“Tyrtaeus, a son of Arkhembrotos, Laconian or Milesian. An elegiac poet and an aulos player. The story goes that he used his songs to encourage the Spartans while they were fighting the Messenians and he made them stronger. He is really ancient, contemporaneous with the so-called Seven Sages, or even older. He peaked around the time of the 35th Olympiad. He wrote a Constitution for the Spartans and precepts in elegiac poems as a well as martial songs, 5 books worth.
Tyrtaeus: The Spartans swore to either seize Messenia or die trying. When Apollo prophesied that they should take a general from the Athenians, they took the poet Tyrtaeus, a disabled man. He helped them take Messenia by encouraging them to excellence. They razed the city and converted the warriors into Helots.”
“That Tyrtaeus was Athenian, a humble person in his fortune. He was a teacher with a disability who was despised in Athens. Apollo prophesied to the Lakedaimonians to send for him–at that time when they were fighting the Messenians and were in great danger–because he would be just enough for them to figure out what would be advantageous. He ordered them to use him as an advisor.”
the biographical tradition that makes Tyrtaeus foreign to Laconia may be rooted in his poetic dialect. Tyrtaeus–unlike, say, Alcman–does not present a Doric dialect, but instead an Ionian dialect closer to the Panhellenic poetic forms favored by Homer and Hesiod. The stories attached to him can be seen, I think, as a individuated biographical allegory for Panhellenism.
East Greek [Ionian] perfume container shaped like a warrior’s head with helmet. 7th century BCE [?] Rhodes Archaeological Museum
“My hair is gray already–
And at my temples it is white.
That charm of youth is no longer present
And my teeth are just old.
The great span of sweet life
isn’t left for me any more.
Now I often weep aloud,
Because I am afraid of Tartaros.
The inner hall of Hades is terrible
And the path to get there is hard.
One thing is certain:
The one who goes down, may not return.”
“I will let my lyre sing.
There’s no contest now,
But practice is important for
Everyone who has seen
a flowering of their art.
I will play with my ivory pick,
Shouting along in a Phrygian measure,
Crooning a clear melody
Like some swan from the Kaustros,
Sounding a complex beat
along with the rushing wind.
Muse, dance with me:
For the kithara is Apollo’s sacred thing,
Like the bay and the tripod too.
My gossip is Apollo’s love,
That unrequited compulsion:
The girl remains safe.
She fled his weapons
And changed the nature of her form,
Rooting herself in the ground to grow.
Phoebus? Well, Phoebus arrived,
Imagining that he ruled the girl,
But he merely picked young leaves,
acting out the mysteries of Aphrodite.”
“I suggest you safeguard my words by writing them on tablet in your minds” αἰνῶ φυλάξαι τἄμ᾿ ἔπη δελτουμένας
Aeschylus, Suppliants, 200-204
“Don’t be too aggressive or broken in speech: These people are especially ready to be angry. Remember to be accommodating: you are a foreign refugee in need. To speak boldly is not a fitting move for the weak.”
“You are the city, really. You are the people. An unjudged chief of state rules The altar, the city’s hearth, With only your votes and nods, With only your scepter on the throne You judge every need. Be on guard against contamination!”
“Write this down with the many other notes In your mind of the wisdoms from your father: An unfamiliar mob is evaluated by time, But everyone has an evil tongue prepared to lash out over immigrants and speaking foully is somehow easy. I advise you not to bring me shame Now that you are in the age which turns mortal gazes.”
“Who shaped the sea?
What maddened craft
Poured waves on its platter?
Who was it over the water’s back
That sketched the shape of soft,
shining Kypris, after turning thoughts
To the gods, the beginning of divine creation?
He made her naked,
Cloaking only as much as it is improper
To see, with the waves.
And she wanders over them,
Like seaweed, pressing
Her soft-skinned body in a voyage
Over the calm white waves,
And shapes a wake in her passing.
A huge wave marks the place
Where her neck meets
Rosy breasts and there
Kypris shines bright amid the calm
In the water’s furrow, like
A lily twisted in the violets.
On the silver surface
Upon dancing dolphins,
Lust, Longing, and Laughter
Ride, sorrowful thoughts for mortals at times,
Along with a curved chorus of fish
Diving into the waves
At play in the very place
Where the Paphian swims while laughing.”
“People who teach translation have never made a lot of money”
numquam magnas mercedes accepisse eos qui hermeneumata docerent.
