Jason and the Argonauts

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Jason and the Argonauts Page 12

by Apollonius Of Rhodes


  a lethal beast. Even the marsh nymphs feared it

  feeding alone along the river flats.

  No mortal knew that it was there.

  When Idmon

  was strolling on the muddy riverbank,

  1070it rushed out of some purlieu in the willows,

  gored his thigh, cut through cartilage and femur.

  Idmon shrieked and fell. His friends called out,

  and Peleus quickly loosed a spear and struck

  the monster as it fled into the swamp.

  1075When it returned and charged them, Idas pierced it,

  and it collapsed upon the sharp tip, squealing.

  Leaving it thus impaled, they trundled Idmon

  back to the Argo where he coughed up blood

  and shortly died in his inconsolable

  comrades’ arms.

  1080 (835)They thought no more of sailing

  but stayed there, grieving, to entomb the body.

  Three days they wailed and on the fourth interred him

  with hero’s honors. Lycus and his subjects

  joined in the mourning, slaughtered many sheep

  1085as funeral offerings around the tomb,

  as is the custom for the dear departed.

  So in a foreign country Idmon’s barrow

  was heaped up, and a marker planted on it

  for future generations to admire—

  1090a wild olive tree, the tree of shipwrights,

  a tree that still is flourishing today

  under the Acherousian cliffs.

  Because

  I heed the Muses’ will, I must declare,

  upfront, this fact as well: Phoebus Apollo

  1095 (847)commanded the Boeotians and Niseans

  to worship Idmon as a city founder

  and build a town around his barrow tree.

  Today, though, all the Mariandynians there

  venerate Agamestor rather than

  1100god-fearing Idmon, Aeolus’ grandson.

  Who else died there? (The heroes surely raised

  a second barrow for a fallen comrade

  because two mounds are standing to this day.)

  Tiphys it was, the son of Hagnias—

  1105so runs the story. It was not his fate

  to steer the Argo farther toward its goal.

  Once they had buried Idmon, a malignant

  disease afflicted Tiphys, left him prostrate

  and bedrid far, far, from his fatherland.

  1110 (858)Struck by these dreadful blows, the men gave way

  to absolute despair. Once they had buried

  this second fallen comrade, they collapsed

  beside the sea in utter helplessness,

  shrouded their bodies tightly in their cloaks,

  1115and lost all love of food and drink. Grief-stricken,

  they threw their hearts away because returning

  to Greece was now outside their expectations.

  They would have stayed there, grieving, even longer

  had Hera not stepped in and filled Ancaeus

  1120with special bravery. Astypylaia

  conceived him underneath the god Poseidon

  and birthed him next to the Imbrasus River,

  and he was wise in all the ways of seacraft.

  This fellow rushed to Peleus and said:

  1125 (869)“Son of Aeacus, how can it be noble

  to rest a long time in a foreign land,

  shirking our task? Surely the son of Aeson

  recruited me out of Parthenia

  to undertake this journey for the fleece

  1130more for my expertise in steering ships

  than making war. Therefore, don’t have the slightest

  fear for the Argo. There are expert sailors

  among us, none of whom would wreck the voyage

  if we should set him at the helm. Go swiftly,

  1135tell our comrades all these things, be firm,

  force them to think again about the quest.”

  So he explained, and Peleus’ spirit

  leapt with delight, and he was quick to shout:

  “Why, comrades, are we clinging to a sorrow

  1140 (881)as profitless as this? These two have died,

  I think, the death they were allotted. Think, now,

  there are other steersmen in our crew,

  a number of them, so stop wasting time,

  cast off your woes and rouse yourselves for labor.”

  1145Jason had nothing but despair to offer:

  “Son of Aeacus, where are all these helmsmen?

  Those we regarded as our guides and experts

  are lying there more dead to hope than I am.

  Thus I foresee an evil ending for us

  1150beside our fallen friends if we can neither

  reach the city of extreme Aeëtes

  nor pass beyond the Rocks again and back

  to Greece. An evil fate, one without glory,

  will hide us here to age in idleness.”

  1155 (894)So he lamented, but Ancaeus promptly

  offered himself as helmsman of the Argo.

  A god’s encouragement had urged him on.

  Next, Nauplius, Erginus, and Euphemus

  stood up in eagerness to man the tiller,

  1160but others held them back because Ancaeus

  was favored by the bulk of the assembly.

  Therefore at sunrise, after twelve days mourning,

  they boarded, since a stiff west wind was blowing.

  Quickly they rowed out through the Acheron,

  1165then trusted in the wind, unfurled the canvas,

  and, with the sail spread taut, went coasting onward,

  cleaving their way in favorable weather.

