Res Gestae

Hippopotami also, or river-horses,[*](Cf. Hdt. ii. 71; Diod. Sic. i. 35, 8; Pliny, N.H. viii. 95.) are produced in those parts, animals sagacious beyond all unreasoning beasts, with cloven hooves like horses and short tails. Of their cunning it will suffice for the present to give two instances.

This monster makes its lair amid a thick growth of high and rough reeds and with watchful care looks about for a time of quiet; when free means are offered, it goes forth to feed upon the cornfields. And when it has finally begun to return, gorged with

Also, when by excessive greed it has made its belly bulge and grown sluggish, it rolls its thighs and legs on freshly cut reeds, in order that the blood flowing from its wounded feet may relieve its repletion; and it keeps the injured parts covered with mud until the raw places scab over.

This monstrous and once rare kind of beast the Roman people first saw when Scaurus was aedile, the father of that Scaurus in whose defence Cicero spoke[*](We have fragments of the oration Pro M. Aemilio Scauro, delivered in 54 B.C. The Scaurus who gave magnificent games when aedile was the same as the one defended by Cicero. His father, who was an aedile in 123 B.C. was poor at the time, and nothing is said of his games, while those of his son were famous. Pliny, N.H. viii. 96, says: eum (= hippopotamum) et quinque crocodiles Romae aedilitatis suae ludis M. Scaurus temporario euripo ostendit. It seems natural to apply this to the man defended by Cicero, and temporario euripo may have been a feature of the temporary theatre which he built on that occasion.) and bade the Sardinians also to conform with the authority of the whole world in their judgement of so noble a family; and for many ages after that more hippopotami were often brought to Rome. But now they can nowhere be found, since, as the inhabitants of those regions conjecture, they were forced from weariness of the multitude that hunted them to take refuge in the land of the Blemmyae.[*](A people of Aethiopia, near the cataracts of the Nile.)

Among Egyptian birds, the variety of which is countless, the ibis is sacred, harmless, and beloved for the reason that by carrying the eggs of serpents to its nestlings for food it destroys and makes fewer those destructive pests.[*](Cf. Cic., Nat. Deo. i. 36, 101.)

These same birds meet the winged armies of snakes which issue from the marshes of Arabia, producing deadly poisons, and before they leave their own lands vanquish

Egypt also breeds innumerable serpents, surpassing all their destructive kind in fierceness: basilisks, amphisbaenae, scytalae, acontiae, dipsades, vipers, and many others,[*](The basilisk was found principally in the Cyrenaica and got its name from a white spot on its head, resembling a diadem; Pliny, N.H. viii. 78. The amphisbaenae were so-called from moving forwards and backward. The scytalae were long and slender like a staff (σκυτάλη). The acontiae are called by Pliny (viii. 85) by the Latin name iaculus, javelin. The dipsades caused excessive thirst (δίψος). These snakes are not found in Egypt in modern times, and the ibis has gone to its native Aethiopia.) all of which are easily surpassed in size and beauty by the asp, which never of its own accord leaves the bed of the Nile.[*](Apparently a misunderstanding of Lucan, xi. 704 f., ipsa caloris egens gelidum non transit in orbem sponte sua Niloque tenus metitur harenas, needing heat, the asp never of its own accord passes into cold regions, but traverses the desert as far as the Nile and no farther (Lucan, L.C.L., p. 557).)

Many and great things there are in that land which it is worth while to see; of these it will be in place to describe a few. Everywhere temples of vast size have been erected. The Pyramids have been enrolled among the seven wonders of the world,[*](The lists of these vary; see Gellius, I, p. 10, note 2, L.C.L.) and of their slow and difficult construction the historian Herodotus tells us.[*](ii. 124.) These are towers higher than any others which can be erected by human hands, extremely broad at the base and tapering to very pointed summits.

The figure pyramid has that name among geometers because it narrows into a cone after the manner of fire, which in our language is called πῦρ; for their size, as they mount to a vast height, gradually becomes slenderer,

There are also subterranean fissures and winding passages called syringes,[*](σύριγγες, xvii. 7, 11, note.) which, it is said, those acquainted with the ancient rites, since they had fore-knowledge that a deluge was coming, and feared that the memory of the ceremonies might be destroyed, dug in the earth in many places with great labour; and on the walls of these caverns they carved many kinds of birds and beasts, and those countless forms of animals which they called hierographic writing.[*](Described in xvii. 4, 8 ff.)

Then comes Syene,[*](Modern Assouan.) where at the solstice, to which the sun extends its summer course, its rays surround all upright bodies and do not allow their shadows to extend beyond the bodies themselves.[*](That is, they cast no shadows. Macrobius, Somn. Scip. ii. 7, 15, limits this to eo die quo sol certain parter ingreditur Cancri, hora dies sexta; Strabo also limits the time to midday (xvii. 1, 48; L.C.L., viii. p. 129).) At that time if one fixes a stake upright in the earth, or looks at a man or a tree standing anywhere, he will observe that the shadows are lost in the outer circumference of the figures. The same thing is said to happen at Meroë, a part of Aethiopia lying next to the equinoctial circle, where for ninety days the shadows fall on the side opposite to ours, for which reason those who dwell there are called Antiscii.[*](From ἀντί, against, opposite, and σκιά, shadow. Ammianus means that the locality is so far south that the sun for a time casts shadows southwards; cf. Pliny, N.H. ii. 183, per eos dies xc in meridiem umbras iaci, the shadows are turned towards the south. )

But since there are many such wonders, which extend beyond the plan of my