Ninus and the maiden were both equally anxious for an immediate marriage. Neither of them dared to approach their own mothers—Thambe and Derceia, two sisters, the former Ninus’ mother, the latter the mother of the girl—but preferred each to address themselves to the mother of the other: for each felt more confidence towards their aunts than towards their own parents. So Ninus spoke to Derceia: “Mother,” said he, “with my oath kept true do I come into thy sight and to the embrace of my most sweet cousin. This let the gods know first of all—yes, they do know it, and I will prove it to you now as I speak. I have travelled over so many lands and been lord over so many nations, both those subdued by my own spear and those who, as the result of my father’s might, serve and worship me, that I might have tasted of every enjoyment to satiety—and, had I done so, perhaps my passion for my cousin would have been less violent: but now that I have come back uncorrupted I am worsted by the god of love and by my age; I am, as thou knowest, in my seventeenth year, and already a year ago have I been accounted as having come to man’s estate. Up to now I have been nought but a boy, a child: and if I had had no experience of the power of Aphrodite, I should have been happy in my firm strength. But now that I have been taken prisoner—thy daughter’s prisoner, in no shameful wise, but agreeably to the desires both of thee and her, how long must I bear refusal?

“That men of this age of mine are ripe for marriage, is clear enough: how many have kept themselves unspotted until their fifteenth year? But I am injured by a law, not a written law, but one sanctified by foolish custom, that among our people virgins generally marry at fifteen years. Yet what sane man could deny that nature is the best law for unions such as this? Why, women of fourteen years can conceive, and some, I vow, even bear children at that age. Then is not thy daughter to be wed? ‘Let us wait for two years,’ you will say: let us be patient, mother, but will Fate wait? I am a mortal man and betrothed to a mortal maid: and I am subject not merely to the common fortunes of all men—diseases, I mean, and that Fate which often carries off those who stay quietly at home by their own fire-sides; but sea-voyages are waiting for me, and wars after wars, and I am not the one to shew any lack of daring and to employ cowardice to afford me safety, but I am what you know I am, to avoid vulgar boasting. Let the fact that I am a king, my strong desire, the unstable and incalculable future that awaits me, let all these hasten our union, let the fact that we are each of us only children be provided for and anticipated, so that if Fate wills us anything amiss, we may at least leave you some pledge of our affection. Perhaps you will call me shameless for speaking to you of this: but I should indeed have been shameless if I had privily approached the maiden, trying to snatch a secret enjoyment, and satisfying our common passion by the intermediaries of night or wine, or servants, or tutors: but there is nothing shameful in me speaking to thee, a mother, about thy daughter’s marriage that has been so long the object of thy vows, and asking for what thou hast promised, and beseeching that the prayers both of our house and of the whole kingdom may not lack fulfilment beyond the present time.”

So did he speak to the willing Derceia, and easily compelled her to come to terms on the matter: and when she had for a while dissembled, she promised to act as his advocate. Meanwhile although the maiden’s passion was equally great, yet her speech with Thambe was not equally ready and free; she had ever lived within the women’s apartments, and could not so well speak for herself in a fair shew of words: she asked for an audience—wept, and desired to speak, but ceased as soon as she had begun. As soon as she had shewn that she was desirous of pleading, she would open her lips and look up as if about to speak, but could finally utter nothing: she heaved with broken sobs, her cheeks reddened in shame at what she must say, and then as she tried to improvise a beginning, grew pale again: and her fear was something between alarm and desire and shame as she shrank from the avowal; and then, as her affections got the mastery of her and her purpose failed, she kept swaying with inward disturbance between her varying emotions. But Thambe wiped away her tears with her hands and bade her boldly speak out whatever she wished to say. But when she could not succeed, and the maiden was still held back by her sorrow, “This,” cried Thambe, “I like better than any words thou couldst utter. Blame not my son at all: he has made no over-bold advance, and he has not come back from his successes and his victories like a warrior with any mad and insolent intention against thee: I trust that thou hast not seen any such intention in his eyes. Is the law about the time of marriage too tardy for such a happy pair? Truly my son is in all haste to wed: nor needest thou weep for this that any will try to force thee at all”: and at the same time with a smile she embraced and kissed her. Yet not even then could the maiden venture to speak, so great was her fear (or, her joy), but she rested her beating heart against the other’s bosom, and kissing her more closely still seemed almost ready to speak freely of her desires through her former tears and her present joy. The two sisters therefore met together, and Derceia spoke first. “As to the actual (marriage?),” said she....”

