Achilles (Mythological character); Epic poetry, Greek -- Translations into English; Trojan War
Those who possessed Argissa, and inhabited Gyrtone, and Orthe, and
Elone, and the white city Oloosson: these the stout warrior Polypœtes,
son of Pirithous, whom immortal Jove begat, commanded. Him renowned
Hippodamia brought forth by Pirithous, on the day when he took
vengeance on the shaggy Centaurs, and drove them from Mount Pelion, and
chased them to the Æthiceans. He was not the only leader; with him
commanded warlike Leonteus, son of magnamimous Coronus, the son of
Cœneus. With these forty dark ships followed.
But Gyneus led two-and-twenty ships from Cyphus. Him the Enienes
followed, and the Peræbi, stout warriors, who placed their habitations
by chilly Dodona, and those who tilled the fields about delightful
Titaresius, which pours its fair-flowing stream into the Peneus; nor is
it mingled with silver-eddied Peneus, but flows on the surface of it
like oil. For it is a streamlet of the Stygian wave, the dreadful
[pledge of] oath.
Prothoüs, son of Tenthredon, commanded the Magnetes, who dwell about
the Peneus, and leaf-quivering Pelion: these swift Prothoüs led; and
with him forty dark ships followed.
These then were the leaders and chieftains of the Greeks. Do thou,
then, O muse, tell me who was the most excellent of these, of the kings
and their steeds, who followed the son of Atreus to Troy. The steeds of
the descendant of Pheres were indeed by far the most excellent, which
Eumelus drove, swift as birds, like in hair, like in age, and level in
[height of] back by the plumb-line. 134 These, bearing with them the
terror of Mars, both mares, silver-bowed Apollo fed in Pieria. 135 Of
the heroes Telamonian Ajax was by far the best, whilst Achilles
continued wrathful, for he was by far the bravest; and the steeds which
bore the irreproachable son of Peleus surpassed those of Eumelus. But
he on his part lay in his dark sea-traversing ships, breathing wrath
against the son of Atreus, Agamemnon, the shepherd of the people. But
his forces meantime amused themselves with quoits and javelins, hurling
[them,] and with their bows; and their steeds stood, each near his
chariot, feeding on lotus and lake-fed parsley. And the well-fastened
chariots lay in the tents of their lords. But they, longing for their
warlike chief, wandered hither and thither through the camp, and did
not fight.
But they went along, as if the whole earth was being fed upon by fire,
136 and the earth groaned beneath, as in honour of thunder-rejoicing
Jove when angry, 137 when he strikes the earth around Typhœus in Arimæ,
138 where they say is the tomb of Typhœus; thus indeed beneath their
feet the earth groaned mightily, as they went, and very swift they
passed over the plain.
Footnote 134: (return) I. e. exactly equal in height, as if they had
been measured.
Footnote 135: (return) This degradation of Apollo used to be
commemorated in the theoria in honour of the god. See Müller Dor. vol.
i. p. 233.
Footnote 136: (return) Such was the glitter of their arms.
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