Sibylline Oracles

Historical printed page 395

THE SIBYLLINE BOOKS. Book IV, Lives 88--129 (88) But when the Macedonians boast of the sceptre, (89) then Thebes too in later days shall experience capture. (90) And Carians shall occupy Tyre and the Tyrians shall perish ; (g1) and sand shall envelop the whole of Samos under sandhills, (92) and Delos shall appear no more, but all Delos shall disappear. (93) And Babylon mighty to behold but puny in battle (94) shall stand buoyed up by ineffective hopes. (95) Macedonians shall occupy Bactra; and the fugitives from Bactra (96) and Susa shall all flee to the land of Greece. (97) Posterity shall know a time when silvery eddying Pyramus (98) pushing forward its strand shall come to the holy island. (99) And thou, Baris, shalt fall and Cyzicus too when the earth (100) quivers with earthquakes and cities perish. (101) And to the Rhodians there shall come a last but crowning disaster. (102) Nor shall the might of Macedonia last. But from the west (103) a great Italian war shall blossom forth, whereby the world (104) shall serve as slaves under the yoke of the sons of Italy. (105) And thou, ill-starred Corinth, shalt one day look on thy capture. (106) Carthage, thy tower, too, shall bend the knee to earth. (107) Miserable Laodicea, thee too an earthquake shall one day raze (108) in precipitate ruin, but thou shalt stand built up again as a city. (109) O fair Lycian Myra, thy quivering earth shall no longer (10) hold thee firm: but falling down headlong on the earth, (11) thou shalt be fain to flee as an exile to another land, (12) {what time over the impieties of Patara the Lord (13) shall spread thé dark sea wave with thunderings and earthquakesy. (14) For thee, too, Armenia, the stress of slavery is in store. (15) To Solyma too the evil blast of war shall come (16) from Italy, and shall lay in ruins God’s great temple, (17) whenever, confident in their folly, they shall cast godliness to the winds (18) and commit hateful murders before the temple. (19) And then from Italy a great king, like a fugitive slave, (20) shall flee unseen, unheard of, over the passage of the Euphrates; (21) when he shall dare even the hateful pollution of a mother’s murder, (22) and many other things beside, venturing so far with wicked hand. (23) And many for the throne of Rome shall dye the ground with their blood, (24) when he has run away beyond the Parthian land. (25) And a Roman leader shall come to Syria, who shall burn down Solyma’s temple with fire, (26) and therewith slay many men, (27) and shall waste the great land of the Jews with its broad way. (28) And then an earthquake shall destroy Salamis and Paphos together, (29) when the dark stormy water shall swamp Cyprus. 89. Thebes was captured by Alexander in 335 B.C. go. Carians perhaps = ‘mercenaries’. Cf. Plato, Laches 187. pig tf Tyre. Capture of Tyre 332 B.C. 91, 92. Cf. iii. 363. Alexandre would place these lines after 96 ; Rzach after 100. 93- Babylon captured without resistance 331 B.C. 95. Alexander’s invasion of Bactria. Cf. Strabo, xi; Arrian, iii. 29. from Bactria. For ὑπὸ Βάκτρων it seems necessary to read ἀπὸ Βάκτρων. 95. Susa surrendered soon after Babylon. 97, 98. The Pyramus is a Cilician river. This oracle is quoted by Strabo, Geogr. i. p. 53, xii. p. 536, who in the second line has ‘ Cyprus’ for ‘ island’. 99. thou, Baris. Badt’s conjectural emendation for ‘Sybaris’, Baris was a Pisidian town, mentioned by Pliny v.42. The ais strictly long. Another conjecture is Κιβύρα, a Phrygian town. lor. Cf. viii. 166. 102. Macedonian Wars beginning in 214 B.C. and ending with the Battle of Pydna, 168 B.C. 105, 106. Capture of Corinth and Carthage, 146 B.C. 107. Laodicea. The famous earthquake here in A.D. 60 (Tac. Amn. xiv. 27) seems too late. On the strength of Sib. iii. 471 Lightfoot (PAilippians, p. 38) postulates an earthquake in Laodicea about 125 B.C.; but the inference is 112-13. The reading is uncertain, and the lines are omitted in many MSS. The rendering follows a conjecture ὁ Μέδων for ὅμαδον. 114. Armenian wars A. Ὁ, 43-66, in which latter year Tiridates came to Rome to receive his crown from Nero. 115-28. Disaster to Jerusalem. 117, 118. Referring to the internal struggles in Jerusalem during the siege. Cf. Josephus, 2. J. vi. 3. 118. and commit hateful murders. The reading of the MSS. is corrupt. 119 ff. Nero died by his own hand in a, Ὁ. 68, but there was a persistent belief that he would return. At least three false Nero’s arose at different times. 119. fugitive slave (δράστης). Some MSS. have ‘star’ (ἀστήρ). 121. Nero had his own mother put to death (Suet. Vero xxxiv). Dio Cass. Ixiv. 9 preserves a pseudo-Sibylline oracle : ἔσχατος Αἰνεαδῶν μητροκτόνος ἡγεμονεύσει. 123. The year of Galba, Otho, and Vitellius. 125. The Roman leader is Titus. 395