746-747) When you are
building
a house, do not leave it rough-hewn,
or a cawing crow may settle on it and croak.
or a cawing crow may settle on it and croak.
Hesiod
For whoever knows the
right and is ready to speak it, far-seeing Zeus gives him prosperity;
but whoever deliberately lies in his witness and forswears himself, and
so hurts Justice and sins beyond repair, that man's generation is left
obscure thereafter. But the generation of the man who swears truly is
better thenceforward.
(ll. 286-292) To you, foolish Perses, I will speak good sense. Badness
can be got easily and in shoals: the road to her is smooth, and she
lives very near us. But between us and Goodness the gods have placed the
sweat of our brows: long and steep is the path that leads to her, and it
is rough at the first; but when a man has reached the top, then is she
easy to reach, though before that she was hard.
(ll. 293-319) That man is altogether best who considers all things
himself and marks what will be better afterwards and at the end; and he,
again, is good who listens to a good adviser; but whoever neither
thinks for himself nor keeps in mind what another tells him, he is an
unprofitable man. But do you at any rate, always remembering my charge,
work, high-born Perses, that Hunger may hate you, and venerable Demeter
richly crowned may love you and fill your barn with food; for Hunger is
altogether a meet comrade for the sluggard. Both gods and men are angry
with a man who lives idle, for in nature he is like the stingless drones
who waste the labour of the bees, eating without working; but let it
be your care to order your work properly, that in the right season your
barns may be full of victual. Through work men grow rich in flocks
and substance, and working they are much better loved by the immortals
[1308]. Work is no disgrace: it is idleness which is a disgrace. But
if you work, the idle will soon envy you as you grow rich, for fame and
renown attend on wealth. And whatever be your lot, work is best for you,
if you turn your misguided mind away from other men's property to your
work and attend to your livelihood as I bid you. An evil shame is the
needy man's companion, shame which both greatly harms and prospers men:
shame is with poverty, but confidence with wealth.
(ll. 320-341) Wealth should not be seized: god-given wealth is much
better; for if a man take great wealth violently and perforce, or if he
steal it through his tongue, as often happens when gain deceives men's
sense and dishonour tramples down honour, the gods soon blot him out
and make that man's house low, and wealth attends him only for a little
time. Alike with him who does wrong to a suppliant or a guest, or who
goes up to his brother's bed and commits unnatural sin in lying with
his wife, or who infatuately offends against fatherless children, or who
abuses his old father at the cheerless threshold of old age and attacks
him with harsh words, truly Zeus himself is angry, and at the last
lays on him a heavy requittal for his evil doing. But do you turn your
foolish heart altogether away from these things, and, as far as you are
able, sacrifice to the deathless gods purely and cleanly, and burn
rich meats also, and at other times propitiate them with libations and
incense, both when you go to bed and when the holy light has come back,
that they may be gracious to you in heart and spirit, and so you may buy
another's holding and not another yours.
(ll. 342-351) Call your friend to a feast; but leave your enemy alone;
and especially call him who lives near you: for if any mischief
happen in the place, neighbours come ungirt, but kinsmen stay to gird
themselves [1309]. A bad neighbour is as great a plague as a good one
is a great blessing; he who enjoys a good neighbour has a precious
possession. Not even an ox would die but for a bad neighbour. Take
fair measure from your neighbour and pay him back fairly with the same
measure, or better, if you can; so that if you are in need afterwards,
you may find him sure.
(ll. 352-369) Do not get base gain: base gain is as bad as ruin. Be
friends with the friendly, and visit him who visits you. Give to one
who gives, but do not give to one who does not give. A man gives to the
free-handed, but no one gives to the close-fisted. Give is a good girl,
but Take is bad and she brings death. For the man who gives willingly,
even though he gives a great thing, rejoices in his gift and is glad
in heart; but whoever gives way to shamelessness and takes something
himself, even though it be a small thing, it freezes his heart. He who
adds to what he has, will keep off bright-eyed hunger; for if you add
only a little to a little and do this often, soon that little will
become great. What a man has by him at home does not trouble him: it is
better to have your stuff at home, for whatever is abroad may mean loss.
It is a good thing to draw on what you have; but it grieves your heart
to need something and not to have it, and I bid you mark this. Take
your fill when the cask is first opened and when it is nearly spent, but
midways be sparing: it is poor saving when you come to the lees.
(ll. 370-372) Let the wage promised to a friend be fixed; even with your
brother smile--and get a witness; for trust and mistrust, alike ruin
men.
(ll. 373-375) Do not let a flaunting woman coax and cozen and deceive
you: she is after your barn. The man who trusts womankind trusts
deceivers.
(ll. 376-380) There should be an only son, to feed his father's house,
for so wealth will increase in the home; but if you leave a second son
you should die old. Yet Zeus can easily give great wealth to a greater
number. More hands mean more work and more increase.
(ll. 381-382) If your heart within you desires wealth, do these things
and work with work upon work.
(ll. 383-404) When the Pleiades, daughters of Atlas, are rising [1310],
begin your harvest, and your ploughing when they are going to set
[1311]. Forty nights and days they are hidden and appear again as the
year moves round, when first you sharpen your sickle. This is the law
of the plains, and of those who live near the sea, and who inhabit rich
country, the glens and dingles far from the tossing sea,--strip to
sow and strip to plough and strip to reap, if you wish to get in all
Demeter's fruits in due season, and that each kind may grow in its
season. Else, afterwards, you may chance to be in want, and go begging
to other men's houses, but without avail; as you have already come to
me. But I will give you no more nor give you further measure. Foolish
Perses! Work the work which the gods ordained for men, lest in bitter
anguish of spirit you with your wife and children seek your livelihood
amongst your neighbours, and they do not heed you. Two or three times,
may be, you will succeed, but if you trouble them further, it will
not avail you, and all your talk will be in vain, and your word-play
unprofitable. Nay, I bid you find a way to pay your debts and avoid
hunger.
(ll. 405-413) First of all, get a house, and a woman and an ox for the
plough--a slave woman and not a wife, to follow the oxen as well--and
make everything ready at home, so that you may not have to ask of
another, and he refuses you, and so, because you are in lack, the season
pass by and your work come to nothing. Do not put your work off till
to-morrow and the day after; for a sluggish worker does not fill his
barn, nor one who puts off his work: industry makes work go well, but a
man who puts off work is always at hand-grips with ruin.
(ll. 414-447) When the piercing power and sultry heat of the sun abate,
and almighty Zeus sends the autumn rains [1312], and men's flesh comes
to feel far easier,--for then the star Sirius passes over the heads
of men, who are born to misery, only a little while by day and takes
greater share of night,--then, when it showers its leaves to the ground
and stops sprouting, the wood you cut with your axe is least liable to
worm. Then remember to hew your timber: it is the season for that work.
Cut a mortar [1313] three feet wide and a pestle three cubits long, and
an axle of seven feet, for it will do very well so; but if you make
it eight feet long, you can cut a beetle [1314] from it as well. Cut
a felloe three spans across for a waggon of ten palms' width. Hew also
many bent timbers, and bring home a plough-tree when you have found it,
and look out on the mountain or in the field for one of holm-oak; for
this is the strongest for oxen to plough with when one of Athena's
handmen has fixed in the share-beam and fastened it to the pole with
dowels. Get two ploughs ready work on them at home, one all of a piece,
and the other jointed. It is far better to do this, for if you should
break one of them, you can put the oxen to the other. Poles of laurel or
elm are most free from worms, and a share-beam of oak and a plough-tree
of holm-oak. Get two oxen, bulls of nine years; for their strength is
unspent and they are in the prime of their age: they are best for work.
They will not fight in the furrow and break the plough and then leave
the work undone. Let a brisk fellow of forty years follow them, with a
loaf of four quarters [1315] and eight slices [1316] for his dinner, one
who will attend to his work and drive a straight furrow and is past the
age for gaping after his fellows, but will keep his mind on his work. No
younger man will be better than he at scattering the seed and avoiding
double-sowing; for a man less staid gets disturbed, hankering after his
fellows.
(ll. 448-457) Mark, when you hear the voice of the crane [1317] who
cries year by year from the clouds above, for she give the signal for
ploughing and shows the season of rainy winter; but she vexes the heart
of the man who has no oxen. Then is the time to feed up your horned
oxen in the byre; for it is easy to say: 'Give me a yoke of oxen and a
waggon,' and it is easy to refuse: 'I have work for my oxen. ' The man
who is rich in fancy thinks his waggon as good as built already--the
fool! He does not know that there are a hundred timbers to a waggon.
Take care to lay these up beforehand at home.
(ll. 458-464) So soon as the time for ploughing is proclaimed to men,
then make haste, you and your slaves alike, in wet and in dry, to plough
in the season for ploughing, and bestir yourself early in the morning so
that your fields may be full. Plough in the spring; but fallow broken up
in the summer will not belie your hopes. Sow fallow land when the
soil is still getting light: fallow land is a defender from harm and a
soother of children.
(ll. 465-478) Pray to Zeus of the Earth and to pure Demeter to make
Demeter's holy grain sound and heavy, when first you begin ploughing,
when you hold in your hand the end of the plough-tail and bring down
your stick on the backs of the oxen as they draw on the pole-bar by the
yoke-straps. Let a slave follow a little behind with a mattock and make
trouble for the birds by hiding the seed; for good management is the
best for mortal men as bad management is the worst. In this way your
corn-ears will bow to the ground with fullness if the Olympian himself
gives a good result at the last, and you will sweep the cobwebs from
your bins and you will be glad, I ween, as you take of your garnered
substance. And so you will have plenty till you come to grey [1318]
springtime, and will not look wistfully to others, but another shall be
in need of your help.
(ll. 479-492) But if you plough the good ground at the solstice [1319],
you will reap sitting, grasping a thin crop in your hand, binding the
sheaves awry, dust-covered, not glad at all; so you will bring all home
in a basket and not many will admire you. Yet the will of Zeus who holds
the aegis is different at different times; and it is hard for mortal
men to tell it; for if you should plough late, you may find this
remedy--when the cuckoo first calls [1320] in the leaves of the oak and
makes men glad all over the boundless earth, if Zeus should send rain
on the third day and not cease until it rises neither above an ox's hoof
nor falls short of it, then the late-plougher will vie with the early.
Keep all this well in mind, and fail not to mark grey spring as it comes
and the season of rain.
(ll 493-501) Pass by the smithy and its crowded lounge in winter time
when the cold keeps men from field work,--for then an industrious man
can greatly prosper his house--lest bitter winter catch you helpless and
poor and you chafe a swollen foot with a shrunk hand. The idle man
who waits on empty hope, lacking a livelihood, lays to heart
mischief-making; it is not an wholesome hope that accompanies a need man
who lolls at ease while he has no sure livelihood.
