by Nonnus
κῆπος ἀιστώθη, ῥοδόεις δ᾽ ἀμαθύνετο λειμών:
80 καὶ Ζέφυρος δεδόνητο κυλινδομένων κυπαρίσσων
αὐχμηροῖς πετάλοισι: φιλοθρήνοισι δὲ μολπαῖς
αἴλινα Φοῖβος ἄειδε δαϊζομένων ὑακίνθων,
πλέξας πένθιμον ὕμνον, Ἀμυκλαίων δὲ κορύμβων
κοπτομένῃ πολὺ μᾶλλον ἐπέστενε γείτονι δάφνῃ:
85 κεκλιμένην δ᾽ ὤρθωσεν ἑὴν πίτυν ἀχνύμενος Πάν:
καί, Μορίης μνησθεῖσα, φερέπτολιν Ἀτθίδα νύμφην
τεμνομένῃ Γλαυκῶπις ἐπεστονάχιζεν ἐλαίῃ:
καὶ Παφίη δάκρυσε κονιομένης ἀνεμώνης,
πυκνὰ δὲ μυρομένη καλύκων εὐώδεα χαίτην
90 βόστρυχον ἁβρὸν ἔτιλλε κονιομένου ῥοδεῶνος:
καὶ στάχυν ἡμιτέλεστον ὀλωλότα μύρετο Δηώ,
μηκέτι κῶμον ἄγουσα θαλύσιον: Ἁδρυάδες δὲ
ἥλικες ὠδύροντο λιπόσκια δένδρεα Νύμφαι.
[60] The old shepherd, terrified to descry the manifold visage of this maddened monster, dropt his pipes and ran away; the goatherd, seeing the wide-scattered host of his arms, threw his reed flying to the winds; the hard-working plowman sprinkled not the new-scored ground with corn thrown behind him, nor covered it with earth, nor cut with earthshaking iron the land furrowed already by Typhon’s guiding hand, but let his oxen go loose. The earth’s hollows were bared, as the monster’s missile cleft it. He freed the liquid vein, and as the chasm opened, the lower channel bubbled up with flooding springs, pouring out the water from under the uncovered bosom of the ground, and rocks were thrown up, and falling from the air in torrential showers were hidden in the sea, making the waters dry land: and the hurtling masses of earth rooted themselves firmly as the footings of new-made islands. Trees were levered up from the earth by the roots, and the fruit fell on the ground untimely; the fresh-flowering garden was laid waste, the rosy meadows withered; the West Wind was beaten by the dry leaves of whirling cypresses. Phoibos sang a dirge in lamentable tones for his devastated iris, twining a sorrowful song, and lamented far more bitterly than for his clusters of Amyclean flowers, when the laurel by his side was struck. Pan in anguish uplifted his fallen pine; Grayeyes, remembering Moria, groaned over her broken olive-tree, the Attic nymph who brought her a city. The Paphian also wept when her anemone was laid in the dust, and mourned long over the fragrant tresses of flowercups from her rosebed laid in the dust, while she tore her soft hair. Deo mourned over the half-grown corn destroyed and no longer celebrated the harvest home. The Hadryad nymphs lamented the lost shade of their yearsmate trees.
καί τις ἐυπτόρθοιο διχαζομένοιο κορύμβου
95 σύγχρονος ἀκρήδμενος Ἁμαδρυὰς ἄνθορε δάφνης,
ἐκ πίτυος δὲ φυγοῦσα βατῷ ποδὶ παρθένος ἄλλη
ἀγχιφανὴς ἀγόρευε μετήλυδι γείτονι Νύμφῃ:
‘Δαφναίη φυγόδεμνος Ἁμαδρυάς, εἷς δρόμος ἔστω
ἀμφοτέραις, μὴ Φοῖβον ἴδης, μὴ Πᾶνα νοήσω.
