“ [2] When the Romans learned of these events, they sent an embassy to Tarentum to demand that the prisoners who had been taken, not in war, but as mere sight-seers, should be surrendered; that the citizens of Thurii who had been expelled should be brought back to their homes; that the property that had been plundered, or the value of what had been lost, should be restored; and finally, that they should surrender the authors of these crimes, if they wished to continue on good terms with the Romans. The Tarentines made difficulties about admitting the embassy to their council at all, and when they had received them jeered at them because they did not speak Greek perfectly, and made fun of their togas and of the purple stripe on them. [The text here describes an indignity put upon Postumius, the chief of the embassy, by one Philonidas, which will not bear translation.] This spectacle was received with laughter by the bystanders. Postumius, holding out his soiled garment, said: "You will wash out this defilement with plenty of blood -- you who take pleasure in this kind of jokes." As the Tarentines made no sort of answer the embassy departed. Postumius carried the soiled garment just as it was, and showed it to the Romans.
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Y.R. 473
Appian. The Foreign Wars. Horace White. New York. THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. 1899.
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