Anonymous, Papiri Greci e Latini, x. 1932, no. 1181, p. 169. 7-23
“When a wave carried from Troy
[a vessel made] of many trees,
Some god announced that one [person]
Would stay there….
But the other would escape
Ruinous death.
Cries went up to the sky
In great numbers in response
To the unexpected joy.
The song of men [restrained]
On their seats was not unheard,
And the young girls prayed aloud
Ie, ie…”
On the internal surface, around the rim, four ships. Cemetery of Ancient Thera. 3rd quarter of the 6th cent. BC Archaeological Museum of Thera. [Wikimedia Commons]
“Then, the unconquerable god
Wove for Deianeira a plan
Of many tears and guile,
Once she learned
The report of enduring grief
that Zeus’ indomitable son
Was sending to his bright home
White-armed Iole as a wife.
Oh! that unlucky, unhappy woman,
To have made such plans!
Broad-powered envy crushed her
Along with the opaque veil
Of events to come later
On that day at rose-covered Lukormis
When she took from Nessos
That divine sign.”
In this Ode, Herakles encounters Meleager in the underworld and hears the story of how the Calydonian hero started to lose strength and fail during battle because his mother had thrown a magic log whose safety ensured his life onto a fire. Herakles is moved by the story and has a somewhat surprising response.
Bacchylides, 4. 156-176
“Then the only son of Amphitryon
Wept, pitying the fate of the long-suffering man
As he answered him saying this:
“The best thing for mortals is not to be born
Nor to see the light of the sun.
Ah, but since weeping over these things
Does no good
We must speak of what will be done.
Is there, in the halls of war-loving Oeneus
An unwed daughter,
Similar to you in appearance?
I am willing to make her
My glorious wife.”
Meleager’s battle-hardened soul said:
“I left in my home
Pale-limbed Deineira,
Still unfamiliar with
Golden Aphrodite, enchanter of mortals.”
“And the fair-haired Grey-eyed goddess / Once made Diomedes an immortal god”: This is the Argive Diomedes who was immortalized because of his excellence. There is a sacred Island Diomedeia in the Adriatic where he is honored as a god. Ibykos records this.”
“After marrying Hermione Diomedes was made a god with the Dioskouroi. For he shares their life. Polemon records this. Among the Argyrippoi he has a sacred place. And in Mentapontion as well he receives honor like a god. Among the Thourians as well, they put up statues of him as if he were a god.”
“Another explanation: Didn’t Athena also make Diomedes a god? For during the Theban War, Melanaippos, a Theban hero, wounded Tydeus. And Tydeus, enraged over the wound, sought Amphiaros to kill Melanippus and bring him his head. When the head was brought to him and his anger overcame his reason, he took a taste of the Melanippian meat, as Euripides writes in the Meleager: “he will arrive at man-eating pleasures / and tear into Melanippus’ head with blood-crusted jaws”
When Tydeus was wounded, Athena was planning on making him immortal, but she did not grant that gift because he ate human flesh. So, because he was not able to receive immortality, he thought it right for the goddess to transfer the gift to Diomedes. Diomedes is therefore honored as a god among the Thourians and Metapontians and there is no record of his death among the historians.”
“Someone born to glory grows super strong,
But one who has only learned is a shady figure,
Inspired about different things at different times and
Never putting down a sure foot– someone who tries to taste
Countless accomplishments without thinking things through.
So, fiery Achilles when he was staying in the home of Philyra,
Even though he was a child, would play out great deeds.
He shook the short, iron-edged javelins in his hands like the winds
And designed murder for wild lions and he slaughtered boars.
He used to carry their bodies still breathing to Kronos’ son, the Centaur,
From when he was six years old and forever after.
“the meaning of this: who ever achieves noble things from practice and learning is shadowed and not similarly brilliant, because they are not always focusing on the same things, but they are changing their ways easily because of the weakness of their preparation from one set of goals to others.”
“Now recognize the wisdom of Oedipus:
If someone could cleave the branches from
A giant oak tree with a sharp-edged axe
And wreck its eye-catching beauty,
It would still weigh in about itself even though
It could no longer bear fruit
If it came face to face with a winter’s fire in the end
Or if set upon columns for some master,
It provides the labor for someone else’s walls,
Leaving its place deserted.
But you are the most timely healer and Paian
Honors your light.
You need a soft touch to work on
An open wound.
It is easy for cowards to shake up a state,
But it is hard indeed to make it stable again,
Unless the leaders suddenly have a god
For a pilot.”
