Pliny the Younger 109 CE · Tuscan villa
Think and dictate on the terrace
09:30–10:30 · Estimated
Estimated by typical tue. 09:30 is an illustrative summer morning placement, not an exact conversion. The one-hour duration is editorial.Source timing: At the fourth or fifth Roman daylight hour
“thinking and dictating”
Short verbatim excerpt · Pliny the Younger
Open the original for the surrounding passage.
Letters, Book IX, Letter 36, to Fuscus
J. B. Firth translation · 1900 · Attalus transcription with minor wording changes
Book IX, Letter 36 · summer routine at his Tuscan villa; Letter 40 identifies the nap as a midday sleep
Passage: Letter 9.36 · paragraph beginning “At the fourth or fifth hour”
Timing & context
Depending on the weather, he moves to the terrace or covered portico. He explicitly says he has no fixed time for this change.
Letter 9.36 describes his recurring summer routine, with variations, rather than one recorded day. All clock times and block lengths here are editorial estimates. Roman daylight was divided into twelve seasonal hours; the calendar uses an illustrative summer day with daylight around 05:00–19:00, not an exact modern conversion. This is his country-villa routine, not a day of public duties in Rome. No weekday is specified.
109 CE is a representative display year chosen by Typical Tuesday from the conventional dating of Book IX. Letter 9.36 is not explicitly dated to that year, and the collection is not strictly chronological.
Dating of Book IX · Dickinson College Commentaries ↗