by Cecil Bowra
His deep-voiced bow-string,
[35] But when he called Aiakidas
To take ship, he found young men feasting.
Telamon bade Amphitryon’s son, the mighty-speared,
To stand on his lion-skin
And begin the rite with pouring nectar.
Peerless Telamon gave to him
[40] A bowl, shivering with gold, full of wine.
Herakles lifted his unconquerable hands to the sky
And spoke such a word: ‘If ever, O father Zeus,
You have listened with glad heart to my prayers,
Now, I beg you, now,
With holy entreaties,
[45] Bring to birth for this man a brave son
By Eriboia, to be my destined friend.
May he be unbroken in body,
As now prowls about me this skin of the beast
Which, first of all my labours,
I slew once in Nemea:
Let his heart be to match.’ When thus he spoke,
[50] The God sent a great eagle, lord of birds,
And sweet delight stung him within.
III
He lifted his voice and spoke like a prophet;
‘Such a son as you ask, Telamon, you shall have,
And from the sight of this bird
Call him by name “Aias” with far-flung strength,
Terrible among men
In the toils of the Lord of the War Shout.’
[55] So spoke he, and forthwith took his seat.
– But for me it is a long task
To rehearse all their acts of prowess.
Muse, I have come for Phylakidas,
To dispense songs of revel for Pytheas
And for Euthymenes. In the Argive way
Their tale shall be told in the shortest words.
[60] They have won victories in the Trial of Strength,
Three from the Isthmos, others from leafy Nemea,
The glorious sons and their mother’s brother.
And what a portion of songs they have brought
To the daylight. Their land of the Psalychidai
They water with the loveliest dew of the Graces;
[65] They have set up straight the house of Themistios,
And dwell in this city loved by the Gods.
Lampon gives care to his works
And pays high honour to the saying of Hesiod,
And commends it in speech to his sons.
He brings to his city honour among men;
[70] He is loved for his kindnesses to strangers,
He keeps measure in his thoughts,
And measure in his doings;
Nor is his tongue outside his heart; you would say
That, a man among athletes,
He is among other stones
A Naxian whetstone to tame bronze.
I will pledge them
In the holy water of Dirka
Which the low-girdled daughters
[75] Of golden-robed Memory
Set springing by the well-walled gates of Kadmos.
Isthmian VI was composed about 484 B.C. The victor, Phylakidas, son of Lampon, is brother of Pytheas, celebrated in Nemean V.
3 ‘Nemea’ refers back to the victory celebrated in Nemean V.
5 The ‘Lord of the Isthmos’ is Poseidon.
7–9 Pindar suggests hopes of an Olympian victory in the future.
17 The Fates were Klotho, Lachesis, and Atropos.
22 The fame of the Aiakidai flies south to Egypt, north to the Hyperboreans.
26 ff. Telamon goes with Herakles to the first sack of Troy.
33 Alkyoneus is a giant, destroyed at Phlegrai in Chalkidike by Herakles and Telamon.
35–55 The myth tells how Herakles foretells the birth of Aias from Telamon’s wife, Eriboia. His name Aias echoes the word for eagle, aietos.
58 Phylakidas wins at the Isthmos; Pytheas and Euthymenes, the boys’ uncle, at Nemea.
65 Themistios is the father of Euthymenes.
67 The line from Hesiod is Works and Days 412, ‘trouble helps work’.
74 Pindar will honour Lampon and his sons with a song from Thebes.
Isthmian V
For Phylakidas of Aigina, winner in the trial of strength
I
Mother of the Sun, Theia the many-named,
Because of you men prize gold in its great strength
Beyond all other possessions;
And in rivalry
[5] Ships on the sea and horses in chariots
Are marvelled at, lady, because of your glory,
As they contend in fast-eddying races.
In the struggle of games he has won
The glory of his desire,
Whose hair is tied with thick garlands
[10] For victory with his hands
Or swiftness of foot.
Men’s valour is judged by their fates,
But two things alone
Look after the sweetest grace of life
Among the fine flowers of wealth, –
If a man fares well and hears his good name spoken.
Seek not to become Zeus!
[15] You have everything, if a share
Of these beautiful things comes to you.
Mortal ends befit mortal men.
– For you Phylakidas, at the Isthmos
A double success is planted and thrives,
And at Nemea for you and your brother Pytheas
In the Trial of Strength. My heart
Tastes song, and the Aiakidai help it.
[20] I have come with the Graces
For the sons of Lampon
II
To this law-loving city.
If she has turned to a clean path
Of god-given actions,
[25] Grudge not to mingle fitting praise
With song for her labours.
For among her heroes brave men of battle
Gained glory. They are renowned
On strings and the loud cries of flutes in every key
For uncounted time. Through Zeus
They were worshipped, and gave a theme
For craftsmen to work.
