Book 26
10.17
Hence, many ships were stranded as if on dry land, and since many men roamed about without fear in the little that remained of the waters, to gather fish and similar thingsE.g. shells. with their hands, the roaring sea, resenting, as it were, this forced retreat, rose in its turn; and over the boiling shoals it dashed mightily upon islands and broad stretches of the mainland, and levelled innumerable buildings in the cities and wherever else they were found; so that amid the mad discord of the elements the altered face of the earth revealed marvellous sights.
10.18
For the great mass of waters, returning when it was least expected, killed many thousands of men by drowning; and by the swift recoil of the eddying tides a number of ships, after the swelling of the wet element subsided, were seen to have foundered, and the lifeless bodies of shipwrecked persons lay floating on their backs or on their faces.Cf. Pliny, N.H. vii. 77: observatum est. . . virorum cadavera supina fluitare, feminarum prona, velut pudori defunctarum parcente natura.
10.19
Other great ships, driven by the mad blasts, landed on the tops of buildings (as happened at Alexandria), and some were driven almost two miles inland, like a Laconian ship which I myself in passing that way saw near the town of Mothone,Called Methone by Thucydides, ii. 25. It was in the southern part of Messenia. There was another Methone in Magnesia. yawningCf. Virg., Aen. i. 123, rimisque fatiscunt. apart through long decay.
