Letters to Atticus/1.9

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Letters to Atticus
by Marcus Tullius Cicero

1.9 (IV)

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Translated by Evelyn Shuckburgh

56497Letters to Atticus — 1.9 (IV)Marcus Tullius Cicero

To Atticus at Athens

Rome, 67 BC

I get letters from you far too seldom considering that you can much more easily find people starting for Rome than I to Athens: considering, too, that you are more certain of my being at Rome than I of your being at Athens. For instance, it is owing to this uncertainty on my part that this very letter is somewhat short, because not being sure as to where you are, I don't choose my confidential talk to fall into strange hands. The Megaric statues and the Hermae, which you mentioned in your letters, I am waiting for impatiently. Anything you have of the same kind which may strike you as worthy of my "Academia," do not hesitate to send, and have Complete Confidence in my money-chest. My present delight is to pick up anything particularly suitable to a "gymnasium." Lentulus promises the use of his ships. I beg you to be zealous in these matters. Thyillus begs you (and I also at his request) to get him some writings of the Eumolpidae.^[1]

Footnotes

↑ Thyillus (sometimes Chilius), a Greek poet living at Rome. See Letters A1.12 and A1.16. The Eumolpidae were a family of priests at Athens who had charge of the temple of Demeter at Eleusis. The patria Eumolpidôn (the phrase used by Cicero here) maybe either books of ritual or records such as priests usually kept: patria is an appropriate word for such rituals or records handed down by priests of one race or family.

[1] Thyillus (sometimes Chilius), a Greek poet living at Rome. See Letters A1.12 and A1.16. The Eumolpidae were a family of priests at Athens who had charge of the temple of Demeter at Eleusis. The patria Eumolpidôn (the phrase used by Cicero here) maybe either books of ritual or records such as priests usually kept: patria is an appropriate word for such rituals or records handed down by priests of one race or family.

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