VALERIUS MAXIMUS:
The History of Damon and Pythias
From De Amicitiae Vinculo
(early 1st Cent CE)
Translated by EDWARD CARPENTER
Valerius Maximus compiled a collection of anecdotes in the
first century, a collection popular in the middle ages. This is
his version of the story of Damon and Pythias.
Damon and Phythias, initiates in the Pythagorean mysteries, contracted
so faithful a friendship towards each other, that when Dionysius
of Syracuse intended to execute one of them, and he had obtained
permission from the tyrant to return home and arrange his affairs
before his death, the other did not hesitate to give himself up
as a pledge of his friend's return. [For the two men lived together,
and had their possessions in common.] He whose neck had been in
danger was now free; and he who might have lived in safety was
now in danger of death. So everybody, and especially Dionysius,
were wondering what would be the upshot of this novel and dubious
affair. At last, then the day fixed was close at hand, and he
had not returned, every one condemned the one who stood security,
for his stupidity and rashness. But he insisted that he had nothing
to fear in the matter of his friend's constancy. And indeed at
the same moment and the hour fixed by Dionysius, he who had received
leave, returned. The tyrant, admiring the courage of both, remitted
the sentence which had so tried their loyalty, and asked them
besides to receive him in the bonds of their friendship, saying
that he would make his third place in their affection agreeable
by his utmost goodwill and effort. Such indeed are the powers
of friendship: to breed contempt of death, to overcome the sweet
desire of life, to humanize cruelty, to turn hate into love, to
compensate punishment by largess; to which powers almost as much
veneration is due as to the cult of the immortal gods. For if
with these rests the public safety, on those does private happiness
depend; and as the temples are the sacred domiciles of these,
so of those are the loyal hearts of men as it were the shrines
consecrated by some holy spirit.
HTML Paul Halsall
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© Site Concept and Design: Paul Halsall created 26 Jan 1996: latest revision 7 February 2023 [CV]
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