Book 3
90
The people of Petra, though their tenths had been sold at a high price, were, very much against their will, compelled to give thirty-seven thousand sesterces to Publius Naevius Turpio, a most infamous man, who was convicted of assault while Sacerdos was praetor. Did you sell the tenths so carelessly, that, when a medimnus cost fifteen sesterces, and when the tenths were sold for three thousand medimni, that is, for forty-five thousand sesterces, still three thousand sesterces could be given to the farmer as a compliment? “Oh, but I sold the tenths of that district at a high price” he boasts, forsooth, not that a compliment was given to Turpio, but that money was taken from the Petrans.
