§1Principes semper Africae, viri Carthaginienses, vetustate nobiles, novitate felices, gaudeo vos tam prosperos temporum, cum ita vacat ac iuvat, habitus denotare.
Leaders of Africa always, men of Carthage, noble in antiquity, happy in novelty, I rejoice that you, so prosperous in respect of the times, when there is such leisure and pleasure, are marking and censuring dress.
Pacis haec et annonae otia.
These are the leisures of peace and of cheap provisions.
Ab imperio et a caelo bene est.
All is well from the empire and from heaven.
Tamen et vobis habitus aliter olim tunicae fuere, et quidem in fama de subteminis studio et luminis concilio et mensurae temperamento, quod neque trans crura prodigae nec intra genua inverecundae nec brachiis parcae nec manibus artae, sed nec cingulo sinus dividere expedito umbratae quadrata iustitia in viris stabant.
Yet for you too the dress of the tunic was once different, and indeed famous for the care of the weft, the harmony of light, and the moderation of measure; because they stood on men, neither prodigal beyond the shins, nor immodest within the knees, nor scanty for the arms, nor tight for the hands, but without even dividing the folds with an easy girdle, shaded with a four-cornered symmetry.
Pallii extrinsecus habitus et ipse quadrangulus ab utroque laterum regestus et cervicibus circumstrictus in fibulae morsu humeris acquiescebat.
The outward fashion of the pallium itself, also quadrangular, thrown back from both sides and clasped around the neck, rested on the shoulders in the bite of a buckle.
Instar eius hodie Aesculapio iam vestro sacerdotium est.
An image of this today is the priesthood of your Aesculapius.
Sic et in proximo soror civitas vestiebat, et sicubi alibi in Africa Tyros.
In this way also the neighboring sister city used to dress, and wherever else in Africa Tyre was.
At cum saecularium sortium variavit urna et Romanis deus maluit, soror quidem civitas suopte arbitrio mutare properavit, ut adpulsum Scipionem ante iam de habitu salutasset, Romanum praecoca.
But when the urn of secular fates varied and God preferred the Romans, the sister city indeed hastened to change of her own accord, so that she had already greeted the landed Scipio beforehand in that dress, precociously Roman.
Vobis vero post iniuriae beneficium, ut senium non fastigium exemptis, post Gracchi obscena omina et Lepidi violenta ludibria, post trinas Pompei aras et longas Caesaris moras, ubi moenia Statilius Taurus imposuit, sollemnia Sentius Saturninus enarravit, cum concordia iuvat, toga oblata est.
To you, however, after the benefit of injury—as if old age had been removed but not your summit—after the obscene omens of Gracchus and the violent mockeries of Lepidus, after the triple altars of Pompey and the long delays of Caesar, when Statilius Taurus reared the walls and Sentius Saturninus declared the solemnities, when concord pleased, the toga was offered.
Pro, quantum circummeavit, a Pelasgis ad Lydos, a Lydis ad Romanos, ut ab humeris sublimioris populi Carthaginienses complecteretur! Exinde tunicam longiorem cinctu arbitrante suspenditis, et pallii iam teretis redundantiam tabulata congregatione fulcitis, et si quid praeterea condicio vel dignitas vel temporalitas vestit, pallium tamen generaliter vestrum immemores etiam denotatis.
Ah, how far it went round, from the Pelasgians to the Lydians, from the Lydians to the Romans, so that from the shoulders of a loftier people it might embrace the Carthaginians! Since then, you suspend a longer tunic with a choosing girdle, and you support the redundancy of the now round pallium with a layered fold, and whatever else condition or dignity or season clothes you in, you even censure the pallium, though generally your own, unmindful of it.
Equidem haud miror prae documento superiore.
Indeed, I do not wonder in view of a greater proof.
Nam et arietem (non quem Laberius reciprocicornem et lanicutem et testitrahum, sed trabes machina est, quae muros frangere militat) nemini unquam adhuc libratum illa dicitur Carthago, studiis asperrima belli, prima omnium armasse in oscillum penduli impetus, commentata vim tormenti de bile pecoris caput vindicantis.
For that Carthage, most fierce in the pursuits of war, is said to have been the first of all to arm the ram (not the one which Laberius calls 'horn-reversing, wool-skinned, and testicle-dragging,' but the engine of timber which fights to shatter walls) into the swinging impetus of a pendulum, having devised the force of the engine from the wrath of a beast avenging its head.
Cum tamen ultimant tempora patriae et aries iam Romanus in muros quodam suos audet, stupuere illico Carthaginienses ut novum extraneum ingenium:
Tantum aevi longinqua valet mutare vetustas! Sic denique nec pallium agnoscitur.
Yet when the last times of the homeland approached and the now Roman ram dared against what were in a way its own walls, the Carthaginians immediately stood amazed as if at a new and foreign invention: so much is long antiquity able to change! Thus, finally, not even the pallium is recognized.