[30] In the glowing sacrifices of the Aitolians
The strong sons of Oineus have honour, and at Thebes
Iolaos, driver of horses,
And Perseus at Argos,
And the spearmen Kastor and Polydeukes
By the streams of Eurotas,
But in the Vineland the high hearts
[35] And tempers of Aiakos and his sons. Twice they sacked
The Trojans’ city in battle,
First in the train of Herakles,
And then with Atreus’ sons.
Start now from the beginning, and tell
Who killed Kyknos, who Hektor,
[40] And the fearless leader of the Ethiop host,
Memnon dressed in bronze? Who wounded
With his spear noble Telephos
By the banks of Kaïkos?
III
To them the lips of men assign
As fatherland Aigina, the surpassing island.
[45] Long ago it was built as a tower
With walls for lofty prowess to climb.
My word-ready tongue has many arrows
To proclaim them aloud.
Now again in war the city of Aias could testify
That it has been set upright by its sailors,
Salamis, in the murderous storm of Zeus,
[50] In the hail of blood of men past counting.
Nevertheless drench your boast in a rain of silence.
Zeus disposes this and that,
Zeus the master of everything.
In the sweet honey of song these honours also
Welcome the delight of a fine victory.
Let a man work and struggle
[55] In the Games by studying
The breed of Kleonikos. The long toil
Of men is not lost in blind
ness.
Nor did counting the cost
Gnaw faith in their hopes.
I praise Pytheas also among those who master limbs,
[60] For he has guided Phylakidas
On a straight course of boxing,
Skilled with his hands, with a, mind to match them.
Take a wreath for him, and bring
A head-band of soft wool,
And with them send this new song on its wings.
Isthmian V may have been written in the autumn of 480 B.C. soon after the battle of Salamis, in which the Aiginetans played a prominent part in routing the Persian fleet. The victor is the same as in Isthmian VI.
1 Theia is traditionally the mother of the sun and the moon and therefore of light both physical and metaphorical, including the light of glory and vivid action.
17–19 There are four victories, two Isthmian and one Nemean, won by Phylakidas, and one Nemean (Nemean VI) won by Pytheas.
21 It is possible that Pindar came to Aigina for the performance of this song.
30 ff. Each great city has its special heroes, who are named with the Aiakidai of Aigina as the climax.
31 The sons of Oineus are Tydeus and Meleagros.
34 The Vineland is Aigina.
39 ff. Trojans and their allies killed in the Trojan War – Kyknos, son of Poseidon; Memnon, son of the Dawn; Telephos, king of Mysia: all killed by Achilles, who however is not named.
48 ff. The battle of Salamis, the island of Aias.
51 The command to keep silent is perhaps a caution against boasting too early before the Persians are finally driven out of Greece.
55 Kleonikos is father of Lampon and grandfather of Phylakidas.
Isthmian VIII
For Kleandros of Aigina, winner in the boys’ trial of strength
I
For Kleandros and his stripling friends, young men,
In glorious release from his labours,
Let one of you go to the glittering doorway
Of his father Telesarchos
And awake the revel
As the prize of his Isthmian victory,
[5] And for finding at Nemea mastery in the Games.
Wherefore I also, though with anguish at heart,
Am called to summon the golden Muse.
We have been freed from vast griefs;
So let us not give in and go without garlands;
Nor should you nurse sorrows. We have ended
Evils beyond contrivance
And shall give the people a sweet song
[10] Even after our suffering;
For the stone of Tantalos
That hung over our head
Has been turned aside from us by some God,
II
An unendurable torment for Hellas. Yet
The passing of fear has delivered men
From overmastering cares. It is always best
[15] To look at whatever lies before our feet;
For treacherous Time hangs over men
And twists awry the path of life. But even those things
Can be healed by men if freedom is with them;
And a man should give care to noble hope.
One who is bred in seven-gated Thebes
Must pay the finest of songs to Aigina,
[20] Because these are the twin eldest daughters
Among the children of father Asopos
And brought joy to Zeus the king.
One of them he made to dwell by the clear stream of Dirka,
And to govern a chariot-loving city.
III
But you he brought to the Vineland isle
And sent you to sleep; and there you bore
To the loud-thundering Father
[25] Godlike Aiakos, finest of earth-men.
He accomplished what was right for the Gods.
His godlike sons and his sons’ children
Delighted in war, and surpassed in courage
As they handled the brazen din of lamenting battle.
They were born modest and wise of heart.
This the assembly of the Blessed Ones remembered,
[30] When Zeus and glorious Poseidon
Strove to marry Thetis,
Each wishing that she
Should be his beautiful bride.
Love held them in his grip.
