Cicero · Letters to Friends §13.34.1

Recommendation and Protection for Lyson of Lilybaeum

Passage 331 of 413 · Latin

Summary

Cicero recommends Lyson of Lilybaeum, with whose family he has an ancestral guest-friendship, and requests that his recommendation be made effective and beneficial to him.

§13.34.1Avitum mihi hospitium est cum Lysone, Lysonis filio, Lilybitano, valdeque ab eo observor cognovique dignum et patre et avo; est enim nobilissima familia.

I have an ancestral tie of hospitality with Lyson, the son of Lyson, of Lilybaeum, and I am highly respected by him and have found him to be worthy both of his father and of his grandfather; for it is a most noble family.

quapropter commendo tibi maiorem in modum rem domumque eius magnoque opere abs te peto cures ut is intellegat meam commendationem maximo sibi apud te et adiumento et ornamento fuisse.

For this reason, I recommend his property and household to you in an exceptional degree, and I earnestly beg of you to see to it that he realizes that my recommendation has been of the greatest assistance and honor to him in your eyes.

Notes

13.34.1cognovique dignum — dignum is accusative, standing in an accusative-and-infinitive construction with the omitted subject pronoun eum and the infinitive esse (i.e., eum dignum esse). The adjective dignus takes the ablative (patre et avo).
13.34.1cures — The conjunction ut introducing the object clause after peto is omitted before the present subjunctive cures.
13.34.1maximo sibi apud te et adiumento et ornamento fuisse — A double dative construction with the perfect infinitive fuisse: sibi (dative of reference) and adiumento and ornamento (datives of purpose/result). The superlative adjective maximo modifies both datives.

Cite this passage

Cicero, Letters to Friends §13.34.1. Humanitext Reader, https://reader.humanitext.ai/en/text/urn:cts:latinLit:phi0474.phi056.humanitext-lat1:13.34.1

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