(ll. 502-503) While it is yet midsummer command your slaves: 'It will
not always be summer, build barns. '
(ll. 504-535) Avoid the month Lenaeon [1321], wretched days, all of them
fit to skin an ox, and the frosts which are cruel when Boreas blows over
the earth. He blows across horse-breeding Thrace upon the wide sea and
stirs it up, while earth and the forest howl. On many a high-leafed
oak and thick pine he falls and brings them to the bounteous earth in
mountain glens: then all the immense wood roars and the beasts shudder
and put their tails between their legs, even those whose hide is covered
with fur; for with his bitter blast he blows even through them although
they are shaggy-breasted. He goes even through an ox's hide; it does not
stop him. Also he blows through the goat's fine hair. But through the
fleeces of sheep, because their wool is abundant, the keen wind Boreas
pierces not at all; but it makes the old man curved as a wheel. And it
does not blow through the tender maiden who stays indoors with her
dear mother, unlearned as yet in the works of golden Aphrodite, and who
washes her soft body and anoints herself with oil and lies down in an
inner room within the house, on a winter's day when the Boneless One
[1322] gnaws his foot in his fireless house and wretched home; for the
sun shows him no pastures to make for, but goes to and fro over the land
and city of dusky men [1323], and shines more sluggishly upon the whole
race of the Hellenes. Then the horned and unhorned denizens of the wood,
with teeth chattering pitifully, flee through the copses and glades, and
all, as they seek shelter, have this one care, to gain thick coverts or
some hollow rock. Then, like the Three-legged One [1324] whose back is
broken and whose head looks down upon the ground, like him, I say, they
wander to escape the white snow.
(ll. 536-563) Then put on, as I bid you, a soft coat and a tunic to the
feet to shield your body,--and you should weave thick woof on thin warp.
In this clothe yourself so that your hair may keep still and not bristle
and stand upon end all over your body.
Lace on your feet close-fitting boots of the hide of a slaughtered ox,
thickly lined with felt inside. And when the season of frost comes on,
stitch together skins of firstling kids with ox-sinew, to put over your
back and to keep off the rain. On your head above wear a shaped cap
of felt to keep your ears from getting wet, for the dawn is chill when
Boreas has once made his onslaught, and at dawn a fruitful mist is
spread over the earth from starry heaven upon the fields of blessed men:
it is drawn from the ever flowing rivers and is raised high above the
earth by windstorm, and sometimes it turns to rain towards evening, and
sometimes to wind when Thracian Boreas huddles the thick clouds. Finish
your work and return home ahead of him, and do not let the dark cloud
from heaven wrap round you and make your body clammy and soak your
clothes. Avoid it; for this is the hardest month, wintry, hard for sheep
and hard for men. In this season let your oxen have half their usual
food, but let your man have more; for the helpful nights are long.
Observe all this until the year is ended and you have nights and days
of equal length, and Earth, the mother of all, bears again her various
fruit.
(ll. 564-570) When Zeus has finished sixty wintry days after the
solstice, then the star Arcturus [1325] leaves the holy stream of
Ocean and first rises brilliant at dusk. After him the shrilly wailing
daughter of Pandion, the swallow, appears to men when spring is just
beginning. Before she comes, prune the vines, for it is best so.
(ll. 571-581) But when the House-carrier [1326] climbs up the plants
from the earth to escape the Pleiades, then it is no longer the season
for digging vineyards, but to whet your sickles and rouse up your
slaves. Avoid shady seats and sleeping until dawn in the harvest season,
when the sun scorches the body. Then be busy, and bring home your
fruits, getting up early to make your livelihood sure. For dawn takes
away a third part of your work, dawn advances a man on his journey and
advances him in his work,--dawn which appears and sets many men on their
road, and puts yokes on many oxen.
(ll. 582-596) But when the artichoke flowers [1327], and the chirping
grass-hopper sits in a tree and pours down his shrill song continually
from under his wings in the season of wearisome heat, then goats are
plumpest and wine sweetest; women are most wanton, but men are feeblest,
because Sirius parches head and knees and the skin is dry through heat.
But at that time let me have a shady rock and wine of Biblis, a clot of
curds and milk of drained goats with the flesh of an heifer fed in the
woods, that has never calved, and of firstling kids; then also let me
drink bright wine, sitting in the shade, when my heart is satisfied
with food, and so, turning my head to face the fresh Zephyr, from the
everflowing spring which pours down unfouled thrice pour an offering of
water, but make a fourth libation of wine.
(ll. 597-608) Set your slaves to winnow Demeter's holy grain, when
strong Orion [1328] first appears, on a smooth threshing-floor in an
airy place. Then measure it and store it in jars. And so soon as you
have safely stored all your stuff indoors, I bid you put your bondman
out of doors and look out for a servant-girl with no children;--for a
servant with a child to nurse is troublesome. And look after the
dog with jagged teeth; do not grudge him his food, or some time the
Day-sleeper [1329] may take your stuff. Bring in fodder and litter so
as to have enough for your oxen and mules. After that, let your men rest
their poor knees and unyoke your pair of oxen.
(ll. 609-617) But when Orion and Sirius are come into mid-heaven,
and rosy-fingered Dawn sees Arcturus [1330], then cut off all the
grape-clusters, Perses, and bring them home. Show them to the sun ten
days and ten nights: then cover them over for five, and on the sixth
day draw off into vessels the gifts of joyful Dionysus. But when the
Pleiades and Hyades and strong Orion begin to set [1331], then remember
to plough in season: and so the completed year [1332] will fitly pass
beneath the earth.
(ll. 618-640) But if desire for uncomfortable sea-faring seize you; when
the Pleiades plunge into the misty sea [1333] to escape Orion's rude
strength, then truly gales of all kinds rage. Then keep ships no longer
on the sparkling sea, but bethink you to till the land as I bid you.
Haul up your ship upon the land and pack it closely with stones all
round to keep off the power of the winds which blow damply, and draw out
the bilge-plug so that the rain of heaven may not rot it. Put away
all the tackle and fittings in your house, and stow the wings of the
sea-going ship neatly, and hang up the well-shaped rudder over the
smoke. You yourself wait until the season for sailing is come, and then
haul your swift ship down to the sea and stow a convenient cargo in it,
so that you may bring home profit, even as your father and mine,
foolish Perses, used to sail on shipboard because he lacked sufficient
livelihood. And one day he came to this very place crossing over a
great stretch of sea; he left Aeolian Cyme and fled, not from riches and
substance, but from wretched poverty which Zeus lays upon men, and
he settled near Helicon in a miserable hamlet, Ascra, which is bad in
winter, sultry in summer, and good at no time.
(ll. 641-645) But you, Perses, remember all works in their season but
sailing especially. Admire a small ship, but put your freight in a large
one; for the greater the lading, the greater will be your piled gain, if
only the winds will keep back their harmful gales.
(ll. 646-662) If ever you turn your misguided heart to trading and with
to escape from debt and joyless hunger, I will show you the measures of
the loud-roaring sea, though I have no skill in sea-faring nor in ships;
for never yet have I sailed by ship over the wide sea, but only to
Euboea from Aulis where the Achaeans once stayed through much storm when
they had gathered a great host from divine Hellas for Troy, the land
of fair women. Then I crossed over to Chalcis, to the games of wise
Amphidamas where the sons of the great-hearted hero proclaimed and
appointed prizes. And there I boast that I gained the victory with a
song and carried off an handled tripod which I dedicated to the Muses of
Helicon, in the place where they first set me in the way of clear song.
Such is all my experience of many-pegged ships; nevertheless I will tell
you the will of Zeus who holds the aegis; for the Muses have taught me
to sing in marvellous song.
(ll. 663-677) Fifty days after the solstice [1334], when the season
of wearisome heat is come to an end, is the right time for me to go
sailing. Then you will not wreck your ship, nor will the sea destroy the
sailors, unless Poseidon the Earth-Shaker be set upon it, or Zeus, the
king of the deathless gods, wish to slay them; for the issues of good
and evil alike are with them. At that time the winds are steady, and
the sea is harmless. Then trust in the winds without care, and haul your
swift ship down to the sea and put all the freight on board; but make
all haste you can to return home again and do not wait till the time of
the new wine and autumn rain and oncoming storms with the fierce gales
of Notus who accompanies the heavy autumn rain of Zeus and stirs up the
sea and makes the deep dangerous.
(ll. 678-694) Another time for men to go sailing is in spring when a
man first sees leaves on the topmost shoot of a fig-tree as large as the
foot-print that a cow makes; then the sea is passable, and this is the
spring sailing time. For my part I do not praise it, for my heart does
not like it. Such a sailing is snatched, and you will hardly avoid
mischief. Yet in their ignorance men do even this, for wealth means life
to poor mortals; but it is fearful to die among the waves. But I bid you
consider all these things in your heart as I say. Do not put all your
goods in hallow ships; leave the greater part behind, and put the lesser
part on board; for it is a bad business to meet with disaster among
the waves of the sea, as it is bad if you put too great a load on your
waggon and break the axle, and your goods are spoiled. Observe due
measure: and proportion is best in all things.
(ll. 695-705) Bring home a wife to your house when you are of the right
age, while you are not far short of thirty years nor much above; this is
the right age for marriage. Let your wife have been grown up four years,
and marry her in the fifth. Marry a maiden, so that you can teach her
careful ways, and especially marry one who lives near you, but look
well about you and see that your marriage will not be a joke to your
neighbours. For a man wins nothing better than a good wife, and, again,
nothing worse than a bad one, a greedy soul who roasts her man without
fire, strong though he may be, and brings him to a raw [1335] old age.
(ll. 706-714) Be careful to avoid the anger of the deathless gods. Do
not make a friend equal to a brother; but if you do, do not wrong him
first, and do not lie to please the tongue. But if he wrongs you first,
offending either in word or in deed, remember to repay him double;
but if he ask you to be his friend again and be ready to give you
satisfaction, welcome him. He is a worthless man who makes now one and
now another his friend; but as for you, do not let your face put your
heart to shame [1336].
(ll. 715-716) Do not get a name either as lavish or as churlish; as a
friend of rogues or as a slanderer of good men.
(ll. 717-721) Never dare to taunt a man with deadly poverty which eats
out the heart; it is sent by the deathless gods. The best treasure a man
can have is a sparing tongue, and the greatest pleasure, one that moves
orderly; for if you speak evil, you yourself will soon be worse spoken
of.
(ll. 722-723) Do not be boorish at a common feast where there are many
guests; the pleasure is greatest and the expense is least [1337].
(ll. 724-726) Never pour a libation of sparkling wine to Zeus after dawn
with unwashen hands, nor to others of the deathless gods; else they do
not hear your prayers but spit them back.
