dwells among the immortals uninjured and ageless evermore. To the unwearied Sun the famous Oceanid, Perseis,1 bare Circe and king Œetes. And Eetes, son of man-enlightening Sun, wedded beauteous-cheeked Idyia, daughter of Ocean, perfect river, by the will of the gods. But she then, subdued in love through golden Aphrodite, brought forth to him fair-ankled Medea. Now fare ye well, gods dwelling in Olympian mansions ;2 [Islands and Continents, and briny Sea within ;] and now Olympian Muses, sweet of speech, daughters of ægis-bearing Jove, sing ye the tribe of goddesses, as many as in truth having been united, though immortal, with mortal men, gave birth to children resembling gods. Ceres, divine among goddesses, after union in delightsome love, bare Plutus to the hero Iasius,3 in a thrice-ploughed fallow, in the fertile country of Crete, a kind god, who goes over all the earth, and the broad surface of the sea; and to him that has chanced upon him, and into whose hands he may have come, him, I say, he is wont to make rich, and presents to him much wealth. And to Cadmus, Harmonia,5 daughter Perseis.] The same as Perse in Hom. Od. x. 136, who calls her own sister to Eetes. Cf. Apollon. Rhod. iv. 59. V. Lennep traces the myth of the Sun marrying an Oceanid from his appearing to sailors to rise at morn from the sea, and return to it at eve. 2 We must here either suppose, with Van Lennep, a considerable omission of lines, which have slipped out before ver. 964, or, with Goettling, read, οἶσιν ὑπ ̓ ἤπειροί τε καὶ ἁλμυρός ἔνδοθι πόντος. Most commentators deem this passage the beginning of a separate work of Hesiod. The same account of Iasius is given in Hom. Od. v. 125, with the additional statement, that he was stricken with lightning by Jove, for his boldness. Theocr. Idyll iii. 51, 52, and Ovid, Amor. III. x. 25, allude to this fable. The former agrees with Hesiod that Crete was the country of lasius. 4 πᾶσαν. Hermann would read nãow, but rãoav may be retained, and referred to carelessness of expression. An anacoluthon follows in τῷ δε τυχόντι—τόν δ ̓ ἀφνειὸν ἔθηκε, referable to the same. Goettling and V. Lennep agree here. Wolf compares Theog. 157, &c., 240, 283. 5 Harmonia here, and Medea (992), are ranked among goddesses wedding mortals, probably because each was of divine parentage. Harmonia, the daughter of Mars and Venus, deities of the higher order, and Medea, of Eetes, son of Sol and an Oceanid. Harmonia's children, Ino, Agave, and Autonoe, are famous for their jealous care for the orgies of Bacchus, the son of Semele, their of golden Aphrodite, bare Ino, Semele, and fair-cheeked Agave, and Autonoe, whom Aristaus of-clustering-locks wedded, and Polydorus in tower-circled Thebes. But Callirhoe, daughter of Ocean, united to brave-hearted Chrysaor in union of all-golden Aphrodite, bare a son the strongest of all mortals, Geryon, whom mighty Hercules slew, for the sake of the trailing-footed oxen2 in island Erythea. And to Tithonus Aurora3 bare Memnon with-brazen-helm, king of the Æthiopians, and the sovereign Hemathion. But to Cephalus in truth she produced an illustrious son, the brave Phaethon, a man like to the gods, whom, I wot, when young, in the tender flower of glorious youth, a lad, conscious but of young fancies, laughter-loving Aphrodite snatched up, and rushed away, and she made him, in her sacred fanes, her nightly temple-keeper, a divine Genius. And the daughter of Eetes, Jove-descended king, Jason,5 son of Æson, by the 4 sister. Agave was the mother of Pentheus. See Theocr. xxvi. ; Eurip. Bacchæ ; Ov. Met. iii. 701-733. The husband of Autonoe, Aristæus, is known to us through Virg. Georg. iv. 317, &c. Van Lennep notes the frequent commemoration of the flowing locks of the gods. 1 Wolf doubts the correctness of the phrase ἐν φιλότητι 'Αφροδίτης. But Muetzellius quotes the same verse from a fragment of Hesiod in the Schol. ad Pindar, Pyth. iv. 35. For Chrysaor, see above at ver. 287. 2 Bowv. A case of Synizesis, or species of crasis affecting two syllables of the same word. Compare Op. et D. 442, 607; Theog. 28, 283. In the Tragics we have dvoīv and πóλews contracted into δυοιν and πόλεως, θεός-θεος. 3 Aurora and Tithonus.] Cf. Hom. Il. xi. 1; Od. v. 1; Virg. Georg. i. 447; Æn. iv. 585; ix. 460. This Phaethon is other than he, of whom we read as the son of Sol and Clymene, Ov. Met. ii., whose end was so disastrous. But Ovid, Met. vii. 701-704, makes Cephalus say, "Cum me cornigeris tendentem retia cervis Vertice de summo semper florentis Hymetti Cf. Ov. Her. Ep. iv. 93, and Pausan. I. iii. 1, quoted by Goettling, where 'Huépa is said to have carried off Cephalus, not Aurora. Núxio (991) is the reading of some editions, others have μúxiov. Daíμova diov, that is, a god of the lower order, one of the Dii Minores. 