1They record that Hercules too was among them, and when about to go into battle they sing of him as the first of all brave men. 1They also have songs of the kind by whose recital, which they call 'baritus', they kindle their courage, and from the chant itself they foretell the fortune of the coming fight; 1for they inspire terror or tremble themselves according to how the battle line has sounded, and it seems not so much a harmony of voices as of valour. 2They aim above all at a harshness of sound and a broken roar, holding their shields up to their mouths, so that the voice may swell fuller and deeper by the echo.
3Moreover, some suppose that Ulysses too, in his long and legendary wandering, was carried into this Ocean and reached the lands of Germany, and that Asciburgium, which lies on the bank of the Rhine and is inhabited to this day, was founded and named by him; 3indeed, that an altar dedicated to Ulysses, with the name of his father Laertes added, was once found in the same place, and that certain monuments and mounds inscribed with Greek letters still survive on the border of Germany and Raetia. 4These things I have no intention either of confirming with arguments or of refuting: let each person take away or add belief according to his own disposition.