100 ὑλοτόμοι, τάδε δένδρα παρέλθετε, μὴ φυτὰ Δάφνης
τέμνετε δειλαίης τετιημένα: φείδεο, τέκτων,
ὁλκάδα μὴ τελέσῃς πιτυώδεα δούρατα τέμνων,
μὴ ῥοθίων ψαύσειε θαλασσαίης Ἀφροδίτης.
ναί, δρυτόμος, πυμάτην πόρε μοι χάριν, ἀντὶ κορύμβων
105 κόπτέ με σοῖς πελέκεσσι, καὶ ἡμετέρου διὰ μαζοῦ
πῆξον ἀνυμφεύτοιο σαόφρονα χαλκὸν Ἀθήνης,
ὄφρα θάνω πρὸ γάμοιο καὶ Ἄιδι παρθένος ἔλθω,
εἰσέτι νῆις Ἔρωτος, ἅ περ Πίτυς, οἷά τε Δάφνη.’
[94] One Hamadryad leapt unveiled from the cloven shaft of a bushy laurel, which had grown with her growth, and another maiden stepping out of her pine-tree appeared beside her neighbour the exiled nymph, and said: “Laurel Hamadryad, so shy of the marriage bed, let us both take one road, lest you see Phoibos, lest I espy Pan! Woodmen, pass by these trees! Do not fell the afflicted bush of unhappy Daphne! Shipwright, spare me! cut no timbers from my pine-tree, to make some lugger that may feel the billows of Aphrodite, Lady of the Sea! Yes, woodcutter, grant me this last grace: strike me with your axe instead of my clusters, and drive our unmarried Athena’s chaste bronze through my breast, that I may die before I wed, and go to Hades a virgin, still a stranger to Eros, like Pitys and like Daphne!”
ὣς φαμένη πετάλοισι νόθην ποιήσατο μίτρην,
110 καὶ χλοερῷ ζωστῆρι κατέσκεπεν ἄντυγα μαζοῦ
αἰδομένη, καὶ μηρὸν ἐπεσφηκώσατο μηρῷ:
ἡ δέ μιν εἰσορόωσα κατηφέα ῥήξατο φωνήν:
‘Παρθενίης ἔμφυλον ἔχω φόβον, ὅττι καὶ αὐτὴ
ἐκ Δάφνης γεγαυῖα διώκομαι, οἷά τε Δάφνη.
115 πῇ δὲ φύγω; σκοπέλους ὑποδύσομαι; ἀλλὰ κολώνας
ῥιπτομένας ἐς Ὄλυμπον ἐτεφρώσαντο κεραυνοί,
καὶ τρομέω σέο Πᾶνα δυσίμερον, ὅς με χαλέψει,
ὡς Πίτυν, ὡς Σύριγγα: διωκομένη δὲ καὶ αὐτὴ
ἄλλη δευτερόφωνος ὀρίδρομος ἔσσομαι Ἠχώ.
120 οὐκέτι ταῦτα κόρυμβα μετέρχομαι, ἡμιφανῆ δὲ
οὔρεα ναιετάω μετὰ δένδρεον, ἧχι καὶ αὐτὴ
Ἄρτεμις ἀγρώσσει φιλοπάρθενος: ἀλλὰ Κρονίων
Καλλιστοῦς λάχε λέκτρον ἐς Ἄρτεμιν εἶδος ἀμείψας.
ἵξομαι εἰς ἁλὸς οἶδμα: τί μοι γάμος; ἀλλ᾽ ἐνὶ πόντῳ
125 Ἀστερίην ἐδίωκε γυναιμανέων Ἐνοσίχθων.
αἴθε λάχον πτερὰ κοῦφα: δι᾽ ὑψιπόρου δὲ κελεύθου
ἠερίοις ἀνέμοισι συνέμπορον οἶμον ὁδεύσω:
ἀλλὰ τάχα πτερύγων κενεὸς δρόμος, ὅττι Τυφωεὺς
ἠλιβάτοις παλάμῃσιν ἐπιψαύει νεφελάων.
