Paolo Diacono – Paulus Diaconus - History Of The Lombards

24.

Having heard these words from his father, Alboino took only forty warriors and went to Turisindo, King of the Gepids, the one with whom he had fought in the war just before, and explained the reason for the sudden visit. The latter welcomed him with benevolence and made him sit on his right where Turismondo, the son who recently died in battle, used to sit. So it happened that while the variously laid table was filling up with food, Turismondo was overwhelmed by the thought of his dead son who used to sit in that place where his killer was now standing, so finally, after taking deep breaths, he gave voice to his pain and he said: "This place is dear to me, and it is bitter for me to see who is sitting there today." Then, stimulated by the words of his father, the other son of the King, who was present in the room, began to insult the Lombards with insults, mocking their custom of covering the lower leg with small white bands, "they are like those mares they have knee-white feet, "he said." The mares you look like are good for nothing. " To these words a Lombard replied: "Go to the Asfeld field and you will have proof of how much they kick these mares of which you speak; where your brother's bones lie scattered, like those of a mare that is worthless. " Upon hearing this, the Gepids, not enduring humiliation, blazed with anger and tried to avenge the injury. The Lombards, before them, put their hand to the hilt of swords ready to fight but the King, jumping from the table, stood in the way, keeping his own from anger and from fighting and threatened to punish who would start the battle first, and also that "God does not like the victory of those who kill the guest in their own home". In this way, she resumed her banquet with a happy heart. Turisindo took the arms of his son Turismondo and gave them to Alboino and sent him unharmed to his father's kingdom. Returning from his father, Alboino since then became his guest and while receiving the sumptuous treatment of the Kings, he told, in an orderly way, all that had happened to him at the Gepids in the palace of Turisindo. Those present were admired and praised both the audacity of Alboino and the noble loyalty of the King Gepide.

25.

In this period Justin Augustus prosperously held the Roman Empire, he successfully ended many wars and also left his mark in civil legislation. With the patrician Belisarius he definitively defeated the Persians and, always by the work of General Belisario, he cancelled, exterminating them, the lineage of the Vandals capturing also their leader Gelismero. So he regained the Roman Empire, after ninety-six years of barbarian rule, and all of Roman Africa. Then, still with the value of Belisarius, he defeated in Italy the lineage of the Goths, also here he captured their King Vitige, and then again the Mauri with their King Amtalan, who infested Africa. Always with the war he also subdued other people and for this he deserved the title of Alamannic, Gothic, Frankish, Germanic, Ancient, Alanic, Vandalic and African. He put order in the laws of the Romans which had become too long-winded and often useless and contradictory, abolished the numerous promulgations of the many principles that had preceded him in only twelve books and called this volume the Justinian Code. Even the laws of individual magistrates and judges, who reached almost two thousand books, ordered them in fifty and called this work the Digest Code or the Pandette. In a new form he composed the four books of the institutions which contain the general principles of all the laws. He also ordered that the new laws enacted by him be collected in a volume and called it the Code of Tales. Within the walls of Constantinople he had a temple erected at Chrysostom, at the Wisdom of God the Father and called it with the Greek word Agian Sophian, or Saint Wisdom. The construction is magnificent and daring, so much so that nowhere in the world can one see such. Justinian was Catholic, righteous in working and righteous in judgments, and that is why he did everything well. Under his reign, near Rome, Cassiodorus lived, excellent both in human science and in divine things, in particular he composed, with a high spirit and acute interpretation, the darkest Psalms. Cassiodorus was first consul, then senator and finally monk. In the same period, the abbot Dionigi also settled in Rome and calculated the Easter cycle with great skill. And yet, Prisciano understood the most profound laws of the art of grammar and Aratore, subdeacon of the church of Rome, put the acts of the Apostles in hexameter verses.

26.

At the same time our blessed father Benedetto also shone for the merits of his extraordinary life and apostolic virtues, first in Subiaco, a place forty miles from Rome and then in the citadel of Cassino also called "La Rocca". As is known, the Blessed Pope Gregory in his Dialogues drafted his biography with beautiful style. I too, in my own small way, have listed his miracles in "elegiac meter" one by one, arranging them in the individual couplets as follows:

Whence I will begin with your triumphs, O blessed saint

with the accumulation of your virtues whence will I begin?

Glory to you, blessed father, who reveals your merit with the name itself!

Shining light of the century, Glory to you, blessed!

Norcia, how much you can join the praise, or you exalted for those who, so great, you raised;

O you who bring the sun to the world, Norcia, how much you can join in praise.

O boyish decoration, which transcends its years with costumes

And the old men overtake, or boyish decorum!

Your flower, O paradise, did not care for what is blooming in the world,

Your flower did not cure the splendour of Rome, o paradise.

Bitterly the nurse gathers the pieces of the broken vase,

Pleased can return the nurse's recomposed vase.

Those who have the name of Rome hide the recluse among the rocks;

he who has the name of Rome offers the help of his pity.

From Lauds to you, Christ, the caves hidden from all mortals resound;

But you know them well, the lairs of Lodi resound to you.

The colds, the freezing winds, the snows animatedly endured for three years;

In love for God do not cure colds, freezing winds, snows.

Deception by veneration is accepted, thefts that inspire piety are praised;

Since man consecrated to God has nourished himself with it, deception is accepted.

It gives the signal that food has come, but the bruise wants to oppose;

Nonetheless, the other faith gives the signal that food has come.

According to the rite, those who listen to Christ celebrate the feast;

By feeding those who fast, according to the rite, they celebrate the feast.

Greedy shepherds bring welcome sustenance to the cave

But they bring back pleasing food to soothed souls.

Fire extinguishers fire, while the flesh tears the brambles;

The carnal fire is extinguished by the celestial fire.

An unjust death is hidden, but from afar he warns it shrewd;

The unjust death hidden does not bear the weapons of the cross.

They correct the mind that wanders slight rods and discipline it;

Slight rods close out the plague that is wandering.

A stream of perennial water flows from the native rock;

the arid hearts irrigate the wave of perennial water.

At the bottom of the whirlpool you had come down, fold like a scythe detached from the handle;

it rose to the surface, leaving the bottom of the eddy.

Dropped into the water while waiting for his father's order, he survives;

runs on the water, while waiting at the order of the father.

The wave led the way to those who were ready for the master's order;

to those who did not know where he was running, the wave made the road.

And you, little child, are drawn on the wave and do not drown;