The student of Latin may well enquire as to why new translations of these particular letters of Pliny the Younger are required. The simple answer is that the current translation is not aimed at the Latin scholar, for whom the original text, while fragmentary, is relatively accessible. Instead, this new translation is intended for students of natural philosophy, as well as those with an interest in the history of science. Such students are unlikely to be well-versed in the Latin of the first and second centuries, but for them, the letters reproduced in this volume cannot fail to be of particular interest.

Pliny the Younger was the nephew and student of the elder Pliny. These letters cover the period during which the older Pliny completed his most famous work, usually referred to as the Historia Naturalis, particularly those revisions to the work which occurred after the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 A.D. and the subsequent exile of both Pliny the Elder and his nephew. As the letters are addressed to the historian Tacitus, it can be assumed that they were among the primary sources used for his Historiae.

                                                                                    Carmen Etta Rur, Translator