Naturalis historia 9.119

9.119

nec haec summa luxuriae exempla sunt. duo fuere maximi uniones per omne aevum; utrumque possedit Cleopatra, Aegypti reginarum novissima, per manus orientis regum sibi traditos. haec, cum exquisitis cotidie Antonius saginaretur epulis, superbo simul ac procaci fastu, ut regina meretrix lautitiam eius omnem apparatumque obtrectans, quaerente eo, quid adstrui magnificentiae posset, respondit una se cena centiens HS absumpturam.

Now let a person only picture to himself, on the one hand, what was the value of the habits worn by Curius or Fabricius in their triumphs, let him picture to himself the objects displayed to the public on their triumphal litters, and then, on the other hand, let him think upon this Lollia, this one bit of a woman, the head of an empire, taking her place at table, thus attired; would he not much rather that the conquerors had been torn from their very chariots, than that they had conquered for such a result as this? Nor, indeed, are these the most supreme evidences of luxury. There were formerly two pearls, the largest that had been ever seen in the whole world: Cleopatra, the last of the queens of Egypt, was in possession of them both, they having come to her by descent from the kings of the East. When Antony had been sated by her, day after day, with the most exquisite banquets, this queenly courtesan, inflated with vanity and disdainful arrogance, affected to treat all this sumptuousness and all these vast preparations with the greatest contempt; upon which Antony enquired what there was that could possibly be added to such extraordinary magnificence. To this she made answer, that on a single entertainment she would expend ten millions of sesterces. Antony was extremely desirous to learn how that could be done, but looked upon it as a thing quite impossible; and a wager was the result.