Sea travel in the ancient world could be terribly frightful. This 4th-century letter by a Roman aristocrat recalls how, during a powerful storm on his sea voyage, all the passengers prepared themselves for death. The soldiers on deck stood with swords drawn, readying to stab themselves to death as a preference to drowning, and the rest were all hanging money or jewelry around their necks, a custom to pay for their burial if their bodies were found drifted ashore.