Publisher's Synopsis
The book called 'The Consolation of Philosophy' was throughout the
Middle Ages, and down to the beginnings of the modern epoch in the
sixteenth century, the scholar's familiar companion. Few books have
exercised a wider influence in their time. It has been translated into
every European tongue, and into English nearly a dozen times, from King
Alfred's paraphrase to the translations of Lord Preston, Causton,
Ridpath, and Duncan, in the eighteenth century. The belief that what
once pleased so widely must still have some charm is my excuse for
attempting the present translation. The great work of Boethius, with its
alternate prose and verse, skilfully fitted together like dialogue and
chorus in a Greek play, is unique in literature, and has a pathetic
interest from the time and circumstances of its composition. It ought
not to be forgotten. Those who can go to the original will find their
reward. There may be room also for a new translation in English after an
interval of close on a hundred years.
Some of the editions contain a reproduction of a bust purporting to
represent Boethius. Lord Preston's translation, for example, has such a
portrait, which it refers to an original in marble at Rome. This I have
been unable to trace, and suspect that it is apocryphal. The Hope
Collection at Oxford contains a completely different portrait in a
print, which gives no authority. I have ventured to use as a
frontispiece a reproduction from a plaster-cast in the Ashmolean Museum,
taken from an ivory diptych preserved in the Bibliotheca Quiriniana at
Brescia, which represents Narius Manlius Boethius, the father of the
philosopher. Portraiture of this period is so rare that it seemed that,
failing a likeness of the author himself, this authentic representation
of his father might have interest, as giving the consular dress and
insignia of the time, and also as illustrating the decadence of
contemporary art. The consul wears a richly-embroidered cloak; his right
hand holds a staff surmounted by the Roman eagle, his left the _mappa
circensis, _ or napkin used for starting the races in the circus; at his
feet are palms and bags of money--prizes for the victors in the games.
For permission to use this cast my thanks are due to the authorities of
the Ashmolean Museum, as also to Mr. T.W. Jackson, Curator of the Hope
Collection, who first called my attention to its existence.