“Now recognize the wisdom of Oedipus”: Pindar encourages Arkesilaos to examine his own riddle. For he wants him to consider the wisdom of Oedipus because he solved the riddle of the Sphinx. And he is riddling here, and he means this kind of thing. Some people were in revolt in Kyrene during Arkesilaos’ reign because they wanted to expel him from power. But because he was stronger than them, he sent them into exile from the country. Demophilos was among the rebels because he was an insurrectionist himself. He also went as exile into Thebes. Some people thought—since others claim that he gave money to Pindar for the victory ode—that Pindar was using the poem to reconcile him to Arkesilaos
“There’s no city so foreign
Nor so tongue-tied that
It has not heard the fame of the Hero Peleus,
Blessed son-in-law to the gods,
Nor Ajax, the son of Telamon,
And his father–Alkmene’s son took him in ships
To the bronze-delighting war,
When he went as a willing ally
From Tiryns to Troy, that labor for heroes,
Because of Laomedon’s duplicity.”
“A great calm listens to me, where I listen for hope.”
-Paul Valery, “Narcissus Speaks”
Ovid. Metamorphoses. Book III. 423-434 (Echo & Narcissus).
He desired himself without knowing it.
The one adoring was himself the one adored.
He pursues and he is the one pursued.
In equal parts he lights the flame and he burns.
How often his vain kisses for the trickster stream!
How often, grasping for the neck he saw there,
He plunged his arms amid the waters
And there failed to clasp himself!
What he sees, he does not understand.
Yet, what he sees he burns for.
What beguiles his eyes sustains his confusion.
Naif, why grasp in vain at a skirting image?
What you seek is nowhere.
What you love, just by turning away, you lose.
What you see is reflection’s shadow.
There’s nothing to it: it comes, it stays, with you.
With you it will leave, if you can leave.
Se cupit imprudens et qui probat, ipse probatur,
dumque petit, petitur, pariterque accendit et ardet.
Inrita fallaci quotiens dedit oscula fonti!
In mediis quotiens visum captantia collum
bracchia mersit aquis, nec se deprendit in illis!
Quid videat, nescit: sed quod videt, uritur illo,
atque oculos idem, qui decipit, incitat error.
Credule, quid frusta simulacra fugacia captas?
quod petis, est nusquam; quod amas, avertere, perdes.
Ista repercussae, quam cernis, imaginis umbra est:
nil habet ista sui; tecum venitque manetque,
tecum discedet, si tu discedere possis.
Caravaggio. Narcissus. 1597-1599. Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Antica. Rome, Italy.
Graces who have dominion over
The waters of Kephisos and
Inhabit a land of fine horses–
Queens famous in songs from bright Orkhomenos
And overseers of the ancient Minyans,
Hear me as I pray.
With you, mortals find
All pleasing and sweet things, whether
Someone is wise, pretty, or famous.
Not even the gods can plan dances or feasts
Without the sacred Graces–
As guardians of all the acts in heaven,
They sit in thrones alongside Pythian Apollo with his golden bow
As they praise the eternal honor of the Olympian father.
Queen Aglaia and,
Song-loving Euphrosyne, children of the most powerful father,
Listen to me now. And Song-lover Thalia,
Gaze kindly upon this band
Moving gracefully for good fortune.
I have come singing for Asopihkos in the Lydian mode,
Singing in my practice because
The Minyan land has won at Olympia, thanks to you.
Go to the dark-walled home of Persephone now, Echo–
Take this wonderful news to his father.
When you see Kleodamos, tell him that his son
Crowned his youthful hair in the well-known valley of Pisa
With the wings of famous contests.”
“I am fighting with many others over
The sheer number of noble things,
How your family has excelled at Delphi and
In the fields of the lion. I just couldn’t imagine how
To speak a true number of all the sand in the sea.
Still, a measure exists for each thing-
And it is best to recognize what is timely.
Because I as a private person went ahead on a common mission,
Praising aloud the wit of their forebears
And their war in heroic endeavors,
I will not lie about Corinth, mentioning Sisyphus
As clever as a god, or Medea
Who set up her own marriage,
Against her father’s wishes,
To be the savior of the Argo and its men.”
Museo archeologico nazionale di Napoli, (inv. nr. 8977). Da Pompei, Casa dei Dioscuri. Medea medita di uccidere i suoi figli intenti a giocare con gli astragali, guardati con mestizia dal pedagogo.
