[Glenn Wright]

Hi, Carl—

Thanks for taking the time to offer detailed and helpful critiques when you have so much else going on. I hope you get everything sorted out soon with your paperwork and promise not to post any more translations for the immediate future.

Originally Posted by Carl Copeland

Hi, Glenn. I’ve been run ragged in recent days renewing my residence status, but I feel a commitment to the Translation Forum, so here goes:

What he said and did were so unrestrained and presented him as being so careless that they only increased his popularity -> made him seem? Also, “What” as a plural sounds odd to me, though of course it’s logically plural, so I won’t make a federal case out of it. I condensed and clarified this.

rolling back into vices -> sinking? “Revolutus” literally means “having been rolled back.” Ovid used this participle to describe Eurydice falling back into the underworld when Orpheus looked back at her in his Metamorphoses. I liked “rolled back [into vices]” because it seemed to suggest an involuntary movement and it seemed like something an obese, swinish, and self-indulgent person might do.

he was adopted into the circle of those intimates of Nero -> into the narrow circle of intimates? “Those” implies some unspecified subset of Nero’s intimates and misses the crib’s “few.” Fixed.

referee of elegance -> arbiter? I like “referee” because it suggests that there was a game being contested for the emperor’s favor. The conflict between Petronius and Tigellinus supports this.

Petronius approved of it to him -> can be deleted with no loss of meaning Fixed.

This caused the envy of Tigellinus -> aroused? Fixed.

one who thought himself more capable in the knowledge of pleasures-> ? Fixed.

he played upon the cruelty of the emperor, to which the rest of his passions yielded -> It’s tempting to identify “his” with “he.” You might consider something along the lines of the Perseus Project’s “to which all other lusts were secondary.” Fixed.

taking away his defense -> ? ”Adempta” can mean “having been removed/taken away/ stolen/denied.” The sense here is that the bribed slave’s testimony contradicts the defense that Petronius would have had to deny a friendship with Nero’s enemy, Scaevinus.

He no longer bore the hesitation of fear -> ? Fixed

he might seek the glory of integrity -> ? The sense here is that Petronius chose not to discuss weighty philosophical matters that might have made him seem like Socrates about to drink the hemlock. Instead he got a bunch of his buddies to come and cheer him up with singing and poetry. Apparently they had enough to drink that they thought it would be fun to write out a detailed account of Nero’s depravities.

He listened as they discussed … light-hearted songs and simple poems. -> Were they discussing light-hearted songs or listening to them, as the Perseus Project translation has it? Since light-hearted songs and simple poems would not have provided much material for discussion, I can only assume that they were singing the songs and reciting the poems.

Not even in his will, like many of those facing death, did he fawn upon Nero -> There’s some grammatical ambiguity here. It could mean that he, like many facing death, didn’t fawn on Nero.I think this was a dangling modifier problem. I moved the modifier next to “he,” which it properly modifies.

He broke his signet ring so that afterwards it might not be used to create danger for others. -> I like the Perseus Project’s “endanger”—or maybe “put others in danger.” Fixed.

Thanks again, Carl! I always learn a lot from your comments.

Glenn