The Iliad of Homer
Page 19
425 to smash roaring along the dry land, and against the rock jut
bending breaks itself into crests spewing back the salt wash;
so thronged beat upon beat the Danaäns’ close battalions
steadily into battle, with each of the lords commanding
his own men; and these went silently, you would not think
430 all these people with voices kept in their chests were marching,
silently, in fear of their commanders; and upon all
glittered as they marched the shining armor they carried.
But the Trojans, as sheep in a man of possessions’ steading
stand in their myriads waiting to be drained of their white milk
435 and bleat interminably as they hear the voice of their lambs, so
the crying of the Trojans went up through the wide army.
Since there was no speech nor language common to all of them
but their talk was mixed, who were called there from many far places.
Ares drove these on, and the Achaians gray-eyed Athene,
440 and Terror drove them, and Fear, and Hate whose wrath is relentless,
she the sister and companion of murderous Ares,
she who is only a little thing at the first, but thereafter
grows until she strides on the earth with her head striking heaven.
She then hurled down bitterness equally between both sides
445 as she walked through the onslaught making men’s pain heavier.
Now as these advancing came to one place and encountered,
they dashed their shields together and their spears, and the strength
of armored men in bronze, and the shields massive in the middle
clashed against each other, and the sound grew huge of the fighting.
450 There the screaming and the shouts of triumph rose up together
of men killing and men killed, and the ground ran blood.
As when rivers in winter spate running down from the mountains
throw together at the meeting of streams the weight of their water
out of the great springs behind in the hollow stream-bed,
455 and far away in the mountains the shepherd hears their thunder;
such, from the coming together of men, was the shock and the shouting.
Antilochos was first to kill a chief man of the Trojans,
valiant among the champions, Thalysias’ son, Echepolos.
Throwing first, he struck the horn of the horse-haired helmet,
460 and the bronze spearpoint fixed in his forehead and drove inward
through the bone; and a mist of darkness clouded both eyes
and he fell as a tower falls in the strong encounter.
As he dropped, Elephenor the powerful caught him by the feet,
Chalkodon’s son, and lord of the great-hearted Abantes,
465 and dragged him away from under the missiles, striving in all speed
to strip the armor from him, yet his outrush went short-lived.
For as he hauled the corpse high-hearted Agenor, marking
the ribs that showed bare under the shield as he bent over,
stabbed with the bronze-pointed spear and unstrung his sinews.
470 So the spirit left him and over his body was fought out
weary work by Trojans and Achaians, who like wolves
sprang upon one another, with man against man in the onfall.
There Telamonian Aias struck down the son of Anthemion
Simoeisios in his stripling’s beauty, whom once his mother
475 descending from Ida bore beside the banks of Simoeis
when she had followed her father and mother to tend the sheepflocks.
Therefore they called him Simoeisios; but he could not
render again the care of his dear parents; he was short-lived,
beaten down beneath the spear of high-hearted Aias,
480 who struck him as he first came forward beside the nipple
of the right breast, and the bronze spearhead drove clean through the shoulder.
He dropped then to the ground in the dust, like some black poplar,
which in the land low-lying about a great marsh grows
smooth trimmed yet with branches growing at the uttermost tree-top:
485 one whom a man, a maker of chariots, fells with the shining
iron, to bend it into a wheel for a fine-wrought chariot,
and the tree lies hardening by the banks of a river.
Such was Anthemion’s son Simoeisios, whom illustrious
Aias killed. Now Antiphos of the shining corselet,
490 Priam’s son, made a cast at him in the crowd with the sharp spear
but missed Aias and struck Leukos, a brave companion
of Odysseus, in the groin, as he dragged a corpse off,
so that the body dropped from his hand as he fell above it.
For his killing Odysseus was stirred to terrible anger
495 and he strode out among the champions, helmed in bright bronze,
and stood close to the enemy hefting the shining javelin,
glaring round about him; and the Trojans gave way in the face
of the man throwing with the spear. And he made no vain cast,
but struck down Demokoön, a son of Priam, a bastard,
500 who came over from Abydos, and left his fast-running horses.
Odysseus struck him with the spear, in anger for his companion,
in the temple, and the bronze spearhead drove through the other
temple also, so that a mist of darkness clouded both eyes.
He fell, thunderously, and his armor clattered upon him.
505 The champions of Troy gave back then, and glorious Hektor,
and the Argives gave a great cry, and dragged back the bodies,
and drove their way far forward, but now Apollo watching
from high Pergamos was angered, and called aloud to the Trojans:
“Rise up, Trojans, breakers of horses, bend not from battle
510 with these Argives. Surely their skin is not stone, not iron
to stand up under the tearing edge of the bronze as it strikes them.
No, nor is Achilleus the child of lovely-haired Thetis fighting,
but beside the ship mulls his heartsore anger.”