(ll. 727-732) Do not stand upright facing the sun when you make water,
but remember to do this when he has set towards his rising. And do not
make water as you go, whether on the road or off the road, and do not
uncover yourself: the nights belong to the blessed gods. A scrupulous
man who has a wise heart sits down or goes to the wall of an enclosed
court.
(ll. 733-736) Do not expose yourself befouled by the fireside in your
house, but avoid this. Do not beget children when you are come back from
ill-omened burial, but after a festival of the gods.
(ll. 737-741) Never cross the sweet-flowing water of ever-rolling rivers
afoot until you have prayed, gazing into the soft flood, and washed your
hands in the clear, lovely water. Whoever crosses a river with hands
unwashed of wickedness, the gods are angry with him and bring trouble
upon him afterwards.
(ll. 742-743) At a cheerful festival of the gods do not cut the withered
from the quick upon that which has five branches [1338] with bright
steel.
(ll. 744-745) Never put the ladle upon the mixing-bowl at a wine party,
for malignant ill-luck is attached to that.
(ll.
746-747) When you are building a house, do not leave it rough-hewn,
or a cawing crow may settle on it and croak.
(ll. 748-749) Take nothing to eat or to wash with from uncharmed pots,
for in them there is mischief.
(ll. 750-759) Do not let a boy of twelve years sit on things which may
not be moved [1339], for that is bad, and makes a man unmanly; nor yet
a child of twelve months, for that has the same effect. A man should
not clean his body with water in which a woman has washed, for there is
bitter mischief in that also for a time. When you come upon a burning
sacrifice, do not make a mock of mysteries, for Heaven is angry at this
also. Never make water in the mouths of rivers which flow to the sea,
nor yet in springs; but be careful to avoid this. And do not ease
yourself in them: it is not well to do this.
(ll. 760-763) So do: and avoid the talk of men. For Talk is mischievous,
light, and easily raised, but hard to bear and difficult to be rid of.
Talk never wholly dies away when many people voice her: even Talk is in
some ways divine.
(ll. 765-767) Mark the days which come from Zeus, duly telling your
slaves of them, and that the thirtieth day of the month is best for one
to look over the work and to deal out supplies.
(ll. 769-768) [1340] For these are days which come from Zeus the
all-wise, when men discern aright.
(ll. 770-779) To begin with, the first, the fourth, and the seventh--on
which Leto bare Apollo with the blade of gold--each is a holy day. The
eighth and the ninth, two days at least of the waxing month [1341], are
specially good for the works of man. Also the eleventh and twelfth are
both excellent, alike for shearing sheep and for reaping the kindly
fruits; but the twelfth is much better than the eleventh, for on it the
airy-swinging spider spins its web in full day, and then the Wise One
[1342], gathers her pile. On that day woman should set up her loom and
get forward with her work.
(ll. 780-781) Avoid the thirteenth of the waxing month for beginning to
sow: yet it is the best day for setting plants.
(ll. 782-789) The sixth of the mid-month is very unfavourable for
plants, but is good for the birth of males, though unfavourable for a
girl either to be born at all or to be married. Nor is the first sixth
a fit day for a girl to be born, but a kindly for gelding kids and sheep
and for fencing in a sheep-cote. It is favourable for the birth of a
boy, but such will be fond of sharp speech, lies, and cunning words, and
stealthy converse.
(ll. 790-791) On the eighth of the month geld the boar and
loud-bellowing bull, but hard-working mules on the twelfth.
(ll. 792-799) On the great twentieth, in full day, a wise man should be
born. Such an one is very sound-witted. The tenth is favourable for a
male to be born; but, for a girl, the fourth day of the mid-month. On
that day tame sheep and shambling, horned oxen, and the sharp-fanged
dog and hardy mules to the touch of the hand. But take care to avoid
troubles which eat out the heart on the fourth of the beginning and
ending of the month; it is a day very fraught with fate.
(ll. 800-801) On the fourth of the month bring home your bride, but
choose the omens which are best for this business.
(ll. 802-804) Avoid fifth days: they are unkindly and terrible. On a
fifth day, they say, the Erinyes assisted at the birth of Horcus (Oath)
whom Eris (Strife) bare to trouble the forsworn. {[0-9]} (ll. 805-809)
Look about you very carefully and throw out Demeter's holy grain upon
the well-rolled [1343] threshing floor on the seventh of the mid-month.
Let the woodman cut beams for house building and plenty of ships'
timbers, such as are suitable for ships. On the fourth day begin to
build narrow ships.
(ll. 810-813) The ninth of the mid-month improves towards evening; but
the first ninth of all is quite harmless for men. It is a good day on
which to beget or to be born both for a male and a female: it is never
an wholly evil day.
(ll. 814-818) Again, few know that the twenty-seventh of the month is
best for opening a wine-jar, and putting yokes on the necks of oxen
and mules and swift-footed horses, and for hauling a swift ship of many
thwarts down to the sparkling sea; few call it by its right name.
(ll. 819-821) On the fourth day open a jar. The fourth of the mid-month
is a day holy above all. And again, few men know that the fourth day
after the twentieth is best while it is morning: towards evening it is
less good.
(ll. 822-828) These days are a great blessing to men on earth; but the
rest are changeable, luckless, and bring nothing. Everyone praises
a different day but few know their nature. Sometimes a day is a
stepmother, sometimes a mother. That man is happy and lucky in them who
knows all these things and does his work without offending the deathless
gods, who discerns the omens of birds and avoids transgressions.
THE DIVINATION BY BIRDS (fragments)
Proclus on Works and Days, 828: Some make the "Divination by Birds",
which Apollonius of Rhodes rejects as spurious, follow this verse
("Works and Days", 828).
THE ASTRONOMY (fragments)
Fragment #1--Athenaeus xi, p. 491 d: And the author of "The Astronomy",
which is attributed forsooth to Hesiod, always calls them (the Pleiades)
Peleiades: 'but mortals call them Peleiades'; and again, 'the stormy
Peleiades go down'; and again, 'then the Peleiades hide away. . . . '
Scholiast on Pindar, Nem. ii. 16: The Pleiades. . . . whose stars are
these:--'Lovely Teygata, and dark-faced Electra, and Alcyone, and
bright Asterope, and Celaeno, and Maia, and Merope, whom glorious Atlas
begot. . . . ' ((LACUNA)) 'In the mountains of Cyllene she (Maia) bare
Hermes, the herald of the gods. '
Fragment #2--Scholiast on Aratus 254: But Zeus made them (the sisters of
Hyas) into the stars which are called Hyades. Hesiod in his Book about
Stars tells us their names as follows: 'Nymphs like the Graces [1401],
Phaesyle and Coronis and rich-crowned Cleeia and lovely Phaco and
long-robed Eudora, whom the tribes of men upon the earth call Hyades. '
Fragment #3--Pseudo-Eratosthenes Catast. frag. 1: [1402] The Great
Bear. ]--Hesiod says she (Callisto) was the daughter of Lycaon and
lived in Arcadia. She chose to occupy herself with wild-beasts in the
mountains together with Artemis, and, when she was seduced by Zeus,
continued some time undetected by the goddess, but afterwards, when she
was already with child, was seen by her bathing and so discovered. Upon
this, the goddess was enraged and changed her into a beast. Thus she
became a bear and gave birth to a son called Arcas. But while she was in
the mountains, she was hunted by some goat-herds and given up with
her babe to Lycaon. Some while after, she thought fit to go into the
forbidden precinct of Zeus, not knowing the law, and being pursued by
her own son and the Arcadians, was about to be killed because of the
said law; but Zeus delivered her because of her connection with him
and put her among the stars, giving her the name Bear because of the
misfortune which had befallen her.
Comm. Supplem. on Aratus, p. 547 M. 8: Of Bootes, also called the
Bear-warden. The story goes that he is Arcas the son of Callisto and
Zeus, and he lived in the country about Lycaeum. After Zeus had seduced
Callisto, Lycaon, pretending not to know of the matter, entertained
Zeus, as Hesiod says, and set before him on the table the babe which he
had cut up.
Fragment #4--Pseudo-Eratosthenes, Catast. fr. xxxii: Orion. ]--Hesiod
says that he was the son of Euryale, the daughter of Minos, and of
Poseidon, and that there was given him as a gift the power of walking
upon the waves as though upon land. When he was come to Chios, he
outraged Merope, the daughter of Oenopion, being drunken; but Oenopion
when he learned of it was greatly vexed at the outrage and blinded him
and cast him out of the country. Then he came to Lemnos as a beggar and
there met Hephaestus who took pity on him and gave him Cedalion his own
servant to guide him. So Orion took Cedalion upon his shoulders and used
to carry him about while he pointed out the roads. Then he came to the
east and appears to have met Helius (the Sun) and to have been healed,
and so returned back again to Oenopion to punish him; but Oenopion was
hidden away by his people underground. Being disappointed, then, in his
search for the king, Orion went away to Crete and spent his time hunting
in company with Artemis and Leto. It seems that he threatened to kill
every beast there was on earth; whereupon, in her anger, Earth sent up
against him a scorpion of very great size by which he was stung and so
perished. After this Zeus, at one prayer of Artemis and Leto, put him
among the stars, because of his manliness, and the scorpion also as a
memorial of him and of what had occurred.
Fragment #5--Diodorus iv. 85: Some say that great earthquakes occurred,
which broke through the neck of land and formed the straits [1403], the
sea parting the mainland from the island. But Hesiod, the poet, says
just the opposite: that the sea was open, but Orion piled up the
promontory by Peloris, and founded the close of Poseidon which is
especially esteemed by the people thereabouts. When he had finished
this, he went away to Euboea and settled there, and because of his
renown was taken into the number of the stars in heaven, and won undying
remembrance.
THE PRECEPTS OF CHIRON (fragments)
Fragment #1--Scholiast on Pindar, Pyth. vi. 19: 'And now, pray, mark
all these things well in a wise heart. First, whenever you come to your
house, offer good sacrifices to the eternal gods. '
Fragment #2--Plutarch Mor. 1034 E: 'Decide no suit until you have heard
both sides speak. '
Fragment #3--Plutarch de Orac. defectu ii. 415 C: 'A chattering crow
lives out nine generations of aged men, but a stag's life is four times
a crow's, and a raven's life makes three stags old, while the phoenix
outlives nine ravens, but we, the rich-haired Nymphs, daughters of Zeus
the aegis-holder, outlive ten phoenixes. '
Fragment #4--Quintilian, i. 15: Some consider that children under the
age of seven should not receive a literary education. . . That Hesiod
was of this opinion very many writers affirm who were earlier than the
critic Aristophanes; for he was the first to reject the "Precepts", in
which book this maxim occurs, as a work of that poet.
