BOOK XXXIII. XV. 51-XVI. 53 



when conquered together with Hannibal, 800,000 202 b.c. 

 pounds weight of silver in yearly instalments of 

 16,000 pounds spread over 50 years, but no gold. Nor 

 can it be considered that this was due to the world's 

 poverty. Midas and Croesus had already possessed 

 wealth without Umit, and Cyrus had ah-eady on con- 

 quering Asia Minor found booty consisting of 24,000 516-5r.c. 

 pounds weight of gold, besides vessels and articles 

 made of gold, including a throne, a plane-tree and a 

 vine. And by this victory he carried ofF 500,000 ^ 

 talents of silver and the wine-bowl of Semiramis the 

 weight of which came to 15 talents. The Aegyptian 

 talent according to Marcus Varro amounts to 80 

 pounds of gold. Saulaces the descendant of Aeetes 

 had already reigned in Colchis, who is said to have 

 come on a tract of virgin soil in the country of the 

 Suani and elsewhere and to have dug up from it a great 

 quantity of gold and silver, his realm being moreover 

 famous for golden fleeces.^ We are also told of his 

 gold-vaulted ceilings and silver beams and cokimns 

 and pilasters, belonging to Sesostris King of Egypt 

 whom Saulaces conquered, so proud a monarch that 

 he is reported to have been in the habit every year 

 of harnessing to his chariot individual kings selected 

 by lot from among his vassals and so going in 

 triumphal procession. 



XVI . \Ve too have done things to be deemed 

 mythical by those who come after us. Caesar, the 

 future dictator, was the first person in the office of 

 aedile to use nothing but silver for the appointments 65 b.c. 

 of the arena — it was at the funeral games presented 

 in honour of his father ; and this was the first 



daughter of King Aeetes. The jfleece was later carried away 

 b}' Jason and the Argonauts. 



43 