  Soon they passed the mouth of Callichorus,

  “River of Gorgeous Dancing.”

  It was here,

  1170 (905)they say, that the Nysaean son of Zeus,

  after departing from the Indic tribes

  and settling at Thebes, initiated

  secret rites and set up choral dances

  before the cave where he had once spent mirthless,

  1175unearthly nights. Ever since then the locals

  have called the nearby river “Gorgeous Dancing”

  and the cave “The Hostel.”

  Next they sighted

  the tomb of Sthenelus the son of Aktor.

  While he was marching homeward after waging

  1180glorious war upon the Amazons

  (he had gone there with Heracles), an arrow

  struck him and laid him dead upon the beach.

  The heroes sailed no farther for a time

  because Persephone herself had sent up

  1185 (917)Sthenelus’ shade. With tears and wailing

  the ghost had begged her, please, please, let him see,

  just for a little, soldiers like himself.

  Watching them from the barrow’s crest, he seemed

  such as he was when first he went to war—

  1190a four-billed, formidable helmet gleaming

  upon his head, its crest a deep dark red.

  Then he descended back into the gloom.

  The heroes marveled at the vision. Mopsus

  son of Ampycus saw it as a sign

  1195and urged the men to beach the ship and honor

  the hero with libations.

  So they furled

  the sail, ran the hawsers to the beach,

  and paid homage to Sthenelus’ tomb

  by pouring offerings and sacrificing

  120
0 (927)sheep to his shade. They also raised, nearby,

  an altar to Apollo Ship-Preserver

  and burned thigh pieces on it. Orpheus

  enshrined a lyre there as well—that’s why

  the spot is known as Lyra to this day.

  1205Then, since the wind was calling, they embarked,

  unfurled the sail, and used the sheets to pull it

  taut, and the Argo coasted out to sea

  with bellied canvas, as on lofted wings

  a hawk goes coasting swiftly through the air,

  1210its pennons poised and level. Like a hawk, then,

  the Argo passed the seaward-flowing stream

  Parthenius, a very gentle river.

  Artemis often stops there after hunting

  and bathes her body in its soothing waters

  1215 (939)before she joins the gods upon Olympus.

  They coasted without pausing all night long,

  skirting Seisamus, rugged Erythini,

  Cromna, Crobialus, tree-lined Cytorus.

  Just as the sun first cast its beams they rounded

  1220Carambis and were pushing past the Long Shore

  the whole day through, the whole night under oar,

  until they beached on the Assyrian coast.

  Here Zeus himself had settled Sinopa

  the daughter of Asopus and allowed her

  1225lasting virginity, but only after

  she hoodwinked him with his own lover’s oaths.

  When he was aching for her love, he promised

  to give her anything her heart desired,

  and, clever girl, she asked for maidenhood.

  1230 (952)When Phoebus tried in turn to lie with her,

  she tricked him in the same way, then deceived

  Halys the River God as well. What’s more,

  no mortal ever stole her innocence

  with vehement caresses.

  On this coast

  1235three sons of brave Deimarchus the Triccean—

  Deileon, Phlogius, and Autolycus—

  had camped out ever since they lost their comrade

  Heracles. As soon as they discerned

  the party of heroic men, they ran

  1240to meet them and explain their destitution.

  They did not desire to be marooned there

  forever, so they climbed aboard, and soon

  a stiff nor’wester started blowing.

  So,

  with new recruits, the heroes took to sea

  1245 (962)before the eager gale and coasted past

  the Halys River, then the nearby Iris,

  then the sandy delta of Assyria.

  That day they also rounded, at a distance,

  the cape that guards the Amazonian harbor

  1250where the hero Heracles once ambushed

  Melanippa daughter of the war god

  when she went traveling abroad. Her sister

  Hippolyta was quick to pay the ransom,

  and he returned her safe and sound.

  Because

  1255the sea had turned too turbulent for travel,

  the heroes anchored at the harbor where

  the Thermodon goes down into the sea.

  There is no river like the Thermodon,

  none that divides into as many branches.

  1260 (974)Reckon them up, the tally would be only

  four shy of a hundred. But the true

  headwater is a single stream that tumbles

  down mountains called the “Amazonian Heights”

  onto a lowland where it multiplies,

  1265its rills meandering this way, that way,

  one near, one far, each seeking lower ground.

  Most of them dissipate anonymously,

  but several merge to form the Thermodon,

  which hurls itself, a vaulted span of froth,

  into the Hostile Sea.

  1270The men might well

  have lingered for a time there, making war

  upon the Amazons, and they would surely

  have suffered losses if they had because

  the Amazons in the Doean plain

  1275 (987)were not at all docile and civilized.