THE GREAT WORKS (fragments)
Fragment #1--Comm. on Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics. v. 8: The verse,
however (the slaying of Rhadamanthys), is in Hesiod in the "Great Works"
and is as follows: 'If a man sow evil, he shall reap evil increase; if
men do to him as he has done, it will be true justice. '
Fragment #2--Proclus on Hesiod, Works and Days, 126: Some believe that
the Silver Race (is to be attributed to) the earth, declaring that in
the "Great Works" Hesiod makes silver to be of the family of Earth.
THE IDAEAN DACTYLS (fragments)
Fragment #1--Pliny, Natural History vii. 56, 197: Hesiod says that those
who are called the Idaean Dactyls taught the smelting and tempering of
iron in Crete.
Fragment #2--Clement, Stromateis i. 16. 75: Celmis, again, and
Damnameneus, the first of the Idaean Dactyls, discovered iron in Cyprus;
but bronze smelting was discovered by Delas, another Idaean, though
Hesiod calls him Scythes [1501].
THE THEOGONY (1,041 lines)
(ll. 1-25) From the Heliconian Muses let us begin to sing, who hold
the great and holy mount of Helicon, and dance on soft feet about the
deep-blue spring and the altar of the almighty son of Cronos, and, when
they have washed their tender bodies in Permessus or in the Horse's
Spring or Olmeius, make their fair, lovely dances upon highest Helicon
and move with vigorous feet. Thence they arise and go abroad by night,
veiled in thick mist, and utter their song with lovely voice, praising
Zeus the aegis-holder and queenly Hera of Argos who walks on golden
sandals and the daughter of Zeus the aegis-holder bright-eyed Athene,
and Phoebus Apollo, and Artemis who delights in arrows, and Poseidon
the earth-holder who shakes the earth, and reverend Themis and
quick-glancing [1601] Aphrodite, and Hebe with the crown of gold, and
fair Dione, Leto, Iapetus, and Cronos the crafty counsellor, Eos and
great Helius and bright Selene, Earth too, and great Oceanus, and dark
Night, and the holy race of all the other deathless ones that are
for ever. And one day they taught Hesiod glorious song while he was
shepherding his lambs under holy Helicon, and this word first the
goddesses said to me--the Muses of Olympus, daughters of Zeus who holds
the aegis:
(ll. 26-28) 'Shepherds of the wilderness, wretched things of shame,
mere bellies, we know how to speak many false things as though they were
true; but we know, when we will, to utter true things. '
(ll. 29-35) So said the ready-voiced daughters of great Zeus, and they
plucked and gave me a rod, a shoot of sturdy laurel, a marvellous thing,
and breathed into me a divine voice to celebrate things that shall be
and things there were aforetime; and they bade me sing of the race of
the blessed gods that are eternally, but ever to sing of themselves both
first and last. But why all this about oak or stone? [1602]
(ll. 36-52) Come thou, let us begin with the Muses who gladden the great
spirit of their father Zeus in Olympus with their songs, telling
of things that are and that shall be and that were aforetime with
consenting voice. Unwearying flows the sweet sound from their lips,
and the house of their father Zeus the loud-thunderer is glad at the
lily-like voice of the goddesses as it spread abroad, and the peaks of
snowy Olympus resound, and the homes of the immortals. And they uttering
their immortal voice, celebrate in song first of all the reverend race
of the gods from the beginning, those whom Earth and wide Heaven begot,
and the gods sprung of these, givers of good things. Then, next, the
goddesses sing of Zeus, the father of gods and men, as they begin and
end their strain, how much he is the most excellent among the gods
and supreme in power. And again, they chant the race of men and strong
giants, and gladden the heart of Zeus within Olympus,--the Olympian
Muses, daughters of Zeus the aegis-holder.
(ll. 53-74) Them in Pieria did Mnemosyne (Memory), who reigns over the
hills of Eleuther, bear of union with the father, the son of Cronos, a
forgetting of ills and a rest from sorrow. For nine nights did wise Zeus
lie with her, entering her holy bed remote from the immortals. And when
a year was passed and the seasons came round as the months waned, and
many days were accomplished, she bare nine daughters, all of one mind,
whose hearts are set upon song and their spirit free from care, a little
way from the topmost peak of snowy Olympus. There are their bright
dancing-places and beautiful homes, and beside them the Graces and
Himerus (Desire) live in delight. And they, uttering through their
lips a lovely voice, sing the laws of all and the goodly ways of the
immortals, uttering their lovely voice. Then went they to Olympus,
delighting in their sweet voice, with heavenly song, and the dark earth
resounded about them as they chanted, and a lovely sound rose up beneath
their feet as they went to their father. And he was reigning in heaven,
himself holding the lightning and glowing thunderbolt, when he had
overcome by might his father Cronos; and he distributed fairly to the
immortals their portions and declared their privileges.
(ll. 75-103) These things, then, the Muses sang who dwell on Olympus,
nine daughters begotten by great Zeus, Cleio and Euterpe, Thaleia,
Melpomene and Terpsichore, and Erato and Polyhymnia and Urania and
Calliope [1603], who is the chiefest of them all, for she attends on
worshipful princes: whomsoever of heaven-nourished princes the daughters
of great Zeus honour, and behold him at his birth, they pour sweet dew
upon his tongue, and from his lips flow gracious words. All the people
look towards him while he settles causes with true judgements: and he,
speaking surely, would soon make wise end even of a great quarrel; for
therefore are there princes wise in heart, because when the people are
being misguided in their assembly, they set right the matter again with
ease, persuading them with gentle words. And when he passes through
a gathering, they greet him as a god with gentle reverence, and he is
conspicuous amongst the assembled: such is the holy gift of the Muses to
men. For it is through the Muses and far-shooting Apollo that there are
singers and harpers upon the earth; but princes are of Zeus, and happy
is he whom the Muses love: sweet flows speech from his mouth. For though
a man have sorrow and grief in his newly-troubled soul and live in dread
because his heart is distressed, yet, when a singer, the servant of the
Muses, chants the glorious deeds of men of old and the blessed gods who
inhabit Olympus, at once he forgets his heaviness and remembers not his
sorrows at all; but the gifts of the goddesses soon turn him away from
these.
(ll. 104-115) Hail, children of Zeus! Grant lovely song and celebrate
the holy race of the deathless gods who are for ever, those that were
born of Earth and starry Heaven and gloomy Night and them that briny Sea
did rear. Tell how at the first gods and earth came to be, and rivers,
and the boundless sea with its raging swell, and the gleaming stars,
and the wide heaven above, and the gods who were born of them, givers
of good things, and how they divided their wealth, and how they
shared their honours amongst them, and also how at the first they took
many-folded Olympus. These things declare to me from the beginning, ye
Muses who dwell in the house of Olympus, and tell me which of them first
came to be.
(ll. 116-138) Verily at the first Chaos came to be, but next
wide-bosomed Earth, the ever-sure foundations of all [1604] the
deathless ones who hold the peaks of snowy Olympus, and dim Tartarus in
the depth of the wide-pathed Earth, and Eros (Love), fairest among the
deathless gods, who unnerves the limbs and overcomes the mind and wise
counsels of all gods and all men within them. From Chaos came forth
Erebus and black Night; but of Night were born Aether [1605] and Day,
whom she conceived and bare from union in love with Erebus. And Earth
first bare starry Heaven, equal to herself, to cover her on every side,
and to be an ever-sure abiding-place for the blessed gods. And she
brought forth long Hills, graceful haunts of the goddess-Nymphs who
dwell amongst the glens of the hills. She bare also the fruitless
deep with his raging swell, Pontus, without sweet union of love. But
afterwards she lay with Heaven and bare deep-swirling Oceanus, Coeus and
Crius and Hyperion and Iapetus, Theia and Rhea, Themis and Mnemosyne and
gold-crowned Phoebe and lovely Tethys. After them was born Cronos the
wily, youngest and most terrible of her children, and he hated his lusty
sire.
(ll. 139-146) And again, she bare the Cyclopes, overbearing in spirit,
Brontes, and Steropes and stubborn-hearted Arges [1606], who gave Zeus
the thunder and made the thunderbolt: in all else they were like the
gods, but one eye only was set in the midst of their fore-heads. And
they were surnamed Cyclopes (Orb-eyed) because one orbed eye was set in
their foreheads. Strength and might and craft were in their works.
(ll. 147-163) And again, three other sons were born of Earth and
Heaven, great and doughty beyond telling, Cottus and Briareos and Gyes,
presumptuous children. From their shoulders sprang an hundred arms, not
to be approached, and each had fifty heads upon his shoulders on their
strong limbs, and irresistible was the stubborn strength that was in
their great forms. For of all the children that were born of Earth and
Heaven, these were the most terrible, and they were hated by their own
father from the first.
And he used to hide them all away in a secret place of Earth so soon as
each was born, and would not suffer them to come up into the light: and
Heaven rejoiced in his evil doing. But vast Earth groaned within, being
straitened, and she made the element of grey flint and shaped a great
sickle, and told her plan to her dear sons. And she spoke, cheering
them, while she was vexed in her dear heart:
(ll. 164-166) 'My children, gotten of a sinful father, if you will
obey me, we should punish the vile outrage of your father; for he first
thought of doing shameful things. '
(ll. 167-169) So she said; but fear seized them all, and none of them
uttered a word. But great Cronos the wily took courage and answered his
dear mother:
(ll. 170-172) 'Mother, I will undertake to do this deed, for I reverence
not our father of evil name, for he first thought of doing shameful
things. '
(ll. 173-175) So he said: and vast Earth rejoiced greatly in spirit, and
set and hid him in an ambush, and put in his hands a jagged sickle, and
revealed to him the whole plot.
(ll. 176-206) And Heaven came, bringing on night and longing for love,
and he lay about Earth spreading himself full upon her [1607].
Then the son from his ambush stretched forth his left hand and in his
right took the great long sickle with jagged teeth, and swiftly lopped
off his own father's members and cast them away to fall behind him. And
not vainly did they fall from his hand; for all the bloody drops that
gushed forth Earth received, and as the seasons moved round she bare the
strong Erinyes and the great Giants with gleaming armour, holding long
spears in their hands and the Nymphs whom they call Meliae [1608] all
over the boundless earth. And so soon as he had cut off the members with
flint and cast them from the land into the surging sea, they were swept
away over the main a long time: and a white foam spread around them from
the immortal flesh, and in it there grew a maiden. First she drew near
holy Cythera, and from there, afterwards, she came to sea-girt Cyprus,
and came forth an awful and lovely goddess, and grass grew up about
her beneath her shapely feet. Her gods and men call Aphrodite, and the
foam-born goddess and rich-crowned Cytherea, because she grew amid the
foam, and Cytherea because she reached Cythera, and Cyprogenes because
she was born in billowy Cyprus, and Philommedes [1609] because sprang
from the members. And with her went Eros, and comely Desire followed her
at her birth at the first and as she went into the assembly of the gods.
