The Sibyl · a new plain-English translation from the original language
Soon for the Jews another mighty evil shall come,
and Phoenicia after them shall drink a deluge of blood.
The walls of the Assyrians shall fall before many warriors,
and again a deadly man shall utterly destroy them.
Then shall come the threats of God who rules all,
earthquakes and great famines across all the earth,
snowstorms out of season, and raging thunderbolts.
And then the great king, through the labor of war,
a Celt, a mountain-treader, rushing to the strife of battle,
shall not escape a shameful fate, but shall perish.
Foreign dust shall hide him, a corpse — and his name shall be
one bearing the name of a flower. After him another shall rule,
a man silver-headed, and his name shall be that of the sea,
bringing forth the first of its element, a four-syllabled Ares.
This one shall dedicate temples to every city,
surveying the world on his own foot, bearing gifts,
and shall furnish gold and amber in abundance to many.
This one shall master all the mysteries of the magicians,
drawn from their inner shrines; and indeed far better for mankind
shall he establish while he reigns... a thunderbolt—
Long peace shall come to be, for as long as
this lord reigns; and there shall be a clear-voiced singer too,
a sharer in the laws, a righteous keeper of justice.
But he himself shall fall in turn by his own fate, his rule ended.
After him three shall rule, and the third shall come to power late,
holding three tens; but then again, from the first unit,
another lord shall rule; and after him another ruler,
out of seven tens; and their names shall be noble ones.
And they in turn shall destroy the many-tattooed peoples,
Britons and Moors, the mighty Dacians and Arabs.
But when the youngest of these shall utterly perish,
then indeed shall Ares come again upon Parthia,
terrible, the one who wounded before, and shall lay it waste utterly.
And then that lord himself shall fall by a treacherous beast,
while exercising his hands at sport; and this shall be the cause of his death.
After him another man shall rule, knowing many wise things,
bearing the name... of the first mighty king,
out of the first unit; and he shall be good and great.
Much shall this mighty one accomplish for the great Latins,
for his father's memory's sake; and soon the walls of Rome
he shall adorn with gold and silver and ivory,
in market-places and temples, coming in his own great might.
And at some time for the Romans a wound shall spring up,
most terrible in war; and he shall lay waste their whole land,
all the land of the Germans, when the great sign of God
shall appear from heaven, and bronze-armored men,
worn down, he shall save through the king's piety;
for to him the heavenly God shall hearken in everything;
when he prays, He shall send down rain at the needed hour.
But when at last these things I have spoken are fulfilled,