  Savage aggression and the works of Ares

  were all their care. In fact, they claimed descent

  from Ares and the nymph Harmonia.

  She bedded down beside him in a dale

  1280in the Acmonian woods and bore him daughters

  that dote on war.

  But, under Zeus’ sway,

  the northwest wind returned and pushed the heroes

  beyond a cape where other Amazons,

  Themiscyreans, girt their loins for battle.

  1285The Amazons, you see, did not inhabit

  one city but were settled separately

  in three tribes scattered all throughout the land:

  those called Themiscyreans lived in one part

  under the warrior queen Hippolyta,

  1290 (999)the Lycastians settled in another,

  and the spear-mad Chadesians a third.

  During the next day and the following night

  the heroes skirted Chalybian country.

  Pushing teams of oxen through the fields

  1295and sowing thought-sweetening plants and trees

  hold no appeal for the Chalybes.

  They cleave dense, iron-bearing soil instead

  and barter what they find for wares and produce.

  Dawn never rises for them without toil,

  1300more toil, unending toil in soot and smoke.

  After the Chalybes, the heroes rounded

  the Cape of Zeus God of the Genes River

  and passed the country of the Tibarenians.

  Here, when a women is with child, her husband

  1305 (1013)wraps his own head in towels, lies in bed,

  and howls, and his woman brings him food

  and draws and boils a childbirth bath for him.

  After the Tibarenians they passed

  a sacred mountain and the country where

  1310the Mossynoeci dwell along the slopes

  in towers or the “mossynes” they take their name from.

  Odd laws and customs mark their way of life.

  Everything that we do out in the open

  either in council or the marketplace,

  1315they find some way to do inside their homes,

  and all the things we do inside our homes,

  they do out in the middle of the street

  without the least compunction. Public sex

  is not disgraceful there. Like boars in heat,

  1320 (1024)they feel not even slight embarrassment

  with others present but engage their women

  in open copulation on the ground.

  Their ruler sits inside the highest tower,

  rendering personal verdicts to his subjects—

  1325poor wretch, since, if his rulings seem unfair,

  they lock him up in prison for a day

  without a meal.

  After the Mossynoeci,

  they labored dead ahead toward Ares’ Island,

  hacking their course with oars all day because

  1330the gentle breeze had left them in the night.

  And then they spotted one of Ares’ birds,

  the special breed indigenous to the island,

  flitting back and forth above their heads.

  With one wing pump above the moving ship,

  1335 (1036)it launched a tapered feather dart, which struck

  the left shoulder of noble Oil
eus.

  Injured, he dropped his oar, and his companions

  sat awestruck gaping at the tufted shaft.

  His bench mate Eurybotes yanked it out,

  1340unhitched the sword belt running through his scabbard,

  and bound the wound. Soon, though, a second fowl

  was circling like the first. This time the hero

  Clytius, the offspring of Eurytus,

  because he had his longbow nocked and ready,

  1345released a speedy arrow, struck the bird,

  and brought it, spinning, down into the sea

  beside the heaving Argo. Amphidamus

  son of Aleus spoke his mind among them:

  “Now the Isle of Ares is at hand.

  1350 (1047)You yourselves, doubtless, guessed the news already,

  since we have met the birds. I doubt that arrows

  will be enough to get us to the shore,

  so let us come up with a plan—that is,

  if you respect the words of Phineus

  and still intend a landfall here.

  1355 Not even

  Heracles, when passing through Arcadia,

  had strength enough to drive off with his bow

  the birds that rode on the Stymphalian slough.

  I saw it all myself. No, what he did

  1360was stand atop a rock and make a racket

  by shaking copper rattles—all the birds

  fled from the noise in terror and confusion.

  We should devise some similar arrangement,

  and I will tell you what I have in mind:

  1365 (1060)let’s all set on our heads our high-plumed helmets,

  and half our number, every other of us,

  mind the rowing, while the other half

  walls off the ship with polished spears and shields.

  Then we should all raise so grotesque an uproar

  1370that they scatter at the strangeness of it—

  the ruckus, bobbing crests, and brandished spears.

  And if we make it to the island, then

  make noise by clattering your shields together.”

  So he proposed, and everyone accepted

  1375his prudent plan. They set atop their heads

  helmets forged from brightly glinting bronze

  with crimson feathers flickering above them.

  Half of the heroes plied the oars, and half

  covered the Argo’s deck with shields and spears.

  1380 (1073)As when a fellow roofs his house with tile

  to trim it and protect against the rain,

  and each tile dovetails snugly with the next,

  so half the heroes locked their shields together

  and roofed the ship. The clangor that arose

  1385from ship to air resembled the percussion

 

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