This honour she has from the beginning, and this is the portion allotted
to her amongst men and undying gods,--the whisperings of maidens and
smiles and deceits with sweet delight and love and graciousness.
right and is ready to speak it, far-seeing Zeus gives him prosperity;
but whoever deliberately lies in his witness and forswears himself, and
so hurts Justice and sins beyond repair, that man's generation is left
obscure thereafter. But the generation of the man who swears truly is
better thenceforward.
(ll. 286-292) To you, foolish Perses, I will speak good sense. Badness
can be got easily and in shoals: the road to her is smooth, and she
lives very near us. But between us and Goodness the gods have placed the
sweat of our brows: long and steep is the path that leads to her, and it
is rough at the first; but when a man has reached the top, then is she
easy to reach, though before that she was hard.
(ll. 293-319) That man is altogether best who considers all things
himself and marks what will be better afterwards and at the end; and he,
again, is good who listens to a good adviser; but whoever neither
thinks for himself nor keeps in mind what another tells him, he is an
unprofitable man. But do you at any rate, always remembering my charge,
work, high-born Perses, that Hunger may hate you, and venerable Demeter
richly crowned may love you and fill your barn with food; for Hunger is
altogether a meet comrade for the sluggard. Both gods and men are angry
with a man who lives idle, for in nature he is like the stingless drones
who waste the labour of the bees, eating without working; but let it
be your care to order your work properly, that in the right season your
barns may be full of victual. Through work men grow rich in flocks
and substance, and working they are much better loved by the immortals
[1308]. Work is no disgrace: it is idleness which is a disgrace. But
if you work, the idle will soon envy you as you grow rich, for fame and
renown attend on wealth. And whatever be your lot, work is best for you,
if you turn your misguided mind away from other men's property to your
work and attend to your livelihood as I bid you. An evil shame is the
needy man's companion, shame which both greatly harms and prospers men:
shame is with poverty, but confidence with wealth.
(ll. 320-341) Wealth should not be seized: god-given wealth is much
better; for if a man take great wealth violently and perforce, or if he
steal it through his tongue, as often happens when gain deceives men's
sense and dishonour tramples down honour, the gods soon blot him out
and make that man's house low, and wealth attends him only for a little
time. Alike with him who does wrong to a suppliant or a guest, or who
goes up to his brother's bed and commits unnatural sin in lying with
his wife, or who infatuately offends against fatherless children, or who
abuses his old father at the cheerless threshold of old age and attacks
him with harsh words, truly Zeus himself is angry, and at the last
lays on him a heavy requittal for his evil doing. But do you turn your
foolish heart altogether away from these things, and, as far as you are
able, sacrifice to the deathless gods purely and cleanly, and burn
rich meats also, and at other times propitiate them with libations and
incense, both when you go to bed and when the holy light has come back,
that they may be gracious to you in heart and spirit, and so you may buy
another's holding and not another yours.
(ll. 342-351) Call your friend to a feast; but leave your enemy alone;
and especially call him who lives near you: for if any mischief
happen in the place, neighbours come ungirt, but kinsmen stay to gird
themselves [1309]. A bad neighbour is as great a plague as a good one
is a great blessing; he who enjoys a good neighbour has a precious
possession. Not even an ox would die but for a bad neighbour. Take
fair measure from your neighbour and pay him back fairly with the same
measure, or better, if you can; so that if you are in need afterwards,
you may find him sure.
(ll. 352-369) Do not get base gain: base gain is as bad as ruin. Be
friends with the friendly, and visit him who visits you. Give to one
who gives, but do not give to one who does not give. A man gives to the
free-handed, but no one gives to the close-fisted. Give is a good girl,
but Take is bad and she brings death. For the man who gives willingly,
even though he gives a great thing, rejoices in his gift and is glad
in heart; but whoever gives way to shamelessness and takes something
himself, even though it be a small thing, it freezes his heart. He who
adds to what he has, will keep off bright-eyed hunger; for if you add
only a little to a little and do this often, soon that little will
become great. What a man has by him at home does not trouble him: it is
better to have your stuff at home, for whatever is abroad may mean loss.
It is a good thing to draw on what you have; but it grieves your heart
to need something and not to have it, and I bid you mark this. Take
your fill when the cask is first opened and when it is nearly spent, but
midways be sparing: it is poor saving when you come to the lees.
(ll. 370-372) Let the wage promised to a friend be fixed; even with your
brother smile--and get a witness; for trust and mistrust, alike ruin
men.
(ll. 373-375) Do not let a flaunting woman coax and cozen and deceive
you: she is after your barn. The man who trusts womankind trusts
deceivers.
(ll. 376-380) There should be an only son, to feed his father's house,
for so wealth will increase in the home; but if you leave a second son
you should die old. Yet Zeus can easily give great wealth to a greater
number. More hands mean more work and more increase.
(ll. 381-382) If your heart within you desires wealth, do these things
and work with work upon work.
(ll. 383-404) When the Pleiades, daughters of Atlas, are rising [1310],
begin your harvest, and your ploughing when they are going to set
[1311]. Forty nights and days they are hidden and appear again as the
year moves round, when first you sharpen your sickle. This is the law
of the plains, and of those who live near the sea, and who inhabit rich
country, the glens and dingles far from the tossing sea,--strip to
sow and strip to plough and strip to reap, if you wish to get in all
Demeter's fruits in due season, and that each kind may grow in its
season. Else, afterwards, you may chance to be in want, and go begging
to other men's houses, but without avail; as you have already come to
me. But I will give you no more nor give you further measure. Foolish
Perses! Work the work which the gods ordained for men, lest in bitter
anguish of spirit you with your wife and children seek your livelihood
amongst your neighbours, and they do not heed you. Two or three times,
may be, you will succeed, but if you trouble them further, it will
not avail you, and all your talk will be in vain, and your word-play
unprofitable. Nay, I bid you find a way to pay your debts and avoid
hunger.
(ll. 405-413) First of all, get a house, and a woman and an ox for the
plough--a slave woman and not a wife, to follow the oxen as well--and
make everything ready at home, so that you may not have to ask of
another, and he refuses you, and so, because you are in lack, the season
pass by and your work come to nothing. Do not put your work off till
to-morrow and the day after; for a sluggish worker does not fill his
barn, nor one who puts off his work: industry makes work go well, but a
man who puts off work is always at hand-grips with ruin.
(ll. 414-447) When the piercing power and sultry heat of the sun abate,
and almighty Zeus sends the autumn rains [1312], and men's flesh comes
to feel far easier,--for then the star Sirius passes over the heads
of men, who are born to misery, only a little while by day and takes
greater share of night,--then, when it showers its leaves to the ground
and stops sprouting, the wood you cut with your axe is least liable to
worm. Then remember to hew your timber: it is the season for that work.
Cut a mortar [1313] three feet wide and a pestle three cubits long, and
an axle of seven feet, for it will do very well so; but if you make
it eight feet long, you can cut a beetle [1314] from it as well. Cut
a felloe three spans across for a waggon of ten palms' width. Hew also
many bent timbers, and bring home a plough-tree when you have found it,
and look out on the mountain or in the field for one of holm-oak; for
this is the strongest for oxen to plough with when one of Athena's
handmen has fixed in the share-beam and fastened it to the pole with
dowels. Get two ploughs ready work on them at home, one all of a piece,
and the other jointed. It is far better to do this, for if you should
break one of them, you can put the oxen to the other. Poles of laurel or
elm are most free from worms, and a share-beam of oak and a plough-tree
of holm-oak. Get two oxen, bulls of nine years; for their strength is
unspent and they are in the prime of their age: they are best for work.
They will not fight in the furrow and break the plough and then leave
the work undone. Let a brisk fellow of forty years follow them, with a
loaf of four quarters [1315] and eight slices [1316] for his dinner, one
who will attend to his work and drive a straight furrow and is past the
age for gaping after his fellows, but will keep his mind on his work. No
younger man will be better than he at scattering the seed and avoiding
double-sowing; for a man less staid gets disturbed, hankering after his
fellows.
(ll. 448-457) Mark, when you hear the voice of the crane [1317] who
cries year by year from the clouds above, for she give the signal for
ploughing and shows the season of rainy winter; but she vexes the heart
of the man who has no oxen. Then is the time to feed up your horned
oxen in the byre; for it is easy to say: 'Give me a yoke of oxen and a
waggon,' and it is easy to refuse: 'I have work for my oxen. ' The man
who is rich in fancy thinks his waggon as good as built already--the
fool! He does not know that there are a hundred timbers to a waggon.
Take care to lay these up beforehand at home.
(ll. 458-464) So soon as the time for ploughing is proclaimed to men,
then make haste, you and your slaves alike, in wet and in dry, to plough
in the season for ploughing, and bestir yourself early in the morning so
that your fields may be full. Plough in the spring; but fallow broken up
in the summer will not belie your hopes. Sow fallow land when the
soil is still getting light: fallow land is a defender from harm and a
soother of children.
(ll. 465-478) Pray to Zeus of the Earth and to pure Demeter to make
Demeter's holy grain sound and heavy, when first you begin ploughing,
when you hold in your hand the end of the plough-tail and bring down
your stick on the backs of the oxen as they draw on the pole-bar by the
yoke-straps. Let a slave follow a little behind with a mattock and make
trouble for the birds by hiding the seed; for good management is the
best for mortal men as bad management is the worst. In this way your
corn-ears will bow to the ground with fullness if the Olympian himself
gives a good result at the last, and you will sweep the cobwebs from
your bins and you will be glad, I ween, as you take of your garnered
substance. And so you will have plenty till you come to grey [1318]
springtime, and will not look wistfully to others, but another shall be
in need of your help.
(ll. 479-492) But if you plough the good ground at the solstice [1319],
you will reap sitting, grasping a thin crop in your hand, binding the
sheaves awry, dust-covered, not glad at all; so you will bring all home
in a basket and not many will admire you. Yet the will of Zeus who holds
the aegis is different at different times; and it is hard for mortal
men to tell it; for if you should plough late, you may find this
remedy--when the cuckoo first calls [1320] in the leaves of the oak and
makes men glad all over the boundless earth, if Zeus should send rain
on the third day and not cease until it rises neither above an ox's hoof
nor falls short of it, then the late-plougher will vie with the early.
Keep all this well in mind, and fail not to mark grey spring as it comes
and the season of rain.
(ll 493-501) Pass by the smithy and its crowded lounge in winter time
when the cold keeps men from field work,--for then an industrious man
can greatly prosper his house--lest bitter winter catch you helpless and
poor and you chafe a swollen foot with a shrunk hand. The idle man
who waits on empty hope, lacking a livelihood, lays to heart
mischief-making; it is not an wholesome hope that accompanies a need man
who lolls at ease while he has no sure livelihood.