[109] With these words, she contrived a makeshift kirtle with the leaves, and modestly covered the circle of her breast with this green girdle, pressing thigh upon thigh. The other seeing her so downcast, answered thus: “I feel the fear inborn in a maiden, because I was born of a laurel, and I am pursued like Daphne. But where shall I flee? Shall I hide under a rock? No, thunderbolts have burnt to ashes the mountains hurled at Olympos; and I tremble at your lustful Pan, who will persecute me like Pitys, like Syrinx – I shall be chased myself until I become another Echo, to scour the hills and second another’s speech. I will haunt these clusters no longer; I will leave my tree and live in the mountains which are still half to be seen, where Artemis also hunts, and she loves a maiden. – Yet Cronion won the bed of Callisto by taking the form of Artemis! I will plunge into the briny deep – what is marriage to me? – Yet in the sea, Earthshaker chased As
terië in the madness of his passion. O that I had wings to fly! I will traverse the heights, and take the road which the winds of the air do travel! But perhaps racing wings are also useless: Typhoeus reaches the clouds with highclambering hands!
130 εἰ δὲ γάμοις ἀδίκοις με βιήσεται, εἶδος ἀμείψω,
μίξομαι ὀρνίθεσσι, καὶ ἱπταμένη φιλομήλη
καὶ ῥόδον ἀγγέλλουσα καὶ ἀνθεμόεσσαν ἐέρσην
ἔσσομαι εἰαρινοῖο φίλη Ζεφύροιο χελιδών,
φθεγγομένη λάλος ὄρνις ὑπωροφίης μέλος ἠχοῦς,
135 ὀρχηθμῷ πτερόεντι περισκαίρουσα καλιήν.
Πρόκνη, πικρὰ παθοῦσα, σὺ μὲν δέο πενθάδι μολπῇ
υἱέα δακρύσειας, ἐγὼ δ᾽ ἐμὰ λέκτρα γοήσω.
Ζεῦ ἄνα, μὴ τελέσῃς με χελιδόνα, μή με διώξῃ
καὶ Τηρεὺς πτερόεις κεχολωμένος, οἷα Τυφωεύς.
140 ἀήρ, οὔρεα, πόντος ἀνέμβατος: ἔνδοθι γαίης
κρύπτομαι: ἀλλὰ Γίγαντος ἐχιδναίων ἀπὸ ταρσῶν
ἰοβόλοι δύνουσιν ὑπὸ χθόνα φωλάδες ὕδραι.
εἴην ὑγρὸν ὕδωρ ἐπιδήμιον, οἷα Κομαιθὼ
πατρῴῳ κεράσασα νεόρρυτα χεύματα Κύδνῳ:
145 οὐκ ἐθέλω παρὰ μῦθον, ὅτι προχοῇσι συνάψω
παρθενικῆς δυσέρωτος ἐμὸν φιλοπάρθενον ὕδωρ.
πῇ δὲ φύγω; Τυφῶνι μιγήσομαι; ἀλλὰ λοχεύσω
ἀλλοφυῆ πολύμορφον ὁμοίιον υἷα τοκῆι.
εἴην δένδρεον ἄλλο, καὶ ἐκ δρυὸς εἰς δρύας ἔλθω
150 οὔνομα παιδὸς ἔχουσα σαόφρονος: ἀντὶ δὲ Δάφνης
μὴ Μύρρης ἀθέμιστον ἐπώνυμον ἔρνος ἀκούσω.
ναί, λίτομαι, παρὰ χεῦμα γοήμονος Ἠριδανοῖο
εἴην Ἡλιάδων καὶ ἐγὼ μία: πυκνὰ δὲ δὲ πέμψω
ἐκ βλεφάρων ἤλεκτρα, φιλοθρήνοις δὲ κορύμβοις
155 γείτονος αἰγείροιο περίπλοκα φύλλα πετάσσω
δάκρυσιν ἀφνειοῖσιν ἐμὴν στενάχουσα κορείην:
οὐ γὰρ ἐγὼ Φαέθοντα κινύρομαι. ἵλαθι, δάφνη,
αἰδέομαι φυτὸν ἄλλο μετὰ προτέρης φυτὸν ὕλης.
