[572] 'Praesto sunt pueri ac puellae, diverso sexu atque aetate conspicuo, quos non facit captivitas esse sub pretio sed libertas: hos merito parentes vendunt, quoniam de ipsa famulatione proficiunt. Dubium quippe non est servos posse meliorari qui de labore agrorum ad urbana servitia transferuntur.' With almost any writer but Cassiodorus this would prove that in the Sixth Century free Italians were selling their children into actual slavery. But I doubt whether he really means more than that the children of the country people were for hire as domestic servants in the cities. If so, the scene is not unlike our own 'statute fairs' or 'hirings' in the north of England. It appears from § 94 of the Edictum Theodorici that parents could sell their children, but that the latter did not lose their status ingenuus. Must they then claim it on coming of age? 'Parentes qui cogente necessitate filios suos alimentorum gratia vendiderint ingenuitati eorum non praejudicant. Homo enim liber pretio nullo aestimatur.' Cf. also § 95: 'Operas enim tantum parentes filiorum quos in potestate habuerint, locare possunt.'
[573] Marcilianum is now Sala, in the valley of the Calore (Tanager). Padula is thought by some to mark the site of Cosilinum. The Island of Leucosia, now Licosa, a few miles from Paestum, evidently does not represent the Leucothea of this letter.
[574] With reference to this event Victor Tunnunensis writes: 'Cujus (Trasamundi) uxor Amalafrida fugiens ad barbaros congressione facta Capsae juxta Heremum capitur, et in custodia privata moritur.' Procopius (De B. Vandalico i. 9) says: Και σφισι (τοις Βανδιλοις) ξυνηνεχθη Θευδεριχω τε και Γοτθοις εν Ιταλια εκ τε συμμαχων και φιλων πολεμιοι γενεσθαι την τε γαρ Αμαλαφριδαν εν φυλακη εσχον και τους Γοτθους διεφθειραν 'απαντας επενεγκοντες αυτοις νεωτεριζειν ες τε Βανδιλους και 'Ιλδεριχον. Both Victor and Procopius seem to place the conflict before the death of Theodoric; Victor says a.d. 523. Probably therefore the fighting, the capture of Amalafrida, and the death of her countrymen, took place in that year, the year of her husband's death and Hilderic's accession. Three or four years later (526 or 527), when her brother Theodoric was dead, the imprisoned princess was murdered—a grievous insult to the young Sovereign of the Goths, her great-nephew.
[575] 'Praedia Curialium, unde maximae mediocribus parantur insidiae, nullus illicita emptione pervadat. Quia contractus dici non potest nisi qui de legibus venit.'
[576] 'Non enim incassum vobis Curiam concessit Antiquitas, non inaniter appellavit Minorem Senatum, nervos quoque vocitans ac viscera civitatum.'
[577] Cf. [viii. 23].
[578] Have we any clue to the geographical position of this farm? The only Rusticiana known to the Itineraries is in Spain.
[579] 'Origo quidem nobilis, sed de flamma suscipit vim coloris, ut magis credas inde nasci, cujus similitudine videtur ornari. Sed cum auro tribuat splendidum ruborem, argento confert albissimam lucem. Ut mirum sit, unam substantiam tradere, quod rebus dissimilibus possit aptari.' Have we here a hint of 'the transmutation of metals?' Cassiodorus seems to think that it is only the furnace that makes the difference between the colours of gold and of silver.
[580] 'Neque enim ob aliud Curiales leges sacratissimae ligaverunt, nisi ut cum illos soli principes absolverent, indulgentiae praeconia reperirent.'
[581] 'Formidare delegata incipient, per quae antea timebantur.' To translate by an analogy, 'And will tremble at the rate-summonses, their signatures to which used to make other men tremble.'