So called the fearful god from the citadel, while Zeus’ daughter
515 Tritogeneia, goddess most high, drove on the Achaians,
any of them she saw hanging back as she strode through the battle.
Now his doom caught fast Amaryngkeus’ son Diores,
who with a jagged boulder was smitten beside the ankle
in the right shin, and a lord of the Thracian warriors threw it,
520 Peiros, son of Imbrasos, who had journeyed from Ainos.
The pitiless stone smashed utterly the tendons on both sides
with the bones, and he was hurled into the dust backward
reaching out both hands to his own beloved companions,
gasping life out; the stone’s thrower ran up beside him,
525 Peiros, and stabbed with his spear next the navel, and all his guts poured
out on the ground, and a mist of darkness closed over both eyes.
Thoas the Aitolian hit Peiros as he ran backward
with the spear in the chest above the nipple, and the bronze point fixed
in the lung, and Thoas standing close dragged out the heavy
530 spear from his chest, and drawing his sharp sword struck him
in the middle of the belly, and so took the life from him,
yet did not strip his armor, for his companions about him
stood, Thracians with hair grown at the top, gripping their long spears,
and though he was a mighty man and a strong and proud one
535 thrust him from them so that he gave ground backward, staggering.
So in the dust these two lay sprawle
d beside one another,
lords, the one of the Thracians, the other of the bronze-armored
Epeians; and many others beside were killed all about them.
There no more could a man who was in that work make light of it,
540 one who still unhit and still unstabbed by the sharp bronze
spun in the midst of that fighting, with Pallas Athene’s hold on
his hand guiding him, driving back the volleying spears thrown.
For on that day many men of the Achaians and Trojans
lay sprawled in the dust face downward beside one another.
BOOK FIVE
There to Tydeus’ son Diomedes Pallas Athene
granted strength and daring, that he might be conspicuous
among all the Argives and win the glory of valor.
She made weariless fire blaze from his shield and helmet
5 like that star of the waning summer who beyond all stars
rises bathed in the ocean stream to glitter in brilliance.
Such was the fire she made blaze from his head and his shoulders
and urged him into the middle fighting, where most were struggling.
There was a man of the Trojans, Dares, blameless and bountiful,
10 a priest consecrated to Hephaistos, and he had two sons,
Phegeus and Idaios, well skilled both in all fighting.
These two breaking from the ranks of the others charged against him
riding their chariot as Diomedes came on, dismounted.
Now as in their advance these had come close to each other
15 first of the two Phegeus let go his spear far-shadowing.
Over the left shoulder of Tydeus’ son passed the pointed
spear, nor struck his body, and Diomedes thereafter
threw with the bronze, and the weapon cast from his hand flew not vain
but struck the chest between the nipples and hurled him from behind
20 his horses. And Idaios leaping left the fair-wrought chariot
nor had he the courage to stand over his stricken brother.
Even so he could not have escaped the black death-spirit
but Hephaistos caught him away and rescued him, shrouded in darkness,
that the aged man might not be left altogether desolate.
25 But the son of high-hearted Tydeus drove off the horses
and gave them to his company to lead back to the hollow vessels.
Now as the high-hearted Trojans watched the two sons of Dares,
one running away, and one cut down by the side of his chariot,
the anger in all of them was stirred. But gray-eyed Athene
30 took violent Ares by the hand, and in words she spoke to him:
“Ares, Ares, manslaughtering, blood-stained, stormer of strong walls,
shall we not leave the Trojans and Achaians to struggle
after whatever way Zeus father grants glory to either,
while we two give ground together and avoid Zeus’ anger?”
35 So she spoke, and led violent Ares out of the fighting
and afterward caused him to sit down by the sands of Skamandros
while the Danaäns bent the Trojans back, and each of the princes
killed his man. And first the lord of men Agamemnon
hurled tall Odios, lord of the Halizones, from his chariot.
40 For in his back even as he was turning the spear fixed
between the shoulders and was driven on through the chest beyond it.
He fell, thunderously, and his armor clattered upon him.
Idomeneus killed Phaistos the son of Maionian Boros,
who had come out of Tarne with the deep soil. Idomeneus
45 the spear-renowned stabbed this man just as he was mounting
behind his horses, with the long spear driven in the right shoulder.
He dropped from the chariot, and the hateful darkness took hold of him.
The henchmen of Idomeneus stripped the armor from Phaistos,
while Menelaos son of Atreus killed with the sharp spear
50 Strophios’ son, a man of wisdom in the chase, Skamandrios,
the fine huntsman of beasts. Artemis herself had taught him
to strike down every wild thing that grows in the mountain forest.