ἔσσομαι,ὡς Νιόβη, καὶ ἐγὼ λίθος, ὄφρα καὶ αὐτὴν
160 λαϊνέην στενάχουσαν ἐποικτείρωσιν ὁδῖται:
ἀλλὰ κακογλώσσοιο τί μοι τύπος; ἵλαθι, Λητώ:
ἐρρέτω αἰνοτόκοιο θεημάχον οὔνομα Νύμφης.’
[130] “But if he will force me by violence, I will change my shape, I will mingle with the birds; flitting as Philomela, I will be the swallow dear to Zephyros in spring-time, harbinger of roses and flowery dew, prattling bird that sings a sweet song under the tiles, dashing about her nest with dancing wings. And, you, Procne, after your bitter sufferings, – you may weep for your son with mournful notes, and I will groan for my bridal. – Lord Zeus! make me no swallow, or angry Tereus on the wing may chase me, like Typhoeus! Air, mountain, sea, I may tread none of them: I will hide me deep in the earth. No! the water-snakes of the monster’s viperfish feet crawl into the caverns underground, spitting poison! May I be a fountain of water in the country, like Comaitho, mingling her newly flowing water with her father Cydnos – no, not to suit the story, because I shall then have to join my virgin water with the out-gushings of a lovesick maid. But where shall I flee? Shall I mingle with Typhon? Then shall I bear a son like the father – an alien, multiform! Let me be another tree, and pass from tree to tree keeping the name of a virtuous maid; may I never, instead of laurel, be called that unhallowed plant which gave its name to Myrrha. Yes, I beseech thee! let me be one of the Heliades beside the stream of mourning Eridanos: often will I drop amber from my eyelids; I will spread my leaves to entwine with the dirge-loving clusters of my neighbouring poplar, bewailing my maidenhood with abundant tears – for Phaëthon will not be my lament. Forgive me, my laurel; I shrink from being another tree after the tree of my former wood. I also will be a stone, like Niobe, that wayfarers may pity me too, a groaning stone. – But why be the shape of one with that ill-omened tongue? Be gracious, Leto! Perish the god-defiant name of a nymph unhappy to be a mother!”
ἡ μὲν ἔφη: φαέθων δὲ πόλον δινωτὸν ἐάσας
εἰς δύσιν ἔτραπε δίφρον: ἀναθρῴσκουσα δὲ γαίης
165 ὑψιτενὴς ἅτε κῶνος ἐς ἠέρα σιγαλέη Νὺξ
οὐρανὸν ἀστερόεντι διεχλαίνωσε χιτῶνι,
αἰθέρα δαιδάλλουσα: καὶ ἀννεφέλῳ παρὰ Νείλῳ
ἀθάνατοι πλάζοντο, παρ᾽ ὀφρυόεντι δὲ Ταύρῳ
Ζεὺς Κρονίδης ἀνέμιμνεν ἐγερσιμόθου φάος Ἠοῦς.
[163] While she spoke, Phaëthon had left he rounded sky, and turned his car towards setting: silent Night leapt up from earth into the air like a high-stretching cone, and wrapped heaven about in a starry robe spangling the welkin. The immortals moved about the cloudless Nile, but Zeus Cronides on the brows of Tauros awaited the light of toil-awakening Dawn.