In fragment B the seventeen-year-old warrior is found marshalling his forces, “seventy thousand chosen Assyrian foot and thirty thousand horse, and a hundred and fifty elephants,” and at the end beginning the advance at the head of his cavalry:

And stretching out his hands as if (offering sacrifice?), “This,” he cried, “is the foundation and crisis of my hopes: from this day I shall begin some greater career, or I shall fall from the power I now possess.”[21]

In this Ninus Romance as we have it, the name of the heroine is not mentioned, but her mother’s name is Derceia and that is a close variant of Derceto, the name of the divine mother of Semiramis in the usual legend. So although the type is different from that of the queen of Babylon, the character is probably hers. It seems evident that this early novelist was, then, building his romance around historical characters. Rattenbury points this out and also shows conclusively that the characteristics of all the other romances are indisputably present in this early fragmentary story:[22]

“The impetuous but honest Ninus reappears clearly enough in the Theagenes of Heliodorus, and the lovesick maiden of unassailable virtue and almost intolerable modesty might be the heroine of any Greek romance.”

Ninus pledges his faith as later heroes take an oath. He like them is the toy of Eros or Aphrodite. In the extant romances,

“The characters, the treatment, and even the plots are almost stereotyped; and yet one difference is observable—a tendency to abandon an ostensibly historical background in favour of a purely fictitious setting. The relative dates of the authors are by no means certain, but the fortunate discovery of papyrus fragments of Charito and Achilles Tatius supports the view, probable on other grounds, that Charito is to be considered the earliest, and Achilles Tatius the latest. It is therefore of interest to notice that Charito, though his hero and heroine are creatures of his imagination, introduces some historical characters and some historical events; his main story is fictitious, but he seems to have been at pains to lend it a historical flavour. Heliodorus, somewhat later, presents a picture of a fairly definite historical period, but no more; his characters are all fictitious and there is no historical authority for the sequence of events which he describes. Achilles Tatius degrades romance from the realm of princes to the level of the bourgeoisie. His story is frankly fictitious, and he evidently had no feeling that romance should be related to history.”

Rattenbury goes on to illustrate his theory of the change from the semi-historical to the purely fictitious romance by a study of the Alexander Romance and the new fragments of other stories. The pseudo-Callisthenes Alexander Romance in the oldest version extant is dated about A.D. 300. But papyrus fragments indicate that a large part of the material in it goes back to a time shortly after Alexander’s death. From the evidence of our late pseudo-Callisthenes version which probably followed tradition it would seem that history was treated as fiction and little attention paid to the love-story of Roxane which could have furnished such a lively erotic interest. New fragments of other romances show other great rulers used as heroes.[23] One is the Egyptian prince, Sesonchosis, called by the Greeks Sesostris. Mythological characters too become protagonists in romances: Achilles and Polyxena; the Egyptian Tefnut, daughter of Phre, the sun-god, who took her adventures in the shape of a cat wandering in the desert of Ethiopia. Other fragments run true to the general type of the Greek Romances in manifesting now this, now that characteristic.

The sum total of all the fragments discovered up to date gives convincing evidence of two important facts: first, the extant Greek Romances are only a small part of the output of this genre; second, the dating of all the fragments places them between the end of the first and the beginning of the fourth century of our era. The Ninus Romance is the earliest fragment, Chariton’s the earliest complete romance, that of Achilles Tatius the latest. On this framework a chronological list of the extant novels arranged on the basis of proved data and the probabilities of internal evidence and comparisons, shapes like this:

The Greek Romances
Date Author Title
I Century B.C. Unknown The Ninus Romance (frag.)
Before A.D. 150 Chariton of Aphrodisias Chaereas and Callirhoe
II Century A.D. Lucian of Samosata A True History Lucius or Ass (an epitome of the lost Metamorphoses)
II-III Centuries A.D. Xenophon of Ephesus Ephesiaca, Habrocomes and Anthia
II-III Centuries A.D. Heliodorus of Emesa Aethiopica, Theagenes and Chariclea
II-III Centuries A.D. Longus Daphnis and Chloe
About A.D. 300 Achilles Tatius of Alexandria Clitophon and Leucippe
Byzantine
XII Century A.D. Eustathius Hysmine and Hysminias
XII Century A.D. Nicetas Eugenianus Charicles and Drusilla (verse)
XII Century A.D. Theodorus Prodromus Dosicles and Rhodanthe (verse)
XII Century A.D. Constantine Manasses Aristander and Callithea (verse)
Also known by translation or abstract
II-III Centuries A.D. Unknown Apollonius of Tyre (Latin translation)
II-III Centuries A.D. Iamblichus, a Syrian Babyloniaca, Rhodanes and Sinonis (abstract in Photius)
II-III Centuries A.D. Antonius Diogenes The Wonderful Things beyond Thule (abstract in Photius)
Not before A.D. 300 pseudo-Callisthenes Alexander Romance