世界小史 第196期:狄奧多里克

Theodoric captured Odoacer, but he promised to spare his life.

狄奧多里克俘獲了日耳曼統(tǒng)帥奧多亞塞。

Instead, he invited him to a banquet and stabbed him to death.

狄奧多里克雖然允諾免他一死，但是后來卻在一個宴會上將他刺死。

It has always puzzled me that Theodoric could have done something so monstrous,

我始終感到奇怪，狄奧多里克怎么會做出這樣令人惡心的事情來，

because in other ways he was a truly great ruler, a man of real merit and distinction.

因為撇開這一點不談，他是一位真正偉大、著名和有教養(yǎng)的君主。

He made sure that the Goths lived in peace with the Italians and gave his warriors no more than one piece of land each to farm.

他力主讓哥特人和意大利和睦相處并只分給他的每一名武士一塊可耕作的田地。

He chose Ravenna, a harbor town in northern Italy, to be his capital and built beautiful churches decorated with wonderful brightly colored mosaics.

他選擇上意大利的一座港口城市拉韋納做首都。他在那里建造鑲嵌美妙的彩色馬賽克(在美術中，用各種顏色的小塊材料如石塊、玻璃、瓷片或貝殼等緊密拼集在黏附性底材上的表面裝飾)的漂亮教堂。

This was all quite unexpected. That the Ostrogoths might succeed in building themselves a mighty and prosperous kingdom in Italy,

東羅馬的皇帝們卻沒有想到會這樣，他們不相信東哥特人會在那邊的意大利建造一個強大和繁榮的國家,

one that would one day pose a threat to the imperial rule in Constantinople, is something that would never have occurred to the Emperor of the East, who must have regretted his advice.

一個最終會對君士坦丁堡的統(tǒng)治者們構成威脅的國家。