170 νὺξ μὲν ἔην: φρουραὶ δὲ περὶ στίχες ἦσαν Ὀλύμπου
ἑπτὰ περὶ ζώνῃσι, καὶ οἷά περ ὑψόθι πύργων
ἔννυχον ἦν ἀλάλαγμα, βοὴ δ᾽ ἑτερόθροος ἄστρων
ἀμφιλαφὴς πεφόρητο, καὶ ἀξονίης κτύπον ἠχοῦς
ἐκ Κρονίης βαλβῖδος ἐδέχνυτο νύσσα Σελήνης:
175 καὶ νεφέων στεφανηδὸν ἐπασσυτέρῃσι καλύπτραις
οὐρανὸν ἐφράξαντο φυλάκτορες αἰθέρος Ὧραι
ἀμφίπολοι Φαέθοντος: ἀσυλήτων δὲ πυλάων
ἀστέρες Ἀτλάντειον ἐπεκλήισσαν ὀχῆα,
μὴ λόχος εἰσέλθῃσι πόλον μακάρων ἀπεόντων:
180 ἀντὶ δὲ συρίγγων ἐνοπῆς καὶ ἐθήμονος αὐλοῦ
ἐννυχίαις πτερύγεσσι μέλος σύριζον ἀῆται.
αἰθερίῳ δὲ Δράκοντι συνέμπορος Ἀρκάδος Ἄρκτου
ἐννυχίην Τυφῶνος ἐπήλυσιν ὑψόθι λεύσσων
ὄμμασιν ἀγρύπνοισι γέρων ἐφύλασσε Βοώτης,
185 ἀντολίην ἐδόκευεν Ἑωσφόρος, Ἕσπερος ἀστὴρ
ἑσπερίην, Νοτίας δὲ λιπὼν ἰθύντορι τόξων
ὀμβρηρὰς Βορέαο πύλας περιδέδρομε Κηφεύς.
[170] It was night. Sentinels stood in line around Olympos and the seven zones, and as it were from the summit of towers came their nightly alarms; the calls of the stars in many tongues were carried all abroad, and the moon’s turning-mark received the creaking echo from Saturn’s starting-point. Now the Seasons, guardians of the upper air, handmaids of Phaëthon, had fortified the
sky with a long string of covering clouds like a coronal. The stars had closed the Atlantean bar of the inviolable gates, lest some stealthy troop should enter the heavens while the Blessed ones were away: instead of the noise of pipes and the familiar flute, the breezes whistled a tune with their wings through the night. Old Oxherd was on guard with unsleeping eyes, in company with the heavenly Serpent of the Arcadian Bear, looking out from on high for some nightly assault of Typhon: the Morning Star watched the east, the Evening Star the west, and Cepheus, leaving the southern gates to the Archer, himself patrolled the rainy gates of the north.
καὶ πυρὰ πάντοθεν ἦεν, ἐπεὶ φλόγες αἴθοπες ἄστρων
καὶ νύχιοι λαμπτῆρες ἀκοιμήτοιο Σελήνης
190 ὡς δαΐδες σελάγιζον, ἀελλήεντι δὲ ῥόμβῳ
πυκνὰ διαθρῴσκοντες ἀπ᾽ αἰθέρος ἄκρον Ὀλύμπου
ἀστέρες ἀικτῆρες ἐπέγραφον ἠέρα πυρσῷ
δεξιτεροὶ Κρονίωνι, κυβιστητῆρι δὲ παλμῷ
πυκνὰ διαΐσσουσα χαρασσομένων νεφελάων
195 ἀστεροπὴ σκίρτησεν, ἀμοιβαίῃσι δὲ ῥιπαῖς
κρύπτετο καὶ σελάγιζε παλίνδρομος ἄστατος αἴγλη,
καὶ πλοκάμους πλεκτοῖο πυρὸς βοτρυδὸν ἑλίξας
φέγγεϊ λαχνήεντι σέλας τρήχυνε κομήτης,
καὶ δοκίδες μάρμαιρον ἐπήλυδες, οἷα δὲ μακροὶ
200 ἠερόθεν τανύοντο δοκοὶ δολιχήρεϊ πυρσῷ
Ζηνὶ συναιχμάζοντες, ὑπ᾽ ἀκτίνεσσι δὲ λάμπων
ἀντιπόρου Φαέθοντος ἐκάμπτετο σύνδρομος ὄμβρῳ
ἴριδος ἀγκύλα κύκλα πολύχροος ὁλκὸς ὑφαίνων,
χλωρὰ μελαινομένῳ, ῥοδοειδέι λευκὰ κεράσσας.