(ll. 502-503) While it is yet midsummer command your slaves: 'It will
not always be summer, build barns. '
(ll. 504-535) Avoid the month Lenaeon [1321], wretched days, all of them
fit to skin an ox, and the frosts which are cruel when Boreas blows over
the earth. He blows across horse-breeding Thrace upon the wide sea and
stirs it up, while earth and the forest howl. On many a high-leafed
oak and thick pine he falls and brings them to the bounteous earth in
mountain glens: then all the immense wood roars and the beasts shudder
and put their tails between their legs, even those whose hide is covered
with fur; for with his bitter blast he blows even through them although
they are shaggy-breasted. He goes even through an ox's hide; it does not
stop him. Also he blows through the goat's fine hair. But through the
fleeces of sheep, because their wool is abundant, the keen wind Boreas
pierces not at all; but it makes the old man curved as a wheel. And it
does not blow through the tender maiden who stays indoors with her
dear mother, unlearned as yet in the works of golden Aphrodite, and who
washes her soft body and anoints herself with oil and lies down in an
inner room within the house, on a winter's day when the Boneless One
[1322] gnaws his foot in his fireless house and wretched home; for the
sun shows him no pastures to make for, but goes to and fro over the land
and city of dusky men [1323], and shines more sluggishly upon the whole
race of the Hellenes. Then the horned and unhorned denizens of the wood,
with teeth chattering pitifully, flee through the copses and glades, and
all, as they seek shelter, have this one care, to gain thick coverts or
some hollow rock. Then, like the Three-legged One [1324] whose back is
broken and whose head looks down upon the ground, like him, I say, they
wander to escape the white snow.
(ll. 536-563) Then put on, as I bid you, a soft coat and a tunic to the
feet to shield your body,--and you should weave thick woof on thin warp.
In this clothe yourself so that your hair may keep still and not bristle
and stand upon end all over your body.
Lace on your feet close-fitting boots of the hide of a slaughtered ox,
thickly lined with felt inside. And when the season of frost comes on,
stitch together skins of firstling kids with ox-sinew, to put over your
back and to keep off the rain. On your head above wear a shaped cap
of felt to keep your ears from getting wet, for the dawn is chill when
Boreas has once made his onslaught, and at dawn a fruitful mist is
spread over the earth from starry heaven upon the fields of blessed men:
it is drawn from the ever flowing rivers and is raised high above the
earth by windstorm, and sometimes it turns to rain towards evening, and
sometimes to wind when Thracian Boreas huddles the thick clouds. Finish
your work and return home ahead of him, and do not let the dark cloud
from heaven wrap round you and make your body clammy and soak your
clothes. Avoid it; for this is the hardest month, wintry, hard for sheep
and hard for men. In this season let your oxen have half their usual
food, but let your man have more; for the helpful nights are long.
Observe all this until the year is ended and you have nights and days
of equal length, and Earth, the mother of all, bears again her various
fruit.
(ll. 564-570) When Zeus has finished sixty wintry days after the
solstice, then the star Arcturus [1325] leaves the holy stream of
Ocean and first rises brilliant at dusk. After him the shrilly wailing
daughter of Pandion, the swallow, appears to men when spring is just
beginning. Before she comes, prune the vines, for it is best so.
(ll. 571-581) But when the House-carrier [1326] climbs up the plants
from the earth to escape the Pleiades, then it is no longer the season
for digging vineyards, but to whet your sickles and rouse up your
slaves. Avoid shady seats and sleeping until dawn in the harvest season,
when the sun scorches the body. Then be busy, and bring home your
fruits, getting up early to make your livelihood sure. For dawn takes
away a third part of your work, dawn advances a man on his journey and
advances him in his work,--dawn which appears and sets many men on their
road, and puts yokes on many oxen.
(ll. 582-596) But when the artichoke flowers [1327], and the chirping
grass-hopper sits in a tree and pours down his shrill song continually
from under his wings in the season of wearisome heat, then goats are
plumpest and wine sweetest; women are most wanton, but men are feeblest,
because Sirius parches head and knees and the skin is dry through heat.
But at that time let me have a shady rock and wine of Biblis, a clot of
curds and milk of drained goats with the flesh of an heifer fed in the
woods, that has never calved, and of firstling kids; then also let me
drink bright wine, sitting in the shade, when my heart is satisfied
with food, and so, turning my head to face the fresh Zephyr, from the
everflowing spring which pours down unfouled thrice pour an offering of
water, but make a fourth libation of wine.
(ll. 597-608) Set your slaves to winnow Demeter's holy grain, when
strong Orion [1328] first appears, on a smooth threshing-floor in an
airy place. Then measure it and store it in jars. And so soon as you
have safely stored all your stuff indoors, I bid you put your bondman
out of doors and look out for a servant-girl with no children;--for a
servant with a child to nurse is troublesome. And look after the
dog with jagged teeth; do not grudge him his food, or some time the
Day-sleeper [1329] may take your stuff. Bring in fodder and litter so
as to have enough for your oxen and mules. After that, let your men rest
their poor knees and unyoke your pair of oxen.
(ll. 609-617) But when Orion and Sirius are come into mid-heaven,
and rosy-fingered Dawn sees Arcturus [1330], then cut off all the
grape-clusters, Perses, and bring them home. Show them to the sun ten
days and ten nights: then cover them over for five, and on the sixth
day draw off into vessels the gifts of joyful Dionysus. But when the
Pleiades and Hyades and strong Orion begin to set [1331], then remember
to plough in season: and so the completed year [1332] will fitly pass
beneath the earth.
(ll. 618-640) But if desire for uncomfortable sea-faring seize you; when
the Pleiades plunge into the misty sea [1333] to escape Orion's rude
strength, then truly gales of all kinds rage. Then keep ships no longer
on the sparkling sea, but bethink you to till the land as I bid you.
Haul up your ship upon the land and pack it closely with stones all
round to keep off the power of the winds which blow damply, and draw out
the bilge-plug so that the rain of heaven may not rot it. Put away
all the tackle and fittings in your house, and stow the wings of the
sea-going ship neatly, and hang up the well-shaped rudder over the
smoke. You yourself wait until the season for sailing is come, and then
haul your swift ship down to the sea and stow a convenient cargo in it,
so that you may bring home profit, even as your father and mine,
foolish Perses, used to sail on shipboard because he lacked sufficient
livelihood. And one day he came to this very place crossing over a
great stretch of sea; he left Aeolian Cyme and fled, not from riches and
substance, but from wretched poverty which Zeus lays upon men, and
he settled near Helicon in a miserable hamlet, Ascra, which is bad in
winter, sultry in summer, and good at no time.
(ll. 641-645) But you, Perses, remember all works in their season but
sailing especially. Admire a small ship, but put your freight in a large
one; for the greater the lading, the greater will be your piled gain, if
only the winds will keep back their harmful gales.
(ll. 646-662) If ever you turn your misguided heart to trading and with
to escape from debt and joyless hunger, I will show you the measures of
the loud-roaring sea, though I have no skill in sea-faring nor in ships;
for never yet have I sailed by ship over the wide sea, but only to
Euboea from Aulis where the Achaeans once stayed through much storm when
they had gathered a great host from divine Hellas for Troy, the land
of fair women. Then I crossed over to Chalcis, to the games of wise
Amphidamas where the sons of the great-hearted hero proclaimed and
appointed prizes. And there I boast that I gained the victory with a
song and carried off an handled tripod which I dedicated to the Muses of
Helicon, in the place where they first set me in the way of clear song.
Such is all my experience of many-pegged ships; nevertheless I will tell
you the will of Zeus who holds the aegis; for the Muses have taught me
to sing in marvellous song.
(ll. 663-677) Fifty days after the solstice [1334], when the season
of wearisome heat is come to an end, is the right time for me to go
sailing. Then you will not wreck your ship, nor will the sea destroy the
sailors, unless Poseidon the Earth-Shaker be set upon it, or Zeus, the
king of the deathless gods, wish to slay them; for the issues of good
and evil alike are with them. At that time the winds are steady, and
the sea is harmless. Then trust in the winds without care, and haul your
swift ship down to the sea and put all the freight on board; but make
all haste you can to return home again and do not wait till the time of
the new wine and autumn rain and oncoming storms with the fierce gales
of Notus who accompanies the heavy autumn rain of Zeus and stirs up the
sea and makes the deep dangerous.
(ll. 678-694) Another time for men to go sailing is in spring when a
man first sees leaves on the topmost shoot of a fig-tree as large as the
foot-print that a cow makes; then the sea is passable, and this is the
spring sailing time. For my part I do not praise it, for my heart does
not like it. Such a sailing is snatched, and you will hardly avoid
mischief. Yet in their ignorance men do even this, for wealth means life
to poor mortals; but it is fearful to die among the waves. But I bid you
consider all these things in your heart as I say. Do not put all your
goods in hallow ships; leave the greater part behind, and put the lesser
part on board; for it is a bad business to meet with disaster among
the waves of the sea, as it is bad if you put too great a load on your
waggon and break the axle, and your goods are spoiled. Observe due
measure: and proportion is best in all things.
(ll. 695-705) Bring home a wife to your house when you are of the right
age, while you are not far short of thirty years nor much above; this is
the right age for marriage. Let your wife have been grown up four years,
and marry her in the fifth. Marry a maiden, so that you can teach her
careful ways, and especially marry one who lives near you, but look
well about you and see that your marriage will not be a joke to your
neighbours. For a man wins nothing better than a good wife, and, again,
nothing worse than a bad one, a greedy soul who roasts her man without
fire, strong though he may be, and brings him to a raw [1335] old age.
(ll. 706-714) Be careful to avoid the anger of the deathless gods. Do
not make a friend equal to a brother; but if you do, do not wrong him
first, and do not lie to please the tongue. But if he wrongs you first,
offending either in word or in deed, remember to repay him double;
but if he ask you to be his friend again and be ready to give you
satisfaction, welcome him. He is a worthless man who makes now one and
now another his friend; but as for you, do not let your face put your
heart to shame [1336].
(ll. 715-716) Do not get a name either as lavish or as churlish; as a
friend of rogues or as a slanderer of good men.
(ll. 717-721) Never dare to taunt a man with deadly poverty which eats
out the heart; it is sent by the deathless gods. The best treasure a man
can have is a sparing tongue, and the greatest pleasure, one that moves
orderly; for if you speak evil, you yourself will soon be worse spoken
of.
(ll. 722-723) Do not be boorish at a common feast where there are many
guests; the pleasure is greatest and the expense is least [1337].
(ll. 724-726) Never pour a libation of sparkling wine to Zeus after dawn
with unwashen hands, nor to others of the deathless gods; else they do
not hear your prayers but spit them back.
(ll. 727-732) Do not stand upright facing the sun when you make water,
but remember to do this when he has set towards his rising. And do not
make water as you go, whether on the road or off the road, and do not
uncover yourself: the nights belong to the blessed gods. A scrupulous
man who has a wise heart sits down or goes to the wall of an enclosed
court.