Pliny, Letters C. Plinius Arrio Antonino Suo S.
“How could I give you a greater sign of how much I want to copy you and admire you than the fact that I am trying to translate your Greek epigrams to Latin? Still, this is a decline. I bring to it the feebleness of my own ability, and add to this the poverty, or what Lucretius calls “the cheapness of our own language.” Nevertheless, if these Latin translations of mine seem at all charming to you, you will know how much pleasure your Greek originals brought me! Farewell.”
Quemadmodum magis adprobare tibi possum, quanto opere mirer epigrammata tua Graeca, quam quod quaedam Latine aemulari et exprimere temptavi? in deterius tamen. Accidit hoc primum imbecillitate ingenii mei, deinde inopia ac potius, ut Lucretius ait, egestate patrii sermonis. Quodsi haec, quae sunt et Latina et mea, habere tibi aliquid venustatis videbuntur, quantum putas inesse iis gratiae, quae et a te et Graece proferuntur! Vale.
Cicero, de optime genere oratorum 18
“Two kinds of objections are possible for this task. The first is: “It is better in Greek.” One can answer such people by asking if they can make anything better in Latin. Another is: “Why should I read this translation rather than the Greek?” Well, the same people often embrace a Latin Andria, Synephebi, and even an Andromache, Antiope and Epigonoi. Why is there so much intolerance for speeches translated from Greek when there is none for translated poems?
Huic labori nostro duo genera reprehensionum opponuntur. Unum hoc: “Verum melius Graeci.” A quo quaeratur ecquid possint ipsi melius Latine? Alterum: “Quid istas potius legam quam Graecas?” Idem Andriam et Synephebos nec minus Andromacham aut Antiopam aut Epigonos Latinos recipiunt. Quod igitur est eorum in orationibus e Graeco conversis fastidium, nullum cum sit in versibus?
“The one who strengthens someone in pain,
Who comforts a young one in love,
Who makes the dancer beautiful over drinks,
That god has descended to the ground,
Offering a calming lovespell for mortals,
A medicine against grief,
The vine’s child, wine.
He is guarding it safe,
Within the vines’ bunches of grapes,
So, whenever they cut the fruit,
Everyone remains free of sickness,
Healthy with shining skin
And a sweet-hearted mind,
Until the passing of another year.”
24: “Aristippos used to say the he took money from students not in order to straighten their lives but so they might learn to spend their money on fine things.”
87: “When he was asked whom he loved more, Phillip or Aristotle, Alexander said “both the same—for the first gave me the gift of life and the second taught me to live well.”
“People have different natures;
They have different ways. But acting rightly
Always stands out.
The preparation of education
points the way to virtue.
For it is a mark of wisdom to feel shame
and it brings the transformative grace
of seeing through its judgment
what is right; it is reputation that grants
an ageless glory to your life.”
“Diogenes used to say that educating children was similar to potters’ sculpting because they take clay that is tender and shape it and decorate it how they wish. But once it has been fired, it can’t be shaped any longer. This is the way it is for those who were not educated when they were children: once they are grown, they have been hardened to change.”
“The art of grammar is the experience-derived knowledge of how things are said, for the most part, by poets and prose authors. It has six components. First, reading out loud and by meter; second, interpretation according to customary compositional practice; third, a helpful translation of words and their meanings; fourth, an investigation of etymology; fifth, a categorization of morphologies; and sixth—which is the most beautiful portion of the art–the critical judgment of the compositions.”
When asked what the difference was between those who were educated and those who were not, Aristotle said “as great as between the living and the dead.” He used to say that education was an ornament in good times and a refuge in bad.
“As I slept through the night
Under sea-purple blankets,
Stretched out, drunk,
I was dreaming I stretched out
Mid-run on a fast course,
On the very tips of my toes.
I was enjoying myself with the girls
But some boys younger
Than Luaios were mocking me,
Teasing me harshly,
Because of those pretty girls.
Then, they all ran away from my dream
When I reached out to kiss them.
They left me alone and poor me,
I only wanted to sleep again.”
![East Greek [Ionian] perfume container shaped like a warrior's head with helmet. Clay/terracota head of warrior with helmet](https://i0.wp.com/sententiaeantiquae.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/East_Greek_plastic_aryballos_-_helmeted_head_of_warrior_-_Rhodos_AM_-_02.jpg?ssl=1)