But the Gods’ undying wisdom
Would not let the marriage be,
IV
When they gave ear to the oracles. In their midst
[35] Wise-counselling Themis said
That it was fated for the sea-goddess
To bear for son a prince
Stronger than his father,
Who shall wield in his hand a different weapon
More powerful than the thunderbolt
Or the monstrous trident,
If she wed Zeus or among the brothers of Zeus.
‘Put an end to this. Let her have a mortal wedlock
[40] And see dead in war her son
With hands like the hands of Ares
And feet like the lightning-flashes.
My counsel is: give her, a wedding-gift from the gods,
To Peleus, Aiakos’ son
Whom, they say, the plain of Iolkos nurses,
Most god-fearing of men.
V
[45] Let messages go forthwith
Straight to Cheiron’s imperishable cave,
And let not Nereus’ daughter
Twice set in our hands
The petals of strife. In evenings of full moon
She will unloose the lovely girdle of her virginity
To the hero.’ So the Goddess
Spoke her message to Kronos’ sons,
[50] And with undying eyelids they consented:
Nor did the fruit of her words wither.
They say that the two Masters
Took thought for the common good and the wedding of Thetis.
The mouths of the wise revealed
To them that knew not the young valour of Achilles;
[55] Who watered and stained the vines of the Mysian plain
With the black blood of Telephos,
VI
And bridged a return for Atreus’ sons,
And set Helen free. With his spear
He hamstrung Troy’s sinews; for they hampered him
As he ordered his task on the plain
Of slaying men in battle, – proud, violent Memnon,
[60] And Hektor, and other champions. For them
Achilles, warder of the Aiakids,
Opened the house of Persephona
And made manifest Aigina and his beginnings.
Not even in death did songs forsake him,
But by his pyre and his tomb
The Maidens of Helikon stood and with many voices
Let flow a lament.
[65] Even the Immortals thought fit to give
A brave man, though he was dead,
To Goddesses to chant in hymns.
VII
It is right now too, and the Muses’ chariot
Hurries to its ringing memorial
Of Nikokles and his boxing. Honour him,
Who in the Isthmian valley
[70] Won the Dorian parsley; for he too in his day
Defeated those from around as he tossed them with unerring hand.
He is not shamed by the son of his father’s famous brother.
Wherefore let one of his companions
Weave a delicate wreath of myrtle for Kleandros
In the Trial of Strength.
For strife and success at Alkathoos’ Games,
[75] And the young men of Epidauros welcomed him before;
He gives a good man occasion to praise him.
His youth is not unskilled in beautiful things,
And he has not buried it in a burrow.
Isthmian VIII seems to have been written in 478 B.C., soon after the withdrawal of the Persian army from Greece.
&nbs
p; 5–16 Pindar speaks of his own feelings. His own city of Thebes collaborated with the Persians, while his friends in Aigina took a leading part in opposing them. This personal distress which he compares with the stone hanging over the head of Tantalos (11) has just passed, and therefore there is a real call for rejoicing.
17 ff. The eponymous nymphs, Theba and Aigina, were both daughters of the river-god Asopos, and Pindar uses the relation to emphasize his own feelings of affection for Aigina, though he is a Theban. Theba wed Zeus and Aigina Poseidon.
26 ff. The Aiakidai, descendants of Aiakos, have the four cardinal virtues – courage, temperance, justice, and wisdom.
30–66 The myth of Thetis. Zeus and Poseidon both wish to marry her, but refrain because Themis prophesies that the child of such a union will be greater than his father. Let her marry the mortal Peleus, and she will bear Achilles, whose career is then sketched.
48 The full moon is the right time for a wedding.
55 The Mysian plain is that of Troy, and Telephos the king of Mysia.
62 ff. At the funeral of Achilles the Muses sang a dirge for him.
68 Nikokles is a kinsman of Kleandros. The reference to the memorial may mean that he has been killed at the battle of Salamis.
74 The Games of Alkathoos were at Megara.
Isthmians III–IV
For Melissos of Thebes, winner in the chariot-race
III
I
If any man is fortunate, either
In glorious prizes or in the strength of wealth
And keeps down odious surfeit in his heart,
He is fit to be wedded to his townsmen’s praises.
Zeus, from you mighty qualities
[5] Come to men. If they honour you,
Their happiness lasts longer,
But when it consorts with twisted minds
It flourishes not in like measure all the time.
In return for his glorious doings
We must sing of the noble man,
And in our revel we must exalt him with the gentle Graces.
[10] It is the fate of Melissos in two contests
To turn his heart to sweet delight.
He has won wreaths in the vales of the Isthmus,
And in the hollow glen
Of the deep-chested lion
He proclaimed Thebes,
When he won in the racing of horses. He casts