Ammianus Marcellinus, Rerum Gestarum
John C. Rolfe, Ph.D., Litt.D., Ed.

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[7] For having been brought up in their [p. 433] midst, as a man well informed on all matters, finding eager hearers, desirous of having their ears tickled, who did not praise him but like Homer's Phaeacians ¹ admired him in silence, he would rehearse the history of the past forty years. He showed that after constant successes in war, especially at Hileia and Singara, ² where that furious contest at night took place and our troops were cut to pieces with great carnage, as if some fetial priest were intervening ³ to stop the fight, the Persians did not yet reach Edessa nor the bridges of the Euphrates, in spite of being victorious; whereas trusting to their prowess and their splendid successes, they ought so to have extended their kingdom as to rule over all Asia, especially at a time when through the continual commotions of civil wars Rome's stoutest soldiers were shedding their blood on two sides.