5 Cf. 965, and notes there. Medeus is mentioned as Medea's son by Justin, lib. xlii. 2. That Chiron was an approved master counsels of ever-living gods, carried off from Œetes, after he had fulfilled the grievous toils, which, being many in number, the great and overbearing king, insolent and infatuated Pelias, doer of deeds of violence, imposed upon him. Which having achieved, after having toiled much, the son of Æson arrived at Iolchos, bearing in his fleet ship a dark-eyed maiden, and her he made his blooming bride. Yes, and she, having been yoked with Jason, shepherd of his people, bore a son Medeus, whom Chiron, son of Philyra, reared on the mountains; whilst the purpose of mighty Jove was being fulfilled. But of the daughters of Nereus, ancient sea-god, Psamathe in truth, divine among goddesses, bare Phocus1 in the embrace of Æacus, through golden Aphrodite : and the goddess Thetis, of the silver feet, yielding to Peleus, gave birth to Achilles the lionhearted, who-broke-the-ranks-of-men. 3 Fair-wreathed Cytherea2 too, I wot, blending in delightsome love with the hero Anchises, bare Æneas on the peaks of many-valleyed, woody Ida. But Circe, daughter of the Sun, born-of-Hyperion, by the love of Ulysses of-enduringheart, gave birth to Agrius and blameless and strong Latinus; Telegonus also she bare through golden Aphrodite. Now these in truth very far in a recess of sacred isles, reigned over 4 in his day we find from Il. iv. 219; Od. xi. 831; Xenophon de Venatione. His cave in the mountains is mentioned by Theocr. Idyll. vii. 149. iPhocus is called, in Ov. Met. vii. 685, Juvenis Nereius, 2 Compare Hom. Il. ii. 819; v. 313; Hymn to Venus, 53 and 75; and, among later poets, Theocr. Idyll. i. 106, where Venus is taunted by Daphnis with her intrigue with Anchises. 3 Thus Hesiod gives the progeny of Ulysses and Circe, which Homer does not. Latinus is called by Virgil, Æn. xii. 164, the grandson of Sol," Solis avi specimen," though elsewhere, vii. 45-47, he calls him the son of Faunus and a Laurentian nymph, and grandson of Picus. The former account (as Servius observes) agrees with Hesiod. The mention of Latinus and the Tyrrhenians shows, observes V. Lennep, that even in Hesiod's age the Greeks had some knowledge of the western peoples of Italy. Telegonus and his connexion with Italy is commemorated in Horat. Od. III. xxix. 8, Telegoni juga parricidæ, and Epod. i. 19, Tusculi Circæa tangat mænia. There may have been scarce enough geographical knowledge of Italy in Greece at Hesiod's date, to say whether it was or was not an island. The peninsula might be called ispai vñoo on account of the dwellings and pastures of the gods there, (especially E all the very far-renowned Tyrrhenians. But Calypso, divine among goddesses, bore to Ulysses Nausithoüs and Nausinous after union in delightful love. These, though immortal, having been united with mortal men, gave birth to children like unto the gods. And now sing ye the tribe of women, ye sweet-spoken Olympian Muses, daughters of ægis-bearing Jove. of Sol in Sicily,) or simply because they were large islands. Cf. Il. ii. 626. Goettling considers that Italy, Sicily, and the Eolian Islands are the isles indicated. Cf. Od. xii. 127, where Trinacria is said to have been the nurse of the sacred bulls of the Sun. THE SHIELD OF HERCULES. A FRAGMENT. OR as Alcmena, daughter of Electryon,2 exciter of peoples, left her home and father-land, and came to Thebes in the train of martial Amphitryon. She, I wot, excelled the race of gentler women3 in beauty and height; yea, and in mind indeed none did compete with her of those, whom mortal women bare by union with mortal men. Both from her head and from her dark eyelids breathed even such a fragrance as from those of golden Aphrodite. Yet she e'en so was wont to revere at heart her spouse, as never any of 'The poet may be supposed to have continued to some length the catalogue of women, with a preface to which the Theogony ends. Having spoken, perhaps, of Niobe and Semele, as of this list, οἵη ἔην Σεμελήἡ οἵη Νιόβη, he goes on to Alcmena, in the now apparently abrupt opening of the "Shield." Commentators assign these verses to some catalogue of women, which has been prefixed by some Rhapsodist. An anonymous Greek grammarian in Goettling's edition of Hesiod, p. 108, leads us to infer that the lines from 1 to 56 belong to a lost poem of Hesiod, the 'Hoĩaι, book iv. -noin. Instances of like comparison are, Odyss. vi. 102; En. i. 502, Qualis in Eurotæ jugis, &c. * Ηλεκτρύωνος. The syllables κτου and ω coalesce in one syllable. 3 Robinson compares Xenophon, Cyrop. ii. 5, and Theocr. Idyll. xviii. 26. See also note 11 in Banks's translation of Theocr. ad locum. Both from her head, &c.] This passage, says Robinson, may have suggested Virgil's'description of Venus, Æn. i. 402–404 : Dixit et avertens roseâ cervice refulsit, Ambrosiæque comæ divinum vertice odorem Spiravere. |