Yet Artemis of the showering arrows could not now help him,
no, nor the long spearcasts in which he had been pre-eminent,
55 but Menelaos the spear-famed, son of Atreus, stabbed him,
as he fled away before him, in the back with a spear thrust
between the shoulders and driven through to the chest beyond it.
He dropped forward on his face and his armor clattered upon him.
Meriones in turn killed Phereklos, son of Harmonides,
60 the smith, who understood how to make with his hand all intricate
things, since above all others Pallas Athene had loved him.
He it was who had built for Alexandros the balanced
ships, the beginning of the evil, fatal to the other
Trojans, and to him, since he knew nothing of the gods’ plans.
65 This man Meriones pursued and overtaking him
struck in the right buttock, and the spearhead drove straight
on and passing under the bone went into the bladder.
He dropped, screaming, to his knees, and death was a mist about him.
Meges in turn killed Pedaios, the son of Antenor,
70 who, bastard though he was, was nursed by lovely Theano
with close care, as for her own children, to pleasure her husband.
Now the son of Phyleus, the spear-famed, closing upon him
struck him with the sharp spear behind the head at the tendon,
and straight on through the teeth and under the tongue cut the bronze blade,
75 and he dropped in the dust gripping in his teeth the cold bronze.
Eurypylos, Euaimon’s son, killed brilliant Hypsenor,
son of high-hearted Dolopion, he who was made Skamandros’
priest, and was honored about the countryside as a god is.
This man Eurypylos, the shining son of Euaimon,
80 running in chase as he fled before him struck in the shoulder
with a blow swept from the sword and cut the arm’s weight from him,
so that the arm dropped bleeding to the ground, and the red death
and destiny the powerful took hold of both eyes.
So they went at their work all about the strong encounter;
85 but you could not have told on which side Tydeus’ son was fighting,
whether he were one with the Trojans or with the Achaians,
since he went storming up the plain like a winter-swollen
river in spate that scatters the dikes in its running current,
one that the strong-compacted dikes can contain no longer,
90 nor do the mounded banks of the blossoming vineyards hold it
rising suddenly as Zeus’ rain makes heavy the water
and many lovely works of the young men crumble beneath it.
Like these the massed battalions of the Trojans were scattered
by Tydeus’ son, and many as they were could not stand against him.
95 Now as the shining son of Lykaon, Pandaros, watched him
storming up the plain scattering the battalions before him,
at once he strained the bent bow against the son of Tydeus,
and shot, and hit him as he charged forward, in the right shoulder
at the hollow of the corselet; and the bitter arrow went straight through
100 holding clean to its way, and the corselet was all blood-spattered.
And the shining son of Lykaon cried aloud in a great voice:
“Rise up, Trojans, O high-hearted, lashers of horses.
Now the best of the Achaians is hit, and I think that he will not
long hold up under the strong arro
w, if truly Apollo
105 lord and son of Zeus stirred me to come forth from Lykia.”
“So he spoke, vaunting, but the swift arrow had not broken him,
only he drew back again to his chariot and horses,
and stood there, speaking to Sthenelos, son of Kapaneus:
Come, dear friend, son of Kapaneus, step down from the chariot,
110 so that you may pull out from my shoulder this bitter arrow.”
So he spoke, and Sthenelos sprang to the ground from his chariot
and standing beside him pulled the sharp arrow clean through his shoulder
and the blood shot up spurting through the delicate tunic.
Now Diomedes of the great war cry spoke aloud, praying:
115 “Hear me now, Atrytone, daughter of Zeus of the aegis:
if ever before in kindliness you stood by my father
through the terror of fighting, be my friend now also, Athene;
grant me that I may kill this man and come within spearcast,
who shot me before I could see him, and now boasts over me, saying
120 I cannot live to look much longer on the shining sunlight.”
So he spoke in prayer, and Pallas Athene heard him.
She made his limbs light again, and his feet, and his hands above them,
and standing close beside him she spoke and addressed him in winged words:
“Be of good courage now, Diomedes, to fight with the Trojans,
125 since I have put inside your chest the strength of your father
untremulous, such as the horseman Tydeus of the great shield
had; I have taken away the mist from your eyes, that before now
was there, so that you may well recognize the god and the mortal.
Therefore now, if a god making trial of you comes hither
130 do you not do battle head-on with the gods immortal,
not with the rest; but only if Aphrodite, Zeus’ daughter,
comes to the fighting, her at least you may stab with the sharp bronze.”
She spoke thus, gray-eyed Athene, and went, while Tydeus’
son closed once again with the champions, taking his place there;
135 raging as he had been before to fight with the Trojans,
now the strong rage tripled took hold of him, as of a lion
whom the shepherd among his fleecy flocks in the wild lands
grazed as he leapt the fence of the fold, but has not killed him,
but only stirred up the lion’s strength, and can no more fight him