(ll. 733-736) Do not expose yourself befouled by the fireside in your
house, but avoid this. Do not beget children when you are come back from
ill-omened burial, but after a festival of the gods.
(ll. 737-741) Never cross the sweet-flowing water of ever-rolling rivers
afoot until you have prayed, gazing into the soft flood, and washed your
hands in the clear, lovely water. Whoever crosses a river with hands
unwashed of wickedness, the gods are angry with him and bring trouble
upon him afterwards.
(ll. 742-743) At a cheerful festival of the gods do not cut the withered
from the quick upon that which has five branches [1338] with bright
steel.
(ll. 744-745) Never put the ladle upon the mixing-bowl at a wine party,
for malignant ill-luck is attached to that.
(ll.
746-747) When you are building a house, do not leave it rough-hewn,
or a cawing crow may settle on it and croak.
(ll. 748-749) Take nothing to eat or to wash with from uncharmed pots,
for in them there is mischief.
(ll. 750-759) Do not let a boy of twelve years sit on things which may
not be moved [1339], for that is bad, and makes a man unmanly; nor yet
a child of twelve months, for that has the same effect. A man should
not clean his body with water in which a woman has washed, for there is
bitter mischief in that also for a time. When you come upon a burning
sacrifice, do not make a mock of mysteries, for Heaven is angry at this
also. Never make water in the mouths of rivers which flow to the sea,
nor yet in springs; but be careful to avoid this. And do not ease
yourself in them: it is not well to do this.
(ll. 760-763) So do: and avoid the talk of men. For Talk is mischievous,
light, and easily raised, but hard to bear and difficult to be rid of.
Talk never wholly dies away when many people voice her: even Talk is in
some ways divine.
(ll. 765-767) Mark the days which come from Zeus, duly telling your
slaves of them, and that the thirtieth day of the month is best for one
to look over the work and to deal out supplies.
(ll. 769-768) [1340] For these are days which come from Zeus the
all-wise, when men discern aright.
(ll. 770-779) To begin with, the first, the fourth, and the seventh--on
which Leto bare Apollo with the blade of gold--each is a holy day. The
eighth and the ninth, two days at least of the waxing month [1341], are
specially good for the works of man. Also the eleventh and twelfth are
both excellent, alike for shearing sheep and for reaping the kindly
fruits; but the twelfth is much better than the eleventh, for on it the
airy-swinging spider spins its web in full day, and then the Wise One
[1342], gathers her pile. On that day woman should set up her loom and
get forward with her work.
(ll. 780-781) Avoid the thirteenth of the waxing month for beginning to
sow: yet it is the best day for setting plants.
(ll. 782-789) The sixth of the mid-month is very unfavourable for
plants, but is good for the birth of males, though unfavourable for a
girl either to be born at all or to be married. Nor is the first sixth
a fit day for a girl to be born, but a kindly for gelding kids and sheep
and for fencing in a sheep-cote. It is favourable for the birth of a
boy, but such will be fond of sharp speech, lies, and cunning words, and
stealthy converse.
(ll. 790-791) On the eighth of the month geld the boar and
loud-bellowing bull, but hard-working mules on the twelfth.
(ll. 792-799) On the great twentieth, in full day, a wise man should be
born. Such an one is very sound-witted. The tenth is favourable for a
male to be born; but, for a girl, the fourth day of the mid-month. On
that day tame sheep and shambling, horned oxen, and the sharp-fanged
dog and hardy mules to the touch of the hand. But take care to avoid
troubles which eat out the heart on the fourth of the beginning and
ending of the month; it is a day very fraught with fate.
(ll. 800-801) On the fourth of the month bring home your bride, but
choose the omens which are best for this business.
(ll. 802-804) Avoid fifth days: they are unkindly and terrible. On a
fifth day, they say, the Erinyes assisted at the birth of Horcus (Oath)
whom Eris (Strife) bare to trouble the forsworn. {[0-9]} (ll. 805-809)
Look about you very carefully and throw out Demeter's holy grain upon
the well-rolled [1343] threshing floor on the seventh of the mid-month.
Let the woodman cut beams for house building and plenty of ships'
timbers, such as are suitable for ships. On the fourth day begin to
build narrow ships.
(ll. 810-813) The ninth of the mid-month improves towards evening; but
the first ninth of all is quite harmless for men. It is a good day on
which to beget or to be born both for a male and a female: it is never
an wholly evil day.
(ll. 814-818) Again, few know that the twenty-seventh of the month is
best for opening a wine-jar, and putting yokes on the necks of oxen
and mules and swift-footed horses, and for hauling a swift ship of many
thwarts down to the sparkling sea; few call it by its right name.
(ll. 819-821) On the fourth day open a jar. The fourth of the mid-month
is a day holy above all. And again, few men know that the fourth day
after the twentieth is best while it is morning: towards evening it is
less good.
(ll. 822-828) These days are a great blessing to men on earth; but the
rest are changeable, luckless, and bring nothing. Everyone praises
a different day but few know their nature. Sometimes a day is a
stepmother, sometimes a mother. That man is happy and lucky in them who
knows all these things and does his work without offending the deathless
gods, who discerns the omens of birds and avoids transgressions.
THE DIVINATION BY BIRDS (fragments)
Proclus on Works and Days, 828: Some make the "Divination by Birds",
which Apollonius of Rhodes rejects as spurious, follow this verse
("Works and Days", 828).
THE ASTRONOMY (fragments)
Fragment #1--Athenaeus xi, p. 491 d: And the author of "The Astronomy",
which is attributed forsooth to Hesiod, always calls them (the Pleiades)
Peleiades: 'but mortals call them Peleiades'; and again, 'the stormy
Peleiades go down'; and again, 'then the Peleiades hide away. . . . '
Scholiast on Pindar, Nem. ii. 16: The Pleiades. . . . whose stars are
these:--'Lovely Teygata, and dark-faced Electra, and Alcyone, and
bright Asterope, and Celaeno, and Maia, and Merope, whom glorious Atlas
begot. . . . ' ((LACUNA)) 'In the mountains of Cyllene she (Maia) bare
Hermes, the herald of the gods. '
Fragment #2--Scholiast on Aratus 254: But Zeus made them (the sisters of
Hyas) into the stars which are called Hyades. Hesiod in his Book about
Stars tells us their names as follows: 'Nymphs like the Graces [1401],
Phaesyle and Coronis and rich-crowned Cleeia and lovely Phaco and
long-robed Eudora, whom the tribes of men upon the earth call Hyades. '
Fragment #3--Pseudo-Eratosthenes Catast. frag. 1: [1402] The Great
Bear. ]--Hesiod says she (Callisto) was the daughter of Lycaon and
lived in Arcadia. She chose to occupy herself with wild-beasts in the
mountains together with Artemis, and, when she was seduced by Zeus,
continued some time undetected by the goddess, but afterwards, when she
was already with child, was seen by her bathing and so discovered. Upon
this, the goddess was enraged and changed her into a beast. Thus she
became a bear and gave birth to a son called Arcas. But while she was in
the mountains, she was hunted by some goat-herds and given up with
her babe to Lycaon. Some while after, she thought fit to go into the
forbidden precinct of Zeus, not knowing the law, and being pursued by
her own son and the Arcadians, was about to be killed because of the
said law; but Zeus delivered her because of her connection with him
and put her among the stars, giving her the name Bear because of the
misfortune which had befallen her.
Comm. Supplem. on Aratus, p. 547 M. 8: Of Bootes, also called the
Bear-warden. The story goes that he is Arcas the son of Callisto and
Zeus, and he lived in the country about Lycaeum. After Zeus had seduced
Callisto, Lycaon, pretending not to know of the matter, entertained
Zeus, as Hesiod says, and set before him on the table the babe which he
had cut up.
Fragment #4--Pseudo-Eratosthenes, Catast. fr. xxxii: Orion. ]--Hesiod
says that he was the son of Euryale, the daughter of Minos, and of
Poseidon, and that there was given him as a gift the power of walking
upon the waves as though upon land. When he was come to Chios, he
outraged Merope, the daughter of Oenopion, being drunken; but Oenopion
when he learned of it was greatly vexed at the outrage and blinded him
and cast him out of the country. Then he came to Lemnos as a beggar and
there met Hephaestus who took pity on him and gave him Cedalion his own
servant to guide him. So Orion took Cedalion upon his shoulders and used
to carry him about while he pointed out the roads. Then he came to the
east and appears to have met Helius (the Sun) and to have been healed,
and so returned back again to Oenopion to punish him; but Oenopion was
hidden away by his people underground. Being disappointed, then, in his
search for the king, Orion went away to Crete and spent his time hunting
in company with Artemis and Leto. It seems that he threatened to kill
every beast there was on earth; whereupon, in her anger, Earth sent up
against him a scorpion of very great size by which he was stung and so
perished. After this Zeus, at one prayer of Artemis and Leto, put him
among the stars, because of his manliness, and the scorpion also as a
memorial of him and of what had occurred.
Fragment #5--Diodorus iv. 85: Some say that great earthquakes occurred,
which broke through the neck of land and formed the straits [1403], the
sea parting the mainland from the island. But Hesiod, the poet, says
just the opposite: that the sea was open, but Orion piled up the
promontory by Peloris, and founded the close of Poseidon which is
especially esteemed by the people thereabouts. When he had finished
this, he went away to Euboea and settled there, and because of his
renown was taken into the number of the stars in heaven, and won undying
remembrance.
THE PRECEPTS OF CHIRON (fragments)
Fragment #1--Scholiast on Pindar, Pyth. vi. 19: 'And now, pray, mark
all these things well in a wise heart. First, whenever you come to your
house, offer good sacrifices to the eternal gods. '
Fragment #2--Plutarch Mor. 1034 E: 'Decide no suit until you have heard
both sides speak. '
Fragment #3--Plutarch de Orac. defectu ii. 415 C: 'A chattering crow
lives out nine generations of aged men, but a stag's life is four times
a crow's, and a raven's life makes three stags old, while the phoenix
outlives nine ravens, but we, the rich-haired Nymphs, daughters of Zeus
the aegis-holder, outlive ten phoenixes. '
Fragment #4--Quintilian, i. 15: Some consider that children under the
age of seven should not receive a literary education. . . That Hesiod
was of this opinion very many writers affirm who were earlier than the
critic Aristophanes; for he was the first to reject the "Precepts", in
which book this maxim occurs, as a work of that poet.
THE GREAT WORKS (fragments)
Fragment #1--Comm. on Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics. v. 8: The verse,
however (the slaying of Rhadamanthys), is in Hesiod in the "Great Works"
and is as follows: 'If a man sow evil, he shall reap evil increase; if
men do to him as he has done, it will be true justice. '
Fragment #2--Proclus on Hesiod, Works and Days, 126: Some believe that
the Silver Race (is to be attributed to) the earth, declaring that in
the "Great Works" Hesiod makes silver to be of the family of Earth.
