Letter 369
To Akakios. (~358 AD)
You delivered a lengthy defense of your concern for the girl when no one, I believe, was prosecuting you. Olympios was not an accuser but a messenger of your alarm — and a pleased one at that.
May you have many such frights, and may you feel that same fear for your sons and your son-in-law, whom you say has become yours through us and who will often have to compete on our behalf.
As for your change of plans about the summer, I approve. It would not have been right for Kalykios to leap from the bridal chamber so quickly, and for Titianos his teacher is close at hand — his own father.
You concealed your reason, but I will proclaim it, dismissing that excuse of yours which claims the young man would be endangered by theaters and crowds. Another man might perhaps have been corrupted by such things, but Titianos's nature is stronger than any harm they could do. Still, with good fortune let him stay and fill himself with the literature of the ancients, with his father as guide.
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.