Res Gestae
Ammianus Marcellinus
Ammianus Marcellinus. Ammianus Marcellinus, with an English translation, Vols. I-III. Rolfe, John C., translator. Cambridge, MA; London: Harvard University Press; W. Heinemann, 1935-1940 (printing).
Since this coast in former times, because of its treacherous and perilous approaches, involved seafarers in many dangers, Cleopatra[*](The pharos was the work of Sostrates of Cnidus, master-builder of Ptolemy Philadelphus. It was destroyed during the Alexandrine war, and rebuilt by Cleopatra.) devised a lofty tower in the harbour, which from its situation is called the
This same queen built the Heptastadium,[*](A causeway seven stadia in length; it is now, generally speaking, a mile wide, and forms a large part of the site of the modern city (Strabo, L.C.L., vol. viii. p. 27, n. 2. Cf. Strabo, xvii. 1, 6 (p. 792). This also is earlier than Cleopatra.) remarkable alike for its great size and for the incredible speed with which it was constructed, for a well-known and sufficient reason. The island of Pharos, where Proteus, as Homer relates in lofty language,[*](Odyss. iv. 400 ff.) lived with his herd of seals, lay a mile from the shore of the city, and was subject to tribute by the Rhodians.
When they had come one day to collect this tax, which was excessive, the queen, who was ever skilled in deception, under pretence of a solemn festival, took the same tax-collectors with her to the suburbs, and gave orders that the work should be completed by unremitting toil. In seven days, by building dams in the sea near the shore, the same number of stadia were won for the land; then the queen rode to the spot in a carriage drawn by horses, and laughed at the Rhodians, since it was on islands and not on the mainland that they imposed a duty.[*](The language is somewhat obscure, but the meaning is clear. The Heptastadion connected the island of Pharos with the mainland, and so took away the right of the Rhodians to tax it as an island.)
There are besides in the city temples pompous with lofty roofs, conspicuous among them the