THE IDAEAN DACTYLS (fragments)
Fragment #1--Pliny, Natural History vii. 56, 197: Hesiod says that those
who are called the Idaean Dactyls taught the smelting and tempering of
iron in Crete.
Fragment #2--Clement, Stromateis i. 16. 75: Celmis, again, and
Damnameneus, the first of the Idaean Dactyls, discovered iron in Cyprus;
but bronze smelting was discovered by Delas, another Idaean, though
Hesiod calls him Scythes [1501].
THE THEOGONY (1,041 lines)
(ll. 1-25) From the Heliconian Muses let us begin to sing, who hold
the great and holy mount of Helicon, and dance on soft feet about the
deep-blue spring and the altar of the almighty son of Cronos, and, when
they have washed their tender bodies in Permessus or in the Horse's
Spring or Olmeius, make their fair, lovely dances upon highest Helicon
and move with vigorous feet. Thence they arise and go abroad by night,
veiled in thick mist, and utter their song with lovely voice, praising
Zeus the aegis-holder and queenly Hera of Argos who walks on golden
sandals and the daughter of Zeus the aegis-holder bright-eyed Athene,
and Phoebus Apollo, and Artemis who delights in arrows, and Poseidon
the earth-holder who shakes the earth, and reverend Themis and
quick-glancing [1601] Aphrodite, and Hebe with the crown of gold, and
fair Dione, Leto, Iapetus, and Cronos the crafty counsellor, Eos and
great Helius and bright Selene, Earth too, and great Oceanus, and dark
Night, and the holy race of all the other deathless ones that are
for ever. And one day they taught Hesiod glorious song while he was
shepherding his lambs under holy Helicon, and this word first the
goddesses said to me--the Muses of Olympus, daughters of Zeus who holds
the aegis:
(ll. 26-28) 'Shepherds of the wilderness, wretched things of shame,
mere bellies, we know how to speak many false things as though they were
true; but we know, when we will, to utter true things. '
(ll. 29-35) So said the ready-voiced daughters of great Zeus, and they
plucked and gave me a rod, a shoot of sturdy laurel, a marvellous thing,
and breathed into me a divine voice to celebrate things that shall be
and things there were aforetime; and they bade me sing of the race of
the blessed gods that are eternally, but ever to sing of themselves both
first and last. But why all this about oak or stone? [1602]
(ll. 36-52) Come thou, let us begin with the Muses who gladden the great
spirit of their father Zeus in Olympus with their songs, telling
of things that are and that shall be and that were aforetime with
consenting voice. Unwearying flows the sweet sound from their lips,
and the house of their father Zeus the loud-thunderer is glad at the
lily-like voice of the goddesses as it spread abroad, and the peaks of
snowy Olympus resound, and the homes of the immortals. And they uttering
their immortal voice, celebrate in song first of all the reverend race
of the gods from the beginning, those whom Earth and wide Heaven begot,
and the gods sprung of these, givers of good things. Then, next, the
goddesses sing of Zeus, the father of gods and men, as they begin and
end their strain, how much he is the most excellent among the gods
and supreme in power. And again, they chant the race of men and strong
giants, and gladden the heart of Zeus within Olympus,--the Olympian
Muses, daughters of Zeus the aegis-holder.
(ll. 53-74) Them in Pieria did Mnemosyne (Memory), who reigns over the
hills of Eleuther, bear of union with the father, the son of Cronos, a
forgetting of ills and a rest from sorrow. For nine nights did wise Zeus
lie with her, entering her holy bed remote from the immortals. And when
a year was passed and the seasons came round as the months waned, and
many days were accomplished, she bare nine daughters, all of one mind,
whose hearts are set upon song and their spirit free from care, a little
way from the topmost peak of snowy Olympus. There are their bright
dancing-places and beautiful homes, and beside them the Graces and
Himerus (Desire) live in delight. And they, uttering through their
lips a lovely voice, sing the laws of all and the goodly ways of the
immortals, uttering their lovely voice. Then went they to Olympus,
delighting in their sweet voice, with heavenly song, and the dark earth
resounded about them as they chanted, and a lovely sound rose up beneath
their feet as they went to their father. And he was reigning in heaven,
himself holding the lightning and glowing thunderbolt, when he had
overcome by might his father Cronos; and he distributed fairly to the
immortals their portions and declared their privileges.
(ll. 75-103) These things, then, the Muses sang who dwell on Olympus,
nine daughters begotten by great Zeus, Cleio and Euterpe, Thaleia,
Melpomene and Terpsichore, and Erato and Polyhymnia and Urania and
Calliope [1603], who is the chiefest of them all, for she attends on
worshipful princes: whomsoever of heaven-nourished princes the daughters
of great Zeus honour, and behold him at his birth, they pour sweet dew
upon his tongue, and from his lips flow gracious words. All the people
look towards him while he settles causes with true judgements: and he,
speaking surely, would soon make wise end even of a great quarrel; for
therefore are there princes wise in heart, because when the people are
being misguided in their assembly, they set right the matter again with
ease, persuading them with gentle words. And when he passes through
a gathering, they greet him as a god with gentle reverence, and he is
conspicuous amongst the assembled: such is the holy gift of the Muses to
men. For it is through the Muses and far-shooting Apollo that there are
singers and harpers upon the earth; but princes are of Zeus, and happy
is he whom the Muses love: sweet flows speech from his mouth. For though
a man have sorrow and grief in his newly-troubled soul and live in dread
because his heart is distressed, yet, when a singer, the servant of the
Muses, chants the glorious deeds of men of old and the blessed gods who
inhabit Olympus, at once he forgets his heaviness and remembers not his
sorrows at all; but the gifts of the goddesses soon turn him away from
these.
(ll. 104-115) Hail, children of Zeus! Grant lovely song and celebrate
the holy race of the deathless gods who are for ever, those that were
born of Earth and starry Heaven and gloomy Night and them that briny Sea
did rear. Tell how at the first gods and earth came to be, and rivers,
and the boundless sea with its raging swell, and the gleaming stars,
and the wide heaven above, and the gods who were born of them, givers
of good things, and how they divided their wealth, and how they
shared their honours amongst them, and also how at the first they took
many-folded Olympus. These things declare to me from the beginning, ye
Muses who dwell in the house of Olympus, and tell me which of them first
came to be.
(ll. 116-138) Verily at the first Chaos came to be, but next
wide-bosomed Earth, the ever-sure foundations of all [1604] the
deathless ones who hold the peaks of snowy Olympus, and dim Tartarus in
the depth of the wide-pathed Earth, and Eros (Love), fairest among the
deathless gods, who unnerves the limbs and overcomes the mind and wise
counsels of all gods and all men within them. From Chaos came forth
Erebus and black Night; but of Night were born Aether [1605] and Day,
whom she conceived and bare from union in love with Erebus. And Earth
first bare starry Heaven, equal to herself, to cover her on every side,
and to be an ever-sure abiding-place for the blessed gods. And she
brought forth long Hills, graceful haunts of the goddess-Nymphs who
dwell amongst the glens of the hills. She bare also the fruitless
deep with his raging swell, Pontus, without sweet union of love. But
afterwards she lay with Heaven and bare deep-swirling Oceanus, Coeus and
Crius and Hyperion and Iapetus, Theia and Rhea, Themis and Mnemosyne and
gold-crowned Phoebe and lovely Tethys. After them was born Cronos the
wily, youngest and most terrible of her children, and he hated his lusty
sire.
(ll. 139-146) And again, she bare the Cyclopes, overbearing in spirit,
Brontes, and Steropes and stubborn-hearted Arges [1606], who gave Zeus
the thunder and made the thunderbolt: in all else they were like the
gods, but one eye only was set in the midst of their fore-heads. And
they were surnamed Cyclopes (Orb-eyed) because one orbed eye was set in
their foreheads. Strength and might and craft were in their works.
(ll. 147-163) And again, three other sons were born of Earth and
Heaven, great and doughty beyond telling, Cottus and Briareos and Gyes,
presumptuous children. From their shoulders sprang an hundred arms, not
to be approached, and each had fifty heads upon his shoulders on their
strong limbs, and irresistible was the stubborn strength that was in
their great forms. For of all the children that were born of Earth and
Heaven, these were the most terrible, and they were hated by their own
father from the first.
And he used to hide them all away in a secret place of Earth so soon as
each was born, and would not suffer them to come up into the light: and
Heaven rejoiced in his evil doing. But vast Earth groaned within, being
straitened, and she made the element of grey flint and shaped a great
sickle, and told her plan to her dear sons. And she spoke, cheering
them, while she was vexed in her dear heart:
(ll. 164-166) 'My children, gotten of a sinful father, if you will
obey me, we should punish the vile outrage of your father; for he first
thought of doing shameful things. '
(ll. 167-169) So she said; but fear seized them all, and none of them
uttered a word. But great Cronos the wily took courage and answered his
dear mother:
(ll. 170-172) 'Mother, I will undertake to do this deed, for I reverence
not our father of evil name, for he first thought of doing shameful
things. '
(ll. 173-175) So he said: and vast Earth rejoiced greatly in spirit, and
set and hid him in an ambush, and put in his hands a jagged sickle, and
revealed to him the whole plot.
(ll. 176-206) And Heaven came, bringing on night and longing for love,
and he lay about Earth spreading himself full upon her [1607].
Then the son from his ambush stretched forth his left hand and in his
right took the great long sickle with jagged teeth, and swiftly lopped
off his own father's members and cast them away to fall behind him. And
not vainly did they fall from his hand; for all the bloody drops that
gushed forth Earth received, and as the seasons moved round she bare the
strong Erinyes and the great Giants with gleaming armour, holding long
spears in their hands and the Nymphs whom they call Meliae [1608] all
over the boundless earth. And so soon as he had cut off the members with
flint and cast them from the land into the surging sea, they were swept
away over the main a long time: and a white foam spread around them from
the immortal flesh, and in it there grew a maiden. First she drew near
holy Cythera, and from there, afterwards, she came to sea-girt Cyprus,
and came forth an awful and lovely goddess, and grass grew up about
her beneath her shapely feet. Her gods and men call Aphrodite, and the
foam-born goddess and rich-crowned Cytherea, because she grew amid the
foam, and Cytherea because she reached Cythera, and Cyprogenes because
she was born in billowy Cyprus, and Philommedes [1609] because sprang
from the members. And with her went Eros, and comely Desire followed her
at her birth at the first and as she went into the assembly of the gods.
This honour she has from the beginning, and this is the portion allotted
to her amongst men and undying gods,--the whisperings of maidens and
smiles and deceits with sweet delight and love and graciousness.
