Works and Days and Theogony by Hesiod Stanley Lombardo Robert Lamberton

Author:Hesiod,Stanley Lombardo,Robert Lamberton [Hesiod,Stanley Lombardo,Robert Lamberton]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781624660658
Publisher: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.
Published: 2013-12-19T15:09:19+00:00

THEOGONY

Invocation to the Muses

Begin our singing with the Helikonian Muses,

Who possess Mount Helikon, high and holy,

And near its violet-stained spring on petalsoft feet

Dance circling the altar of almighty Kronion,

[5] And having bathed their silken skin in Permessos

Or in Horse Spring or the sacred creek Olmeios,

They begin their choral dance on Helikon’s summit

So lovely it pangs, and with power in their steps

Ascend veiled and misted in palpable air

[10] Treading the night, and in a voice beyond beauty

They chant:

Zeus Aegisholder and his lady Hera

Of Argos, in gold sandals striding,

And the Aegisholder’s girl, owl-eyed Athene,

[15] And Phoibos Apollo and arrowy Artemis,

Poseidon earth-holder, earthquaking god,

Modest Themis and Aphrodite, eyelashes curling,

And Hebe goldcrowned and lovely Dione,

Leto and Iapetos and Kronos, his mind bent,

[20] Eos and Helios and glowing Selene,

Gaia, Okeanos, and the black one, Night,

And the whole eerie brood of the eternal Immortals.

And they once taught Hesiod the art of singing verse,

While he pastured his lambs on holy Helikon’s slopes.

[25] And this was the very first thing they told me,

The Olympian Muses, daughters of Zeus Aegisholder:

“Hillbillies and bellies, poor excuses for shepherds:

We know how to tell many believable lies,

But also, when we want to, how to speak the plain truth.”

[30] So spoke the daughters of great Zeus, mincing their words.

And they gave me a staff, a branch of good sappy laurel,

Plucking it off, spectacular. And they breathed into me

A voice divine, so I might celebrate past and future.

And they told me to hymn the generation of the eternal gods,

[35] But always to sing of themselves, the Muses, first and last.

But why all this about oak tree or stone?

Start from the Muses: when they sing for Zeus Father

They thrill the great mind deep in Olympos,

Telling what is, what will be, and what has been,

[40] Blending their voices, and weariless the sound

Flows sweet from their lips and spreads like lilies,

And Zeus’ thundering halls shine with laughter,

And Olympos’ snowy peaks and the halls of the gods

Echo the strains as their immortal chanting

[45] Honors first the primordial generation of gods

Whom in the beginning Earth and Sky bore,

And the divine benefactors born from them;

And, second, Zeus, the Father of gods and men,

Mightiest of the gods and strongest by far;

[50] And then the race of humans and of powerful Giants.

And Zeus’ mind in Olympos is thrilled by the song

Of the Olympian Muses, the Storm King’s daughters.

They were born on Pieria after our Father Kronion

Mingled with Memory, who rules Eleutherae’s hills.

[55] She bore them to be a forgetting of troubles,

A pause in sorrow. For nine nights wise Zeus

Mingled with her in love, ascending her sacred bed

In isolation from the other Immortals.

But when the time drew near, and the seasons turned,

[60] And the moons had waned, and the many days were done,

She bore nine daughters, all of one mind, with song

In their breasts, with hearts that never failed,

Near the topmost peak of snowcapped Olympos.

There are their polished dancing grounds, their fine halls,

[65] And the Graces and Desire have their houses close by,

And all is in bloom. And they move in the dance, intoning

The

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