’ quisquam is often found in negative contexts and is more emphatic than quis, ‘anyone at all’.) cunctos qui novissimi consilii expertes fuimus meo unius discrimine defendam. (cunctos qui novissimi consilii expertes fuimus meo unius discrimine defendam: ‘I shall speak, at my own exclusive risk, for all [of us] who have not been privy to his latest scheme.’ novissimi consilii expertes: here with gen., expers can also take abl.; meo unius discrimine: abl. of manner or of instrument; lit. ‘at the risk, my own, of one man alone’) non enim Seianum Vulsiniensem set Claudiae et Iuliae domus partem, quas adfinitate occupaverat, tuum, Caesar, generum, tui consulatus socium, tua officia in re publica capessentem colebamus. (non enim Seianum Vulsiniensem set Claudiae et Iuliae domus partem, quas adfinitate occupaverat, tuum, Caesar, generum, tui consulatus socium, tua officia in re publica capessentem colebamus: ‘it was certainly not the Volsinian Sejanus we courted, but a member of the Claudian and Julian houses he had got into through his alliance by marriage, your own son-in-law, Caesar, your partner in the consulship, the man taking in hand your functions in the state.’ Vulsiniensem: as mentioned in Book 4, ch. 1, Vulsinii is today Bolsena, a town on the homonymous lake, north of Viterbo in northern Latium. Claudiae et Iuliae domus partem: Sejanus almost became the father-in-law of the future emperor Claudius’s son, had not the bridegroom died just before the marriage. See Book 3, ch. 29. As to Sejanus’ hopes of entering the Julian house by marrying Livilla, the widow of Tiberius’ son Drusus, see Book 4, ch. 39-40 and Book 5, ch. V. 6.; tui consolatus socium: in 31 A.D. See note at the end of ch. 5 in Book 5. tuum …tui …tua: unlike English or French, Latin seldom uses the possessive adjective before a noun, except to lay special stress on the possession.) non est nostrum aestimare quem supra ceteros et quibus de causis extollas: (non est nostrum aestimare quem supra ceteros et quibus de causis extollas: ‘it is not our concern to judge whom you may raise above all others and for what reasons .’ non est nostrum: idiom, lit. ‘it is not of us to …’; nostrum is one of the two genitives plural (the other being nostri) of the personal pronoun nos; its sense is here possessive, i.e. ‘it does not belong to us’, while nostri is objective genitive; cf. B. 242.; quem …et quibus de causis extollas: subjunctive in indirect question introduced by quem and quibus de causis; de + abl. is occasionally found denoting cause; see Oxf. Lat. Dict. for other examples.) tibi summum rerum iudicium di dedere, nobis obsequii gloria relicta est. spectamus porro quae coram habentur, cui ex te opes honores, quis plurima iuvandi nocendive potentia, (spectamus porro quae coram habentur, cui ex te opes honores [data sunt], quis plurima iuvandi nocendive potential [est]: ‘moreover, we see what presents itself before our eyes, to whom riches and honors are given from you, those who have the supreme power to help or to harm.’ Characteristic of Tacitus’ style is the omission of any verb that can reasonably be supplied by the reader, particularly, but not exclusively, forms of sum. quis plurima iuvandi nocendive potentia [est]: quis, ancient form of quibus, is dat. of possessor with implied est. iuvandi nocendive: genitive gerunds objects of a noun; the enclitic -ve, according to Ernout, is an archaism having the force of a weak vel mainly joining words that form pairs, like antonyms.) quae Seiano fuisse nemo negaverit. (quae Seiano fuisse nemo negaverit: Seiano …fuisse is again dative expressing possession with a form of sum, a construction equivalent to Sejanus habebat (or possidebat), an alternative that coexisted, but was less favored (Ernout): ‘that Sejanus had possessed these powers nobody can deny’; the relative quae placed at he head of a clause is translated as being demonstrative, ‘these powers’; negaverit is potential subjunctive, both present or perfect being used indifferently for eventuality in the present, imperfect or pluperfect in the past. In English it is rendered with ‘would’, ‘will’, or ‘can’ + infinitive.) abditos principis sensus et si quid occultius parat exquirere inlicitum, anceps: nec ideo adsequare. (abditos principis sensus et si quid occultius parat exquirere inlicitum, anceps: nec ideo adsequare: a sentence with an infinitive as subject: lit. ‘to seek to discover the hidden views of the prince and to see whether he is meditating anything too secret, [is] a prohibited and dangerous thing, and, though you may try, you would not discover.’ si quid occultius parat: si here expresses intention, not condition in the usual sense; its meaning is ‘to see if …’, ‘to ask oneself whether …’; essentially, the clause is complementary in that it completes or defines exquirere (Ernout, p. 387). non ideo adsequare: the adverb ideo means ‘for thar reason’, ‘therefore’, i.e. as a result of trying to conjecture the emperor’s plans; adsequare is potential subjunctive, the alternate form of adsequaris, present subjunctive of adsequor; the second person singular is used impersonally. occultius is an example of absolute comparative, so called because it lacks anything to compare with; it is translated by qualifying the positive of the adjective or adverb with words or phrases expressing disproportion, such as ‘too’, ‘rather’, ‘rather too’, ‘somewhat’, ‘unusually’, ‘overly’, and the like.) ne, patres conscripti, ultimum Seiani diem sed sedecim annos cogitaveritis. (ne … cogitaveritis: ‘do not think that …’; ne + perfect subjunctive is one the ways to express prohibitions; see A.G. 450.) etiam Satrium atque Pomponium (Satrium atque Pomponium: for Satrius Secundus see Book 4, ch. 34; Pomponius is unknown: any previous reference to him may have occurred in the lost part of Book 5.) venerabamur; libertis quoque ac ianitoribus eius notescere pro magnifico accipiebatur. (libertis quoque ac ianitoribus eius notescere pro magnifico accipiebatur: another sentence having an infinitive for subject: ‘even to become known by his ex-slaves and porters was reputed a great privilege.’ notescere is one of the verbs with the -sco suffix called inchoative verbs, which show an action as developing or becoming. The suffix is not present in the perfect and the tenses derived from it. pro magnifico: idiom, ‘as good as a noble distinction’; the prep.pro takes abl.) quid ergo? indistincta haec defensio et promisca dabitur? (quid ergo? indistincta haec defensio et promisca dabitur?: rhetorical questions, asked for the purpose of prescribing the answer: ‘what then? Shall my defense be accepted indiscriminately, [valid] without distinction?’ The conjunction ergo both marks the conclusion of a reasoning and invites to draw the consequences.) immo iustis terminis dividatur. insidiae in rem publicam, consilia caedis adversum imperatorem puniantur: (dividatur …puniatur: hortatory or jussive subjunctives; cf. A.G. 439 and Note 2.) de amicitia et officiis idem finis et te, Caesar, et nos absolverit.’ (de amicitia et officiis idem finis et te, Caesar, et nos absolverit: ‘as to our friendship [to Sejanus] and the duties thereof, o Caesar, its termination may excuse us in the same way it excuses you.’ absolverit may well be future perfect, rather than potential subjunctive, lit. ‘it will have absolved you as well as us’. If finis means ‘boundary’ or limiting line between what is legal and illegal (as has been suggested) then the meaning is ‘the same norm that excuses you, excuses us also, [since we stopped being Sejanus’ friends when he was no longer yours]’)