Letter 4

From: Isidore of Seville, bishop and scholar To: Braulio of Zaragoza, bishop Date: ~633 AD Context: Isidore writes about the progress of assembling and copying the Etymologiae for transmission to Braulio, and discusses several other books being sent. To my beloved son Braulio, bishop, greetings. The copying is underway. I have set three scribes to the task and we are making progress, though not as quickly as I would wish — there is always more business demanding my attention than the day can hold, and a bishop who wishes to be a scholar must steal his hours from sleep and from what others would call leisure. I am sending along with this letter three volumes that I thought might be of use to you: a copy of my De Natura Rerum, which you may already have; the Differentiae, which I revised again last year and which I think is now in better shape than the version you may have seen; and a small tract on biblical geography that I have not formally published but which I hope you will find useful. The Etymologiae itself — I expect to have a complete copy ready before the summer is out. It runs to twenty books now, and I am not entirely certain I have not made it worse by adding to it, but there it is. The section on medicine has been particularly troubling; I know more about theology than I do about the humors, and any physician who reads it closely will find cause for complaint. Write when the books arrive safely. Isidore