Dimitrios Selefkidis was displeased to learn that a Ptolemy had reached Italy in such a squalid state: poorly dressed and on foot, with only three or four slaves. This way their dynasty will become a joke, the laughter of Rome. Selefkidis knows of course that basically they have become something like servants to the Romans; he also knows that the Romans give and take away their thrones arbitrarily, as they please. But they should maintain a certain dignity, at least in their appearance; they should not forget that they are still kings, are still (alas) called kings. This is why Dimitrios Selefkidis was displeased; and right away he offered Ptolemy purple robes, a magnificent diadem, precious jewels, numerous servants and retainers, his most expensive horses, so that he might present himself at Rome as he should, as an Alexandrian Greek monarch. But Ptolemy, who had come to beg, knew his business and refused it all: he didn’t have the slightest need for these luxuries. Shabbily dressed, humble, he entered Rome, put himselft up in the house of a minor artisan, and then he presented himself as a poor, ill-fated creature to the Senate in order to make his begging more effective.
Reprinted from C.P. CAVAFY: Collected Poems Revised Edition, translated by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard, edited by George Savidis. Translation copyright © 1975, 1992 by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard. Princeton University Press. For reuse of these translations, please contact Princeton University Press.
The Canon